Yale
brand campaign

Work > Yale brand campaign

Eyes on the prize

After years of working with Yale Materials Handling Corporation, a lift truck manufacturer, we had a clear understanding of their primary target audience – warehouse managers that have lift truck purchasing power. We’ve come to know and successfully reach these decision makers through industry events, trade publications, social media and other channels. For a new campaign, however, Yale wanted to engage an entirely new group – the lift truck operators who use their products every day. Although they’re not the ones who sign order forms to purchase new equipment, lift truck operators have major influence. Our goals were to:

Creating the game plan

To connect with lift truck operators, we recognized that their work is physically demanding and requires a great deal of athleticism. This message acknowledged their contributions, while challenging them to ask how much better they could feel and perform if they were properly equipped. Which, in turn, created a framework for how Yale can support them – by putting operators at the center of equipment designs and engineering more ergonomic, effective lift trucks. We concepted creative that showcased some of the common physical feats of lift truck operators and compared their typical workloads to those of top athletes. For example, operators walk the distance of two marathons every week and lift 15 tons every shift. We branded operators as industrial athletes — which we referred to as Yale Elite. The central creative asset of the campaign was a 2-minute-long video which cut between athletes training and a lift truck operator working in a warehouse. Cinematic videos like this are not usually part of our marketing strategy for warehouse managers, but we needed to do something different to reach our new audience of lift truck operators. The video was posted on YouTube and used in sponsored social posts on LinkedIn, YouTube and Facebook.

Interacting with fans

To foster a greater sense of community and open a dialogue with our new audience, we started a Facebook group where lift truck operators and technicians could share stories and memes, ask questions and communicate with each other, no matter which brand of lift truck they typically operate. New members are required to complete a short application form to join the group, providing Yale the opportunity to learn more about their audience, including things like the brands of lift trucks they use and their experience levels.

The big advertising play

We’re used to marketing to warehouse managers and know where they go online. But reaching a new audience meant finding the best places to engage lift truck operators, so we targeted operators with programmatic ads. Using search engine and browser history, we were able to track which sites operators were visiting, and then use that information to bid in real-time on those sites’ available ad inventory, giving us a better chance to catch the eyes of lift truck operators than with general ad buys. These targeted ads featured a 15-second cut of the Yale Elite campaign video. More than 76% of impressions converted into video completions, coming in above the campaign goal. We aired the full 2-minute video as a YouTube pre-roll ad, which could be skipped after 15 seconds. To target the right audience, we built a custom audience segment based on search history that suggested the user could be designated as a lift truck operator. With a very conservative budget, these ads generated more than 1.3 million impressions in just six months, and 17% of viewers went on to watch the entire video.

We also sponsored social posts on Facebook and LinkedIn. From past experience, we knew that warehouse managers would respond to our campaign on LinkedIn, but we were uncertain whether our new operator audience would, too. It turned out that operators were far more likely to engage on LinkedIn than managers. Warehouse managers generated significantly more impressions on the platform but engaged at an industry-average rate and clicked through at a below-industry-average rate. However, lift truck operators averaged a 6.98% engagement rate and a 1.3% click-through rate, both well above the industry average.

Overall, our advertising campaigns across programmatic, social, trade media and Google Ads generated more than 2.2 million impressions, nearly 4,400 clicks and a video completion rate of 42.4%.

Watching the scoreboard

In the first 12 months, the Yale Elite campaign has generated:

video views on YouTube

social media engagements

Facebook group members

goal completions

Yale
brand campaign

Eyes on the prize

Create an open dialogue and relationship with the people who use Yale equipment

Build a community of loyal Yale advocates

Exemplify the brand’s commitment to and support of lift truck operators

Celebrate operators and demonstrate their true value to warehouse managers

Creating the game plan

Interacting with fans

The big advertising play

Watching the scoreboard

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