Summary
Segro Logistics Park East Midlands Gateway (SLPEMG) was Segro’s first substantial foray in the UK big box property market. An integrated and highly targeted B2B campaign – with particular emphasis on innovative digital technology, because nothing was yet built at the empty brownfield site – needed to ultimately support the leasing of the buildings as quickly as possible.
Digital elements such as channel-agnostic animation, 360° virtual fly-through, 360° ‘Le Mans’ style video, and 3D-modelled app had their fair share of challenges. But the team’s vision and persistence paid off. This campaign delivered salient information in an engaging and playful way – an antidote to the prosaic marketing communications that usually accompanies industrial spaces.
Segro is now a credible big box player in the UK. No mean feat for a development that hadn’t even been built.
About
Established in 1920, FTSE100 business Segro is a UK real estate investment trust, and a leading owner, asset manager and developer of modern warehousing and light industrial property. Segro Logistics Park East Midlands Gateway (SLPEMG) is a 700-acre industrial development with planning consent for up to 6,000,000 sq ft of logistics accommodation.
Strategy
SLPEMG was Segro’s first substantial foray in the UK big box market.
An integrated, highly targeted B2B campaign needed to cut through the competition, establish Segro as a credible big box provider, and position it as the number one choice in the UK for logistics occupiers.
Objectives of the campaign
Ultimately the campaign needed to support Segro to lease the buildings on site. Success would be measured by:
- Leasing 1,000,000 sq ft by the end of the third quarter in 2018.
- Target audience engagement levels.
- Campaign element results versus objectives.
- Return on marketing investment.
The target audience
The primary target audience included high profile companies from the following sectors: third party logistics (3PLs), online retailers, high street retailers, manufacturers, parcel operators, automotive sector and food producers. Another important group were local and national industrial agents, who often act on behalf of the primary target audience. In total, the campaign was aimed at around 2,000 people: 800 prospective occupiers and 1,200 agents.
Media, channels or techniques used
In order to best position SLPEMG, Segro conducted focus groups with prospective customers to understand the most relevant big box USPs. This revealed key customer needs for large industrial warehouses: easy access to multi-modal transport, scale, power, location, workforce, quality and credibility. Because SLPEMG is the only site that offers all of these, the intent was to position it as the number one choice in the UK.
A competitor audit revealed grey, anodyne, prosaic branding and campaigns for industrial spaces, with little digital innovation. Usually they take a size and location approach centred around building imagery, with a website as the digital element. In the property market, big box is the well-known colloquial term for large industrial warehouses.
The lightbulb moment was to establish SLPEMG as a big box in its own right – a means to deliver messaging about key customer requirements in a relevant, simple and memorable way. Using this term to market SLPEMG might seem blindingly obvious, but it had never been done before.
By seizing this space, SLPEMG immediately challenged the norm. To firmly position SLPEMG as the number one choice in the UK for logistics occupiers, everything in the campaign asks “How do you deliver the best big box?”.
Along with the slogan ‘Big brands need a big box with a big name’, the campaign placed particular emphasis on unique digital elements to fully engage prospective customers with a site that hadn’t yet been built. A launch animation not only seeds intrigue, but its illustrative style, simple messaging, and playful language sets the tone for all campaign elements: electronic direct mail, website, 3D modelled app, book, brochure, marketing suite, social media marketing, and an on-site event with 360° immersive fly-through.
This campaign contrasts dramatically from that of typical B2B real estate campaigns. The look and feel of all the marketing communications are refreshingly different, but it’s the innovative digital elements that bring SLPEMG to life:
- Launch animation
Built to be channel agnostic, content changes around a cardboard box that retains its form and position. - 360° immersive fly-through
Guests arrived at the building site and walked into a specialist projection dome for lunch, treated to a visualisation of the scheme literally being built around them. - 360° video
The event also premiered a 360° video – a series of cut shots projected around the dome to show drone footage of the site with its own particular set of challenges. - 3D-modelled app
Segro developed an application for use on a large touch table in the marketing suite and a 3D-modelled smartphone-enabled app.
Timescales of the campaign
Feb-Apr 2017: Research/planning.
May-Dec 2017: Phase one – including launch animation in May, event in October, and follow up/measurement after each marketing activity.
Early 2018: Phase two begins.
Budgets
Total campaign budget
- £400,000 £265,150 media spend/outside costs.
The campaign was led by SEGRO, but none of this would have been possible without the following agency partners:
- Siren Design: Creative agency (Fees: £90,000)
- Igloo Vision: Immersive 360° projection dome creation (Fees: £20,000)
- Maelstrom: 360° fly-through film (Fees: £4,000)
- Perspective Pictures: Drone and 4×4 filming (Fees: £850)
- Wagstaffs Design: Interactive 3D technology to create app (Fees: £20,000)
Results
Meeting or surpassing all objectives, Segro has quite literally taken ownership of big box in the UK:
Lettings +100% versus target – more than four months ahead of schedule
By the end of May 2018, almost 2,000,000 sq ft were let – that’s one-third of the total square footage available. Not only is this 100% more than the objective, it was achieved a full four months before the Q3 2018 objective. And the lettings are all to key target sectors: online retailer, high street retailer and two 3PLs.
Engagement levels exceed all expectations – based on target audience survey after campaign began:
- 97% identified SLPEMG as a key scheme in the UK – versus 85% objective.
- 97% recognised Segro as a big box provider in the UK – versus 85% objective.
Campaign element results
- 1,300 views on the animation: the animation was initially sent via EDM to just 2,000 people, so this represents a 65% view rate – well above industry standards.
- 43% average click to open rate for electronic direct mail: more than double 20% industry average.
- 98% attendance rate at event: 54 of the 55 top agents invited went to the event.
- 78% app downloads from target group.
- 1:600 marketing ROI over total leasing period
Segro has leased almost 2,000,000 sq ft at an average rent of £6/sq ft – so total rent achieved is approximately £12 million pa. However, the leases are for 20 years, so rent achieved over that period is £240 million. With total campaign spend of £400,000, the ROI over the total leasing period is 1:600 (or 1:30 over one year).