National Trust for Scotland: TV’s Membership drive

Key Points

With Memberships accounting for 1/3 of National Trust for Scotland’s revenue but the cost of living crisis had meant sign ups had taken a hit. IT was crucial for the NTS to showcase the value of membership in both cost and experience.

With 3 new audience segments to target, TV offered the best chance to reach as many as possible and drive fame for the brand.

Smashed all the targets set in the objectives, 11% higher signs up compared to target, grew fame 5% above target and with just under ¼ of the Scottish population spontaneously mentioning NTS when asked.

The Challenge

The National Trust for Scotland (NTS) looks after the most beautiful and treasured places in the Scotland and has always had a special place in people’s hearts. After a few turbulent years with a global pandemic, conflicts and a cost of living crisis; membership’s had taken a hit. This presented a problem for NTS. Memberships accounted of 1/3 of the Trust’s annual income. It was crucial for them to showcase the value of a membership in both cost and experience and give people a reason to sign up.

This meant the membership campaign would be about ‘the ask’, driving fame for the brand and increased sign ups. NTS handed media agency Carat a clear set of objectives. The campaign would need to increase new membership sales, grow spontaneous brand awareness, grow relevance and finally understanding that NTS was a charity with a mission to protect Scotland’s heritage.

The TV Solution

With a clear set of objectives to work toward Carat got to work in understanding the problem at hand. With 3 new audience segments to target; Adventurous families, Culture lovers and Mindful Meanderes; Carat interrogated them to understand which aspects of the NTS offering would best resonate with them and how to reach them.

Using agency planning tool, Consumer Connection Survey (CCS), Carat where able to identify the right channel that would hit all three audience segments. TV. TV would drive fame for the brand across Scotland by driving mass reach and awareness. Added in with BVOD to add incremental reach to audiences who were lighter linear viewers.

The Plan

Having landed on TV as the lead channel for the campaign, CCS had highlighted how different the viewing habits of each audience segment actually was. So settling on a channel would be a difficult task as it wasn’t a one size fits all approach. Carat needed to deliver high reach against all of the segments in Scotland to inform them of the need and importance of the work that the Trust carries out, it wasn’t just lovely days out, it was preserving and conserving the nation. The campaign would kick off in mid-March and run through to July to focus on key dates. Firstly with clocks changing it was a chance to spend more time out and about in nature and with the school year coming to an end it was opportunity for families to sign up and explore NTS properties and places they might not have visited.

The campaign launched on STV for linear with a focus on the highest viewed programming with spots in Ant and Dec’s Saturday Night Takeaway and The Jonathan Ross Show for us to drive awareness and increase adstock early in the campaign. STV and Channel 4 provided scale and attentive reach. BVOD and addressable TV were deployed across Sky AdSmart with channels including Channel 5 and Sky Atlantic in the second week of the campaign with a focus on impacts delivered in programming that hadn’t typically featured on NTS campaigns in the past. Across the 3 months period their wasn’t a week were NTS wasn’t running some form of AV taking an always on approach to keep the brand front of mind.

With younger and lighter TV viewers being harder to reach through linear TV, NTS and Carat needed to take a slightly different approach to past membership campaigns. Shifting the budget allocation into BVOD from 10% to 20% allowed NTS to match the viewing habits of these audiences. This approach allowed the NTS to feature in slew of top programming across STV, Channel 4 and Sky across March and May; this would drive frequency as viewers binge watched episode after episode, with key shows including, The Last of Us, Dalglish, Gogglebox, Love Island and I’m a Celeb South Africa. Across June the campaign dropped from the 30” hero asset to a 10” cut down, maximising cost efficiency and ramp up messaging in the lead up to the Scottish summer holiday, converting viewers who hadn’t made up their mind about membership yet.

To support the campaign, Caret took at social approach, taking the membership creative to social platforms to drive mass awareness across Facebook and Instagram. Using learnings from past activity, NTS used formats, Single images and carousels, to drive conversions. Knowing that frequency was key to generating the conversation needed for success, Carat implemented a remarketing approach. This approach would see NTS re-engaging website visitors who had not signed up and encourage them to sign up today, using a tailor made message to drive cut through and engagement.

Results

The campaign delivered against the objectives set out at the start. With the aim of growing membership, the campaign broke the original KPI target and delivered 11% higher new memberships above the target. The goal of growing fame for the NTS, again the campaign was a success, delivering grow of 5% above target. Carat and NTS were able to make viewers feel closer to the cause as well, breaking the target by 10%. And finally with the goal of making the Scottish public aware that NTS was a charity and their work was much needed, again smashed the set targets delivering double digit improvements on target. Overall a successful campaign that saw NTS grew their spontaneous awareness levels above those of their competitors with just under a ¼ of the Scottish population spontaneously mentioning NTS.

Databank

Sector: Charity

Brand: National Trust for Scotland

Campaign objectives: raise awareness, increase sales

Target Audience: ABC1Aduts

Budget: £305,000 Approx (Nielsen AdIntel)

Campaign Dates: March-July 2023

TV Usage: Linear and BVOD

Creative Agency: Leith Agency

Media Agency: Carat