Founded in 2004 just outside Coventry, YOODOO is an online greeting card company that specialises in exclusive designs by new artists and illustrators. The cards offer a degree of customisation that is not available with storebought cards, with both the front and the inside of YOODOO cards allowing personalisation. Recently, off the back of their greeting card success, YOODOO have moved into offering flowers and stuffed bears on their site. AdWords has played an important role in this new chapter for the business.

 

The Challenge

The founders of YOODOO could see that there was a very limited selection of greeting cards in high street card retailers and supermarkets. So, in late 2004, they launched their innovative greeting card website www.YOODOO.com. Working off a ‘lean and mean' business model, Managing Director Bob Leslie decided that web-based advertising to target consumers who were already aware of personalised greeting cards would be the best launching platform for the company. The model also relied on attracting visitors to the site who would ultimately become repeat customers.

 

With this in mind YOODOO launched their online marketing. It quickly became apparent that Google AdWords was attracting a level of traffic far superior to its competitors. Leslie estimates that "the volume of clicks that we get on Google AdWords is probably tenfold what we get with other programmes. It's incredible. It wipes the floor with them."

 

The Approach

YOODOO uses a wide variety of AdWords tools to maximise the performance of their campaigns. However, the first thing that struck Leslie when he began using AdWords was the control “I don't think I've ever, in my many years in business, found a marketing tool where I'm able to directly interact so quickly and responsively. It is quite remarkable…it's a dream to use."

 

Once YOODOO had established themselves online, they still faced the hurdle of the seasonality of much of the greeting card market. Leslie kept this is mind as he structured his campaigns for upcoming holidays and occasions. Furthermore he began using website analysis tools. Leslie describes how he has used Analytics: "it has helped me with the trends over the weeks. I can look at patterns of sales, special occasion dates, what volumes were coming in from certain keywords…it has opened up a whole new level of understanding."

 

This ‘new level of understanding' came about through Analytics' range of reports which allow you to trace how users found your site and how they interact with it, as well as a wealth of other metrics which allow you to tailor your advertising and website based on past user behaviour. Leslie concludes that Analytics "opened my eyes to the URLs where clicks are coming from, geographical locations and browser types…I think it gives me access to whatever I want and the flexibility to change the parameters of what I'm measuring. It is an ideal tool for me to get beneath the bonnet really."

 

Results

When asked about any results he is proud of over his first year in business, Leslie points to the bottom line of his AdWords account: over 23 million impressions and 285,000 clicks. He says, "when you actually think about it in those sort of terms, its pretty impressive for the amount of spend that we've spent…bear in mind we're getting world-wide coverage with AdWords as well. It's incredible." The first year's advertising has established YOODOO as a major force and recognisable brand in the online greeting card market. Leslie reflects on the first year of YOODOO: "we started this twelve months ago and we didn't know anything about AdWords. We were real rookies." And how has AdWords helped your business? "I'd go as far as to say that for our first year's trading, Google AdWords has been the foundation of our business."