Propelling Brand Growth for Josh Cellars

Long before Josh Cellars memes went viral, the vintner established itself as a trusted brand with premium products and accessible prices, no easy feat in the competitive wine category. At the heart of the brand’s success is its commitment to authentic storytelling through innovative, well-targeted digital advertising.

Rooted in family values, gratitude, and celebration, Josh Cellars is the perfect brand selection for the holidays. Josh Cellars turned to Havas Media Network (HMN) to develop a campaign that broke through the 2023 seasonal noise to drive incremental brand lift among adult alcohol drinkers (35–65). Powerful creative, paired with thoughtful audience targeting, was needed to deliver impactful results.

Determining if Josh Cellars is top of mind

Marketers are under pressure to prove the ROI of every ad dollar. An already very recognizable brand like Josh Cellars faces significant challenges in showing how ad campaigns move the needle with their target audiences. It’s very common that ads for well-known brands don’t produce statistically significant lifts in brand awareness, but that does not mean the campaign did not work.

That’s why HMN wanted to look at lift in other important performance indicators beyond brand awareness, like brand favorability and purchase intent. HMN needed reliable cross-platform measurement to answer:

• Where does the Josh Cellars brand currently stand with alcohol drinkers?
• At which stage of the funnel were alcohol drinkers most significantly influenced by the campaign?
• Which platforms were most influential in driving brand lift KPIs beyond awareness?
• What tactical optimizations could be applied to future campaigns to resonate even more with targeted consumers?

DISQO Brand Lift: future-proof, cross-platform measurement

To showcase how the campaign fueled brand growth among alcohol drinkers, HMN turned to DISQO. Fueled by a direct audience of more than 2 million consumers sharing first-party data, DISQO’s identity-based platform enables complete cross-platform campaign effectiveness measurement without relying on cookies, across all channels and devices, including social media.

DISQO’s single-source brand lift methodology gave HMN the objectivity they needed to understand how different media in the plan performed, individually and together. Consumers exposed to the Josh Cellars campaign were compared to mirror-matched control groups with similar attributes, allowing HMN to identify which cohorts were most moved by the campaign and why, and how its media mix worked to drive brand lift.

Test-and-learn measurement delivered valuable optimization insights

HMN confirmed that the campaign drove significant lifts in brand familiarity (+4 pts), favorability (+7 pts), consideration (+4 pts), and purchase intent (+5 pts). Across all of these metrics, Josh Cellars’ campaign outperformed DISQO’s Adult Beverage brand lift benchmarks, and purchase intent lift was more than 2x the food and beverage benchmark.

Brand perceptions revealed lean-in messaging opportunities

The campaign increased all brand perceptions by five to seven percentage points. Not only did it drive positive agreement with key brand statements, it also gave HMN and Josh Cellars insight into which messaging and positioning resonated most with their target audience, a primary goal of the campaign.

The strongest agreement in both groups was for “Josh Cellars is a brand I would share with my friends and family” and “Josh Cellars is an approachable wine brand.” These qualities were established outside of the campaign, whereas the campaign had a more notable impact on the other perceptions.

Tactical optimizations can maximize future ROI

Optimize ad exposure frequency to between four and six

The campaign drove increased unaided brand awareness and persuasion metrics after just one to three ad exposures. With four to six exposures, it delivered an eight-point lift in aided awareness and sustained lower-funnel lift, while frequency above six saw diminishing results. For seasonal activations, minimizing frequency in exchange for increased reach can move more buyers closer to purchase.

Expand targeting beyond alcohol drinkers

The campaign performed particularly well on favorability, consideration, and purchase intent with segments like gifters, parents, and those with annual incomes between $30K and $49K. Given the brand’s focus on family values and premium quality at a low price, segmentation by these attributes could yield even greater results, especially during the holidays.

Focus on specific formats and channels

CTV/OTT and OLV performed best overall, delivering lift from familiarity through purchase intent. Native display delivered the highest unaided awareness baseline, while native video and pause ads delivered less impact on attitudes. Adjusting the media mix based on these insights helps Josh Cellars and HMN double down on the channels that perform best on priority KPIs.

“Havas Media Network delivers media that meaningfully drives our clients’ desired business outcomes. Our partnership with DISQO has helped us to deliver actionable cross-platform and full-funnel campaign measurement, essentials for any modern media agency.” Mike Bregman, Chief Brand Officer, Havas Media Network

Measure your campaign brand lift with DISQO. Let’s DISQO: hello@disqo.com