The Situation
Elsevier, a global leader in information and analytics that helps researchers and healthcare professionals advance science and improve health outcomes for the benefit of society, approached Digital Gearbox with a critical challenge. They were trying to combat a predicted dip in research article submissions across a number of STM journals, due to changes to the journal markets.
Having previously partnered with Digital Gearbox for other projects promoting their journals and events, due to our good understanding of their business needs and the target market. Elsevier chose to work with us again to increase the awareness of the target journals, and engage with new researchers in the relevant fields of study who would be open to the new open access publication route.
The challenge was a significant one, but through meticulous campaign structuring, advanced targeting, and diligent optimisation, we helped Elsevier overcome their submission challenges and achieve significant growth in journal traffic and minimise the anticipated submission dip.
Here’s what we did.
The Solution
Following a research period to understand and define Elsevier’s audiences for these journals, we implemented a comprehensive strategy that combined precision targeting across the Display Network, and iterative optimisation. Our approach included:
Awareness Campaigns
Using Google Display custom segments, we created several campaigns targeting audiences that had searched for terms related to the target journal names, sister journals, key journal topics, and competitor journals to attract highly relevant audiences.
Remarketing
Leveraging Google’s vast Display network, we created campaigns with audiences segmented by journal type. The aim was to recapture previous site visitors and drive them to submission pages.
Expanding to Microsoft Ads
Through in-depth audience analysis, we recognised Elsevier’s potential power users were likely to use Bing as an alternative to Google. Using the Microsoft Advertising ecosystem, we employed auto-targeting and LinkedIn audiences to capture additional relevant traffic, ensuring comprehensive coverage across multiple platforms.
Once launched, a strict budget management and performance optimisation strategy was needed to ensure we were consistently achieving the desired results. This included:
Geographic and Audience Refinements
- Initial geographic bid adjustments based on initial performance data.
- Further segmentation of specific regions to minimise budget cannibalisation.
- Additional segmentation based on prioritisation of country to allow us to give high-performing regions more budget.
- Pausing of lower performing audiences to give the stronger performers more budget.
Ad Experimentation
- Controlled testing of local language ads versus English ads.
- Controlled testing of informational versus social proof ad copy.
- Asset refresh to combat ad fatigue.
Continuous Performance Refinement
- Ongoing ad placement reviews and refinements.
- Ongoing budgetary adjustments.
- Experimentation with different bidding strategies.
The Results
Our targeted approach led to significant achievements across both Google and Microsoft Ads platforms:
Google Ads Performance:
- Over 8 million clicks generated
- Average click-through rate of 4.49% well surpassing industry benchmarks for Display Ads (0.46%).
- Consistently low average cost per click.
Microsoft Ads Performance:
- Total spend: $43k (~£35.5k).
- Over 841,000 clicks
Overall Impact:
- 10,355 unique button clicks on the “submit your paper” button, showing a high level of submission intent.
- 768 of these unique button clicks were from Bing/LinkedIn
- Contributed to 6.5% uplift in accepted articles on targets, while supporting 45% of journals to YOY submission growth surpassing targets
- A number of key learnings made for the business that will drive key decisions in their overall marketing strategy moving forwards.
- Hours of time saved internally, so they could focus on other marketing activities.
What the Client Had to Say
“Reaching new audiences within diverse markets can be a challenge for our journals. Digital advertising, run by Digital Gearbox, helped us to reach new prospective journal authors during the transition, while helping spread the word among our current author base.
We partnered with Digital Gearbox to design the campaign plan, iterating on execution month after month, and year after year, adjusting strategy whenever the digital landscape transformed. DG brought a depth of technical knowledge, personable energy and consistent communication that helped to make the programme a success.”
Franca Driessen, Marketing Manager at Elsevier
