Successful paid social strategy: On? Always.

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Someone holding a phone with a Vintage Inns social post; the background is a leafy plant.
Digital marketingSocial mediaStrategy

See how we used an always-on paid social strategy to increase impressions, engagements, and clicks with less budget for Mitchells & Butlers’ premium brands.

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Someone holding an iPhone displaying a Miller & Carter social post about steaks.

Brief

We were given the challenge of increasing impressions, clicks, and engagements across Mitchells & Butlers’ premium brands: Miller & Carter, Vintage Inns, and Premium Country Pubs.

At the same time, we needed to reduce costs per results (CPR), reducing the spend needed to reach each guest, attracting new people while retaining brand advocates.

A person with red nails holding a phone. It displays a Vintage Inns social media post about 40% off mains.

Approach

We ditched the “on and off” method of media planning – after all, social media users are always on… Shouldn’t our approach reflect that?

Decision makers are always jumping between websites, social media, emails, peer recommendations, review sites and so much more. On top of that, many of them are likely to be at different stages of the sales cycle. 

It’s also important to consider the length of the sales cycle and what’s required to pull a prospect completely through the sales funnel. Getting prospects to take that journey typically involves up to 10 pieces of content being consumed to reach a decision – time-sensitive, short-term campaigns are unable to meet this demand. 

A man holds a phone towards the camera. On its screen, a Miller & Carter social media post is displayed.

Solution

For Miller & Carter and Vintage Inns, we moved to an always-on paid social strategy. 

“Always On” paid social strategies become more efficient for both performance and cost, as most paid social campaigns are based on a bidding system, allowing for a consistent strategy. 

This also means that, though we do keep checking in to optimise performance, that the ads are automatically optimised based on how they’re performing, who they’re reaching, and how many people are engaging. 

A Miller & Carter table, featuring a menu, cutlery, a cocktail and some kind of starter with a dip.

Miller & Carter

Impressions+136%
CPR per 1,000 people16p to 5p
Monthly clicks+59%
Monthly engagements+71%
Two guests clinking their glasses of red wine while enjoying dinner.

Vintage Inns

Impressions+195%
CPR per 1,000 people54p to 10p
Monthly clicks+54%
Monthly engagements+35%
A phone with a social media post from Premium Country Pubs. It displays a GIF that promotes a Wine & Dine experience.

Premium Country Pubs

As a “soft brand” that requires local-level paid social, our strategy for Premium Country Pubs had to be completely unique.

During FY23 we have been testing budget, number of sites, campaign length, and ad objectives. We discovered a clear correlation between the number of sites involved and budget, indicating a minimum budget requirement for each site’s ads to deliver good results.

In Q4, we took our learnings and created a Lunch and Reasons to Visit (RTV) campaign, running an ‘Awareness’ ad campaign alongside two traffic-driving campaigns with:

1. Multiple ad objectives of impressions and traffic
2. Bigger budgets per site
3. Longer campaign duration of six weeks
4. Multiple ad creatives in each campaign

Premium Country Pubs

Impressions12m
Landing page views34k
CPR per 1,000 people42p & 24p

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