IPG Mediabrands Commerce boosts toys advertising revenue in Australia for Mattel by 1,220% on Prime Day

Barbie. Fisher-Price. Hot Wheels. These Mattel brands are well known to customers around the world. And since Amazon launched down under in 2017, Australian customers have been drawn to the ease of browsing the Store, especially during events that feature deeply discounted products. Mattel saw an opportunity to connect with Australian customers to help drive greater sales on Amazon.

In 2022, Mattel changed their advertising strategy from siloed bursts of activity to an always-on investment for eight of their brands. They engaged Amazon Ads partner IPG Mediabrands Commerce for the full calendar year in an effort to help boost toy sales.

IPG Mediabrands Commerce knew that Prime Day was an important event for Australian shoppers. The agency wanted to optimize Mattel’s Prime Day campaigns to reach Australian customers who were likely to be looking for a deal.

IPG Mediabrands Commerce has offices in 48 countries, offering a suite of solutions to help clients optimize their performance on Amazon. Research and historical performance had told us that a large increase in Prime Day traffic tended to consume brands’ budget allocation earlier in the day, meaning it was critically important to up-weight budgets.

Additionally, IPG Mediabrands Commerce anticipated that Mattel’s competitors were likely to spend more during Prime Day, so they needed to devise a strategy for allocating money outside of their always-on monthly spend in order for their advertising to last through the 48-hour event.

To meet this challenge,IPG Mediabrands Commerce optimized spend toward campaigns with higher ROAS. To make the budget last for the entirety of Prime Day, IPG Mediabrands Commerce increased the daily allocation by 500%. They checked on remaining budget and campaign performance every two hours, using Amazon Ads tools to optimize spend based on near-real-time consumer demand.

In an effort to increase sales during this key event, IPG Mediabrands Commerce first audited their sponsored ads campaigns to verify that they were increase sales that were in stock, retail ready, and historically well-performing. Mattel’s Sponsored Products and Sponsored Brands campaigns focused on reaching a range of branded, generic, and competitor keywords and products.

For their Sponsored Brands campaigns, IPG Mediabrands Commerce featured only products with Prime Day deals to emphasize the products’ discounts. To help maximize conversion rates, IPG Mediabrands Commerce increased audits of their inventory so that they were promoting only those Mattel products that were in stock and ready for sale.

To connect with past viewers and purchasers of Mattel toys, as well as audiences browsing and purchasing from complementary categories, IPG Mediabrands Commerce used Sponsored Display ads.

By optimizing Mattel’s campaign in response to consumer demand, IPG Mediabrands Commerce far exceeded historical averages and important benchmarks.

For the two days of Prime Day 2022, Mattel achieved an uplift ad revenue of 1,220% compared to their historical daily average to date.¹ IPG Mediabrands Commerce also helped Mattel achieve their highest-ever daily ad revenue.

Mattel’s ROAS for their Prime Day campaigns exceeded their benchmarks for Australia by 363%.² Overall, the sponsored ads revenue contributed to 500% growth in total Prime Day revenue for Mattel compared to the prior year.³ Following Prime Day, Mattel’s Amazon sales in Australia continued to improve by 150%.⁴

Continuing the upward trajectory, IPG Mediabrands Commerce applied their Prime Day learnings to post-Thanksgiving Black Friday and Cyber Monday promotional days in late November and found additional success. Mattel saw a 136% uplift in revenue compared to baseline sales in the quarter.⁵ Additionally, revenue grew 294% compared to Prime Day.⁶ Mattel also experienced improved efficiency in their ROAS, exceeding their benchmarks for the year by 339%.⁷