A Lesson in Free Vitamins

Photo: bradley j

A friend mentioned an interesting way that the Internet can reduce cost, raise output, and that uses incentives cleverly. Her company created an educational ad campaign to encourage young women to engage in healthy activities. On several occasions various unrelated blogs mentioned that free vitamins were being given through the campaign’s website linked to the ads. Using Google Analytics she discovered that the website’s hits went up over tenfold after each mention on the blogs; but the data also showed that most of the new hits were by people who got onto the website just long enough to get the freebies.
In the next round the offers will be restructured so the freebies are available only after the person has watched an online educational video—and thus imbibed the health-promoting knowledge that was the purpose of the campaign.
[HT: CS]