Staples understands how paid marketing affects organic app installs

Staples is well-known as the nation’s largest supplier of office supplies and having a strong back-to-school presence. The mobile marketing team at Staples, led by Gwen Murray, works closely with the product team in order to deliver the best-in-class customer experiences.

Gwen has been working in mobile since 2006. She’s worked at Qualcomm on the Brew platform, at Sony, at Amazon marketing the Kindle app, and at L’Oreal doing mobile optimization to their CRM program. She knows mobile. We asked her how using the TUNE Marketing Console helps her get her job done. Here are the best snippets from the uncut version of her interview. You can watch the final version below.

At Staples, Gwen’s team manages push notifications and app messaging. User acquisition, retention and engagement are their biggest responsibilities. We asked Gwen about her mobile strategy and how she uses an attribution partner to help her. 

Can you describe how you use the TUNE Marketing Console or what portions of the TUNE Marketing Console that you use the most?

When I use the TUNE Marketing Console, the fact is we don’t do a lot of paid acquisition marketing. But when we do, it’s really important to me that I understand how those dollars are being spent and maximized, so I can make the case to get more budget to do more paid acquisition. So, understanding that attribution within the marketing console is extremely important for me.

What were you using before and why did you choose to switch to using the TUNE Marketing Console?

In terms of attribution, what I was using before was some analysts on my team and we were doing a baseline lift analysis model where we basically would do burst spending and then see if that raised our downloads, our installs, our active users, all those good things. But it’s a really, you know, I call it squishy math. So for us to have more rigorous analytics was really important to me.

Can you tell us how TUNE integrates into your day-to-day work and responsibilities?  How do we help you do your job?

TUNE is just such a great partner. And in terms of understanding my app users, what I look for a lot is my organics and really understanding how the halo effect from paid to organic is playing out for me. A lot of people just go directly to the app store and type in Staples. So understanding the behavior of my organic users versus my paid users is what’s very helpful for me in terms of understanding how I can prioritize, be it app stop optimization or do more paid acquisition. That’s the way I use TUNE probably the most.

What results have you seen since switching to using TUNE?

So for me, the results I’ve seen are when we look at our organics and then the halo effects I get when I run my paid campaigns, that’s the thing that has really been helpful for me to say, okay, well here’s our budget, here’s what we’re spending, we’re getting this sort of direct revenue and direct attribution, but I also see this halo effect and I can help, you know, that helps me make the case again to go back and say, it’s more than just the $30,000 I spent with X, Y, Z partner.  It’s also that incremental lift that helps us rise in the rankings, that helps us be more discoverable.

What’s your favorite part about being a TUNE customer?

I think my favorite part about being a TUNE customer is I feel like I get treated so well by the customer service team. I mean, it started from the beginning when I worked with the sales team.  The relationship that I’ve developed and the way you guys are so responsive and helpful, it makes me feel like TUNE is really an extension of my team and that’s what I really want from my partners, be it my technology partners, my agency partners, and I feel that really to my core that you guys are there for me and supporting me and helping me make better decisions.

Here’s the edited testimonial from Gwen:

To learn more about how clients use the TUNE Marketing Console, here’s a playlist spotlighting all the unique ways.