From performance to brand building - A story of growth for David Lloyd Leisure

Client: David Lloyd Leisure

David Lloyd Leisure’s brief to The Kite Factory was to accelerate growth.

Our big idea was to generate short-term revenue to fund long-term growth and build the confidence to reinvest. We mapped out a four-year journey from performance to brand, using data and insight to inform an evolving strategy that would change the game for David Lloyd Leisure. In year 1, our focus was steadying the ship, based around integrated performance planning using linear attribution. In year 2, we began building the data foundations, using econometric modelling that changed the view on media effectiveness. In year 3, we utilised more testing and learning., and applied insight to change the shape of performance media. Year 4 was when we changed the game, using data from our econometric modelling to build a scenario planner and combined this data with expected medium-to-long-term outcomes of improving brand understanding and consideration on future acquisition activities. This modelling was used to convince senior stakeholders to make their largest quarterly investment in paid media ever in Q1 of 2020. This enabled us to design our first brand-response campaign that would focus predominantly on boosting understanding and consideration. This successfully delivered a record Q1 and speedy recovery from Lockdown. Overall, enquiry volumes and sales saw a step-change in growth from year one, with 13% average growth in annual enquiry volumes from 2015-2019. Our long-term media strategy helped take David Lloyd Leisure from pure performance to brand building, without ever compromising business effectiveness.