Café Express integrated direct marketing campaign

When award-winning US restaurant chain Café Express made its first foray into the breakfast market take-up was slow. Its owner, celebrated US chef Robert Del Grande, decided to raise awareness of the chain and drive footfall to the Houston and Dallas branches with a marketing campaign inviting people to try the new breakfast menu for free, courtesy of a breakfast gift card.

Integrated marketing agency Dukky came up with a cross-platform campaign that used direct mail to send out the gift card along with a personalised URL (PURL) to harvest valuable customer information and help profile its target audience.

But the agency didn't stop there. Customers were also invited to use social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter and Linked-In to share the free offer with their friends and colleagues with the added incentive of a free prize draw.

The campaign achieved an impressive response rate of 24%, 62% of which came from the personalised mail pack. But this was a lot more than a free breakfast for recipients.

As Allan Blair, social media director at Tribal DDB says: ‘By combining direct mail with social media, Café Express has grabbed the attention of its audience, really got to know them and opened up the opportunity for future dialogue.’