2013 Holiday Retail Insights

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About NetElixir

NetElixir offers search marketing services and technology to retailers like

Lenovo, Oneida and K-Swiss. We are headquartered in Princeton, NJ and have

global offices in London and Hyderabad (India).

The 70+ member NetElixir team consists of a multitude of search marketing

engineers, data scientists, technologists, and global operations managers, all of

whom are constantly ideating, innovating, and implementing unique practices

that drive towards our vision of empowering global search advertisers.

Follow us @NetElixir

www.NetElixir.com

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About NetElixir University

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NetElixir University was launched in 2012 with a vision of “democratizing the

digital marketing industry through exceptional knowledge and expertise

sharing.”

Our goal is to share best practices in retail + digital marketing with 10,000

businesses, worldwide, by 2015.

NetElixir University

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About Udayan Bose

• Founder & CEO, NetElixir,Inc.

• Founded PartyBingo.com (PartyGaming, Plc).

• Guest Lecturer at:

• Johnson School of Management, Cornell University.

• City University of New York, Baruch.

• Indian School of Business.

• Quoted in New York Times, Forbes and Time.

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Table of Contents

NetElixir Holiday Calendar: Forecast vs. Actuals.

Tracking Y/Y CPC Inflation on Google and Bing.

Mapping CPC Inflation against Ecommerce Revenue Growth.

Key Takeaways.

How NetElixir Helped Kansas City Steaks tap incremental SEM revenue

opportunities and grow Y/Y Revenue

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Data Sources

• NetElixir Retail Intelligence Research: Since August 2008, we have been

tracking key search engine marketing metrics for 32 mid size and large

US online retailers. During holidays, this data is captured on an hourly basis.

• comScore Holiday eCommerce Trends through Green Monday. (Dated: Dec 13, 2013).

NetElixir Holiday Calendar 2013

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Forecasted Y/Y

CPC increase:

+ 50%

+ 30%

+ 25%

Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat

11/24 11/25 11/26 11/27 11/28 11/29 11/30

12/1 12/2 12/3 12/4 12/5 12/6 12/7

12/8 12/9 12/10 12/11 12/12 12/13 12/14

12/15 12/16 12/17 12/18 12/19 12/20 12/21

12/22 12/23 12/24 12/25 12/26 12/27 12/28

Note: Our 2013 Holiday Calendar was released in August 2013.

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Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat

11/24 11/25 11/26 11/27 11/28 11/29 11/30

12/1 12/2 12/3 12/4 12/5 12/6 12/7

12/8 12/9 12/10 12/11 12/12 12/13 12/14

12/15 12/16 12/17 12/18 12/19 12/20 12/21

12/22 12/23 12/24 12/25 12/26 12/27 12/28

Was a $1 B+ Ecommerce Day

The weekends have been surprisingly strong.

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Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat

11/24 11/25 11/26 11/27 11/28

(21%)

11/29

(46%)

11/30

(30%)

12/1

(29%)

12/2

(61%)

12/3

(33%)

12/4

(30%)

12/5

(40%)

12/6

(15%)

12/7

(19%)

12/8

(40%)

12/9

(23%)

12/10

(45%)

12/11

(30%)

12/12

(61%)

12/13

(53%)

12/14

(48%)

Actual Y/Y CPC Inflation

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Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat

11/24 11/25 11/26 11/27 11/28

(21%)

11/29

(46%)

11/30

(30%)

12/1

(29%)

12/2

(61%)

12/3

(33%)

12/4

(30%)

12/5

(40%)

12/6

(15%)

12/7

(19%)

12/8

(40%)

12/9

(23%)

12/10

(45%)

12/11

(30%)

12/12

(61%)

12/13

(53%)

12/14

(48%)

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Key Takeaways

Cyber week (12/2) has been the strongest ecommerce week ever,

however, the bid inflation has not been in total alignment.

The holiday weekends have been stronger than in previous years.

Both of the above trends presented opportunities that could have been

tapped through real time opportunity tracking and quick execution.

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Kansas City Steaks: A Holiday Case Study

Strategic Holiday Planning & Real Time Execution

Drive Exponential Growth

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Premium Steaks and Fine Foods Company established in 1932.

Holiday Revenue Growth Goal: 50%.

Grab PPC Share of Voice for Competition.

Holiday SEM Revenue Goal

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Building the Holiday Plan

Detailed Execution Plan built around Holiday Calendar.

The Plan was finalized on September 19 after an

intense Executive Meeting that lasted for 4+ hours.

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Proprietary Real Time Bid Optimization (RTBO) platform identified Revenue

Maximization opportunities and executed strategic bid changes.

Account Management team worked around the clock, in 3 shifts, analyzing

competitive landscape, identifying incremental opportunities and making

campaign changes.

We had a Plan B in place just in case Plan A did not work.

Executing the Plan

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RESULTS

Y/Y SEM Revenue Growth (Thanksgiving to Dec.14)= 89%

Source: AdGooroo PPC Share of Voice Report

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Conclusion

An ability to monitor, analyze and manage bids around-the-clock through a

combination of real time bid optimization technology and expert management

can have a substantial impact on revenues and ROI.

A holiday plan, however detailed it may be, needs to have adequate flexibility

for adaptation and change. Real time decisoning can trigger Plan B at an

appropriate time, thereby gaining significant advantage over competition.

We believe, this holiday season will go down in ecommerce history as a

landmark season where better prepared and sophisticated retailers won..

at others’ expense.

Thank you!

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To request more information about NetElixir’s Search Marketing

services and technology, email marinn@netelixir.com.

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