COHN ICSC RECon iBeacon Program

ICSC iBeacon Program
RESULTS & ANALYSIS
JUNE 12, 2015

COPYRIGHT© 2015 COHN
GENESIS OF THE PROGRAM
As beacon technology continues to gain momentum in the retail real estate industry, COHN
and the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC) saw the opportunity to provide an
interactive program that showcased beacon capabilities at the 2015 RECon conference - the
largest retail and commercial real estate conference in the world.
Together with COHN, ICSC launched a pilot program featuring more than 100 beacons at
seven Las Vegas locations and six RECon and attendee-sponsored events. In an effort to
legitimize and expand the program, we reached out to a network of technologically-
advanced industry “family and friends” to participate, ensuring that the inaugural program
was diverse, strategic and comprehensive. Following is a global overview of the program
and a breakdown of our results.
OVERVIEW
3

PROGRAM GOALS
• Further position ICSC as the industry thought leader in the area of digital and mobile
marketing within the retail real estate industry.
• Introduce beacon technology as a real world application to an industry that would directly
benefit from the use of beacons - retailers, shopping centers, cities, etc.
• Introduce a new messaging platform that cuts through the conference clutter and stands
out in a sea of sponsored messaging and traditional ads.
• Achieve a 30% engagement rate.
• Generate $10,000 in revenues to cover program hard costs and management.
OVERVIEW
4

PARTICIPANTS
5

PROGRAM LOGISTICS
6
PRODUCT VENDOR
BEACON HARDWARE ESTIMOTE
BEACON CMS PUSHMOTE
BEACON STRATEGY & EXECUTION COHN

PROGRAM PROMOTION
In an effort to maximize our user pool, ICSC promoted both the updated ICSC mobile
application and beacon program through a variety of channels:
• Press release distribution
• ICSC emails
• Beacon-specific messaging - one email
• ICSC mobile app messaging - all RECon emails
• Window clings at the Las Vegas Convention Center
• ICSC blog post
• ICSC social channels (115k followers) - daily to weekly across all channels
• Full ad in Shopping Centers Today May issue
• Digital slides at RECon keynotes and educational sessions
• Featured YouTube video on ICSC television
• Shopping Centers Today “Daily” newspaper during RECon
AWARENESS
7

PLACEMENT
8
BEACONS WERE ALSO PLACED AT THE ENCORE BEACH CLUB, WESTGATE HOTEL,
WYNN HOTEL, CAESARS PALACE, AND CHATEAU NIGHT CLUB AT PARIS HOTEL.

INSTALLATION
9
INSTALLATION PHOTO GALLERY
COHN, PUSHMOTE & CAESARS PALACE TEAMS
PLACING BEACONS AT CAESARS PALACE
The execution of the RECon Beacon program required a
robust team, including:
• COHN: Integrated marketing and digital agency based in
Denver, CO responsible for strategy, messaging, installation
and program management.
• Lisa Wieting - VP Integration & Planning
• Justin Kutner - Digital Director
• Mike Margiotta - Digital Strategist
• Samantha Drake - Digital Strategiest
• Pushmote: Beacon CMS provider, made up of a team of
three founders currently participating in the Austin TechStars
program. The entire team came to Las Vegas to help
manage the messaging platform and monitor attendee
engagement.
• Tarik Ozket - CEO
• Taha Ozket - CTO
• Gokay Hamamci - CMO
• Andy Aguiluz - TechStar representative

INSTALLATION
10
Placements had to be both strategic and practical, ensuring we
were allowing the beacons space to work while protecting
them from being removed or damaged.
ESCALATORS AT CAESARS PALACE
BRIXMOR BOOTH
MAIN HALL ENTRANCE
(PRE-CONFERENCE START)

INSTALLATION
11
JLL BOOTH JLL BOOTH

INSTALLATION
12
RECON WELCOME RECEPTION - ENCORE
RECON WELCOME RECEPTION - ENCORE

INSTALLATION
13
The Las Vegas Convention Center is 3.2 million square feet; 2
million square feet of that is exhibit space. In order to be able
to jump to action, we set up “mission control” in the Grand
Lobby where we were stationed 10 hours a day for four days.

MESSAGING
14
MESSAGE AND ENGAGEMENT EXAMPLES

MESSAGING
15

MESSAGING
16

BEACONS AT CONFERENCES
ICSC became one of the first major conferences in the world to integrate beacon
technology as a content vehicle for its attendees and the first to execute a beacon program
at the Las Vegas Convention Center - which features 2 million square feet of exhibit space.
We also were the first group to integrate beacons into several Las Vegas hotels and casinos,
including Caesars Palace, Wynn, Encore, Westgate Hotel and Paris.
PIONEER PROGRAM
18

BEACONS BY THE NUMBERS
The biggest hurdle for a beacon program is finding an established mobile app to host the
program. For the RECon Beacon program, we were able to leverage the ICSC mobile
application - an app with 20,000 downloads and a solid user base that peaks during RECon.
That said, there are several factors that impacted the ‘actual’ user pool. Following is a funnel
that shows how we got from ‘potential’ user pool to ‘actual’ user pool:
THE NUMBERS
19
RECON ATTENDEES
35,000 - 40,000
TOTAL APP DOWNLOADS
20,000
UPDATED APP
6,000
BLUETOOTH
1,700
ACTUAL USER POOL
2,068: TOTAL ENGAGEMENTS

With an ‘actual’ pool of 1,700 people (those who had both the latest version of the app as
well as bluetooth activated), there was a total of 2,068 swipes from 769 unique users. That
averages out to be a:
45% engagement rate
So, how does that compare with other digital content/communication channels?
ENGAGEMENT
20
CHANNEL ENGAGEMENT*
EMAIL
OPEN RATE: 22%
CTR: 3.15%
TWITTER ADS PROMOTED TWEETS: 1 - 3%
FACEBOOK ADS NEWSFEED ADS: 1 - 2.5%
LINKEDIN ADS
ADS: .025%
SPONSORED UPDATES: 0.6%
ONLINE ADS
DISPLAY ADS: .20%
SEARCH: 1 - 5%
THE BIG NUMBER
*Engagement rates are an overall average based on several different “industry standard” reports from a variety of sources.

ENGAGEMENT FREQUENCY
Not only did 45% of our ‘actual’ pool engage, but 254 of our unique users (33%) engaged
multiple times:
ENGAGEMENT
21
NUMBER OF SWIPES UNIQUE USERS
2 140
3 61
4 29
5 11
6 7
7 2
8 2
9 2

ENGAGEMENT
22
TOP TEN RANKINGS
Location Engagements
Registration1 441
Roaming Beacon1 (carried on a person) 271
Roaming Beacon2 (carried on a person) 210
Registration2 201
Westgate Hotel (Commander Rorke Keynote) 198
South Hall 196
Company Booth (Central Hall) 89
Starbucks (4 hour morning window) 56
Central Hall 52
Lucky’s Restaurant 45

WHAT WE ACHIEVED
RESULTS
23
• Further position ICSC as the industry thought leader in the area of digital and mobile
marketing within the retail real estate industry.
- All program participants applauded the forward-thinking program and at the end of the
conference we were able to generate the following results:
✓ Raise $1,000 for the ICSC Foundation through a beacon program that donated $10
for every “swipe” at an industry fundraiser.
✓ Build a partnership with Caesars Palace that allowed us to leverage rewards and
offers for our attendees.
✓ Increase social media engagement due to “beacon buzz” being talked about on all
ICSC social channels.
• Introduce beacon technology as a real world application to an industry that would
directly benefit from the use of beacons - retailers, shopping centers, cities, etc.
- 100 beacons
- 7 Las Vegas locations
- 9 messaging partners

WHAT WE ACHIEVED
RESULTS
24
• Introduce a new messaging platform that cuts through the conference clutter and
stands out in a sea of sponsored messaging and traditional ads.
- Targeted users with a custom message based on time and location
- Provided immediate calls-to-action
- High engagement rate compared to other digital and traditional platforms
- A novel/new platform that generated buzz and attention from attendees
• Achieve a 30% engagement rate.
- 45% engagement rate
• Generate $10,000 in revenues to cover program hard costs and management.
- $21,000 in revenue (funds generated from selling beacon messages to participants)
- $1,000 in donations toward the ICSC Foundation

WHAT WE LEARNED
A 45% engagement rate is a solid average, but not all beacons are created equal. On the
following pages, we will take a look at what lead to higher success rates and what lessons
we can learn for future beacon initiatives.
• Make it easy to connect the dots. Beacons work better when users could connect the
dots between the message and their surroundings.
• Clear calls-to-action boosts engagements. Similar to many online advertising platforms, a
clear, relevant and engaging call-to-action boosts engagement.
• Creativity is rewarded. Finding a balance between creativity and business objectives
leads to a more successful beacon application.
• There can be too much of a good thing.
- Locations that see a large volume of people in a dense setting can get diluted as people
can literally become physical barriers, shielding the beacon messaging.
- When competing beacons are placed in close proximity, the messages are impacted
because the broadcast radius’ for the beacons must be set tighter to ensure that they
aren’t overlapping.
TAKEAWAYS
25

WHAT WE LEARNED
• Catch them when they are in the mood. Running from meeting to meeting (especially in
a 3.2 million square foot convention center) is not be the best time to try and engage
someone. It’s important to think about linger time and what the user will be doing in that
location at the time of message deployment.
• Beacon thieves are among us. Whether curious bystanders or suspicious security,
beacons beckon people to take them down.
• Awareness is still low. Business Insider recently stated that beacons are just now coming
out of pilot phase. It is clear that beacons are a new frontier, which presents both
challenges and opportunities for beacon programs. On the up side, the market hasn’t
been saturated so there is an opportunity to put a stake in the ground as a beacon
pioneer. The challenge is to communicate the program in a clear and meaningful way to
build a strong user base.
TAKEAWAYS
26

THANK YOU!
COHN, INC.
2881 N. SPEER BLVD.
DENVER, CO 80211
COHNMARKETING.COM
@COHNMARKETING
FACEBOOK.COM/COHNMARKETING

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