333%
Higher Revenue Than Forecasted
56%
Higher ROI
90%
New Customer Rate Since Launch
About the Brand
Threadbare is a family-owned British direct-to-consumer brand with a focus on great quality pieces at great prices offering wardrobe staples from men’s shirts, knitwear and denim to loungewear and sweats.
The Story
Threadbare first launched its programme on the Rakuten Advertising affiliate network in May 2021 following recommendations from its agency, Customer First Digital.
This was at a time when Threadbare was a relatively new Direct to Consumer retailer, with the majority of sales coming via resellers and marketplaces. Due to this, awareness of the brand as a retailer was low, which typically makes launching an affiliate programme more challenging. In addition, Threadbare was entering a highly competitive market, with a significant increase in fast fashion brands entering the affiliate market, especially since Covid, potentially suppressing share of voice.
The Goal
- Deliver £53.8k revenue in the first 12 months
- Deliver an ROI of £5.78 in the first 12 months
- Minimum of 7.5% of overall revenue to be contributed
Strategy
A strong collaborative approach was developed between Threadbare, Customer First Digital and Rakuten Advertising, with a clear strategic plan implemented at pace. The strong partnerships formed, and reactive decision-making has enabled the programme to significantly outperform forecasts and continue to trend with positive Month on Month and Year on Year uplifts.
A launch offer with higher commission levels was created to ensure publishers were recruited, engaged and actively promoting the programme. The top tier high converting publishers were the primary focus. All target affiliates onboarded by October 2021.
Threadbare has been open to working with a diverse range of publishers with a focus on upper and mid funnel content publishers and influencers which have contributed 24.5% of last click revenue.
A campaign was launched to increase the number of traffic/sales driving publishers. An exclusive offer to promote the Threadbare brand was provided to more than 250 publishers and drove a 51.5% increase in traffic and 108.5% increase in sales.
The early stages of the programme relied on commission increases to gain exposure on publisher sites. With increased competition, the teams commenced testing with paid for exposure across three publishers, who offered different opportunities to support the customer journey (from awareness to conversion).