Campaign success with Weather Driven Advertising
Weather and climate have major influence on our leisure and consumer behavior. This affects almost all industries – including app providers such as wetter.com. Online weather portals and weather apps can use their own expertise and knowledge of weather effects to optimize their campaign planning.
In summer 2023, our colleagues from wetter.com therefore set themselves the goal of optimizing the performance of their Google campaigns. The aim was to improve retention rates and user acquisition by generating additional weather-based campaigns while maintaining the same costs per install. But how exactly can such complex, regional weather-based campaigns be managed as precisely and convenient as possible?
App Users waiting for rain…
A short glance at the sky is no longer enough for a lot of app users these days. They want to know as precisely as possible what weather conditions they have to expect in the upcoming hours and days so that they can be prepared as best as possible. In summer we want to know whether the temperatures are finally heading towards bathing weather, and in autumn we want to be warned of storms and thunderstorms in good time, while at the beginning of the winter months, the first snow and the associated frosty and icy conditions are eagerly awaited by many. Depending on the weather conditions, we check our weather app(s) several times a day.
Additionally global warming is causing certain extreme weather events to occur more frequently and much more locally. The desire of users to be well prepared with a short glance at their weather app is therefore increasing even further. As a result, weather portals and apps such as wetter.com are experiencing significantly higher usage rates and an increased number of new installations in the affected region, especially during unusual weather conditions – such as extreme temperatures, severe thunderstorms, hailstorms or black ice.
Weather apps can take advantage of their own expertise and use the knowledge about extreme weather events to further optimize their app installs during specific weather conditions. The higher usage and increased number of new installations during exceptional weather conditions is also due to the fact that ads from weather apps are much more relevant for users on these days. That makes the generation of additional Google campaigns with appropriate weather targeting a promising approach for campaign optimization.
Generating additional campaigns with Weather Targeting
These campaigns, which run in addition to the “always-on” campaigns, ensure that more volume can be generated on certain days. The implementation takes place at regional level (e.g. federal state) and the weather information is transferred to Google Ads via a special script. The daily budget of the campaign is automatically being increased or decreased depending on which weather conditions are being predicted. The Smart Bidding logics are not affected, as Google automatically adjusts them to the previously defined target (e.g. tCPI, tCPA, tROAS).
The Google algorithm also reacts to corresponding weather conditions, but it is very sluggish. The “always-on” campaigns very quickly reach their capacities here. The additional campaigns are ready to go even before the unusual weather conditions take place, as the METEONOMIQS weather script runs every day in the early morning. Thanks to the data preparation and support provided by METEONOMIQS, there is no need for a massive query of a weather API.
Result:
„ Our regional script- and weather-based campaigns on Google show that, compared to standard campaigns, in exceptional weather conditions we can acquire better quality users at the same cost per install, who are interested in the app and the content in the long term!“ (Anton Stopka, Senior Performance Marketing Manager at wetter.com)
- +14% IN APP RETENTION RATE*
- +50% SESSIONS PER USER*
- 0% HIGHER COSTS PER INSTALL*
*07-2023, Test in 15 Ländern, Split auf Bundesländer/Regionen
Conclusion:
The weather conditions at the user’s location are a decisive factor influencing the usage of online portals or apps such as wetter.com. Especially the weather influences whether and which products are sold. However, these effects can change rapidly and also vary a lot from region to region.
These insights are necessary in order to advertise based on the weather, so that users can be reached with the right messages in a targeted manner. In this respect, our plug-and-play solution for various advertising channels automatically takes the local weather differences into account. In this way, we make weather targeting simple, efficient, and entirely without the use of cookies.
Further information on weather targeting and our location-based product weather indices can be found here.
You can download a short summary of the case study on this page.
About wetter.com GmbH – a ProSiebenSat.1 Media SE company
With up to 22 million users per month, wetter.com is one of the market leaders among online weather portals in Europe. Our employees at three locations work with passion and fun on our products. Experienced meteorologists and editors provide daily information on current weather conditions and trend forecasts. A precise precipitation radar, thematic weather maps, bioweather, HD live webcams, and detailed news and blog articles complete our broad portfolio via website and app. In addition, we present wetter.com TV, the only 24-hour weather channel on German television, and produce the weather shows for the ProSiebenSat.1 Group. With our B2B brand METEONOMIQS, we use our global weather expertise to drive companies forward through data-driven marketing, weather-optimized sales planning and other data solutions.
