The British are renowned for discussing the weather. But it's not just a social nicety, Britain is an island of microclimates, the temperature & conditions can change dramatically within a few miles. In one weekend you can go from winter to summer in the blink of an eye.

There was a clear need to build a smarter optimisation tool. First up, the team identified the key sales indicators where data could be captured by region in real-time:

1. Temperature rises

2. Pollen count rises

3. Hay fever-related queries

The team then worked with Benadryl to build a dynamic new adaptive programmatic planning tool: Compass

Our always-on digital campaign kicked-off in March as we started to detect the first sniffles of summer.

As live data flowed in, Compass reacted. We adjusted our ad spend in real-time to ensure ads were only visible when and where people were most likely to be suffering.

For instance, when we spotted that more people in London than Manchester were searching for hay fever, we reallocated more of our budget there. And when pollen counts and temperature caused eyes to water, we increased spend accordingly.

The model even picked up day parts when symptoms were worse, like mornings and evenings.

Using data matching techniques, Compass enabled us to shift ad spend across all digital channels and online video. Spend was optimised down to the region, day & hour. A result not to be sniffed at.

The campaign delivered outstanding results against our objective:

? Our ads reached 5.6m people, at times when they were looking for hay fever relief.

? With Benadryl top of mind, sales have shot up 12% YOY.

? +20% value sales growth, faster than any other allergy manufacturer (YTD Oct ’16 data), double our target of +10%

? Sales increased by 36%