Inviting new customers with Facebook ads for Marks & Spencer

M&S decided to used custom conversions and a conversion lift test to unlock insights about how efficient Facebook ads are at acquiring new customers and discovered an 11% lift in incremental purchases by net new customers.
Founded in 1884 by Michael Marks and Thomas Spencer, Marks & Spencer (M&S) is a household name. Popular for its high-quality food, drink and clothing, with 959 stores across the UK, and a significant online presence.

Insight into new customer purchases

M&S wanted to take advantage of Infectious Media status as a Facebook Marketing Partner for Agencies, and its access to the latest measurement research initiatives available to premium members—in this case, a net new customer incrementality test.

Evolving Facebook measurement for ads

M&S had already worked with Infectious Media on direct response campaigns. For this experiment, the Facebook Marketing Partner created custom events from M&S’s own data to separate new customers from repeat customers. Then, they partnered with Facebook to run a conversion lift test that used these custom conversions.
Thanks to this net new customer incrementality test, M&S gained better insight into online purchases. This meant they were able to determine how many purchases were made overall, along with whether they were new or reoccurring customers. This found that existing customers were a stronger source of new purchase than the brand had realised. 

The results 

The lift test results showed a strong overall return on ad spend, helped M&S quantify new customers, and also shed light on a new customer demographic:

• 2.6X return on ad spend

• 1.4% lift in incremental purchases by new customers

• 11% of incremental purchases came from new customers

• 5.1% lift in purchases from existing customers

• 2X higher incremental revenue from existing customers than new customers

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