When the High Street uses hyper-local digital marketing to increase physical sales by 700%.

There was a very clear need to reverse this situation in Watford as we came out of lockdown and give a much-needed boost to the High Street in the lead up to Christmas 2021.

Watford has an active and award-winning Business Improvement District (BID), who have been working with We Are Acuity for several years. It’s funded by over 400 Watford town centre businesses and its objective is to improve the wellbeing of its visitors, employees, and residents. It funds major town centre projects such as the Christmas Lights, Summer Floral Displays, Food & Drink Week and Wellness Week. The aim being to benefit the consumer whilst increasing footfall and sales for Watford town centre businesses.

Although vacancy rates are comparatively low in Watford and footfall hadn’t been impacted as badly as other towns, the BID knew it needed to encourage consumers back to the High Street post pandemic. So, they turned to local marketing experts We Are Acuity for support.

As part of Watford BID’s efforts to support local businesses, it launched the Watford Gift Card in February 2020. The programme is designed to lock in additional money for participating businesses and encourage local spend. It allows anyone to discover the best of Watford with one handy gift card. By taking the decision out of gifting it enables recipients to treat themselves in over 50 Watford businesses, whilst also supporting local. From a night out to a pampering treat they can choose whatever gift is right for them.

The Watford Gift Card had initially been a traditional card, but for Christmas 2021 it would also launch as a digital e-Card. We Are Acuity’s role was to not only launch the card in its new digital form, but also increase awareness and ultimately sales giving the High Street the boost it needed during this important trading period. We had one week to get the one-month campaign live!

Glen Hempenstall, marketing and communications manager at Watford BID said:

“Having spoken to our businesses, it was becoming increasingly clear that many of our businesses are moving towards contactless payments only. Combining this with growing consumer trends towards smart phone payments, we felt it was essential that we introduced digital gift cards so that the programme was more inclusive for our businesses and that it met the needs of the modern-day consumer in Watford.”