How A&W Lowered Acquisition Costs
with Constrained Resources

SUMMARY
Together, A&W Restaurants and Quikly achieved the following results in just one week:• 26,654 consumers signed up to participate• 11,000 new email subscribers acquired• 35x lower cost-per-email acquired (compared to other email acquisition campaigns for A&W)
A&W was ultimately able to acquire new diners and engage existing ones in a cost-effective, quick
way — and all with constrained resources.

“ We needed to let

THE BACKGROUND

current fans know this is

A study by Perry Group International concluded thata special year and create

most restaurants close during their first year ofoperation, and seventy percent of those that make itpast the first year close in the next three to five.
That’s why this year is so big for A&W Restaurants.
“We were the first restaurant chain to turn 100,” said

positive sentiment forthem. And what a greattime to add new fans to
our platform, as well. ”

Liz Bazner, Digital Manager at A&W, which hit its
centennial in June. “It’s never happened.”

Liz BaznerDigital Manager, A&W

To get ready, she and her team have been planning forthe last three years. They prepared to launch a new website, amplify PR efforts and order exclusive A&W
merchandise — everything from gold-plated mugs to branded pillows.
“We needed to let current fans know this is a special year and create positive sentiment for them,” she added.
“And what a great time to add new fans to our platform, as well.”A&W CASE STUDY1

THE CHALLENGE
In order to achieve their greater goal of acquiring new diners and retaining existing ones, the A&W
marketing team knew that they would need to build up their digital audience, starting with the additionof quality new email subscribers“But then, also, one of our big focuses was not just growing our email program,” Liz said. “We wanted toget some traction on the other marketing campaigns we were doing and to bring some excitement tothem.”
First campaign on the list? National Root Beer Float Day, a six-year-old A&W holiday where every national
store gives out free root beer floats and raises money for the Disabled American Veterans.
National Root Beer Float Day is the busiest day of the year at A&W, and Liz and her team had solid plans.
But she still understood that, given all of the noise in the restaurant market right now, capturing theamount of consumer attention she desired for the big day would be no easy feat.
“It seems that restaurants have to get bigger and better and crazier to get attention,” Liz said. “For theones who can, budgets are large, teams are large [and] they have a lot of agency partners.”
The more she considered this, the more Liz felt like she and her team should be doing more. But thenshe thought about all that her team needed to take on to make National Root Beer Float day a success —the travel, the press tours, the influx of diner comments and questions.
“So in our minds, we’ve got all of that stuff going on and know how busy this day was in the past,” Lizsaid. “When I thought of executing something new, I also thought, ‘Capacity wise, I don’t know if we canactually do that.’ ”
I thought of executing something new, I also thought, 'Capacity wise, I don't know if we“canWhenactually do that.'
Liz Bazner, Digital Manager, A&W”

A&W CASE STUDY

2

THE SOLUTION
Then Liz met the team at Quikly, a technology platform that uses the human motivators of scarcity,
anticipation and fear-of-missing-out to increase consumer response to marketing campaigns, so thatbrands can achieve their acquisition and retention goals faster and more cost-effectively.
Quikly said that they could “activate” National Root Beer Float Day to dramatically increase engagementof new and existing diners around the holiday, and even help with email acquisition as part of it. And
they promised that they could build it all out with minimal resources from Liz’s team.
It would all be automated through Quikly’s platform, and it would work like this:

MESSAGESnow

The A&W Giveaway is
NOW LIVE! Claim Now:
SECRET LINK

Earn Time Now!
Take actions below to earn a heads up!
+3
MIN

Text Your Friends+3

Invite Friends via Messenger+3

Copy Referral Link

MIN

MIN

6:00
Earned Heads Up

REWARD

HOW TO EARN REWARDS

BONUS

Diners would be told that a limited set of giftcards ($500 worth) and exclusive A&W
merchandise would be releasing soon.

Participants simply needed to give their email
address to sign up and then click a special claim
link when the rewards were released. The

Participants could receive a “heads up” before
the rewards were released to increase theirchance of earning a reward. They simply

fastest to click claimed the biggest reward.

needed to share the activation with friends.

Liz decided to move forward, but then almost instantly wondered if she’d made the right choice.
“We’d never worked with Quikly at a busy time, and I did have anxiety around it,” she admitted. “But thenas we got going, I was like, ‘Okay, this is really easy.’ For us it was a very painless process and there wasn’t
a whole lot of back and forth.”
And true to their word, Quikly built out the entire activation efficiently and with minimal resources.
“It was turnkey,” Liz said. “I was like, ‘I think we missed the boat on Root Beer Float Day,’ and thenyour team turned it around in 10 days.”

A&W CASE STUDY3

“ It was turnkey. Iwas like, 'I think we
missed the boat on
Root Beer FloatDay,' and then yourteam turned it
around in 10 days.”
Liz BaznerDigital Manager, A&W”

THE RESULTS
The activation ran for just one week leading up to National Root Beer Float Day. Together during thattime, A&W and Quikly were able to cut through the noise and produce the following results:• 26,654 consumers signed up to participate• 11,000 new email subscribers acquired• 35x lower cost-per-email acquired (compared to other email acquisition campaigns for A&W)
“We were refreshing the Quikly Dashboard every two minutes,” Liz said. “I went into one meeting andcame back and refreshed and we were up to 10,000 participants. We were very excited with thoseresults. We were excited to see how we could grow our fan base on a national level.”

A&W CASE STUDY4

FUTURE PLANS
Since National Root Beer Float Day, Liz and her team have continued using Quikly to activate themarketing campaigns that lead back to their greater goals of acquiring and retaining diners in thiscritical year.
They recently ran an activation around social-“ This has been themost affordable
solution for acquisition
we've tried. I thinkwith Quikly we'reaveraging $1.35 forsocial, and our goal forthat is $3 and under,
so we're well underthose limits.”

Liz Bazner

media acquisition and achieved the following injust one week:

18,050Consumers signed
up to participate

3,599

New Instagram
followers

3,927

New Facebook
likes

122%

Improvement in cost
per social follower“This has been the most affordable solution for
acquisition we’ve tried,” Liz said. “I think with
Quikly we’re averaging $1.35 for social, and ourgoal for that is $3 and under, so we’re well underthose limits.”
Next up, she and Quikly will look at how they canmake A&W’s 101st year just as exciting.

Digital Manager, A&W

ABOUT QUIKLYQuikly is the leader in urgency marketing. Marketers leverage the Quikly platform and expertise tomotivate consumer actions and create excitement and fear of missing out around branded promotions.
In turn, marketers generate incremental revenue and reduce customer acquisition costs.
Interested In Learning More? Say Hello!

quikly.com

A&W CASE STUDY@quikly

5