There's new money in town: How PayPal is using their $20.4M ad spend to attract and convert more customers.

Fri, 26 Jul 2019 10:59:42 +0000

Launched in 1998 as Continuity by Ken Howery, Luke Nosek, Max Levchin, Peter Thiel and Elon Musk, Paypal is an online payments system that works as an electronic alternative to conventional transaction methods like money orders and checks. Over the years, the company has operated worldwide as a payment processor for commercial users including online vendors and auction platforms, who benefit from one-click transactions, and seller protection in exchange for a nominal fee. After PayPal’s IPO was listed at $13 per share that eventually generated more than $61 million, the company was acquired by eBay for $1.5 billion in 2002. By 2017, the company was earning US$13.094 billion in annual revenue (20.8% increase from 2016) and their market valuation was projected to be US$98.2 billion. They were ranked 222nd on the 2018 Fortune 500 of the biggest corporations in the United States. As of 2019, PayPal is operational in more than 200 countries and have 277 million active, registered users. The company allows customers to send, receive, and retain funds in 25 different currencies.On the marketing front, the company has invested in TV commercials, social media channels, and outdoor advertising since their inception. Jeff Goldblum’s ‘OneWayToPay’ campaign: In 2012, PayPal decided to move on from being known as “just a mobile payment provider” and get people talking about the other advantages their service offers, like, online shopping and in-store transactions.Paypal’s first-ever nation-wide ‘OneWayToPay’ campaign included four videos featuring Jeff Goldblum who praises the ubiquity and convenience of the platform—from being accepted pretty much anywhere to not requesting for your personal information over and over. “It’s so easy and quick. You do it, you PayPal it, and you’re done,” he says in one of the videos, “You want to move on with your life. You want to have lunch. You want to go take a tango lesson." “There’s a lot of consumer awareness of the PayPal brand, but the understanding of all the different ways you can pay with PayPal is something we wanted to focus on,” Anuj Nayar, PayPal’s (former) Senior Director of Global Communications explained on their website,” PayPal is expanding our core product to solve problems for consumers, merchants, developers, and advertisers — not just trying to re-create a wallet that we already invented 14 years ago.“

While the company did not air these commercials on TV, they purchased ad spots on Hulu, AOL, and Yahoo to deliver their marketing message to potential users. The videos were also seen on the several web properties owned by eBay (acquired by PayPal in October 2002). 2014 Holiday campaign with Conan O’Brien and Ellen DeGeneres In order to bring attention to the speed and security that make PayPal stand out from the crowd, the company partnered with The Many — a California-based agency that’s worked for Hot Wheels, TripAdvisor, and GoFundMe in the past—to create a thoroughly integrated campaign for digital, social and TV.By collaborating with popular TV show hosts, Ellen and Conan, alongside Collegehumor’s YouTube channels PayPal inserted themselves into conversations about the importance of credit card fraud and identity theft. They lay the basic foundation to launch a large-scale digital campaign that focussed solely on PayPal’s online security.

Overall, the entire campaign resulted in an increased total payment volume—27 percent from the previous year.During the same year, Apple also unveiled their digital wallet and mobile payment service—Apple Pay, establishing themselves as direct competitors of PayPal. Soon after, when the technology conglomerate was under fire following the iCloud Hacking scandal, PayPal issued a full-page takeover in The New York Times taking a shot at Apple and introducing their new One Touch App functionality.

Paypal on Adbeat

There's new money in town: How PayPal is using their $20.4M ad spend to attract and convert more customers.