Data miners dig up gold for petfood firm

There is still no such thing as a free lunch, not even for cats.

A Whiskas Singles sample was sent out to 60,000 households recently, the result of an intense campaign to target cat owners most likely to buy more.

The data mining campaign to market the wet catfood, which comes in a plastic pouch, was a gold winner for AIM Proximity in the Direct Marketing Association awards.

AIM Proximity's director of database services, Geoff Cooper, said eight people had worked on the campaign to stake out the "high value targets."

He said cat owners were a fickle lot. Some would buy only jellimeat. Others would buy only top-range petfood.

The key to a successful direct marketing campaign was to build an extensive database accurately showing where discerning cat owners lived, and how they related to their cats.

Mr Cooper said what people chose to feed their cats was a reflection of their relationship.

"Some buy their cats Christmas presents and birthday cards. For others, it's just the neighbourhood mousecatcher."

The campaign for client Effem Foods, which owns the Whiskas brand, began with a questionnaire and catfood mailout to 5000 Flybuys cardholders.

From census data and the responses of those who received the mailout, AIM Proximity built profiles of "household characteristics".

The type of household, including income, ethnicity, and family structure, was then built into AIM Proximity's database.

Mr Cooper said the process sidestepped Privacy Act restrictions, as an individual's details were not known, just their demographics.

A supermarket trial was used to find out what type of people would respond to free Whiskas Singles.

The information was given to a distribution firm, which dropped more Whiskas Singles, and another questionnaire, on streets where residents had the same demographics.

The response rate to the questionnaires - 12.5 per cent - was extremely high, Mr Cooper said.

AIM Proximity database miners were now using it to build the database further, and target potential buyers of Whiskas Singles.

So far, the campaign has cost Effem Foods about $250,000.

Effem Foods spokesman Clinton Beuvink said the profiles built up were extremely valuable.

They are so commercially sensitive even the questionnaires are kept under wraps to avoid any hint of the results getting out.

Mr Beuvink said the petfood market was worth around $204 million annually.

Catfood made up 60 per cent of the market.

Whiskas Singles, which has been on the market two years, is growing 80 per cent a year.

"Cat owners are promiscuous with their brands," said Mr Beuvink. "This takes some of the unknowns out."