• by Mike Bloxham , Op-Ed Contributor, May 16, 2013

Weekends are big for Home Depot and Lowe’s. As countless thousands use the precious two days of “rest” to put in a new deck or acting out the wish list they’ve built from weeks of watching HGTV and trolling around on Pinterest, the cash registers at both Home Improvement stores across the land ring loud and long.

With weekends accounting for so much business, it becomes critical to ensure that potential customers are reached effectively before they are likely to visit the stores.

This USA TouchPoints analysis looks at which media are more or less likely to deliver Home Improvement shoppers on the average weekend by average weekend reach and indexed against adults 18-64.

• advertisement

  advertisement

  Unsurprisingly, Liive TV scores the highest reach over the weekend among this group at 81%, with an index of 105.

• Radio comes in second place at 72% (index 109), due in part, to time spent in the car going to the Home Improvement stores, where it works as a path-to-purchase medium right into the parking lot, other stores and generally running errands, socializing etc.

• While Internet use on the computer is lower than it might be during the week, due to less work use, it still places third at 45% and indexes at 116.

• Interestingly, especially in light of the investments in mobile seen in the Home Improvement sector, reach for the use of the Web or apps via cell phones is relatively low at 17% and under indexes at 87. (That's possibly a factor of the age of the customer base vs. those making the higher levels of use in the broader population.) However, while use of mobile apps and Web may under index, the presence of the medium in-store can outweigh this.

• Perhaps the most intriguing part of the analysis lies in the media that over-index to the greatest extent. Tablets weigh in at 11% reach, but over index at 122. Print, which has been read the last rites more than can be counted, delivers 13% reach for Newspapers and 7% for Magazines.  But they over-index to the tune of 140 and 172, respectively.

While the case for TV and Radio are obvious, and the development and use of mobile marketing is largely carried by the medium’s proximity to point of sale, print media cannot be expected to fall off the schedule any time soon. Not if we look at the data. Its reach may not be particularly high, but with the right titles, it can deliver the Home Improvement shopper.

• Add