Posts Tagged ‘marketing’

What’s your consumer label?

Thursday, June 23rd, 2011

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(credit: Marketplace)

Labels: not just for food anymore. Companies have to organize their customers somehow – otherwise they’d be marketing denture cream to 8-year-olds and tampons to middle-aged men. Are you a High Rise Renter? Part of Main Street USA? Live in a college dorm? There’s a label for that.

How do they do it? Well they used to just make their best guess about who was watching a given channel at a given hour (guess who was watching Oprah at 4pm every day?) and tailor their advertising appropriately. But now marketers have all sorts of information about us. From online profiles to credit card transactions to Google searches and Foursquare check-ins, everyone with some kind of connection to the outside world is pretty much leaving a trail of data every where they go.

So – surprise! – a huge industry has sprung up to collect and analyze this data (called “data mining”) and sell it to the companies that want to sell you stuff. You can read all about it here, and “identify your lifestyle category” here.

Advertising to the Unconscious Mind

Sunday, March 13th, 2011


(photo credit: e³°°°)

Humans are easy… right? Well, no.

  • It turns out that discovering whether a consumer actually likes a product has more to do with the unconscious mind than the one that tells market researchers what they want to hear.
  • Effective researchers have always tried to look “behind the scenes” for subtle changes in facial expression and tiny eye movements that reveal a subject’s true feelings about the product they’re viewing.
  • But today’s best market researchers are computers. Even something as simple as an Internet or iPhone app with a camera function can track and analyze your facial expressions – meaning the jig is up for product testers just trying to be nice.

Best Quote

“The trouble with market research is that people don’t think how they feel, they don’t say what they think and they don’t do what they say.” – David Ogilvy, late British advertising pioneer

>> What do you think?

Have you ever convinced yourself you liked a product even though you actually didn’t?


”Child Labor” at the Ad Agency

Wednesday, January 26th, 2011

“JWT, a WPP ad firm that works for advertisers such as Unilever, kicked off a reverse-mentor program late last year where children ages nine to 14 of JWT executives are brought in to work on specific projects for clients, with the thinking that young people understand the digital world better than many in the work force.”

What do you think?

Is this cool or creepy?

What Company Logos Are Really Trying to Tell You

Tuesday, January 25th, 2011

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You know how things aren’t always what they seem? Well, take a look at these companies’ logos.

A company creates a logo to help you remember their product, but also to make sure you think of it in a certain way – whether you know it or not. This is one of the ways that a company helps build their brand, which is what makes them different from everyone else who’s selling the same thing.

Check out the link to see what we’re talking about!

Grounded Jets, Space Jets(!), and Misleading Celebrity Tweeters… TILE Two-Liners 1.10.11 >> 1.14.11

Monday, January 10th, 2011

MONDAY

  • “Cupcake leader” Crumbs (a chain of bakery shops) was just sold for $66 million, proving that the American epidemic of childhood obesity *can* be profitable. (The Wall Street Journal)

TUESDAY

  • Radiohead just keeps on flipping the music industry script. They’re allowing a group of fans to sell a bootleg concert DVD made up of clips secretly shot by 14 different audience members. The catch? All profits have to go to Oxfam. The concert was, after all, a benefit for Haiti. (BBC News)

WEDNESDAY

  • Someday, someone will literally fly you to the moon and let you play among the stars. For a price, of course. (BBC News)

THURDSAY

  • Don’t believe everything your favorite celebrities tweet: They may be on an ad agency’s payroll. (Bloomberg)

FRIDAY

  • If you thought this winter’s snowstorms were annoying for your family, think about the airline industry, which lost over $100 million because of cancelled flights. (The Wall Street Journal)

Starbucks Fishes For Customers With Free Stuff

Wednesday, October 20th, 2010

Would you like a free e-book with that grande caramel macchiato?

  • In an effort to boost profits, Starbucks is trying a new promotion with partner Yahoo! to bring free e-books, movies, online news subscriptions, and mp3s to customers using its free wifi.
  • The online freebies will only be accessible through Starbucks wifi networks, meaning customers will have to return to a shop to pick up where they left off with their books and movies. Alternately, they can purchase the product from the provider, which gives Starbucks a portion of the profit.
  • To make the program happen, the company has partnered with The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, USA Today, Apple, Patch, Zagat, HarperCollins, Penguin Group, and SnagFilms.

Facts & Figures

  • Starbucks made its wifi free to everybody this July.
  • Users logged in to Starbucks wifi over 30 million times in September.

Best Quote

“Users across the Internet are moving more into this ‘snackable behavior’ to begin with.” – Burke Culligan, Vice President of Product Management at Yahoo!

Keeping Up With The Millennials

Friday, March 5th, 2010

Luxury brands aspire to engage a younger generation by adapting and innovating their delivery of fashion.

  • A recent study conducted by the Pew Research Center showed that millennials, people between the ages of 18 and 28, are both turned off by more conventional and blatant marketing approaches and have a sophisticated understanding of social media and entertainment.
  • Nowness.com, launched by Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton, exemplifies the new trend of companies utilizing artistic videos and images, implying exclusivity and offering cultural commentary.
  • Traditionally, magazines fulfilled the primary role of communicating fashion news to consumers; now many of the brands connect directly with their consumers.

Key Stats

  • 75 percent of Millennials regularly use social networking sites.
  • Burberry opted to make Harry Potter icon Emma Watson the new face of its brand.
  • Last month Armani gained 268,000 new “friends” on Facebook after Lady Gaga wore a space age Armani creation.

Best Quote

“Our goal is always to create a seamless brand experience, especially with our younger lines, communicating the brand wherever the customer wants to touch it – on their mobile devices, via a social network, on blogs, in store, in print and outdoor media.” – John Hooks, Deputy Chairman of Armani

Ford for Facebookers

Friday, February 12th, 2010

American automakers shift their focus to smaller vehicles and younger consumers. Who’s buying?

  • Ford, Chrysler and GM are attempting to expand their consumer base by utilizing social media platforms such as Facebook.
  • Dealerships are remodeling their stores and lots, so they no longer resemble truck lots and instead have a clean, modern aesthetic intended to appeal to people who buy small cars.
  • Salespeople are being taught how to effectively discuss potential buyer concerns, such as fuel efficiency, as well as how their cars compare to Toyota’s and Honda’s.

Facts & Figures

  • In 2009, small cars made up 19% of the 8.65 million light vehicles sold in the U.S, which pickups and SUVs composed 46%.
  • Only 7% of “millennials” (people born between 1979 and 1985) consider a Ford when shopping for a small car.
  • Ford will send a social media consultant to its largest 800 dealerships – about 25% of its stores, to build an online infrastructure within the company.

Best Quote

“Gas prices and lifestyle changes are going to push more people into small cars.” – Tony Pack, General Manager of “Five Star Ford” in Dallas, TX

Will Cheaper iPhones Create Converts?

Friday, September 25th, 2009

Even a company as glitzy and popular as Apple needs to cut prices to compete in this economy – nobody can escape basic economic relationships between price and demand.

  • Hoping to sustain the momentum for its trendy smart phone in the middle of the recession and among increasingly prominent competitors, Apple decreased the price of its entry-level iPhone 3G from $199 to $99.
  • Main competitors include Palm Inc. and Research in Motion Ltd. (creator of the BlackBerry line of devices).
  • Apple also decreased the price of some of its other products, including the MacBook Pro, the MacBook Air, and the Mac OS X Snow Leopard operating system.

Facts & Figures

  • Apple has sold more than 20 million iPhones so far.
  • The new $99 iPhone 3G could increase iPhone demand by as much as 50%.

Best Quote

“These are very aggressive prices.” — Richard Doherty, Analyst with Envisioneering Group (a technology consultancy)