Times change and so does marketing…
Here’s a nice video by German advertising agency icon Scholz&Friends. Altough around one year old, I think it is worth a post because it nicely illustrates how profoundly number of products offered, consumer behavior and thus the whole marketing business has changed in about half a century…
Scholz & Friends: „Dramatic shift in marketing reality“ – aka „A short history of marketing“ … from Michael Reissinger on Vimeo.
Mobile Marketing: 2007 vs. 2010
This presentation dates back to the year 2007 and provides a really good introduction to the topic of Mobile Marketing.
What is Mobile Marketing?
View more presentations from Jerome Sudan.
This now is a recent presentation covering Mobile Marketing Trends in 2010. You will at once see how much has changed within 3 years!
Mobile Marketing Trends 2010
View more presentations from Brad Beckstrom.
Chevrolet to Bury "Chevy" in Corporate Communications
On June 10, I came across several articles dealing with an internal GM memo which apparently prohibited its staff to use the name „Chevy“ when speaking of Chevrolet models or the brand in general. „Why this?“ you may wonder. Isn’t this term common all over the U.S or even the world and doesn’t this express that to many people Chevrolet is more than a brand, something that has been part of American lives for centuries and that people have strong affection for? Damn right! And what is the corporate benefit of only using Chevrolet instead of Chevy? Should Coca-Cola avoid the use of Coke? Surely GM’s marketing department has had its reason for this. I use this opportunity to provide you with some interesting facets of the history of the US automobile market and the central role of patriotism.Many American automakers make heavy use of patriotism in commercials. Why? Well, simply because it works and it helped sell cars for many centuries.
When in the late 70s Japanese makes with surprising product quality and price-quality-relation entered the U.S. market, pointing to U.S jobs and the economy helped push sales of U.S. automobiles. Using the country-of-origin effect to gain a competitive advantage towards foreign makes and playing the patriotic card is what I term „patriotic marketing.“ Especially the U.S. is a country most popular for its loyalty towards its nation and its cultural heritage and thus patriotic marketing has seen great success throughout different industries. Wal-Mart, Ford, Chevrolet and Budweiser are just some examples. And patriotic marketing is not a recent phenomenon. It can be found in markets all over the world. In the the U.S. it has been applied already in the days of the early colonies in order to support the local economy and to push the independence from British goods and dominance.
The sad side: Patriotic marketing has the same effect on domestic economies as other trade barriers have. They hinder foreign goods from entering the market. If they had been produced more efficiently , the tariffs make them more expensive than they actually would be and thus less attractive to the US consumer. Unfortunately this did not give U.S. auto brands in the 80s the time and space to improve in terms of productivity and quality. Instead patriotic marketing just helped to distract consumers from the obviously lower quality compared to German or Japanese makes. By avoiding direct competition and by producing specifically to a patriotic US target group, US automakers lost touch of the Japanese and European competitors. This is the reason why in the past you could barely sell US automobiles outside of the US. As a result GM, Chrysler and Ford all have been struggling in the beginning of the 21st century.
Status Quo: Today Ford and GM have realized that future market share comes from quality and innovation and from producing globally competitive vehicles that are attractive to auto buyers all around the world. Ford today is known for a strong focus on Social Media. Why? To connect with young target groups and in order to rejuvenate the brand. In the US more and more small-sized cars enter the U.S. market and GM is among the leaders when it comes to Hybrid technology or battery-powered vehicles such as the promising Opel / GM Ampera. Also GM started to introduce successful European Opel models in the US (under the Saturn brand). And they did NOT sell Opel, which may be playing a central role for the future of the GM corporation.
Learning: Patriotism may work nicely in domestic markets but in a global economy values such as quality, innovation and fit-to-market is what matters. President Obamas decision against a major Buy American campaign to boost domestic economy may have cost a short-time boost, but in the long run and in a global context, this was certainly the right decision. The recent financial reports by Ford and GM show that they obviously have made the turn: They again make good money with better vehicles. And Toyota who has always been ahead in terms of quality and reliability now has the quality troubles…. If this GM memo has been a move away from the patriotic American background towards a more global positioning, I cannot tell. Future commercials may provide an insight. But I am sure that the future of GM can only lie in becoming a strong global brand such as Ford or VW. Only then you can selll enough vehicles, profit from economies of scale and invest in order to be able to equip your vehicles with the latest technology.
Today, we are experiencing exciting times in the global automobile industry. Never before have there been challenges such as gas prices, battery technology, etc that may fundamentally change the auto business.
But let’s get back to America’s love for Chevy and how important a role Chevy had been playing in the past. When writing my master’s thesis on „Patriotism and American Values in U.S. Advertising“ I came across numerous examples of patriotic marketing applied in US TV commercials. And I must admit that some of them also have a strong impact on me. To many proud Americans, these commercials may feel like a confirmation in their beliefs, in the cultural values many Americans so proudly cherish. I have provided you with a selection of commercials that are filled with references to American cultural values such as „work ethic“, „freedom“ „risk-taking“ and „individual achievement“. And in almost all of them you come across „Chevy“. Enjoy these colorful, moving commercials. Some of you may find them pathetic or stereotypical. But just imagine how these images may move a patriotic American citizen and ease the complex purchasing process…
1994: „Like A Rock“
2007: Chevrolet Super Bowl Commercial „Ain’t We Got Love“
~2006: This Is Our Country (Chevy Silverado)
1991: Chevy Truck „The Heartbeat of America Campaign“
1992: Chevy Like a Rock
Ads like these show that Chevy is a positive synonym for Chevrolet, a brand that helped make America what it is today. A brand that brought mobility to generations of Americans.
Article dealing with the issue:
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN1024152620100610
TT – Telekom twittert: Service in 140 Zeichen
Jetzt ist auch die Deutsche Telekom dem Trend von Dell & Co. gefolgt und nutzt Twitter als Servicechannel. Laut n-tv ist die Deutsche Telekom damit eines der ersten Unternehmen die Twitter als Servicekanal nutzen. Das zeigt einmal wieder, dass deutsche Unternehmen im Bereich Digital Marketing und Social Media doch nur „Follower“ sind. Die Early Adapters sitzen noch immer anderswo…
Gelaunched am 05.05.2010 hatte der Twitter-Account bereits innerhalb eines Tagesüber 700 Follower.
Telekom twittert
Heute am 06.05.2010 sind es bereits über 1.300 Follower, und die Zahl steigt….
Telekom twittert
Jeden Tag von 08:00 bis 20:00 stehen qualifizierte Mitarbeiter der Deutschen Telekom ihren Kunden zur Verfügung wenn es um Probleme in Sachen DSL, Handy, Festnetz und Co. geht. Glaubt man dem Wallpaper des Accounts so stehen insgesamt 8 Mitarbeiter zur Verfügung die versuchen im Rahmen von 140 Zeichen die Probleme der Kunden zu lösen.
Als Erstkontakt und für schnelle Anfragen zu gängigen Userproblemen sicherlich eine gute Sache. Für kompliziertere Themen und technisch wenig affine Kunden dürfte dieser Kanal nicht das Richtige sein. Hierfür steht der direkte Telefonsupport oder der Besuch des Technikers zur Verfügung. Aber in der Regel twittert dieses technikaverse Kundensegment ohnehin nicht.
Personenbezogene Daten sollen über Twitter nicht ausgetauscht werden. Dies geschieht dann direkt zwischen Mitarbeiter und Kunde.
Uns stellte sich die Frage, wie bei der Vielzahl der eingehenden Tweets die Übersicht behalten werden kann. Sicherlich laufen die Tweets in eine Art Datenpool, aus denen sich die Sachbearbeiter einzelne Tweets rausfischen und bearbeiten. Nach einem kurzen Blick auf die einzelnen Tweets der Telekom-Mitarbeiter sieht man, dass diese CoTweet für die professionelle Abwicklung verwenden. Neben der Deutschen Telekom schwören auch Firmen wie Ford, Southwest Airlines, McDonalds und Coca-Cola auf diesen Service.
So wie es aussieht wird das Angebot gerne angenommen. Dem Image der Telekom ist eine schnelle Reaktion via Twitter sicherlich zuträglich, verbindet man Serviceanfragen an den magenta-farbenen Riesen ja in der Regel mit endlosen Warteschlangen und nicht immer kompetenten Sachbearbeitern. Aber es geht auch anders, wie dieser Twitter Account beweist. Und nicht zu vergessen: Oft sind eben jene technikaffinen Kunden, die sich im Social Web pudelwohl fühlen auch die stärksten Meinungsführer. Sich als schwerfällliger Konzern diesen extrem krtischen und anspruchsvollen Kunden von seiner innovativen Seite zu zeigen kann viel bewirken. Und wenn es die Deutsche Telekom tatsächlich schafft guten Service in 140 Zeichen zu packen, dürfte das dem Image sehr gut tun.
Wir werden verfolgen wie die Zahl der Follower sich entwickelt und wie das Feedback der Kunden ausfällt
Upate 10.05.2010:
Das Twitterprofil hat nun schon 1.661 Follower!
Update: 02.06.2010:
Das Twitterprofil hat nun schon 2.679 Follower!
SOM sagt Herzlichen Glückwunsch:
Quelque chose en francais – trouvé par SOM
Voila une presentation par l‘ agence Vanksen qui s’appelle „10 Best Practives en Marketing 2.0 – Conference BuzzTheBrand 2009. J‘ ai choissisez cette presentation parce qu’elle explique très bien le link de une marque forte et le phenomen „Buzz“.
Case Study: How to use Social Media to promote your brand
There are numerous examples of companies using Social Media for their business purposes. The most common is to promote one’s brand, to allow consumers to experience the brand, allow it to enter their private sphere and even show their affinity to the brand to their peers. I will not enumerate the psychological motivation behind such actions but rather focus on an example – a regional one – in which Social Media activity is being triggered and even had to compete with classical media, a newspaper.
Case Study: Bischofshof Beer Queen Vote
Bischofshof is 360 year old German brewery based in Regensburg, Bavaria. Aside from their regular varieties the brewery also offers the „Bruckmandl“ which seems to be targeted to a younger yet sophisticated audience (the radio spots use American dialect). Breweries in Germany are struggling with a decrease in demand and in Bavaria in particular, the market is colored by a tough competition between numerous small and medium sized regional breweries. To fight beer giants such as Becks or Krombacher, these breweries have to make sure their regional target groups remain loyal and enjoy drinking a local beer.
Among other marketing activities, Bischofshof holds an annual beer queen election. This year, 10 young women have been elected to fight for the title of Bischofshof Beer Queen – two others will become Beer Princess.
The election takes place in several stages. Two jury decisions, an online pool and a weekly newspapers voting contribute to the final decision. Via online poll and newspaper voting the consumers and brand fans are invited to participate by not only voting for their favorite candidate but also by spreading word-of-mouth and online by sharing the news about the election. On the Bischofshof website, visitors can constantly check the current ranking. Facebook turned out to be a preferred medium to spread the news and to activate one’s peers to vote for the favored candidate. It should be mentioned that the brewery does not (yet) have its own facebook fan page. Given the number of votes in the online poll (the leading girl currently has more than 1300 votes) you can imagine that website traffic must have incresed greatly through this campaign.
The other benefit is that the brand is word on the street, especially in the greater social networks of the 10 candidates: their friends, their colleagues, fellow students, family,….
It remains to be seen how well the competition is being documented on the Bischofshof website. And what is most interesting: It would be very interesting to see which medium resulted in more votes – online media or classical media. We will try to get information on that after the new queen has been chosen.
SOM is voting for Daniela Meidinger! Join the vote today! Thursday 22 April is the last day to participate!
Here is the link:
http://www.bischofshof.de/aktuelles/Wer_wird_die_Bierkoenigin_91x6.htm
More info on Bischofshof:
www.bischofshof.de
How consumers shop online
Ever wondered how consumer really behave when shopping online?
If you are running your own ecommerce website you can invest a great deal into web analytics. Analyzing visitors paths, conversion rates and visitor loyalty can provide interesting insights. Still it may be really hard to get definite information. Changing IP addresses, inexact origins due to electronice data processing centers and all the common inconveniences of web analytics make it hard for online retailers to analyze their customers behavior.
McAfee Secure now came up with a white paper that summarizes the results of the analysis of 163 million consumers who completed a total of 2.52 million transactions. The results are stunning. And they prove what we already know from real life shopping: We love to promenade through the inner city stores monitoring all the interesting products and comparing prices before we finally come to the obviously bet decision based on the information we have gathered. The same happens online. Consumers do not shop at once (except for spontaneous purchases). The average online shopper is in no hurry. Of course not, as stocks online usually last some time and there is barely any fear someone else might grab the last item available. The average online shopper of those 163 millions shoppers surveyed take their time – on average up to two days – between first visiting a website and finally purchasing a product.
What happens within those 33 hours and 54 minutes? Well, nothing extraordinary. Consumers compare prices elsewhere, read test results and consumer reviews, ask their peers about the product and gather recommendations from other users. An ever growing source of information are social networks and the entertaining social media presences of brands. They may lack elaborate information but they provide a good impression of a brand’s character and its fans. Some ecommerce websites even allow shopping together making use of social media technology. We call it social commere. Paul Marsden, an expert in this field defines social commerce as follows:
Selling with social media – the use of social media in the context of e-commerce (Source: www.socialcommercetoday.com)
What are the implicatios of this analysis for online retailers?
Well in order to assure that shoppers really shop with you instead of finding another place to get the product of their desire, you might want to assure this: clarity / good usability, transparency in terms of costs, shipping and handling, warranty, product details and of course the reputation consumers have of you! You know, price is not everything. Simply treat your customers the way they expect it. And for your own sake, always keep an eye on costs. The best service in the world is useless if it costs you too much and eventually ruins your business. Then customers with a service issue will sadly have to find out that only some months after they bought your products your business went bankcrupt….
For a more detailed list of advice, please see a really good article on this here:
http://www.practicalecommerce.com/articles/1799-Online-Shoppers-Wait-Two-Days-to-Buy
Don't go Social Media if….
well, plenty of reasons to enumerate!
As I had been previously writing about the fact that not every company or organization should blindly invest in Social Media campaigns or open up a group, account or whatever wherever possible, I much enjoyed an article by Lisa Barone on her blog. She lists up „10 signs your company isn’t suited for social media“ – which pretty much covers the issue.
Here they are:
1. You have no social skills (and don’t want to fake them)
2. You have no sense of humor/can’t handle criticism
3. You’re going to forget about it in the morning
4. Openness is a problem for you
5. You’re only there to sell
6. You view social media as a numbers game
7. You’re inclined to call people’s wives ‘douchettes’
8. You think Twitter is a social media strategy
9. You don’t have a ‘social’ culture
10. You don’t have permission
For the details, well you know where that is to be found!
Please see her blog for the entire article.
SOM is back and here's a goodie on B2B Marketing
After a brief cold that came across my way and totall corrupted my schedule I am back on track. Having barely found the time to provide content for this blog here is a goodie published today on mashable.com.
Social Media still is in every mouth and this is very likely to continue for much longer. These two words combine the hopes of oh so many companies out there, fearing to lose touch of their consumers as times change faster and faster. But Social Media can also be of help in the B2B sector. The only trouble is that solution are not as evident as in the B2C field. Open a Jaegermeister youtube channel or a Nike facebook page. No big deal. But in the B2B area you need to be a little more fact-oriented and less entertaining. To successfully apply Social Media here, you might need more phantasy than in the B2C field. Sounds weird? Well, who would have thought that an electronic devices supplier such as Farnell would successfully establish a community (element14) for its business customers where they can exchange their insights, tips, troubles and so on about Farnell products. And it obviously does work and they do love it!
Another aspect is going out into the existing platforms such as facebook, twitter, and so on. This may not be the ideal place to sell B2B goods, but at least what you can do is learn and find the appropriate partners. Mashable.com’s today article provides you with 10 essential Social Media Tools for B2B Marketers. If Social Media is a topic in your business you might wanna check their article. But do not forget: in the end it is still you who has to find out if Socia Media does make sense and does generate real profit for you business! Enjoy!
Here is the link:
http://mashable.com/2010/04/08/b2b-marketing-tools/
