I guess this campaign is more than a year old now — but it is fresh and new to me. John St. is an agency based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is hard to call any agency an “ad” agency as most — like John St. — do all kinds of promotional efforts. The clever video below demonstrates a wide range of its services in a cute way. It actually fits as a B2B and B2C example at the same time — and it also demonstrates integrated marketing communications.
An emerging technology is augmented reality (AR). Wikipedia defines AR as “a live, direct or indirect, view of a physical, real-world environment whose elements are augmented by computer-generated sensory input such as sound, video, graphics or GPS data.” It won’t be long before shoppers are using AR to help them make buying decisions. I just read about AR in National Geographic, “Revealed World” (January 2012) – be sure to check out the photo montage to get an idea about how this will work. The article suggests that what you can now see on your smart phone is moving to specialized glasses and in a few years may be embedded in contact lenses. National Geographic used the technology in a shopping mall to promote its cable TV channel — see below.
For another example, see what Krystal did with a smart phone app below. I don’t think this really shows the full potential of AR, but it does show a low-cost way to generate some buzz around a brand. I applaud Krystal for dabbling in the new technology.
I think there is something to this technology — it sure seems like potentially useful information for shoppers — at least if you consider what it will be — not what it currently is. For that view, look back at the National Geographic article. What else could marketers do with this technology? Be creative and think of new applications, ideas, or brands AR might help.
Marketing is most interesting when you can see many of the concepts you learn tied together. This article, “Philly Cream Cheese’s Spreading Appeal” (Bloomberg Businessweek, December 12, 2011) shows how some of the different elements you have been learning about in marketing can be tied together – with successful results.
Sales of Philadephia brand cream cheese were pretty much flat (mature or decline stage of the product life cycle) for most of the last decade. Then Kraft researchers (market research) noticed that heavy users of the product were using cream cheese (consumer behavior) as an ingredient in their cooking — not simply as a spread for bagels. Starting in Europe back in 2008, Kraft’s brand managers tapped into social media and the Internet to gather and share recipes using Philadephia brand cream cheese, they promoted it on cooking shows and with contests (Promotion). In the U.K. the share of customers using cream cheese as an ingredient (effective repositioning) has almost doubled to 37% — and sales are up 20% in Europe (results).
This is a great case study of a successful brand revitalization. Check out the article for more details on the strategy.
The battle of the brands is the “competition between dealer brands and manufacturer brand” (from our text books) over which will be more popular. Dealer brands, sometimes called private labels, are brands created by store chains (for example Safeway’s O Organics line of organic foods) and manufacturer brands are created by a producer (General Mills Cheerios). Dealer brands have been gaining share — boosted recently by economic downturn induced consumer price sensitivity.
This Bloomberg Businessweek article “Why Grocers Are Boosting Private Labels,” gives an update and some great examples. Dealer brands used to differentiate on price and then more recently offered comparable and sometimes higher quality. Now many retailers are adding brand managers and investing in more aggressive promotion. Surprising fact: in 2009, 8.7% of food and nonalcoholic drink new products were private label – by 2011 the number more than tripled to 31.4%.
What do you think of this trend? Will it continue? Have you noticed more aggressive promotion from dealer brands?
The iPhone has considerable market share and mind share among consumers. So how do you break into that market? Maybe you start by copying Apple’s iPad and iPhone. Then you try to differentiate your phone with a larger screen and 4G connection speed. Samsung’s Galaxy 2 S phones have received good reviews. But then how do you battle that Apple mystique?
These Samsung ads don’t appear to be targeting Apple loyalists who stand in these lines — they are already too loyal to Apple. And obviously it hits a niche that just hates Apple — but Samsung and Android phones already have a reasonable share of those customers. The question is, does it work with the larger market segment of customers looking for smartphones and not Apple lovers or haters? What do you think? Should Samsung be promoting phone features or image?
This provocative idea is put forth by Aaron Shapiro in his new book Users Not Customers. The video below is an ABC News video with Shapiro, who is also a consultant. I have not read the book and feel we must be cautious expecting that all businesses can use Google and Facebook as models. Online firms like this have a unique cost structure that plays some role here. Still, I think Shapiro has some interesting ideas that would benefit many businesses.
What do you think? Should all firms eliminate advertising? If not all firms, what types of businesses should heed this advice?
This ABC News video describes both how consumers are changing their behavior — and how major marketers like Target and P&G are responding. The video is short at only 2:39 — though you do have an ad before it starts.
What companies might do well in this economic environment? How would you respond if you were Best Buy? Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream? or Coca-Cola?
VW’s new side assist technology is a nice safety feature — though a bit complicated to explain to your target market. To get the point across, VW created a website that demonstrates the “idea” in an office environment.
Let’s assume that VW’s promotion objective here is to “Inform consumers how its new side assist technology works — so they see the value in the new feature.” How well does this promotional effort work? What are its strengths? Weaknesses?
Mercedes Benz has struggled in recent years in its battle with other Germany luxury carmakers — with BMW and Audi both passing the fabled brand. In “A Mini Mercedes with Big Ambitions” (BusinessWeek, September 22, 2011), you can read about a new Mercedes Benz the B-Class. This smaller and more affordable Mercedes targets a “younger, hipper clientele” than the traditional Mercedes target market.
The move is an example of expanding a product line downmarket — which has implications for Mercedes positioning and brand equity. What do you think about Mercedes risk to its classic positioning? What could Mercedes have done — or could they still do — to minimize such concerns? What other promotion ideas do you have to help Mercedes as it aims at a new target market?
