Archive for the ‘MARKETING’ Category

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Dr, Pepper says “More taste for only 10 measly calories”

March 8, 2011

TakeAway: Will Dr. Pepper 10 be able to capture the elusive male diet drinker market?

With a strong campaign aimed directly at males they sure hope so. 

Allowing the drink to have 10 calories instead of 0 enables the drink to deliver a flavor closer to the original and they believe will differentiate their product from the crowded diet drink market.  

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Excerpted from AdAge, “Can Dr Pepper’s Mid-Cal Soda Score a 10 With Men?”  by Natalie Zmuda, February 21, 2011

Dr Pepper doesn’t want there to be any confusion. Its new 10-calorie soda is simply “Not for Women.”

Dr Pepper Ten, … targeting men, a bold move in a category that has had its fair share of marketing missteps. Coke Zero and Pepsi Max, …had difficulty nailing down the right message for a diet product that’s meant to appeal to men.

Aware of those missteps, Dr Pepper is rolling out an extensive test campaign for the new product, its packaging and marketing. Dave Fleming, director-marketing at Dr Pepper, called the test, which runs from now through June, “elaborate,” saying the strategy is atypical for the company, …

Dr Pepper Ten was created for 25- to 34-year-old men who prefer regular Dr Pepper but want fewer calories. And its inclusion of 10 calories, rather than zero like its competitors, allowed it to deliver a flavor closer to the regular version…

“We have a lot of excitement about this and wanted to give it fair treatment, so it would resemble a national launch in test markets,” he said. “We want to make sure that, if we do take this national, we understand all the variables.”

To that end, Dr Pepper Ten will be trotted out with commercials … A mobile “Man Cave” will also travel to each of six test markets, …The branded trailer will set up in “testosterone zones” such as ball fields or car shows and give men a place to watch TV and play video games. …

The packaging and marketing are both heavy on masculinity, but also clearly state the brand proposition, …

Mr. Fleming said he’s not out to alienate women, … “But we did the research, and it scored well with men and women.”

In theory, so-called mid-calorie sodas will appeal equally to men and women, with a sweet spot among 25- to 34-year-olds, said Bill Pecoriello, CEO of Consumer Edge Research. But he points out that Dr Pepper Ten is clearly intended to appeal to the target market staked out by Coke Zero and Pepsi Max. …

Mid-calorie sodas such as Dr Pepper Ten could be just the boost the struggling soft-drink category needs, as consumers look to trim calories from their diets and health advocates blame the fizzy drinks for obesity and diabetes. …some in the industry believe this in-between category could appeal to consumers, …”The performance we’re seeing from brands like Coke Zero, Diet Mtn Dew and Diet Dr Pepper indicates that diets and perhaps mid-cals may be the future route to growth for the soda category.”

 

 

Edit by HH

 

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Posted in Mktg - Brands, Mktg - Product & Innovation | Leave a Comment »

Aunt Jemima wants to friend you … no kidding.

March 7, 2011

TakeAway: One of America’s oldest brands, Aunt Jemima (established in 1889), launched its first ever social media campaign to show consumers exactly how the pancakes and other menu items from its frozen breakfasts division are made. 

The company plans to have the social campaign “in perpetuity.”  In addition to the Facebook page, there will be a Twitter handle to engage with fans and have a two-way conversation.

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Excerpted from Brandweek, “Aunt Jemima Deconstructs the Pancake (and More)” By Steve McClellan, February 17, 2011

Aunt Jemima purposefully wants consumers to see that the way the company makes flapjacks and waffles is just like they do at home. 

The core of the campaign is a series of videos appearing on the brand’s new Facebook page, featuring veteran Aunt Jemima employees who describe the “just like homemade process” and the people behind it.

The company held a contest to determine which employees would be featured in the videos and they’ll be appearing at numerous events throughout the coming year.

The campaign will also have an extensive online ad component to drive people to the page, where they can access the videos. Coupons and recipes are also available at the page.

The core target: families with harried weekday mornings, or pretty much everybody.

Edit by AMW

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Posted in Internet - Soc Networking, Mktg - Brands | Leave a Comment »

Kraft goes back to basics: targeted spending, innovation and feet-on-the-street

March 4, 2011

Punch line: Kraft plans to increase marketing to lift lagging sales

Kraft’s U.S. sales are lagging the company plans to boost marketing on targeted brands.

The foodmaker plans to fight rising ingredient costs, the aftereffects of the recession and a stagnant packaged-food market by spending more on its biggest and most profitable brands.

Specifically, Kraft will hike marketing spending by 10% on the 20 brands that make up two-thirds of its revenue and income.

“Under the theme of fewer, bigger and faster, we have 12 big bets in North America this year …  In total, our innovations represent over $2 billion of sales in new products.”

Among the new products is Mio, a “flavor pod” for water that Kraft calls its biggest brand launch in a decade. “Mio is the ultimate way to personalize your beverage.”

Other “big bets” include Trident Vitality and Stride Spark vitamin-enriched chewing gums; Planters NUTrition; Oreo Fudge Creams: Philadelphia Cooking Cream: Oscar Mayer Carving Board and Lunchables with fruit.

The company will ramp up its 7,000-person salesforce.

“We intend to win every account, every store, every household, even yours and mom’s.”

Thanks to Diana M. for feeding the lead

Posted in Mktg - Product & Innovation, Mktg - Sales Force | Leave a Comment »

Diet Pepsi wants you to “get the skinny” … (and, psst, “get skinny”)

March 3, 2011

TakeAway: Diet Pepsi’s new skinny can is being met with controversy because of the perception that skinny is better and that this will influence the image issues young people face nowadays regarding their body types.

Pepsi on the other hand thinks it’s a new skinny can will provide as a marketing tool for people to “get the skinny” on what is trendy and in.  Who will win the battle?  

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Excerpted from AdAge, “Skinny Pepsi Can Launch is Heavy with Controversy”  by Natalie Zmuda, February 21, 2011

It’s hard to imagine that a brand the size of Diet Pepsi spent only $500,000 on measured media in the past three years combined, but that’s exactly what happened.

With the focus on programs such as Refresh Project and brands such as Pepsi Max, Diet Pepsi was pushed to the sidelines. …

“We are going to actually start talking to our consumer again. … We have our loyal followers that are a specific psychographic, and we want to make sure we talk to them on a one-to-one level.”

To that end, the brand is introducing a new package, the Skinny Can, and building a major marketing program around it, slated to run throughout 2011. The can will become part of Diet Pepsi’s permanent lineup. (Pepsi’s Skinny Can is a full 12 oz. serving. )

… Ads promote the can but also convey the idea of “getting the skinny” or the inside scoop on the latest in culture, fashion, style and design. …

A slew of partnerships and retail promotions are also a part of the effort. A promotion that gives consumers $5 off a purchase at Target when they buy a four-pack of Skinny Cans and a People magazine is launching late this month. …

To help conceive the effort, it formed a “Pop Culture Council,” …that was presented with various ideas and advertising concepts and told to “pull them apart and rebuild them.”

“They were saying you need to stop thinking as a staple product and think as we think in the fashion and design industries,” …

The effort is not without controversy. The National Eating Disorders Association put out a press release saying it “takes offense” to the idea. “Pepsi should be ashamed for declaring that skinny is to be celebrated,” …

“It’s the new shape of a product. We’re not talking about the form or shape of a woman,” she said. “And it’s also the marketing platform, getting the skinny, the inside scoop, on fashion, style and design.”

Eric Gustavsen, founding partner at creative firm Graj & Gustavsen who has no connection to the project, said … “This particular idea is simple enough and understandable enough that it may very well have mass appeal. It’s cool and different. That doesn’t mean it’s going to redefine what a soda can shape is, but there’s nothing wrong with breaking away and experimenting.”

Edit by HH

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Posted in Mktg - Packaging | Leave a Comment »

Groupon’s second mistake.. it’s response to its first mistake- offensive Superbowl Ads

March 2, 2011

TakeAway: Just because you were recently offered $6 Billion to be acquired does not mean you can do no wrong.

Groupon’s unclear response to the backlash from its Superbowl Ads was worse than the offense caused by the actual commercials. 

Groupon should take a lesson from Nokia about clear decisive message saving it from its earlier faux pas. 

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Excerpted from AdAge, “Groupon vs. Nokia: The Right Way to Respond when Backed into a Corner”  by Rosanna Fiske, February 17, 2011

When CEOs of tech and digital media companies speak, people pay attention. …everyone is listening to the titans of the tech industry.

…recent statements from two well-regarded tech CEOs made international headlines. …Groupon’s botched attempts at explaining its much-hyped and controversial Super Bowl ad. The second was intended to be far more subdued; it was surely not meant for a global audience of several hundred million — the leaked “burning platform” memo from Nokia CEO Stephen Elop.

[In case you missed it, Groupon’s commercial made light of the political and social problems in Tibet – bringing the company more notoriety, than fame.]

The Groupon fallout has many questioning the company’s maturity and ability to handle immense market pressures. …the time for brushing aside their sometimes cavalier approach to communications is long past.

What exactly has allowed Groupon’s Super Bowl ad to continue haunting the company, …concern has far more to do with a general lack of acumen in Groupon’s communications with its customers and stakeholders, rather than the visual offensiveness of its advertising.

… Groupon … can no longer rely on the goodwill of the digerati. Letting slip an errant message in an email blast is one thing; offending a good portion of 111 million U.S. consumers is quite another.

…, Groupon chose the path of least resistance, with multiple attempts at acquiescing to outside interests.

After initially issuing an apology, Groupon CEO Andrew Mason in a blog entry… attempted to explain the ads by rehashing some pre-Groupon history. … a rash decision to pull the ads. This … approach clearly affects the company’s image and reputation.

Contrast … to the skillfully-written Nokia memo. … CEO Elop eloquently expressed his concerns, comparing the company’s faltering sales and prestige to “standing on a ‘burning platform,'” while imploring that “[Nokia] must decide how [it is] going to change [its] behavior.”

Little chance analysts, investors or employees might misconstrue that message.

Mr. Elop’s impassioned plea was decisive and clear; … he delivered a superbly contrasting perspective of how to act … when your company is on the brink of international acclaim …

Also revealed … a long-held secret of successful brands: … executives appear to have their act together and explain the “how” and “why” behind their thinking.

 

 

Edit by HH

 

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Posted in Mktg - Advertising | Leave a Comment »

E*Trade tells baby: “Just shut-up !”

February 28, 2011

TakeAway:  E*Trade has generated a lot of awareness with its talking baby ads, but is losing ground to its competitors.

Byt, awareness doesn’t lead to customers if the message is wrong.  And, for most people money is not a joking matter..

E*Trade has caught onto this and is reworking its campaigns going forward.

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Excerpted from Bloomberg Businessweek, “E*Trade Looks to Outgrow That Talking Baby,” by Ben Steverman, February 16, 2011

E*Trade may boast some of the most popular advertisements on TV, but the company still can’t make a profit. Hobbled by bad loans that blew up in the financial crisis, it’s stuck at fourth place in the highly competitive online brokerage industry.

E*Trade executives are thus trying a new strategy: While not entirely abandoning their talking baby campaign, they’re spending more than half of an increased ad budget on messages without the stock-trading infant. The talking baby ads, which began airing during the 2008 Super Bowl, have been a hit with TV viewers. Nielsen says that an ad featuring the E*Trade baby with a sneezing cat was the third most-liked commercial during the 2011 Super Bowl, watched by a record 111 million people. Because of the baby, “we have much higher brand recognition vs. the competition,” says E*Trade’s chief marketing officer.

Despite the attention, the New York-based company has fallen behind rivals in assets and new customer signups. Since the end of 2007, E*Trade has boosted its number of brokerage accounts by 9.4 percent, to 2.7 million. That’s solid growth, but much of the online brokerage industry has seen a heavier influx of assets. Charles Schwab has increased its active brokerage accounts by 13.5 percent since 2007 and TD Ameritrade has boosted total accounts by 24 percent in that period. …

… What’s holding back E*Trade may not be its offerings but its customer image, something the talking baby ad campaign isn’t improving… It’s an unusual strategy for a financial company. “How many people want to take advice from a baby?” …

Edit by DMG

 

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Posted in Financial Services & Crises, Mktg - Advertising | Leave a Comment »

Don’t Discount the Men!

February 23, 2011

TakeAway: It seems like no matter where you turn today, there’s a fascination with the idea that women are taking over – their receding unemployment rates, increased number of college degrees, etc.

However, the true growth—even in categories that courted female shoppers for years—lies with the guys.

So, while the buying power might be moving toward women in purely fiscal terms, marketers should not lose sight of the fact that it’s increasingly men who are writing up the shopping lists, hitting the stores and doing the actual spending.

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Excerpted from Brandweek, “Women Are Wealthy, but Guys Mean Growth” By Kathy Oneto, December 5, 2010

The “everyday Joe” has been taught that it’s OK to look good, smell nice and dress well. The motivations (while varied) for this new man’s grooming activities are less about vanity than instilling confidence and creating a feeling of success. Then there’s the growth of the full-time dad. Since 2007, 6.3 million American men have lost their jobs, which has among other things served to redefine their household roles.

What’s significant about this from a marketing perspective is that as fathers assume traditional “mom” jobs such as packing lunches and doing laundry, their interest in the brands associated with these activities—from convenience foods to fabric softener—has increased proportionally.

Some brands have been prescient enough to capitalize on this gender-role drift already. Nutrisystem, for example, has defied industry norms in the weight-loss market by directing its messaging toward men. The move not only gave the brand a new base of consumers, but it also furnished Nutrisystem with an alternative to slugging it out with competing weight-loss plans for share of the same female demo.

Similarly—and after years of soft-focus commercials full of soft-skinned women—the Dove soap brand made a play for the masculine market with a new suite of products called Dove Men + Care, which emphasizes deep-cleaning over softness and signed spokesmen like the Yankee’s Joe Girardi to make clear that Dove was no longer your wife’s beauty bar.

A broadened strategic attention is necessary for any company or any brand that hopes to stay competitive and relevant in a marketplace as lean and mutable as this one is. As one target demo (women, in this case) has moved to the economic forefront, the other (men) may have been inversely impacted. But opportunity often arises from disruption. The sooner that the marketing community catches on to men as a market for goods that previously weren’t aimed at them, the sooner they’ll reap the rewards.

Edit by AMW

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Posted in Mktg - Consumer Behavior, Mktg - Positioning | Leave a Comment »

Anyone care for a Buck Range Light or a Big Flats?

February 21, 2011

TakeAway: New beer brands from retail giants Supervalu and Walgreens are part of a growing effort by chain stores to make a hit of private-label beer, a category that has proved difficult for retailers.

The retailers are trying to tempt shoppers with lower-priced alternatives to domestic mass-market brews such as MillerCoors’ Keystone Light.

The effort comes amid declining sales volumes for the beer industry, which has been hurt by stubbornly high unemployment.  But store-branded beers have struggled to gain traction for years in the U.S., in part because beer is typically consumed in social settings and brand image is important.

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Excerpted from WSJ, “Private-Label Beers Take a Shot at Earning Joe Sixpack’s Respect” By David Kesmodel, February 8, 2011

Supervalu, the third-largest U.S. grocery chain by revenue, began selling Buck Range Light, a low-priced domestic brew (12-pack of cans for as little as $5.99), in December. Drugstore chain Walgreens recently began offering Big Flats 1901 for as little as $2.99 a six pack. Costco rolled out craft beers under its Kirkland Signature brand in December 2008.

Part of the attraction for retailers is that sales of other store-branded goods—from soap to pasta—have been robust. Revenue for private-label products rose 2% last year in food, drug and mass-merchandise outlets, according to market-research firm Nielsen Co., compared with a 1% decline for branded items.

Annual sales for the U.S. beer market are about $96 billion, according to market-research firm Beverage Information Group. MillerCoors, which has a 29% share of the U.S. beer market, argues that house brands can pose downsides for the whole beer category. “Retailers should be cautious about over-proliferating their beer shelf with private label, unsupported brands that can commoditize the category”. Dave Peacock, president of Anheuser’s U.S. division, said “the industry is defined by players who invest heavily behind brands.” Anheuser-Busch controls about 48% of the U.S. beer market by volume.

Industry observers said it could be tough for Walgreens and Supervalu to build a following for their new brews. “I think it’s a hard sell, mainly because nobody has succeeded on the low-end with private-label beer,” said Harry Schuhmacher, publisher of the newsletter Beer Business Daily.

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Posted in Beer & Liquor, Mktg - Brands - Private Label | 1 Comment »

Mobile ads more effective than TV … ring, ring.

February 18, 2011

TakeAway: Data showing effectiveness of mobile advertising, specifically Apple’s iAd platform just released.

Folks seeing ads on their mobile devices via iAds are more likely to remember the brand, like the product and want to buy it more than those who see an ad on TV.

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Excerpted from AdAge, “Apple, Campbell’s Say iAds Twice as Effective as TV” by Kunar Patel, February 3, 2011

It’s been seven months since the first iAds — …and now that those campaigns are over, we’re seeing the first effectiveness study, funded by Apple and one of iAd’s early adopters, Campbell’s.

In it, is a fairly big claim: Those exposed to one of Campbell’s iAds were more than twice as likely to recall it than those who had seen a TV ad. …the five-week study showed that iAd consumers remembered the brand “Campbell’s” five times more often than TV ad respondents and the ad messaging three times more often.

IAd respondents intended to purchase Campbell’s four times more than the TV group and that they liked the ad five times more.

… Apple is looking for data that would persuade existing marketers to renew or increase their initial investment as well as win over new advertisers standing on the sidelines. The problem Apple is facing is for their high cost of entry — a reported $1 million minimum for first-run advertisers — many other options exist for mobile advertising, including rich-media competitors like Medialets that look and feel a lot like an iAd.

… Out of 53 million impressions, 1% of users that saw the ad clicked through and spent an average of nearly one minute perusing it. …these results for iAd also beat the marketer’s benchmarks for static banner ads.

… “This does show, in really traditionally brand metric terms, that iAd really outperformed.”… The study was put in place to validate mobile, a relatively new medium for the marketer.

The brand is struggling with preconceptions of the decades-old brand and iAd was a way to frame the brand in a new light. “

…the survey could also reflect overall demographic differences of each medium, or the targeting that Campbell’s used in their iAd campaign. The iAd sample was weighted to reflect the iPhone and iPod Touch universe in terms of age, gender and income, while TV survey results were weighted for a general TV audience.

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Posted in Mktg - Advertising, Mobile Marketing | Leave a Comment »

I took this to a drugstore and they didn’t even know what it was …

February 17, 2011

In my marketing strategy class, we were chatting about product life cycles, and I commented that being the ‘last guy standing’ in a declining market can be a profitable position since the last guy is by definition a monopolist, and momopolists are positioned to make beaucoup d’argent — that is, lots of money.

A student pointed out that might be true … until the declining market just flat out dies.

Good point …  supported by an interesting story about the end of a photography era and an iconic brand:

A sign on the wall reads: “I took this to a drugstore and they didn’t even know what it was”.

Dwayne’s Photo, a small family business has through luck and persistence become the last processor in the world of Kodachrome, the first successful color film and still the most beloved.

Kodachrome …  is noteworthy in no small part for how long it survived.

Created in 1935, Kodachrome was an instant hit as the first film to effectively render color.

Even when it stopped being the default film for chronicling everyday life — thanks in part to the move to prints from slides — it continued to be the film of choice for many hobbyists.

That celebrated 75-year run from mainstream to niche photography is scheduled to come to an end on Thursday when the last processing machine is shut down at Swayne’s —  to be sold for scrap.

Kodachrome rewarded generations of skilled users with a richness of color and a unique treatment of light that many photographers described as incomparable even as they shifted to digital cameras.

Kodak stopped producing the film last year.

At the peak, there were about 25 labs worldwide that processed Kodachrome. That number got winnowed down to one – Dwayne’s.

Last year, Kodak stopped producing the chemicals needed to develop the film.

The last frame of the last roll to be processed: a picture of all Dwayne’s employees standing in front of the store wearing shirts with the epitaph: “The best slide and movie film in history is now officially retired. Kodachrome: 1935-2010.”

NYT, For Kodachrome Fans, Road Ends at Photo Lab in Kansas, December 29, 2010

Thanks to DM for feeding the lead

Posted in Mktg - Brands, Mktg - Product & Innovation | Leave a Comment »

Congrats on your new baby … need some Disney duds?

February 16, 2011

TakeAway: The Walt Disney Company wants to clothe newborns with its newest priority, Disney Baby.

Its distribution model starts with 580 maternity hospitals in the United States.

A representative visits a new mother and offers a free Disney Cuddly Bodysuit, a variation of the classic Onesie.

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Excerpted from NYTimes, “Disney Looking Into Cradle for Customers ” By Brooks Barnes, February 6, 2011

In bedside demonstrations, the bilingual representatives extol the product’s bells and whistles — extra soft! durable! better sizing! — and ask mothers to sign up for e-mail alerts from DisneyBaby.com.

In this new venture, the company gains access to the maternity hospitals through a company called Our365, a business that sells bedside baby pictures.

Our365 pays hospitals for exclusive access, and companies like Disney pay Our365 to promote their own products.

 

More than 200,000 bodysuits will be given away by May, when Amazon.com is set to begin selling 85 styles for a starting price of $9.99 for two; Nordstrom and Target will follow with more Disney Baby items, including hats.

The endeavor dances close to a flame. Disney has suffered harsh criticism in recent years over products directed at the very young. The fiercest battle has involved Baby Einstein, the Disney-owned maker of “developmental and entertainment” videos and toys for babies and toddlers. The Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, a nonprofit organization, claimed victory in 2009 when Disney, apparently acknowledging that the products did not turn babies into geniuses after all, offered some Baby Einstein refunds.

Certainly hospitals have given new mothers gift bags for decades. In recent years, however, more have banned the practice, citing criticism that free baby formula, for example, discourages breast-feeding. Privacy also is a concern.

Disney already operates a line of licensed products for infants, but results have been limited because Disney has relied almost entirely on simple licensing deals with companies like Kimberly-Clark, the maker of Huggies diapers. Grouping baby products under one brand that is controlled and heavily marketed by Disney represents a bigger opportunity.

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Posted in Mktg - Customer Development | Leave a Comment »

Hey, that handbag is a fake !

February 15, 2011

TakeAway: Counterfeit products, especially low quality versions can damage a brand’s reputation.

For pharmaceutical products, counterfeits can also be very dangerous.

There are some promising new solutions to thwart counterfeiters like the one described below.

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Excerpted from brandchannel, “New Tag Aims to Impede Chinese Counterfeiting,” by Barry Silverstein, February 2, 2011

Counterfeit branded products continue to plague legitimate marketers both on the street and online. Fueled by wary consumers seeking bargains and a global economy hampered by weak or non-existent intellectual property protection, phony goods skyrocketed last year, and this year will likely be no different.

Counterfeiting is a global problem, but it seems that China has developed a reputation as ground zero for fake brands. In China, counterfeiting is a black market industry that goes far beyond luxury brands, pervading virtually every product category.  …

Now the Leo Burnett ad agency thinks it may have the ultimate solution — the 1-TAG, a proprietary anti-counterfeiting application … which can be applied to a product during manufacturing and serve as “a signature authentication.”

With the 1-TAG, products “can be verified and authenticated at every stage of their manufacture and distribution, right through to the consumer.” The brand manufacturer can associate data to the tag code, including a product description, the manufacturing date, a product expiration date, and the product’s destination.

A salesperson or a consumer uses a standard mobile phone camera to “decode” the information via a free software application loaded on the phone. Burnett says the 1-TAG can be valuable for supply-chain inspections and to authenticate a product every step of the way. So the 1-TAG is both a behind-the-scenes product control mechanism, as well as something the consumer can use to protect herself against brand fakes.

The 1-TAG is currently in development and is likely to be tested in China soon. Burnett intends to market and sell 1-TAG beyond its own clients and potentially roll it out on a global basis. …

Edit by DMG

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Posted in Mktg - Brandmarks & Logos, Mktg - Brands | Leave a Comment »

Looking for whole grains? Well, follow the signs.

February 14, 2011

TakeAway: To help consumers sort through myriad of cereal options, General Mills is using social media as part of a new campaign to promote its cereals’ whole grain content.

The company expects this presence to  give consumers a shortcut or identifier to direct them to whole grain cereals.

The company will include special banners at the ends of aisles, more displays, including on pallets and in Spanish, colorful balloons and information at the checkout, as well as pointing out the check marks for whole grain content from the Whole Grains Council, an industry group that encourages eating whole grains.

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Excerpted from NYTimes, “And Down This Aisle, Many Whole Grain Options” By Elizabeth Olson, February 2, 2011

General Mills began adding whole grains to its cereal in 2005, after federal dietary guidelines recommended daily food intake include whole grains. Its products, which include Cheerios, Cinnamon Toast Crunch, Fiber One and Total, each contain at least eight grams of whole grains per serving.

General Mills competes with Kellogg in the $6.5 billion cereal industry. It has slightly less than the one-third of Kellogg’s market share.

General Mills is moving to close the gap by spending 20 percent more on its whole grains advertising in 2011. The company spent nearly $245 million on all cereal marketing in the first nine months of last year.

The company advertises the whole grain content of its Big G cereal lineup, including Cheerios and Wheaties, separately from its advertising for individual cereal varieties.

For years, cereal makers have been battling with bread and pasta makers over which product has the higher whole grain content.

To help the baffled consumer, the General Mills campaign was reaching out to bloggers, including the MyBlogSpark network of people who review new products and other “influencers” — people who set a buying example for others. Consumers can sign up with the company’s Web site, generalmills.com, to receive and review products and host get-togethers to try new items with friends.

The whole-grains campaign is planning to give away one million servings of its whole grain cereals to needy families to spur consumption, although the company has not yet announced specifics of the giveaway. The campaign also created a series of pro-whole grain videos with a company nutritionist and Dr. Travis Stork, a host of “The Doctors” daytime talk show.

Edit by AMW

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Posted in Mktg - Packaging, Mktg - Positioning | 1 Comment »

This season’s latest trend: revamping your logo

February 11, 2011

TakeAway: Changing up your brand’s logo seems to be this seasons latest fad. 

But just because everybody’s doing it doesn’t mean you should, and especially not if you are removing the most iconic parts of your logo. 

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Excerpted from Brandchannel, “NBCUniversal new logo might be ‘the Gap logo’ of 2011” by Abe Sauer, January 27, 2011

Look, we know the economy is bad and times are tough and the future is unknown. And we know that a brand looks at its logo …and wonders if it’s doing everything it can, if it maybe isn’t doing enough. …

But seriously, would brands all stop destroying the most recognizable elements of themselves.

…And now we come to NBC Universal. Is it a passive aggressive move … to pluck the iconic peacock from the new corporate logo?

Or is America’s biggest cable operator’s belief t that it needs to downplay the NBC part of NBCUniversal — name? It surely understands the NBC peacock is one of the most identifiable logos in America, if not the world, right?

We appreciate that it’s Comcast acquiring NBC Universal, …And it’s a new owner’s house and they can gussy up the joint as they see fit.

But Comcast — and Burke — are cable operators not known for their branding, naming (Xfinity?) or design savvy. NBCU, on the other hand, is home to some of the smartest branders on the planet, particularly on the cable networks’ side. Which would you rather do the redecorating in your house?

Also, what’s with running it all together into one word? Just try to pronounce how it looks. Do it, try. “NBCUniversal.”

This rebranding … celebrates the rich and dynamic content, a meeting of brands — so why would Comcast want new toy to be so…. blah? no vibrancy? no color? so… undistinguishable?

 

 

Edit by HH

 

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Posted in Mktg - Brandmarks & Logos, Mktg - Brands | Leave a Comment »

Keep your Bud, gimme a Walgreen’s … huh?

February 10, 2011

TakeAway: Cheap beer is nothing new, but private label beer is not so common.

But now, Walgreens is introducing its line of Big Flats lager across 4,600 stores.

As if AmBev and MillerCoors didn’t have enough to worry about, there might be some more competition among those companies’ low-end offerings.

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Excerpted from brandchannel, “Walgreens Offers Private-Label Beer,” by Jennifer Sokolowsky, January 31, 2011

Drugstores are the place to go to get your cough drops and allergy tablets, and now they are the places to pick up another kind of medicine — the self-medicating kind found in alcoholic beverages.

Duane Reade is luring Brooklyn hipsters by offering high-end bottled beer and fresh beer on tap to go in Williamsburg.

Now Walgreens is going in a completely different direction: offering its own private-label beer at the low end of the price scale.

Quietly introduced in mid-December, Walgreens now offers Big Flats 1901 lager in more than 4,600 of the chain’s 7,655 locations, according to the Chicago Tribune. …

Big Flats 1901 may be labeled “premium brew,” but its price is anything but premium at about 50 cents a can, or $2.99 for a six-pack, though prices may vary by region. …

Walgreens is surely betting that those who come in looking for cheap beer will probably leave with something else as well — and that those who come in for something else just might not be able to resist leaving with some cheap beer. …

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Kellogg’s Crunchy Nut cereal: it’s not just for breakfast any more … say, what ?

February 9, 2011

TakeAway: Adult cereal is rarely advertised primarily on the basis of taste (e.g. Special K as a dieting aid, Wheaties as “fuel” for athletic performance, etc.).  However, Kellogg’s Crunchy Nut is going “radical” and claiming great taste, on which most children’s brands do focus.   

Trivia point Kellogg’s may need to message around: its sugar content (maybe part of its “great taste”) is on par with Frosted Flakes – yikes!

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Excerpted from WSJ, “Did We Mention That It Tastes Good?” By Andrew Adam Newman, January 26, 2011

With nearly all American households already buying cereal, there are few people to initiate, so cereal marketers often focus on increasing so called “usage occasions,” like incorporating cereal into an every-meal diet plan, as Kellogg does with Special K, or featuring non-breakfast recipes on boxes, like Kellogg’s Corn Flakes-coated chicken, Chex Mix and Rice Krispies treats.  A  Leo Burnett creative director said that the campaign aimed to reinforce that Crunchy Nut “really is a breakfast cereal,” but “baked into our tagline and concept that ‘It’s morning somewhere,’ is that we’d like to extend usage occasions.’”

A publicity stunt to encourage eating Crunchy Nut round-the-clock is being organized, fittingly, around a clock. In Los Angeles on Saturday, the brand hopes to break the Guinness world record for the largest cuckoo clock, with a timepiece that is 66 feet tall and 28 feet wide.

At the top of the hour for 24 consecutive hours, emerging from the innards of the clock will be not a mechanical bird but an actor, Brad Norman, who will perform as characters from countries where it is morning. Videos from the performances will be uploaded to the Crunchy Nut Facebook page and to YouTube.

Additionally, scanning a quick response code printed on the back of Crunchy Nut boxes with smartphones, which can recognize users’ location and local time, prompts a video of an exotic locale where it is morning.

In a survey by Mintel of American adults who eat cereal, respondents rated the importance of cereal attributes, and taste ranked highest, followed by price, wholegrain content, familiarity of flavor, fiber content and sugar content.

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Oh, just pay whatever you feel is fair …

February 8, 2011

TakeAway: Pay-what-you-want experiments have yielded some interesting results.

When consumers pay what they feel is fair for the benefits received, there is no excess value ceded to them.

However, consumers are probably less likely to take advantage of this arrangement when the stakes are low, like in the study below.

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Excerpted from NPR, “  Can Allowing Customers to Pay as They Wish Increase Profits?” by Jess Jiang, January 19, 2011

Do you pay more when you can pay what you want? Yes, according to a recent study published in the journal Science.

… a group of researchers from the University of California wanted to test how letting people pay what they want could work for other businesses. The researchers took photos of over 100,000 people on a roller coaster ride at an amusement park. Then they split people into two groups. Group A could buy the photo for a fixed price, and Group B could pay what they wanted.

The results — people who paid what they wished bought more photos— 8 times more, and these same people also spent more money per photo.

Then, the researchers added a second-dimension, charity. Half of the participants in each group were told that some of the revenue would go to charity. Although the number of sales in both group A and B remained roughly the same, purchasers who paid as they wished spent much more money when they were told charity was involved.

As for what they want people to take away from the study, the researchers point to company ethics, “our study suggests a method in which the pursuit of social good does not undermine the pursuit of profit.”

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Appeasing the ‘greenwashing’ cowboys …

February 7, 2011

TakeAway: Today’s consumer speaks out against those companies they feel are falsely marketing themselves as ‘green’  … some companies have stopped trying, so that they don’t get called out.

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Excerpted from AdAge, “Don’t let Greenwashing fears hold you back. Transparency is key as companies move towards sustainability” by Ian Yolles, January 20, 2011

Accusations of greenwashing are rampant right now, and many are well-founded. … consumers are more likely to purchase products from a brand perceived to be more “sustainable”; that is, if faced with a choice (and price being relatively equal), they would select the “greener” product. To capitalize on this trend, some companies have cobbled together feeble marketing programs that have gotten them called out for greenwashing.

Yet today’s consumer speaks out against those companies they feel are falsely marketing themselves… Social media give anyone the ability to immediately amplify and propagate their dissatisfaction, and serves as a forceful greenwashing deterrent.

On one hand, policing by industry and consumer forces is positive, weeding out those that are talking the talk but not walking the walk. …but is the fear of being labeled a greenwasher is preventing brands that are earnestly looking to do something positive from doing so for fear of a massive backlash? …hindering us from making real progress in moving toward a more sustainable future?

When it comes to the notion of a purpose-driven brand and being green, …there’s no such thing as a truly green or truly sustainable product or company. It’s about a journey, a continuum. …everyone is somewhere along the continuum of becoming more sustainable. The key is to be transparent about where you are.

… those that have green DNA intrinsically embedded in their businesses. the foundation, core of their company, service or product. Others integrating sustainability attributes into their products and brands in a way that is meaningful and makes a difference. Moving along this continuum …can be costly and time-consuming and sometimes is even fundamentally impossible. The shift often happens in small steps, especially regarding large brands, and each step needs to be taken one at a time.

So amid this climate of skepticism, how can companies move along this spectrum? Two ingredients can authentically translate corporate responsibility into a positive impact and help avoid accusations of greenwashing and a subsequent social backlash:

  1. Take action: The process of change should reflect an “inside-out process.” By that I mean start with your own house and take steps that move your business practices toward more sustainable solutions. …it gives you permission to engage in a dialogue with your consumers. …the internal transformation inspires a shift in consumer behavior, moving individuals along the green spectrum as well. It’s the “give a man a fish” strategy, and it can be accomplished through education or motivating action.
  2. Make that action measurable and trackable: If you attach goals to your efforts, both internal and external, and are able to measure and track those goals, your efforts become more credible; the impact, more tangible. …showing consumers the impact that their individual actions have in the context of the collective action of others.

To appease the greenwashing cowboys and weary consumers—and to authentically align your brand with a larger social or environmental purpose—you should focus first on measurable internal actions and use those as a basis to engage your consumer audience in a dialogue that inspires them to act in accord with your brand.

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L’Oréal Wants to Give Brazil a Makeover

February 4, 2011

TakeAway: Brazilian women are among the biggest spenders on beauty products anywhere, but L’Oréal isn’t raking in reales. 

Brazilian women have traditionally bought their skin creams and mascaras from door-to-door sales representatives, not the shops where L’Oréal sells its brands. 

To compensate, L’Oréal is introducing personal beauty advisers at department stores and trying to tailor its makeup to the consumer.

For example, foundation, a strong L’Oréal category world-wide, isn’t a big seller in Brazil because women find it increases the oiliness of their skin, so the company has been charged with creating a foundation from natural ingredients.  

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Excerpted from WSJ, “To L’Oréal, Brazil’s Women Need New Style of Shopping” , January 21, 2011

For L’Oréal, winning over Brazilian women is crucial if it is to meet its goal of adding one billion consumers—a doubling of its current clientele—over the next decade. L’Oréal currently makes about a third of its €17.5 billion ($23.36 billion) in yearly sales from emerging markets, and it wants to increase that to half by 2020.

Getting Brazilians to alter their buying habits won’t be easy. The two major players who use the door-to-door method claim roughly 50% of all color cosmetics sales and 42% of skin-care sales. Natura Cosméticos, the market leader in beauty and personal care, has one million salespeople across the country, and U.S. cosmetics company Avon has built up a larger market share in Brazil than L’Oréal thanks to its expertise in direct sales.

L’Oreal’s challenge also reflects the rising competition that global consumer-goods companies face from local rivals who understand the tastes and peculiarities of their home markets. Door-to-door vending is a longstanding custom in Brazil that has ushered millions of Brazilian women into the middle class. Some 2.5 million women, out of a total female work force of 42 million, earn a living from direct sales in Brazil.

Two years ago, L’Oréal was looking for new ways to grow as the financial crisis hit its core European and U.S. markets, and Brazil, the world’s third-largest cosmetics market after the U.S. and Japan, seemed an obvious target. While it had been in Brazil for 50 years, it had mainly focused on hair products.  Combined, makeup and skin care account for less than 15% of L’Oréal’s sales in Brazil, a paltry amount compared with the nearly 50% of sales the two categories provide the company world-wide.

For L’Oréal’s makeup offensive, it is focusing on department stores like Lojas Americanas, which is similar to Kmart in the U.S. The company is currently negotiating with the chain to expand its makeup walls country-wide. For skin care, it is targeting pharmacies and drugstores.

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The marketing message that ALL of your customers see …

February 3, 2011

TakeAway: Packing is not just what is on the outside of your product but rather a vehicle to convey a message.  What is that message you are trying to convey and what are you trying to do with that message?  

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Excerpted from AdAge, “What is your product saying to consumers? Rethinking the role of packaging in communications.” by James Black, January 18, 2011

Two fundamental truths about packaging are routinely overlooked by marketers. First, packaging is the only marketing vehicle that 100% of the consumers who buy your product see. Not necessarily the brand’s advertising or the exciting social media that your brand is doing. But all of the consumers who buy your brand do interact with your humble package.

… the package is really the only vehicle that you have 100% control over in-store. … and once it has a consumer’s attention, it starts conveying your message. … it is vital to get the communications right on the package. The first step is to decide what message you want packaging to convey …

A package can attract new users rather than just retain current users … can also be updated to communicate a new positioning for the brand… can close a sale with the consumer in store.

Attracting new consumers vs. retaining current ones
…who the consumer is that we are trying to engage. Is it current consumers? New users? Are we trying to transition the brand from one user group to another?

…recent launch of the “U” feminine care products by Kotex … black packages (vs. pastels of other products) draw attention from shoppers at shelf… but windows on the package reveal pastel packets inside, a cue to category norms. … brand effectively communicates by being both differentiated and relevant at the same time.

In contrast, recall Tropicana redesign hastily withdrawn from market earlier last year. …so disruptive that it was not easily recognizable to current users, … the brand lost significant volume overnight. Ultimately, brands must strike a careful balance in keeping the brand recognizable to current users while also making it disruptive to new users.

Communicating a new positioning for the brand
In 2009, Bath & Body Works re-staged its core Signature Collection line. With the update, the packaging was designed to communicate that Bath & Body Works was more sophisticated, more elegant and more premium, also supported by improved product formulations. …packaging supported new and improved in-store marketing and navigation. Here, by integrating package design, product design and in-store marketing, the brand was able to holistically communicate a new positioning.

According to the company, successful test-market sales led to a nationwide rollout and the company also witnessed improved perceptions of the brand in equity measurements.

Closing the sale
In order to close a sale, it is important to understand how the consumer will respond to simple claims vs. the need for extended education at shelf.

Here, consider how the “five” subline by Haagen Daz is brought to life. … underscoring a key brand equity point around premium-ness and pure goodness by simply listing five core ingredients prominently on the front of the package: milk, cream, sugar, eggs and whatever the natural flavor is. … advances this message without disparaging the parent brand.

Is your packaging achieving the goals you have for your product? If not, it might be time to revisit what your products are communicating from store shelves.

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Home Depot Gets in Touch with its Feminine Side

February 2, 2011

TakeAway: To balance a decline in sales related to major renovations, Home Depot is pushing products related to redecorating.

Moreover, realizing that Home Depot stores can intimidate women (who just happen to be half of its customers), the chain is trying to simplify shopping through Martha Stewart Living products that carry icons to assist with coordination across categories.

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Excerpted from NYTimes, “Revamping, Home Depot Woos Women” , January 28, 2011

Without a housing recovery to revive sales of big items or major renovation supplies, Home Depot and its competitors are promoting smaller projects this spring, during what is the major selling season for home improvement stores. And that means sprucing up departments to get female customers excited about window treatments or new colors for makeovers of existing spaces.

Lowe’s, which says it has had a female focus since its beginnings, has added a line of décor products like mood lighting and chrome toilet-paper holders to appeal to women. True Value recently opened a corporate-owned store near Chicago that had wider aisles, better lighting and clear signs, part of an effort to attract women.

Home improvement stores “have been viewed as ‘very large hardware stores’ where big, burly men go to purchase their tools and supplies.”

“These big-box stores need to appear less hardware- and more improvement-driven in the image, and reflect more women in their messages.”

This is not the first time that Home Depot has tried to figure out what women want. It has been running Do-It-Herself workshops for female customers since 2003. In the early 1990s, it opened Expo Design Centers, showrooms with fresh flowers and other feminine touches. (It closed those centers in 2009.)

The Martha Stewart products are aimed at getting women who are already visiting the stores to buy more.

They are meant to spur spending across different categories, so a woman can buy paint, rugs and countertops that coordinate, increasing how much she spends for each visit.

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40% of companies who have used Groupon won't do it again …

February 1, 2011

TakeAway: Despite the craze over sites like Groupon and LivingSocial, many companies are finding it difficult to maintain sustained growth after using the site.

New research shows that the buzz these sites generate can’t make up for products that do not deliver a good value.

So perhaps the 40% of companies that wouldn’t use Groupon again should reevaluate their offerings.

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Excerpted from Bloomberg Businessweek, “What Groupon and LivingSocial Cannot Offer,” January 25, 2011

Last month,Amazon invested $175 million in the number two online coupon site LivingSocial. True to form, Amazon is already using the platform to create enormous buzz: last week, they announced a coupon: $10 for a $20 Amazon gift certificate. Within hours, the offer generated massive interest, giving LivingSocial one of their biggest growth days and selling over $10 million in Amazon gift cards …

LivingSocial is not the first to create a compelling coupon offer. That honor goes to the market leader, Groupon. …Now, thousands of companies are jumping on the latest trend trying to generate buzz for their products.

Putting aside whether coupon sites are sustainable, all this begs the question of the value of buzz and being a first mover.

The costs are clearly high, but companies with products that tend to generate early buzz seem to do very well. At least that is the conventional wisdom. But a new study shows that no amount of buzz, excitement or first mover’s advantage will lead a product to sustained growth.

The study … tested whether early buzz could precipitate a product’s ultimate success. Using an online music test site, researchers tested whether music that was highly praised early on would be downloaded more than songs with less buzz. True to form, results from an initial study demonstrated that buzz and social influence generated early adoption and the more a song was discussed, reviewed and downloaded, the more people wanted the song. Success begets success.

But then the research team took that data and dissected it further. When they did, a surprising result emerged: while social influence can give a product an early advantage, that edge is typically not sustainable. “Social cues could convince you to take a look … but didn’t necessarily make you go in the store and buy something.” …

In business, we too often forget that what we are selling is value: we instead try to sell technology, or packaging, or just plain vaporware. To add value, your technology needs to be productized, and to do that you need to offer unique value to a customer. Without a valuable and unique product, viral marketing, social influence and buzz will help initially but will be of no lasting consequence.

No surprise, this is what many companies are finding on sites like Groupon and LivingSocial. There has been a large backlash by companies stating that these sites just don’t work: they cost a lot of money and the initial pop in sales dissipates moments later. A Rice University study found that upwards of 40% of companies who have used Groupon say they wouldn’t do so again. …

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Does the Volt have enough power to cross the chasm?

January 31, 2011

TakeAway: Like many new, innovative products, there is an adoption chasm between the early adopters and the early majority.

While the new Chevy Volt has already demonstrated appeal to the early tech adopters, there are some issues that could spell trouble.

One, the short battery range doesn’t really offer a complete solution to eliminating the need for gasoline.

Two, once you have exhausted the battery, it’s just another car.  Until the battery technology improves, the “killer application” seems to be lacking.

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Excerpted from NPR, “Electric Cars Steal the Spotlight at Auto Show,” by Sonari Glinton, January 14, 2011

When the North American International Auto Show opens in Detroit on Friday, there’s going to be electricity in the air. …

… the star of the show is the Chevy Volt, the electric car with a backup gas engine. It won the top prize — the 2011 North American Car of the Year. …

GM has high hopes that the Volt will be adopted by a mainstream audience.

“Today a lot of our customers are early tech adopters — typically the first on the block to have an iPhone or an iPad,” says Tony DiSalle, the head of marketing for the Chevy Volt. He thinks those numbers will improve over time.

“The most important thing is to get consumers — mass-market consumers — to understand the benefits of the Volt,” DiSalle says.

GM expects to sell about 10,000 Volts this year. In 2012, the company will ramp up production to about 45,000 cars. But even that figure is small compared with the more than 2.2 million cars and trucks that GM’s four brands sold in 2010. …

One of the barriers to the adoption of the electric car is a phrase that keeps coming up at the auto show — range anxiety. Many of the cars on display can only travel under electric power for short ranges. Analysts say that until the big car companies can conquer consumer fears of running out of charge, electric vehicles will remain on the fringes.

“Look, the electrification of the American fleet is not going to happen overnight,” says Bob Lutz, who retired as vice chairman of GM in May.

… He says electrification will be a gradual process, predicting that it will take until 2025 for electric vehicles to account for 10 percent to 15 percent of the overall market. …

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Posted in Autos - Travel, Mktg - Crossing the Chasm, Mktg - Product & Innovation | Leave a Comment »

Does the Volt have enough power to cross the chasm?

January 31, 2011

TakeAway: Like many new, innovative products, there is an adoption chasm between the early adopters and the early majority.

While the new Chevy Volt has already demonstrated appeal to the early tech adopters, there are some issues that could spell trouble.

One, the short battery range doesn’t really offer a complete solution to eliminating the need for gasoline.

Two, once you have exhausted the battery, it’s just another car.  Until the battery technology improves, the “killer application” seems to be lacking.

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Excerpted from NPR, “Electric Cars Steal the Spotlight at Auto Show,” by Sonari Glinton, January 14, 2011

When the North American International Auto Show opens in Detroit on Friday, there’s going to be electricity in the air. …

… the star of the show is the Chevy Volt, the electric car with a backup gas engine. It won the top prize — the 2011 North American Car of the Year. …

GM has high hopes that the Volt will be adopted by a mainstream audience.

“Today a lot of our customers are early tech adopters — typically the first on the block to have an iPhone or an iPad,” says Tony DiSalle, the head of marketing for the Chevy Volt. He thinks those numbers will improve over time.

“The most important thing is to get consumers — mass-market consumers — to understand the benefits of the Volt,” DiSalle says.

GM expects to sell about 10,000 Volts this year. In 2012, the company will ramp up production to about 45,000 cars. But even that figure is small compared with the more than 2.2 million cars and trucks that GM’s four brands sold in 2010. …

One of the barriers to the adoption of the electric car is a phrase that keeps coming up at the auto show — range anxiety. Many of the cars on display can only travel under electric power for short ranges. Analysts say that until the big car companies can conquer consumer fears of running out of charge, electric vehicles will remain on the fringes.

“Look, the electrification of the American fleet is not going to happen overnight,” says Bob Lutz, who retired as vice chairman of GM in May.

… He says electrification will be a gradual process, predicting that it will take until 2025 for electric vehicles to account for 10 percent to 15 percent of the overall market. …

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Posted in Autos - Travel, Mktg - Crossing the Chasm, Mktg - Product & Innovation | Leave a Comment »

Best brands: It’s how you treat (not tweet) your customers …

January 30, 2011

TakeAway: Social media has increased the speed at which customers hear from their friends about good and bad experiences with companies.  In times of recession, low prices AND good customer experience are what’s needed to succeed.  People-centric industries, like retail and hotel, where there is more competition tend to spend more to create a good customer experience and find success in doing so.

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Excerpted from AdAge, “The Marketing Value of Customer Experience,” by Josh Bernoff, January 12, 2011

Customer experience is marketing. That is, in a world drenched in social word-of-mouth, the way you treat your customers — and the way they perceive you — makes all the difference in what they say to their friends.

…results from Customer Experience Index survey.

  • Only six percent of the brands were ranked as excellent… two-thirds were rated “okay” to “poor.” Eighteen percent were ranked as poor. …
  • Retail and hotel companies did the best; health insurance and TV service providers ranked worst. … The cost of great experience in the retail and hotel business is very high, they are people intensive businesses where it’s easy to fail. And yet the companies that succeed here succeed in part based on great service — because they compete. In health insurance and TV service, there is far less competition. 

The best performers overall were Borders, Barnes & Noble, Kohl’s, Costco, Amazon, JCPenney, Walgreens, Target, BJ’s Wholesale Club, and USAA (credit cards). …a great experience by itself doesn’t make up for an industry facing digital disruption. It’s also fascinating how many low-price providers are in the top ten,… . In a recession, providing low prices and an experience that’s better than people expect is a prescription for success.

… advertising is a lot cheaper and easier than changing… to focus on customer experience. … sure, you can keep hammering the message of how great you are, even if your customers think differently. … But in the end, people will find out the truth — and with social technology, that happens more easily every day.

Or, you could put your money and effort into improving the experience. That’s an effort that will take a couple of years, but with buyers coming back and seeking value as the recession lifts, you’ll attract the leaders. They’ll talk. You could end up like Zappos, where the customer word-of-mouth is most of the marketing. Or, you could just develop a customer experience that resonates with consumers, which is a whole lot easier to advertise.

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May I speak with the man of the house?

January 28, 2011

TakeAway: In line with its history of unusual marketing, P&G wants its new website to take advantage of an untapped marketing opportunity with the family man.  Its top rival Unilever took a raunchier approach in its Axe campaign, while P&G’s site focuses on what’s happening outside of the bedroom.

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Excerpted from NYTimes, “As the Web Turns” By Andrew Martin, January 12, 2011

The P&G site offers tips on grilling burgers, cleaning toilets and disciplining children. It promises, “We’ll make men out of you yet,” while also promoting Gillette razors, Head & Shoulders shampoo and other company products.

“What we are trying to do is speak to the whole man,” said Jeannie Tharrington, a spokeswoman for Procter & Gamble Productions. “Certainly, relationships and sex are part of an adult man’s life.”

More and more big companies have discovered the how-to genre as a marketing tool.  In the years since Beinggirl.com was created, Procter & Gamble has started several other lifestyle Web sites, including one that is directed at women, Homemadesimple.com. David Germano, the general manager of ManoftheHouse.com, said consumer data showed that 10 percent of the visitors to the women’s site were men.

ManoftheHouse.com has brought on several writers who had established father-focused blogs.  So are men drawn to a PG-rated Web site when so much R- and X-rated competition is out there? Procter & Gamble says that so far it is pleased with the number of visitors. The site was started in June, and by December it had topped a half a million monthly unique visitors.  By comparison, AskMen.com, a site with similar, if more titillating content, had 5.5 million unique visitors in December, according to comScore, the market research firm.

Jonah Disend, chief executive of the brand strategy firm Redscout, questioned whether ManoftheHouse.com would generate a big following. He said men tended to be more interested in specialized publications about a specific hobby or sport.

“Just because no one’s doing it doesn’t mean there’s a real market for it,” he said.

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If at first you don’t succeed, try, try, again … unless it’s not working, that is.

January 27, 2011

TakeAway: If what you’ve done in the past isn’t working, understanding why and communicating changes to consumers is imperative. 

But if what you are offering is not what the consumers want, no amount of restaging will solve the problem. 

It’s also important to understand where in the PLC your product is and what are the feasible alternatives for stretching maturity out as long as possible.

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Excerpted from AdAge, “Pantene set to try again to reverse slide,” by Jack Neff, January 17, 2011

After a second restage in three years failed to take hold with consumers last year, the Procter & Gamble Co. brand is preparing another course correction later this month for what remains the leading brand in U.S. and global hair care.

P&G believes it’s identified and will soon fix problems with the latest restage. … problems included consumers being more loyal to discontinued products (particularly two-in-one shampoo-conditioners) than the brand, and restrictive policies at Walmart that kept the brand from communicating changes to consumers…

But some say the problem goes deeper to the basic premise behind the restage. Traditionally hair-care products touted what they do for your hair — be it volumize, smooth or add shine. Pantene took a different approach — organizing into ranges based on hair types, not solutions.

One hopeful sign is that the midcourse correction following Pantene’s last restage, which included more readable packaging and more focus on value positioning vs. salon brands, ended a similar skid.

Even so, the restages and tweaks have engendered skepticism among analysts. Pantene may be facing consequences of line extensions that aimed to blunt advances by competitors leaving Pantene with a complex product lineup and growing distance from its “healthy, beautiful hair that shines” equity.

To be sure, the U.S. hair-care business has been brutal for big players and design firms beyond P&G — though the mass business did begin growing again last year after two years of decline. Unilever last year discontinued Sunsilk in the U.S. four years after its launch and little more than two years after a 2008 Super Bowl ad for the brand created by design firm Desgrippes Gobe (now BrandImage) and positioning specialist BrandThinkTank. L’Oréal Vive, launched in the 1990s, is hanging on in drug and grocery stores, but is off shelves at Walmart and Target.

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How do you say “M’m, m’m, good” in Chinese?

January 26, 2011

TakeAway: Campbell Soup wants to boost its business in China via a joint venture with the conglomerate Swire Pacific Ltd. to sell soup and broths.  Swire has been the company’s distribution partner in China, but with its varied business lines (it is also the largest Coca-Cola Co. distributor in China), Campbell can now access broad distribution channels in China.

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Excerpted from WSJ, “Campbell-Swire Venture To Market Soups In China” By Paul Ziobro, January 12, 2011

Campbell, which has slowly been building its business in the emerging markets of China and Russia, will control 60% of the joint venture, called Campbell Swire, which will launch early this year. The partnership will manufacture, distribute and market Campbell’s soups, broths and stocks in China. Profits and losses will be shared according to ownership.

Faced with slower growth in the U.S., food companies have focused on developing markets to inject growth into the business. China represents one of the biggest opportunities, with 1.3 billion consumers that have the spending power of the U.S. population, according to a recent PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP report. But challenges lurk in trying to develop enough scale to turn a profit and navigate a complex distribution network.

The arrangement has the potential of helping Campbell accelerate its growth there without having to pay most of the costs, although it is sacrificing some potential profits.

For Campbell, the prize in China is a demographic with one of the highest rates of per-capita soup consumption in the world, although most of it is homemade. Campbell says Chinese consumers have nearly 355 billion servings of soup a year.

Campbell will keep ownership of its brands and recipes, and license them to the joint venture.

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Wait a minute, you’re not a TV program … you’re a commercial.

January 25, 2011

TakeAway: With the proliferation of DVRs such as TiVo, building awareness for products and services through TV commercials is more challenging than it used to be.

To get viewers to stop skipping through the commercials, advertisers are starting to make commercials look like the shows they interrupt.

It’s tricky but effective.

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Excerpted from NPR, “‘Podbuster’ Ads, Calculated To Make You Hit Pause,” by Neda Ulabe, January 12, 2011

Call it smart advertising — or bad boundaries. You may have noticed a spike in the number of TV commercials designed to look and feel like whatever show you’re watching. They’re called podbusters, DVR busters or interstitial ads, and they’re designed to remove viewers’ fingers from the fast-forward button during blocks — or “pods” — of ads.

The advent of TiVo and similar devices can be thanked for the rise of the podbusters. About 40 percent of households have DVRs — meaning 40 percent of households can easily zip past commercials. Think of podbusters as speed bumps for ads.

Media consultant Dan Portnoy got caught while watching … the AMC drama Mad Men. That evening, he was speeding through the commercials as usual when he saw guys in ’60s fashions in a familiar-looking office, and he thought the program had started again. So he stopped fast-forwarding. What he saw looked like Mad Men. It sounded like Mad Men. But it was an ad for shampoo. …

He’d been caught by one kind of podbuster: a commercial that looks like the show. Bravo’s Top Chef employs a different variety: brief, vacuous outtakes from the real show, slotted in between commercials to make you think the program has started up again. …

There are other kinds of podbusters, too. Both Glee and 30 Rock are punctuated by commercials featuring actors from the shows. When you see Tina Fey in an American Express ad as it whizzes by on fast-forward, it’s easy to mistake it for 30 Rock — and so you stop to watch. …

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Messing with my brand … How dare you !

January 24, 2011

TakeAway: While some consumers balk at logo changes for aesthetic reasons, others react due to an emotional connection companies wanted to create in the first place. Companies involve consumers in what used to be regarded as internal corporate operations. Sometimes, you get what you ask for.

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Excerpted from The Economist, “Logoland: Why consumers balk at companies’ efforts to rebrand themselves” By Schumpeter, January 13, 2011

Starbucks wants to join the small club of companies that are so recognizable they can rely on nothing but a symbol: Nike and its swoosh; McDonald’s and its golden arches; Playboy and its bunny; Apple and its apple.

The danger is that it will join the much larger class of companies that have tried to change their logos only to be forced to backtrack by an electronic lynch mob.

The people who spend their lives creating new logos and brand names have a peculiar weakness for management drivel. Marka Hansen, Gap’s president for North America, defended the firm’s new logo (three letters and a little blue square) with a lot of guff about “our journey to make Gap more relevant to our customers”. The Arnell Group explained its $1m redesign of Pepsi’s logo with references to the “golden ratio” and “gravitational pull”, arguing that “going back-to-the-roots moves the brand forward as it changes the trajectory of the future”.

People have a passionate attachment to some brands. They do not merely buy clothes at Gap or coffee at Starbucks, but consider themselves to belong to “communities” defined by what they consume. A second reason is that the more choices people have, the more they seem to value the familiar.

The debate about logos reveals something interesting about power as well as passion. Much of the rage in the blogosphere is driven by a sense that “they” (the corporate stiffs) have changed something without consulting “us” (the people who really matter). This partly reflects a hunch that consumers have more power in an increasingly crowded market for goods. But it also reflects the sense that brands belong to everyone, not just to the corporations that nominally control them.

Edit by AMW

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Full Article:
http://www.economist.com/node/17900472?story_id=17900472&fsrc=rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+economist%2Ffull_print_edition+%28The+Economist%3A+Full+print+edition%29
 
 

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Posted in Mktg - Brandmarks & Logos, Mktg - Brands | Leave a Comment »

Starbucks Wants “In” in India

January 21, 2011

TakeAway: Starbucks unveiled an alliance Thursday with India’s flagship conglomerate, Tata Group, a wide-ranging company that owns everything from Jaguar cars to steel mills and tea plantations.  This move is designed to pave the way for retail locations and to sell more Indian coffee world-wide.  The alliance is with India’s Tata Coffee Ltd. unit, which owns the Eight O’Clock Coffee Co. in the U.S. and is a big coffee producer in India. 

Starbucks’s success will depend on its adaptability to local tastes, but plans to stick to its strategy of being a “third place” for young Indians. 

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Excerpted from WSJ, “Starbucks Brews Plan to Enter India” By Paul Beckett and Vibhuti Agarwal and Julie Jargon, January 14, 2011

India remains one of the big untapped markets for Starbucks.  Chairman Howard Schultz said India could one day rival China, where the company recently announced plans to more than triple the number of outlets to about 1,500 in five years.

Although known as a land of tea, India is also a major coffee exporter—the fifth-largest in the world, according to the USDA.  Indians have been flocking to coffee themselves as well. Overall domestic consumption rose to an estimated 94,400 metric tons in 2008, up almost 90% since 1998, according to Indian government figures. Much of that has been driven by quick-service, comfortable cafes that are Starbucks’s specialty.

Mr. Schultz said one of the reasons for the alliance is to raise the profile and use of Indian premium Arabica beans in Starbucks stores elsewhere. The first phase of the alliance involves sourcing and roasting beans.

The companies also are considering the opening of Starbucks outlets in Tata retail locations and hotels, Mr. Schultz said. Tata’s Taj hotels are among the most upscale in India and include the landmark Taj Mahal Palace & Tower besieged in the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks.

In recent years, many brands have been expanding as greater exposure to western culture has boosted their appeal among young people and a growing middle class. Starbucks had been looking for a partner in India since about 2007.

Some Indian consumers in New Delhi welcomed the prospect of Starbucks’s arrival, while others see it as a status symbol for the elite.

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Full Article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703583404576079593558838756.html?mod=dist_smartbrief
 


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Who’s controlling the purse strings? … Why, old Dad, of course.

January 20, 2011

TakeAway: As times change, more and more men are self-identifying themselves as the primary decision makers for the household and they don’t feel companies are doing a good job of targeting them? 

Know your audience and what is important and communicate that message in channels they will see. (NFL games perhaps?)

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Excerpted from AdAge, “Time to Rethink Your Message: Now the Cart Belongs to Daddy,” by Jack Neff, January 17, 2011

Mom is losing ground to Dad in the grocery aisle, with more than half of men now supposedly believing they control the shopping cart. The implications for many marketers may be as disruptive as many of the changes they’re facing in media.

… marketers of packaged goods … take solace in one thing — at least they could count on their core consumers being moms and reach them through often narrowly targeted cable TV, print and digital media.

But a study last year of 2,400 U.S. men ages 18 to 64 finds more than half identify themselves as the primary grocery shoppers in their households. …about six in 10 identifying themselves as their household’s decision maker on packaged goods, health, pet and clothing purchases. …only 22% to 24% of men felt advertising … speaks to them…

Recession has forced millions of men in construction, manufacturing… out of work and … into more domestic duties. At the same time, Gen X and millennial men in particular more likely to take an active role in parenting and household duties.

…any stigma once attached to men as shoppers is fading fast.

Behavioral research of shoppers shows a number more like 35% of grocery and mass-merchandise shoppers are now men…. That number has been growing thanks to the economy and changing gender roles, she said.

… the fact that a third of a brand’s shoppers are male is an awful lot to ignore. As a result, shopper-marketing efforts are increasingly gender-neutral rather than targeted for female shoppers,

Last year’s tear-jerking “Behind Every Olympic Athlete is an Olympic Mom” Winter Olympics ads for P&G created some resentment from dads, who still make up the vast majority of volunteer coaches for youth sports.

Perhaps favorably for marketers… men are more brand-loyal and less focused on promotions than women shoppers, Ms. Weinberg said. In advertising, they do more product research …because they’re often newer to the categories, prefer ads with more information.

There are more ads that speak to men,… But many …still portray [men] as hapless domestically, which doesn’t help marketers. “Men,” he said, “need to be something other than invisible or buffoons in advertising.”

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Full Article
http://adage.com/article?article_id=148252

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Posted in Mktg - Consumer Behavior | Leave a Comment »

Can you put my name on that M&M?

January 19, 2011

TakeAway: Fostering innovation for a decades old candy isn’t easy.

To come up with some new ideas, Mars implemented an innovation initiative.

The result – a new business unit making customized M&Ms.

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Excerpted from Bloomberg Businessweek, “How Mars Built a Business,” by Jessie Scanlon, December 28, 2009

“There is little reason for an individual to have a computer in their home,” Ken Olsen, the president and founder of the Digital Equipment, famously said in 1977. As Olsen’s quote suggests, predicting demand for new, innovative products and services can be difficult, in part because many of the traditional methods of market testing—using historical data to forecast sales, for instance, or asking customers in a focus group to compare a new product with an existing, competing one—aren’t well-suited to the innovation process

This was the dilemma that Dan Michael, then R&D director for Mars‘ M&Ms brand, faced in 2000. He and his research team at the advanced R&D lab in Hackettstown, N.J., had an idea: to make customizable M&Ms printed with the word or image of a customer’s choosing. …

… Michael and team needed to convince management there could be a market for customized candies. To do that, they had to reinvent the development process—and the role of marketing within it.

Mars had recently launched an innovation initiative called Pioneer Week. Select research teams were given a modest budget and 90 days to build a trial production line, after which the new product would be made available to Mars’ 65,000 employees. “The teams were allowed to bypass some of the testing normally associated with product development,” says Marc Meyer, a professor at Northeastern University’s College of Business in Boston, who has studied the company. …

The internal trial provided critical marketing feedback: The four-pound minimum order size was too big, and customers wanted colored candy and “party favor” packaging options.

Setting the price was another challenge. For the internal launch, the team chose $12 a pound, $4 more than the retail price for standard M&Ms. Since then, according to Cass, the price has changed four or five times. …

Ready to take it to the next level, the team began selling My M&Ms, as the custom candies are now known, to the public through a small link from the main M&M Web site in March 2004. Without any marketing blitz, sales took off. That’s also when the team began to do more serious customer research. …

In 2006, Mars’ My M&Ms experiment became a formal business unit called Mars Direct. …

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Full Article
http://www.businessweek.com/innovate/content/dec2009/id20091217_120646.htm

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Dial Puts Crystals in Your Laundry

January 18, 2011

TakeAway: Dial hit it big in 2009 with Purex Complete 3-in-1, which combines detergent, fabric softener and an antistatic treatment in a single laundry sheet. 

Now, for the new year, Dial is seeking to score a second success by bringing Purex Complete Crystals Softener to the United States.  The softener is in crystal form, meant to replace liquids and sheets.

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Excerpted from NYTimes, “Laundry Products Put Into Yet Another Form” By Stuart Elliott, January 5, 2011  

The product is being billed as “a purer way to get laundry that smells clean and fresh for weeks.” It is making its way this month onto the shelves of American grocery, drug and mass-merchandise stores, priced around $4 to $7 for a 28-ounce package that can be used for 32 loads of laundry.

The campaign will include, in addition to television and print advertising, discount coupons, online ads, ads in stores and an extensive presence in social media. For instance, a group of so-called mom bloggers, whom Dial describes as Purex Insiders, have received samples of Purex Complete Crystals to write about on their blogs.  To help sell consumers on the idea that Purex is more than just prosaic laundry products, the campaign for Purex Complete Crystals ends with a word, “Purextraordinary” that also appeared in the campaign to introduce the 3-in-1 laundry sheets.  “The idea is that there would be a brand story of continual innovation,” said Dan Fietsam, chief creative officer at Energy BBDO, “a substantial innovation story in a category that isn’t known for a lot of innovation.”  A commercial for Purex Complete Crystals plays up its distinctive differences, among them that the product is to be added to the washer with the laundry at the beginning of the wash cycle rather than placed in the dispenser for liquid softener.

“In this recession, we learned consumers are looking for value,” said Eric Schwartz, vice president for United States laundry care marketing at Dial, “but ‘value’ doesn’t mean just low price.”  The word “value” can also mean “products that work differently.”

Dial tested the laundry sheets under names besides Purex, in case consumers said they associated the brand only with lower-price mainstay products like liquid detergent.  But “we found our brand is more extendable than we expected,” Mr. Schwartz said, so 3-in-1 and Crystals are part of a new Purex Complete line.  It can cost less to market a new product under a familiar brand name than to try to make shoppers aware of a name they have not heard before.

Edit by AMW

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Full Article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/06/business/media/06adco.html?ref=media 

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Posted in Mktg - Brands, Mktg - Product & Innovation | Leave a Comment »

When it comes to Under Armour bet ‘over’ …

January 17, 2011

TakeAway: Under Armour started slowly, but wants “to be a legitimate number two [after Nike] in the basketball market, and that may take time.” 

To get there, CEO Plank focuses on a set of principles for success – “Passion,” “Vision” and “People.”  He also abides by what he calls the “four pillars of greatness:

  1. Build a great product
  2. Tell a great story
  3. Service the business
  4. Build a great team.

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Excerpted from Knowledge@Wharton, “Under Armour’s Kevin Plank: Creating ‘the Biggest, Baddest Brand on the Planet’” By Suzanne Vranica, January 5, 2011  

Plank says: “Great companies have to manage the cadence of what they do.  Every great brand is like a great story. Every commercial we run, every product we make, is like a chapter in that book. If we don’t manage the cadence, though, we will get too far ahead of ourselves.”

“Organic growth is happening everywhere,” Plank noted. “Our object cannot be to try to convince 25-year-olds to change brands, though that is always something good. But now 8-, 9- and 10-year-olds have a relationship with Under Armour [and say] it is their brand. I tell them that their great-great grandfather [bought products from] the guys from Germany [Adidas] and their grandfather grew up with the guys from Oregon [Nike]. But you will grow up with Under Armour.”  Accordingly, Plank has gone after young athletes to become the faces of Under Armour because they have great potential for marketing into the future.  Plank also likes his team young. He said the average age of his more than 3,000 employees is 32, “and we want to keep [the work environment] young and fresh.” Under Armour’s advertisements tend to include young athletes in action – competing in extreme sports “X Games” events, snowboarding, soccer, wall-climbing, ultimate fighting and beach volleyball.

Plank plans to solidify the company’s growth in the women’s sports apparel market, which he said now accounts for about 30% of sales. He is also looking to create more of a presence for the brand in Europe and Asia – an effort that will take time because the company has to break into the soccer and, to a lesser extent, basketball markets.

Under Armour’s advertising makes full use of two of Plank’s favorite slogans – often together: “We must protect this house” and “We will.”  Protecting the brand ensures consumer respect, and Plank believes the company must work hard to continually improve.  In fact, he says “we have not yet built our defining product at Under Armour. We are not living in the past. Our larger competitors are 20 times our size. There is running room all over.”

Edit by AMW

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Full Article:
http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=2665

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CPGs “Slim Down” with their Consumers

January 14, 2011

TakeAway: From PepsiCo to Kraft Foods to Campbell Soup Co., makers of some of America’s most well-known products are trimming the calories and content when it comes to package sizes. 

ConsumerReports.org listed examples of household and grocery products that have decreased in size, thanks to packaging shrinks, in part due to rising commodity and energy costs.

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Excerpted from Forbes CMO Network, “What? America’s Favorite Brands Are Slimming Down, Too?” By Elaine Wong, January 4, 2011

Häagen-Dazs’s ice cream container went from 16 to 14 ounces, a reduction of 12.5 percent. ConAgra Foods’ Hebrew National franks are now 11—not 12—ounces. Even household products are not immune: anti-chafing gel Lanacane is now 99 and not 113 grams (12.4% difference).  Kraft sliced the weight of its 2% Milk Singles and Fat Free Singles from 16 to 14.7 ounces last May.

Package shrink is not a new tactic to either the consumer or manufacturer (including private label companies).  Indeed, it has been going on for a while, most frequently during times when ingredient costs are soaring high. And calorie-conscious consumers, newly refreshed from their 2011 vows, might actually have something small to cheer about. After all, smaller amounts of product might, hopefully, lead to smaller waistlines. But in this day and age of social and digital media, when today’s cost-conscious consumer is much more smartly trained to detect such downsizes, even if unannounced, can such maneuvers actually hurt advertisers?

Robert Passikoff, CEO and founder of Brand Keys, a New York-based consultancy that specializes in brand engagement and loyalty, says most definitely yes. Social media’s prevalence and transparency aside, consumers, over the last two decades, have just become smarter shoppers, and such changes, even if subtle, aren’t likely to go unnoticed.  Consumers, especially in today’s tough economy, are more likely to balk if such increases get passed along in the form of price hikes.

Though most instances of package shrink happen stealthily, some marketers, such as PepsiCo, make it up by publicly announcing the changes to make sure consumers weren’t surprised. Such was the case when the company’s Tropicana brand announced that it was reducing the packaging on one of its most popular orange juice cartons by about 8 percent, in addition to raising the price, to cope with a severe citrus crop loss in March.

Regardless, some consumers are bound to complain as Consumer Reports found that some instances of package shrink were as high as 20 percent. Procter & Gamble’s Ivory dish detergent, which went from 30 to 20 ounces, was one.

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Full Article:
http://blogs.forbes.com/elainewong/2011/01/04/americas-favorite-brands-are-slimming-down-too/

 

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Posted in Mktg - Packaging, Mktg - Pricing | 1 Comment »

Madison Avenue’s Predictions for 2011 Ads

January 13, 2011

TakeAway: Ads have begun to make consumers work harder during the past few years.  More companies are incorporating technology into their marketing to make their promotions stand out and forcing consumers to engage with pitches in new ways.

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Excerpted from WSJ, “Ad Execs Gaze Into 2011 Crystal Ball” By Suzanne Vranica, January 3, 2010

Souped-Up Mobile Ads: As marketers spend more on mobile ads, experts predict the ads will start to contain more elements beyond basic images and text.  “The big thing in mobile ads this coming year will be the ability to directly buy products from within brand ads,” says Eric Litman, chief executive of Medialets Inc., a mobile-ad firm based in New York.

Virtual Product Demos: Companies increasingly will introduce products with technology that creates a virtual feel for a product—such as test-driving a car.

TV Apps: Marketers have blanketed Apple’s app store with branded mobile apps, from store finders to games. Charmin offers an app that lets consumers find clean restrooms. This year couch potatoes can expect branded applications to make their way to the TV.

Brands Get Fit: More marketers will look to sponsor lifestyle activities, such as running, triathlons and yoga. “Those sports tie to a macrotrend in individual consumers being focused on fitness and wellness,” says Kevin Adler, president of sports-marketing consulting firm Engage Marketing Inc. Going Long:

Over the past few years, shorter ads have risen in popularity as marketers trimmed their pitches to match consumers’ dwindling attention spans. But longer ads will make a comeback, thanks to new technologies, such as Internet enabled TV’s, Microsoft Corp.’s Xbox, Apple TV and interactive features coming from cable operators, says Alan Cohen, chief executive of the U.S operations of OMD, a media buying firm.  “Creative agencies will be developing deep, long-form content as consumers engage in marketers brands as they do their favorite TV shows,” he says.

Big Government:

The ad business has seen plenty of legislation and federal oversight, including the Federal Trade Commission’s recent call for the development of a “do not track” system that would enable consumers to avoid having their activities monitored online. There is more to come.  Look for a tougher hand in areas such as Internet privacy and food advertising directed to children. Getting Real:

Brands will be more honest and open about their products as companies seek to develop deeper relationships with consumers on sites such as Facebook, says Andrew Keller, CEO of Crispin Porter + Bogusky.

Ringing Up Jingles: Jingles—short songs used in commercials for decades—began to resurface last year, a trend that is expected to pick up steam this year. “Coming out of the Depression in the ’30s, happy music became very important,” says Susan Credle, U.S. chief creative office at Leo Burnett.Edit by AMW

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Full Article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204204004576050141843811676.html

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First, it was the artist formerly known as Prince. Now, it’s …

January 12, 2011

STARBUCKS !

Remember when Prince decided to chuck his name and start going by a symbol ? Many folks thought it a bizarre move.

Apparently Starbucks thought it was a stroke of brilliance.

The Seattle-based coffee giant unveiled a simpler logo (below) that no longer includes the green circle that says “Starbucks coffee.” The iconic mermaid inside the circle is now larger

The company says the move is preparatory to it becoming more of a consumer packaged-goods company.

“Even though we have been and always will be a coffee company and retailer, it’s possible we’ll have other products with our name on it and no coffee in it.”

Already, the move has generated some backlash.

Some folks have accused the company of arrogance for losing their name … others think the mermaid is sexist or sexy – a blade that cuts 2 ways.

[0105starbucks]

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704405704576063940765196656.html?mod=WSJ_hp_MIDDLENexttoWhatsNewsThird

Posted in Mktg - Brandmarks & Logos, Mktg - Brands | Leave a Comment »

Tata Auto asks: What if the bottom of the pyramid thinks cheap stuff is, well, cheap stuff?

January 11, 2011

TakeAway: India’s middle class is enormous but still relatively poor.

With the world’s cheapest car, the Nano, Tata Motors thought that large segment was finally accessible.

But Tata forgot that the Nano comes with more than a low price, it also comes with the stigma of driving the world’s cheapest car.

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Excerpted from Washington Post, “India’s Tata Nano, ‘the world’s cheapest car,’ struggles to move ahead,” by Emily Wax, January 3, 2011

When the Tata Nano – known as the world’s cheapest car – zipped out of factories in 2009, it was praised as an example of Indian innovation in cost-cutting. It quickly became a cult hit … [b]ut today, sales are so slow that the $2,200 Nano is barely seen on Indian roads. …

The podlike vehicle dubbed “the people’s car” has also suffered from … poor marketing and competition from a flood of slightly more expensive cars made by companies such as General Motors India and Maruti Suzuki. Those companies have launched aggressive campaigns aimed at India’s growing young families and call-center workers, with claims that their cars are better made and more reliable.

… the low sticker price, which was predicted to be Nano’s selling point … has also contributed to its downfall.

For India’s newly middle class, owning a car is the ultimate sign of status, and the Nano is synonymous with something cheap, said Ashish Masih, assistant editor of India’s edition of What Car? Magazine. …

Many of the top-selling automobiles fall into a sweet spot of under $7,000, industry experts say. …

… at the Nano factory in India’s western state of Gujarat, about 7,000 cars are parked in the open, and just 509 cars were sold from the plant to dealers in November, according to the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers.

The lagging interest in the Nano comes at a time when India’s auto industry as a whole is enjoying record sales, with a reported a 33 percent growth from April to October 2010, compared to the same period in 2009, according to a study by SIAM.

Tata Motors is trying to revive the Nano’s fortunes. Debasis Ray, head of corporate communications for the company, said it has launched a comprehensive marketing push and added a free four-year manufacturer’s warranty. …

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Full Article
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/03/AR2011010302721.html

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“It starts with the product …”

January 10, 2011

TakeAway: Consumers are still cash-strapped, but that hasn’t stopped Ford from selling more cars. The company’s sales were up 19% last month, and its year-to-date sales increased 21% versus the last year.  Ford’s secret?  “It all starts with product.”  Because without product, there’s nothing to market!

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Excerpted from Forbes, “Ford: How To Maintain A Sales Streak In Tough Times” By Elaine Wong, November 5, 2010

Ford’s VP of U.S. marketing, sales and service describes how Ford is tapping into social media and consumer trends toward vehicle customization, fuel efficiency and higher product quality to drive sales in an economic downturn.

Ford’s product development team has been focused on their four pillars – quality, green, safety and smart. The sales and marketing team  has done a lot of work to transform the image of Ford to being not just a company that makes the bestselling truck [F-Series] in America for 33 years or the Mustang, but a company that delivers products that are fun to drive.

Ford has a program called Drive One 4 UR School, where thousands of dealers help support local high schools, many of which are under a lot of financial stress. Fundraisers give people a chance to test drive new products. People aren’t naturally inclined to go to the dealer to get a new car when they go to a school event, but if they’re test driving it to help raise funds for their school and as part of a no-pressure environment, they may reconsider.

Ford is continuing its “rant” style of advertising when launching its new campaign for the F-150.  The ads cut through the clutter, have great recall among consumers and, if imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, more kinds of advertising with the “rant” style are being used in Iots of other commercials.

Edit by AMW

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Full Article:
http://www.forbes.com/2010/11/05/ford-sales-strategy-economy-social-media-elaine-wong-cmo-network_print.html

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Posted in Mktg - Product Line Mgnt, Mktg - Promotion | Leave a Comment »

Corn flakes, floating soap, disposable handkerchiefs, potato chips and …

January 5, 2011

TakeAway: Some of today’s most common products became hits because their manufacturers, or in many cases ordinary consumers, noticed unplanned uses for them.

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Excerpted from Forbes, “Inventions That Were Accidents” By Elaine Wong, December 23, 2010

They say that necessity is the mother of invention. But sometimes pure chance is.

  • Kellogg’s Corn Flakes came about when two brothers forgot to properly store wheat and then noticed that it came out as flakes when later processed. They soon applied the same procedure to other types of grain. 
  • Procter & Gamble, which started as a candle- and soap-making company, discovered by chance that its Ivory soap could be made to float – a quality that somehow communicated “clean” to consumers – when an employee left the mixture for it churning and went to lunch. Air seeped in, but the resulting cakes of soap were shipped out anyway. Americans loved the new, floating cleanser. 
  • Kleenex was originally developed for removing cold cream. Ernest Mahler, the head of research at Kimberly-Clark, had hay fever and started using the tissue as a disposable handkerchief. The consumer goods company then began advertising it as “the handkerchief you can throw away.” Sales doubled, and Kleenex went on to become, and remain, the world’s top facial tissue.
  • Sometimes, inventions arise in a moment of frustration or anger. That happened when George Crum, a restaurant cook, sliced up potatoes as thin as possible to serve to a customer displeased with the way his spud was cooked. The result was the world’s first potato chip.

Edit by AMW

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Full Article:
http://www.forbes.com/2010/12/23/ten-accidental-inventions-leadership-cmo-network-common.html

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Posted in Mktg - Product & Innovation | Leave a Comment »

Wanna be a CMO? … Then, start crafting your ‘mosaic’

January 4, 2011

TakeAway: One of the major trends among global top marketing talent is that the concept of traditional brand marketers is giving way to an emerging breed of “mosaic” marketers. 

The mosaic marketer may be someone who has worked in several international markets or across different marketing or functional disciplines such as classical brand management, customer/channel marketing, retail, luxury and customer relationship management.

Focus on the P&L…sound familiar, Advance Mark Strat guys?

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Excerpted from AdAge, “How to Become a CMO” By Marie Han Silloway, December 8, 2010  

Given this new reality, we believe there are seven critical competencies necessary for CMOs to succeed in this playing field:

1. Be a visionary, creative thinker
See what others don’t see, resulting in a stronger consumer and commercial proposition.

Example: When P&G launched one of their shampoo brands for women in China in the early 1990’s, the brand director was agile enough to launch single use sachets (trial size packages) in addition to regular bottles. They understood that female consumers holding down blue collar jobs in factories did not want to buy large amounts of shampoo. Typically, the factories had common shower facilities and they did not want to share their ‘good’ shampoo with others. Hence the sachets were not only affordable, but removed the embarrassment of refusing to share their nice shampoo.

2. Communicate effectively in and out of the region

Example: Dermot Boden, CMO of LG Electronics, is a 23-year veteran from the consumer healthcare world who’s worked across 20 countries, such as the U.K., the Philippines, U.S., Brazil  and Japan. LG wanted someone from a different industry, but with some Asia experience, and Dermot’s mandate was to work with the team to establish and elevate the marketing to world class levels. to shift the focus from product to consumer, and to lead the way to building a stronger relationship with consumers.  It was actually a huge change-management agenda requiring Dermot to understand the state of LG’s marketing across all of their global markets and know how to communicate effectively, respectfully and with finesse about raising the marketing bar.

3. Handle a complex portfolio across diverse markets
A diverse brand portfolio requires thoughtful investment strategies that take into account operational needs and restrictions of the market. As a result, the new breed of CMOs must be visionary but also able to balance innovation with commercial practicalities.

4. Focus on the P&L
Marketing will receive more and more operational and bottom line targets.

5. Be organizationally savvy
In a common pitfall, executives don’t invest enough time building “bridges” within the organization. In the field, it’s the relationships that lead to trust that will get you the test market you want or the focus that you need to make an initiative successful. At headquarters, it’s the relationship and trust that gets the budget approved or the KPI blessed.

6. Develop talent
The CMO needs to develop a culture that values talent and must know how to build a flexible team that can anticipate rapid market changes. Marketing is one of the hardest functions to develop competencies for because of the depth and breadth of strategy, innovation, lateral thinking and international perspective required.  In particular, exposure to international markets, growth markets, mature markets, religious and culturally diverse markets.

7. Speak another language
Some clients have recognized the role that Asia plays in leading innovation in certain categories and have built global R&D centers to drive innovation out of Asia in cosmetics, personal care products, food and beverage, apparel design and even sports such as Badminton.  Speaking the local language enables one to connect with the local market and teams in a way that no other can.

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Full Article:
http://adage.com/print?article_id=147510 

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Target Gets Fresh with Mommies

January 3, 2011

TakeAway: Target has been aggressively marketing its fresh food offerings this year in a major nationwide campaign, which includes direct mail, billboards, television, radio and vehicle wraps, among other elements.

The ads focus in part on the three daily meals that could be put together with a trip to the store, and the company hopes its efforts will resonate with mothers, who are a prime target of the campaign.

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Excerpted from NYTimes, “Shopping at Target?  Now You Can Pick Up a Dozen Eggs” By Tanzina Vega, December 16, 2010

While Target has carried snack foods like potato chips and soft drinks for years, the company has expanded to include fresh groceries like steak, chicken, eggs and apples. So far, 350 of the 1,752 Target stores nationwide have been reformatted to include the new food layout, and the company expects to add the arrangement to additional stores at the rate of about 400 a year.

While the fresh food offerings will include items similar to what a customer can find in a grocery store, “The concept is built around the notion of fill-in trips and convenience trips. There’s a real need for convenient and affordable grocery options.”

Target stocked fresh food items alongside local products like Turkey Hill ice cream, Ellio’s Pizza and Herr’s potato chips.

To market the concept, the company ran ads in local newspapers, used direct mail and placed door hangers on homes. It also used “guerrilla tactics,” like distributing 10,000 samples of produce on the streets of Philadelphia using branded bicycles and trucks with the Target bull’s-eye logo and “Get Fresh Philadelphia!” messages.

The look of the campaign incorporates Target’s bold red lettering against a white background with fruits and vegetables splashed across the layout.

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Full Article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/17/business/media/17adco.html?_r=2&ref=media

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Posted in Mktg - Consumer Behavior, Retailing | 1 Comment »

Food Trucks Serve Up Branding, Not Just Lunch

December 30, 2010

TakeAway:  Pairing a brand’s message with a food truck has been increasingly employed in recent months, with major advertisers using trucks as rolling sandwich boards while advertising agencies issue the call to independent food truck operators to participate in brand-sponsored events.

Food trucks have grown in popularity in major cities, and advertisers now see them as a vehicle for delivering their message directly to consumers.

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Excerpted from NYTimes, “Marketers Discover Trucks Can Deliver More Than Food” By Tanzina Vega, November 28, 2010

When the Heavenly Mountain Resort in Lake Tahoe, Nevada, wanted to promote its ski passes this season, it bypassed the usual advertising media like billboards, radio and print ads and instead chose a truck filled with snow cones driven by two improv actors to publicize its message.  For Heavenly, the idea to distribute snow cones from a truck was simple: “We’re going to give you a little bit of the mountain..”  

The challenge with buying traditional media is “paying for eyeballs of people who have no interest in what you’re trying to sell.”

But some brands prefer to create their own food truck instead of hiring an independent operator. To promote its new product, Heinz Dip & Squeeze Ketchup, the H.J. Heinz Company bought a used truck and added a custom kitchen. The truck was then branded with a custom wrapping that displayed the “Heinz Ketchup Road Trip” message along with the related Twitter handle and Facebook page address.  At each stop, visitors get a free serving of Ore-Ida crinkle cut fries or Ore-Ida sweet potato fries and a packet of the Dip & Squeeze Ketchup.  The company will also give away promotional T-shirts to people who have participated in one of the social media parts of the campaign.

Most food trucks, corporate or not, use social media tools like Twitter to post their location to their followers, and now Zagat, the restaurant guide, has gotten into the game. In early November, Zagat announced a food truck Web site that features a map with the location of the food trucks that it partners with. They are also conducting a survey of the best food trucks in New York.

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Full Article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/29/business/media/29truck.html?_r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=a210

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Pucker up with Nivea in Times Square for NYE

December 24, 2010

TakeAway: Surely there is no moment when more Americans lock lips than at midnight on Dec. 31, when a kiss marks the New Year, and that is why Nivea Lip Care ties its biggest marketing effort of the year to New Year’s Eve. 

Nivea is a natural fit as a sponsor, just as Waterford Crystal is for the crystal ball that descends on Times Square for the countdown.

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Excerpted from NYTimes, “For New Year’s Eve, the Tie-Ins Erupt” By Andrew Adam Newman, December 13, 2010

For the third consecutive year, Nivea is an official sponsor of the New Year’s Eve celebration in Times Square, and along with sponsoring a stage called the Nivea Kiss Platform, it will hand out about 30,000 samples of lip balm to revelers in the hours before the countdown.

“The brand is based on the insight that something wonderful happens when skin touches skin and humans connect, and the New Year’s Eve kiss sets the tone for the new year to come,” said Magnus Jonsson, vice president for marketing at Beiersdorf, parent company for Nivea.

This year, Nivea also is holding a contest on its Facebook page where couples in long-distance relationships vie for a chance to win a free trip to New York to be reunited in Times Square on New Year’s, with two couples who garner the most votes on Facebook winning.

Nearly as prominent as the ball are the numerals that light up to mark the dawning year, and Duracell is hoping to become similarly synonymous. For the third consecutive November, the brand set up what it calls the Duracell Power Lab in Times Square, which consists of four stationary bikes that when pedaled charge batteries that will subsequently be used to light the sign.  This year the bikes are housed in a trailer that for the rest of the year will be deployed to disaster areas, where it will provide charging stations for items including cellphones, laptops, and rechargeable batteries.  “We talk a lot about people trusting Duracell when it just has to work,” said its marketing director. When the numerals light up, “it’s that one iconic moment of the holiday season when millions of people are watching and it’s a great association for Duracell batteries being trusted in an important moment.”

The Times Square Alliance estimates that one million people attend the New Year’s Eve festivities. A Trylon Strategic Media Relations study commissioned by the group pegged the international audience at more than one billion.

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Full Article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/14/business/media/14adco.html?ref=media

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2010’s Most Memorable Product Launches

December 23, 2010

TakeAway: In today’s mass production age, so many new products hit the shelves that most go unnoticed.  Schneider Associates, a Boston-based public relations and market communications firm, compiles an annual list of the year’s most memorable new product launches.  Here are the top ten to keep in mind.

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Excerpted from Forbes, “The Most Memorable Product Launches Of 2010” By Elaine Wong, December 3, 2010

This year Apple came in first with the introduction of its iPad tablet computer. Forty-two percent of consumers named it as one of the products they most remembered out of the flurry of new launches that came between October 2009 and September 2010.

Tech brands overall had a heavy presence, with new introductions, such as Microsoft’s Windows 7 (No. 2), Motorola’s Droid smartphone release (No. 4) and Samsung’s 3-D TV (No. 8) among the most recalled new offerings on consumers’ minds this year.

Sales aside, a product launch that’s effortlessly recalled by the public proves that marketers – and their brands – have staying power. Plus, with about 250,000 new products launched globally each year, creating one that stands out can be pretty tough. Consider, too, that the typical failure rate of new product launches can be anywhere in the 85% to 95% range, according to Mintel.

Rolling out a product that appeals to an audience that uses social media to chat about new things can help make it a hit. That’s what Kimberly-Clark did when it rolled out Huggies Little Movers Jeans (No. 9) this year. This limited-edition offering is a diaper with a denim-like style. Mommy bloggers loved them.

For some marketers, thumbing a nose at conventional wisdom can work. KFC did this by ripping the bun off its fat-soaked Double Down sandwich (tied for No. 10). That’s two pieces of chicken – fried or grilled – serving as the one and only cover between an indulgent bacon, cheese and secret sauce center combo.

Food companies, on the other hand, tapped into recession-weary consumers’ hunger for quick, cheap eats. Among the hits: McDonald’s Real Fruit Smoothies (No. 5) and Mars’ Pretzel M&Ms (No. 3). The latter was a simple spin on an idea, but it satisfied Americans’ craving for a sweet, simple treat in an economic downturn.

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Full Article:
http://www.forbes.com/2010/12/03/most-memorable-products-leadership-cmo-network.html

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Posted in Mktg - Product & Innovation | Leave a Comment »

The Evolution of Focus Groups

December 22, 2010

TakeAway:  Arguing that focus groups were never really all that effective in the first place, agencies and research facilities have introduced a variety of methods aimed at shaking up the traditional focus group approach. 

Young & Laramore, an Indianapolis-based agency, frequently runs what the company president calls “friendship groups.”

That’s when the company will tap one consumer and ask that individual to recruit two or three others from his/her social circle. The assumption is that one is more likely to be comfortable in an experimental setting when with others in one’s social network.

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Excerpted from Forbes, “From Focus Groups to ‘Friend’ Groups” By Elaine Wong, November 19, 2010

In these situations, researchers can tell when participants are sharing “secrets with each other, you can catch them winking their eyes or exchanging signals with each other, and you dig into that and find out what’s up.”

Contrast that with the conventional focus group model, in which the scenario in question usually runs something like this: A packaged goods company, retailer or marketer, let’s say, asks an agency or research partner to recruit a panel of consumers with whom to test new products, packaging or ideas. These groups, which can range anywhere from six to 12 or more in number, then gather in a “sterile” room, as many agency execs describe it. A moderator then runs through a list of questions and records participants’ responses while researchers in the back room watch. Such procedures are routine, boring, not to mention long—one session can last 90 minutes—and yield few, if any, new insights.

One catalyst driving the push is the proliferation of social media mining tools, which allow companies to test and tweak new go-to-market strategies in real time and without the need for an actual focus group.

To avoid the typical, ho-hum answers, one company, The New England Consulting Group, uses a methodology called Super Groups, which involves finding the extreme, “lunatic fringes” of a consumer set. Talking to those who are not your average consumer ensures that you get not-so-average—and in some cases, off the chart—results. Several agency executives also brought up the idea of “conflict groups,” when “you recruit and mix people who love something [with] others who hate it or [bring together] passionate lovers of two different brands,” explains an Arnold executive.

Efficiency aside, the historical focus group also posed other problems. One is the gap between what people think and how they later act. Consumers may rationalize their shopping or buying behaviors, but emotion, rather than reason, is often a big driver of these decisions.

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Full Article:

http://blogs.forbes.com/elainewong/2010/11/19/from-focus-groups-to-friend-groups/

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Posted in Mktg - Consumer Behavior, Mktg - Market Research | Leave a Comment »

Profile: Just-in-Time Consumer

December 20, 2010

TakeAway:  The recent recession has left in its wake a deeply changed shopper: the just-in-time consumer. Manufacturers and retailers report that people are buying less, more frequently, and are determined to keep cash on hand. Executives peddling wares from canned goods to cashmere say the shift in consumption habits is prompting them to change how they produce, package, price and deliver their goods.

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Excerpted from WSJ, “The Just-in-Time Consumer” By Ellen Byron, November 23, 2010

So far, the impact of just-in-time buying on the corporate bottom line is mixed. Smaller unit sizes, for example, generally mean higher prices—and therefore higher profit margins for manufacturers.  Still, the phenomenon is so new it hasn’t shown up broadly in earnings. A Kimberly-Clark spokeswoman notes that potentially higher profits on smaller packages can be offset by higher manufacturing costs.

And companies are still reeling from lower sales volumes that began in 2008 with what some dub “pantry deloading.” Over the past two years, the number of items kept in American pantries has fallen about 20%, according to a recent survey. Consumers are also cutting back on the range of goods they stock.

The new shopping behavior is having a big effect on club stores, the ultimate pantry-filling destinations, which offer low prices but require bulk purchases. Some, including Costco and BJ’s, have reported increased shopping-trip frequency and decreased transaction sizes. To adjust, some discounters are rethinking their businesses. BJ’s began courting new customers two years ago to expand its membership, including smaller households and empty-nesters. It began shrinking its package sizes, in part to lure shoppers more interested in weekly purchases than monthly stock-ups. Now, the chain sells cartons of 18 eggs, instead of only five-dozen egg packages. It offers two containers of margarine of nearly two pounds each instead of only five-pound buckets.  The margarine change alone resulted in 46% more members who bought margarine.  BJ’s is trying to make its stores more attractive and change promoted items to encourage more frequent visits.

The changes at retail are often prompted by manufacturers. This summer, Del Monte began reducing the number of canned fruits and vegetables in multi-packs sold at club stores—and advising other retailers to reduce the number of cans required to qualify for a discount. The company realized consumers were more worried about overall cost, even if it meant a higher cost per can.

Just-in-time consumption is also disrupting long-established purchase cycles, including the annual back-to-school shopping ritual.  Shoppers of high-end discretionary products are shifting to just-in-time buying as well.

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Full Article:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704865704575610452319977706.html?mod=WSJ_business_LeftSecondHighlights

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Posted in Mktg - Consumer Behavior | Leave a Comment »

HTC builds a name, and profits for itself

December 17, 2010

TakeAway: In a short period of time, HTC has risen from a nameless contract manufacturer to the world’s market leader in Android phones.

With Android sales growing faster than iPhone sales, HTC is well-positioned to grow even more.

Such a position has given HTC more clout, and more profits than it could ever earn as a brandless company.

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Excerpted from Bloomberg Businessweek, “A Former No-Name from Taiwan Builds a Global Brand,” by Bruce Einhorn, October 28, 2010

… HTC, a brand virtually unknown in the U.S. two years ago, is the market leader in Android phones—the one segment of the market that’s growing faster than Apple’s iPhone. …

… with a market cap of 552 billion Taiwan dollars ($18 billion) the company is now the third-most-valuable Taiwanese technology company … HTC launched the first Android smartphone in 2008 … and has a 39 percent share of that market globally. Thanks to the success with Android … analysts expect sales to soar 78 percent this year, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That’s far better than rivals Apple, Nokia, Research In Motion, and Samsung Electronics. …

HTC is an unlikely Android leader. When the company got its start in 1997, it manufactured personal digital assistants for Compaq. HTC followed the tried-and-true Taiwanese outsourcing formula of designing and manufacturing gadgets for other companies without a brand name of its own. … In 2002 … Microsoft awarded HTC a contract to make smartphones, and the manufacturer quickly became the world’s top producer of Windows phones. …

Even as the Microsoft business was growing, [the CEO] worried that a brandless HTC would forever remain a low-margin manufacturer of commodity products. … In 2007, the year Apple … [HTC] decided to move away from the anonymous contract-manufacturing business. Last year, HTC spent $100 million on a fourth-quarter marketing blitz, and … will spend up to $400 million this year. The company is now the world’s fourth-largest smartphone manufacturer after Nokia, RIM, and Apple, according to IDC.

HTC’s rise to the top tier of handset makers has given it more clout with partners … [and] wireless operators are more willing than before to work with HTC on technology and marketing plans. …

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Full Article
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/10_45/b4202037166312.htm?chan=rss_topStories_ssi_5

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Posted in Mktg - Brands, Mktg - Product & Innovation | Leave a Comment »

Call centers aren’t just cost centers

December 16, 2010

TakeAway: Many consumers have effectively become unreachable to marketers.

Choosing not to receive email, direct mail or phone calls, businesses are looking for ways to connect with these customers.

Toward this end, many companies are re-orienting customer service call centers to do sales pitches.

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Excerpted from Advertising Age, “Why Marketers are Turning Call Centers into Profit Centers,” by Michael Bush, December 13, 2010

Next time you’re on the line with a call center complaining about a product not working properly, don’t be surprised if you’re not rushed off the phone in record speed. The interactions between consumers and call center reps are evolving from hurried griping sessions to extended sales pitches and consultation meetings.

In fact, more and more marketers are looking to turn their call centers into revenue generating centers, according to a new study by Portrait Software, a provider of customer interaction optimization software. A number of factors are driving this shift but none more significant than the challenge of reaching consumers when a growing number of them are opting out of direct mail and email and opting into do-not-call lists. The study shows that 69% of large business-to-consumer marketers view their call centers as “business critical revenue generators.”

Jeff Nicholson, VP of product marketing at Portrait Software, said … “If you take a deep look into the existing customer bases of many marketers one of the largest segments they have are the unreachables,” …

“These customers have opted out of email, unsubscribed or added their name to a do-not-call list. Considering what that does to the potential for increasing the customer lifetime value and the potential to reach out and retain customers it’s dramatic. But when you have people calling into your call centers, in some cases this can be your only opportunity to service that customer, cross-sell them or get them to un-opt out.” …

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Full Article
http://adage.com/article?article_id=147618

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Posted in Mktg - Customer Development | Leave a Comment »

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