Wine in Australia

So here goes another of my old presentations. This was a presentation for my International Business Course in the beginning of my MBA. Just thought I’d share this with the rest of you all.

Coca Cola Facebook Strategy

I was going through some old files (Laptop Housekeeping) and stumbled across this old presentation I made for my consumer behavior class.

Red Bull Gives You Wings

I #LOVE Red Bull’s marketing campaigns. Everything they communicate, everything they put out there can be tied to one central idea. be it dumping empty Red Bull cans outside prominent parties as a guerrilla marketing tactic or being associated with every adrenaline spiking, heart thumping, ‘Energy‘ based activity. (More on their marketing strategy here.)

I saw this commercial online and fell in love with it. It is minimalistic – no body is shouting at me to buy this product. It is encompassing – I almost felt a spike in adrenaline watching this ad and imagining being there.

Whoever worked on this commercial. You have my respect!!!!!!!!

Brands and Social Media Carelessness – The Nissan Example

Social Media channels have a ‘delete’ button. Does that mean Brands use the delete button and go through as many iterations as possible to get the right message across?

The ability to ‘delete’ mistakes does not imply the freedom to make mistakes.

Lets say a company posts about their latest campaign and misspells a word changing the meaning altogether. Should the company then apologize and correct or ‘delete’ the mistake hoping nobody noticed.

What about if a consumer notices the mistake by the brand and tries to correct it. what is the right thing to do? should the brand delete the mistake and the comment on it and start as if it was a new baby diaper or should it acknowledge the suggestion by the consumer at some level?

Nissan Canada launched a ‘Rear-Seat comfort concept‘ and were promoting it through their digital channels.

This was their post on January 25th 2012, 9:28 AM. My comment 59 minutes later (10:27 AM).

Now I love this brand and thought I’d let them know about this. this post slipped my mind after that day and life got busy. I noticed this picture today when I was cleaning out my desktop and decided to see what Nissan had done about this. I was intrigued as I did not receive any notifications or even a simple ‘Thank you’. A free car would have been nice too but I was just expecting acknowledgement.

This is the post on their page now, revised, without a blink.

Question:

How should brands react if their social media campaigns give the exact opposite message that needs to be conveyed? Should they be ‘Delete-Button-Happy” and get their message across in iterations?

When Brands spend millions of dollars and thousands of man-hours proof reading their statements, TV and print campaigns - Why should social media be delegated to an intern high on caffeine with a smart phone and knowledge of the Delete Button?

Would Nissan’s management be OK if this mistake was in their print ads any leading national newspaper?

Would the Board be happy to hear this mistake being said out loud in their commercials?

What about their billboards?

If they think these would’ve been a nightmare and would never happen because of quality control, Why does it happen in Social Media?

Balzac’s Coffee

Ever since man discovered coffee beans, he has tried his best to improve the concoction. If you are in Toronto and crave for the perfect cup of coffee with the perfect ambiance to enjoy it in, you must find yourself in Balzac’s Coffee in the distillery district.

How good is their coffee you ask? It is so good that I doubt if they drank this instead of wine during the last supper. So good that I fear it might start a war between countries that have it and countries that don’t. It is so good that I wonder if Starbucks Management have surveillance on Balzac to track its success. I swear I saw some shifty eyes and some camera’s the last time I went there.

As an MBA (Marketing) student, I have been taught to observe the intricate aspects of the experience that defines the brand. So What defines Balzac’s Cafe?

First it is the smell. Regulars at the Distillery district would often find a full-grown man floating in the air drawn to the smell of perfectly roasted and brewed coffee. I swear I feel a couple of pounds lighter every time I smell the heavenly aroma.

And then you step into the café to be transformed into another era. Right from the decades old posters to the antique coffee grinders to the chalkboard menu – everything screams of the perfect getaway café. My perfect spot in the Distillery District café is upstairs on the landing – cut off from the first floor overlooking the ground floor, it is the perfect place for coffee and people watching.

It is a shame that its market awareness is bordering dangerously low. It is frequented by people with offices in the distillery district and some tourists who stumble across the café looking for a cup of java. It is not an alternative to Tim Hortons or Starbucks.

Balzac is a Destination Brand

Balzac’s Cafe operates in a whole different league and should be branded as a destination brand. People travel miles for a Tiffany’s store or even the 360 restaurant on CN tower for the experience and the destination. Balzac has the potential to be a destination coffee café but it needs more market awareness. Can’t wait for the new stores in downtown Toronto.

Their recent influx of marketing for this great chain has been due to its pitch in Dragons Den on CBC.

You can find the video of the pitch here.

I do believe that there are good times ahead for my favorite café with Diana Olson working with Arlene Dickinson of Venture Communications & Bruce Croxon of Lavalife. I would love to see Balzac’s being transformed into a destination brand for its customers to look forward to.

Balzac’s need to have their marketing strategy defined and in place. Everyone wants to be associated with a café with heritage. Starbucks has been well-known to pull off some of the best media campaigns (I’ve written about it in my earlier posts – 1, 2.) to create awareness – not that it needs any, and to attract new customers who would one day become loyal brand advocates.

With the budget constraints of a small operation (Balzac’s sale are $ 3.2million), it would be wise to design an integrated marketing campaign that uses social media to create a buzz around the destination and follows it up with some in-store campaigns. I am sure that once consumers visit the store they would become repeat customers. The question is how do we create awareness to drive people to Balzac’s Coffee Roasters?

Superbowl 2012 Commercials – Budweiser has the Lead

One of the best commercials are those that elicit an emotion from the viewer. This campaign by Budweiser does just that.

Brings emotions, creates communities and advocates. Whoever worked on this, I salute thee.

10 Great Magazine Ads That Don’t Just Sit There Looking Pretty

<This is a re-post of a great post on adweek. No commercial intentions behind it.>

1

Hit the front end of the Peugot on the opening page, and an actual airbag inflates on the spread inside. Ad agency Loducca made 50,000 of these things for a Brazilian magazine.

The Talking Ad2

QR codes got dictators talking in a recent print ads from the free-press advocacy group Reporters Without Borders. You scan the QR code with your iPhone, then place the phone over the leader’s mouth. The mouth starts talking—but it’s the voice of a journalist discussing media censorship in that country.

The Solar-Powered Ad3

This print ad promoted green energy by being solar-powered itself. In the magazine, it’s just a black-and-white sketch. But held up to sunlight, it blossoms into full color.

The Bottle-Opener Ad4

Follow the instructions on this ad, and you can use the flimsy piece of paper to open a bottle of Carlsberg. Useful!

The Edible Ad5

Volkswagen cooked up a lovely little ad you can eat, and placed it inAuto Trader magazine. The ingredients are listed on the side as “glutinous rice flour, water, salt, propylene glycol, FD&C colour, glycerine.” OK, kind of gross.

The Bra-Tightening Ad6

This Wonderbra ad lets you do a little imprompu boob cinching—a nice little pick-me-up when you’re in the middle of a boring article.

The Bubble-Gum Ad7

Simple and fun.

The Test-Drive Ad8

This Norwegian ad for Volkswagen showed a long stretch of road (in summer and winter versions) and told readers to download an app that lets you “drive” a car on the road by hovering your iPhone over it. You could test three different features of the vehicle—lane assist, adaptive lights and cruise control.

The Sunbather’s Ad9

Just what you need—a suntan-lotion ad that comes with a handy way to completely cook your face off.

The Sticky Ad10

A fertility clinic in Australia placed an ad in FHM that caused the magazine’s pages to stick together. When unstuck, the pages revealed a woman posing in lingerie, along with the line, “Don’t waste your sperm.” The message being—donate it at the Repromed fertility clinic instead.

Positioning with Social Media

A successful positioning strategy is critical to creating a successful brand. The attempt is to understand how organizations position & adapt to the social media landscape. The lens of a strategist views Social Media positioning as a key business driver whereas a marketer embraces it as an enabler of communication. Positioning is the backbone of strategy formulation in organizations. The rules of old media were based on fact checking and attribution. Social media is the mechanism that tempers opinions in the networked world, feeds rumors, innuendo, facts and fiction. As marketing strategists our primary objective is to influence the chain from awareness to advocacy. In the hands of a strategy-focused organization, social media becomes business tools and processes to enable collaboration among employees, partners, and customers.

Social Media has changed the rules of engagement for marketing. The Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning have evolved beyond boundaries and demographics. The boundary between organizations and consumers is on the verge of extinction and the new format of marketing – People to People is evolving. Organizations are expected to position themselves close to their consumers and engage them to earn consumer loyalty.

Segmentation rules are governed by attitudes, opinions, behaviour, interest and values. The understanding of tribal characteristics is critical to find customers. The changing landscape brings to light intricate consumer behavior and calls for a revised marketing funnel.

The rules of Engagement become more intricate where customer engagement is the determining factor for sustainability. Brands strive to innovate and occupy consumer mindscape to sustain for centuries. Managing consumer’s voice/ motions/ grievances/ opinions/ perceptions/ biases play a role in brand longevity.

Marketing Funnel Metaphor for centuries has been marketer’s guide to understand purchasing behavior starting with large number of brand narrowing down to a consideration followed by a decision. The new consumer journey shows that consumers add or subtract and the decision is based on long term association. Consumer is interested in open ended relationship and sharing of experiences.

Importance of Social Media Positioning: The growth of Social Media is directly proportional to growth of internet and convergence of applications. Increasingly relationships, opinions, communications and commerce are moving online overcoming the limitations of physical world. Individual and consumer have a new voice via blogs, Social Media networking, podcasts and other tools which enables them to become the ambassadors or the critiques of the brand and have a huge impact.

Self-Propelling Traits of Social Media Positioning

• Social Media is a self-correcting mass medium and cannot be controlled but can only be influenced. As we know marketers are uncomfortable to cede control. Then we have viral communication based on C2C communication creating online consumer opinions
• Social Media is permeating all forms of communication and business
• Content is crucial to survival. Consumer will lose interest if the message is not communicated with clarity
• Real time information. Social Media crosses the limitations imposed by time and location
• Application spans across industries and entire part of value chain. Whether it is design, manufacturing or retail there are ways in which Social Media can create a difference
• Social Media has capabilities for one person to communicate globally about products

Social Media Positioning myths: Old school thought brings fear and wow-factor towards Social Media. Never exposed to the speed of change they fear they will lose control of brand. Part of this is driven by lack of knowledge and suspicions on social loafing among employees. The managers must learn to shape discussions that are consistent with objectives defined by corporate strategy. The secret is to engage the targeted consumers actively, positioning the brand to create engagement and tribes while consistently converting them to brand ambassadors.

Our presentation on the positioning with social media is here.

Facebook’s Branding Challenge

Facebook’s Challenge in Branding – by Interbrand

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The ROI of Smart Brand Management

Harnessing the power of digital systems for a stronger brand – A study by Interbrand

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