General Motors Ad Trenders

In this article, Rob Medich explains the history of General Motors and obstacles that they have had to overcome with respect to internal and external factors. GM has used its marketing communication tools to stay at the top of effective advertising methods, sponsorships and other collaborations.

This article is meant to create awareness to people who do not know much about GM as a company. When you think of GM, you think of the recent troubles they have encountered in the past decade. GM is one of the oldest automobile manufactures and is still at the top of the industry. Dating back to 1934, when GM released their first Cadillac ads, they used their marketing tools to dig a niche and become known for making integrated marketing communication what it is today. GM is a great example of a company that changed with the times to stay relevant in its market by using resources, partnerships, sponsorships, and other IMC communication skills.
Rob Medich is the a graduate from Ohio State University and director of sales at Jive Software. He was also the account executive at SAP Americas and a stretegic manager at Mercury.

http://www.adweek.com/sa-article/marketing-machine-130646

Newspaper industry, learning to adapt

              In the article “Newspaper Website Audiences Up 20 Percent in Past Year. Online advertising increases too,” it shows how an industry must learn how to adapt to new times.  I have been to conferences about how the newspaper industry is failing because people are now getting their information via internet.  Newspaper publishers are now learning to adapt by utilizing what their target audience wants. 

                Today’s society is becoming very technological.  The newspaper industry has started using websites to post stories and the traffic on these websites has increased 20 percent in the past year.  This is a good way to show how things change quickly and to keep up with the competition one needs to see what the target audience wants and then adapt to it.  Research has shown that there is a monthly view of 110.4 million unique visitors.  This number is about 64 percept of all Internet users over the age of 18.

                Since newspaper websites have grown, so has advertising online.  When looking at newspaper advertising dollars, 14 percent make up web advertising through only the first half of 2011 whereas last year was 12 percent for the same time frame. 

                Everyone must change with the times and I think that it is a good idea to start including newspaper websites because physical newspapers are starting to become obsolete with the Internet so readily available.  The newspaper industry needs to search for new and creative ways to get their stories out into the public and I believe they are doing a good job by utilizing the Internet and the numbers are proving it.  I believe that many companies can learn a lot from this.  It is important to constantly be looking at what the target audience wants.  It is always changing and this is a major change for the newspaper industry.  Some other companies may not realize that things are changing until it is too late and their numbers are too far down. 

http://www.adweek.com/news/press/newspaper-website-audiences-20-percent-past-year-136038

Location-based Mobile Advertising, What's that?

Not only have people begun to use cell phones at an earlier age, but now more and more people have smart phones and iPhones – which give people access to the Internet at any time during the day. Marketers decided to take advantage of this and create advertising that can be sent to the consumer through their phone.

Using social media like Twitter, Foursquare, or Yelp is one way that LocalResponse can track you. Their company mainly delivers location-based ads primarily through Twitter by collecting data that’s “explicit” and “implicit.” This means that if someone is using a social media like Foursquare where they document their exact location, or if they are uploading pictures or mentioning a certain place in their tweets – they could receive ads based on where they are located. Basically if you are going to post your location on a public site, be ready to receive some LocalResponse ads.

The company totals around one billion check-ins a month. LocalResponse looks to expand their ads through other social media along with Twitter. Right now the system is very limited because it can only send ads to smart phone users with Twitter accounts. This is going to become a huge in the marketing world because in this generation people are constantly on “the go.” No one can stand to sit around and relax, everyone feels like they have to go, go, go. Cell phones and, better yet, smart phones have made this possible. They have connected society to their friends and to the internet wherever they are. Marketers realize that everything else is brought to a persons hand through their cell phone, so why not bring ads to them too? Take advantage of what your consumer is doing. If they are going document their location publicly then companies should take advantage and target those customers.

http://www.adweek.com/news/technology/location-based-mobile-advertising-real-135758

New Trends In Digital Advertising

 

This article featured in Adweek discusses different trends in online marketing. The article breaks up many online trends into categories. Online marketers always have difficulty in trying to break through clutter. New technology has formed and marketers are trying to find the most effective way to get their message absorbed by consumers. millions of dollars will be put in online marketing with that number skyrocketing every day.

The first trend is the usage of click-through advertisements. Adweek believes that click-through advertisements will finally come to end. It is very difficult to measure the success of a click-through advertisement. There are now programs to measure how long people view the Ad before they click-through. When that information comes through and sees potential customers are not viewing the Ad for a very long time companies will stop running click-through Ads. I agree with Adweek's rationale because I find click-through Ads very ineffective. I typically click-through right away and find them very annoying.

The next trend brought up in the article is the switch from desktop computers to mobile devices such as tablets and smart phones. With the emergence of the tablet and mobile phones providing internet services companies will be trying to feature new ways to market consumers. Adweek discusses Apple's new systems OSX and iOS, they believe these two systems will help in marketing. They believe this software will emerge as the leading form of online marketing. It is interesting to see how the development of technology will affect marketers. As a marketing major it is important that you get a grip of this new technology and understand what you are trying to accomplish. By the time I graduate there will be something completely different than OSX and iOS.

Another interesting trend is the downfall of Adobe Flash and the upgrade to HTML5. Apple refused to use Adobe Flash and decided to use HTML5 instead. Many games and other applications will now be using HTML5 which means there will be more advertising on that program rather than Adobe. I personally do not have an iPad so I have not used HTML5, I am curious to what the differences are.

Probably the most interesting trend is the use SuperCookies. SuperCookies allows marketers to view what is being viewed on their sites. This makes it much easier to market to the customer because you have a pretty good idea on what they are interested in by what they view. Adweek said websites like Hulu and MSN.com have apologized for using SuperCookies to “spy” on web browsers. Web viewers feel that websites like Hulu and MSN.com are disgraceful for doing this while they visit their sites. Many websites are fearful that this will cause less hits to their website, but there is not enough fear to stop the usage of SuperCookies. It is perfectly legal to obtain this information and the risks far exceed the rewards. As a marketer I think the use of SuperCookies is great. Being able to personalize your customers by what they are interested will be much more effective. As a consumer I have mixed feelings, on one hand I feel like I am a citizen in the book 1984 where “big brother” is constantly watching my every move. On the other hand, having personalized Ads that I am interested would be beneficial. I am very interested in snowboarding and if I get the latest information about Burton's new board because of SuperCookies I wouldn't be unhappy.

http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/trends-digital-advertising-135805

Who Actually uses FourSquare?

Chances are most of you haven't created a Foursquare account or even taken the time to check out what the site has to offer.  What many people have yet to figure out is that Foursquare is the ideal social media tool for integrated marketing communications.
Foursquare is a social media site that allows people to check into whatever location they are at and write a blurb about their experience.  Other people can also see who has checked into the same place as them and who may be using the app at the same time at the same place. For marketers, this is the perfect tool to understand just who their target audience is. Not only can marketers see who is visiting their place of business, they can also see what peoples' experience was, customers' demo/psychographics, when customers are checking in, what they look like, who is visiting their competitors' and why. All of these tools have been fit into one simple website.
Foursquare not only benefits the marketers, but even greater it can benefit the user. As a user checks into more and more places Foursquare gets to know the person and their interests. Eventually, as the site grows, marketers will be able to offer coupons to fit every individual's interest. If a person checks into the gym often, Foursquare can offer a coupon to the local health store. The effectiveness of the coupon can be measured by how many people checked into that health store who received the coupon.
This is a completely untapped marketing tool, that within the next few years will likely be as big as Facebook or Twitter.

This is how Synectics Media in Detroit is using Foursquare to help understand their audience.

As you can see, a majority of their customers are female, between the age of 18 to 25. They usually check in around noon. Understanding their customers will help them in the future to market to a more specific audience.

Beer: An Advertising Crisis

As reported by Advertising Age, beer sales are declining and the future doesn't look promising unless the beer industry finds a way to out-market the spirits category.

In a National Beer Wholesalers Association conference this week, MillerCoors CEO Tom Long suggested that the decline in sales against spirits - Absolute Vodka, Grey Goose, etc - is due to a lack of focus in advertising for beer.

"Spirits advertising has been praised by lots of folks and I think rightly for its ability to connect with its target," Long said. "Look at Grey Goose, this brand was created right out of thin air. French Vodka? Who would have thought such a thing? But with a relentless sales effort and clear positioning, they created a whole new price tier in vodka and Grey Goose took flight."

The article presents an interesting point about beer advertising.

Brewers seem to coincide that the industry needs a reboot, a new advertising strategy that focuses on delivering a clear message about the benefits and features of beer and less about the jokes.

It's fair to say that most beer ads for TV have a humorous appeal that aims to create a memorable image for viewers to remember. However, brands like Coors Light and Budweiser don't seem to communicate their brand equity as well as Heineken does. Like Heineken's marketing strategy, beer ads should focus less on being funny and more about emphasizing the taste and ingredients of their beer; perhaps, associating their brands with socializing and having fun without being too funny that people only remember the joke and not the product.

Sickweather is in the forecast

A new kind of 'social network' is seeking to capitalize on the cold/flu-ridden.

Sickweather is startup business that both tracks diseases and functions as a social network. This network scans various social media sites, such as Facebook and Twitter, and looks for illnesses that could be affecting those in your community. Adweek has referred to this as "social media for hypochondriacs" due to its ability to detect and filter real time updates of people reporting illnesses.

Using algorithm technologies, this system compares the real time data against other sources, including its own online community (in which you actively participate in by signing up with a login and password and contribute to their database) and creates "maps" of sickness to alert users of their potential risks.

The system claims to be able to track everything from simple colds to chronic illnesses, and even depression. This tool allows the worrisome to check on the health of their friends and families at any time (permitting that they update their status via Sickweather).

What's interesting about this hybrid social media is how it plans to make money as a startup business. It's hoping to earn revenue by strategically placing ads on health sites, targeted to "suburban moms, business travelers and others who actively dodge illness" who may use this tool. This symptom-targeted advertising also plans on hosting healthcare providers on its own site.

Since this is a startup business their IMC approach is different. They haven't yet become established enough to fully utilize all outlets of strategic marketing communications. However, what they do have going for them is their use of certain outlets to hit a specific target audience. They're positioning themselves to be specialized in a field where there are a lot of health-alert sites and social media platforms. But instead of just being a source of information, they're a business. And they are using other publications (like Adweek) and news releases to promote themselves.

Overall, Sickweather's strategies are still pretty pliable. They seem to be in the trial stages of their development, but with any luck, they may get featured in ad space on online healthcare sites and begin to profit from the hypochondriac market.

Photo credit: http://news.discovery.com/infectious-diseases/

Integration is the Whole Picture

This article discusses a wine company out of Australia that has designed a new labeling system for their bottles of wine. Instead of displaying a simple logo on the bottle, they are incorporating the process of creating the wine on the bottles. The images show the different grapes that are used for each type of wine "Between Five Bells" wine harvests. The consumers can see the processes the winery had to go through to create each type of wine. This information lets consumers know what their wine is going to taste like before they purchase it.

This is a great marketing idea for the company. Adding this feature to the label increases the marketing mix for "Between Five Bells" wine. By letting consumers know the process their product has gone through on the label, it increases the credibility of the company through the packaging method. This offers an appeal to the audience, allowing them to feel cared about, and involved in the buying process more directly.

Consumers want quality in their products and by giving them the opportunity to see their products history it allows them to put a value to the product. Consumers will see the duration of the wine process and realize that this correlates to the expensive price of the wine that the company is selling it for. They can judge how prestigious the grapes that were used to create each type of wine are and then form an opinion about the company.

Place is also considered as individuals will know through the location of where the wine was chosen from, how good the wine is. Since the consumer can see where and how the wine was processed, they can develop an image for the company.

Promotion is another key factor in the marketing mix. By allowing the consumer to see the contents of the wine before they purchase it will create a positive image in the customers mind about the business and they will be more inclined to purchase the product because they know what the contents of the bottle are.

If I were the consumer of this wine, I would be more apt to purchase this product. Knowing the process this wine has gone through gives me comfort and helps me to believe this company cares about its consumers and wants them to know more about their wine. By having a company care about its customers, makes the customer feel appreciated and special which also helps increase a positive brand image.

Going the extra mile in the marketing department allows companies to increase a positive image of their company in the minds of consumers. This integration of material dealing with the creative wine labels, helps consumers become engaged in the process of purchasing. More consumers equals a larger customer database which means higher sales. Take the extra step and the rewards will be worth it.

link: http://www.adweek.com/adfreak/australian-wine-uses-infographics-its-bottle-labels-135674