Marcom this week: From A to zinc – 3/4/11 edition

Although Charlie Sheen’s rants made more than enough headlines this week, marketers managed to squeeze in a few of their own. From the announcement of Apple’s iPad 2 to the latest research on what consumers want from brands online, here is a look at what happened this week in the integrated marketing communications industry.

iPad 2 raises the bar for marketers
In case you missed it, Apple announced its next-generation iPad on Wednesday. The lighter, thinner, faster tablet arrives March 11 with a price tag of $499 for the 18GB Wi-Fi version. More important than its new software and front- and rear-facing cameras is the fact that the iPad 2 is driving the post-PC conversation forward at full speed. Just a day after Apple’s announcement, Gartner lowered its growth forecast for worldwide PC shipments in 2011. Looks like the iPad is well on its way to bridging the gap between laptops and tablets, which means it’s time for marketers – who haven’t done much to test the tablet waters – to take notice. Faster browsing means a host of new apps are probably already in development. However, if PC alternatives are the future, then how do marketers get on board in a meaningful way?

For brands, it’s all about being "liked"
Take note marketers: consumers want to hear from you when online – if you’re offering discounts. This is the latest finding of a new Ad Age/Ipsos Observer survey of digital-media habits. Facebook was a clear winner, with 41 percent of respondents preferring to receive communication from marketers via this platform. The runner up was Twitter, which received 18 percent of the vote. Coupons are the most sought-after item, with 65 percent of respondents hunting for online discounts. In fact, for most respondents, this was the reason why they “liked” a brand on Facebook. Not surprisingly, only 22 percent of respondents cared about customer news, a reminder that pushing self-promoting content won’t win a brand many friends.

Taco Bell: Where’s the beef?
This week, Taco Bell debuted a series of commercials in response to a lawsuit claiming its beef isn’t beefy enough. According to the ads, Taco Bell’s beef is comprised of 88 percent premium ground beef and 12 percent signature recipe. Viewers are encouraged to visit the fast-food chain’s website to view the entire ingredients list. Overall, the ads aren’t very interesting. We probably would’ve dismissed them with a shrug had it not been for the commercial’s inopportune airing on Sunday evening during a repeat of Fox’s new animated series, "Bob’s Burgers." Titled “Human Flesh,” the episode is about a misunderstanding surrounding the beef content of Bob’s Burgers signature hamburgers. (Sound familiar?) The first ad to air during the commercial break? Taco Bell, of course. Bad timing for the brand, and a big “oops” for Fox.



Marcom This Week: From A to Zinc is compiled by the Vitamin IMC editorial team. They can be reached at vitaminimc@gmail.com. Miss your vitamins last week? Visit the “Marcom this Week” archive.

Marcom this week: From A to zinc – 1/27/11 edition

From social networks' expanded ad offerings to celebrity endorsement ads for the Super Bowl, here is a look at what made headlines this week in the integrated marketing communications industry.

Social networks expand ad offerings
Facebook made a move this week to provide more social context for advertisements through Sponsored Stories. The Sponsored Stories format ditches the days of stock promotional copy and serves ads based on user interactions with a brand. The ads leverage the power a personal network has on purchase decisions by pulling content from a user’s feed to display on their friend’s page. Research shows that contextually targeted ads are more relevant to users, which increases ad effectiveness. Sounds like it will be a win-win for Facebook’s advertisers and users.

LinkedIn also beefed up its display ad offering, announcing many new features, including expanded targeting that enables advertisers to serve ads based on age, location, job title, and seniority. The expanded features were launched in an effort to improve LinkedIn's ad effectiveness and increase its share of revenue from display advertising.

With rumors swirling around impending initial public offerings, both social networking giants are finding more and more ways to monetize their sites. What do you think will be next?

Edelman Trust Barometer®: Trust across all U.S. institutions declines
According to the 2011 Edelman Trust Barometer survey, the U.S. is the only country to see trust in business and government decline. This statistic is not surprising following years of financial crisis and corporate scandal. To build trust, President and CEO Richard Edelman recommends corporations adopt a new trust architecture built on profits with a purpose, transparency in reporting, and multi-channel/multi-communicator engagement.




Super Bowl update: Celebrity endorsements all the rage
The Super Bowl is synonymous with attention-getting, low-relevance advertisements. A couple of weeks ago Vitamin IMC reported that the 2010 Celebrity Advertisements study found that celebrity ads performed below (or on par) with other advertisements. Despite these findings, advertisers continue to sign on hot (and expensive) celebrity personalities to push their product during the big game. A few noteworthy pairings include Kim Kardashian for Sketchers and Justin Bieber for Best Buy. And don’t forget about the yet-to-be-revealed mystery celeb for GoDaddy.

Marcom this week: From A to zinc is compiled by the Vitamin IMC editorial team. They can be reached at vitaminimc@gmail.com. Miss your vitamins last week? Visit January 21's “Marcom This Week.”

Marcom this week: From A to zinc – 1/7/11 edition

From Oprah Winfrey’s successful cable network launch to cash inflows and employee outflows at top social networking companies, here’s a look at what made headlines this week in the integrated marketing communications industry.

OWN Debuts with Strong Numbers
Early results show Oprah Winfrey’s new cable network – OWN – enjoyed a successful launch on New Year’s Day. For its Saturday premiere, OWN was the No. 3 cable network among women ages 25 to 54 during the 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. hours, averaging 1.2 million viewers per time slot. Sunday proved tougher, with the network attracting 968,000 viewers for the launch of “Ask Oprah’s All Stars” and only 602,000 viewers for “Master Class.” Although Oprah has a solid track record and loyal following, extending her personal brand to include a cable network isn’t without risk. However, backed by the world’s leading tastemaker, along with the many stars she has helped make famous, we don’t think the network is in bad shape. With the launch complete, we’re anxious to see the full programming schedule – and what product integration opportunities it will afford marketers.

Social Networking Site Shakeups
2011 is ushering in big changes at top social networking companies, including Facebook, Myspace and LinkedIn.

In an effort to stay private longer, Facebook struck a deal with Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Digital Sky Technologies, among others, to raise $500 million. The agreement values Facebook at $50 billion. The deal also puts Facebook over the critical 500-shareholder limit set by the Securities and Exchange Commission, meaning it will be forced to begin disclosing financial information or host an initial public offering by April 2012.

In other IPO news, LinkedIn plans to go public this year, according to sources close to the matter. In fact, the social network is expected to deliver a prospectus as soon as this quarter. The company’s estimated value is $2.2 billion.

Unfortunately for Myspace, its future doesn’t look as bright. It’s rumored the social network will soon announce massive layoffs, which could lead to reductions in staff by as much as 50 percent. This news follows the company’s 30 percent reduction in staff that occurred last summer. Myspace recently redesigned its site, but it continues to lose market share, dropping to 4.75 percent after losing nearly 7 percent over the past year.

LEGO® Makes it “Click”
Thanks to this latest film short from LEGO, this week we enjoyed a momentary return to the innocent and imaginative days of childhood. Entitled “Brick Thief,” the video promotes LEGO’s idea hive, Click, which provides an online forum for sharing stories, videos and photos that depict moments of inspiration. “Brick Thief” is a sequel to “Cl!ck” and features the same oddly spectacled and mustachioed Imagineer hard at work in his lab on his latest LEGO creation. We bet you’ll be scrambling to dig out your LEGO Pirate’s Fort set before it's over.

Marcom This Week: From A to Zinc is compiled by the Vitamin IMC editorial team. They can be reached at vitaminimc@gmail.com. Miss your vitamins last week? View Jan. 1's “Marcom This Week."

Marcom this week: From A to zinc – 12/31/10 edition

From social networking sites dominating our search queries in 2010 to growing social media budgets in the year ahead, here’s a look at what made headlines this week in the integrated marketing communications industry.

Facebook Beats Google in 2010 for “Most Visited Site” Title
According to Experian Hitwise’s analysis of the top 1,000 search terms for 2010, "facebook" was the top-searched term overall, accounting for 2.11 percent of all searches. This is the social networking site’s second year as the top-searched term. Not surprisingly, overall, social networking-related terms dominated the results, accounting for 4.18 percent of the top 50 searches. "YouTube" was the third most-searched term, followed by "craigslist," "myspace" and "facebook.com." Facebook also took top honors as the most-visited site in 2010, moving up from No. 3 and accounting for 8.93 percent of all U.S. visits. Google came in second with 7.19 percent of visits, followed by Yahoo Mail at 3.52 percent, Yahoo at 3.3 percent and YouTube at 2.65 percent. Bing popped up on the top-10 list for the first time in 2010, sitting at No. 10. Will be curious to see where the newbie search engine site goes from here.

Social Media Spending in 2011
With nearly 80 percent of corporations undertaking social media efforts, social media has quickly evolved from a shiny new object to a marketing toolkit must-have. So it’s no surprise that total budget for social strategy is projected to rise in 2011. Advisory firm Altimeter Group recently asked 140 corporate social media strategists how much they spent in 2010 and learned that the amount varies greatly based on the size of the organization. However, on average, companies spent $833,000 last year on social strategy. Next year, this number is expected to reach an average of $1.16 million. The following chart breaks down social media budgets and strategy based on an organization’s level of SM sophistication. We’d be curious to hear how this compares to your experience – let us know in the comments.

TaylorMade Scores a Hole-In-One with "Sesame Street"
The leading manufacturer of golf clubs, TaylorMade, has teamed up with the sounds of “Sesame Street” for a major TV ad campaign that will launch Jan. 3 on the Golf Channel, ESPN, NBC and CBS. The commercial features the song “One of These Things is Not Like the Others” – a “Sesame Street” staple – and will plug the company’s high-tech R11 driver, which has an unusual mostly white-colored clubhead. While we think the cutesy song will perk the ears of golf enthusiasts tuned into the season’s top competitions, we’re not sure these viewers will totally get the deeper meaning intended by TaylorMade’s ad agency, NYCA. As Michael Mark, CEO and creative director of the Encinitas, Calif.-based shop, explained in a recent AdAge interview, “We wanted to disarm the fear. We wanted to bring people back to a time of learning and openness when they would make personal leaps ahead without worry of what they didn’t know. That’s what ‘Sesame Street’ is all about.”

Marcom this Week: From A to Zinc is compiled by the Vitamin IMC editorial team. They can be reached at vitaminimc@gmail.com. Miss your vitamins last week? Visit the Dec. 24th edition of “Marcom this Week."

Marcom this week: From A to zinc – 12/17/10 Edition

From PR headaches to monetization strategies for social media start-ups, here’s a look at what made headlines this week in the integrated marketing communications industry.

‘Tis the Season for Damage Control
As if its logo debacle earlier this year wasn’t bad publicity enough, this week Gap launched an anti-hunger FEED campaign that touted the “Made in USA” status of the FEED-branded bags it’s currently selling. Oh, did we mention the bags are actually made in China? Ouch. But, who are the bigger victims in this latest gaffe by Gap? Try presidential niece and FEED founder Lauren Bush and the American children she had hoped to feed through the sale of her products at Gap. A recent poll by the Huffington Post shows that 75 percent of respondents would opt not to buy the bags as a result of the mislabeling.



Also taking some heat this week was eyelash growth product Latisse. Rumor has it Latisse spokesperson Claire Danes is suffering from a known side effect of the product: skin discoloration. The starlet is keeping a video diary of her experience using the lash grower, and we can’t imagine this side effect will make for good material. At the same time, the online diary could serve as a useful tool in dispelling the rumor, if it is just that. We’re staying tuned to see how Latisse handles.

Twitter: Web’s Next Golden Child?
Twitter is flush with cash after receiving $200 million in funding this week, valuing it at $3.7 billion. With 175 million registered users, the platform appears to be following in the footsteps of Facebook in its pursuit of World Wide Web domination. However, these big numbers aren’t adding up quite yet. This is because Twitter is still figuring out how to turn itself into a profitable business. It’s expected the web start-up will end the year with nearly $50 million in revenues – approximately $.29 per user. This is a far cry from rivals Facebook and Google, which generate around $2-$3 per user and $25 per user, respectively. However, with only eight months of ad service under its belt and former DoubleClick CEO David Rosenblatt joining Twitter’s board of directors, the company’s future appears promising.

“Go down your gullet, just like a mullet”
This week, our pick for ad of the week goes to Pepto Bismol. Or, rather, the star of its holiday campaign: Ken Jeong. Best known for his comedic roles in "Knocked Up," "The Hangover" and "Community," Jeong has set his sights on eradicating holiday party under-indulgence this season by introducing the power of Pepto to partygoers with sensitive stomachs. What the commercial lacks in taste and sophistication, it makes up for in awkward dance moves and strange lyrics. Go ahead, click replay a few times – it’s worth it. But, we’re not so sure we can say the same for Jeong’s career.



Marcom this week: From A to zinc is compiled by the Vitamin IMC editorial team. They can be reached at vitaminimc@gmail.com. Miss your vitamins last week? Visit last week's “Marcom This Week."

Marcom this week: From A to zinc

From pledging away billion-dollar fortunes to laughing along with Kevin Bacon’s biggest fan, here’s a look at what made headlines this week in the integrated marketing communications industry.

Zuckerberg Pledges to Give Away Fortune
The Giving Pledge, which invites the wealthiest individuals and families in America to publicly commit to giving the majority of their wealth to philanthropic causes, added Facebook-founder Mark Zuckerberg as a signatory this week. The effort – the brainchild of Bill Gates and Warren Buffett – also added AOL co-founder Steve Case and investor Carl Icahn to its roster, along with 13 other billionaires. While initially suspected to be a publicity stunt, the Giving Pledge highlights the trend of billionaires opting to give away greater amounts of their wealth to philanthropic efforts earlier in their lives. We respect Zuckerberg and the other signers for their commitment to giving back, but also applaud the effort as a great reputation management tool. Reputation management seems to be top of mind for the young Zuckerberg, who announced his first major charitable gift on “The Oprah Winfrey Show” in September: a nearly $100 million donation to public schools in Newark, NJ.

Kevin Bacon’s Biggest Fan
After viewing Logitech’s latest commercial for the first time last week, we thought, “Wow, that guy does a great Kevin Bacon impersonation.” Come to find out, it is Kevin Bacon. In this humorous spot from Goodby, Silverstein & Partners for Logitech Revue with Google TV, Bacon plays his biggest fan, reminding us of some of the actor’s most memorable roles – and hairstyles. Great play by Logitech. It may take a few views before remembering what the spot is advertising, but it’s worth watching multiple times.



Yelp No Match for Family
An exclusive AdAge/Ipsos Observer survey revealed that consumers consult family members for advice before making major purchase decisions. Family beat out friends, professional reviews and online reviews in nearly every product category. With nearly 90 percent of respondents stating that family recommendations had an impact on purchases, it appears marketers have a big job ahead of them: getting in the conversation. This may come as a surprise to marketers who have spent recent years investing in social media strategies in an effort to seamlessly enter the conversation.

Marcom this Week: From A to Zinc is compiled by the Vitamin IMC editorial team. They can be reached at vitaminimc@gmail.com. Miss your vitamins last week? Read Dec. 3rd's “Marcom this Week."

Marcom this week: From A to zinc

From multi-billion-dollar takeover bids to warm-and-fuzzy car commercials, here’s a look at what made headlines this week in the integrated marketing communications industry.

Celebrating the Digital Decade

As the Digital Decade comes to a close, The One Club announced this week its favorite One Show Interactive winners from the past 10 years. From Burger King’s Subservient Chicken to Dove’s Evolution campaign, these works showcase how the real and interactive worlds were seamlessly brought together. The decade of digital may represent the successful launch of the first branded viral video and the birth of online social engagement, but what will its legacy be 10 years from now? And, what does the next decade have in store for us?

View the top 10 digital campaigns.

Groupon, Meet Google

Google is expected to make a staggering $5.3 billion bid for Groupon in the near future, a move that at first seems intuitive, as Google hasn’t had much success making a name for itself in online social technology. (Remember Google Buzz? We didn’t think so.) This acquisition could also serve as a remedy for its local advertising problem, an issue it attempted to solve by offering to acquire Yelp for $550 million in late 2009.

However, some industry experts are calling Google’s near-record-setting offer an act of desperation. Next in line to acquire Groupon would be Google’s arch nemesis, Facebook. The two sites have established a symbiotic relationship, and Facebook’s acquisition of Groupon would only strengthen its growing online advertising prowess. It seems likely that Google’s bid is merely to ensure Facebook can’t get its hands on Groupon. This especially seems probable when you consider that Groupon’s popularity peaked around the end of summer and has since dropped off substantially.

In related news, Groupon wasn’t the only discount email company making headlines this week. Its rival LivingSocial is reportedly in talks with Amazon to receive an investment of up to $150 million.

GM Falls Down

Vitamin IMC’s campaign pick of the week is General Motors’ heartfelt, but not too heavy-handed “Thank You (We All Fall Down)” commercial that aired over Thanksgiving weekend. The 60-second spot created by Goodby, Silverstein & Partners is a tribute to iconic American entities – GM, included – that have fallen hard, only to rise up and stand tall once again. A reminder that, perhaps, those things worth fixing are never broken beyond repair.

Marcom This Week: From A to Zinc is compiled by the Vitamin IMC editorial team. They can be reached at vitaminimc@gmail.com.

Content marketing: A win-win for customers and businesses

By Daniel Hindin

If a major tenet of integrated marketing communications is customer-centricity, a great way that marketers today are plying their trade is through content marketing.

Content marketing is all about sharing valuable information with potential and existing customers and clients. The information is usually shared for free, and many people take that knowledge and apply it to their lives or businesses without ever engaging in a transaction with the company offering the information.

What better way to form a bond with the public and put the customer first than giving away free, no-strings-attached information?

I’m spending my summer quarter away from Medill working at a communications agency in Chicago called Arment Dietrich, where I manage the globally respected blog Spin Sucks.

What I love about my work there is the unbelievable volume of positive interactions I have with our readers. A large portion of my job consists of procuring valuable content that I think our audience will enjoy and having fun with our readers in the comment section of our blog, through my personal Twitter account, on the company’s Facebook page and wherever else we might find each other.

As early as my first day on the job, I felt an outpouring of warmth from our community. And when I say “community,” I’m talking about both paying customers as well as readers who have never spent a dollar with our company and quite possibly never will.

It doesn’t bother us that most of our readers won’t become customers. We’re committed to providing what amounts to a free media channel focusing on marketing, social media and entrepreneurism for small- to medium-sized businesses. And that commitment will basically cost us the same amount whether 100 people are reading or 100,000 people are reading.

In July, more than 15,000 people visited Spin Sucks. If 14,900 of them never do business with us, we still end up with far more clients on our hands than an agency of our size could handle.

But beyond that, these 15,000 visitors are coming to our site because they want to be there. We’re not buying ads anywhere. We’re not bombarding them with mismatched messages as they go about their day. Our readers are self-selecting themselves as potential clients by simply being attracted by the information we’re providing.

So it’s a win-win situation. Our readers win because they benefit from our knowledge and experience from the comfort of their own home or office. We win because more people every day are learning about us and the services we provide.

By putting the customer first and not putting on the hard sell, through Spin Sucks and content marketing, Arment Dietrich is enjoying more success every day.

***

Daniel Hindin is Managing Director of Vitamin IMC and a student in the Masters in Integrated Marketing Communications program at Northwestern University’s Medill School. He also works as Community Manager of Arment Dietrich’s blog Spin Sucks and can be found tweeting at all hours of the day at www.twitter.com/danielhindin.

Facebook introduces Groupon-esque application– but will consumers hit the ‘like’ button?

By Ashley Graves

When I moved to the Chicago area a little less than a year ago, one of my most useful finds was the website Groupon.com.

In case you’re unfamiliar, Groupon is a group discount website. It provides coupons on activities, restaurants and services—as long as enough people purchase the deal. Groupon enabled me to try new things in an unfamiliar city, with a cool discounted price.

Over the past year, couponing websites like Groupon have exploded. And for good reason — consumers still want to have fun experiences in the cities they live in despite a less-than-booming economy.

Last week, a new application for Facebook called Group Deals was introduced. Group Deals lets companies provide fans with a deal-a-day coupon for their products or services on their Facebook fan pages.

This new application (the first of what I bet will be many) has excellent potential for brands to provide concrete value for their Facebook fans and reinforce consumers’ liking or loyalty to a product or service.

As an added bonus, because friends frequently view a Facebook user’s activity, the ability for these deals to spread would greatly increase.

Word-of-mouth, the much sought after and hard to create integrated marketing tool, has huge potential here. Facebook’s public news feed will display purchase decisions made by a user to their close friends and family, people who care about their opinions and influence their decisions.

The only potential drawback is for items that someone might not want their Facebook friends to see they have purchased. Do you really want your mom to see that you’ve bought five bar coupons in a week? Or for that cute guy you met last weekend to know you’re planning to attend a six-week diet bootcamp?

By connecting the purchase of a deal directly to a Facebook application, brands will be better able to track the value of their Facebook fan page (an issue still hotly up for debate). The potential to calculate a rough return on investment from social media might have some doubters in the marketing world singing a different tune.

Will Group Deals on Facebook be a win-win for consumers and brands alike?

***

Ashley Graves is the Editorial Director at Vitamin IMC and a student in the Masters in Integrated Marketing Communications at Northwestern University’s Medill School. She is hoping that her favorite clothing retailers will decide to use Group Deals. She can be reached at AshleyGraves2010@u.northwestern.edu.

Whole Foods Dives Into the Social Media Deep End

While some companies are slowly dipping their toes into the social media waters, Whole Foods Market has dove in! Over the past eight months, Whole Foods’ social media presence has grown from corporate accounts to over 120 Twitter profiles and 97 Facebook pages.

Whole Foods is often cited as a social media success, but the details of its amazing tactics are what make them unique – taking a completely decentralized approach to their social media strategy. They have taken the close interaction between Whole Foods employees and consumers, along with team member empowerment and applied it to their social media strategy to create local relationships. This grassroots approach has fueled the explosion of their social media presence while supporting their corporate values system.

Their social media accounts range from umbrella corporate accounts to individual accounts for store locations. There are accounts that cover the many locations for metro-areas (think @WholeFoodsCHI) and topic-specific accounts discussing such topics as wine or cheese. They even created a social media presence around their participation at Bonnaroo.

Some may criticize such a fragmented approach to their social media, but Whole Foods learned from their experiences with their corporate social media accounts and expanded to fit their customer’s needs. They started to see that customers had very specific questions about local stores and quickly adapted, adding social media into the local marketing mix. Liz Bootz, the marketing team leader for Whole Foods Oakland, provides support to customers on Twitter. "One of the things I like best about being on Twitter is if a customer has a question, I can tweet the answer to them and provide that information to 200 other customers at the same time," she said.

Other companies should follow their lead and apply unique company culture traits to social media, taking a personal and on-brand approach to their online presence. Their responsive, customer-centric method has seemed to work judging by the numbers. Whole Foods Twitter accounts recently reached one million followers.

--Brandi Heinz