If you stepped out to the kitchen for a beer during last night’s Browns-Packers game you might have missed it, but Adcom did a 10-second spot for the National Senior Games, which will be held in Cleveland next year. Take a look.
How digital apps can drive e-commerce and m-commerce sales
With e-commerce spending reaching a double-digit share of all retail spending, online B2C marketers are devising push-and-pull strategies to grab the attention of consumers. These methods must provide assurance and convenience, while also standing out amongst other similar techniques in practice.
One way to do this is through digital applications, a slight shift from e-commerce to m-commerce. Not all shoppers are ready for this yet, but they soon will be and smart brands will be waiting for them when they arrive. Below are 3 ideas to drive online sales.
1. Blend Physical and Digital Interaction via a Unique Social Spectacle
Launch a provocative digital-based spectacle that causes consumers to gather in a physical space to engage with your brand and, ultimately, make a same-day purchase. Here’s how you do it:
- Connect the event with a phenomenon or cause (not related to the brand) that resonates with the target group.
- Include a digitally-based spectacle that consumers can interact with only through their mobile devices; the same tools they can then use to make a purchase.
- Bring consumers closer to the brand with a promotional offering they can’t resist.
Once they make the purchase on a mobile device via a digital application, allow customers to pick the most convenient route to obtain their goods (i.e. delivery or pickup).
While congregated, consumers can mutually influence one another’s purchases through group think, engendering effective social shopping.
If executed adeptly, the spectacle will wow the masses, including media. More importantly, it will induce multiple and instantaneous online purchases.
South Korean big-box retailer Emart did this with its ‘Sunny Sale-QR Code’ campaign. The stunt boosted sales and earned lots of free publicity.
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How to get to the heart of what you’re writing
Writers have a habit of getting in their own way. Faced with a writing assignment — a white paper, a press release, a blog post, ad copy — we tie ourselves in knots wondering how to begin. Too often, we tangle the opening paragraphs in clauses and context and never really get to the point until later in the piece. Maybe our readers will trail along after us that far, but probably not.
I was taught a good way to avoid this when I was a reporter for a daily newspaper. Though it originated in journalism, I’ve found it works for marketing as well. Whenever reporters would get together at lunch or Happy Hour, we’d talk about our latest stories. It was understood that no one wanted to hear a lengthy recap so the response inevitably was a quick summation delivered between swallows of beer or bites of a sandwich.
“The mayor and City Council are fighting over block grant funding.”
“Warehouse fire on the East Side. Nobody hurt, but hazardous waste was hidden inside so they had to call the EPA.”
“Acme Corp. is expanding its anvil factory. Adding a new production line and 200 jobs.”
Because we didn’t have the time or feel the need to formulate elaborate explanations, we summarized quickly and accurately, delivering the news and skipping all the extras. That summary is never the entire story, but it is the kernel, the most important part of the message.
Next time you find yourself paralyzed at how to begin a writing assignment, imagine you’ve been asked about it by someone who doesn’t care to hear too long or too detailed of an explanation. What you come up with might not be the lead of the piece, but it will be the essence of what you’re trying to say and that’s always a good thing to remember when you’re sitting at the keyboard.
Using employee expertise to market
Les Paul knew how to sell guitars.
Certain retail businesses are more likely than others to attract knowledgeable salespeople. The cashier at Target ringing up your car floor mats, laundry detergent, flip flops and deodorant is not likely to be particularly enthused about or expert on any of the items.
On the other hand, the guy selling you a new Harley-Davidson Super Glide Custom is almost certainly a biker. You wouldn’t want to buy one from someone who wasn’t. He’s selling bikes because he loves them and loves riding and wants to share that passion with you.
Employees who are passionate about what they sell – whether it’s tropical fish, quilting supplies or snowmobiles — can help your marketing. Guitar Center, the national music store chain, hires musicians in each of its 220+ stores and it’s not unusual for customers to turn to the clerks for advice about everything from guitar strings to the relative merits of Zildjian vs Paragon cymbals.
Questions turn into discussions turn into swapped advice and news about whose band is playing where this weekend and who’s looking to add a keyboard player to their lineup. As a result, the stores become more than just a place to buy a new pedal or mic stand; they become resources and hangouts for musicians.
Guitar Center has taken the next logical step by posting the photos, bios and expertise of employees at each store online and inviting people to email them questions. By positioning their employees as experts and not merely salespeople, the company accomplishes the following:
- It establishes itself as an authoritative resource.
- It humanizes itself in the eyes of consumers who can see online that Jeff is a guy who really knows recording equipment.
- It lets music-loving customers see what they have in common with the salespeople and, by extension, the brand.
- It creates goodwill by offering free advice to people who aren’t in a store.
Well played, Guitar Center.
You are surrounded by content
The problem with undertaking a content marketing campaign is that you need content and plenty of it. It’s natural for you, particularly if you’re new to this sort of marketing, to worry about where it’s going to come from.
It could be right under your nose, unrecognized and underused.
Traditionally, it’s been difficult for Halloween haunted houses to distinguish themselves. Haunted Warehouse, Haunted Factory, Haunted Laboratory — they all have costumed ghouls, chainsaws and things that go bump in the night. Their marketing largely is limited to websites and garish ads in the local alternative weeklies. But Nightmares Fear Factory in Niagara Falls, Ontario, got a brilliant idea on how to use something it had plenty of – scared people.
The haunted house rigged a camera to take photos of people at their most frightened and posts them on Flickr and its website. The photos are hilarious, popular enough to trigger remix memes and sell Nightmares better than any ad could. And it took a minimum of effort to create and push it out to the world.
In some cases, content produced for internal use can also be sent out to consumers. Maytag created 3D instructional animation to teach salespeople the differences between regular washing machines and High Efficiency washers. But modern consumers like to do their own research and not rely on salespeople so, after tweaking the videos to make them more consumer-friendly, Maytag posted them on Lowes.com.
Sometimes what a company has to offer is expertise and a venue. Commercial plumbers and pipefitters are the most loyal customers of RIDGID Tools. They like to talk to each other about tools, jobs, customers, problems etc. So RIDGID established a forum where they could talk, comment and ask questions. RIDGID moderates the forum and sometimes weighs in with answers or explanations, but it’s largely self-policing and self-perpetuating.
Forum users provide the content and RIDGID benefits from having a website where its customers go to get answers and swap stories.
While content marketing sometimes does mean starting from scratch, there is often an easier way. Just look at what you are already doing.
Comparing digital media device use by male and female shoppers
Shoppers are better armed than ever. An increasing number use smartphones and tablets in stores to not only read product reviews, but to consult with friends about purchases. Below is a comparison of in-store digital media device use by gender.
Stay tuned for more insights.
The Future of Market Research: 5 Innovations to Watch for in 2012
The great David Ogilvy once said, “I notice increasing reluctance on the part of marketing executives to use judgment; they are coming to rely too much on research, and they use it as a drunkard uses a lamp post for support, rather than for illumination.” Those words from the great David Ogilvy are as true today as they were then.
Market research professionals, firms and organizations from IBM to Forrester Research are projecting the next trend in market research to be “making the transformation from research to insight.” If you ask me, that’s what market research has always been. An effective market researcher should be able to plan, conduct, analyze, and report actionable market insights and solutions to clients.
If you can’t do that, you’re probably just sharing stats that you found on eMarketer. I’m not discrediting eMarketer, which is an excellent research provider, but I see many advertising and marketing professionals searching for and relying too much on the latest stat or trend instead of taking that data point and translating it to something of value. Does that trend even make sense for your client’s unique situation? Or are you simply trying to impress them? This is not a problem with the research provider, but the researcher himself.
Instead of projecting the next trend in market research to be “making the transformation from research to insight,” which should already be innately infused into the mantra of the market researcher, I project the future of market research to be the convergence, or mash-up, of emerging technologies and lateral creative thinking across industries with the discipline of market research.
We are all living in a perpetual state of beta. We all have the ability at any time, to analyze our past and present to optimize for the future. And for market researchers, now is the perfect time to seize the opportunity to innovate the industry in ways George Gallup could have never imagined. So borrow from other competitors, borrow from other industries, borrow from culture – use lateral creative thinking to expand your potential and create new methodologies to reveal new insights and solutions. Below are five examples of this approach, which will continue to grow, especially in 2012.
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Facebook Brand Timeline: What You Need to Know
Beginning March 1, 2012, Facebook Timeline became available to brand and business pages. Businesses have one month to set their Timeline up to best serve their brand and their fans before Facebook automatically upgrades all of the pages on March 30, 2012.
Before you turn your Timeline on, learn how the latest Facebook feature can benefit your brand or company:
The Cover Photo: Similar to personal profiles, the cover photo is a large, banner-like image that lives atop your Timeline. Brands may immediately think of this as a large space for advertising, but proceed with caution. The cover photo can of course put an identity to a brand, but can’t be an advertisement, can’t be a call-to-action (‘Like Our Page!’) and can’t include any contact information. Take a look at some impressive cover photos: Today Show, SportsCenter, Coldplay, Nike.
Pin to Top: With the Timeline, the landing tab is no more. Those brands who utilized a ‘Welcome Tab’ or a promotion as the default tab will need to find new and engaging ways to gain attention from their potential fans and current audience. Brands can, however, ‘Pin’ items on their page, which will be prominently displayed at the top of the Timeline.
Tell Your Story: In line with the profile pages, companies can now tell their story with the Timeline. When did your brand make its debut? Did you acquire another company years ago? Have you won awards you want to highlight on your Timeline? Companies need to think about key dates and historical data about their brand to paint a larger picture for their Facebook audience.
Like (and more): Facebook actions are a new part of the Apps tool for Timeline. Not only can users ‘Like’ something, they will be able to express their ‘love,’ ‘want,’ ‘need,’ ‘own’ along with a variety of other verbs towards a product.
Messaging: At last, brands can send private messages to their fans. Instead of messaging the entire community, brand managers can build deeper, more personal relationships with fans of the page.
If your brand is ready to upgrade to the Timeline before it switches automatically, learn more here.
- Written by: Alana Munro, Social Media Manager at Optiem, part of The Adcom Group of Companies.
Better Marketing Through Personas
It’s no surprise that advertising has gotten more complex in recent years. With the emergence of unique digital opportunities, mobile, and a more competitive, complex marketplace, brands need to do a lot to avoid getting lost in the crowd. One of the simplest, most effective ways to make products and communications efforts stand out is by understanding the target audience. One way we examine and define the target audience at the Adcom Group is via persona development.
Landau Public Relations Merges into The Adcom Group of Companies
The Adcom Group of Companies is pleased to announce that Landau Public Relations is joining us! Our neighbors on West 6th Street have become the fourth operating division of The Adcom Group, joining Adcom Communications, Optiem and Uppercut Motion & Sound.
The addition gives The Adcom Group even more capability in social influence and brings such clients as Giant Eagle Supermarkets and Daimler Trucks North America into the fold.
Read the details.