Promotion Creativity

There are millions and millions of videos on the internet. They are mostly silly and funny videos to entertain people with an idle mind. However, these videos can reach a huge market and receive millions views. Firms are realizing the potential these videos and video hosting sites,such as Youtube, and they start making videos. It is beneficial for both the firm and the consumer: firms get their message out, while the consumer gets entertained. I find it that it has much more promotional value than the traditional TV commercials. Some of the more popular viral video campaigns include:

The Spice Guy



There are also more subtle promotional videos that is not exactly promoting a specific product. This video shows a creative approach to create a brand image.


Note that there are no mentions of Volkswagon or the benefits of its product. The brand is not even in the video title. When I watched this video, I have no idea that it is made by VW. I thoroughly enjoyed the video regardless. There is actually a series of these videos which just as much creativity. Although it may not be as popular as the spice guy commercial, it generated a significant amount of views, and it probably didn't cost them millions of dollars.

Location, Location, Location

Advertisements are virtually everywhere in our modern society. Where ever there are people, there are ads. Look around you and you will probably see promotion for a certain product or company. Whether its on a calendar, poster, and most likely, on a webpage. You can't go around the web without seeing advertisements nowadays. Ads are literally integrated into every part of our lives.
Ads are found in public bathrooms:

Top: obnoxious company placing ads in questionable location.
I have to admit its an easy way to segment their market (female, male, college, high school,etc), but I find it quite annoying to see these ads in the bathroom. Seeing them time after time in a not so clean place does not help with company image, in my humble opinion. Some company actually invest quite a sum of money in these bathroom ads (or so I assume). I've seen one that is either heat or motion sensitive and will talk to you when you stand in front of it. Another one is digitalized mirror that displays messages and the company logo.
Some other creative ad locations:
Left: Grocery Divider

Left: Red Envelopes for Chinese New Years




Top: Advertisement in a popular game

I expect more of these to come in the near future. Although I can't tell if it's doing the company image any good.

The Bay

The holidays are just around the corner which means its shopping season! Who doesn't enjoy shopping season ,besides those who don't have the time to shop but instead have to study for finals. I once have had the luxury to spend time shopping around for presents, either for myself or for others. I have a very simple method to decide where to do my shopping: Where the biggest discounts are!
Recently my mom has received a mail from The Bay.

It is a thank you card of some sort and they are showing there thanks by giving us discounts. Finally, I get to see a Customer Management System at work. The Bay has such a positive image in my mind; a simple golden logo, Canadian spirit (from the Olympics) and its long withstanding history in Canada. I can say that I actually respect this company. I never thought of myself as The Bay "loyalist" but I realize that I won't even consider shopping at Sears. When looking at the flyers, I would skip right away Sears and onto something else. When I read about brand loyalty will make consumers less sensitive to price, I thought that was ridiculous. Well I still  think it's illogical, but I no longer think it's that ridiculous.

Blogging Marketers

After reading several marketing blogs, I've came across this:

http://marketing-expert.blogspot.com/2010/11/google-preview-are-you-kidding.html

I couldn't disagree more to what this expert blogger has to say. I found the google preview extremely helpful. It is not as he suggested that "[people have] gotten that lazy that [they] can't even click-through on a search result listing?" I think it enhances my searching experiences by saving time. When doing research, I have to go through a lot of websites and clicking in to check will consume unnecessary time. Also some websites takes forever to load and a lot of times a preview is sufficient to tell whether the website is what I am looking for. Regarding the possible decrease in traffic, web designers can make their websites more attractive to adapt to this new change. In fact it might increase traffic as a result.

CSR

A fellow blogger has pointed out that customer service representatives are not doing the best that they can.
>>> http://blogs.ubc.ca/mtsuimarketing/ <<<
I read about how companies gain sustainable competitive advantage by customer excellence, product excellence,  operational excellence, and locational excellence. I thought customer excellence would be the easiest to achieve out of the four, but everywhere I go, I get bad customer service. Most often, I get bad service from restaurants. Sometimes I understand that waiters won't be the most polite people in the world (since their job is pretty demanding, mentally and physically), but in other cases, its outrageous how they treat their customers. I don't expect hugs and kisses, but I do expect some courtesy and helpfulness from these people.
Other than incompetent and unhappy waiters, I also have bad encounters with sales associates. I was walking around Futureshop and I picked up a pretty nice headphone. Then this employee comes up to me and pretends to be my best friend. I know people who are genuinely friendly and kind but this guy is definitely not one of those  people. He then goes on and scans my headphone for payment, assuming I am done my browsing. After printing the receipt, he told me to go the the Futureshop website and rate him as being very good. I stared at him and lied  about doing it for him. This guy don't deserve a raise.

Pizza Hut

Hmmm who doesn't like pizza? In fact, just a simple commercial will be enough for me to crave for a hot delicious pizza from PIZZA HUT. I don't care for the grease, the long wait and not the apathetic cashier; all I want is that hot pizza in their oven. I can say that their commercial or any food commercial in general works pretty well on me. Then I saw this:



I am not quite sure how to make of this. I understand that they are trying to reach their target market of hipsters and young people. However, this dance seems so awkward with the pizza. Dance and pizza don't seem to go well together. It is no surprise that this is not a North America ad campaign. This commercial is from Korea and it has become a internet phenomenal. It certainly achieved its goal of getting the brand of Pizza Hut to a large amount of people. I wonder if these kinds of commercials will work just as well right here in Canada. Probably not.

Internet + Marketing = Success?

How many people use the internet in the world? 1M? 10M? 100M? 1B?
according to World Internet Stats, 2 Billion people use the internet. That almost 30% of the world population!
Never before are the audiences so freely accessible to marketers. There is an enormous opportunity on the internet for companies to reach out to their potential clients and its CHEAP (relatively speaking)

I am not surprised when someone proposes this:
http://mashable.com/2010/10/19/chief-marketing-technologist/

my first thought is: really? Is he just trying to make up jobs to benefit his company?

But after some thought, it does make sense to have a specialist for technology and marketing. As the world changes, the company also has to adapt to these changes. What is a bigger change than the emergence of the internet? Companies from around the world are hopping into the bandwagon and it makes good sense. Just 4 or 5 years ago, the web is virtually ad free (except for spam and junk) but now you can't click a link without seeing adverts from mainstream companies to sketchy internet popups.

As companies begin to realize the dying influence of Television and the growing importance of the internet, I would expect to see more ads and campaigns done in cyberspace. Websites and social media will never be the same.

GOOGLE

Google worth more than US $172 billion dollars is not a company founded in the 1800s with a longstanding reputation. It was founded by two guys in 1996. It took Google 14 years to become one of the biggest, most innovative companies in the world. Google is so well known that the term "Google" is used interchangeably with search or find (in an online context). Nobody would say "hey just bing that" because it sounds stupid. Honestly the search results of Yahoo and Bing or any other search engines are not any worse than that of Google. It seems to me that most Google users are loyal to the brand because its pretty awesome. 

   

That strange looking car is a Google car. Not those once with cameras for Google Street but a new product altogether. This is a car that drives itself. Pretty cool huh? There are many more amazing products such as this that Google develops every year. They never fail to fascinate me in the stuff they do. In fact any negative news  about Google,such as privacy concerns, are easily dismissed by my loyal devotion to this company. In Google, I trust. 

CK Jeans

I don't exactly follow the fashion trend closely but its always interesting to read about it (especially the crazy stuff). 

Apparently CK has introduced a new kind/tread/line of jeans probably because they ran out of ways to rip their jeans. Whatever the reason, CK's new line of jeans will put "emphasis" on a man's genitalia area. For more details visit a fellow classmate's blog:

http://blogs.ubc.ca/bonnieyeung/2010/09/22/ck-jeans/

I applaud their innovation. I won't be surprised if this trend catches on. CK might help ease a lot of insecurities that some men might have, especially men who can't afford to buy a Hummer. I guess we can see if this trend will catch on in a few years. 

Movies

What do I, robot, The Island and Transformers have in common?

Besides being mediocre and mindless action movies, they also share one annoying trait that I really hate to see in movies: product placement.


To be fair, it is not as obvious in the movie, but it's not that subtle either. There are many movies with product placement and I get it. Brands are everywhere and it is ridiculous to make every product brand neutral in every movie. That point is only valid, however, in a modern setting. I don't want to see a McDonalds sign in the 1800s and I certainly don't want to see Ovaltine and Converse logos in the distant future. It just makes the movie less realistic and less enjoyable.

Commercials

When I think of marketing, the first thing that comes to mind is commercials. Most commercials are rather forgettable; rarely do I see a cleverly made commercial that sticks to my mind. Even the most well made commercial quickly becomes dull as they play it over and over again. The only good thing about commercials is that it gives me some time to grab something to eat.
I know the purpose of a commercial is to provide exposure to a company or product. But what I have noticed is that some commercials are becoming increasingly more annoying. One example I can think of right now is all the Koodo Adverts.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvHO_kQHFJA
This just makes me not want to go near any Koodo store, employees, or any of their associates