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Are you Young and Penniless? Get an iPhone!Posted September 15th
Ramit of I Will Teach You to Be Rich pointed out a great stat from a recent Time Magazine article:
Yet as of last week, the income segment with the highest percentage of visitors to the iPhone site was 18 to 24 years of age, earning less than $30,000 per year. Could Steve Jobs have been aware of that when he lowered the price of the 8GB iPhone to $399 on Wednesday? We can only guess.This is startling, considering an iPhone is 1.6% of your salary if you make less than $30k a year. Gen-Y has never been good with money, but Ramit's advice to them is that they should pay attention to this calculation (percentage of income) when making large purchases. What makes me chuckle is that when I speak to fellow Gen-Y peers about their iPhone (I own one too, company write-off though!) most don't use all the features. They're a status symbol, hottest product on the market, eye opener — they don't use it for music, e-mail is to complicated for most, surfing the web is to slow (except the perfect iPhone Facebook), and the stock ticker is a joke. However, in Seth Godin's words, Apple created "a product that people actually want to buy--and talk about," which was definitely laking in the cell phone industry and in the Gen-Y market. Tagged as Technology, Marketing, Trends, Business | No Comments » | Continue
How Phil Collins and a Gorilla Made Me Love Cadbury ChocolatePosted September 13th
I love this viral video campaign from Cadbury, and their explanation is hilarious:Well it just seemed like the right thing to do. There's no clever science behind it - it's just an effort to make you smile, in exactly the same way Cadbury Dairy Milk does. And that's what we aim to continue to do; simply make you smile. So if a drumming gorilla's not enough, wait until you see what else we have up our sleeves.Cadbury is quite daring to say their product will bring you pleasure, just like their viral video, and not make any other connections. However, I feel it does make a powerful association with the viewer later down the road — when their talking with a friend or in line and see a bar of Cadbury chocolate. This daring and random content is the stuff Gen-Y love — it's more entertainment than advertisement (just look at the top youtube videos of any day). I'm guessing somebody at their ad agency read Made to Stick Tagged as Viral, Video, Internet, Marketing, Branding | No Comments » | Continue
Facebook Product PlacementPosted September 12th
Today, Skittles threw a bit of a curve ball by partnering with Facebook for the first time and allowing users to send a gift (tiny tokens of appreciation, that live on your profile and usually cost a dollar). The gift, their new Skittles Gum, was free (very important to the success of the campaign) and limited only to 250,000.
However, this gift is not real, edible, or fun at all — it's just a damn icon/graphic! This may sound a little ludicrous to anybody over 21 (hell, anybody over 10), but I can't help but notice that they did a great job cleverly announcing their new product in front of a large amount of people within seconds. By giving it a limited edition, it had to make users feel the product was exclusive or worthy. Also, allowing users to send it to a friend, had to make users feel the brand valued their relationships (important with the Gen-Y).
By the end of the day, the gift "Sold Out" (meaning all 250,000 were given away) and a minor buzz was created. Furthermore, speaking to several peers, most we're quite disgusted with Facebook. As Facebook continues to reach for new revenue streams, especially with advertising, they hurt the user experience and their overall brand. Will this hurt them as it has MySpace? or will the community accept it?
Tagged as Internet, Marketing, Design, Branding | 2 Comments » | Continue
MySpace Down, Facebook UpPosted September 11th
As the school year starts, we see Facebook exploding in growth (thanks to their F8 Developer Tools) and MySpace faltering (but recently passing the 200 million user mark.) The rumor is MySpace will release their own Developer Tools, however, will it be a shifty product that we expect from MySpace? can it compete and hold down Facebook? I doubt it, things are looking a little shaky for MySpace, but it's years away from any type of a collapse.
Tagged as Internet, Technology, Marketing, Trends | No Comments » | Continue
Can Guerrilla Marketing work for Luxury Brands?Posted September 11th
A recent report surfaced that insisted that YSL (Yves Saint Laurent) was using guerrilla marketing tactics in the New York City. A brand, as powerful as YSL, using a manifesto pamphlet campaign on the streets of NYC is very strange and interesting at the same time.
On one hand, this is very daring for a somewhat fading brand, I give them proper recognition for the courage. It seems like a move by the marketing heads at YSL to get the brand back in to the minds of the mainstream fashion consumers — especially the youth.
On the other hand, it strips all the authenticity and control a luxury brand needs when aligning itself in the high-end markets. It seems the campaign has just begun (http://www.ysl.com/english/index.html), I'll be keeping my eyes to see if this can succeed.
Tagged as Fashion, Marketing, Branding | No Comments » | Continue
MTV’s VMAs 2007Posted September 11th
I'll give MTV some congratulations for preparing and presenting the VMAs very well this year.
As you can see: MTV VMAs Ratings, Web Traffic Up
Some things I noticed during the broadcast that helped with this surge in traffic/viewership: 2 hours in length (an hour shorter than usual), valuable remix/rare-joint performances in intimate venues (rooms), longer more professional performances on the main stage, quicker presentations, flashier graphics, using other brands, easy to access web content (especially to view that Britney disaster), and so much more.
I'll give it to them, MTV seems to finally get it — if only for a second.
Tagged as Entertainment, Technology, Marketing | No Comments » | Continue
The Pulse on Facebook (aka Network Statistics)Posted December 23rd
I’m just as much as a Facebook addict as the next person.
Well today (December 23rd, 2005), when I went to check up on my friends on Facebook, I noticed a new feature on Facebook called “The Pulse”. The Pulse simply shows the latest trends on your campus and even compares them to other campuses or networks. They show the most popular Music, Movies, Books, Clubs, Hometowns, etc. of a college campus or of the entire Facebook network. As someone interested in marketing and advertising, these lists and statistics were amazingly fascinating. For example, 9.2% more UCLA students listed To Kill a Mockingbird than The Bible. The top 3 television shows of college students are 1. Family Guy, 2. The OC, and 3. Friends. The top 3 music acts are 1. DMB, 2. Coldplay, 3. Jack Johnson. Sometime the data/trends are hilarious, sometimes it is dull and predictable, but most of the all it’s interesting. If you would like to know a college or areas top trends (and you don’t have access to Facebook), just shoot me an email and I’d be happy to share the data with you. ###UPDATE### If you are on Facebook, you can find the Pulse on any network page: For Example, Los Angeles Stats: http://www.facebook.com/networks/stats.php?nk=67108865 ############ Tagged as Marketing | No Comments » | Continue
Can the Record Labels Last Another 5 Years?Posted October 25th
My favorite bands are only on MySpace, but aren’t signed to a record label. These bands have sold out shows on Sunset Blvd and all throughout Western America, but they don’t have a manager. These shows are full of people that love the music, but would never buy the record.
These bands make their money off of concert sales, and that’s it. Period. Nothing more, nothing less. I don’t know if this is the direction that music is going to take concerning the economics of the business, but even the smallest bands and music acts now know how to capitalize on the internet. They are killing the radio – slowly. They are killing record labels – slowly. They are actually making money and surviving on their own. ‘Clap Your Hands and Say Yeah’, one of my favorite bands of the year, produced and sold their own record through their website. Thanks to a fantastic album, brilliant reviews, and a great internet presence, they have already managed to sell 20,000 copies of their album, allowing them pull in around $200,000 without any record company or distributor. For bigger bands like Korn, deals with record labels are focusing more with concerts then albums. This is great for bands, because it motivates the people at the record labels to put their heart and soul in to the band and leads to more artistic creativity. Furthermore, my favorite outcome of the internet’s affect on the music industry is the quality. The quality is becoming fantastic and bands are starting to realize with no record label, they can have full artistic creativity and rely on their own passions. Thus they can use the internet to connect to the most important market in the music industry - the youth, and turn them in to fans and make profits through concerts ... Tagged as Marketing, Trends, Business | No Comments » | Continue
Of Course, Word of MouthPosted October 4th
I’ve just recently discovered the WOMMA’s Word of Mouth blog, which I must say is amazing – so check it out. The advice on the WOMMA blog holds up to exactly what I’ve been reiterating on here. The youth, just like the general population but more extreme, are waiting for great things (products, services, sales, promotions, etc.) to talk about with their peers. When you present them with these great, unique, or amazing things, they will talk up a storm. With the internet, youth dialogue with their peers is accelerated extremely quickly. For example, in one year both MySpace and Facebook were able to add millions of youth accounts with zero advertising dollars spent, no promotions, and no annoying pop-ups. This is why above all, companies need to stop spending huge sums of money on advertising on the youth generation and funnel that money in to making their product better in all aspects. It doesn’t mean cutting advertising entirely; it is the brand’s job to find a balance between effective affordable advertising and an increase of product research and development Mentioned on the WOMMA Word of Mouth blog was a great example of how an organization trying to attract the youth market could apply this technique. They used the Armed Forces as an case in point to show the ridiculous amount of money they spend on marketing and advertising to enlist new recruits. The Armed Forces could simply slash that budget in half and put the money in to higher enlistment fees which I know for sure would entice more youth to sign-up. Give us value, give us something we can fill was the right move; not canned messages replayed over and over again that don’t resonate with us - which I believe the Armed Forces has been doing and will ... Tagged as Marketing | No Comments » | Continue
It’s a Viral Thing…Posted August 9th
I’ll admit it; I’m in love with the concept of internet viral advertising.
Internet viral advertising is the quick and easy way of creating word of mouth by hiding your brand or product inside a medium (such as movie, image sound) which is so crazy, interesting, funny, scary, etc. that people would pass it along to their friends. Two prime examples of this concept would be Burger King’s Subservient Chicken and Ford’s Ka commercial.
In the last year though, I’m disappointed to see how mainstream and saturated the entire thing has gotten. Furthermore, I’m more upset about the fact that companies using viral marketing treat it more like traditional advertising instead of something that catches our attention.
For it to work now, especially if you want the youth to catch on, the advertisement for the product has to be subtle, but explosive. I know that sounds hypocritical, but stay with me here.
The first key to the advertisement needs to be the word of mouth, but to achieve the word of mouth the advertisement needs to be so damn crazy young people have to share it with their friends. Your brand has to take a risk, but believe me; young people love it when a brand takes a risk. Too many companies are playing it safe and throwing soft balls at us all day. We just bat them off and continue on our day.
Throw us a fast ball and we have to duck, we have to take notice, and we have to focus. So make the advertisement really edgy, but whatever you do, don’t throw your brand in our face at the end or in the middle of the viral advertisement. Earlier this year, Verizon released this horrible ...
Tagged as Technology, Marketing, Branding | No Comments » | Continue