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Okay, we warned you in the headline, this is a bit of a dull read. However, if you can get through the entire document, you'll earn a ton about UGC and social media and how you can use it to get people involved with your brand.
Or, you can just call us and we'll be happy to go through some thinking with you.
Enjoy.
I found this on Cool Hunting website. A neat video about Simon Pace, drummer for Blonde Redhead and his love of Moto Guzzi bikes and design.
Great song too.
http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid1426749166/bclid1428686961/bctid1428676019
In celebration of the M1's 30th anniversary, BMW quietly introduced a new model at the Concorso d'Eleganza Villa d'Este last weekend. An aggressive, low-profile sports car, aspects of the design hark back to the original M1.
I've been driving BMWs for over 10 years, so I love the brand. But holy hell, this takes it to another level.
A great article from AdAge.
Affluent Keep Tighter Hold on Purse Strings
But Weak Economy Presents Pockets of Opportunity for Marketers
By Beth Snyder Bulik
Published: April 28, 2008
YORK, Pa. (AdAge.com) -- Being rich isn't what it used to be.
Today there are more affluent households than ever before, from more diverse ethnic and psychographic backgrounds, and they include a wide range of age demographics as well as various degrees of wealth. They're just as likely to be shopping at H&M or grabbing a latte at Starbucks on Saturday as they are to be making the rounds at an exclusive country club.
Luxury aspirers are highly materialistic and identify luxury as what they buy and what they own.
However, thanks to the flagging economy, many have one thing in common: They're not feeling nearly as affluent as they once did.
About 55% of the wealthiest Americans -- the top 10%, with an average net worth of $3.1 million and an average annual salary of $315,000 -- have cut back on expenditures in the past year and will make a conscious effort to keep cutting during the next 12 months, according the spring 2008 survey by the American Affluence Research Center.
Tightening belts
Plans to buy vehicles, build new homes or extensively remodel their current ones have also hit historic lows among the über-wealthy that are the subject of the center's six-and-a-half years of twice-annual surveys.
Pam Danziger of Unity Marketing, who classifies affluent consumers as those who make at least $100,000 in wages -- or about 20% of American households -- recently noted that luxury-consumer confidence is way down. Some 41% of those consumers expect to spend less in the next year, and only 13% plan to spend more.
"When gas hits $3.50 a gallon, I don't care how much money you make, you're going to notice it," Ms. Danziger said. "Luxury is the easiest thing to hold back on. ... They might have just as much money as they did six months ago, but today they don't feel as flush."
So what's a marketer looking to sell to affluent consumers to do?
The unaffected few
Well, there are some at the rarefied levels of wealth who are still spending at the same or increased levels. It may take more targeting or research, but there is evidence that certain segments are still indulging.
The weak economy also may open opportunities to appeal to affluent consumers' "bargain" side. Why buy a $1,500 Tod's handbag when substituting a $350 Dooney & Bourke bag (as Ms. Danziger just did) makes you feel just as good?
And because there are more affluent consumers than ever before -- thanks to double-digit growth of households with incomes of $100,000 or more in the past few years, according to Unity Marketing -- there are more potential customers.
This burgeoning affluent class is also more diverse than before, with more women, minorities and young people heading the households. Minorities lead 13% of affluent households, 5% are headed by women with no husbands present and 30% are either Gen X or Millenials. That means greater segmentation than in the past -- and a more difficult marketing challenge.
In short, marketers need to get to know the modern affluents. So we pulled stats and figures from various researchers to help you do just that. The five categories on the left are Ms. Danziger's characterizations of the "personalities" of affluent consumers, while the traits on the right were culled from other researchers' demographics and psychographic studies.
TEMPERATE PRAGMATIST
When Unity Marketing profiled the personalities of the affluent market in 2003, this category didn't exist. But in 2007, temperate pragmatists accounted for 22% of the market. They appreciate luxury products but the pursuit and purchase of them holds no great appeal. They are least likely to "indulge" and spent only about $9,000 on lux purchases in the second quarter -- about half of what the average affluent consumer spent. Of the five personalities, they have the lowest average incomes, at $146,000, and the oldest average age, with the majority in the 55-to-70-year-old range.
BUTTERFLIES
As the name implies, this group is changing, morphing from self-indulgent spenders to more socially responsible consumers. While they only slightly outspend the more pragmatic-affluent personalities, this group has the highest average income. They spent just over $15,000 on luxury items last quarter, almost exactly average. Much of this group is made up of baby boomers aged 45 to 55.
COCOONERS
Equal in size to the pragmatists is this group of affluent consumers who desire luxurious homes as both shelter and investment. Ms. Danziger describes them as "luxury consumers who prefer the status quo." They tend to be somewhat cautious in their luxury spending and dropped about $12,000 in the second quarter, or about 25% less than the average affluent. Men account for more than half (52%) of this group.
LUXURY ASPIRERS
The mantra for this group could be buy, buy, buy. They are highly materialistic and identify luxury as what they buy and what they own. They haven't reached the level of affluence they hope to attain but recognize -- and buy -- brands with the best lux recognition. Their incomes are below the average, but they dropped almost $17,000 in the second quarter on luxury items.
X-FLUENTS
Less-than-ideal economic conditions won't slow this group down. These consumers want what they want when they want it. They "describe their luxury lifestyle as the best of the best," Ms. Danziger reports. They spent more than $24,000 on luxury items in the second quarter. They're also the youngest-skewing of the five personalities, with the majority falling into the 24-to-34-year-old range, and are most likely to live in the downtown area of a major city.
HIGHLY ASSERTIVE
People who make more than $100,000 a year are 38% more likely to be extremely assertive, and people who make $200,000 or more are 57% more likely to be that way, according to Mindset Media. Sarah Welch, Mindset's chief operating officer, said: "It makes sense -- they're not afraid to ask for those raises and promotions." They are also 52% more likely than the average consumer to purchase four or more pairs of sneakers each year, 54% more likely to always buy organic and 57% more likely to see four or more movies at the theater every month.
HOUSE-RICH
While the subprime-mortgage market crumbles, many of the wealthiest 10% of Americans are safely ensconced in their primary homes with low mortgage balances or none at all. That means while their real-estate values may be dropping, the equity in their homes is extremely high, with incidences of being "upside down" on mortgages very rare, said Ron Kurtz, president of the American Affluence Research Center. The spring 2008 study found that those who did have the lowest level of equity in their homes were least likely to make major purchases this year and also more likely to decrease spending on a variety of smaller-ticket items such as dining out, furniture, home-entertainment equipment, recreational activities and charitable contributions.
SOCIAL MEDIA-SAVVY
Households with annual earnings of $100,000 or more use the widest range of internet tools and websites to learn about brands' customer-service experiences when buying new products. Research from the Society for New Communications Research, funded by Nuance Communications, showed that those in the wealthier group use multiple search engines and advanced search techniques, in contrast to their sub-$30,000-salary compadres, who are more likely to choose -- and believe -- customer information on corporate websites, along with popular social sites such as YouTube, MySpace and Facebook.
"They're very sophisticated in terms of their use of social media," said Nora Barnes, research fellow and one of the study's authors. "They're also the people who say they're most likely to share their own experiences online ... and to say they choose companies and brands based on customer care online."
I read this article on FutureLab's blog today. Very compelling.
Social Media Biggest Shift In Marketing Strategy Since Television?
by: Karl Long
Hyperbole? I don't think so. I believe that social media is reshaping the business landscape and is changing, or requiring change from every aspect of the business, from business strategy, to product development, to marketing, to human resources (hey, even Microsoft is taking notice see this FT article "A revolution is taking shape").
The Newcomreview.com just posted on a report from TNS media intelligence/Cymfony that found 50% of Marketing Executives Believe Social Media Is a "Vital Component" of Corporate Communications, that's a pretty huge shift if is really representative of marketers across the board.
I really like the way they seperated between "wait and see" folks who are just dipping their toe in with social media and and "revolutionaries" who have embraced the change.
The survey reveals that the early adopters ("Revolutionaries") are more advanced in their understanding and execution of social media marketing initiatives than more cautious marketers ("Wait-and-Sees"). First, nearly five times as many Revolutionaries are already implementing social media in their organizations and three times as many Wait-and-See companies are only at the learning stage. In addition, Revolutionaries are far more optimistic about the future of social media with 81% saying it will grow in significance over the next five years. Only 33% of the Wait-and-Sees agreed with this outlook.
When asked about how they would use social media to influence their marketing initiatives, Wait-and-See companies put more emphasis on using social media for new types of marketing campaigns such as viral marketing and videos, while Revolutionaries focus more on listening to consumer and bloggers' points-of-view. One area where they were in accordance was that both Revolutionaries (95%) and Wait-and-Sees (60%) are eager to connect with other colleagues to study consumer feedback and learn from
In other words the wait and see folks are still hooked into the "campaign" big bang fire and forget model, and the revolutionaries are "participating in the conversation" and building deeper relationships with their customers. Hmm, I wonder what has a better ROI.
So which one are you? Wait and see? or a revolutionary?
Watching TV the other night, I ran across a commercial for Maxwell House that points out that the average commercial costs $245,000 and that one only cost $19,000. Then it asked me to go Brewsomegood.ca to nominate a good cause to receive the difference.
The I saw a commercial about giving tampons to South African girls so they can go to school every time you buy a brand of tampons.
Then I saw a spot about saving dogs with Purina dog food.
Then I saw a spot about giving underprivileged kids sporting good equipment.
And I began to think about it. Tying a brand with a good cause has become the formula du jour. It seems that every brand out there wants me to help them save the world in some way.
I like helping out as much as the next . But sometimes, I just want a good cup of coffee. I don't have time to save the world 100 times a day. And when I want that cup of coffee, I want a brand that involves me in a relevant, meaningful way so that I trust that cup of coffee is going to be great.
Advertising is supposed to be about original ideas. It's funny how every time one brand, like Dove, succeeds at building an audience in some way, every other brand jumps on the bandwagon.
A couple of years ago it was "non-traditional" executions. Every campaign had to have some non-trad component. Last year it was a micro-site with a game, and this year, it's causes.
The thing is, when everyone is doing something, it's not longer differentiating. And when I'm being told 100 times a day to save the world, it's too much. And all those people that honestly want to do some good have a harder time because I'm starting to get jaded.
I know it's a marketing ploy. And so do most people. They're smarter than we often think.
We have a thought here at HQvB. Maybe the only formula should be creating original ideas, in original ways, that build brands through relevant, meaningful connections with people.
By Mark Barden
Published: April 21, 2008, in Advertising Age
Downturns are tough on everyone and are not to be taken lightly. We'll all have to do more with less. But luckily for marketers, we're surrounded by sources of inspiration at times like these. In every category there is a "challenger" seeking to compete with a leader and trying to do more with less.
It's as though challengers live in an almost permanent recession. Maybe Hal Fass is right and "little players tend to shake out in a recession," or maybe they are already implementing their more innovative recession-busting marketing plans right now, because they're more nimble than you. Only the paranoid survive.
Spending every day as David outgunned by Goliath -- with his massive R&D budgets, TV campaigns, end-cap displays and free shipping -- requires quite a different mind-set. And what's interesting for those of us who spend time with these people is how liberated challengers seem to be by this. They see their challenges as sources of strength and creativity.
Perhaps as marketers we could all be invigorated by the recession if we embraced the challenger mind-set.
What follows are four ways to make your marketing money work harder, inspired by real-world challengers. I offer the below as an innovation program. Much has been said about the long-term benefits of innovating in a recession, and this almost always equates to developing new products. That may well be the right thing to do, but it won't pay off any time soon. These four ideas can start working for you much sooner.
1. DENIAL IS A GOOD THING
Instead of, say, cutting your media spend by 10%, what if you slashed it by 100% instead and forced yourself to look for alternative forms of media, those "media" already at your disposal? If you're Method, you use your packaging. On the hand-wash refill package there's a witty as well as substantive top 10 list of reasons to be "Against Dirty," which both engages us for a minute in the way a good ad does, while conveying what the brand believes in. Method uses some of its packaging to project its beliefs, much as a leader might use TV, but the cost to Method is minimal. No, this can't replace the power of TV, but how many package-goods brands still see their package as a container rather than a medium? In a recession, this is a costly mistake.
2. PICK A FIGHT
Challengers get people to pay attention to them by strategically picking fights. There's a reason why we used to run from one end of the schoolyard to the other to watch two kids brawling. When it was someone finally taking on the school bully, we ran as hard as we could. Would this be the day when our lunch money would once again be safe?
Public battles between brands hold the same promise if someone, or something, might be liberated from the tyranny of the big guy.
Miller Lite made headway against Bud Light for the first time in years when it busted it publicly for putting out what Miller called a tasteless Bud Light. It revealed a truth that any self-respecting lovers of suds ought to know about before parting with its hard-earned money. Three cheers for David. Guys at Miller: Time to bring that approach back. As money tightens, our suspicions of being ripped off only rise.
3. IT PAYS TO HATE
If you're a lover, not a fighter -- as Majorcan shoe company Camper is -- it can still be useful to pick an enemy, if only for the attention it will get you. Especially when it requires taking a stand against something we all seem to hold sacred: the striving for accomplishment that defines modern life. Their "Walk, don't run" philosophy, explained in magalogs, on its website, and stenciled on the walls of their stores, calls us out pretty sharpish on our 24/7, CrackBerry-adled existences. One small company is taking a stand against our entire civilization.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Mark Barden is a partner at eatbigfish. He is a specialist in challenger brands -- those plucky No. 2 or No. 3 brands that manage to compete effectively with brand leaders. His clients include eBay, Unilever, PepsiCo and Lexus.
OK, hate can be a nasty idea at the best of times, but in the worst of times, it can be a tremendous ally in creating the kind of theater and energy needed to grab the imaginations of the consumer.
4. TAKE IT PERSONALLY
In each of these cases, the reframing was around some very strongly held personal beliefs. Successful challengers are nearly always invested with a very personal sense of mission. Whether it be to detox the home (Method) or get the world to slow down (Camper), it is the people behind the challenge who give it its teeth, because they take it personally. This personal conviction acts as a huge multiplier on even the smallest budget.
At the second installment of the Venice Media Festival, one of the big questions discussed was that in today's media world where media planning and creative are so tightly intertwined, should media agencies be re-united with their creative brethren from which they were spun off some 15 years ago? The answer was a resounding...maybe. In fact, only a third of media leaders held steadfast to their independence.
So maybe they should be put back together.
But perhaps there's another possible future. We could see a future where media stars break off from their buying agencies and form creative media hotshops, much like many creatives (including ours truly) have. They could then offer advertisers the high-value thinking and creative media approaches, while outsourcing the commoditized buying function to the large buying agencies.
At HQvB, we work in a flat, multi-disciplinary "brain trust" model. The idea is to allow clients to focus their resources on a senior, high-value team, that includes creative, media and planning as equal partners in the development of ideas that get people involved in bands. The lower-value execution and buying is then either outsourced, as in the case of media buying, or handled by HQvB, but only at cost.
No matter what the future has in store for media agencies, or creative agencies for that matter, we see the future in terms of focusing on high-value delivery. Sadly today, far too much of most clients' fees are consumed by low-value execution and administration.
Maybe it's time to to rethink this.
A few days ago, we were looking through the Applied Arts Interactive Annual. We saw an online experience created Andy's old shop that was more than a little "inspired" by a campaign he had created when he was there. Since he had left, we thought "fair's fair" about not including him in the credits.
But then we thought about it more. And we thought about how many times we have heard of so-called creative people taking credit for the ideas of others. Sadly, it happens all too often in advertising. After all, this is a business where the currency is ideas. Careers are made on the credit for ideas.
If you are truly a creative person, dedicated to the creation and celebration of original ideas, no matter whether the person who created the idea is still at the agency or not, they should receive credit. Sure it's more expedient to take credit for yourself. And more financially rewarding. But it's just plain wrong.
This business needs a major infusion of integrity. This lack of integrity is part of why many clients don't trust their agencies anymore.
I can't see Bill Bernbach, Lee Clow or David Olgilvy stealing credit. It's not the way they did business. The best don't need to steal credit.
If you want to be great, start by being honest. You may not be financially rewarded right away, but over time, it gets around who has integrity and who doesn't.
Just something to think about.
Read this in the New York Times. It shows how a new generation is coming up consuming media in a very, very different way. There's a lesson in here for marketers.
Finding Political News Online, the Young Pass It On
By BRIAN STELTER
Published: March 27, 2008
Senator Barack Obama’s videotaped response to President Bush’s final State of the Union address — almost five minutes of Mr. Obama’s talking directly to the camera — elicited little attention from newspaper and television reporters in January.
But on the medium it was made for, the Internet, the video caught fire. Quickly after it was posted on YouTube, it appeared on the video-sharing site’s most popular list and Google’s most blogged list. It has been viewed more than 1.3 million times, been linked by more than 500 blogs and distributed widely on social networking sites like Facebook.
It is not news that young politically minded viewers are turning to alternative sources like YouTube, Facebook and late-night comedy shows like “The Daily Show.” But that is only the beginning of how they process information.
According to interviews and recent surveys, younger voters tend to be not just consumers of news and current events but conduits as well — sending out e-mailed links and videos to friends and their social networks. And in turn, they rely on friends and online connections for news to come to them. In essence, they are replacing the professional filter — reading The Washington Post, clicking on CNN.com — with a social one.
“There are lots of times where I’ll read an interesting story online and send the U.R.L. to 10 friends,” said Lauren Wolfe, 25, the president of College Democrats of America. “I’d rather read an e-mail from a friend with an attached story than search through a newspaper to find the story.”
In one sense, this social filter is simply a technological version of the oldest tool in politics: word of mouth. Jane Buckingham, the founder of the Intelligence Group, a market research company, said the “social media generation” was comfortable being in constant communication with others, so recommendations from friends or text messages from a campaign — information that is shared, but not sought — were perceived as natural.
Ms. Buckingham recalled conducting a focus group where one of her subjects, a college student, said, “If the news is that important, it will find me.”
A December survey by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press looked broadly at how media were being consumed this campaign. In the most striking finding, half of respondents over the age of 50 and 39 percent of 30- to 49-year-olds reported watching local television news regularly for campaign news, while only 25 percent of people under 30 said they did.
Fully two-thirds of Web users under 30 say they use social networking sites, while fewer than 20 percent of older users do. MySpace and Facebook create a sense of connection to the candidates. Between the two sites, Mr. Obama has about one million “friends,” Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, his rival for the Democratic nomination, has roughly 330,000, and Senator John McCain, the presumed Republican nominee, has more than 140,000. Four out of 10 young people have watched candidate speeches, interviews, commercials or debates online, according to Pew, substantially more than people 30 and older.
Young people also identify online discussions with friends and videos as important sources of election information. The habits suggest that younger readers find themselves going straight to the source, bypassing the context and analysis that seasoned journalists provide.
In the days after Mr. Obama’s speech on race last week, for example, links to the transcript and the video were the most popular items posted on Facebook. On The New York Times’s Web site, the transcript of the speech ranked consistently higher on the most e-mailed list than the articles written about the speech.
The way consumers filter their news is being highlighted now that a generation of Americans is coming of age in the midst of a campaign that has generated intense interest and voter involvement. Exit polls in 22 states estimate that more than three million voters under the age of 30 participated in Democratic primaries this year, up from about one million four years ago.
In three of the most populous states — California, Texas and Ohio — the share of voters under 30 who turned out for Democratic primaries increased to 16 percent, up from less than 10 percent in 2004, according to exit polls by Edison/Mitofsky. In the Republican primaries, the increases in most states have been less striking but still visible.
“Young people are particularly galvanized in this campaign, and they have a new set of tools that make it look different from the enthusiasm that greeted other politicians 30 years ago,” said Lee Rainie, director for the Pew Internet and American Life Project. “They read a news story and then blog about it, or they see a YouTube video and then link to it, or they go to a campaign Web site, download some phone numbers, and make calls on behalf of a candidate.”
Media companies are benefiting from the heightened interest. CNN, which drew about 60,000 viewers ages 18 to 34 a night in February 2007, drew 218,000 on an average night this February, numbers that were increased by coverage of several presidential debates. Fox News and MSNBC also posted gains among young viewers last month, with both networks averaging more than 100,000 young viewers in prime time, according to Nielsen Media Research.
Although some college seniors may say they learned about Mr. Obama’s speech about race on CNN, more are likely to have seen it on YouTube, where it has been viewed almost 3.4 million times, or on Facebook, where it remains among the most shared links.
Candidates are capitalizing on this social development, and so are their supporters. A youth-minded music video called “Yes We Can” has been perhaps the biggest beneficiary. A musical version of Mr. Obama’s campaign speech made by the singer will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas and a bevy of celebrities, it was released on YouTube three days before the series of coast-to-coast nominating contests on Feb. 5. Counting hits on YouTube and other sites, the video has been viewed more than 17 million times.
To a lesser extent, videos of Mrs. Clinton and Mr. McCain have also been traveling through the online networks. A video of Mr. McCain asking citizens what issues matter most in the election has been viewed 300,000 times.
Rather than treating video-sharing Web sites as traditional news sources, young people use them as tools and act as editors themselves.
“We’re talking about a generation that doesn’t just like seeing the video in addition to the story — they expect it,” said Danny Shea, 23, the associate media editor for The Huffington Post (huffingtonpost.com). “And they’ll find it elsewhere if you don’t give it to them, and then that’s the link that’s going to be passed around over e-mail and instant message.”
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