“If the United Nations was fully funded, why would we need the Arc or social enterprise”?

Why? Because the impact caused by the United Nations is different than the impact caused by social enterprises; while the United Nations aims to temporarily alleviate urgent social problems and issues around the world, social enterprises see social issues in a long-term perspective and strive to use the methods and disciplines of business as well as the power of the marketplace to solve social, environmental, and human rights problems.

According to Arielle Uwonkunda, while monetary donations to impoverished countries may create positive changes in the short term, they fail to create long-lasting impacts. In contrast, by educating and initiating business tools with entrepreneurs in developing and impoverished countries, social enterprises create long-lasting positive change that solves social, economic, and environmental problems. Hence, creating long-lasting social impacts is the feature of social enterprises that the United Nations cannot replicate with its short-term aids, no matter how much money it has.

Thus, social enterprises would still be necessary to our world even if the United Nations was fully funded – the short-term financial and political aid of the United Nations and the long-term development through the projects of social enterprises must combine to create a synergistic effect to the developing countries of our world today.

Sources:

http://news.ubc.ca/2014/06/30/upward-arc/

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/small-business/sb-growth/day-to-day/can-fair-trade-boutique-expand-without-alienating-customers/article4405520/

http://skollworldforum.org/about/what-is-social-entrepreneurship/

A hashtag (#) is a word or keyword phrase with a “#” sign placed in the front. This seemingly ordinary symbol that was interpreted as a number sign for decades now has infinite power and potential to change the business world. The impact of hashtags on modern culture has become undeniably huge today – in 2011, a hashtag of a street vendor’s name in Tunisia spread on Twitter and started revolutions throughout the Middle East, and in 2012, the American Dialect Society declared “hashtag” as word of the year.

Hashtags are now an exciting, new way of marketing for the business world today that allow for businesses to create engagement, interaction, and conversation with their targeted audiences. Highly targeted brand messages in forms of hashtags, when used in a proper and effective way, help drive businesses’ brand recognition, positively impact customer loyalty, and enhance brand visibility.

For example, Red Bull’s hashtag #givesyouwings became extremely popular with their targeted customers and effectively created brand awareness across users of various social networking platforms. Customers around the globe interacted with each other as well as the company by taking pictures of their Red Bull drinks and sharing it on social networking websites with the hashtag #givesyouwings. Domino’s Pizza UK had an event in which they offered 1 pence off each pizza for every person who tweeted #letsdolunch. The tweets containing the hashtag added up and dropped the price of each pizza from £15.99 to £7.74.

Through the use of hashtags, businesses are easily able to interact with their targeted audiences… and this is where the magic happens. The interaction turns the audiences to customers.

#HashtagsAreNowBusinessEssentials.

Sources:

http://contentmarketinginstitute.com/2014/02/hashtags-social-media-content/

http://www.forbes.com/sites/stevecooper/2013/03/31/5-reasons-businesses-should-care-about-hashtags/

http://www.business2community.com/infographics/history-power-hashtags-social-media-marketing-infographic-0997768

Nancy Lu, in her blog post Abercrombie’s Exclusive Marketing? criticizes the Abercrombie’s extremely exclusive marketing tactic of only targeting thinner women by refusing to stock women’s XL or XXL sizes.

In 2013, the American retailer Abercrombie & Fitch caused a scandal well known as the “skinny scandal” in which the company was hugely criticized for the CEO, Jeffries’ remarks about plus-size women. “A lot of people don’t belong [in our clothes], and they can’t belong. Are we exclusionary? Absolutely,” Jeffries had said, in a 2006 interview with Salon.

To have the CEO of a universally renowned company like Abercrombie proudly stating that the company doesn’t want to market anyone other than cool, good-looking, attractive, and skinny people is very tragic; being a tremendously influential company to the teenagers of this era, Abercrombie should change their marketing strategies and furthermore take on the leading role in embracing the diversity of race, gender, and body types.

Why not have a “revolution” and start using “real-sized” models or hiring store workers from diverse backgrounds? By extensively changing its marketing strategies and broadening its customer segment, Abercrombie will be able to increase profit, repair its reputation, and most importantly cause positive change in the world – after all, there is no exact definition of “beauty.”

Sources:

Nancy Lu’s blog post: https://blogs.ubc.ca/nancylu/2014/10/05/abercrombies-exclusive-marketing/

http://www.businessinsider.com/abercrombie-wants-thin-customers-2013-5

http://www.salon.com/2006/01/24/jeffries/

Photos:

http://www.abercrombie.ca/

Pieces of paper or a small thin plastic? I’d prefer the latter option. Starbucks’ gift cards – Christmas themed, Valentine’s Day themed, spring, summer, fall, and winter themed, all, of course, with the legendary icon “Siren” in the top right corner, are the most wanted gifts for the average trendy consumer as well as the retailer. The invention of the gift card was a groundbreaking idea for people who are just extremely unskilled in choosing gifts.

In 2001, Starbucks marked a new era in history of the gift card revolution by selling gift cards that could be loaded more than once; this was a big shift from the traditional, one-time gift cards that would be tossed into the garbage can after their use. Ten years later, in 2011, Starbucks started providing its mobile app service for its gift cards, a stored value system that let customers pay, load money, and have access to prepaid funds in their gift cards through a 1-second “beeping” on a smartphone.

Today, one out of seven purchases in Starbucks is made with a gift card, and thus, the company absolutely loves gift cards for the benefits they bring to the company. When a gift card is never used after it is bought, the store still keeps the money. Unused gift cards add up to profits of billions of dollars for business; from 2005 to 2011 in the United Sates, an absurdly high $41 billion worth of gift cards were gone unredeemed! Furthermore, the advertising effect of gift cards allows for additional sales. Being a gold member of the Starbucks gift card rewards system myself, Starbucks’ gift card app compels me go back to the store so that I can earn an additional “star” for a free drink.

The gift card, building customer loyalty, increasing brand awareness, and improving sales, is an unique innovation of the 21st century that will continue to change its form as time passes. From plastic cards to barcodes on screens – I’m positive that the next transformation of gift cards will be a breathtaking one.

Sources:

http://marketingland.com/coffee-mobile-king-starbucks-serves-mobile-strategy-98823

http://www.canadaone.com/ezine/oct07/gift_loyalty_card_programs.html

http://www.canadianpizzamag.com/content/view/1390/38/

http://www.bluepay.com/blog/4-advantages-gift-cards

https://www.firstdata.com/downloads/thought-leadership/fd_giftcardmarketingguide_toolstips.pdf