pragmatist: creation, practicality

I can’t believe this is going to be my last blog assignment.  It’s been a great semester for me. Through this marketing class, I learned so much about the marketing insights that I have never knew before, and I also got to know more about Lululemon, which was my group’s brand for marketing plan assignments. By researching about Lululemon  and thinking about how my ideas  and my groups’ marketing knowledge can be implemented into their business successfully, we  learned how to apply our academic knowledge to the real  life example. Additionally, I realized myself to engage with the brand that I was not interested in before.

Lululemon was the brand that I knew before, but I was not into the brand. However, as I was doing the marketing plan about  Lululemon, I actually dropped by the store where I never visited before and had a chat with one of the sale associate to gain more insights about their grassroot marketing strategy.  After having a chat with the sale associate, I could learn so much more the brand’s marketing insights and activities about the brand.  I was quite surprised by my imitativeness, which led me to develop my communication skills and leadership skills.

This term’s marketing projects were very creative and less stressful assignments than other assignments  in university. By doing this assignments, I was able to see myself to improve my team working skills, and to develop my passion to apply the academic knowledge to the actual world, which I really wanted to get out of my university education.

Among all these skills and experiences, my top takeaways are  my imitativeness and my passion about my education that I developed through the course.

I am thrilled to learn and explore more not only about the exciting marketing field , but also my enthusiasm toward my education in business.

The stereotype of the men is that they don’t care about what they are wearing. If you see a guy who is too fashionable, many people ( at least me:P) think that he may be a gay. This stereotype is so typical. Today, I want to talk about the importance of the men fashion.

My classmate, andrew, mentioned about man fashion brand, J-crew, in his blog. Andrew pointed three factors, Joint venture, mediap-product placement, celebrity endorsement,  that leveraged the J-crew ‘s market share in men’s clothe industry.

While I was reading his blogs,i realize that there is a huge man fashion marketing growing.  Many men starts to care about what they are wearing. It could be in a fashionable way or functional way. Men begins to be more cautious about the brands that they buy, and there are many fashion magazines/ Tv- shows , which are focused on Man, as well.

With this trend, Lululemon ( the brand that our group picked of marketing project) begin to focus on Men’s clothing line by emphasizing their practicality, and being fashionable. Unlike Nike, Adidas, what the brand only focus on the practicality of the clothes, Lululemon stresses their trendy aspects of the clothes along with its functional advanced.

Then, just like J-crew, what strategy makes Lululemon succeed in their men’s product line? I know it is an early stage for them to say whether their line is successful or not. There are definitely several ways that we can leverage their men clothing market share in this industry.For example. they can grow its product lines in sport categories- masculine appeal, such as soccer and basketball, to build it self as men’s brand as equally as it is a women’s brand. Utilizing a social media to present how men can be fashionable wearing lululemon’s functional clothes.. etc. There are various ways that Lululemon can attract men customers which is a high pontential profitiability segment.

Anyway, I begin to realize how much Man actually care about their fashion, and I am very excited to see how long this trend will  last and how far it will go

Here is a quick video of Men’s fashion tip! ( If you want to be fashionable, start with this video!- for business guy? i guess?)

 

Do you think Social media can save  individuals’ life? Yes, it does! According to Mark’s blog, Mark, who was on the twitter on the right time, helped Homeless service centre to get the generator after Hurricane sandy. Each person, each tweet and retweet  contributed to avoiding a serious crisis in Homeless centre.  This example definitely related to the my awesome 5days for homeless campaign.

 

For the past 5 days, I participated in the campaign called “ 5 days for homeless” which tries to raise the awareness of youth homeless issue on campus by experiencing a superficial level of homeless life. From the campaign, we were luckily enough to raise more than $2000 for the youth direction service( homeless help organization).  This campaign allowed me not only to experience how strong the ubc community is, but also to realize the power of social media. During  and before the campaign, participants and executive teams of the campaign promoted the campaign through facebook, twitter and blogs. Especially, facebook, that many university students uses on daily base, was a great tool to spread the word of what we are doing. By posting pictures, putting the links of all the participants’ blogs, and 5 days for homeless link, many students began to acknowledge about the campaign and even few people came by our basecamp( In front of UBC bookstore) with the food and fruits.  Making class presentations in each classes and demonstrating the campaign in front of UBC bookstore where many students drop by were  a great way to do the campaign. However, I believe the social media, that we used, played the most significant role for the success of this campaign. If we did not utilize the social media, not as many as people know that I was sleeping outside of bookstore for youth homeless. They might think, I AM CRAZY:P

As Mark said in his blog, There is a real power in a connected network! and if we utilize  it correctly and sincerely, then we can make a difference   in the world! Just like my experience!

( I hope I contributed to making a difference in world little bit!) 

Here is a youtube video of the campaign ( last year’s)

Last year, when I was taking comm 101 class, I blogged about a healthy, quick fast food restaurant called “Freshii”.

Here is “Healthy Luch! yes Freshii PART 1”

After a year, I finanlly managed to visit ” Freshi” and experience their FRESH , HEALTHY food and QUICK Service.

Before I visited the restaurant, I thought they only serve the vegetables( I meant, only sald menues ;p), but there were various food choices from customizing salad menus from bowls. If you happen to read my blog during lunch time, check their menu!

So, instead of experiening their customizing salad, I just ordered the sald ” Freshicobb” from the menu.

Here is me, I LOOK SUPER HAPPY in this picture =)

 

 

The portion was huge, and the food came out very fast. Since I visited the freshii which was located near waterfront station during lunch time, there were many business men and women who would like to enjoy fast and healthy lunch at Freshii.

One more tip for people who care about their calories!

when you go to freshii website, and click the calculator, it will take you to the customizing order page, where you can know about nutrition information as you make your own healthy lunch/snacks/ breakfast/ dinner !

So, maybe, It could be a good idea for you to build your own food before you head to the freshii restaurant.

Overall, My experience in freshii was 10/10. THE FOOD, THE ATMOSTPHER, THE INTERIOR WERE PERFECT AND AMAZING !

Meatlover! you are afraid to try Freshii since they don’t have  meat? No worries, they have various menus with Chicken, which is my favorite!

 

What does this picture represent?  Have you ever suprised how different your actual hamburger from the tv commercial that you saw on tv last night?

THIS IS THE ISSUE OF MISLEADING ADVERTISING

Misleading advertising occurs when a claim about a product or service is materially false or misleading, in an attempt to persuade the consumer to buy it.

In order to pursuade the consumer to buy their products, the companies somtimes mistated their products information and sometimes exaggerate their products’ quality.

Here is the another example of false advertising issue

 

Listerine as a Cure-All

Listerine is an antiseptic mouthwash , first over-the-counter mouthwash sold in the United states in 1914 and by 1921. This product is popularly known by the phrase “kills germs that cause bad breath”. Also, it is very notorious for its false advertisement. it declared itself a cure-all for common cold ailments like sore throats and coughs, a dandruff preventative, and anti-shave tonic, and a safe way to protect yourself from cuts, bruises, wounds and sting.

What, Listerine can cure everything and it solves every health issue that I have?

No way, this is way too much exaggeration.

Through its false advertisements, Listerine was slapped with numerous false advertisement lawsuits.

In 1975, the company was order to spend $10 million to correct all advertisements- seeing as its products was no more effective in treating colds than gargling warm water- by the Federal Trade Commission.

 

Even after this, Listerine did not realize its fault. In 2005, the company was sued for another false advertising because of their advertising- “effective as floss”

However, Dentist did not agree to this  and even emphasized that it is not that effective in reducing the cause of tooth decay.

Other than this examples, there are still many companies who utilize false advertising for their marketing tactic. We, consumers, should be all responsible enough and should always check!!! check! check!! our products cautiously before we make a wise decision to buy them.

Check other false advertising examples( source) – 6 cases of shamelessly false advertising

 

Picture references: google.ca- faluse advertising/ Listerine

Have you guys heard of the new trend marketing type, cause markeitng? It sometimes called ” Kind marketing“.

so, what does the exactly mean of “Cause marketing” ?

it comes from ” cause” definition; the reason or motive for some human action.Companies involves inthe cooperative efforts of a “for profit” business and a  “non-profit” organization for mutual benefit. This is different than the companies’ community/ social contribution service because cause marketing connects the social issues with the companies’ brand marketing tactic, not actually either donation or contributing time to help them. Social issues are melted in the marketing tactic.

As consumers’ interest about social issues increases and ethical consumtion, ethical cooperation conduct have been focused , consumers hope that their consumption can make a differnece in the society and influence the companies’ ethical conduct. These tendency start to have an impact on the companies’ profit, furthermore, it even affects the companies’ social responsibility. Therefore, many companies begin to realize the signifiance of the cause marketing and start to utilize it as well.

Especially, as SNS(social networking serive) has been developed and popular, many companies  utilize their social media and social networking service for cause marketing.

The most successful company who utilizes the casue marketing is

:TOMS SHOES – Shoe for tomorrow, one for one business model, through this model, they empasize their companies’ social cause and atthe same time, consumer can contribute to making a difference in the society- donating the shoes for the kids who can’t afford to buy shoes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cause marekting is a new way for the companies not only to practice their business ethics and but also to give consumers oppourtunity to make an impact in the social issues by their consumption. It is a great marketing type that connects consumers, companies and even society to seek one goal and to become one world.

Here is a quick video about TOMS’ one for one business model- Cause mareketing,

 

Picture reference: cause marketing, toms