Pure Business

During the last lecture of Comm 296 (marketing class), my professor, Tamar talked to us about the product placement promotional strategy. Her example of product placements in movies captured my attention. She talked to us about FedEx appearing in the movie Cast Away and some other examples. These examples made me wonder if there were other product placements in the movies that I’ve seen in the past, so I did some research and came across a very amusing website called Brandchannel.com. In the Brandcameo – films section of this site, “Brandchannel tracks  brand appearances and product placement in each week’s number one film”. This site is amusing in that it is cross-referenced by brands and movies so I can find out all the movies that featured a certain brand or all the brands that appeared in a certain movie.

Here, I found out some brands and product placements that I have never noticed or thought about before while watching the movies. Some of the brands in the films that I’ve seen include Bud Light, Burger King, Sony, Cheerios and more in Paranormal Activity 2; Hummer, Desert Eagle Pistol and more in Resident Evil: Afterlife; Coca-Cola, Mercedes, Range Rover and more in Inception; Cheetos, NBC, Wii and more in Despicable Me; Apple, Barbi, Corvette, eBay, Monopoly, GI Joe and more in Toy Story 3. In this site, I also learned that the leading brand appearances of this year are Ford and Apple.

Next time I watch a film (which will probably be none other than this week’s number one film, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1), I will be paying more attention to the appearance of brands. This movie was this week’s tracked film in the Brandcameo section and it tracked Amaretti Del Chiostro, Belstaff, Samsung and Sanyo.

Barbie in Toy Story 3 (left), Desert Eagle Pistol in Resident Evil (right), Wii in Despicable Me (bottom)

Kori Ellis brought up a topic of an interesting promotional campaign held by IKEA called The Life Improvement Project in his blog.

I think that this campaign is very original and engaging to their customers. With the tag-line, “Improve your community. Improve your life.”, IKEA will capture the interests of many customers to participate, as well as encourage and influence them to improve their own homes by using the IKEA products. This campaign creates a company image to the many consumers that they “care” not only for their own sales and profit but also for the community and for the good of their customers to improve their lives. Also, the contest gives a very valuable opportunities for their customers with no risk involved and people are always attracted by opportunities.

This “The Life Improvement Project” is a very creative campaign that is related and unique to the company. I am very curious to find out the project of the winning customer’s creation in the contest.

CLEAN WHAT?! Clean BALLS!?

While I was watching some TV today, I came across a very “interesting” commercial of Axe Detailer. I’ve always known Axe for their “unique” commercials but this one that I saw today particularly stood out even from their unique collection of commercials. I said an “interesting” commercial because it was hard for me to find the one right word to describe it based on my attitude. My attitude created the two words that are distinct from each other; disturbing and funny at the same time. If you watch the video above, you will know exactly what I mean.

This commercial made an obvious sexual image by using sports equipment balls to refer to as the testicles of men. They used different types of balls to describe the different stereotypical testicles: Old rugby balls as an old man’s testicles, big soccer ball sacks as a black man’s testicles, fuzzy tennis balls as a hairy man’s testicles.

While these analogies made me laugh, some features such as the old woman’s expressions and the spokesperson “playing” with the balls disturbed me as well. Also, an immediate question that came up to my mind was “Is this even APPROPRIATE to be shown on TV?!?!”

In order to take advantage of the holiday season, “financial giant” Chase began its annual Ultimate Rewards promotions on Nov. 3. This holiday promotions include “Give a gift, get a free gift card,” “Cyber Monday,” and “Eight is Great” which offers cardholders with rewards points and bonus gifts cards in limited-time deals.

On top of this, in an effort to promote these holiday promotions, Chase created a microsite that features print advertising, e-mail marketing and promotions on Oprah.com.

I think that these promotional strategies are in good timing for the holiday season which creates an extra value to the customers. The rewards that Chase offers to the customers will definitely encourage them to spend more and effectively using Chase’s card.

I can see Chase having a great financial success through the usage of marketing strategy for this year’s holiday. Plus, their company name itself sounds great! CHASE! (that’s my name!)

Me, in front of Chase Bank in New York

When Mercedes-Benz introduced the new C-Class, they used a diversification strategy for the growth of their brand. C-Class is an entry-level luxury sedan which is a new category of vehicle products to a new market segment. Mercedes, who is a known brand for their luxurious and expansive vehicles recognized the need to target new market segments who can’t afford the expansive $100,000 vehicles but wishes to drive a car with a name that “looks good” in front of their peers. C-Class granted the wishes of these segment groups with prices starting at only $31,975, yet it still offers the customers with the brand image of being Mercedes-Benz.

This TV commercial gets this point across to the consumers in a short but filled with strong facts that shows their brand image which gives the customers the trust, value and reliability of their brand: 

As the commercial says “Why? Because we promise you a Mercedes-Benz.”, the brand of Mercedes-Benz is a promise to their customers. So even with the less luxurious and cheaper products that they offer, the C-Class, this promise of their brand is strongly kept. That phrase almost gave me goose bums that implemented a powerful feeling of attraction to the brand. Also, the usage of the word “we” gave me a feeling of closeness and trust of having a relationship with the brand.

As Eileen has addressed in her blog post “Crabtree & Evelyn launches Breast Cancer campaign“, Crabtree & Evelyn is running a promotion strategy that offers its market with values in two areas: consumers who are aware and caring of the seriousness of breast cancer and consumers who simply go for the special offers. This promotion should reach out and attract new segment groups in the market.

In addition to the campaigns Eileen has mentioned, Crabtree & Evelyn is also donating $1.00 to the world’s largest breast cancer organization called Susan G.Komen for the Cure for each Limited Edition Pink 60-Second Fix® Kit for Hands sold in the US in October with $25,000 guaranteed minimum donation. As well, Crabtree & Evelyn is helping to spread the awareness of the breast cancer along with educational tips on staying healthy.

I think this promotional strategy of holding a breast cancer campaign is a clever move in a marketing prospective and will result in an effective outcome in business for Crabtree & Evelyn.

As for their post-purchase service, I agree with Eileen in the satisfactory level. When I purchased a hand cream for my girlfriend from their retail store, I received a $10 off coupon!

In a group of commercials, Nike produced a special contribution for the 2009 NBA Playoffs that features two of the highest performers and most popular NBA superstars today: Kobe Bryant and LeBron James. Only, not the players themselves but as PUPPETS!

As an NBA/Kobe Bryant fan, I enjoyed these commercials a lot. There are many episodes that are “short and sweet”, which are humorous as well as a right-on portrait in representation of the superstars’ characteristics, achievements and products. These features of the commercials kept me entertained and I just couldn’t stop watching them.

This is one of the commericials:

Nike spokesman Kejuan Wilkins stated about these commercials that “this is about celebrating two of the game’s best players and giving fans a glimpse into their personalities, not only on the court, but away from the game.”

These types of commercials are what makes Nike. The brand image and the value of the brand it gives out to their target markets; in this case of commercials, the NBA/basketball fans. Even without featuring their products in the commercial, Nike does an effective job of selling their brand and creating value to the customers by representing it with popular stars such as Kobe and LeBron. All the commercial needs is one simple Nike logo at the end to show that these superstars represent Nike Basketball.

If you are either a Kobe or LeBron fan like me, you can enjoy all the episodes of these commercials at MVPs – Kobe & Lebron Puppet All Episodes

According to the Wall Street Journal on October 11th, it has been announced that the ex-CEO, Fredric D. Rosen will be the CEO of Outbox Enterprises LLC.

This new ticket selling company, Outbox Enterprises brings in a different type of ticket selling model called the white-level service which offers direct selling of tickets from the websites of their clients.  Ticketmaster uses its one, centralized website to provide all the tickets for the consumers. This model which is the works of Rosen in the 90’s is considered outdated according to Rosen himself. Due to the high usage of search engines such as Google and other social-media sites, Rosen claims that “The middle-man model is dead,” and that “You have to evolve.”

I find this statement made by Rosen very ironic. A business model that led a company to being the most popular in its industry until now is described as “dead” by the CEO who built the very model. This shows that the market trend is growing rapidly with both internal and external factors. These changes in the market can go so far to the necessity of taking down the entire business model for a new one.

Rosen observed the society in North America and recognized the change of market behaviors and trends. This analysis evolved into a new idea which created the model, white-level service. Along with the change of market trend of consumers, the sales of tickets has been decreasing this year. Rosen takes these two market change and takes them as an opportunity for Outbox Enterprises to compete against Ticketmaster. “I view that as an opportunity,” Mr. Rosen says. “If everything’s good, and everyone is happy, and everyone is making money, it’s a lot harder to break in.”
It would be interesting to see after several years how the ex-CEO of Ticketmaster positions his new company, Outbox against his formal company in the ticket sales industry.

As a fellow “baller” as John said in his blog post, “MJ’s Back“, I was thrilled about the new release of NBA 2K11 reliving Michael Jordan when I saw the commercial for it. It is just like how John described. I can “barely able to contain” myself. Especially as I was watching the NBA 2K11 Michael Jordan Premiere Trailer, my heart was pumping with adrenaline rush and my hands, sweaty.

The creator of NBA 2K11, 2K Sports did an excellent job in their marketing strategy to effectively deliver the value of NBA 2K11 to their target market. Their target market being basketball or NBA fans, they created a product and a commercial that pinpoints their targets’ interest and value. Being a basketball/NBA fan myself, I was attracted and persuaded by their marketing strategy.

The commercial features some of the popular NBA stars today simply enjoying a game of NBA 2K11 and remembering all of the great moments of Michael Jordan at the same time. They create a humorous, fun and “chill” atmosphere that makes the viewers say “I can’t wait to gather with my friends and play that game and have fun just like how they are doing!”

They also used the slogan at the end of the commercial, “Become the Greatest” which gives a feeling to the consumers that they can be “great” by “becoming” Michael Jordon, one of the greatest basketball players himself.

I very much agree with John in that 2K Sports created a commercial that effectively sells the game, as well as featuring comical and humorous scenes that captures the attention of the consumers. Going further, this commercial is able to give an engaging feeling and experience in a short 1:23 minutes of time to their target groups.

For improvement, if 2K Sports can recruit the actual Michael Jordan himself to be in the commercial, I think I would be running to the store at instant.

Eye-catching. Fancy! EXTRAORDINARY. COOL!

These are some of the words that might come into your mind when you check out the newly created website of Off The Wall.

Using the ever so popularizing 3D effect, the clothing retailer Off The Wall and the clothing store Bench has taken marketing to a whole new level with technology.

When I first played the Bench ‘Art of the Street’ 3D Video, I got attracted by the music. However, the fast past visuals kept me unfocused on the details of the video. Nevertheless, this idea of “3D”  in marketing glasses, postcards, videos, prizes and the look-book in the website seem so brilliant and perfect for the ages of youth. Off The Wall and Bench has recognized the popular trend from the Hollywood Movies and branded themselves by marketing with “going 3D everything”. This is a perfect example of creating and adding value to their brand, stores and products for their target market; youth.

This 3D marketing shows the unique and creative ideas marketing is taking its steps into, and it is definitely what the kids are going to be talking about at their schools with friends.