If I could go back in time…
This is it. My final post for COMM 296: Intro to Marketing. It’s time for some self-reflection.
The designated topic for this post is a reflection on the group project which ultimately involved creating a video. If I could go back in time, what would I have done better?
First of all, our newly formed group needed to pick a company to research and explore from a marketing perspective. We ended up choosing Tata Motors, as none of us were familiar with the company and we were intrigued by the Tata Nano, which some of us were introduced to in COMM 101.
Tata Motors, a challenging company to explore, especially because it’s located on the other side of the globe.
For the first two parts of the assignment, I would’ve contributed more overall. Due to reasons such as conflicting schedules and procrastination, I could’ve put in more effort than I did. If I would be able to go back in time, I would visit the CLC and look for more resources regarding Tata and its target market with the Nano.
The final part of the project involved making a video. When the media expert from the CLC came to talk to us, just the thought of planning, filming, and editing sounded like a huge time and effort investment. Many ideas were thrown here and there throughout the whole process, taking lots of time and effort.
Now, the things that I personally could’ve done better for the video project. If I could go back in time, I would like to participate more in the editing process. I would help the team and learn about video editing using Premiere Pro along the way. I would also brainstorm more sketches for the drawing part, as well as contribute more towards the content of the voice-over script.
It’s always good to end on a positive note. I would say that I did a pretty good job coming up with the idea of drawing out our ideas instead of acting. I also contributed in recording the voice-over and some of the drawing. Overall, our group put in lots of effort and time, and the final product, our video, is the result of hard work and creativity. Good work, team!
RE: Why is everyone playing Candy Crush Saga in the classroom?
In memory of my Level 305 achievement on Candy Crush Saga, I have chosen to respond to Claire Choi’s blog post that explores the immense popularity and profitability behind the game.
A little bit of background info regarding my history with Candy Crush: I started playing earlier this year, and it became a part of my life. I would play it on the bus, when I’m eating, before class, after class, even before I go to sleep. Whenever I have time and lives, I would be playing Candy Crush. Why did I spend so much time of my life playing this game?
In her blog post, Claire mentions three principles of consumer behaviour with regards to the game. The first one is the liking principle. The interface itself is sweet and likeable. The candy within the game looks delicious, even without the deep voice saying it.
Every day, when I check my Facebook news feed, I always see Candy Crush posts. The consistency principle would also apply here. If your closest friends are playing the game, you would likely want to play too. With the number of people using Facebook these days, the marketing of the game reaches an audience that is very broad, making the social validation principle relevant here too.
The second principle she mentions is the reciprocity principle. It’s free to play, but power-ups and extra lives cost real money. Because the game is free to play at first, people may be more inclined to pay for power-ups in later levels. I think that the commitment principle may be a better application here, because once players have one foot in the Candy Crush door, it’ll be hard to step out.
The limited number of lives within a certain amount of time also relates to the scarcity principle. Players will value the game more when they cannot play on forever. They will also be enticed to pay for another life, which is priced at $0.99.
Candy Crush is able to appeal to 6 of 7 principles of consumer behaviour. Maybe that’s why people are unable to stop playing, even in class.
If you would like to play too…
Holiday marketing, the right way
I wonder what’s inside…more customers?
Since it’s nearing the holiday season, I decided to read a blog about holiday marketing. I found a post titled “4 simple ways to engage holiday shoppers online” by Courtney Buchanan on the New School Marketing Blog on responsys.com. In her blog post, Courtney goes over some ways to attract the online customer during the holiday season.
The first tip she mentions is to embed videos in marketing emails. Videos can convey more information than just text and pictures, and companies can be more creative. If the video is well done, it may linger around in the consumer’s thoughts when they go about holiday shopping.
The second tip has to do with social media and public wish lists. There is a rising trend to advertise through social media due to the sheer size of the audience. The public wish list on Pinterest is a great way for retailers to get their product exposed and increase online sales without spending big bucks and precious time on extensive market research.
The third way to engage a customer is to turn marketing into games. This is a good way of interacting with customers and building a relationship with them. This will also attract attention from new customers who were just looking for some fun. I wouldn’t mind playing a fun game myself.
Last but not least is the countdown clock. This is similar to the scarcity principle that we learned about in class. People are more likely to see something as valuable when that something is limited and scarce. When there is a limited time for a sale, people will be more inclined to make a fast purchase and avoid missing a good deal. When they do make the purchase, the product itself will feel more valuable, like something “limited edition”.
The holidays are not just about people giving gifts to each other. With the rise of value-based marketing, the holidays are a great opportunity for companies to receive the gift of brand exposure and gain new, valuable customers.
Happy holidays, everyone!
Tangerine…is a bank?
This is ING Direct’s current logo.
“I’m going to open an account at Tangerine.” Right now, I cannot imagine anyone saying that. But that just might happen in the near future. According to this news article, ING Direct is going to take the namesake of a citrus fruit that I personally do enjoy eating. When Scotiabank acquired ING Direct in 2012, changing the name was part of the deal. I understand that the ING Direct lion was of an orange colour, but the question here is, why a fruit?
“Invest with Tangerine, it’ll be a sweet deal.” I’m already imagining what their new slogan would be (excuse the pun). Is ING Direct trying to become the Apple of the banking industry? I wonder how much market research went behind this name decision. The new name sounds “silly”, according to a commenter in the article. Will Tangerine achieve the brand awareness it needs to sustain a competitive advantage? Would consumers link Tangerine to forward, direct banking?
Maybe Scotiabank acquired ING Direct to eliminate competition. Some commenters in the article mentioned that ING Direct offers good customer service, and maybe Scotiabank is also trying to take advantage of that. Acquiring a competitor that excels in customer service may help Scotiabank itself increase customer loyalty. 1.8 million clients is a pretty big number, if you ask me.
Another thing that I’m curious about is the new logo. I doubt that the ING Direct orange lion would stick around after the name change. Would the logo be a tangerine? Would it stick around in consumer brains and fend off the competition? What I do know is that marketing costs may increase in order to communicate to savers and borrowers that ING Direct is now called Tangerine.
Whether Tangerine becomes the Apple of the banking industry is unknown as of now, but let’s just hope that Tangerine doesn’t end up like another fellow fruit, the Blackberry.
This could be ING Direct’s, or Tangerine’s new logo.
New blend, new positioning?
Tim Hortons is introducing a new blend of coffee, for the first time in its 49-year history. Why did Tim Hortons choose to increase its product depth now? It may be the intensifying competition from Starbucks and McDonald’s, or maybe the new blend is trying to meet a consumer need that was previously unaddressed.
From a consumer standpoint, Tim Hortons is the place to go for a “cheap, quick-serve morning fix”. However, the company’s vision is to be the “quality leader”, which may not be exactly aligned with consumer’s thoughts. In my opinion, the new blend is a way to attract attention and invite people to try Tim Hortons coffee with a different mindset.
Speaking of a different mindset, I recently watched a commercial showing the coffee-making process, from planting to brewing, in the form of a stop motion sand animation, using coffee grounds instead of sand. I did not recognize that it was a Tim Hortons commercial until the logo showed up. At first, I thought it was a commercial for some new gourmet coffee that was going to be in the trendy single-serve coffee makers. This story behind the quick and inexpensive Tim Hortons coffee did not seem too believable for me, but it did lead me to think about how Tim Hortons is trying to change its positioning in the market and work towards its vision of being a quality leader. But the real question is, will consumers see Tim Hortons in a new light?
Back to the new blend. What if the new dark roast just ends up moving customers away from the regular blend? There is a certain degree of risk to product diversification and increasing product depth. What puzzles me is why Tim Hortons would want to introduce a new dark roast blend after 49 years of (successfully) selling one blend. Whatever the reason, it has caught my attention, and I am willing to try a small double-double in dark roast, if the blend makes it to Vancouver.
Newspaper ads for BlackBerry
A recent news article from Bloomberg News states that BlackBerry is using newspaper print ads to try to convince consumers to buy BlackBerry smartphones.
After investing millions of dollars into a Superbowl ad that did not successfully sell the new Z10, BlackBerry is launching these newspaper ads in an attempt to regain consumer confidence.However, the Superbowl ad and the newspaper ad are targeted towards two completely different market segments. The Superbowl ad focuses on attracting a younger audience, using lots of special effects. However, sales for that product did not do so well. Being a member of that younger target segment, BlackBerry was never appealing for me, no matter how many rubber ducks were used in its commercials.
At first, the newspaper ad seemed like a desperate, last-resort attempt. Even newspapers themselves are not doing so well in this digital age, why would BlackBerry dump money into this form of advertising? However, after some thought, I found this move to be a form of targeting and segmentation, since people who read newspapers in print most likely do not prefer using smartphones for their news, and thus may prefer an actual keyboard as opposed to a virtual one. The ad is also in the form of a letter, and the impatient younger generation is not likely to be willing to take the time to read through it. The target audience for the newspaper ad is most likely older consumers in need of an efficient phone that does not need to have all the latest aesthetics and features.
Placing an open letter in newspapers is not just because every other form of advertising didn’t work. The letter allows Blackberry to communicate to consumers, as well as carriers and partners. It also sells BlackBerry as a reliable company to potential customers in a different target segment from Apple and Android. BlackBerry is trying to find a niche market that can possibly save it from its current struggles.
Same topic, new perspective
This blog post will mark my transition from a first-year COMM 101 student to a second-year student studying marketing in COMM 296. Last year at this time, I posted about ethics in business, namely the ethics involved in the NHL lockout. This year, I will post about ethics in business from a different view.
In today’s demand-driven society, marketing is all about trying to create loyalty and build sentimental relationships with customers. Appealing to the customers’ morals and ethics is certainly one way of doing so.
To me, corporate social responsibility always appeared as a form of marketing. I, for one, would be more inclined to purchase a product that contributes to society in some way, whether that is through donating to a charity or through using recyclable materials. The business can build its image as a socially responsible company and make its brand well-recognized. However, are some businesses unethically using philanthropy as a marketing scheme to attract and retain customers?
The answer is unfortunately yes. This kind of marketing can be seen through “green” products that actually have no benefit for the environment. On the “The Toilet Paper Chase” episode of CBC’s Marketplace, the show reveals that a certain brand of toilet paper, which has the “Sustainable Forestry Initiative” logo prominent on its packaging, is actually clear-cutting parts of the forests in New Brunswick. I found in the comments below that some types of forest certification have lower standards than government regulations and that the logos are just for marketing. When social responsibility becomes a selling point that walks the line in terms of truth, the business is unethically taking advantage of what consumers’ believe to be ethical.
In my opinion, when companies are socially responsible, the marketing should be just a good side effect. In fact, I find that since big corporations have more financial power than the average individual will ever have, social responsibility should become an ethical standard, not just a way of appealing to consumer ethics.
Black Friday in Canada?
A screenshot of how Future Shop, a Canadian company, is jumping on the Black Friday bandwagon.
Canadian retailers will try to keep shoppers at home this upcoming Black Friday, as they will take the American tradition into their own hands. Many Canadians have opted to shop with American retailers for the holiday season because of their good deals. In order to get Canadians to do their holiday shopping here, many retailers have put up prominent signage and advertising for a Canadian Black Friday.
Black Friday is not Canadian, but holiday shopping is a big opportunity for revenue for retailers, and it is sad to see the US always winning the price competition. It is interesting to see the competition between the same companies in different countries. What are their points of difference between each other? What benefits will a Best Buy in Canada bring that a Best Buy in the States will not? Canadian stores do not necessarily have a better product, since most products are the same. Sales taxes are higher here, as well as the selling price, despite the US dollar and the loonie being practically equal in value. Instead of allowing people to spend more during overnight stays, shouldn’t the Canadian government do something to keep Canadian money in Canada?
Sources:
http://www.futureshop.ca/en-CA/category/black-friday-future-shop/Black-Friday-Deals.aspx
Re: Branding parti in le Quebecois
This is a response to Melissa Monaghan’s blog post about big companies taking the Quebec government to court.
Melissa mentioned that the altering of company logos could defer companies from entering the Quebec market. These private English-speaking companies have to go through a lot of trouble just to establish a branch in Quebec.
I would like to take a different point of view on the matter, because I think that these companies should develop logos in many different languages if they want to expand globally. It’s not just Quebec that speaks a different language. A flexible logo could make these companies known world-wide, instead of just English-speaking countries. For example, in countries like China where the written language is made up of characters and not letters, they would have to re-establish the brand anyways. Quebec’s law is too picky, but I would like to think of the law as a barrier to entry. If a company can overcome the barrier, then it would have a bigger competitive advantage over other companies who don’t want to expand into Quebec because of language barriers.
It’s Chapter 11 and shutdown for Twinkie-maker Hostess
The Twinkie could become extinct after the shutdown of Hostess.
Poor organizational culture can lead to liquidation, as shown by 82-year-old Hostess. Heavy debt and changing consumer tastes to healthier food are contributors too, but the battle with its workers and their union eventually caused Hostess to go for Chapter 11 and shut down its factories.
Hostess was not able to keep up with the costs and obligations they had to fulfill regarding their employees, similar to how General Motors had trouble because of legacy costs. Lack of production due to the strike caused inability to keep up with the supply chain, and thus a loss in sales to the retail stores. If the employees are not happy, the whole company could be paralyzed.
However, the employees did reject a contract offer. Lower wages is better than no job at all, which could be the case for 18,500 people. What bothers me is that the bakery workers are only 30% of Hostess’s workforce, but everyone else could result in being jobless too. This is like my post about the NHL lockout. It’s the players that want better a better salary, but it’s hurting all the other employees of the NHL that have no say. I think that’s a social issue that some social entrepreneur out there should help solve.
Source:
Image:
http://heritageaction.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/twinkies.jpg