Working on a video project can be a great experience, as well as it can be a pain, depending on the subject, people’s skills and what they like in general.

I really appreciated doing it, because it is an innovative way to study, it seems less like an assignment and (a bit) more like leisure. As an originally non-English speaking person, it also allowed me to go over the language barrier, because a video may be less formal than an essay, and because it doesn’t only ask for knowledge, but also for creativity. I think it also obliged us to work deeper on our informatics skills, which we maybe wouldn’t try to improve by ourselves if not forced to. Nowadays, being able to present a good PowerPoint or video is very important, because they are tools that we will use in our everyday working life, so if we are able to master it from now on, it can only be an asset.

I think that the hardest thing in that project was the length of the video. We had to talk about a lot of different things, concepts and go through recommendations, in a very short time, thus we had to be able to select the important information and be concise. After that, we had to choose what to use for the video, either film some members of the group talking or writing, or using some external videos. We had to find the balance between these possibilities, in order to make it relevant with what we were saying, but also in order to make it interesting and entertaining.

Concerning the peer feedbacks, my opinion is not really set. I think that it is always interesting to have several points of view, because different people will look at something in different ways. However, our feedback will probably be based on points that a teacher might not take as much into account, and skip some other that he/she would have considered more. A student will indeed more judge the video upon its general aspect, how entertaining it is, while a teacher will be more interested by the content itself.

Here it comes! We have been waiting for it. For more than 10 months we have been planning the meal, complaining about all the gifts we have to buy; finally the day is near, Christmas is right around the corner!

But despite its beauty, excitement and all its expectations, it also comes with something terrible, that we hope each year will finally disappear… The Christmas Sweater!

#My own creation!#

Because everyone knows that it’s a “must do” and that even if it goes against all the trends people will buy and wear it, Coca Cola Zero came up with a very innovative idea: The Sweater Generator. Anyone can create their own Christmas Sweater on the website, post it, and wait to get as many “Likes” as possible, because the top 100 of them will be created and sent to their designers!

David Kiefaber points out this kind of unique marketing tactic in his blog post, because it is not actually related to the brand (there is absolutely no link between Coca Cola Zero and a Christmas Sweater), but in the end, it will advertise their brand. It is a very good example of public relations. Except from a small logo which will be on the sweater, no one will notice where people got it. It is only the excitement during the competition and the word of mouth created by it which will market the company.

It benefits both the people taking part in the competition and the brand, because the person will get a free Christmas Sweater and a lot of fun, while the company only had to pay for the website where the competition was held, and the production of the sweater, for which the price is really low comparing to a TV ad or a billboard. As Coca Cola is also criticized because of its possible involvement in obesity, it also permits them to make some kind of indirect marketing, so that people don’t only associate Coca Cola with sugar and weight gain anymore, but also with Christmas and fun!

After all, Santa’s red and white costume is sometimes said to come from a Coca Cola ad campaign…!

I love travelling.

I’m not really fond of taking the plane, but I’m not scared of it. But there is one thing that I don’t like, or at least I just don’t really care for (and I guess 99% of the population agree), which is the safety announcement before taking off. You have been waiting for your trip to Hawaii for almost half a year, and a boring (and bored) cabin crew member delays your arrival to the white sand beach by the longest 5 minutes of your life…

Virgin America recently found a very interesting way to change this (boring) moment into a very engaging one: by launching a pre-flight safety video which is actually a real musical!

That was the subject of Jeffery’s 4^th Blog Post, which really caught my attention compared to other Blogs I visited.

Airline companies currently have two main kinds of differentiation strategies: either lowering their prices, or increasing their service quality. But once they have positioned themselves in one of these strategies, how do they attract new customers? How do they continue to maintain the loyalty of the current ones?

By launching this video, Virgin America reinvented the (boring) safety video, common to any airline company, even making it into a new asset and a way to differentiate themselves from their competition.

This won’t increase the service quality, lower the prices, or change anything within the company, but it will instead create a huge Internet hit, and appeal to people who didn’t know about, or haven’t flown with Virgin America before. Because travelers will associate a positive emotion to the company after watching this video, they are more likely to fly with this airline instead of a random unknown airline.

This is a perfect example of market penetration! 

I’m a woman. Like (almost) all of them, one day, I’ll have children.

What does it mean?

Seeing those little human beings growing, taking them to their first day of school, teaching them how to make a lovely bouquet of flowers, having great…

STOP!!

Because it also means, staying stuck at home, giving up work for at least a couple of months, meeting and seeing less people….

That’s what some new event organizers, travel agencies, marketing specialists and companies want to change. Why can’t mothers go on business trips and attend company events while the father stays home?!

Thus, 8 years ago, the company BlogHer (a blog portal mostly for women) organized its first event to gather its users for a few days in the Silicon Valley, and help these women ‘escaping’ from their kids to think about something else. It was a huge success, and was renewed every year from that moment.

These events are highly supported by several brands, because it lowers the price for the women to come, and strongly advertises their name and products. As women are the main buyers of everyday use products, they are key customers that those brands need to attract. Their marketing mix is highly focused on a very specific target market: women with young children, who stay at home most of the time, and are looking for social interactions with other women in the same situation.

Even if this positioning is very clear, it doesn’t mean that it’s not expensive. Sponsoring these events costs a lot, but in the long term, and notably with the lifetime value of

customers (the women in the first place, and then their whole family and friends afterwards), these investments might be (are expected to be?) highly profitable.

The brands don’t only sponsor the events, but also create product “ambassadors” out of women attending the event, which is a doubly profitable strategy: these women get the possibility to sell some of the brands’ products, which both gives them a new source of income (totally adaptable to their role as mother’s), and advertises the brands for a negligible cost.

However, money is definitely not the main goal for these women, but only an added value to their renewed social life!

[Source: http://www.courrierinternational.com/article/2013/07/03/maman-est-en-voyage-d-affaires]

We often link marketing to brands, and companies… But are they really the only users of marketing? What about politicians, ministry, NGOs, and culture? They use it as well!

To prove it, I will base my post on a singular exhibition which is taking

place in the streets of New York City, during the month of October.

The famous street artist Banksy (whose identity is still unknown) is using the streets of New York revealing a new painting every day, in a different place, for the whole month. He based this idea on a quotation of Paul Cezanne:

“All the pictures painted inside, in the studio, will never be as good as those done outside”

This principle is strongly related to his own story, because he started as an unknown street artist, to become one of the most famous of them, and whose paintings are now sold for several hundreds of thousands dollars on auctions (some reached more than $450,000). He wants to give back his work to the street, where it belongs originally.

And that’s when marketing enter the game.

By doing that, he’s creating a new interest to his work. People look for the paintings, spread word-of-mouth, then newspapers relate it, it goes on internet, and the rumor is set.

Banksy doesn’t earn money on his actual paintings, but thanks to his books, movies and exhibitions, that’s why this marketing operation is very subtle.

He doesn’t target anyone in particular, because it may appear anywhere in the city, but just anyone how is walking in the street, which means everyone.

This outdoor and free unique exhibition may continue to increase his popularity, by attracting new fans, and making the old ones even more interested in his work.

I really appreciate this idea, that even if he became world famous, he wants his work to stay where it belongs, in the street, right in front of everyone’s eyes. I also think that thanks to all the buzzing created by this October ephemeral exhibition, people will widely spread the news, and in the end, advertise Banksy’s work for free.

Isn’t it much better and much more efficient than spending several millions of dollars in a 45 seconds TV add?!

Sources:

http://www.banksy.co.uk/

http://www.lemonde.fr/culture/article/2013/10/07/banksy-fait-des-rues-de-new-york-son-nouveau-terrain-de-jeu_3490926_3246.html?xtmc=better_in&xtcr=1

“Write a blog post about Ethics in Marketing”… It may sound like a joke, but it’s the assignment… So I started to wonder how can I talk about ethics and marketing in the same post?! Isn’t it like talking about a nuclear bomb and… Growing flowers in the same spot?! I may exaggerate a bit, but it’s the general idea.

Most people see it like that nowadays. Most people see ethics as the sustainable, nice part of an idea or a product, while they see marketing as the evil process which will make you buy stuff. But minds, attitude, perception and culture are changing, people are looking for sustainability, they are starting to escape from the “bigger and cheaper” to look for “better and greener”.

That’s the moment when marketing people get in trouble. How do you adapt marketing to that completely new type of demand? They may also ask how to redefine the previous strategies which used to work, but are now given a cold shoulder by customers?

Let’s look at an example: in France, in 2006 (it shows that this concept is not totally new), the French water brand Volvic launched a campaign called “1L=10L”. It means that every time someone bought 1L of water, Volvic financed the drill of well in Niger, to collect 10L of water for the local population. This is what we call Ethical Marketing. The positive aspect of the purchase is 3 main points: for the local population (they get some water, a physiological need), for the customer (they feel good about their purchase, a self-actualization need), and for the firm (they increase their sales, improve their image, and achieve their main goal of creating more profit).

So if ethical marketing is so positive, why aren’t people more aware about that? Why don’t they act more that way? Preconceived ideas may be to blame, but it’s probably not all!

External link:

http://www.ethikenblog.com/index.php?post/2008/09/30/Le-marketing-ethique-%3A-une-definition-un-exemple2

Blablabla !