Kate Dai's Blog

Subaru is making itself visible and catching the attention of potential customers through linking it’s SUV the forester to the very cheeky sexy sumo. Hitting the audience with something new, interesting, and out of the blue, Subaru has strayed from traditional advertising strategies promoting benefits and features to simply just making it sound fun and sexy. The sexy sumo will stay in people’s minds and when a Subaru Forester drives by you’ll think of it.

The irony of a Sumo being sexy is funny and entertaining.

Sticking to this strategy, Subaru has gone as far as bringing in one of the advertised Sexy Sumos to the Vancouver International Autoshow this year. Take your picture with the Sexy Sumo and Subaru forester at the autoshow, something very different than what Subaru’s competitors present.

This is recent a clip of a family taking a photo with a real Sexy Sumo at the Autoshow at the Vancouver Convention Center.

I’m sure everyone will now be thinking of a Sumo when they see a Subaru. The awareness and attention is getting out but how will this affect their sales. It is a bold strategy that requires some risk. Simply entertaining and capturing the attention of people isn’t enough to bring in the dollars. It will be interesting to see if the Sexy Sumo can do the job.

Although there are many different factors that can contribute to success, preperation is the most important one. You cannot rely on luck, intelligence, spontaniety, or persistance to succeed in everything you do, but you can prepare for it in order to minimize risk and maximize the chance of success. Preparation works for everything. Too often do people run into issues and trouble when doing something that they think they have the capability to do. Be it running a marathon or writing an exam, one must prepare well to ensure the maximum possibility of achievement.

A friend of mine was very confident in his capabilities and qualifications for a specific job. Everyone thought he would get it and therefore he did not prepare for the interview. He was sure he could answer all questions easily and be sure to get the job. Due to lack of preperation, he stumbled on his words and stuttered while answering questions. It didn’t go smooth for him and he didn’t get the job although he was a highly qualified candidate for the position.

Although it doesn’t guarantee sucess, good preperaton increases the chances dramatcally.

In Angela Ahn’s Blog, she commented the difference of culture that influence the way of advertisment approachment.

I strongly agree with her. In general,  Asian commercials use more celeberty endorsements while North American commercials use more of others such as humour or sex appeal. 

Due to culture difference, components of commercials in different countries are quie different. As memtioned in her blog posted March 21, https://blogs.ubc.ca/seyoungahn/2011/03/22/52/#content. The Korean commercial focuses on celebrity endorsement while the North American comercial focuses on creativity and effectiveness of delivering messages through humour.

Regardless of which country, sometimes it just depends on the culture of the company to choose how to market their products in ads. Pepsi, no matter where in the world, uses celebrity endorsement. A combination of it with humour would make for a win-win scenario such as the ad below. 

Global soccer stars attract the attention of fans and local humour by addition of sumo wrestlers make the ad appealing to the target market. It’s alright to mix or combine different appeals of different cultures together as long as the target market is satisfied.  
Larger companies  in North America now consider it a must for celeberty endorsements. It’s not a surprise to see Justin Bieber in commercials since he’s become a hit. The method is growing popular internationally.

People are bombarded with advertisements everyday of their lives. Regular marketing strategies through media are no longer very effective. Ads may need to be repeatedly viewed several times before the audience can pick it up and remember the ad. Thus, marketers need to think of more catchy ways to draw attention to products if they were to be beat competitors. Red Bull has come up with a unique strategy of catching attention and creating buzz. The use of a live stunt that would make people stop and stare the very first time they see it; people parachuting off of a tall tower or building advertising Red Bull. What’s better is they purposely film it and make use of the internet where it can be shared amoungst people worldwide. The idea is to create buzz and have the video go viral where everyone will recognize Red Bull.

This is one of many advertising videos from Red Bull’s Air Force team. A team dedicated to parachuting off tall buildings in various parts of the world to promote and create buzz for Red Bull.

Its initial reaction from the public was great and so they continued to do the stunt all over the world where Red Bull is entering markets or to increase sales where it is already sold. Red Bull has now become a global brand in short matter of time and continues enjoy growth and success with various marketing strategies that set it apart from competitors just like this one.

How much would you pay for a glass of beer? Is there such a thing as high-end beer? Apparently, yes!

It is the marketing and advertising of beer that help add value and build the brand of Stella Artois being a high-end beer brand. The “perfect” beer might not taste 100 times better than regular beer but it can seem that way. The ritual made to create a perfect glass of Stella is quite fancy and definitely adds value and validates a higher price.

This is a shortened video of the 9 step ritual to pouring a perfect Stella Artois for the purpose of using it as an ad.

For further detail on the ritual there is a complete version available as well.

Either way, Stella Artois is positioning itself as a high end brand of beer. Differentiating in the beer market is vital to survival and so far, Stella Artois is doing well as the only beer with long a pouring ritual. Be sure to watch your bartender the next time you order a Stella Artois from the tap. (As the ad now provokes you to getting one – marketing success!)

Everyone has heard of Rolex and everyone knows they aren’t cheap. Rolex uses a Premium Pricing Strategy and has enjoyed the luxurious profits of it throughout its “time”. The market of luxury goods usually include premium priced brands well known to the entire world. The products become status symbols, signs of achievement, or simply say that the owner is living well off.

The Rolex ad below features the world famous tennis player, Roger Federer and his achievements. Rolex is presented as a brand for Champions in their field. A mark or symbol for every success.

This next Rolex ad below features Brad Pitt advertising the Rolex Evance. A successful man that attracts a lot of attention – the idol of many others (and heartthrob of many women). 

Rolex is marketing to successful middle-aged men that want to express their achievements with premium priced products that never go on sale. The value a customer receives from purchasing a Rolex extends beyond the costs of production which only makes up a small portion of the selling price. World-wide brand recognition, status and symbolic worth add value and thus, Rolex proves itself as a successful value priced luxury brand.

Do all men in their 30-50s want a Rolex? (They probably do.)

Businesses explore options to save money and get marketing statistics and feedback from a large group of people when launching new products. Traditional methods such as surveys and test markets can be costly. Now, with the introduction of Second Life, they can get it all virtually”.

Many companies, such as Telus and Starwood Hotel, are picking up on how useful it is as a test market for products and to gain valueable feedback. The virtual world of real users enables them to bring forth more innovative products and designs that would be too costly and risky to test in real life.

Businesses have no limits to what they can create and test in the market. However, packaging, delivery, and other aspects are limited in the virtual world. For example, smaller packaging of food products (such as the smaller coke cans you can now buy)  for elderly people (or children) that cannot eat as much is very difficult to test in Second Life.

If Second Life continues to expand its reach to customers worldwide, its popularity amongst businesses will sky rocket as it becomes the world’s cheapest and safest test market for products.

Today in class, we were taught about positioning. A company has to set there goal of either be first in the category, or be the first in the segment. There is an audi commercial that really left me with a great impression when I first saw it. 

Here is the ad: 

As we know, the public generalizes each brand with a certain selling point. Alfa Romeo’s selling point is design, Volvo’s is safety, BMW’s is sportness, and Benz’s is comfort. In this commercial, Audi claims that it has all the best features of some of its competitors put into one car. In other words, Audi delivered a message to the audience that it is the number one in the car industry among those competitors. (Why buy the others when you can have the best of all of them in one car?) The ad defines Audi’s motives and featured components leveraging the strengths of its competitors to better itself. A bold and strong positioning statement.

Taking comm296, we have learned that determining market segments are essential for companies to develop marketing strategies. Finding the way to reach these segments effectively and efficiently is a crucial factor of a company’s success. The Walt Disney Company is a great example that uses value-based marketing to be successful. 

Disney land, for example, target people of all ages through charging different age groups different prices for entry. Differentiating among the customers is smart because Disney has a broad target market. This strategy matches with Disney land’s vision: make everyone happy and improve the world. Disneyland provides all its customers with unique and entertaining experiences. In addition, having affective family theme related advertisements on TV and magazines are another approach of value-based marketing.  

Recently, Disney has partnered with MasterCard by signing a six-year contract; European MasterCard holders can get discounts in Disney stores, in Disneyland Paris and on Disney films. This new deal shows the segment that Disney focuses on right now is adult. By cooperating with MasterCard, Disney will be able to gain new customers and maintain old customers. This is also value-based marketing because Disney tries to convert new customers to advocates, and it tries to build a stronger network and business adventage by having MasterCard as a partner.  
 
The Walt Disney Company has expanded its existing operations by diversifying into live-action film production, television, travel and online media. Nowadays, it owns and operates the ABC broadcast television network, cable television networks, merchandising division, and eleven theme parks all over the world. Without a doubt, Disney has established itself as a leader of the family entertainment industry proven by an average annual revenue of 36,370 millions for the past five years.

Ever wonder why Zara always has most of its clothes on hangers? Ever wonder why they don’t have stock in the back when they run out of sizes? Ever wonder why Zara only has small quantities but huge variety? There is a reason: it’s all part of a grand marketing plan.

Zara beats its competitors in variety and speed. It’s clothing is fashionable and up to date with the latest trends. All the designs and most of the manufacturing are in Spain. Twice a week, designers must come up with new designs, most of which are from new and developing trends found in the media, fashion magazines and fashion shows and high-end brands. These designs can be manufactured locally there in just a few days and distributed world wide in just a few days as well. Surprisingly, from designing to getting the products into the stores, the entire process can be done within only a week.

The production distribution is so fast because of the following reasons:

1. They design and manufacture locally.

2. They distribute their products world widely using airplanes and trucks.

3. The design, production and distribution cycle happens twice a week.

Zara gives out outsourcing, pay high prices for distribution, create low quantity, huge variety and lower cost to beat its competitors. Competing brands would think manufacturing locally is crazy becuase they usually consider outsourcing to China to lower the costs. They also think using airplanes and trucks for distribution instead of ships and trains is crazy because the cost is so high. However, Zara has proven to be successful despite these high costs. Applying this unique marketing strategy, Zara attracts customers to visit them more frequently and makes their cutomers buy at the time they see the products because customers know that these is only limited number of the product and they won’t make the same thing again. It is hard for Zara’s competitors to compete with Zara with this marketing strategy and it is hard for them to copy.