Month: November 2011

Recently, EU banned drink producers from claiming that water could prevent dehydration. It is now illegal for bottled water manufacturers to make such a claim; they face jail time if they are to defy the EU.

The oddity of this ruling aside, this could impact drink manufacturers greatly.

Without this simple, widely accepted point of parity to market, producers of bottled water must now find other ways to promote their product. They may have to rely on their established brand image, or other special points of differentiation. However, there is a fundamental problem with this: water is a commodity product that is, in all respect, more or less the same thing regardless of who produces it. Without being able to advertise it’s ability to prevent dehydration, the main reason for consumers to purchase water, they are left with very little to work with. If they cannot claim the most basic function of bottled water, what is there left to market?

Creativity is therefore crucial to overcoming this barrier. Existing companies may find it easier to build upon their existing brand image, but new entrants could find it difficult to establish themselves without this point of parity.

The importance of the Internet today is unmistakable. With the widespread use of social media, information is transferred from user to user incredibly fast. This, of course, means that businesses also have to keep a close eye on what people are saying about their company online, as a bad reputation could spread very fast, and it will, in turn, show dramatically in the sales.

As mentioned in the blog Veribatim, Internet  is able to give a company an immense amount of exposure over a short period of time, whether good or bad. With the world observing companies with scrutiny on the web, firms are finding that there is more and more pressure to make ethical choices that boost the company’s image. As beneficial it is to have publicity on the Internet (ex. viral marketing), there’s no denying the damage negative exposure does. A brand’s position and image, carefully established, could fall to ruin in an instant if things slip online. Take the example of Brian King from the blog above, for example. Unsatisfied customers could sabotage your brand’s careful facade, and online, users tend to believe first-hand accounts more so than what the company puts out.

Is this a vegetable? Congress thinks it is.

Congress recently ruled that pizza could be classified as a vegetable due to the amount of tomato sauce used in the food, despite the lack of nutritional value the sauce contains. Apparently, this is a way of cutting costs for the US government, as they do not have to spend as much on healthier  food in school lunches.

What could this mean for parents and businesses, though?

Parents concerned for the health of their children could shift towards purchasing healthier food for their children as they realize the lack of nutrition in school lunches, but producers of frozen pizza and industries associated from this will benefit regardless. Schools are likely to shift towards pizza and purchase it more heavily, as the popular food now satisfies the new health regulations.

As good as this is for the pizza industry and current government budgets, encouraging food like this will promote unhealthy lifestyles for the children in the long run, defeating the purpose of health regulations.  It’s a sacrifice of short term and long term goals, and also a sacrifice of ethical choices for a money-driven decision.

There’s no denying the impact the Internet has on the world. With the emergence of popular networking sites, a large portion of a business’ marketing efforts are being focused towards the Internet. However, these methods get repetitive, and users quickly get desensitized by the flood of advertisements online. Creativity and innovation are now required to capture the attention of consumers. With the ease of information sharing online, news of a popular advertisement will quickly spread and snowball, generating an immense amount of publicity.

Take Dane’s post on the Old Spice guy. The commercial’s fresh humour generated massive publicity, doubling their sales and gaining them an international audience. Clearly, viral marketing is highly successful, but it is also a “hit or miss” venture. Too often, viral marketing attempts make the company look like they’re trying too hard, and it is always difficult to predict how consumers will respond.

Another option is hiring already-popular Internet idols to market their ideas, using their fame to boost their popularity. This is much less riskier, while also guaranteeing some degree of success. Companies like McDonald’s and Coca-Cola have already taken advantage of this by hiring Youtube stars MysteryGuitarMan and RhettandLink for their commercials. (below)

source: deviantart.com

Founded in 2000, DeviantART is the largest online art community. The website allows artists to share, promote, and comment on artwork that they have created. By building on the concept of social networking that had just started to expand in 2000 and innovating it to incorporate a specific, common interest for users (that is, art), DeviantART has attracted millions of artists and art enthusiasts to their website. The community attracts “over 100,000 daily uploads of original art works ranging from traditional media…to digital art, pixel art, films…”

DeviantART has expanded rapidly ever since its creation 11 years ago. Boasting over 19 million registered members (or “deviants,” as they are called), DeviantART has an estimated net worth of several million, generated from advertising, membership and merchandise. In recent years, the company has embraced a variety of changes to their website to keep it up-to-date and innovative. The ability to imbed twitter, share on Facebook, submit multiple artwork together, create online portfolios, and critique other deviants’ artwork is just some of the fresh new additions to the website. The way DeviantART is tailored to meet the interests of artists is one of the main reasons that make the website so attractive, and in turn, successful.