Patrick Francis Go's Blog

While checking out cool advertisements in brandchannel.com I accedentally came accross an awesome advertisement that brought feelings of nostalgia. A video of Coca-cola’s marketing campaign of openning happiness shows how it hits the streets of Manila as it promotes the strong brand of Coke.

Part of their campaign is deploying coke happiness trucks which go around certain districts distributing freebies like coke, flowers, merchendise or anythign that symbolizes fun and happiness. It’s not the typical ice cream truck strategy where people have to line up and pay for goods that they want. In this strategy coke simply drives the message of happiness which is represented by coke through the distribution of gifts to people. Indeed, these reflect joy and fun amongs people who come accross the trucks.

In this 2 min video, it is eveident how coke employs this global strategy by employing some aspects of global marketing as well as adaptation strategies to effectively market their brand.In my opinion, coca-cola standardizes by providing the same message of the campaign as well as providing the same consistent merchendise of coke. In addition, the brand logo, color and song remained standardized in order to facilitate immediate recognition of the brand.

On thee other hand, the company tailors the campaign a little bit in order to cater to a specific demographic and geographic market segment. As  Filipino myself, our culture feels strong about the idea of sharing, family and most importantly happinness amidst the challenges and hardships of life. I believe the coca-cola campaign is something that Filipinos can greatly relate to. In addition, as compared to other happiness trucks in the world, the gifts of the trucks are quite simple. This reflects how much value the target segment gives about simplicity.

As a whole, a marketing campaign utilizes both adapatation and standardization stragies which made it a very effective campaign. By tapping into local culture, the brand now is conveniently integrated to its culture.

Here’s a a video for you to check out: Enjoy!

Social Media has been playing an increasing visible role in leveraging company’s promotional strategies. By having a relatively low cost than advertisements as well as having a wider market reach,  there is no question that companies are riding the social media wave. However, one growing concern is about the loss of personal interaction between consumers, companies or among users.  In  the Influential Marketing Blog site, Rohit Bargava writes in his post entitled Overtweeting: Are We becoming  Socially Anti-social, about how people express certain thoughts only in various social media sites making the current generation anti-social and indifferent from personal interaction.

In my opinion, although expressing and sharing of thoughts in social media is an amazing way to connect with friends and other users, it makes social interaction impersonal that it losses its value. I absolutely agree with Rohit when he says that it is important to define the line about thoughts that you would discuss online as well as those that should be shared through personal interaction. Since the conception of online communication, interaction as has been never been convenient as before, however; it also filters some aspects of interaction such as expressions of emotions. In addition, thoughts expressed in these forms have high risk for prejudice since they become the sole basis of judgement of a person due to the lack of physical interaction.  As a result, people should be careful of which thoughts they express online as well as those to be shared in person.

People should be sensitive enough to consider the context, topic and audience when people share their thoughts in order to avoid misrepresentations and understanding of ideas. Given the limitation of the media, much care and consciousness must be taken.

In our class last week, we talked about the integral role that packaging plays for the different members of the supply chain management.  For these people, it is important for the packaging to be able to display information about the product particularly the benefits it has to offer. In addition, retailers and producers take into account the turnover rate of these products in order to make sure that they make margins.  One important factor for ensuring the success of this depends of the truthfulness of the label and information displayed on the packaging of the product.

In a recent video I saw in YouTube, a consumer questions the truthfulness of the packaging of Folgers coffee. He compares two coffee containers of the same size, one from this year and another 2 years ago. He noticed that the packaging is the same but the label for the current pack of coffee claims to be able to make 20 more cups with much less grams of coffee.   Here’s a video for your reference.

In my opinion, truthfulness in advertising matters because it helps build the brand of a product as well as establishing trust; which in turn adds equity to the firm. It is indeed surprising that a very well established company such as Folgers would make a serious mistake such as this one. It could be an honest mistake or a deliberate intention of lying to the general public. In addition, truthfulness in advertising is a two way benefit for both consumers and suppliers.  Besides the benefits mentioned previously, consumers on the other hand benefit as well since they will be able to base their decisions to effectively satisfy their needs. I believe that such false advertising simply jeopardises both parties involved. Although it may lead to short-term returns, the long-run adverse effects and consequences simply outweigh them.

Back in the old days before social media marketing as well as print and or even billboards were utilized as marketing tools, early marketing strategies relied heavily on Word of Mouth marketing as a powerful tool in communicating a company or brand to consumers. With the developments in technology, new promotional tactics and channels to reach their targeted consumers. From print ads to TV and Radio advertisments. companies have targeted their audiences and spread their name through these forms. However, I’ve recently encountered a new online marketing tool called spreadable developed by Grass Hopper group.

This marketing tool utilizes word of mouth marketing strategy in an unconventional way by using e-mails, and other social media forms. The difference is that it enhances these advertisments by reaching other consumers from a highly credible source:  their friends and family. Spreadable is a customize tell a friend widget customize for a comapany’s website and emails that drive word of mouth referrals. It reduces the need of hiring highly complex marketing experts that simply incurrs excessive and high costs. It works by having a spreadable widget on your page which allows visitng customers to automatically share this with their friends and family via email or facebook. It allows the company to track these activities and reward these people. In addition, the spread the word link is different by sending a consistent message about their product or brand. it employs referrent strategies to be able to sell these product by adding value to these consumers. For more ifnormation you can visit the link to the website: http://spreadable.com/

This innovative tool really reflects how marketing changes and adapt to changing consumer preferences and markets while still maintaining traditional effective forms. In addition, no matter how good a product is or it’s promotional strategy, having a positive perceived value for it is one of the most vital factors for its success. This tool by spreadable insures this type of position in the market. Here’s a simple Video about the product.

As the midterm approaches, I thought it would be good practice to look at the blog of my other colleagues and try to apply the marketing concepts that we’ve learned in class. In my search for this, I came across Alex Joshi’s blog post entitled “You’re not the car you drive. You’re not the contents of your wallet”, which talks about how marketing dictates the identity of a person and actually shapes or define who you are. Alex argues that marketing strategy and a product defines a person.

However, I  beg to differ since in my opinion, a person’s personality causes him to fall prey to such marketing strategies. Given our discussion of STP, marketers use different marketing strategies to target people using different bases which includes demographic, psychographic geographic and product. Based on our lecture, the psychographic base of segmenting market groups consumers according to their self-values, self-perception as well as their lifestyle. For example, A health consious individual believes in fitness and in health, sees himself as a healthy individual thus engages in an active lifestyle. All of these are the characteristics of a particular consumer. The marketing strategies simply uses these characteristics to tailor products and services to such individuals.

With that said, marketing does not really define a person contrary to what Alex was proposing. However, these people submit to such marketing strategies as a result of their personality and characteristic as an individual.

Marketing Simply Mirrors Who You Are

The main point: it’s the other way around, people define themselves, mayketing just echoes this self perception of these people.

Less than 2 weeks from today, Apple will be launching their second generation line of tablet- the Ipad 2. Following the15 million sale of its predecessor, speculations have been made regarding the success of this new version. Since the iPad’s launch, other consumer electronics makers have been scrambling to develop tablets of their own. For example, Samsung Electronics Co. began selling the Galaxy Tab last year, and Motorola Mobility Inc.’s Xoom tablet goes on sale this week. Many of these new tablets run Google Inc.’s Android software.

The iPad is the first tablet computer to win over mainstream consumers. A decade earlier, PC makers were selling tablets that ran Windows, the same operating systems found on most full-fledged PCs. Although a number of businesses bought them, it did not really appeal to mainstream consumer due to its heavy weight, shorter battery life as well as its need to be used with a mouse and keyboard rather than the touch screen features that the ipad offers.

The tablet industry has been long available and based on my evaluation, is in its maturity stage. In 2000, the first tablets were released and today, quite a number of companies have caught up with the trend making the industry competitive. However, the development of the Ipad could have saved a declining industry of tablets and revived it. With the increasing developments, upgrades and intense competition, it will take apple more than a first mover advantage in the tablet industry in order to make the launch of Ipad 2 to be more successful than the first generation Ipad.

The 2011 Superbowl is no doubt one of the most viewed events in television programming with over 111 million people watching in America alone.  Although the NFL finals is the highlight of this event, sports fans are were also entertained by the commercials aired during the 3 hour program.  In UBC, the various advertisments from Doritos, Heineken,Best Buy and other sponsors and partners created quite a stir about the super bowl weekend besides the intense game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Green Bay Packers.

Based on abc’s show Good Morning America, they believe that the Doritos Pug commercial is bby far the favorite amongs all the other advertisments aired. Next to this were Best Buy`s Bieber and Ozzy tandem as well as Chrysler`s Eminem appearance,who effectively communicated their their product towards their intended viewers. As a result it created a positive impression of their product towards the viewers. It was through their ability to elicit response and emotion through their referent endorsers that made the  minimum 3 million dollar investment worth while.

On the other hand, there were also some who actuallycause some controversy in terms of their advertising message and method of communication. In particular, Groupon, a deal of the day coupon provider, did the exact opposite and elicited negative opinions and attitudes regarding their company. The advertisment featured Tim Hutton who was initially talking about the serious issues Tibett faces then awkwardly shifts the focus to groupon`s amazing deals regarding Tibettan food. It seemed to look like a spoof for public service announcement done by celebrities. However, the advertisment did not evoke humour amongs its viewers rather of disgust and disappointment.  Based on our marketing discussion about word of mouth marketing, I guess this negative effect caused by this add would not only cause viewers to have negative attitudes but also cause them provide negative insights about the company resulting to negative word of mouth marketing.  You can view the video at the bottom taken from Youtube.

Sex Sells is usually a common saying for advertising campaign idioms which says that a product is more likely to sell itself (based on male market segments) if it is in a context of sexual content. Typical examples include promiscuosly dressed women in print ads and commercials for cars, cigarettes, cologne etc, which simply serve as eye-catchers for the consumers. In addition, the presence of women does not necessarily need to be, any double meaning advertisment which implies sexual context can be considered to this category.

According to psychological study, products are remembered better into the memory, if it is become acquainted with in an emotional exciting context. Such an emotional excitation can be caused except by sexual allusions by fear, disgust or rage. Take for example this advertisement by volvo. It is apparent that there is a sexual connotation with the focusing of the erceted hand break which really has nothing to do with consumers being excited for a volvo vehicle.

" We're Just as excited as you are."

In my opinion, using this type of advertising may seem counter-productive and may result to negative effects for the marketing campaign. First of all, based on the marketing mix factor Communication, it pertains to the ability to effectively communicate the product to the target market as well as represent the product as well as to further add value. However, this is not an effective way of communicating. It does not become part of the evoked set of a consumer because of the value that it offers, rather because of mere emotions elicited from the sexual content. In addition, given the more educated times of people as well as their sensitivity to these type of issues, people might not appreciate this form of advertising the same way as before. Finally, in relation to value based marketing, this represent the fact of changing times where marketing strategies should include this shift in trend.

In Raissa Cheu’s blog post (https://blogs.ubc.ca/raissac/) last week, she talked about false advertising and how these results to adverse effects on viewers and individuals, particularly the effects of false advertising by beauty products to the actual health and well being of consumers.  According to her, current marketing campaigns tend to ” conceal negative and reveal exaggerating characteristics about the product being sold.”  Quite a handful of marketing campaigns by weight-loss, fitness and beauty products that actually use false advertising by trying to make their models seem perfect on T.V, magazines through “photoshopping” or manipulating their true nature given the available technology we have today.  Viewers who actually consume their product to satisfy their need( that the product calims to provide), end up disappointed or even worst off. This is because the value that the advertising promotes is not reallyattainable.

Based on previous discussions we talked about the importance of marketing in creating value for a product. However; based on what Raissa has posted, it seems that their is a sensitive issue regarding it as well which is the truthfulness of that prodcut in its ability to provide that value and satisfy a need. Truly, ethical issues are also a huge concern for the public when it comes to these marketing campaigns.

I saw this advertisement on the bus which talks about a campaign against false advertising in canada. I discovered that a non-profit organization called The Advertising Standards Canada (CSA), is behind this marketing campaign.  CSA is committed to fostering community confidence in advertising and to ensuring the integrity and viability of advertising in Canada through responsible industry self-regulations. They promote truthfulness, fairness and accuraccy. They are also supported by 150 advertising agencies, suppliers and media organizations. The ASC has a code of advertising which is recognized widely by different organizations. They also accepts Ad complaint reports where they will examine and review the truthfulness of the ad and when proven false, will result to legal actions.

This campaign seems to provide assurance to the public that the truth not only matters to the consumers but also other governing bodies in the society as well.

Social Media Marketing

After our in class discussion of about the analysis of the marketing environment, one reality about today’s marketing plans is the use of different social sites as part of their activities. Only less than 3 years after the world wide boom of social networking sites like (facebook and twitter) as well as the frequent use of instant messaging (msn, skype etc.),I noticed that almost all companies utilize these new and innovative form of media as part of their marketing strategies. Majority of the advertisments that I encounter usually involves a tag line which says “follow us on facebook and twitter”. Indeed, it is evident that most companies engage and take advantage of  the macroenvironmental factors particularly Social Trends.

This makes me wonder what are the possible reasons why most companies (even those big and established) would utilize this medium of communication to reach their consumers.

With over 100 million users in facebook, it is no doubt that integrating with social sites is one of the best ways of hitting the critical mass of target market. With the wide range of consumers that it connects with, social media has become a platform that is easily accessible to anyone with internet access. This allows firms to increase their brand awareness and facilitate conversations with the customer. Also, social media serves as a relatively inexpensive way for companies to implement marketing campaigns. It is not only a cost effective way of marketing but also an efficient way to reach different people. In addition, the information received by individuals are mostly from trusted people often friends and family that they connect with. As a result, this increases the likelihood of the users to actually be into the promotion or advertisement of a product/service. This is just one idea about the emerging trend of social media marketing; it would just be amazing to think where it would lead not only the world of marketing but other idustries as well.

P.S this blog is a form of soial media, wonder how else it can be used for the purpose of learning.