Author: snam0405

I have a little confession to make.

When I went to Frosh two years ago, there was someone who just blew my mind with his charming personality and inspiring words. Ever since then, I’ve been following him on his blog every time I needed a word of encouragement or inspirational role model.

I never knew that I would get an opportunity to actually get to know him in person and have an interview with him though! Life is full of mysteries – after all.

Since I’ve been following him on his blogs on and off, I knew that he is working for lululemon as a leadership trainer. While I was working on my final marketing project, I was frustrated because there was too much information and I wasn’t sure which ones were more important than the other ones.

Guess what? I took a leap and decided to shoot him an e-mail! He was very encouraging and answered all of our questions in great details!!

So, I’d like to post this blog in honour of Matt Corker – the one and only.

If you want to explore his awesomeness…I strongly encourage you to pay a visit and check his blog out!

http://www.thatsacorker.com/

I think he’s done a great job building his own brand (the one and only!) and his blog truly shows his brand equity.

Interesting advertisement – is smart car only for smart people?!

Hey everyone,

Recently, I was just trying to search something on Google and a bold headline caught my eyes. “North Korea Tries Viral Video Marketing; Old Spice Guy Unfazed”.

I couldn’t believe my eyes. So I actually went to Youtube to see if I can find any interesting video clips to see what people in North Korea actually see on everyday life as part of the propaganda controlled by its own government.

If you click on this link below, it will show you one of the videos posted by North Korea’s government:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFdvi2by8eI

Also, the article explained that the clips praised Kim Jong Il as the “general sent from the heaven”. Furthermore, the article demonstrated that these clips were used as the country’s propaganda to defend its state “during a multinational investigation into its alleged March sinking of a South Korean warship”. (Callaghan, All things Digital)

If you’re interested in learning more about the news here is the link as well: http://voices.allthingsd.com/20100810/north-korea-opens-youtube-account-posts-viral-propaganda-videos/?mod=ATD_rss)

I thought it was pretty interesting that the North Korean government tried to use Youtube in order to spread their propaganda. I’m also wondering why they decided to post these random patriotic videos on Youtube. Does anyone have any ideas on why they would do such a thing?

Yes, I’ve seen these similar-looking posters and advertisements at the sky train stations before. Yes, I do think some of these outfits are pretty cute. Yes, I would love to try some out and possibly buy them. No, I did not know that Joe Fresh Style is Superstore’s main clothing line.

A couple of weeks ago, I was skyping with one of my besties from Montreal and she was wearing a really cute t-shirt that I’ve never seen before. So, I complimented on her outfit and asked where she got it from.

“Oh, I just bought it from Superstore when I was doing my grocery shopping. It was such a great deal and it’s quality is surprisingly good as well.”

I couldn’t believe my eyes. I’m a bit of a shopaholic and I kind of became curious of Joe Fresh and what made them choose to launch their clothing line with Superstore of all the choices they had.

That’s why I began to do my mini-research on Joe Fresh. It seems like Joe Fresh first launched its clothing line in 2007 and their sales have reached $400 million by the end of the year. They also predicted that their sales is expected to hit $1 billion, “which would make it Canada’s largest apparel manufacturer”. (Vancouver Sun, 2007)

I would’ve never considered shopping at Superstore for fashionable items before but it seems like Joe Fresh have done a pretty good job on re-branding its position. My attitudes toward Joe Fresh Style have changed overnight! At least I know how to motivate myself to go grocery shopping next time I visit Superstore! I found my experience with Joe pretty fascinating and thought it would be a good example of a company which succeeded in re-branding.

If you’re interested in reading more about success of Joe Fresh, check it out:

http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/arts/story.html?id=d9761d8e-defc-445a-8fce-88102604ed50

Hi everyone!

It’s been awhile since I posted my last blog on Malibu. First of all, happy Halloween! I hope you all had fantastic ‘halloweekend’. I sure did have awesome time visiting my friends in the U.S. and became curious of what Halloween means to people in general.

Some believe that it is a day for satanists while others celebrate it by attending costume parties or visiting haunted houses. For some children, it’s time of the year when they get to compete with one another in order to count how many treats they received from trick-or-treating. Also, it’s time of the year when the few giant candy companies sell massive bags of cheat chocolate and other snacks.

As long as we get our share of treats, no one seems to complain that Halloween has become one of the most over-commercialized holidays in modern society.

One thing that we need to remind ourselves is that Halloween is not just about handing our candies nor receiving them. We’re talking about a serious business transaction with revenues of $2.5 billion dollars. Halloween has “become retail’s second-highest income generating season after Christmas…$500 million are spent on costumes alone”. (Hopper, http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0BDW/is_1998_Oct_12/ai_53096527/)

From this year’s Halloween experience, more than 70% of my friends spent more than $50 on costumes and props (some even ordered them online weeks in advance to dress up like lady Gaga).

Here are some questions for you! How much time and money did you spend last week in order to find a perfect Halloween costume for today? What motivates you to spend so much time and money on finding out what you’re going to wear for Halloween? Why do some people spend so much time and energy to create their own perfect Halloween costume? Why do some people celebrate Halloween while others don’t?

Last week, my friends and I were having an interesting conversation on the drink mix and we started talking about Malibu and some of our favourite mixes of all time.

Also, this heated discussion led us to argue over which mix is better than the other one. So, we decided to go on the website to check out some mixes and what not.

Voila!
From catchy upbeat background music to colourful taps and well designed tabs and labels, this new Malibu blog completely caught me off guard. I was more expecting boring list of different mixes and prices of drinks; whereas this fresh-looking blog where you can mix your own drinks and hear the sound of it was an astonishing discovery for me.

Whoever created this blog did a great job since I ended up persuading my friends to buy Malibu instead of tequila or flavoured vodka.

So, what exactly is in Malibu? What’s in it? Was it the taste which attracted me to buy this drink or was it something else? What makes you choose Malibu over wine, soju, vodka or tequila? There are hundreds of other alternatives that I could’ve chosen over Malibu, but what was so special about Malibu that I persuaded others to follow my decision?

After checking out this website, do YOU think you’ll buy Malibu over other drinks? Why or why not?

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What do these numbers represent? Do they form a certain shape or an image?
To me, these numbers don’t matter much. In fact, it could’ve been any other number.

Power of exponential growth. That’s what I want to talk about today. Power of virus. Even though the term ‘virus’ contains negative connotations, you have to give some credit to virus as well. He has a way of living in dark shadow until he’s ready to take over the world. It just keeps on replicating, again and again with increasing dominant power, doubling with each iteration.

What does a virus have to do with marketing? Well, Viral Marketing is any strategy used to encourage people to pass marketing message or to simply create a buzz amongst the crowd so that the messages will spread quickly like wildfire. Just like viruses, these marketing strategies take advantage of spreading message to thousands and millions of people within a relatively short period of time.

There are six elements of Viral Marketing Strategies:

1. Gives away products or services
2. Provides for effortless transfer to others
3. Scales easily from small to very large
4. Exploits common motivations and behaviors
5. Utilizes existing communication networks
6. Takes advantage of others’ resources

Think about Hotmail, Facebook, and Skype. What do they all have in common? Can you identify some of the similarities and differences between these examples?