terrylee

Hours and hours of research, discussions, writing, and video production.  The marketing plan assignments were definitely not an easy feat.  But then again, neither is any major achievement in life.  Much like Comm 101, the marketing assignments were gruelling (especially the video project), but at the end of it, I felt like I actually learned something and developed skills that were useful and practical.  We see the product of such hard work all the time, whether it be a 30 second advertisement or a 3 hour movie, but we rarely get to see or experience what goes on behind the scenes of making such productions.  Having done the assignment, I definitely appreciated all the other teams’ work a lot more, and I feel like the assignment has given me a foundation to improve my skills upon.  This is similar to what Comm 101 did in terms of case analysis and presentation skills, and although I didn’t learn everything about case analysis or presentation skills in Comm 101, it did spark my interest in it and instilled the idea that I have much more to learn.  The only suggestion that I have would be to remove or at least lengthen the time limit on the video project, as our group felt limited by it, and I felt a lot of great content was cut out because of it.

In this blog post by I believe in Advertising, a campaign by Maes beer is highlighted.  In the campaign, Maes, the second most popular beer company in Belgium, gave away a barrel of Maes beer to everyone named Maes, which is the third most common name in Belgium.  I think this was an ingenious campaign for Maes.  Simply sharing a name with someone or something can be quite a strong link as we perceive them to be more similar to us than others. For example, John Terry was my favourite soccer player on the English team just because we shared the same name and played the same position.  Leveraging this feeling of commonality, Maes sparked all the Maes’ in Belgium to take pride in their name, and created a sense of speciality in the name Maes, and as a further incentive to take action, Maes gave them a BARREL of beer.  By creating both an affective attachment for the company, as well as an incentive to take action, Maes was able to generate a huge response from the Belgium consumers, and ultimately increased the brand value of its company, as well as everyone with the name Maes.

In Sheida’s post, she describes that the purpose of the ad above is brand recognition.  But I think it’s more than that.  P&G is a massive company, and for them, brand recognition isn’t a problem anymore.  Most consumers recognize its iconic logo, and most consumers know it as a multi-billion dollar corporation that makes everyday household appliances.  What P & G might have a problem is creating emotional attachments within consumers.  Since it is such a large corporation, and since it provides only off the counter instead of face to face service (as opposed to companies such as Starbucks who have a front end face to serve customers), fostering a sense of affective attachment is a challenge for P&G.   I think advertisements such as the one shown during the 2012 Olympics are aimed at building an emotional relationship and creating a “feel-good” factor within customers when they buy a P&G product.  For parents (particularly moms, who are the main decider and purchaser of house hold items), waking their kids up early in the morning and driving them to a practice is something they can relate to.  And the emotions that come at the moment their child achieves something great is also something parents can relate to or hope to relate to.  With this advertisement, P&G is sending an underlying message to moms saying “Hey, we understand.  You supported your kid through it all.  We know what you do and we appreciate you.” which is a powerful message heard too infrequently, and a message connecting moms to P&G.

Having lost nearly 18% of its marketshare over the past two years, Blackberry has struggled to maintain its position as a market leader in the smartphone industry, and fell behind to its competitors such as Samsung and Apple.  With continually eroding marketshares in an extremely competitive market and a failed attempt into the tablet market, it’s time for Blackberry to do or die; to either reestablish its brand as an innovative leader in the tech industry or disappear as a has-been.  In an attempt to rebrand itself and start anew, RIM changed its name to Blackberry, and the launch of the new blackberry Z10 and Q10, as well as the new blackberry 10 OS, presents the first test for this rebranded company, and will determine its future.  The blackberry Z10 and Q10 takes a step away from the traditional blackberry, and integrates a touchscreen similar to its competitors such as the iPhone or the Galaxy, and it seems Blackberry has learned from its past mistakes with the new operating system offering a wider variety of apps, and overall is at a much closer functional level as the top-tier smartphones such as iPhone and Galaxy.  So far, it has gained very positive reviews from consumers, but it remains in question if it will continue to innovate and return to its competitive position in the market.

Since its establishment, Nike has developed its brand and its trademark swoosh as a de facto standard in the sporting equipment industry.  A part of its success can be attributed to its continual endorsements and sponsorships of influential athletes, who showcase the Nike brand proudly, and show the general audience that Nike equipments can perform on a professional level.  Nike is quick to endorse these superstars, but it’s also been shown that they’re just as quick to drop these endorsements when the going gets rough.  Lance Armstrong, and most recently, Oscar Pistorius, serve as famous examples of these dropped endorsements, and from a pure business perspective, it makes sense.  The costs simply outweigh the benefits.  Why would Nike continue to pay tens of millions of dollars to continue these endorsements when at the end of the day, continuing to do so does not attract any new customers, or even make current customers feel good about the product.  These callous, yet rational, decisions to drop their endorsements remind us that Nike is ultimately a profit seeking business, and it is not the past relationships, but the future potential that the endorsees hold that Nike ultimately bases its decisions on.

Did the advertisement above shock you?  And if so, what effects did it have?  Was it effective in gaining and holding your attention?  The long open mouthed kiss certainly does trigger an awkward cringe factor, and it must have been successful in gaining and holding people’s attention because it was one of the most talked about ads after the super bowl, where the competition between advertisers  to stand out is fierce.  But did it achieve its purpose of increasing sales?  I think it did.  Along with the shock factor, the advertisement made it clear what services it offered – providing internet websites and domain names for small businesses.  Yes, it sparked a controversy about when advertisements take it too far simply to grab attention, but if I’m a small business owner trying to develop a website for my own needs, I’m not really going to care about the controversy; I just need a domain name.  And from this advertisement, now I know that godaddy.com provides that service, whereas I don’t know of any other competitors.  In this case, the advertisement was effective because it allowed godaddy.com to move to the known, from the unknown, in an industry where most of its competitors are in the unknown.  But had this advertisement been for an already established company in a mature industry, such as Coke or Pepsi, it would not have been as effective.  This is because for these companies, the goal is not to be in the known (most consumers already do), but to convince consumers that its product is better than its competitors.  And the fact that advertisements such as these often arouse negative feelings and responses (as shown in the youtube rating and comments) works against the company and could deter customers away from its product.  Overall, the shock effect in advertisements should be treated as a double edged sword, that could spur attention, but also spur negativity.

http://i98.photobucket.com/albums/l255/borderlinenos/Marijuana.jpg

With the legalization of marijuana in Colorado and Washington state, advertisement of marijuana has not only become a possibility, but a necessity for any profit seeking producers in the marijuana industry.  They would need to advertise heavily to create a positive aura around their product amidst the negative anti-marijuana campaigns and advertisements.  But the question is, would it be ethical for these producers to advertise their possibly health hazardous product on a mass market?  Should the government ban advertisements promoting marijuana on the grounds of ethics?  We can analyze this by comparing marijuana and its effects against a massive bench mark in legal drugs: tobacco.  Over the years, the tobacco industry has set a fine line where a government could and should intervene to keep the public from self-harm.  So how does marijuana compare against it?

First, it’s important to consider why tobacco advertisements are restricted. The Tobacco Act of 1997 which restricts the advertisements states 4 purposes:

(a) to protect the health of Canadians in light of conclusive evidence implicating tobacco use in the incidence of numerous debilitating and fatal diseases;

(b) to protect young persons and others from inducements to use tobacco products and the consequent dependence on them;

(c) to protect the health of young persons by restricting access to tobacco products; and

(d) to enhance public awareness of the health hazards of using tobacco products.

To summarize, tobacco is seen as an addictive, health hazardous product that creates social harm, and its advertisement is seen to negatively influence the population, particularly the young population.  Although it could be argued that marijuana is a gateway to hard drugs that are addictive and that do create social harm, the fact is that marijuana itself is not physically addictive (although it can create psychological dependence), and does not create social harm as tobacco does by causing fatal diseases.  When compared to the reasons why tobacco was restricted, it’s clear that marijuana does not meet the same criteria to be restricted.

I believe that some of the world’s greatest presenters are stand up comedians.  Great comedians, such as Jerry Seinfeld, deliver presentations in front of colossal crowds; furthermore, they are masters of drawing the audience in, communicating their ideas clearly, and convincing the audience to agree.  So how are they able to do this?  First, they are able to draw the audience in with their confidence.  The greatest comedians are also often the most confident.  By moving around the stage, and speaking slowly and clearly, they indicate that they are confident and comfortable, naturally letting the audience lower their guards and drawing them in.  Second, they are also able to communicate their ideas clearly by using effecting language, whether in words or in body.  By using simple, understandable words, comedians are able to speak to the general audience without making them feel inferior.  If the message is still unclear, great comedians often use body language to describe their words, making the message clearer.  By drawing the audience in, and communicating their ideas clearly, they naturally convince the audience to agree, and often receive a howling response from the crowd.  By examining great stand-up comedians, we can learn to deliver better presentations.

In my mind, Richard Branson and Virgin persist as one of the most entrepreneurial person and company.  Not only are they unafraid to take risks, venturing into such competitive markets of mobile phones and airlines, but they are able to overcome the risks and become successful in their risky ventures.  One of the ways Virgin distinguished itself in the airline and mobile phone industry is by recognizing the poor customer services in the industries, and then providing a new, more innovative way to provide the service, such as simple more leg room.

Furthermore, by offering such innovative services as Virgin Galactic, Virgin tapped into a very small, but also very profitable target market of the wealthiest, by offering consumers a chance to venture into space.  Since Virgin is the only company offering space tourism, and space tourism is such a unique service with an incredibly low supply, Virgin holds monopoly over the space tourism industry, and is able to charge at incredibly high prices and generate great profits.

Virgin holds true to the definition of entrepreneurship, venturing into risky territory, and succeeding into the territory by providing innovative ways to do provide the service better, gaining tremendous wealth rapidly.

Groupon, the originator of online group discount websites, soared in the stock markets on Friday after being initially offered to the public for $20 on Thursday.  By the time the markets closed on Friday evening, shares of Groupon were selling for $27.19, an astounding 36% above the initial price.  At this current value of $27.19, the company is valued at more than $17 billion, a seemingly ridiculous value, considering the recent problems that Groupon had with accounting, and the fact that, after the accounting adjustments, the company did not actually seem profitable.  Yes, Groupon does have potential to grow, with more and more bargain hunters emerging everyday in the turbulent economy, and it has the advantage of being the first to tap into the target market, establishing its brand position; however, how long can they hold that position?  Some of the biggest names in the internet industry, such as Google, are emerging as competitors with the launch of such projects as Google Offers.  Google, a company with massive capital and brand recognition, could emerge as a threatening competitor in the future.  Because of such negative factors as lack of profit and risk of competitors, it seems that the rise of the stock was mostly due to hype, and is a growing bubble, that is soon to pop.