How to Effectively Connect With Consumers in Their “Content Cocoons”

• Posted: August 31, 2015

Pat LaPointe, Executive Vice President at Resonate and ARF Board member, analyzes the challenges faced by marketers trying to connect with digital consumers in this Advertising Age article.

Many digital marketing campaigns are based upon the premise that consumers like personalized ads, and that such personalized ads make marketing and advertising more relevant.  However, consumers are suspicious of these ads, consider their offers to be false, not relevant, or intrusive.

As a result, consumers create their own “content cocoons,” in which they search for information, engage in social media or watch videos.  However, each online interaction provides data for marketers, and represents an opportunity to become part of the curated web of consumers.

The author advises marketers that to be relevant in this digital world, they need to demonstrate an understanding the of the mindset and motivations of consumers. LaPointe recommends, “marrying observed behavioral data to surveys and consumer-initiated dialogue to shape highly curated marketing experiences to blend into the content cocoon consumers have curated for themselves online.”

By building insightful profiles and understanding consumer motivation, marketers will be able to provide relevant, curated content, and relevant messaging.

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Challenges and Opportunities of Measurements in Mobile

• Posted: August 31, 2015

As spending increasingly moves to mobile platforms, there is a critical need to accurately and independently evaluate audiences, media, and advertising. Joe Nguyen, Senior Vice President, Asia Pacific at comScore, analyzes the need for measurement in order to maintain trust and encourage growth in mobile media.

The author reminds readers that measuring mobile is especially complex due to the use of multiple devices by consumers.  Accurate measurement must address this fragmentation.

Three key criteria for measuring any market or platform must address the need for products that:

-are holistic and objective in measurement.

-deliver outputs and metrics that fit the needs of the entire ecosystem.

-have relevant scope but can be delivered at a viable cost for the market.

In a digital ecosystem, it is also important for measurement solutions to mirror or to be comparable across different geographies and to be comparable with different media. Nguyen also advises that measurement must be done on a person-level, including demographic targets, and must factor in the impact of non-human traffic, including fraud, as well as viewability and brand safety.

In addition, this article discusses the assets, systems, and methodologies needed to develop these measurement solutions.

 

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Multicultural Marketing to Become Mainstream in a Millennial World

• Posted: August 31, 2015

Yuyu Chen, writing for ClickZ, highlights the reasons why effective multicultural marketing to Millennials has become increasingly critical to many companies.  Both the spending power and the demographics of African-American, Asian-American and Hispanic Millennials have made it critical to connect with these consumers.

Among the brands that have been building connections with multicultural Millennials according to this article are: Honda, Toyota, Wells Fargo, State Farm, Procter & Gamble, McDonald’s, and Kimberly-Clark.

However, there are challenges to effective multicultural marketing, which include language barriers and cultural nuances.

Among the important factors to be considered when developing multicultural campaigns, according to Lia Silkworth, Executive Vice President and Managing director of Tapestry, a division of SMG Multicultural:

-Deep cultural insights.

-Knowledge of the media habits, behaviors, and interests of the target segment.

-Research is important in order to create authenticity in marketing campaigns.

Chen points out that an alternative to targeting individual multicultural segments is the total market approach.  This holistic marketing approach involves incorporating ethnic insights into overall marketing communications.

 

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Big Data: Too Many Answers, Not Enough Questions

• Posted: August 31, 2015

In this Forbes article, Bernard Marr reminds readers that data on its own is meaningless. To avoid drowning in data, and for data to be useful, marketers must first know what data is needed.  Otherwise, too much data will obscure the needed answers.

Marr stresses the importance of starting with a strategy and identifying the right questions. Know what you are trying to achieve, then develop the questions to which answers are needed.

By knowing the critical questions, the data needed to answer those questions can be accurately identified. By following this process, you will be able to improve performance and harness the primary power of data.  Decision-making will be supported by the data developed by asking the right questions

Marr concludes that data is a strategic asset, but it must be used constructively and appropriately, as he has outlined above, in order to deliver optimal results.

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10 Amazing Out-of-Home Campaigns

• Posted: August 31, 2015

The large quantity of ads in urban environments can be challenging for marketers.  However, the creative out-of-home advertising demonstrated by the brands highlighted in this article enables them to stand out.

The author’s favorite out-of-home campaign discussed in this Designer Daily article is a Simpsons movie ad that appeared at the bottom of an escalator when the movie was released.

Additional campaigns noted by the author:

• A bus stop campaign by IKEA
• An IWC Schaffhausen bus campaign
• A giant Mars truck ad
• A KitKat bench
• A Sprite shower
• A Law & Order billboard
• A Nike bench
• Durex XXL public restroom ad
• Superman elevator ad

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Global Advertising Industry Will Lose an Estimated $21.8 Billion to Ad-Blocking Software in 2015

• Posted: August 24, 2015

According to a study released by Adobe Systems and PageFair, the estimated loss of global revenue due to blocked advertisements exceeded $21.8 billion in 2015, and this loss is projected to rise to $41.4 billion in 2016.  

On a global basis, the number of consumers using ad-blocking software grew by 41% during the first half of 2015 compared with the same period in 2014. There were 198 million monthly active users of major browser extensions that block ads as of June 2015.

In the United States, the number of consumers using ad-blocking software grew by 48% during the first half of 2015 compared with the same time period in 2014. As of June 2015 there were 45 million active users of ad-blocking software.

Additional increases in ad blocking growth will likely come the from the installation of ad-blocking software on mobile devices.

Laurie Sullivan, in her article for Media Post, points out that the use of ad-blocking software could explain the slowing growth of revenue from search and display ads supported by Bing, Google, and Yahoo.

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Google’s Alphabet Restructuring

• Posted: August 24, 2015

According to Knowledge@Wharton, the school’s online business analysis journal, Google’s move to restructure itself under a new holding company named Alphabet will help protect its core brand. In addition, this reorganization will provide greater independence for its riskier investments, such as driverless cars and human longevity, and it will also bring greater accountability and transparency to those investments.

Google, as an Alphabet subsidiary will retain the Internet products, which represent about 90% of the company’s 2014 revenues. Google’s non-Internet subsidiaries will  include Calico, a research and development biotech company, Google Ventures, a venture capital subsidiary, and Google Capital, a growth equity investment fund.

This new organizational structure will allow Alphabet to build these non-Internet brands, which have high potential but are riskier, without damaging the Google brand.

Additional benefits of the restructuring according to this article:

-Innovation at Google could get a boost.

-Opportunities for greater internal competition, which can benefit all the brands.

-Encouragement of entrepreneurship.

-Retention of top talent.

Wharton management professor David Hsu suggests that in the near term ”the main challenge will be to have the two parts of the organization work well together.” The new Google and the rest of Alphabet may need different staffs, human resource incentives, cultures, etc., which may represent management challenges for the new holding company.

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Individual-Centric Digital Marketing

• Posted: August 24, 2015

Marketers now have the ability to reach consumers with targeted and highly personalized marketing across devices. The rise of individual-centric digital marketing has transformed the way in which marketers address their audiences according to David Williams, CEO, Merkle, writing for iMedia Connection.

Marketers are able to blend the data and insights from both offline and online data. As a result, the targeted consumer can receive personalized recommendations and contextually relevant information.

Individual-centric marketing will drive additional sales and have provable ROI.

Successful individual-centric digital marketing will involve:

-Consistent targeting of users across devices.

-Less waste to ad fraud.

-The ability to bridge online and offline targeting.

-Better accountability and measurement.

-Respect for consumer privacy.

Individual-centric digital marketing will benefit both the consumers and the marketers. Consumers will receive more relevant ads and offerings, and marketers will be able to achieve higher measurement standards and overall accountability.

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Customers as Ethnographers

• Posted: August 24, 2015

Writing for the Harvard Business Review, Julie Wittes Schlack, co-founder and Senior Vice President, Innovation and Design, C Space, discusses the value of insights gathered from consumer mobile self-ethnographies. Bringing consumer experience to life for clients can be extremely valuable for a variety of purposes, including product and service development, package design, promotional strategies, as well as revealing shopper behavior and in-store behavior.

Companies are equipping consumers with mobile ethnography apps to enable these customers to upload photos or videos, provide narratives and reflections, record sounds, provide multi-media diaries, and provide brief responses to questions tailored for each project. Valuable GPS location data can also be generated by ethnography apps.

As a result of these ethnographies, marketers can immerse themselves in the sights, sounds, thoughts, experiences, and emotions of consumers. These customers become more than data points to the marketers. Self-ethnography can yield a deeper understanding and a more intimate profile of the customers for a specific product or service. In addition, well-designed mobile self-ethnographies can result in rapid, highly actionable insights.

Schlack concludes, “Ultimately, the outcome of consumer-conducted ethnography is not just to reveal unmet needs and innovation opportunities, but to humanize customers for the brands that serve them.”

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Turning Social Media Influencers Into Brand Advocates

• Posted: August 24, 2015

Companies are challenged by the need to locate the right social media brand influencers and to craft the content that will turn these influencers into brand advocates.

Jack Loechner, writing for the Research Brief From the Center for Media Research, presents the finding of a report by SoftwareAdvice which shows how predictive analytics software can address these issues.

Key findings of this report include:

46% of marketers surveyed say they struggle to identify and communicate with social media influencers.

46% of marketers say they struggle to predict the preferences and behavior of social media influencers.

68% of marketers aren’t yet taking advantage of predictive analytics software.

Predictive analytics software can improve the brand’s advocacy-based social media marketing by enabling the company to identify key influencers and target audiences, and to generate user-centric content.

Dmitri Williams, founder of social analytics company Ninja Metrics, estimates that 5-10% of social media users are responsible for 60 to 80% of influence. Therefore, it is critical to turn these influencers into brand advocates.

 

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