Marketing
Vending machine gives free beer
Most men love beer. Most men love doing nothing. Imagine my surprise when I learned about a vending machine that dispenses free beer for doing nothing in front of it for 3 minutes. Basically you stand in front of it motionless for 3 minutes. You are rewarded with a cold can of refreshing thirst quenching Amstel beer. This marketing campaign is being done for Amstel (called Amstel Pause).
Apple the most valuable company in the world
Even with all the negative press surrounding Apple, Apple was voted the #1 brand in the world by Marketing Week. It will be interesting to see how this changes in 2014 based on Apple's 2013 product releases (which many are hoping brings the company back to the forefront).
US thanksgiving black friday sales record set
Although the final numbers arent in yet, many analysts are already predicting a record year for Black Friday sales. IBM is predicting a 24.3% increase sales over last year for black friday sales. ComScore says online sales grew 26% (compared to 2010) totalling $816 million. ShopperTrak said : “This is the largest year-over-year gain in ShopperTrak’s National Retail Sales Estimate for Black Friday since the 8.3 percent increase we saw between 2007 and 2006. Still, it’s just one day. It remains to be seen whether consumers will sustain this behavior through the holiday shopping season.
DEALING WITH CHINA (PART 3)
The importance of “Saving Face” Having spent many years in Asia, I quickly learned the importance of maintaining “face” when dealing with Asian businessmen. This becomes important when engaging in negotiations (for example). You must always allow the other participant to have a little wiggle room [even after submitting their best offer]. Even tough the new offer may be only minimally better, it should allow the Chinese participant (whether customer, partner or other) to have the final say and maintain face.
DEALING WITH CHINA (PART 2)
... continuation Intellectual Property The previous paragraph highlighted the difference between laws “on the books” and the extent to which business people are willing to bend them for profit. As a foreign company entering into the Chinese market, you should be thinking about how you will protect your Intellectual Property. A common example of this is that of Will-Burt. Will-Burt is a company that manufactures and sells Night-Scan telescoping masts for police or military use. They entered the Chinese market and sales boomed.
Dealing with China (part 1)
If you have spend any time at a multinational company, the one topic that comes up is how to benefit from the rise of the dragon (aka China). Over the next couple of entries, I will provide some information about China that I hope you will find useful. The socialist impact Although it is easy to overlook China’s socialist political system, it is important to understand that it influences every aspect of their business style. As an example, they have very little creditor protection.
Twitter for marketing and Public Relations (PR)
When I first discovered Twitter, I thought it was the stupidest thing in the world. After all, how can you effectively communicate in 140 characters. Would it be worthwhile to follow others? I just did not understand it. Then after playing with it for a while, I finally understood it s value and power. It has started revolutions and has helped companies build direct relationships with their customers. Twitter uses related to Marketing and Public Relations (PR) Executive proof I have worked with dozens of large multinational companies whose CEOs started blogs [to communicate directly with their customers and employees] but gave up after a handful of posts.
Some Interesting Twitter Statistics for 2011
Here are some interesting twitter stats I wanted to share We can then take a look at some interesting site statistics provided by Compete : Twitter.com had: 28,741,503 Unique Visitors in May 2011 148,742,825 Total Visits in May 2011 1 year graph comparing unique visits to total visits: Click on the above thumbnail to see a full size image. Pingdom has created a nice graphic showing the growth in tweets per month. This includes all tweets (including those made with 3rd party apps):
Facebook has identity and your attention
Facebook has become the premium identity management company on the web with 500 million+ users. Just think of how many apps allow you to log-in using your facebook ID (aka Facebook Connect). In late 2010, Sheryl Sandberg (Facebook COO) stated that 10,000 websites integrate with Facebook everyday (that is over 3.6 million new sites every year). Facebook knows who you are, what you like, who your friends are, where you have been (Places) and what you are thinking about (status updates).
Are coupons an efficient marketing tool
From newspapers and magazines to flyers and pamphlets, coupons are everywhere. They have become so popular that “coupon clipping” is now a hobby. Putting aside the thrill of saving money (sarcasm intended), is the cost worth it for the retailer or manufacturer? Risk Sharing Using your friends and neighbors as your own personal test subjects is always a lot of fun. Recently a new Greek restaurant opened in my area. The decor looked simple but elegant and their menu appealing. I have gone to too many “bad” restaurants and I simply wasn’t in the mood to risk going to another one.
Honest Tea: The Most Honest City In America
Honest Tea is a competitor to the Snapple brand in the United States of America. They conducted a brilliant marketing campaign and social experiement. It was so original I wanted to share it with you. They wanted to see which of the major US cities was the most honest. They installed un-manned racks of their product and asked people to voluntarily donate a dollar per drink. The experiment was filmed and the results were tabulated. Watch this fantastic experiment and campaign unfold.
Real Twitter Usage Statistics
Edison Research/Arbitron Internet and Multimedia Series released an interesting report entitled “Twitter Usage in America: 2010”. What really sets this report apart is the fact that they spent 3 years collecting and tracking usage. The most interesting conclusion is the fact that “twitter is a broadcast channel” contrary to what many marketers believe. The majority of twitter users are lurkers and rarely post. The report is filled with useful and actionable information but some interesting highlights include: In 2 years, American’s awarness of twitter has increased from 5% to 87% Although the level of awareness of Twitter now matches that of Facebook, the latter has significantly more active users.
When choice cuts into profits and margin
Until recently, most executives operated under the impression that consumers demand choice and lots of it. You could walk into any electronics store and see 5 different versions of the same computer system (each with only minute differences). But is this really what the modern, educated and busy consumer is demanding? Early this year, I read a research paper by Forrester Research (1) that discussed the experiential difference between the typical Personal Computer and the iPad. The author discusses the fact that the iPad has a “curated” experience.
Marketing to the different GENERATIONS
Long term strategic planning is one of the most important tasks a business executive must perform. Properly determining market direction can mean the difference between becoming number 1 or edging on the precipice of bankruptcy. There are 5 distinct generations alive today in the United States. The GI Generation This group of the population was born between 1905 to 1924 and at one time accounted for as much as 57 million live births in the USA. This number has now dwindled to less than 5 million.