How emarketers can benefit form product placement

until this week i never really took much notice of product placement. In my integrated marketing communications class however, we learnt about how brands use product placement in music videos. It got me thinking, surely there must be a few other communication channels in which product placement occurs.
Turns out there is.

according to my mates at wikipedia, product placement is ‘any form of audiovisual commercial communication consisting of the inclusion of or reference to a product, a service or the trade mark thereof so that it is featured within a programme’

So where you see a branded product in a audio visual presence, chances are its been paid for.

quite often we’ll see this

or this

or this

and with the web 2.0, we can now watch videos with this stuff in it all the time!

So whilst music videos, movies, and tv shows have been the dominant channels with which to explore this communication type, brands are now experimenting and pushing how far they can go, blurring the lines between music video/ tv show/ movie and advertisement.

This is supposed to be a music video for DJ group Swedish House Mafia. To me it seems more like a really long boring ad for volvo with music. But it is clever in that people want to view it because it plays the Swedish House Mafia track.

Here is another interesting piece of content which was funded by Nike’s new fuelband. The two guys in this video were asked to create a movie about what it means to #makeitcount. This hashtag is used for the Nike fuelband campiagn and the video is subtle in its product usage.

And here is another ‘episode’ like feature from Jaguar. But this does kind of start to deviate from the true representation of product placement.

Without YouTube or other online sharing sites, it is highly unlikely we would ever see these on TV or film.

If you’ve ever happened to notice Video games too tend to display a great deal of branded content.

Additionally i believe that product placement can extend to blogs, tweets and other online discussion forms. Its easy for a brand to approach an online user and ask them to mention or recommend their product in an online discussion.

So why do brands do it??
Well i believe firstly that there is relatively low risk for the brand. No one is going to get angry at sony if the product placement is too obvious in Britney’s new video. No, they would get angry at Britney for selling out!

Secondly product placement occurs in media where the content wants to be viewed and shared. everyone is dying to see the Biebs’ new video, and the more often people view, the more they are openly viewing our branded product.

So in my opinion product placement is a winner for brands and all emarketers should experiment more with how they use it. The better it is the more likely it will be shared.

Seen any really bad/ obvious product placement lately? share your experience!

Why do we find the need to ‘Check in’?

So the other day my friend was discussing with me what he had recently been learning about in sociology. He was telling me about how there is a pattern with people who go out on the weekend and post about it and ‘check in’ on facebook.

And it got me thinking about all the social media outlets one might utilise when they do in fact do a certain activity and how it can influence marketing of a certain business.

So for instance a night out on the town usually follows a pattern somewhat similar to this one..

1. pre-drinks

2. selfies –> post to instagram

3. discuss random conversational topics with friends –> post a tweet. start mass hashtag trend and debate.

“Hannah Montana versus Miley Cyrus #whoisbetter”

4. head out to party/club –> check in

“gettin white gurrl w8sted!”

5. hack friends facebook –> ‘like’ embarrassing pages

6. then later proceed to check in to maccas and then upload photos of your night out.

Another typical pattern belongs to those fitness addicts. They check in at the gym, share photos of their healthy, clean eating meal or review that latest protein powder from bulk nutrients on twitter.

Anyway what i’m getting at is this pattern. And for some reason people have this desire to let other people know what they are doing, what they’re wearing, who they’re with and so on and so on.

As a marketer there must be so many opportunities to exploit from this trend.
And i’m pretty sure I’ve seen or heard of companies displaying signs in store with promotions along the lines of “check in to receive 20% off your frozen yogurt” or even “like us on facebook”.

But how else as marketers can we make people actually want to check in at ‘Mynt’ or want to show that they’re drinking Absolut Vanilla vodka, or wearing those new nike free runs, or swear that Bulk Nutrients whey protien isolate cookies and cream gets you huge?

And i think ultimately it comes down to developing your brand’s image long before you think about the social media side of things. If you’re business is passionate about something and you’re good at what you do, then your consumers are obviously going to want a bar of it and want to be recognised as being associated with that image that your brand portrays. Naturally the check ins and likes will follow.

So in my opinion brands should worry less about how many ‘likes’ and ‘check ins’ they have and start focusing on what they stand for and develop a following of consumers who value the fact that what the business does, it does well.

Any brands that you know excel at something or have an image which you want to be associated with?

or have you seen any recent incentives advertised by brands to get you to ‘check in’ or ‘like’ their page?

Lettuce know 😉

To Be, or not to be Flawsome

so this week as i prepare for my electronic marketing assignment on Training Day Health Club, i’ve done some research into what kind of information it is that consumers are really interested in when they go online to check out a company or brand.

And its quite safe to say that the brands that perform best are those that actually produce some quality and genuine content.
Consumers don’t want to read about marketers wishy washy claims that ‘Our product is the best at…’ or ‘100% guaranteed to…’, which usually end up being false and lead to heartbreak and misery.

And when claims don’t live up to their promise, consumers are upset from the poor brand experience which ultimately may lead to distrust and an overall negative brand perception.

This is why consumers trust other consumers more than they do the marketers behind the brand. Blogs and product reviews from consumers provide a two sided opinion weighing up the benefits and disadvantages of products and services. After all, in most cases its not like these people are being paid to say good things about the brand.

So as i often read The Age, i came across an interesting article in which it highlighted brand’s that marketed their business’s weaknesses rather than its strengths. Brands have begun to be ‘Flawsome‘, deliberatley trying to appeal to consumers through authenticity and transparency by stating the brand’s weaknesses. Flawsome is a conjunction of flawed and awesome.

The idea behind being flawsome essentially puts the marketer in the shoes of the consumer reviewer. It creates the notion of a two-sided story and legitimises the brand providing the honesty that consumers desire and respect.

And brands which have chosen to go the ‘flawsome’ road and acknowledge their weaknesses, have actually been relatively successful.

for example….

Marmite’s love it or hate it campaign. Some people really do love it…

iinet launched a ‘get real’ campaign in which they openly acknowledged that they weren’t the best DSL broadband provider in Australia but they were indeed the second best.

The Red cross in America also almost stumbled into an unplanned flaw when this tweet was sent out from their account.

But rather than immediately delete the post and pretend it never happend- Which undoubtedly would have caused some kind of uproar and commotion, the Red cross quickly and wittingly responded with this.

and even Moro in New Zealand cleverly launched this ad promoting itself as being the fourth favourite chocolate bar amongst New Zealanders.

so why flaunt your flaws?

well in our digital society it is easy for anybody to gain insight of a brand and quickly identify fact from fiction. There’s no point in hiding because thanks to the power of the Internet, its all very transparent and we’re eventually going to find out

But ultimately we appreciate honesty and by showing us your flaws from the get go, you’ll only build your brands credibility and trustworthiness.

Mynt Lounge and how Facebook has helped them create value

This week i made my mark on youtube. i finally uploaded a video!!

It was quite a bit of fun. i learnt a few things and overall thoroughly enjoyed the experience.

Anyway, my video is all about how Mynt Lounge – a club in Weribee and how it  creates value to their consumers through utilising facebook.

Mynt has got to be one of my all time favourite clubs to go to in Melbourne. Everyone is always having a good time, the drinks are cheap and the tunes are bangin’.

If you’re keen to learn a bit more check out my video!!

A house plumbed with beer

When i first saw this video i was amazed. i felt so happy that friends could play such a nice prank on another friend where no one got hurt and everyone was nice to each other and laughed a lot 🙂

But then an hour or two later i got a feeling that the video could in fact be fake. My happy, warm, fuzzy feelings vanished.

I was lead to this belief upon thinking about my last post about Jimmy Kimmel’s ‘fake’ viral video, and his remarks on the fact that we can no longer trust the internet.

But im still unsure as to this videos authenticity.

There’s no brand logos or sponsors that i can see and no mention of any particular beer. could it be for something other than beer? fixtures and fittings maybe?

I dunno.

What do you guys think? real or fake?

Jimmy Kimmel twerks us around

so this weeks post incorporates a little somethin’ somethin’ from my last two posts…

twerking

and lying…

this week this video went viral…

In half an hour i saw it shared by friends on facebook, had it messaged to me by my brother and saw it on the front page of reddit. later that week i chatted to friends about it and we laughed at the embarrassment that the featured  girl must be feeling right now. It was ALL over the net and everyone knew about it. i think its fairly safe to say that this was a viral video.

but as per my usual scannings of The Age online i discovered something shocking. That twerking video was a fake.

That talk show host  Jimmy Kimmel fooled us all.

He revealed the hoax on his show stating that the girl in the video was actually a stunt woman and that the video was made a couple of months back and then uploaded to youtube via a private channel not linked to the show.

Kimmel laughs about how renowned TV networks across the country showed the clip believing it was real and then a few days later showed it again highlighting the fact that it was indeed fake.

What a double whammy for kimmel. Twice the free advertiment.

Kimmel also mentions that we can now no longer trust the internet. Well kimmel, i think we all became a bit sceptical a while ago now but your use of deception is quite genius. i find this all quite fasincating and brilliant.

Since the video went viral, viewer ratings for kimmel’s show have increased as well as a huge increase in google searchs -Cheers Kogan for the google trends tip ;D

This incident reminded me of another similar video not too long ago of a marriage proposal in a Dubai shopping mall.

Quickly, speculation grew of the authenticity of this video and it was soon found that the video was in fact a set up.
The video coincided with Cadbury’s ‘not so sweet’ campaign and features a train running through the scene halfway through the video featuring the brand’s logo.

So it made me think. do we as viwers really appreciate this kind of material? does it work?

A quick search on ‘not so sweet’ and ‘cadbury’ in google trends showed a steep spike in searches and then back to a a plateau.

And i suppose all viral videos kind of work in the same way. The generate rapid momentum and interest, and its all we can talk about for a week, and then a month later its as if Rebecca Black never even existed.

So is it worth big brands going to all the effort to turn their videos viral?

Have you guys seen or can think of any long term viral videos that have stuck?

Let me know 🙂

i like viral videos.

they’re….lying to us?

so im a little disappointed.

Apparently Beyonce may not actually like pepsi despite what this picture may suggest..

does KK even wear these bad boys?

Does George Clooney actually prefer to drink nespresso coffee as opposed to real coffee?

does dr dre even wear beats by dre?

… well quite potentially no.

But thats ok, because we all know that these are quite obviously paid endorsements. but recently after reading an article in The Age it only kinda dawned on me the power of a celebrities tweet.

Twitter is all too exciting when we actually get to see what celebrities are up to. it feels so personal when Justin Beiber tweets “gonna sleep at the studio”…

but aside from telling people your every daily move, i do appreciate twitter as a a source to write compliments or complaints about a brand.

This leads to my point…

how do we know when a celebrity – or anyone for that matter- is giving their own legitimate opinion on a brand, product or service or when it is being endorsed or sponsored by a third party?

I feel that when we can clearly see an advertisement with a celeb in it, we know its been paid for.

But how do i know if kk really likes eos lip balm or if she just got paid $10, 000 to say that she does.

$10, 000 is a lot of money for less than 140 characters.

Apparently though, the more followers you have on twitter, the more money people are likely to give you to say something nice about their brand.

But its so misleading!!

Have you ever bought a product or tried something just because someone you follow or like gave a great review about it?

Seen any blatantly obvious endorsed tweets lately?

lemme know 😉

when Oxford meets ‘Twerk’

When twerk becomes a word in the Oxford dictionary online I think there is only one person to point the finger at…

Thanks Miley.

and funnily enough ‘twerk’ hasn’t been the only recent interesting addition.

Take for instance…

srsly – short for seriously

derp – to describe foolishness or stupidity as a noun (also herp derp). such as ‘stop being such a derp Daniel!’ (my brother). Or used as an exclamation after a stupid  or foolish comment. derp would be an appropriate following to this…

unlike – the act of withdrawing ones liking approval from a social media site, photo or page

selfie – the act of taking a picture of yourself and then uploading it to a social media site. see here for more on selfies.

TL;DR – a time saving acronym. ‘Too long, didn;t read’.  For example, unit guides – tl;dr

So what’s the big deal?
Well i guess im trying to elude to the power that the online world has on our lives and culture. And its interesting that these words are starting to come off our small screens and used in everyday verbal exchanges.

How often have you heard someone say ‘lol’ and you’ve cringed so hard that you’ve gotten shoulder cramps?

Or when someone accidentally forgets to do their part of the assignment and they muster up a simple ‘soz’, and you just want to hurtle your laptop at them?

These words are commonly strewn across the Internet by users who have developed them and understand them merely because of their engagement in online activities. Their meanings have developed and evolved through user interaction and creation. The significance of these words in online usage has become overwhelming and has thus warranted Oxford’s dictionary online to include them so everyone can understand what a twerk is.

My mum still wont get it though.

fml.

Have you heard any other online words used in day-to-day verbal exchanges?
Noticed any other significant language changes due to social media?

http://www.theage.com.au/lifestyle/oxford-dictionaries-adds-twerk-fomo-selfie-and-other-words-that-make-me-vom-20130829-2ss5m.html

http://blog.oxforddictionaries.com/2013/08/new-words-august-2013/

She took a picture of what?!

Selfies.

Love them or hate them, there’s no doubt that they’re flooding your social media feeds.

In case your over 25 and have never heard of the term, a selfie is;

• A picture of you with your face in it
• The photo was taken by yourself without the help of another human 

• You shared the photo on the internet – instagram, twitter, facebook, tumblr and so on.

And there is a fair amount of debate and cringing over the appropriateness of a selfie. And its all very subjective as to whether a selfie is good or compeltely and utterly embarrassing.

And I suppose there are rules as to when a selfie is allowed.

Firstly, please dont take yourself too seriously.

Dont pout/ duck face.

Dont hashtag #bored #nomakeup or #selfie. We can see that its a selfie, thank you.

Dont show us your boobs.

And dont take too many selfies. Your ratio of selfies to photos of other stuff has to be 1:8. If scrolling through your instagram profile and you have more than 1 selfie in every 9 square grid, you’re verging on being a selfie whore.

Even with these rules though, I still feel that there are times when selfies just aren’t appropriate. Why, Im not entirely sure. But I think I get annoyed when i see a selfie taken and it seems that the pure objective of the person taking it is to achieve  ‘likes’.

Is it a popularity contest? Maybe.

I think that the biggest problem I have with selfies is that when people take a million photos of themselves before they’re satisfied with the lighting and then apply a filter (one of instagrams biggest calling cards) to enhance their features they are clearly trying show off.

Dont even get me strated on gym selfies.

What are people achieving with those? Surely they’re a search for pure praise and acknowledgement of how much of a hard worker and healthy person they are.
do you feel bad when you see these?

Dont. The art of the selfie is that it can be purley manufactured by the selfier.

But with no roadblocks for selfies on the social media highway there is no doubt that the selfie will be around for a while.

Thank you Instagram.

do you take selfies? why dont’/do you do it?

and before you point it out, yes my display picture is essentially a selfie. but it was manufactured that way. The angle of my hand holding my phone didnt work well for the intended picture. so i got my friend to take the photo for me with my arm held out towards the camera to make it look like i took it.

i know, the epitome of cool.

Here’s the original selfie

 

 

http://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/wellbeing/8989760/Rise-of-the-gym-selfies

Do you even prosume?

According to Wikipedia a prosumer is pretty much someone who is ace at buying stuff – a professional consumer.  

Have you ever gone into a shop found a killer pair of jeans and then walked around the stores to see if you can find the same pair at a cheaper price?

Sure you have. 

Ever whipped your phone out to do the same thing?

Me too.

 

For retailers this is no doubt a worrying predicament to be in. Prosumers can now use brick and mortar stores purely for the use of showrooming – A place to view and test the product before they make a real purchase online.

Many apps now, such as that from Amazon, allow prosumers to scan a barcode of an item (or take a photo or type a search for it) and enabling them to purchase the product online.

Another app called ‘Decide shopping and price predictor‘ also helps you determine whether or not you should make a purchase (particularly on electronic items), based on how long the product has been on the market for, the likelihood that a new model could be coming out soon, and other shoppers reviews collated from numerous sources. This function showcases the power of the internet and its ability for word of mouth communication.

‘Shop advisor’ is another app that helps you keep track of products that you are interested in by keeping tabs on price changes and special deals ultimately informing you of the right time to buy.

As a prosumer these apps couldn’t make me more happier. As a retailer however they make business that much more difficult.

About a month ago I went on a quest to buy some new jeans. After trawling through Chadstone for 2hours I found a pair I was satisfied with at Universal. In the end they didn’t have the size in the style I was after. Bugger. Naturally I went home to see if I could find the jeans cheaper online.

My search online allowed me to find the jeans at a marginally cheaper price. Eventually though I ended up purchasing the jeans from the Universal store site.

Despite the fact that I could have saved $15 from another site I chose to purchase from Universal because;

I was impressed with the customer service I received in store,

• The site was extremely user friendly,
• The online chat function cleared up my question on exchanging my purchase with something from in store if the product didn’t fit, and
• Delivery was free and came the next day.

 

My point is that whilst prosumers are savvy in sourcing the best deals through online means, mortar and pestle stores should keep in mind that price isn’t the only deciding factor when making a purchase.  Additionally you can’t fight the net. Whilst online stores pose a threat, having an online presence is crucial for consumers to acknowledge your existence and search your catalogue.

EMBRACE THE EMARKETING REVOLUTION!

 

 

What is your ultimate prosumer shopping moment? What lengths have you gone to to get the cheapest deal?