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Monday, April 26, 2010

Are we really friends with our friends?

Kin is doing an amazing social media campaign. Congrats to them for finding a way to market their product without me even knowing it.

Yesterday I was checking some of my favorite blogs, elbo and hypem to name a few, and a banner ad spoke to me:

"Are we really friends with our friends? We found Rosa.. armed her with a Kin, and sent her on a journey to visit her social network ... in person."

Kin posed a question that I often ask myself, then offered me an answer. I can watch Rosa, a Gen Y-er just like me,  visit her Facebook friends that she's never met to find and see what happens.

This is personal, it is real, it address thoughts we all have:

"Do I wave at him? I'm friends with him on facebook but I don't really know him..."
"She texted me that she wasn't going out but she has pictures at the bars last night..."
"We've been dating for a while but now he's 'in a relationship' with some other girl..."

Kin's campaign is aimed right at our generation and they have found a perfect way for us create a relationship with them. We are a part of this brand.

"Our Story"
"We made Kin for you.
We saw how you talk, text, tweet and post in real life
Then we made Kin to communicate as naturally as you do.
So Kin is everything you love, everything you want, all together, in one place"

And then they created a campaign true to their brand.

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Toyota Matrix

I recently came across this ad campaign for the Toyota Matrix. The tag line: "Now in the Prairies. The urban-inspired, 2009 Toyota Matrix"

Canadian advertising agency, Venture Communications, rolled out a series of ads in 2009. I don't get it. Can anyone give me some insight on this?


I mean, its rapper-ish, with grills, picks, and Nelly's signature Band-Aid but is this the best way to appeal to the urban market? Were they using a humor approach or were they trying to be serious?

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

AMA at the University of Iowa

















Why didn't AMA work with designers for this advertisement? This ad is not appealing, its obnoxious. It hurts my eyes, its underlined everywhere, and the pictures are blatant cut-outs. Why didn't the AMA work outside its comfort zone with a design student?

AMA at University of Iowa ... not the best thing.
The adviser is probably the most caring professor at the University of Iowa.
The students are all Marketing majors.

But...

They do not understand that learning to work with other majors is important. Marketers, designers, PR, Journalists; we all have to work together to find the best solution for our campaigns. We cannot assume that we are the best at everything, we are not. We must understand that sometimes looking for a professional in another industry is needed. TEAMWORK! If we haven't learned anything a the University of Iowa, we have learned that working with a team is detrimental to our future. Every class involves teamwork; why aren't we utilizing this skill and working with teams that are the best in the industry?

Word of Mouth Marketing

Last night at SCOPE's meeting the directors handed out a clever bit of marketing. It was a piece of bright yellow fabric that had the name of our upcoming concert and the date. It was written in black Sharpie "Girl Talk & Wale, May 4th, Get your tickets at the IMU"

Now previously we have made shirts announcing our line-up. This is nothing new, nothing eye-catching, and it doesn't spark any interest. After all, everyone wears T-shirs, but the directors hit gold with this new idea. Everyone in SCOPE is sporting this yellow sign safety-pinned to their backpacks. Imagine 50 students wandering all over campus for two weeks attached with these bright yellow signs. Seems to me some people will begin to wander what this is, pay attention, and then talk about it.

Other students will promote this show, whether or not they want to go, because SCOPE is creatint a spectacle. Its weird, its different, and worthy of starting a conversation about.

"Hey did you see those people with the yellow signs on their bags?"
"Yeah, what was that?"
"They had the Girl Talk & Wale concert written on them."
"Weird."

I can see it now, spreading like a wildfire throughout a college campus thirsty for something new to talk about.

Congrats on this one SCOPE.

Monday, April 19, 2010

Kia!

I'm not sure how I forgot to post this wonderful use of a song by Kia for their SuperBowl commercial. The Heavy - How ya Like Me Now



High-Energy and excitement. Great song choice KIA

Amazon Kindle

Just a quick thought here:

Amazon Kindle advertises using the peripheral route. They play feel-good songs, re-enact scenes from books, and get you to feel all warm inside by the time the commercial is over. Granted, I am not a consumer behavior genius, but I do remember my professor explaining that for high-tech items your audience wanted to know features. The techie audience has more knowledge and higher knowledge items like E-readers (in contrast to things like beer) should use the central processing route to reach the consumer. I'm not saying to eliminate the feel-goodness, but maybe add in a couple of selling points to those commercials. Or is that campaign coming next?

Friday, April 16, 2010

Songs that create buzz

We live in a radio dominated world. A radio that plays what the record labels shove down our throats. Forget if the musicians can sing (ehhhmmmm Ke$sha), or if the band is talented (ehhm Nickleback , same chords over and over on every song on each album), all that matters is that the song will make money for the record label.

Do people enjoy being exposed every day to bad music?
Do people like what record labels are shoving down their throats?

I think not.

Companies understand this phenomena. Instead of using uber popular music in their commercials, which they could afford, they spend time searching out talented music to feature.

Why? Whats the benefit?

By highlighting an under-the-radar artist, viewers have to do a little searching to find out who was singing on the commercial. The mystery, the search, and the discovery help fuse a connection between consumer and company.

My generation (Y) doesn't respond to traditional mass marketing like previous generations. We like to become a part of the product and feel like a part of the brand. Established companies can't go back underground and start over using Word of Mouth marketing, what they can do is take an aspect of their advertising, leave a little mystery, and let consumers do what they do best; promote it.

Back to the music side of things :

Hello record labels, WAKE UP. People hear less tha 30 seconds of a song and are so in love with it that they go search it out so they can buy the song. I think people are starved for good music.

Here are companies who are doing it right:






Thursday, April 15, 2010

Luna Flooring



Note to Luna Flooring: If you cannot execute a stolen idea better than the people you stole it from, it makes your company look desperate and uncreative. Luna has taken an original idea created by Mac, a company with a devout cult following, and as a Mac user it kind of makes me feel like they are stealing something. My Mac, my brand, my loyalty is being used a marketing ploy for a flooring company? I think Luna would have been better off not doing the commercial. Before I didn't know about the company, now I dislike the company. Good Job!