What’s that? You have a hankering for some marketing infographic magic? Oh fine. We’ll oblige.
Check out Hubspot‘s collection of what they feel were 20 of 2012′s most memorable marketing moments below. From Facebook hitting 1 Billion users and acquiring Instagram, to the Twitter-LinkedIn split and Newsweek’s move to go all-digital as of January 2013, this one’s got it all covered.
What do you think? Was there anything that you think missed this list? Sound off in the comments below or Tweet at us @AndersonAdPR.
Cheers for a happy, healthy New Year from all of us at ANDERSON. See you in 2013!
According to SEOmoz’s 2012 annual SEO industry survey, 44% of marketers self-professed either “advanced” or “expert” level social media ability. Great! But how effectively are you using social media in terms of integrating your hard-earned fans into your regular marketing practices?
The always insightful, kickass team over at HubSpot has just previewed the release of its latest free eBook on The Future of Social Media Lead Management, and we couldn’t agree more with the team’s philosophy.
Its top tips go something like this:
1. Settle in to viewing your social media database just as you do your email database.
As HubSpot points out, your social media database consists of followers and fans who want to engage with your brand online — they’re retweeting, resharing, and repinning your posts as advocates of your brand.
In this context, the interests and actions of your email recipients and social followers overlap. The act of opting in to receive email updates from a company is very similar to, for instance, hitting the ‘Like’ button on a Facebook Page.
2. Get the right content to the right people.
Learn about your fans, then segment them accordingly based on preference and behavior exhibited.
They recommend allocating a few hours each week to discover and learn about your “people”. Look at who is retweeting and commenting on your content, and cross-reference that with your contacts database. Constant, positive, and targeted sharing of information will ultimately help grow your pool of evangelists, which will ultimately help you in other areas of your marketing.
3. Put your social media intelligence to work in all of your follow up interaction.
Make an impact by using the knowledge you’ve taken in from the wonderful word of social media to establish and define a clear reason, backed up by a clear action, and followed up with a clear benefit to each marketing lead you snag and follow up on. By showing your social advocates that you’re taking the time to learn about them, you’re fostering even more positive association with your brand.
We are caffeine addicts in our office, we won’t even dance around it. Coffee, tea, Diet Coke, each of us have our own personal caffeine vice, and that need for a energy boost unites us all. That all being said we do our fair share of coffee runs throughout the week.
Picture via Starbucks' Facebook page
3 pm hits and we’re all dragging, so someone boldly stands up and says, “Alright, I’m going to Starbucks. Who else wants coffee?”
The orders stream in on their sticky notes attached to cash or card, and off they go, a caffeine fairy off to retrieve the magical, mystical brew.
The task of the coffee runner is not an easy one, they carry a lot of responsibility to get every syrup flavor, extra shot, and no-whip special order correct. They also literally have to carry a lot of coffee.
Now through the month of September, buy four coffees at your local Starbucks and get the fifth free!
It’s a simple incentive, but the way that the coffee-conglomerate presented it showcases such a great application of its understanding of its customers and how they enjoy their coffee creations — in groups… often at work.
They’ve even provided order forms to make mass office coffee runs easier!
So thank you, Starbucks: thank you for your coffee and tea, and thank you for this great example of marketing.
One of the things I love about the advertising business is working hand-in-hand with clients to help their businesses succeed.
Having the latitude of being the “crazy ad people” allows us to bring ideas to the table without worry. One of the best examples of an agency unfailingly doing this, and creating a world wide brand, was led by industry legend George Lois. Some say Don Draper was inspired by George. He was recently interviewed on NPR and told this great story.
If you missed NPR’s interview yesterday with legendary adman George Lois about his new book, Damn Good Advice, it’s worth going back and giving it a listen. The highlight for me was hearing the tale of how Lois (in his version of the story, at least) single-handedly invented Aunt Jemima syrup. It’s one of those advertising yarns you’d expect to have heard a million times over, and possibly you have, but it was new to me.
When Lois was working the Aunt Jemima account, the Quaker-owned brand was known for pancake mix but didn’t make a syrup.
“I said to them, ‘How come you guys don’t have a syrup? You own the pancake business,’ ” Lois recounts in the NPR interview. “And they said, ‘Well, that’s not our business,’ and they came up with 12 reasons why they don’t have it.”
Not getting any traction after months of pressing the issue, Lois decided to drop the idea into a consumer survey about pancake habits.
“The last question in this questionnaire about pancakes listed a bunch of syrups, and I included the words ‘Aunt Jemima syrup,’ and I said, ‘Which of these syrups have you bought in the past year?’ And something like 90 percent of the people circled that they had bought Aunt Jemima syrup, which was nonexistent.… I showed them my research and said ’90 percent of Americans believe they are already buying Aunt Jemima syrup. Would you please make Aunt Jemima syrup?’ And of course they created the syrup, and they became the leading syrup brand in the world in two days.”
Just goes to show, there’s no limit to what creativity can accomplish when you add in some pestering and unsolicited advice.
One thing that I tend to always consider when brainstorming, working, animating, or designing, is the concept of character, and its emotional investment from the viewer. While this concept of character is important on a technical and practical level for animation/design to be effective, I am much more interested in the actual creation of a character or characters for use in advertising. Creating effective characters results in more memorable campaigns and higher retention among viewers.
Creating effective characters, especially through comedy, allows viewers to empathize and relate to situations and products that could otherwise go unnoticed. Thanks to the internet and web advertising, videos can now be much longer, and much more involved. This allows for short stories and webisode-like content that can help sell products much more effectively. The use of social media, and the concept of user discovery, (allowing a user to find content on the internet via social media and word of mouth) has become a very crucial paradigm for advertising in the new age.
Case in Point: There are several already effective campaigns out there, that people will seek out and watch, simply because the content is funny, viral, or otherwise interesting. Many of these campaigns involve specific characters to deliver the selling points.
Allstate Mayhem guy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nFVpaQGltrI
Over 1,000,000 views!
Old Spice – The Man Your Man Should Smell Like
Almost 40,000,000 views!
Kenny Powers – K Swiss
Almost 3,000,000 views.
Characters can really make a campaign shine! It can also help unify a look or branding that sell the product. Using characters in advertising over the internet is also great because censorship becomes much less of an issue.
So obviously, I am a big fan. And after leaving my thoughts with you, I figured I would leave you with one more wonderful video link. You may have seen this, but if not, you are in for a fun treat.
I am now in month five of my job here at ANDERSON. So while I am no longer just fresh out of college, I am still new to the professional marketing and advertising worlds. That being said, being an industry youngster in the grand scheme of things can have its benefits.
At a boutique agency that houses more than 70 years of combined experience across its staff, having a newbie around can bring about new and different ideas – especially when it comes to completely new (or relatively new) technologies. Throughout my education, online marketing techniques and practices were taught with as much emphasis and importance as all of the more traditional forms of marketing and advertising. I worked through my studies learning the purpose and potential that lies in making [good] use of social media to elevate a brand to the next level.
While I know how to tweet, blog and am a keyword fiend, I also know that social media and the wonderful world of online media is just one – albeit crucial – element of an overall campaign. In order for any one aspect of a marketing strategy to be successful, it has to fit together with all the other pieces. Each element is just one cog in a greater machine.
I came across this infographic on Social Times and I was floored. I had to share.
What I see here is a big infographic with big lessons.
While the title says it’s the “Noob Guide to Online Marketing,” I think that marketers with any level of experience with online marketing can learn a thing or two from it.
Take a look and happy marketing!
(Side note: Be sure to click on the image & zoom in so that you can absorb all the marketing goodness.)
No guts, no glory. We’ve all heard this idiom used in many situations (I tend to use it alot when my son is working on a new move in his Xtreme TaeKwonDo form).
When it comes to our work – whether it be a new idea for a client or a new strategy, it usually involves convincing a client that the “same old, same old” can never produce more than it has in the past. I give an incredible amount of credit to clients that are willing to take risks and welcome ideas that can break through — those that don’t find themselves taking the easy way out by just doing what has always worked.
I’m never more proud of the ANDERSON team than when our team members decide to take a risk, go out on a limb and blow a client away with a new creative concept– even securing a feature in a national magazine the client has coveted, or utilizing a new media strategy. While it can definitely be disappointing when the client doesn’t respond, we’re not doing our job if we don’t bring fresh ideas to the table. If you’ve seen our Feature Friday blog posts, you’ve seen a lot of the projects we’re most proud of. Frustration only comes into play when clients are not able to make a decision, or want to change elements that are irrelevant to producing what they want — RESULTS! Those that say they want our expertise, but then disregard that same expertise in the execution.
The walls of my office are adorned with framed covers of some of my favorite bands’ best albums… Artists that took risks and succeeded. I also have a framed poster of Apple’s (now famous) “Think Different” campaign, which is my all time favorite TV spot. One that not only conveyed a brand message, but did so in way that inspired.
One of the things I love about what we do is being able to live in the moment in an industry that is shaped, responds and sometimes does the shaping itself of the world we live in. A new media, a new product, a new tactic — a new way of talking to people, responding to the trends and maybe even being part of the start of a new trend. There’s nothing better than seeing a client’s business take off, knowing you were a part of the team. Most of the time it’s because they were willing to take a risk and do something no one else had done before. That decisiveness is critical. Not over thinking it and being bold? That can make you, your client or your project really stand out and lead to accomplishments you only dreamed about.
