With the popularity of social media - viral marketing campaigns, blogs, twitter, etc - large corporations have the opportunity to listen to their customers and engage on a more personal level. This can lead to more transparency from the company as it communicates with its customers in real language and not through marketing speak.

Can we, as consumers, trust these big brands more because of a switch in tone? Do we assume that what they write on their blogs, what they tweet every hour, or what they tell you in a viral video is genuine rather than thoughtfully constructed and highly produced?

I believe that the even when the tone or the medium of the message adapts to the available technologies, the original positioning is what still shines through. So that positioning needs to be honest and socially aware. If a company enters the social space without knowing what consumers want, and thereby not fully asserting its position in the space, then it needs to be forthright and clear that it is searching to re-establish a vision that can make a difference. Auto companies might be in this position, while they try to gauge how drivers want to see the industry change (or be rebuilt after it’s burned to the ground).

Some of the major brands that are more socially aware have accomplished this by listening to consumers and positioning the brand in a way that will reach their target audience. The Brand Channel noted that, “socially aware brands such as Dove received praise because their marketing campaign “talks to real women and not skinny models.” In the early stages of Dove’s campaign, Brand Channel remarked that, “Dove’s refusal to bow to aesthetic convention is a clever piece of branding, unifying its products around a compelling idea and setting Dove apart from rivals Johnson & Johnson and Nivea.”

With these goals in mind, Dove can easily enter any conversation with a clear statement while still listening to women and adapting to what they need.

Since I’m loving the concept of putting your company’s logo in the hands of your customers, I thought I’d share an initiative by an El Paso County children’s museum.

flickr: cambodia4kidsorg

The Pikes Peak Children’s Museum, still in the early stages, is asking the children of the community to inspire the design of the logo. They’re holding a content until April 17th open to all children aged 1 -11.

That’s right, aged 1 to 11! However, the top designs are simply going to be inspiration for a professional graphic designer who will prepare the final logo design. I’m curious to see just how much of the children’s drawings are carried over to the final logo. Contractually, how much liberty can the designer take?

According to the Colorado Springs Gazette,

Five designs will be chosen on April 20 by a panel from the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center and the Bemis School of Art. These five will be displayed in all branches of the Pikes Peak Library District, and the public will choose the top three.

The winning designs will be showcased in the museum and the kids will receive gift certificates for an art class in the area as well as an artist’s kit.

This is a bit different from our previous conversations about Burger King and Firefox because it is about building an existing brand rather than putting an established brand in the customers’ hands. There is no sanctity to be preserved, necessarily.

Who knows whether the final product will be anything like what the kids come up with, but getting them involved is an important first step for return visits. That sense of ownership over a community staple is important for the success of the museum.

What do you think? Is this effort taking it a bit to far? Will the kids be disappointed if the designers takes too many liberties when designing the final logo?

A bit of a dramatic title for some long overdue news. Just tonight I saw on CNN the new ad campaign that Cisco is rolling out. “The Human Network” I suppose would be the campaigns title, since that’s what they’re branding themselves with now.

I mentioned this was a bit overdue, and I would guess some people out there would agree with my opinion. Cisco is a great technology company delivering some brilliant products and services to companies out there. However for the past couple of years it seems they forgot that even behind big companies, humans are the ones running the show, making the decisions, and calling the big shots. Perhaps that’s what they’ve realized now and are turning around to be a more human and down-to-earth brand that can service and excel with anyone out in the world.

I have to say I absolutely love the ads, they seem to capture some life in its purest essence and form. They are brilliantly executed (if anyone knows the agency, please let me know) and they finally speak in a language that we can all understand perfectly: that of experiences! Life experiences, ease of experiences, fulfilling experiences that are being fully communicated through the beautiful images they present. Well done Cisco! I hope to see more great ads like this ones, but overall a majestic branding campaign that re-captures the brand in the arena that matters the most: human consumers.

Check out some of this links:

Cisco - “The Human Network” - A whole site dedicated to this campaign, which even pushes the efforts further into real engagement with consumers.

Youtube link for Cisco’s ad  

” situation number one, it’s the one that’s just begun
but evidently it’s too late
situation number two, it’s the only chance for you
it’s controlled by denizens of hate
situation number three, it’s the one that no one sees
all too often dismissed as fate
situation number four, the one that left you wanting more
it tantalized you with its bait “

- Jack Johnson’s song “Situations”.

Just a friendly remainder of what situations are and mean to marketers. The power a situation has in a person can might as well be the greatest influence on taking a decision or what action to take. I’m reminded of one of my favorite books, “The Tipping Point”. Gladwell’s third law (The Power of Context) is the best way to understand how a situation takes and overwhelms a person pushing them to taking a certain course of action, or thought.

How can this be managed and applied into marketing plans? Not that simple, really; but rather effective. If we, as marketers are able to construct the “perfect” context and situation for a consumer to be in, we might be able to have an influence on them and create a positive attitude and experience towards a brand. Especially useful when analyzing and preparing a brand to reach out to consumers and make them have the best possible Brand Experience.

Technorati : brand experience, power of context, situation

Birthday’s are for sure marketing tools. Yesterday was my birthday and I can’t even remember how many e-mails I got from different companies and brands wishing me the best of days, and many more to come.

CRM, when built and used right, is a great way to keep in touch with customers, and of course, with the ease of e-mail there is better way to do it.

Either for a new product launch, a promotion, Christmas, thanksgiving, or a birthday…. keeping in touch with your customer base is always profitable….and sometimes even nice.

How are you keeping in touch with your customers? Do they feel good about it?

Technorati : CRM, email, marketing strategy

Much has been written and talked on how to build a true brand benefit that the consumers will recognize as something important and make it part of their lives, helping revenues and brand equity to increase. Researchers and experts have different ideas on what a brand benefit is, segmenting it into three or four categories. These are the three I find to be most appropriate:

• Functional Benefit - Actual benefit from the brand. (ie. Low Fat)
• Emotional Benefit - Benefit felt in the heart and mind of the consumer. (ie. feeling light and healthy)
• Social Benefit - Benefit acquired by the consumer, only once it comes in contact with other people (ie. being a healthy person among a group of friend.)

In this post I’ll focus on the Emotional Benefit, since I believe there is a great chance for many brands to improve in it.

However, only few brands (worldwide) have been able to translate the functional benefit into something consumers understand and are able to deal with emotionally, moving them to adopt it as part of their daily lives; hence, starting a new relationship with a brand. Some examples of such brands are: Coca-Cola, Starbucks, Singapore Airlines, and recently Apple.

When we speak on emotional benefits, the benefit gotten by the consumer isn’t something material they can show off as an Oscar statue. Instead, it works more directly into the heart and mind. The key here is that in most cases, even though it isn’t a material good, it can be showed off as a batch of honor or status. (…arriving to the creation of a social benefit…)

For example:

• Singapore Airlines allows their users to have fun, test new business models, be the first ones to discover new airline paradigms, and enjoy their ride as no other brand allows them to.

The tricky part on establishing an emotional benefit for consumers is the transition and translation of the functional benefit into something that consumers can experience emotionally that will leave them touched with the brand’s benefit itself. How to do that?

Through relevancy and consistency.

A benefit will never attract the emotional side of a consumer if it isn’t relevant to her. Singapore Airlines offers the functional benefit of high quality, innovative, different and even ‘fun’ flights around the world; all of which are relevant and important to consumers, that is what they’re looking for a in a 12-hr flight. But they take it a step further by utilizing communication strategies like advertising branding, and positioning through various mediums to connect emotionally with their users. By putting forth, what I’d call, a ’cause-effect’ strategy they target consumers both ways, through advertising (prior to service delivery, promising great things) and then finally connecting the dots with the amazing experience they provide to the users once on-board.

How to keep it going? There is actually no other way to keep the brand benefit rolling like a snowball but through consistency. To stick with the example, Singapore Airlines have continuously stayed on track with what their brand offers. No tactic or strategy of theirs deviated from their original brand benefit and positioning.

By having strategies (all around) that are relevant to your consumers (or potential ones), and then keeping the promise through a sustained period of time, you will be able to tie in the emotional brand benefit that consumers get from your brand experience.

This is for sure a very juicy topic on which we could all write for days, so I will keep it to here for now. Later I will surely discuss the other two types of benefits brands provide to their consumers, and how to make it right. Cheers!

Technorati : brand benefit, brand strategy, branding, communication strategy, marketing strategy, singapore airlines
Del.icio.us : brand benefit, branding, strategy
Buzznet : brand benefit, branding, strategy

I found a great site (via Logic+Emotion) called “Pinko Marketing“. It is essentially a wiki with what they call a new way of marketing. The essence of it remains the same, but with new and more relevant objectives, strategies, tactics, and ways of applying the marketing basics to your brand or product.

This is a short description on what Pinko Marketing is:

“…because there is no “consumer” anymore. We are in the age of peer to peer power over all other forms of messaging. Producer to producer. There are no passive parties in this new world. No longer is word of mouth merely a powerful tool, it is quickly becoming the only trusted source of information. The internet, mobile and other advanced forms of communication are allowing communities to form and gain power more quickly than ever.”

This is a great site, really recommended!

Top 3 pages to check out:

1. Pinko Manifesto
2. Pinko Examples
3. Marketing Map

Check it out and let me know what you think…

Thanks D.Armano for the great site.

(via Logic+Emotion)

Technorati : marketing 2.0, pinko marketing, social marketing

Wow, Twitter has been getting some amazing blogosphere attention lately! Since the launch, I can’t recall the amount of times I’ve read the word Twitter. That’s when you know you have a ‘talkeable’ or ’shareable’ brand in your hands. The Twitter team has made it easy for users to open up there daily lives and let the world know what we’re all up, in a very easy way… and what’s even more important, they’ve made it so cool and easy to share the Twitter service with friends that everyone is taking up a chance to do so.

So why is it so easy to love?…and to share? I think it is so because it touches and stimulates a hidden part of our humanity. A little something I like to call:

Stalker-ism: The act of wanting to be involved in other peoples lives. Even when it’s nosy or you don’t even know them.

This appeals to humans (I’ve Heard), and by letting users publish they’re daily actions, it is attractive both ways. So…Twitter me! www.twitter.com/ronelizondo

Since I’ve seen an impressive amount of Twitter-related blog posts I’m doing a compilation of some of my favorites. Here we go:

Twitter Mining

Could Advertising Pollute Twitter and Friday Fun: More Twitter Club Ideas

Twitter: The Fad and the Potential

When is Too New Just Right - I love the way his daughter responded! Love it!

Twitter Part II

Edwards on Twitter- Very interesting news! A presidential candidate twitter-ing

Twitter: At the Tipping Point and may not survive SXSW

Twitter: Still Don’t Get it ?

Thoughts on Twitter

Anyway, we’ll have to wait and see… If this, indeed, is nothing more than a fad or something that’s here to stick for a longer while. Have your say via comments please. (…and if you may, twitter me! user: ronelizondo)

Technorati : list, marketing, posts, twitter

Consumers know, they really do! Trust me on it. There is no way you can manage to execute a faked authentic ad campaign, or promotional campaign, or marketing strategy without consumers noticing.

Sometimes we, as marketers, believe that by making something feel and sound real, we’ll get the attention needed and have a successful campaign. However, we might fall into a dangerous trap… taking authenticity for a far stretch. Lately we have been seeing this with viral campaigns where companies have created viral videos to be distributed “virally” (initiated by them), and when some of they fail or get bad reviews the managers frown and ask “Why did it go wrong?”

Most of them share one and only one answer: TOO authentic… to be real!

My favorite 5 ways to notice a too (fake) authentic marketing campaign:

1. It is too good to be true.
2. (If it’s supposed to be a consumer generated video): The video was shot with some great piece of equipment, lighting seems perfect and the ‘actors’ are all wearing makeup.
3. The whole campaign is TOO happy. Nobody can be too happy in this world. A normal dose of happy is OK, though.
4. The brand is being worshiped like a deity. No brand gets THAT good feedback on real content. Keep it real.
5. The campaign spells out the main brand’s benefit, with the exact wording. Buy insert brand and you will be the coolest guy in your school. Don’t tell me I’m going to be cool, tell me something cool that’ll make me feel (unconsciously or consciously) cool !

Tips or comments? Please drop a line. Tell us how you manage your campaigns to look real and authentic, even when they’re not.

Technorati : authentic, branding, marketing campaigns, viral marketing

Just like Mr. Seth Godin himself concluded in his latest post on Sarah’s visit to give out samples of her chocolate products, I too conclude that it’s not only a possibility or opportunity that Sarah (like any other business owner or manager) has, but it is rather a growing necessity and need.

Quoting Sarah directly from her blog, she said to Seth Godin on heir Zabar’s adventure: “Why, you may ask? How else do we know how people really think, feel, react, to our product, without going out there to talk to them? Hanging out in stores is one of the best ways to find out.”

Easy as that. Business owners or manager at large companies should be reading those lines rather carefully and taking them into consideration next time they’re in doubt of why consumers act the way they do, or why sales are shifting, slowing, or even if they’re speeding up. Take some time from the boring office and step out to meet up with your customers.

Easily said, but not done enough in today’s world, in my opinion. Managers and owners that get this (and do it) will have the opportunity to grow beyond their competition because of the accumulated knowledge they will have.

Great story guys,

Technorati : consumer engagement, marketing, sampling, sweetriot, touchpoints