P & G hosted an EMEA Digital Night at in Geneva bringing together its marketing , ecommerce , digital communications people and their agencies to participate in a digital and social media experiment on a real live campaign. At its outset it appeared to be a daunting proposal , to spearhead a full blown digital media campaign in two hours with the ultimate idea being to maximize the groups reach , push their influence, and market and sell the idea of donating for a Pampers & UNICEF program to eliminate Tetanus aiming to raise 100, 000 GBP in 18 hours.
Pampers Save a Baby. One pack , one baby.
“A baby dies every three minutes somewhere in the world from tetanus. It is completely avoidable and Pampers is sponsoring and raising money for a UNICEF vaccination program worldwide.”
The ensuing two hours was bold and adventurous as assigned groups armed with a few basic executional assets and a donation landing page split off to devise and execute a fund raising campaign utilizing only digital channels. There were no set rules in what the approach needed to be other than it needed to be “executed with integrity”.
The groups immediately raced to begin and obvious point to turn to were their friends and associates linked in the various social networks. Facebook groups emerged , links appears, a donate widget application got added to personal pages and the conversation began in earnest. The emergence of strategy then began to permeate the groups as each devised campaign message and a reach strategy in how to maximize audience across a multiple touch points making the approach more sophisticated, pointed and less haphazard.
Blogs , YouTube videos, an influencer campaign on Tweeter and through Facebook , chasing and contacting high value donors , negotiations for impressions across online publishing networks linking multiple contact channels and coming together at a rapid pace. In a jaw dropping moment a little while latter a one million impression banner campaign appeared across one of Germany’s major newspaper sites. The buzz and influencer phenomena then took over with global reach. As the intensity of the push to raise money took hold , groups began to monitor their competitors actions and tactics, calling for quick decisions on how best to out wit the competition and move to next channel almost in a race to be first. Viral campaigns riding on the back of Selma Hayak’s ambassadorship sprung up, well designed internal direct email campaigns raced through the P & G network , tell to friends campaigns in the social sites. A directed and awe inspiring frenzy of digital buzz. The results .. they are a secret .. but it worked.
Digital Marketing is all about the consumer experience with , accompanied by, and within a brand virtually. From the physical dimension of a brand to its mental associations, its brand equity, or brand essence , down to very granular services or information surrounding its place in a consumer’s life, all can and should be experienced digitally.
One way of considering the full digital marketing mix is to look at as a digital ecosystem. As in any successful ecosystem, all the elements and their inter- relationships support and keep the ecosystem alive, adapting and thriving. And across the digital marketing mix there is a problem if these all remain in silos. The traditional marketing pillars of awareness, acquisition and consumer retention should be applied across all types of digital interactive services or content in that ecosystem as active environmental roles that support the ecosystem. More importantly, they must all be considered as digital consumer touch points, each with an active role to play. In a cohesive or holistic sense these traditional marketing pillars should applied against very activity in standalone website or across a full digital ecosystem ( sites, services, distributed content, social networks, digital media/advertising, email marketing and CRM ) and should always be considered. Conversely , these digital touch points should be supported by other non digital channels ( POS, above and below the line media , on pack) ; a virtual environment needs to exist with a physical counterpart.
While some of the activities, content, or interactive services you have on a site may seem obvious its always good to justify there existence against what your aims or goal are in the marketing mix. No one element is exclusive , all are interdependent just as they would be in the normal sales funnel, and what’s interesting about this is that you can seek to balance activities against the goals and make decisions of what interactive pieces you might consider for the traditional marketing pillars of awareness, acquisition and consumer retention.
What’s interesting today in the more social interactive world is that in the consumers journey along the traditional sale funnel seems to be either accelerated or they can identified anywhere in the funnel a lot quicker. The activities surrounding your he traditional marketing pillars of awareness, acquisition and consumer retention seem blurred. Lets take, for example, Bacardi . In its recent digital campaign to further its association with a night clubbing and dance club lifestyle worldwide, it chooses to be a trusted facilitator in an aspect of that lifestyle, by providing the service of a digital music sharing platfrom . It uses social media by offering aspiration based rewards of free limited edition, 1st to hear, music tracks to those consumers (its digital advocates) that act as a word of mouth spokes-peoples for the brand’s service by being the source of introduction of the Barcardi music sharing platform to their friends and rewards them accordingly. One could say that its the digital equivalent to brands giving away a utility that is associated with or inherent in products consumption. Like a coffee brand giving a branded cup or spoon or something inherently needed with the process drinking coffee. But in the case of Bacardi its wrapped up in a social relationship reward program that only digital can provide at relatively low cost and be highly. What is does is either accelerate the potential for identifying advocates or it even makes a brand advocate out of a consumer who may not necessarily consume the brand or be an MVC. This is not bad thing, who wants to stop a consumer talking about your brand in a positive way whether or not they consumer your brand?
Recently OgilvyOne Paris released a widget for Croquons la Vie , Nestle France’s revamped online Consumer Relationship Marketing Program . Aided by what appears to be a concerted digital PR campaign targeting blogs and digital influencers and using its inherent widget -portability or share-ability , it appears to be making some traction. Readily downloadable from the main site Croquons la vie its easily transferable to Netvibes or iGoogle where you can make a number of choices on where and how you want to display the widget.
When it comes to looking at CRM practices this widget doesn’t disappoint from the marketer’s, and more importantly, the consumer’s standpoint. Loaded with a rich content offering of monthly recipe videos, recipe links , and coupons , this widget provides the “value add” that consumers expect from relationship marketing programs. As well, it also adds the possible concept of social marketing and content distribution into the CRM mix as it extends the digital marketing ecosystem beyond websites into the desktop world and potentially into mobile phones overtime.
What is clear about using widgets is that you can extend the CRM based services and value added content , personalize it , and use them as your own private brand driven media channel , pushing content or marketing communications to the widgets, where ever they may be. By simply adding the widget the consumer has actively subscribed to the brand communications , placing themselves very clearly in control of the content they will view as it changes over time. The relationship is nurtured through a constant evolution of digital content offerings and the promise of discounts via coupons that can be claimed directly through the site. What will become apparent over time is that as the install base for the widget expands dramatically, so does its propensity to become a media conduit for other brand communications . Content could even extend to retail partnerships as a way of subtly extending the shopper communications that may link consumers back to instore promotions or e commerce applications.
What is also clear is that in the coming year through consumer uptake of iPhone an or smartphones and the development of Google’s Android ( Open Handset Alliance Project) in 2009/2010, is that the mobile phones will become “widget compatible” . The consumers use of smartphone or Androïd platform, will not be bound to simple static applications but open to a diverse range of content services that can be streamed onto the phone , although for the time being the support of Adobe’s Flash file format seems hard to accomplish on phones.
As Bruno Walther , CEO of OgilvyOne Paris says “The more time passes, the more I am certain that the widget is the future of the client relationship (CRM). ” , and on this note I can only agree with him wholeheartedly. Pick the widget up from Netvibes
There are “No Rules” anymore when it comes to the music industry and how band or musical acts market themselves in the digital age. To underscore the changing ways of doing business and the ability of an act taking control of its music and image outside of the “record deal” - traditionally label based system, Groove Armada’s deal with Barcardi Rum is unprecedented. Its a pure play “Branded Content” deal. The UK based , world renowned DJ and dance music act Groove Armada, has signed an exclusive one year recording, DJing and promotional deal with Barcardi. And it has the music industry pundits questioning whether its a ”Sell Out” or another wake call in the ever evolving era of media portability and its impact on all traditional entertainment media.
In the 21st Century music scene, with music sales down and the internet transferring power to the artists, their options are wide open. In what could be called a symbiotic exchange or promotional deal, Groove Armada gets to be promoted and play to new audiences worldwide under the marketing flagship of Barcardi. It is what could be called a branded content viral or social marketing deal too. Bacardi is the facilitator of content or music sharing, is associated to a “hip act ” and right in touch with core audience and their media and social habits. A four-track EP - the only music to be released under the contract - was launched by Tom and Andy Cato at the Midem international music convention in Cannes yesterday.
The Branded Content - Social marketing deal
The EP will be delivered through an innovative sharing mechanic called Bacardi B-LIVE Share; a pioneering online application encouraging and rewarding consumers who share Groove Armada’s music from the EP with their own online communities. Andy Cato says of the model - “Sharing music has always gone on. It’s giving music away that’s the problem. We wanted to come up with a 21st century version of what we used to do with cassette tapes. When you give music away for free it’s disposable. When you share it, it’s done with love.”
The first track has just been released as a free download for free from http://www.bliveshare.com , Baracardi’s brand spanking new music / promotional sharing platform.
In what is surely an experiment in Social Media and Viral marketing , to get the other three tunes, fans must share the first with their friends, who share it with their friends, who share it with their friends.
To get the second track, the fans and their network of friends must spread the first 20 times through the website. To get the third, the network must share it 200 times. And for the fourth, the first MP3 must be shared 2,000 times in total. The originator or ancestor being able track their spread of music through their social network with a window of six weeks to spread it, after which time all four songs will go on sale through normal digital stores.
The site includes social sharing applications with Facebook , MySpace , blogs , websites , and a call to social email campaigning.
Recently OgilvyOne Paris released a widget for Croquons la Vie , Nestle France’s revamped online Consumer Relationship Marketing Program . Aided by what appears to be a concerted digital PR campaign targeting blogs and digital influencers and using its inherent widget -portability or share-ability , it appears to be making some traction. Readily downloadable from the main site 