Social Media
Kmart's newest target market: 12-year-old boys.
When did Kmart decide to shift its target demo from women—73 percent of whom control household spending (Boston Consulting Group)—to unemployed, middle school-aged boys?
Market estimates about U.S. women’s purchasing prowess varies, ranging anywhere from $5 trillion to $15 trillion annually. My 12-year-old son rarely has enough change in his pockets to cover a fun-sized candy bar. So why has the troubled retailer so wantonly abandoned women in its latest ad campaign?
The campaign kicked off in April with the video “Ship My Pants.” (Go ahead. Say it out loud for full effect.) Featuring assorted shoppers professing that they had “shipped their pants” to promote Kmart’s Shop Your Way rewards program and its shipping feature, the video has garnered more than 17 million views on You Tube. The viral traffic is impressive, but will it drive store traffic? Doubtful.
Kmart followed “Ship My Pants” with the radio commercial “Gas Problem,” a juvenile play on words to market Shop Your Way. The rewards program is a growing loyalty club that offers members benefits, including discounts at participating gas stations.
“If you’re like most people, you suffer from occasional gas problems that prevent you from doing the things you love,” the announcer states delicately, cuing up a series of people who confess to a family history of gas problems, missed dinners out and more. “My gas problem got so bad, I had to cancel a father son camping trip,” says a woeful parent.
Reportedly this is Kmart’s attempt to relate more to shoppers, but to what shoppers? Free shipping isn’t exactly a novel idea, nor are loyalty programs. So once the value proposition has been sifted out of the ads, all that’s left are bathroom jokes to hang the brand on. Not exactly chick magnet material.
Women are poised to control two-thirds of the consumer wealth in the U.S. over the next decade and be the beneficiaries of the largest transfer of wealth in our country’s history, according to Fleishman Hillard Inc. If Kmart wants share of the purse, it’s particularly important that its advertising and marketing resonate with her.
The first step toward creating brand loyalty is grabbing her attention; the second step is retention. The female brain is hard-wired with evolutionary strongholds to create a very specialized customer, according to Nielsen NeuroFocus research. In other words, it takes a lot more than fart jokes and complimentary shipped shorts to make her take notice.
Women remember more and differently than men do, so talk to both her emotional and rational sides and acknowledge her careful attention to detail, suggests Nielsen NeuroFocus research. Appeal to her heart and her mind with a mix of emotional decision-making opportunities and rational information to increase purchase intent and bolster loyalty.
Finally, accentuate the positive. Eliminate the negative. According to Nielsen NeuroFocus, the female brain is programmed to maintain social harmony, so messaging should be positive and not focus on negative comparisons or associations.
Attention women: What’s your favorite ad campaign today and why?
The week in review - May 13, 2013.
Social media is constantly evolving, with vigilant bloggers following every new app, rule and Facebook flicker. We sift through hundreds of blogs weekly to keep on top of developments and seek out new client opportunities. It’s our job. And we like to share. So, don’t fret about what you might be missing. We’ve got your Cliffs Notes.
Vines Get Shared 4x More Than Online Video
Unruly Media found that branded Vines are shared 4x more and 5 Vines are shared every second on Twitter.
A Brand’s Value Proposition
Marketers need to give prospective customers a reason to come to their brand.
Network Through LinkedIn Groups
LinkedIn Groups are great way to build credibility and make new connections that can ultimately help grow your business.
Generating Leads Through Your Blog
You already know you need to create awesome blog content, but there’s more to business blogging than just that.
Examples of Great Advertainment
When advertising and entertainment collide, as it so often does, "advertainment" is born. Brands like Red Bull and Ford have great examples of this technique.
Comment on Facebook Through Bing
Bing will show comments from Facebook relevant to your search in the sidebar. From that search, you can Like a friend’s post, comment, or see the original post in its entirety on Facebook.
Pinterest is not your mother's Facebook.
Its 48.7 million users – predominantly women with children – get this in spades. They spend hours pinning recipes and clever ways to entertain, filling their virtual closets and bookshelves, and building craft boards. The beautiful images they repin speak millions of words that they’d never expect or hope to find buried in their Facebook feed.
Pinterest inspires them; Facebook connects them.
They are as unique and different as each of their children, which is why mom doesn’t need to be schooled on the subject.
Still many brands continue to grapple with the differing value propositions, chasing the audience without understanding the medium. It’s like Facebook all over again. Build a page, push product and services via posts and act surprised when your fan base doesn’t blow up overnight. It took years for brands to learn how to use social media effectively. Now that it appears to be working, they’re applying it across all platforms – from Facebook to Pinterest and every social channel in between. That’s like using your car manual to fly a Cessna.
If the brand doesn’t fit, don’t build a board
Pinterest is not for all brands. The general litmus test follows: (1) Does your product or service appeal to women? (2) Does your brand fit into one or more of the following categories – cooking, fashion, healthcare, beauty, decorating, entertaining, crafting or travel? (If you’re thinking too deeply, you’re trying too hard.) (3) Can your brand be adequately captured in images? (4) Do you have resources necessary to build a business case, operational plan and manage said plan?
The CMO of a medium-sized credit union recently asked if the financial institution should start a board. While we immediately cleared the first question, we racked our brains far too long attempting to answer the second. True, credit unions can help provide the financing to realize our wish lists. They can help us envision a certain lifestyle or dream vacation. But that’s aspirational, not inspirational.
If it takes too many steps to connect the source of inspiration to the brand, your marketing dollars can probably be better spent elsewhere. Facebook, perhaps.
Here a pin, there a pin
Similar to Facebook, the most visited place on Pinterest is the home page. But unlike Facebook, pins are not sorted in or out by EdgeRank. This means that anything you pin could be seen in the feed when people log in. What’s more, over 80 percent of pins are re-pins (Pinterest Insider, April 2013). So most people are re-pinning directly from the newsfeed rather than searching out original pins. This means you need to be pinning far more often per day than you’re posting on Facebook.
A picture is worth 1,000 impressions
Pinterest is image-driven. You’re competing against professional photography and graphic illustrations meant to spark an emotional or cerebral connection. If you’re building a board, you need engaging, thoughtful and relevant images that will demand attention and beg to be repinned. Brogan has used a combination of beautiful photography and irreverent, clever graphic design to pepper the HoneyBaked Ham Company’s boards with content that followers enjoy sharing.
All pins lead to your website
Your Pinterest plan should begin and end with your website. This is where all visitors will go to learn more about your brand. Because more than 80 percent of pins are repins, you should expect a lot of new visitors to your site. Consider having an interstitial with a brief introduction and special offer for new visitors, whereby you may feed your database while delighting a new potential customer.
Pinterest continues to gain great momentum, building a passionate and influential consumer base. When properly planned and managed, it can help propel brand awareness and profitability. It needs to be treated as the unique communications channel that is it, rather than Facebook’s twin sister.
What do you think? Has your brand delved into Pinterest with any success?
For more, download our free white paper on “How to Sell Pinterest to Your Hospital C-Suite.”
The week in review – May 6, 2013.
Social media is constantly evolving, with vigilant bloggers following every new app, rule and Facebook flicker. We sift through hundreds of blogs weekly to keep on top of developments and seek out new client opportunities. It’s our job. And we like to share. So, don’t fret about what you might be missing. We’ve got your Cliffs Notes.
The History of the Second Screen
Using two screens at once has become more common than only using one.
How People Use Their Mobile Device While Shopping
84% of people are browsing and shopping on their mobile device while they are physically in different stores.
Youtube Maps Out Trending Videos Across the Country
Youtube unveiled a new feature on Tuesday that maps out videos trending right now in cities across the U.S. You can filter the results by the gender and age of viewers, as well as by choosing to see videos trending by the number of shares verses the number of views.
Tighter Mobile Marketing
National brand campaigns using "geo-precise" techniques such as geo-fencing or targeting based on location-specific consumer behaviors increased to 58% in the first quarter.
Cost Per Facebook Like
Facebook unveiled a new metric for evaluating advertising campaigns on Facebook, called "cost per action" (CPA). Now, advertisers can pay not just for impressions or click-throughs, but for specific actions they want consumers to perform once they've seen the ad - including becoming a fan of the Page.
The week in review - April 29, 2013.
Social media is constantly evolving, with vigilant bloggers following every new app, rule and Facebook flicker. We sift through hundreds of blogs weekly to keep on top of developments and seek out new client opportunities. It’s our job. And we like to share. So, don’t fret about what you might be missing. We’ve got your Cliffs Notes.
Why Social Media Fails Businesses
Brands have to know how to use social media correctly in order for it to yield results.
“Snackable” Content
Sometimes little “snacks” of content are more effective than long-winded posts since attention spans are so short.
Online Videos are More Effective Than TV Ads
The audience for online video is soaring, with 58% of the U.S. population streaming, up from 38% five years ago.
Big Brands Want Instagram Ads
Mark Zuckerburg disagrees with brands, claiming that ads could end up stunting Instagram’s rapid growth. Instagram is currently growing at a faster rate than Facebook did at the same age.
70% of Brand Engagement on Pinterest is User Generated
This study reveals the opportunity for brands to drive the conversation on visual platforms like Pinterest.
Instagram Adds Tagging
On Thursday, users can tag people in photos, and browse feeds of photos you and others appear in.
Healthcare social media review: Patientslikeme.com
A few weeks ago I reviewed Sharecare, a healthcare social media platform that I felt really didn’t deliver any true benefit to its users, let alone serve as a good example of a successful healthcare social media example. But while I was researching, I came across Patientslikeme, which was extremely interesting and unique, and from my introduction, seemed like a much better and successful example of how a healthcare social media platform can really change the world of healthcare. In fact, Forbes notes that the site is "producing some of the most compelling clinical data the healthcare industry has ever seen."
The idea of PatientsLikeMe.com came from three MIT engineers, who had a family member/friend diagnosed with a rare disease. They were having trouble finding research, data or even a network of people that shared a common diagnosis. With that, they developed a platform that has now grown and into the site PatientsLikeMe. Within the platform people can connect with others that share a similar diagnosis and track/share their own experience. While this may not sound very interesting, the greatest part is the data mining that happens simultaneously with the sharing. Throughout the whole process, the company is very openly gathering the stories and data to help with the future of these specific diseases – sharing it with researchers, pharma companies, providers, non-profits, etc.
My initial reaction to the idea is that of brilliance, but I wanted to test the platform. It was during this test and review that I continued to be Wowed. Below, I have highlighted some of the key areas of the platform for an in-depth review:
Create a profile:
I started with creating a profile, which took less than 5 minutes and instantly gave me a snapshot on my condition, how many within the network had the condition and a breakdown of other age/gender/diagnosis information.
Part of building your profile included questions about your history with the condition:
Connecting with Patients:
And then after that, I was quickly able to start using the site to my advantage. One of the greatest areas was the "find patients" tab, where you are able to search for patients like you to connect with and to read their stories.
Treatment information:
Another area that I found extremely beneficial was the “your treatments” tab that allowed me to enter in my personal treatment information and to read about other treatments reported by other patients of my condition. This area is complete with information from patients on how the medicines made them feel, benefits, drawbacks, etc. In addition to being clear and easy to understand, the network is actually large enough to make the data useful.
Not only did I find the site and the information relevant, useful and beneficial, it also made me want to share my story, which in the social media world, is the ultimate goal. The more that share their story, the greater the chance of making medical progress and advancements. I am truly impressed with PatientsLikeMe.com and believe that the site is one of only a select few of healthcare social media sites that understand how to leverage social media, ultimately making a direct change in the healthcare world.
The week in review - April 19, 2013.
Social media is constantly evolving, with vigilant bloggers following every new app, rule and Facebook flicker. We sift through hundreds of blogs weekly to keep on top of developments and seek out new client opportunities. It’s our job. And we like to share. So, don’t fret about what you might be missing. We’ve got your Cliffs Notes.
Creating Viral Tweets
This article is full of tips on how to create content that is forwarded and shared over and over again.
Twitter to Add TV
Twitter is close to reaching partnerships with TV networks that would bring more high-quality video content and advertising to the social site.
Mastercard and AmEx Feed Data to Advertisers
Credit Card companies are partnering up with digital advertisers, which makes some question the issue of privacy.
Facebook Will Debut Video Ads This Summer
It's assumed that the videos will auto play and will be presented in a video player that expands beyond the main news-feed real estate to cover the right- and left-hand rails of users' screens on the desktop version of Facebook.
A Facebook Fan is Worth $174
The study compared Facebook fans and non-fans based and their corresponding product spending, brand loyalty, propensity to recommend, media value, cost of acquisition and brand affinity to arrive at the figure, which is up 28% since 2010.
Instagramming Your Brand
Instagram is easy and engaging, so why wouldn’t you want to use it for your brand or business?
The week in review - April 12, 2013.
Social media is constantly evolving, with vigilant bloggers following every new app, rule and Facebook flicker. We sift through hundreds of blogs weekly to keep on top of developments and seek out new client opportunities. It’s our job. And we like to share. So, don’t fret about what you might be missing. We’ve got your Cliffs Notes.
Vine hopes to make exploring content easier with the launch of trending hashtags. The new feature allows users to easily see what the community is Vining about.
Brands Buy Real Time Mobile Ads Based on Weather
Twitter and The Weather Channel announced an agreement centered on a new weather-based ad-targeting product. Twitter says that 60% of its audience derives from smartphones—where users will be seeing Promoted Tweets thanks to the TWC deal.
“Home” lets consumers enable an ever-changing rotation of visual content from their Facebook friends called "cover feed" on their home and lock screens -- where ads will eventually also go.
More Customer Service Experiences are Being Shared via Social Media
With regard to wielding their social networks, almost half (45%) of respondents said they share bad customer service experiences via Facebook, Twitter, and other popular platforms, while 30% reported sharing good customer service experiences via social media.
Facebook Opens Up Advertising to Very Specific Targets
Over the past year Facebook has been expanding the data that can be used for ad targeting to include non-Facebook information like the sites someone visits outside of Facebook, loyalty program memberships and, more recently, the types of products they buy in a brick-and-mortar store.
A new music lover's space, a new advertising space, the New Myspace.
Justin Timberlake is back, but not just with a new album. He is the biggest supporter and face of a new networking site – the New Myspace. The fresh site is putting itself on the level of Pandora and Spotify and backing away from social networking giants Facebook and Twitter. The New Myspace won’t compete with Facebook anymore; instead it will provide content that can be shared via social media.
The new site is all about music and making connections. Users can connect to and get updates from all their favorite artists. You can even become a number one fan of an artist if you interact with them more than any other user. When connecting to friends, the New Myspace shows your “affinity” or commonalities in music with that person. You can also connect to mixes (playlists other users create), music videos and radios (artist based radios – similar to Pandora.)
It’s also all about being visual. The profile pages allow you to put a very large, high quality cover photo and then as you sideways scroll across, you can see smaller pictures of music, comments and connections. The homepage is also very photo based – giving you the latest news on your connections and the music world.
Other cool features include a large search toolbar that appears no matter where you are on the site and a music player that remains on the bottom of the screen always.
There is no advertising on the site right now, but it will be added over time. What does this mean for marketers in the future? It means connecting to a targeted demographic in a new way. When advertising does come to the site, it won’t be in the same cluttered way as the old site. Options could include pre-roll videos before music videos and branded content (articles, photos, etc.) The advertising would be more integrated in the site and not just a mess of banner ads.
Marketers could target a specific age group with specific interests easily. At first, the New Myspace will definitely skew to a younger demographic, but also might attract the original Myspace users who are a little older. As time goes on, more and more people of all ages will become users. You can narrow down who to target by what music they listen to and what they list as their interests – similar to Facebook.
Pandora advertising is taking off and the New Myspace could follow suit. Do you see yourself joining the New Myspace? Or more importantly, can you see yourself advertising on it?
Facebook reveals redesigned News Feed.
Yesterday I was able to watch the live conference at which Facebook announced that it is revamping the News Feed. Zuckerberg explained that 50% of content in the average user’s News Feed is compiled of photos and videos since the launch of timeline in late 2011. Also important for brands to note, he mentioned that the amount of content from Facebook brand pages appearing in users’ News Feeds has also increased and that 25% of News Feed content is brand content.
Zuckerberg continued on to say that how users are sharing content is changing and that the Facebook News Feed needs to evolve as well. With that he introduced the three major components of the new News Feed that is “designed to reflect the evolving face of the News Feed”:
- Rich Stories
- Choice of Feeds
- Mobile Consistency
Facebook gives you a sneak peek of the new News Feed here.
Rich Stories
Basically the News Feed will focus on stories and will become more visual with larger images that will be front and center. This goes for sharing individual photos as well as photo albums. This also means that articles and attachments will feature a larger image, more prominent title, longer summary and the logo of publisher in corner.
*Before and After shot courtesy of Business Insider
When users check in or tag a place in your status update, the new News Feed will give the place more prominence by including a map and image. And when users post 3rd party content, or post new events, the content will be more visual to reflect the beauty of the images and to align with the visual nature of sites like Pinterest and Instagram.
*Photo from Facebook
Have you ever logged into Facebook and noticed that multiple friends like a story/ link/ etc.? Well now Facebook will make these stories visually prominent in the News Feed, with the profile pictures of your friends who have liked/ shared the content on left-hand side. If you hover over the image you can see what each friend said.
Choice of Feeds
The Facebook team also announced that there will be new options for the New Feed. These options will include:
*Photo from Facebook
- Friend Feed- All of the posts from our friends will be in one place in chronological order.
- Music Feed – Posts from our favorite musicians, info about concerts happening near us, news about albums that have recently been released and the music that our friends are listening to will show up in this feed.
- Photos Feed – Every photo that our friends and pages that we follow have posted will appear in this feed.
- Following Feed – All of the posts from pages and public figures that we follow will appear in one place in chronological order.
- Most Recent Feed– This feed shows every single action from all of our friends and all of the pages we like.
- Close Friends Feed – This will stay the same and will feature posts from those we have designated as our close friends.
- Games Feed – This will stay the same and will feature posts/ updates from the games that we play.
All of the feeds will be sorted in a list by how often we use them, with the most frequently used feeds appearing at the top.
Interface consistency
Finally, the Facebook interface will be consistent across all screens – desktop, tablet and mobile. The “New Story Bubble” will be making an appearance in the web experience as we currently see it on the tablet and mobile interfaces. This will allow users to jump right to the latest stories.
*Photo from Facebook
The new interface will appear on tablets and mobile devices sooner than it will appear on desktops. Facebook is planning to test it amongst a small group of users, work our the kinks and then roll it our to everyone later in the year.
What are your thoughts on the new News Feed? Do you think it will make the Facebook experience better for users?
