Users of our text books know that we have a great chapter opening case scenario for chapter 2 that describes Cirque du Soleil. I was doing some research on Cirque today and found some great videos. There is a short (0:41) video at the Cirque du Soleil website. [NOTE: January 7, 2011 - this video no longer available]. And at YouTube I found several longer (4-8 minute) videos. I liked this one the best. If you use our books, I suggest showing the short video (or an excerpt from this longer video) to introduce Cirque du Soleil and describe its marketing strategy planning process.
FedEx is targeting small businesses with a series of web parodies. One commentator in the Wired article “TV Ad Powerhouse FedEx Woos Small Biz with Web Parodies” (February 26, 2010 – UPDATE 7-8-11: link no longer works and we cannot find the article, sorry) wonders how well this will work. I watched a couple of the 3 minute videos — they are kind of funny and educate customers on FedEx services at the same time (not an easy task). They are modest budget productions and the media costs are zero. The videos I saw had anywhere from 20,000 to more than 400,000 views. At this point, the payback from the use of YouTube and other social media is hard to predict, but one good way to find out is through experimentation.
The video is a versatile example of many marketing concepts. It is always nice to have clear, understandable B2B examples. The video shows how FedEx tailors its strategy for the small business target market and could fit with chapter 2′s discussion of strategy planning and chapter 4′s coverage of segmentation and targeting. The video might also be shown with a lecture on organizational buying, where we talk about service businesses. Finally, it also fits with integrated marketing communications and advertising on the web.
[NOTE, January 7, 2011 - sorry, FedEx removed the video.]
It is always great to have marketing examples that show problems with translation in foreign markets. It is easy to fall back on the classic Chevy Nova (“no va” in Spanish means “no go”) — but this new article will give you some newer and more relevant examples. See “Don’t Let Your Brand Get Lost in Translation” in Brandweek, February 10, 2010.
Media behavior in today’s fragmented landscape is best evaluated by looking at the “life stages” that people experience as opposed to their demographic profiles.
We are not quite ready to drop demographics from our text books, but as users of Basic Marketing and Essentials of Marketing know, we consider the family life cycle (see chapter 5) an important influence on consumer behavior.
As some of you may know, I have done a fair amount of academic research on trust. I believe that trust is a very important factor in marketing. This article cites a recent study on trusted brands, “Study: Amazon.com is most trusted brand in U.S.” (CNET News, February 22, 2010).
“Distracted Customers’ Wait Times Fly,” from Scientific American’s 60-Second Science. Thanks to Shuoyang Zhang for this suggestion. Click through for a listen.
A study in the journal NeuroQuantology found that people forced to wait, for example in line, experienced the time spent as being far less if they were amused and distracted. Cynthia Graber reports.
This is a new podcast I will have to add to my playlist. I already listen to the 60-Second Pscyh for psychology research. If you are a podcast listener and science lover — check these out.
Sometimes students think that developing a successful marketing strategy is so easy. Maybe it will help to show that some big companies can have bad ideas. See “9 Poorly Conceived Marketing Campaigns” over at the Business Pundit blog (February 18, 2010). The examples are all pretty dated, but the explanations for their failures are helpful.
Customer ratings and reviews are not only useful to other customers — marketers can use this information to improve products. Of course some customers are more vocal — and some products solicit more comments — than others. Would people care about sink mats? Like the author of “Rubbermaid Proves the Value of Listening to Customers,” (The 1to1 Blog) I was surprised to see that customers writing reviews. In my previous life I worked in sales and marketing with Eastman Kodak. I also saw the power of customer comments when one of my fellow sales reps tape recorded interviews with fine art photographers about what they liked and didn’t like about black-and-white photo papers. When the R&D folks who engineered and manufactured the paper heard these interviews it had a huge impact — and better products soon followed. The potential for this form of low-cost market research to influence new-product development, product quality, and various other elements of the marketing mix is tremendous.
BusinessWeek’s “Customer Service Champions” issue (February 18, 2010) has its usual set of interestin stories. This year’s list includes the usual cast of characters – see “World-Class Customer Service” for links to all the articles. This year’s issue highlights L.L. Bean and USAA –plus you can find a slide show and the “Top 25.“ Many great examples to use when discussing customer service and retailing.
Campbell’s Soup engaged in some unusual consumer research to make decisions about soup packaging — and consumer will see the results this fall. The video below and article, “The Emotional Quotient of Soup Shopping,” The Wall Street Journal, February 17, 2010 – subscription may be required, if you do not have a subscription, try entering the title of the article in a search bar for the back door to the article).
For two years, Campbell researchers studied microscopic changes in skin moisture, heart rate and other biometrics to see how consumers react to everything from pictures of bowls of soup to logo design.
This “neuromarketing” approach is a fresh attempt among consumer-good companies to understand how consumers really respond to marketing and advertising.
This video example might supplement a class session on packaging or marketing research.
