teachthe4ps.com - For instructors of marketing.

Marketers have always been excited about the idea of turning consumers into powerful Promotion tools for their brands — but fostering word-of-mouth isn’t easy.  Now Facebook is hoping they have a strategy that makes it easy for consumers and marketers to work together to promote brands and products we “like” (as in pressing the “Like” button on Facebook).

No one is quite sure where this is going, but many consumers are already clicking the Facebook “Like” button on their favorite brands — or maybe mentioning in a post a recent  purchase of the brand.  Now it seems that Facebook will mention this ads targeting that customer’s friends.  So for example, if I “Like” a brand like Ikea on my Facebook page, an ad could appear on my friends pages that mentions “Joe (and perhaps more of their friends) Likes Ikea.”  In theory, knowing that Joe likes Ikea may make the store more appealing to my friends. This short article at Fast Company suggest that Facebook’s sponsored stories work – see “Facebook Sponsored Stories Performing 2 Times Better Than Standard Ads” (July 15, 2011).

Why could it work?  Because Facebook users are trusting people.  There is evidence that social networks foster trust.  You can read more about it in another Fast Company article, “Digital Oxytocin:  How Trust Keeps Facebook, Twitter Humming” (July 18, 2011).

These short articles epitomize one of the original motivations for Teach the 4 Ps – how can we keep our customers up-to-date when books only publish every few years.  So many new things are happening in marketing — so the blog is designed, in part, to help you stay current.  Also posted at Learn the 4 Ps.

As consumers get better at avoiding traditional advertising, marketers keep looking for better ways to get their message in front of consumers.  Enter social gaming — games on sites like Facebook.  P&G’s Bounty brand of paper towels appears prominently in Electronic Arts’ Playfish social game “Restaurant City.”

Often times marketers will just stick their product into a game just to build awareness — even if there is no connection to the brand.  At least in this case Bounty’s appearance in the game reinforces its positioning.  Players who unlock rolls of Bounty towels are able to clean more quickly than the standard paper towels.  They can also unlock a Bounty janitor who is 30% more effective at cleaning than the regular janitor.  A tie-in with Facebook helped Bounty gain more than 500,000 new fans at its Facebook page (how can more than 1.2 million people “like” a brand of paper towlels on Facebook?).  Read more at “P&G’s Bounty Picks Up Fans From Social Gaming” (AdAge, June 30, 2011)

P&G has long been a trend-setter and leader in consumer packaged goods marketing.  They were one of the first to increase point-of-purchase (in-store) advertising and have made many bold moves on the social media front.  We have highlighted some of these in previous posts on Teach the 4 Ps (see Sit or Squat phone app and the Old Spice “Man Your Man Could Smell Like” viral video campaign).  The video below is a segment from an interview with P&G CEO Bob McDonald which includes a look at where P&G sees marketing going in the future. In the process, McDonald reveals that Old Spice is now the #1 body wash and deodorant following the “Man Your Man Could Smell Like” campaign.

Have you ever been felt stalked on the web?  We have found it downright creepy when ads start following us all around the web.  Recently Joe went to the iRobot website to get the latest on the Roomba which we have as a chapter opening case in our books.  For the next month, he kept seeing ads for the Roomba as he surfed the web.  It can get very creepy.

A previous T4Ps post “How Advertisers Use Internet Cookies to Track You” includes a video with some background on hot it works.  A recent article at PCWorld, “Help!  A Web Ad Is Stalking Me” (June 20, 2011) offers a lot of detail and insight on how it works.

We find that our students notice the “creepy ads” and sometimes ask about them.  Now after reading this article, we have a much better idea about how to answer the question.  I am not sure I will give my students this level of detail, but it will help me understand how things work.

The whole topic of behavioral targeting raises a lot of interesting questions.  Technology offers marketers many new targeting capabilities.  But just because they can do this, does it mean they should do this?  The article might help you lead a thoughtful discussion about the ethical implications of behavioral targeting.  The article could also provide you with useful background and examples to use when you cover segmentation and targeting as well as online advertising.

How about this as an example of the AIDA model that can guide marketing promotion?  We usually think of marketing communications as having one or more of the following jobs (with link to the video)

• Getting Attention - the large billboard, with lots of people watching will certainly grab attention
• Hold Interest - you can watch, wait to play the game, or play the game
• Arouse Desire - perhaps all that game playing or watching will make you hungry
• Obtain Action -  deliver coupons to winners, one of the oldest ideas for getting customers to take action

The McDonald’s Pick n Play outdoor promotion in Stockholm, Sweden does it all.  See the whole plan below.  You might want to show this as a creative example of promotion.  Also posted at Learn the 4 Ps.

We all know how difficult it can be to change consumer behavior.  Try selling razors in India, where only half of men shave at home (the other half shave at barbers — and then not everyday).  Is this a threat or an opportunity? P&G India saw this as an opportunity — hundreds of thousands of men who were not using its product.

So last year P&G launched its “Women Against Lazy Stubble” campaign — see TV commercial below for one of the early ads. The campaign reflects subtle changes in P&G’s marketing strategy under new CEO Bob McDonald which is described in “Why Procter & Gamble Needs To Shave More Indians” (Bloomberg Businessweek, June 9, 2011).

The article and television ad (you can find more ads in the campaign by searching YouTube) could make a great example to use in a number of different class sessions.  For example, you could start a class session on consumer behavior by giving your students shaving data from the article and then ask how P&G could encourage more Indian men to shave at home.  The case might also work to show how consumer behavior differs around the world — or in international marketing or advertising and promotion.

Amazon sells two variations of its Kindle e-book reader.  You can get a $25 discount if you are willing to put up with “special offers and sponsored screensavers.”   It appears that customers don’t mind the ads — or at least many will tolerate the ads in exchange for the lower price.  The ad-supported model outsells the ad-free model.  This could be the beginning of a new business model.   Read more about it at “Discounted Kindle points to future of ad-supported electronics,” (CNN, July 1, 2011).

Amazon’s strategy could stimulate a discussion of advertising, pricing, or business models.  You might ask students if they would be willing to put up with advertising to save money on an electronic gadget.  You could ask them what price would buy their willingness?  Also, what other products might be good candidates?  Also posted at Learn the 4 Ps.

Here are two very powerful examples of how marketing that helps make the world a better place.  The first one (an ad created by Ogilvy, Dublin, Ireland) is especially hard to watch — but as you will see that is the point.  I don’t want to say anymore, because the ad and video explain themselves, and need no further introduction.  Also posted at Learn the 4 Ps.

My students love Nike — when I survey them about their favorite brands it consistently ranks #1.  My point – Nike examples play well in class.  Of course any example should be relevant to marketing and this one could work well with a discussion of segmentation, new product development or advertising.

Nike is aggressively going after youth action sports like skateboarding, snowboarding, surfing, trick-bicycling and others – see “Nike Tries to Enter the Niche Sports It Has Missed” (New York Times, June 1, 2011).  Nike’s tactics in these markets are in many ways similar to those it has used in other markets — employing top athletes in each sport to endorse the brand and support it ith dynamite advertising that appeals to its target market.  The video below was released on Facebook (where Nike has specialty pages for various sports) even before it launched on network TV (during the NBA finals).  Nike created the Nike 6.0 sub-brand (see its Facebook page here) just for the action sports market.  Also posted at Learn the 4 Ps.

I just like the long version of this advertisement for a newly launched cell phone by NTT Docomo.  The phone is made of domestic woods produced from a Japanese forest.  A fun example of using advertising for positioning.  The ads embedded in the video make watching it a bit annoying.  Hmmm.  Also posted at Learn the 4 Ps.