News Bulletin 17 May 2006
Email is one of the most effective and efficient ways to reach young women in a targeted way
Rimmel’s email will be sent to 215,000 recipients Make-up brand Rimmel is turning to email marketing to amass a database of 18- to 24-year-old customers for its foundation range.
The company, fronted by model Kate Moss, has appointed Iris Female to create an email marketing campaign promoting its new foundation brand, which has been developed to suit a wider variety of skin tones.
The email will be sent to 215,000 recipients, encouraging them to log on to rimmellondon foundations.co.uk. Visitors to the site can claim one of 10,000 free full-size samples of Stay Matte or Lasting Finish Foundation, worth £4.99, by providing their details.
They will then be entered into a prize-draw to win a pair of tickets to the MOBO music awards and aftershow party. Visitors can also register to receive e-newsletters about Rimmel’s latest products. Recipients will be encouraged to forward the email on to friends.
Shannon Alley, brand manager at Rimmel, states: “We chose Iris Female because it demonstrated a clear understanding of how today’s women communicate.”
Nicola Armstrong, head of Iris Female, says/ “Email is one of the most effective and efficient ways to reach young women in a targeted way. We can contact large numbers of customers with the message, within a short space of time.”
http://www.rethinkpink.com/prog_33.asp
Consumers upload video blogs from mobile (or web) and other interested consumers download them
What is causing quite a stir with media owners?
How you can find the latest user generated content video blog service?
Andrew Sirs-Davies from the DA Group wrote to me with news of their new baby… The Milia Blog. Have a look at it and let me have your comments. Andy writes…Just for interest, we’re running a blog service for clients.. take a peek at http://www.miliablog.com and on mobile at http://wap.miliablog.com . It is a User Generated Content video blog service, and is causing quite a stir with media owners. Consumers upload video blogs from mobile (or web) and other interested consumers download them.. We ran the miliablog for Reed in Cannes at their tradeshow. It went down very well as a B2B service..
Unilever owns brands such as Persil, Flora and Dove
Poor financial results could mean the breakup of Unilever.
“The forces of conservatism are too powerful in this company,” one City shareholder told The Observer.
Unilever, the UK’s biggest advertiser, is facing calls from investors to be broken up following poor financial results.
A report in The Observer said that investors want the Anglo-Dutch multinational to be broken up after stagnating sales in Europe and poor financial results.
Last year, Unilever topped Marketing’s list of 100 advertisers with a total media spend of over £208m in 2005, according to figures provided by Nielsen Media Research, an increase of 7.6% year-on-year for the FMCG giant.
Unilever, which owns brands such as Persil, Flora and Dove, is seen as being too conservative by some investors, according to sources quoted by the paper.
“The forces of conservatism are too powerful in this company,” one City shareholder told The Observer.
Another investor said that pressure would be put on Unilever management to change its strategy, boost its valuation and sell off non-performing brands.
Earlier this year, Unilever offloaded its Birds Eye frozen foods brand after unsuccessfully trying to boost its image and sales last year.
At the time, Patrick Cescau, Unilever group chief executive, said: “Deciding to put the majority of our European frozen food business up for sale has been a tough call.
“However, although we have made great progress in increasing profitability in recent years, growth has been harder to come by.”
Unilever has also sold off other brands recently, including its classic men’s grooming range Brut in the Americas. The sell-offs are part of its “path to growth strategy” to reduce its number of brands from 1,600 to 400.
Plans being suggested by investors include selling more non-performing brands and even demerging the food and personal care divisions because of perceived lack of synergies.
Sixties fashion icon Twiggy with contemporary model Erin O’Connor
Which group accounts for 40% of consumer spending and a staggering 80% of personal wealth?
Brands are being forced to accept that it is the old, not the young, who represent their future.
http://www.brandchannel.com/start1.asp?f…
The sight of customers tying themselves into knots is usually a spur for businesses to invent something better. Yet brands willfully ignore the frustration of a particular market segment, which is growing larger and wealthier each year. The insults dealt casually to older consumers are numerous: websites that fly in the face of accessibility, packaging that is difficult to open, fiddly IT products that put fashion before easy use, portions that force aging singletons to buy meals designed for kids. Then there are the age-ghetto items, such as stair-lifts, which mainstream advertisers dispatched long ago to a no-man’s-land, sign-posted geriatric.
Today’s oldest consumers were born too early to benefit from the ongoing revolution. Fast-forward through a couple of decades and the world may look very different. The most successful businesses, in all likelihood, will appeal to age, not youth.
Society will change because of population aging. The baby-boom generation’s age now ranges from 42 to 60. As the demographic bulge works its way from mid to late life, businesses will be-as Dick Stroud, author of The 50-Plus Market, states-compelled by economic logic to shift their center of gravity from the younger generation to the older generation.
Stroud, working from UK census figures, predicts that over the next 15 years, “If you focus on the 15 to 34 market sector you will see virtually no increase in your market [from population growth]… If your customers are in the 50 to 69 category, you will increase your business by over 20 percent without having to increase your market share.”
The corporate world’s failure to take advantage of this opportunity is as much about culture as strategy. Put simply, wrinkled faces are not aspirational, either for brands or the advanced guard of baby boomers massing at the gateway of later life. So how should brands cater for a society growing older but wanting to stay young?
One possibility is for advertisers to take the lead from youth culture, in the hope that what appeals to the biologically young will also appeal to youthful seniors.
Superficially, the approach is justified by our obsession with youth. But there is a problem. In a UK study conducted by Millennium, a mature market advertising agency, it turned out that far from being flattered by this treatment, 86 percent of consumers over 50-years-old considered contemporary advertising “irrelevant” to them. Studies elsewhere have produced similar results.
The flaw in youth-centered marketing is the obvious one. As Stroud observes, while older consumers may have “youthful” instincts, they won’t necessarily take to the imagery, language and humor that appeals to a 20-year-old. So might the solution be to associate brands with youth icons from the past?
The UK retailer Marks & Spencer clearly thinks so. Last autumn it launched advertising, featuring sixties fashion icon Twiggy with contemporary model Erin O’Connor. The style press lapped it up and the campaign has taken some of the credit for an improvement in M&S’s clothing sales. Fashion brand Gap ran a campaign four years ago by mixing younger and older celebrities, which was followed by an eleven percent rise in sales.
Such successes apart, there is clearly a limit to how often the device can be used. An obvious danger is hiring warmed up celebrities who lack credibility-think Lulu and David Bowie, not Joan Collins and Cliff Richard. Blending iconic hits or retro imagery into contemporary settings is another possibility. But, even here, there is a risk of restricting a brand’s appeal. What draws in the Woodstock generation, for example, won’t necessarily play well with an eighties punk, let alone an Elvis fan.
Stroud argues that while nostalgia has a place in the marketer’s repertoire, the most effective commercials, such as Honda’s fantasy creations, are timeless. But age-neutral marketing isn’t only about creative ideas.
“It’s simply a fact that from around the age of 40, eyesight deteriorates,” says Millennium director Kevin Lavery. “As much as the creative director may object, you need to be aware that plain typefaces, larger fonts and high contrast color combinations work better for older consumers.”
The marketing world’s lack of interest in mature customers can have bizarre consequences. One example is media owners not differentiating between consumers who are 90 and those who are 60. Over-55 specialist Janet Kiddle, founder of Steel Magnolia, says ageism is rife. “Many brands segment their customers by attitude, but then apply an age-cap. Sometimes it’s 65; but many don’t segment beyond 55.”
Ignoring a group that accounts for 40 percent of consumer spending and a staggering 80 percent of personal wealth is nothing short of lunacy. So, it’s not surprising that some companies are putting a positive spin on aging, pronouncing “sixty the new forty,” and claiming that having changed the face of youth, the rock-and-roll generation will change the face of old age.
Such clichés are at best an over-simplification carrying an implicitly ageist message: older people are consumers too-just as long as they behave like young people. What also gets lost in the froth is the fact that individuals of the same age can be light years apart in life-stage: raising a family at fifty or babysitting grandchildren; globe-trotting at seventy or caring for a partner who is frail and dependent.
Some businesses are already negotiating the complexities of population aging. Just over a year ago, Thomson Holidays scrapped its “Young at Heart” brochure aimed at over 55s. Says head of product development Stephen Lane: “Many people in their fifties and sixties are adventurous-they don’t want to be labeled young at heart.” To cater for this segment, Thomson brought in sports breaks and spa packages and added yoga and tai chi to its leisure options. Says Lane: “We have to keep experimenting.” But he adds: “There are still a lot of people who want tea and biscuits and a brandy in the evening.”
Other far-sighted businesses are looking at how aging affects the human body. A prime example is Ford Motor Company which developed the Ford Focus with the aid of a special “third age suit,” allowing designers to get a taste of how it feels to drive with stiff joints, dulled vision and restricted mobility. Another innovator is the British home improvement firm B&Q, which sells ergonomically “inclusive” products. Says B&Q diversity specialist Joy Ward: “The products aren’t marketed for a particular age-group, but they are designed not to exclude people. If you make a lighter-weight drill or a garden tool with padded grips that suits an older person, everyone benefits.”
The emergence of inclusive design shows that businesses are waking up to the fact that mature consumers will reward brands that show them consideration. In fact, there is also an opportunity to make products specifically for older people. Some of the large IT firms, such as Intel and Philips, are exploring this niche. Among the latest advances are virtual networks designed to combat social isolation, and “smart home systems,” which raise the alarm when the resident is inactive or takes a tumble.
For the moment such experiments are dwarfed by the anti-aging industry, which revolves around functional foods and high-tech cosmetics to help baby boomers cheat the passage of time. But, the oldest cohort of mature consumers is expanding too, boosting the number of centenarians by eight percent each year. As the purchasing power of the oldest of the old rises, helped along by the trend for converting equity into income, it’s inevitable that firms will look more seriously at a group that many still term “geriatric.” Much as they might regret it, brands are being forced to accept that it’s the old, not the young, who represent their future.
http://www.brandchannel.com/start1.asp?fa_id=311
The growing power of recommendation
Rethink Pink 2006 marketing to women conference
The decision by research agency BMRB to begin gathering and analysing Word of Mouth (WOM) data is proof that Engagement Marketing, and more specifically word of mouth, is now a serious marketing contender.
The fact that a market research consultancy the size and stature of BMRB is investing in this research means that, as a marketing tool, word of mouth is making its way up the communications agenda.
As consumers become more wary and cynical of traditional advertising messages, they are increasingly relying on friends and other people they trust to advise and guide them when it comes to making consumer choices. In addition, it is women who already have those relationships and networks in place, and are willing to use them, who are benefiting most from this word of mouth information.
While direct marketers are perhaps not always know for their lightness of touch, I believe we, at iris Female, can capitalise on the need for a ’ light touch’ as we understand the need to get the trust and ear of ’social space users’.
Our own research reveals that women are three times more likely than men are to recommend a product or service that they know their friends are looking for which makes word of mouth marketing a particularly effective, and prevalent, channel among women.
How often do you hear someone say, “I saw this great poster for brand X face cream - and it really inspired me to go out and try it”? You would be far more likely to hear “I tried this great new cream the other day and picked up a couple of samples - want one?”
Consumers today want more than just a two-dimensional brand experience - they want to see, hear, touch and smell it a product. Moreover, if it comes recommended by a friend, so much the better.
To further enhance Wonderbra brand values, we teamed up with Glamour magazine, which supported the campaign with editorial to launch 4effect, as well as follow-up coverage in the spring. As direct marketers, we want consumers to identify with the brand - something that is increasingly difficult through traditional media alone.
Experiential campaigns can stimulate the emotions, interest and excitement that make a brand accessible and, crucially, memorable. By integrating experiential activity as part of a long-term brand strategy, both above and below the line, you can provide a rich environment for trial and education, creating loyal and informed consumers who will become your most effective brand ambassadors.
Clients are beginning to realise that their marketing money can be much more effectively used by finding out who the influencers are in their network of influence. The fact that BMRB will now be able to provide measurable data on this increasingly important marketing tool is good news for those of us who have known for a while that word of mouth marketing is no longer an optional extra for marketing professionals.
Nicola Armstrong from iris Female will be speaking at Rethink Pink 2006 marketing to women conference at Cumberland Hotel, London on Thursday 9 November 2006.
What is “Engagement Marketing”?
For over a century, marketing has ’interrupted’ audiences - a concept that (in today’s media fragmented society) is proven to be wasteful and inefficient, with no opportunity for participation.
Engagement Marketing is about helping businesses and customers better engage with one another.
Engagement marketing is about building customer advocacy.
Research shows that companies with greater customer advocacy, have sustainable growth and profits.
Engagement Marketing creates compelling content that intellectually/emotionally engages its audience through multiple media channels.
Engagement Marketing is built upon what we call the 4C’s: Commerce, Culture, Community Connectivity Interruption v. Engagement ’Interruptive Marketing’ attempts to change belief through image building
Engagement Marketing attempts to change behaviour through involvement
http://www.rethinkpink.com/prog_12.asp
