The Vendor-Client Relationship

Earlier this week I received one of the funniest video forwards from a coworker and was instantly compelled to voice my opinion on the client-advertiser relationship. Here’s the clip:



This video, called the The Vendor Client relationship - in real world situations, shows the cursed relationship of advertisers with their clients in an amusing way. Clients usually want more than what they are paying for, and advertisers, often do not want to perform services without being compensated—a simple concept that most (if not all) would agree with. But in the world of advertising, we often have to do some pro-bono work to stay on the client’s good side to retain business, and sometimes also to showcase other services that we can provide to increase business.

However, the fact still remains—in order to produce captivating messages for a client’s customers, clients must understand that an agency is only as good as the people at the agency who produce and manage their messaging.

Advice for Clients--
Compensate your agency, and you'll be better able to build your brand.

Advice for Advertisers--
Produce good work to better build your clients' brands and they will compensate you for your efforts.

'Why We Should Listen' to Twitter

So by know, you should have heard about, if not experienced on your own, Twitter.com. According to the Website, “Twitter is a service for friends, family, and co–workers to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: What are you doing?”

Like many people out there, I joined Twitter just to see what it was all about (shameless self promotion – follow me on Twitter @eckramer). I think that although Twitter answers the “What are you doing?” question, I think it also raises the question of why should we, as advertisers, listen?

Twitter is a massive echo chamber allowing us real time insight into consumers’ attitudes, opinions, and experiences with our products and services. For example, recently, I purchased a vacation package through a popular online travel agency, and was really upset when I was charged $30 more for my trip than my friend who purchased the same vacation package four minutes after I did. I logged a complaint ticket with customer support, and after being told that I should be happy with the deal I got through their agency, I informed the very polite customer service associate that I would (1) not use their company again (which I will not), and (2) I would take my complaint to the Web to inform others of my overall dissatisfaction. Once of the first places I voiced my frustration was on Twitter.

In an ideal “Twitterverse,” a representative from the online travel agency would have been monitoring either their hash tag or company name, and would have contacted me to settle my dispute via Twitter--thusly quelling my negative WOM advertising campaign. However, I was never contact by the company, and I can’t even begin to tell you how many of my friends contacted me to ask me about my poor personal experience with this company. They’ve lost not only me as a customer, but also several of the people with whom I am associated.

My personal example above indicates how important it is for companies to keep their pulse on consumer feelings and experiences. My poor personal experience has most likely led to thousands of dollars of lost revenue with that particular travel agency—but has also opened the door for another travel agency to woo my business and more importantly, more recommendation. This example is true across other products and services—companies need to capitalize on what Twitter can tell us, and that’s really why we, as advertisers, should listen.

References:

http://www.twitter.com/
http://www.slideshare.net/jwtcet/why-twitter-for-advertisers

Fwd: Viral Videos

I was forwarded an email a couple of days ago containing a viral video, and I think it’s a good time to discuss them as this is a great way for advertisers to promote products through WOM. With the innovations of Twitter and YouTube, viral videos are able to reach a wide array of audiences in usually humorous ways. While a lot of viral videos are shot my amateurs (like the Numa Numa Guy video), I’d like to focus on actual videos that promote products.

With that, here is the video that I received via email:



This video is being used to promote A&E’s new reality show Hammertime, starring MC Hammer and his family.

Some other viral videos spotlighting products are—

Cadbury Eyebrows


Durex Get It On




Yes We Can Barack Obama Video



The list goes on and on, but the outcome of these videos is evident--consumers watch them and send them along to friends, family, and colleagues. I think that advertisers need to take risks with these videos as it seems as those that are the most humorous videos are the most remembered.

References:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVblWq3tDwY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t5sTBrs4fhQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjXyqcx-mYY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwzN4633mpI

Brand Z Top 100 Most Valuable Global Brands Summary

As you’re well aware, brands are vital to corporate success. Brands are commodity that create sustainable competitive advantage, drive demand and market share, and help to improve margins by leveraging premium pricing and supplier time. To better understand the importance of branding and also focus attention on some of the world’s most valuable brands, I attended the Brand Z Top 100 Most Valuable Global Brands webinar last week.

By combining financial and consumer research data, the Brand Z Top 100 list is an annual ranking of the world's 100 most powerful brands and is considered the most comprehensive brand valuation report in the world. This ranking allows us to better understand consumer behaviors and brand perceptions, and how to make more informed decisions based on this information.

Even with the economic downtown in 2008, the resiliency of the Top 100 brand thrived – growing in overall value by nearly 2% or $2 trillion from 2007. Consumers have developed coping strategies and purchasing “brands that contribute to their pleasure, quality, purpose, and security of their lives.” Nine of the top 10 brands, and 85 of the top 100 brands remained ranked from the previous year. Of the 17 categories, 11 grew in value. Here is a list of the top three brands and their value ($M) in each category:

Apparel: H&M Clothing (12,061), Nike (11,999), and Zara (8,609)
Beer: Bud Light (6,655), Budweiser (6,637), and Heineken (5,063)
Bottled Water: Aquafina (810), Evian (750), and Perrier (689)
Cars: Toyota (29,907), BMW (23,948), and Porsche (17,467)
Coffee: Nescafe (5,648), Nesspresso (2,451), and Folgers (1,331)
Fast Food: McDonalds (66,575), SUBWAY (10,997), and KFC (6,721)
Financial Institutions: ICBC (38,056), China Construction Base (22,811), and Bank of China (21,192)
Gaming Consoles: Nintendo DS (9,659), Nintendo Wii (8,256), and Microsoft Xbox 360 (4,581)
Insurance: State Farm (6,922), Allianz (5,669), and AXA (3,701)
Luxury: Louis Vuitton (19,395), Hermes (7,862), and Gucci (7,468)
Mobile Operators: China Mobile (61,283), Vodafone (53,727), and AT&T (20,059)
Motor Fuel: BP (5,936), Shell (4,151), and Mobile (1,525)
Personal Care: Gillette (22,919), L’Oreal (14,991), and Colgate (12,396)
Retail: Wal-Mart (41,083), Tesco (22,938), and Amazon (21,294)
Soft Drinks: Coca-Cola (53,315), Coke (Diets, Lights, and Zero) (14,310), and Pepsi (12,761)
Spirits: Smirnoff (5,201), Bacardi (3,519), and Johnnie Walker (2,571)
Technology: Google (100,039), Microsoft (76,249), and IBM (66,622)

I was most surprised by the by the categories of Beer, Cars, and Coffee. The value of beer increased by 15%, with Bud Light surpassing Budweiser in brand value and thus reflecting the consumer shift to light beers (possibly as a result of increasing health concerns). Overall, the Cars category dropped by 22% -- every carmaker on the list dropped in value with the largest brand value drops being Chevrolet at 60% and Ford at 46%. Lastly, Insurance, which has been heavily scrutinized by the media, has declined by an astounding 48%.

For a complete list of the brands, and their category rank, please visit http://thestorewpp.wtms.com/report.pdf.