Archive for the ‘Caroline Harrison’ Category

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Thank Crunchie it’s Friday

Caroline Harrison this week takes a look at a current promotional campaign which gives us all another reason to be glad today is Friday.

It’s one of the top challenges for marketers: how do we drive more traffic to our website? There are many different search engine optimisation and search engine marketing tactics we can employ to help us in our quest, but we shouldn’t necessarily forget some of the good old fashioned basics: aside from creating an informative and user-friendly website, we can try to make the site – or a feature/section within it – different and unique, make it engaging or interactive, offer website-only deals and special promotions…basically give people a reason to visit in the first place and to return.

Of course, increased traffic to your website doesn’t automatically translate into increased sales. There is, however, clearly some correlation. More visitors give you more chances to showcase your services and, with it, more opportunities to turn those visitors into brand advocates and loyal customers.

I read in the marketing press recently (further note to marketers: don’t forget to generate a PR buzz around a quirky website feature or promotion) about a ‘freebie’ being offered by Cadbury at its Crunchie chocolate bar website, www.getthatfridayfeeling.com. (Why is it that my Thursday Night Insights always seem to be about Cadbury’s chocolate??) In its latest digital campaign for this brand, Cadbury is, for a limited time, giving away a free Crunchie to the first 500 visitors to register on the site each Friday.

Now, for those international readers of this blog who aren’t so familiar with a Crunchie, the brand has been associated with a ‘Friday Feeling’ advertising concept, encapsulated by the well-known strapline ‘Thank Crunchie, it’s Friday!’, since the mid 1980s.

I remember when Cadbury first introduced this strapline. Somehow it just struck a chord – certainly with my peers in the school playground, many of whom, in retrospect, would have been avid guzzlers of this chocolate bar and among Cadbury’s prime target markets.

Even today, many years on from the start of the campaign, I regularly see ‘Facebook friends’ – all now in their 30s – update their ‘status’ at the end of the working week with those immortal words ‘Thank Crunchie it’s Friday!’. Friday is, after all, the day to treat yourself…What the heck, it’s nearly the weekend – I’ll have fish and chips for lunch, a Chinese takeaway for dinner, let’s open another bottle of wine, give me that chocolate bar…

So, do sales of Crunchie rise significantly on a Friday? Does a sizable proportion of the UK’s population effectively promote the brand by word of mouth one day a week? If so, I guess you could call it a pretty successful campaign. But, let’s face it; Cadbury won’t want sales to suffer the other six days out of every seven. By encouraging us all to ‘Get That Friday Feeling Every Day’, Cadbury is trying to associate its brand with feeling good, enjoying life, treating ourselves. Why should we only feel happy as we’re leaving work or finishing school on a Friday? Life’s too short to be miserable the rest of the week!

This latest campaign centred around getthatfridayfeeling.com might not be groundbreaking as such, but it’s still pretty inventive and a clever way to encourage people to go to the site. Giving away 500 Crunchies a week for 6 weeks won’t exactly break the bank for Cadbury, but there are bound to be far more than 500 website visitors trying to get their hands on a free chocolate bar. Why, with 500 available every Friday, it certainly seems within the realms of possibility that you or I could be munching away on a free Crunchie soon. Even if you’re not one of the lucky ones, it’s still brought the brand to front of mind. If you haven’t had a Crunchie for some time, it could just whet your appetite for one. Next time you’re in the chocolate aisle at the supermarket, Crunchie might just get the nod ahead of your usual preferred snack.

This wasn’t my planned Thursday Night Insight for this week, but seeing as the promotion finishes next Friday (30 October), I thought you might appreciate the tip. I’m afraid this offer is only available to UK residents, but I’ll keep my eyes peeled for any tasty global freebies.

Posted in Caroline Harrison, Digital Marketing, Marketing, Marketing Strategy, Promotion, Thursday Night Insight |
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A Mysterious Case of Rebranding

In this week’s Thursday Night Insight, Caroline Harrison reflects on an amusing case of rebranding and ponders what the outcome may be.

In what surely must be one of the strangest cases of rebranding known to man, UK supermarket Sainsbury’s announced earlier this month that it is changing the name of its ‘pollack’ fish to ‘colin’, the French word for hake. The reason for this rebrand is that Sainsbury’s believes many customers are too embarrassed to ask for pollack because of the way it sounds.

The retailer is hoping that this move will increase sales of the fish, which is cheaper per kilo than the similar tasting cod, and is more sustainable.

Now I have to admit that it took me quite some time to work out why on earth I should be embarrassed to request ‘pollack’. Personally, I think I would feel more stupid asking for ‘colin’. That’s because, although I now know that colin is a French word and should thus be pronounced ‘co-lan’, most English-speaking natives automatically recognise this word as the boy’s name ‘Colin’, and would find it difficult to say anything other than ‘col-in’. Certainly the thought of having to adopt a faux-French accent at my local fishmonger seems pretty embarrassing to me.

Now I am not for one moment suggesting that just because I have no problem asking for pollack, that my views are representative of the wider fish-buying marketplace. Indeed, I understand (and would expect no less) that Sainsbury’s made this move only after conducting market research among its customers.

Certainly you do wonder whether there might be some explanation for the comparatively low sales of this fish – over and above the fact that it’s far less well known than cod in the UK. What’s more, it wouldn’t be the first time that a fish that had fallen from favour with the British public underwent a stunning resurgence following a rebrand. Just a few years ago, by changing the name (not to mention the perception) of the humble pilchard to the Cornish sardine, an unfashionable fish was transformed into a popular national favourite (and gave a much-needed boost to South West England’s economy to boot).

Returning to our friend Colin, the truth of the matter is that this is more than a rebranding campaign. It’s obviously a massive publicity stunt, but it’s also an exercise in raising awareness.

I suspect sales of Sainsbury’s pollack have increased massively in recent weeks, but I’m sure it won’t be because customers are no longer embarrassed to ask for it. It will be, in part, thanks to a curiosity brought about by the media hype of this unusual case. It will, of course, also be because the public is suddenly aware that this fish is a very decent alternative to the more popular cod. I for one, when next at the fishmonger’s, will be aware of pollack (or colin). I now know that it is a good, cost-effective and eco-friendly option, and will likely give it a try in the near future.

I’d also be very interested to know if competitor supermarkets and independent fishmongers who still sell plain old ‘pollack’ as they always have, are witnessing an upturn in sales on the back of Sainsbury’s actions? Only time will tell…

To learn more about B2B International can help you with branding, click here.

Posted in Branding, Caroline Harrison, Food, Market Research, Retail, Thursday Night Insight |
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Bowled Over by Super Adverts?

As the furore surrounding this week’s Super Bowl commercials begins to subside, Caroline Harrison reflects on the advertising world’s most important annual ‘event’.

Where would we be without a blog article on advertising this week?  After all, Super Bowl Sunday is, for some people, more about the ads than the game.  According to one recent poll, 21 percent of those who expected to tune in last Sunday said they would watch "exclusively or predominantly for the commercials."  A further 34 percent said they would be as interested in the commercials as in the game itself.

The Super Bowl, the year’s most watched television event with an audience of 90 million viewers, is America’s premier ad showcase.  Not surprisingly, advertising spots are highly sought after.  A record $206 million of advertising revenue was generated by broadcaster NBC this year for its 69 Super Bowl spots.

After a thrilling game in which the Pittsburgh Steelers snatched a late victory over the Arizona Cardinals, I fully expected to be seeing re-run after re-run of the game’s highlights for days afterwards.  Yet, to my surprise, breakfast TV on Monday morning seemed oblivious to the previous day’s sporting achievements, and instead had panels of ‘experts’ analyzing the Super Bowl’s commercials.  Indeed, in the days leading up to the game, before the much-anticipated commercials were even aired, the viewing public was being treated to sneak previews of the adverts on television shows and news broadcasts, and many of the advertisers were using pre-game website efforts to generate anticipatory interest in their commercials.

Advertising Age has very kindly given us a link to all the Super Bowl ads so we can watch and re-watch them at our leisure.

I guess the point is that nowadays, if you fork out to be one of the big Super Bowl advertisers, you’re not just paying for the advertising slot alone. For one thing, any commercial usually forms part of a wider integrated campaign, and is not just a one-off.  In addition to appearing in other media, you are guaranteed to benefit from all the hype and publicity this high-profile position generates; your advert is seen around the world, discussed on TV shows, dissected in newspapers, posted on blogs and discussed in online forums…  All of which must make the outlay – of up to $3 million per 30-second slot – a little easier to swallow.  After all, even if your ad isn’t deemed ‘the best’, they do say that no publicity is bad publicity.

Of course, you would hope that no commercial is deemed a total disaster, as no advertising campaign should ever be launched without thorough pre-testing to check it’s suitable and hits the mark.  Even after launch, post-campaign research should be used to monitor awareness of a campaign and track its effectiveness over time.

The other thing to bear in mind is that everyone has their own opinion on which commercials they do or don’t like; which would inspire them to make a purchase or otherwise.

I came across this online review of all the adverts, which I read with interest.  Personally, Sunday’s most memorable adverts, those which had stood out for making me laugh or smile, were not particularly well received by this blogger.  Yet the debates that are raging just serve to highlight that one man’s meat is another man’s poison; what some people will love, others will hate, or at the very least may be indifferent to.

To some extent this doesn’t matter.  Companies can never satisfy everyone, nor do they try.  Through customer profiling and careful segmentation, they try to identify groups of like-minded individuals who have similar characteristics or needs, and who they can satisfy in a profitable way.  So, for example, if I don’t like a beer commercial, it’s of no particular consequence to the beer manufacturer.  I don’t drink beer, don’t buy beer, and I don’t even influence anyone else’s purchase of beer; I am, therefore, not the brewer’s target market and I was not front of mind when the campaign was conceived.

As time goes by, it will probably become clearer which companies are adjudged to have been the biggest winners and biggest losers of this latest bout of advertising.  But no amount of debating or criticism will deter companies from snapping up advertising spots at next year’s Super Bowl, nor will it stop the general public’s intense anticipation and subsequent examination all over again.  Only 360 more days to go!

Posted in Advertising Research, Caroline Harrison, Commercials, Marketing, Segmentation, Thursday Night Insight |
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The Future of Customer Service?

Caroline Harrison takes a break from the usual business-bashing to show how good service can leave a lasting impression on customers for all the right reasons.

It’s very easy to criticize the service we receive from shops, banks, utility companies and the like.  I could recount a million and one tales of incompetence, annoyance and frustration, where the actions of companies – or individuals within them – have left me feeling unimportant, undervalued, and frankly furious.  But today, for a change, I’m going to be more positive, and praise a good customer experience.

A couple of weeks ago, my husband and I decided the time had finally come for us to embrace the twenty-first century and buy a docking station for our iPods. 

As if to highlight our lack of technological prowess, we didn’t log on to the internet, spend 20 minutes clicking the mouse, and then lo and behold have a brand new docking station delivered to our door the very next day.  Nor did we even use the internet to thoroughly research our product options in advance.  Ever daring, we simply got in our car and drove to our local Apple Store at the mall. 

Yet when we arrived, it didn’t feel like we had driven 10 miles down the road – it felt more like we’d driven 10 years into the future.

The first thing I noticed was that Apple, in creating its clean, white shop façade, had done away with the need for a name.  The simple yet oh-so-recognizable Apple-shaped logo was all that was needed to entice customers – especially the younger generation – into this wonderfully spacious store.

The second thing I noticed upon entering was a brigade of blue t-shirted ‘youths’; at least 30 of them were milling about, rather like a school party that had got lost on its way to the Science Museum.  But no, these individuals were the staff, and at an impressive ratio of around one per customer.

With so many sales staff waiting to pounce, I half expected to be cornered before I had got through the door, but we found ourselves able to browse for a minute or two before a friendly but professional young man approached us and asked if he could help.

When we explained that we were looking for a docking station, he led us over to the correct department, before attempting to narrow down our choices.  Did we have a specific brand in mind?  Any particular colour or size?  How important was sound quality to us?  How much were we hoping to spend?

He then proceeded to point out various options, gave us a concise, balanced summary of the pros and cons of each model (notably without pushing the most expensive choices), and even demonstrated the same song on each so we could compare like-for-like sound quality.

When we had asked and he had answered any remaining questions, he discreetly took a step back to allow us to discuss among ourselves which docking station most suited our needs (or, to put it another way, gave me the chance to make clear to my husband that we really didn’t need the biggest, flashest, loudest and most expensive product available).

Decision made, he stepped forward again, whipping a hand-held electrical unit out of his pocket.  A couple of taps of the keypad later, he sped off, only to return after 30 seconds with our newest purchase packed up and ready to go.  He then asked if we would like to pay by card, to which we nodded.

Without moving from the spot, he tapped his keypad a couple more times, swiped our card, and handed us the unit so we could enter our pin number.  Our receipt was already printing out before we had had chance to return the unit to him, and so, within little more than a minute of making our purchase decision, we were heading out of the shop, bag in had, smiles on our faces.

Attentive, knowledgeable, and uber-efficient service isn’t as common as any of us would like.  It’s rare to leave a shop thinking “wow, that was great service”.  Yet I would happily return to the same store, would recommend it to others, and am even extolling its virtues today on the world wide web.

Is this how shopping will be 10 years from now?  Well I don’t know, but I certainly hope that many more organizations work towards putting such an emphasis on customer satisfaction.

Posted in Caroline Harrison, Customer Satisfaction, Thursday Night Insight, USA |
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The Biggest Survey On The Planet

In a topical Thursday Night Insight blog post, Caroline Harrison reflects on why this week’s American elections have resonance for marketers and market researchers everywhere.

It probably hasn’t escaped your notice that the U.S. presidential elections took place earlier this week.  Throughout Tuesday evening and into the early hours of Wednesday morning, the results from all 50 states, from the east coast of America to the west, trickled in to news networks and media broadcasting stations across the U.S.A.  As I watched the drama unfold live on TV, it got me thinking.

The election in the United States is arguably one of the biggest, most important, and eagerly anticipated ‘surveys’ on the planet.  Yet there are certainly some parallels to be drawn between this kind of poll and the surveys we carry out for our clients.

The first thing that struck me was the amount of detailed statistics available for analysis.  Just a quick look at the exit polls conducted by CNN for New York state show the predicted voting behavior of so many different segments of society: you can study the trends by sex, race, age, income, education, political persuasion, or indeed any combination of these factors.  Of course, similar statistics – and more besides – can be analyzed for every American state.

Obviously it’s no secret that businesses – whatever their size and whatever their industry – are continually looking to understand buyer behavior; that is to say, what motivates consumers in their choices and their actions.  Most organizations aim to segment the whole potential market into groups of like-minded individuals, one or more of which will form their core customer base.  Only by doing this can they develop a clear strategy to meet the needs of the target market(s) they decide to serve. 

In much the same way, politicians know that they will never be able to appeal to all the different sections of society, many of which will have diverging or even conflicting values and opinions.  Yet political parties recognize that they must try to understand how these groups differ, and assess the value they place on different aspects of a politician’s ‘offering’.  Like companies, they can then try to satisfy needs and/or improve their current offering.    

With this in mind, a phenomenal amount of time, effort and money has been spent by the candidates over recent months and years to find out what their ‘customers’ want.  Even more time, effort and money has then been spent in communicating and promoting how they will be able to provide better solutions than their competitors.

Yet the same rules apply to politicians as corporations.  By all means find out what people want so you can serve them better.  Just beware of making promises you can’t keep.

Posted in Caroline Harrison, Market Research USA, Quantitative Research, Segmentation, Thursday Night Insight |
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