…to the blog for Velvet Integrated PR, an agency specialising in PR for the marketing services industry (advertising, design, digital, social media etc), the retail sector and entrepreneurs/SMES.
This is where we talk and rant about everyday things that somehow, always manage to come back to the subject of marketing and retail. We hope you enjoy it – do leave a comment and let us know!
As a group of professionals who are deeply immersed in the marketing industry we are bombarded daily with examples of best practice. Taking big data as an example, it’s all too easy to fall into the trap of thinking that every brand is doing a brilliant job of targeting us all with pinpoint precision.
Except the reality is often so desperately disappointing.
I bought a new Range Rover Evoque a year ago. I don’t get much in the way of communication from Land Rover other than endless email surveys that I’ve tired of completing, especially as there is no feedback or thanks in return.
Image taken from mccabemotors.co.uk
So you can imagine that I was quite excited to receive a personalised letter inviting me to a VIP event at my local Land Rover dealership. I was told to call or email to secure my place as numbers were strictly limited. I wasn’t quite sure what I was being invited to, but it looked exciting enough for me to get in touch. It transpired that I was essentially being invited to an event to flog me a stock car. Why on earth would I be in the market for a new car I asked when I’d just bought one a year ago? The caller simply explained that they’d ‘gone through their database’ and invited everyone. So much for targeting!
The caller was unable to explain what if anything was VIP about the approach and the event. But the experience did leave me feeling let down and thinking much worse of the marque as a result. Surely in this age of big data companies can do better. I know car dealerships are a thorny issue for manufacturers but there is simply no excuse for a sloppy approach of this kind.
Let’s face it the summer of 2013 has hardly been a classic so far. In fact some would say that, even with June already here, we’re still waiting for it to start. Now and then a few heroes see some sun and step out in t-shirt and shorts – if it’s sunny, it’s hot, right? – but they look a bit silly when they’re shivering in the corner of a chilly beer garden an hour later when the sun has gone down.
Of course the dismal weather hasn‘t stopped marketers wheeling out their long planned summer campaigns, featuring the young and beautiful enjoying blue skies made that bit bluer by the presence of product X. Am I the only one left wondering where they found all that sunshine? One such hazy sun-dappled Shangri-la of a TV-ad world is presented by Bulmers in their ‘Begin with a Bulmers’ campaign. The ad shows a perfect evening’s fun in reverse, going back from a roof-top party, through an open air concert (no woolly jumpers in sight) to a bar and a flat where the first Bulmers bottles of the day make their appearance at the end of this ‘Reverse’ ad. The thing is I actually quite like it, despite my where-was-that-filmed-I bet-it-wasn’t-around-here cynicism and I’ve been trying to work out why it works for me.
When does innuendo reach a crescendo? When does tongue-in-cheek become foot-in-mouth? When some months ago I was introduced to the energy drink known as “Pussy”, I thought that this was unique; a soft drink with a name open to interpretation as either something innocuous – a cat – or a woman’s private parts. The strap tells me that the “The drink’s pure. It’s your mind that’s the problem.” Oh, sorry my fault. Close to the knuckle? Definitely. Eye catching? Certainly. Unique? Well apparently not.
Image taken from The Drum website
Say hello to ‘Fanny’, the new name for IrnBru. Wow. So that’s two soft drinks in the borderline-offensive, feminine niche. It’s a tight spot to be sure. Adherents of IrnBru can claim that this works on more than one level – that Fanny is not only anatomically rude, but also a colloquial pejorative, especially north of the border. There is currently a further dig at Coke who are naming bottles after people and Fanny is after all a girl’s name, albeit rather underused these days. It kind of works – more so if you’re Scottish, according to the social networks.
“Great! Just what we need!” were the first thoughts that went through my mind as I read the news that Confused.com is launching a brand new mascot to front their new ad campaign.
In one of the most unimaginative advertising pushes I’ve ever seen: Confused.com’s ‘Brian the Robot’ is ready to jump onto the insurance mascot bandwagon to be seated alongside the Go Compare operatic annoyance and the ‘OH MY GOD MAKE IT STOP’ Compare The Market Meerkats.
Image taken from Marketing Week
A blushing bride bursts through a church gate to be greeted by cameras and well wishers, all pearly teeth, flawless tanned skin and a beaming husband who knows he’s bagged a total hottie. There are a ton of beautiful, famous and even royal friends in attendance and the scene is so picture perfect it looks like an ad for bespoke weddings, or diamonds or . .or .. . Smirnoff Ice???
Image taken from Daily Mail website
A man gives away clothes to the homeless and makes a video of it. Nothing massively unusual in that so far – some people need to record themselves doing good. In fact some need to record themselves doing pretty much anything, but that’s a different story.
So this video gets set to music and uploaded to You Tube - still nothing odd, plenty of people do that too. So why has this upload got nearly 400,000 hits? More importantly why will it have some of the world’s most highly paid brand managers squirming at their desks and surreptitiously checking the job pages?
Image taken from entertainment.ie
Until just last year the 3D printer seemed only a ‘how do they do it’ quirk, housed in factories and the territory of geeks. Yet suddenly its broad potential as a massive business disruptor is becoming clear, due in no small part to Chris Anderson’s 2012 book, Makers, exploring the technology and its implications. Cutting costs, shipping and time, astronauts in space able to print tools and parts, and bringing your own designs to life is only part of the story. The economics of China as the world’s factory could be changed drastically, putting production control back into the hands of entrepreneurs, small businesses and consumers with a desire to ‘make their own’, in their own backyards.
Image taken from Staples website (U.S.)
The scenario has quickly changed for the 3D printer user. Scaled down and available in a range of consumer-friendly coloured versions, Staples has just announced its ‘3D Systems Cube 3D Printer’. On sale for $1,299 a unit with accessories such as cartridges at $49.99, the product imagery is of colourful, banal objects such as plastic toys, vases, bracelets and a luminous plastic chess piece.
I was driving into town a couple of weekends ago. As I hit the junction of Baker Street and the Marylebone Road a huge billboard on the side of a building struck me. It was for the new Bailey’s bottle. I wanted to take a picture but a run of green traffic lights – oh the irony – put a stop to that. I saw the same hoarding near Shepherd’s Bush Green on the way home. The same run of green lights.
Image taken from Daily Mail website
Everyone knows the British High Street is changing fast and one reason for this is shoppers seizing on the convenience of internet shopping. However, I think that there’s one channel that could not only lead to a revitalised independent retail economy but also keep craft skills alive in this country – and this channel is eBay.
Image taken from B2C
I went into Lloyds the other day to pay some cash into a non-Lloyds account. I’d received a call while I was out asking for the money to be paid into the account there and then as it was pretty urgent. I’d not had to do this sort of transaction for many years so was a bit staggered when I found there was a £20 charge. If I’d been paying into another major bank I’d probably have been able to take the cash out of my account and walked it over the road and pay it in. However there wasn’t a Halifax anywhere close. The irony is if the bank had provided Wi-Fi, I’d have pulled out my iPad and made the payment there and then via the Lloyds app. Instead, I headed to Starbucks and did it there for free (well, for the price of a coffee…..see how Starbucks made money out of Lloyd’s fail?). While retailers are increasingly bringing Wi-Fi in store, the banks seem to be ignoring the march of technology when it comes to the branch environment. The cashier told me there wasn’t even any Wi-Fi for staff. Boo.
Image taken from The Daily Telegraph
