OVK :::Let it ring

BRAND OWNER:OVK
CATEGORY:Charities
REGION:Belgium
DATE:Apr 2009 - Dec 2008

Most people know that using your mobile phone while driving can cause accidents, and a large number of accidents could be avoided if people didn’t answer their mobile phones while driving. A charity for parents of child road victims, OVK, wanted to hammer home the dangers of speaking on your phone while driving in a surprising way.
OVK created a website letitring.be where people could enter their friend’s mobile number and email address. The friend would then receive an email containing a link to a Belgium’s largest video portal Garage TV video and a message saying “check out this crazy car crash I found on the web (be sure to put your sound up loud)”. When the friend clicks on the link, the Garage TV video opens in his browser.

The friend thinks they are about to see a user-generated car crash movie on a video website. The video shows a driver’s view of a car journey, with the camera looking through the windscreen at the road. While the person is watching the video, their phone will start to ring at a crucial moment in the video. As soon as they answer the phone, the car in the video loses control and crashes. Then the message appears on the screen saying: “avoid an accident. Let it ring.” They are then given the option to pass the viral prank on with the website’s details. This was supported by a separate campaign aimed at young people who listen to their MP3 players in traffic. Teaming up with popular musicians Sioen, Joshua and Sound of Stereo they created tracks that could be freely downloaded. They songs start as normal, but halfway through you hear the screeching sounds of car tyres and a crashing sound, followed by the brand message.

copy cat bag

LESS ORIGINAL :

Unknown Advertiser - 2006

Agency : Artmaster Kiev (Ukraine)

THE ORIGINAL?

Dubai Autism Center - 2005

Agency : Bates Pangulf (UAE)

Amstel ::: Truck vrachtwagen

Nothing is allowed to slow the progress of an Amstel delivery truck on its rounds. The truck is allowed an exclusive lane on the motorway, it takes precedence on a car ferry, and hundreds of marathon runners are forced to wait while it passes. Traffic cops turn a blind eye while the truck speeds past. A young man learning to drive is astonished when his instructor slams on the breaks, even though he has right of way. But nothing comes before Amstel, that Dutch national treasure.
Language: Dutch,
Length: 45"
Agency: Doom & Dickson Amsterdam
Production house: Bonkers

A Day in the Life of...♀| Lactacyd TV Spot

Can Brand Loyalty Be Bought? - how susceptible are consumers to loyalty programs?

The classic brand loyalty program offers a combination of rewards and recognition. The bottom-line objective of the program, however, is retention—to ensure that a customer continues to purchase a product or service and remains loyal to that particular brand.
First airlines, and then hotels, used loyalty programs to offer incentives to frequent travelers, but today brand loyalty programs are just as common in financial services and retail.
One of the fastest-growing brand loyalty markets is financial services. Credit card companies in particular have adopted the rewards model with increasing frequency. In some cases a credit card will be linked with a specific airline; in other cases, the credit card rewards its “members” with miles that can be used on any airline. Some credit cards also offer merchandise, cash back or other incentives that build up with credit card use. Some even promise customers they can get preferred seating at events or restaurants.
Brand loyalty is big business. More than 1.8 billion memberships exist in US loyalty programs, averaging 14 memberships per household, according to 2009 research conducted by COLLOQUY, a leading provider of loyalty marketing, publishing education and research.
COLLOQUY estimates about 44 percent of these memberships are “active.” Among the general US population, 57 percent of respondents claim to belong to a loyalty marketing program. This compares to 86 percent of Canadian consumers who participate in loyalty programs, according to another research study conducted by COLLOQUY in late 2007.
But do these programs work? Kelly Hlavinka, partner of COLLOQUY, tells : “From the results of our clients’ programs, loyalty programs are indeed effective at 1)increasing visit frequency, 2)increasing the amount spent annually and 3)retaining customers.
The current economic environment may heighten the importance of a company’s loyalty program.
For the consumer, participating in a loyalty program can help them stretch their limited budget a little bit further. For the company, retaining your best customers that have enrolled in your loyalty program is more important than ever.”
For hotels, loyalty programs seem to be paying off. Jill Noblett, senior vice president of loyalty and direct marketing for Wyndham Hotel Group, discussed the chain’s loyalty program at a “Loyalty Leaders” session at the Direct Marketing Association Conference in October 2008. She says the chain works “to deliver the message that points earned are an enabler.
You can take that vacation or visit one of our fabulous resorts with your expenses covered by redeeming points. What guests earn during their stays also provides them benefits—like a Home Depot gift certificate to use to fix up the kitchen—long after they return home.” Noblett says, “we’ve seen a correlation between redemption and repeat stays.”
For retailers, buying brand loyalty may be more of a challenge. The research conducted by COLLOQUY “suggests that typical two-tier pricing and discount-based rewards—the model that dominates high-frequency retail environments—simply don’t engage consumers,” the company says. “The retail discount reward is now a commodity.”
Aubyn Thomas, senior vice president of marketing services for credit and loyalty for Macy’s, also spoke at the aforementioned Loyalty Leaders session. “Because consumers are very selective in what they buy, we’re relying far more heavily on our Star Rewards program today than ever before,” she says.
The economic environment makes it especially challenging for retailers to reward customers appropriately. As a result, Thomas says, “…we’re turning to less-costly experiential ways of reinforcing customer relationships. So instead of thinking only about discounts and coupons… we’re now thinking about experiences. For example, an experiential reward might be first-class travel to see the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in person.”
While brand loyalty programs are designed to reward customers with tangible benefits, there is also a “softer” side to customer engagement. “The key to sustaining positive results from loyalty programs is a blend of economic and emotional rewards,” says COLLOQUY’s Hlavinka. “Smart companies strive to move beyond simple economic incentives to incorporate meaningful recognition benefits.”
Wyndham Hotels’ “ByRequest” program is an example of this recognition. “It’s high touch and provides guests with a personalized experience on property,” Noblett says. “ByRequest members can complete an online profile and tell us, ‘I want a certain type of pillow,’ ‘I want a snack and beverage in my room when I arrive,’ ‘I want a certain number of hangers in my closet.’ A manager on property welcomes ByRequest members and ensures that their preferences are met. How nice for a business traveler… to be able to check into a Wyndham and get that kind of special treatment.”
Still, a significant percentage of consumers do not participate in loyalty programs. As reasons for their lack of participation, they cite such economic factors as the need to spend too much and not wanting to pay a program fee, according to COLLOQUY’s research.
There are other non-financial demotivators that brand marketers need to understand. Consumers cited “boring rewards” and the feeling that “all loyalty programs look alike” as reasons for not belonging to a loyalty program. Additionally, there was a high percentage of what COLLOQUY refers to as “category churners—people who had previously played the game and dropped out.” According to the company, “While dropping out of a program is a common consumer experience, the number of consumers churning from the entire category of loyalty programs should raise alarms for loyalty marketers. Clearly, we’re not doing enough to keep customers engaged.”
All audience segments offered as a primary reason for non-participation the “lack of compelling rewards.” Almost half of non-belongers said loyalty programs look too similar. A third issue is the amount of churn: it appears that, regardless of audience segment, people join and then drop out of loyalty programs in relatively high numbers.
Those disappearing high numbers represent lost brand engagement opportunities—a high price for brands to pay in such challenging economic times.

Substral Fertilizer: Tree

Advertising Agency: Bark Copenhagen, Denmark

Advertising Discipline and others

My reflections to an employment ad

Marketing Communications practitioners usually formulates own approaches on analyzing and developing advertising ideas
Personally, I learned to question and judge my approach as following:
Impact “Does it sell?”
Marketing is not entertainment business, even humor driven approaches aim to link brands with consumer mindsets emotionally.
Relevancy!
Is my communication strategy on core brand values? Does the expressive values share common ground? Is it relevant to my target group life style/ life stage?
Originality!
Is the idea familiar to my target group or sound odd? Has it been done before? Does it incorporate some or all of my brand essence? Is it going to employ brand advocates?
Touch point!
Is my brand having a dialogue with target group? Is it a positive brand activation and engagement on the long run? Do the brand in need to create its own medium at point of truth?
Traditional media Vs. New media

Complexity, mobility and fragmentation of any target group command brands to think out of the box in order to be differentiated specially on visibility, consumer promotions and below the line tactics that deliver on one single unique insight and relevant brand key proposition.

The Global Online Media Landscape

Social Media And Video Site Engagement Reshapes The Web
April 22nd, 2009
Online engagement by Internet users is deepening, according to a new report on the online landscape released today by The Nielsen Company. This increased engagement is in part a result of a shift toward video content and social networking as popular online subcategories.

Highlights Of The Report Include

• The number of American users frequenting online video destinations has climbed 339 percent since 2003.
• Time spent on video sites has shot up almost 2,000 percent over the same period.
• In the last year alone, unique viewers of online video grew 10 percent, the number of streams grew 41 percent, the streams per user grew 27 percent and the total minutes engaged with online video grew 71 percent.
• There are 87 percent more online social media users now than in 2003, with 883 percent more time devoted to those sites.
• In the last year alone, time spent on social networking sites has surged 73 percent.
• In February, social network usage exceeded Web-based e-mail usage for the first time
• Retail, and the auto and financial services industries, have obviously made dramatic cuts to their online spending. On the other hand, the pharmaceutical industry is actually spending more on online ads today.

View PDF Report :

The Global Online Media Landscape

View more documents from Ayman Sarhan.