The Extraordinary Experience*

Ogilvy teams up with Technocrati to build stronger brands

Ogilvy North America will soon offer its clients a means to strengthen their brands through blogs, vlogs, videos, photos, and other citizen media. The Technorati Conversational Marketing System will allow for the syndication of content, online conversations with clients, and facilitate the building of relationships with online communities that are relevant to Ogilvy’s clients. This wide range of strategic tools ultimately enables Ogilvy to build web sites, advertising, and links to blog posts associated with the brands.

The selling point is that they will be able to deliver an authentic, personal message across the internet by reaching influential communities and bloggers. While the whole offer sounds really exciting to me, it (once again) sheds light on the ethical debate surrounding viral marketing. Thing about promoting brands ‘authentically’ by infiltrating conversations between influential bloggers? I’d better to go and check my voicemail; these guys from Ogilvy must have called me by now…

Pros, Cons and Tips in conducting market research in SecondLife

SecondLife is an Internet-based virtual world developed by Linden Lab that seems to be taking the market research industry by storm. In the past year, the community grew from 100,000 to 2.8 million members.

Two market research firms Market Truths and Reperes, already have Second Life offices. In addition, Market Tools and Social Research Foundation are now teaming up to conduct online focus groups in the online virtual world.

Pros

Unlike other Internet-based games such as World of Warcraft, Second Life is an economy (based on the Linden Dollar). In a recent interview, François Abiven, Reperes’ CEO  emphasizes the relevance of this economy for brands (many of them already opended stores in Second Life), hence the relevance of conducting research.

Data can be downloaded from the online environment, saving plenty of time and costs in transcription.

Incentives in second life are paid in Linden Dollars, a much cheaper currency than the US Dollars that have to be paid to real life focus groups participants. The cost for a 2 hours group in the US these days can be up to $200 per respondent! And this is for easy to reach, laundry soap users

In SecondLife, Fieldwork can be conducted on an ongoing basis, as the researcher does not really ever leave the field. This allows checking out the validity of the findings with members of the community at any time, even while the report is being written. 

Cons

The respondent’s dual identity (one real and one virtual) is a methodological challenge for the researcher. Indeed, respondents may have several identities with a same community, or across multiple communities (Caterall and Maclaran, 2001)

The profile of the respondent is unknown beyond his (probable) age and gender.

Caterall and Maclaran (2001) bring to light limitations in

The lack of paralinguistic cues,

The lack of control of the moderator over the interview

Less spontaneity in respondent’s reactions

Top tip: the virtual community must be accepted for what it is, rather than trying fitting traditional research methods to the virtual world.

References:

See also the findings of an exploratory study from Reperes on how SecondLife is perceived by its residenthttp://www.reperes-secondlife.com/image/SL_perceived_residents.pdf

And an interview of F. Abiven (in French): http://marketingisdead.blogspirit.com/archive/2006/12/11/un-institut-d’etudes-sur…-second-life.html

Caterall, M. and Maclaran, P. (2001) Researching consumers in virtual odyssey, Journal of Consumer Behaviour, Vol. 1 (3), pp. 228-237.

---

Fahrenheit 212 takes responsibility for its clients' bottom line

Fahrenheit 212 is an innovation agency founded by advertising veterans. Their philosophy is called Idea Led Innovation.  This philosophy involves finding new ideas and coming up with new products using the client’s existing assets (for example: a production plant).  Step 1: They fully immerse themselves in the client’s problems, its market environment and assets. Also at this stage an agreement is made with the client about how the agency should be rewarded.  Generally, a significant share of Fahrenheit 212’s earnings is based on its results. Step 2: The agency comes up with ideas that could be deployed quickly. Step 3: The ideas are selected and the feasibility and costs are assessed. Step 4: Fahrenheit 212 helps with the graphic and industrial design.  Most importantly, it then assists its clients with building a marketing strategy and a sales pitch for the new product. In a nutshell, Fahrenheit 212 is a compromise between a traditional innovation agency, a branding agency and a marketing consultancy, with a fee structure inspired by the Payment By Result model. It looks like these guys have a clear competitive advantage...

The key characteristics of lovemarks

This is a cool deck that brings to light the key characteristics of lovemarks . Thanks to Brand Autopsy. Enjoy...

Perfume brands deliver an extraordinary experience by creating bespoke perfumes.

Perfume brands work hard to build an identity, add value and create a branded experience in general (They’d better have a good story to tell as there is usually not much inside the little bottle). Now a few brands are going the extra mile by delivering extraordinary experiences and building one to one relationship with their clients.

Thierry Mugler has created four workshops, which are led by industry experts and allow the delegates to learn how a perfume is created.  They also allow the delegates to learn the language, emotions and secrets associated with the product.

Guerlain offers to create a bespoke perfume through several one to one appointments with the client.  Thus, allowing for the creation of an elaborate and unique ‘jus’ to suit her personality. Interestingly, these one to one sessions don’t only focus on the sense of smell, but involve having clients choose among pictures and fabrics that best describe their personality. Creating the perfume takes from 6 months to one year. I trust the perfume could be created in a few days or weeks, but simulated shortage helps with building exclusivity and justifying the price tag: 30,000 Euros (about $35,000) for 3 litres.

Starbucks is pushing the mountain experience too high

Away in Michigan this week, I decided to treat myself with a complimentary cup of tea when arriving at my hotel. The tea sachet (‘Tazo’, brought to me by Starbucks) read:

‘A single cup of Tazo calm has been known to have the same effect as sitting for 45 minutes in a mountain meadow on a sunny day with your shoes off’

The Starbucks cardboard cup read:

‘High up, where the mountains meet the sky, Starbucks journeys to find the best coffee beans in the world’

The funny thing is that I was staying at the airport, so my feet were still firmly anchored to the ground at the time I read these lines. I was trying to imagine what would be written on the (Starbucks) cup that would be served to me on board. Maybe ‘Higher up, above the clouds, Starbucks roasts its coffee beans with the heat of the sun’. The tea sachet could read: ‘This subtle blend of stardust has the same effect as sitting on the moon’.

I think Starbucks should take it easy with this mountain concept.

Lessons on branding from Dog the bounty hunter

Dog (Duane) Chapman is the star of the TV reality show ‘Dog the Bounty Hunter’, broadcasted on A&E every Tuesday evening (by the way, A&E apparently stands for ‘Arts and Entertainment’; they must broadcast the ‘art’ bit at 4am, as I have only watched ‘entertainment’ on this channel).

If you scratch behind the bullet-proof jacket and the sunglasses you find out that Dog is a great brand.   

Dog is clearly positioned, away from the other ‘cop type’ TV shows. Instead of competing on impressive gear and weapons, Dog has developed his very own fashion style (Hawaiian shirts and bullet-proofs jackets, native American jewellery) and carries only pepper spray. Dog likes his apparel so much that he didn’t mind turning up at his wedding rehearsal wearing his gear.

Dog can be instantly associated with specific added values

q       Dog is a family man. A proud father of 9 kids, Dog also works with his brother, wife and some of his sons.

q       Dog believes in God and often prays before going bounty hunting.

q       Dog used to be a bad boy (he actually went to prison in Texas) but is now on the other side.

q       Dog adds value by creating a relationship with the fugitives. Once captured, he does not hesitate to lecture them on how to get their life back in order, reflecting on his own experience. More often than not, fugitives seem to be thankful to him even if his primary job is to send them to prison.

Dog maintains a high standard quality of service; you would never see him failing to catch a fugitive. Furthermore, he satisfies both functional and emotional needs (most fugitives could be captured by simply knocking at their door, but Dog likes to jump on them with 3 or 4 of his associates). Last but not least, Dog’s brand is legally guaranteed (well, sort of). Dog is a Bail Recovery Agent (let’s face it, ‘Bounty hunter’ sounds much more cool) and carries a big star around his neck.

Just to let you know, Dog is also available for motivational seminars, coaching and counselling…

A car falling out of Marina towers?

Marina towers are two buildings that look a bit like corncobs, located just in front of the Chicago River. This is where the insurer Allstate shot its latest commercial. Their advertising agency (Leo Burnett) had the excellent idea to orchestrate a ‘Steve McQueen type’ car chase…ending up in the Chicago River. If you haven’t seen the commercial yet, you can watch it (as well as a making of) at: http://www.allstate.com/landingpages/GENADV_marinatowers_Q107.aspx.       

If you pass by the actual building these days, you will see a car stuck on the edge and ready to fall off with the Allstate slogan underneath. The commercial generated a massive buzz in Chicago and some good PR coverage. Well done to the agency for their creativity, although it is worthwhile mentioning that Leo Burnett’s windows open on Marina towers!

Ed Debevic's in Chicago

My wife recently took me to Ed Debevic's (640 N Wells st in Chicago) for lunch. Ed's is a family oriented burger place, where you can eat good burgers, just like in 1000's of restaurants in the US. But Ed's Unique Selling Point is clear: their waiters are rude, and people like it! In fact, that's why people go there, to have waiters throwing menus and straws at them and patronise them. Ed's strap lines are straightforward: "If you like what you're eatin', order more. If you don't ­ there's the Door." and 'Eat and get out'.

Although Ed Debevic's is good fun, I have always wondered how people feel about bouncers at club doors. These people tend to be condescending and rude, sometimes not even being polite with the patrons (in fact, the more exclusive the club is, the more condescending the bouncer is). How do customers (clubbers) feel about this (hopefully) short encounter? Especially when they expect to pay $400 for a bottle of champagne once inside? A stream of research looks at 'mental accounting and the pain of paying'. Should we also be looking at 'the pain of getting in'? Watch this space…

Experiential Marketing defined

Many definitions can be found for experiential marketing. I like Bernd Schmitt definition and framework, which you can watch at: http://video.ft.com/?channel=Business%20School&clipid=1359_FT0009.

When I started my doctorate, my supervisor was getting annoyed at me for using ill defined jargon of marketers in an academic context. 15 months down the line, I now get irritated myself at words and expressions that sell but don’t necessarily mean much. Schmitt did a good job at putting together a definition that makes from both academic and practitioner’s standpoint.