i [love] marketing.

Visual clues, attribution theory & brand affinity

This is a great example of attribution theory. Facebook did A/B testing to determine in which scenario would users attribute slow speed of loading to Facebook vs. their iOS. What do you think?

Answer: in the first case, users blame Facebook. In the second, they blame iOS.

black & white

I was in Belgrade this past week and my photographer friend Sonja took some pics. It was fun. 

Neighbors help neighbors, and TaskRabbit helps you

More great things are coming from crowdsourcing plus brands-and-startups-partner-together department. In the latest installation of this inter-species collaboration, Walgreens banded up with TaskRabbit to quickly and efficiently deliver cold and flu medicine to those who pressingly need it.

The program goes on during what's known as the high flu season, lasting from January 7th to February 18th (thanks Gallup). Best thing yet is that the program is promoted and conducted through existing Walgreens app, which a lot of its customers already have. This is a great example of "build onto existing infrastructure" approach. Those who opt in to get their meds delivered, can select their delivery time and then just wait for someone to bring in the goodies.

Doing something good for your customers is brand creativity at its best. 

Human-centered innovation comes to postal delivery

Parcel is the new online service that *finally* solves the problem of all of us who order inordinate amount of things online. Some of us don't want their co-workers to know about their shopping addiction, and some of us just don't have a doorman to sign for everything that comes through the door. So we are left with chasing our coveted future possessions between delivery slips, always delightful USPS, and "did my neighboor took my parcel or did she not" dilemma. 

There are certainly ways that Fedex or UPS could have think of this. But they didn't, simply because they are focused on their business innovation more than they are focused on their consumer innovation. Make no mistake: in ideal scenario, consumer innovation is business innovation, which means that one can build a business around consumer insight. Parcel is a proof of this. 

Now, the only thing I have to wait for is for them to start delivering to Brooklyn ... 

Car, meet the 21st century

Cars-as-media has been going on for some time. More than any other connected device, connected cars make sense in a way that was not imaginable 10 years ago. A roadblock? A traffic jam ahead? Fastest route to somewhere? Check, check and check. 

Truth to be told, the pressure's been building up for car companies to modernize their dashboards. Today's drivers, used to touch-based, interactive interfaces get in the car only to discover an old-fashioned tech dashboard staring back at them. Not a turn-on for driving.

To bring cars into 21st century, Google set its sights on integrating Android OS into vehicles of car manufacturers like Audi, Honda and Hyundai. Aside of making the dashboards look better, this integration would allow the apps and music on Android smartphones to also work more smoothly. Another benefit are traffic overlays over Google maps, which inform commuters about road issues and traffic jams ahead as well as car diagnostic info, sent directly to car mechanics when needed. People are already using their phones in their cars, so why not make it actually better and safer for them?

Talk about creating a closed information system. No wonder Apple's in the race, too (it has deals with BMW, GM and Honda).

Brand loyalty test

I can't decide if this is a successful brand stunt or a completely unnecessary monkeying with a brand's Facebook page. 

Burger King Norway opted in for a ballsy move to find out. In order to see which ones among their FB fans really, trully love Burger King, BK gave them a loyalty test. Or, rather, they offered them a Big Mac via BK's FB page. Those who decided to go for it, got a goodbye letter and a voucher for a Big Mac.

30K fans decided they'd rather have a one-time Big Mac than the lifetime of BK FB updates.

8K of those who stayed are, however, ready to die for BK. 

(and McDonald's marked an unexplained surge in traffic during the stunt)

Looking Understanding Making

Source: Luma Institute 

Why aren't more brands solving more problems like this? And why aren't more agencies suggesting this sort of solution?

Innovation often comes from unexpected places, as the saying goes. This time this unexpected place is Comcast, one of the not exactly most beloved brands in America. If you have any doubts about this, just google "Comcast hate" and compare the number of results it with "Comcast love."

Regardless of the quality of the service it provides or what we thinking about it, Comcast has done something really forward-thinking. It partnered with notorious Khan Academy to bring free education to those who can barely afford cable service. Comcast’s minimum offering called Internet Essentials, priced at $10, is now equipped with access to Khan Academy.

This is a good brand move. First, it expands both of the brands’ markets. Second, it’s responding to a real customer need. Third, it shows a combination of the old and new technological, educational, economic and cultural establishment. 

Partnerships like this should become part of every brand’s marketing playbook, and of every agencies’ creative problem-solving toolkit.

BikeStock keeps you rock'n'rolling

It was definitely a matter of time before someone made the vending machine for bike parts a reality. BikeStock is just that someone. This vending machine (currently just one, in Bushwick, Brooklyn) offers everything from tubes, locks, tools, ponchos and drinks.

Here's an idea for bike brands: jump on this trend.

What should it cost? Economic value vs. social values

How do we calculate the value of a product or service we seek to purchase? Most of us do some sort of price comparisons, gain management analysis or choice framing based product quality, design and other factors. Some of us to this add their brand loyalty. Yet some of us go even further and add sustainability and social responsibility info to their mental calculus.

For this last (and growing) group, JUST provides exactly this information. This organization details six criteria evaluating things like a company's safety, diversity, or worker benefit, with subcriteria like gender equality and animal wellfare.

This is interesting, and not only because it rewards companies with sustainable business practices.

JUST has the potential to deeply upset the established economic model where monetary price is, traditionally, the sole indicator of a good's value. The consequences are huge. Prices of various goods correlate; prices are set as the outcome of a company's various costs (production, operations, distribution, overhead) and profit projections; and prices are an indicator of brand equity and value. 

Once all of this becomes not the ultimate, but just one of the ways for companies to set the value of a product, what happens then?

Consumers are already getting there: they actively seek out the corporate business practices information and demand transparency. This means that the ways they make decisions are radically different than in the past, bounded rationality notwithstanding. It also means that economic factors of pricing are going to become critically intertwined with the social responsibility ones. Social values are going to become the core of the price, forcing all other pricing factors to adjust. Our economy may as well become social. 

Or at least forced to be more responsible. 

Flexible distribution against poverty

Coming on the heels of ColaLife idea, Avon Ladies are working their high heeled legs to close the last-mile gap to the remote African villages. Well, not exactly the Avon ladies, but some other men and women who use the Avon's flexible distribution model to sell and deliver necessities to those in need. The flexible distribution model idea comes from The Paradigm Project, who currently employs 25 salespeople walking the grounds in Africa. Once they prove the model is viable, hopefully more brands will join. 

Good brand utility grows from the brand mission

The thing I like even more is a simple direct line between the utility and the brand mission. (Yes, no more silly gadgets!) Coke's mission is to deliver happines. Christmas is the time of happiness, often wrapped up in a festive holiday paper. To deliver happines, one actually needs a wrapping paper. So Coke put it everywhere it possibly could, in the format of outdoor posters. A pretty good brand awareness/utility combo idea.

This campaign comes from Belgium, and is done by Duval Guillaume.

words to live by

by IDEO.

Happy New Year.

 

I've always loved good fireworks. Happy New Year!