Corporate Eye

...compare, compete, excel

Archives for 2010

Google and Apple Face Off

google_nexus_oneTuesday, January 6, 2010 marked an important date in the ongoing battle of brand supremacy between Apple and Google.  That was the day that both companies made major announcements which represent a shift in the mobile phone market — the effects of which won’t be fully realized immediately.

On January 6th, Google announced it was entering the mobile phone retail business with its new Nexus One phone from HTC, which is only available through Google’s new online store.  On the same day, Apple announced it was entering the mobile advertising game by acquiring mobile advertising company Quattro Wireless.

While neither announcement is an instant game changer, they do foreshadow things to come.  It’s been speculated in The New York Times that Apple’s interest in mobile advertising is probably less about competing with Google in the mobile advertising market than it is about finding a way to monetize its popular apps with developers by giving them a way to generate income (since apps are currently available for free download).

Similarly, Google claims not to want to become a major player in the handset market.  Instead, according to a separate article from The New York Times, Google’s hope with its new online store and the Nexus One is that more people will have access to handsets running its Android software.

As we watch this battle play out with both major players, Google and Apple, seemingly pursuing very different paths to reach their goals, it’s interesting to wonder how this will end.  Can any other company compete with Google and Apple in the future?  RIM’s BlackBerry still holds a sizable chunk of the business market, but with the new extensions Google and Apple are bringing to the mobile market, it makes one wonder what the industry will look like in 5-years (or sooner).

And how will the landline market be affected?  I’ve read multiple predictions over the past few weeks that traditional home phones are nearing the end of their lifecycle.  How soon will that prediction come true?

It’s an exciting time, particularly since consumers continue to get some great new products from the frenzied competition that really do make their lives easier.

What do you think?  iPhone or Droid?  What’s your prediction for the future of the mobile market?

Image: Flickr

Repsol: An Engaging Website

Some companies understand the value of a well designed content rich corporate website. Repsol, a Madrid based energy company, understands this very well. Their homepage is an engaging array of content–

Seldom have I seen such an entertaining, informative and well designed corporate website. Some observations–

  • Quick access to more information about the company
  • Same for products and services
  • A 3D tour of a service station
  • More information for the visitor

Next take a look at the Who we are section and you will see an interactive section —

Abstract art, yes but when you move the mouse over the diagram you will see more specifics about the company–

Simply put this is innovative and a uniquely entertaining method of presenting company information. But there are more innovations on this site. For example, visit the Strategy section to see a lively and interesting display of the companies strategy out to 2012.

Next the Corporate Governance section–

 

Note the extensive menu on the left and the comprehensive display of Corporate Governance issues. Well designed, eye appeal and just about anything you need to see about Corporate Governance.

Bravo to Repsol for communicating with stakeholders in an engaging manner.

Note from Editor: Ed wrote this post some time ago, but it got missed in the publication queue. Here’s what the Repsol home page looks like today – you’ll see that it has been updated with content which reflects the current season (snow!) and is still bright, engaging and colourful:

Repsol home page

Apple Ranks as the Most Social Brand

social_mediaEach year, Virtue (a social media management company) creates a ranking of the most social brands by measuring online conversations about brands.  Whether those conversations offer positive or negative impressions of brands doesn’t matter.  Virtue’s methodology simply measures the online buzz about brands on social Web sites such as blogs, Facebook, and Twitter regardless of the nature of the conversation.

The 2009 results of Virtue’s ranking of the most social brands is in, and Apple came out on top.  Apple is one of the most powerful relationship brands, so it’s not surprising that people talk about it across the social Web.  In fact, Apple’s iPhone brand took the ultimate top spot in the list of the most social brands, while Apple’s iTunes brand ranked 6th, and the Apple parent brand ranked 8th.  Interestingly, according to an article from Adweek, the only other companies to have multiple brands ranked in the top 20 of Virtue’s list were Sony (for both the parent brand and PlayStation) and Microsoft (for both the parent brand and Xbox).

While it’s important to remember that Virtue is not the only company to attempt to rank brands in terms of their online buzz and each company’s ultimate list is different from the next, it’s equally important to recognize the factors that are driving some brands toward the top of these lists.  For example, what makes the iPhone brand one that people like to talk about so much online?  One could argue that it’s connection to digital media gives it an upper-hand in terms of generating online conversation about the brand, but there’s more going on than a digital link.

Many of the top brands in Virtue’s ranking are entertainment and technology brands.  People like to talk about entertainment and technology, so it’s not surprising that these types of brands rank high.  What if your brand is not an entertainment or technology brand?  How do you compete?

The key is to not think of the social Web and your social media marketing strategy as a competition.  It’s a brand-building opportunity that can help you raise awareness of your brand and develop relationships with a broad audience, which can lead to brand trial and hopefully brand loyalty and advocacy.  Naturally, you need to be aware of what your competitors are doing in all areas of their marketing, including the social Web, but it’s most important to remember that one-size does not fit all when it comes to social media marketing.  In other words, don’t “market scared.”  Just because your competitors are pursuing a specific social media marketing tactic, doesn’t mean that tactic is right for you, your brand, your business, your products, or your customers.

Successful social media marketing comes from creating amazing content, building relationships, interacting with others, engaging them, and being human and personable.  You might not be able to compete with iPhone in terms of social brand rankings, but successful social media marketing is about quality (content, relationships, and so on), not quantity.

Your thoughts?

Image: Flickr

Landor Associates Releases Annual Brand Survey Results

2009_calendar_SeptLandor Associates conducts a survey each year to learn more about what marketers and consumers think about brands, branding trends, and more.  The 2009 survey results are in, and they definitely reaffirm what most marketers have believed to be true throughout the year.

For example, the most coveted brand of 2009 and the past decade according to the survey results is Google.  Given the fact that in the first decade of the 21st century, Google became the search engine, launched a Web browser, rolled out dozens of free applications and acquired even more, it’s no wonder that Google is so strong.

Furthermore, survey respondents identified the digital era as the one thing that impacted their lives more than anything else over the past decade.  Again, this is not surprising considering the fact that the social Web was really just starting to catch on in the beginning of the decade.  Look at where we’ve gotten so fast.  Today, we rely on the quick spreading of information and discussing that information via the tools of the social Web like blogs, Twitter, Facebook, and more.  Major news events have even been covered in greater depth through the social Web than through traditional media (think of the death of Michael Jackson, which broke on the TMZ.com blog or the spreading of information from inside Iran after the 2009 Iran Election via Twitter).  The world changed significantly during the first decade of the 21st century thanks to the social Web.  Interestingly, the survey also found that 75% of respondents preferred Facebook over other social networking tools.

Some of the most important issues to survey respondents during the past decade include the environment and green issues as well as the economy, both of which directly affect their buying habits and lifestyles.

While none of these findings are new revelations, they do reaffirm marketers’ views that digital and social media are integral components in the future of branding and marketing.  If you don’t already have a digital and social media strategy for your brand, make 2010 the year that you get on board before you find your brand left behind.

Image: Flickr

What’s New (and Who’s Who) in E-Recruitment Software

The 2009 Gartner Magic Quadrant offers two scoops of info on all the major E-Recruitment players, plus a look at the up-and-comers.  Peopleclick has celebrated their location in the Leader Quadrant with complimentary access to the MQ, so I’ve been enjoying a stroll through the E-Recruitment landscape.

The MQ is always fun (for us wonks, anyway) because it does three things:

  1. Sets up the significant factors for evaluating vendors in a specific subject area
  2. Provides a nice visual of how the different players place in relationship to one another and to core considerations
  3. Offers a snapshot of what’s special—and what’s problematic—about each vendor

Thing #3 often includes some mild gossip (“customer references say XX is not very YY”), so the report makes for fairly interesting reading if you have the time and curiosity.   If not—or in the meantime—here are some highlights:

Gartner defines e-recruitment software as systems that “help to automate the requisition-to-hire process,” and characterizes this market space as “made up of recruitment specialists, ERP/human resource management system (HRMS) vendors and talent management suite vendors.”

According to Gartner, most customers responding to their survey (about 200, widely varied in size and industry) had “the basics” in place, and it appears that such fundamentals as requisitioning, candidate self-service, job board posting and applicant tracking are fairly similar among various vendor offerings.  The report goes on to describe several differentiators among the products included in the Quadrant:

  • Onboarding. Though “most vendors offer some sort of solution,” Gartner says there are significant functional differences, and niche providers are growing fast in this area.
  • Social Software. Amazingly enough, 22% of respondents say they are using social-software functionality from their e-recruitment vendor–but 34% report no plans to use social software. Here again, niche players are strong.
  • Interview Management. A difficult functionality area, according to Gartner, with some offerings significantly better than others.
  • Assessments. An important area for hourly hiring, with some providers excelling significantly over others.
  • Workforce Planning. Worth quoting:  “Understanding what demand will emerge for new hires, especially for critical roles in the organization, so that recruiters can proactively build talent pools, is the essence of workforce planning. However, only 16% of organizations have implemented it, and more than 50% had no plans to do so.”

Those differentiators were identified by survey respondents.  Gartner adds a few emerging areas:

  • Flexibility of Data and Workflow. Apparently . . .  much difference in degrees of flexibility regarding data captured in a requisition and on a candidate/applicant record.  “Some vendors require consultancies to modify workflows, others are more flexible.”
  • User Experience. Hmmmm.  “Improving the hiring manager and candidate user experience is key to addressing many challenges.”  Gartner says social software is “starting” to have an effect on this area” (I’d say that’s a bit behind the curve!) and that many vendors have “renewed or redesigned their user experiences to take advantage of advances in user interface technologies.”
  • Multinational Support. My note:  This is a complicated and increasingly important area of functionality that hasn’t yet received sufficient attention.  Gartner says: “Although many vendors offer several languages and flexible tools, few vendors provide out-of-the-box localization for multiple countries.”
  • Reporting/Analytics. Metrics for time to hire and cost per hire are standard, but some products also offer more sophisticated sourcing data.  There’s a growing focus on the quality of hire as well.  Gartner notes that some vendors build their own solutions, others rely on BI vendors.

Looks like I’m hardly even halfway through the report, so this post is Part 1!