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Archives for 2012

More on Mandatory CSR in the EU

Back in January I wrote about how I believed mandatory CSR reporting was going to come into the EU’s regulatory frame work under the auspices of the Single Market Act (SMA), which is on schedule for adoption by the end of this year.

In brief, the EU has said it by 2014 it will provide a “legislative proposal on the transparency of the social and environmental information provided by businesses” which apply to large companies, such as those with over 1,000 employees.  Read New CSR Regulation Coming Your Way for more details.

Now, it may have skipped your notice but this month saw the 20th anniversary of the EU’s Single Market (the Maastricht Treaty, when the EEC became the EC).  To celebrate it the EU launched a debate entitled “Europe, Wake Up!  We will only return to growth and prosperity if we complete the the Single Market”, including this video and this Google hangout.

In the best tradition of Hollywood slasher/romcom/fantasy flicks (delete as appropriate) it also launched SMA The Sequel, more properly known as the Single Market Act II.

This addresses several key areas for which the European Commission considers to be priorities for rapid adoption to try and stimulate the EU out of the current economic crisis.  Proposals in these areas will be put forward in 2012-14.

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BP to Launch Ads to Boost Positive Brand Sentiment

bp oil truckIt’s been nearly three years since the catastrophic April 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico occurred, but for the company behind the tragic events, BP, negative brand sentiment is still rampant.

Despite agreeing to a $4.5 billion settlement, the highest fine in United States history, consumers still aren’t willing to forgive the company and brand that was responsible for spilling millions of barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico, which killed 11 people and far more wildlife.

Within a few weeks of the April 2010 oil spill, research reports from various companies and organizations revealed just how far the BP brand image had been tarnished by the events.  According to a USA Today/Gallup poll at the time, 34% of the respondents rated BP’s response to the spill as “poor” and 39% rated it as “very poor.”  Only 6% rated BP’s response as “very good,” and 18% rated it “good.”

In June 2010, YouGov and The Economist conducted a separate survey. When respondents were asked whether or not they trusted BP to “do the right thing in stopping the oil spill and cleaning it up” the results showed that negative sentiment was still the predominant feeling that consumers felt towards the BP brand.:

  • 27% had no trust in BP at all.
  • 24%dvery little trust in BP.
  • 24% had only some trust in BP.
  • 13% had quite a bit of trust in BP.
  • 6% had a great deal of trust in BP.

Results from an August 2010 poll conducted by GfK Roper Public Affairs & Corporate Communications revealed that 66% of respondents disapproved (40% disapproved “strongly”), “of the way BP was handling the oil spill that was caused by the rig it was operating in the Gulf of Mexico.”  That was down from the 83% who disapproved in a June 2010 poll, but it was still far from giving BP any peace of mind that the oil spill was behind them yet even though oil was no longer gushing into the Gulf of Mexico.

Fast forward to 2012, and BP launched its first television advertising in the United Kingdom since the Gulf of Mexico oil spill of 2010 when it rolled out a campaign to promote its sponsorship of the 2012 Olympic Games in London. Now, BP plans to expand its strategy of hyping its efforts to “do good” through a new advertising push with a goal to boost positive brand sentiment.

According to Marketing Magazine, BP will launch new television, print, and online advertising to “make people feel more positive” about BP by focusing on the company’s cultural sponsorships, which include partnerships with the Royal Opera House and British Museum.

Will it work? This effort will require a very sensitive tone, but when the campaign launches in March 2013, nearly three years will have passed since the tragedy that damaged the BP brand occurred. It’s certainly time for the brand to make a strategic effort to revitalize its image. Brand sentiment for the BP brand won’t change unless the company finds a way to regain some sense of trust with consumers, and that won’t happen unless the company gives them a reason to trust the brand again. Will ads hyping feel-good partnerships do the trick? It’s  a start. Hopefully, there will be more to come from the effort after the March 2013 roll-out.

What do you think?

Image: Graham Richardson

Media: Open to Bloggers

A tiny point with a big impact: the Vodafone dropdown menu for Media refers to ‘media and blogger contacts’ – very unusual.

We like this because it demonstrates that the company is open to bloggers communicating with them (some companies don’t see bloggers as part of the media pack – telecoms companies often do).

Vodafone

Mind mapping website data

Sometimes the simplest things in life are so darned simple it’s like running full tilt into a brick wall.

Take data presentation for example.

In the brave new world of data journalism, I spend much of my life digging around in corporate websites trying to put together facts and figures.  Usually I don’t care about the surrounding story: just nice articulated figures.

Like carbon emissions: how many plants does a manufacturer have and what are their respective emissions?  Or, supposing I was into IR, what are the business’ product lines and their respective turnover and net profit?

It’s not that the figures are hidden or even deliberately obscured.  It’s just that getting hold of them quickly and easily is like throwing yourself at the ground and expecting to miss: impossible.

Then I stumbled upon a site which made it all so wonderfully simple using one of the simplest of tools around: mindmaps.

[Read more…] about Mind mapping website data

CorpGov: Contact The Board

In common with a very few other companies, ExxonMobil provide a way of contacting the independent directors via a dedicated page, which is clearly identifiable via the navigation.

Note that there are dropdowns for the visitor to select from, when completing the form: one for areas of interest, and the other is for the named person, or committee, that the visitor would like to contact.

We like this because it makes it easier to raise a concern, and easier to communicate with the board. While we’re sure that emails from the site to the generic Contact Us links would eventually find the appropriate destination, this makes the visitor feel that their concerns would be highlighted directly to the Board.

We are particularly impressed that this includes named individuals, though we do note that this is yet another page to be maintained when the Board constituents change.

ExxonMobil

4 Ways Brands Can Use Big Data to Optimize Marketing Results

Big data is the big thing these days, and companies are actively looking for ways to make sense of large scale information assets in order to affordably process that data, gain insights from it, and use it for effective decision-making. Considering that 5 exabytes of data is generated online every two days, harnessing the power of big data is a big task.

Taking a closer look, it’s clear that big data is growing at an increasingly fast rate:

  • 100 terabytes of data are uploaded daily.
  • 294 billion emails are sent every day.
  • 234 million tweets are published on Twitter every day.
  • 4.8 trillion online ad impressions were served during 2011.
  • 2.7 zettabytes of data exist in the digital universe.
  • 60% growth occurs in structured and unstructured data annually.
  • 35 zettabytes of data will be generated annually by 2020.

Companies can view this astounding growth in one of two ways — as a big problem or as a big opportunity. IBM is just one of the companies that sees big data as a big opportunity. IBM offers enterprise technology and support to help companies use big data to optimize brand marketing performance and their bottom-lines.

According to IBM, there are four specific ways that big data can be used:

1. Audience Optimization

Big data can be used to identify high potential audiences and accurately target them. For example, Epsilon increased retention and revenues by 20% using the IBM Netezza data warehouse appliance to simplify advanced analytics on massive data volumes.

2. Content Optimization

Big data can be used to enable the right message at the right time via the right content targeting. For example, Kelley Blue Book improved conversion rates and reduced model processing time from three days to one day (a reduction of 48 hours) using IBM’s Netezza data warehouse appliance to personalize content.

3. Yield Optimization

Big data can be used to maximize ad inventory by identifying high-value audiences across publisher properties. For example, MediaMath increased its delivery output by 10-times while cutting necessary manpower in half and displayed 13 million ad impressions per day using the IBM Netezza data warehouse appliance.

4. Channel Optimization

Big data can be used to optimize ad media purchase by understanding the value of channels higher up in the funnel. For example, Merkle reduced end-to-end run time for marketing campaign execution using IBM Netezza advanced analytics software.

IBM shares many these statistics about big data and more in its The Big Data Flood infographic, which you can see below. Click the image to view it at full size.

big data infographic

Is your company leveraging big data to improve brand marketing performance yet? Leave a comment and share your thoughts.