Corporate Eye

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Susan Gunelius

Susan Gunelius

Innovative Branding Through Facebook

I found a great article on Trendhunter today that lists 40 Facebook innovations.  Interestingly, many of the innovations are brand promotions from companies such as Coca-Cola, Adidas, Mazda and more.   It just goes to show that the social web should be an integral part of your marketing plan if you want to stay ahead of the curve.

A few brand-related Facebook innovations jumped out as particularly inspiring for future social media marketing campaign planning:

  1. CokeTag: Coca-Cola launched the CokeTag on Facebook that people can use to promote themselves.
  2. Mazda Design Challenge: Facebook users were invited to design a new concept car for Mazda.
  3. Adidas Celebrate Originality brand campaign: This campaign was supported by YouTube and Facebook videos and content.
  4. Mars Snackfood: Using the Facebook Celebrate application, people can give each other virtual gifts like candy bars.  If they give a Mars candy bar, the recipient gets a virtual gift and a coupon for the real thing.
  5. Clinique, Harley Davidson and more use free gifts as ads: When a user sends a virtual gift of a product with your brand name on it, your brand gets a nice bit of advertising!
  6. PETA2: Peta launched a special Facebook group for youth activists.

The possibilities for brands to leverage the social web, including social networking sites such as Facebook, are incredible.  Is your brand on board yet?  Don’t get left behind!

Image: Flickr

Brands Get Noticed with Microsoft Live Search Cashback Program

In a weak economy, consumers are looking for deals.  There are many websites dedicated to providing coupon and discount codes to frugal shoppers, but did you know Microsoft Live Search jumped on the discount bandwagon earlier this year with the Microsoft Live Search cashback program?

The initial purpose of the Microsoft Live Search cashback program was to boost Microsoft’s position in the online search market as well as to make some extra money for Microsoft.  While it’s unknown if Microsoft has reached either of those goals, new data released by Microsoft does show that the Microsoft Live Search cashback program certainly helps advertisers give their brands a boost at a time when consumers want to save money and retail sales are down industry-wide.

According to The Register, eBay has increased its paid search ROI by 50% using the Microsoft Live Search cashback program and ShoeMall.com has seen an increase of 6-times its previous ROI.  Microsoft Live Search claims that 4.5 million consumers use Microsoft Live Search to conduct over 68 million product or brand searches each month.  That’s a lot of targeted exposure for an ad!

Microsoft also claims (via their own study with comScore in 2008) that, “Live Search referred almost 12% of all U.S. commercial online transactions and about 13% of all U.S. online spending among key retail categories in the second quarter.” 

No one knows how accurate that claim is since Microsoft spearheaded the comScore research, but cashback search does seem like a viable brand marketing option that can easily be incorporated into a brand marketing plan.  What do you think?

Image: Flickr

Ad Testing Via New Facebook Application

The Ad Battle application for Facebook is a new app that’s getting a lot of buzz lately.  The Ad Battle app was created by Buddy Media and Jason Culbertson of Atmosphere BBDO.  It’s been compared to the popular Hot or Not website by Advertising Age, and it gives Facebook members the ability to compare two randomly displayed ads then vote on which one they think is better.  Once a person votes, the voting results to date are displayed to see if he or she voted with the majority or not, and then that person can move on and vote on the next pair of ads.  Users can also upload their own ads to add to the voting mix.

Albeit, Ad Battle is far from an exact science, and most users at this early stage are ad industry insiders, but the potential is huge.  The basic concept could be applied in so many ways to create a social web buzz, to test ad concepts, to rate ad performance, and more.  [Read more…] about Ad Testing Via New Facebook Application

Invest in Bags – Not Ads

If you rely on new data from a study by Advertising Specialty Institute that was released this week, then you’ll shift much of your advertising budget into promotional items like bags, coffee cups and magnets. 

According to the study which surveyed 600 consumers (primarily businesspeople), promotional items are better at getting the attention of consumers and doing so at a lower cost-per-impression of just $0.004 on average vs. $0.33 for national magazine ads and $0.019 for prime time television ads.

Following are some of the survey findings (via Brandweek): [Read more…] about Invest in Bags – Not Ads

Generation Y Weighs in on Green Brands

Two buzz topics – Gen Y and green brands.  Put them together and you get an interesting list of brands that the sought after 20-something audience likes and thinks are actually making positive efforts to help the environment.

In a study conducted by Outlaw Consulting, 100 Gen Yers living in New York, Los Angeles, San Fransisco and Miami were surveyed and asked which brands were their favorite “green brands” and why.  The results showed the following:

[Read more…] about Generation Y Weighs in on Green Brands

Even Category Leaders are at Risk in a Weak Economy

Over a year ago, I wrote a post on a blog about branding that I used to write where I pointed out that Toyota might be the automotive category leader, but based on my experience at the time with a local dealership, Toyota was also quite arrogant about that position in the marketplace.  In that post, I suggested that Toyota should rethink its brand strategy to remain in the leadership position in the long-term, because no matter how great a product is, consumers won’t stick with it if they don’t feel valued by the faces of that brand.

So today, I read an article on BusinessWeek.com that talks about Toyota’s tumbling profits.  It seems even the arrogant, untouchable category leader is at risk in a weakened economy.  The question is, will Toyota change its brand strategy from one of arrogance as in, “we’re doing customers a favor by letting them buy our cars,”  or will the typical road of finding places to cut costs and reduce value to both employees and consumers be followed?  I think we can assume the latter will be the likely path taken by Toyota, but of course, that remains to be seen. [Read more…] about Even Category Leaders are at Risk in a Weak Economy