Corporate Eye

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Susan Gunelius

Susan Gunelius

5 Corporate Brands that Know How to Merchandise

Branded merchandise is very popular within the entertainment industry.  Consumers love to wear T-shirts featuring images of their favorite bands or characters from popular movies.  However, merchandising isn’t limited to Twilight dolls and Harry Potter wands.  There are actually many corporate brands that make a nice amount of money each year by selling products with their corporate logos on them.

Check out the list below to learn about five companies that have found success in selling corporate branded merchandise:

1. Harley Davidson

The Harley Davidson brand represents freedom, rebellion, and a lifestyle that consumers want.  It makes sense that the Harley Davidson logo and related-imagery and messages would be popular on T-shirts, jackets, hats, jewelry, and just about anything else you can imagine.  In fact, popular automotive brands that have clear brand promises often find success in merchandising.  Brands like NASCAR, Ford Mustang, and more are examples of an industry whose consumer audience has demonstrated its interest in purchasing branded merchandise.

2. Playboy

Like Harley Davidson, the Playboy brand represents a lifestyle, but in this case, it’s a lifestyle that promises good things and good times.  Interestingly, the vast majority of Playboy merchandise is purchased by women, showing that the Playboy brand appeals to a diverse audience who choose to experience the brand in very different ways.  Today, merchandise sales make up a significant percentage of Playboy Enterprises’ annual profits.  You can learn more about the Playboy brand in my book, Building Brand Value the Playboy Way.

3. Walt Disney

While most people think of Mickey Mouse toys, Cinderella dresses, and Finding Nemo pajamas when they think about Disney merchandising, the Disney company also offers a wide variety of merchandise that features the corporate brand logo or imagery.  Consumers around the world have demonstrated that they’re happy to buy all kinds of products bearing the Disney logo.  In fact, the Disney Company is amazing at finding every opportunity to exploit not just its corporate brand merchandising opportunities but all of its sub-brands as well.

4. John Deere

Who would have thought that a company that makes lawn mowers and farm equipment would also find success selling merchandise with the John Deere logo on them?  Even celebrities have been photographed showing their love of John Deere while wearing Deere-branded merchandise like hats and T-shirts.  However, in an effort to expand the John Deere brand to a younger audience, the company also makes John Deere tractor and equipment toys as well as John Deere branded merchandise like the kids’ party favors pack shown to the left.

5. Coca-Cola

Coca-Cola merchandise has been around for a long time, and today, a lot of Coca-Cola branded merchandise items are considered to be collectibles.  You can find clothing, clocks, signs, furniture, toys, holiday decorations, ornaments, and more with the Coca-Cola logo on them, and consumers pay for these items and proudly display them all the time.  Coca-Cola sells its branded merchandise and offers it as part of the Coke Rewards program as well.

When consumers purchase, wear or display corporate-branded merchandise, they’re demonstrating their brand loyalty and advocacy.  It’s a brand manager’s dream come true!

Social Media and Purchase Decisions — Take Survey Results with a Grain of Salt

It seems like every month a new report comes out from another company that surveyed a group of Internet users to learn how they’re affected by social media conversations when it comes to brand perceptions and purchase decisions.  The trend for the past year or more has been survey results that tell us people are very influenced by social media conversations, reviews, and so on when they research products and services online and ultimately make purchase decisions.  However, a new poll conducted in April 2010 by Harris Poll paints a different picture (via BrandWeek).

According to the new study by Harris Poll, we’re given the following data:

  • 34% of adults who use social media have used social media tools “as an outlet to rant or rave about a company, brand or product.”
  • 26% of those adults use social media to share their dissatisfaction with a company, brand or product.
  • 23% of those adults use social media to share their their feelings about the companies, brands and products they like.

The Harris Poll also sheds light on how different demographic segments are influenced when it comes to making purchase decisions by social media conversations:

  • 50% of 18-34 year olds are influenced by opinions published through social media.
  • 37% of people age 55 and over admit that reviews from people they follow on social media sites affect their interactions with companies, brands and products.

Another piece of the Harris Poll results tells us how much consumers are affected by various media messages:

  • 71% of respondents say that they are influenced by “reviews from family members or friends.”
  • 46% of respondents say that they are influenced by “reviews in newspapers and magazine articles.”
  • 45% of respondents say that they are influenced by “reviews from friends or people I follow on social networking sites.”
  • 33% of respondents say that they are influenced by “reviews on blogs or message boards.”

So what does this tell us?

There is still no reliable data about how people are influenced by social media conversations vs. traditional media.  Survey results are inconsistent.  However, it is clear that social media conversations are important, and the Harris Poll study supports that theory not only in the statistics shown above but also in the response to a specific question — 38% (more than 1 in 3) people who participated in the survey said that they “aim to influence others when I express my preferences online.” This tells us that people like to feel important and influential, and the social Web empowers them to exert their influence to a wide audience irrespective of whether or not they actually have success influencing others.

The key learnings for brand managers and marketers are two-fold:

  1. People pay attention to, listen to, and react to social media conversations.
  2. People like to influence others with their social media conversations.

Bottom-line, if you’re not working to find your brand’s loyal group of online influencers and brand advocates and giving them reasons to talk about you, then you’re missing a big opportunity that shows no signs of stopping.

Huge Growth Coming for B2B Social Media Marketing Spending

keyboard_computer_internetAccording to reports by Outsell and Forrester Research, social media marketing spending by business-to-business companies is expected to grow by 43.3% in 2010 and will hit $54 million in 2014 (up from $11 million in 2009).

Is your company ready for what’s being called the business-to-business social media marketing explosion?

Business-to-business companies are shifting marketing budget dollars to social media and online marketing quickly in order to leverage the opportunities the social Web presents, even though according to a November 2009 survey by Business.com (reported by eMarketer), 73% of business-to-business marketers who were using social media had less than two years of social media marketing experience.  That’s nearly 3 out of 4 people who really don’t know what they’re doing, but they’ll be getting more money to keep doing it.

Following is the breakdown of the change in social media marketing spending for several popular initiatives among business-to-business marketers in 2010:

  • Spending on social networking sites: up 43.3%
  • Spending on webinars: up 26.0%
  • Spending on search engines: up 17.1%
  • Spending on company Web sites: up 7.5%

I should point out that I’d argue that spending on search engines and company Web sites doesn’t necessarily equate to social media marketing spending in my book, so take that into consideration when you look at the results above.

Business-to-business social media marketing might happen on different branded destinations than business-to-consumer marketing and the type of shareworthy content a company publishes is certainly different, but the underlying principles and strategies of social media marketing still apply regardless of what you’re selling and to whom.  Just as with traditional marketing, you have to modify your placement and messages to match your audience.  In other words, you need to find your target audience online, and start and join the conversations that matter to them.  Until you take that step, your social media marketing investments can only take you so far.

Should business-to-business companies increase their social media marketing spending sooner rather than later?  Absolutely.  Why?  Because their clients and customers are spending time on the social Web.  Would you ignore those people if they were standing in front of you ready to engage in conversations that interest them?  No.  Then why would you ignore them on the social Web? Get out there, find your audience, and start interacting with them!

Image: stock.xchng

Luxury Brand Gimmicks – Do They Really Work?

Luxury brands commonly use gimmicks to give their brands a little something extra that the commoner brands simply can’t compete with. Often these gimmicks are completely unnecessary and don’t add any real benefit at all, but they do appeal to emotional triggers that the luxury brand customer responds to.

Infiniti recently launched an ad campaign for the 2011 Infiniti M that is filled with luxury brand gimmicks.  Do you want a car with an air conditioning system that mimics the gentle breezes of a rain forest?  How about a wood-grain dashboard sprinkled with silver dust?  You can get both in the new 2011 Infiniti M.

Unfortunately, the pixie dust version that enables your car to fly is not yet available, although that would actually be useful, unlike the silver dust.  Alternately, you could buy a bottle of Goldschlager and pour it over your dashboard to infuse it with real gold flecks.  But I digress.

Check out the commercial for the 2011 Infiniti M below to see for yourself.


So back to my original question — do gimmicks in luxury brand messages really work.  Do they really motivate consumers with high discretionary incomes to choose one brand over another?

It would seem that the answer is yes, when those gimmicks target those emotional triggers related to being a leader, keeping up with (or staying ahead of) the Joneses, and so on.  Most of these gimmicks are fairly short-lived though, and brand managers have to come up with new ones fairly frequently to keep the attention and interest of the luxury brand consumer.  It’s an interesting difference from non-luxury branding.

What do you think?  Do gimmicks truly work in luxury branding or have they become laughable to not just the masses but also the target audience they’re trying to appeal to? Leave a comment and share your opinion.

Brand Messages Affect Just 1 in 10 Purchase Decisions

laptop_web_searchA new study from Alterian (via eMarketer) reveals some statistics that are actually not all that surprising if you’ve been following my posts here on Corporate Eye for the last year or so.

According to the survey, only 1% of respondents (made up of Internet users from the United States and the United Kingdom) never compare products and services before making a purchase.  The results of the survey were as follows:

  • 51% always compare products and services before making a purchase
  • 44% sometimes compare products and services before making a purchase
  • 4% rarely compare products and services before making a purchase
  • 1% never compare products and services before making a purchase.

And of those people surveyed, 71% said they look for as many sources to find information as possible to ensure the information they find is accurate.

However, the above findings are not the most interesting from the Alterian study.  The far more interesting information comes from responses to who respondents are most likely to trust for advice when researching a product or service.  In answer to that question, only 13% said they trusted what a company says about itself or advertising or promotional features.  The results of the survey were as follows:

  • 40% trust friends and family
  • 28% trust professional reviews on Web sites, newspapers or magazines
  • 19% trust reviews from people “like you” on Web sites
  • 8% trust what the company says about itself
  • 5% trust advertising or promotional features

This is not the first time these type of research revealed similar findings.  Back in 2007, I remember writing a piece about research conducted at that time that showed consumers trusted advertisers and companies less than they trusted friends, family members, and even complete strangers who wrote about products and services online.

In other words, the findings from this survey are not new, but they certainly do add to the growing pile of evidence that supports shifting marketing budgetary investments away from traditional advertising and toward new media conversations.

What do you think?  Has your company made the budget shift to actually gain favor with consumers where their eyes, ears and trust are?

Image: stock.xchng

Online Display Advertising is Growing but No Single Brand Dominates

internet__browserAccording to comScore, display advertising is making a big comeback since the economic downturn in 2009.  During the first quarter of 2010, the U.S. Internet audience received over 1 trillion display ads (up 15% from the same period in 2009).

Facebook and Yahoo! served the most display ads to the U.S. Internet audience during the first quarter of 2010 as shown below:

  • Facebook.com = 16.2%
  • Yahoo! Sites = 12.1%
  • Microsoft Sites = 5.5%
  • Fox Interactive Media = 4.9%
  • AOL LLC = 2.9%
  • Google Sites = 2.4%
  • Turner Network = 1.4%
  • Glam Media = 0.7%
  • eBay = 0.7%
  • Tagged.com = 0.6%

The story is a bit different, however, in terms of companies that pay for those display ads with no single company or brand leading the way.  According to comScore, the share of first quarter 2010 display advertising impressions was spread across a large number of companies and brands as you can see from the list of the top 10 display advertisers by number of impressions to the U.S. Internet audience during the first quarter of 2010 shown below:

  • AT&T = 2.4%
  • Verizon Communications – 2.1%
  • Scottrade, Inc. = 1.5%
  • Experian Interactive = 1.4%
  • Sprint Nextel Corporation = 0.9%
  • Netflix, Inc. = 0.9%
  • eBay, Inc. = 0.9%
  • Intuit Inc. = 0.8%
  • Privacy Matters 1-2-3 = 0.8%
  • IAC – InterActiveCorp = 0.8%
  • Everyone else = 87.5%

Online display advertising is fair game for any company or brand.  The fact that does stand out from comScore’s findings is that the mobile communications carrier category is represented three times in the top 10 list of display advertisers by brand impressions (AT&T, Verizon Communications, and Sprint Nextel Corporation).

Another finding that’s not particularly surprising is Intuit’s place on this list.  Given that the first quarter of the year in the United States also marks tax season, it’s not surprising that companies like Intuit (a tax software provider) is included in the top 10 list above.  The vast majority of Intuit’s advertising budget is probably spent during the first quarter of the year.

I’d love to see a trend chart using this data over the course of a year or longer.  What do you think?  Any surprises in this list?  Were you surprised to learn that there isn’t a dominant player (or players) when it comes to number of display ad impressions?

Image: stock.xchang