Tag-Archive for » Public relations «

22
Mar
Social Media is still Media
Jeannie Chan

Marketers like to talk about social media as a marketing platform. How can we get the message out? How can we control the message? How can we leverage this? Well, here’s the thing. The thing about social media is that it is in fact a media venue. (I heard about the health care reform on social media channels before I caught it on traditional news channels.)

Recently, I learned an equation from Michael Levine’s book, A Branded World: Adventures in Public Relations and the Creation of Superbrands. Branding = marketing + advertising + public relations.

Branding is the all encompassing effort of building a brand. It starts with marketing. Marketing defines the strategy. Marketing defines the 4Ps. Marketing defines the positioning.

Marketing’s plan gets translated into words and visuals through advertising.

Public relations builds on the advertising campaign and turns marketing’s plan into actions. Such actions include gathering media attention.

In that case, social media really falls into the realm of public relations. You build a relationship with bloggers the same way you build a relationship with traditional journalists. You “control” the message the same way – truthfully, honestly, and organically. It’s the same idea as controlling the press. Today, in addition to asking the question “What would the press say?”, we need to also ask “What would the world say?”

The world may be changing, but the basics still hold.

Photo credit: Scott Beale / Laughing Squid

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11
Oct
Money vs Time
Jeannie Chan

This week I learned that the more money you have, the less time you have to spend on any particular tasks. You could hire someone to do it for you.

However, if you don’t have the money, you’d have to spend more time.

This is the equation that any marketer must understand. You don’t need to have a lot of money to have a successful campaign. However, the smaller your budget, the harder each dollar must work, the more creative you’d have to be, the more work you’d have to do yourself. The larger the budget, the more crazy stuffs you could try, the more you could have someone else do the work for you.

However, a small budget shouldn’t limit the success of your marketing campaign.

What’s sad is that this formula, that’s so obvious with small businesses, is sometimes forgotten by big companies.

This is the new economy. This is the new reality. This is a new year. This is the new budget. Everyone of us needs to learn to do more with less.

Photo Credit: funny money, originally uploaded by Material Boy.

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04
Oct
Failed Starbucks Via Challenge
Jeannie Chan

Today I took the Starbucks Via challenge… and I was disappointed.

First of all, I could tell the difference. I didn’t know which was which, but I could tell the difference… and I did not like Via. The regular brew had a cleaner taste. So, the challenge did not sway me to buy Via.

However, I learned something about Via… it could be instantly dissolved in cold water, or cold milk! Imagine the possibility in the summer! But, wait… it’s only 50 degrees out… I don’t need a cold coffee… So, that’s an irrelevant message to me. However, I believe that Starbucks would launch a cold Via campaign in the summer. But of course, the problem would be how to differentiate this against the Starbucks’ bottled Frappacino.

Toward the end of the demonstration, I learned something even more exciting about Via. I learned that Starbucks designed the most nifty travel mug for Via. It is a regular travel mug, with a twist off cap that allows easy storage of the Via packages. Now, why isn’t this the focus of the campaign?

I understand that Starbucks is about taste, but Via is about the on-the-go lifestyle Americans have. In addition, a quick survey online would reveal that many could taste the difference between Via and the fresh brew. I am not alone in this. So, by solely focusing on taste, Via’s campaign is missing the opportunity to truly address what the product brings to the consumers’ life. Via’s branding should not be built on taste, something people already expect from a Starbucks product. Of course, people would wonder if Via could deliver on taste, but it isn’t a problem, unless Via really couldn’t deliver… People would not buy Via because of taste. They buy Via because it’s convenient! They buy Via because they wouldn’t have to make a coffee stop. They buy Via because they wouldn’t have to wait in line for a coffee. They buy Via because they could save two minutes in the morning!

Now, let me also give you the context of how this demonstration went. The barista was very diligent in focusing on the taste message. However, being a coffee addict and a marketer, I was particularly interested about this product launch. So, I stuck around and chatted with the Barista a little. It was after I was given the coupon, and the other couple that was also at that particular demonstration had left, that I learned about the cold brewing and the travel mug. Now, imagine how many people never knew about those two really cool facts about Via. How much potential sale lost…

Photo credit: Starbucks Via travel mug, originally uploaded by mhaithaca.

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