Singing Pringles Usher in the Holidays

What could be more appropriate for the holidays than singing Pringles? You might have ideas of your own, but if you’re Procter and Gamble the answer is, “Nothing.”

Yesterday Ad Age reported on the Pringles Christmas contest P&G held in the UK. They started out looking for a new jingle. They liked this video so much they declared it the winner and will air it on Christmas Day. Here it is; it’s season-appropriate and perfectly charming. The page has other finalists as is common in these contests.Enjoy the video here.

I agree with the comment on AdAge.com—why not play it in the US as well as the UK? I don’t know if that has to do with the non-standard length—40 seconds—or with the cult-like popularity of Pringles with young Europeans. Whatever the reason, it is an engaging way to sign off for a few days of family fun and fellowship.
Best Holiday Wishes to All!
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Where Are The Viewers Going?

Yesterday the AlwaysOn newsletter published a video interview with Tina Brown. As the former editor of Vanity Fair and the New Yorker, she is a respected observer of the media scene. Admittedly “a print junkie,” she has scathing things to say about network news and interesting observations about online news, current and future.
View the video here.

The video led me to Beet.TV, which seems best described as a channel of BlipTV, the video hosting service. BeetTV focuses on media, so it’s a site marketers might keep an eye on.

It also led me back into my files to review some of the data on how consumers are using their media time. The data from eMarketer is about what most of us would expect, except possibly the continued gains of television (overall) in terms of viewing time. Other viewers seem to feel like Tina Brown does, though; network TV is not faring well. The chart from Forrester may help explain why. As the Boomers age and retire, they are watching more TV. That’s not true of younger age cohorts, as we know.













They are watching video and a Harris study quoted today in Marketing Charts gives data on what and where they are watching it. In an article entitled “Viewers Want More TV Episodes and Movies Online,” they summarize key findings:

•Online video viewership has increased overall in the past year (81% versus 74%).
•YouTube’s viewers have increased the most: Nearly two-thirds (65%) of US online adults say they have watched a video there, compared with 42% at the same time last year; the greatest gains were among those over age 25.

Viewers over 25 are discovering YouTube; wonder how far that will go. But if anyone doubts this is an ongoing trend, these data should put that to rest. The only real question is how to incorporate these trends into your media buy and your branding plans.

Think consumer behavior. Think consumer engagement. Then proceed to find out what consumers want to hear from you. Marketing research that follows in the tracks of the Harris study would be worthwhile. Interactive experiments are likely to be even more effective. Your website, newsletters, and blogs can all allow you to track individual pieces of content—how often they are accessed, where viewers go/what actions they take subsequent to viewing your content. Let your customers tell you what they want!
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Widgets Go Mainstream

Widgets are all over our desktops and the websites we visit. You may have downloaded a local weather service for your home page, an icon that offers news about your favorite sports team, or you may have reached this blog by an RSS feed. These are all icons of one sort or another that provide access to content or other Internet functionality with a single click.

A well-known one is the Southwest Airlines Ding widget that provides reduced-fare alerts. It is credited with over $150 million in ticket revenue in about 2 years of operation. Their widget program is ongoing. If you look at Southwest’s Travel Tools, they have a new Wireless Alert for your mobile phone using the standard RSS icon.
With all this going on it’s no surprise that Widget platform Clearspring has just announced an advertising network for widgets. Here’s some background on the subject:
•In June comScore announced a metrics service for widgets. In April 2007 they said that widgets reached almost 178 million people worldwide.
•For a good, quick video explaining how ad networks work, see “The Evolution of Ad Networks.”
•Clearspring helps users develop widgets. Widgetbox is one of the many free platforms for DIY widgets. All the large portals have them also. I pointed out earlier that even I could develop one using Google’s freestyle widget template.

Widgets offer exciting possibilities but before you dash off in all directions, this is a good time to study Google’s Open Social platform. It’s stated purpose is to make it easier to share what they call “social gadgets” between social applications. Some of the larger ones like MySpace and LinkedIn are already part of the network.

Do you need to deploy anything from content to marketing offers to people who are willing to hear from you? Think widgets!
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Consumer Reviews Are Positive

Not long ago I wrote a post for the eBrandMarketing blog urging marketers to encourage consumer ratings of their products. Data keeps rolling in that shows the power of this user-generated content in the consumer decision process. Not only do consumers use peer reviews; those who do spend more money. According to eMarketer:

Some 27% of the respondents who read customer reviews reported average spending between 5% and 10% higher than those who did not read them. Another 21% of review readers reported average spending between 1% and 5% higher than that of non-readers. Nearly 7% of respondents who said they read customer reviews reported average spending 20% higher than other online shoppers. (Newsletter, December 4, 2007)

Wow!

A few days ago eMarketer reported on a study that should reduce—if not eliminate—manager’s worst fears. They worry that customers will say negative things. While I can, and do, argue that negatives should be heard (and acted on!), that’s another issue. This data comes from BaazarVoice, a company that helps retailers with social media applications. They analyzed their data for a single month, and found most reviews positive. If this was a five-point scale, 36% were “Always” and 51% were “Most of the Time.” That’s 87% in the top 2 boxes. That’s amazing! That’s huge! The main reason for writing the reviews (90%) was to help other customers.
That’s nice of them, but, given this data, it would behoove retailers to be proactive about reviews. I referenced ShopNBC in the earlier post. Amazon recently asked me to review purchases, see the email above. Since these are automated messages, it doesn’t cost the retailers much, and the results may be significant!
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Does the Marketing World Need a Blog Council?

Once again I owe one of my students, Amy Yen, a vote of thanks for turning up an important new web activity. A group of corporate leaders has formed The Blog Council, “dedicated to promoting best practices in corporate blogging” under the leadership of Andy Sternovitz, CEO of WOM consultancy GasPedal. The founding members are a roster of leading corporate names, many of which are already well known for the success of their blogging efforts.

With a blog that’s dedicated to exploring marketing applications of social media, in which I’ve written about blog transparency, I couldn’t be more pleased to know there’s a best practices group. I’m fortunate to contribute to a major corporate vertical blog, eBrandMarketing, while I interact with smaller businesses and non-profit organizations. In a nutshell, large corporations need a way to engage with their customers. Smaller businesses and non-profits need a way to get their message out in an environment where mass media are expensive and increasingly ineffective.

However, we all know there’s a tremendous amount of hesitance to “join the conversation”— with thanks to Joseph Jaffe whose phrase (and book) I find to perfectly capture the spirit. I don’t think it’s any more true of large or small organizations. All are wary. Many have spent years building their businesses and brands and are reluctant to open them up to new media. It’s a scary world they don’t know much about. The smaller ones and the non-profits, however, have fewer resources to devote to learning about it and in some ways they need the access even more.

So I wish the new Blog Council well. In creating an environment where they can openly and freely discuss best practices, I hope they’ll also consider how to share their expertise with a broad set of marketers who need guidance even though some of them don’t even know it yet.
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