Consumers are in charge of your brand

Some sage advice from Martin Lindstrom on how deal with the new reality.

The evolution of computer games

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The future of TV

The BBC have just released a special report on the future of TV. Well worth a dig around.

Customer Engagement

E-consultancy have just pulished their Customer Engagement Report, based on a survey of more than 800 companies and agencies. Some highlights...

Appetite for 'Web 2.0' technologies:

• 42% are planning to apply user-generated content (UGC) to their websites in the next 12 months; 23% are using it already.
• 35% are planning to use corporate blogs in the next 12 months; 17% are using them already.
• 33% are planning to use podcasting in the next 12 months; 18% are using it already.
• 35% are planning to use videocasting in the next 12 months; 17% are using it already.

Company respondents deem the five greatest “barriers” to delivering the best possible customer experience to be:

1. Lack of resources / time (regarded as a “great barrier” by 66% of company respondents)
2. Disconnected systems and technologies (50%)
3. Lack of skills and training (38%)
4. Lack of finances (37%)
5. Lack of regular processes and / or suitable methodology (36%)

Agencies, looking from the outside, more commonly perceive lack of boardroom buy-in and organisational culture to be serious issues...

There is more to life than brand engagement

Richard Huntington has a mild rant about brand engagement

Survey of UK Internet Trends

The CBI have just released a new survey of internet trends.

There's some really good stuff in here, both for optimists and those that wish we could bring the debate back down to earth. I've picked out a few things below, but you should print out the whole thing and see for yourself.

Consumer Internet Usage - Online Advertising
TV advertising is most noticed by 63% of [UK Internet users], newspaper advertising is most noticed by a third (34%) and online advertising is close behind (29%). Mobile advertising has yet to make an impact.

Looking specifically at online advertising, 74% agree that they only want to receive adverts for products that they are interested in. 90% agree that pop-up adverts are annoying and they ignore them, whilst three quarters (76%) agree that most email adverts go straight into their spam folder. Four in every five (80%) said that the only adverts they take interest in are those relevant to what they are searching for or doing online. One half of [UK Internet users] (52%, dropping to 40% amongst females) agreed that they are prepared to accept advertising in exchange for a service being free, with 19% disagreeing.

Consumer Internet Usage - Tools for shopping online
[UK Internet users] are most likely to use search engines when looking online for information about products and services (83%), and a large percentage also go directly to familiar retailer sites (61%). 47% look at price comparison websites, and 22% consult review sites. Other sources included online business directories (9%), online community websites (4%), media sites (4%) and blogs (1%).

80% agree that search engines are a necessary tool when looking to buy a product, whilst almost three-quarters (72%) agree that search engines help them find products and brands they haven't thought of before. A third (29%) have bought more products than originally planned due to information they obtained using a search engine. Google was the search engine chosen by 73% of Internet users.

Consumer Internet Usage - Online Purchasing
The single most popular method of purchase [amongst UK Internet users] is still simply to go into a shop (27%). However, Internet-influenced purchases are a rising trend - 18% prefer to make the purchase in a shop only once they've researched the product online. 19% prefer to go straight ahead and buy online, whilst another 13% prefer to make the online purchase once they've looked at the product in a shop.

Women are keener on the traditional shop environment (33%), and less likely to buy straightaway online (11%), as are purchasers aged 45+ (12%). More consumers who work full-time prefer to purchase online (24%), than visit a shop (23%).

The online shopping boom is being driven mainly by the twin factors of convenience (80%) and cost saving (54%). Financial factors are particularly important to 18-34 year olds, 70% of whom said that cost saving was a main motivation.

The key restraints on online shopping are the inability to try before you buy (44%), particularly amongst females (52%), and the difficulty/expense of returning goods (40%). The more familiar people are with the Internet the more likely they are to trust it, and 39% of respondents as a whole said there was nothing in particular holding them back from making further online purchases.

Consumer Internet Usage - Brands Online
The key factors influencing trust in an online brand [amongst UK Internet users] are timely delivery (56%), provision of clear and upfront pricing information (52%), good visible online security (46%), and provision of comprehensive product/service information (46%). Also important to respondents was having an order and delivery tracking service (32%), and a helpful telephone customer support service (26%). Only 4% of people said that there was nothing online sites could do to win their trust.

The more trusted online brands are financial service providers and the supermarkets. Timely delivery, clear and up front pricing and good, visible security are seen as the most effective ways companies can win consumers’ trust.

Business Internet Usage - Online Marketing
The average (mean) proportion of business' total marketing and advertising budgets spent on Internet marketing and advertising is 11.68%

The average proportion of Internet marketing and advertising spend varies as follows by company size:

• 50-99 employees: 12.12% (£19,150)
• 100-249 employees: 11.79% (£39,379)
• 250-499 employees: 9.94% (£66,797)
• 500-999 employees: 7.37% (£35,302)
• 1,000+ employees: 14.21% (£520,370)

58% expect to increase their spend on Internet marketing and advertising in the next 3 years; only half of one per cent expect to decrease it. Almost a quarter (23%) of those anticipating an increase expects their Internet marketing budget to at least double. The average expectation for Internet marketing spend increase over the next 3 years is 57%.

The most common form of online advertising and marketing is email marketing (45% overall - rising to 96% in Hospitality/Travel/Tourism and 79% in Leisure/Entertainment). Search marketing (34% overall - 58% in Professional/Business Services, 54% in Hospitality/Travel/Tourism) came in second and online community websites (29% overall - 49% in the Public Sector) third. Viral marketing (8%), podcasts/vodcasts (6%) and blogs (6%) are currently most prevalent in the Technology/Media/Telecoms sector (13%, 23% and 24% respectively) and Financial Services (12% blogs). Usage of podcasts/vodcasts (22%) and blogs (21%) is expected to more than triple to almost one quarter of businesses within the next 3 years, while viral marketing will be trailing behind at 15%.

34% of businesses noted that they do not currently use any form of online advertising and marketing (against 22% of companies with 500-4999 employees and 20% with 5,000+ employees).

The most widely cited reason for engaging with customers via the Internet was to develop new sales channels (78%). 67% cited competition from business rivals as a driver, 64% said operational efficiencies, and 61% said they valued the ability to quantify the response to their efforts. 62% said online engagement with customers had improved operational efficiencies. Almost 80% of respondents noted an extension of customer reach after online advertising and marketing. Similarly, over 70% benefited in terms of better customer engagement.

The Creative Mind

Beautiful, although strangely reminiscent of the seminal Samorost.

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Update: Creative Showcase has more details.

Digital Creativity

NMA carries a feature this week on Digital Creativity. Nothing new, but a few choice quotes:

[David Alberts, Executive Creative Director of Grey London] says that when he's presented ideas by his creatives, his first question to them is what user-generated website could come out of it.

And then they all log-in to second life and have a virtual brainstorm. However, back on planet earth, Becky Power, Creative Director at Modem Media:

"Focus on big ideas first; medium, technology and execution choices should follow. Don't assume that TV will always lead a campaign. Campaigns work more effectively when all agencies are briefed at the same time. Interactive agencies should be involved from the beginning."

And from my former colleague, Ben Clapp, Creative Director of Tribal DDB:

"the digital part of a campaign, far from being the less glamorous, can outshine the above-the-line part, and that ideas need to communicate across all the media that people use, not just the ones creatives are comfortable with."

A case study in customer generated advertising

Matt Dyke summarises:

Interesting case study from Wired Mag on last spring's brand campaign for Chevrolet, which was entirely consumer generated. In summary, people were given a pretty much free reign to say anything they liked through the format of video. With 30,000 videos submitted in four weeks, it won't surprise you find out that a number of people put together negative brand messages about Chevy. What is more surprising is that Chevy didn't try and gag these consumers and in fact there was a positive overall sales effect.

Here's the full article.

Honda ditches 'outdated' iTV

Honda ditches 'outdated' iTV

Honda, one of the pioneers of interactive TV advertising, is dropping the medium from its media schedule for 2007, claiming that red-button ads are 'clunky' and 'outdated'.

The marque's marketing director of seven months, Jeff Dodds, plans to divert the six-figure sum it is believed to spend on iTV to 'more effective' digital platforms. The decision represents a surprising U-turn for Honda, which has been at the forefront of the sector since airing its first red-button ad as part of the award-winning 'Cog' campaign in March 2003. In 2004 it pledged to incorporate red-button interactivity in all its TV campaigns, saying it represented the future direction of its business.

Maybe I was right after all...

The pervasive influence of blogs

Some surprising results in from MORI research

• Blogs are now a near second to newspapers as the most trusted information source: A quarter (24%) of Europeans consider blogs a trusted source of information, still behind newspaper articles (30%), but ahead of television advertising (17%) and email marketing (14%).
• High spenders are most trusting of blogs: Of those who spend more than €145 (£100) online every month, the proportion of people who trust blogs rises to 30%.
• Blogs are now driving purchase decisions: More than half (52%) of Europeans polled said that they were more likely to purchase a product if they had read positive comments from private individuals on the internet.
• They also block purchases: Nearly 40 million Europeans have not bought something after reading comments posted online.

Theses figures will only go up in the coming years...

Online sales will rise by 40% in 2007

E-consultancy reports:

The IMRG has predicted that the UK online sales boom will continue through Christmas into next year, with the internet driving sales of up to £42 billion in 2007, up from about £30 billion this year.

Web 'fuelling crisis in politics'

Matthew Taylor, Tony Blair's outgoing chief strategy adviser, fears the internet could be fuelling a "crisis" in the relationship between politicians and voters:

The internet has immense potential but we face a real problem if the main way in which that potential expresses itself is through allowing citizens to participate in a shrill discourse of demands.

If you look at the way in which citizens are using technology and the way that is growing up, there are worrying signs that that is the case.

What is the big breakthrough, in terms of politics, on the web in the last few years? It's basically blogs which are, generally speaking, hostile and, generally speaking, basically see their job as every day exposing how venal, stupid, mendacious politicians are.

The internet is being used as a tool of mobilisation, which is fantastic, but it only adds to the growing, incommensurate nature of the demands being made on government.

Guido Fawkes, Britain's top political blogger, and perhaps the target of the comments, responds:

Guido intends to be a thorn in the side of corrupt politicians for a long time. There is nothing the vermin can do about it, no media proprietor for them to brandish baubles to, no job you can offer, no bribe we will accept. They deserve everything they get, the crisis has been brought about by their lies. In an age where all can be journalists and information is freely available they have lost control of the media. That is their crisis and our victory.

And Jamie Kenny, who should be Britain's top political blogger, adds:

He also said that the public in general were “teenagers”. Funny that. It seems to me that it’s teenagers who think it’s just not fair and that nobody likes me and that you just don’t understand what I’m going through.

I don’t think that blogs are very influential anyway, and political blogs are only a small subset of general blogging. It couldn’t be that these sad, sad people are vanity googling themselves in the expectation of glowing reviews of their latest schemes for Moderate Progress, could it? Or having some prehensile flunky do it for them?

How their little faces must fall. Makes it seem all worthwhile.

Is today the start of the Mobile Web?

Sam Sethi reports on the launch of 3’s X-Series. Flat-rate broadband on your 3G mobile. Things are changing. Fast.

In Real Life Internet

Anastasia Potter of Anterior Insight:

As the popularity of social networking sites and use of the internet sky rockets there were fears that consumers would become increasingly antisocial as they spent a greater proportion of their leisure time online. The reality of the situation is quite different as friends who meet on the internet are increasingly getting offline and meeting socially in the real world, further fusing the line between the virtual and the real.

Meeting people on the internet is no longer for geeky losers, instead people are meeting each other on the net via their shared interests whether it be food, music, travel, love of Satsuma vases, 20th century furniture or even a fascination with certain pets and animals. The crucial change is that these meetings are no longer confined to the virtual but transgress into the real, they may meet online but they are also engaging offline. It’s all about the increasingly blurred line between the virtual and real worlds. A marketing or branding strategy needs to consider that it’s not just about an online strategy or a billboard campaign but how these two spheres now interact, how to utilise this cross over and profit from it.