How did they know I like that product?



Click here to read the article this picture is from.

Have you ever gone to a website and an ad shows up on the screen. You then say to yourself, hey, I like that product...how is that happening? How does my computer know that I like that product?

I have asked myself this many times when an ad shows up and I realize I was just looking at the same product the other day. This is all due to behavioral targeting and personalized retargeting.

What are these you may be asking? Well, behavioral targeting is where "e-commerce marketers serve up customized ads on websites or cable TV stations based on a consumers prior activity."* So, if you visit a site, an ad will show up with a product similar to it. TV stations use data to determine what commercials to play in each house.

A news article by CBS News explains behavioral targeting well. On a very basic level, an ad marketing company will track the online behavior of consumers, including every webpage a consumer views, the links they click and if they make a purchase. Companies then purchase this data to get sales leads and save costs by only displaying relevant ads to those consumers that are most likely to make a purchase.

Personalized retargeting is a form of behavioral targeting. It basically goes further than just showing related ads. It "provides messages that refer to exact products a person views on a website."*

A way to understand this is using an example from the textbook. The consumer visits a site, a cookie will then be inserted into the browser, then when the consumer is on their computer again an ad will show up for that same item.*

It may seem like an invasion of privacy for people to track every move consumers make on the internet. The ads shown on my computer are all relevant to me and that is kind of nice. (Except for when the ad marketing company gets something wrong....and I have to ask myself...what is this product? Why do they think I would want this?)

As I am researching behavioral targeting, an ad for Nike showed up on the right side of the screen, because I had been looking at new shoes. I guess the marketing worked because I purchased them!

*Solomon, M. R. (2013). Consumer behavior. (10th ed., pp. 235-236). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Brady/Prentice Hall/Addison-Wesley.

What is the personality of that brand?



Every brand has its own personality with characteristics that consumers attribute towards it. The product is personified and has personality traits that are associated with it. The image that the brand portrays causes consumers to either buy the product or completely avoid it.

For example, Wal-Mart has low prices, so it may cause some consumers to think that products may also be cheap and not of good quality. Geico continually shows the gecko in its advertising, this creates a sense of familiarity for the consumers. Ford trucks are thought to be tough, strong and durable, thus falling into the 5th dimension of brand personality.

The chart to the right is the five dimensions of brand personality, that Mike Edelhart summarized. (The full article can be read here).

When a company creates a brand, they have an image in mind that they want to have portrayed to the consumers. Everything the company does adds to the image and personality of the brand.

For example, if a company has had to reposition many times, consumers may not trust the brand as much.* Here is a site when you are creating an product or brand to help determine what your brand personality is.

Also, if a company treats a person right, that consumer may think of the brand to be sincere because they get the impression that the company truly cares about them.

In my opinion, the personality of a brand is extremely important for how consumers choose to purchase or avoid a product. What do you think?

*Solomon, M. R. (2013). Consumer behavior. (10th ed., pp. 223-226). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Brady/Prentice Hall/Addison-Wesley.

The Power of Cult Branding

We've all heard of the people who stand in line on the first day that a new version of the iPhone comes out? You may have even participated in this event.

Having people camp out in front of a store, just to get one of the first new items shows the power of a cult product.

A cult product is anything that has a loyal group of followers.

This article explains the 6 factors of a cult brand.

1. Customer Devotion
2. Cultural Orientation
3. Trendsetting
4. Richness of Story
5. Persuasiveness
6. Distinctness

People who follow a cult brand want to feel like they are part of a group and want to have a sense of belonging. To think about a cult brand, think about NFL fans. There are some diehard fans that are willing to get into fights about their team. They are the ones that are watching every game and feel the same emotions as the players after a win or loss.

Followers of a cult brand are some of the consumers that companies would want, they are completely brand loyal. They are the consumers that are free advertising. They will talk about the brand and tell other people to go get the product or go to that certain place where their brand loyalty lies.

What are some cult branding examples?

• The NFL
• Apple
• Oprah
• Harley Davidson
• WWF

To see more cult brands, go to this article by the Cult Branding Company.

People are so in love with these products, that the products become part of their extended selves. A company's goal should be to try to create a product that has the potential to become a cult brand. They would want it to attract people who are going to become so devoted to the product that they would never make a switch to a substitute.

However, this is way easier said than done...but it is a goal to shoot for!

Read more about cult branding here.

Are Celebrity Endorsements Effective?

With the Olympics starting today in Sochi, it made me think of how many of the athletes will endorse products after they win.

Are these ads that feature the athletes and other celebrities effective and worth the money that companies pour into them?

There are many celebrity endorsements these days, click here to see a list.

Shaun White is one of these athletes that has endorsed many
products, since 2010. Including Oakley and American Express. And we can't forget about his Stride Gum! You can see more Olympic Athletes and what they have sponsored here.


Some experts believe that having a celebrity endorse a product will help in the short run, but in the long run will make no difference. They think that it is a waste of money because the celebrities will require first class treatment and a large sum of money. There is also the risk that after you shoot this multi-million dollar ad, controversy will exist. The celebrity may get into PR trouble or contradict themselves.

Companies may have wasted that money and have to pull the ads they spent so much time on.  Kevin Harrington, talks about Pepsi paying 50 million dollars for Beyoncé to endorse drinking Pepsi, but the controversy that arose when she joined Michelle Obama's Let's Move Campaign.

The celebrity endorsement is going to raise awareness at first, but then will people even remember
which celebrity endorsed the product or which product they had been associated with?

A study performed by WPP agency Mediaedge:cia (MEC), was noted in this article. They "found that 35% of consumers believe celebrity endorsements improve a brand's awareness, help define its personality, and generate interest. Yet, 53% of respondents said they have problems remembering which celebrity is endorsing which product."

30% of young people would try a product if it was endorsed by their idol, with the number being substantially lower for adults and older people.

What does this mean?

Will companies continue to use celebrities in their ads for immediate returns?

Or does the celebrity need to be the product for it to be effective. Meaning everything the product represents, so does that celebrity.

It will be interesting to see what Olympic athletes win and get these endorsements after the Olympics.
Go Team USA!

Super Bowl Ads...A thing of the past?

Are Super Bowl Ads becoming a thing of the past? There are three things that people get excited for during the Super Bowl:

1. The game, of course. Although this year was upsetting, especially for me since I am a Broncos Fan.
2. The half-time show.  
3. The commercials, for a 30 second slot it can cost $4 million dollars. If you missed them, you can view them here.

All year long, people are trying to avoid commercials as much as possible. They do this by recording their shows and fast-forwarding through, so they can see their show uninterrupted.

However, during the Super Bowl people are looking forward to humorous, exciting advertisements. In my opinion, there weren't too many that were extremely memorable due to their humor. In this article, Brian Lowry wrote his opinion of which commercials flopped and which ones were a success. He states that some were a draw, including the only ads that stuck with me, the Tebow ads for T-Mobile.

 

With the high cost of ads, some companies are trying to do what the movie The Persuaders talks about to "break through the clutter." Companies are having to become more creative in order to persuade people. There were two companies that stood out on my Twitter feed, JC Penny and Esurance.

 

According to an article, written by Mae Anderson, Esurance saved $1.5 million by purchasing an ad that aired after the Super Bowl. If you missed the ad, then you missed your chance to tweet #EsuranceSave30 to win $1.5 million. As the article states, it has been a top trending hashtag and the number of Esurance followers has increased dramatically. I did not participate in this, but many of the people I follow were tweeting this hashtag multiple times until the deadline.



 

 

JC Penny did not run an ad during the Super Bowl and took a different approach with Twitter. Their tweets looked like drunk tweets. One tweet was "Toughdown Seadawks!! Is sSeattle going toa runaway wit h this???"

 

I saw retweets on my feed and decided to look at it more. Apparently JC Penny was promoting their Go USA Mittens, so they were #TweetingWithMittens. According to this ENews article, this is what a JCPenny spokeswoman said:

 

"We knew Twitter would be very active but wanted to find a way to stay above the Super Bowl fray and instead create our own narrative," a JCPenney spokeswoman explained to BuzzFeed. "Given it was cold, and we are selling Go USA mittens—we thought it could be a fun stunt!" 

 

 

In Mae Anderson's article, she writes that "J.C. Penney said it gained over 10,000 followers on Super Bowl Sunday, received over 40,000 @jcpenney mentions and 1,800 mentions of the hashtag #tweetingwithmittens."

 

 

Getting to consumers can be very tricky. Advertisers are having to come up with different way to reach their targets, as shown by ESurance and JC Penny. Both of these companies had an increase in followers, mentions and hashtag recognition.  It is unclear if these attempts were a complete success, but they have to find some way to be different.

 

What will we see in the future for companies that are trying to get through to consumers with all of  the other advertising clutter?