Devil lies in details? 

Big Data and Digital Marketing

Since the unification of networks around the world with the TCI/IP protocol and the emergence of internet followed by the creation of the World Wide Web developed by European scientists at CERN (European organization for nuclear research), our world has changed, and keeps changing faster and faster. Internet has enabled a shift in the way we do business. A company can now become multinational much easier and faster than 30 or even 20 years ago. So, in order to survive in an increasingly competitive market, companies had to adapt. 

But what has changed? First of all, the information flow has rocketed, and as they say, information is power. With the increase of computation power and the development of algorithms, companies evolving in the cyber space started gathering and analysing as much data as possible in order to determine an efficient strategy for their businesses. Knowing your customer is obviously the best way of satisfying him/her by bringing him/her the maximum value and thus generating higher profits. And that is why big data and digital marketing are so strongly linked to one another. By knowing your customer and what he/she values, you have a better idea of what to do in order to fulfil his/her needs. Indeed, the gathered and analysed data help companies to understand who their customers are, and how to offer them what they need.

Here are some examples of digital marketing strategies using big data analysis:

Amazon’s A/B test: The online platform Amazon uses A/B tests to determine what is the more effective web design. Basically, when you go on the Amazon website, you see either the A type homepage, or the B type one. Those different homepage designs have a unique purpose, draw customer’s attention to make them click on a specific window by using different web design techniques to lead you on buying the promoted product. An algorithm then analyses the results by counting the amount of clicks for both homepages and selects the one that has the higher conversion rate. That way, Amazon selects the best homepage design and increases its profit.

Starbuck’s text message marketing: In the US a couple of years ago, Starbuck was sending coupons via text message during rush hours. Drivers that were stuck in traffic jams were localised and invited to drink a Frappuccino in the nearest Starbuck, just the time to relax and get rid of the traffic’s stress. A coupon exclusively usable in the nearest Starbuck was sent and it was a big success for Starbuck’s sales.

Marriott Hotels price setting method: Marriott is an American multinational hospitality company that also uses big data analysis to maximize value for their customers. Marriott uses big data across the hotel chain’s operations. Structured and semi-structured datasets such as weather reports, local events schedules are used to forecast demand and determine value for each individual room. Those prices also adapt depending on the customer and its personal data, if it is available on Marriott’s large customer database, to set prices with optimum efficiency. 

All those practices use big data analysis to increase the value for the customer and the company as well. But how much information can a company gather without risking to compromise your privacy rights? Most of the time, we willingly share information on Facebook for example, even though Facebook’s privacy policy is still quite ambiguous and there is a controversy about whether or not Facebook sells those data to other companies. Google is another giant company that collects a lot of data from its users. As you know, every research you type on Google is recorded and used to profile you. Imagine what kind of person is your cyber self. It probably isn’t the same person as your real self, but Google still define you by what you search or what you watch on the internet.  Sometimes, we don’t even know in who’s hands our personal information are. Some companies are specialised in gathering private information about people in order to sell them to other companies that will use our data to establish a marketing strategy. We call those companies data brokers. They aren’t that well known but they are very big. For example, a British data broker company called Experian generates a yearly turnover of 4.8 billion dollars. The controversy is pretty big on that subject and the market is not regulated, at least not enough.

To conclude, internet has brought us a lot of good things: easier access to information, easier access to product or services, etc., but maybe we need to be more careful and protect our privacy a little bit more firmly. Our privacy is not something to be taken lightly. 

Evian’s Roller Babies Ad – The Best Video Ad ever!

Advertisements, now-a-days, are not only for promotion but as a means to connect with consumers. Increasing number of brands are using emotions to communicate their brand personality to the consumers. Also, most of the brands are shifting to online channels (like YouTube) to promote this message rather than conventional TVCs. This is mainly because of higher ROI and greater reach offered by online channels. In this article, we will learn how Evian used these two strategies to sell mineral water!

About the brand and the campaign:

Evian is a French brand of mineral water. ‘Live Young’ was Evian’s first ever global campaign. It was one the first brands to launch YouTube-exclusive ad campaign. With their Roller babies’ advertisement, they set the way for a new strategy of seeding content, testing creative, and building on a global brand.  It was so successful that in 2009 the Guinness Book of World Records officially declared Roller Babies as the most viewed online ad. With over 100 million total views, Roller Babies demonstrates the ability of online video to reach far beyond that of traditional media alone. By focusing on digital channels this campaign made a huge impact at a cost far less than that of its traditional counterparts.

About the Ad:

The Roller Babies ad features babies that are about one year old. Throughout the ad they dance to the tune of Sugarhill Gang’s Rapper’s Delight on roller skaters. The advertisement aims to represent their water as the one that can keep adults young at heart. They accomplish that by associating their ads with baby dances, which can symbolize energy and youthfulness at the same time. By focusing on that message, Evian brings its audience’s attention to a societal norm: everyone wants to become young again as they gradually grow old. Their slogan “Evian, Live young” that’s repeated at the end of the advertisement shows their positioning. Through the campaign, advertisers want their audience to learn the art of living young by consuming Evian water.

You can watch the advertisement here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQcVllWpwGs

Decoding the Ad:

The main purpose of the ‘Live Young’ campaign was to build on the concept of youth. They used this emotional benefit to connect with the consumers and strengthen the brand relationship.

We generally associate babies with adjectives like cute, young and active. Evian created a connection between Evian and babies. The “Live Young” slogan was used to direct its audience to read the desired meaning of the babies, which is to be young. This quality of the babies was transferred to the product through the ad. This way Evian created a cultural meaning for its brand; the youthfulness of babies became a brand identity for Evian.

We can see how advertisers may purposefully make the ad so irrational and strange to a point that the image may seem humorous. With the combination of gimmicks and bizarreness in the ad, both serve to level out the other. In other words, the cute babies may make it easier for the audience to accept the irrationality in the ads and drive awareness of Evian across the world in a fun and innovative way. Activity was focused primarily on digital channels as Evian’s ad heritage was not familiar to most people outside of France, and therefore could not be built upon.

Achievements:

Roller babies ad has been awarded the Guinness Book of World Records award for the most viewed online video advertisement. It has also won top honors from Time magazine as the #1 TV ad of the 2009 and a recognition on TBS’ Funniest Commercials of the Year. It has 84,613,402 views on YouTube till date.

Key Takeaways:

1.       By creating buzz online and utilizing social networks and having great content, Evian was able to leverage their online ad to its absolute fullest for spreading its marketing messages globally.

2.       By focusing on these web-centric tactics Evian also saw a huge return on investment.

3.       It also created a brand identity on which future campaigns could be built upon. The goal for new iterations of the ‘Live Young’ campaign is to move toward delivering the message that by drinking Evian one feels youthful

How do you increase engagement and drive traffic?

Now that you have presence over internet with great website and social media connections like Facebook, twitter, Instagram etc., you must be wondering what should you be doing to achieve increase in engagement and drive traffic simultaneously. 

Our team at Digital Disrupter recommends any organisation with the below mentioned ways of  building content and why it works. 

1. EDUCATIONAL: You should design content in such a way that people feel it is worth to know and it should aid in their learning. People will be willing to share if they feel amazed about it. This will also drive more site revisits.

2. ENTERTAINING: You should make it as entertaining as possible with multiple graphics, videos, images and so on. It will bring them happiness and gather more positive energy

3. INSPIRATIONAL: You can do it by giving inspirational content be it sportsman success, quotes, short stories, etc., Doing so will help them keep motivated and great way to build loyalty.

4. SUBSCRIPTIONS: You can motivate them providing with short or quick ways to subscribe to newsletters, notifications, etc., Doing so will customers updated with the recent happenings. 

But while you implement, it is also highly recommended that too much of the content other than that is related to organisation may be confusing or sometimes irritating to the customer. Make sure the frequency of updates is not bothersome. Choose an appropriate right time to post your content. 

Is it Intentional or Just a Mistake?

Social Media had become a default option to reach huge masses. Given its potential reach, it is a huge cost saving measure in disguise for majority of Businesses to conduct Marketing, Advertising and also maintaining lasting relations. No one wants to miss out on this opportunity to tap markets which will make their business grow and prosper. Given increasing penetration of smart phone and internet  usage across globe, concomitant rise of social channels like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, blogs, LinkedIn, etc., had become a major solution to interact and engage in networking, knowledge sharing and what not. Many companies started interacting with their customers and are also adopting innovative ways of engaging their fans by posting images, videos, events, contests, etc., and encouraging fans to like, tweets, comments and shares.

Digital Disrupter saw an interesting analogy between social icons while browsing through websites of some notable companies and institutions across industries like ITC, HUL, PEPSICO, IIMB, IIMI, LIC, ICICI etc., Have a look yourself below on placement of their social connections within their websites.

We found that there was difference in placement of social icons, one preferring to place it above while others below. Surprisingly some even preferred to place them on sideways too.

So DOES IT REALLY MATTER? Whether to place as they wish or there is a logic behind it to place them strategically. Let’s have a quick look on what it means about icon placements- 

If the icon is above, you can see it as soon as you open the website, you will most probably want to explore, thereby willing to become a fan by following and engage in future promotions. Well this is possible even if icons are placed below, we can assume to some extent that the user may not see the icons in the first place and may not be willing to scroll down all the way, hence a missed opportunity.

Added to icon placement there are some more interesting insights gathered by Disrupter which include the size and colour of these icons. Again does it matter at all, well to some extent it does matter, let’s safely assume that it’s hard to decipher whether it is Facebook or not if we look at its colour which is other than blue. 

Or it may so happen that search for solution(s) will not take place unless you find out the problem.