Marketing

Think Different!
By Martin Lindstrom

Some years ago, an Australian takeout pizza place used the Internet in an attempt to boost sales. Traffic was slow. Hardly anyone visited the site. The need for an increase in traffic was urgent.

If traditional online media planning had been used, banners and links would have been purchased and the URL added to the shop’s phone-book entry. It might even have invested in some traditional ads.

The pizza place went a different route. [Read more…] about Think Different!

“CRUMBLE INTO DUST.” Soft-drink, fast-food, and beer brands rely heavily on advertising to shift market share and drive traffic to stores. Yet Wendy’s (WEN ) scored zero recognition after more than two years of advertising “It’s Better Here.” Coke’s (KO ) 18-month-old “Real” effort scored just 5%. On the other hand, McDonald’s (MCD ), which launched “I’m Lovin’ It” in early 2003, scored a better than respectable 33%.

What separates a good ad slogan from a poor one? David Droga, worldwide executive creative director for French ad agency Publicis, says slogans work best when they reflect “not only the soul of the brand, but the company itself and its reason for being in business.” Contemporary catch-phrases, he says, “just crumble into dust.”

https://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/oct2004/nf20041014_4965_db035.htm

Larry Light, global chief marketing officer at McDonald’s, once again publicly declared the death of the broadcast-centric ad model: “Mass marketing today is a mass mistake.” McDonald’s used to spend two-thirds of its ad budget on network prime time; that figure is now down to less than one-third.

https://www.adage.com/news.cms?newsId=41759

How Does Anybody with a Business to Run Do All This Customer Analysis Without Spending Tons of Time and Money?

How do you do it? You can begin to learn a lot about your customers, playing field-both current customers and potential ones-without conducting expensive market research and without wasting tons of time in focus groups. You can integrate your research into your daily conduct of business. It’s not hard.

First, keep it simple.

[Read more…] about Your Customer Playing Field

[Read more…] about Patternoster Chop House

In the old days, the only “commercial” text normally found in toilet stalls and on urinal walls were those placed by anti-social cranks and hookers of various sexual orientations. Often using ballpoint pens as chisels, they scrawled phone numbers and crude taglines like “For a good time in Dallas, call…”

[Read more…] about MARKETERS CHASE CONSUMERS INTO THE BATHROOM

Subway enters toy market with sandwich-making sets for kids

Subway restaurants has made its first foray into retail merchandising, selling a Deluxe Subway Sandwich Artist Play Set at Toys “R” Us stores.

The 77-piece set includes sandwich-making material made of plastic: submarine-sandwich and deli rolls, sandwich ingredients and condiments, salad ingredients, fruit, potato crisps, drink cups and sandwich wrappers. The price is $14.99. A 66-piece set is $9.99, and a 35-piece set costs $8.99.

Energy drinks have been one of the fastest growing segments of the beverage industry, fueled by high-impact marketing targeting young people.

And while they were not originally designed to be mixed with alcohol, much of the marketing activity surrounding energy drinks promotes their consumption in bars and clubs, where consumers are looking for increased stamina for late nights.

[Read more…] about Red Bull mixer fails to offer energy high