building a brand (social media marketing)

The One Thing You Must Get Right When Building A Brand

By Patrick Barwise and Seán Meehan

The Rise Of Social Media

And

The Shift Of Power To

Consumers

Recent example of its rise and power with the consumers:-Flipkart faced significant backlash on reports of it joining Airtel's net neutrality violating Airtel Zero and forced to pull out of Airtel Deal Amid Backlash

social media helps amplify companies reputation that

consistently deliver what they promise

Obvious danger - failing to keep pace with social media

developments.

Equal, less obvious - getting distracted by them and

losing sight of the fundamentals.

The GAPCase

Gap, known for everyday basics, tried to redo their image to appeal to a more hip crowd.

In October 2010, Gap launched a new logo in an attempt to be more modern. Guess how long that lasted?

A whopping two days

Gap quickly put the old logo back into place after unbelievable backlash from the public.

failure on two fronts with this new logo

Unfortunately, they didn’t understand who their target market is - the people who want the basics and aren't interested in trendy styles.

• Their loyal customers felt that Gap was changing their image for

the worse and lost a connection with the brand.

• Gap was also unsuccessful at attracting the younger, trendy

generation with the redesign

It wasn't so awful for Gap to pursue a logo redesign, the lesson is simply to stay in touch with your buyer personas so you can ensure your new design reflects them.

Marketers focus a lot on metrics -- for good reasons -- but never underestimate your audience's feelings towards your brand.

They're harder to quantify, sure, but people will speak out when their sensibilities are offended.

Made it rightOne of the most recognizable fashion brands in the world, GAP also recognizes the need to moderate the use of social media amongst their employees within the work place.

Here are some excerpts from their current guidelines in social media

“Some subjects can invite a flame war. Be careful discussing things where emotions run high (e.g. politics and religion) and show respect for others’ opinions.”

“Your job comes first. Unless you are an authorized Social Media Manager, don’t let social media affect your job performance.”

“If you #!%#@# up? Correct it immediately and be clear about what you’ve done to fix it. Contact the social media team if it’s a real doozy.”

“Don’t even think about it…. Talking about financial information, sales trends, strategies, forecasts, legal issues, future promotional activities. Giving out personal information about customers or employees. Posting confidential or non-public information. Responding to an offensive or negative post by a customer. There’s no winner in that game.”

The Coca-Cola

Case

In 1985, Coca-Cola tried to introduce a new, sweeter version of their beverage to combat their new competitor, Pepsi.

As people preferred the taste of Pepsi over Coke in blind taste tests, Coke felt the need to regain market share with a new recipe. So, how did it turn out?

Not well.

Public response was so negative, in fact, that people were actually hoarding the old Coke and selling it on the black-market for grossly inflated prices!

Why were people so upset? Coke’s brand embodied classic American traditions -- they didn't want new Coke! They wanted that classic beverage whose secret recipe is guarded under lock and key in Georgia! After finally retiring the “New Coke” recipe, sales of the old classic -- actually renamed “Coca-Cola Classic” to make it extra clear to consumers -- rose significantly.

What do we take away from this marketing mistake? Learn what your customers want before spending time and money on a top-secret product or service change!

Exploit the many opportunities presented by social media while keeping an

unwavering eye on their brand promise .

Judiciously revising the marketing playbook rather than trying to rewrite it.

To succeed in this environment

Leverage Social Media

social media as a tool for

E n g a g e m e n t and C o l l a b o r a t i o n

Marketers at leading companies create lively exchanges with and

among customers by tapping into participants’ expertise and

creativity for product development on sites such as

• American Express (OPEN Forum) • Cisco (MyPlanet)

• Ford (Fiesta Movement)

• Examples:

• Procter & Gamble

• Toyota

Indian Example

How Volkswagen leverages on Social Mediausing Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and YouTube

How Volkswagen India practices Social Media

• Right now, Volkswagen India mainly has a presence across four social media platforms: Facebook, Twitter, YouTube & LinkedIn.• Apart from that they have dedicated sites for their ‘Innovations for

Everyone’ and ‘Think Blue campaign’ campaigns.• The important aspect of Volkswagen India’s strategy is a long term

approach to build loyal community and the use of all the marketing channels: TV, Radio, Print, Outdoor & Online to leverage their promotional campaigns.

• All the social media properties are being cross-marketed on one another. • The Facebook and twitter properties are highly interactive and keep the

users engaged with interesting contests, offers and replying to various queries and feedback.• On Facebook, they have grown the community organically to over

60,000 fans with the average rate of interaction being 150 fans per post.• The communication is mostly about travelling, holidays, cars, roads,

etc.apart from cross-marketed content from other social media properties, contests, campaigns.


• On Twitter, they have identified the owners of Volkswagen vehicles on twitter & have added them to the respective lists of different vehicles. • They use these lists to keep a track of their customers & occasionally inform

them about any new initiatives or offers.• On YouTube, the videos have received admirable number of views and the

videos have been distributed well among the influential bloggers and other new media channels!• They have made good use of LinkedIn company page by connecting to

relevant professionals there.


The Tweeting Newspaper – Volkswagen India#anything4jetta

• What will you do for all the new jetta? Was the question asked in the third page of the Hindu. To answer the same you need to Tweet away with the hashtag #anything4jetta. The wittiest and most popular tweet wins daily prizes and wins an entry to the grand prize “The Jetta” itself.• The Ad is well explained, usage of the image supports the title, people are also

encouraged to send in an audio tweet, a video tweet or a call in tweet.• It is an excellent example of integration of traditional and social media to

generate curiosity, outreach and therefore mass participation!

Through social media

gain rich, unmediated customer insights, faster than ever

before

boost brand awareness, trial, and ultimately sales

profound shift

o making market research customer-centric rather

than product centric

o products fit into people’s lives

o Social networks provides powerful new ways to

explore consumers’ lives and opinions

o Procter & Gamble

feminine care group

early adopter of social media

appreciate the need to listen to rather than talk at

customers the main value of Beinggirl.com to P&G is not that it drives product sales but that it illuminates the target consumers’ world.

o Amex

uses OPEN Forum to learn about small-business

owners

o Cisco

uses myPlanNet to better understand the new

generation of developers.

These sites work because

participants are engaged with the brands

find the platforms authentic, and

trust one another

The companies create active communities byceding some control— often the hardest adjustment for marketers.

The McDonald’s

Case

McDonald’s Twitter bane

Usually known for its smart social media strategy, McDonald’s thought it was on to something interesting when it launched the #McDStories tag to channel conversations and optimize conversions.

Surprise, surprise!

The hashtag started attracting more negative stories than positive ones, and the

situation soon got out of hand.

One only needs to sample this tweet (courtesyLA Times) to understand how unpleasant

it must have been:

“These #McDStories never get old, kinda like a box of McDonald’s 10 piece Chicken

McNuggets left in the sun for a week.”

The lesson here is clear: Social media doesn’t

always behave as you want, and it doesn’t take

long for the exception to become the rule. Factor in

these considerations when planning your

campaigns.

Indian Example

The Snapdeal

Case

Listening on Social Media - Snapdeal.Com – How poor advertising leads to bad online reputation

Poor Advertising and Consequences On Social Media

• There was a huge negative response from bloggers and influential people on social media after 2 bloggers commented about snapdeal’s fake and poor advertisements.

• After the negative buzz, Rohit Awasthi (Head – User & Communities at snapdeal.com) replied back apologizing for such advertisement and explained what had probably went wrong and promised to clean up such ads.

companies should incorporate

social media into their

marketing

Fundamental Qualities

o THE CUSTOMER PROMISE

o TRUST

o CONTINUAL IMPROVEMENT

o INNOVATION BEYOND THE FAMILIAR

ENHANCING THE PLAYBOOK

Social media can be used to reinforce all four, even

as they make them more urgent

THE VIRGIN ATLANTIC AIRWAYS MODEL

Virgin Atlantic Airways has used social media to buttress the branding basics

THE CUSTOMER PROMISE

o Learn What People are Saying in Call Centers, Websites, and Public Opinion.

o Uses Social Media to Support the Brand Values and

Promises:

o Innovat iono Funo In formal i tyo Honestyo Valueo Car ing Att i tude

BUILDING TRUST

o Operational Execution

o Service delivery

o Websites Up -To- Date

Accurate

o “Rapid Response” solutions Twitter

Facebook

CONTINUAL IMPROVEMENT

o Gathering Insights to Improve

o Travel Blogs

o Customer Complaints Tedious & redundant requests for security information Online-community suggestions

o Solutions Opt-in service Arrange taxi sharing from pax from same flight

INNOVATION beyond the familiar

•Big Trip’s Planning• Facebook Flight Status App (first for airline)

• VTRAVELLED (inspirational journeys)

• Flight Club, VVA iPhone app

• Taxi2 Cab Sharing

• Flight tracker (real-time Aircraft positions)

• Flight Entertainment systems @ “Premium Economy Class”

•Benefits• Exchange information, Stories, Advices

• Creation of “Trip Pods”

• Brand reinforcement

• Novel customer insights

KEEP YOUR EYE ON THE BALLo Don’t throw out your P laybook

Start wi th Brand Promise; Gu ide them with Soc ia l Media

o Use Soc ia l Media Pr imar i ly for Ins ight

Real Va lue is learn ing about Customers

o Str ive to go Vi ra l , but Protect the Brand

AUNTHENTIC ITY & RELEVANCE WILL IT BLEND? [ YouTube Video] SONY

o Engage, but fo l low the soc ia l ru les

Indian Example

57

Adidas on Facebook- Cricket based Social Media marketing case study

Adidas on Facebook - Background

• Cricket is like a religion in India and in order to connect to the target audience on the online space, they had to connect Adidas with Cricket

• They had to create a platform where the cricket fans come, discuss, consume content and spread word of mouth among their peers so that it snowballs into a movement and by the start of world cup, it becomes the one platform where the real cricket fans can identify with

• The primary target audience for adidas was in the age group of 14 – 19 years extended to 25. This audience had a huge affinity towards digital media. Their digital footprints cover social networking, mobile, entertainment, sports, online videos etc.

• For sustained engagement, encouraged the users to share their views through constant cricket related conversations

• Other engagement hooks were Games, Trivia and long term games like Fantasy cricket

• Sneak previews and premiering of the new campaign TVC’s are released first on Facebook before they are taken live on TV which has also increased the excitement manifold

• The 60 sec Director’s cut of the TVC for the pure cricket campaign was exclusively unveiled on Facebook during the IND AUS series in Oct

• There were many other activities which happened on a daily basis to make sure that the excitement never stopped:

PREDICT AND WIN RAPIDFIRE CONTEST SPOT THE BALL CONTEST IMMORTAL WORDS CONTEST

Adidas on Facebook – Implementation & Response

Adidas on Facebook – Implementation & Response

• Fantasy cricket generated phenomenal responses on all the engagement parameters - It has more than 50 thousand registered teams

• Photos were the most highly consumed form of media on the fan page. Users are constantly sharing their photos on the page to display their love for the brand.

• The video plays shot up with the launch of the directors cut TVC on the page.

• It has been a story of 24/7 engagement since the beginning and still going strong.

Situation in India

How Top Brands In India Are Using Social Media Platforms In 2014

The scope of social media marketing in India

•The scope is tremendous, the pace and understanding of the domain is low

•Marketing managers still need to realize the potential of social media over traditional media

•Marketing and brand managers need to understand social media beyond Facebook and Twitter - as in its utility in form of social applications, online communities, social campaigns

•A lot of questions are being asked about ROI and that is holding them to make significant investments. Marketing managers need to be comfortable with the social media metrics like active users, engaged users, evangelists etc

•Having said that however, India is a market, which once convinced, adopts newer technologies and business models very fast. Hence once marketing managers are convinced about this new media, we will see tremendous change in initiatives and outlook. Even till today a lot of brands have done some exciting stuff for Indian audiences on social web like

Companies get the basics right in developing

and reliably delivering on a compelling brand

promise.

Social media make it more urgent than ever that

Created by : Anirudh Gupta,

Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati,

during an internship with

Prof. Sameer Mathur,IIM Lucknow,

www.IIMInternship.com

http://www.iiminternship.com/