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User generated content allows brands to communicate in order to maintain relationships, attract and keep customers, strengthen brand value. When Gap realized it needed to revamp its branding and reconnect with their consumers, it chose Facebook. Why? Because it was the most effective way of being able to integrate its wide range of activities from advertising, public relations, promotions to gaining customer insight for product development. The Coca-Cola Company recently joined Twitter Fortune 100 clan with designated pages for each of its brands, the corporation has build its own virtual community to strengthen its branding image.
When it comes to consumer generated content, everyone loves Facebook and Twitter. Apart from its easy navigation and reconnecting with people, Facebook provides the opportunity for brands to share any type of content from any media.
The Gap Facebook Page allows its fans to develop their own Gap ads, complete with personal information and photos from individual Facebook albums, learn about upcoming events and promotions, and even get linked to and participate in varied Gap contests, such as their ‘Born to Fit’ campaign contest, featured on Polyvore, to design an inspirational outfit with your own ‘Born to’ message.
Twitter has allowed Coke to gain information related to customer’s satisfaction, brand loyalty, desired future products/services and product attributes. The brand’s identification of different customer segments, based on culture and traditions that the virtual brand community members share has become a tool for strategically targeting marketing activities in real life environment, as well as predict future market trends and activities based on changes in behavior.
When we look at advertising strategies and the best ways to reach customers, we instantly visualize creatives that fit broadcast and print media. With personal data collection, Facebook is a powerful advertising platform. Through social media, Gap ditched TV and promoted its 1969 line (Born to Fit) mainly through Facebook. Coke not only utilized Twitter to discover what interests their targets, but have also succeeded in discovering the most active brand consumers, based on the millions who participated in the ‘happiness ambassador’ competition.
As such, brands succeed in conveying their messages through print, visual and audio techniques that facilitate consumer perceptions and interpretations of the brand and its products and services. At the end of the day, it is all about strategy, who is your target audience and what the brand is aiming to accomplish. Social networking is ultimately about communicating and maintaining relationships. And the best way to create this in order to strengthen your brand is by keeping your consumers updated, sharing images, inviting them to participate in events. In other words, displaying the human nature of your brand.
David Hallerman, Senior AnalystVideoMore marketers will increasingly embrace online video advertising, supported by the twin boom of video streams and video ad networks.Further suppor
Brands have always focused on allocating large budget for their advertising and marketing efforts to develop their branding, style and promotions based on their target consumers. What they often oversee is that consumers are becoming more sophisticated in their purchasing behavior, and the effectiveness of the traditional means of marketing within the fashion industry is no longer enough. With a deteriorating economy, brands face the increasing skepticism of consumers towards advertising messages.
A recent research by Unisfair reported that three-fourths of marketers are planning to increase their outreach to social media in 2010. Lead generation and customer retention/engagement are the most critical objectives for marketers today. According to Crispin Porter and Bogusky, brands need to consider every form of marketing communications, from active and passive store experiences (staff-customer interaction and buying environment) to the style of press releases and internal corporate communications to ensure that new advertising will not just have temporary benefits (Zmuda, 2009).
For example, Gap Inc. has begun focusing on strengthening its brand by shifting to a mix of traditional and non-traditional tactics, including influencer programs and multi-faceted campaigns (Moin, 2007). In celebrating 40 years, Gap’s most recent campaign- ‘Born to Fit’ was featured on Polyvore, a cutting-edge fashion site with 3.7 million unique visitors a month (Hillier, 2009).
To further promote its image, Gap Inc. encouraged fans to declare what they were born to do with an interactive Facebook gallery, style mixer iPhone application, and pop-up shops. Furthermore, the corporation hosted “the nation’s largest simultaneous acoustic concert at more than 700 Gap Stores across the US”, while outfitting the New York Stock Exchange with 1969 jeans, for the first time in history, and ringing the closing bell (Gap Inc., 2009). The campaign also used visual (in-cinema and through their stores), outdoor and print mediums ( New York Times, New York Post, Vogue, Vanity Fair, Elle, Harper’s Bazaar, InStyle, US Weekly, People, Interview, Nylon, GQ and Rolling Stone) in major metropolitan areas nationwide, to increase consumer awareness and encourage their key publics to express their personal style.
This type of IMC efforts maybe just the thing that other fashion brands need to consider to keep their multi-variant customers. As the fashion industry’s main source of advertising, the monthly glossy, is experiencing sharp declines in ad sales this year – some down 47% for the September issue, according to Forbes, social media has deconstructed the traditional means of communication between retailers and consumers by adding new channels for discussion (Kavilanz, 2009). Brands need to use all tools available to be able to recreate the customer relationship based on effective two-way communications and trust (Karolefski, 2003).
As I sit here in the middle of the desert, I am wondering if there was no failing economy, would we be so focused on cluttering new media tools? So what happens after that?
References:
Gap Inc. (2009). Media Center. Retrieved November 6, 2009 from http://www.gapinc.com/public/Media/Press_Releases/med_pr_GapPremiumDenim08132009.shtml
Hillier, K. (2009). Six social sites every fashion marketer should know. Retrieved November 6, 2009 from http://adage.com/digitalnext/article?article_id=138893
Karolefski. J. (2003). PR stirs it up. Retrieved November 6, 2009 from http://www.brandchannel.com/features_effect.asp?pf_id=166
Kavilanz, P.B. (2009). Merchants get punished in July. Retrieved November 6, 2009 from CNN Money website: http://money.com/2009/08/06/news/economy/retailsales_july/index.htm
Moin, D. (2007). Latest blow for GAP: Group plots new tack as sales slide goes on. Retrieved November 6, 2009 from HighBeam Research: http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-157109868.html
Zmuda, N. (2009). Crispin picks up all ad work for Gap brand. Retrieved November 6, 2009 from http://adage.com
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