International Digital Marketing

We all want our brand to be attractive, exciting, trendy, sexy and … young. Our society adores youth, we want the young generation to buzz about us, brands and campaigns winning awards are aimed to youth. Facing declining sales, we cannot help hearing that we must rejuvenate, rejuvenate, rejuvenate…

However, many times there is a big conflict between the people we want to buy our brand and the people who actually buy it. Too many times the marketing and communication target is 20-30 years younger than the loyal consumers forming the grand majority of the database.

Cosmetic “brand” surgery?

Some brands tackle this by going through a long process of changing their brand image. More or less successfully. Ford experienced this problem in Spain with its upcoming launch of the new, young, trendy Ford Fiesta. In Spain this particular car model was perceived as a car for 40-50-year-old women, but few years before the launch, Ford Spain started creating a community especially for youth www.maskedummies.com. The booming trendy community changed slowly the image of Ford Fiesta and made the marketing message more believable in 2008. Another example of successful change of brand image is of course Old Spice.

But is it really so bad to be a brand for “old” people? What if the sales are declining, not because our brand is getting older and new generation does not buy it, but because we are ignoring the older generation who does?

Aging global population

With the declining fertility and improved health and longevity, the population aging has become the biggest demographic trend globally. In 2009 the global population of +60-year-old people reached 680 million, 11% of the world’s population. It has also been predicted that by 2030, the amount will increase to 20% in 55 countries.

By 2050, Europe will increase its elderly population from 40 million to 219 million, China will experience a growth of 30% from 109 million to 350 million and India will increase the number of elderly from 62 million to 240 million. Japan, with the largest percentage of +60 people, will increase the current amount from 27% to 44%.

While number of youth decreases across the planet and the number of older people increases, does it not make more sense to take advantage of the “older” brand image instead of investing resources and money to desperately rejuvenate the image? Older people are more loyal to the brand than the new multitasking and impatient generation. Besides – they have also more money and time to spend.

Aging Social Media and Blogosfare

Yes, but young people make more noise in the Internet you might say. Not true.

In January 2011, +55-year-olds represented 7% of the global Facebook users, however the amount of 45-54-year-old users reached 12% and the percentage of 35-44-year-old users increased to 18%. What comes to Twitter, +55-year-olds represented 9% of the global Twitter users, while 45-54-year-olds reached 17% and 35-44-year-olds 27%.

Meanwhile, the older generation is also getting more comfortable with blogging: 11% of the over 30-year-old adults blogged in 2010, compared with 7% in 2007. Also, during the last two years blogging by the 34-45 year-old Internet users has increased 6%  (up to 16%), 46-55-year-old bloggers saw an increase of 5%  (up to 11%), and even 65-73-year-olds blogged 2% more (up to 8%).

But how to reach the increasing older generation?

#1 Stay cool, but use more mature marketing message

Older generation wants to remain cool, but also see people and situations they can relate to – people little younger they are, well aging and sophisticated, such as Meryl Streep and George Clooney. What comes to the situations, if you know that 90% of the people in your cruise are +55, do not show images of young people and babies in your advertising – it pushes older generation away. Instead, show older generation having fun, flirting, enjoying life in a cool environment.

#2 Aim advertising for the right target

In advertising we are so youth focused, that we often forget that the hopes and dreams are different in each age group. They change as people get older, handling more relationships, family experiences, health, happy memories and personal fulfilment. If you are too young to know what your target group dreams about, ask them. They are happy to share their opinion.

#3 Listen and influence in consumer forums

Age makes us more wise and careful. Older people do a lot of investigation before spending their time and money. Older generation compares prices, goes to consumer forums and listens what people have to say in social media.

#4 Focus on emotional bond and quality

Older generation is more interested in quality and value for money than latest fashion. They do not like to be rushed into a decision, but have time to compare different options. However, older people are also more loyal and stay with brands they trust. If you success creating an emotional bond with older users, they do not hesitate to promote your brand to their friends and other users across the social media.

Old trends in young generation, new trends in older generation

To stay always ahead of the competition targeting older generation, it might be a good idea to remember that in the end young people are early adopters of the new technologies and communication channels and “old” people are slow to follow. It means that you can observe youth-focused brands while they try to exploit new trends and conquer new channels by trial and error, and once they become “hot” in your target age group you are well prepared to be “trendy”.

According to a 2010 study by Pew Research Center, the amount of young bloggers has decreased dramatically over the past few years by half. The number of blogging teenagers decreased to 14 % compared to 28% in 2006 and the amount of young adult bloggers (18-29-years-old) has dropped 9% since 2007.

Meanwhile, the older generation is getting more comfortable with blogging: 11% of the over 30-year-old adults blogged in 2010, compared with 7% in 2007. Also, during the last two years blogging by the 34-45 year-old Internet users has increased 6%  (up to 16%), 46-55-year-old bloggers saw an increase of 5%  (up to 11%), and even 65-73-year-olds blogged 2% more (up to 8%).

It seems like the blogger generation is getting older and younger generation prefers social networking – is blogging becoming the sport of “old” people?

Micro-blogging in Social Networks

“The first thing going on here is the broader movement from MySpace, which had a integrated blogging function, to Facebook, which doesn’t put its blogging capabilities up front as MySpace does,” says Aaron Smith, a research specialist at Pew Internet & American Life Project.

There has been a clear movement from long blog posts, “macro-blogging”, to quick status updates and messages, “micro-blogging”, offered by Facebook, Twitter and other similar social networks. Young people “do not have time” to write long blog posts nor can they be bothered to read “two page novels” of someone’s life or brand’s awards. The new generation wants it short, actual and in real-time.

Also, according to a 2010 study by Technorati based on respondents in North-America, Europe, APAC and South America, even users who are currently blogging say that their devotion to micro-blogging (30%) and social networks (28%) have reduced their blogging activity. Another very interesting detail was that on average the bloggers actually spent more time on social media sites (9.9h/week) than they spent reading other blogs (9.2h/week).

Increasing popularity of Smartphones

Smartphones are constantly increasing their market share around the globe, especially among young people, and as Japanese “Twittermania” has shown they are perfect for micro-blogging. With the augmented Internet use and social media apps, people spend more time checking the latest headlines and status updates, watching videos, commenting with few words and sharing interesting content through mobile devices.

Anyone who has ever blogged knows it requires hard work and concentration and anyone who has ever read a blog post in a mobile knows the effort it takes to read a long post in the small screen. More online or digital communications are happening through mobile devices and the amount of text user can type and read is quite limited.

So, are blogs getting out of fashion?

No. Let’s say they are just becoming more refined by age.

According to the Technorati study, bloggers are more affluent and educated than the general population: 79% have college degrees and 43% have graduate degrees, 30% has a household income of $75K+ and 25% has a household income of $100K+.

65% of the bloggers are 18-44-years-old and 81% of them have been blogging more than 2 years, which increases the quality of the content. In the early ages, blogging was seen as an entertainment for teenagers while now Facebook and other social networks are taking that role and “old” people are catching up. Also, the amount of companies using blogs for marketing has been increasing during the years as shown in the graph below.

Now let’s see. How much relevant content can you include in 140 characters or a Facebook status update if you cannot link it to anything? Why users would be interested in any of your posts if they cannot click to find out more?

Linking the posts only to the official website or other people’s content does not seem enough either. Blogging allows the brand to talk more than just products and services and explore more fun and creative ideas. Blog is also a great way to establish an image of an expert and let your or brand’s voice to be heard over the competition. Only passing someone else’s posts or tweets around without bringing anything your own to the content does not really show who you are or what you really are worth. People and brands without opinions are boring.

From SEO perspective, new and relevant keyword filled content quickly shows in Google, which increases traffic to your blog. Linking posts properly can increase traffic to your website, which in turn improves your website’s ranking.

In reality, social media, micro-blogging and blogs can complement each other. Including social bookmarking buttons into the blog posts helps it to spread around the social networks and promoting the blog posts in Twitter and Facebook increase traffic to the blog. Meanwhile, short relevant posts or tweets about the blog posts add interesting content to your social network sites.

New generation, new trends

However, it is very important to remember that in the end young people are early adopters of the new technologies and communication channels and “old” people are slow to follow. First blogs were for teenagers, then Twitter and Facebook were just for silly teenage talk and no doubt the increased amount of Smartphones will change the settings and trends even more. Whether new generation moves from micro-blogging to traditional blogging in the future is a good question, but at least for the next few years blogs will still remain a good channel to express more profound thoughts, ideas, expertise and opinions of current events and future trends.

European Parliament’s Internal market and consumer protection committee has adopted this week (8th Nov 2010) a report on the impact of advertising on consumer behaviour by French MEP Philippe Juvin.The report focuses on intrusive new advertising techniques that have arrived with online social networks, forums and blogs.

Even if the current EU legislation (2005) battles against aggressive and misleading advertising, it does not cover fully the new online advertising practices, such as abuse of data privacy by targeting individual’s interests or community managers who pretend to be consumers and leave comments and information in the forums. These practices should be controlled by the message board monitors and require “behavioural advertisement” warnings, says the Internal Market committee. Consumers must receive clear, accessible and comprehensive information about how their data are collected and used. This private information cannot be used without consumers’ opt-in.

Data privacy and ads tailored to individuals

Law makers want to prohibit certain intrusive practices, such as:

• “Robots” on Google’s Gmail service that are able to scan private emails for keywords to automatically generate targeted advertisements.
• Practices that tailor advertising to individual consumers’ needs involving retrieval of information from social networking sites such as Facebook and “geolocation” services via  mobile phones connected to the Internet.

The report states that these practices constitute “an attack on the protection of privacy when it involves tracking individuals”, e.g. with cookies or profiling.

“Behavioural ad” warning and data collection

Lawmakers also suggest implementation of “the clearly readable words ‘behavioural advertisement’ into the relevant online advertisements along with a window containing a basic explanation of this practice” e.g. posts from advertisers posing as consumers on Internet forums.

The report also demands the Europe Commission and Member States “to ensure that different levels of data collection are kept wholly separate” and stresses that consumers must be well informed on how their data is been used and what it is used for. This information should be kept and used “only by explicit agreement by the consumer”.

Hidden advertising

The current EU legislation does not cover yet the development of “hidden” internet advertising, which happens in forums where consumers post comments to one another about products or services. This may not only mislead consumers, but can also ruin a company’s brand image with one click. An example would be TripAdvisor, which received complaints from hotels and restaurants accusing the company of many users’ defamatory comments.

According to the report, Member States should “encourage the emergence of forum observers/moderators who are alert to the dangers of hidden advertising”.

Transparency and education

The Commission is asked to develop an EU web site labelling system, modelled on the European Privacy Seal, that certifies a site’s standard of data protection. To monitor and control the websites, the report suggests the use of  EU-wide simultaneous web site “sweeps” carried out by Member States. To protect and educate “vulnerable consumers such as children”, the lawmakers urge EU commission to develop an EU advertising literacy programme modelled on the UK’s “Media Smart” initiative and create information campaigns to warn consumers of “hidden” forms of advertising.

If this new legislation goes through, CRM and data collection through Social Media will surely become more complicated. What will happen to Facebook and its huge database it sells to the world, targetted advertising based on key words, cookies and consumers interests, LBS, Facebook Deals@Places, etc…? Who draws the line between customer service in forums and “hidden advertisements”?

The report was approved in committee with 30 votes in favour, 1 against and 2 abstentions. The plenary vote will take place in December.

Note: The report has been plenary approved in December.

Who does not like graphics, charts and images? Maria Pergolino classifies in her blog post the top 5 B2B Marketing Infographics, but I believe they are relevant also for B2C. After going through all the five, I have put them in new order according to my personal preference:

1. CMO’s Guide to the Social Landscape

A very, very interesting social landscape infographic. It  is a guide to help you understand how best to leverage major social media sites (Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, LinkedIn, Youtube, Digg, StumbleUpon, YahooBuzz)and to evaluate which one suits your needs most. It is a clear compare and contrast grid ranking the platforms (Good, Ok, Bad) among customer communication, brand exposure, traffic to your site and SEO. I find it great, but it is a shame it stops there, showing examples of only a few sites. However, if you consider them as examples of their genre, you will be able to adapt them to your local platforms. You can see microblogging site,  personal social networking site, image and video hosting site, professional networking site, video sharing website, social news site, social news community and social bookmarking site. For example, even if you are using different professional networking site, it probably has the same pros and cons as LinkedIn.

2. Who participates Online

This infographic shows you what people are doing online and which age groups are doing it. Even if it unfortunately only concentrates in U.S. it is a nice indication to use when evaluating your social media tactics. It shows the %/age group of: Content creators (write blogs, post videos), Critics (who post comments, reviews), Collectors (RSS, bookmarking), Joiners (Social network users), Spectators (read&watch) and inactives (online, but not connected.

3. Life Cycle of a Blog Post

An excellent infographic of the blog lifecycle showing a detailed process showing where the blog post goes (servers, data miners, spam blogs), what the ping servers contact (search engines) and what the reader sees (blog, socal media, bookmarks). It gives you an understanding of the more technical side of blogging and what you should take in account to optimize the results.

4. Visualizing Facebook

Considering that there is even a Facebook movie coming up, The Social Network, this social network should definitely not be ignored. I would not use it for the professional networking since people like to keep their personal and professional lives separated and do not necessary like to show their weekend photos or status updates to potential future customers (and if you join a group there is a danger they can see everything – especially after Facebook’s sometimes questionable privacy politics). Anyhow, for consumer marketing Facebook is beginning to be “a must”. This infographic shows the profile of the average Facebook user, which is very interesting to know…but with a little money you will be able to get the statistics of your exact target group: just contact the company.

5. Corporate connection

A visual representation of globalization showing the connection among 3 celebrities, 35 corporations, 40 subsidiaries and more than 300 brands. It is a nice snapshot to show you it is possible to be all over the world and also that your competitors are already going global.

Have a close look at these five and think how the information could be adapted to your brand. They look very nice and can be very useful if adapted right.

You have finally identified your key influencers in the blogosphare, now what? The question is delicate since even if you want to promote your product, you need to forget the usual sales speech. Wrong approach might be perceived in a negative way, since no one likes to be sold to. The strategy should be based on relationships NOT selling.

But what to do? Think “Out of the Box” like Nokia does.

To promote Nokia’s navigation tools and accessories, the company decided to use a different strategy to reach its key influencers. Sexy sports cars were dropped at five different bloggers doorsteps and the quest begun. All bloggers were given Nokia navigation tools they could use in different missions. At first the bloggers had to find the car keys, then a enigmatic box, then another group of bloggers on bikes…The adventure ended at a hotel where all participants could try out all the toys and watch a little video of their journey.

The result is quite impressive: Nokia identified its key influencers, surprised them and gave them something to talk about. 1000heads created a great video case study, #NokiaNav: The Story in Full, which has already 2,500 views in Youtube. I recommend watching the video, since it shows a great example on how to create a real bond with the key influencers by moving the virtual relationship with bloggers into a real-life relationship. In the end of the video the viewers are directed to a special Nokia dedicated site.

Well done, Nokia.

Social networking is exploding in Eastern Europe. A study by the Interactive Advertising Bureau shows that of all internet users surveyed in 16 European countries, Hungary was in top rank with 65% participation, followed by Romania at 61% and Poland at 56%. Most users are 18-34 year olds, yet older people have started creating their profile. Indeed an interesting audience to catch!

According to Facebook statistics, in 2008 the social network increased their users by 180% in the region and has now more than 1.8 million “active” users (once a week or more) in 19 countries. In the Czech Republic, the quantity of Facebook users doubled in 2009 to more than 1.3 million, 10% of the country’s population. The phenomenon has increased in the country the number of advertisers on Facebook by 30% in 2009, according to Ataxo, In Serbia and Croatia it has more than 300 000 users in each country. In end of 2009 the network had obtained 271 000 users in Romania, but its competitor Hi5 gathered more than 2.3 million users (more than 10% of the population). The lowest figures appeared in Moldova and Belarus with under 10 000 users.

Is it all about Facebook? No. Foreign social networks are facing rough competition from local social networks that are increasing rapidly. For example, in Poland the largest social network, Nasza-Klasa is adding 20,000 new accounts daily. At the end of 2008 it had already more than 11 million active users and nearly 90% in Poland have heard about it.  An interesting detail is that it is also the 6th largest social networking site in the U.K. ahead of Twitter, according to Hitwise UK, since the “British” Polish community consists of about 500 000 people. Foreign networks are less known and popular in Poland: My Space.com is known by around 12%, Facebook only by 5%.

What comes to the Polish social media habits, 37% of Polish people create their own content on the Internet. According to the study by moje-ankiety.pl, social media is mostly used to talk with messenger and to find old friends (75.1% respondents). 68.7% likes publishing pictures and 50% write “on the wall”. Only 25% likes to play games.

In Romania, Twitter gathered 11 000 Romanian users, with 1 000 users creating over 80% of the content.  It is not seen as a social network, but as an interaction zone used in integration with other platforms by bloggers and other social media readers/contributors. Youtube obtained 2, 000, 000 monthly unique visits, WordPress has 11 430 active users. These blog readers/writers are mainly 20-35 year olds (73,7%). They have higher income and education than the average internet user and 50% have finished their university studies. They interact considerably with the blogs they read, 44,7% has commented at least once. Of the foreign brands, Puma has already used blogs in its marketing and communication strategy.

The new, fast and free way of communicating, long distances and the increasing internet penetration in Eastern Europe might have their part on the recent boom. Or maybe it is the freedom of expression and individualism that result so attractive to the region. Time to throw the traditional media in the carbage? Maybe not yet, but it is surely time to add Social Media to the marketing strategy.

Implementing a communication strategy in Europe can be tough. It is a special mix of different nationalities with their own language, culture, habits and preferences. And different Social Media habits.  Here the attitude “What works in NY works in LA” does not really apply: the message that works for the Nordics does not necessarily work for the French. Tools that are used in UK, are not necessarily popular in Italy.

If you are pushing your message through a Social Media tool the citizens do not use, you are wasting your money and resources. It can be the most innovative, clever campaign ever created, but if there is no one who sees it…failed. Big time.

Here is a small snapshot on the European Social Media habits based on the statistics from the Universal McCann study wave 3:

Blogs

9% of all Europeans maintain blogs or publish Web pages. Highest percentage of blog readers in Europe is in Italy (78,9%), France(78%) and Spain(77,8%) and the lowest in Hungary(50,5%), Germany(56,6%) and Austria(59,7%).  The most active blog readers are in Italy (77% reads daily or weekly), Spain (71% reads daily or weekly), Russia (67% reads daily or weekly) and France (66% reads daily or weekly).

However, writing blogs as an activity in Europe is not as popular as reading blogs. The highest percentage of users writing blogs is in Spain(41,4%), Turkey(39,2%) and Italy(33,3%). It has not been well adapted in Hungary(7,8%), Czech Republic(18,2%) and Romania(23,2%). Biggest growth is happening in Germany with a jump from 7,5% to 27,8%. In France the situation has stabilized, but in Russia, Spain, UK and Italy percentage is still increasing.

The most active blog writers can be found from France (66% daily or weekly), Spain (55% daily or weekly) and Russia (49% daily or weekly).

Social Networks

The highest percentage of active users participating on Social Networks is in Hungary(79,9%), Poland(76,8%) and Russia(71,7%). Countries that have the lowest adoption rates are France(33,1%), Czech Republic(35,5%) and Italy(38,6%). The biggest growth percentage is in Russia, Germany, Italy, UK and France.

The most active users participating on Social Networks can be found from UK(75% daily or weekly), Spain (64% daily or weekly) and Italy (66% daily or weekly).

Video clips

The most adapted social media tool in all countries. Countries with highest percentage of users watching video clips are Turkey(93,4%), Romania(92,5%), Poland(90,5%), Spain(86,6%) and Hungary(86,6%). Countries with lowest ranking are France(63,4%) and Russia(67,9%). Usage is strongly increasing in all countries.

The most active users/country are from Italy (73% daily or weekly), Spain (76% daily or weekly) and France (69% daily or weekly)

Pod casts

What comes to Podcasts, there is a great difference between countries. As a media it is used in Romania(64,4%) and Russia(57,9%) as well as in Spain(51%) and Turkey(50,8%). It does not interest much in Italy(26,6%), Netherlands(26,3%) and Hungary(25,1%). The percentage is increasing especially in Russia.

Most active users can be found from Italy (72% daily or weekly), Russia (53% daily or weekly)and Spain (65% daily or weekly).

RSS

Subscribing to RSS is especially popular in Russia(56,6%) and Poland(47,7%) compared with other countries. It is also used in Spain(33,6%) and Turkey(32%). It is not very used in Hungary(14,7%), Czech Republic(15%) and Netherlands(14,7%).

Most active users are in Italy (69% daily or weekly), France (60% daily or weekly) and Russia (51% daily or weekly)

Go global, but in Europe act local.

Source: http://www.universalmccann.com/global/knowledge#/proprietary_studies