Last week, when we discussed the case concerning social media, we spent a lot of time on annoying, pop-up, youtube advertisments. Do you believe that an ad, just as interactive as the video I posted, could have a greater effect on a user than a conventional commercial?
Is it possible to calculate the return on investment (ROI) of Social Media Marketing activities? I’m sure that this question haunts the minds of many investors, but also of many experts in this field.
Let’s start by saying that there are several agencies / portals that suggest some formulas that might be useful.
For example Marketo.com suggests the usefulness of calculating the SOV (on Facebook pages), acronym of Share of Voice, with the following formula: Number of shares / Number of “Likes”. In this way it is possible to measure the influence of each individual “Like” .
Instead, to calculate the increase in visits generated by a “Like”, Radian6, suggests the Continue reading ROI of the activities of Social Media Marketing→
Producer fabricates personal computers with different attributes. You as a consumer choose from the options and will have a computer that best suits your wishes. It sounds familiar.
At dell’s they turn it the opposite way. You as a consumer bring together the computer that perfectly suits your requirements. Dell as a producer combines its resources and provides you with this perfect computer.
Dell is an international giant in production of computers. When it’s about customers’ involvement, Dell is close to the maximum. At the website of Dell. Inc you can find this option for having your own, custom-built PC.
At Dell’s you can choose to customize almost every computer on almost every detail. At Continue reading Involment at Dell’s and Lay’s→
During class we have discussed the concept of ‘Mass Customization’ a lot and after the article group 7 posted I am always curious about why many companies fail to implement this concept.
The following article that I found actually explains what steps you have to take to implement mass customization.
It gives insights in how you should reorganize your business to be able to benefit from mass customization. First of all the authors of the article explain that you should not see mass customization as an exotic approach but a strategic mechanism that can be applicable to most businesses as long as it is properly understood. You should see mass customization as a process within your business that you should align with your customer needs. To be able to do this you should implement three organizational capabilities: Continue reading Mass Customization implementation→
During the seminar we have discussed a lot of times how important is for a company to be close with its customers and maintain an active dialogue with them. Making customers a part of their brand story, companies can make them create positive experiences and associations that will engage them to the brand. Hence, more and more companies have been trying to encourage active customer involvement to their activities in order to build stronger relationships and affect them towards a more positive buying behavior. It is interesting to view examples of companies that find different kinds of ways to keep customers involved. I enjoyed a lot all the previous posts the other students made and also other examples I saw while searching on the internet. All that is needed is creativity and Continue reading Active customer involvement→
As I read the UnME Jeans Case I was wondering whether all companies can use social media to advertise their products. A category of companies that came quickly into my mind was publishing companies.
Is it therefore wisely for publishing companies to advertise their books through social media?
Many will think that the target group for a publishing company consists of people of old ages that are not interested in social media, as a result the idea of advertising through social media will seem a joke. However, in such a competitive market where companies Continue reading Social Media for Publishing companies→
Albert Heijn, the supermarket, has a very nice app for their customers. This app is called Appie (which is a very nice name since most Dutch people refer to Albert Heijn as Appie and the word “app” is in this name). In this app, customers can give their opinion, contact customer support, see what is on sale (“Bonus” articles), see what products Albert Heijn sells, etcetera. For me, the nicest part is the recipe part. Albert Heijn supplies recipes in different manners (through a monthly magazine, recipe cards in store) and the app also has a recipe part. In this part of the app, you can see the recipes from the monthly magazine, see which recipes are popular among other users, save your favourite recipes and search for recipes based on different search options (what part of the course you are Continue reading Sharing recipes with Albert Heijn→
Something women and maybe some men dream about.. designing your own shoes!
We all know the famous examples of Nike where you can create your own sportive shoes. But there are also several websites where you can create your unique non-sportive pair of shoes. I have found a fun and interesting website where women can create their own pair of heels. When you’re having trouble finding the right pair of shoes for underneath that particular dress or just want an exclusive and unique pair of shoes, Chiko Shoes is a good option for you!
Philips, one of the most famous firms in the high-tech market, uses the user interface design at its website, helping the consumers to decide which TV is the best for them according to their needs. The website focuses on user’s experience and interaction and tries to make it as simple and efficient as possible. Philips uses both parameter-based and need-based interface, in order to support the user-design process, taking into account the consumer expertise. For example, at the choices of “type of room” and “level of picture quality” a need-based interface is being used while, at the same time, the consumer can define the design parameters of the TV for the design and the screen size. There is, also, not a customization problem because Philips provides initial designs from which a Continue reading Philips and user interface design→
After seeing different examples of customer interactions with firms, I just noticed an article about a new Spotify service in ‘de consumentenbond’, a dutch comparison company that focuses on consumers.*
The article called ‘Spotify helps to discover’ indicates that Spotify will test a new discover-function in the upcoming weeks. User can discover new music that fits the already listened collection (roughly similar to the discussed examples in class). Another service is to combine different playlists and ‘follow’ music artists.
So for those who use spotify (I don’t use it myself), try and discover it!
What is interesting about this video is that it does not only talk, just, about how the brand communities are being created, but it is about a company who promises to create your own brand community..The following video is an advertisement of a company, Dynamic Signal, who promises to deliver to companies custom analysis of their brand influencers in order to be able and create their own brand community. It is stated, in the video, that in our modern times the consumers can connect to whatever they want, whenever they want spending a large amount of their valuable time in the web in niche categories that interest them the most. In addition to that, the increased role of the social media, plays, also, a huge role in increasing the involvement of each brand with its devoted enthusiasts. This Continue reading creating brand communities→
Couchsurfing is a community of over 5 million members in 97,000 cities — and every country — around the world. Their website connects travelers and locals who meet offline to share cultures, hospitality and adventures – whether on the road or in their hometowns.
Their Mission is simple: Create inspiring experiences.
They envision a world where everyone can explore and create meaningful connections with the people and places they encounter. Building meaningful connections across cultures enables them to respond to differences with curiosity, appreciation and respect. The appreciation of diversity spreads tolerance and creates a global community. Continue reading Couchsurfing and Community Utilization→
Customer service is something that many companies think of as very important. Especially for premium brand products and services a good customer service is one of the differentiation points. Yet, in practice the customer service is always worse then companies would make you believe. I don’t recall the last time that I was actually surprised by the high quality of service I received. When I look online the complaints about customer service seem endless, which made me wonder: How can something that is perceived as important for many companies be so bad and what can be done about it?
Nowadays, we are living in an extremely fast-paced world. Somehow it seems like many people are always in a rush. Everyday activities and necessities may even seem to become burdens. One example of this is doing groceries.
But, do not worry! The solution might not be far. Actually, in South Korea it already exists. South Korea is one of the most hard working countries and many do not have the time to go to the supermarket. Tesco has been working on an innovative way to engage the consumer in order to make grocery shopping more convenient.
A few years ago Leo Burnet created a brilliant integrated campaign for Canon Australia. Using completely unique and original idea the company established the brand image of Canon EOS as a creative and inspiring. The campaign succeed to raise awareness, extend the time people spend on the website and even involve photographers who use other brands. The example shows how consumers could be connected to a chain via simple online platform and an innovative idea. Enjoy the video 🙂
After some research, it turned out that a lot of pilots were still using paper maps to navigate their route! Although there was already enough technology to make the navigation task faster, smarter and more efficient. Jeppesen, an american daughter of Boeing, remarked this gap and opportunity and started the development of an app, which include all routes and fit for every plane.
It would be however a huge and expensive to task to make all (optimal) flighting routes digital. So they decided that the pilots could co-create the app. For a long time they worked intensively with 58 pilots of 9 different airlines. This process started with just an observation by means of shots from the cockpit to get insight into the needs and Continue reading Pilots create for pilots an application→
While I was searching for examples of mass customization, the first that came up in my mind were cakes. There are moments when you don’t want a cake designed by the bakery, for example: on birthdays, weddings, baby showers and so on. These are moments when you want your own creation. There are bakeries that give the option to design your own cake.
When you design your own cake, the starting point is sponge cake, Mud Cake or Ice Cream Cake. The starting points are important because consumers don’t always have the appropriate knowledge to bake a delicious cake. If they also have to choose the Continue reading Mass Customization – Design your own cake→
The demands of consumers is changing rapidly and the access to information and communication technologies are transforming the supply chain into a network of partnerships. Nowadays most of the companies innovate due to information of consumers through fashion magazines, fashion shows, blogs, social media and forums. Consumers are constantly talking about the newest fashions and are longing to have the new collection of the fashion designers. However, these products of fashion designers are too expansive for most consumers. Zara is doing it differently. Zara segments its market into a set of customers who share the same or similar set of needs and wants, which are customers who are aware of fashion. Instead of asking consumers what they want, Zara goes to fashion shows or meets with the designers to decide where there is a trend. After identifying a promising fashion, Zara simply goes into action.
Looking at the best examples of crowsourcing campaings (http://www.gottaquirk.com/2011/05/13/fact-box-10-of-the-best-crowdsourcing-campaigns-in-the-past-year/) I started to wonder about users‘ behavior. Some users are active for a long period of time whereas others stop participating after a few submissions. There is not a lot of research done to analyse this behavior, therefore I would like to summarise two research papers/ articles which found some interesting conclusions and tips for companies using crowdsourcing platforms which want to increase the participation rates. Also, I include the practical examples which help to understand the theory. Continue reading Motivations for crowdsourcing→
Consumer Value Creation 