BrandKnew January 2014

Branding matters. Because branding matters.

Published by ISD Global

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07 Dear Friends: Am sure all of us are looking ahead to a glorious 2014 and from the entire team at Brand Knew our very best wishes to all of you. As the year came to a close, we look back at how Instagram was the most popular social media platform for brands in 2013. We also look ahead to the 5 Unmissable Consumer Trends that will shape the Asian market in the year 2014 courtesy our collaboration with trendwatching.com. The talk about Big Data is omnipresent and our feature attempts to unravel some more of the ambiguities that surround it.

Liz Goodgold in her inimitable style talks about creating a branded vocabulary. There is merit in brands seeking the right kind of partnerships as is articulated in the piece How Partnerships Make Brands Sexy. We get into a bit of Neuroscience and how there seems to be a link between creativity and madness! We also cover action points that need to be complied with when brands advertise internationally. All this and lots more in this edition.

Have a wonderful, happy, Brand Knew year!

Suresh Dinakaran @sureshdinakaran ae.linkedin.com/pub/suresh-dinakaran/67/355/335/

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blog.sureshdinakaran.com/wordpress suresh@groupisd.com

Managing Editor: Suresh Dinakaran Creative Head/Director Operations: Pravin Ahir Magazine Concept & Design/ New Media Specialist: Mufaddal Joher Country Head, UK: Sagar Patil Country Head, India: Rohit Unni Digital Marketing Strategist: Mark Cijo Associate: Brand Success: Andre Van Helsdingen Web Specialist: Prasanta Kumar Sahu Online Support: Mahendra Kumar Behera

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CONTENTS

The Secret Science Behind Big Data And Word Of Mouth Blair Enns: 12 Revolutionary Proclamations for Ad Agency New Business Can You Master a Branded Vocabulary? It’s Elementary Infographic: Things to Think About When Advertising Internationally What Neuroscience Says About The Link Between Creativity And Madness 5 Unmissable Asian Consumer Trends For 2014 The Secret to Selling Your Brand With One Sentence Three Marketing Tactics to Tap Into the Emerging Apple Demographic Partnerships make brands sexy 10 Social Media Marketing Ideas From Big Brands The rise of the prankvert: a controversial emerging content trend Instagram is the ‘best platform for brands’ in 2013, beating out Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ Book, Line & Sinker

The Secret Science Behind Big Data And Word Of Mouth Jonah Berger

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08 Why do some companies, products and services get more word of mouth than others? It’s not luck. There’s a science behind it. Social media gurus always preach that no one talks about boring products or boring ideas. So you would think that more interesting products and brands get talked about more. Surprisingly, they don’t.

Startups live and die by word of mouth. Whether it’s a new website, a revolutionary recruiting service, or B2B play, consumer awareness is always low at the beginning. No one realizes you exist, so you have to get the word out. But most new ventures don’t have a big advertising budget. They have to grow organically: Get existing customers or fans bringing in new ones — one at a time.

Why, then, do some companies, products and ideas get talked about more readily than others? People often think getting word of mouth is like capturing lightning in a bottle.

You have to get lucky. The market has to be just right. Or you need the right combination of three or four indescribable qualities that combine in some inexplicable way to create magic.

That’s a great theory. Except it’s completely wrong.

People often think getting word of mouth is like capturing lightning in a bottle. You have to get lucky.

There’s a science behind word of mouth. It’s not random and it’s not luck why people talk about some things rather than others. Just like behavioral economists have studied why people make certain choices, or statisticians have pulled out insights about human behavior from “Big Data,” researchers have been hard at work analyzing the human behavior behind our decisions to talk and share.

In one recent investigation, for example, my colleague and I looked at word-of-mouth data on almost 10,000 products and brands from Coca-Cola and Walmart to small startups. Everything from technology companies to services, from B2B to consumer package goods. In another project, we analyzed the virality of almost 7,000 pieces of online content. Everything from politics and international news to funny pieces, sports, and style.

through the cereal aisle. This makes Cheerios more top of mind more often, increasing the chances it gets mentioned.

A product or idea might be really interesting, but if people aren’t triggered to think about it, they’ll never bring it up.

Top-of-mind means tip-of-tongue.

Triggers are only one of the key word of mouth drivers my colleagues and I uncovered in our research. Again and again, I’ve seen the same six principles driving what people talk about and share. These six principles can be arranged in an acronym (STEPPS: Social Currency, Triggers, Emotion, Public, Practical Value, and Stories).

Social Currency.

Just like the car we drive and the clothes we wear, the things we say affect how people see us. So the more something makes someone look good, the more likely they’ll be to pass it on.

Triggers.

If something is top-of-mind it will be tip-of-the-tongue.

Just like peanut butter reminds us of jelly, the more we’re triggered to think about a product or idea, the more we’ll talk about it

Emotion.

When we care, we share. Whether positive (excitement or humor) or negative (anger or anxiety), high arousal emotions drive us to share.

Public.

People tend to imitate others. But as the phrase “monkey see, monkey do” attests, the easier it is to see what someone is doing, the easier it is to imitate.

Public observability drives imitation (e.g. iPod’s white headphones).

Practical Value.

People don’t just want to look good, they also want to help others. So more useful equals more shared. Think articles about 10 ways to raise capital or five key negotiating tips.

But the focus of these studies wasn’t just documenting which products get talked about more, or what types of online content go viral. Rather, it was about understanding the motivations behind those outcomes: the underlying human behavior that drives some things to get talked about more than others and some things to go viral; how different emotions (e.g. sadness versus anger) shape what people share; how communicating online versus offline impacts whether people talk about what is top-of-mind; the psychology of talk; the science of social transmission.

Stories.

Take Triggers. Disney is more interesting than Cheerios. It’s a really engaging emotional experience. But the problem is that people aren’t triggered to think about it very often. Sure, people talk a lot about the brand right after they go to one of the theme parks, but unless they’re reminded to think about that experience in the weeks and months that follow, they don’t keep bringing it up.

Will following this formula guarantee a viral hit? No. But it will increase the batting average. No one hits a home run every time, but by understanding the science of hitting, people can raise their average by hitting more singles, doubles and even home runs.

Cheerios is less interesting, but people eat breakfast once a day, 365 days a year. Even if they don’t buy Cheerios, they still see it once a week when they wheel their grocery cart

No one wants to seem like a walking advertisement, but they will talk about something if it’s part of a broader narrative. So build a “Trojan horse” story, a message that carries your brand along for the ride.

These six principles comprise a formula for getting more word of mouth. They’re a recipe for crafting contagious content and for getting more people talking about any product or idea.

The same is true with word of mouth. By understanding the science behind why people talk and share, companies and organizations can get more word of mouth for their products and ideas and help those products and ideas catch on along the way

Blair Enns: 12 Revolutionary Proclamations for Ad Agency New Business Michael Gass

How to win new business without pitching, reclaim control of client engagements and stop giving away your thinking for free.

My friend, John Sharpe, has spent nearly forty years in the ad agency business and the last twenty in business development exclusively. He is a personal friend and mentor with an impressive resume. So when John tells me that he has just read one of the most influential business development books in his lifetime, he had my attention. The book John recommended was, The Win Without Pitching Manifesto, written by Blair Enns. I immediately ordered a copy.

We Will Be Selective: When given a choice to operate from the position of power that comes with deep expertise or to pursue work outside that area for clients who will not allow him to lead, the expert will refuse.

We Will Build Expertise Rapidly: We will build a culture of continuous learning by hiring for skill, by developing it through training, by empowering our people to form their own professional development plans that we will approve and fund, by holding them accountable to these plans, and, most importantly, by leading with our own example.

We Will Not Solve Problems Before We Are Paid: Our thinking is our highest value product; we will not part with it without appropriate compensation.

After finding the time to thoroughly digest its contents, I agree with John, this is an excellent book. Business development is the lifeblood of any advertising agency and this book should be a “must read” for every person in your firm.

We Will Address Issues of Money Early: We will resist putting ourselves in a position where we have overestimated in the buying cycle only to find the client cannot afford to pay us what we are worth.

Blair is calling on agencies to once again reclaim the high ground in client relationships. He lays out a clear path on how to do it through 12 proclamations of a win without pitching firm. This is a guide that will transform your agency and the way that you go about doing new business.

We Will Refuse to Work at a Loss: We will leave to our competition those clients that would neither bring us profit nor merit for charity.

Here are Blair’s 12 Proclamations: We Will Specialize: “We must simply choose to take control, first by specializing and shifting power back from the client toward us, and then we begin to shape our future.”

We Will Replace Presentations with Conversations: To be truly free of the pitch we must change the tone of these meetings with our prospective clients and move from the presenter/ compiler role to that of the expert practitioner.

We Will Diagnose Before We Prescribe: From here forward we will view the act of prescription without diagnosis for what it is: malpractice.

We Will Rethink What It Means to Sale: We will seek out those that see a fit between their needs and our expertise and how are willing to let us lead the engagement.

We Will Do With Words What We Used to Do With Paper: Let us be clear to our clients and ourselves: we are not in the proposal writing business.

We Will Charge More: We will invite the client to tell us that he would prefer to work with a more affordable firm.

We Will Hold Our Heads High: We will seek respect above money, for only when we are respected as experts will we be paid the money we seek.

Blair challenges agencies to find the fortitude to make these hard decisions. They are doable and will transform the way agencies are currently dong new business.

About the Author Blair is a business development advisor to creative firms worldwide. He and his family reside in Kaslo, British Columbia, Canada. He is a gifted writer. His book is beautifully written.

You will find that it is not a typical business read. You can tell that he spent a lot of time on each chapter, allowing the words to percolate overtime until they were just right. Rich, fresh, concise copy. In an attempt to descrive his writing to one of my agency friends, I told him that Blair is the Ernest Hemingway of business book authors. You will enjoy this book immensely.

Can You Master a Branded Vocabulary?

It’s Elementary Liz Goodgold

Contrary to skeptics, the age of writing is not dead. In fact, we write more than ever – from email to blogs to websites to Twitter. However, what has changed is that our words must be more distinctive than ever. We must create, write, and speak a “brand vocabulary” in order to reap the rewards.

So, just what is a brand vocabulary? It is words and phrases that are proprietary - that belong to your brand only.

“Elementary” as Doctor Watson would reply.

To be clearer, If, for example, my by-line at the end of this article, read: Liz Goodgold is a curiously strong branding expert…,” you might instantly think of Altoids Mints which has been using that tagline for over 25 years. It is not trademark infringement, but mindshare infringement!

Creating a “branded vocabulary” takes work, but allows brands to: 1. Differentiate - It strikes a line in the sand between “us” and “them” 2. Reiterate – After all, BMW, is still the ultimate “driving machine” 3. Repudiate – There are designer shoes.. and then there are Manolo Blahnik’s “On brand” words and phrases can be created, twisted, or merely stolen from the dictionary and turned into “ownable” words. New Orleans chef Emeril Lagasse repeatedly exclaims “bam” after adding ingredients so that it’s become his signature phrase. His colleague on the Food Network, Sandra Lee, built an empire based upon her Semi-Homemade

created term. And, rival Rachel Ray turned Extra Virgin Olive Oil into her trademarked phrase of “EVOO.”

So, how can you create a hot vocabulary?

1. Identify Your Lexicon Library – Determine which words relate to your brand and which should be avoided like the plague. And, don’t forget: you can always create new words as well. Carfirmation, Skintervention, Sharknado, Carmelistic, and even the “quicker, picker upper” are now ownable words and phrases.

2. Employ Your Terms Consistently – Building a warehouse of words takes time and a commitment; don’t change willy-nilly.

3. Speak Like Your Peeps (People) – If your target thinks you’re “awesome,” return the favor and use just as colorful language. Glamour Magazine, for example, uses the email OMG@glamour.com . Just fab!

4. Remember the Medium – Twitter is very clear: 140 characters and you’re cut off. On LinkedIn, the rules are more informal: don’t self-promote on discussion groups: add value, not a commercial. Follow both official and unofficial rules to boost your message.

Now that you know the rules, Sherlock, it’s easy to unlock the mysteries of a brand vocabulary. Or, as I like to say, now you’re armed you with my Words of Lizdom, go ahead and create your own dictionary.

Liz Goodgold is a branding author, consultant, coach, and motivational “speecher” who is on a mission to prevent brands from falling into the sea of similarity.

Download her free 99 Sure Fire Ways to Build Your Brand and Business at www.redfirebranding.com or connect with her at Liz@RedFireBranding.com

Infographic: Things to Think About When Advertising Internationally Michael Gass

U.S. companies have a lot of potential in international markets for their products and services. A number of these markets are huge in terms of population, in countries such as China and India. American firms also want to advertise in other countries because the purchasing power of consumers and businesses in these markets is significant.

“As many advertising agencies have learned, a successful advertisement in one country is not so simple to translate into another language without understanding a market’s distinctive cultural differences.�

This infographic created by the InternationalBusinessGuide.org provides some great examples of the difficulties in marketing to different cultures.

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What Neuroscience Says About The Link Between Creativity And Madness Eric Jaffe

NEW RESEARCH SHEDS MORE LIGHT ON THE STRONG TIES BETWEEN AN ORIGINAL MIND AND A TROUBLED ONE. The idea that very creative people are also a little crazy has been around since humanity’s earliest days. In ancient Greece, Plato noted the eccentricities of poets and playwrights, and Aristotle saw that some creative types were also depressives.

In modern times, that connection has persisted, from Robert Schumann hearing voices guide his music to Sylvia Plath sticking her head in an oven to Van Gogh cutting off his ear to Michael Jackson … being Michael Jackson.

Today the link between creativity and mental illness is firmly embedded in the public conscience. Unlike some supposed cultural wisdoms, however, there’s a good bit of scientific evidence behind this one. Behavioral and brain researchers have found a number of strong if indirect ties between an original mind and a troubled one (many summarized in a recent post by psychologist Scott Barry Kaufman at his Scientific American blog).

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Creative professionals are a bit more likely than others to suffer from bipolar disorder. The healthy relatives of schizophrenics tend to enter creative fields. A genetic variant of some psychoses may be related to creative achievement.

Some dimensions of schizotypy--personality traits that may make a person more vulnerable to schizophrenia--predict a person’s creativity. The list goes on.

A neuroscience group out of Austria, led by Andreas Fink of the University of Graz, recently took the study of schizotypy and creativity a step further. Fink and collaborators recruited study participants who were low or high in schizotypy measures. While inside a brain scanner, the participants completed an idea-generation task that asks people to come up with original uses for everyday objects--a common assessment of creativity.

COGNITIVE DISINHIBITION MAY MAKE SCHIZOTYPAL PERSONALITIES MORE PRONE TO DELUSIONAL THOUGHTS. IT COULD ALSO MAKE CREATIVE MINDS MORE FERTILE. Fink and the others found some key similarities in the brain patterns of people who scored well on originality and those who measured high in schizotypy. These groups both showed reduced deactivation in the right precuneus, an area of the brain that helps us gather information. In the September issue of Cognitive, Affective, and Behavioral Neuroscience, Fink and the others conclude that perhaps creative and schizotypal people share an inability to filter out extraneous or irrelevant material.

“The finding that creativity and schizotypy show similar effects

at the level of the brain would thus support the idea that similar cognitive processes may be implicated in creativity as well as in psychosis proneness,” they write.

The new work enhances a theory by Shelley Carson, a Harvard psychologist and author of the book Your Creative Brain, which says that creativity and mental illness share a process called “cognitive disinhibition.” The term is a mouthful, but essentially cognitive disinhibition describes a failure to keep useless data, images, or ideas out of conscious awareness.

This failure may make schizotypal personalities more prone to delusional thoughts or mental confusion; on the flipside, it could make creative minds more fertile. “[Y]ou have more information in conscious awareness that could be combined and recombined in novel and original ways to come up with creative ideas,” Carson tells Co.Design.

Cognitive disinhibition is part of Carson’s larger model of “shared vulnerability” between creativity and psychopathology.

The idea here is that the presence and power of various cognitive factors will influence whether a person becomes creative, mentally unstable, or a little of both. These factors

MOST CREATIVE PEOPLE DON’T EXHIBIT SEVERE MENTAL PROBLEMS AT ALL, IT’S JUST THAT THE NOTABLE EXAMPLES STICK IN OUR MINDS. include cognitive disinhibition, of course, but also IQ, working memory, attention style, novelty preference, and more.

What’s important to keep in perspective when considering the “shared vulnerability” model is that two people can share behavioral and biological vulnerabilities without being alike.

That’s why not all creative people are a bit crazy and why not every mentally ill person is especially creative. “It’s not a one-on-one correspondence,” says Carson. In fact, she says, most creative people don’t exhibit severe mental problems at all; rather, the notable examples stick in our minds.

Which brings us back to our list of eccentric artists through the ages. Perhaps genes contributing to mental problems have persisted across humanity in part because they also contribute to superior creativity. “Even though we know mental illness in and of itself is not conducive to survival of the individual, there may be aspects of mental illness that promote survival in the overall species,” Carson says. If that’s true, the idea that very creative people are also a little crazy will be around for a long time to come

5 UNMISSABLE ASIAN CONSUMER TRENDS FOR 2014

trendwatching.com 2014 looks to be another year of changing mindsets and priorities in Asia. Despite a much-reported growth ‘slowdown’ (just single digits ;) and political upheavals, the region’s development will continue apace, pushing Asian consumers to rethink the status quo and to demand that brands help them better manage – and even deliver balance – to their hyper-crammed lives. Simple ;) For those who adapt to Asian consumers’ rapidly changing needs, there are countless opportunities ripe for the picking. Brands that champion change – giving voice to the concerns of the masses, then answering them – will also win priceless consumer favor.

But where brands fail to catch on fast enough, expect a new breed of Asian ‘civic-consumers’ to step in – showing off their resourcefulness with a dose of Made-in-Asia-for-Asia ingenuity.

For more on where to begin and how, here are 5 trends reflecting Asian change that you can run with in the next 12 months.

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1. SPACE STRAPPED Small innovations. Big opportunities.

One result of Asia’s unfettered growth and population explosion? In 2014 and beyond, the region’s sprawling megacities will witness increasingly scarce space to live, work and play in – making every square meter worth a higher and higher premium. The figures say it all: “Between 2010 and 2013, the city of Beijing will have absorbed an estimated 210 million migrants.”

(UN, August 2013) “Leases on Beijing’s Finance Street cost an average of USD 137 per square foot a year, 30% more than the USD 104 per square foot buyers pay for on Fifth Avenue, Manhattan.”

(Jones Lang LaSalle, October, 2013) “The number of shoebox units – apartments of 500 square feet or less – in Singapore will grow from 2,400 at the end of 2011 to 11,000 by 2015.”

(Singapore Urban Redevelopment Authority, September 2012)

“In Mumbai, each cramped citizen already accesses 1.1 squaremetres of open, public city space – 26 times less than New Yorkers, and much less than the 9 square-metres that the UN FAO advises.”

(Open Mumbai, May 2012) In perpetual discomfort and dissatisfied with being SPACE STRAPPED, 2014 will see many Asian CITYSUMERS turn their attention to smaller, affordable and well-designed brand solutions*.

Searching for big opportunities in the coming months? Then think small: compact, foldable, stackable, modular, vertical, cantilevered, portable, flexible, even hidden. Remember: the goal is to squeeze more from less, and make Asian microliving as efficient, creative and comfortable as possible. * Note: Of course those thinking expansively about SPACE STRAPPED can look at a number of other trends when addressing this consumer pain point. Subscribe to ensure you don’t miss our upcoming Asia Trend Bulletin on SHAREONOMICS: how cities and consumers are embracing collaborative consumption and sharing business models to reduce personal assets or storage.

IKEA: Make Space Better Campaign highlights compact furniture solutions Released in September 2013 in Singapore and Malaysia, IKEA’s Make Space Better print and video campaign accompanied the furniture company’s 2014 design catalogue. Acknowledging the space constraints that multi-generational families often experience, the advertisements highlighted the catalogue’s section on compact, foldable and affordable furniture solutions.

Daewoo “Mini” wall-mountable washing machine and ultra-slim fridge Catering to Korean city-dwellers with limited floor space, Daewoo Electronics introduced the Mini Washing Machine: the world’s first wall-mountable washing machine. Around one-sixth the size of a regular washing machine, the Mini runs a 60% shorter wash cycle and consumes 80% less water. Within six months, Daewoo then unveiled FR-C24LB, the smallest combi-refrigerator in South Korea. Designed for the growing number of single households, the ultra-thin compact fridge is 60% smaller than a regular refrigerator, while its freezer compartment is 30% larger, for storage of convenient frozen meals.

YOY Art works featuring life-sized furniture images double as chairs In April 2013, Tokyo-based design studio YOY debuted a series of two-dimensional chairs which can be hung like art works. Made from an aluminum and wooden frame covered by flexible fabric, each canvas features a life-sized image of furniture which can be ‘sat’ upon.

Three versions of the 2D art works are available, including a sofa, an armchair and a stool.

KAIST: Armadillo-T Electric car folds into half to save space on streets August 2013 saw KAIST (the Korean Advanced Institute of Science and Technology) announce the Armadillo-T: an electric car that can fold itself in half. Created to save parking space in traffic-congested cities, the compact two-seater can ‘tuck’ its rear structure away during parking, to occupy only one-third of a regular five-meter-wide parking lot. Drivers can operate and fold their cars remotely via a smartphone app.

Apostrophy’s: Living in the City Micro-home prototype May 2013 saw Thai firm Apostrophy’s debut Living in the City: a 97 meter2 micro-home prototype. To create the illusion of space, the design utilizes ‘floating’ mezzanine levels, mesh walls, open-plan communal areas and dual- purpose interiors (including a staircase that doubles as shelf space and vertical gardens-cum-kitchen walls that grow herbs and produce).

Peruri 88 Vertical ‘micro-city’ in Jakarta Proposed for construction in downtown Jakarta, Peruri 88 is designed to accommodate Jakarta’s high population density. Resembling ten vertically stacked blocks, the 88-storey complex will house retail, office and residential space as well as a luxury hotel, wellness centers, parking structures, a mosque, wedding venue, IMAX theater, an outdoor amphitheater and sky gardens aplenty.

2. SECONDHAND STATUS First time consumers trading up and trading in.

Asia’s breakneck development has created hundreds of millions of newly affluent middle class VIRGIN CONSUMERS: exposed to increasing numbers of new products on the global market and ever more curious and eager to try them.

But for many, these rising consumer aspirations are set against traditionally frugal, price-sensitive mindsets and still limited personal purchasing power. All of which makes buying the latest or brand new international and luxury products an enticing, yet often slightly uncomfortable (if not outright unaffordable), stretch.

So in 2014, as they move up the consumer pyramid, expect many of these first-timers to settle for the next best thing: SECONDHAND STATUS*.

Aided by the proliferation of brick-and-mortar retail outlets (such as Hong Kong’s Milan Station and India’s YNew below), and by a host of online and mobile portals, watch as Asian consumers more readily trade in and trade up via a variety of pre-used, pre-owned models and offerings in many sectors. Whether buying marked-down luxury items,

secondhand (design) fashion pieces, or consumer electronics, these consumers will seek status and access, but at a more affordable – and less intimidating – price point.

“60% of those living in Beijing and 39% of those living in Shanghai demonstrate a strong willingness to cash in luxury items.”

“In 2013, over 300 new secondhand luxury stores opened in China, including in second tier cities like Changsha, Hangzhou and Chengdu, with sales of approximately CNY 3 billion (USD 4.94 billion).”

(Both: Fortune Character Institute, October 201) But remember, most secondhanders still lust after the truly new. So while SECONDHAND STATUS grants the user a certain amount of status today (that of owning or experiencing something that would otherwise be out of reach), tomorrow those customers may return with the cash and the confidence to indulge. Be ready ;) * Again and again, we return to ‘status’ and the desire to appear attractive to one’s peers as a key driver of consumer behavior. Re-read our (now ancient yet still applicable!) Trend Briefing on the evolving STATUSPHERE for a deeper immersion.

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YNew India’s first consignment store re-sells used electrical devices Opened in Hyderabad during July 2013, YNew is a consignment store which allows consumers to buy and sell pre-owned electrical devices like smartphones, tablets, and laptops. All products are tested and certified

by YNew engineers and sold with a free 30-day service warranty, with sellers charged a 12-15% fee of the final sale price.

GreenBug Mumbai nonprofit runs stores specializing in pre-used goods Opened in Mumbai in March 2013, GreenBug is a nonprofit which launches and operates retail stores specializing in secondhand or gently used items, to encourage reused or upcycled retail. Regular promotions include pop-up shops at university campuses and reusable mug giveaways to reduce disposable cups.

Milan Station Secondhand luxury booming in China Milan Station, a chain selling secondhand luxury branded handbags and apparel, opened its sixth store in Shanghai in 2013, with plans to expand further in 2014. With the government cracking down on corruption and Chinese netizens exposing lavish displays of wealth by officials, expect the (re)selling of luxury “gifts” to continue into 2014, further increasing the supply of affordable secondhand goods (and opportunities for those who (re)sell them).

“In 2013, over 300 new secondhand luxury stores opened in China, with sales of approximately CNY 3 billion (USD 4.94 billion).”

(Fortune Character Institute, October 2013)

Duriana Find, chat and buy with local sellers Launched in Singapore in November 2013, Duriana is a locationbased, P2P marketplace app enabling users to search for ‘pre-loved’ items within their immediate vicinity, such as vintage apparel, gadgets, furniture and baby clothes. Sellers can create listings by taking a picture of the product and posting it via the app, then communicate via Duriana’s inbuilt messaging platform to finalize bidding, payment, delivery or an exchange.

Chic Stash Concierge service makes secondhand fashion convenient Launched in February 2013, Chic Stash is a Singapore-based ecommerce platform for ‘pre-loved’ fashion. Users submit garments they wish to sell on the site, or arrange for Chic Stash’s concierges to pick up unwanted items free of charge. Shoppers can find secondhand goods from brands such as Gucci, Marni and Givenchy for up to 90% off retail.

3. FAITHFACTURING Keep the (modern, urban) faith.

In 2014, watch as age-old faith reinvents itself for its progressive Asian followers – with an entire selection of faith-based products, services and media tailored to modern lifestyles, technologies and expectations.

From Jakarta to Jaipur, many young and affluent Asian consumers are becoming increasingly liberal, try-out-prone and urbane – yet faith remains a cherished part of their socio-cultural identity. Some numbers: “Asia is home to 62% of the world’s 1.6 billion Muslims, 99% of the world’s 1 billion Hindus and 99% of the world’s 500 million Buddhists.”

“90% of Muslims in Southeast and South Asia say that

religion is ‘very important’, compared with only 30% of people in Europe and 56% in the US.” (Pew Research Centre, December 2012) 64% of young Millennial consumers surveyed in China & India want to ‘keep’ their traditional (or inherited) religious observations, despite globalization.

(JWT, September 2013) Indeed, brands hoping to remain relevant, accessible and empathetic to these enthusiastically modern yet committed consumers in 2014 should focus on bringing religious consumers the relevance, choice, quality and mobile-led convenience they’ve come to expect from all other parts of the consumer landscape.

Crescentratings: Crescent Trips App helps Muslim travelers keep prayer times Launched in March 2013 by Singapore-based Muslim travel firm Crescentratings, Crescent Trips is a free mobile app created to help Muslim travelers adhere to their daily prayer requirements. Passengers who log their flight details into the app’s prayer time calculator will receive notifications of prayer times (which depend on the local time on the ground) and the direction of Mecca.

When traveling for leisure, 67% of Muslim travelers cited halal food and 49% a Muslim-friendly experience, as important criteria.

(Dinar Standard & Crescentrating, July 2012)

Peace Mobile Islamic smartphone contains religious apps and curated content Developed by the Mumbai-based Islamic Peace Research in August 2013, the Peace Mobile is an Android smartphone that contains curated Islamic content, including prayer-based ringtones, wallpaper, e-books and videos, as well as over 50 customized religious apps. Priced at INR 15,000 (USD 240), the device also features a 4.6 inch screen, a five megapixel camera and up to 32GB of memory.

Hijabella and Laiqa Indonesian magazines celebrate ‘hijab’ fashion 2013 saw the launch of Indonesian magazines Hijabella in March and Laiqa in July. Targeted at modern and urban Muslim women, the magazines feature hijab (or Islamic headscarf) fashion from local designers, as well as conservative style lookbooks and lifestyle articles.

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Ganpati Darshan App ‘livestreams’ temple ceremony Launched in India, Ganpati Darshan is an online portal enabling devotees to virtually attend temple ceremonies. During the ten day festival in September 2013 dedicated to the Indian elephant deity Ganesh, the site live-streamed daily rituals from participating temples, allowing followers who were unable to make the arduous journey to the temple ceremony, including the elderly or disabled, to nevertheless digitally receive temple blessings. Users could also share personal images of their celebrations via the in-app feature, ‘Ganestragram’.

Subway India Sandwich chain creates offerings for Jain customers In March 2013, Subway India opened its first dedicated, Jain-friendly counter. Available in a vegetarian-only outlet in Ahmedabad, the counter offers sandwiches that strictly adhere to Jain dietary requirements, for instance refraining from ingredients or condiments that contain root vegetables such as onions or garlics. There are over 4 million Jain practitioners in India.

4. CROWDCRACKED How civic-consumers are tackling Asian metropolises.

In 2014, emboldened by the change they can individually effect, younger generations of Asian ‘civic-consumers’* will no longer blithely accept the status quo – they’ll instead turn to CROWDCRACKED solutions.

As with so many trends, CROWDCRACKED is the result of new, tech-fueled consumer expectations converging with long-established cultural mores.

First, witness the wave of increasingly ‘e-mpowered’ netizens as more Asian consumers, from the bottom to middle of the pyramid, gain access to proliferating digital devices and platforms – and the vast knowledge banks, real-time collaboration and wide reach they offer. Next, look to deeprooted, prevailing ‘Asian values’. Whether in Kuala Lumpur or Kolkata, many young consumers feel a traditional sense of civic duty to family and community.

Mix these with pressing urban issues like fraying infrastructure and/or rising corruption, and stir. The result? In 2014, Asia’s civic-consumers will look for ways to participate like never before: “Between 2010 and 2012, China’s citizens exposed 156

corruption cases via new media (Weibo, net forums), twice that of traditional media reporting.”

(Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, June 2013) 73% of Indian Millennials and 83% of Chinese Millennials feel that they and their peers are prioritizing “we” over “me”; as to how collective action can solve social issues.

(JWT, September 2013) Looking to get started with CROWDCRACKED? Forwardthinking socially-minded entrepreneurs will already be working with communities to deliver crowd-powered solutions.

Brands too should consider how to foster, support, incubate, include, and, yes, lead enthusiastic Asian consumers.

Also, be mindful of the wider implications around the CROWDCRACKED trend. As you head into 2014, think about how to behave and respond in a world where consumers have very different (read: higher) expectations around brand – and indeed consumer – participation and contribution. * Of course, this trend isn’t just confined to Asia. Across the globe, consumers’ expectations continue to rise, as does their desire (and ability) to contribute to their communities. Check out the CIVICSUMERS trend in our South & Central America Trend Bulletin to learn how this trend is playing out in another region.

72% of Thai respondents believe that ordinary people can contribute to the fight against corruption.

(Transparency International, July 2013)

Bribespot Crowdsourced portal tracks corruption in Thailand Released in August 2013, Bribespot Thailand enables residents to anonymously log and track incidents of bribery. Via a free smartphone app and dedicated microsite, posters can indicate which type of authority was involved in the bribe as well as its reason, sum and location; these incidents are plotted onto interactive, GPS-enabled maps of corruption in local neighborhoods. Users can also comment on or verify each incident, and explore categorized posts.

Google: Crisis Map Flood victims in the Philippines and India turn to Google platforms In August 2013, Google launched a Crisis Map tailored to the Philippines, in response to critical flooding in Manila. Behaving as a centralized resource database, the real-time portal helped users compile and share information via geo-tagged posts and its Missing Person Finder tool, where users could search for or list information about victims. The site also mapped out flood shelters, evacuation centers, emergency information and synced with the Filipino emergency site rescueph.com. Later that month, Google India offered a similarly real-time, crowdsourced Crisis Map to Uttarakhand residents during tropical flooding.

82% of Indian Millennials agree that they and their peers are actively seeking outlets to air their opinions on social problems.

(JWT, September 2013)

UP Singapore Civic hackathons help source urban solutions In August 2013, UP Singapore (an organization dedicated to improving urban environments through innovation) launched its series of monthly hackathons designed to tackle urban Singaporean challenges, with themes such as Smart Cities, Health and Energy & Environment.

Participants are given access to government data and encouraged to create prototype solutions.

Code for India Online platform empowers users to collaborate with local public service providers Launched in August 2013 in India by Indian-American entrepreneur Karl Mehta, Code for India is a technical initiative similar to Code for America: an online open-sourced and crowdsourced platform that aims to place civic action projects, tools and public data in the hands of passionate citizens and activists. Code for India aims to empower a global community of software engineers as well as tech-savvy Indian residents alike, to better track urban problems in India, and cooperate with governments and their communities to create tech-based solutions.

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5. MADE LIVABLE IN CHINA Why Chinese consumers are rushing to ‘health hacks’.

In 2014, personal health and safety will remain a key priority (and therefore a focus of attention and spending) for hundreds of millions of Chinese consumers.

Chinese respondents were least confident about domestic food safety.”

(XiaoKang Chinese Peace Index, May 2013)

Yes, our trend MADE GREENER IN CHINA flags some notable examples of promising eco-innovations being initiated by and in China, in its attempt to ensure a sustainable (as well as successful) future.

“67%, 79% and 80% of Chinese Millennials surveyed agreed that climate change, food safety issues and urban pollution (respectively) contributed to their personal stress levels. 65% agree that living in urban cities is unhealthy.”

(JWT, September 2013)

But this doesn’t change the fact that right now, the daily reality for the majority of Chinese citizens, from Beijing to Harbin, remains an often unbearable challenge: living amid strenuous, unpredictable smog (Beijing’s Airpocalypse being just the most notorious example); experiencing evermore-regular stomach-turning food scandals; and, in the extreme, hearing of the rise of ‘cancer villages’. Some figures explaining the health safety panic streaking across China: “Over 400 towns across Anhui, Shandong and Jiangsu provinces, which encircle heavily polluted river basins, reported cancer rates higher than the national average.”

(Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, June 2013) “Breathing Beijing air for just one day can be equivalent to smoking 21 cigarettes.”

(Xinmin Weekly, February 2013) “Choosing from a list of 20 public safety concerns, 72% of

So, while they await the implementation of long-term sustainable eco-efforts that pledge to make China GREENER, Chinese consumers are now focusing on immediate, reactive solutions that make it LIVABLE. From urban-scale pollutionbusting prototypes, to health-hacked devices for personal use, Chinese consumers will embrace the latest and greatest health safety innovations in 2014.

Brands who believe that health is wealth should think beyond obvious medical sectors, incorporating affordable urban design or reliable ways to track information provenance.

And don’t be afraid to use China as a launchpad: though Chinese consumers might be experiencing some of the most extreme environmental and health challenges, similar innovations will undoubtedly be welcomed by pollutionafflicted urban audiences throughout the rest of Asia too.

Panasonic: Jing-ling Compact air purifiers for tabletops In July 2013, Panasonic launched its range of compact tabletop air purifiers in response to Chinese interest in clean indoor air quality.

Intended for office desktops and home surfaces, Jing-ling (meaning ‘spirit’) is an affordable device capable of removing ultra-fine air particulates, which contribute to urban pollution and health problems like asthma and bronchitis.

Frog Design: AirWaves Connected face mask collects location-specific air pollution data Developed by design agency frog Shanghai in March 2013, AirWaves is a prototype face mask that protects wearers from external air pollution.

Embedded particle sensors measure surrounding air quality, which is collected by each user’s dedicated smartphone app via Bluetooth.

This location-specific data is then visualized and auto-shared with the AirWaves community, creating a crowdsourced pollution map.

Chen Guangbiao Cans of oxygen combat polluted city streets January 2013 saw Chinese philanthropist and entrepreneur Chen Guangbiao unveil mobile stores in Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou selling sealed, pull-top cans of oxygen for CNY 5 each. Containing approximately enough oxygen for three deep breaths, approximately ten million cans were sold over ten days, during a bout of record pollution.

Smart Air Filters Site offers DIY-assembled air filters Beijing-based Smart Air Filters offers DIY assembly instructions for a fine-particulate indoor air purifier, using only a motorized fan and vacuum cleaner filter. Costing CNY 200 (USD 32), the devices have been proven to filter 91% of PM2.5 (fine particulate matter that comprise air pollutants), comparable to high-end filters costing CNY 11,000. The site also home-delivers DIY kits, and organized workshops in October 2013, teaching participants how to protect themselves from air pollution.

Danger Maps Online mapping system tracks environmental hazards Danger Maps is a Chinese nonprofit that tracks health and safety hazards via an online mapping system which overlays potential dangers from pollutants (toxic waste, oil refineries, or radiation hazards) on Baidu Maps. In April 2013, the site began accepting crowdsourced user input, to add to data aggregated from China’s environment protection agency.

It also expanded its maps to include civic themes such as missing people and child abuse.

pH Conditioner Skyscraper Floating units clean and neutralize air Proposed by Chinese designers Hao Tian, Huang Haiyang and Shi Jianwei during the 2013 eVolo Skyscraper competition, the Chongqingbased pH Conditioner Skyscraper is a stand-alone treatment center for urban acidic pollutants. Resembling robotic jellyfish, each pod is buoyed by hydrogen air bags, which enable them to float 300 meters above ground level, where acidic pollutants gather. Its porous membranes absorb the pollutants, neutralize them into safe liquids, then separates this into reclaimed water as well as green nutrients that feed plants embedded on the pod’s tentacles.

Breathing Bicycle Beijing resident creates ‘breathing bicycle’ In response to record-breaking pollution in March 2013, Beijing-based inventor Matt Hope created the ‘breathing bicycle’: a modified bike fitted with an air-filtration device that provides clean air. Made entirely from ‘hacked’ household items bought at IKEA, the device consists of a perforated bin containing a DIY-filtration system and pedal-powered generator. During periods of pedaling, the rider activates the air filter and receives purified air via a long rubber tube that connects to his fighter-pilot breathing mask.

Studio Roosegarde: Smog Electrostatic system sucks up Beijing smog October 2013 saw Dutch design firm Studio Roosegarde announce a pilot test in Beijing of ‘Smog’: an electromagnetic-based system that clears urban air pollutants. Embedded copper coils buried underground generate an electrostatic charge, which ‘pulls’ soot and other particles from surrounding air; these pollutants can be collected and even repurposed. Smog’s indoor trials successfully cleared 1 cubic meter of air particulate pollution.

The Secret to Selling Your Brand With One Sentence You believe in the importance of your vision, but how do you get others to stop and listen to you? There will be many instances when you don’t have a lot of time to grab someone’s attention, be it a potential investor or a licensee.

That’s why you need to be able to summarize the benefit of your business idea in a single, powerful sentence -- a sentence that is so direct and compelling, it stops whoever reads or hears it dead in their tracks. A good one-line benefit statement should make someone think: “I want to know more about that.”

I’ve learned that if I craft just the right sentence, it’s all I need to get people to listen to my pitch, open my emails and answer my calls. I still remember the day the iPod launched and Steve Jobs called it “a thousand songs in your pocket.”

Wow. That’s captivating. He didn’t have to explain any further.

We wanted it already!

People don’t care about how something works.They want to know what it’s going to do for them.

Newspapers, tabloids, and these days, Twitter have been making use of the headline for years. How often do you find yourself on a webpage you never intended to visit, all because a headline was so tempting, you had to click on it? That should give you an idea of what I’m talking about.

Creating excellent one-line benefit statements isn’t an easy skill, but it’s an important one, because it can be used to explain your idea in so many different kinds of situations in an attractive, successful way.

Sometimes, you only get one chance to make an impression.

Cut through the clutter to make it count! Here three ways to create an awesome one-line benefit statement:

1. Make it emotional.

Why should people care about what you have to say? Grab them with something they can relate to. Benefits sell ideas, not facts. What is your idea going to do for the consumer or the world? Don’t be afraid to use emotion. People are motivated

Stephen Key

by their emotions more often than they are motivated by reason. Emotion also evokes visual imagery -- if people can begin to see your idea, that’s a good thing. Some emotional words include: “free”, “incredible” and “unbelievable.”

2. Keep it short.

Like -- really short. I’m talking no more than 10 to 12 words, ideally less. Remember, you don’t have much time. If your statement is too long, people may move on before they’ve even finished reading or hearing it. Don’t be intimidated by using fewer words. This is a really good exercise in general.

Too often, I ask an inventor or entrepreneur to tell me about his or her idea and I’m overwhelmed with a five-minute speech. “What is he talking about again?” I find myself thinking. I’m not even sure. Brevity forces clarity.

3. Use numbers.

Numbers convey specificity. Look around you. Headlines with numbers dominate our world. One has only to look at Buzzfeed to understand the power of numbers.

Here are some examples of one-line benefit statements my students and I have used with great success in the past:

“The most versatile organization system available.”

“The store all, carry all, go anywhere elevated pet feeder.”

“This label will increase space on your packaging by 75 percent.”

Try out potential statements on everyone you know. Which one has the greatest impact? Ask for feedback. Then, start using this line all over the place. When someone asks: “So what is it you’re working on again?” you will have a great answer!

Three Marketing Tactics to Tap Into the Emerging Apple Demographic Charles Nicholls Apple customers are emerging as an important new demographic, accounting for a massive 89% of mobile commerce sales.

When Orbitz admitted that it ranks products differently for Mac users, citing 20-30% higher average order values, much comment was made about the difference between Mac and PC customers.

But that is only half the story. When you factor in mobile devices, the new Apple demographic begins to have significant implications for marketers.

Apple mobile customers dominate mobile commerce, especially on tablets. Analysis of 21 million mobile ecommerce transactions by SeeWhy in February and March (2013) found that Apple customers are fundamentally different from Android customers: 89% of mobile ecommerce sales were on iOS, with 70% of total mobile sales coming from iPad alone.

Remember that there are significantly more Android devices than iOS devices, so if Android customers were the same as Apple ones, those figures shouldn’t be so: In essence, Android should drive more mobile sales.

Digging into this in more detail by looking at Web traffic sources, it becomes clear that Android usage is higher than iOS over cellular, but iOS usage is much higher over Wi-Fi, suggesting that Android users have less access to WiFi—or aren’t using it.

In fact, Android device usage patterns suggest they are used more as utilitarian devices, helping to achieve tasks when out of the home, such as finding stores and accessing the web using cellular. Those patterns are what we normally

associate with smartphones—many fewer purchases with a much smaller average order value than tablets.

Tablets are used in a fundamentally different way from smartphones. Used primarily at home, on the couch and in bed, tablets are a recreational device with dramatically higher average order values than desktops or smartphones, generating three times more revenue for e-commerce merchants than phones.

Are Apple customers really different?

Apple was first to market with the iPad and has a larger market share. Could that account for the difference, or are Apple customers really different?

In a survey (SeeWhy, April 2013) of 1,500 US consumers, we found clear differences in the demographics of Apple phone owners. They tend to be younger, better educated, living in urban areas, and are more affluent than Android users: 60% of Apple phone users earn over $75,000 per year, compared with 44% of Android phone owners.

As for market share, 10.3% of US online consumers own an iPad, whereas 8.9% own an Android tablet. That means there are a lot of Android tablets out there not being used for shopping.

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Apple customers are spending more on mobile for three fundamental reasons: Premium customers. Apple customers chose to buy the premium product in the market, attracted by style, fashion, and form. They are prepared to pay extra. Their demographic profile is different, and they are more affluent. This is a sophisticated market that chooses high-end products, and a market that most marketers will want to tap into.

Tablets. Although there are slightly more Apple tablets in the market than Android ones—and, therefore, we should expect more Apple conversions—Android tablets are not being used for shopping at anything like the same rate. By comparison, Apple tablets are shopping machines, being used late into the night as part of an evening’s recreation.

Usability. Some evidence suggests that Apple tablets are easier to use and somehow more engaging. Easy Wi-Fi connections may be part of the story, coupled with more apps and a consistent app experience that encourages user engagement. If users spend more time on the device and are using Wi-Fi to surf recreationally on a big screen while sipping a glass of wine on the couch in the evening, then purchases follow.

How can marketers tap into the Apple demographic?

Optimize for Apple tablets. E-commerce sites should focus on getting a full website experience (product range, product detail, functionality, etc.) optimized for tablets.

Customers have shown that they prefer a tablet version of

the full site over a shopping app. Accordingly, a priority for e-commerce businesses should be to optimize natively for iPad first; since the device alone accounts for 70% of mobile sales, that should not be a hard decision. Case studies show that where merchants have built device-optimized experiences, significant increases in conversions, average order values, and revenue have followed.

Treat Apple customers differently. Orbitz has shown that presenting a different product mix, more suited to a particular segment, can drive incremental revenues. Just as you may already segment high value traffic sources and show different content, if you make it easier for your Apple customers to find the types of premium products they are more likely to buy, then sales will increase. Be wary, though, of offering differential pricing on different devices.

Adapt (or implement) remarketing strategies. If you’re not already remarketing with retargeted advertising and browse-based email campaigns, you need to. Now that you can recognize high-value customers easily, giving them a nudge will drive more to purchase. You should test adjusting your retargeting strategies to recognize the higher value of Apple customers and adapt your emails so that they display well on mobile devices (though Apple is very good in general with emails). Perhaps more important is to recognize that an iPhone shopper is unlikely to buy now but is probably a high value client. Remarketing can deliver great personalized service to bring them back on a different device to purchase.

We’ve reached a point now where, for the immediate future at least, tablet-based commerce is big and growing bigger fast, and it is dominated by Apple customers. It’s time to apply this knowledge and accept that we now have a new demographic.

sexy

Partnerships make brands Chris J Reed

How do you make cloud computing sexy? Add Stephen Fry. How do you make Starwood sexy? Add Bayern Munich. How do you make The Hard Rock sexy? Add Linkin Park.

Brand partnerships are an amazing way for one brand to leverage the positive brand values of another brand to 1) target a new customer audience 2) reinforce loyalty in the existing customer base 3) change brand perception 4) double marketing and brand power.

Cloud Computing brand Databarracks would not have gained nearly 40,000 views for their YouTube video without Stephen Fry narrating the explanation of the history of technology and inventions. He hardly mentions what the company does and could do for you but it works in terms of capturing your attention and becoming interested in the brand and what they do. People shared it with me and I have shared it with other people and it’s cloud computing. But it’s cloud computing made sexy.

One new partnership that did surprise me was between Starwood Hotels and European Champions League

Champions Bayern Munich. Brands like Thomas Cook sell Manchester City European packages but they don’t market it to people in Asia. As a Starwood Preferred Guest member I received an email offering me the chance to go and see Bayern Munich in Germany.

While I admire Starwood’s optimism it’s very broadbrush marketing. Bayern Munich are not Barcelona or Real Madrid or Manchesters United in global popularity and brand appeal.

They are very much a German brand trying to become a Manchester United or Barcelona, to become desired to be associated with, a popular truly global brand. They have an uphill battle.

Every taxi I get into in Singapore the driver, without fail says, you English? Which Premier League club you support? They usually support 1) Manchester United 2) Liverpool 3) the whole of the English Premier League (EPL) – they just love the action and of course the chance to gamble. Not once have I ever met a taxi driver who says that they are a keen Bundesliga fan.

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EPL trumps every other league in Asia by a million to one.

That includes La Liga because they like the variety of teams in the EPL over the two dominant teams in La Liga. Bayern Munich have reached out to Asia through football schools in Indonesia and have in the past done tours of places like China but they didn’t do anything this year for example.

Unlike the La Liga giants and most of the EPL you don’t see people wearing Munich tops here in Asia. I once saw someone where a Dortmund shirt but they were German.

the World” campaign.

I can see what Bayern Munich get out of this partnership.

Money and marketing and the ability to have their tickets to be sold globally. Starwood presumably think that they can sell accommodation off the back of the partnership but I think it’s a struggle in terms of brand reach of Bayern Munich and appeal in Asia.

The second part is that the Hard Rock global network of venues acts as location for Linkin Park Underground (their fan club) members to meet up across the world. In a quite clever move on both sides Linkin Park promote the event through social media and arrange for videos to be shown along with an exclusive episode of their video blog. Although no Linkin Park member is there fans feel connected and closer to the brand as a result of meeting other fans and going to an official event.

The Hard Rock Café always strikes me as a brand that people who drive Harley Davidson’s visit. Old Americans with too much time and money on their hands trying to recapture their youth. So it’s surprising that Linkin Park have chosen them as a partner. The partnership works in a couple of ways.

Firstly Hard Rock act as a distribution partner for the launch of the limited-edition Linkin Park t-shirts benefiting Music for Relief and “Power the World” initiative to create awareness that over a billion people in the world don’t have any power.

The exclusive t-shirt line features artwork by Linkin Park member Mike Shinoda. A portion of the retail price from sales of the t-shirts will benefit “Music for Relief”, a nonprofit organization founded by Linkin Park, and its “Power

Linkin Park and Music for Relief launched Power the World to raise awareness about what it means to live without energy access and to highlight innovative clean energy solutions.

Linkin Park’s latest single “A Light That Never Comes” was all about this issue and they used gamification to market it and raise awareness for “Power the World” through parts of the gamification rewards.

Hard Rock clearly benefit as the events tend to be done on off peak days and the fans spend money on drink and food. Once fans try the venue they may also be back and recommend the venue through social media to their friends.

It’s a way for Linkin Park to engage fans without having to tour the same city. With Hard Rock having global outlets it allows Linkin Park to cover the world by using content engagement and increase fan loyalty in the process.

Partnerships really do make brands sexy and drive business through win-win agreements.

10 Social Media Marketing Ideas From Big Brands Rohit Bhargava There is an under appreciated difference between a story and an idea.

A story is captivating and memorable. It entertains and often stays with you for longer than you thought it would. An idea, in contrast, is a spark. It happens in a moment and then it’s gone. And if you missed it or if you never acted on it … then you lose it.

Recently I’ve been to several storytelling events. One gathered together a dozen innovators to share their stories on human behavior. Another curated every form of storytelling you could imagine – from stop motion Vine video creators to street opera singers. Each offered an amazing collection of stories that entertained and inspired. And I remember those stories.

Today I have been moderating an event filled with ideas instead of stories. The Corporate Social Media Summit in San Francisco (#CSMSF) is the second edition of a popular series from the Useful Social Media team that includes a flagship New York event, the West Coast edition today, and a European edition next month. In listening to more than a dozen brands sharing their experiences with social media – there were several ideas that emerged which got people talking. Here are just a few of those ideas:

1. Deflection Isn’t Engagement As more brands turn to tools like Twitter for customer service – one of the increasingly common strategies is to “escalate” issues to the call center. What this actually means is that brands immediately engage with customers who share a question via Twitter by telling them to call the 1800 number to speak to a customer service person. As Adobe Director

of Strategy and Business Development Jeff Feldman shared in the opening keynote session, this type of deflection isn’t optimal. Instead, brands that aspire to provide great service need to answer questions in the channel they are asked (unless you truly need to access their private information, of course).

2. B2B Is Better Than B2C For Social Thanks to the visibility of efforts from leading brands like Coke and Oreo’s, it is easy to focus attention on the role that social media has taken in helping major consumer brands to create lots of buzz and some engagement. Instead, Dell’s Global Director of Social Media Richard Margetic pointed out that social media is actually better for B2B brands because they tend to be far more about relationships than B2C brands.

As a proof point, he noted that more than 9,000 of Dell’s employees have gone through social media training and are allowed to represent the brand in their engagements online.

3. Social Gratitude Is Powerful It is no secret that people passionately share stories and images of pets online. So when Kat Smith, PETCO Director of Social Media and Commerce took the stage to talk about how social media could engage pet owners – the opportunity was pretty obvious. Still, the big question was how a brand in the popular pet category could engage with these passionate pet owners in a way that wouldn’t just try to upsell them more supplies and materials. One great strategy Kat shared in her presentation was the power of offering validation to customers. Simply by having the brand like customer’s Instagram photos, for example, PETCO could offer tangible proof that it was listening and engaged in its community. And this one act caused intense consumer gratitude … which then led to engagement and conversation.

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4. Solve Unique Problems As often as we hear about social media offering yet another channel for brands to interact and solve customer challenges, there may be situations that social media or social customer care is uniquely positioned to solve. One example that Kimarie Matthews, Wells Fargo Vice President of Social Web shared was of a customer tweeting about there being trash outside of an ATM machine. This is exactly the sort of thing that no one would ever call into a 1800 number and wait on hold in order to report. Yet thanks to this tweet, the brand was able to respond both to the customer as well as respond by actually correcting the problem and cleaning up the trash

5. Treat Everyone Like An Influencer In a highly entertaining presentation about the state of the travel industry, disruption, handlebar moustaches (for Movember!) and being Canadian – Flight Centre Global Social Media Leader Gregg Tilston shared a powerful story about the nature of influence. Using the example of how you might be influenced differently to attend a food related event whether you hear about it from the newspaper versus a restaurant versus a chef versus your best friend … he noted that the most influential source among those is probably your best friend. That is also the source among those listed with the least ACTUAL influence when it comes to potential reach and size of their network. So who is truly influential? His ultimate conclusion: “Treat everyone as if they have a Klout score of 80.”

6. Social Can Force Convergence Telling the story of how the Clorox brand thinks about social media, Helen Lee shared how increasing conversation online inspired far more convergence and collaboration among all of the more traditional silos of the marketing organization – from advertising to PR to in-store promotions. One interesting conclusion her presentation raised was to turn one of the most often cited challenges about social media into perhaps its greatest opportunity. As brands struggle to align efforts among multiple teams and divisions, the crossover potential of social media may become the driving force to actually help make it happen.

7. Focus On The Audience You Have As audiences shift and the attention paid to social media platforms evolve, segmenting an audience is a consistent challenge. One of the downsides of this challenge, as Ammiel Kamon from Kontera noted, is that sometimes brands can get romanced or misled into focusing on creating content and messages for the audiences they want instead of the ones they have. The key is to remain connected to the

audience you have today and grow that organically rather than dreaming of a nonexistent audience you wish you had instead.

8. Avoid OverEngagement What if greater engagement wasn’t the ultimate goal that every brand should aim for? As Charles Schwab VP of Owned Media, Content & Client Marketing Helen Loh shared, “money is important, but sometimes people don’t want to engage with it day in and day out.” As great as the temptation may be for any brand to think that customers always want a brand interaction, the reality is that most of the time they probably don’t. Understanding customer journies and engaging customers at the right moments along that path is more important, according to Loh – and something that really allows the promise of content to connect with social media.

9. Don’t Measure Social Media, Measure Initiatives In an interesting caution against taking data from a unique effort and overestimating its ability to define the entire value of social – Thomson Reuters Senior Director of Social Strategy Jen McClure shared that the real key to understanding the power of your efforts is to separate out what the results are truly telling you about what went right and wrong, and how to apply those learnings effectively.

10. Find Opportunities To Delight Southwest Airlines has built a reputation around having a personality, and as Senior Communications Specialist Christi McNeill shared – this extends to creating opportunities for staff to build on the strong culture to delight customers with service. KLM Manager of Social Media Karlijn Vogel-Meijers also shared several new initiatives that KLM is pursuing which have the potential to truly drive the airline industry forwards. Already launched is a unique feature on Twitter that allows anyone to see the average response time for KLM to get back to you on a tweet you send directly (on average, it is 23 minutes). In addition, a soon to be launched idea she previewed at the conference was a new program called Wannagives which will allow consumers to pay for a surprise gift to be delivered to a friend or loved one in flight.

The rise of the prankvert: a controversial emerging content trend Matt Davies Brands are well aware that they should be producing entertaining and shareable content; but with over one hundred hours of video uploaded to YouTube every minute, the competition for attention is high. In a quest to crack the content challenge, this year has seen a host of content strategies launched, with mixed results.

There has been one emerging trend in particular, most notably in the US, which has proved both controversial and successful in creating buzz and shareability – the ‘prankvert’.

In the style of Trigger Happy TV, prankverts are branded content videos that use hidden cameras to ‘prank’ the public.

Defined by the Pita Group as involving those “who have no idea that they’re playing a part in the creation of a video or TV spot that will (hopefully) go viral.”

Pepsi in the US has arguably had the most success with a prankvert. As sponsors of NASCAR racing champion Jeff Gordon, they created a prank video of Gordon, with the help of prosthetics to disguise his identity, taking a Chevrolet Camaro for a test drive with an unsuspecting dealership salesman (pictured). However, as you can imagine, this was no normal test drive; with Pepsi positioned as the brand that pushes things to the max, they did not hold back.

With Gordon driving at high speeds around a course that involved hairpin turns, jumps and near collision passes, the salesman is seen shouting and screaming for the car to stop. At the end of the video, Gordon’s identity is revealed to laughter and relief for all. To date, the video has been viewed over 38 million times and shared over 79,000 times.

Belgian bank Febelfin, successfully raised awareness about safe online banking by filming a ‘mind reader’ predicting customers’ bank details. In reality, it was a team of hackers accessing their details online. However, it still successfully communicated the importance of safe online banking and the need for consumers to take precautions.

When Carlsberg tested customers’ friendships with their prankvert, they received over six million views on YouTube, and a host of press coverage. Unsuspecting individuals were called at 3am by a friend to bail them out of an underground poker game. When they arrived they were welcomed by bouncers into a very intimidating environment. Thomas Moradpour, VP, global marketing at Carlsberg explains, “it will more than pay for itself in earned media and share of conversation. That, in turn, translates into brand worth, which in turn drives sales”.

The most high profile UK prankvert came from Think! who

are no strangers to creating shocking content. The aim was to make people reconsider the consequences of drink driving through a frankly terrifying portrayal of injury. The video takes place in the toilets of a pub and recreates the effects of a car crash using the mirrors as a fake windscreen as people wash their hands. It has achieved almost 9 million views to date and 12,000 shares.

All of these examples reveal the potential of prankverts to drive significant earned value, with millions of potential customers watching, debating and recommending engaging and entertaining content. They also demonstrate that to get it right, the brand has to be very focused on what they want to achieve, and crucially, with content born from the brand’s authentic attitude.

Is it not risky to create something like this? In short, yes. It is critical that brands take precautions to ensure the wrong people are not exposed. For example, Carlsberg cleverly only used close friends to recommend participants for the prank, which increased the assurance they would take it the right way. In the case of Pepsi, it is rumoured that the video was faked, and that an actor played the salesman, so in reality it is likely that no one was genuinely pranked. While the Production Company and brand have stayed tight lipped, debate has continued online about whether it was or was not a fake, which only increasing shares and buzz. It is not only the Pepsi prankvert that is suspected to be staged – a number of others are too, including the Think! example above, where liability would clearly be too great.

There is also the question of how brands can be sure that the content will go viral. It is sometimes assumed that making content go viral is similar to playing the lottery; an investment without any guarantee of achieving high levels of earned media. As with any form of branded content, it is important to undertake social listening at the outset to recognise what content your audience consumes and how they consume it. This ensures that the brand is part of the conversation rather than an outsider. Furthermore, brands can test against sample audiences once the video has been made.

Prankvertising is certainly not for everyone. Brands that do pursue it must evaluate the risks involved, ensure they do not confuse viewers and create content that is consistent with brand values. They must also recognise that whilst there is no guarantee, scalable earned success in the form of views, conversation and debate is achievable. Either way, prankvertising is a hot trend, and we are certain that we will be seeing a lot more of them in the UK in the future.

Instagram is the ‘best platform for brands’ in 2013, beating out Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ John Koetsier Instagram is the best platform for brands, according to a new study that reviewed all brands on social with over 25 fans on each of four major social platforms: Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Google+.

“With increases in fan/follower engagement nearly three times that of other networks studied, Instagram is the clear winner for 2013,” SumAll CEO Dan Atkinson said. “If a company has a visual product to sell and it’s currently not on Instagram, that company is missing out on significant brand awareness and revenue.”

SumAll, a business analytics tool, currently tracks over 100,000 businesses on social networks, analyzing over 290 billion social actions per year.

Across businesses that are on all four networks, SumAll says that Instagram resulted in the most new followers in 2013 — and significant revenue. Brands on Instagram saw an average of 7 percent growth in both followers and engagement. And while U.S. brands saw a nice little revenue lift from Instagram — 1.5 percent to 5 percent — businesses in the U.K. reported more, up to 3.6 percent.

Which means that social commerce may finally be a real phenomenon.

Social media marketing expert Eric Dahan, the CEO of Instabrand, agreed. Instabrand is a social marketing organization focused on visual media. Right now that means Instagram, but Vine, Tumblr, and Pinterest are on the horizon.

“Instagram is the best platform for brands,” he told me. “It’s much stronger than Facebook.” thumbs downInstabrand says its customers saw their followers grow from zero to 30,000 in campaigns costing just $3,000 to $5,000. One jewelry company, NouviNomi, got 50,000

unique visitors to its site from Instagram in two months as a result of a campaign that cost just $3,000.

“We average around 2 cents per engagement,” Dahan says.

“We can’t measure impressions — Instagram doesn’t allow it — but we can measure engagement. If you have 200,000 followers, we’ll see 3,000 to 15,000 likes for a post, for a 2 percent to 10 percent engagement rate. Sometimes that jumps to 20 percent.”

Clearly, with a visual medium, visual brands that can communicate via images do best.

SumAll says that fashion retailer In God We Trust credits 2.3 percent of its revenue to Instagram, a number that may sound small but is actually huge for social commerce stemming from just one mobile social network. And SumAll’s Atkinson says that a bicycle manufacturer, Pure Fix Cycles, reports that every Instagram post it publishes is worth roughly $100 in revenue.

That’s impressive.

The best approach on Instagram, Dahan says, is not what you might think. Many brands are turning to celebrity endorsements as a quick-fix strategy to drive views, engagement, and ultimately revenue, but that can backfire.

“We match businesses with users that already like the brand,” he told me. “We tend not to like using celebrities — they’re almost corporate now, and people know they’re promoting a product just because they’re getting paid. We like to use grassroots people.”

And other networks, such as Facebook and Twitter?

“Twitter is mainly text-based … great for articles and headlines … but not as good for brands,” he said. “And Instagram is … much stronger than Facebook.”

Book, Line & Sinker The Branded Mind

All Customers Are Irrational

Those interested in emotional branding take note. The Branded Mind provides an in depth and contemporary analysis of how people think, and how that relates to branding. De Plessis describes consumer behavior, emotions and moods, decision-making, market segmentation, and brand strategy in the context of science and philosophy. This not an easy read, but those in search of a rich and comprehensive understand of neuromarketing should look no further.

This is another marketing book about the human subconscious, yet this one offers a focus on the importance and financial prudence of retaining existing customers over engaging new ones.

Mr. Cusick goes on to explain why satisfaction surveys are meaningless (customers won’t tell you the truth) and how the truth in consumer thinking lies not in their words but in their behaviors. As Mr. Cusick writes in the introduction, “The truth is, we don’t think the way we think we think.”

The subconscious isn’t about rational thought, but emotions, and understanding emotional intelligence—when dealing with consumers and employees—is the key to successful marketing and branding. It’s not about thoughts because emotions truly dictate behavior. Sound repetitive?

It is. And so is this book. There’s another truth.

By Erik du Plessis

By William J. Cusicke

Tell to Win

By Peter Guber

There’s a reason why Tell to Win has been a bestseller since it was published on March 1st. He’s the chairman and CEO of Mandalay Entertainment, and a veteran producer of films that have earned over $3 billion worldwide and racked up more than 50 Academy Award Nominations - including his latest project, The Kids Are All Right. With box office hits including The Color Purple, Midnight Express, Batman and Flashdance to his credit, Guber knows a thing or two about branding and marketing. But don’t believe us - Tony Hsieh, the founder and CEO of Zappos.com, who sold his company to Amazon and presumably doesn’t need to read books on business and marketing, also gives it a rave review on its Amazon page.

Emotionomics: Leveraging Emotions for Business Success Emotionomics: Leveraging Emotions for Business Success analyzes important breakthroughs in brain science and facial coding to inform author Dan Hill’s compelling conclusions and insights on storytelling, sensory payoff, defusing skepticism and other branding essentials. A blend of psychological lessons and industry applications, Emotionomics bridges the humanity of the heart and the logic of the mind in an artful and skilled discourse on the business of life.

By Dan Hill

Habit: The 95% of Behavior Marketers Ignore

Nation Branding: Concepts, Issues, Practice

In, Habit: The 95% of Behavior Marketers Ignore, Neale Martin explains how consumer response is guided by the subconscious mind. Martin provides a practical guide to the human psyche and the behaviors that form a habit: discovery, purchase, and use. From analyzing neurons in scientific experiments to broad theories regarding advertising campaigns, this book explores the psychology of consumers without reducing them to brainless purchasing machines.

From Iceland to Egypt, countries across the globe are capitalizing on the power of branding to promote the values indigenous to their respective heritages, cultures, economies, environments, ethnicities, and histories.

Determining a candid national identity, however, is not a simple process. But, in Nation Branding: Concepts, Issues, Practice, author Keith Dinnie explains the complexities of nation branding in straightforward prose, supplementing each of the ten chapters with poignant and revealing case studies. Industry experts will learn how traditional strategies and concepts such as brand equity, competitive identity, and internal branding relate to the growing and compelling business of nation branding.

Edited by Keith Dinnie

By Neale Martin

Passion Brands

Brand Risk: Adding Risk Literacy to Brand Management

Passion Brands, author Kate Newlin explores a phenomenon branding industry enthusiasts can’t always explain. As the field of behavioral economics intensifies, experts are beginning to isolate the motivations behind consumer perspectives and purchases. Newlin insightfully explores just how passion brands such as Fresh Direct, IKEA, Apple and Red Bull—among many others—have become part of individual purchasing routines, society and culture.

By kate newlin

By David Abrahams

Risk is unpredictable by nature, but without it success wouldn’t be possible—or even interesting, for that matter. In Brand Risk: Adding Risk Literacy to Brand Management, David Abrahams delves into the murky realm of the unknown as it applies to branding and business. He explains how effective brands do not avoid risk, but find ways of determining acceptable levels of risk and navigating them to leverage their branding power, influence, exposure, and value. This book not only details the strategies behind risk literacy, but the attitude as well—an attitude that must be embraced not only by CEOs and managers, but the entire brand architecture.

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Brand Relations Management: Bridging the Gap Between Brand Promise and Brand Delivery Brand Relations Management is a book for all those interested in strategy and marketing. The primary intention is to show that both brand promise and brand delivery are necessary in order to build a sustainable brand. The book’s greatest strength is that it gathers and presents all the relevant theories of brand building.

Designing Brand Identity

By Alina Wheeler

By Tony Apéria, Rolf Back

What Great Brands Do: The Seven Brand-Building Principles That Separate the Best from the Rest

By Denise Lee Yohn

How great organizations put their company’s brand front and centerResearch suggests that only a small portion of companies practice brandbuilding the way great brands do. “What Great Brands Do” reveals how exceptional firms rely on a brand-as-business management approach in order to grow and succeed in tough economic climates, regardless of the size of their marketing budgets. This must-have guide distills their approach into seven guiding principles and best practices to provide a thoughtful and practical methodology for putting a company’s brand in the driver’s seat of the organization.

StoryBranding: Creating StandOut Brands Through The Power of Story Having worked on many famous brands as an advertising executive, Jim Signorelli has found that today, in order for advertising to be truly effective, the brand being promoted must work the way a good story works. Many brands continue to get in their own way with an over-reliance on editorialized benefits. “Today, that’s a deathwish,” says Signorelli. “To remain competitive, brands must provide consumers with story themes they can relate to, identify with, and share with their tribes.

By Jim Signorelli

The Brand Gap

By Marty Neumeier

THE BRAND GAP is the first book to present a unified theory of brand-building. Whereas most books on branding are weighted toward either a strategic or creative approach, this book shows how both ways of thinking can unite to produce a “charismatic brand”-a brand that customers feel is essential to their lives. In an entertaining two-hour read you’ll learn: the new definition of brand the five essential disciplines of brandbuilding how branding is changing the dynamics of competition the three most powerful questions to ask about any brand why collaboration is the key to brand-building how design determines a customer’s experience how to test brand concepts quickly and cheaply the importance of managing brands from the inside 220-word brand glossary

Kellogg on Branding: The Marketing Faculty of the Kellogg School of Management

By Alice M. Tybout, Tim Calkins, Philip Kotler

The Power of Habit

The Foreword by renowned marketing guru Philip Kotler sets the stage for a comprehensive review of the latest strategies for building, leveraging, and rejuvenating brands. Destined to become a marketing classic, Kellogg on Branding includes chapters written by respected Kellogg marketing professors and managers of successful companies. It includes: The latest thinking on key branding concepts, including brand positioning and designStrategies for launching new brands, leveraging existing brands, and managing a brand portfolio.

Thinking in New Boxes: A New Paradigm for Business Creativity

In “The Power of Habit, “award-winning “New York Times” business reporter Charles Duhigg takes us to the thrilling edge of scientific discoveries that explain why habits exist and how they can be changed. With penetrating intelligence and an ability to distill vast amounts of information into engrossing narratives, Duhigg brings to life a whole new understanding of human nature and its potential for transformation.

By Charles Duhigg

A revised new edition of the bestselling toolkit for creating, building, and maintaining a strong brandFrom research and analysis through brand strategy, design development through application design, and identity standards through launch and governance, “Designing Brand Identity, Fourth Edition” offers brand managers, marketers, and designers a proven, universal five-phase process for creating and implementing effective brand identity. Enriched by new case studies showcasing successful world-class brands, this Fourth Edition brings readers up to date with a detailed look at the latest trends in branding, including social networks, mobile devices, global markets, apps, video, and virtual brands.

THINKING IN NEW BOXES is a revolutionary process for sustainable creativity from two strategic innovation experts from The Boston Consulting Group (BCG). To make sense of the world, we all rely on assumptions, on models on what Luc de Brabandere and Alan Iny call “boxes.” If we are unaware of our boxes, they can blind us to risks and opportunities. This innovative book challenges everything you thought you knew about business creativity by breaking creativity down into five steps

By Luc De Brabandere, Alan Iny