jordan
fox
Introduction Case One: Keystone Ski Resort Case Two: Easy-Bake Oven Case Three: Dell Contact Information
Introduction
I am not a philosopher, an anthropologist, a sociologist, or a counselor. And I believe that to understand people you don’t need to be any of the above.
I am a problem solver. From a young age I learned that I was able to understand and help people very unlike myself. Adults, including my parents, my mother’s friends, and eventually my colleagues and peers, would come to me looking for a listener and for a fresh perspective. As I grew up, I realized that as an outsider I could see people in ways that they couldn’t see themselves. I could provide them with solutions they had never even considered. In order to truly be a problem solver, you have to be extremely open-minded, have an insatiable curiosity for society and those who comprise it, and a single-minded determination for finding the best solution possible - to every problem. Another quality that defines any real problem solver is the ability to question the boundaries that make up society - the stereotypes that segment people into neat, tidy categories. Solutions based off of stereotypes, in my opinion, are not solutions at all. True solutions are born from hidden insights. They are complex, messy, and difficult to come by. But they do exist. And I can help you find them.
62% of adults surveyed believe family vacations can help them bond more than stay-at-home activities.
Keystone Ski Resort
BRINGING THE EAST TO THE WEST Keystone was lacking a point of difference in the eyes of consumers. One of many, many ski resorts throughout the West, Keystone’s brand was getting lost because it was marketed very much like every other ski resort. Our challenge was to give families from the East a reason to choose Keystone over all other ski and vacation destinations.
APPROACH Our segmentation study, using MRI+ & Simmons OneView, guided us to target adults ages 29-54 with at least one child between the ages 6-17. This group is most willing to take at least one destination vacation per year with their families and spend more money in the process. After conducting a national survey on the vacation selection process and consulting numerous secondary sources, it became apparent that one of the main reasons parents take their families on a destination vacation is to bond. Not too surprising. But what does family bonding really look like? What does the term bonding really mean to families today? In order to avoid traditional responses we used projective questioning and asked parents and young adults –
“What is your favorite memory of your parents/children?”
“...and she went off the rope swing and did a gigantic belly flop into the water.�
Keystone Ski Resort
MAKING MEMORIES Young adults who were interviewed overwhelmingly said that their favorite memories of their parents were those when they acted youthful, foolish, or impulsively. Yet, we also found that on a day-to-day basis parents spend so much time trying to keep their families functioning that they forget to just be a family, and more importantly, to be themselves. Vacations are a time when parents can escape the stress and responsibilities of life and make these memories.
INSIGHT Children’s favorite memories of their parents are the fleeting instances when they get a glimpse of their parents as people.
CAMPAIGN The small, pivotal moments that make a family, and get retold time and time again, cannot be cultivated or manufactured. They have to happen in an environment where stress is non-existent and there are unlimited opportunities to just kick back and have fun together. This is why they happen at Keystone.
Family Happens Here
RESULTS In post-campaign testing 80% of the target demographic that was surveyed responded that the executions would make them consider Keystone for their next family vacation.
“Family Happens Here�
Mobile App
Tablet/Print
This integrated campaign allowed for traditional and digital elements to work together seamlessly. The insight transcended mediums, opening up opportunities for interactive tablet apps, a mobile app with planning and family forum features, and a social media campaign. Each piece was designed to help relieve the stress behind a Keystone vacation, so that families are able to just happen.
Easy-Bake Oven
CURRENT BRAND The Easy-Bake Oven has been a staple toy in many homes since the 1960’s. But there is currently a brand makeover underway. Today the Easy-Bake Oven is branded as a toy that helps introduce little girls to the wonders of domestic life. Baking with the oven has been seen as an activity that mothers and daughters bond over.
EXTREME MAKEOVER The oven, that has typically been marketed to girls and adorned in pink, will now be available in gender-neutral colors. This is largely due to national complaints about the toy’s gender-stereotyped marketing, which stigmatizes the product for young boys. But why just change the color? The goal of this campaign is to rebrand the Easy-Bake Oven as a toy for children - rather than a toy for girls.
Hasbro Easy-Bake Oven
APPROACH In order to understand why kids like to bake today, it was vital to understand why and how they express themselves. Through extensive online ethnographic research and reviewing psychological studies about children and their play habits, I began to have a better view of the world through a child’s eyes. For children today, creativity and fun are encapsulated within every child’s need for individuality. Every child wants to be unique and share that uniqueness with the world. Yet, in today’s world, children can act out their fantasies on an iPad or paint on a computer screen. The concept of creativity and the bounds of imagination are changing, and so must the Easy-Bake Oven.
THE MAGIC OF BAKING Through research it was clear that children enjoy baking with their parents, but they resent the limitations involved, like not being able to use the oven. Now children have an oven of their own. In their minds, the Easy-Bake Oven allows them to take part in the metamorphosis of seemingly ordinary parts into an extraordinary expression of their imagination. It’s simple really; the oven allows children to create something magical all by themselves.
“Your Oven. Your Rules.”
INSIGHT Kids see baking a form of artistic expression, with a touch of magic. It’s a way for children to create what would be impossible on canvas or paper.
CONCEPT CAMPAIGN “Your Oven. Your Rules.” This campaign asks children to create everything and anything they can imagine. This is their oven and they make the rules. There is no one “right” recipe or decorating technique. It celebrates individuality and thinking in a unique and unconventional way. Children who bake can combine all of their favorite pastimes and become, for instance, a mad scientist, painter, sculptor, and taste-tester all at the same time.
Ready. Set. Bake. Since children today are more tech savvy than ever before, what better way to get them to share their creations than online. “Ready. Set. Bake.” is the digital counterpart of the campaign, which will include a children’s baking forum and a Pinterest account. The children’s baking forum will live on the Hasbro Ultimate Easy-Bake Oven website. It will be a place where children can share pictures of their creations, decorating tips, favorite recipes, and challenge other young bakers to EasyBakeoffs. Pinterest will be a way for parents to get involved and share their children’s Easy-Bake masterpieces.
Dell
FALLING BEHIND After struggling for years in the consumer market, Dell is in desperate need of a change in strategy. Dell products have not kept pace with other consumer technology manufacturers, like Apple and HP. Attempts to keep up, like their creation of a mobile phone, proved to be outside of their comfort zone and were discontinued. As a result, Dell has fallen behind in the past few years with stocks at the “lowest price in more than three years after forecasting a fourth straight quarter of declining sales.� The consumer technology market, driven by innovation and creativity, has surpassed Dell, so it’s time to make a big change. How could Dell go from floundering in the consumer market, to forging the business technology model?
APPROACH Dell needs to find a niche market that has yet to be tapped into by competitors. Since most other technology manufacturers are creating new products for personal use, the business market has lacked innovation for some time. Dell needs to expand on their current offerings for businesses in a drastic way. First, I had to understand what businesses look for in technology and the importance of technology in the workplace. Through online ethnographic research I found there were two distinct angles that needed to be examined to understand what businesses value in technology: the technological needs of employers, and the technological wants of employees.
(Ricadela 2012)
companies are expected to fulfill employees basic “needs” “ While to do their job - competitive pay, a functional workspace - CNN Money
Dell
“
modern organizations understand they need to do more to foster creativity, drive innovation and improve productivity.
THE TRUTH IS... Employer’s select technology that is: • Cost efficient • Going to last as long as possible • Manufactured by a company that will service the products • Going to complete day-to-day tasks and keep the office functional Employee’s believe their office technology is: • Outdated, behind the times • Creating a connectivity barrier • Stifling creativity and mobility
THE FUNCTIONAL RUT This issue of technology needs versus wants is creating a divide within companies. Gallup Research found that the second most important dimension of a great workplace environment is that employees, “have the materials and equipment they need to do their work right.” Employees stuck with outdated technology feel bound to a desk and limited in what they can accomplish. Therefore, the office environment and productivity levels become stagnant and creativity becomes stunted.
“Life Force”
INSIGHT The workplace has become functional - a place where employees settle.
RECONNECT The term functional should never be used to describe any office or person. Only when talking about a prosthetic limb is it a compliment. Otherwise, it essentially means that you’re getting by. No more, no less. Companies today don’t know how to get out of this functional rut. They don’t have the time or resources to find out exactly what employees need in technology and then re-outfit the office accordingly - until now.
CONCEPT CAMPAIGN “Life Force” Today, technology has become an extension of the self. People take great pride in their personal technology - it is a reflection of who they are, what they can do, and who they want to become. Our technology has become so critical to our personal success that we would be lost without it. This is no different when discussing the work place. In order to operate at full capacity, everyone must have the proper technology. Out-dated technology, on the other hand, will do the opposite - stifle creativity, decrease efficiency, and hinder performance.
A work place with the wrong technology is one lacking a life force.
Imagine a small accounting firm... Employees spend the majority of their days at their desks in front of the same calendars, desktop computers, and telephones. What comes to mind is a depersonalized, sterile, and mundane space. Now picture one of these same employees with a new set of technology. Perhaps a convertible laptop that has software programmed to sync his office laptop to his home computer. Now he is wireless and can detach his tablet from the laptop and take it down the hall to ask a colleague a quick question. His office telephone can be easily transferred to his personal mobile phone with the touch of a button, in case he gets an important call. When he gets back he docks his mobile at his desk and is able to charge his phone, listen to music in his office, and sync his personal and professional calendars. This is the future of business with Dell technology.
“Life Force�
WHAT DOES THIS MEAN FOR DELL? Dell will become the life force for businesses. Rather than creating theoretical industry solutions like its competitors, Dell will bring industry solutions to life. Dell will pave a new path for these solutions, designing intricate digital Ikealike “showrooms� designed for different business and industry models based on their unique technological needs. This new model for businesses will reframe the way that companies select technology. It will offer the same price that businesses respected previously, while making the technology outfit for the company streamline, up-to-date, and will bring the comforts of personal technology to the workplace.
mission Inspire change and ignite passion in fellow humans. Grow my career through an Account Planning position at an agency that will benefit from my savvy, yet inquisitive, point of view.
experience
jordan
fox
THE NEWHOUSE AGENCY • Syracuse, NY Strategic Planner • October 2012 – Present • Manage strategy for 12 client teams at the largest student-run advertising agency in the country • Aid teams with research proposals, creative briefs, and creative executions • Clients include Head & Shoulders (partnership with Saatchi & Saatchi), Connective Corridor, and Fuccillo Nissan
THIRTY BELOW ADVERTISING • Syracuse, NY Managing Director • September – December 2012 • Created an integrated advertising campaign for Keystone Ski Resort, “Family Happens Here” • Found that people get so caught up in the daily stress of familial roles that they forget to just be a family • Creative concepts captured the small, fleeting moments when these roles become transparent at Keystone
STARCOM • Los Angeles, CA Media Intern • May – August 2012 • Aided associates with inputting buys and contacting representatives for upfront television media buys • Participated in structuring media plans and creating presentations for clients such as Mattel, WWE, and THQ • Created a social media incorporation for an ongoing WWE media campaign
UNWRAPPED MEDIA • Syracuse, NY Media Planner • January – May 2012 • Crafted an efficient and creative $20M media plan for Chipotle • Reached the young adult segment by understanding their chaotic media usage patterns • Partnerships with music festivals and social media promotions became essential supplements to our media mix
ODEN • Memphis, TN Account Planning Intern • June – August 2011 • Assisted business development and various account teams with strategy and consumer research • Researched consumers’ digital presence for several clients and participated in a re-positioning for FedEx
education Syracuse University • May 2013 • Syracuse, NY S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications & College of Arts and Sciences Dual Major: Advertising and Psychology
Milestone: Fashion and Beauty Communications
Honors: Dean’s list all semesters, Golden Key Honor Society, GPA: 3.8
activities Study Abroad: London • August – December 2011 comm.UNITY • January – April 2010 • Updated sponsorship and collateral materials for the Boys and Girls Club of Syracuse
skills • Understanding people Have consistently held a position in customer service since the age of fifteen. (Occupations include manager at McDonald’s, server, cashier, and fitness center supervisor) • Adobe Creative Suite 6, MRI+, Simmons OneView, Mintel, LexisNexis, Social Media
315.200.8580 jefox01@syr.edu 956 Ackerman Ave. Syracuse, NY 13210
Jordan Fox Email: jefox01@syr.edu Mobile: (315) 200-8580 www.coroflot.com/jordanfox