Marketing Magazine SG - May 2015

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ED’S LETTER ................................................................................................................................................................................................................

ARE YOU CONTENT-ED? Elizabeth Low, Deputy Editor elizabethl@marketing-interactive.com Rezwana Manjur, Senior Journalist rezwanam@marketing-interactive.com Noreen Ismail, Journalist noreeni@marketing-interactive.com Editorial – International Matt Eaton, Editor (Hong Kong) matte@marketing-interactive.com Production and Design Shahrom Kamarulzaman, Regional Art Director shahrom@lighthousemedia.com.sg Fauzie Rasid, Senior Designer fauzier@lighthousemedia.com.sg Advertising Sales – Singapore & Malaysia Johnathan Tiang, Senior Account Manager johnathant@marketing-interactive.com Ee Kai Li , Account Manager kailie@marketing-interactive.com Grace Goh, Account Manager graceg@marketing-interactive.com Jocelyn Ma, Account Manager jocelynm@marketing-interactive.com Ong Yi Xuan, Advertising Sales Coordinator yixuano@marketing-interactive.com Advertising Sales – International Josi Yan, Sales Director (Hong Kong) josiy@marketing-interactive.com

Is content marketing the new kid on the block?

Not at all, but for businesses it is more of a differentiator now than ever before. Given ever-stiffening competition, brands aren’t “contented” with the progress they have made and there is much more that is left to be achieved as far as content marketing is concerned.

In my opinion, if anything, great content marketing makes a brand look inward and that’s where most brands struggle. It is tempting to start looking for content outside, hire an agency to do it and manage content just as you would manage advertising.

While I’m not saying that’s a wrong approach, the most important and the oftoverlooked source of content is from within the company.

Great, share-worthy content can be found in every department of a company. It is, therefore, the marketers’ job to play the curator, make sure it is in accordance with the brand values and make it visible both within the company and outside.

Let’s face it – it’s not rocket science, but it ain’t a walk in the park either. Rigid silos are a legacy issue businesses are dealing with. Silos are as much a problem for content marketing as they are for any other aspect of marketing, be it social, mobile or digital in general.

In an interview with Marketing magazine, Vaasu Gavarasana, head of digital marketing at AXA, said: “The way companies are structured, corporate comms, brand comms and product comms all sit in different silos. These silos need to be brought down for brands to embrace a brand philosophy just like established publishing brands such as Fortune or Time do.”

How can marketers overcome these organisational challenges? What are some other obstacles to overcome when dabbling in content marketing? What are some of the success stories around which can inspire us?

We looked at all of that over the course of two days at Content 360 this year. In this edition, we have tried to summarise all of that for you- from content creation to distribution to governance and integration.

Enjoy the edition and I hope it helps you fine-tune your content marketing strategy for 2015 and beyond.

Photography: Stefanus Elliot Lee – www.elliotly.com; Makeup & Hair: Michmakeover using Make Up For Ever & hair using Sebastian Professional – www.michmakeover.com

Editorial Rayana Pandey, Editor rayanap@marketing-interactive.com

Events Yeo Wei Qi, Regional Head of Events Services weiqi@marketing-interactive.com Circulations Deborah Quek, Circulations Executive deborahq@marketing-interactive.com Finance Evelyn Wong, Regional Finance Director evelynw@lighthousemedia.com.sg Management Søren Beaulieu, Publisher sorenb@marketing-interactive.com Tony Kelly, Editorial Director tk@marketing-interactive.com Justin Randles, Group Managing Director jr@marketing-interactive.com

Marketing is published 12 times per year by Lighthouse Independent Media Pte Ltd. Printed in Singapore on CTP process by Sun Rise Printing & Supplies Pte Ltd, 10 Admiralty Street, #06-20 North Link Building, Singapore 757695. Tel: (65) 6383 5290.

MICA (P) 180/03/2009. For subscriptions, contact circulations at +65 6423 0329 or email subscriptions@marketing-interactive.com. COPYRIGHT & REPRINTS: All material printed in Marketing is protected under the copyright act. All rights reserved.

No material may be reproduced in part or in whole without the prior written consent of the publisher and copyright holder. Permission may be requested through the Singapore office. Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in Marketing are not necessarily the views of the publisher. Singapore: Lighthouse Independent Media Pte Ltd 100C Pasir Panjang Road, #05-01 See Hoy Chan Hub, Singapore 118519 198755 Tel: +65 6423 0329 Fax: +65 6423 0117 Hong Kong: Lighthouse Independent Media Ltd Unit A, 7/F, Wah Kit Commercial Building 302 Des Voeux Road Central, Sheung Wan, Hong Kong Tel: +852 2861 1882 Fax: +852 2861 1336 To subscribe to Marketing magazine, go to: www.marketing-interactive.com

Rayana Pandey Editor

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CONTENTS

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14 WHY ASIA-BASED SENIOR EXECUTIVES ARE MORE LIKELY TO QUIT Rezwana Manjur finds out the reasons.

22 KRAFT-HEINZ MERGER: A NEW BRAND POWERHOUSE? Industry watchers fear it may mean trouble for agencies if the firm focuses on cost-cutting.

Rezwana Manjur reports.

24 ARE YOU GUILTY OF THESE MARKETING SINS? A social media analysis reveals what really riles consumers.

26 OCBC BANK AND DBS IN A SPAT OVER SOCIAL MEDIA SUCCESS But are fans and followers the best gauge of social media success? Rezwana Manjur asks.

29 THE TOUGHEST QUESTION MARKETING FACES: SO, WHAT? What are the pressing concerns of marketers when it comes to great content makreting?

Marketing in this edition explores the challenges as well as potential solutions.

How can marketing overcome the biggest challenge of moving the needle for the business? MasterCard’s CMO Raja Rajamannar tells Rayana Pandey.

34 MASTER REPORT: SPORTS MARKETING Our latest Master Report explores how sports marketing has evolved in the digital age and what it means for brands.

42 DIGITAL OOH – WHAT ARE THE LIMITATIONS? Regulations and frustrations with technology continue to plague out-of-home advertising.

Rayana Pandey reports.

48 THE CONTENT CONUNDRUM From storytelling to organisational readiness to embracing content marketing to budgets and measurement – here’s all that went on at our annual Content 360 conference.

64 WHAT MARKETING CAN LEARN FROM FEMINISM Is it time for the world of marketing to pick up a few tips from the feminist movement?

SCAN TO SUBSCRIBE!

26 22 KEY TAKEAWAYS: >> How to keep your content marketing strategy on track. >> Why is it important for marketing to truly understand the business. >> Understanding social media beyond vanity metrics.

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NEWS

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WANT MORE BREAKING NEWS? SCAN THE CODE TO FIND OUT WHAT’S GOING ON IN THE INDUSTRY.

MediaCorp restructures MediaCorp redeployed more than 50 employees to what it has called growth areas and removed some existing vacancies. In this reshuffle, 33 employees will be laid off and offered severance payments and outplacement support.

Meanwhile, some 13 employees were offered employment as part of outsourcing agreements with two of its business partners. In January, MediaCorp made the announcement it was becoming more customer-centric, moving away from traditional media lines towards a focus on specific consumer groups.

#TweetMyPower WWF partnered with Havas Media Group’s mobile marketing arm Mobext Singapore to develop a new Twitter-based campaign called #TweetMyPower for the Earth Hour. #TweetMyPower is a hashtag-related donating platform developed by Mobext that processes donations for Earth Hour. This platform works in three steps and requires donors to connect to their Twitter account through the website tweet mypower.earthhour.org.

Users can join a global tweet blast stressing the need to #ChangeClimateChange.

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Shake up for Omnicom Omnicom-owned creative network TBWA split its Asia Pacific operations into three focused regions, shifting its regional headquarters from Hong Kong to Singapore. This came as part of several sweeping changes.

The move was in alignment with many of the region’s key clients.

Philip Brett assumes the role of president of TBWA Asia Pacific.

Brett takes over the management of Asia from Keith Smith who is now global president.

Arla Foods appoints Havas Scandinavian dairy product brand Arla Foods appointed Havas Worldwide London as its creative agency following a pitch. According to M&M Global, Havas was picked over DLKW Lowe to help build the Arla brand across categories in emerging markets. Havas will be handling the Arla brand account centrally, partnering with teams in its healthcare network across São Paulo, Singapore and South Africa.

Winning pitch Ricola Singapore appointed Starcom MediaVest Group its media agency for Singapore.

SMG’s remit covers media planning, digital and content solutions. This came after a closed-door pitch with five agencies. The shortlist saw three agencies vying for the account. The incumbent was Maxus Singapore.

Just wild about Harry’s Harry’s International appointed Singapore-based public relations agency PR Communications.

The appointment was for The Club which is the latest hospitality destination to be launched by bar and dining chain Harry’s International. The 12-month contract sees the agency managing overall media communications strategies and opening activities, encompassing its luxury rooms and five F&B venues. Formerly known as The Club Hotel, The Club is slated to reopen its doors in mid-2015.

Parting ways MediaCorp and Microsoft parted ways with the closure of XinMSN on 1 April 2015. Current users of XinMSN are redirected to msn.com.sg or toggle.sg.

Post separation, Microsoft’s MSN expanded its portfolio to provide users with breaking news, entertainment, lifestyle, food and fitness content from more than 1,000 media outlets globally. Meanwhile, MediaCorp’s Toggle continues to host local entertainment and lifestyle news, catch-up TV and live streaming of local shows.

Strategic move Y&R Singapore appointed Yousuf Rangoonwala director of strategy.

The role is a newly created one.

He has had more than 10 years in advertising, seven of which he worked as a strategist across agencies such as BBH, W+K and McCann in India and Indonesia.

He has also worked on brands such as Axe, Nescafé, Nokia, Activia, Danone, Powerade and Acer.

Calling on Cohn & Wolfe InterCall in Asia Pacific appointed Cohn & Wolfe Singapore its public relations agency. Cohn & Wolfe Singapore will work with InterCall APAC in positioning it as a thought leader in unified communications, conferencing and collaboration and digital media. Cohn & Wolfe Singapore serves as the regional co-ordination hub, working with several Cohn & Wolfe offices and affiliates in-country to drive its communications activities across several markets in APAC. Spotting danger Lowe Singapore worked with Handicap International to create a new TVC to raise awareness of land mine victims. Called “The Crutch Chair”, the campaign explained land mines posed a continuing threat in 75 countries.

The Crutch Chair acted as a rally point for students and adults in a position to help. Members of the public were urged to spread the word through #StandwithKanha #crutchchair on their social networks.

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NEWS

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Ekiden comes to Singapore Mizuno is introducing the first fully fledged Ekiden race in Singapore.

Working with Infinitus as the appointed events agency from March to August, the Mizuno Ekiden 2015 will showcase the concept of relay running that has stemmed from Japan and has been incredibly popular since its inception. The inaugural race will take place on 18 July 2015 at The Meadow, Gardens by the Bay.

A Clear space for brands Clear Channel Singapore has been contracted to manage the outdoor advertising space at conservation landmark Peranakan Place Complex, along Orchard Road. Placed between the Singapore Visitors Centre and The Centrepoint, this unblocked view of the billboard will contribute to the Orchard Road landscape.

Clear Channel Singapore seeks to offer brands a variety of ways to promote their campaigns through the Peranakan Place Complex outdoor advertising space starting 1 May 2015.

A creative fit Fitness First appointed Maxus Singapore as its media agency.

The appointment is for the Singapore market and Maxus will handle all aspects of media planning and buying for the brand.

The agency will also focus on performance marketing on leads generation. No time frame was slated on the account win. The appointment came after a closed door evaluation of agencies. The incumbent on the account was Havas Media.

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Joining forces Changi Airport Group and the Singapore Tourism Board (STB) inked the biggest deal yet to market Singapore and the airport.

This is a two-year partnership for joint marketing campaigns that will be launched globally and in “mutually aligned key markets”, aimed to build affinity with travellers. This initiative is aimed to shape long-term global perceptions of both Singapore and the Changi Airport.

Eyeing expansion Entrepreneur and media executive Harry Dewhirst has invested in Mutant Communications and taken a stake in the company.

He joined the board of directors as non-executive chairman, and will contribute to the company’s business strategy and growth plans. The funding is set to propel the Singapore-based PR and content marketing agency’s expansion in 2015. Mutant is focused on expanding its three practices – HR and recruitment, luxury, lifestyle and events, and media and technology.

Raising standards The Advertising Standards Authority of Singapore (ASAS) is set to work with industry players, including social media agency Gushcloud, on a set of ethical guidelines following the recently reported Singtel blunder with the latter. The incident spurred industry watchers to suggest the influencer community lacked proper guidelines. Gushcloud was fired after word got out that its bloggers were slamming Singtel’s competitors M1 and StarHub.

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NEWS

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Cerebos settles pitch Cerebos has appointed media agency UM for its media planning and buying for two years, with OMD as the incumbent. The media buying and planning duties are for the Singapore market. Meanwhile, UM has also previously handled the Cerebos Malaysia account. In Malaysia, the account, recently shifted to Starcom MediaVest Group Malaysia following a pitch. SMG’s remit includes strategic planning for all brands under Cerebos, across the analogue and digital platforms, as well as the social management for some brands.

Word of Mouth wins Boutique PR consultancy Word of Mouth (WOM) was appointed on a 12-month retainer by two of Singapore’s retail malls, VivoCity and Scotts Square. Both wins came following a pitch. Other recent wins have included natural and ethical beauty brand, The Body Shop, for a 12-month contract and books retailer, Times Bookstores, for a 10-month contract. The agency will be responsible for planning strategic and tactical media outreach campaigns.

Firefly calls for media pitch Firefly, Malaysia’s short-haul premium airline has called for a media pitch. The pitch runs across markets such as Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand.

Late last year Firefly introduced the launch of its new service operating between Ipoh and Johor Bahru. Meanwhile, the airline also signed a co-operation agreement with Citilink mid-last year to expand its regional reach.

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Kindness begins The Singapore Kindness Movement (SKM) released a short film about kindness and intergenerational bonding called “Mud Doll”. Conceptualised by 3-Sixty Brand Communications, the two-minute spot premiered on channels 5 and 8 on 30 March 2015, while a 60-second version runs in selected cinemas island-wide. The full-length clip can be viewed on SKM’s YouTube channel, KindnessSG.

Hosting new duties C&C International, a manufacturer and distributor of branded beverages, awarded Host Singapore its creative mandate for Irish cider brand, Magners.

The agency won the account following a pitch in February. Host will be conceptualising a 360 creative campaign for Magners in Singapore and Hong Kong. The first campaign will be launched in the coming months and will run across advertising, digital, retail and on-ground activations.

Regional ride Designer and manufacturer of two-wheeled motor vehicles Piaggio Asia Pacific appointed The Hoffman Agency as its public relations agency of record following a pitch. The agency was contracted for 12 months.

The Hoffman team will lead the regional co-ordination for the Piaggio brands. The agency will support the company’s communications strategy as part of an integrated programme covering the organisation’s markets across Asia Pacific.

Inspiring Singaporean women Revlon Singapore appointed Mindshare, the global media agency network, part of GroupM and WPP, its media account after a closed pitch. The agency will be tasked “to help inspire and engage Singaporean women”.

Revlon’s global brand portfolio includes Revlon colour cosmetics, Almay colour cosmetics, SinfulColors colour cosmetics, Pure Ice colour cosmetics, Revlon ColorSilk hair colour, Revlon beauty tools, Charlie fragrances, Mitchum anti-perspirant/ deodorants, and Ultima II and Gatineau®skincare.

Investing in parents Singapore parenting magazine theAsianparent announced a multi-million dollar investment from Vertex Venture Holdings.

The investment from Vertex brings the company’s total funding to SG$4.5 million. With a sustained growth in revenue throughout its five years of operation, theAsianparent offers marketers one of the most targeted and largest platforms for tapping the “mums” segment.

TheAsianparent generates it revenue from custom advertising and market research.

Adding some heat British street food restaurant MEATliquor appointed HEAT Branding to lead its marketing and PR efforts. The company is making its international debut in Singapore. The appointment comes following a pitch in Singapore. The agency is contracted for a six-month period. HEAT Branding’s clientele includes 1-Altitude, LeVel33, Dining City Restaurant Week, World Gourmet Summit 2015, UNA at 1-Rochester, Lewin Terrace, Wildfire, Time Out Singapore and Esquire Singapore.

A tribute request Singapore Press Holdings sent out an email to marketers and agencies regarding the queries it was getting on tribute ads to Mr Lee Kuan Yew. In a letter penned

by Leslie Fong, senior executive VP, marketing and digital divisions of SPH, the company said that at the request of the family, SPH would not accept all such advertisements.

Singtel saga Singtel terminated the services of social media agency Gushcloud and its employees who were involved in the marketing campaign that smeared its competitors StarHub and M1.

In a statement released on its Facebook page, group CEO of Singtel, Chua Sock Koong, said: “We regret that a Singtel employee who worked on this campaign did not adhere to our professional standards and values.”

Understanding autism For its 10th anniversary, non-profit organisation St. Andrew’s Autism Centre partnered with Grey Group Singapore’s philanthropic arm, Grey for Good, to educate people about autism. The partnership was launched in April to coincide with World Autism Awareness in Singapore. This collaborative autism advocacy effort was shared among five partners. The organisation hopes to improve the public’s understanding and awareness of autism through its advocacy.

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NEWS

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Sweet delivery Krispy Kreme Philippines and Mobext launched the brand’s first foray into mobile – the Krispy Kreme app. This marked the company’s entry into m-commerce. The app allows users to order their Krispy Kreme favourites and have them delivered right to their doorstep or have them ready for pick up at their preferred branch. The pick-up and delivery functions are available in selected stores nationwide.

Bite-size knowledge The Economist Group launched a new digital app, The Economist Global Business Review, focused on delivering insightful analysis on global trends in business, finance and technology. The bilingual Chinese-English app allows The Economist Group to reach a new set of global business leaders in markets such as Mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Malaysia and Singapore. The app is the first bilingual product featuring Economist content to be offered by the publication.

Saving the animals In partnership with the Humane Society of the United States, Hilton Worldwide has joined the fight against animal cruelty.

All hotels in the Hilton Hotels & Resorts, Waldorf Astoria Hotels and Resorts, Conrad Hotels and Resorts, Canopy by Hilton and DoubleTree by Hilton brands, will adopt cage-free eggs and cratefree pork produce.

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Stars join adidas campaign Adidas launched its “Uncontrol Yourself” campaign. This is to promote the new spring/summer 2015 Climachill product range.

The campaign will include ATL, BTL, digital and PR activations across the globe. The campaign features international athletes such as football star Gareth Bale, tennis ace Simona Halep and basketball player Jeremy Lin. The campaign presents the evolution of Climachill from 2014 with the new and valiant black training shirt.

Lighting up Indian real estate and hospitality group K Raheja Corp tied up with Grey Group Singapore’s new philanthropic arm Grey for Good, and Grey’s rural communications arm RC&M, for a new campaign called “The Escalator Project”. The campaign is aimed at lighting up homes using 50 lamps supplied with rechargeable batteries, and was tested in Chandori village near Nashik, Maharashtra, India.

Media review Consumer product retailer SC Johnson is reviewing the global media buying duties of its two media agencies: Omnicom Group’s PHD and WPP’s Maxus.

At present, PHD handles the company’s digital buying while Maxus is the lead media network on the account. The review is said to focus on regional capabilities and costs.

Healthy accessory Grey Group Singapore’s newly formed philanthropic arm Grey for Good launched a campaign looking to alleviate iodine deficiencies in women in rural India by swapping the bindi for an iodine patch. The “bindi” is worn by many Indian women on their forehead as a decorative.

3D test drive In partnership with digital marketing agency Isobar, Chevrolet launched CoDriver, a virtual reality platform to challenge the traditional car retail experience. With CoDriver, passengers take a seat in a specially fitted vehicle and are transported to a real-life environment to experience the vehicle’s capabilities. It was created for the launch of the Colorado High Country pickup truck.

A new partnership Content discovery platform Outbrain inked an exclusive multi-year global deal with ESPN to deliver sponsored content recommendations to its users.

Through the contract, ESPN will be taking advantage of Outbrain’s real-time analytics and insights capabilities. Using Outbrain technology, recommended content will be presented to ESPN users as well as trending stories and branded content.

The company will provide ESPN with predictive analytics tools to help improve engagement and performance.

HOW MUCH DOES THAT COST?

THE BEAUTY OF PERTH

The campaign shows a transformational day and night image of two destinations beyond Perth on Clear Channel bus and taxi shelters.

To bring out both day and night visions of regional Perth, a special technique known as reverse printing was applied to the posters. Launched

on 19 March, the campaign runs for two months. About 20 central bus shelters were picked for these specially printed six-sheet posters.

Each poster costs $160 and the total execution cost was $3,200. OMD Singapore was the media agency behind the campaign.

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NEWS

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AUDIT WATCH

BARCODE MAGAZINE DEBUTS IN SINGAPORE New strategy Adidas unveiled its five-year plan to boost its brand desirability, with an increased focus on its e-commerce offering and marketing a major part of it.

Adidas Group launched its latest business strategy, “creating the new”, a five-year strategy aimed at accelerating growth through increased brand desirability. The new business plan focuses on three major strategic choices: speed, cities and open source.

Going international Bloomberg Television partnered with Cignal TV to create Bloomberg Television Philippines.

Bloomberg Television Philippines is scheduled to launch in 2015.

The Philippines has become a key focus for US media groups after CNN went live in the market last month. Cignal TV is a subsidiary of multimedia conglomerate Media Quest Holdings, which in turn, is wholly owned by the country’s largest telco PLDT.

Merging tastes Kraft and Heinz are set to merge into one F&B entity and is set to take on the title of the fifth largest F&B company in the world, and will be named The Kraft Heinz Company. Kraft shareholders will own a 49% stake in the combined company, and current Heinz shareholders will own 51%.

An estimated US$1.5 billion in annual cost savings are to be implemented by the end of 2017.

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Indochine Media Ventures (IMV) issued its fi rst edition of Barcode Singapore in January this year, tailored to “curious co-ed” readers aged 20 to 28.

The magazine has an initial print run of 30,000. It ran as a bimonthly for January-February and March-April. From May the magazine will be printed monthly.

A spokesperson told Marketing there were no plans to run an audit on the magazine’s circulation as it is currently looking to establish its “foothold into the market fi rst”.

Barcode’s Singapore edition features conversations around fashion, dining, beauty and wellness, entertainment and travel.

IMV president Michael von Schlippe said: “We are delighted to bring a quality lifestyle publication to Singapore. Barcode

Vocanic expansion Vocanic expanded its tech capabilities with the inauguration of its new offshore engineering office in Colombo, Sri Lanka.

The facility will contribute in the areas of Vocanic’s state-of-theart cloud-based social customer care and customer relationship management platform, VSocial, and its application programme interface, VSocial-API, as well as custom-built campaigns. At present, Vocanic’s Sri Lankan office has full web, social and mobile engineering capabilities.

New appointment Creative agency Cheil India appointed Vaarunya Bhalla as senior brand manager. He will help develop and strengthen the agency’s reputation in the market, working closely with group president Shiv Sethuraman to communicate the agency’s vision, values and achievements to key external and internal stakeholders.

He will lead Cheil’s efforts to strengthen the agency’s brand position in the country.

is the companion of the individual where the intellectually curious and the socially aware meet. Our team of creative and imaginative individuals, backed by a pool of local contributors, will ensure a quality print for our readers.”

Rachel Tan, the magazine’s editor-in-chief, said: “Barcode Singapore aims to be the best friend of the individual who curates their closet, for the wanderer who loves to travel, and for the creative mind who dares to daydream.”

The lifestyle magazine retails at $3.90 and is available at all major bookstores, newsstands, cafés and airport lounges.

Following Apple Following news of Apple’s smartwatch, Swiss luxury watch brand TAG Heuer announced intentions to launch its own Android wear smartwatch later this year, along with Google and Intel. The announcement was made at watch and jewellery trade show Baselworld. The watch is slated to debut in October to December.

Starbucks’ campaign issues Starbucks launched a campaign called Race Together in the US to get communities to start an open dialogue about race with the brand. Starbucks’ senior vice-president of global communications, Corey duBrowa, decided to delete his Twitter account following a backlash over the campaign. (Read in detail on page 18.)

Programmatic partnership CNN, The Financial Times, Reuters and The Guardian, along with the Economist, will create a programmatic partnership called Pangaea Alliance allowing brands to reach their audience of 110 million users. This will allow brands to advertise using programmatic technology. The beta phase of the Pangaea Alliance will be managed by a central team which includes commercial leadership and operational resource from all the member publishers.

Supporting equality and diversity Anti-diversity and inclusion comments by iconic fashion duo and brand Dolce & Gabbana prompted a #boycottdolcegabbana online campaign, fronted by Sir Elton John. DigitasLBI joined in the protest, declaring its support for equality and diversity. The agency’s symbolic gesture comes in the form of “iitasLBI” – that is, by dropping off the letters “g” and “d” from its agency as well as personal names which prompted #dropDandG. New platform for Standard Chartered International banking group Standard Chartered launched a publishing platform called BeyondBorders. BeyondBorders aims to put the group at the front of the financial services publishing pack and reach out to a wider audience. With a multi-channel approach to content created by the group, the written blogs, videos, infographics and reports published on BeyondBorders can be accessed across social media, traditional news media and marketing channels.

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NEW WORK .................................................................................................................................................................................................................

1 Campaign Mud Doll Brief SKM’s “Mud Doll” aims to inspire reflection on the virtues of simple kindness and its role in Singapore’s future. The spot provides an opportunity for introspection, so that more people will start taking ownership for the state of kindness in Singapore.

The spot runs on local free-to-air channels 5 and 8 and at selected Cathay Cineplexes’ screens islandwide. The a longer version of the video spot is available for viewing on SKM’s Facebook and YouTube channel.

Client

Singapore Kindness Movement

Creative

3-Sixty Brand Communications

Media

3-Sixty Brand Communications

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2 Campaign France is in the Air Brief The campaign aims to position Air France as a company open to the world and its pride in offering a unique French travel experience with elegance, inventiveness and humour.

It highlights the best of France – a positive, caring and inspiring France that reaches out all over the world.

The campaign runs on TV, in cinemas, on digital media and on social media networks, including Vine for the first time.

Client

Air France KLM

Creative

BETC

Media

Havas

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NEW WORK ................................................................................................................................................................................................................

3 Campaign Tiger presents the unofficial official history of Singapore Brief Singapore is the home of Tiger Beer and it is on a mission to make its local provenance meaningful for Singaporeans by getting Singaporeans to celebrate the nation’s 50th through a fresh perspective on the things that make us Singaporean. The campaign will run on out-of-home, TV, cinema, and online (social and website) platforms. It is a proudly Singapore campaign, running only in Singapore.

Client

Asia Pacific Breweries, Singapore

Creative

BBDO Singapore

Media

Starcom MediaVest Group

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4 Campaign KFC “So Shiok, SoGood” Brief The campaign was created to introduce a special SG$5 two-piece chicken meal while aligning the food brand with an early celebration of SG50. The advertisement ran on terrestrial TV channels and cable TV. It also ran in print in The Straits Times, Today, The New Paper, Lianhe Wanbao and Berita Harian while bus posters ran on out-of-home media such as Clear Channel. The campaign also ran on digital banners and social media channels such as Facebook and Twitter.

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Client

Kentucky Fried Chicken Management Singapore

Creative

Ogilvy Singapore

Media

Mindshare Singapore

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M AY 2 01 5 M ARKE TI N G 1 1

6/5/2015 3:03:07 PM

OPINION: AD WATCH/WEB WATCH

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Antonio Bonifacio Creative director Grey Group

AD WATCH HOT: Control – TENA men commercial

NOT: No worries – Adcare men diapers

Nine am on a Monday morning, you have a brief for a new TVC – you don’t know anything about the product.

The first thing you hear when you walk into the meeting is the same old “cliché”: guys this is a great opportunity! Out of curiosity, before you even sit down, you ask the question: so what’s the product?

And here comes the answer that changes your lovely Monday morning – men’s urinary incontinence. What do you do next? Leave the meeting without further explanation or stay to create an awesome campaign against all odds? Being able to talk about a real problem in a simple, fun way and align it with great production proves partnerships between agencies and clients still exist. That is what creativity is all about: finding unexpected solutions for any type of problem.

Twelve pm on a Friday, you are about to go to lunch, your phone rings, and you recognise the number: it’s the account manager. Because you’re very professional, you end up answering the phone. All your fears come true, he needs a print campaign by EOD. You cancel your lunch and you start to brainstorm. You have a nice first idea, and with the help of your best friend, who happens to be a photographer, you can make it look great. You run to the account manager and present the idea. He loves it, not because of the idea itself, but because you were able to turn the situation around. For me, this is an example of a first idea that was well executed. I am sure nine out of 10 creatives would end up here if they received the same brief – sometimes time doesn’t allow us to move ahead.

Preetham Venkky Head of digital strategy and business KRDS Singapore

WEB WATCH HOT: dbs.com.sg

iras.gov.sg

With a search function at its core, the DBS website immediately means business. I think it’s both endearing and ingenious to use the search function, making it immensely convenient for the user to find the most relevant information. In the section below search, DBS has effectively utilised user personas to direct visitors to specific sub sections of the website based on their needs. Flat design principles, make the site quite pleasing to the eyes. For the review, I selected DBS under the personal banking section and was immediately impressed with how the navigation bar was divided based on the goals I wanted to achieve as opposed to what the bank had to offer. This subtle yet important shift makes a huge difference to the way the website is perceived and functions. The DBS colour palette has been used sensibly, making the site look simple and elegant. The use of faces makes the site look more personal. The website is intelligently responsive, making it easy to access on mobile and tablet devices

While I understand the website is trying to cater to too many groups of people and multiple requirements, the organisation of content is completely missing. Every user who accesses the website has a specific goal in mind, yet the website doesn’t utilise the most basic goal-directed design principles. Its only text approach makes the site quite cluttered. Using relevant icons could’ve brought some relief. Font size of the navigation bar is too small and mostly contains information which could have been pushed to the footer. The spacing between lines and sections is haphazard, making the layout look disorganised.

Negative space hasn’t been used appropriately and design elements (such as section bars, main carousel) look patchy. This website is a complete CSS faux pas. To add to the above, the website currently isn’t device-responsive, making it extremely difficult to use on a mobile or tablet device. The reason it even gets a 1.5 star rating is because, luckily enough, its core functionality doesn’t fail.

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6/5/2015 3:03:56 PM

DIRECT MAIL CASE STUDY

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FISHING FOR LOYALTY Zouk reached out to its members with a direct mail tuna can to act as a cool party invite. Here’s what the tuna can did for the event.

THE MAIL Objective: To generate interest for Zouk’s members-only party, Zouk Supermart.

Carted away: Zouk appealed to youth with a clever branded tuna can mailer.

Idea: Zouk wanted to reward its members with a special members-only party called the Zouk Supermart.

The goal was to reach out to members to collect their new cards. It is also a party we do as a means of rewarding our members for their continued support. It was a very targeted reach.

The Zouk Supermart was a membersonly night shopping event held on 6 February on Zouk’s premises. Participants were asked to participate in games at the event,

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with games such as The Prize I$ Right, with prizes sponsored by Citibank, Leftfoot, P.V.S, Samsung and W Singapore – Sentosa Cove to be won.

We sent out a total number of 300 direct mailers in the form of tuna cans to the media, selected influencers and partners. For members, they received a receipt in a plastic bag inviting them to the event.

As a result, we saw 1,200 people turn up to the event.

Send out items typical of a supermarket such as a tuna can and a shopping plastic bag.

Results: 1,200 guests at the party.

Sofie Chandra Head of Marketing & Events, Zouk

M AY 2 01 5 M ARKE TI N G 1 3

6/5/2015 3:06:58 PM

NEWS ANALYSIS

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WHY ASIA-BASED SENIOR EXECUTIVES ARE MORE LIKELY TO QUIT Low decision making influence over global HQ and higher scepticism of global leaders are among other causes. Rezwana Manjur reports.

PAY, LEADERSHIP BRAND, AND RECOGNITION VALUED MORE BY LEADERS IN ASIA Top 10 EVP Drivers of Attraction for Leaders in Asia Percentage of Leaders Selecting a Driver Among the Top Five Factors influencing Selection of a potential Employer attributes that significantly vary for Leaders in Asia ( relative to leaders in the Rest of the World1) Rank

Rest of the World2 Leaders

Leaders in Asia

Leaders in China

Leaders in Hong Kong

Leaders in India

Leaders in Singapore

1

Compensation (44%)

Compensation (50%)

Compensation (48%)

Compensation (54%)

Compensation (47%)

Compensation (53%)

2

Ethics-Integrity (35%)

Respect (34%)

Respect (39%)

Respect (35%)

Ethics-Integrity (45%)

Empowerment (37%)

3

Respect (34%)

Empowerment (34%)

Future Career Opportunity (31%)

Senior Leadership Reputation (29%)

Empowerment (38%)

People Management (33%)

4

Empowerment (32%)

Senior Leadership Reputation (33%)

Empowerment (30%)

Recognition (27%)

Respect (38%)

Respect (30%)

5

Development Opportunity (27%)

Ethics-Integrity (31%)

Market position (29%)

Development Opportunity (27%)

Senior Leadership Reputation (37%)

Senior Leadership Reputation (30%)

6

Future Career Opportunity (26%)

Recognition (29%)

Senior Leadership Reputation (28%)

Ethics-Integrity (27%)

Future Career Opportunity (32%)

Ethics-Integrity (28%)

7

Market Position (24%)

Future Career Opportunity (26%)

Recognition (28%)

Empowerment (25%)

Recognition (27%)

Development Opportunity (23%)

8

Senior Leadership Reputation (24%)

Market position (25%)

Development Opportunity (25%)

Future Career Opportunity (24%)

Growth Rate (22%)

Future Career Opportunity (22%)

9

Location (22%)

Development Opportunity (22%)

Location (21%)

Market position (23%)

Stability (20%)

Recognition (21%)

10

People Management (20%)

People Management (22%)

Growth Rate (21%)

Location (23%)

Market position (20%)

Market position (21%)

n = 105 (rest of the world); 771 (Asia); 233 (China); 171 (Hong Kong); 183 (India); 132 (Singapore).

1 Plus or minus five percentage points difference from the average for leaders in the rest of the world.

2 Rest of the world includes responses from Australia, New Zealand, Europe, Middle East, Africa, and North and South America.

Source: CEB Global Labour Market Survey Q3 2012; CEB and Russell Reynolds Associates, Asia Leadership Survey,2012.

A study of senior-level executives based in Asia has found that leaders in the region show higher turnover rates compared with other regions.

Asian leaders are also considerably more receptive to recruiters from other organisations, said a survey by CEB and Russell Reynolds Associates. One reason for this is because of the tensions between headquarters and the regional leaders, which is a leading cause of dissatisfaction and intent to leave among Asianbased executives in many WMNCs. The research, which studied more than 1,000 Asia-based CEOs and other executives, found the high turnover rate is contributed by

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factors such as lack of confidence among local leaders that global headquarters understands their regions, and values their opinions.

“Although the long familiarity Indian executives have with Western multinationals seems to give them a relatively favourable view of headquarters, their counterparts in China, Hong Kong and Singapore feel that corporate bosses aren’t listening to them,” the study said.

This is a concern regularly aired by regional marketers. In an earlier article by Marketing, one issue highlighted was influence without authority, where in most companies a regional role has little authority to influence decisionmaking.

Sandeep Khanna, who formerly held regional marketing roles at LG and Nokia, said the survey results were a little surprising.

“In my experience, there was always a universal understanding and appreciation that China and India needed to be treated in a special way in Asia. Assuming the results of the survey are representative, the fundamental issue is around trust,” Khanna told Marketing.

One reason, said Khanna, could be a lack of exposure. Only when both the global and regional leaders have been in the saddle long enough, does trust develop. Another reason can be a lack of visible success if the category and the businesses are relatively new to Asia.

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11/5/2015 11:33:50 AM

NEWS ANALYSIS

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Managing the industry and Asia’s high turnover From the point of view of managing turnover, it is important for marketing leaders to help employees re-evaluate their goals for the year ahead, and think long-term about their needs, so staff members do not find themselves in the same position further down the track.

She added that often where agencies and marketing leaders fall short is on retention strategies. In such a situation, it is incredibly easy (and common) for leaders to refuse responsibility for staff leaving, instead blaming the employee, the recruiter or accepting high turnover as an industry trend norm.

“If your staff is leaving by the dozen, you

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Receptivity to working in a Different Function by function Percentage of Leaders Who “Agree” or “strongly Agree” 57% 50%

48%

47% 39% 35%

33% 26%

24%

24%

22%

22%

Manufacturing and Supply Chain Roles

A REVOLVING DOOR: HIGHER LEADER CHURN AND GREATER RECEPTIVITY TO RECRUITERS IN ASIA Percentage of Leaders Receptive and Recruiters from other Organisations

41%

More Important for Local Leaders in Asia

Recognition

9%

Future Career Opportunity Respect

6% 2%

34%

Rest of Asia the World (n - 771) (n - 105) Intent to Stay

2

AND CAREER GROWTH EVP Drivers of Attraction: Differences Between Local and Expatriate Leaders in Asia Difference in percentage of Leaders Selecting a Driver Among the Top Five Factors influencing Selection of a Potential Employer

More Important for Expatriate Leaders in Asia

Compensation

25%

1

Customer-Facing Roles

37%

India

44%

Hong Kong

41%

38%

46% Singapore

Percentage of Leaders with High Intent to Stay’

2

15%

Sales (Business to Business and Business to consumer

Information Technology systems

Human Resources

Marketing and Market Research

Finance and Accounting

Corporate Strategy, Legal Real Estate

General Management

administrative Support

Operations

Research and Development

Procurement

Supply Chain Logistics

Manufacturing

15%

Communications

28%

Mainland China

More leadership in Asia is needed Priya Bala, regional director at font, added that historically, many multi-nationals have aimed to replicate their success across Western borders in Asia by sending leadership to Asian markets.

But cultural nuances and the changing business landscape means it can take several years for them to fully understand the market.

In the marketing industry, measures need to be set in place to grow a solid leadership bench that nurtures local talent. Asia is no longer just a region for localisation of global products and content – each market has its unique nuances and opportunities for growth.

Corporate HQ leaders, therefore, must seriously consider building strategies that include Asia leaders’ market-specific considerations, rather than simply pushing global approaches from Western HQs. “You need to develop an approach specific for that region, which will often be completely separate from their Western approach,” Bala said.

WILLINGNESS TO SWITCH FUNCTIONS ESPECIALLY STRONG IN SUPPLY CHAIN LEADERS (AND WEAK IN SALES AND COMMUNICATION EXECUTIVES)

Quality Control and Assurance

“Nothing succeeds like success and that is true in the corporate world more than anywhere else. If the Asian business has not yet delivered profits and is still in investment mode, the HQ leaders are always circumspect and would like to replicate the ‘Western way’ of working.

In many industries, Asia will have a longer gestation and that is something the West does not understand that readily.”

In everyday behaviour, this can create problems and sometimes leaders in the West are not sensitive enough to understand the nuances that underlie behaviour. But this understanding is a two-way street. Asian leaders also at times fail to understand the Western DNA and do not make the muchneeded added effort.

“As a result both operate from their cultural positions and there is not enough meeting of the minds.”

Rest of Asia the World (n - 771) (n - 105) Receptivity to Recruiters

Percentage of Leaders with high intent to stay current organisation over the next 12 month Percentage of Leaders who “ Agree” to responding to recruiters from others organisation

2%

3%

Industry Desirability

3%

People Management

4%

Job Impact

5%

Market Position

5%

Location

n=271 (expatriates); 427 (Local Leaders)

Source: CEB Global Labour Market Survey Q3 2012; CEB and Russell Reynolds Associates, Asia Leadership Survey,2012.

need to take stock of what’s going on internally, and whether your current processes – such as taking a global approach to local growth – are working,” Bala said.

“In the end, employees leave because they feel they are just not being heard. Marketing leaders need to look into more effective engagement measures for their staff’s welfare and happiness.”

Greg Paull, principal consultant of R3, added the talent squeeze would happen in Asia as much as anywhere else because the demand was so high. “For a start, there’s an oversupply of agencies. Meantime, there are more startups in ad tech in Asia than elsewhere in the world and the quality of talent is so variable – ranging from outstanding to average. These dynamics are driving high turnover rates and a short-term mindset.”

However, he is optimistic the trend will shift.

“We need to reach the happy medium of a job for life with a job for a year, the current mindset in China and other places,” he said.

The study also showed that compared with expatriate counterparts in Asia, local leaders

place a greater emphasis on recognition and future career opportunity. Meanwhile, expatriates also place relatively greater value on a potential employer’s location and market position.

The study also showed the willingness to switch functions especially strong in supply chain leaders and weak in sales and communication executives (15%). Marketing and market research sit somewhere in the middle with 24% willing to change.

Creating a better cohesion between East and West Khanna suggests what could help the situation is to have more companies have more of their Asian counterparts in the board rooms globally.

Global leaders should personally hold roles in Asia as exposure to local markets will make them more sensitive to the cultural nuances.

“Diversity will surely help bridge the trust gap and culture. At the end of the day, it’s invisible and needs to be experienced at a visceral level.

Everyone gets it theoretically, but there’s nothing like a dose of reality,” he added.

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11/5/2015 11:33:51 AM

NEWS ANALYSIS

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AGENCIES FALL BEHIND WHEN IT COMES TO INNOVATION Will the traditional agency model last long? Rezwana Manjur asks.

With innovation fast becoming a buzzword for marketers, many are noticing this is seldom driven by agencies.

This sentiment was seconded by Jonathan Oliver (pictured), global head of innovation at Microsoft Advertising.

“I truly do not think the traditional agency model will be around in the next two years. The rate of change gets faster every day and the next two years will be hyper fast. Agencies need to evolve to become consultants,” said Oliver in a conversation with Marketing.

He added that traditional agencies are fast becoming disintermediated and brands are coming directly to companies such as Microsoft as they see these companies as providers of tech and innovation.

Oliver said that while many agencies were today trying to evolve, this was still a struggle.

However, Publicis buying Sapient does mark a good start for the advertising industry.

“Agencies are in an interesting predicament because they have to move as fast as culture is moving and constantly changing. There’s a lot of risk on the agencies’ part – they are always playing catch up, but at the same time they have a client to convince. And if it goes wrong they get fired and clients find someone new.”

A fear of failure and high expenses Innovation is proving just as difficult on the client side as well.

Innovation, said Oliver, has to be wrong to be right. If it’s true innovation, it has to be something that has not been done before.

“However, brands do not really want radical innovation because it is very expensive and has a high failure rate.”

He added that while brands wanted media firsts, the problem was they don’t usually define what kind of innovation they want and the level of risk and marketing spend they were willing to fork out.

A good way to understanding innovation – which is still difficult to define – is that innovation should help communicate the product at hand

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and it should be embedded throughout the company culture. A practical breakdown of spend in the marketing budget for a company dabbling in the innovation pool should be 70% on traditional, 20% on new, but tested technology and 10% on true new innovative products.

“The measurement of success is how quickly you funnel in money to make that 10% a 20% then turn that into a 70% – that’s key,” Oliver said.

Is data to be blamed for a lack of innovation?

“When you have too many choices, it usually leads to a choice paralysis – that is where we are with data.”

He added that while data was vital, we should not lean on it too much.

While companies can refine and understand data patterns, there is still a “handbrake on innovation as marketers are too scared to make decisions based on all the data they have”.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, however, when there is not enough information, innovation is also equally difficult.

Furthermore, because of the availability of data today, there is a rise in a number of

decision-makers thinking that failure rates in innovation should be lower as data leads to a clearer understanding of customer behaviour patterns.

But the truth is, said Oliver, it doesn’t. This is primarily because data is always looking backwards rather than forward. True customer insight is not in the data, but rather in the gaps in the customer journey and experiences.

“If companies looked backwards with the data at hand we wouldn’t have the iPhone or CNN channels and many other products. Data would have told them not to do indulge in these product innovations. If you look at data too much you can’t really see the real insights.”

However, data alone cannot be blamed for a lack of marketing innovation.

In Asia, culture plays a big part in the lack of marketing innovation, said Oliver. Historically, in many Asian cultures, failure is not welcomed.

“The US is leading in innovation and pulling ahead of many markets because in the US failing is seen as a badge of honour. In Asia it isn’t looked at positively or harboured.”

To truly successfully innovate, marketers must be ready to fail, said Oliver.

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7/5/2015 6:00:07 PM

NEWS ANALYSIS

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SALES AND MARKETING CANDIDATES MOST SOUGHT AFTER IN 2015

Source: JobStreet.com

Among the job applicant pool, candidates in sales and marketing are the most sought after in 2015, followed by those with expertise in human resources and engineering, a recent study by JobStreet.com revealed.

This is despite a conservative outlook on the job market in 2015, with 82% of candidates surveyed expressing conservative expectations.

However, a majority (80%) are still considering switching jobs over the course of the year.

With regards to salary expectations, candidates who anticipated bigger salary growth (58%) attributed the main reason to having fulfilled management’s expectations in terms of their work, while candidates who expected lesser salary growth believed the main reason to be lower business profits.

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However, most Singaporeans’ employment yment and salary expectations are aligned with that of employers, with 86% of employers expected to offer a salary increment to their employees.

The study also revealed candidates in managerial roles take a more ambitious approach towards job search, as compared with executives. For executives, salary is the main catalyst for a job switch. Managers, on the other hand, look for job opportunities that provide greater autonomy in decision-making and respond only to compelling offers.

According to Jobstreet.com, employers who took part in the survey revealed the primary reason for hiring in 2015 would be to replace for staff attrition rather than expansion.

Due to the tight employment market in

Singapore, 89% of employers expect bonus growth to either decrease or be maintained, since bonuses are no longer a major pull in retaining employees, citing other reasons for an employee’s departure from a company.

One employer said: “The average turnover rate of a candidate is between two and three years. Candidates tend to leave for perceived ‘greener pastures’ after this duration, believing there is better out there and some are even looking at venturing into something new.”

A total of 311 Singaporean employees and 100 employers took part in this survey by JobStreet.com in December 2014.

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13/5/2015 9:51:49 AM

NEWS ANALYSIS

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WHY STARBUCKS’ BOSS FELL SILENT ON TWITTER What happened when Starbucks launched its Race Together campaign in the US? Rezwana Manjur writes.

Starbucks recently launched a campaign called Race Together in the US to get communities to start an open dialogue about race with the brand. The Seattle-based coffee company instructed its baristas to write “Race Together” on the side of customers’ cups in an effort to engage them to discuss race.

However, the effort was not entirely well received by the public. Comments on social media sites revealed anger and scepticism towards the campaign, with online users accusing the coffee brand of being opportunistic and capitalising on such a controversial issue.

Following the backlash, Starbucks’ senior vice-president of global communications, Corey duBrowa, decided to delete his Twitter account. He later wrote an opinion piece on Medium explaining he blocked a handful of Twitter users because of “the hostile nature” of their comments and deleted his account.

He said on the post: “Twitter has proven to be a valuable tool for me to interact with my professional community, with media, on behalf of Starbucks, as well as on behalf of me. But I felt personally attacked in a cascade of negativity.

I got overwhelmed by the volume and tenor of the discussion and I reacted. Most of all, I was concerned about becoming a distraction from the respectful conversation around Race Together that we have been trying to create.”

However, as a PR person, did it serve him and the Starbucks brand any good by deleting his account?

“Blocking users and deleting your account is quite unbecoming of someone representing a brand that just launched a bold initiative. People

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would be quick to assume that duBrowa himself didn’t believe in the cause,” said Preetham Venkky, head of digital strategy and business at KRDS Singapore.

He added that if he was trolled, he could have simply not engaged. For valid tweets, it was more important for him to stay, engage and participate in the conversation.

“On social media, it’s better to have

your brutal honest viewpoint as opposed to remaining silent, or even worse, running away.

It needs to be a conversation, not elocution,” Venkky said.

So was Starbucks right to take on the race issue?

Since the online backlash, Starbucks released a statement saying the company knew the campaign and issue would not be an easy one to tackle, but the company felt the issue “is worth the discomfort”.

“It’s a gross generalisation, but I would never recommend consumer brands to tackle grassroots issues. People feel offended, since they usually smell the motive of profit behind such initiatives,” Venkky said.

However, he added that in the case of Starbucks, the issue was different since the brand had always been an integral part of the community wherever they were located.

“It’s never easy to discuss such complex issues, such as race, either at work or at home, so it’s important for communities to come together at a neutral place. Starbucks’ locations can serve to be that neutral place.”

He added that in the case of Starbucks, when users stopped trolling the campaign, consumers might see an honest initiative gain momentum.

Lars Voedisch, founder of PRecious Communications, also seconded Venkky’s comments saying that while duBrowa’s reaction “was unfortunate”, the company did successfully steer a conversation on race.

“Starbucks knew that tackling race is a sensitive issue and most companies would have moved away from this – or any other emotionally loaded topic. So I applaud Starbucks and their CEO to go out there and have this conversation, fully being aware there will be sorts of backlash,” Voedisch said.

He added that it showed the brand genuinely wanted to get involved in society and community issues.

“There are thousands of brands that claim they are getting involved in the communities they are in – but which company actually goes beyond some safe CSR programmes or supporting generally accepted charities? We need more companies out there that take a stand and go where it might hurt.”

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6/5/2015 4:10:19 PM

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11/5/2015 7:01:01 PM

NEWS ANALYSIS

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REAL PRODUCTS WHICH SCORED ON APRIL FOOLS’ DAY MARKETING Yes, these were actual products, Noreen Ismail writes.

While each year sees tons of new fake products “launched” on April Fools’ Day, here are some brands that actually debuted or marketed real ones around the prank season.

Amazon is one clever brand to do this. A day before April Fools’ Day, the e-commerce retailer debuted Dash – a physical button that lets its customers order items with a push of a button.

Amazon’s one-click feature takes a realform of a small plastic hardware that you can stick on walls for on-the-go shopping. Shoppers can order for more products whenever they need them.

Run out of coffee? Press the coffee button.

Is your favourite detergent running out? Just hit the detergent button. Any time you need more diapers, shampoo, toothpaste or what-haveyou and you find yourself too lazy to run to the store, the dash button takes care of that and ships your necessity with a push of a button.

Amazon banked so much on the product’s “wow” factor that it was confused with a prank.

The product was so unheard of that netizens started to question if it was a legitimate product or just another prank from the Seattlebased e-commerce giant. The confusion was widespread, particularly on Twitterverse: The launch of the product around April Fools’ Day appeared to have been marketed and timed perfectly – when consumers are more likely to check out innovative products.

Spurring online buzz, albeit unintentionally or otherwise, the product gained some serious online traction. The online debate surrounding the product suggests that it’s either an incredulous or ingenious product – as Will Smith aptly chimed in: Another brand eager to pick up traction on April Fools’ was MINI Cooper that launched a game on its Facebook site to market its MINI 5 – a five- door MINI launched last year.

Irene Nikkein, marketing manager of BMW Asia, said: “We want to tell consumers about the extra doors, but in a more engaging

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“I keep waiting for someone to tell me that Amazon’s new dash buttons are an April Fools’ joke. http://t.co/ lHUM4bevjM @CNET.” – Jessica Dolcourt (@jdolcourt) April 1, 2015

“Amazon dash was by far the best April Fools’ this year.”

— joshua schachter (@joshu) April 2, 2015

“I think the Amazon Dash is both idiotic and brilliant.”

— Will Smith (@willsmith) April 1, 2015

manner. So we thought up MINI DOOR-RE-MI. In this game, we used the doors of the MINI 5 Door to test your memory. MINI DOOR-REMI was launched just before April Fools’ Day, a time when consumers are on the lookout for tricks and pranks and are, hence, more likely to click on interesting posts!”

Rod Strother, director of digital and social centre of excellence for Lenovo Singapore, highlighted that marketing content on April Fools’ day should be about adding value for the consumers.

“In cases such as this, adding value could

be something as simple as putting a smile on our communities’ faces. Obviously any piece that we put out still has to feel like it’s coming from the brand regardless of the timing of the piece – in fact, if it’s for April it’s probably essential it looks like it’s coming from the brand.

Otherwise no one is going to be fooled.”

Strother also cautioned marketers who may have a wrong agenda in promoting their products on April Fools’ Day. “I don’t know about using this day specifically as one to release product communication. If you’re using the rationale that people will click through to read it, then you have to assume that they are in a specific frame of mind when they do that.

“If you are not playing along with the theme of the day then it’s going to feel out of context.

Tricky task though if you’re trying to get the product message over at the same time as pulling a stunt. Get it wrong and it’s got great potential to backfire.”

However, BMW did it again – successfully – when it marketed its brand new BMW 1 Series right on April Fools’ day. The marketing stunt came in the form of a generous giveaway from the car brand.

NZ Herald printed a seemingly bogus ad on the front page, inviting people to swap their car at the Newmarket for a brand new BMW 1 Series.

The first person to do so, the ad claimed, would be rewarded with the new car.

Nina Englert, managing director of BMW Group New Zealand, said: “BMW has been New Zealand’s most popular premium automotive brand for the past three years in a row, and today’s reverse joke is evidence that people are willing to throw caution to the wind in the quest for a new BMW – even on April 1.”

The BMW prize featured the personalised number plates NOF00L plus a five-year warranty. The video of the surprise giveaway has had more than one million views on YouTube.

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11/5/2015 10:58:56 AM

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12/5/2015 11:34:16 AM

NEWS ANALYSIS

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KRAFT-HEINZ MERGER: A NEW BRAND POWERHOUSE? Industry watchers fear it may mean trouble for agencies if the firm focuses on cost-cutting.

Rezwana Manjur reports.

Kraft and Heinz will be merging into one giant F&B entity and is set to take on the title of the fifth largest F&B company in the world.

The combined entity is to be named The Kraft Heinz Company.

Kraft shareholders will own a 49% stake in the combined company, and current Heinz shareholders will own 51%.

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According to a press statement, the joint entity will have revenues of about US$28 billion, with eight US$1 billion-plus brands and five brands between US$500 million to US$1 billion. Following the merger, there is also an estimated US$1.5 billion in annual cost savings that are to be implemented by the end of 2017.

Alex Behring, chairman of Heinz and the managing partner at investment firm 3G Capital, said bringing together these two iconic companies would create a strong platform for both US and international growth. “Our combined brands and businesses mean increased scale and relevance both in the US and internationally. We have the

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NEWS ANALYSIS

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utmost respect for the Kraft business and its employees, and greatly look forward to working together as we integrate the two companies,” Behring said. Behring will now be taking on the role of chairman of The Kraft Heinz Compa Meanwhile, John Cahill, Kraft chairman and chief executive officer, will become vice-chairman and chair of a newly formed operations and strategy committee of the board of directors.

“Together the company will have some of the most respected, recognised and storied brands in the global food industry,” he said.

He added the combination offered significant cash value to shareholders and gives them the opportunity to be investors in a company very well positioned for growth, especially outside the United States, as it brought Kraft’s iconic brands to international markets.

Bernardo Hees, chief executive officer of Heinz, will be appointed chief executive officer of The Kraft Heinz Company. The board of directors of the combined company will consist of five members appointed by the current Kraft board, as well as the current Heinz board, including three members from Berkshire Hathaway and three members from 3G Capital.

Warren Buffett, chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway said: “I am delighted to play a part in bringing these two winning companies and their iconic brands together. This is my kind of transaction, uniting two world-class organisations and delivering shareholder value.”

Good news or bad news for agencies?

An article on Adweek shed light on the fact this may impact agencies negatively as the combined company will be spearheaded by

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a group known for its efficient cost-cutting measures. This was also further validated by the fact the company estimated that US$1.5 billion in annual cost savings were to be implemented by the end of 2017.

Is this good news or bad news for agencies?

Agency leads have given mixed comments.

Marie Gruy, regional director of Carat Asia Pacific, said that as a part of the streamlined operations, there was always the looming possibility of agency consolidation. However, while cost savings are likely to be a focus for any global F&B company today, the silver lining remains there will be a strong focus on growth and expansion which is a core priority for this newly formed entity.

“Given this, innovation and good ideas will always still be welcomed, as long as they can be well quantified by partner agencies too,” Gruy said From an agency point of view, she explained that any company which has the capability to “substantiate its media efficiencies and contributions to the business in the shorter and longer term can only benefit further from working with newly created global entities”.

Thomas Sutton, country director of Landor Indonesia, was less optimistic.

“I doubt the merger will have a positive impact on anything other than for the new brand powerhouse being created. Clearly economies of scale will be of benefit in logistical areas such as distribution. This merger may give them more negotiating clout with retailers when negotiating product listing … will these economies of scale be passed on as price benefits to consumers?

We can only hope,” he said.

“Unless there are clearly conflicting brands within the new merged portfolio, I doubt much

“I doubt the merger will have a positive impact on anything other than for the new brand powerhouse being created. Clearly economies of scale will be of benefit in logistical areas such as distribution.

This merger may give them more negotiating clout with retailers when negotiating product listing … will these economies of scale be passed on as price benefits to consumers? We can only hope.”

Thomas Sutton – country director, Landor Indonesia

will change. However, if cost-cutting is key we may see rationalisation of the individual brand ranges themselves – perhaps a reduction of the number of variants and SKUs some brands offer.

“Without a doubt, agencies will be affected by the merger. Some will lose out, but some may see their portfolio increase as the new entity consolidates their agency roster with fewer agencies.”

Meanwhile, Tom Child, senior consultant at Clear Ideas, also highlighted that when the merger was announced, share prices rocketed by up to 35%. This clearly demonstrated the consumer has trust in the stability and longterm success of these brands working together.

“The bigger challenge comes from a portfolio perspective and recognising where the international growth will come from. The merger provides a diverse portfolio of brands, which needs an efficient and effective approach to innovation in order to gain the return of growth the owners are clearly after,” Child said.

John Cahill, Kraft chairman and chief executive officer, who will become vicechairman and chair of a newly formed operations and strategy committee of the board of directors, said that together the company would have some of the most respected, recognised and storied brands in the global food industry.

The combination, hence, will offer significant cash value to shareholders and gives them the opportunity to be investors in a company very well positioned for growth.

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NEWS ANALYSIS

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ARE YOU GUILTY OF THESE MARKETING SINS? Social media analysis reveals what really riles consumers.

New research for the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) has identified the seven key ways that brand marketing is most likely to annoy consumers.

Social media agency We Are Social conducted a detailed analysis of English

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language Twitter comments about ads over the course of six months in the context of Project Reconnect, the WFA’s flagship initiative to better align brand and marketing strategies with people’s changing expectations in the digital age. The goal was to help marketers

identify acceptable versus unacceptable behaviours with a view to identifying potential recommendations and solutions.

The findings were based on analysis of 670,000 English language Twitter mentions making negative reference to advertising in the

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six months between August 2014 and February 2015. A random sample of 5,000 tweets was analysed to identify key concerns.

The research found: There were more than two million negative tweets about advertising in the past year in all languages. There were, however, more

“The good news is there are three million positive tweets compared with two million negative ones.

But it’s the latter we should focus on as an industry. We are not blind to the fact that ads can be annoying, intrusive and even be seen to contribute to social problems.”

Stephan Loerke - managing director, WFA.

tweets were replies, usually agreeing with the negative sentiments of the original tweet.

Men are more likely to complain about brand marketing by a ratio of 60:40, but both sexes are equally likely to be positive. Many of the comments reflected strong emotions and profanity was a common feature of the most negative comments.

The average complainant had more than 1,000 followers, indicating each negative comment reached a significantly larger audience.

TV ads caused the greatest number of negative comments followed by online and radio. Adverts on music streaming service Pandora appeared to annoy our sample the most, but YouTube and Spotify interruptions were close behind.

From the research, Simon Kemp, from We Are Social and Jon Wilkins, executive chairman of Karmarama, picked out the seven most common triggers of consumer backlash against brand marketing messages.

1. Ad malaise: A very large number of tweets expressed a generic dislike of ads or commercials. More extrapolated tweets referenced the ubiquity and overall frequency of ads, the length of the ad break or the context in which the ad appeared.

2. Interruption: Consumers recognise that ads help pay for content, but they expect marketers to make an effort to make their marketing less irritating. The tweets analysed showed that interruption was most annoying during highintensity content such as action and drama shows or live sporting events. Interruptions to The Walking Dead were the most common references to a specific piece of content.

Marketers need to make more of an effort to add value to the context in which they appear rather than simply interrupting it.

3. Incongruity: Too many brands are choosing the wrong moment and the wrong audience for their messages. It might be the right time, but the wrong place or the right time, but the wrong audience. Tweets complained about inappropriate ads – those that appeared when they watched TV with their parents or ads that were simply irrelevant. Constant re-targeting was also heavily criticised.

than three million positive comments about advertising during the same period.

Just over half the tweets were original statements, but 37% were re-tweets, meaning Twitter users have retweeted negative comments almost 750,000 times. One in 10

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4. Deception: The truth will set you free.

Claims that consumers feel to be exaggerated really rile people; they expect brands to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing, but the truth.

Thanks to social media it doesn’t take long for

people to call out false or deceptive claims and drive negative engagement around the brand.

Brands will gain credibility if they are honest and don’t airbrush the challenges they know they face and consumers know they face.

5. Overkill: Too many ad breaks and often ad breaks that are too long. Frequent interruption to a particular piece of content or media channel can create irritation with all commercials, regardless how often any individual message appears. This is combined with a rage against high frequency advertising. Even the best stories lose something in the retelling, particularly if you’ve already heard it seven or eight times before.

6. Getting personal: Online targeting that’s meant to be clever, but is actually annoying.

Deficient algorithms might be the industry’s biggest challenge: ads inappropriate to the content alongside which they feature; consumers clumsily targeted without heed for personal circumstances and sensitivities; and numerous cases where individuals were targeted by certain brands even though they had already expressed negative sentiments about the brand in question online.

7. Dearth in quality: Too many ads are just poor and end up annoying consumers.

Brands need to prioritise quality over quantity, meaningful engagement over frequency of exposure, and work harder to test whether the ads are engaging and add value before they expose them to consumers.

Stephan Loerke, WFA’s managing director, commenting on the results, said: “The good news is there are three million positive tweets compared with two million negative ones.

“But it’s the latter we should focus on as an industry. We are not blind to the fact that ads can be annoying, intrusive and even be seen to contribute to social problems. Project Reconnect tries to help marketers identify these problems and propose solutions so they can better align their strategies and executions with what people want and expect of brands.”

The research builds on existing work in the context of Project Reconnect in collaboration with We Are Social on what makes for great brand marketing in the digital age in 2014, which identified the new four “P”s of successful marketing in the digital age (people, purpose, principles and participation) and by Firefly Millward Brown, with parents and teens in 2011, on rules for marketing in the digital age.

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OCBC BANK AND DBS IN A SPAT OVER SOCIAL MEDIA SUCCESS But are fans and followers the best gauge of social media success? Rezwana Manjur asks.

OCBC Bank’s claim it’s the leading “social media” bank in Singapore has sparked retaliation from arch-rival DBS. In a media release, OCBC said it had more than 578,000 fans on Facebook, 9,900 followers on Twitter and 21,000 followers on LinkedIn. OCBC Bank claimed to have developed the “largest Twitter following among local banks” since its Twitter account was created on 17 June 2011. It added its Facebook page was started on 12 September 2012.

Quoting Socialbakers, OCBC Bank said its corporate Facebook page grew by 40% in 2014 alone, with interaction peaking in August during the promotion of the Juventus versus Singapore football match.

But social media experts have advised against looking at the number of followers or fans as a measure of success.

Don Anderson, managing director of We Are Social, said the discussion should be bigger than the numbers mentioned – it needed to be about purpose.

“Corporations ideally need to avoid attaching themselves to vanity metrics such as likes and followers,” Anderson said.

“At the end of the day, these metrics are largely meaningless. While response times to customer enquiries are critical to brand reputation, it’s the quality of the engagements and interactions with consumers that count

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most and add value to the organisation.”

Anderson added that brands, particularly those in the financial services sector, were still struggling with treating social media largely as a customer service platform.

“That’s not a complete relationship. While OCBC, DBS and UOB are making progress in this area in adopting more conversational approaches through content that is relevant to their customers, and not just about themselves, they still have a long way to go to truly comprehend the opportunity that social media provides.

“Are banks really listening to their customers or just simply reacting? In many cases it’s the latter, and that doesn’t necessarily lead to a long-term relationship, loyalty or ‘brand love’.”

In an earlier interview on the limitations of social media data with Marketing, Christopher Wong, CEO of Klarity, talked about how Hong Kong brands use this as a measure of campaign effectiveness, then went on to critique this measurement.

“In my opinion, that is a very superficial way of looking at things. Having fans does not necessarily equate to true brand enhancement or real leads,” Wong said.

Comments and shares are much more powerful because they show affiliation to your brand, but they are limited to very active fans – it is possible to have engaged less active fans

who do not leave a comment or share your post, he added.

Wong also said the path-to-purchase is often an indirect process and customers may have to be channelled through well-known sales and marketing funnels, therefore a careful analysis of how social media adds to a brand is needed. (Read also: 6 limitations of social media data).

In reaction to OCBC’s claims, Edna Koh, senior vice-president of group strategic marketing and communications for DBS Bank, has refuted the claims and told Marketing that in 2010 DBS was the first Asian bank in Singapore to adopt a regional corporate Facebook page which now has more than 590,000 fans across its 12 Facebook pages established for different audiences.

She added that over the past few years, DBS had adopted a multi-channel approach across the region and the bank also had more than 36,000 fans on Twitter and 100,000 followers on LinkedIn. Also quoting Socialbakers, Koh said DBS had an average response rate of 100% in August 2014 and an average of about 95% on Facebook for 2014.

“It is important for us to keep pace with the latest technology and be part of our customers’ social network,” she said.

“We have also enjoyed success engaging our customers with YouTube videos. For instance, the recent “8 types of friends you’ll meet at Lohei” video created for Lunar New Year garnered over 280,000 views on YouTube alone. The post on Facebook had close to 370,000 views, likes and shares.”

When contacted by Marketing, OCBC said the release was focused on its corporate social media channels such as OCBC Bank’s Facebook page and did not factor in product and event channels such as FRANKbyocbc and the OCBC Cycle Facebook page.

“In this instance, combining the two would mean we have a Facebook following of more than 600,000 fans. In addition, the media release focused on our Singapore-centric social media channels, as opposed to regional channels,” it said.

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NEWS ANALYSIS

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THE TOUGHEST QUESTION MARKETING FACES: SO, WHAT? How can marketing overcome the biggest challenge of moving the needle for the business? MasterCard’s CMO Raja Rajamannar tells Rayana Pandey. marketing initiative in recent years. He said it had moved the needle for the business.

“The brand scores have gone up. We use the BrandAsset Valuator which measures brand energy and brand differentiation – and both moved up, including NPS, yielding incremental business results.”

MasterCard now looks at Priceless Surprises more as a marketing platform than an advertising campaign. It has identified nine passion points for its customers and offers them experiences in the form of surprises across those passion points which range from music to different sports.

From this has also stemmed its latest initiatives such as Priceless Causes.

MasterCard is also in the process of rolling out its newly launched digital and social media engine in markets outside of Asia.

If a typical conversation between marketing and business was to be “Facebook-ed”, here’s what it might look like: Marketing: Our brand awareness post this campaign is significantly higher than last year! *celebrates* #wediditagain #weareawesome Business: Great. So? #notagain #sowhat #showmethemoney #youjustdon’tgetit Marketing: So?!!?? … #whycantyouseewhatI’mtryingtodo #youjustdon’tgetmarketing And so on and so forth. As marketers, surely you would know how the rest of the conversation would go like.

We have heard from many marketers that the future success of marketing and marketers depends on how keen is their understanding of the business and how marketing can turn into a profit centre from being a cost centre.

In a conversation with Raja Rajamannar, chief marketing officer at MasterCard, he reiterated the same.

For marketing to survive in the world of

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business, it needs to speak the language of the business.

“Marketing is no longer about softer KPIs. Brands have started putting emphasis on financial KPIs,” he said.

In no way are softer KPIs, such as brand awareness, brand perception, overall opinion, NPS and others immaterial, but they need to be funnelled in a way that shows the link between them and business results.

“Marketers get excited about these softer KPIs, but if a marketing guy comes to me and says my awareness has gone up, I’d say that’s great, but what does it do to the company’s bottom line?” he said.

The “so what?” is absolutely critical.

According to Rajamannar, in the past 12 months MasterCard has brought in the discipline and methodologies to connect marketing KPIs to business KPIs. “We are creating funnels to understand if our brand awareness goes up by a certain measure, what is going to happen to the bottom-line,” he said.

For MasterCard, its Priceless Surprises platform has been the most successful

From pure play marketing to business: A mind-shift While in theory it makes a lot of sense for marketing to be business oriented, what does it take a brand to truly implement this on the ground? Training and hiring the right talent, says Rajamannar.

At MasterCard, from time to time, every regional head sits in a financial 101 directly with the CFO. “Our CFO educates them on how to look at financials and understand them,” he said.

Other than that, MasterCard also uses third-party companies to carry out objective assessments through methodologies and a framework that eliminates bias.

“If a marketing campaign will be evaluated only by the marketing team, results, of course, will be biased. Instead we get these thirdparties to look at how we link marketing results to the company’s bottom line.

“We have made significant investments to get this attribution model right and we are far ahead of the game than most companies in that aspect.”

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IS DATA PRIVACY TRADEABLE, AND IF SO, WHAT DO BRANDS NEED TO UNDERSTAND? REZWANA MANJUR TALKS TO NICHOLAS WODTKE, VP OF SAMSUNG ASIA’S MEDIA SOLUTIONS CENTRE, TO FIND OUT MORE. W W W .MA R KET ING - INT ERAC TIVE . COM

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The answer to the first part of the question – is data privacy tradeable – is an easy yes.

A recent study by Nielsen found that more than two-thirds of global respondents (68%) were willing to share or rent their personal data for financial gain. Across regions, respondents in Asia Pacific were most receptive to the idea, said the study. Meanwhile, another study by Ernst & Young found that 40% of consumers agree that they would be more willing to share personal data if incentivised to do so.

This trend will only grow as consumers choose the advantages of Internet of Things (IoT) at the cost of privacy.

What does all of this mean for marketers? I sat down with Nicholas Wodtke, VP of Samsung Asia’s media solutions centre, for a chat on the topic.

Wodtke, who is not a traditional marketer by profession, has spent years in the media and content industry understanding the likes and dislikes of everyday consumers.

His passion for content and media was evident during our chat as we delved into his past experiences running major departments across big media companies. His portfolio of companies boasts names such as Columbia TriStar Television, AXN Action TV, Sony Pictures and many others.

He says, more than ever, privacy today comes at a price and marketers are fast learning the cost of privacy – and using it to their benefit. Southeast Asia, specifically, he says, seems to be a market that is agreeable on putting a price on privacy.

“Southeast Asian consumers seem to be more willing, and more flexible, with their privacy settings in exchange of having better customer experiences,” he says.

While in the US consumers tend to guard their privacy more closely, and are highly concerned with sharing personal data with third parties, in Asia there is a willingness to share personal facts in exchange for convenience.

And therefore, what it does is to make SEA a great market for new product launches and a viable test bed for many brands.

“Singapore in particular is a great market to launch tech products,” he says.

This is mainly because the country has a high GDP, concentrated geographic area and tech-savvy consumers who are ready to experiment. Its multicultural nature also allows for a lot of diverse input and a preview of what to expect in other less racially diverse regions.

“Going forward, there is going to be a lot more emphasis on bringing the right messages to the right customers at the right time,” he says.

This will ultimately make for a big push for location-based marketing, an area which didn’t take off as well as it was expected to in a market like Singapore.

But what will be different this time?

While in the past there was a lot of hype over location-based marketing, the technology is finally ready to be cultivated the right way today, Wodtke explains.

“Smartphones are smart enough. There is consumer acceptance and data analytics are at a point where big data can be crunched more quickly. Technology has finally caught up.”

This is also further aided by the fact marketers today are ready to spend money and move money and resources out of typical abovethe-line marketing into more digital spends and content marketing.

But there are a few curveballs marketers should be prepared for.

A WORD OF CAUTION While these advancements might make room for increased opportunity,

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marketers should be prepared for digital fatigue on the near horizon, according to Wodtke. This is going to put a whole new burden on digital marketers as they soon need to make sure the campaigns are not being invasive, but rather are additive in nature.

“The line between pushy and useful is a very fine line. Currently, consumers are in the receptive phase where they are willing to soak in new apps or feed or content, but the honeymoon phase is about to expire. I think consumers are going to say – I had my share.”

Hence, marketers need to start moderating more of their content or otherwise face negative brand association.

“Content is an alchemy with no defined rules," he says.

If a marketer is looking to create content, authenticity is ultimately key. A brand should not stretch beyond its measures when it comes to creating content. Marketers at our recently concluded Content 360 and Customer Experience Conference 2015 also reiterated this thought.

Vivek Kumar, director and head of NTUC membership, says that when a brand chooses to pick up content marketing, what is essential is for the brand to be “true to its DNA”. It is important to be sincere about the content and stay true to the brand to ensure success. Only by staying true to its DNA can a brand be transparent in its objectives and build trust with the customer.

Geoffrey Pickens, segment director of men’s and shave prep for APAC at Energizer Personal Care, also adds that while for content marketing to succeed only one stroke of brilliance is needed, this idea still needs to stay true to the brand’s personality.

“This idea has to reflect the overall essence of the master brand personality and link back to the brand DNA. The master brand personality, or tone of voice, is how we say what we say. It is our attitude and is built from the words and images we use to convey who we are. This helps to create a distinct look and feel for our brand and helps consumers to recognise us.”

Other veterans in the industry also added that another common mistake marketers make in the arena of content marketing is not crafting out their brand philosophies clearly before starting on the journey. If a brand doesn’t do this it runs the risk of trying to jump onto every oncoming opportunity. Ultimately, it’s the brand that suffers as its presence gets diluted.

And, as with any other discipline, content needs the right talent to make it work for the business.

WHERE TO LOOK FOR THE RIGHT TALENT Wodtke, whose professional training cuts across a range of silos ranging from finance, operations and even as a CEO in the media industry, says in his numerous roles, one constant and big struggle is finding talented content creators in the market.

Organisations serious in their pursuit of content creation need to nurture and cultivate the few truly content-centric and inspired folks on their teams.

“Inspired creative content creators are hard to find – a lot of times they not only need recognition, but companies should also fight to preserve those handful of people,” Wodtke says.

He adds there are more people today in the business side of marketing with a clear understanding of logistics, media buy and agency relations, but those skills are not at the heart of what content marketing truly is about.

“The true content person needs to be nurtured and coddled and given the flexibility to take risks in the organisation,” Wodtke says.

At the end of a busy day, Wodtke says he still has to make room to understand the concerns and address the concerns of these rare creative individuals.

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When asked where the content function should sit in an organisation, he explains his own bias is to have the product owners given more authority over what the content will be. In his ideal setting, his product teams would not only innovate and ideate the products, but also create the content around it, because after all they know the products best.

Content is what drives loyalty in a world where customers are spoilt for choices. For 2015, Samsung’s Galaxy Life app, one of its most wellknown loyalty apps, has set its sights to triple its user base. This would be achieved through a targeted content offering.

“Content is an important part of the Samsung ecosystem and it creates demand for Samsung products.”

He adds that currently 55% of mobile users claim that apps and services impact their purchase, while 85% of tablet users say content is a reason for them to purchase a device.

Content is thus vital in helping Samsung move volumes when it comes to selling its products. Ramping up on content and creating more personalised experiences on the platform is one strategy Wodtke and his team will be heavily investing in going forward.

Samsung as a company will also be zooming in on digital marketing and looking at connectivity as a key element in its marketing mix. With Samsung’s diverse range of products, the company will now also invest

"MORE THAN EVER, PRIVACY TODAY COMES AT A PRICE AND MARKETERS ARE FAST LEARNING THE COST OF PRIVACY – AND USING IT TO THEIR BENEFIT." heavily in the “Internet of Things” and connect different devices together for a seamless pre, during and post-retail experience.

While still in the early phases of transition, this is a definitive direction the brand is heading towards and accumulating brand evangelists along the way.

Wodtke adds that Samsung’s combined strong commitment to brand with speed-to-market is rare and what sets it apart from many of its competitors. When the company sees an opportunity it is extremely agile and can rally its resources very quickly.

“I think managing that trade-off between keeping it brand-centric while at the same time not losing speed is the alchemy brands need to figure out.”

He adds his career experience in Walt Disney has helped in his lessons of brand management in his current role. In his view, not many companies are as well regarded as The Walt Disney in terms of how the organisation manages its brand and the details of its characters, theme park experience and movies.

“All of its moves are well calculated and thoughtful and a lot of tender loving care goes into creating that experience. From that, I take away the importance of brand and detail.”

Working in a world filled with innovation and cool widgets, I ask Wodtke how he stays on track and away from getting dibs on all these new toys. Speaking candidly, Wodtke says that steering clear from distraction and setting up the right team with the right targets is how he manages to get the best out of his team and his time.

It is ultimately all about focus, focus and more focus.

“There is always a new task to take on, a colleague to coddle or a meeting to head to. The best thing I can do is cut through all that distraction and keep my team focused on the prize. Ultimately the customer is our boss so we need to do what we can to keep them happy.”

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GIVE YOURSELF A SPORTING CHANCE Sport has long been a great marketing opportunity for brands given the passionate fan following it has across the globe. Our latest Master Report explores how sports marketing has evolved in the digital age and what it means for brands.

BROUGHT TO YOU BY:

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HITTING A HOME RUN Sport today is a big part of most people’s everyday lifestyle. It has become a point of passion and entertainment and brands are fast picking up on this trend. Rezwana Manjur explores how marketers can score big in this arena.

Making the right choice: Why SIA chose the Singapore Grand Prix?

Sports events have the power of attraction. They are able to pull in people from all walks of life and across generations into one singular platform. The infiltration of technology has made any localised sporting events a shared form of global entertainment.

“Sports marketing allows brands to piggyback on the sentiments and devotions of fans towards their favourite teams and athletes,” says Kiyoshi Tatani, president of Mizuno Singapore. And brands are fast learning how to use this to their benefit.According to a study by research organisation A.T. Kearney, the market for sporting events was worth US$80 billion in 2014. During the FIFA World Cup last year, globally, more than three billion people watched at least a minute of the major football event and the media rights were worth as much as US$1.7 billion in total.

Yet, the report cited the World Cup to be only a small fraction of sports’ total economic impact within the scope of the global sports events market.

The same study cited market revenue for sports events in 2014 from the sale of tickets, media rights and sponsorships was worth nearly US$80 billion. Tying that in with sporting goods, apparel, equipment and health and fitness spending, the sports industry generates as much as US$700 billion yearly. This, according to A.T. Kearney, is just 1% of the global GDP. EVOLUTION OF SPORTS MARKETING In a conversation with Marketing, Lucien Boyer, president and global CEO of Havas Sports & Entertainment, explains that in the 1970s associating with a sports team or event simply meant buying a sponsorship package to grab eyeballs and expose your brand.

If a team did well, the brand would be associated with a great success

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story. If it did not succeed, brands at least had the consumer’s emotions at that point of time. If a brand was savvy enough, it could possibly craft a story to get a journalist’s attention – but even then it might not be exactly what the brand had in mind.

“But essentially the brand sponsorship story essentially ended there,” Boyer says.

Fast-forward to modern-day sports marketing, negotiations have taken a completely different turn.

Today, buying a hefty sports sponsorship package does not do anything for your brand if you cannot generate a meaningful conversation with your target audience.

“What is important today is not that you are exposing your brand, but rather that people are talking about your brand. You can’t just hope for people to notice your brand because there are so many brand exposures that people do not really pay attention,” Boyer says.

He adds that in modern-day sports marketing, the concept of buying eyeballs is dead and brands need to earn the attention by connecting with the consumers.

“It is not about touch-points anymore, it is about passion points and connection.”

Brands today need to find a reason to be in the arena and create share-worthy content which gets consumers involved. Echoing similar sentiments is Nicholas Ionides, vice-president of public affairs for Singapore Airlines, who says that it is the right fit that matters.

“We can only speak from our own perspective, and we would put it this way – we would not be doing this if we did not feel it was right for us,” he says.

Both the SEA Games and the Singapore Grand Prix are exciting

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events on Singapore’s sporting calendar and through the brand’s involvement it is able to enhance both tourism and sports for the benefit of Singaporeans and visitors alike.

He adds that prominent sports events in Singapore go a long way on the global scale towards boosting Singapore’s standing as a sporting hub, while adding to its attraction as a leading tourism destination.

“It is simply the case of the right opportunities presenting themselves at the right time.”

While buying into a pricey sponsorship gives a brand a medium to plaster its name across, and rights to some exclusive bits of content, it is what it does after with the content that actually matters.

Tatani adds that sports marketing and content marketing today have several areas of overlap.

“If content marketing is bread, sports marketing is butter. The two are dichotomous, and have to work hand in hand,” Tatani says.

AMBUSH MARKETING With the fragmentation of media, consumer attention is getting more and more sporadic. While most content creators’ and advertisers’ struggle is to reach out to different demographics, sports naturally cuts across numerous target audiences.

Because of this, and the fact that sports sponsorship does not come cheap, more and more brands are resorting to ambush marketing. Ambush marketing is done by advertisers who wish to be part of a conversation around an event, but may not want to fork out huge amounts of cash for it.

One example of effective ambush marketing was during last year’s FIFA World Cup. While adidas had the official rights for the World Cup, arch-rival Nike managed to grab a big slice of the conversation.

While Nike was not able to have the logo of the World Cup in its ad campaigns, it found a way around the situation. The brand came up with a mega million-dollar TVC that ran across various platforms and in various short and long-form clips. These ads featured football heavyweights playing in the World Cup. Nike was able to get its brand name out there and ambushed adidas by its sheer association with players.

“Ambush marketing was easily blocked in the past and you could say you are an official sponsor and people would care about the title. But that’s not the case with the rise of media fragmentation today. We always advise our clients today is to think like a challenger brand and ambush yourself. Be in the challengers mind. Do as if you didn’t have the exclusive rights,” Boyer says.

So if that’s the case, and ambush marketing can potentially be so rewarding, why dole out the billions of dollars on sponsorship?

“Exclusive content is still a major component of any successful sports marketing strategy,” Boyer explains. “If a brand can combine its exclusive content rights with a challenger mindset of ambush marketing, it can work wonders for the brand.”

In the case of adidas, the brand did just that.

Adidas gave birth to its ball Brazuca. Unlike any other ball, Brazuca had its own personality. It also had a camera inserted in the ball and players were urged to interact with it. Brazuca had its own tone of voice, own perspective and was able to tell the World Cup story in its own way on its own blog.

Instead of being just an official sponsor, adidas came across as a cheeky fun brand that brilliantly displayed behind-the-scenes footage and stories which it already had in hand due to the official partner title.

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Riding the wave: It is important to keep in mind the value big sporting events such as the FIFA World Cup add.

The brand was able to take the experience out of the pitch and throw it onto the global sphere.

“Today media fragmentation has led to people watching the match on one screen while simultaneously engaging in conversations on the the second and third screen ones. A brand that can feed this second or third screen with interesting and relevant content will maximise the connection,” Boyer says.

WHAT EVENT ORGANISERS FEEL ABOUT AMBUSH MARKETING ONE Championship CEO Victor Cui says while his event organising committee pens down strict guidelines to ensure that ambush marketing is not allowed inside the premises of the sporting event, it is still a compliment to any event organiser if the event is ambushed.

“Ambush marketing means you are doing very well in the arena and that organisations want to market around your event to form an association with your brand,” he says.

He adds this is when event organisers should strike up a conversation and reach out to brands to convince them of the value of being an official partner.

Like Boyer, he adds, that being an official partner has added benefits such as marketing within the event premises, receiving broadcasting rights and PR support which cannot be replicated in an unofficial capacity.

“Brands now want more than just awareness and exposure. They are looking for strategic partnerships with world-class sports organisations that are aligned with the goals they want to achieve. Sports events provide the brand with more mileage as they can tap on a myriad of live activities and broadcasting opportunities,” he says.

He adds that while marketing spend in the sports sponsorship arena is at an all-time high today, it is only about to get higher as marketing gets more and more sophisticated.

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TECHNOLOGY: THE MARQUEE SIGNING AND MVP FOR SPORTS MARKETING SUCCESS Sports and sports marketing involve blockbuster fixtures won or lost by defining moments, determined by quality of decision-making and predetermined strategies. However, here’s the real kicker: Technology. When purposefully adopted, it is a proven game changer.

England’s elimination from the 2010 FIFA World Cup serves as a case in point. During England against Germany, the referee’s failure to award England a legitimate goal was the defining moment. FIFA has since introduced real-time technology to confirm if a ball has crossed the goal line, helping referees make informed decisions. In addition, teams are partnering analytics providers to capture sophisticated player data, and formulate strategies such as players’ diet plans and training regimes, for optimal match-day performances.

Off the pitch, the narrative remains the same. Regional interest in sporting events is growing – the 28th SEA Games, Asian Mixed Martial Arts tournament and ICC Cricket World Cup were recently added to an Asia-Pacific (APAC) broadcast roster that already includes the Barclays Premier League, English FA Cup and Formula One, creating an attractive environment for brand-fan engagement via sports sponsorships.

In 2014, a projected US$12 billion or 28 percent of global spending was invested in sports sponsorships in APAC, and that number is set to increase by 4.4 percent in 2015. As shareholders relentlessly pursue product sales through partnerships, cash investment is being scrutinised more than ever before. The demand for informed decision-making and accountability is on the rise.

Furthermore, as fans come to expect personalised content, the goal posts have shifted. Success is now dependent on a brand’s ability to identify opportune moments and effectively engage sports audiences.

Taking a scattergun approach – mindlessly placing commercials across multiple TV channels throughout the day, or slapping a logo onscreen at every given opportunity, then hoping for a rub of the green is becoming ineffective in raising brand awareness and product purchasing intent.

Today, brands must identify the precise moment where they can leverage the rich emotional attachments that leagues, teams and athletes have with their fans. And understanding the following trends would score a brand its first sports marketing hat-trick.

TREND #1: ‘MAKE YOUR OWN LUCK’ WITH DATA ANALYTICS Sports fans epitomise loyalty, also a barometer for brand engagement and business profitability. Engaged consumers are also more loyal and more likely to purchase products. However, engagement is now a game of inches. Straight off the bat, marketers need to adopt a data-driven approach to understand and address needs and wants.

For a single view of fan behaviour or preferences, brands can integrate anonymised data from the following advanced analytics tools to cover all bases. Data is then used to formulate strategies by selecting the most relevant advertising media based on niche audience segmentation: • Sports channels’ viewership data from a household’s pay TV set-top box • Sports-related web browsing data from Internet broadband and 3G/4G mobile subscriptions

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Research on household demographics and purchasing preferences for each product category Message testing conducted to a select group of registered consumers

TREND #2: GEO-ANALYTICS (LITERALLY) ENHANCES A BRAND’S POSITIONAL AWARENESS Imagine this: The 2018 FIFA World Cup is underway. Public community centres in Singapore screening ‘live’ matches are attracting huge crowds daily. During half-time, viewers receive messages on their smartphones highlighting a discount for food orders in the next two hours, encouraging them to visit a nearby outlet of an official World Cup food and beverage sponsor. These messages are personalised based on an individual’s geoanalytical data and profile.

Geo-analytics enable marketers to shortlist and rank locations by density of potential customers. Businesses can even open new outlet locations or adjust operating hours to catch the anticipated crowd. By interpreting historical and real-time footfall volume, sports marketers can target consumers at the right moment, to meet a specific need or want.

TREND #3: VIDEO TECHNOLOGY THE NEXT BIG HIT FOR BRAND INTEGRATION AND FAN ENGAGEMENT Virtual advertising uses virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) technology, embedding three-dimensional brand images into a ‘live’ broadcast. Sports marketers can then create and tell editorially relevant stories during the programme itself. While such ad formats previously required significant financial investment, the technology has made its way into APAC and has become more affordable.

With VR and AR technology, sponsors are no longer limited to advertising during commercial breaks. Virtual advertising ensures that the attention of audiences are captured when viewership is at its peak, so advertisers can stay in the game.

Huffing and puffing is the lifeblood of sports teams and marketers.

However, a proverbial advertising arms race and a market of fragmented consumers mean that that endeavour alone is insufficient. As the saying goes, “Life is not measured by the number er of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.” There’s no better time than now for brands to leverage technology and create opportune moments for engagement across multiple platforms.

As England’s national football team m would attest – technology-led game plans are no longer an option, but a necessity. Marketers mustt do more with technology, to avoid the ignominy of being blindsided by the high-stakes, high-pressure re demands of fans and shareholders.

Anurag Dahiya, Head of Content and Advertising Sales, Group Consumer, Singtel

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CASE STUDY

HOW SINGTEL’S ANALYTICS CAPABILITIES AND AD SOLUTIONS SUPPORT OPPORTUNISTIC CROSSBORDER EXPANSION THE BACKGROUND Founded in 2004 and based in Guangdong, OPPO is an electronics manufacturer that delivers mobile devices in more than 20 countries.

Its major product lines include portable media players, LCD TVs, DVD/Blu-ray disc players, feature phones and most recently, smartphones and tablets.Having successfully entered China’s mobile phone market in 2008, OPPO began exploring international expansion in 2010.

By mid-2014, OPPO had established a presence in the US, China, Australia and other countries in Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Africa.

By now, the tactile and aesthetic qualities of OPPO’s designs, and its commitment to co-develop products with its customers through userexperience feedback channels had achieved widespread recognition.

As such, with its latest N3 and R5 models, OPPO started its most challenging cross-border expansion project yet in the final quarter of 2014 - delving into Singapore's saturated smartphone market.

THE CONTEXT/CHALLENGE The rise of smartphones has been swift, with technological innovation creating an incredibly sophisticated mobile ecosystem. Singapore’s advanced infrastructure meant it was uniquely poised within this vibrant scene. The early introduction of 3G and public Wi-Fi made Singapore a “mobile-first” nation. By 2014, Singapore had the highest smartphone adoption rate globally, with most consumers carrying either an Apple or Samsung model.

“As a new entrant in a mature and small, but affluent market, quickly building brand equity would be essential for successful expansion. So we sought a partner that could provide a comprehensive understanding of and access to local consumers across multiple platforms,” said Sean Deng, managing director of OPPO Singapore.

Building brand equity involved a three-step approach: • Increasing brand awareness among consumers mostly likely to purchase smartphones.

• Driving preference by communicating the distinctiveness of the new N3 and R5 smartphones.

• Encouraging product trials at the newly opened OPPO Concept Store at Suntec City Mall.

Finally, the campaign had to be consistent with OPPO’s brand positioning, “The Art of Technology”, which required its marketing partner to consider the granular details in everyday living and combine that with technology to create trendsetting by-products and unique consumer experiences.

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THE SOLUTION Acknowledging that digital media has created a more elusive consumer with short-term thinking and who lives across multiple screens, OPPO sought a partner that had been keeping up with the times, one that apart from offering a cross-platform approach, was agile and armed with the latest marketing technology.

Singtel’s latest data-driven solutions analysed dynamic consumer behaviour across platforms and delivered robust insights. With these insights, OPPO could then strategise and select the right platforms for effective engagement, optimising its advertising spend.

Daily channel-by-channel viewing data from Singtel TV subscribers was combined with insights from Singtel’s Project Newsroom – a commissioned report detailing household demographics and product consumption information. Using this data set, consumers who tuned in to watch the Barclays Premier League (BPL) were identified as OPPO’s most relevant niche target segment for the following reasons: • BPL viewers had one of the highest purchase percentages (81%) for consumer electronics.

• A majority (40%) of BPL viewers within the 20-39 age group and 32% were highly affluent (>$10,000 monthly household income) – in line with OPPO’s aim of “capturing energetic young hearts”.

• These viewers are also steadfast seekers of the best in local food and beverage (97%) – the R3 and N5’s superior smartphone cameras being a perfect foil for these “foodstagraming” gastronomists.

Informed by these insights, OPPO opted for a marketing campaign that included Singtel TV channels broadcasting the BPL, online assets HungryGoWhere and inSing – popular sources for local food and beverage and lifestyle recommendations, as well as news aggregator NewsLoop for content amplification.

“With the fragmentation of media consumption, ‘audience targeting’ has become today’s marketing imperative. The identification of target segments must be insight-driven for sound decision-making.

Singtel’s data-driven solutions, variety of platforms and BPL telecasts provide OPPO with flexibility and dynamism. Consequently we have been partnering with Singtel since we entered Singapore,” Deng said.

BUSINESS RESULTS OPPO evaluates a marketing campaign by looking at how it increases brand awareness, drives product preference, increases foot traffic at its Concept Store and contributes to revenue. Overall, the campaign led to an increase in brand awareness and consumer purchasing

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intent, contributing to a rise in OPPO’s smartphone sales during the final quarter of 2014, while delivering the following: 1. Increased brand awareness by engaging more than 243,000 BPL viewers per month from October 2014 to December 2014.

• Association with the most watched football league reinforced OPPO’s premium positioning.

• Optimised media plan across both “live” and repeat BPL matches by airing an OPPO TVC to reach out to its target audience of young, affluent and tech-savvy consumers.

• Brand integration within Goals HQ, a top-rating show on Singtel TV hosted by celebrity host Tabitha Nauser, where coverage on the OPPO launch event was seamlessly incorporated.

2. Content marketing and online re-targeting to highlight product features, driving preference across online and mobile platforms.

These efforts engaged more than 1.3 million active monthly users, with resultant click-through rates exceeding the industry benchmark (5% higher for inSing, 65% higher for NewsLoop).

• inSing: “Live” social media coverage and a video of the OPPO launch event on Facebook and YouTube, along with advertorials and customised banners highlighting features of the N3 and R5.

• HungryGoWhere: Creative execution of gallery sponsorship on Singapore’s top food and beverage portal, where a dining guide for Gardens by the Bay featured images taken using the N3’s high-res auto-rotating camera.

• NewsLoop: Advertorials and banners on Singtel’s news aggregator application, with a sponsored category on the homepage ensuring clutter-breaking brand visibility.

3. Product giveaways and in-store footage which encouraged product trials and drove foot traffic to the OPPO Concept Store from October 2014 to December 2014.

• A quiz was incorporated on Goals HQ, allowing viewers a chance to win a new N3 smartphone.

• Segments of Goals HQ were shot in the OPPO Concept Store to provide a sneak preview of the store’s physical space and location.

“Singtel’s advertising channels are an integral part of OPPO’s intent to build its brand equity in Singapore,” Deng said.

“Given the integrative nature of the Singtel platform, OPPO has certainly benefited in terms of heightened brand and product awareness.

“It is for this reason and also due to the collaborative nature of the Singtel advertising team that we have embarked on a second campaign in February 2015. As we continue our content marketing efforts, we project our smartphone sales to grow at an increasing rate in the months ahead.”

THE SECOND CAMPAIGN With Singtel introducing virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) technology in early 2015 to help local advertisers address the

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challenge of viewers paying less attention during commercial breaks, OPPO will be the first brand in Singapore to utilise the Singtel-acquired virtual studio.

“Being a technology company, we are always on the lookout for new ways to showcase the brand in a manner that befits our obsession with quality and R&D,” Deng said. “With VR and AR technology, we are able to have our brand visually incorporated into sports programmes through three-dimensional scoreboards and a stylistically redesigned virtual background. This ensures that our content captures the attention of audiences when viewership is at its peak.

“Singtel’s approach when providing marketing services mirrors OPPO’s brand philosophy when designing consumer electronics.

“As a part of improving the user experience associated with our products, we are keen to advance the use of VR and AR, as well as our engagement with local football fans. Our second campaign involves advertising on Singtel TV channels broadcasting the BPL and English FA Cup, coupled with Singtel’s online and SMS advertising platforms.”

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MARKETING FEATURE: OUT-OF-HOME

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DIGITAL OOH – WHAT ARE THE LIMITATIONS? REGULATIONS AND FRUSTRATIONS WITH TECHNOLOGY CONTINUE TO PLAGUE OUT-OF-HOME ADVERTISING. RAYANA PANDEY REPORTS.

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MARKETING FEATURE: OUT-OF-HOME

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Back to the brand: Are brands creating the right experience for consumers?

In a recent report, the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) highlighted the top five trends in digital out-of-home, globally. Here’s a quick summary from the IAB before we dive deeper into what’s happening locally.

“We tend to spend a lot of time outside and on the go – getting from one place to the next. It’s no surprise then, the average global consumer is exposed to various digital outof-home media for 14 minutes per week, and investments in the space are expected to grow 14.2% year-over-year between 2011 and 2017.

New York City’s Fulton Centre in Lower Manhattan has recently reopened, accommodating up to 300,000 daily riders and boasting more than 50 digital screens available for marketers. The largest and most expensive digital billboard debuted in Times Square in November, with just as many pedestrians expected to pass though the area daily. The overlapping powers of digital, mobile, outdoor and out-of-home content seem to be stepping up.

Digital out-of-home (or “DOOH” as the channel is commonly referred as) encompasses a variety of screen shapes, sizes and levels of interactivity.

From digital billboards and signs on taxis to digital signage at airport gates and gyms

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and waiting rooms, these varieties underline a necessary bridge between context and location in relevance and favourable recall – vital components of any media campaign.

The IAB sees norms and expectations from the online advertising world informing and expediting the growth of DOOH, and the IAB’s Digital Out-of-Home Task Force, launched this past fall, aims to define the DOOH channel, while positioning its place within the larger interactive advertising industry.

The IAB task force shares its thoughts on the top five trends in DOOH. 1. platform targeting opportunities are on the rise As mobile devices become more advanced and ubiquitous, the proliferation of captive digital screens in home and out of home has been growing. Interactions with consumers have become more prominent via new mobile technologies such as NFC, beacons and more accurate geo-fencing capabilities.

Such technologies may allow a marketer to personalise the consumer’s experience and even allow for immediate interaction.

2. DOOH will provide increasingly relevant messages in locations that matter

The amount of time spent outside and in transit is increasing in many regions. New forms of targeting and subsets have made the art of reaching specific audience segments in ideal locations easier – and in our highly distracted modern experience, a consumer’s receptivity to new concepts outside the home can be highly impactful.

In fact, a recent study by YuMe and IPG Media Lab found that consumers were 41% more receptive to advertising in public places than at home, and 16% more receptive at school/work than at home. As a consumer, the device you carry with you creates a natural tie-in to your visual experience outdoors, and relevant DOOH messages enhance the value via existing screens throughout popular locations.

3. Data is (literally) where it is at, locally and programmatically According to BIA/Kelsey, marketers spent $1.4 billion on location-targeted mobile campaigns in 2012. By 2017, spending on location-targeted mobile advertising will reach $10.8 billion, representing a 52% share of all mobile ad dollars. (In fact, next month the IAB’s location data working group will release a primer on using location data for attribution and ad effectiveness.)

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DOOH is benefiting from this rapidly growing segment, using big data to reach the same mobile consumer on larger, higher impact screens and enabling marketers to craft crossscreen location-based strategies to maximise the impact of advertising to consumers outside the home.

At the same time, finding scale and ease of buying in DOOH is being made easier through programmatic conversations and datadriven media buying. Programmatic solutions are developing in DOOH and are leading to a deeper connection with the mobile and interactive marketplaces.

Programmatic DOOH has the potential to drive standardisation and reduce overall fragmentation in the marketplace. The first and third party data sets that allow buyers and sellers to better define audiences exposed to DOOH

media are also rapidly evolving. Programmatic bidding enables buyers to more accurately target the most appropriate audience, while sellers benefit from yield optimisation of their media assets.

4. Out-of-home creates a unique canvas for top-notch creativity From street furniture and cinema ads to augmented reality and live experiences on outdoor screens and vehicles – the ability to build awareness and drive impressive results is getting easier in DOOH. Whether it’s part of a larger cross-media effort or a locally focused campaign, DOOH offers opportunities to reach a unique audience, creating unexpected parallels between location (as content and backdrop) and messaging.

DOOH has huge potential to drive immediate

"Re-targeting in the real world is more than just copying the online model; the best context is location – where we are and who we are."

OUT-OF-HOME AD SPENDING IN SELECT COUNTRIES AND REGIONS, 2014 & 2020 Billions

US $161.9 $207.2 EUROPE $126.3 $161.8 ASIA-PACIFIC $109.7 $180.2 JAPAN $55.2 $63.4 LATIN AMERICA $25.5 $40.3 CANADA $9.4 $11.8 MIDDLE EAST & AFRICA $5.7 $8.4 2014

2020

Source: Global Industry Analysis, "Outdoor Advertising: A Global Strategic Business Report," Feb 10 2015 www.emarketer.com

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impact and scale close to point of purchase; it also can garner award-winning praise and even the Direct Grand Prix at Cannes.

5. There is a rise of new measurement and addressability opportunities in DOOH New location and mobile data sets are leading to new ways of measuring attribution in experiential and out-of-home media. Location, as an audience definer, is just as important to DOOH as it is to mobile advertisers.

Re-targeting in the real world is more than just copying the online model; the best context is location – where we are and who we are.

It is about delivering real-world context and campaign messages that are close to point of purchase.

A consumer’s exposure to these mediums can now be verified beyond the self-reported opportunity to see, improving marketers’ confidence in their ability to isolate the impact of DOOH from other mediums in the crosschannel mix.

Looking forward, the space is heating up.

The number of digitally connected screens is growing, and all signals indicate that inventory and creative options in digital out-of-home media will continue to grow.”

What’s happening with OOH in Singapore?

According to an eMarketer report, Out-of-home ad spending is set to grow faster in Asia-Pacific than any other region of the world. Quoting Global Industry Analysts Inc, the report said last year, advertisers spent US$109.7 billion on outof-home ads in Asia-Pacific (excluding Japan), a figure that the firm expects to rise to $180.2 billion by 2020, for a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 8.6%.

Based on that prediction, out-of-home advertising will be bigger in Asia-Pacific by 2020 than anywhere else in the world except the US. Currently, the region still lags Europe for outdoor ad spending. Japan will tack on an additional US$63.4 billion to the regional total in 2020, pushing the aggregate figure past the US as well.

Global Industry Analysts cited several factors that would contribute to increasing outdoor ad spending, including innovations like 3-D or multifaceted prismatic billboards, the rise of digital out-of-home ad options, urbanization and overall growth in transit media placements.

While outdoor is becoming increasingly digitised, the take up of DOOH isn’t as satisfactory as it should be given Singapore is one of the most well-connected nations in the region – be it internet or mobile penetration.

“One reason digital OOH screens are not taking off the way one would want is clients asking agencies to run their TVC on digital OOH,” says Shrivathsa Raghunathan, director

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of ZenithOptimedia, adding that digital screens are essentially a “mute” medium, so running a TVC on a digital OOH is a sub-optimal usage of that medium.

And this issue of copy-pasting work from one medium onto another is not necessarily an OOH advertising issue. It is with any new medium brands are trying to experiment with.

“Clients need to have a separate creative which exploits the medium’s strengths rather than running their TVC on digital OOH.” If we were to look at technologies – those such as the QR codes and NFC aren’t popular either. According to a comScore report, “the number of people who have scanned a QR code seems to have plateaued since 2012. As the number of smartphone users continues to rise, the number of consumers scanning QR codes remains the same”.

Although augmented reality has gained some traction, forcing creative and media to work together, therefore allowing room for creativity, it faces a limitation in space.

“While the concept of immersing the consumer in the AR environment to experience the brand or product is nice, the malls and walkways in Singapore simply do not have enough space,” says Elaine Poh, executive director of Starcom MediaVest Group.

Adds Raghunathan: “One methodology which is lying in the palm of our hands which is not used at all, which is a criminal waste, is mobile technology.

“In a country which is 167% mobile penetrated, I am sure that we can use the mobile phone, triangulated to an OOH location, to determine actual audience for every single vehicle/format, but sadly, we do not seem to be doing it.”

However, it is not so much about the technology, but rather the experience brands are designing for consumers.

An example was Samsung’s GALAXY S4 launch in New Zealand. To create desirability for the S4, the team created a virtual queue for people who wanted to be among the first to own the S4. Consumers lined up virtually in the queue by sharing as much S4 information on social network sites.

Consumers earned points through shares, comments and likes, and were put further up in the queue. Live outdoor billboards projected the online line in real time. The OOH display rallied people together to cheer each other on to get ahead in the line. This generated much PR hype on national TV and print.

In Singapore, for the launch of the GALAXY Tab S, SMG worked with the creative agency Cheil to run images that reacted to the weather on the Knightsbridge Grand Park Orchard digital screen.

Called colour therapy, it displayed cool

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“Sales teams at outdoor media partners need to adopt a more consultative approach rather than a order-taker approach.”

Shrivathsa Raghunathan – director, ZenithOptimedia.

colours such as blue on a scorching hot day to soothe commuters and warm colours such as orange to cheer commuters on a gloomy rainy day. The technology pulled in real-time weather information to sync with the system to trigger the relevant colours.

“The Samsung examples demonstrated the use of technology that enabled the OOH media to become addressable with customised messaging to build context and relevance,” Poh said.

Another interesting example was that of Lexus in Australia. Lexus created personalised message combinations which were then flashed to non-Lexus cars. The billboard had a series of advanced cameras which captured car images and sent them to a device which classified the make of cars and colour, along with the time of day and weather, to generate a customised and relevant message such as, “Hey black Merc driver, the heavens have opened. This is the new Lexus NX”.

Marrying technology with the OOH sites means results can be measured and therefore, this tackles the other, and perhaps the single biggest challenge of out-of-home – measurement.

Creativity claustrophobia The other concerns raised by industry professionals were government regulations on locations that aren’t allowed OOH ads or billboards, or which can’t exceed a certain size, or the extent of creative executions, for example, 3D pop-up and sounds, and so on.

“The amount of restrictions placed on outdoor advertising can fill a book (if one ever gets around to writing one). In a nutshell, there is not as much flexibility as is available in other markets,” Raghunathan says, adding that most of the formats are the same old channels and nothing new or innovative has come up in recent times.

“The Singapore OOH market is basically an oligopoly (buses – two vendors, taxis – three vendors and so on). Economics 101 shows that oligopolies stifle innovation and what we are seeing is a lack of innovation in the Singapore OOH market.”

And last, sales teams at outdoor media partners need to adopt a more consultative approach rather than a order-taker approach, he adds.

“The conversation is more like, ‘do you have a mall’s façade available in Oct 2015 or platform

screen door at Raffles Place in November 2015 and they say yes or no?’

“The onus therefore falls on us to be very clear of what we want, when we want it, where we want it, rather than approaching it as, ‘I am planning a campaign to target credit card spending in Christmas season, what are the channels that will meet this campaign need’?”

Raghunathan says.

And what’s a possible solution to this?

Working with OOH vendors to use sources such as SOAR, Nielsen Media Index and traffic count numbers to best estimate opportunity to measure reach, experts say.

SOAR is the official provider of audience measurement data and a first-of-its-kind for the Singapore out-of-home media industry

by Nielsen. It produces audience insights for out-of-home advertising that can be used as a common currency for planning, trading and valuing advertising investment in the medium.

SOAR allows clients to find out who exactly sees out-of-home advertising campaigns, provides a single source of robust data for out-of-home and tells more about the audience brands are looking at. It also covers the out-ofhome advertising space in Singapore – from bus shelters to billboards, from trains to buses and taxis.

Advertisers can now more effectively measure ROI for out-of-home campaigns. They can get pre-campaign and objective insights into out-of-home media effectiveness, increase visibility for out-of-home media and get better opportunities to optimise advertising spend more effectively across multiple out-of-home platforms.

However, there are certain limitations there as well.

“SOAR helps to a certain extent when the medium/vehicle is covered, but it is limited and hamstrung by queries on how realistic/accurate the measurement is,” Raghunathan says.

“Clear Channel provides some reach and frequency numbers, but again this is limited to its formats and queries abound on whether they are realistic/accurate.”

According to Raghunathan, there needs to be an opening up of the OOH sector to competition instead of allowing the same two vendors to dominate, which will spur innovation.

“The amount of restrictions needs to be reduced to spur creativity, instead of saying do not do this or that. The approach should be ‘anything goes’ within a very broad framework.”

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The second edition of Content 360 saw 120 senior marketers and industry professionals discuss the evolution of content marketing. Topics ranged from storytelling to organisational readiness to embracing content marketing to budgets and measurement. Here are the key discussions that took place at the conference.

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CONTENT MARKETING LESSONS FROM THE SINGTEL-GUSHCLOUD SAGA

A hot topic during the first day of the Content 360 conference held by Marketing was the Singtel Gushcloud saga.

Recently, a leaked social media brief got both the telco and its then social media partner Gushcloud in trouble, as the brief was found to be urging bloggers to slam Singtel’s competitors, M1 and StarHub, to promote Singtel’s youth plan.

Speaking on the issue was Miguel Bernas, currently director of digital marketing at PayPal. (Bernas was last Singtel’s digital director.)

Reflecting on the situation, he said that what this saga clearly highlighted was the fact brands

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needed to have a proper content strategy and an execution process in place when it comes to content marketing. This process then needs to be implemented throughout the organisation and to be taken seriously by staff and external members across the board.

Unchartered territory for brands He added the second and possibly more pertinent issue that the incident highlighted was the “fundamental flaw in the blogging industry which is, to date, mostly unregulated”. Adding the industry is mostly dominated by “a bunch of youngsters” who have a voice and audience,

but what it “lacks in standards are authenticity and honesty”.

“Authenticity is about a brand being honest about its role in creating a piece of content. The idea of paying a person to share positive words about a brand and then passing it off as their own content does not sit well with the notion of honesty and authenticity,” he said .

His views were supported by Jamshed Wadia, head of social and digital media at Intel APJ. Wadia added that while there was a lack of awareness on authenticity in the blogger influencer sphere, and that the realm

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desperately needed regulations, ultimately it boiled down to brands exercising plain and simple common sense.

He explained that content marketing was ultimately the basis of online marketing and for it to succeed, clear definitions are needed.

“If a brand’s processes and products have flaws, those issues need to be fixed before the brand can jump onto the content bandwagon.

Failure to do so will simply end up in negative publicity through the content marketing strategies put in place,” he said.

Bernas and Wadia added that content marketing needed to be viewed as a long-term strategy, but mostly, marketers treated it as they would a traditional marketing or acquisition strategy where they were in a hurry to see the ROI. This “fear and pressure of ROI in return makes brands embark on crazy [strategies]”, added Wadia.

Building trust online Meanwhile, Anthony Hearne, regional director for SEA, India and new markets for Outbrain, also added that today trust was a major issue in the online realm. However, he was optimistic content marketing could play a big role in pushing the needle on the trust factor and influencing digital marketing as a whole.

“For the first time, through content marketing, marketing can be valuable to consumers,” Hearne said.

Quoting the Edelman trust barometer, Hearne said that in 2015 there were more distrusters in the world then trusters. A deeper delve into the data showed that 75% of major institutions in today’s world have all declined in trust over the past 12 months. Trust in the media is down by 2%, in business down 2% and even in NGOs, down 3% globally.

Another 2013 survey by Nielsen showed the trust factor was especially low online when it came to display ads on mobile and online banner ads. However, that same Nielsen “Trust in Advertising” research illustrated that while most forms of “advertising” languish at the bottom of the trust list, towards the top of the list there were high trust opportunities that should form an important part of any brand’s digital “marketing” efforts.

Nearly 69% of consumers indicated they completely or somewhat trust branded websites – more than any other form of online or offline media. Close behind this is consumer opinions posted online (68%) and editorial content (67%) both of which can be used powerfully by brands in their digital marketing efforts.

“This shows that with content marketing,

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we have the fresh buds of hope sprouting out of web pages and onto our many different devices,” Hearne said.

He added that in our increasingly digitalised world, the most important thing for marketers in Southeast Asia to wrap their head around in digital marketing is the idea of trust. This is a far more human-based issue than a technical one.

He added that content has much more to offer than traditional advertising to both the brand and the consumer.

“You can finally tell your brand story online and in a way that is authentic. You’re giving your customers advice and taking them behind the scenes. Not selling a product.”

Hearne, however, noted that with the emergence of native advertising and other innovations, there were perhaps too many opportunities for brands to try to “dupe” their customers.

“Content marketing is not about camouflaging your ads on a publisher page to bait people into clicking on them or to try to get them to buy your product. It’s about being part of someone’s day,” Hearne said.

Ultimately creating and distributing spam content will hurt the industry as a whole and risk the future of publisher monetisation, he added.

In-house content creation versus external sourcing Nissan Motor Corp’s editor-in-chief Dan Sloan added that while paying for external content creation may offer greater peace of mind, creating content in-house also has its perks.

One such arena is for a brand to have better access to speak about issues previously closed to the public that are sensitive. Addressing

those issues will ultimately depict the brand in an honest light and help build a better relationship with these customers.

Sloan explained that manufacturers are known in Japan for “monozukuri” (making things), and his team saw similarities in traditional factory production and their media centre content “kojo” (factory). This led to the birth of the term “koto-zukuri” – the stories behind making things. Essentially, he added, this is what content marketing is all about.

“While it was more trial and error when the media centre began, we operate to a good degree in this production vein now, trying to learn from utilisation metrics on how to make the next round of content creation even more successful.”

Distribution partners and audience targeting However, Sloan was also quick to add that while any brand might have a content team of experienced journalists and writers, this is not complete without the right distribution partners.

“Having an agency with a distribution strategy as part of the overall plan would be essential. To be frank, making it is often easy, but shepherding it to an audience, the right audience, is more of a challenge.”

This was a sentiment echoed by Chris Reed, global CEO of Black Marketing, who was on the panel later in the day. Reed added it was vital for brands to understand the content that would resonate with their consumers and understand which channels to use in the distribution process. Ultimately, it should not just be about content marketing, but rather content that resonates with the right audience.

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TARGETING YOUTH WITH CONTENT In 2011, OCBC created a people-powered content marketing strategy by listening to its consumers’ desires. Taking a cue from the burgeoning popularity of the hipster culture in Singapore at the time of its launch, OCBC’s FRANK tapped into the lifestyle trends of youths and young professionals and tailored its content accordingly.

“Content marketing begins with understanding the buyer persona,” Aldrina Thirunagaran, assistant vice-president of digital marketing at OCBC Bank, said at Marketing’s Content 360 conference.

“We wanted to tell our consumers that FRANK is not all about credit cards, so we wanted to share stories that are relevant to the audience.” The content team at OCBC adopted the look and feel of “hipster art” for FRANK’s products through its infographics, typography and photography.

OCBC maintained an active audience on its Facebook page, based on three key engagement screens which it found to be of most interest to its targeted audience. The bank found Millennials were more interested in curated posts pertaining to financial advice,

lifestyle as well as events and news that were in the social media landscape.

As such, its Facebook page content was tailored to provide information on how to be financially savvy; tips on lifestyle choices; and socially relevant content in order to increase consumer engagement and pique their interests in current events.

Further, understanding the target audience’s need for more lifestyle content, FRANK launched a series of “list” content, with the aim of guiding the tastes of Millennials.

OCBC also used visual content to engage its young audience. For its video campaign launched in 2014, “Get It Right This Christmas”, Thirunagaran said OCBC “took a couple of risks when making the video”.

The content team decided to cast a familiar face: the young boy was “Andy” whose character became famous for the World Cup advertisement on gambling. According to Thirunagaran, working with a familiar face for content creation generated a lot of conversations with users.

It also prompted shares and comments on OCBC’s campaign and helped to keep the bank

more engaged and connected to its viewers.

The decision to include a familiar face impacted the shareability of the content produced, Thirunagaran said.

Another campaign OCBC launched for FRANK CNY Tips was called “O$P$”, which featured two local female netballers with an extensive following on social media.

Thirunagaran said the cast’s popularity helped the video launch with considerable interest and buzz. Eager to play a “big brother” role to its viewers, the video was conceptualised

by OCBC to convey tips for the Chinese New Year season, while also reminding its viewers of a cultural practice common to locals in Singapore.

The importance of engagement was evident in the Facebook shares generated by online advocates for its visual content, which also led to a positive response from online viewers.

For OCBC, creating a people-powered content marketing strategy relied heavily on the bank’s willingness in listening to its consumers and suiting its content to align with current trends that are popular among its target audience.

HOW TO SELL CONTENT MARKETING TO THE C-SUITE Speaking at Marketing’s Content 360 conference, Keith Lin, associate director for strategic and public affairs (digital news and content lead) at Temasek International, shared three tips on how to sell a content marketing strategy to the C-suite.

“There is a general enthusiasm to sell brands using stories,” he said, and that the key to staying authentic and personal on social media channels lies in the brand’s ability to engage with its audience.

“Engagement is the ultimate destination when it comes to successful content marketing.”

In executing a successful content marketing strategy that guarantees effective engagement with consumers, Lin shared tips on how to convince your management to get on board with the plan.

1. Identify the target audience to shape content Ensure that content articulates the brand message consistently. There is also a need to highlight competition and know who is currently

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in the landscape. Content marketers must set clear time frames to avoid burnout and know the objectives of the content. There must also be a realistic marketing budget.

2. Build a community of content champions “Have touch-points across the world,” he advised. Employees are marketers’ biggest advocates and make up an important part of the brand’s online community.

Facilitating the ease of sharing preapproved content on employees’ individual social networks encourages engagement with content that genuinely interests them. He advised that it was crucial to calibrate employee social media guidelines to increase comfort levels with sharing content.

3. Use ROI terms that make sense to the layman Marketing jargon needs to be explained and articulated in a way that demonstrates impact.

According to Lin, marketers must be able to show the proposed content is lasting and

permanent. There is also a need to estimate up-front expenses and be able to demonstrate long-term benefits for the brand.

Since content marketing is all about tapping into the social media space where consumers and users are able to start a conversation around a brand, it is crucial for marketers to map the content strategy directly to the organisation’s vision and strategic objectives.

According to Lin, broadcasting small wins can earn big buy-in, and that it is important to “land your own ROI and don’t oversell” in the boardroom.

Essentially, he noted that marketers need to plan thoroughly, but also be prepared to change course when necessary.

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HOW TO GET YOUR IDEAS APPROVED BY GLOBAL

Geoffrey Pickens (pictured), segment director of men’s and shave prep for APAC at Energizer Personal Care, said one hurdle he had to face when coming up with a content marketing strategy for the Energizer shaver personal care division in China, was having to convince his Western counterparts of some of his creative ideas.

Speaking at Marketing’s Content 360 conference, he said that most of the time, the response to new ideas (from global) would be one which was positive, but then he would be quickly shut down by being told it would not work in the Western market.

A survey by CEB and Russell Reynolds Associates highlighted the trend of local and regional leaders feeling unheard by global executives.

However, he insisted that having a localised strategy in marketing is key for any creative ideas’ success. He added, “often regional and global creative ideas fail because of a lack of local input”.

He explained that when his brand of shavers

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kicked off its marketing agenda to use a Bruce Lee impersonator named “Smooth Lee” to reach the youths, the idea was met with some resistance from the other markets thinking it was not adaptable enough.

However, over the past three years, the idea has been recreated in eight countries. Brand awareness for the master brand spiked from 15% to 35% and sales increased more than 21%.

“For content marketing to effectively work, all it takes is one brilliant creative idea,” he said.

“This idea has to reflect the overall essence of the master brand personality and link back to the brand DNA. The master brand personality, or tone of voice, is how we say what we say.

It is our attitude and is built from the words and images we use to convey who we are.

This helps to create a distinct look and feel for our brand and helps consumers to recognise us.”

He also added 91% of global consumers would switch brands for the same price and quality if they felt that a brand supported a

purpose beyond a business goal. Hence, brands need to actively listen to what the consumers’ bigger problems are and create great creative ideas focused on making their lives better.

“Evolve from simply storytelling to storydoing by listening to your consumers’ bigger issues. Help make life easier for your consumers and be authentic and real in the process.”

All these will ultimately serve to bring your brand to life.

Kris LeBoutillier, digital content director of AP at Visa, added that having a global strategy trickle down to a regional level and then finally adapted to a local one drives deeper insights and generates closer conversations with those on the ground.

What content creators have to remember is that content marketing is both editorial and marketing. While it is an arena that allows for more creativity and play, content created cannot, hence, simply go off tangent.

“The content ultimately needs to be a part of the overall brand strategy,” he said.

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HOW TO SET UP GOVERNANCE PROCESSES IN CONTENT MARKETING

Just as your social media marketing needs governance, so does your content strategy.

Speaking at Marketing’s Content 360 conference, Nadeem Amin, regional digital marketing manager for Kellogg’s Australia, highlighted the importance of social media governance. “There are different kinds of issues, as many as there are individuals, and each individual has a different way of looking at things,” he said.

Likewise with content marketing – content governance is needed to standardise the way in which an organisation deals with contingencies on its social media platforms, he said.

He defined content governance as a set of policies that includes processes, guidelines and educational resources to best represent your organisation to an internal and external audience. Any kind of content governance should be tailored to manage across different levels of issues that pervade across local, regional and global markets.

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Governance tools are also needed as an optimal way of managing reactions carefully through collective intellect, aided by the use of technology.

According to Amin, tools here refer to a wide range from policy making to applications which are a set of best practices, guidelines, processes, procedures and best-in-class available software to do the job of content governance in ensuring the quality of an organisation’s social media platforms.

He said it was crucial to define your governance team to include the following divisions: legal, corporate communication, consumer affairs, brand, public relations, human resources and digital.

Create a workflow In ensuring the quality of dissemination of information, organisations need to create a specific content workflow.

Amin advised that companies needed

to first plan their workflow before drafting content. Next, companies need to revise and troubleshoot any problems that arise in the initial stages before testing the final product.

The finished work ought to be approved by appropriate divisions, preferably from more than three departments, before running the content to be published into the digital sphere.

After the content was published, he said a social media policy had to be drafted immediately as a pre-emptive way to deal with any standard issue.

The social media policy, he said, had to be “organic and flexible, with regular updates on social media best practices”.

“Companies should also create a social media playbook that aligns with brand guidelines.”

To do that, he recommended a content calendar so as to not clutter content with erratic updates and changes.

A flowchart with department names and titles of the people, name of the person, contact details of that person, keeps things neat and tidy when it comes to communications.

For approval processes to run smoothly, companies should develop an RACI code of conduct, and be responsible, accountable, consult and informed when drafting an approval process. An added advantage is having a flowchart of your approval process for easy reference.

“Regularly training and educating your key stakeholders is a must to keep everyone up to date on what’s relevant and current in the social space.”

To best achieve this, he said, it was necessary for companies to engage everyone to be responsible, while also having relevant people from various departments to be responsible for any issues that arise.

To be consistently ready, companies would do well to (1) partner closely with its agency; (2) contract a specialist agency; (3) hire a specialist or a consultant, and (4) empower its digital team to be well-versed in up-to-date information technology.

Overall, he said the planning stages were the most crucial.

“Planning out for the long haul, not shortterm, is important. Long term planning is important in order to have effective responses and procedures.”

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A CASE FOR COST-EFFECTIVE CONTENT MARKETING According to Vaasu Gavarasana, one of the co-founders of content marketing association, Asia Content Marketing Association (ACMA), the reason for embarking on a content marketing journey should be no different from traditional marketing: to drive active brand awareness.

However, traditional marketing is a costly means, and running a campaign every day for 365 days a year is not sustainable for any brand, explains Gavarasana (pictured).

“The only way to do marketing 365 days a year is content marketing,” said Gavarasana, speaking at Marketing’s Content 360 this year.

He added that for a content marketing presence throughout a year with written articles (and no videos), one could start with a budget of SG$400,000. He explained that content marketing works out more effectively because of the advocacy the content creates.

“It’s very difficult to compare digital to offline, there are simply too many variables.

But if one were to attempt to make an apple to apple comparison, then to achieve 52 weeks of brand awareness and engagement, you can start a content marketing programme with SG$400,000. And if we were to attempt the same on TV, the budget can start anywhere from SG$1 million plus.”

Therefore, your brand active awareness does not decay at all in an ideal scenario or declines more gradually.

“In the case of a GRP-led method, the decay is almost immediate,” he said. He also advised that marketers move away from using the word “campaign” for content marketing because content marketing “is not about campaigns”, but rather “it is about being always on”.

He added that more marketers must advocate a change in mindset from GRP-led to POEM (paid, owned, earned media).

He explained that another common mistake marketers often made was not having their brand philosophies clearly stated in briefs sent to their agency partners.

“How many marketing briefs have brand philosophy mentioned in it? Almost none.

Start your marketing strategy with the brand philosophy and not the USP on your marketing brief.”

However, Gaurav Gupta, marketing director of ASEAN for Kimberly-Clark APAC, is of the view that while no doubt content marketing can be a cheaper alternative to getting your brand awareness up as compared with your traditional

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marketing, a number such as SG$400,000 is by no means cheap. For many smaller brands, it is still an expensive avenue to invest in.

So how can a brand cut through the clutter?

Beyond cost-effectiveness, cutting through the clutter is yet another hurdle to overcome in using this means.

He added that with more and more brands breaking into this space, marketers are fast running out of fresh ideas to cut through the clutter. Despite content marketing being the buzzword in today’s marketing mix, the arena still has restricted resources when it comes to great executions. Results in the short-term are also limited.

“Today, every brand is starting to look and sound alike,” he said.

He added that at this stage of content creation, brands need to evolve from branded storytelling to brand storytelling.

He explained that while the former is simply “borrowed interest stories with limited link to brand and generation of mindless content creation”, the latter “is a choiceful selection of content creation that actively tells stories”. It is the latter that builds the brand’s affinity with customers by telling the brand’s story.

“Simply put, a brand story is a story that turns a brand’s promise into a unique point of view that helps the brand be differentiated, credible and appealing to its target audience,” he said.

“Marketers need to find their brand story to bring their brand values to life. Find the reason for your brand’s existence, its purpose, its values, its history.”

Once the brand is able to get its brand story in order, it can take it one step further to the realm of content marketing where it can take its brand story and put it in a specific context. This is where Gupta urges brands to create a “glue” that is made of sensorial and emotional cues that bring to life and build the brand story.

“Choose to then create content where you can build your brand story and bring it to life.

And then execute your brand story consistently.

It is better to have one fantastic content post rather than jump on every opportunity and stretch your brand.”

He outlines three viable steps to creating a cohesive content strategy: 1. Create visual consistency • Ensuring all pieces look and feel like they are from the same brand.

• Comprises of colour palette, fonts, logos and other sensorial elements.

2. Create brand story consistency • Ensuring all content is part of and builds the brand story.

• Comprises brand tone, voice, character and personality.

3. Set your challenges • Simple enough that teams can understand and execute.

• Low cost enough that following it doesn’t break the bank.

• Executable across touch-points, media formats.

• Agile enough to allow for user generated/crowd-sourced content.

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6 LESSONS ON COMPELLING B2B CONTENT MARKETING While the B2B sector seldom has the luxury of working with the kind of emotional marketing strategies the B2C sector tends to use (think of Dove’s Beauty Sketches), B2B strategies can be equally engaging.

Speaking on the brand’s content marketing strategies at Marketing’s Content 360 conference, Rupali Shah, digital marketing lead for Asia Pacific at Fuji Xerox, defined the goals of B2B content marketing this way: To increase awareness of the scope and variety of the business; drive engagement with the key decision makers and influencers; and support sales with qualified and interested leads.

With that in mind, here are several effective strategies for B2B content marketing: 1. Leverage cultural trends boldly B2B campaigns don’t have to be boring. For example, in Japan, observing cultural trends, Fuji Xerox ran a “Doraemon Challenge”, a play on the popular Japanese anime series. It engaged five companies across departments such as design and experience, offering them its software to create the telephoto megaphone in the anime.

In the cartoon, the gadget allows a user to speak to a person at a very long distance, like a megaphone. However, only the person the message is intended for is able to hear it. The campaign allowed the companies as well as the viewers of the video to see Fuji Xerox’s software capabilities.

2. Make full use of digital’s ability for personalised targeting Xerox Corporation ran a content marketing campaign in the US, the Chief Optimist, with Forbes Inc in 2012.

“The idea was to show an optimistic future in business at the time, which was a very negative period,” Shah said.

Forty per cent of the content was from Xerox and 60% from Forbes. This went across many sectors and was written so it could be read by a CIO or a CFO. “We print as well and we were able to print it so that the recipient’s name was on each copy,” Shah said.

A personal URL was created for each person who received the magazine. When they went to the site, the magazine was personalised for them with their name in the URL. “This resulted in 70% of targeted companies interacting with the microsite and a 300% to

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400% increase in readership over previous email campaigns. It helped our sales people get to their C-suite targets. Our sales people gave feedback that the prospects had already gone onto the website and consumed the content and were able to talk about it.”

Xerox has its own dedicated site called realbusiness.com discussing the issues of the business community.

“The only thing from Xerox you will see is the name, powered by Xerox, but nothing else is branded,” Shah said.

Fuji Xerox is also starting a digital centre in Singapore which will include a content team.

3. Take a leaf out of the book of B2C brands’ engaging sites The gripe many consumers have of B2B brands is their “brochure” sites – ones that lack depth, objectivity and strategic context that buyers are seeking to inform them through complex processes. Keep your site simple and easy to navigate, advised Shah.

4. Make content as authentic as possible The most compelling content is authentic, and it’s always quality over quantity.

“I walk around with my iPhone and if someone (within the company or a visiting client) says something good about the product I record it and use it in marketing. This is not staged and is most compelling,” she said.

5. Give more than you take One of the worst things to do is to make consumers give out too much information just to read your content. Shah gripes about it, saying:

“I personally hate it when websites ask you all your details just to send you a white paper.”

“Content that comes with too many requirements for downloading is a major turn off. Give people what they want, if they like it they will come back,” she adds.

Ask for an email address first. If your content is interesting they will give you more.

6. Tailor your content to the right part of the marketing funnel Your content approach should be tailored to where the customer is in their journey. For example, if your consumer is at the stage where they are researching different solutions and finding out more about the subject, you need to help with awareness, said Priyanka Nath, digital and social media lead for South Asia at Dell.

“You are giving the person the ability to give influence when speaking to the upper management. This is for the upper funnel – here you need to be agnostic and objective.”

Monitoring tactic here: Sit back and listen.

Get to the heart of your customers’ pain points, then look at how you can support with content.

What are they researching? Use that as triggers to create content, said Nath.

In the middle funnel this should change.

For example, Dell is looking to build its big data solutions. It is trying to understand what is going on in the market.

If you look at the amount of times big data is mentioned it is huge. This is the place where most people understand what big data can do for you. But they are still grappling with pain points. It’s important to join the dots for them, said Nath.

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GOING BEYOND CLICKS AND LIKES: LENOVO ON EFFECTIVE SOCIAL METRICS how loyal our audience is. Moreover, we can pinpoint which areas of social we need to put more focus on, while also looking at how our activities are making an impact on our overall social efforts.

Marketing: Is it worthwhile to attach a measure of financial value/return to social media investments?

Gorostiaga: If you are able to properly attach a financial value to your social measurements, then it is definitely worthwhile. The biggest challenge is how to track this successfully. If your company’s objectives are not just about generating leads, but also around building loyalty, or awareness, then the “return” on investment may not necessarily be a monetary figure.

While social media and the online medium offers marketers the benefit of measurability, the issue this throws up is also an information glut.

Myra Gorostiaga, global social analytics lead for Lenovo, talks to Marketing about effective social media measurement.

Marketing: What are the biggest social media measurement mistakes companies make? How has Lenovo avoided these mistakes?

Gorostiaga: Focusing on one metric, without the context of another. For example, you can choose to look at total volume of engagement to measure how well an activity on a social platform performed. The volume of engagement might tell you how responsive your audience was to your content, but without the context of reach you would not know the proportion of people exposed to the content that took action to engage. At Lenovo, we try not to focus on a single metric to measure success, rather we choose a mix of metrics to add context and tell a story.

Marketing: Surely most marketers realise that vanity metrics such as “likes” and “followers” have limited value. What is a better way of looking at it?

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Gorostiaga: I do not believe that “likes” or “followers” should be completely discounted, depending on the maturity of your social presence. What is important is that marketers use it to supplement other measurements of success. Having a multitude of metrics at your disposal gives you the flexibility of aligning the right metrics for your business, but it can also be overwhelming. That being said, every company is different and marketers should first define their objectives for social media, and then map the appropriate metrics back to each goal.

Marketing: What key metrics does Lenovo track on the major social networks it is present on?

Gorostiaga: We look at four key areas on social: participation (unique number of people interacting with our content); acquisition (how much is our community growing); retention (how many people are coming back frequently to interact with us); and shareability (how many people are sharing our content with their own communities). This is what we call the PARS scoring system, as part of the social health index. Through this, we are able to assess how our audience is responding to our content and

Marketing: What advice can you give marketers who want to refine their social media measurement strategies?

Gorostiaga: You should start out by asking yourself a few questions.

1.

Is your social media strategy aligned to your business objectives? If it is, then the metrics should easily fall into place.

2. Do you have a complete view of your social performance across your key metrics and platforms? For Lenovo, it was essential for us to be able to benchmark our performance over time so we could understand how we were improving and what was driving our successes.

3. Do you have the right tools to measure all your needs? At Lenovo we recognised the need for an online dashboard that would pull in all our social data as well as all our competitors’ data. This empowered us to make informed decisions, and track against the industry.

As the global social analytics lead for Lenovo, I have to continually ask myself, “Am I supporting the business?” In an industry that is constantly changing, answering these questions has helped me formulate our measurement plan.

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6 PREDICTIONS FOR CONTENT MARKETING IN 2015 Call it what you want, content marketing isn’t a new concept.

Brands have employed content to reach audiences for decades, but it’s only recently that the phrase “content marketing” has come into vogue, largely due to audience fragmentation stemming largely from the spread of social media and shifting consumer interests.

If the past year was about brands wading into the choppy waters of content creation and distribution, 2015 should see more brands diving in with both feet, and marketers paying greater attention to setting actual objectives and outcomes and not just “doing content” for the sake of being seen to be active.

The Asia Content Marketing Association (ACMA), association partner of Content 360, was established a year-and-a-half ago with the intent to assist brand marketers in understanding the complexities of this discipline, while encouraging debate and sharing best practices.

Its board, which includes a mix of content production agencies, brands and consultants, share their observations on how content marketing will evolve in 2015.

1. Realistic budgets, increased commitment Relevancy, frequency, audience targeting, amplification and monitoring and data analysis will be the critical ingredients for brands to succeed in content marketing and realise value from their investments.

Committed brand marketers will lobby for realistic content budgets and supportive input from dedicated teams or agencies. The less committed will simply fall back to old, tired habits and their brands and careers will suffer for it.

As attention spans decrease and traditional advertising models continue to lose influence, it’s becoming clearer consumers expect brands to be telling some form of story, and one that is often less about themselves and more about their fans.

Don Anderson, ACMA chairman and managing director, We Are Social Singapore 2. 2015: The “smarter” year Although implementation is most commonly led by the marketing department, content marketing touches upon many more functions of the organisation (HR, PR, legal, etc).

A clear and well-documented content strategy is therefore crucial to a company’s ultimate success. As most brands have been

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testing the technique of content marketing – largely through campaign-based executions in 2014 – the “do things smarter” year of 2015 will see a surge in the development of cohesive and comprehensive content strategy work.

Peter Bakker, commercial director, Asia, King Content 3. Multimedia content strategies will prevail 2015 has already been a time of remarkable transition in content. We have seen the progressive clients of 2014 move on from content marketing trials to become fully fledged brand broadcasters. Brands have sought out dedicated hubs delivering multimedia content in a balanced blend of video, graphics and long form copy and seen integration with social media and e-commerce platforms. The biggest surprise has been the transition from five-figure to seven-figure investments virtually overnight.

Nick Fawbert, managing director, Asia, Brand New Media 4. Quality content will power the ecosystem, B2B demand explodes I believe 2015 will be the year where brands across Asia embrace content as part of their overall strategic plan. Campaign-based strategies will remain an important part of the mix, however, brands will demand consistent quality across their entire content ecosystem.

B2B content demand will explode. And the single biggest problem the B2B industry will face is a lack of knowledge in certain verticals – including finance, ICT and natural resources – across the agency landscape.

Simon Cholmeley, CEO, Novus Media Solutions

5. Mobile, mobile, mobile – it will matter more than ever Today, more than 20% of video views are happening on mobile devices and that trend is growing quickly. In 2015, brands can expect their content to be viewed primarily through mobile devices. With this in mind, brands will need to develop a mobile website and blog that is mobile-friendly.

Brands will also need to focus on local SEO and real-time mobile marketing. This can only be accomplished by understanding your target audience and implementing real-time marketing efforts.

Shamila Gopalan, managing director, BlinkAsia 6. Video: the best performer in content marketing I think video will emerge as the best performing content marketing format and the driver will be the auto play feature on your Facebook feed.

The simple innovation of auto play without audio will reposition web video closer to the way we knew TV ads. More importantly, I’m betting it will drive similar ROI to that of television advertising prior to digital disruption.

Simon Kearney, Click2View

co-founder

and

director,

The Asia Content Marketing Association is a notfor-profit body and forum for discussion, debate and sharing of best practices and to help set industry standards. Membership is open and free to similarly passionate and content-focused individuals.

For more information, please visit the ACMA LinkedIn Group or follow the content conversation on Twitter.

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12 TOP BRAND CONTENT MARKETING STRATEGIES ANALYSED

In 2014, MBS averaged a 60% year-on-year increase in followers across social media. With these numbers, the MBS team was on its way to having one million social followers in Asia.

With three months of only celebrity campaigns in the pipeline, directed by our leadership team of Lisa Williamson and Timothy Hou, we achieved a 50 million-plus reach over Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn, Instagram, YouTube, Weibo, Youku and blogs.

Taking the words of Christel Quek, the content lead for Twitter APAC, we decided to “humanise or vaporise” our brand. In an attempt to be more than just a leading integrated resort and to connect with our customers, the MBS social media team has helped travellers and guests solve problems by capturing the nuances of a luxurious life with an integrity that transcends the average brand experience.

Eventually, we tripled our LinkedIn followers, won the LinkedIn award as the Most Engaging Brand 2014 for SEA/HK region and won two Marketing magazine awards – gold for Excellence in Social Media and bronze for Best Use of Social Media at Events.

Digital and social brand content needs passion, skill and purpose. It has to be useful, desirable, engaging and take adventures in engagement, one story at a time. Personally,

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I’m influenced by some magnetic marketers and optimistic brands. Here are a few of my favourites in content right now.

1. Get Krafty In a recent article in Ad Age it was revealed Kraft Foods now generates the equivalent of more than 1.1 billion ad impressions and four-times better return on investment through content marketing than even targeted advertising, says Julie Fleischer, the company’s director of data, content and media.

2. Dream up themes Philips got FleishmanHillard to rewrite the “power profile” of LinkedIn CVs of its staff and leverage its 11,000 staff in employee social storytelling. A pilot Linkedin content programme also runs for its top 10 executives.

In its Singapore social media command centre, headed up by Asia CMO Damien Cummings, it has segmented its consumer model into five content conversation “themes”: Clean air, smart home, look good, feel good, ageing well and connected work spaces.

From these themes, the brand created three types of content: Longer form content such as research papers and documentaries (on clean air), editorial pieces such as blogs,

press releases and articles, and lastly, social media posts such as Facebook posts, tweets, etc.

Philips expects to have 4000 to 5000 pieces of content per conversation. Fifty to 70% of the content is planned, the other is in real-time. You can read more on Cummings’ explanation of the move here.

3. Dunk a trend The Mondelēz approach is amazing: own conversation themes, partner with exHuffington Post founders of Now Then News out of NYC, cranking out branded storytelling videos that ride on the latest morning trends by lunchtime every day and amplifying what trends with programmatic buying. (Its global director of innovation, who leads this project from Asia, Pete Mitchell, will be speaking on the Content 360 stage.) “Our efforts are driving twice the ROI on a global level,” Mitchell said. (Read about its strategy in detail here) Through this initiative, it has rolled out social content such as YouTube and Instagram videos in the style of a 24/7 newsroom that never sleeps and has received up to 50% engagement rates as a result (versus industry average of 3%). Mondelēz encourages large companies to think like a start-up to “hack

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themselves to grow”Read more on Mondelēz’s move here.

4. Get real According to the recent @ShareThis study, recommendations make up 57% of purchase decisions. This is the power of social content and social sharing – driving authentic conversations from people to people rather than brands.

5. Think tribal According to SocialMedia.org we must think tribal and know our micro segments’ “passion graphic” not demographic. At the SocialMedia. org Brands Only Summit October 2014, in his presentation on micro marketing (available on Slideshare), MotiveQuest’s David Rabjohns explains that: “We cluster around the things we’re passionate about.”

He continues to point out that Nike’s traditional ad budget was reduced by 40% as Mark Parker, the Nike CEO, decided to go where the customer was – to online communities to interact even more closely with consumers.

6. Track impact, get a plan At Curata’s 2014 Content Marketing Tactics Planner we see that all participants through content saw a massive increase in these things: awareness building, buyer/customer engagement, thought leadership, SEO or web traffic, lead quality and lead quantity.

Curata again showed us a sensible split of created (65%), syndicated (10%) and curated content (25%). In its marketing pyramid you can see an effective visualisation from low and frequent to high and rare effort: curated, shortform blog posts, infographics ad webinars to e-books and white papers.

7. Sharing deeply The New York Times tells us that 73% of respondents process information more deeply, thoroughly and thoughtfully when they can share it. This is certainly true of Weight Watchers’ customers as reported in The Social Times. Weight Watchers had a great example where it crowd-sourced recipes through its community through polling, resulting in the perfect peanut butter-related offering.

8. Data makes content Nike and AKQA got together to pull in all the data from wearables to use data in a beautiful and meaningful way to create 100,000 unique videos. Imagine what info your Fitbit and Nest holds that can be repurposed as individualised content.

9. Global local GLocal is a style of content where the global brand owns thought leadership/branded

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storytelling and the local properties localise and transactionalise it. Whole Foods gives us a great example of GLocal, where branded content is localised for local property social pages and also supported by user-generated content.

10. Do more with less Reebok shares with us how it does more with less and focuses on being committed to realtime engagement personally at the front of the conversation.

11. At the movies Like Philips and Mondelēz, Marriott Hotels has a content studio to create, curate, collect and repurpose its content.

12. To infinity (pool) and beyond Yes, we got Michael Bublé, Jamie Cullum, Serena Williams, Eva Longoria, Taylor Swift, David Beckham, Posh, Hugh Jackman, Jamie Foxx, Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone and The Rolling Stones last year as Marina Bay Sands

is where celebrities come to play. We choose to care and share their content in our celebrity social strategy and we have even more coming in 2015.

But more than being entertainers, we believe our content gives presence to the individual who chooses to follow us digitally – and gives us a chance to create a meaningful impact on their life.

For me personally, content enables our team to become values-based, playful and ultimately be powerful explorers of engagements every day.

The Writer tells us that Kurt Vonnegut spent days editing just a single page of his writing. He eliminated every single word that he felt didn’t fit. We are not quite that indulgent, but if big data is a science then content is definitely its complementary art – and our word is powerful.

The writer is Sara Varela, associate director of social media for Marina Bay Sands.

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SNAPSHOT

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CAREERS

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CAREER PATH Yvonne Tey Marketing director, Hootsuite APAC

First job? My first job was selling IPC computers. This goes way back to the days when Texas Instruments (a global electronics company that designs and makes semiconductors) used to be popular, especially among the industry veterans.

First job in advertising/ marketing? It was at Ogilvy

Direct Marketing (now known as OgilvyOne).

Three best jobs? I really

enjoyed my time at Ogilvy where it gave me the best foundation in marketing. Second, it would be working at Volvo where I had the luxury to drive not only Volvo cars, but all of my competitors’ cars as well. I also had a great time working at Viacom where I had free access passes to all the gigs and concerts.

Perks of your current job?

All things Hoot – we have hoot camps, hoot breakfast and even #hootsuitelife. In all honesty, I really enjoy the Hootsuite culture and working with people who are passionate about their jobs.

Worst job? Selling sport shoes at

a fair during my school vacation.

Marketing professionals you admire? Malcolm Gladwell.

He has the ability to marry storytelling to social science.

Best career advice you’ve been given? If you want to

achieve greatness, stop asking for permission. Just do it.

Why a career in marketing?

Marketing is constantly evolving and adapting which helps to keep me on my toes. Also, I’m fascinated by the impact marketing brings on the human psychology.

If you weren’t in marketing, what would you be? A sky

diving instructor.

How do you wind down?

A well-bodied glass of red.

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JOB SHUFFLE GroupM Singapore promoted its trading director Linda Lim to head of trading. She will remain based in Singapore, and will continue to report to Jon Thurlow, CEO of GroupM Singapore. She will be responsible for providing leadership to the agency trading community by working with local agency management, as well as managing a new internal GroupM team focused on buying operations.

Brandable, a Singaporebased marketing and branding consultancy, named Michelle Froah as managing director. In her new capacity, she will be working with brands as chief marketing officer.

She will help in applying essential tools in brand assessment, strategy, communications, operationalisation, capability building and management.

Publicis 133 LUX hired Frances Kong as its first client service director following a series of new business wins. Before taking on her role at Publicis 133 LUX, she worked for iris in Singapore where she led assignments on Johnnie Walker’s global F1 sponsorship and Heineken. Before iris, she worked in Shanghai for five years with Euro RSCG and Leo Burnett.

Creative network iris appointed Mark Hadfield as regional planning director. Based in Singapore, he will report directly to Craig Mapleston and Luke Nathans, CEO of APAC, and will be responsible

for the quality and profile of the strategic output for clients across Asia, including Diageo, Shell and Philips. He will also contribute to driving commercial performance and providing leadership for the planning team in Singapore.

Lowe Singapore hired Mei Cheong as regional business director.

She joined Lowe after four years as head of brand at Malaysian mobile services provider Maxis. She will be responsible for leading the Unilever brand Knorr across Southeast Asian markets. She has 20-plus years of career experience and has worked in markets such as Hong Kong, London, Kuala Lumpur and San Francisco.

Saatchi & Saatchi appointed two new creative directors Jeremy Chia and Fajar Kurnia, who will report to ECD Dominic Stallard.

The pair will work across the agency’s portfolio on local, regional and global clients. Both Chia and Kurnia began their careers at Saatchi & Saatchi (Chia in Hong Kong and Kurnia in Malaysia), and they have also worked at agencies such as iris Worldwide Indonesia.

Mimi Nicklin joined Grey Group Asia Pacific as vicepresident of GSK. She spearheads the nutrition and oral health businesses for the brand. She reports to Konstantin Popovic, executive vice-president for GSK. She has a background in communications and advertising.

She was also part of the Grey family from 2006 to 2010, with roles based in Europe and Asia.

Razorfish appointed AKQA’s Nick Turner in the role of international executive creative director, effective on 30 March. He is responsible for driving the highest creative standards and output while attracting, inspiring and retaining exceptional talent. He will be a driving force in promoting experience-led innovation throughout the agency’s international offices.

He reports directly to Daniel Bonner, Razorfish’s global chief creative officer.

Golin appointed Calvin Wong as director of research and analytics in Asia.

Wong will focus on strengthening the firm’s research and analytics capabilities in the region, bringing its award-winning brand intelligence and strategy planning tools, such as the delta set, to clients. Wong has 10 years of experience in strategic consultancy roles for major consumer and technology brands, including Dell, Ford, Qualcomm, Microsoft, Invisalign and Huawei.

SAP appointed Darren Rushworth as MD for Singapore.

He was previously the managing director for SAP Philippines. In this new role, he will oversee sales, business strategy development and SAP operations in Singapore.

He will also be responsible for helping businesses in Singapore run better and simpler.

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LAST WORD

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WHAT MARKETING CAN LEARN FROM FEMINISM Is it time for the world of marketing to pick up a few tips from the feminist movement?

Have you ever wondered how it would feel to have Harry Potter pop up in a scene from The Lord of the Rings, maybe riding pillion with Gandalf, wand in hand? Or how it may feel to see Bill Maher in a Christian evangelical prayer meeting?

Or if you are a vegan, invited to a Brazillian churrascaria? These pretty much sum up what it feels like to be a feminist in the marketing world.

Recently I was at a network conference in Phuket and signed up for what is called an Ignite Talk – 15 slides, 15 seconds each, four minutes to communicate effectively a topic of your choice. And the slides moved automatically after 15 seconds, so you do not have the “clicker power”.

Fun meets stress? That’s exactly what it was.

I decided to be controversial and talk about being a feminist in the marketing world. And it resonated with many colleagues and peers, men and women, alike.

Often in this industry, I feel like a misfit or a paradox, but since I have chosen this infinite time loop-ish career to be a part of, I thought it may be most useful to learn from feminism and apply it to marketing.

Even us feminists widely disagree on many aspects of feminism, but three pillars which have stayed unchanged over the years have been: 1. Equality of genders.

2. Breaking of gender stereotypes.

3. Anti-objectification.

How about we take these three tenets and see how they can make us all better marketers?

1. Equality of gender: Equality of consumer and marketer Each one of us who is a marketer is guilty of having forgotten how it feels

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to be the consumer, which each one of us is. As a consumer, we don’t like being told and we constantly pick brands, which approach us as equals.

So, how about we leave the patriarchal terms of engagement alone and attempt to create an equal conversation? A conversation based on mutual respect and actual listening.

2. Breaking of gender stereotypes: Breaking consumer and marketer lines of divide Over the years, it’s like consumers and marketers have assumed predetermined parts they play and the divide is almost as severe as a LOC in many cases. We get caught up in making sure “our” message gets through. Our message, which is more inward-focused than anything and in a certain tone, is decidedly salesy at times. How about we ditch the selling for a while and give the consumer the want to cross these invisible lines and find out about us? Find out more about us because we are truly stellar in product, service or brand belief.

3. Anti-objectification: Humanise the consumer Yes, we say this all the time. But we continue to talk about our consumers in complex terms like segments and archetypes. How about we step back and start talking about a consumer’s human motivations which drive them in their lives. Not of their motivations to consume our product or service.

On that note, carpe diem or as Sheryl Sandberg would say “Lean In”!

The writer is Preethi Sanjeevi, regional CMO of VML Qais.

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FUTURE-PROOF YOUR RESEARCH In an age where the only constant is change, Market Research must keep ahead of the game. As consumers adapt and work with an increasing array of digital platforms and technologies, the evolution of research techniques continues.

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Jason Ong Senior Marcom Manager CapitaMalls

Priyadarshini Sharma International brand director for premium brands, Asia Carlsberg

Danielle Siauw Manager (CRM, M&E-commerce, New Media) EpiCentre

Chinmay Malaviya Vice President Business Development, Global foodpanda

To discuss sponsorship and exhibition opportunities, please contact: SOREN BEAULIEU Publisher, Marketing Magazine +65 6423 0329 sorenb@marketing-interactive.com To book your place at event, please contact: SUHAIL SUHAIMI Project Manager, Conferences & Awards Marketing Magazine +65 6423 0329, +65 9830 4454 suhails@marketing-interactive.com

Roger Yuen CEO and founder Clozette

Ronald Fernandez Head of shopper marketing Malaysia FrieslandCampina

Dione Song Managing Director, Marketing ZALORA Singapore

Chitkala Nishandar Head of insights, Asia Pacific 3M Singapore

Enrique Pinilla eHub Head, APAC 3M Singapore

Sponsor

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