|
|
Marketing Smarter to Earn More
An accountant once told me that he never met anyone who didn't want to make 30% more money. Whether you want a better lifestyle or to take more vacations, buy a fancy car, spend more time with your family, send your children to college or to...
Marketing Tips- Who Are You Competing With?
Before you can market, you need to know who you are marketing to. Who is your customer? How will you market? Will you cold call, mail, set appointments or employ a walk in approach? Be careful with the walk in approach as many businesses do not...
Marketing Your Business Website On A Budget
Owners of home based businesses that are trying to make a living working from home know the problems encountered trying to get your website noticed in order to increase traffic and ultimately revenues. After all, if people don't know about your...
Online Marketing: 10 Volcanic Ways To Erupt Your Website Sales
Do you want to pump up sales at your website?
If you answer, yes, today is your lucky day.
Below are 10 web site marketing, volcanic secrets to erupt your
sales starting now...
1. Save time and money using ad submitters. You will...
Planing Your Marketing
Planning your marketing is an essential part of your efforts to attract clients or customers to your business.Everyday, you will be presented with various marketing communication opportunities. Many organizations will be just too happy to work with...
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Contrarian Marketing at Benetton's
Perhaps, with apologies to Dale Carnegie, we should call this article: "How to make enemies AND influence people."
The subject: United Colors of Benetton's campaign to promote its clothing, using photos and stories about death row prisoners in the U.S. It's what journalist James Bone of the Times of London called the "latest in a string of deliberately provocative campaigns".
In an age when most advertisers try their hardest to avoid offending anyone, this company takes a clearly contrarian approach. A cynic might call it a cheap trick to get attention and free media coverage (like this article). But, Benetton has run campaigns like this for quite some time, and important communication lessons come out of them, regardless of how we feel about the subject matter.
Let's start with focus. Obviously, if the company willingly offends the moral sensibilities of many potential customers, it must focus on a particular part of the market, specifically people with liberal social and political attitudes.
In marketing terms, that suggests Benetton segments with psychographic criteria. Psychographics refers to the lifestyles, values, and attitudes of consumers, including social and political viewpoints.
Given that it has run campaigns like this one for some 20 years, we have to believe that Benetton knows this segment well and focuses on it intently.
Turning to positioning, just about every other clothing company uses warm and fuzzy advertising themes. Advertising that makes you feel good about yourself because you look good, which makes you attractive to others, and therefore popular, and all of that should satisfy some of your important goals.
Benetton, on the other hand, apparently wants its customers to feel good about themselves because they have a social conscience, because they feel moral outrage about one of the hot-button issues of our time.
This positions the company very
distinctively. While no end of warm and fuzzy strategies may get mixed up in consumer minds, Benetton has a clear and unequivocal position that won't be mistaken or soon forgotten.
Diversity is the next issue: we who live in North America sometimes forget other large markets exist beyond our immediate borders. Benetton, an Italian company, probably recognizes those markets.
Voters in all major industrialized countries, except the U.S., have rejected the death penalty since World War II. That includes people in the powerful economies of Western Europe.
So, from Benetton's bottom-line perspective, it can afford to offend some potential American customers as it builds or maintains markets in Europe and Asia. Not that Benetton has been reticent to offend Europeans either. Another recent ad campaign showed a nun and priest kissing, which raised many hackles among European consumers.
As you can imagine, this contrarian strategy could backfire easily, if used by a firm with that couldn't carry it off well. To succeed with it, you need to know your marketing and markets very well indeed.
In summary, a contrarian positioning strategy like Benetton's, one that might offend some potential customers while increasing the loyalty of others, presents a high-risk, and possibly high-reward, option.
Robert F. Abbott writes and publishes Abbott's Communication Letter. Learn how you can use communication to help achieve your goals, by reading articles or subscribing to this ad-supported newsletter. An excellent resource for leaders and managers, at: http://www.communication-newsletter.com
About the Author
Robert F. Abbott writes and publishes Abbott's Communication Letter. Learn how you can use communication to help achieve your goals, by reading articles or subscribing to this ad-supported newsletter. An excellent resource for leaders and managers, at: http://www.communication-newsletter.com
|
|
|
|
|
KnowThis: For Marketing, Market Research, Internet Marketing ... |
KnowThis.com offers a wealth of information, forums, and resources for professionals, academics and students in traditional and internet marketing, ... |
www.knowthis.com |
  |
Marketing - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia |
Marketers depend on marketing research, both formal and informal, ... The next big thing is a concept in marketing that refers to a product or idea that ... |
en.wikipedia.org |
  |
Marketing - Marketing Strategy - Marketing Plan - Marketing ... |
Learn about marketing careers, the stages of developing a marketing plan, how to begin marketing research, create a marketing strategy, and how to market ... |
marketing.about.com |
  |
Marketing.org - Home of the Business Marketing Association |
Serves the professional, educational and career development needs of business-to-business marketers. |
www.marketing.org |
  |
Welcome - American Marketing Association - www.marketingpower.com |
Dedicated to serving the educational and professional needs of marketing executives. |
www.marketingpower.com |
  |
Advertising, Marketing, Media and PR News - Brand Republic |
Find the latest Advertising, Marketing, Media and PR news from Brand Republic, the online resource for up to the minute advertising and marketing news and ... |
www.brandrepublic.com |
  |
Marketing Magazine - Marketing News - Brand Republic |
Marketing Magazine - Marketing News - Brand Republic. |
www.brandrepublic.com |
  |
Marketing (Canada) |
Offers a Canadian source of news and articles on marketing, advertising and media. |
www.marketingmag.ca |
  |
BidVertiser - Pay Per Click Advertising On Sites Of Your Choice. |
Pay per click advertising - online advertising directly on sites of your choice, internet marketing solution for online advertisers. |
www.bidvertiser.com |
  |
Online Behavioral Contextual Advertising and Marketing. |
Promote your business with today's most effective online advertising technology, contextual advertising at a cost effective metric of CPC, PPC, CPM or CPV. |
www.clicksor.com |
  |
Sales Jobs / Marketing Jobs / Advertising Jobs - MarketingJobs.com |
Employment site for marketing and sales professionals. |
www.marketingjobs.com |
  |
The Chartered Institute of Marketing |
The Chartered Institute of Marketing is the world's largest international marketing professional body and helps with career support and information ... |
www.cim.co.uk |
  |
Marketing: See what people are saying right now on Technorati |
See all blog posts tagged with marketing on Technorati. |
www.technorati.com |
  |
Marketing Profs - Marketing Concepts and Strategies: Expert ... |
Marketing knowhow from professionals. Newsletter, articles and how-to's. |
www.marketingprofs.com |
  |
Guerrilla Marketing Online - The Official Site |
Guerrilla Marketing Online is anonline magazine for small business, entrepreneurs, sales people and marketers of all kinds. |
www.gmarketing.com |
  |
Business Marketing - Small Business Marketing |
Business marketing - Read everything your need to know about small business marketing. |
www.entrepreneur.com |
  |
All About Marketing |
Adapted from Field Guide to Nonprofit Program Design, Marketing and Evaluation ... Inbound Marketing Includes Market Research to Find Out: ... |
www.managementhelp.org |
  |
Pages tagged with "marketing" on del.icio.us |
USA Network Announces a NASHVILLE STAR Marketing Partnership With ... - Yahoo! ... Direct Marketing Association: Telephone, Mail & Internet Marketing ... |
del.icio.us |
  |
ClickZ Internet Marketing Solutions for Marketers |
Includes columns with commentary and analysis on a wide variety of internet marketing subjects ranging from B2B marketing to search engine marketing. |
www.clickz.com |
  |
Direct Marketing Association: Telephone, Mail & Internet Marketing |
Trade association for users and suppliers in the direct, database and interactive marketing fields, offering seminars and resources, and lobbying for ... |
www.the-dma.org |
  |
|