Posted by truecreek on November 9, 2009 under More Dam News | 
The battle between AT&T and Verizon is going to make for some great advertising in the near future…
Marketing Casts Verizon Device as Antithesis of the Ubiquitous iPhone
By Rita Chang
SAN FRANCISCO (AdAge.com) — Verizon’s droid is pitching itself as the anti-iPhone, and nowhere is that more evident than in the look and feel of its campaign — a blanket push you won’t be able to escape.
The integrated campaign, the largest in Verizon history, will receive an estimated $100 million in support, most of it spent before the end of the year. Within it, the new phone is touted as the robotic do-it-all antidote to the Apple handset’s shortcomings.
The TV spots set to hit airwaves Monday night are about as far from the iPhone’s cheery spots as possible. Visually somber and testosterone-packed, they could be mistaken for ads for “The Terminator.” But, like the iPhone spots, they also demonstrate what the device can deliver, such as voice-activated turn-by-turn directions, fast web-browsing and video viewing. The tagline: “In a world of doesn’t, Droid does.”
More here.
Posted by truecreek on November 6, 2009 under More Dam News |
Franchisee’s obscure idea turns sandwich maker into national phenomenon
By Matthew Boyle
Stuart Frankel isn’t what you’d call a power player in the world of franchising. Five years ago he owned two small Subway sandwich shops at either end of Miami’s Jackson Memorial Hospital.
After noticing that sales sagged on weekends, he came up with an idea: He would offer every footlong sandwich (the chain also sells 6-inch versions) on Saturday and Sunday for $5, about a buck less than the usual price. “I like round numbers,” says Frankel, a brusque New Yorker who moved to Miami in 1972 and owned a drugstore before opening his first Subway outlet in 1988.
Customers liked his round number, too. Instead of dealing with idle employees and weak sales, Frankel suddenly had lines out the door. Sales rose by double digits. Nobody, least of all Frankel, knew it at the time, but he had stumbled on a concept that has unexpectedly morphed from a short-term gimmick into a national phenomenon that has turbocharged Subway’s performance. “There are only a few times when a chain has been able to scramble up the whole industry, and this is one of them,” says Jeffrey T. Davis, president of restaurant consultancy Sandelman & Associates. “It’s huge.”
In fact, the $3.8 billion in sales generated nationwide by the $5 footlong alone placed it among the top 10 fast-food brands in the U.S. for the year ended in August, according to NPD Group. That puts the $5 menu’s success just a notch behind KFC and ahead of Arby’s and Domino’s Pizza. It helped privately held Subway, of Milford, Conn., lift U.S. sales 17 percent last year at a time when most restaurant chains, save for industry leader McDonald’s, struggled.
Read more.
Posted by truecreek on November 5, 2009 under More Dam News |
By John Horrigan.
Some 69% of online Americans use webmail services, store data online, or use software programs such as word processing applications whose functionality is located on the web. Online users who take advantage of cloud applications say they like the convenience of having access to data and applications from any Web-connected device.
However, their message to providers of such services is: Let’s keep the data between us.
Download the report here.
Posted by truecreek on November 3, 2009 under More Dam News |
By Cat Moriarty
Sure, your brand message is consistent across all channels. But you haven’t truly integrated your marketing efforts unless you’re putting those channels to work together.
Mixing media — especially print and digital — is not only a smart idea, but with a little creativity, it can be a highly profitable one.
If your company depends on offline purchases, for example, improve direct mail conversions by e-mailing your audience before a drop, like True North did during a campaign for a New York–based credit union. The print-digital combination quickly produced 5,543 new members — 122 percent above expectations.
And with personalized URLs (PURLs), you can use direct mail to help drive online purchases, too. It’s what office machinery and consumer electronics company Ricoh did (with some pretty impressive results) when promoting its new high-end production print equipment
Retailer W.L. Gore had similar success when it included PURLs in its “Take Me to Everest” campaign. Not only did PURLs strengthen the company’s direct mail–Web connection, they also helped build brand awareness and generate shoe sales during the coveted holiday season.
And as this holiday shopping season soon gets under way, don’t underestimate the power direct catalogs — and their hybrid cousins (magalogs and catazines) — can have over online sales. With so much online competition, sending catalogs and other direct pieces is helping brands like mark and Zappos.com motivate customers to visit their sites more often, stay longer and get to know them better.
