Dove Gives Facebook Ads a Makeover
Preying on insecurities is a common ‘strategy’ in advertising, and especially so when targeting women who are forever conscious of their weight, height, level of hair shine, amount of belly roll, etc. But it really can make you feel ‘not so special’ when you see such ads on Facebook because they have been specifically targeted to people like you. Oops.
I found this sponsored story in my news feed today from Dove:
I remember reading something about Dove this morning so I took a quick look around the blogs. As it turns out, Dove has launched a Facebook “Ad Makeover” campaign in Australia that makes a stand against negative-body-image type ads and uses that to push their own positive brand messages:
The campaign works in the form of a Facebook app on Dove’s page. Without having to become a fan of Dove, users can choose what message they want to send: e.g. “Hello beautiful”, “The perfect bum is the one you’re sitting on”, “Think of your cups as half full” etc. They can also do their own targeting by choosing who to send the message to – women who are thinking about careers, love, beauty or fitness (I wonder if this is real targeting or part of the idea of giving users a sense of empowerment/control over who they send their message to..?). The app then tells you how many women your positive message will reach.
Of course, the ads don’t actually replace would-be negative ads. They are using normal Facebook advertising and targeting methods. There’s also no way that my ‘ad’ message is going to reach 542,900 women as Dove tells me. But I think it would work well as it’s a nice feel good campaign that uses people power to spread the word and makes a stand against stereotypes and insecurity – which has been Dove’s approach for a while as we have seen in Campaign for Real Beauty and Dove Evolution.
Although Dove has received a bit of flak from its past campaigns that on the surface, promoted self-esteem (…and behind the scenes: heavily photoshopped images and involved cellulite cream sales as a KPI…), I think this one will be better received. What do you think?
Alert the Media: FRANk PR is here
Welcome to FRANk PR. As a social business agency that challenges assumptions about communications and looks at how we can engage with people in media, it was a logical next step that we incorporate PR into our offering, fusing it with our social business know how and connecting the missing link for our clients.
And I am the one who will help you do this – hi!
Who am I?
My name is Sarah Kempson and I come to FRANk Media after a number of years working across a variety of marketing disciplines. My background includes PR, advertising, branding and social across corporate, government and consumer clients, in both agency and client-side. I also produce my own blog and write for online and print publications, helping me to better understand the traditional and new media platforms and how best to engage them.
So what is PR today? And how do we address the challenge of integrating PR and social?
PR today is more targeted than even before. In an environment where most people in media have a Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest – or whatever the flavour of the month is – personalisation is required. Who is the right person to talk to? What is the best way to engage them? Who do they influence? Finding the right approach is paramount – one size does not fit all and it’s important to integrate across all platforms – old and new.
PR now needs to focus on engaged content, rather than just push content
Old vs New
PR Professionals need to be savvy in the way they approach journalists today – a press release emailed to the newsdesk is no longer enough to get your client in the media. Hooks need to be stronger; news needs to be quirkier; a unique point of difference is required. What makes your story special?
And it’s not just traditional media that we are sending a press release to anymore. Whilst print, radio and TV might seem the most logical (or most powerful) choices, are they the right ones? Or are they simply the ones we know and are familiar with? As the graphic below represents, half of our media consumption is now via the internet. Social media, be it viral campaigns, blogger engagement or getting your message across in 140 characters on Twitter – needs to be a part of this mix.
50% of our media consumption is via the Internet
Where to now?
At the end of the day, the basic premise of both PR and social business is the same as it has always been; the building and maintaining of personal relationships. This should always remain at the forefront of any planning for your brand’s PR and social strategy. The communications landscape is changing often and while it may seem daunting to keep up, the key will always be to keep it personal.
What are some of the best integrations of PR and social campaigns you have seen recently? Or, the worst?
Advertising: the good, the bad & the ugly
You decide which one is which because like most things in life, advertising is a personal thing. You relate to one more than the other and that is fine. Or is it? This week I’ve come across a few ads which I thought everyone might find too irresponsible, tasteless and rude. But hey, somebody approved and published them, so not everyone is on my page. Decide yourself:
“In 5 hours he’ll be clearing Flight 87 for take off” (Image left)
So let me get this straight: you can get as drunk as you want but if you take “Recovery” you’ll be right as rain in just 5 hours. In fact you will be able to clear flights for take off or use a nail gun at construction sites. Irresponsible much? I think so. There are enough problems with binge drinking and alcohol abuse and we certainly don’t need to promote this abuse further.
Moving on to the next piece of tasteless advertising (image below):
“Always offer your seat to a pregnant woman. Unless she is wearing a Red Sox hat”
Pretty bad, huh? I actually don’t know what to say about this except “WTF?” I thought we are fighting racism and promoting equality but apparently some advertising agency did not get the memo.
Moving on to advertising that is just WRONG- in fact it is so wrong that the mayor of London just banned it himself:
” Not Gay! Ex-Gay, Post- Gay and Proud. Get Over it!” (Image left)
Go Boris! This type of advertising is just wrong (despite freedom of speech and all that) plus it also implies that being gay is an illness you can cure. Bullshit and very offensive indeed.
I guess this sums up the bad and ugly of advertising, at least for me. You might like these ads and think they are brilliant. Hence the blog post title (see what I did there?) and we just have to agree to disagree in that case.
Now on offer: Facebook Offers
In a move that surely surprises no one, Facebook this week launched ‘Offers’ in Australia, currently available in beta to a limited number of business pages and soon to be available to all pages.
Facebook Offers follows in the footsteps of FourSquare and the multitude of group buying websites that have sprung up over the past years, leveraging the power of bulk buying and word of mouth.
While FourSquare integrated with Facebook over two years ago, at the time Facebook Places replicated the technology of using the location based services facility that FourSquare offered. Facebook Places was replaced with the tagging location technology soon after.
How Does It Work?
Facebook Offers works in much the same way as FourSquare, without the check-in component – an offer is posted on the business page of a brand, such as a coffee shop and appears on the brand page and in your newsfeed. The offer might involve a buy one get one free, or a discount on a product or service, which is redeemed on the brands page. Facebook Offers differs by emailing the offer directly to the consumer, who then takes their mobile device, or a printout, to the venue to redeem their offer.
The offer can be capped, and made available for a limited time only. Facebook then tracks how many offers have been redeemed, which is displayed on the brand page, and the offer can be shared with friends in the same way other content on Facebook is shared.
Here is a bit more about Facebook Offers.
What Does this Mean for FourSquare?
FourSquare announced this week they have 20 million users worldwide, with over 2 billion check-ins, but Facebook Places had 30 million users within two months of launching in 2010. So, will brands choose FourSquare, which uses location based che
ck ins for their offers, or Facebook, which only requires you to ‘like’?
Questions could also be raised about how to police the redemption of Facebook Offers – what is stopping a consumer from redeeming an offer on more than one occasion, especially if that offer is on a mobile device? And what about staff training and ensuring that your brand ambassadors are across all the offers published in time for them to be redeemed?
Recent evidence from Group Buying sites show discounts and freebie offers generally bring customers in the door, but getting them to come back is the area that needs work. It may be that Facebook Offers provides the key to loyalty marketing in the future, given that most people redeeming the offers will already be fans of the brand.
Will you use Facebook Offers for your business?
Desperate times: model strips for likes on Facebook for fashion brand
Facebook is not a new tool. It has been around for a while now and brands have had some time to get their heads around how it works. It is not about chasing likes.
I was rather surprised when I read about fashion brand Stüssy undress a female model for likes on their Facebook page. It looks like this:
And it works like this:
“As you can imagine the model must be suffocating under that many layers of clothing. It is almost a public duty to free her out of this misery so we are expecting Facebook fans to help out here. Like and undress.” (via Econsultancy)
Seriously, what are they thinking? There are several issues with this campaign besides the point I made earlier that Facebook is not about likes:
Facebook rules: As noted by The Next Web, Facebook rules clearly state that it does not allow this form of generating likes plus it has a no nudity policy so fans of Stüssy may actually never see the naked girl. How disappointing…
Branding: Clearly this campaign is aimed at men (and lesbians?) but Stüssy also makes fashion for ladies. How they feel about this campaign I can only guess but also is it clever for a brand to be associated with stripping?
Sales: While this campaign may generate likes of the brand page in the short term, how does this sell more exactly? I guess this brings us back to why Facebook is not about generating likes.
We’ll see how this campaign unfolds and report back if anything interesting happens. In the meantime, let us know what you think about this? Genius or insanity?
UPDATE: The campaign has finished and the end result is this:
Image via http://adverveblog.com
I would feel seriously jibbed if I had “liked” the page to see this lady naked but I would also be offended by the middle finger action of the model. Well done! [NOT]
Random Acts of Marketing and Social Media – Are you Socially Guilty?
A quick hello & intro from me – my name is Bec, I’m new to the FRANk team . I’ve been told I’m not official until the first post, so here it goes…
I was driving through Chippewa, Wisconsin – population 480 – and there it was, right in front of me at the local petrol station, written with a sharpie & duct tape: “JOIN OUR FACEBOOK PAGE!”
It’s quite endearing thinking about the motivation behind this, but the marketer in me says…why?
This is what we like to call Random Acts of Marketing & Social Media (RAM or RASM). We don’t know why, who we’re targeting, or what the purpose is, we just know we need to be on Facebook/Twitter/FourSquare/Pinterest! You’re inviting consumers to your party, forgetting to provide nibbles and locking them inside. Bad host!
RAM has been around for years, and has pretty much gone un-noticed. Without little consumer insight or ROI, it’s gone as quickly as it appeared.
With RASM, however, you’ve baited your consumers with the promise of (insert content strategy, sales pitch here). Your brand is linked with your consumer’s social circle and they are expecting you to deliver. When you fail to, or no longer deliver content, your brand sits stagnant. You’ll lose your consumers trust and potentially their business.
Unfortunately for the consumer, it’s not just Mum & Pop shops that are taunting us with RASM, the big brands are doing it too.
Take this all too familiar corporate example from our friend Tom:
Big Boss Man: We need a Facebook/Twitter/FourSquare/Pinterest strategy!
Digital Chief: Social is a long-term strategy. I’m not sure what you mean.
Big Boss Man: We need a Facebook/Twitter/FourSquare/Pinterest strategy!
Digital Chief: I can pull money from “ x” and put in on Facebook/Twitter/FourSquare/Pinterest
Big Boss Man: Perfect – Now we have a strategy!
In comparison to the slow evolution of ad dollars to digital, at lightning speed, social media spending is about to explode.
So, like “Big Boss Man” above, some brands are quick to jump at whatever is trending without first developing their social strategy. Like it or not, social is in it for the long haul. Take this as your opportunity to prepare yourself for wherever the constantly evolving social landscape takes you.
Your strategy behind social should be approached as any other platform: with business values & consumer needs at the core.
So, if you’ve realized you may be guilty of Random Acts of Social Media – you should expect your business results to be just that: random. Not sure where to start? Give yourself a FRANk social business check.
Come across any interesting RASM lately? Share them below…
5 tips for creative brilliance
Advertising… if it only were a bit like in Mad Men. I would just love to smoke all day, drink scotch for lunch and then have a snooze on my office couch before I head out for a long client dinner and extra-marital fun. Reality unfortunately looks a bit different in our times, especially for creative agencies.
Creative agencies don’t have it easy. Tight deadlines and clients make it hard to deliver creative brilliance. Many ideas start out great and then have to be watered down by legal departments to nothing but mindless mush. The situation does not get better when creative agencies then take to producing mindless mush in the first instance just to get their work across the line. Watch this video (appropriately titled “Dead Ideas”) to see what I mean:
So how do you avoid getting shot in your next client meeting? Here are some tips and example of a creative job well done:
Start with the consumer in mind- example IKEA in Norway: 
IKEA Norway found a creative way to sell the new iPad catalogue by getting the consumers to be creative. Nice and easy execution with maximum impact!
Be playful- example Monster: Embracing the inner child is sometimes a very powerful creative tool. The play set by Monster is just such a simple but brilliant execution.
Controversy- example: Milwaukee Library. The librarians had the big task of making reading interesting for the young ones again and it was not an easy task. To draw the youngsters’ attention away from social media it used it instead to sell the slightly out of fashion business model of borrowing books. But because of the humorous execution it worked and even went viral. Not bad Milwaukee Library!
Nostalgia- example Stihl: Who doesn’t remember the good old times? Childhood memories are a very powerful creative to tool and the creative heads behind this ad know that.
State the obvious- example Fishermen Waterproof Wellies. Aren’t all wellies waterproof? Exactly, wellies are pretty much all the same and keep water away from your fee. So there is not much room for distinction between brands. Fishermen however found a visual way to differentiate from its competition:
If you have any other tips you would like to share with us or have other examples of excellent creative work, let us know!
Sources:
http://thecoolcommentator.com/post/18124498632/what-a-brilliant-concept-for-an-ad-by-monster
http://thecoolcommentator.com/post/16110079503/awesome-packaging-for-waterproof-wellies-wait
http://adsoftheworld.com/media/print/stihl_the_original_playstation?size=_original
http://thecoolcommentator.com/post/15395594379/this-is-such-a-brilliant-ad
A guide to Social Business by Banksy
What is Social Business? There are many definitions and there will be many more to come as the social space evolves. It is certainly not a new business concept but it is still very new to most companies. And in the absence of a definite guide to social business, many continue to struggle to understand it. And some definitions are just a bit airy fairy and open to too many interpretations.
Banksy, THE street artist from the UK, however has put it in words like no other. In his rant about advertising, he actually talks about the fundamental rules for social business. If you like, social business is the exact opposite of advertising. Some call it therefore also Unvertising:
VIA This isn't Happiness http://thisisnthappiness.com/
I have read this blurb many times and think Banksy hits the nail on the head with this article. So I’ve taken some key statements, reversed them and formed 5 fundamental rules of Social Business.
Rule #1: Banksy writes that advertising people “butt into your life, take a cheap shot at you and then disappear”. Reverse this approach and voilà you know what social business is about: never butt in, engage by adding value, develop long term relationships.
Rule #2: Advertising, as Banksy puts it “bullies and laughs at you”. That is a big NO NO in social business. Social Business empowers its community and creates compelling content for the community to share. The community is respected and valued. Have a laugh together and bring some magic into a boring day.
Rule #3: Advertisers hide behind “trademarks, intellectual property rights and copyright law” and prevent the community from speaking up. Social Business does not live according to the rule of Fight Club “You do not talk about Fight Club”. Social business wants the community to take content, share it, talk about it and even improve it. Social business thrives on the community feedback and creativity to come up with a better and stronger brand.
Rule #4: Advertisers “re-arranged the world to put themselves in front of you”. Social business is not about that. Instead, social business fits into the community’s life without being disruptive or unsettling. It is a subtle, quiet but powerful approach that lets the community chose when and how to interact with your brand.
Rule #5: Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken (also from Fight Club). Social business does not pretend to be something it isn’t. Advertising on the other hand is pretence and makes “flippant comments [...] that imply you’re not sexy enough and that all the fun is happening somewhere else.”
There are of course other aspects of Social Business but I think Banksy did a fine job outlining the fundamentals in his rant about advertising. What do you think about Social Business? Do you have any definitions that are different to our understanding? And can you guess what movie I watched recently? (Hint: look for clues in purple font)
Facebook updates brand pages & advertising formats
Wahey! The long-awaited Facebook Timeline-style formats for brand pages has officially rolled out today – which lets pages have a large cover photo for aesthetic purposes (no written information is allowed on it), and a reshuffling of the information on it. Check out what it looks like at FRANk’s Facebook page.
One of the interesting changes for brand pages now is that when someone first visits a brand page, they may see friends’ interactions with that page spotlighted as friend activity, making each visit to a page more socially relevant. People will also see how many of their friends are connected to a page.
Besides the changes to brand pages however, Facebook also announced several advertising developments at its first-ever Facebook marketing conference (fMC) in New York City.
Premium ads and Sponsored Stories will enter mobile feeds and more
Previously, ads were only shown on the sidebar and desktop News Feed. Now they will begin to appear in the News Feed on m.facebook.com and native iOS and Android apps. This marks the first time the company has brought ads into its mobile products and is part of a significant update to its marketing and advertising products. Advertisers will now be able to reach the company’s 425 million monthly mobile users.
Sponsored Stories in the mobile News Feed will appear similar to Sponsored Stories on the desktop News Feed, which were introduced in January.
Premium ads are only available to advertisers working directly with Facebook representatives, not form the self-serve of Ads API tools. The introduction of premium ads in both types of News Feeds (as opposed to being confined to the sidebar on the desktop site) allows premium advertisers to reach fans connected to their Page from within the News Feed, even if there is no friend activity that could generate a Sponsored Story.
Ads will thus be able to be distributed in several channels (from left to right) – on the brand’s Facebook page, on users’ home page sidebars, in users’ News Feeds on the desktop, in the News Feed on mobile, and starting in April, as part of the log out experience.
Updated premium ads
Facebook has just phased out the Classic Premium Ad formats – premium like, premium event, video comments, and premium poll and will be introducing new versions instead. The new premium ads work like this:
Offers through the News Feed or ad units
Facebook pages will soon have access to a new story type that allows page owners to post offers that users can collect from News Feed or ad units. Unlike check-in deals which required users to first visit a physical location, offers can be redeemed in-store or online. The social network plans to remove check in deals in the coming weeks.
Offers are free to make, just like any other post, and do not require approval from Facebook before going live. For users, getting offers will be frictionless – one tap / click will send the offer to the user’s email account. From there, they can use the offer at a physical location, or enter the coupon code at an ecommerce site. When users obtain an offer, a story is generated to be shown on their Timeline and in their network’s News Feed, thus increasing the viral reach of the promotion.
Although it’s free to make an offer, brands can pay to boost the offer into Sponsored Stories, or turn it into a premium homepage ad.
Exciting times ahead for brands on Facebook!
GE study proves consumers respond better to shared content than to paid placements
What’s the worth of a social share? Marketers have always been trying to put dollar values and ROI on social and it is never an easy answer. However, with a new study by GE and social media site Buzzfeed, we may be on the verge of getting some real numbers!
They tested a campaign in which GE distributed “The GE Show” as a video through Buzzfeed both in paid display placements and sharing, and then assessed the attitude changes among the people exposed through each method. Thousands of respondents were involved in the study.
Earned media vs paid media
People who were exposed through sharing had a significantly bigger lift in positive attitudes towards GE – associating the brand with concepts such as ‘creativity’ and ‘innovation’ – than those who were exposed via paid placements. This might have been due to people paying more attention to content that’s shared with them than to paid ads.
People who were exposed to the content via sharing were 83% more likely to rate GE as ‘creative’ than those who were exposed through paid advertising.
How does each method relate to shaping positive attitudes?
- Control group (saw no branded content) – 42% had positive attitudes towards GE
- Group exposed through paid advertising – 55% had positive attitudes towards GE
- Group exposed through sharing – 77% had positive attitudes towards GE
Obviously shared media has the advantage of being “free inventory,” said Paul Marcum, director of global digital marketing and programming at GE. But he was also interested in knowing whether it actually has more impact on consumers than paid media.
“We all would intrinsically think that if you see something your friend has shared or a community you’re part of has shared, you’re more likely to value it differently” than paid placement, he said. “But no one we could find had actually tried to quantify the difference.”
Although the GE study represents a wonderful breakthrough in social metrics, it would be great to have more supporting studies for the value of earned media vs paid media. I believe that earned media is an incredibly powerful unit of branding, even though it may be chaotic. But this chaos is what gives the element of interest and trust – it’s real sharing by real people, not churned by the marketing factory.
Original article at AdAge.
‘Social Sofa’ Drives Reality TV Engagement
The guilty pleasure of reality television is more fun shared, with a new survey released showing 67 per cent of dedicated fans of the genre use some form of social media while they watch.
Specifically, 38 per cent interacted on Facebook and 35 per cent on Twitter while watching their favourite shows, according to Reality Ravings blogger Emma Ashton, a phenomenon dubbed “the social sofa”.
Ashton and market research company Nitty Gritty surveyed more than 400 viewers nationally for the “Reality TV Viewer Insights” survey, which showed that Facebook and blogs were the most popular fan forums.
“Viewers clearly like the social nature of the format of reality TV, and people using social media during or after a reality TV episode are more likely to become an entrenched fan of show,” Ashton said.
“These fans who are using ‘the social sofa’ are more likely to watch the shows more regularly, and get emotionally involved with the series and with the contestants.”
There are no prizes for guessing what viewers like the most: 72 per cent said they “enjoyed seeing drama and controversy between contestants”.
The survey also found product placement in programs was extremely effective, with 93 per cent of the respondents saying they were influenced by the advertising and information in the shows and 98 per cent able to make an association with brands aired during reality TV.
The most-recognised brands were Coles, Qantas, Handee Wipes, Freedom and Woolworths.
“Advertisers are definitely getting more for their money by aligning with reality shows,” said Nitty Gritty’s Julia Houston. “Reality TV viewers like the information they receive from reality shows. This would indicate they are more receptive to brand placement and lifestyle messaging than (viewers of) other formats.”
With the high number of viewers interacting in the social media and online, advertisers need to rethink the advertising opportunity, extending it to a conversation with the consumer after the show has finished airing.
This was also important as the research showed 68 per cent of the viewers fast-forwarded through ads and eight per cent watched shows online.
The full report can be found at www.realityravings.com or www.nittygritty.net.au
Inbound Marketing, the way forward.
We all love a good infographic. I think I’ll let this one speak for itself…
Graphic thanks to Voltier Digital
Were flies born to do advertising?
We’re starting to feel a bit of summer coming, and so are the awful Melbourne flies. It’s a universal truth that flies have no concept of personal space and have boundless amounts of energy. And some marketers have certainly exploited these very salesman-like qualities of the flies by using them as vehicles for advertising!
To promote their exhibition stand at the 2009 Franfurt Book Fair, publishing company Eichborn (which has a fly logo) attached super light banners to 200 flies with natural wax and set them loose around the convention centre. After a short time the banner dropped off by itself and the flies were not harmed (this might calm down any insect-loving people reading this).
Check out the flyvertising in the video:
What do you think? I think having a cute little banner makes flies a little more adorable and as you can see, it was a very novel way of attracting attention to the message on the banner (whenever the fly needed a rest stop)
The Best Ads…
There’s a great website (a weekly summary of which I’ve been viewing via podcast) that showcases creative talent from around the globe. Bestadsontv.com (contrary to it’s name) provides a weekly update of interesting work in breaking campaigns across TV, Print, Outdoor, Radio and Interactive.
It’s great for anyone who loves great creative, wants to keep tabs on global brands, or is seeking inspiration. One of the best features is that the content is provided in a number of formats; via the web, on weekly podcast through iTunes, an RSS feed, and also via their presence on Twitter. This means users can interact with the content on their own terms.
My current favourite is the Vanilla Ice TV ad from the Virgin ‘Right Music Wrongs’ campaign out of Sydney. Enjoy!
The toughest ad job in the world
Alex Bogusky is arguably the Steve Jobs of ad land. Agency Crispin Porder + Bogusky has won the much coveted $300 million Microsoft account. The brief: Make Microsoft Cool
Fast Company June cover story featured Alex Bogusky on it’s front cover with a detail article on the history of the Microsoft brand and challenges it faces.
In recent times, Microsoft has stood by quitely as Apple took a blatant approach to mock it’s largest rival. Mac vs PC ads are now pop-cult fixtures. Continual large and innovative ad campaign approaches by Microsoft are often off mark and swiftly dissembled by Mac advocates. The rapid growth of Google and it’s cult following has also left Microsoft further behind it’s tech competitors.
So how can Microsoft, traditionally viewed as a highly corporate, arrogant, and a bully, be “cool” again? As Andrew Keller, Crispin’s co-executive creative director says, “To try to be cool is to not be cool”.
Crispin’s award winning and historic work on Burger King, BMW Mini, VW, and Truth, will now stand the toughest test with their new Microsoft account.
The question remains to be seen, can Microsoft beat Apple and Google?