Marketing in Real Life

For years we have all been reading studies about the power of Boomers, including our own, however recent research from PhocusWright shows that, at least in the travel sector, Boomer power may be dwindling. Now finally Boomers can see the power of younger generations correctly (take that Mom and Dad!) Certainly this group has more reason to be concerned about dwindling 401Ks than the Gen X and Y crowd who won't be touching theirs for decades and its showing in travel bookings. According to the study, "trailing-edge baby boomers (45-54 years old) actually spent the least of any age group per household on travel. They are also the most likely to reduce their travel spending in 2009, with 27% planning reductions in travel frequency and spending. " Read the entire article here .

We seem to be seeing lots and lots of client-side researchers being laid off lately, so a story in yesterday's Daily Research News caught my attention stating that many companies are bringing more research in house. This conflicts with other reports I have seen, so it will be interesting to see how it all shakes out through the rest of 2009. Certainly activity is picking up, but summer is coming so stay tuned. Excerpt: Research suppliers may see declines in 2009 revenue as more clients prepare to take a proportion of their online research in-house, predicts an industry survey conducted earlier in the year. The survey, conducted online in February among senior research practitioners and co-sponsored by online-oriented companies Cambiar, MRops and Peanut Labs, suggests that the decline in research industry revenues in 2009 may be higher than suppliers are expecting. While clients are anticipating that budgets may be flat to falling, the fact that they intend to do more in-house su...

For a few weeks I have been wondering which companies were going to take advantage of the reduced number of advertisers and lowering rated by expanding their own spend. Its been obvious on the local level, where local businesses have gotten increasingly better placements. Or they have been sending the right bribes to media traffic staff. On the national level, it looks as they Dr Pepper and Snapple are among the first to raise their spend. A good move in my mind, we'll see if it works the way it has in the past. From Flex News via Reuters: Company executives said they decided on the strategy after research firm Nielsen produced a study for them that detailed ad spending patterns during the early 1980s, the last prolonged advertising downturn."We wanted to find out what were the brands that were successful in '83 and '84, coming out of the recession?" said Trebilcock. "What did they do differently than others during the middle of the recession? Uniformly, the ...

For a few weeks I have been wondering which companies were going to take advantage of the reduced number of advertisers and lowering rated by expanding their own spend. Its been obvious on the local level, where local businesses have gotten increasingly better placements. Or they have been sending the right bribes to media traffic staff. On the national level, it looks as they Dr Pepper and Snapple are among the first to raise their spend. A good move in my mind, we'll see if it works the way it has in the past. From Flex News via Reuters: Company executives said they decided on the strategy after research firm Nielsen produced a study for them that detailed ad spending patterns during the early 1980s, the last prolonged advertising downturn."We wanted to find out what were the brands that were successful in '83 and '84, coming out of the recession?" said Trebilcock. "What did they do differently than others during the middle of the recession? Uniformly, the ...

In marketing pubs and blogs you often see people raving about the power of social media and web 2.0, but our friends at Domino's had quite a different experience last week. In case you missed it, two uniformed employees posted a video of them making a mess of someone's order, boogers and all. Not surprisingly this made its way around the web in record fashion. Watch the video here. The lesson: Not all buzz is good buzz. It will be interesting to see if there is a real impact, but at least for a few weeks many consumers will think twice about what toppings they are really getting with their Domino's pie. Here is a great article on how one YouTube Video can ruin a brand, including some research on the video's impact. ...And the pretty well thought out response from Domino's

In marketing pubs and blogs you often see people raving about the power of social media and web 2.0, but our friends at Domino's had quite a different experience last week. In case you missed it, two uniformed employees posted a video of them making a mess of someone's order, boogers and all. Not surprisingly this made its way around the web in record fashion. Watch the video here. The lesson: Not all buzz is good buzz. It will be interesting to see if there is a real impact, but at least for a few weeks many consumers will think twice about what toppings they are really getting with their Domino's pie. Here is a great article on how one YouTube Video can ruin a brand, including some research on the video's impact. ...And the pretty well thought out response from Domino's

Brandweek recently published an article proclaiming that (based on NPS scores) Apple is the most recommended company by consumers, just in front of Amazon.com and Costco. I happen to be a huge fan of all three, so I can't question Satmetrix's methodology. In fact, I love the concept of Net Promoter Score as a key metric and when attached to other useful data it can be a great predictor of brand strength and customer loyalty. Here at CMB, we run one of the world's biggest custom NPS-style programs and have found that for the right audience it can be incredibly useful and powerful. Stay tuned for a webinar and booklet on the topic. In the meantime, we'd be happy to share some slides from a co-presentation on the topic we did with eBay last year. Just let me know ! More importantly, would you recommend this blog to a friend our colleague?

One area of the marketing world particularly hard hit in this economy is trade shows and conferences. And for companies like mine it is hard to know how to plan. Conferences have always been a great source of leads at a relatively affordable price, but given travel restrictions and budget cuts, who is going to be willing or able to go? Definitely a challenge worth monitoring. In this article, USA Today explores what the economy is doing to the trade show business and the great cities who host them. "A double whammy has come down," says Geoff Freeman of the U.S. Travel Association, a trade group. "There's no doubt that all types of business travel are paying a heavy price, but meetings and events are paying the heaviest price." http://www.usatoday.com/travel/news/2009-04-12-canceled-conventions-virtual-meetings_N.htm?csp=usat.me

One area of the marketing world particularly hard hit in this economy is trade shows and conferences. And for companies like mine it is hard to know how to plan. Conferences have always been a great source of leads at a relatively affordable price, but given travel restrictions and budget cuts, who is going to be willing or able to go? Definitely a challenge worth monitoring. In this article, USA Today explores what the economy is doing to the trade show business and the great cities who host them. "A double whammy has come down," says Geoff Freeman of the U.S. Travel Association, a trade group. "There's no doubt that all types of business travel are paying a heavy price, but meetings and events are paying the heaviest price." http://www.usatoday.com/travel/news/2009-04-12-canceled-conventions-virtual-meetings_N.htm?csp=usat.me

A little different than the custom primary research we normally talk about in this space, but an interesting article in today's USA Today about the impact of the media's negative reports about retailers and the negative impact on their brands. Three excerpts from the article... Retail implosion forecasts typically come from the same handful of retail consulting gadflies — at least one of whom says he makes money when retailers' stock prices fall — and the forecasts are often based on subjective criteria that do not jibe with widely accepted methods of assessing corporate health. "People are really paying attention to these articles, and the effects are extremely damaging," says Tracy Mullin, CEO of the National Retail Federation, which represents most major retailers. The complications of analyzing retailers' financials go beyond just a sound bite. "It is very dangerous to speculate who may or may not be surviving without being inside the circle of knowle...

My friend Jon Godin, CMB's Director of Analytic Services, is a brilliant guy but clearly never feels quite smart enough. So he recently attended the Sawtooth Software Conference to lean more about the latest and greatest trade off tools and techniques. We'll be posting some of what he learned over the coming weeks. First up is a presentation from our friend Chris Goglia at Critical Mix .... Here is the abstract from his presentation. “To Drag-n-Drop or Not? Do Interactive Survey Elements Improve the Respondent Experience and Data Quality?” by Chris Goglia and Alison Strandberg Turner: Abstract: Chris Goglia presented a paper on the increasing demand for interactive survey elements in questionnaires (like sliders instead of rating scales and drag-and-drop functionality instead of numeric rankings). What they found is that these interactive elements increase time-to-complete but there were not significant differences in the resulting data. Furthermore, other studies on slide...

We obviously have a bit of bias on the topic, but over at eMarketer, their CEO Geoff Ramsey makes a nice case for why now is not the time to be cutting research budgets and that they should be evaluated indpendantly from advertising budgets. He cites three reasons why you might want to put yourself in the “increase” (or at least “maintain”) market research camp: With the economy clouding the future, why throw away your flashlight when it could shine on intriguing consumer insights, hot technology trends and market opportunities? Market research can help you preserve budgets, projects and even people. Prepare for better times ahead. Take a read by following the link below and feel free to post your thoughts. http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?id=1007001