Life has changed immeasurably in the past fifteen months. Social distancing, self-isolation, and WFH are now part of our everyday vocabulary. Physical barriers were put up between us and our friends and family members. The same is true between brands and consumers.
However, as restrictions are loosened, these physical barriers will eventually come down. In a Post-Pandemic world, what legacy will COVID-19 leave for brands, and what newly adopted trends and ways of communicating should stay with us?
Physical Connection – a balancing act
Research suggests that over the course of the pandemic we have leapt 10 years into the future in terms of e-commerce penetration. This has accelerated a decrease in personal interaction with retailers and experiences. Physical connections have been slowly diminishing for decades, as tech-led startups compete with high street brands. From banking to beds, consumers have benefited from the increased choice and embraced the added online convenience. The suggestion being that the death of the high street is inevitable.
However, the jury is still out on the right balance between virtual and physical connections. Just as the pandemic enters its second year in the UK, Amazon launched its first physical UK store (cashless and packed with technology). Tesla – arguably the most future-forward car brand in the world – also places value in physical shopping centre outlets in the heart of towns and cities. Brands venturing offline have one thing in common – they see the move offline as establishing a new touchpoint for the brand as part of an overall ecosystem and to create memorable brand experiences.
‘Phygital’ is a term gaining traction meaning that consumers may be able to have it both ways — online and offline can live together to create more holistic brand experiences. UK-based furniture company Made.com continues to open physical shops that have the look, feel, and product assortment of their online persona.
Some sensory experiences just can’t be duplicated online, such as smelling the coffee, being able to browse to feel a fabric and see quality, or even engaging with a salesperson. Retailers should be thinking of ways to highlight the sensory and personal aspects of offline shopping even after lockdowns are eased.
Brands should remember that once consumers are offered convenience, there’s no going back. If last week they were able to shop online and pick up their order, then they might be unsatisfied if they have to resort to the old method of simply browsing the aisles.
Togetherness – tapping into consumers’ needs
Togetherness and inclusivity have become themes for consumer engagement during the Pandemic. Brands that successfully communicated, “We’re With You,” were able to tap into consumers’ need for comfort in a time of stress. Brands that reinforced this message with positive actions were the most successful.
Aldi developed an ad campaign designed to curb “panic buying.” Their reassuring tone of voice emphasising high quality, low prices and a focus on supporting their own workers as well as local charities has earned them a 10% increase in sales.
Deliveroo made positive gains when they provided 500,000 free meals to NHS workers and those most vulnerable who were unable to leave their homes. They also partnered with VISA to offer financial packages and advice to new restaurants looking to convert to delivery-only.
According to YouGov Plc, 79% of people say that they are more likely to buy from companies that have responded well to the crisis. Brands’ handling of the pandemic will affect how consumers see them and ultimately where they spend their money.
Realness – being refreshingly honest
During the pandemic we all had to adapt to new ways of communicating with each other via digital screens. Seeing our friends and colleagues’ kitchens or spare rooms; being interrupted by kids and cats all helped establish a new level of intimacy to our daily interactions. This also manifested itself in brand communications.
If you didn’t have your Ad ‘in the can’ you had to look for new ways to communicate your message in an ad-hoc way. The result was often lo-fi, socially-distanced campaigns that embraced the realness of the situation – both a practical response but also a human one to which we could all relate. Good examples are: “Nan’s Long Distance Roast Lamb,” from Tesco’s’ Food Love Stories campaign (via BBH) or, “We’ll get through this,” from Maltesers’ Isolation Life (from BBDO).
This blurred the lines even further between brand-generated content and influencer content, opening up opportunities for communication concepts that used hashtags and visual mnemonics to strengthen brand recognition and attribution. Zoom-style ads may get tired. But the fact remains, that the pandemic taught us that brands can embrace a more intimate and real style to tell refreshingly honest and compelling stories.
Convenience – a point of entry for survival
Through lockdown many of our freedoms and conveniences have been curbed. It’s not as easy to simply pop to the shop and grab ingredients for dinner. With this in mind many retailers were forced to reappraise how to provide more convenience and alternative ways to shop.
An Adobe and YouGov study found that 74% of retailers have changed their products and services in 2020 as a result of the pandemic – and that many of the changes would be permanent. 26% of retailers had introduced new digital and e-commerce services in response to demand.
Retailers have extended delivery slots, added click and collect services, or made temporary shifts to full online retailing. Brands that have adapted to support changing consumer needs and habits during this time of uncertainty have strengthened both their relationships and their reputations.
As we begin to relax strict lockdowns (hopefully for good), brands will need to consider how to re-establish physical connections with consumers. How do we embrace the convenience we have grown accustomed to and carry forward a more authentic and inclusive tone to messaging that helped carry us through this last year? Each of these things present strong future opportunities for those nimble and visionary enough to embrace new models.
By Shannon Osment, Director of Accounts and Pete Hawkins, Creative Director Chase Design Group UK
Chase Design Group ( www.chasedesigngroup.com) is a creative agency with offices in Los Angeles, New York, Chicago and the UK handling brand strategy, identity development, package design and retail environments for clients including Procter & Gamble, PepsiCo, Nestlé, Campbell Soup Company and Pfizer.
In the first blog of this two-part series, we break down the findings of LinkedIn and the B2B Institute’s joint report, ‘5 principles of Growth in B2B Marketing’, and explore why it takes a balance of brand building and sales activation marketing to effectively grow their businesses.
People are emotional creatures. That’s why brand building works so well on consumers. People become invested in – and attached to – their favourite brands, from cereal, to phone networks, to operating systems.
But business buyers are rational. Right?
Wrong.
OK – maybe not completely wrong. Purchasing decisions are made rationally in any successful business. But you’re missing a trick if you think building a B2B brand doesn’t matter.
But sales activation or performance marketing is the most effective way to measurably grow a B2B business. Right?
Wrong again.
In fact, a jointly commissioned report by LinkedIn and the B2B Institute – ‘5 Principles of Growth in B2B Marketing’ – has the data to prove it. (And, by the way, so does our client’s data.)
So where do these entrenched views come from?
B2B companies tend to be driven by either product leaders, service leaders or sales leaders.
Product/service-led companies tend to view marketing as ‘the price you pay for an inferior product or service’. Sales-led companies are driven by short-term sales targets, and they want leads. Now.
So, whilst many B2B marketers recognise the commercial potential of longer-term brand building, they face an uphill internal struggle to make their case.
But the ‘5 Principles of Growth in B2B Marketing’ report empirically proves the business case for longer-term B2B brand building and its impact on growth, by demonstrating:
· B2B brand building increases ‘mental availability’ and ensures your brand is easily remembered in a buying situation
· Effective brand campaigns reach every buyer in your category
· Creative brand campaigns that capture attention at an emotional level are delivered consistently over time, growing significant sales in the future, not just in the short-term
· Increasing loyalty does not significantly add to growth, but customer acquisition does
B2B brands follow the same ‘share of voice’ rule as their B2C cousins. The report defines the rule as follows:
“There is a well-known relationship between a brand’s “share of voice” (typically defined as its share of all category advertising expenditure) and its rate of growth.
Brands that set their share of voice (SOV) above their share of market (SOM) tend to grow (all other factors being equal), and those that set SOV below SOM tend to shrink. The rate at which a brand grows or shrinks tends to be proportional to its “extra” share of voice (ESOV), defined as the difference between SOV and SOM.”
The research data shows a significant correlation between market share growth and ESOV for B2B brands, specifically, demonstrating that in B2B, 10% extra advertising share of voice causes 0.7% market share growth per annum.
The report shows that the best performing B2B brands have an optimal balance between long-term brand building and short-term sales activation/performance marketing.
In B2B, the optimal budget allocation is 46% for brand and 54% for sales activation.
Sales activation focuses on an immediate response, and is generally a rational sell, featuring a piece of informational content, an offeror a product/service feature capable of generating a cost-efficient response.
It’s tightly targeted at hot prospects who are in-market with an intent to purchase, and designed for simple, quick response. Sales activation is great for short-term lead generation and delivering directly measurable ROI, but, it’s unlikely to be memorable, so the effects are short-term and won’t contribute to long-term growth.
In contrast, brand building drives long-term growth, with its effects lasting longer and accumulating over time.
It uses creative impact at an emotional level to create a lasting memory that influences buying decisions long after the adverts run, with a reach that’s much broader than sales activation campaigns, targeting the whole of market, and its effectiveness relying on repeated exposure.
The time frame for any brand building to take significant effect and pass the sales activation peaks shown in this graph is typically 5-6 months.
Not convinced? We recently we decided to test this theory out for ourselves, using the website data of one of our clients. And the results were pretty impressive.
Not only did we find that brand traffic – both direct and brand search – built consistently over time in line with their brand building activity, but we also found that the conversion rates from website visit to meeting requests and paying clients was 50% higher than any other traffic source.
If that wasn’t enough, we also discovered that in territories where there is low brand awareness the conversion rates from lead generation campaigns increased over time as the effects of our brand building efforts kicked in.
Stay tuned for part two, where we’ll explore the case for making your brand famous.
In the meantime, if you’d like to discuss your brand strategy armed with the latest industry data, or to discuss your creative marketing requirements, get in touch with us today at [email protected].
Mr B & Friends has welcomed two new members of the team this summer. Olivia Cox and Faye Stephens have joined the Client Services team as Senior Account Manager and Project Manager respectively.
Olivia has lived in Bristol since her time at UWE, and has solid experience both client and agency side. She had Mr B & Friends on her radar having seen the agency’s work on the Bristol Bears rebrand, and when the role came up, the timing was right for her to make the move. In her spare time she likes to take on new challenges – from learning to row to calligraphy to building a bin store!
Faye has recently relocated to the area from London, where she worked on the ASDA account. With a solid background in communications and content, she’s excited to delve further into the world of brand transformation. Faye has been embracing her move to the South West, getting to know the area and soaking up the culture. She also enjoys turning her hand to art and craft projects.
Simon Barbato, CEO at Mr B & Friends says, ‘We’re delighted to have secured these appointments to the team. With excellent project management experience and fantastic relationship building skills we think both Olivia and Faye will be a massive hit with our clients.”
Cytel, the world’s largest provider of statistical software and advanced analytics for clinical trial design, has appointed AgencyUK to lead the strategy and roll-out of Solara, the next generation in statistical and predictive trial design and selection software. This trial strategy platform combines massive cloud computing with Cytel algorithms to dramatically expand available design options for confident selection of the optimal design. Unifying statistical design and clinical strategy to improve clinical development productivity, Solara helps teams control uncertainty by simulating millions of design options in minutes; minimizes costs by ensuring teams find opportunities to shorten trial duration; accelerates speed to market (10-20% faster) and benefits the patients sooner.
The technology is such an advancement for the sector, that the Cytel board are investing heavily in its rollout, which includes a significant marketing effort led by Rebecca Grimm (Vice President, Marketing), Cytel and the team at AgencyUK.
“Solara is a real first for our industry, and we’re already active with live customers and their case studies which are starting to emerge. We appointed AgencyUK based on their sector experience, proven test and learn methodology as well as their passionately creative team. In partnership with AgencyUK, we’re looking forward to seeing the rollout expand globally over the coming months” says Rebecca Grimm, VP Marketing, Cytel.
“Our team has been working with pharma, biotech and clinical research organisations since 2008, and it’s always exciting to be at the forefront of new technology that can change how an industry operates forever. We’ve been developing the Solara brand and proposition alongside the go-to-market strategy. Digital media plays a vital role in its successful adoption by big pharma teams and biotech leaders alike, and we’re looking forward to its global roll-out over the coming months” says Sammy Mansourpour, Managing Director, AgencyUK.
Bristol based digital marketing agency, DNRG, previously Digital NRG, has had an exciting brand update. The graphic ‘D’ brings together 8 triangles that represent the company’s eight solutions. When reorganised together, the triangles form the split hexagon – denoting the top to lower marketing funnel. Combining DNRG’s solutions, through the consumer journey when all used together, creates a robust, smarter digital marketing strategy.
With its Head Office in Bristol, DNRG encompasses 53 team members with some of the most powerful brains in the business. DNRG’s rebrand has been driven by the desire to always be leaders in digital marketing and offer a strategy-led approach, rather than off-the-shelf solutions. The company’s business model is built on tailor made integrated digital solutions for any sized business, creating a competitive digital presence for SMBs to support lead generation and local sales to complex National brand led campaigns or Nationwide ecommerce solutions.
As Google Premier Partners, Facebook Business Partners and Microsoft Advertising Elite Partners, DNRG is always implementing the latest advancements in automation, AI and reporting with the support of their partners. DNRG has developed solutions accessible for businesses who do not have the budget for in-house experts or depth of knowledge within a marketing department. With a 96% retention rate in the last 5 years DNRG is clearly getting something right for their clients.
Along with the rebrand DNRG has responded to the digital evolution following the challenging period that the pandemic has presented by adding to their client product portfolio. To support its Website, SEO, Paid Media and Social propositions DNRG will be launching Smarter Performance, Rapid Talk, LinkedIn Accelerator, NRG Connect and a CRO proposition in July 2021.
With a strong focus on their team’s learning and development, DNRG has also set up an in-house academy which devotes 10% of hours a month for each employee to grow their knowledgebase and skills, so that they’re always ahead of the curve. Employing several apprentices, members of their team have made it from ‘The Apprentice’ to director within that five-year period. This all filters through to an enriched client experience.
Neil Rogers, DNRG’s CEO said: “Our rebrand is representative of our continuous growth in services, clients and team members. We offer our clients strategy-led solutions that are driven by their business goals and objectives. DNRG has developed award-winning campaigns that utilise technology, automation and highly skilled digital professionals to increase the return on our clients’ investments. It is our DNRG team players’ incredible support and adaptation to their clients’ goals alongside the delivery of effective digital strategies that has made DNRG the successful agency that it is today.
We truly have become the outsourced marketing department for 1000’s of UK based businesses and we know how to match the right digital solutions to their incredibly varied briefs and objectives. For the agency it is about building partnerships whilst delivering proven value results led by data driven decisions.”
DNRG is proving to be one step ahead of the game with the implementation of new techniques and operational processes in this rapidly changing industry. It is difficult for any business to stay abreast of digital updates, consumer demands and the online experience digital users expect, but DNRG offer extremely competitive solutions to ensure their clients can adapt to these requirements.
Designers, animators, writers and everything in between. If you’re an ambitious student or graduate brimming with creative thinking, we want to offer you an authentic taste of agency life. We’re giving you the chance to work on big projects and campaigns, from conception to completion, alongside our talented creative team.
So if you want to break into the industry, learn from some of the best, and have fun doing it; send your portfolio and a covering letter to [email protected]
Want to know more?
The lucky candidate will be offered a six month, paid internship starting around August or September. We’re happy to be flexible.
During your time with us, you’ll get an opportunity to experience every facet of agency life; from marketing strategy and collaborative idea generation, to beautifully crafted creative solutions across design, motion, copywriting and digital.
All of this while side-by-side with great people and an agency culture that’s second to none.
Here are just a few of the things you’ll benefit from at Mr B’s:
“As a Mr B intern you’re straight into the deep end of agency life: with briefs rolling in, there’s never any doubt that you’re an important part of the team. I couldn’t have found a better way to learn huge amounts about design and the industry, or to meet so many great people.”
Interested? Send your portfolio and a covering letter to [email protected]
The rebrand that sees the agency, originally founded in 2014, become The Co-Foundry, reflects its mission to work collaboratively with founders, bringing in specialist co-creators such as designers, photographers, animators and copywriters, according to specific project needs.
Owner, Sue Bush has developed a process that empowers client teams to be part of the strategic discovery phase, as well as the creative process. She is a firm believer in co-creation, “Ideas can come from anyone, and are not just the preserve of the design team. Brand identity design can, to a large degree, be democratic – not ‘design by committee’ but more, ‘winning ideas by group spark’.”
Having been at the helm of two agencies, Sue feels well placed to help solve the brand challenges tech and creative firms face. She co-owned a Shoreditch design agency when the internet was still in its infancy and then went on to establish her own brand design agency, Touchpoint Design, which harnessed design to the opportunities afforded by tech, “The challenge for tech and creative founders is the same, you strive to make a positive impact but are often too close to your business with too few hours in the day to find the best and most appropriate direction for your branding.”
“I set up The Co-Foundry because I believe there’s a better, more personal and inclusive way to approach branding. We work together with creative and tech founders and their teams to forge unique, purposeful brands, using co-creation and interactive discovery sessions to bring everyone in on the journey.”
The Co-Foundry sees Sue acting as an independent consultant with a team of specialists supporting her. When client needs dictate, she builds out and brings in this bigger team of co-creators to support her, creating a lean, agile and expert offer that’s especially designed to serve the creative and tech sectors.
To launch the new brand, The Co-Foundry has put together a series of short practical guides on how to start building a compelling brand, especially designed for small teams. Download the first instalment here.
“We should definitely launch a podcast, more people than ever before are listening, and we’ve got budget to spend as we’re no longer running that big outdoor campaign”
This is the sort of conversation going on within brands and agencies in 2020 (well, at least we hope it is). It is a really exciting time to be launching a podcast, and so it’s really easy to go all in on imagining what podcast might sound like, who’s going to present it or how you’re going to get it produced. But before you’ve allocated your entire budget before you’ve even started, to get an idea of the costs it’s worth take a little step back and looking at the bigger picture.
We chat to a lot of brands about podcasts and hear some amazing ideas, but there’s a few vital podcast costs to consider that it’s easy for brands to overlook when you’re planning to nudge Joe Rogan down the charts. So, we thought we’d share them with you:
Hands up who has ever (literally) judged a book by it’s cover? 🙋 Or, bought a bottle of red saying ‘i love that grape variety’, when really it was the colourful art or on-trend font that really swung it? 🙋 Then we can all appreciate the value of having podcast artwork that pops. With a patchwork of podcasts in any given podcast app, it’s worth ensuring that your artwork isn’t an afterthought or ends up being your company logo hastily pasted onto a background in Photoshop.
Hosting is the means of getting your podcast out there to the world and the best and easiest way of doing this is with a good hosting provider. At its most basic you should expect your podcast to be distributed to every listening platform (the big three of course being Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Google Podcasts). But, for brands especially, getting insight into who is listening and how they’re listening via a great set of analytics, is the added value that your podcast needs.
We know that most people listen to podcasts via a podcast app on their smartphones (around 65% according to Edison Research), but that doesn’t mean it’s not important to have somewhere online for people to listen. Having a dedicated podcast page on your existing site, or it it’s more relevant, a standalone site is important for a few reasons:
At its most basic, the site can be a list of all your episodes with an embedded audio player, which all the top hosting platforms provide for you. The more added content you can then add, the better.
The hard work doesn’t end when you hit publish and put your podcast out there to the world, in a way it’s only just beginning. There are a lot of podcasts out there for listeners to choose from (we’ll be reaching one million active podcasts at some point soon), so they’re going to need a helping hand finding yours, no matter how great it is. We like to talk about how brands are going to promote their podcast and how it fits into a wider strategy right from the start, it’ll have an impact on your production and release schedule and maybe even the content too. There’s lots of things you can that don’t cost (apart from time), earned media such as creating engaging assets to share on social media and good old fashioned plugging on other podcasts, blogs or media. But increasingly important is assigning some budget to run podcast ads on other podcasts, a great way of attracting listeners who are already into the same podcasts as yours.
when we’re working with brands, we’re having these conversations from day one
A well known host or having notable guests on your podcast can be a great draw for listeners, giving you a boost to your promotional efforts. Someone with presenting skill or experience sets a high bar in terms of professional quality as well as making for better script delivery and guest interviews. Ultimately however the decision, like many you’ll make, should be based on your audience, the sweet spot is finding someone who your listener will connect with and who has a natural curiosity and interest in the subject matter, even if they’re from a different walk of life (and often they’re the best ones). However, people don’t expect to work for free, so have a think about who might be a good fit, it goes without saying that the more well known they are, the higher the fee, but there’s no harm in aiming high!
There’s a lot to think about when creating a podcast from scratch that not only stands out from others but fits seamlessly into your wider content strategy. That’s why when we’re working with brands we’ll make sure that we’re having conversations about all of the points in this post from day one. Nothing should be an afterthought, and finding the right approach all depends on the objectives, the audience and the budget available, but knowing what’s required from the outset means that budget is spent in the most effective ways.
Paul Feldwick worked at the legendary creative agency Boase Massimi Pollitt for over 30 years. His latest book, Why Does The Pedlar Sing?, examines what creativity really means in advertising. In April, he joined Bristol Creative Industries to share some of his insights. Dan Martin summarises the fascinating event.
Paul Feldwick has a distinguished career in advertising and has worked on some of Britain’s most famous advertising campaigns including the PG Tips chimpanzees, Rowan Atkinson promoting Barclaycard and the Sugar Puffs Honey Monster. What all those ads have in common is entertainment, a factor which Paul believes is essential in successful advertising.
But there is actually a long-held belief by many that entertainment actually doesn’t work. Claude C. Hopkins famously argued in his book Scientific Advertising in the 1920s that people don’t buy from clowns. “Advertising pictures should not be eccentric”, he wrote. “Don’t treat your subject lightly. Don’t lessen respect for yourself or your article by any attempt at frivolity. People do not patronize a clown. There are two things about which men should not joke. One is business, one is home. An eccentric picture may do you serious damage. One may gain attention by wearing a fools cap. But he would ruin his selling prospects.”
“Father of Advertising” David Ogilvy was a big fan of Hopkins and Sergio Zyman, who worked for Coca-Cola in the 1980s and helped launch the Diet Coke brand, said that advertising that merely entertains does not work.
But Paul Feldman is a big fan of entertainment in advertising, a subject of his book, Why Does The Pedlar Sing?
“The tradition of advertising that works by entertaining is not a new one, it probably is very ancient indeed”, he said during the event. “I see it as going right back to the medieval peddler, who would travel from house to house from village to village with what he was selling. He was a travelling entertainer, he would sing songs, he would tell jokes and he would dress in a funny way. He was all purpose, general entertainer.
“Entertainment as a way of selling things contradicts all those arguments about people not buying from clowns and selling a serious business. How is it that despite the fact that so much advertising through the ages has used entertainment, have we got saddled with the ongoing belief that selling ought to be a serious business?
Before he tackled why entertainment and humour are good for advertising, Paul acknowledged that Claude C. Hopkins’ argument does hold up for direct response advertising, the kind of ads that you see in Sunday newspapers.
“It tends to be very sober,” he said, “it tends to be giving you the facts, it tends to be avoiding jokes and it doesn’t do anything that is eccentric or odd. If it’s well done, it works absolutely brilliantly. You know it works because the advertisers know exactly how much each insertion sells and exactly what the responses are.
“The split-run technique used by direct response advertisers originated back in the 1890s. It was based on using coupon responses that Hopkins evolved his give the facts, give the information argument around.”
“We used to tend to believe as a default that advertising works by a matter of rational persuasion; it has to give reasons why, it has to give consumer benefits. That’s the language that we still use a lot. If you look at most people’s creative briefs, they still have the idea of the central proposition. There has to be a single-minded proposition, we are telling people why the product is better.”
But Paul said that idea was turned on its head by the work of marketing specialist Andrew Ehrenberg and then Australian professor called Byron Sharp, who wrote the influential book, How Brands Grow.
“He had the radical idea, which was originated by Ehrenberg, that advertising doesn’t really work by persuading people or giving information at all. It works by creating something that they call mental availability. To put that very simply, it’s like fame. All that needs to happen in order for a brand to grow is that it needs to come to more people’s minds, more often, and then they’re more likely to choose it.”
Paul continued that this is also why people choose one brand over another. “Why do more people buy McDonald’s products than Burger King? Because more people think about McDonald’s more often than Burger King, and they have more associations with McDonald’s than they do with Burger King because they’ve had more experience of it.”
Paul said neuroscientists like Antonio Damasio have shown that what underpins our decisions is something that’s emotional. If we don’t have an emotional response, we simply cannot make decisions so there’s no such thing as an entirely rational decision. “That’s why so much advertising has done something different, and what it has done differently is using entertainment”, he added.
So why does entertainment work?
It makes us feel good and simulates an emotional reaction, Paul said.
To illustrate the point he used the example of the massively successful advertising campaign by tea brand PG Tips which used anthropomorphic chimpanzees dressed in human clothes. It started in 1956 and ran until 2002.
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The brand remained a bestseller throughout that period despite lots of advertising by other tea brands and the introduction of much cheaper own brand products by supermarkets. Paul explained: “PG Tips maintained a significant business advantage, not by telling people why their tea was better, but because people remembered it more, it was more top of mind, and they felt more positive about it. That was through doing advertising that was entertaining and fun.”
Another example is the Compare the Meerkat advertising campaign from Compare the Market which Paul says uses the principles of entertainment.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CIfWCrAdtX4
“It has characters, it has drama, it has incident, it has talking animals, it’s childish, it’s ridiculous.” It is also massively successful.
Holding his own cuddly meerkat, Paul Feldwick said the brand has gone one step further by using merchandise that generates even stronger consumer connections with the brand. The Kevin the Carrot campaign by supermarket chain Aldi is another example of a business linking merchandise to its entertaining advertising.
Another brand ticking the entertainment box is Premier Inn and comedian Lenny Henry.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yeZI_p2_dYw
“It has to distinguish itself from the very similar business Travelodge and it has been hugely succeeded in doing that,” Paul Feldwick said.
The use of Lenny Henry also epitomises the use of a ‘distinctive asset’. It’s something or someone that is unique, distinctive and recognisable. The meerkats and Kevin the Carrot are other examples.
“If you create something that is trying to say something about your product, the chances are you’ll produce something that looks pretty much like what all your competitors are doing,” Paul advised. “But if you produce something that has nothing whatsoever to do with your product, like a meerkat, then you have got something that is unique and is part of the psychology of what lodges in people’s memory.
Good distinctive assets are those that follow the rules of what makes good entertainment, Paul Feldwick said.
Upcoming Bristol Creative Industries events:
The leading homeopathy group in the UK, 4Homeopathy, is celebrating a successful campaign to raise awareness of the benefits of homeopathic practice. The engaging video campaign was created by independent brand consultancy Mr B & Friends and has seen over 13,500 people view the films within the first month of launch.
Founded in 2011, 4Homeopathy brings together ten of the UK’s largest homeopathic organisations to promote the positive impact of homeopathy. Through the website findahomeopath.org people can find a wealth of information about how homeopathy works, registered practitioners and training courses.
For Homeopathy Awareness Week (10-16th April), 4Homeopathy appointed Mr B & Friends to create a campaign to increase their profile and to encourage people to visit their website to find out more.
The agency designed a video-based campaign comprising a main film with testimonials from several people who have successfully used homeopathy, plus three shorts that focus on individual experiences. The video was designed to be a teaser – recounting personal experiences but only revealing the subject matter right at the end, in a bid to provoke interest and encourage further exploration of homeopathy. Built around the proposition that you can ‘Turn your life around in a moment’, the campaign shares the stories of people with a range of conditions who have had life-changing results from homeopathic treatment.
Kate Gorringe, Creative Director at Mr B & Friends, says, “We wanted to share the stories of some of the individuals who have quite literally had their lives turned around because of a homeopathic approach. As homeopathy is based on working with the body’s natural healing abilities, we created a hand drawn animated illustration that reflected the thoughts and feelings of the contributors.”
Due to ongoing Covid restrictions the interviews were all recorded remotely, with equipment sent out to the homes of those featured. Combined with the bespoke graphics, the end result is an emotive and authentic campaign that takes the viewer on a journey from problem to resolution.
In addition to featuring on the website, the campaign has been distributed by the various member organisation and is being supported by advertising on Facebook and Instagram plus Google ads.
Mani Norland, Principal of The School of Homeopathy, says, “Homeopathy provides so many benefits to both people and animals through its patient-centred approach of individualised medicine. The remedies come from nature and work in line with nature. We’re on a mission to raise awareness of the profound difference homeopathy can make to a person’s health and wellbeing, we want to help people see the choices they have in healthcare, and this video campaign will help us take another huge step forward in achieving that.”
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