Ikea's new catalogue ~ a disappointing experience

Who doesn't love browsing through Ikea catalogues; dreaming of the day you have a home to furnish with Swedish design (with the house prices in Vancouver, you'll certainly be dreaming for a long time!). It was with great interest that I read an article on Marketing Mag about Ikea's new interactive catalogue. 

With the new catalogue, users can download an app on their smart phone or tablet. In the top right corner of certain pages in the catalogue is a mobile symbol. By activating the app and holding it over the catalogue users see additional content, such as different furniture designs, different paint colours, and so on.

The Ikea Catalogue App in action ~ Image courtesy of Gadget Lab

On the day I read the article, I receive the new Ikea catalogue in the mail. I downloaded the app, held it over the page, and waited. Nothing happened! Hmm.... read instructions, tried again... nothing. Tried another page. I watched the choppy image as I slowly scanned the page, and suddenly a new image appeared. I had to hold the phone still over a very small section of page to see anything. Deflated, I gave up.

The challenge for companies is to come up with ways to use technology to interact with the customer in unique ways. Ikea came up with the idea, but the execution was poor. In 2012, consumers expect nearly flawless technology, and have little patience when things don't work as advertised. If your execution is poor, and consumers disappointed, your idea becomes a waste of money. 

Although I will still shop there in the future, I am disappointed with Ikea's execution of this app. I doubt the poor execution will result in lower sales, but it's unlikely to produce any surge. What could Ikea have done differently? They could have used QR codes to unlock extra content, or trialed the app on their specialty catalogues, such as the mattress catalogue, first. 

Did you try the new Ikea catalogue app? What was your experience? Has it changed your perceptions of Ikea? What do you think Ikea could have done differently?

It's all about the customer experience!

In the age of the internet, instant communication, and social media, creating a great product is not enough anymore. Consumers have choice; they can support their local small business, a national or multinational retail chain, or shop online. A great product is a good start, but it might not get you very far. 

I think the shift from the 4 P's to the 4 C's is a great way to encouraged companies to consider the consumer throughout the product development process.  This consumer-centric focus should run from product conception to post-purchase experience, as the consumer's needs and wants are king! As a consumer, you can guy a great product and have a great retail experience, but if you cannot get your item fixed under warranty are you likely to purchase from that company again? Probably not. Are you likely to post on Facebook, tweet, and tell your friends about it? Probably!

The internet and social media are both a blessing and a curse to companies and the marketing industry. Approaching your product or service with a consumer-centric mindset should lead to success in this competitive world!

What do you think? Is consumer-centric really the way to go? Should companies be expected to forgo profits to provide better customer care? 

Why Blog?

Why blog? Why bother? Is blogging worth it, really? With over 160 million blogs and counting, is it worth for you to add your voice to the cacophony? My answer would be yes!

According to Netcraft there are over 644 million websites, but companies still set up websites without question. You should, however, ensure that you approach a blog with the same care and planning as any other marketing activity. You should make sure you have something to say, and that you will keep the blog up over time; there's nothing worse than a dead blog!

Here are my 3 considerations as to why a blog can help your business:

1. Keep customers engaged: You might have a business where your customers don't visit on a regular basis, but you want to make sure you're top of mind. Blogging interesting content is a way to keep in touch with customers, and keep them engaged, so they think of you next time they need you!

2. Be seen as an expert: Blogging is a great way to prove to the world that you know what you're talking about! Be an expert and blog about inside information, tips, and tricks in your particular industry. You might not only find new customers, but become an expert source for journalists (free publicity anyone?).

3. Create a community: By keeping customers engaged and becoming an expert, you can build an online community of loyal customers. Is that not what every business wants?!

Do you have a question about creating a blog for your business? Do you agree that blogging is good use of company time and resources? Your comments are always appreciated!

Analyzing a Facebook Page

As a marketer, it's always important to run a critical eye over your work, look at it from a consumers perspective, and understand how you can improve. One of my current marketing tasks is to manage the Facebook page for the Greater Vancouver Orienteering Club. Here is my analysis, and notes on what I need to improve on.

I first signed out of Facebook, and looked at this site as a first time visitor would. I need to update the cover photo, as the one at present is not quite in focus, and has been up for about 2 months. The profile picture should be more zoomed in, so it is more legible. Also, the photos for each of the apps should be updated, as the welcome page does not even have a proper photo. All of these details are important, because they are the first items a person will look at before they even see the content, and will create the first impression.

This is what users see currently when they log on to the Orienteer Vancouver page

In terms of content, my posts are fairly regular; one every 1-2 days. The new addition of being able to schedule posts has made managing content way easier, as I can set posts to appear around 6pm when I am at school/work/out running, but this ensures that when our fans log on in the evening or early morning to check their Facebook (heaviest usage times), my post will be near the top of their feed. I should look at posting content everyday, rather than every 2 days.

Most of the content is promotion of our upcoming events. As we hold at least 1 event per week, this is understandable. However, the event information links are usually just text and a link to our website, which has no image. I will look in to adding an image of each park we visit to the event page of the website, so an image will appear on Facebook. This should give more visual appeal to the posts.

I will also look in to adding a better variety of content, such as sharing information on other running races in Vancouver (as many of our members are also runners, bikers, or engage in other physical activity). I currently follow Canadian Running Magazine and Get Out There Magazine, but I should look for more local running clubs and sites to follow.

In terms of interaction, most of our posts either have likes or comments. I noticed 1 comment that went unanswered, and have corrected this. I could increase interaction by engaging users after a race and encouraging them to share information on what routes they look, or issues they had with the map.

Overall, I am pleased with the way our Facebook page looks and feels, however, I would like to increase the amount of interaction. I will act upon the suggestions above over the next week, and analyze, using the Facebook Analytics system, to see if increases engagement and interaction.

Please take a look at the Greater Vancouver Orienteering Club Facebook page, and leave a comment if you think there's something else I could work on that I have not covered above.

Social Media Tracking Tools

McDonalds recently set up a webpage called "Our Food, Your Questions"; Canadians are invited to pose questions about McDonalds food, which are answered by a representative. The aim of this campaign is to dispel myths around McDonalds food. In response to the question "Why does your food look different in the advertising than what is in the store?", McDonalds released the video below explaining the food photographing process. 

I was interested to see whether this video changed opinions surrounding McDonalds foods. To measure this, I found a number of online reports on the video. A selection of comments were taken and rated based on their sentiment towards campaign, not towards McDonalds itself. The comments +1 for positive, 0 for neutral, and -1 for negative. 


Here are a selection of comments from the thestar.com:

So does every other food shot: This is a common practice for food photographs; there are food stylists who strive to make their food "edible". but the majority of the food in shots can't be eaten. Stop the McD hate.

Score: +1


and "drum roll"..... Crap is still crap no matter how you dress it up... but so nice to see how they dress the crap... Score: -1Dishonest - How lovely to have an inside view into the business of lying to your customers.Score: -1 (this comment is interpreted as sarcasm)McDonald's vs Subway - McDonald's advertising photos look a lot closer to what you're served, compared to Subway...Score: +1Good for McDonald's - It's not like people are going to stop buying their products if they reveal why their burgers in commercials look better than in real life.Score: +1Good for them - Be honest and show people why. NO need to hide the truth.Score: +1Here are a selection of comments from Twitter:@lindsaysherry - Don't know if this was a good idea #mcdonalds - http://t.co/velfTxT9Score: -1@Budd_Dwyers_Bag - I love everything about this story. Especially the awkcent of the presenter htt://t/co/fuY6Bnh4 #imlovingit #thisiswhywerefat #mcdonalds Score: +1@leannmifsud - "@TorontoStar @McDonalds #AdvertisignSecrets http://t.co/mJCI2cN Still want a Big Mac?" Yes... Yes I do.Score: +1@tifutifers - "@TorontoStar: Melting cheese w/a blow dryer and other @McDonalds #advertising secrets: http://t.co/AgSAdWV5" bold+smart move by @McDonaldsScore: +1Overall Score: +4
From these comments, it appears McDonalds has been successful with their campaign. Some praise McDonalds for being honest and answering the question, even if they wouldn't eat at McDonalds themselves, whereas others seem to harbour a negative attitude towards McDonalds that cannot be undone by one video alone. The conclusion from this analysis shows that the campaign has been successful in improving attitudes towards their food, but more work is needed to improve the company image.What do you think? How do you feel after watching the video? Do you think that McDonalds has been successful with their new, behind the scenes approach?

Social Media and Tourism

An industry I've always been interested in is tourism, especially in beautiful BC! The tourism industry is using social media to promote themselves across the world. Tourism BC, for example, has a website, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube accounts. Tourism Vancouver utilizes Blogger, Flickr, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. Whatever the channels a company chooses to use, they must have exciting and enticing content that connects with their target audience. There are a variety of campaigns that tourism groups use to attention; one time larger events to grab attention and pull people in to the social media sites, then ongoing campaigns to keep people coming back.

An example of a one time event to grab attention is the 'smart' mob at YVR on behalf of the "This is Great Britian" campaign. The dancers are dressed in costumes to resemble some of the most famous British acts; the Spice Girls, the Beatles, and Elton John, to name a few. The dancing is great, and the video is fun to watch. The link in the information section of the YouTube video takes viewers to the "This is GREAT Britain" Facebook page, where you can choose to interact and follow the campaign.

An example of a great ongoing campaign is Tourism BC's "Fan Photo of the Week". Fans post their photos to Facebook, and Tourism BC selects the best ones in for the "Fan Photos of the month" album, then selects one per week to be displayed as Fan Photo of the Week. I think this is a great use of social media, as Tourism BC gets a fantastic collection of photos from across the province, and fans get the excitement of having their photo shortlisted, and possibly displayed as photo of the week.

Makes me want to jump in my car and go find a lake and mountains! Photo Credit: Tourism BC Facebook page

Are there any tourism social media campaigns that caught your eye? It's not just about being clever, it's also about being memorable!

Educating Canadians about Online Behavioural Advertising

Welcome to my first vlog on this blog!

I came across the article on Marketing Mag, and felt that there was a great lesson for marketers ~ be upfront, honest, and educate your public!

As I mentioned in the video, I strongly believe that proactively educating consumers about changing technology is a very important move. There was lots of media coverage of Google's recent move to combine search and viewing information across various Google platforms to enhance its online behavioural advertising. Google was not upfront or completely transparent with these changes, and was written an open letter by Jennifer Stoddart, Canada's Privacy Commissioner, to be more transparent. This is a great example of a situation to be avoided by clearly and concisely education consumers about their options upfront, and allowing them an easy way to opt out. You can judge for yourself whether you think Google's policies are transparent enough.

P.S. Learn more about IAB Canada.

Do you agree with online behavioural advertising? Do you think it's an invasion of privacy, or an enhancement of the online experience?

You Tube moves from "views" to "engagement"

I was interested to read that YouTube is changing the focus of how it wants its users to engage with the site. The article, referenced by MarketingMag.ca, explains that YouTube has changed it's 'related videos recommendation' from number of clicks/views to time spent viewing videos or channels. The idea is that users will spend more time viewing videos and be more engaged with the site, rather than clicking quickly through quirky videos of cats playing the piano or a baby biting his brother's finger!

I posted this article to Digg, as I was interested to see how the community would view this change in the YouTube user experience. This change took effect on March 15, 2012, and so far the number of views is down slightly, but the length of time spent viewing videos is up slightly.

From MarketingMag.ca

There was an interesting Forbes article released yesterday, where contributor Adam Theirer talked about the relationships between advertisers and consumers. He acknowledges that consumers hate advertising and do everything to try and avoid it; using PVR's to record shows and fast forwarding through commercials, and downloading AdBlock software for internet browsers. However, he points out that without advertising revenue, we'd all be paying for online content, we'd pay more for TV subscriptions, and so on. For companies who choose to advertise on YouTube, having users more engaged with the videos they're watching means they are likely to also be more engaged with the advertisements. It will be interesting to monitor whether this is actually the case, and if metrics, such as click throughs, increase due to this change in user experience.

What do you think? Do you think advertising click-throughs rates will increase with this new model? 

Back to Basics ~ Wind Mobile

If there's an industry in Canada that suffers from lack of transparency, it's the cell phone industry! Fees for everything, extra costs, high charges, etc... we all love to hate our cell phone providers! Wind Mobile is trying to change that.

Wind's customer engagement strategy stands out to me as innovative, yet so simple; Wind listened to their potential customers! They set up an online forum where they encouraged consumers to vent their feelings about what is wrong with the cell phone industry. Wind then built their cell plans and overall service around the weaknesses of their competitors. This approach built a great foundation of consumers, who feel that they helped build the Wind Mobile brand, and therefore built brand loyalty before they even provided cell services! So simple, yet so effective!

Market Share of Canadian mobile network operators in Q3 of 2011 (CWTA), Sourced from Wikipedia

The main challenges facing Wind are coverage and cell phone compatibility; the popular iPhone cannot be used on Wind's network. Although there are many challenges ahead, I feel that Wind has positioned itself well in the Canadian cell phone market, has connected with its target market through advertising and the use of internet forums, and will continue to build a strong nationwide brand.