marketing

10 Must Have Labour/Greens on their 10% Coupon Card – Observation by the Owl

The whole idea of having my power bill reduced by 10% by the Greens and Labour in a far-left economic country closely linked to socialism got me thinking about what other 10% discounts the Labour/Green government could do for me.

So I have listed my wish list below:

1. 10% off my power bill (That is a given as already offered)

2. 10% off my taxes ( this is simple to do and no one will complain)

3. 10% off my fuel bill – very simple – just nationalise Marsden Point and that will control the price at the pump – NZOG shareholders will take a hit but so what!  Read more »

This article by Joel Makower on Linkedin exposes a truth the green movement refuse to accept; people base their buying decisions on price and trust of a brand before the environment.

Sometimes it’s hard to face reality, especially when a dream is so alluring. And the alluring dream of green marketing is this: that consumers would cast a vote in favor of a more just and sustainable world whenever they shop.

But the reality has been vastly different. For well over 20 years, consumers haven’t been willing to vote with their dollars. The reasons are many and complex, but the result is clearcut: With the exception of some energy-saving devices, no green product has captured more than a tiny slice of the marketplace, at least in the U.S.

Think about it: No environmentally preferable car, carpet, cleaner, cosmetic, clothing, coffee, credit card or cell phone has captured more than 2 percent of its respective market. In most cases, sales of green products represent well under 1 percent of any given category.  Read more »

Advertising Strategy 101

- Choose an old man that people are slightly familiar with. Describe him as retro cool. People will warm to him immediately.

- Get him to shout out and gesticulate wildly. People like this and don’t find it intimidating or irritating.

- Then associate him with hip hop slang. People will find this credible and listen closely.

A to the S to the B needs to back to the drawing B to the O to the A to the R to the D.

via the tipline, a reader emails me:

You’ll see in the news today that Foodstuffs Wellington who own Pak’n Save and New World in Wellington are slamming NZ suppliers with a 3% rebate.

Well that’s just the start! I hear  from someone working there that they’ve just opened a product buying centre in China too. Does that mean we’re going to see even more Chinese products on our supermarket shelves?

I thought a NZ owned supermarket group would support local suppliers - obviously not!!

I’m going to shop at Aussie owned Countdown.

It certainly sounds like Foodstuffs is employing bullyboy tactics against suppliers…and when you have a duopoly I guess they can.

Grocery suppliers say supermarket giant Foodstuffs has partly backed down on its decision to hit suppliers with a 3 per cent promotions charge on products sold in its supermarkets.

However the retailer claims there’s been no backdown.

Foodstuffs Wellington – which has the Pak’n Save, New World and Four Square brands throughout the lower North Island – sent letters to all its suppliers in recent weeks informing them it would start charging the ”promotions rebate” from October 1 this year.

The Food & Grocery Council [FGC] said Foodstuffs Wellington has agreed to delay implementation of the rebate for homebrand products, which are Foodstuffs’ own brands such as Pams and Budget.

Suppliers have never had any say in promotional activity for such brands, and in fact are often faced with a situation where a product they supply for use in a Pams or Budget product is actively competing with their own branded product on supermarket shelves, FGC chief executive Katherine Rich said.

Suppliers should not be expected to foot the bill for promoting such products, Rich said.

I would have thought the 3% “promotions charge” was in fact a secret commission to Foodstuffs in order to prefer suppliers who coughed it…I say that because what are the implications for a supplier if they don’t pay it vs a supplier that does pay.

Imagine say a supplier of a readily available commodity like say honey…or a ubiquitous product like salt or something with multiple suppliers didn’t pay the “promotions charge”…and another supplier out there did, and as a result Foodstuffs changed the core component of their Budget and Pams house brands to the supplier that paid the “promotions charge” forsaking the previous supplier then a case could easily be made that it was in fact a secret commission in order to secure the business. A quick read of the Secret Commissions Act 1910 would seem to support this.

Perhaps this is something the Commerce Commission might like to have a look at?

A car wash in Malaysia has cottoned onto a winning strategy….though perhaps they should have tried this in Las Vegas. Perhaps Air New Zealand should try this to “realign” their Air Points scheme:

Malaysian police have shut down a car wash that was offering regular customers free sex after every ninth car wash.

Malaysian newspaper The Malay Mail reports the car wash in the Kuala Lumpur suburb of Sunway Mentari had been open for three months and had formed a partnership with a local massage parlour, enabling customers to redeem free sex from the brothel as part of a customer loyalty scheme.

The Mail reports that police stormed the parlour and found several stamped loyalty cards that had been used by customers to cash-in on the car wash deal.

Malaysian officer Emmi Shah Fadhil told The Malay Mail that the bust was unexpected.

“It was supposed to be just another routine operation,” Emmi Shah told the paper. The police squad that raided the massage parlour were told of the deal during the raid, and they found five customers taking advantage of the offer.

“To get the extra ‘offer’, customers must send their cars for washing nine times within a certain period,” Emmi Shah says. “The tenth car wash will entitle them to free sex.”

The CCO Strategy Review Committee, which Len Brown chairs, resolved to direct a rebranding exercise for all Auckland Council CCOs.

Part of this appears to be a requirement for all CCOs to align with the Council’s pohutukawa brand.  Documents released to this blog show that the cost of this exercise for Watercare alone is in the region of $2 million. One can only wonder how much other CCOs are shelling out on re-branding as ordered by Len Brown.

Here is a standalone company responsible for delivering potable water and processing shit. And instead of leaving it to do its job, Auckland Council, under direction from Len Brown, is continuing to apply a mothership approach to operational matters such as corporate branding and as a consequence burdening these organisations with considerable additional uncalled for costs.

Will Aucklanders feel better when they turn on the tap or flush the toilet knowing that the Mayor is demanding that a pohutukawa brand logo will cost Watercare alone in the region of $2m. Is this part of the mayoral plan to make Auckland the world’s most liveable city?”

Worse though, is it appears that the changed has been forced upon Watercare even after they sought some public relations advice from Senate Communications also released to this blog. That advice states:

Hmmm…”lightening rod for wider ratepayer dissatisfaction“….you bet it will.

ᔥ Andrew Sullivan

This is why print media is in terrible trouble. Once companies get their head around where the audience is, and is not then print media is going to see a gutting of their revenues.

According to this chart — adapted from a Mary Meeker slideshow excerpted by Bill Gross — we spend more time engaging with mobile devices than reading print. But print publications still get 25-times more ad money than mobile. Either the eyeballs are moving faster than the advertisers, who will eventually stop paying for print … or the ad teams don’t think a minute spent around mobile ads is worth a minute spend around print ads. Those aren’t mutually exclusive.

That revenue is going to go to those with a loyal and solid audience.

Are we watching the death of newspapers?

The chart above displays total annual print newspaper advertising revenue based on actual annual data from 1950 to 2010, and estimated annual revenue for 2011 using quarterly data through the third quarter, from the Newspaper Association of America.  The advertising revenues have been adjusted for inflation, and appear in the chart as millions of constant 2011 dollars.  Estimated revenues of $20.7 billion in 2011 will be the lowest annual  amount spent on newspaper advertising since $19.5 billion in 1951, exactly 60 years ago.

The decline in newspaper ad revenues to a 60-year low is amazing by itself, but the sharp decline in recent years is pretty stunning.  Last year’s ad revenues of about $21 billion were less than half of the $46 billion spent just four years ago in 2007, and less than one-third of the $64 billion spent in 2000.

I came home yesterday to a parcel on the porch. Nice, it was my birthday, who could this be from.

Turns out it was from marketing company Sputnik, on behalf of ZUMWOHL. Apparently according to the letter included ZUMWOHL is a a German style schnapps produced in NZ.

They have sent out a bottle of Feijoa schnapps as part of an Election Survival Kit.

Included in the kit was the following:

Awesome! Free booze. Always greatly appreciated.

Since they sent me a bottle of liquor  the least I can do is what they wanted and promote their booze. According to the attached letter, if you tweet your take on all things electoral and include the hashtag #zumwhol then the nest tweets each day will be awarded ZUMWHOL merchandise. Hopefully that includes booze.

A couple of days ago I went and cleared the mail box.

Once again Colin Craig has mailed out an expensive coloured brochure. The brochure itself is 12 pages long. It is basically tl;dr. But what makes it worse is it was delivered with a whole lot of other glossy brochures otherwise known as junk mail. I very nearly threw the whole lot in the recycling bin then noticed it was the Conservative Party brochure.

The only reason I kept it was because I couldn’t believe that the Conservative Party and Colin Craig are repeating the errors of Colin’s failed mayoralty bid. back then he sent a brochure to every elector, instead of every household. This time it is every household but delivered with all the junk mail.

I know the direct mail industry thinks a return of 1% from their mail-outs is considered spectacular. I would think that less than 1% of households even read this brochure, instead they are now junking up the landfills around the country.

Slow learners are painful in politics, but then again it is his own money, so Colin Craig can do what he pleases with it. If he wants to repeat the same mistakes over and over again and blow wads of cash it then he can go right ahead.