Imagine that it’s winter time and you go to the sale rack at the clothing store. There are a ton of bathing suits marked down. This is an example of demand driven pricing. It’s a method that considers fluctuations in customer demand and adjusts prices to fit changes in perceived value of items/services. Let’s think about what goes into the price of an item or service. Looking at an item we have to think about factors, such as manufacturing costs, market, competition and quality. Taking these factors into consideration allows for demand driven pricing tactics as long as the brand is covering their costs to manufacture their product with some profit left on top. There are a few different demand driven pricing tactics to discuss.
Brand Audience vs Brand Community
Sometimes the line between a brand audience and brand community can get blurred. They are not the same thing. Although, your brand community can also be part of your audience, there are some key differences between the two. A brand audience can be defined as a specific group of consumers who will use your product of service that is decided by the brand based on age, gender, income, location, interests, etc. A brand community is group of individuals who are invested in the brand beyond what is being sold. They become advocates and part of the brand itself. Think of it this way. Your audience is who the brand talks to and the community talks to the brand. Let’s look at what makes these two different from one another.
Common Mistakes to Avoid in the UGC Space
UGC found content is a very effective way to market your brand. It helps create an emotional connection, reduce marketing spend, engage your audience and make your brand stand out from the rest. However, it’s important to know what good practices are when creating a UGC found content campaign. Here are some common pitfalls to avoid and why you should steer clear of them in order to have a successful campaign launch.
Women’s History Month: Women in Advertising, Eliza Jane Nicholson
The first female publisher in U.S. history was Eliza Jane Nicholson. She ran the Daily Picayune from 76’-96’. And when we say that, we mean 1876-1896! Not only was the first female publisher, she owner the entire major newspaper. She moved to New Orleans to become a professional journalist and began working for the Daily Picayune, where she wrote under the name, Pearl Rivers.
Consumer Trends March 2023
Trends shift so very quickly in our society today. It’s important to stay on top of what’s hot and what’s not in the advertising world. Every few months we do a dive into what is important to consumers and the trends that they’re following. Here is what we found as we’re about 4 months into the year so far.
AR & VR: What is the Difference & Why is it Important in Marketing?
Well, from all the science fiction movies over the years, I think we all understand what virtual reality is. It’s a software that immerses the user completely in a 3-D environment that is interactive in a 360-degree way. A good example of this is the Get Supernatural Fitness experience. Augmented reality is slightly different from that. This virtual space layers elements on top of a real-world scene in order to use the space they’re actually in while changing elements of the experience. Pokémon Go is an example of this digital reality experience. Let’s dive into how each type of these digital reality experiences can be used for marketing.
Product Ecosystem Theory
Let’s go way back to science class. Remember what an ecosystem is defined as? Yea, we didn’t either, so we did some research and it is defined as a biological community of interacting organisms and their physical environment. It’s also simplified by saying that it is just a complex network or interconnected system. Let’s go with this last one to describe what a product/service ecosystem is. I’m sure you’ve guessed already. It’s a new theory that describes how products coexist and complement one another. It also implies that products will inherently evolve over time, such as that in nature and parallels how species do the same.
Jack of No Trades, Master of One: Benefits to Niche Businesses
Sometimes it is better to stop trying to please everyone! I know this might seem counterintuitive to a business, but it is the truth. Jess Wheeler talks about this in his recent newsletter and it has inspired us. We couldn’t agree more. You’re never going to stand out from your competitors if all you’re doing is trying to be like them. It’s time to stop following the crowd and create your own path. The only way you’re going to do this is by making people some type of way.
The Frequency Illusion
Clustering vs Market Segmentation
We’re pretty positive that if you’re reading this, you already know what marketing segmentation is and most likely clustering as well. For those that may not understand what these terms mean, we will define them before diving in. Marketing segmentation is the identification of unique groups with commonalities that exist within your audience and will respond to market action similarly. It can be done through geographic locations, demographics, psychological traits, filmography, and/or behaviors. It helps brands minimize risks through understanding which products/services will sell and the best way to market them. Clustering is very similar to this. It uses machine tech and algorithms to find these unique relationships between the people in your audience. The difference here is that while marketing segmentation organizes the audience, clustering actually creates new groups based on their unique characteristics. This helps brands gain a competitive advantage over their competitors. The benefits of clustering vs segmentation are that it is done through machine learning and not manually. But, that being said, it’s also a pitfall. It cannot be done with technology. Let’s imagine that a brand has a high-end dress line. They use clustering to find out who they should market too. You enter data that you’ve collected from past purchases and input this into a cluster analysis tool that will give you the answers you’re looking for. This is an example of clustering in marketing. It helps tailor messaging for the right groups. Segmentation can only take you so far is a broader approach while clustering dives into the quantum details of your audience.
Loss Aversion
No one likes losing and it isn’t limited to certain parts of our life. Losing sucks in any way, shape, or form. Loss aversion is the behavioral phenomenon that individuals perceive loss more severely than gains. According to Behavioral Economics, the pain is about twice as powerful than a gain. This means that people will go out of their way to make decisions or take risks purely based on what they avoid losing rather than what they will be gaining. This is why it’s sometimes argued that punishments, rather than rewards for doing or not something are more motivating.
This or That: The Framing Effect
Let’s create a hypothetical for you. You go to the store to get some yogurt. One claims to be 80% fat free and the other brand says that it only contains 20% fat. Which do you choose? If you’re like most individuals, you choose the 80% fat free option. This is the framing effect. It is a cognitive bias that influences our decisions by the way that information is presented or “framed.” When something is framed in a more positive way, we tend to lean in that direction since we’re wired to avoid loss. This can sometimes cause us to overvalue how something is said and undervalue what is being said. Looking deeper at this takes you into the prospect theory of psychology. As we age we become more susceptible to the framing effect as our cognitive functions diminish.
Sticking with What’s Familiar: The Mere Exposure Effect
Sometimes the best decision is not always the familiar one. The mere exposure effect, also known as the familiarity effect, is when people chose preferred things, they’ve seen over things that are new. You can see why it is also called the familiarity effect because we tend to choose things that are familiar. This effect occurs even if the exposure is short and goes unnoticed by the viewer’s conscious mind. Therefore, the more someone has been exposed to something the more likely they are to like it.
Notable Women in Advertising: Phyllis Robinson
Phyllis Robinson was born in 1921 and earned her Bachelor’s Degree in sociology from Barnard College. After WWII, she moved to Boston from NYC and started working at Grey Advertising where she wrote fashion ads for Bresnick & Solomont. She was a chief copywriter for DDB in 1949 and was the first ever woman to hold this roll.
Decoy Effect
How many times have you been out to purchase something and ended up with more than you essentially went for? The decoy effect may be the explanation for how you’re being influenced without knowing it. This is a pricing strategy that offers 3 options and one of which is only designed to get you to switch your choice to the more profitable one.
The Verbatim Effect: Get the Gist?
How many of you have read something long and when asked about it can only recall the overall gist of details? We know that we have! This is called the verbatim effect and it is defined as a cognitive bias that causes people to only remember the gist of the information instead of its exact form. And, this isn’t limited to text. It extends to videos, photos, infographics, etc. So, how can brands use this to their advantage in marketing? People are skimmers.
While Supplies Last: Scarcity Marketing Tactics
Why do we all want things that we can’t have? This is what the scarcity principle is based upon. Creating want for a product or service through limited accessibility. Things that seem rare are perceived to have higher value. Marketing uses this principle often to get customers to buy but there needs to be proof of scarcity, of course. Here are some examples of ways that marketing use scarcity.
Extra, Extra Read All About It: Press Releases
News spreads fast nowadays in the digital world we live in. Before the internet, the press release was used to reach a wider audience through sending them directly to journalist. The journalist would then publish in their newspapers to reach a large audience, but only if they deemed the releases to substantial enough to send out. With social media today, it doesn’t matter if anyone thinks your press release is subpar, it’s going to go out anyway. It has become a way for companies to reach their audience directly without the middle man so it’s important for brands to know how to use them strategically to benefit their marketing tools. There are some key elements to your release that you want to make sure you have as well as sending to the proper places. Aside from this you need to know why you’re creating it. Let’s start with that.
Women’s History Month: Erma Perham Proetz
Erma Proetz was the first woman to be inducted into the Advertising Hall of Fame. She was a copywriter, account executive, director, creative vice president and executive vice president, who spent most of her advertising career at Gardner Advertising Company in St. Louis. She received multiple awards for her advertisements in the 1920’s.
Women's Role in Advertisements Today
In 2022, 46.6% of the workforce in the United States was female (Mathew Zane of Zippia). That’s almost half of the entire workforce! So, why then are women still being portrayed in a stereotypical manner in advertisements? A recent article written by The Drum shows that stereotyping women in advertisements has actually went up in the past year by 66%. What’s going on? Are we not in the progressive 21st Century? On top of this fact, women of darker skin tones have been featured 80% less than women with lighter skin.
