Selling a premium shaving experience to cost-conscious consumers in a challenging economy requires extreme measures. Witness efforts from Procter & Gamble and Target this week to generate trial use of the Gillette's Fusion ProGlide razor. In addition to a stunning point-of-purchase merchandising display, complete with motion and light, positioned on an endcap, Target also featured the new razor on the front page of its circular this week for $8.99. To sweeten the offer, a bonus $5 gift card was offered to shoppers who purchase two ProGlide razors or cartridges.
Timberlake Fashion Line Set To Launch at Target This Winter
Target announced that William Rast, the fashion line by celebrity Justin Timberlake and his childhood friend Trace Ayala, will debut at Target in December, and the line will be available for a month.
The typical William Rast look is casual, with an emphasis on jeans and leather jackets. The fall runway collection, presented earlier this year at New York Fashion Week, was dubbed "New America" and inspired by road trips between the Mississippi River and the West Coast, according to Timberlake.
Paper Supplier Receives "Bullseye" Award
NewPage Corp. announced that it recently received a "Best of the Bullseye" award from Target. This highly coveted award is presented to creative agencies, production and paper partners as well as individuals who exceed Target's expectations in one of four award categories: Effectiveness, Innovation, Leadership and Collaboration. NewPage received the award for Effectiveness in being a valued paper supplier.
NewPage, the largest coated paper manufacturer in North America, has been supplying the paper for Target weekly circulars from its Duluth, Minn., mill for more than 20 years.
"In order to operate in a lean manner, Target does not carry paper inventory -- and Target has been able to trust NewPage to deliver high quality paper products in a timely way," noted Chuck Herrig, VP marketing for Target Stores. "Reliability from our suppliers is critical. As a retailer, our stores are very dependent upon the circular to be a reflection of our stores and drive consumers through our doors. NewPage has demonstrated superior reliability, quality and a true dedication to us as customers which can be pretty rare in this industry."
Smooth moves indeed by Target...Creston's comment, "KUDOS!"
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
Sunday, July 25, 2010
The Blogger Generation Still Dominates Blogging by Jack Loechner
According to Sysomos.com, after an analysis of more than 100 million blog posts, not surprisingly, the most active bloggers are younger people who have grown up during the blogging "revolution", which started about seven years ago. Bloggers in the 21-to-35 year-old demographic group account for 53.3% of the total blogging population.
This group is followed by the generation just behind them - people 20-years-old or under are 20.2% of the blogging landscape:
* ≤ 20 years (20.2%)
* 21-35 yrs (53.3)
* 36-50 yrs (19.4)
* ≥51 yrs (7.1)
* Source: sysomos.com, June 2010
The difference between genders in the blogosphere is balanced with women making up 50.9% and males 49.1% of bloggers. This suggests the Internet is a gender neutral environment.
This group is followed by the generation just behind them - people 20-years-old or under are 20.2% of the blogging landscape:
* ≤ 20 years (20.2%)
* 21-35 yrs (53.3)
* 36-50 yrs (19.4)
* ≥51 yrs (7.1)
* Source: sysomos.com, June 2010
The difference between genders in the blogosphere is balanced with women making up 50.9% and males 49.1% of bloggers. This suggests the Internet is a gender neutral environment.
Friday, July 23, 2010
One Third of Consumers Turn to Facebook, Twitter to Engage Brands Online
A new study released today by ExactTarget finds nearly 40 percent of consumers turning to Facebook and Twitter to supplement the news, information or deals they receive via email marketing.
Featured in ExactTarget’s Social Profile report, the survey of more than 1,500 consumers identified 12 distinct personas for how consumers interact with brands online by studying the levels of social media creation and consumption across all ages and income levels.
“Consumers don’t silo their engagement with brands to a single channel, instead they tend to ‘layer’ marketing channels on top of one another to meet their different objectives,” said Morgan Stewart, principal, ExactTarget’s research and education group. “The things that motivate consumers to go online initially dictate where and how they choose to engage with brands – whether that be email, Facebook or Twitter.”
Key findings of the research include:
# More than 90 percent of consumers that are a fan of, or “like,” at least one brand on Facebook also receive at least one permission-based marketing email per day.
# More than 75 percent of consumers that follow at least one brand on Twitter subscribe to at least one brand’s email marketing.
# Nearly half of consumers who engage with brands via Twitter do so silently, regularly reading tweets even though they do not have their own Twitter account.
# 45 percent of mothers with children living in the home identify themselves as ‘Deal Seekers’ and on average are a fan of 10 brands on Facebook, follow 10 companies on Twitter and receive 14 permission-based marketing emails daily.
# 33 percent of consumers identify themselves as Info Seekers, influenced most heavily by product reviews and other forms of user-generated content.
# While 28 percent of consumers under the age of 25 identify themselves as “social butterflies” and fan the most brands on Facebook, they are more likely to buy from companies that send them permission-based email.
“Simply understanding demographics of a customer group is no longer enough,” said Tim Kopp, ExactTarget’s chief marketing officer. “By bridging the gap between demographics and consumer motivations, the Social Profile research identifies unique personas that give marketers an entirely new level of understanding of consumer behavior.”
ExactTarget’s Social Profile study is the third research brief in ExactTarget’s six-part Subscribers, Fans & Followers research series set for release through September. The series provides marketers exclusive insight into how U.S. consumers’ interact with brands online based on a series of focus groups, interviews and surveys conducted in March and April. For more information about the study, to access an interactive application of the Subscribers, Fans & Followers data or to subscribe to receive future research briefs delivered via email, visit www.ExactTarget.com/sff.
Featured in ExactTarget’s Social Profile report, the survey of more than 1,500 consumers identified 12 distinct personas for how consumers interact with brands online by studying the levels of social media creation and consumption across all ages and income levels.
“Consumers don’t silo their engagement with brands to a single channel, instead they tend to ‘layer’ marketing channels on top of one another to meet their different objectives,” said Morgan Stewart, principal, ExactTarget’s research and education group. “The things that motivate consumers to go online initially dictate where and how they choose to engage with brands – whether that be email, Facebook or Twitter.”
Key findings of the research include:
# More than 90 percent of consumers that are a fan of, or “like,” at least one brand on Facebook also receive at least one permission-based marketing email per day.
# More than 75 percent of consumers that follow at least one brand on Twitter subscribe to at least one brand’s email marketing.
# Nearly half of consumers who engage with brands via Twitter do so silently, regularly reading tweets even though they do not have their own Twitter account.
# 45 percent of mothers with children living in the home identify themselves as ‘Deal Seekers’ and on average are a fan of 10 brands on Facebook, follow 10 companies on Twitter and receive 14 permission-based marketing emails daily.
# 33 percent of consumers identify themselves as Info Seekers, influenced most heavily by product reviews and other forms of user-generated content.
# While 28 percent of consumers under the age of 25 identify themselves as “social butterflies” and fan the most brands on Facebook, they are more likely to buy from companies that send them permission-based email.
“Simply understanding demographics of a customer group is no longer enough,” said Tim Kopp, ExactTarget’s chief marketing officer. “By bridging the gap between demographics and consumer motivations, the Social Profile research identifies unique personas that give marketers an entirely new level of understanding of consumer behavior.”
ExactTarget’s Social Profile study is the third research brief in ExactTarget’s six-part Subscribers, Fans & Followers research series set for release through September. The series provides marketers exclusive insight into how U.S. consumers’ interact with brands online based on a series of focus groups, interviews and surveys conducted in March and April. For more information about the study, to access an interactive application of the Subscribers, Fans & Followers data or to subscribe to receive future research briefs delivered via email, visit www.ExactTarget.com/sff.
Thursday, July 15, 2010
Cisco Visual Networking Index Forecast 2009-2014
The Cisco Visual Networking Index (VNI) Forecast, 2009-2014, projects that global Internet traffic will increase more than fourfold to 767 exabytes -- or more than 3/4 of a Zettabyte, by 2014.
This amount is 100 exabytes higher than the projected level in 2013 -- or an increase the equivalent of 10 times all the traffic traversing Internet Protocol networks in 2008.
The growth in traffic will continue to be dominated by video, exceeding 91 percent of global consumer IP traffic by 2014. Improvements in network bandwidth capacity and Internet speeds, along with the increasing popularity of HDTV and 3DTV are key factors expecting to quadruple IP traffic from 2009 to 2014.
The Cisco VNI Forecast, which focuses on two primary user groups -- consumers and businesses -- was developed as an annual study to estimate global IP traffic growth and trends. Projections are based on Cisco analysis and modeling of traffic, usage, and device data from independent analyst sources. Cisco validates its forecast, inputs, and methodology with data provided by service providers worldwide.
Total Global IP Traffic in "Bytes"
Global IP traffic is expected to increase more than fourfold (4.3 times) from 2009 to 2014, reaching 63.9 exabytes per month in 2014, up from approximately 56 exabytes per month in 2013. This is equivalent to 766.8 exabytes per year -- almost three-quarters of a zettabyte, by 2014.
The nearly 64 exabytes of global IP traffic per month projected for 2014 is equivalent to 16 billion DVDs; 21 trillion MP3's; or 399 quadrillion text messages.
These projections, released by industry leader and industry giant, Cisco, http://www.ciscovnipulse.com/ provides information that can be used to develop a plan for the present, a five year plan, and the future. Not suggesting that any marketing plan should exclude traditional media. The analysis of the information provided by Cisco, along with additional research in your specific market will involve more time, more effort, and more strategy based on the ever-changing marketplace.
Is your company prepared to take bigger "Bytes" of the market...is your company still considering things...is your company ready to pull the trigger, or is this on the back burner?
And if so, that an internal decision, but I ask you to examine why? If you, and your company, ignore this research, it won't go away. What's your competition doing? Or, do you really know?
This amount is 100 exabytes higher than the projected level in 2013 -- or an increase the equivalent of 10 times all the traffic traversing Internet Protocol networks in 2008.
The growth in traffic will continue to be dominated by video, exceeding 91 percent of global consumer IP traffic by 2014. Improvements in network bandwidth capacity and Internet speeds, along with the increasing popularity of HDTV and 3DTV are key factors expecting to quadruple IP traffic from 2009 to 2014.
The Cisco VNI Forecast, which focuses on two primary user groups -- consumers and businesses -- was developed as an annual study to estimate global IP traffic growth and trends. Projections are based on Cisco analysis and modeling of traffic, usage, and device data from independent analyst sources. Cisco validates its forecast, inputs, and methodology with data provided by service providers worldwide.
Total Global IP Traffic in "Bytes"
Global IP traffic is expected to increase more than fourfold (4.3 times) from 2009 to 2014, reaching 63.9 exabytes per month in 2014, up from approximately 56 exabytes per month in 2013. This is equivalent to 766.8 exabytes per year -- almost three-quarters of a zettabyte, by 2014.
The nearly 64 exabytes of global IP traffic per month projected for 2014 is equivalent to 16 billion DVDs; 21 trillion MP3's; or 399 quadrillion text messages.
These projections, released by industry leader and industry giant, Cisco, http://www.ciscovnipulse.com/ provides information that can be used to develop a plan for the present, a five year plan, and the future. Not suggesting that any marketing plan should exclude traditional media. The analysis of the information provided by Cisco, along with additional research in your specific market will involve more time, more effort, and more strategy based on the ever-changing marketplace.
Is your company prepared to take bigger "Bytes" of the market...is your company still considering things...is your company ready to pull the trigger, or is this on the back burner?
And if so, that an internal decision, but I ask you to examine why? If you, and your company, ignore this research, it won't go away. What's your competition doing? Or, do you really know?
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