Fear factory

Eindelijk : we zitten in een recessie! Een 'self fulfilling prophecy' of toch niet? Lees de column hier.

Weerwraak

Vorige week had in Mechelen het congres van de Belgische direct marketeers plaats met als titel ‘Revenge of the I’ ofte weerwraak van de consument. Een toepasselijk thema in tijden van gedupeerde, gefrustreerde en betogende beleggers. Het is boeiend om te zien hoe deze lotgenoten elkaar massaal via het net vinden. Web 2.0 en sociale media zijn een dagdagelijkse realiteit.

Lees de volledige column hier.

Wint 'Het merk mens' de PIM?

'Het merk mens' is genomineerd voor de in Nederland prestigieuse literatuurprijs - PIM - voor het beste marketingboek van het afgelopen jaar (samen met 11 anderen) en als enige Vlaamse marketingboek onder verder alleen maar Nederlandse publicaties (er zijn 32 boeken uitgekomen in het nederlandse taalgebied).
Bekendmaking van de winnaar eind november.

Meer informatie vindt u hier.

Valse verleiding

Iedereen is er zich van bewust dat reclame verleidend kan werken. Wanneer deze echter misleidend wordt, dient men de riem harder vast te trekken. Hoe adverteerders in Nederland strenge regulering van buitenaf een stap voor willen zijn, leest u hier

Nummer 2

De financiële crisis slaat iedereen elke dag opnieuw met meer verstomming. Hoe gulzigheid naar meer marktaandeel de machtigste banken de dieperik heeft ingejaagd, terwijl de challengers voorlopig stand houden, leest u hier.

Groen kleurt rood

Hoe gaan bedrijven in economisch onzekere tijden om met duurzaamheid en ecologie? Blijven zij deze kaart trekken of kruipen ze terug in hun schelp en focussen ze op prijs? Lees de column van deze week hier.

Marihuana in een goktent

Het lijkt een grotere spreiding dan Kim Clijsters ooit in haar carrière gemaakt heeft, maar zo zou men de financiële crisis in tijden van de multitaskende consument kunnen lezen. Lees de gedachtengang hier.

Halfvol of halfleeg?

Een pertinente vraag. Want enerzijds is er de financiële en hypotheekcrisis, anderzijds zijn er ook tekenen of indicatoren die positieve signalen geven. Het geboortecijfer of het modebeeld om er twee te noemen.

Lees de volledige column hier.

Small is beautiful

Dat is ook wat de monniken van de succesvolle trappisten bieren denken. Zo kondigde de brouwerij van Westmalle recent aan de productie niet te verhogen, ondanks de toenmende vraag. Het succes van de abdijbieren bewijst dat consumenten op zoek gaan naar authenticiteit en echtheid. Lees de volledige column over trappistenmarketing hier.

USA

Binnen enkele weken weten we wie de nieuwe president van de Verenigde Staten van Amerika wordt. Lees hier een reeks van 4 columns over de minder bekende aspecten van de grootmacht: de Amerikaanse consument en burger, de Amerikaanse media, de Amerikaanse merken en het misschien wel meest verrassend sociale Amerika .

Terug van weggeweest

Na enkele weken vakantie en een tijd van stilte, kan u vanaf heden weer wekelijks nieuws op deze blog verwachten! Veel leesplezier!

Fons

Wassup

The bid of Inbev on Anheuser-Busch has been widely discussed, and not only financially. A real solidarity movement has risen to defend thé national brand par excellence, ‘Bud', comparable with our own Jupiler. The loss for the 'king of beers' brand is real in the US and emotions are running high.
After the refusal of the bid, Inbev has started an advertising campaign ‘What would not change at Anheuser-Busch’, to illustrate its historical positioning as 'the world's local brewer'.
The saga is a perfect illustration of the development of brands in a global world, where the choice between global efficiency and local relevance has to be made. One thing is clear: thé global consumer does not exist.

See the historical Wassup campaign for Bud beneath and read the column of this week here.

Made by You

It is clear by now that 'user generated content' is more than a hype. Innovative and up-to-date brands have learned to deal with it. User generated content is only one outcome of the empowered consumer. Look at one of the latest hits on You Tube these days, 'Why every guy should buy their girlfriend a Wii Fit’, a movie made by a guy of his girl friend doing her Wii Fit hula-hoop exercises. Excellent and free advertising for the Nintendo play console?

A global CEO study done by IBM, shows that CEO's are aware that the empowered consumer is more than a flash in a pan and most of them consider these 'prosumers' as an opportunity more than a threat.

Read the column of this week here.

We Cannes

Last week, the 55th edition of the International Advertising Festival took place in Cannes. Like every year at the end of June, the whole advertising industry kept its eyes on Cannes to see what campaigns took a Lion home and who was the talk of the town.
Advertising is obviously evolving and changing as it is harder to attract the attention of the hard to get, hard to capture and hard to convince consumer of today. More and more, advertising is evolving towards entertainment, sometimes with a social message behind it. 3 strong campaigns as a proof.

One of the Belgian Lions was for the Music for Life campaign, made by mortierbrigade, where a thirsty black boy interrupted several TV shows. A simple idea made to practice to illustrate the shortage of water in developing countries.



Our BBDO colleagues in New York won a Grand Prix for the campaign for the TV channel HBO. They created the concept 'HBO Voyeur', online but also in real. See the concept and the images of the projection they did on a wall in New York, where it looked as if one could see everything that happened behind the walls of an apartment block.



The Grand Prix Lion in the category direct or one-to-one communication went to JWT India for the newspaper Times of India, which organized the campaign 'Lead India' to promote India from 'potential nation' to 'kinetic power'.



Common in these 3 campaigns is not only the strong 'think out of the box' idea, but also the high consumer relevance and social message. Advertising with a conscience.

Read all about it in this week’s column.

Windchill

Do you also think your weekly shopping bill at the supermarket is higher then before and your fuel, gas and electricity expenses are rocketing?
HUMO and VRT questioned 1000 Flemish people. Seems that 96% feel life is (a lot) more expensive then a year ago. Even amongst the higher incomes, there's a feeling that buying power is declining. Reality or psychoses? Result of the 'spending power' campaign pursued by unions and media?
Also in the supermarket landscape, the effect of the spending power psychoses is noticed. Logically, discounters like Aldi, Lidl and Colruyt attract more shoppers with their low price positioning. But also premium supermarkets like Delhaize play on price. 'The price, quality included' was the headline of one of the ads Delhaize published in national newspapers last week. The spending power debate affects our shopping cart in several ways.

Read the column of this week here.

Search the 10 differences

The cover of the new album of Coldplay 'Viva La Vida' has a strong resemblance with the cover of my book 'Het Merk Mens'.

Both feature the painting 'Liberty Leading The People' by the French Romantic painter Eugène Delacroix. The painting dates from 1830 and shows Marianne, the symbol of the French nation.

Mom said: get a degree,...

...then a job...
These times might be over.
While son, daughter, or students in your entourage may be worrying about the upcoming exams, recent research has shown that many graduate students already have a contract in pocket. To them, exams are a mere formality before their careers take off.
The labour market has evolved, the youth as well, and companies must introduce themselves asap to the youth.

Learn it all in our weekly column.

Music to my ears

Some 6 months ago, Radiohead offered its new album on the internet at a 'free' price, from nothing till whatever fans were willing to pay for it. Did this strategy pay off?
It seems so. According to a source in Advertising Age, 1.2 million people downloaded the album and 32% paid for it, good for 6 to 10 million dollars in their pockets. Afterwards, 122 000 examples of the physical album were sold, good for another 25 million dollars. Not bad for an experiment.
It shows that marketers sometimes have to give before they can take. And it also illustrates that distribution models ask for an innovative and inventive approach.

Read all about it in this week's column.

Culture of fear

What a surprise it was to see an almost empty freeway and no traffic jams on a Tuesday morning on the E19! The result of the media alert that already started a week in advance on the possible effects of the train strike. It illustrates the effect the media has on our lives.

Read all about it in this week's column.

The power of ideas

Beyond the idea box. That is the concept of www.mystarbucksidea.com and www.dellideastorm.com, 2 websites were consumers can not only post ideas to Starbucks or Dell, but also vote and discuss ideas posted by other visitors.
This is the ultimate expression of consumer empowerment, thé characteristic of the 21st century consumer.

Read all about it in this week's column.