Karen Cunningham

Great summary of NFC and, more importantly, that no one tool is sufficient. A successful activation requires weaving multiple executions together to get the most complete picture.

Have you had any experience interacting with an in-store beacon or similar execution? If not, why might you?

I actually haven’t had any personal experience with this technology. Maybe because I shop online too much?!

I would definitely find NFC tags fascinating. Beacons and Wifi will take me a bit more time to accept — with NFC, I am choosing to engage, the others can engage me without my consent. The technology blows my mind, but as a consumer, it seems too invasive. The idea of a brand sending me a coupon as I approach their product in a store feels a bit too much like the sci-fi Minority Report.

Great post Karen. I find this topic very interesting. It’s one of those new technologies that’s disruptive and innovative. Disruptive because in some instances it’s replacing and/or providing a different option to bluetooth and wifi. Innovative because it has created a whole new mobile pay (mobile wallet) market. What’s really fascinating to me is the super grip that Apple has on NFC, they pretty much control the mobile pay market because of the iPhone and Apple Pay. “The iPhone maker controls about half of the US smartphone market and around 10% worldwide… 80% of US teens have an iPhone. Every one of those devices comes pre-installed with Apple Pay, the company’s mobile wallet.”. Contributing to this super grip is that more and more retailers have added point-of-sale systems that include the NFC technology. As the market continues to grow as you noted and the iPhone remains the most popular smartphone, Apple should continue to control the lion share of the mobile app market. From a strategic standpoint Apple blocks outside mobile wallet apps from using its NFC application programming interface (API). “The lack of access impedes startups as well as giants like Amazon, which operates Amazon Pay. “They don’t want rivals launching a wallet…if they opened it up, it would mitigate their market position.”

It will be interesting to see how this market develops over the years and if Apple will continue to control it. Or will there be a new technology that comes along and disrupts NFC, just like NFC is disrupting QR codes, bar codes, bluetooth and WIFI.

https://qz.com/1726203/apple-is-suffocating-mobile-payment-rivals/

Cliff – I agree, the commercials with the two annoying guys definitely do not showcase one of Sonic’s differentiators –the drive-up delivery service — and they absolutely don’t appeal to a younger audience.

This really was a brilliant campaign, I was trying to find out what agency they worked with, but couldn’t find any references. I would be even more impressed if turned out to be completely internally designed.

Awesome!! Thanks Cliff. Can’t wait to read this and continue to fight the urge for a shake!

Hi Karen. This is a really interesting post and a great example of how brands can be creative and unique in how they engage their brand digitally. Plus a great use of social listening and acknowledging how consumers are talking about their brand. My engagement with Cheetos is pretty much out of the bag watching a movie on television. I have taken notice of some of the interesting shapes and while I never posted them online, I have friends that did! While reading your post I Googled Cheetos Museum on on my phone and saw that they had also taken the digital into the real world and partnered with Ripley’s Believe It or Not! in Times Square for a museum exhibit that summer. And yes, I also downloaded the Cheetos Vision App and am considering using my Cheetos image as my Facebook Profile Pic this month. I envision the app playing a role in my family’s next get together – they all love Cheetos and would have fun immortalizing their image in Cheetos. Thank you!

Gretchen – that’s awesome! I’m so glad this post was inspiring on several levels. I can’t wait to hear about your next family get together!

I love this execution from a pure creative perspective, but I wonder if it achieved anything for the brand beyond a quick burst of publicity.

Knowing the pressures from health-conscious consumers on brands like this, I see this at best a defensive tactic to keep loyalists engaged, Even then, it’s an indirect connection with the product experience rather than consuming Cheetos itself.

Building on this success, would running a Cheetos Museum experience where you “searched” for the next great Cheetos artifact be more successful from a business perspective?

Do you think the intent here was something more than my take?

Great take on the travel industry and how they utilize video to spread their content! While 49,000 views doesn’t sound like quite that many, it also didn’t take into account the short period of time those views were acquired. Since the eclipse was a fleeting moment in time Jetblue had limited time to capitalize on the “no-blackout” event. And since the video was shared/liked hundreds of thousands of times, I’d say they really struck a cord.
Based on our readings, I would see this as a “content as support” strategy. Jetblue is actively engaged with its consumers at all time and does an excellent job with customer support. Priding themselves on keeping their customers happy is essential to meeting their business objectives.
Airbnb, however, seems to have taken a different approach to their content strategy. Their “content as a window” strategy gives consumers a look into what travel destinations are available and the chance to emerge themselves in their videos. Leveraging customer reviews and experiences gives Airbnb customers the chance to see what their lives could be by seeing what other consumers have gained from utilizing their services. “If all of these people had a great time at these amazing places, then I trust Airbnb to provide that same experience to me”, is esentialy the tone Airbnb is trying to obtain.
Both of these content strategies work well for utilizing video content. But, I think Airbnb does a slightly better job only because the videos are so visually attractive. Any thoughts on which company you think handles their content strategy better?

Karen,

Great post and I couldn’t agree with you more on a lot of the topics you hit, specifically the Airbnb Experiences Instagram page. I’m a living example of how the power of social media correlates to the travel and hospitality industry. This past weekend I went to Wissahickon Park, which is located about 20 minutes from Philadelphia because we kept seeing people post about it on their Instagram channels. The trails looked fun and we never were there before, so we decided to give the trail a try and loved it! If we would have never seen pictures on social media of the park, we would have probably not even known about it. A picture is worth a thousand words and in the way of travel, a picture could be worth thousands of dollars!

Karen, great post! I really liked both examples and found them very interesting. Your first sentence struck a chord, where you said, “With video as the favorite form of brand content for consumers” because I vaguely remembered (WAAAAY back to the first semester of our program!) reading about how video as a way to reach consumers has increased and is so prevalent now. I couldn’t remember exactly what I read, so I looked the topic up and I found this interesting article, titled “Why 85% of People Want to See MORE Video Content From Brands.” It outlines the rise over the past several years in video content marketing and explores why people want to see more of it. One of the reasons is that video content provides education and it states that brands can summarize their message in a “concise, short manner.” It explains how “consumers want to gain access to additional information at the touch of a button, and video content allows this” while also citing the statistic that “95% of people have watched an explainer video to learn more about a product or service.” I know that I definitely have and I often prefer seeing it, and seeing how it works or looks, rather than simply reading about it. Another reason stated is instant gratification, which ties into the “Live” aspect that JetBlue tapped into. The article explains how people want to stay engaged and video content in the form of live sessions via social channels or even Q&A videos do this for consumers. Some stats related to this that they cite are that “Facebook video receives, on average, 135 percent more organic reach than a Facebook photo” and that “73 percent of B2B marketers say that video positively impacts marketing ROI.” The third reason described is that it is a “visual treat.” This article cites Airbnb as well and writes that it is a “master in converting data into viral-worthy marketing campaigns” and cites one of their campaigns, a short film called “Hollywood & Vine” where their fans from all over the world were invited to create short vine videos that could be features in the mini-movie and the chosen applicants received $100 in Airbnb vouchers. Did anyone in class know about this campaign? In case you wanted to see it, here is a link to the campaign video:

There are several other reasons as well (the article is a bit lengthy), so if anyone is interested in reading the rest, I added the link below!

Reference: https://www.business2community.com/brandviews/wyzowl/85-people-want-see-video-content-brands-02017613

Great Post! I love this! Video really is a great way to reach consumers and I have never personally used Airbnb but I have seen some great videos from people who have used photographers or other experiences offered by Airbnb to increase their fun on a trip. One day i would like to use them on one of my Airbnb adventures but I haven’t built up the courage just yet! They really have done a great job incorporating this into their strategy.

Great insights guys. Nate, I agree with you, I think Airbnb does a better job with video, but maybe it’s because – as Ben and Kricket suggest – the nature of their business lends itself better to video content?
Elaina, great info about the preference and power of video. I did come across the Hollywood & Vine article and it made me sad – RIP Vine. 🙁