This blog post will look at successful implementations of location based service campaign and with the use of academic literature, I will also analyse how this concept has the potential to influence a consumers spending habits. Although location based services can be used in other technological contexts, this blog post will only look at its’ marketing use through smartphone technologies.

What is location based service marketing?

The marketing of location based service’s (LBS) is a direct business to customer marketing approach used to deliver informative services, through the method of tracking a consumers geographical position to offer services from nearby businesses based on location (Pitta, 2011).

Adidas

Adidas created a campaign entitled “The full value of mobile’. Adidas worked with Google and iProspect to measure how its mobile searches affected its in store traffic, the campaign redirected consumers to the companies store location page on the brand’s website. The aim of this campaign was to drive sales to the adidas stores and achieved this with a 20% conversion rate of mobile store location use to in-store visits (ThinkwithGoogle, 2013).

Thoughts:

An application like this requires a data roaming package and could result in expensive bills for consumers on fixed or limited internet usage price plan and might not be practical for everyone.

Best western hotel

Best western create a location based service campaign that was made to target potential hotel bookers near their airport locations. The location specific application worked in partnership with Paypal to create a digital strategy that allowed consumers to book hotels from as soon as they land or view their hotel locations on a map. The concept was created in an attempt to eliminate the sometimes impossible notion of having reserve hotel room weeks in advance (DeVoren, 2013). The aim of this campaign was to drive booking sales and saw over 20% increase in revenue during their first two months of their spring promotion (Paskin, 2010).

Thoughts :
Paypal payments require a 5 days waiting acceptance period and might not be suitable for consumers who do not have the sufficient funds to meet the hotel fees upfront, additionally the concept of paying through Paypal makes this services only convenient to existing Paypal users.

O2

O2 UK a telephone service provider, saw success in 2013 with the companies mobile phone application, Priority moments. The O2 app is mobile loyalty program that provides exclusive rewards, deals and sales to its customers, that are sent through the companies mobile app, websites and text messaging services, the offers are chosen based on consumer interest and location. The Priority moments app works in collaboration with a wide variety of business that offer discounted and even free promotional produce under the O2 brand to create awareness (campaign live, 2013)

The aim of this concept was to create a brand loyalty scheme that encourage users to stay with the brand through discounts schemes that would not be available after their contracts or mobile services with the brand ended. 18 months after the launch in 2012, Priority Moments acquired millions customers, which was the equivalent of 100% brand participation, making it one of the UK’s fastest growing loyalty programs.(marketingsociety, 2014)

Thoughts:
This concept is great and as users of this application I can personally say that having the options to buy from familiar brands at discount prices has at times influenced my spending habits. The concept could also on the other be considered an intrusive spamming technique as the offers are not specifically tailored to the consumers needs but are just simply indirect promotional techniques to increase brand awareness.

How does location based services have the potential to influence a consumers spending habit?

An article written by the Guardian entitled Retail disruption: how technology is influencing consumer buying habits, discussed the concept of analysing a consumers decision making process against a theoretical model relating to consumer behaviour. The model discusses five stages that consumers go through when purchasing produce and looks at: the search for information, the recognition of needs, pre and post purchase evaluation and evaluation of alternative produce. The article goes on to say that with new technological advancements such as location based services businesses are able to directly market their produce to consumers on a convenient format of their mobile devices; with this digital strategy businesses could use consumer habits and locations to offer services, tailored to cater to their consumers needs (Abidi, 2012).

In conclusion the concept of location based service campaign has many aiding consumption benefits but despite the success of these campaigns it is apparent that although these features have been tailored to meet the consumers geographical needs the personal limitations and annoyances have not fully been considered in all of three industry examples.

References
Becky Paskin. (2010). Best Western achieves highest sales growth following ad campaign. Available: http://www.bighospitality.co.uk/Business/Best-Western-achieves-highest-sales-growth-following-ad-campaign. Last accessed 19/04/2015.
Campaignlive. (2013). Connected Campaign of the Month: O2. Available: http://www.campaignlive.co.uk/news/1180271/. Last accessed 19/04/2015.
Danielle DeVoren. (2013). Best Western International Named 2012 eMarketer of the Year. Available: Best Western International Named 2012 eMarketer of the Year. Last accessed 19/04/2015.
Marketingsociety. (2014) 2013 winner: O2 Priority Moments, Mobile Marketing – case study, 2015, https://www.marketingsociety.com/the-library/2013-winner-o2-priority-moments-mobile-marketing-case-study
Mazher Abidi. (2012). Retail disruption: how technology is influencing consumer buying habits. Available: http://www.theguardian.com/media-network/media-network-blog/2012/may/22/retail-technology-disruption-consumer-buying. Last accessed 19/05/2015.
Pitta, Dennis A. (2011). Location-based social networking and marketing. Journal of Consumer Marketing. 28 (2), 0.
ThinkwithGoogle. (2013). Full Value of Mobile: adidas Drives In-Store Traffic with Mobile. Available: https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/intl/en-gb/case-study/adidas-and-iprospect-explore-in-store-conversions/. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

This blog post will discuss Ryanair’s investments into the world of digital marketing and with the aid of literature, I will evaluate the effectivity of their website design marketing initiatives. Although Ryanair has created other digital marketing strategies,  I will only be discussing their new website strategy.

Ryanair’s old approach

Ryanair is infamous for providing low cost airline services. The companies past marketing strategies where centred around the concepts of  solely providing no frills low price travel. The incentive behind this strategy is to encourage consumer to save money by checking in online. Ryanair’s service proposition state “we offer significant discounts as long as you follow our rules which in turn allow us to cut expensive overheads”. Despite the negative scandals in recent years surrounding the businesses low cost concept, Ryanair CEO Michael O’ Leary has managed to beneficially use the allegation  made against the company to reiterate the companies core objectives to provide consistently low prices (Kitching, 2014).

Ryanair’s new approach

As competition within the airline market begins to increase, Ryanair has been left to evaluate their customer service strategy, which could be described as poor and uncaring. The company also felt it needed to address its somewhat outdated website experience (figure 1), which has be considered ineffective in a generation of e commerce and mass internet usage (Paul McGarrity, 2015).

Figure 1. Ryanair old website

Website design

Different companies consider different factors to relate to their consumer when creating their websites. The most important factors to consider when creating an effective website are usability and accessibility. The theory behind usability is simple, it is all about creating a simple functional and elegant design that allows consumers to navigate through online content effectively. Accessibility in relation to website design refers to the creation of a concept that provides, the equal access to information and functions to everyone that uses it (Damian, 2009).

An article entitled DISADVANTAGES OF A BAD WEBSITE LAYOUT DESIGN, additionally discussed some other attributed of a bad website design and the way it could affect a companies business (Littleblogger.net, 2014). An example of a bad website design was discussed in this article entitled, WHAT WENT WRONG WITH THE MARKS & SPENCER WEBSITE REDESIGN THAT MADE THEM LOSE SALES? and talks about how easy it is for even established companies such as  Marks and Spencer’s to get website design wrong (Digital tonic, 2014).

As shown in figure 2, 3 and 4 in contrast to figure 1, Ryanair has drastically changed it website layout is no longer clutter with disorganised content and the information and function seem consistent on their Great Britain, France and Italian websites. With the above factors taken into consideration I feel their new website has successfully implemented a new website design.

Figure 2. Ryanair’s  English website

Figure 3. Ryanair French website

Ryanair 4. Ryanair Italian website

The companies aim was to improve the functionality of the brands website and was made  to resolve issues associated with the brand unfriendly and approachable custom; this was achieved as the company saw a 32% increase in profits, from their new technological initiatives (Topham, 2014).

In conclusion the strategic choice to enter the world of digital marketing is definitely an initiative that requires a lot of secondary analysis into the most appropriate conduct for an effective website because even the most established companies such as M&S can get website design wrong.

Source:

CHRIS KITCHING. (2014). EXCLUSIVE: No more Mr Meanie! Ryanair’s famously combative boss Michael O’Leary admits he was too extreme and should have been ‘nicer’ to customers sooner Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel. Available: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/travel_news/article-2813863/Controversial-Ryanair-boss-admits-no-frills-carrier-nicer-customers-sooner.html. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Digital tonic. (2014). WHAT WENT WRONG WITH THE MARKS & SPENCER WEBSITE REDESIGN THAT MADE THEM LOSE SALES?. Available: http://www.digital-tonic.co.uk/digital-tonic-blog/went-wrong-marks-spencer-website-redesign-made-lose-sales/. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Gwyn Topham. (2014). Ryanair puts 32% jump in profits down to being nicer. Available: http://www.theguardian.com/business/2014/nov/03/ryanair-raises-profit-surge-winter-bookings. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Littleblogger.net. (2014). DISADVANTAGES OF A BAD WEBSITE LAYOUT DESIGN. Available: http://littleblogger.net/disadvantages-of-a-bad-website-layout-design/. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Paul McGarrity. (2015). Why Ryanair Is Investing In Digital Marketing. Available: http://www.octavedigital.co.uk/2014/05/why-ryanair-is-investing-in-digital-marketing/. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Ryan, Damian; Jones, Calvin (2009). Understanding digital marketing: marketing strategies for engaging the digital generation. London: Kogan Page. 40.

This blog post will analyse the strategic concept of using crowdsource marketing as a tool for co creation in a business to customer marketing platform. I will also analyse the advantage and disadvantage of using public participation in product development.  As an example, I will also analyse the effectivity of Starbucks crowdsourcing blog campaign and how consumer interaction has influenced the brands strategic process. Although other medium of use for business to customer marketing  exist, I will be only be discussing it in relation to  crowdsource marketing.

What is crowdsourcing?

A term coined by Jeff Howe in 2006, Crowdsourcing refers to a method of gathering opinions or information through public assistance to complete  business-related tasks, that are usually resolved by third-party service providers. Crowdsourcing is used by businesses to gain a direct insight into the desires of their consumers. (Rubel, 2006).

How can crowdsourcing be used as a tool of co creation in business to customer marketing?

An article entitled Business‐to‐Consumer (B2C) Collaboration: Rethinking the Role of Consumers in Supply Chain Management, discusses a concept created by (Fawcett and Walker, 2014)  which says competition derived from emerging technologies has forced business to create “a new source of customer intimacy” in supply chain management (SCM), that can be defined as co-creation. The article goes on to say that consumer who choose to participate in crowdsourcing are considered “active” players in value creation and should also be considered collaborator within the broad spectrums of SCM.(Ha, 2015) Taking into consideration  the broad spectrum of SCM, businesses could choose to use this concept within their business to address their marketing initiatives and would be considered a business to consumer marketing concept created to aid SCM.

Advantage and disadvantage of public participation

Advantage- A newspaper article from the Guardian titled How crowdsourcing and open innovation could change the world, discusses the notion that open innovation created through crowdsourcing could be used as a tool to develop sustainable technology. The article goes on to state that opening a businesses workforce to the public invites a diverse set of skills and experience that could not only be used tackle difficult issues faced in business but also create new concepts based on the direct needs and opinions of those who consume from a brand (Ferrari, 2013).

Disadvantage- An article titled Crowdsourcing faces ethical, legal risks discusses the concepts that crowdsourcing campaigns created by established brands could be considered an unethical form of public exploitation, especially when brands use crowdsourcing to create or improve concepts from services that are usually paid for. The article goes on to state that the allocation of ownership rights from crowdsourced market research remains unclear and if businesses want to avoid legal action crowdsourcing should be conducted in a consultative manner (Phneah, 2013).

Industry example of crowdsource co creation in a business to customer marketing platform

About Starbucks

Starbucks is one of world most famous coffee stores, with more the 18,000 retail location in 60 countries. The companies segmentation currently stands in a dominant region of the upper market share of the coffee industry, competing and functioning on  a distribution mass level with brands such as Mc Donald’s and Dunkin Donuts (Starbucks, 2015).

My Starbuck Ideas campaign

Starbuck is one of the earliest adopters of incorporating social media into their website, using platforms such as Twitter, Pinterest, Google + and Youtube, to promote  brand awareness. A new addition to the companies marketing strategies is My Starbucks Ideas, (Figure 1.) the company uses crowdsourcing through the My Starbucks Ideas blog, to give consumers the chance to create and voice there opinions on new coffee recipes.(Schoultz, 2015) 

Figure 1. My Starbucks blog

Source: www.mystarbucksidea.com

This digital strategy has received a lot of success,  falling under the areas of market research that provides the consumers with the platform for change, experimentation and direct engagement with brand; this interactive approach has beneficially given the brand a direct source to their consumers needs. The concept resulted in participants voicing a broad spectrum of ideas unrelated to the core drink recipe idea concept. The brand also encourages participants to share their ideas through their social media platforms Twitter and Facebook, (Figure 2) through voting concepts that encourage participants to compete for the implementation of their ideas.(Schoultz, 2015) 

Figure 2. My Starbucks idea social media intagration

Source: www.mystarbucksidea.com

How effective was this approach?

Fundamentally, Starbucks core object was to create a digital marketing concept that would give the brand a direct insight into its consumers needs and the company achieved this. Over 150,000 ideas have been submitted to the my Starbucks idea website since it began in 2008. Through crowdsource marketing over 3 million mobile transactions now occur on average per week and the company now sell on average over 5.8 million new snacks and drink recipes per year (csnnews, 2013)

Critical analysis: Does the campaign sufficiently meet consumer demand?

As previously stated over 150,000 ideas have been submitted to the my Starbuck campaign blog, a blog article written in 2010 titled Tough love for Starbuck investigated the companies promises to implement successful ideas; the findings showed that at the time only 50 out of the 80,000 ideas sent in were enforced representing .06% of consumer demand and went onto state the resulting figures conflicted was the companies share vote discuss and see strategy (Brand autopsy, 2010) Today  Starbucks have implemented 277 out of 150,000 ideas shared representing .18% of consumer demand once again showing that company has potentially missed many opportunities for product development and innovation (Starbucks, 2015)

Conclusion

In conclusion my findings show that crowdsourcing in a co-creation format could be considered to be a powerful initiative within a business to customer marketing platform and the concept of allowing the public to influence and manipulate a companies strategic process could be considered a open and undefined and innovative strategic approach to digital marketing.

References

Ben Ferrari and Mehmet Fidanboylu. (2013). How crowdsourcing and open innovation could change the world. Available: http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/crowdsourcing-open-innovation-change-world. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Brand autopsy. (2010). Tough love for Starbucks . Available: http://www.brandautopsy.com/2010/01/tough-love-for-starbucks.html. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

csnnews. (2013). http://www.csnews.com/industry-news-and-trends/competitive-watch/starbucks-celebrates-five-year-success-my-starbucks-idea. Available: http://www.csnews.com/industry-news-and-trends/competitive-watch/starbucks-celebrates-five-year-success-my-starbucks-idea. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Ellyne Phneah . (2013). Crowdsourcing faces ethical, legal risks.Available: http://www.zdnet.com/article/crowdsourcing-faces-ethical-legal-risks/. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Rubel, Steve. (2006). Who’s ready to crowdsource?. Advertising age . 77 (43)

Starbucks. (2015).http://blogs.starbucks.com/blogs/customer/archive/2013/04/24/our-best-idea-was-asking-you-for-yours.aspx. Available: http://blogs.starbucks.com/blogs/customer/archive/2013/04/24/our-best-idea-was-asking-you-for-yours.aspx. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Starbucks. (2015). About Us. Available: http://www.starbucks.co.uk/about-us. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Souad Djelassia Isabelle Decoopmanb. (2013). Customers’ participation in product development through crowdsourcing: Issues and implications . Industrial Marketing Management. 42 (5), 683–692

Ta, Ha. (2015). Business‐to‐Consumer (B2C) Collaboration: Rethinking the Role of Consumers in Supply Chain Management. Journal of business logistics. 36 (1), 133 – 134.

MIKE SCHOULTZ . (2015) STARBUCKS MARKETING MAKES SOCIAL MEDIA A DIFFERENCE MAKER, http://www.digitalsparkmarketing.com/creative-marketing/social-media/starbucks-marketing/

This blog post will  discuss Burberry’s unique online email marketing strategy Burberry Kisses (Figure 1.) and how this indirect marketing initiative has added value to the brand, through the support of academic resources and my additional theoretical perspective on this innovative marketing strategy. Although the company uses other method of digital marketing, I will only be looking at its email marketing initiative.

Figure 1.

Source: Burberry

About the brand

A British brand founded in 1856, Burberry Group plc is a luxury clothing company that distributes cosmetics, fragrances, sunglasses, accessories and outerwear. (Burberry, 2015) Burberry has 443 stores worldwide that include 56 third party franchise stores, throughout 80 countries. (Thomson, 2012)

Burberry’s digital strategy

Burberry has recently reinvented their online digital presence in an attempt to remove the negative “chav” connotations associated with the brand (Figure 2). (Jones, 2008) The company’s strategic development now focuses on creating a digital culture that implements various social media campaigns that encourage consumers to interact and engage with the brand, through electronic customer relationship management (E-CRM) mediums that encourage consumers to share their interpretations of the brands collections, through their websites and social media platforms.(Bunz, 2009) E-CRM is a method that involves the use of digital communication technologies that are used to increase sales and encourage the use online services and could include; (Chaffey and Ellis-Chadwick, 2012)

• Customer services
• Personalised web messages
• Databases
• E-mail and social media marketing

Figure 2.

Source: Daily Mail

Burberry Kisses

Burberry’s most recent digital marketing initiative Burberry Kisses campaign falls under the e-mail and social media marketing  sub-sector of E-CRM and could be applied to a customer to customer marketing (C2C) model. C2C marketing is an extension of customer to customer interaction but with the additional focus on the creation of a service or product that has a specified promotional strategy that encourages consumers to share company content or services online from consumers who perceive a companies product value, with other consumers. (Chaffey and Ellis-Chadwick, 2012)

Burberry partnered up with Google to create the Burberry Kisses campaign, which is an interactive email experience that allows consumers to send sealed virtual kisses to loved ones, friends and even strangers. The product takes a digital print of the users lips and provides them with option pick a favourite colour from the companies Burberry Kisses lipstick collection.(Swinton, 2013) The digital strategy was created in an attempt to humanise the concept of consumption, through technology that encourages loves and  affection, allowing the brand to engage with new consumers and spread awareness.(Swinton, 2013)

The technological features of this campaign included:

• Double click rich mead display
• Google maps street view location detector
• Mobile advertisements
• Social sharing via google plus
• Web and mobile device applicable

In terms of its effectiveness the campaign was made with intent to create brand exposure and received over 253,000+ search results for “Burberry kisses” on Google, 13,000 cities used the campaign within the first 10 days and the “kisses” travelled over 109 million miles within the first week. (Burberry, 2014)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRiZMVEIhas

How does a strategy like this increase the companies customer value proposition?

The concept has received many critiques, with people asking how this new concept can be connected to the value chain of the brand or convert into sales. Now ex CEO Angela Ahrendts calls it “the million square foot store”, she goes on to discuss the importance of consumer interaction, implying that  every experience a customer has with the brand will determine their next, regardless of the channels that the consumer wishes to use to engage with the brand through.(Jessica Swinton, 2013) Burberry’s campaign  statement additionally when on to say “We were able to deliver a magical, creative experience at scale in a true “build once, run everywhere” fashion. By creating a personal yet shareable experience that appeals to everyone, this campaign built a connection to the Burberry brand without feeling like a traditional ad.”(Burberry, 2014)

The concept of customer value proposition was analysed through a paper entitled Identifying competitive customer value proposition in retailing, the paper provided a framework that could be used identify a consumer value proposition based on influential factors of economy, function, emotion and symbolism. (Rintamiki, 2007) Based on the perceived intention of this campaign, I felt that Burberry’s customer value proposition was influenced by emotion; this particular framework focuses on the idea that customers are motivated by the experiential aspects of  shopping from retailers that create emotional value within their consumption experience. Emotional value can be defined as the “perceived utility derived from an alternative’s capacity to arouse feelings or affective states” (Sheth et al, 1991)

My Theoretical opinion

“Brand equity could be used to define a companies potential to reach a customers value proposition. Brand equity is the commercial value, derived from consumer perception of the brand  rather than from the product or service itself (Business dictionary, 2015) combining this notion with  C2C marketing, consumers are given a connection to an established famous brand (Burberry) from a source they know and trust, that knows the brands value. A concept like this not only has the potential to increase brand value in existing consumers eyes but it also has the potential to create it to the receiving recipient”

Critical analysis: There is no defined target audience

Fundamentally, my only critique would be that the concept of Burberry Kisses was created around the companies Burberry Kisses product line (Figure 3), stating that this campaign was made “to appeal to everyone” is a broad statement that inconclusively projects the notion of a undefined target market for the brand, which could cause the brand to attract similar attention that caused them to be associated with chav culture, in the past. A blog post entitled Why Cosmetics Brands Must Embrace Age-Specific Marketing, discusses the concept of target marketing produce to age specific demographics (Emily Saka, 2012) based on its potential to craft marketing concept of direct relevance.

Figure 3

Source: Burberry

In conclusion this innovative email marketing strategy has the potential to change the way consumers view email marketing, specifically if the content is presented in a non traditional format that encourages customers to inadvertently  interact with the brand.

References

Burberry. (2015). BRAND BUSINESS CULTURE. Available: http://www.burberryplc.com/about_burberry/brand_business_culture. Last accessed 19/04/2015.
Rebecca Thomson. (2012). Burberry: A great British success.Available: http://www.retail-week.com/burberry-a-great-british-success/5034635.article. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Business dictionary. (2015). brand equity. Available: http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/brand-equity.html. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Burberry. (2014). Think Insight. Available: http://www.google.com.au/think/campaigns/burberry-kisses.html. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Chaffey, Dave; Ellis-Chadwick, Fiona (2012). Digital marketing: strategy, implementation and practice. 5th ed. Harlow: Pearson Education. 19/04/2015.

Emily Saka. (2012). Why Cosmetics Brands Must Embrace Age-Specific Marketing. Available: http://blog.salsify.com/why-cosmetics-brands-must-embrace-age-specific-marketing. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Jessica Swinton, (2013) How Burberry’s digital strategy is boosting brand value, The Guardian, http://www.theguardian.com/media-network/partner-zone-brand-union/burberry-digital-strategy-brand

Liz Jones. (2008). The luxury brand with a chequered past, Burberry’s shaken off its chav image to become the fashionistas’ favourite once more Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1023460/Burberrys-sha. Available: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1023460/Burberrys-shaken-chav-image-fashionistas-favourite-more.html. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Mercedes Bunz. (2009). Burberry checks out crowdsourcing with The Art of the Trench. Available: http://www.theguardian.com/media/pda/2009/nov/09/burberry-art-of-the-trench. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Ryan Goodrich. (2013). What is Crowdsourcing?. Available: http://www.businessnewsdaily.com/4025-what-is-crowdsourcing.html. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Sheth, J.N., Newman, B.I. and Gross, B.L. (1991), “Why we buy what we buy: a theory of consumption values”, Journal of Business Research, Vol. 22 No. 2, pp. 159-70.

Timo Rintamäki, Hannu Kuusela, Lasse Mitronen, (2007) “Identifying competitive customer value propositions in retailing”, Managing Service Quality: An International Journal, Vol. 17 Iss: 6, pp.621 – 634

This blog post will discuss the concept of personalisation in a mobile digital marketing format through the analysis of Tiffany & Co’s ring mobile application; with aid of literature I will also analyse how consumers could be concerned about privacy issues within this concept and how businesses could address this.

What is personalised marketing?

Personalised marketing is method created through the medium of information databases that are used to send appropriate information relating to a consumer users present activities, past preferences and future plans (Gratton, 2002).

Industry example of personalised marketing

Tiffany and Co ring finder application

Tiffany and Co a luxury jewellery store has brought out a mobile application, giving its customers the opportunity to virtually experience the brands exquisite diamond engagement ring collections.The applications ring finder feature directly give the consumers the chance to select the perfect ring for a romantic proposal. The company decided to create this application in an attempt to respond to growing interest for convenient online mobile shopping, The companies Ringer Finder product provides its consumers with an interactive shopping experience, that allows the customer to accurately size its chosen finger through the company latest mobile technology and is the first tool of its kind within the jewellery industry (Tiffany, 2010).

The ring sizer feature on the app also allows the customer to browse the companies products according to shape, setting, metal or design, with true size examples. The application gives the consumer the options to zoom in to analyse the products detailing, giving the visual impression of an in-store experience. The company has paired its application to its social media platforms allowing the consumer to share their favourite collection via email, Facebook and Twitter (Tiffany, 2010)

The application also gives the consumer the chance to make in-store consultation appointments via phone or email and is available in the U.S, UK, Australia, Japan and China; This digital marketing strategy could be considered to be technological innovation within the online shopping experience, having a product the shows its true and exact nature, is an issue that most consumers take into consider when buying online as most brands often disclose that some items may be appear different due to lighting and camera quality. The concept creates the impress of assured quality and trust that not only gives the consumer to opportunity to virtually experience the brands produce but also come in-store to confirm it (Tiffany, 2010).

The aim of this application was to increase sales from a consumer generated content medium that allowed consumers to share and pick their favourite jewelry from the companies collection; this was achieved with a 20% increase in sales after the application launch (Sommerfeld, 2014).

Being the first of its kind and having the success that this product has had, I personally have no in depth critical opinions against this product; expect to say that having a product presented in such an openly accessible format, could open the door for product plagiarism. An article entitled How to Watch for Plagiarism of Your Web Marketing Material, provides information on how to avoid content plagiarism and the advice could be transferred to Tiffany and Co’s mobile app (Arnold, 2015).

Privacy concerns with personalised marketing, how can business address this?

The concerns:
An article entitled Privacy Issues in Mobile Advertising, states the innovative methods currently used to collect consumer data can only effectively be received if business address public privacy concerns when creating mobile advertising campaigns (Cleff, 2007). The concept of a personalised service could be considered a beneficial method of marketing practise for businesses and customers. The level of tolerance towards unsolicited communication differs based on information pertaining to services or products of interest as opposed to services of little interest or personal relevance (Ross,2003). However, the use of this method could be considered intrusive if the content is presented in an unanticipated manner e.g. spamming to the consumers/user (Gratton, 2002); based on this factor providing privacy could be considered a complex execution. Despite the benefits of personalised marketing without adequate privacy protection businesses face scrutiny from the constant surveillance of consumer behaviour.

The potential solution:
Permission based advertising could be used to address the issues associated with personalised content in marketing; this method establishes a legal foundation to control the use and surveillance of personal data and is created through the use of consumer consent, a method that discloses the terms and conditions on how personal information may be processed for use.
In conclusion the practice of personalised marketing is an innovative and creative tool, that could be used to directly meet the needs of the consumers on an intimate and relevant level but despite this the findings within this blog despite the benefits received from this concept it is always strategically smart to assume that not all consumers share the same level of openness towards concepts that abuse the accessibility of personal data.(Cleff, 2007).

Reference:
Cleff, Evelyne Beatrix. (2007). Privacy Issues in Mobile Advertising. International review of law, computers & technology. 22 (3), 225.

D Petty Ross ‘Wireless advertising messaging: legal analysis and public policy issues’, Journal of Public Policy & Marketing Vol 22, No 1, pp 71–82, 2003.

Gratton, L., and Ghoshal, S. (2002) “Improving the Quality of Conversations” Organizational Dynamics, Winter 2002, 31/3: 209-223

John Arnold, Michael Becker, Marty Dickinson, Ian Lurie, and Elizabeth Marsten. (2015). How to Watch for Plagiarism of Your Web Marketing Material. Available: http://www.dummies.com/how-to/content/how-to-watch-for-plagiarism-of-your-web-marketing-.html. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Karen Sommerfeld . (2014). Tiffany & Co.: A Digital Marketing Gem. Available: http://www.paceco.com/tiffany-co-digital-marketing-gem/. Last accessed 19/04.

Tiffany. (2010). Tiffany and Co. Launches Iphone app for engagement rings. Available: http://press.tiffany.com/News/NewsItem.aspx?ID=93. Last accessed 19/04/2015.

Hello and welcome back to my blog!

Todays post will be a continuation of the previous topic on “Big Data” looking at a video created by Shyman Sankur entitled “The rise of human- computer cooperation”

http://www.ted.com/playlists/56/making_sense_of_too

Shyam Sankar debates the notion that algorithmic formulas used in computer softwares for Big Data detection can not solely be used to resolve the world’s problem and presents an additional perspective which shows the symbiotic relationship between computation and human creativity.

From a marketing research based perspective businesses need to decide whether or not the physiological patterns found within a consumers buying habits can conclusively be used to back up the desires for simple functionality and easy access to modern  technologies  which  relieve  us a consumers notion of actually having put any real work into the products or services we use.  The information collected within Big Data surrounding this subject can sometime lead companies down a grey path especially when information collected is randomised and a particular type of product or service is predominant  during the analysis of their findings.

I hope you have enjoyed todays blog for the full article I will leave a link below as well any additional referencing that might have been used in todays post.

All the best,

Mavis

References

http://www.ted.com/playlists/56/making_sense_of_too

Ted, Shyam Sankar: The rise of human-computer cooperation, 2014

Hello and welcome back to my blog!

Todays post will be about business intelligence and analytics for the purpose of  ”Big Data” analysis.

The sole purpose of Big Data analysis is to analyse and reveal patterns, trends, and associations that relate to human behaviour and interactions. Companies use this information to detect opportunities and risk that might occur within the use of their products or service, that could protect their businesses as well as  new and present consumers.

The article discussed in todays blog was written by Hsinchun Chen, Roger H. L Chiang and Veda C. Storey for Mis Quartley and is entitled “From Big Data to Big Impact”.

Business Intelligence and analytics focuses on the reflection of the overall magnitude and impact of  data related problems that might need to be resolved within contemporary platforms of business.

The article focuses on the capabilities and characteristics of intelligence research method areas BI&A, BI&A 1.0, BI&A 2.0 and BI&A 3.0, which are variated sequences of business intelligence and analytics, which looks at the evolution, application and emerging research through the mediums of text, web, network and mobile analysis.

The purpose of this method of research from a marketing perspective would be to understand the ways in which  businesses choose to gather and analyse  data, with the intension to reach a wider or broader market, through various new and old mediums of communication these methods of big data collection can be used to compare  the patterns of consumer behaviour to help companies make the best decisions for their business as well as new and existing consumers.

I hope you have enjoyed today blog,

Mavis

Reference

Provost, F., & Fawcett, T. (2013). Data Science and its Relationship to Big Data and Data-Driven Decision Making. Big Data, 1(1), 51-59.

Hi my name is Mavis Williamson I am a 24 year old student at the University of Brighton in East sussex. This blog is solely for the use of Digital Marketing analysis and will be used to analyse current debates and issues within the world of advertising through the medium of social media, feel free to follow my journey here.

All the best,

Mavis

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