The Marketing Week – 12/7/2013

Welcome to The Marketing Week, your guide to the good, the bad and the ugly in the marketing industry over the last seven days.

CAMPAIGN OF THE WEEK

Budweiser

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wt9jTZwWA2c

Budweiser has paired Rihanna and Jay-Z together (we guess Beyonce is too busy drinking Pepsi Max) for the beer brand’s first ever global music strategy. The “Umbrella” singer and “99 Problems” rapper front Budweiser’s “Made For Music” campaign, which feature’s the couple’s latest single “Right Now”.

Budweiser says it hopes the campaign will inspire millions of people across the world to “achieve their dreams” (and drink responsibly).

GOOD WEEK FOR…

UnilverLynxSnapchat-Campaign-2013_304

Lynx has had an eventful week after dodging an ad ban and revealing the findings from its Snapchat experiment. The Unilever-owned brand was slammed by the advertising watchdog for promoting racial stereotypes, after it ran an ad that implied that the black character had bigger “balls” than the white character. It escaped an outright ban after the watchdog ruled the ad’s target market of young males would not be offended.

The reprieve came on the same day the brand revealed it had become one of the first in the UK to test photo-sharing service Snapchat as a marketing platform. Marketers have been apprehensive to use the platform – a mobile app that allows users to send photo messages that self-destruct after a period of 10 seconds or less – to date because it leaves them open to offensive content. Lynx’s community team says, however, the risk is a price “worth paying” to deliver “compelling” content to fans.

BAD WEEK FOR…

MarketerWhiteboard-Person-2013_304

Agencies were dealt a crushing blow in their ongoing efforts to champion creativity, after a report revealed that most (78 per cent) of CEOs say their agencies are not ROI driven. The latest research from the Fournaise Marketing Group found that more than three quarters (76 per cent) of bosses believe agencies talk too much about “creativity as the saviour” without being able to quantify its impact on business results. It follows last year’s findings from the research group, which revealed that 70 per cent of CEOs had lost trust in marketers’ ability to prove ROI on campaigns. With CEOs seemingly losing faith in marketing’s discipline to impact ROI, marketers need to be better communicators at board level, or risk losing their influence within business.

INTERNATIONAL NEWS

Top tweeters fly the nest in international expansion drive

Twitter logo

Three of Twitter’s top executives are reported to have left their San Francisco base to help further its international expansion. Katie Jacobs Stanton, Twitter’s VP of international growth, is reportedly headed to bolster its office in Pairs, France. Similarly Ali Jafari, formerly director of sales at Twitter, is also heading across the pond, basing himself in its Dublin office, to take up the role of director of mid-market sales for Europe.

Meanwhile, Twitter’s VP of international sales Shailesh Rao is readying himself for a move to Singapore heading up direct sales for the Asia Pacific region as well as Latin America and other emerging markets.

Nokia promises new marquee apps in New York launch

nokia-product-2013-304

With its focus very much on cracking the US market, much of Nokia’s flagship launches are taking place away from its traditional European home and this week it unveiled its latest Windows Phone 8-based Lumia 1020 in New York City.

However, more vitally in Nokia’s (and Microsoft’s) bid to claw back smartphone market share from Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS, it revealed imminent key app launches on Windows Phone 8. Namely, these include: Twitter video sharing service Vine, Flipboard, Hipstamatic and the ‘privacy-based social network’ Path.

ONE TO WATCH

Behavioural-based content recommendation

Last.fm founders Felix Miller and Martin Stiksel have come into the limelight this week with their next start-up Lumi, after selling their earlier online music service to CBS for a reported £140m. Lumi recommends new content to users based on their internet search history, in a service they described as ‘like Last.fm but for everything’.

TWEETS

Paul Frampton, CEO of Havas Media, @Paul_Framp: Dear Marketing, pls get back to people and human motivation. Platforms only valuable once you understand the meaning they have for people.

An understated Colgate UK, who underestimated demand for its #BrushSwap electric toothbrush giveaway earlier this week, @ColgateUKWe’re sorry to say that #BrushSwap won’t return to Waterloo this week. We’re looking at alternatives and appreciate your patience.

Media commentator and former Marketing Week columnist Raymond Snoddy, @RaymondSnoddyGood to see press pushing ahead with Independent Press Standards Organisation – that it has so enraged Lord Prescott is an additional bonus

Tomi Ahonen, ex-Nokia exec and bloggerEveryone wants to be liked RT @textually: ‘State Department bureau spent $63K buying ‘Likes’ for its Facebook page’

DATES FOR YOUR DIARY

15 July The latest British Retail Consortium figures, detailing footfall in June are published.
18 July A big day in Silicon Valley as Google and Microsoft both announce their quarterly earnings.

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