Tango Class- Some thoughts on my community

Today I had my first Tango class near my home. I really love my neighborhood where I can find good restaurants, yoga class, Tango class and nail shop. Everything goes well except for my cranpy house. So bad luck to live in this old room which I have never been able to experience in my past life. First time see a mouse inside my room, kill numerous roaches and clean the bathroom. Anyway, what I got no chance to know in China, I have a way here including those housekeeping issue.

So back to topic. I am going to talk about something interesting I observed from my yoga center.

Life in Motion, a gym that locates on 106st Street used to have a horrible website. But recently, I start to receive their e-mails which promotes great local sports events. I was talking to myself, wow, finally they hired some marketing people.

Last week, after 2 months crazy for job hunting, I finally got time and mood to reenter my yoga class again. So I went to their website to find the schedule. To my surprise, they secretly changed their whole website including the schedule page. Now, the new one looks friendly, interesting and advanced. It contains more event information, clean design and light color.

I am not talking about how great their marketing is. But it is so grateful to see that such marketing improvement is being done in this community. I feel so happy that such concept finally be recognized by this gym. The reason I study marketing is to learn the methodology and incorprate that nature to my work and even my life. The charisma of Marketing is that it is alive just in your life. Step by step, when merchants understand more of our needs and care more about our exprience, our life is better off by marketing.

Marketers go go go! Let's make the life better!

http://www.lifeinmotion.com/

Sugar Crush: Customer Engagement

(I keep this diary to highlight the interesting marketing things in my life. And more importantly, find a way to enhance my sucking English....)
I don't play games, especially those without an end. Good thing is that I was never addicted to online games and studies very hard in the past. Bad thing is that I have no idea on how much money this game industry can make.

In the morning, my roommate shared her company visit to Facebook and Zinga. She told me that inside Zinga (maybe a typo?), there are game machines everywhere. Congratulations to those game lovers and code farmers, you find your wonderland. Envy your working environment and living environment especially on such a rainy day in NYC. BTW, it is almost June, why I still wear the same as December.

Entering the mobile times, smaller screens start to play a greater role in everyone's life. For games, you have got your customer everywhere at every moment. In order to kill the time in the subway, I downloaded Temple Run. Well, I felt I am so strange to fall in love with this silly game. Moreover, I downloaded Sugar Crush after being annoyed on facebook.

I have to say, Sugar Crush must have hired a lot "bad" marketing people because you are doing unbelievable amazingly on customer engagement: Friends can send friends lives; You need friends to send you boat ticket in order to proceed to next level; You see your friend's facebook profile picture labeled where they are in the game.

Game comes to a social times. Sugar Crush gives a great example after draw something which I quitted playing for one year as it is so boring to wait for the other's reply and I am so lazy to draw well. The game philosophy is not original. Previously, I was a loyal customer for "Bad Apple" which is almost same apply crush game on my iphone and ipod. However, Bad Apple is not a social game, you just play it on your own and get more challenging rounds.

Ok. Got 3 interviews to go this week, my empirical modeling paper due this week and Jedidi's Phd Multivariate Stats homework due on Friday. Let me end today's diary with my best friend's sugar candy post on Facebook.

Come on... I am on level 10, how can you reach level 189.......

CitiBike, A service or A marketing campaign?

(I keep the diary to highlight the interesting marketing issue in my life and try to improve my sucking English.)

CitiBike, from the first sight on street, I thought it was a free service sponsored by Citi to provide better public transportation in NYC. Interestingly, it is not~. Instead, a $95 annual fee will be charged.

Well, having been a student in Beijing for about 6 years as a whole, I do not see NYC as a great city for riding a bike. NYC looks more like Chongqing, (my hometown) which has narrow streets and no bicycle lane. But New Yorkers seem to like anything about sports to label their lifestyle. I still remember the shocking scene in Central Park when I had a Sunday jogging for the first time in NYC.  You are an alien if you are walking there! Everybody is running or bicycling.

Anyway, from my perspective, this business will end up as a marketing campaign for Citibank. With more than 600 stations and 3000 bikes running in the city, every rider is doing an lively advertisement for Citi. But I have to admit, it is a great idea! But not sure how much profit can be driven by this. In my mind, Citibank does not have a great service as Chase. Definitely, service matters the most in consumer bank business.

Will keep an eye on this bike service as a walking lover.


Related website:
http://citibikenyc.com/

Fashion Flash Deal- Inspired by MyHabit

(This was written before my trip to Brazil. And I stopped writing for 3 weeks.)

Yesterday, I received an interview invitation from MyHabit, an Amazon owned company doing fashion flash sales business. As a result, I checked my junk mail box and opened the link from MyHabit and browsed the website. I looked into See by Chloe and Hermes. Finally, bought one shoe from See by Chloe within 15 minutes. The unified payment system with Amazon makes everything just one click away.

Such flash deal websites are prevalent both in US and China. However, it turns out those so-called luxury positioned websites end up promoting other unknown brands, especially in China. I remember the company called VIP(唯品会) has a bloody lesson going on IPO in US. I am not criticizing the business model, but without a good channel of getting the products from the best brands, those Chinese born companies cannot succeed. MyHabit even has Hermes scarf deal at the price around 220 USD, which will never happen in China. I believe Hermes will never dilute its pricy image in Asia by cooperating with flash deal sites.

Another insight from the flash sales sites is that I have no interests in reviewing brands that I am not familiar. As a result, even though such websites may have a high subscription rate, the ability to transform to sales is limited as different people have different brand preferences. And for those non-first tier brands, I don’t think they can increase the exclusivity of their brand image by being presenting with those first tier brands. For example, when there is Jimmy Choo and See by Chloe, I will naturally ignore other brands that are also on sales. I only focus on those I have interests. For other brands that I do no know, it become so obvious that people will neglect them. My words to those brand managers are: be where you should be.

STARBUCKS, Your great CRM

Well, I spent the whole day researching on Customer Lifetime Value and Customer Relationship Management to prepare for an interview next week. At the end of the day, freaked out by numerous papers and books, I decided to walk around and check the mailbox downstairs.

Surpirse. I got my starbucks mail in a brown envelope with an old style.  I can not believe how great the starbucks marketing team has been doing! How can you succeed in every touch point and bring me such a huge emotional shock? In this internet era, you have such an integrated offline/online system that make my customer experience as convenient as it can be. Now I have my starbucks app in my phone, my physical member card and starbucks products with me.

Although data-driven marketing is going to rock the industry, I still keep my faith in the traditional way. I believe computers can not accomplish that job. Such intimacy can only be built on human being. So I never regret to be an Art student (even I am now a so-called science student).

Everyday, there are so many interesting things I should learn to become a better marketer.

Thank you Starbucks!

A Trip to White Plains

Never heard about White Plains, Harrison, or Rye, the three towns I have been today. Theses two days, I was busy meeting with potential employers and got the chance to experience the life out of Manhattan. And I realize that I will never survive or get used to the country style. From childhood, I stay in big cities and noisy places. Although I enjoy the peaceful scene, it will kill me after three days.

So the question comes, as a marketer, what are the difference between marketing in cities and towns? I have no idea how that works in US. In towns where everybody has to drive, the merchants seem to crowd in one zone and people will drive to get all the stuff. I guess, the promotion and display inside those big malls must be essential. And e-commerce should have a larger effect on those zone as a lot of brands do not need physically present at some places. Consumers shop through clicks. Such trend leverage the pressure of investing in real stores to building up one online store. And how to establish such a great brand experience online becomes the key.

When it comes to China, the huge difference between the two demographics exist still. However, due to the unbalanced development between cities and towns, the infrastructures are not well built in less developed area which hinders the surge of e-commerce. On one hand, people are not well educated to internet, online finance, and online shopping. On the other hand, transportation is not easy. As a result, the best to reach this market is still to be there.

There are too many things for me to learn as to understand the environments other than New York City. Well, the best way is to be there! Keep learning.~

Mother's Day is on the Way

Today I went to Macy's and saw this lovely poster. Suddenly, I realized Mother's day is coming. Every festival is an opportunity for marketers and thanks to their effort, we become more and more familiar with all kinds of festivals and enjoy more promotions.

The whole Macy's is in such an atmosphere. Moreover, Amazon is doing the same. Online stores and offline stores both are paying attention to the festivals which is a good reason for consumers to spend more in the name of festival. I don't know from when people start to associate festival with shopping. But such tradition indeed help retailers get sales performance.

From my personal experience, I feel American companies utilize every opportunity to do sales which makes me feel a little bit unattractive because I know next month, they will have another promotion for another reason. While in China, we do not see such frequent sales and merchants always focus on several limited festivals or promotional seasons. I will assume that the retailing competition in US is much more fierce than in China.

Go back to the poster "Every mom is a star." from Sunglass hut. It features a young lady with an elder lady. Mum can be as a star as her daughter. A sunglass can make you stylish and shine.

Anyway, although I did not buy one for my mom, I bought one for myself.
Thanks for the coming mother's day.

Iron Man 3 in China

Iron Man 3 in China (Click for the video)

OMG. This morning, I opened youku.com and clicked on the preview of Iron man 3 for China market. After that, I watched Tony's presence in the Chinese release party which was unbelievable great.

The event was held in Forbidden City. It is such a shock for me to see Iron Man in the Forbidden City and I can feel how ambitious the Disney & Marvel together with DMG entertainment are to win the China market. In order to capitalize on the Labor Day holiday, they even decided to change the release date from the same US release data to two-day's early.

Although US is still the major market, to be honest, I do not feel enough effort has been put into the film promotion. I only saw a Iron Man-Verizon ads on Youtube once, and some ads in the cinema. (But I have already booked the IMAX ticket. Anyway, I will go and watch it.)

Another interesting tactic is translating Iron Man into "铁哥们" which means a brotherhood relation. (but the official film name is still 钢铁侠) This strategy show the power of Iron Man, present a kind of responsibility and reliability. FYI, in the past months, a lot movies are focusing on the emotion of "屌丝" ( short, poor and ugly boy-- Dior's) which is a hot word in the whole society. For me, that focus is not fresh anymore. However, the marketing team of "American Dreams in China" (中国合伙人) which will be on release in Mid May, still utilized that old method and I even felt disgusting to watch the preview. Their marketing should better focus on the story itself and the castings -- they have got the most popular actors! Why they still make fun of the  Dior's emotion?

Thinking about watching film in US as a Chinese, I wanna talk more about the Chinese film in US. Although people criticized that Chinese films do not perform well in US, I would argue that they deserve it because they never do marketing! As a Chinese, on one hand, I can not watch those great film on the same date as in China, on the other hand, I do not know the cinema here like AMC has films from China. If any of the film can come to US fast and do marketing to the Chinese in US, the market is huge enough.

I think Americans in China can watch the films from their country even earlier than Americans. But I can not watch the hot Chinese films on time! I hope that day can come soon.

Coke's Personalized Package

Although this is not something happening recently, I just read about this campaign today which will be copied in the US market. I really love personalized product and merchants can easily capitalize on me. One month ago, when in Orlando, I specially look for key chain with my name (now it rests on my desk.. not use it). Apple also shows the emphasis by providing engraving service for customers.

Personalized products can have two side effects. On one hand, consumers may feel closer to the brand and increase purchase probability. One the other hand, the brand itself may be neglected as people focus their personalized feature.

For small brands, this strategy may be risky when lots of players are utilizing it as people will not feel the special. For big brands, I personally see great potential not only for Coke but also for PC manufacturer and some other mass product. and the cost can be compensated from the economy of scale and borrow resources from marketing expense.

But when it comes to China, difficulty occurs as it will be so weird to have my Chinese Last name on the bottle. And due to the diversified first names in China, you can not capture the full name of people. You may argue that we can try to produce the names used most often. However, those popular names always are considered as tacky, not-knowledgeable which may show that you come from a family without a great   education background. So what I think will work better may be just character instead of the full name. And a good association would be character with Chinese calligraphy for bottle water product and PC product.

Ice cream Micro Film Campaign in China

This blog is just some thoughts and thinking in my daily life. I want to record those interesting marketing campaigns in China and US.

Yesterday, I happened to click on this video ads on Youku, the Chinese YouTube. Micro film has been so popular in China after the introduction of micro blog which caters to the fast information processing of the new society. Naturally, brands are seeking opportunities to be involved in this new trend and marketers are making every effort to incorporate brand into the micro film in an indirect way.

Micro film normally has a length of 15 minutes. It has a simple story which is coherent with the brand message. Compared to commercial ads, the micro film is longer to have a more complete message and fans can have a better engagement with their idols. Compared to the real film, the micro film is short which people will not spend much time to watch and can get the message immediately and clearly. So in terms of consumer impact, micro film far more outweighs the traditional way.

Let's focus on this micro film for the ice cream brand "Ke Ai Duo" which means "more cute" or "Love more" in Chinese. The campaign positioned the ice cream to be a label of "Love" instead of just an ice cream that can cool you down in summer. Giving up the functionality of ice cream, the ads pay more attention to transform the product into an emotional accessory.

In the micro film, we do not see a direct mention on the ice cream. Instead, the ice cream is just a prop, a daily life snack, a source of surprise.

I highly recommend to watch the series of films. It is not only about the ice cream, but about love, especially, love for the youth. And maybe you will feel more in love if you watch it with this ice cream.

NYC Teen Moms Campaign

This blog is just some thoughts and thinking in my daily life. I want to record those interesting marketing campaigns in China and US.

These days, I was overwhelmed by these ads on the subway. For me, it is the first time to see such ads from a government to discourage being a teen mom . The approach is very interesting. Since abortion is such a sensitive topic in US that we can never directly encourage, the other creative way is to use the prevention focus incorporated into the ads and scare the potential teen mom away.

The four ads have different targets but the cohesive message.

1) Mom 

2) Dad

3) The development of the child

4) The financial burden from a child on the parents

The mom & dad are the decision making unit of the kid.

And the financial burden and the education of the children must be the two major concern of those teen moms. I believe this approach comes from a market research to understand the key focus of the parents.

And by presenting the innocent children's faces, the ads easily draw attention from the public. The voice of the kids is more appealing. 

This campaign reminds me of the PR campaign from Jiaduobao, a Chinese beverage company. After they lost the law suit towards Guangyao, they started a PR campaign, on one hand, to apologize for their unsuitable use of the brand name, on the other hand, to show their great effort in growing the brand.