Arun Sudhaman’s article How to fight a green backlash (PR Week, 1/5/09) made for interesting yet not entirely surprising reading, I must say. That 81 per cent of consumers indicated that they are paying more attention to cost over environmental credentials is entirely understandable as this god-awful recession bites ever-harder into household budgets. We’d be doing Green ‘Team GB’ a disservice if we painted ourselves as frugal spendthrifts all too willing to trade off long-term ecological sustainability for short term savings at the supermarket, however. The market outlook isn’t necessarily that vile, after all. At the risk of countering one survey with another, Branding consultancy Clear recently reported that 42 per cent of Britons are still spending money and feeling positive about their financial situation. This is surely cause for celebration, and evidences that there’s still market share out there to be had. Business rules of engagement have fundamentally changed these past months, obviously. The companies and brands which will not only survive but even prosper during the rest of 2009 and beyond will be those whose marcoms reassure consumers and whose products/services are perceived to add value – to their hip pockets, sense of wellbeing and the environment. Now is definitely not the time for clever eco-tricks or marketing gimmicks, in my opinion. Offer the punters something tangible and aspirational and believe me, as the CEO of a company who’s products stop over 1.3 billion items of unnecessary junk mail being sent each year, they can and will respond. At the risk of sounding like a heretic, maybe this is the recession we had to have to roll back the faux-Green marcoms tide once and for all. The public, environment and marketing practices will be all the better for it in the long run, I reckon.
no comments
Discovering that Twitter – Britain’s favourite digital channel du jour – has a retention rate of only 40 per cent really doesn’t come as much surprise. Maybe I’m getting a little old in the tooth, but Nielsen Online’s confirmation that even the short term appeal of reading such scintillating Tweets as ‘back from gym, swore at cat, now making cuppa’ points to the limited appeal of 140-character messaging. Even for ADD types.The marketing moral of this story? Gathering more and more followers on Twitter is one thing, but keeping them engaged and interested is a very different (and difficult) kettle of Tweets for brand managers. My company’s on Twitter and this week I’m setting up my own account as the new Chair of the DMA’s Data Council, so I’m not just barking from the sidelines here. You can be sure I’m giving my ‘sticky content’ fingers a very thorough licking. (Sorry – didn’t mean to gross you out.) In this post-content age, do the Twitter stats point to the medium no longer being the message, perhaps? Sure, Twitter’s now adding applications like Tweetdeck and TwitterGadget in a bid, I assume, to enhance the service’s retention rates. But at the risk of sounding like a cyber-canary tweeting in the digital coal mine, maybe we’d all do well to heed this warning: Online’s no ‘magic bullet’ for recession-bred client communication strategies.Must fly. Stephen Fry’s just Tweeted that he’s going to the loo. Can’t miss that now, can I?
1 comment(s)
Darling Alistair’s budget, swine flu and news that a stage musical based on the life of Jade Goody is possibly in the offing. What do these disparate events have in common? Nothing, actually – except that all are in no way welcome, if you ask me.I won’t add to the acres of column inches which accompanied last week’s budget, except to say that we should probably warn our children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren (should we have them), to get used to hearing the word ‘DEBT’ quite often for the next fifty years or so. And of course the less said about the late Primark Princess the better.Unlike ‘debt’, a word we’re not hearing too often enough currently is ‘responsible’ – a concept which has particular resonance for DM. Great to see President Obama calling for US banks to clean up their mailing practices, for example. As reported in past days on Brand Republic, that 200 million Americans each receive 10 to 15 credit card offers per week verges on the obscene, in terms of damage to both brand image and the environment.Times are obviously tough at present. Yet surely the brands which will not only survive but even prosper during this recession will be those who show a more respectful relationship with customers by not playing fast and loose with their information, mailing deceased persons and/or boring punters senseless with mismatched offers. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Welcome to DM’s Mission Imperative, as opposed to Mission Impossible.
Mark Roy
Blogging for:
Member since: 05 Jun 2008
Last login: 19 Nov 2009
Total Posts: 18
