Geomarketing and mapvertising juin 8, 2006
Posted by Postmaster in Innovation, Mobile, eMarketing.add a comment
eLab – Geomarketing and mapvertising.ppt
The goal of geomarketing is to deliver relevant content for a given geographical context. Geomarketing tools have been traditionally used to determine where consumers are or what type of consumers live in a specific area, but the popularity of online services such as Google Earth or MapQuest opened new fields of application.
Dubbed “mapvertising”, combinations of maps or satellite pictures with geographic/thematic search functions allow marketers to place relevant information, ads, promotions, etc.
Many services support interactive Yellow Pages-like advertising combined with maps: Google Local, Microsoft Live Local, Yahoo Local, national geoportals, etc. A user can search for a shop, a hotel or a gaz station around a given location and sponsored results usually appear before “organic” results. Yahoo! Local shows them as links next to the map and Google is experimenting with red pins for regular results and icons/blue pins for sponsored results. When a user clicks on a pin, a balloon shows up with name, address and phone number, as well as information such as customer reviews and a link to the business Web site. Google is planning to integrate video, chat and pay-per-call or click-to-call in these balloons. A potential customer could watch a video about the product and then directly contact the seller to get more information or to know if a given model is still available.
The potential for mapvertising development is huge, as (for now) Yellow Pages advertising market is bigger than the entire existing online search advertising market.
Marketers also develop new ways of using these tools:
- Fiat used Google Earth for an online treasure hunt promoting the Fiat Sedici.
- Adidas launched a quiz combining football trivia and location of players and teams (via Google Earth).
- HBO used Google Maps to create a tour to follow some of the Sopranos storylines.
- A company called RoofShout paints ads on rooftops in order for them to be viewed on satellite mapping sites (Google Earth, Windows Live Local).
- A German company called Artfield transforms fields into huge advertisements that you can see from planes or Google Earth.
Gamers and advertising juin 2, 2006
Posted by Postmaster in Innovation, eMarketing.add a comment
eLab – Gamers and advertising.ppt
The idea is to sell real-world advertising in electronic games, played on a computer, a console or online. Companies such as Massive Inc. (bought by Microsoft in May 2006) place billboards, posters, vehicles, pizza boxes, etc. within the game in order to increase gamers’ brand recognition. In virtual worlds such as Second Life, people create their own avatars (online alter ego), they build houses, they start virtual business (clothing, real estate, detective agencies, sex shops…), they organize social events, and so on. These virtual worlds are extremely interesting because they show people’s intimate dreams and fantasies, and because they have a huge potential for marketers.
Gamers account for 70% of the 18-34 year-old male demographic who spend more time gaming than watching TV. Furthermore Nielsen Interactive Entertainment has shown that gamers recall advertisements in games up to 35% of the time and a Harvard Business School study shows that over 90% of core gamers do not mind in-game advertising, as long as content is relevant to the game and enhances the gaming experience.
Some figures:
- gaming industry’s revenues are expected to break the $10 billion mark in 2006 (of which in $300 million from in-game advertising)
- 6 million paying subscribers for the online game World of Warcraft, 165’000 residents in the Second Life virtual world, 7 million avatars as visual representation in the Yahoo! community
- Second Life residents spend 5 million (real) dollars a month for virtual products and services; according to this Business Week article, more than 3'000 residents earn an average of $20'000 (the real green ones) a year; British branding firm Rivers Run Red is working with real-world companies to bring their products inside Second Life.
In Second Life it is already possible to find Coke, Corona, Evian, virtual McDonalds with free burgers, Nike shoes that make avatars run faster, etc. What is really interesting is that some of these brands or products have been brought in Second Life by residents and not by the companies themselves.
There are however anti commercial feelings coming from some gamers/residents, who do not want to have “3D spam” in their world. Some also express concern about privacy issues, as their activities in virtual worlds can be tracked. Others are skeptical about real-world marketing in Second Life, because they completely change their personality online and like to keep the two worlds separate. Finally, each virtual world or game has a different culture and public, which means that no single marketing approach is likely to be successful. As this Harvard Business Review article concludes, this is virtually unexplored marketing country.
Future of advertising? mai 5, 2006
Posted by Postmaster in Devices, Innovation, eMarketing.add a comment
Some MIT Advertising Lab's predictions:
"Consumers will be advertisers' most important medium."
Consumers even create their own ads on Current TV for Sony, L'Oréal, Toyota, and Converse, Ban, Mastercard, etc.
"Some advertising will be targeted not at humans but at their robotic assistants powered by artificial intelligence to make the most optimal purchase decisions."
We are not there yet, but Conversagent developed an Automated Service Agent (ASA) for Panasonic in order to market plasma TVs. Customers can type questions in natural language and AskPanasonic will help them make informed purchase decisions or get the most out of the products they purchases: it provides information on key features and benefits, major comparison points across various product offerings, best places to purchase, installation, etc.
Successful innovation mai 5, 2006
Posted by Postmaster in Collaborative Web, Innovation, Office of the Future.add a comment
eLab – Innovation framework.ppt
Innovation happens most efficiently and most effectively when people can follow a structured process in their pursuit of new solutions: there is a need for a structured platform as the basis of an environment that supports emergent innovation…
Read full article: “Turning Knowledge Workers into Innovation Creators“
