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Author Archives: Gabby T
To The Real World & Beyond
Like so many college students, I am in the middle of the dreaded post-graduation job search. As one of my classmates put it, we are always marketing ourselves in one way or another. This is especially true during this trying time, when we’re all vying for attention. The perpetual question is, how do we set ourselves apart from the rest? In the marketing and advertising industry, there is a lot of wiggle room to answer this question.
Take Jannic Nielssen. As a Jamaican and Norway citizen, Nielssen studied at Millikin University in Illinois on a student visa. After graduation however, he had until May 1st, 2013 to find a job, or he had to leave the country. To better his chances of getting noticed among his competitors/fellow classmates, Nielssen built a creative CV called KickJannic.
KickJannic is an interactive online CV modeled after the crowdfunding site Kickstarter. In lieu of project information, Nielssen showcases his references, job experience, and past social media projects. And instead of asking visitors to pledge money to projects, the site asks visitors to pledge an internship, an email conversation, share the page with their social media networks, or the big kahuna—a job. Not only is the idea innovative in itself, but it sets Nielssen even farther than the rest because everyone who shares this site is an advocate of him and his ability. A lot of jobs these days are joined through networking and having someone to vouch for you from the inside. You can proclaim your merits all day long, but when others start to do so too, that’s when you know you’ve got something special. As you’d expect, the project was successful, landing Nielssen a job at Thrillist Media Group in New York City.
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| Pick me! |
But with all of the resumes, CVs, and LinkedIn profiles on the web, it’s hard to have a successful online project like this if you don’t have a strong online following; Nielssen has 850+ Twitter followers and over 9 million YouTube views. I’ll admit that this find was slightly terrifying—this is what I’m up against? It sparked some reflection on what I have to offer that not many others can. I may not have a huge Twitter following, and I’ll admit my Klout score is nothing to write home about—but I do have some real world agency experience under my belt, and this blog to show that I know what I’m doing. Nielssen may be off the market, but I’m still searching…
Sources:
http://www.psfk.com/2013/04/kickstarter-digital-resume.html
http://www.kickjannic.com
Image: http://newsletter.schoolbox.com/2011/05/05/attention-grabbers-keep-their-attention-even-in-may/
A Fire In Your Bottle, Rather Than Your Belly
Heineken is arguably one of the most popular and recognizable beer brands available. High school kids know it, college kids know it, parents know it, grandparents know it. A large part of its brand recognition is the green bottle. Heineken is not the only bottle to be housed in a green bottle (Stella Artois, Yuengling, Becks, and Dos Equis rock the green as well), but it certainly is the only brand that makes the bottle an integral part of its image. Which is great and all, but what about when the lights go down and all you see is a beer bottle silhouette?
Think about it: alcohol is standard fare in venues with dimmer lighting, e.g. bars and clubs. How can you show consumers what their fellow patrons are drinking if it’s too dark to see the bottle color, let alone the label? For Heineken, the answer was to make the bottle an active part of the experience.
During Milan’s Design Week in April, Heineken introduced Heineken Ignite, the first interactive beer bottle. The bottle is outfitted with lights, which can pulse and blink in response to sound and motion, thanks to micro sensors and wireless technology. Once you clink the bottle in salute with other drinks, the bottle ‘ignites’—from then on, the light pattern depends on what you’re doing. Sipping from the bottle causes the lights to pulse, while holding the beer on the dance floor leads to a light show that corresponds to the music. And when the bottle just sits on the bar, the lights shut down.
Just as in my last post, a small innovation completely changed the dynamic of this product. By adding these interactive lights, Heineken went from being an accessory to being part of the experience. So while Budweiser and Yuengling bottles are hidden in the crowd, Heineken bottles will be the center of attention—find them on the dance floor.
Sources:
PSFK article: http://www.psfk.com/2013/04/heineken-interactive-smart-bottle.html
Heineken Ignite Tumblr post: http://heinekenignite.tumblr.com/post/47457321990/heineken-ignite-background
All images from cited sources, except for black bottle (courtesy of ClipArt).
How Now Purple Cow
Earlier this semester, my IMC class read about entrepreneur and author Seth Godin’s ideology behind the Purple Cow. In short, a Purple Cow is Godin’s term for a truly remarkable product or company, one that would really shine amongst “a crowd of perfectly competent, even undeniably excellent cows.” (You can read more about Seth Godin’s Purple Cow here. LINK TO FC ARTICLE) In this day and age, it’s increasingly difficult to find a truly remarkable idea. It seems like all the good ideas have been taken, and any other ideas just aren’t feasible or sustainable. Well, ladies and gentlemen, I believe I have found a Purple Cow.
Goodwill and The Salvation Army Family Store, hospice stores and secondhand boutiques. We all know thrift stores, and after Macklemore’s hit song, “Thrift Shop,” these shops are more popular than ever. Despite the vast number of thrift stores, and the various organizations behind the shops, they all receive their wares in the same way—donations. The behind-the-scenes process is tired and worn out. But there really isn’t any other way to set up the donation system—right? Wrong! Brazilian advertising agency Loducca and the VillaLobos Mall in São Paulo came up with a Donation Purple Cow. Instead of the age-old standard donation process, the two collaborators established “A Loja Vazia,” or “The Empty Shop.”
In essence, A Loja Vazia is the same as any other thrift store. But here’s what it does differently:
- Rather than a dingy space, the store has a clean, minimalist feel to it. That vibe translates to the clothes: new, modern space = new, modern clothes—despite being donated.
- To encourage donations of gently used clothing, employees create outfits from the donations, and display them as fashion looks, much like we would see in the window of any clothing store.
- The space is filled with donations during the day, and emptied out at night. Every morning, it’s a new, clean space.
The store was opened to help stimulate a winter clothing drive, but the concept can be applied year-round. Already, malls from around the world are taking note of this Purple Cow, so the concept has been open sourced. It’s had a pretty big impact for such a small change. Change the look, change the game, reap the benefits.
Sources:
Purple Cow image: http://www.sethgodin.com/purple/
A Loja Vazia image: http://g1.globo.com/sao-paulo/noticia/2013/04/shopping-em-sp-cria-loja-para-receber-roupas-da-campanha-do-agasalho.html
A Loja Vazia article: http://www.fastcocreate.com/1682882/a-fashionable-store-where-the-clothes-are-your-own
Seth Godin’s Purple Cow Concept (Summary): http://www.fastcompany.com/46049/praise-purple-cow
Unexpected Brand Partners
For my Integrated Marketing Communications class, we’re working closely with nonprofit ABAN to come up with strategies to increase traffic and sales. As a new brand, ABAN is not strong enough to stand on it’s own; it’s a great company with an incredible purpose, but it’s not bringing in the profits necessary to sustain its goal. That said, one strategy is to form a co-branding partnership with an established company. My group and I have been investigating the best brands that ABAN should partner with. From our experience, the correlating brands have the most successful partnerships—it certainly is the popular route. But a friend brought the following ad to my attention:
My personal love for the Pillsbury Doughboy comes into play here, but I thought this commercial was awesome. (Now that I’ve established that, at times, random is good!) But more importantly, what the heck does Pillsbury have to do with GEICO? Aren’t brand partnerships supposed have some kind of relation? The more I thought about these questions, the more I realized that there are a ton of successful unexpected brand partnerships out there:
The more unexpected brand partnerships (let’s call them UBPs for convenience’s sake) I found, the more excited I got. Maybe it meant we could find a delightfully random pairing for our ABAN assignment! But then I remembered that in past classes, we talked about the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation, and how it’s co-branding strategy seems a bit scattered. I mean, breast cancer awareness and KFC? What the cluck? Definitely NOT a winning combination. Maybe successful UPBs only apply to non-cause-related marketing. Or regular marketing, as it were.
My train of thought here made its way back to the beginning of the semester, when my IMC class discussed the importance of emotional ties in cause-related marketing. Remember Holly Stewart? To refresh your memory, she’s a brand strategist who had some sharp insight on cause-related marketing. One to focus on is her focus on what she calls the “heartache to hope” factor. Non-profits need to present their missions in a way that inspires us as viewers to help. Thus, the breast cancer and KFC flop. Again, proving that successful UPBs work best with regular marketing, rather than cause-related marketing.
Looks like no random brand pairings for this assignment. Back to my research…
Sources:
GEICO commercial: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvFul32xKCs
KIA Hamsters image: http://www.skrhak.net/2011/08/26/kia-hamsters-roll-into-a-new-ad-campaign/
Philadelphia Angry Eagle: http://blog.pennlive.com/fanbox/2012/08/fan_box_eagles_edition_of_angr.html
PSY Pistachio: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2273096/Super-Bowl-2013-commercials-Dodge-Audi-battle-brands.html
Brad Pitt Chanel: http://www.selectism.com/2012/10/14/there-you-are-the-chanel-n5-film-starring-brad-pitt/
The Old Spice Conundrum
We’ve all been there: scrolling through YouTube, wasting time watching any and every video that happens to mildly interest us. And we all know those lovely ads that interrupt our YouTube viewings, featuring everything from movie trailers to skincare products. I came across one such ad featuring Old Spice. Check it out below:
While Old Spice does have its share of awesome commercials, this one had me more confused than anything. What was the point of this? It was too weird to be funny—was it being weird just for the sake of being weird? What was Old Spice trying to say about its products? What about its target consumers? I tried to get a frame of reference from its top competitors, AXE. The competing company is known for its sexually charged commercials, promoting the concept that its users will be irresistible to women. In comparison, Old Spice’s commercials can really only be described as hilariously weird. Does this mean Old Spice users are oddballs? Surely not! I figured I would find some answers from the mission statements of both companies, but was surprised to find that neither Old Spice nor AXE had individual statements. Rather, the brands were covered by the umbrella mission statements issued by their owners, Proctor & Gamble (P&G) and Unilever, respectively. P&G’s ‘purpose statement’ reads:
“We will provide branded products and services of superior quality and value that improve the lives of the world’s consumers, now and for generations to come. As a result, consumers will reward us with leadership sales, profit and value creation, allowing our people, our shareholders and the communities in which we live and work to prosper.” (Source)
Unilever’s consumer mission statement reads:
“Unilever is committed to providing branded products and services which consistently offer value in terns of price and quality, and which are safe for their intended use. Products and services will be accurately and properly labelled, advertised and communicated.” (Source)
Not exactly helpful here! The more digging I tried to do, the more frustrated I got. I showed my roommates the commercial and asked for their opinion, but they were just as confused as I was. More frustration. A day would pass, I’d bring it up again; lather, rinse, repeat. I could tell they were getting tired of me talking about it. And then it hit me: Old Spice was just trying to get people to talk about its brand. (Granted, I had done a lot more investigation than the average viewer.) AXE is an incredibly strong brand identity in the market; how could Old Spice compete? Enter the strange commercials. In retrospect, it was actually a very successful commercial because I had been thinking about it for days after. I went around showing it to my roommates to share my confusion—and the brand name. Old Spice has the only notable marketing campaign I’ve seen that found (and continues to find) major success from getting people to talk about the brand, not necessarily by promoting the product and its supposed aftereffects. Just goes to show, there is always another way of doing things!
Do you know of any other brands that found another way to success? Comment below!
Women Shop For A Good Cause; Men… Drink?
Generally, socially good companies seem to be largely supported by women. That’s not to say that the companies are feminine, just that its client base is mostly women. Bridget Brennan, a contributor to Forbes.com, had some interesting points in her online article, The Real Reason Women Shop More Than Men. Brennan states that, not only do women shop a lot more than men, but women tend to buy for everyone in her life: husband, kids, parents, in-laws, colleagues; the list goes on and on. Since women buy on behalf of so many other people, their purchasing decisions often carry more emotional weight. What’s more, women constantly evaluate how their purchases might impact the people they care about the most.
Because of the emotional and consequential aspects of women’s buying, it’s easy for companies like TOMS and Warby Parker to target their campaigns to that characteristic of women’s shopping.
Although women tend to shop more, men still have a significant amount of buying power. Like I said before, it’s not as though existing companies and their ads are inherently feminine. So how do men get in on the socially good action?
Women can help a cause by engaging in one of their favorite pastimes, it’s only fair that men can help out by engaging in theirs! Let’s think. The stereotypical male is into sports, video games, women, and drinking. Narrowing that down, almost every guy I know loves a good beer. And where do we socialize and drink? BARS. In comes Shebeen, a nonprofit bar in Melbourne, Australia.
The bar sells beers and wines from around the world, and profits from each drink sale go to a development project in that drink’s country. At the moment, the bar supports seven nonprofits, including an African AIDS group known as mothers2mothers and an Indian eyeglass charity called Vision Spring. So the more you drink, the more you give! Pretty awesome, huh?
And Shebeen isn’t the only bar with this business model. The Oregon Public House in Portland shares the same sentiments. Again, not necessarily a male-oriented business, but one that will appeal to men a lot more than shopping. So far, these two businesses have proven very successful. Shebeen’s founder, Simon Griffiths, estimates having sent $800,000 over the last three years. The main problem for the Australian bar is supply-based; the beers from Ethiopia, Kenya, and Laos in particular are flying off the shelves.
The nonprofit bar business has a lot of potential in any major city, where there are always people looking to place to meet, drink, and be merry—and still feel good after a big night out.
Sources:
http://www.fastcoexist.com/1681835/at-the-worlds-first-nonprofit-bar-its-good-to-drink-a-lot#1
http://www.news.com.au/entertainment/restaurants-bars/shebeen-in-melbourne-australias-first-non-for-profit-bar-giving-back-to-developing-world/story-fn93ypt9-1226593389866
http://www.shebeen.com.au
http://oregonpublichouse.com/pdx-supported-charities.php
Changes in the Playing Field: New Rules to Marketing from David Meerman Scott
David Meerman Scott gives his readers a new manual to marketing in his book, The New Rules of Marketing and PR. I say this manual is ‘new’ because the dynamics of marketing has significantly changed, especially with the emergence of the Web. The Web has made creating content and sharing said content as easy and efficient as ever. And what’s more—it’s FREE. Talk about a game changer. Here are a few of the old rules before the playing field changed, and the updates they have undergone:
Advertising needed to appeal to the masses.
A huge goal of advertising once upon a time was just to get your message out there and be seen by everyone. However, this is no longer the case. We’ve found that targeting a message to specific groups, such as the stay-at-home mom, or the independent college student. Each of these groups has explicit wants, needs, and nuances that are not shared with any other group. For example, an independent college student has no need for a gas efficient SUV, but a stay-at-home mom could really benefit from using such a vehicle. Thus, advertising firms now divide their target audience into these subgroups, and create advertising and content to match the interests and needs of these subgroups in order to bring in consumers.
Advertising was exclusively about selling products.
Obviously this will always be a priority for businesses, but now there are additional goals as well. One of these now prominent additional goals is to create and foster customer relationships. Nowadays companies want (and need!) to create interaction with their target audiences to build lasting customer relationships and brand loyalty. To do this, businesses need to know their goals, create content to help create avenues towards those goals, and let this content drive the action, aka attract consumers.
The only way buyers would learn about the press release’s content was if the media
wrote a story about it.
Here the change in playing field is a huge component. Businesses used to depend on the media to get their message out, and the most successful advertising executives were the ones who had connections with the reporters. But marketers and entrepreneurs no longer need lament if reporters don’t write about their content and press releases. The Web has so many free tools that businesses use to connect with their customers: Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest, SoundCloud, blogs, to name a few. One can even find tutorials on how to use certain programs and how to build a personalized website and such on the Web. In fact, some companies don’t even have a marketing team—one or two employees take on the marketing tasks that would normally take a team of 10+ people. A great example of this is charity:water’s Viktoria Harrison. Check out her story in the video below!
Taking The New Rules Out To Sea
Scott show cases a successful business that runs by these rules in his blog post, How Ocean Frontiers use Facebook to get dive clientsreturning year after year. Ocean Frontier’s managing director, Steve Broadbelt, constantly circulates pictures and videos on Ocean Frontier’s Facebook page, which fans are eager to share. But that only brought people back to the Facebook page, not the actual diving location in the Cayman Islands. So Broadbelt gammified the company’s diving options and created the Green Shorts Challenge. If a participant dives at all 55 diving sites the company has to offer, he/she wins the following: a pair of coveted, limited-edition green shorts (just like the Ocean Frontiers staff wear), a party to celebrate the achievement, a gold medal, a plaque embedded into the dock that leads to the boats, and special recognition on the Ocean Frontiers Facebook page—with photos documenting the achievement.
The celebration that follows has two-fold benefits: both the company AND the winner share the occasion on their Facebook pages, really building on that customer relationship that Scott wrote about in his book.
Marketing Star Player
A brand that ties together Scott’s rules brilliantly is Starbucks. The coffee contender has found success in typical social media accounts, Facebook and Twitter, but Starbucks continues the social media reach with its Starbucks app and My Starbucks Idea microsite. The app allows users to pay for purchases (by having the barista scan the barcode provided by the app), track and redeem rewards, reload Starbucks card balance, send eGifts to contacts, and more. But Starbucks really takes the cake with My Starbucks Idea.
The site allows customers to submit their ideas and thoughts about Starbucks to be voted on by fellow consumers. The site also has an “ideas In Action” feature, where users can find updates on the most voted ideas. This feature lets Starbucks consumers know that the company is seeing/hearing their ideas, and taking them into consideration—not just brushing them off. With these components, Starbucks is an idol for businesses in social media use, but as I’ve mentioned, the playing field is changing. I wonder how Starbucks will up the ante next!
The Lowdown on Marketing for NPOs
Many think marketing is a no-brainer; I was guilty of this thought before I started college. I mean you just make eye-catching advertisements and stick ‘em where people will see them, and people will automatically do what you want them to, right? WRONG. So, so wrong. There are so many factors to consider when writing a marketing plan, both internal and external. For example, some internal factors are what kind of organization you are marketing, and what their mission is. In keeping with the theme of my Integrated Marketing Communications class, we will look at some marketing tips or “morals” to keep in mind when working with nonprofit organizations, as detailed by David Williamson, Managing Director of the consulting firm Bernuth & Williamson, in his essay, Marketing & Communications in Nonprofit Organizations.
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| Source: http://lafetraconsulting.com/blog/ |
The first of these morals relates to my very misconstrued first impression of marketing: Show marketing some respect. Marketing is assumed to be extremely easy, but many don’t see all of the work and planning that goes into each marketing strategy. And because of this, when a company’s budget needs to be cut, marketing is one of the first areas to be trimmed—especially in nonprofits, when the leaders believe the money would be better spent elsewhere. But this is really just a misunderstanding of what marketing can really do for an organization. Without marketing, how would the public know about the organization in the first place? If the cause behind the NPO doesn’t catch the public’s eye, the only audience it will attract are those directly affected by the cause, but those are not the people they should be trying to reach! They need to be expanding their audience, so that more people will know, learn to care, and take action—that is what marketing can do for an NPO.
But for marketing to effectively work, it needs to match your brand and your brand’s mission. As Williamson puts it, “Your brand defines your organizations to the outside world. Take the initiative and define yourself before one of your enemies tries to define you.” I think a great example of this is Walmart: in recent years, Walmart faced sexual discrimination charges, and while such charges would be substantially damaging, the company worked to counter the negative publicity. Before any of Walmart’s competitors could take this story and plaster it anywhere and anywhere possible in attempts to blacklist Walmart, the company actively worked to reverse the damage. The most prominent effort, I would say, is their Empowering Women Together campaign. Through this campaign, Walmart calls its customers to help the company support women-owned businesses by buying their wares, which Walmart has made widely available through their website.
While the underlying intentions of this campaign are questionable, there is no doubt that Walmart took the initiative and solidly defined themselves as not only a proponent of equal employment opportunity, but as an advocate of female business owners. Rather than letting the competition or the public taint their image, Walmart did what it could to make the company seem better than ever.
The third moral comes from another misconception, one about the audience. It is widely believed that the bigger the target audience, the better. This could not be more wrong! What appeals to a 45 year old housewife does not appeal to a 35 year old bachelor, what interests an 18 year old athlete does not interest a 25 year old business professional, 15 year old boys do not share the same priorities as 15 year old girls, etc. The bigger your target audience is, the more difficult it is to create and deliver a captivating advertisement. By finding a precise audience to appeal to, you won’t have to waste resources on trying get the attention of people who won’t listen.
Let’s recap:
1. Respect marketing.
2. Your brand defines your organization to the world—be the one who sets that definition.
3. Find and focus on the audience that matters most to your mission; not the necessarily the other way around.
There are plenty of other tips to help with your marketing success, but you can never go wrong by implementing these three!
Purposeful Marketing with ABAN
A really cool part of my Integrated Marketing Communications class is the service learning aspect. Our community partner is A Ban Against Neglect (ABAN), a non-profit organization in Accra, Ghana with a two-fold mission: “empower street girls while cleaning up the environment.”
While studying abroad in Ghana, founders Callie and Becca encountered some social issues that really shook their bones: plastic pollution of satchet bags, and young girls, many of which are mothers, and babies sleeping in the streets amongst the pollution. Satchet bags are small plastic bags that hold the only clean drinking water for the community. The counter both of these problems, Callie and Becca developed ABAN and the ABAN school, which provides the street girls with “shelter, seamstress training, Business, English, Math and Life Skills Education, and the means to save, matching their individual savings up on graduation”. ABAN finances these endeavors through grants, but they hope to become sustainable from the products they sell, which are made by the street girls. This is where the satchet bags come into play: the girls make bags and small pouches out of the bags and cover them with handmade batik fabric to make the final for-sale products.
Holly Stewart, a renowned brand strategist, came to talk to the class last week, and shared with us her insights regarding purposeful marketing and social cause. Her definition of a non-profit really resonated—a brand selling a cause, goodwill, and products to benefit their mission. The non-profit must sell an experience that induces emotions in order to be successful, the seed for the necessary heartache to hope factor. Holly emphasized that heartstrings need to really be pulled in order to make an impact, but not so much so that the viewer is depressed into inactivity. The best example of an emotional ad gone wrong is SPCA’s Sarah McLachlan commercial. While initially successful, viewers tend to ignore the commercial or change the channel when it comes on because it is too emotional. Thus, the message is lost and the commercial has become useless. How do you think one of ABAN’s videos compares?
Based on my research and Holly’s shared insights, I have noticed some useful trends that can be applied to my class’s work with ABAN:
1. Sell the Story and Appreciate the Customer
This really ties into Holly’s heartache to hope factor. Successful non-profit organizations present their mission in a way that inspires us to help. They also show us how we can help their cause, and how any help we put in goes a long way for them. These organizations are still businesses and must maintain good business practices, which means they must make the customer feel wanted and needed while working towards their goal.
2. Co-Branding is NOT Always Successful
A number of non-profits have found success in tying their name to a popular brand, such as Sephora and Operation Smile and The Wounded Warrior Project and Under Armour. A large part of the success with these co-branding projects is that they relate. If a cause ties itself to a brand that completely unrelates to its mission, it really calls into question the integrity of the brand. Susan G. Komen’s “pink washing” is the perfect example of co-branding gone wrong.
3. Communication is key!
Communication with the customer is such a huge aspect of the success in non-profits. The communication can’t stop with conveying the mission- it needs to continue to where the help is going, how much impact said help is having on the cause, etc. I am one of many who are cautious of what organizations I donate to, solely because I have no idea where my money is going.
I will definitely be remembering these points for our strategy plan for ABAN. But these are not the only trends that will lead to a successful strategy plan. What trends have you found?
Brand Image Takes A Turn… For The Worse?
In my senior seminar class, we analyzed a Robin Hood case study in which Robin Hood faces the dilemma of straying from the Merrymen motto, “Take from the rich and give to the poor.” Instead, he considers setting a fixed tax that applies to everyone. The class discussed reasons as to why or why not it would be a good idea, and I felt that it was a bad idea, in a trust point of view. If you think about it, when companies flip their values 180 degrees, the public calls the company’s integrity into question. Can the company really be trusted?
So this made me think of how a few brands these days are trying to change their image. Granted, this isn’t as drastic as their values, but it is a change nonetheless. One example is Volkswagon. In the past, VW always focused on the quality of its cars, proclaiming the geniusness of German engineering. But recently, the company has turned to a more emotional tactic to market its product. While heartwarming, it really threw me off- if I had not waited until the end of the commercial, I would have never guessed that Volkswagon was behind the commercial.
Another example is Chanel, whose newest ad features Brad Pitt. The marketers of Chanel veered away from the glamor aspect of the perfume, and toned down the overall image of the commercial to minimal elegance. While this does maintain somewhat true to the Chanel brand, it definitely strayed from the traditional luxe and glamor generated by past Chanel faces Nicole Kidman, Keira Knightley, and Blake Lively. Again, I would have never guessed Chanel was behind this! Where did the rich colors go?!
The most recent example is pulled from the commercials that aired during the Super Bowl this year. Skechers released a commercial that pushed the benefits of the show, saying it would make one run faster. It kept a light tone, which was a tell-tale sign that the commercial didn’t belong to UnderArmour or Nike, but the speed and quality orientation of the clip was decidedly different.
Despite learning in our Business Ethics class that we should keep to our values, brands across the map are changing theirs. Or is it that they are just changing how they portray them? What do you think: do these changes make you question how you feel about these brands?