Celebrities Marketing: Brands Take Hit in China

I found this video on Adage today of Michael Phelps apologizing to his Chinese fans on his recent inappropriate behavior. What is interesting and ironic is the eye catchy remark of the video "Mazada to Phelps: You Apologize to China Right Now!" As it turns out, this video is distributed by Mazada after it announced earlier this week that it will stick by deal with Michael Phelps, its million dollar record-breaking spoke person, despite his bong incident.

Apparently Michael Phelps is not alone, A-Roid, Chris Brown all joined the celebrity bad behavior list just in the last few weeks. Brands that spent millions on these celebrity endorsements found their images damaged. When Mazada stick with the deal, Kellogg and Wrigley quickly dropped Phelps and Brown and suspend all future contract. These celebrity missteps may blow over in the U.S, where we like to see our heroes to make mistake and we tend to forget and forgive, consumers outside of U.S. are far more less forgiving of poor behavior. In Michael Phelps case, the Chinese have a much more conservative view on drug use than here in the United States, brands that supports Phelps in the Olympics such as Omega and Visa suffered serious damage on their image in China.

So the question is then if the money spend on celebrities marketing is really helping the brand especially at a time when consumer is cutting back on spending ever more than before. I think the answer to that will not be just a simple yes or no. There are examples of successful celebrity endorsement, such as Nike with Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods. These endorsements work because the image of the celebrities and the brand fits. People wear Air Jordans because they think they'll help them play basketball just a little bit like Mike. People use Nike golf gear to hit that ball a little bit straighter and farther, a little more like Tiger does. To sum up, brands will continue to rely on celebrities in marketing because we continue to be fascinate by them. To minimize the risk of involved with celebrity marketing, company need to choose the celebrity who actually fits the brand and also consider how his or her action will be perceived not just in the U.S. but around the world.

What Does the Box Say to You?

As Americans, we live in a world of freedom, freedom of choice, but are we? When it comes to shopping? Are we really free in making choice, choosing what we buy, what we wear, and what we give? I'm afraid we are not. We all have experience when we judge or being judged by the clothes we wear and the things we buy, and what's more? It is not really the things or clothes themselves we are being judged on because they could essentially all be identical, but the brands of these things we own identify us. There are strong messages associated with different brands, messages that speak to people about you. These messages are universal and recognized globally with the increasing number of global brands. Because of the power of these brands that speak to who we are, we are bound by them in making our selections on how we want to be perceived.

Two weekends ago, I celebrated my birthday and I received a gift in mail from a good friend. As I was opening the package, I immediately recognized the brown box of Coach.
Without even open the box, I was already thrilled and happy about getting this gift. It was a scarf in the box and of course I really like it. But what is more important, it was from Coach. That brown box speaks so much to the gift receiver that it doesn’t really matter what is inside, I would have love it. So this really makes me think whether we as the consumers are shopping for things or for brands? Rapaille in his book explored the culture code in America for shopping and luxury. What he discovered, I believe, explains why the Americans value more of the packaging box of a brand than the actual product itself. If shopping to Americans is reconnecting with life and a social experience, it makes sense why we spend on the packaging box of some brands. Because it is the brown and green boxes signify our social status and speak to people of who we are.

We are in a culture where luxury is good and appraised. Marketers add luxury to any product they sell because the idea of luxury sells in America as luxury proves our rank in American society. What’s more on our culture code of luxury than designing the package of the luxury goods we purchase as a symbol of luxury as well. Brands like Tiffany and Coach both use their package box to convey this message and had success in building equity into their boxes and hence increasing the value of their brands.

Ethic Buying Behavior

As a member of the Asian pacific subculture group, i wonder what some of our buying behaviors are as a group. From the ecological perspective, the fact that most of Asians have higher education leads to our needs to be well informed before making buying decisions. We tend to base our decisions heavily on the qualities of the products and we believe the numbers and facts would never lie. Internet is usually our best tools when it comes to research for the specs and details of the product and compare and contrast with similar products. We are not impulsive buyers and we do enough homework and research before we buy. Therefore, we prefer products with readily available information on the web and we only trust objective information and numbers to testify the quality of the product.

From the social structure point of view, Asians value virtues such as humbleness and prudence. We don't chase after luxury and we save most of what we make. The buying decisions for the most part still fall on the man of the family. With that in mind, most of Asian family consume on a need basis and buy products for their functionality. When the quality standard is met, we are considerably price sensitive and respond well to promotions as thrifty is a quality we celebrate. We are also a culture that respects the elder, specially elders in our own family. Giving gifts to our parents or grandparents is a tradition when we visit them, and we are not thrifty at buying gifts to show our respect for the elders. Food is also highly praised in this culture, and Asians view eating well as a sign of wealth and living an abundant life. Overall, this ethnic subculture has strong spending power with their higher social status as a result of higher education. However, they are not over spenders and most of time frugal on spending but they are willing to spend the big bucks on things reflect their values.

Lastly, I would think for any marketers to target their product to a particular ethnicity audience, they need to really understand the culture and what this subculture values or takes offense on. Sometimes good intention will not come through as a positive message. Dealing with ethnic subcultures can be very risky if not handle well, it could damage the image of the brand remarkably and hard to change the brand image in this group of people once that image builds in. A thorough study and using advice from member of the subculture itself would be an appropriate approach to reach out to these valuable ethnic consumer groups.

Marketing at Airports

Airport is one of the favorite channels for marketers to reach their consumers. It is no doubt that airport can be a great place for marketing with a captive audience, waiting, bored, with nothing to do except eat terrible overpriced food.

I traveled to Atlanta over the past weekend, and as I was passing by the airports, I paid extra attention on the advertisements and marketing that dominate every space in the airports. Many companies invest heavily on them, and they are at every corner of the airport in the form of banners, wraps, spectaculars. They can be on the wall, as the overhead of escalators, in the rail system, inside the gate bridges, and even on the luggage carts. However, are all these supposedly 'eye catchy' billboard type of advertisements really getting the results they intend? From my own experiences and my observation, the answer is 'no'. Most travelers probably don't even remember the very last advertisements they walked by a minute ago. The airports are so overloaded with these ads that they become as irrelevant as background color to the travelers. I did not see a single traveler who stops to look at these banners or spectaculars through my observations.

There are a few of these banners do catch my attention as they are more sensorial using color and design, such as the beach view on Chase's widescreen spectaculars that really brings the beach experience, however, majority of the ads are not so appealing and have no connection with the viewer whatsoever. If the new way to reach people is to create an experience with a powerful message, as Gobe says in his book, the marketers apparently miss the great opportunities airports offer in achieving that. Rather than pushing undifferentiated or unappealing ads at travelers with no interest of how they will use this information, marketers should seek for more interactive ways to reach the travelers that can actually create an emotional bond between the travelers and the brand.

One successful concept of experiential marketing is introduced by Zurich Land at Heathrow and Frankfurt airports in Europe. Passengers traveling through these airports benefit from the interactive stands as part of ZurichHelpPoint campaign, which provide passengers with customized advice, services and practical solutions to a range of travel-related queries. Among the many services provided are internet access, phone and laptop charging facilities, maps, and advice on restaurants and hotels. The general feedback is very positive from the traveler and the message of the campaign 'Zurich delivers when it matters' is well received.

"Jazzup" Guitar Hero

This past weekend, I played Guitar Hero on Wii for the first time at a friend’s place. I’ve never played guitar in my life, but the way the game is designed, it was really easy to pick up and play. The instructions are easy to follow and the notes are simple enough to hit on the plastic model guitar, the real challenge lies on the difficulty of the note charts of the song. I had a blast playing it. The song selection is excellent, a nice mix of classic rock, metal, punk and hard rock. It was so fun to feel the pleasure of success from my efforts, and was such a simulated experience to feel like being on the stage. I got sucked into the game pretty quick and the next thing I knew it was already three hours into the game.

So why do some experiences like this can trigger such passionate responses in people. I think is because there are only a relative few of us who can, in the real world, reach pro status. But through these video games, you can actually live your fantasy and dreams with no worries of failing. To give the player the immerse experience of being a rock star on the stage, in the case of Guitar Hero, and tap into that inner rock star that so many of us have wanted to be at some point in our lives is what give the company wild success. It works because it gives players a taste of an experience that they want in a way that lets them to dream and dream big–even for a few foolish minutes–that they can be gifted, talented, a rocker on the stage, and the kind of person who gets their face on the cover of Rolling Stone.

Guitar Hero is not only a great piece of entertainment, but also an effective marketing vehicle. The latest versions of Guitar Hero are music marketing masterpieces with product placements by everything from bands to music publications and beyond. On a basic level, there is embedded advertising for products from leading manufacturers like Gibson, Mackie and JBL. These product and logo placements are both passive (a logo on the stage monitor) or active (play a Les Paul guitar). Beyond the direct music tie-ins are lifestyle placements from brands like Axe and Pontiac, and music publications like Guitar Player and Kerrang. The entire music industry is “jazz up” because of Guitar Hero. Many who play Guitar Hero are inspired to take up real guitars. How did they achieve all these? By creating a culture and life style all of its own.

Coca Cola's Super Bowl Ad

I really like both Coca Cola's animated ads during the Super Bowl. One shows how people in today's busy world use technology to stay virtually linked, creating a lack of real connection. People in the ad turn into avatar of their personality as they use their technology gadgets, only when two people in a diner unexpectedly share a Coca-Cola, the human connection breaks down digital walls and creates a moment of happiness. The "stranger no more" song in the background does a nice job summarizing the concept. The other one is the animation of a picnic. The ad features a man dozing off in a park, unaware of a plot among the park's smaller inhabitants to unite in an effort to run off with his Coca-Cola. The ending is a cheerful one with the bugs steal away the Coke and enjoy the happy drink. Both these two ads give the warm fuzzy feeling of happiness which is what Coke's new "Open Happiness" campaign wants to delivery.

Since my archive is also on Coca Cola, I've been researching the brand before I saw these two ads. The brand is so prestige and successful not just because of the great taste of coke, but more credit to its marketing. Coke is know for their emotion advertising. These two new ads for the "Open Happiness" campaign are the extension of the animation theme of the "Happy Factory" in its last "The Coke Side of Life" campaign. In the "Happy Factory" commercial, viewers are taken on a tour into the fantasy world inside a Coke vending machine coke machine and meet the dedicated and happy workers who make every bottle of Coke enjoyable. The tour is not only an visual experience, but a joint adventure for all our senses plus some imagination. This commercial was a great success with lots of positive feedback, and was the momentum behind the "Heist" and "Avatar".


Both these two Coca-Cola commercials play on its image as a symbol of comfort and optimism, and in a tough economy we are in now, the stakes are ever higher for Coke to stay on the brighter side. These two super bowl ads deliver exactly the happy and joyful side of Coke. I remember feeling very positive and cheerful after watching these two commercial, and this positive reinforcement connects the brand and the consumers effectively. Coke really seems to be taking this positive sentiment to heart.

Facebook Connect: The Next Great App War

I found this to be a great post on the new redesigned Facebook Connect. Many of us are very familiar with Facebook and use it to connect and share with people in our life. You might also remember the numerous silly applications you got invited to by your friends in the old Facebook (many of them still exist). I used to found them very annoying and useless that the only functions they have are to take my time and waste it like nothing. The redesigned Facebook regulated these apps which made me happy; however, I didn't know much about the new Facebook Connect until I read this post.

Interesting enough, the idea of Facebook Connect is brilliant in that it recognizes the potential of the already established social network platform and expands it into also social media. The success of recent CNN's Inauguration Facebook integration proves the powerfulness of the Facebook Connect and made Facebook apps more important than ever. Now the new breed of Facebook apps through Facebook Connect is designed to facilitate connections. They are invisible to the end users and only pop up until the installation is needed for the function they requested to work. In a sense, it's what they help the users do, not what they do themselves.

How can the marketers make Facebook Connect to work for themselves? To understand the new online marketing trend would be the first step. Make consumers part of the marketing process and use tools such as Facebook Connect that sparks connectivity is more likely to generate successful media and publicity. It's how the companies can make things work with the social networks platform puts them at a head start in the new online marketing era.