The Power of Facebook

Anybody who had any doubt of the power of marketing on Facebook has had an object lesson this week from a couple from Essex. Jon and Tracy Morter successfully campaigned using only a single medium, gathering nearly half a million fans on their Facebook page. Taking a song originally released 17 years ago and beating the 4-month long marketing campaign driven single from Joe McElderry shows the real power of reaching people. Taken in conjunction with the fact that this campaign was only one week long, and had no budget at all the results are truly remarkable.

This may now mark a true shift in UK businesses perceptions about online and social media. As we’ve already said in other blogs, more and more companies are using social media to reach and understand their customers. This is what research has always been designed to do, but the advantage of social media is that it enables the possibility of personalised two-way feedback between a brand and their customers. 2010 will be a year that using social media will become a mainstream business strategy, with more brands realising the huge potential that platforms such as Facebook and Twitter bring.

It’s Cyber Monday

For those who didn’t already know it today, Monday 7th December, is set to be the biggest day for online shopping this year. Obviously many of you won’t actually read about this until Tuesday since you will be busy elsewhere in the internet!

Apparently we are likely to spend around £350m, according to IMRG. Interestingly our own research into Christmas shopping showed exactly what we will be both researching on the internet and actually buying this year.

The most popular product categories for ‘researching’ on the internet will remain CDs/DVDs/music (52% of those researching online will look at this category), ahead of books/stationery/cards (43%) and toys and games (40%). However electrical items (43%) appear set to be much more popular for internet research this year compared to our results from last year.

Items that will actually be ‘purchased’ on the internet are again headed by small entertainment goods such as CD/s and DVDs (54% of those who will buy on line will buy within this category), ahead of books/stationery/cards (43%) and toys and games. Internet clothes shopping appears to have fallen back vs. last year, whilst electrical good have held their own. The former may represent the best opportunities for off-line retailers, however we also know that this is the most popular product category for holding back on in anticipation of sales!

Virtual Malls revisited?

I know we’ve seen these before, but the latest version seems more interesting; although having said that despite the media coverage it doesn’t actually appear to be live just yet – maybe a case of the PR release going out a little too soon.

Going under the name NearLondon, a new web site will offer a virtual shopping trip around central London, apparently consisting of Oxford Street, Bond Street and Regent Street in a slimmed down SecondLife style.

It appears that a number of major retailers have signed up to NearLondon already, which will allow browsing ahead of any real visits to London, as well as actual purchases to be made online. Interestingly, there is some talk in the media of replacing the traiditonal shop layout with more interesting interfaces: catwalks for fashion and stadiums for sports.

The rise and rise of online shopping

Yet again we see a rise in online shopping; this time for clothes. This puts traditional shopping centres in a difficult situation: not only do shopping centres have to compete with online retailers with much lower overheads, but there is the added complication over whether to link from their websites to their retailers’ websites, potentially driving sales traffic away from their centre.

Most centres now do link away from their site. The rationale being that customers will use the internet to find an item they think they like, but come in to the store to look at it in more detail and maybe try it on and buy it. Clothing was seen as good example of this, but as we can see, growth in this particular area has been above all expectations.

From our own recent research, we know that 30% of Christmas Shopping will be done on the Internet this year, with a quarter of shoppers doing more shopping online this year than last.

Christmas spend set to fall by 15%

Despite signs that the recession is beginning to pass, research we conducted in the past week paints a worrying picture for the high street.  The run up to Christmas is the busiest time of the year for most stores; indeed many rely on this period to make any profit in the year. Results from our survey show, however, that the average spend on non-food goods this Christmas is set to decline by 15%.   As many as a third of all shoppers also believe that they will be spending less this Christmas than last year, with a little more than half believing that their total non-food spend will be unchanged. Unsurprisingly, the main reason given to explain this is that they are ‘cutting back’ in the face of the recession.

In further worrying news for the high street, shoppers project that almost 30% of their non-food shopping will be done online this Xmas, with as many as a quarter of respondents doing more so this year than in 2008.  We also found that around one in 10 shoppers say that they are ‘definitely holding back’ their purchases this year in anticipation of pre-Christmas sales.  This shows a rise compared to our previous research. A further third believe that they will hold back ’somewhat’ this year – as a group these shoppers make up more than twice the proportion of previous years.  Clothing remains the most popular category to hold back on in anticipation of sales, but toys and games are estimated to be well up on previous Xmas research, as are electrical items.

Shopping centres as brands

A couple of thoughts for today.  Firstly, can a shopping centre ever be more than the name of a large building?  And if not, what can be done about an existing name should there ever be a need to change? 

In the best traditions of yes, no and maybe I’ll go with ‘maybe’ in the first instance. Yes, there are shopping centre brands but they are quite a rare species.  Much of this is down to sheer scale but its not just about scale it’s also about personality, and daring to be different, but quite frankly again there are only a few centres that have the capacity to be different.  In many cases, however, I would suggest that a shopping centre brand is no more than a trading name, a badge on the front of a large building within which are housed a number of true brands in the form of shops and restaurants.  Whilst the desire to create a brand is not of itself wrong, the reality is that few centres will ever mature into ‘brands’.   Rather an arrogant statement BUT it is not about just an aspirational, clever or connected name.  It is about an experience which starts with a name and becomes synonymous with everything you do – the type of shops, the service style, the people you employ, the way you treat your suppliers and indeed your tenants. It is about every little thing and all the little but extremely clever, thoughtful touches that create a unique and memorable event.

The other issue that is related to this is the one of naming. One of the challenges for shopping centres is that once a particular centre is named it is quite difficult to re-educate shoppers into the use of the new name.  We’ve recently conducted research amongst users of a large urban shopping mall whose name was changed more than 5 years ago.  Even amongst users correct name recall was only around 80%, and that is amongst shoppers using the scheme on average once a week. 

Recent coverage was given to the decision by Wyevale Garden centres to revert to their ‘local’ brand names, on the basis that people have more of an affinity for a local centre.  I feel confident that the new Chief Exec conducted more research than just taking his Mother’s view before making such a big decision. Having driven past my local Wyevale sorry Brighton Garden Centre, the new signage did look very nice and I am sure a signage company (local I hope) is mighty relieved of the order in such hard times!  Whilst I can see the appeal of this “house of brands” approach in terms of playing the local card, which from all the research we have conducted we wholeheartedly support, people would far rather go local than a chain as long as you get better quality in terms of service and products. I wonder about the practicalities of marketing so many different locations, a single national brand would certainly give more bangs for the buck.  Or is the marketing being decentralised and are the Garden Centre Managers becoming marketing as well as Gardening experts?  

I am really excited about visiting my local Brighton Garden Centre to experience the new proposition and become more emotionally connected with all the changes they have implemented to make it feel independent/local beyond the pristine signage.  I will let you know what I find…

Economic downturn impacts health food retailer

When I worked in health products it was certainly quite a conservative business.  Own label vitamins were still in their infancy and even in Holland & Barrett there were restrictions on the strength of different supplements.  The raciest thing we marketed under the Healthcrafts brand was a supplement called Z.E.S.T.  It was packaged in a black box with a grey top and was a vitamin based concoction including ginseng, hardly a forerunner of blue pills!

But I was some surprised, even amused by the news that Holland & Barrett are to diversify their product range into adult toys, or to be more specific ‘intimate massagers’.  The rationale in this case seems to be that this is as a result of the current recession.  In the words of a spokesperson for the retailer “People are spending more time at home during these difficult economic times.”

However the most positive way to respond to an economic downturn is to take risks, do something different when the tendency is to be more conservative, drop prices, stop spending and put your head in the sand. Why not try something new? It certainly gets people’s attention and changes perceptions of even your regular customers.  Even better, a shopper who never visits Holland and Barrett might be more tempted to see what else they have to offer and become a loyal customer. 

We know from our own research with shoppers that they are creatures of habit and visit the same shops day in day out without trying alternatives unless they have a significant huge reason to do so.

Could the actions of Holland & Barrett be enough to attract new customers and convert them to regulars buying their full range AND increase loyalty and frequency of visits of existing customers?

Why track party size?

This is question we are often asked, “can you explain to me why you track the size of shopper parties amongst shopping centre visitors and also why you ask spend questions of the shopper party not the individual level?”

Well, we know on average that around 60% of shopper parties are solus shoppers, in other words for these people the individual spend and the party spend is one and the same, but let us consider the other shopper groups. Let us take the example of a shopper group. Mum, dad and the ‘little un’ who is only 4 years old. Let us consider £30 spent by them on their shopping trip. The £30 was spent by the mother, but the actual cash came from the father’s bank account via cash point machine and wallet. The £30 was actually spent on clothing and toys for their daughter.

So is this spend by the mother the father or the child? Is this actually £10 per head or is it more meaningful to keep this at the £30 per party level?

Party size remains a key statistic for shopping centre managers. A fall in average party size combined with constant footfall can indicate a rise in the number of shopper parties and hence it is vital to measure spend at the party size too.

Focus Groups Briefing

The brief is the cornerstone of all research. It need not be a lengthy piece of work but there should be a written document to ensure that everyone is clear what they are expecting from the work. Whilst not comprehensive, the following ‘headlines’ should be considered, and like this post proves the brief really can be short and sweet!

1) Purpose of the research: Why is the research being considered in the first place? What hypothese do you have about your business? What questions are you hoping to get answered? Think here about who exactly will want to get access to the information provides and ultimate give consideration to just how the results are to be used in the organisation?

2) Objectives: Map out the specific topics that need to be covered, in short you need to be clear on just what it is you want to find out?

3) Target group profiles: Ideally as tightly defined as possible, with some thought to where these people might be found. One challenge we are sometimes faced with is that of wanting to find non-users. Non-users of a new or a niche brand may be very easy to find, and as such they may represent a potentially large segment to target. However we’re sometime asked by shopping centres to find non-users of their scheme. Bearing in mind that the centre itself may have existed for many years, and may potentially dominate the town centre the chance of finding non-users i.e. never users may be the equivalent of looking the needle in the haystack so perhaps you can focus on lapsed users – those that have been but have made a decision not to return – an incredible source of rich material on the areas your business may need to focus. Especially in these challenging times where sales are all important – every person in a focus group (no matter what they look or sound like) that has an opinion based on their experience has a valid and important insight into the performance of your brand and may be more helpful than you think.

4) Required feedback: How do you want or need the information, for instance this can be a ‘book of the film’ approach, more of a presentation format, an executive summary report, the full blow by blow transcript of the focus group or a video of the groups from start to end

5) Timing: Not forgetting of course to be clear just when feedback is actually needed!

So there it is. Not too hard after all.

Just two words does it

It is not often that a phone call to a call centre puts a smile on my face but the last call to my bank did just that. With my home PC being particularly slow the other evening and wanting to make a payment in case I forget it, I picked up the phone to my bank. I have to admit I do have a soft spot for first direct and am more than happy to recommend them to any one who wants to listen. Anyway having gone through security I was quite taken a-back when the lady on the other end of the phone wished me ‘happy birthday’. Strangely enough I found this actually rather nice and even made a point of telling my wife. I must say at this point that it was indeed my birthday!

So what are the lessons here?

Well for one thing I felt that I was being treated as a real person, not just a person on the end of the phone. Secondly it reinforced all that ‘good feelings’ I get from a brand I trust, and thirdly I’m sharing that with you and that has to be good for first direct.

Cost of two words negligible, value to the brand immense. I suppose the question is what can we all be doing in our own respective businesses to create the holy grail of complete and utter brand loyalty?