There are many sensitive and serious issues that need marketing, but how to reach the audience in an effective way when most people do not want to talk about these issues? How to get their attention and furthermore, how to get the message across? It seems that especially with men, campaigns with beautiful women tend to work well. A male cancer awareness campaign in England promotes a sensitive issue in a very clever way
I think this way of advertising is a lot more effective than 'scare advertising' that has been used for some other serious issues, such as trying to get people to quit smoking by showing disturbing images or raising awareness of speeding with emotional videos of people dying. Sure, that way you get the message across but it makes you feel stressed and emotional whereas the cancer campaign brings up a serious issue with a humorous feel.
What is the best way to deal with serious and sensitive issues?
Marketing has a lot to do with colours, images, words and especially sounds. What many companies fail to take into account are the minorities that might not be able to hear the campaigns. The question is, how to engage with these consumers while engaging with the masses? One of the issues is that marketers often consider deaf people to be handicapped without understanding how they can be reached simultaneously while reaching people who do have the ability to hear. Volkswagen geniously incorporated both into their campaign of VW Tiguan:
Another example comes in the form of an unusual musician. Not often do we come across deaf musicians. However, Signmark - a deaf Finnish hip-hop artist - is the first deaf person ever to get a record deal with an international record label. He was performing in Melbourne earlier this year and I think he is an amazing example of someone creating something special in a way that cannot be understood by everyone, reaching far outside the square. For those who are curious
Singmark said it himself, music goes beyond listening - it is about more than what you can hear. He follows the beat by feeling the bass line and writes all the lyrics himself. The sign language performed in the videos is American sign language. Too many marketers are only concerned about pushing the message to the consumers nowadays. But as social media marketing is increasing and influencing buyer behaviour more and more, it is crucial to recognise that marketing goes beyond pushing the message. In today's environment it is more about listening, watching, observing, giving more power to the consumers and thinking outside the square. So many examples have proven this lately (one of the latest ones being Mt Buller, check out Sarah's blog).
Should marketers focus more on sign language? Can there be a new type of benefit gained from it, what do you think?
Coke has come up with another exciting and innovative campaign in Australia called 'share a Coke'. The aim is to share a virtual can of Coke with a friend who's name is on the list of 150 names and each name has a song on the Coca-Cola Australia Facebook page. The retail outlets will be selling Coke but it wont have Coke as the brand name but a random name from the list of 150 which have been created to cover a variety of names in different cultures based on the demographics of the population of Australia. To make it more exciting, they have little shopfronts where anyone can go and get their name labeled on the bottle. Coke is encouraging consumers to create an ad 'share a Coke with (your name)' and share it through social media in order to win some amazing prices. This is the first time in 125 years that Coke has changed the packaging!!! They have given consumers the chance to display their name on the Coke billboard in Kings Cross, Sydney by sending a text message (cost $0.30) with your name on it. This is the best know outdoor advertising sign in Australia and the campaign will run until the 30th of November 2011.
It's pretty courageous campaign. On their Facebook page it has created a lot of discussion already and it's interesting to see that Coke hasn't really kept up with responding to the posts. Some of the earlier ones had replies but then the replies from Coke kind of stopped... There are a lot questions from fans asking why their name is not in the list of 150 names and clearly it has created a lot of frustration among customers. The page also has many responses from satisfied customers who even post photos of a Coke bottle with their name on it.
I think this is an interesting campaign. I would love to find out how Coke decided to have only 150 names and whether or not they analysed the risks of not including everyone's names. At least they tried to solve the issue by giving everyone the chance to have their name labelled on the bottle. Clearly the list would've been way too long with every possible name on it but will this lead into unhappy customers? Another issue would be that how many people want to buy a Coke with someones name on it when you know that you didn't have a chance to have your name up on the shelves?
