Marketing Managers: 3 Ways to Leverage Big Data into Big Success

For marketing managers, it is becoming increasingly imperative to combine big data with an integrated marketing communications strategy in order to increase brand awareness, relevance, and growth. As an undergraduate student in the Integrated Marketing Communications program at Northwestern University, I have found two articles that highlight two brands that have executed highly successful marketing campaigns through the creative use of data. 

The article, “Big Data as a Marketing Strategy – Spotify’s 2016 Campaign,” by Lior Schneider at Overdrive Interactive analyzes the huge success of Spotify’s data-driven campaign, “Thanks, 2016. It’s been weird.” In this campaign, Spotify shared funny, interesting, and culturally relevant insights from user data. For example, a billboard in London read, “Dear 3,749 people who streamed ‘It’s the End of the World as We Know It’ the day of the Brexit vote, hang in there.” The brand took an integrated marketing communications approach by presenting these insights across different forms of media, from billboards to sponsored advertising on social media. All in all, this campaign strengthened and raised awareness of the Spotify brand, as it generated high levels of engagement and conversation from Spotify’s users and target audience. 

Source: http://crossing-technologies.com/big-data-analytics/

Further, the article, “Dove’s New Billboards Criticize the Way the Media Discusses Female Athletes’ Looks,” by Adweek's Kristina Monlios explains how Dove created a machine-learning algorithm to detect sexist quotes about female athletes in real-time in order to increase Dove’s brand relevance and to re-establish Dove as a thought leader in conversations about beauty and body. Similar to Spotify, Dove took an integrated marketing communications approach by not only sharing insights on its social media channels, but also by live streaming negative commentary regarding female athletes’ appearances on digital billboards. The campaign encouraged people to join the conversation, challenge sexist rhetoric, tweet at media outlets, and use the #MyBeautyMySay hashtag. The campaign was widely successful, as it turned #MyBeautyMySay into a globally trending movement that reached and engaged millions of people. 

Based on my review of these two articles, as well as my relevant studies in the Integrated Marketing Communications program, here are three action items to consider when creating your next marketing campaign: 

1. Become Data-Driven –  Do not restrict big data to just behind the scenes; instead, create data-driven campaigns to share valuable insights with consumers. 

2. Be Relevant – Create campaigns with insights that are culturally relevant and interesting to your target audience.  

3. Always Engage – Create a campaign that does more than just market your brand or product; create a campaign that engages, surprises, or inspires your audience, whether that be through humor, social change, or really any method of your own choosing. 

As you prepare your next marketing campaign, think about how these three action items can leverage engagement and growth for your brand. 

  

Justine Ivanov is an undergraduate student currently pursuing a Communication Studies major, an Economics minor, and an Integrated Marketing Communications certificate at Northwestern University. 

She hopes to work in marketing upon graduating in June 2019. 

To contact Justine, you can find her on LinkedIn or Twitter. 

CMOs: 3 Tips on Improving Your Brand’s Social Media Strategy

As a CMO, you know that mastering your brand’s presence on social media is like trying to solve a Rubik’s Cube. Despite your confusion, you’re still responsible for building and revising a social strategy daily. As an IMC grad student and marketing professional, I’m fascinated with how a brand is supposed to know their place within the constantly evolving world of social. I’ve come across two articles that provide basic yet important principles for guiding your brand to a strong social strategy. In the article Marketing Tips for Awkward Brands in a Social Media Era” by James Jorner, he gave the reader strong but simple suggestions such as "Infuse Humor” or “Be Interactive." Published in Adweek, the article took a macro-level approach in offering easy-to-remember tips to build or maintain a strategy around. Jorner also provided a relevant analogy on how a brand should view their place within the social media landscape: being at a party, and figuring out who to mingle with. You can approach the guests however you’d like, just make sure you don’t pass up the opportunity.

Source: AOK Marketing

In the article “See How These Brands Pranked Their Fans on April Fools’ Day” by Mary Sollosi, she allowed the social media content of 22 unique brands to speak for itself. After reviewing Entertainment Weekly's published pranks, two points became clear: each brand created their social content well before April Fools’ Day, and they followed the tips from the article posted above (i.e. Infuse Humor, Create Interesting Content). The concept of a brand injecting itself into the day’s news is called Newsjacking, and it can be an extremely relevant way to use social media. Each brand took a constructive approach to their holiday-themed content, and made sure their material was fun and inoffensive.

Based on the articles’ insight, and my own professional experiences, I’ve listed three action items to help your brand get started (or maintain) a social media strategy:

• Don’t Abandon Social - No matter what your brand does, maintaining a social presence within platform/s you feel comfortable with is key for long-term success.

• Be More Entertaining – Your brand’s content should preserve a balance between promotion and engaging followers with fun/interactive materials.

• Think Newsjacking – Producing social content directly related to real-time news can be a great way for your brand to stand out.

Remember CMOs: social media trends will evolve, and new platforms will emerge. But utilizing these three tips will always be helpful to begin your strategy.

Ryan McDonough is currently a Master of Science Candidate in Integrated Marketing Communications program at Medill-Northwestern University. He is also a Chicago marketing professional with 10 years’ experience in brand communication and marketing strategy. He is graduating in June 2017, and can be reached via email (rmcdonough32@gmail.com) or LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryan-mcdonough-60a10235/) 

Brand Strategists: 3 effective ways to keep consumers engaged in the age of technology

As a Brand Strategist in the age of technology, it is becoming increasingly imperative to ensure that new developments in technology don’t alienate your consumers from your brand. As a graduate student of Integrated Marketing Communications at Northwestern Medill interested in brand-consumer relationships, I have found two articles on technological trends and their implications that you will find interesting.

In the article Hourglass brands and blurred reality: The top 5 trends for marketers in 2017 published on Campaign US, Mark Curtis, Fjord’s Chief Client Officer, writes about the predominant undercurrents identified in the Fjord trends 2017 report. In this article, Mark Curtis describes the influence that emergent technologies will have on marketing, customers, and society, and the shifts marketers need to make to form new types of relationships with their customers. He also stresses the importance of staying in touch with technologies and practices, and devising flexible strategies to reach, engage, and captivate audiences.

Image source: Hakisa

In the article Why the Most Important Word in 2017 Will Be ‘Experience’ published on Adweek, David Shing, Digital Prophet at AOL, writes about why ‘Experience’ will be more important than ‘Disruption’ and how going forward brands will find their space for differentiation in experience. In this article, David Shing details his predictions for the future of marketing trends around experience. He explains how brands can leverage technological innovations like IoT, VR, smart watches etc. to create better experiences and how these new technologies can make old experiences better. David Shing also stresses that while consumers will enjoy new and unique experiences, they will punish bad experiences.

Based on my review of these two articles and relevant studies I have done in the Northwestern Medill Integrated Marketing Communication program, here are 3 effective ways to keep your consumer engaged this year:

• ENRICH ROUTINE EXPERIENCES - Take the fuss out of daily decision making and make things more convenient for the consumer. Turn tools into gadgets to simplify and enhance routine tasks.
• CREATE STORY-MAKING MOMENTS - Hand over control of your platform and let consumers shape your brand story. Don’t tell consumers what your brand can do, let them experience it for themselves.
• DEMONSTRATE EMPATHY - Respect consumers’ need for space and privacy, and strengthen your relationship with the consumer by taking a step back and earning their trust.

The next time you want to enrich consumer experiences using technology, think about these three ways to keep your consumers engaged.

About The Author: Hello, I’m Rujuta Gandhi. I am currently pursuing a Master’s degree in Integrated Marketing Communications specializing in Brand Strategy at Medill at Northwestern University and will graduate in 2017. I am an experienced advertising professional committed to changing consumer behavior with actionable insights. You can follow me on Twitter @TheLittleGandhi or find me on LinkedIn.