Key lessons for brands emerge from the most anticipated ad of the holiday season

On initial viewing the John Lewis’ £7m Xmas 2016 commercial  tells a quaint story of a girl whose trampoline becomes popular with the local wildlife community.

Set against a backing track of Randy Crawford’s ‘One Day I’ll Fly Away’. The commercial features a Boxer dog in a typical Middle-England home. The dog enviously stares out of a living room window as it watches two wild foxes, a badger, a squirrel and a hedgehog liberally jumping on a trampoline built by the household’s father for his daughter. 

Come Christmas morning Buster (the Boxer dog) pushes aside a surprised Bridget (the daughter) to merrily jump on trampoline all for itself.

Given a tumultuous political year, John Lewis’s customer director Craig Inglis said:  

“You could say 2016 has certainly been quite a year.  We…

Automated customer lifecycle marketing will be the future of email marketing

To look forward to the future of email marketing 2020 - a report I have contributed to from Litmus, I believe we need to look back to appreciate how little the support for marketers from email marketing platforms has evolved to deliver customised lifecycle messaging. Frankly, I have been amazed how few companies have adopted email as a strategic communications tool for personalised, behavioural based email across the years since I started training on email marketing in 2001.

Research on the adoption of email targeting still shows us a reality where the majority of email marketing involves either no segmentation at all or targeting of just 4 to 6 segments.

So, by mid 2017 I’d like…

Plan your use of new marketing technologies to future-proof your business

Digital Marketing is constantly playing catch up with the latest new tech trends. This means that the only way to get great results from digital marketing and execute a successful digital marketing strategy is to be aware of the latest technology and be actively innovating by putting cutting-edge techniques into practice. Not doing so is a sure fire way to fall behind the competition. The pace of technological change is not just relentless, it is constantly increasing. Where once it may have taken 10 years for a platform to achieve 50% adoption, now it may only be two or three- as you can see from the chart below. As these trends accelerate we could soon enter a time well new technologies decelerate so fast we measure the time for them to reach the masses in weeks and months rather than years and decades. …

A guide to the marketing job market for those looking to enter it

In a few months a new wave of fresh-faced college grads will start applying for their first real job. Some may have had internships or summer jobs in the past but this is a whole different thing. This is where your real career starts and it is something to be extremely excited about. I mean you have technically worked your entire life to get to this point. What is not so exciting is that millennials like those college grads are having a tough time in the job market. Unemployment is at a steady 5% for the recent past. Wages are down 14% in a short ten-year time span and income inequality is rising. And do not even get me started on the explosion of college debt. Plus the older generation think that we are literally the worst and should have…

Our interview with Rob Hammond, Head of SEO for publisher Trinity Mirror group

We asked the head of SEO for Trinty Mirror Group (the publisher behind major UK daily newspapers, such as The Mirror) about key SEO trends and how he see SEO changing in future.

What do you regard as the most significant SEO trends (and updates) that have impacted your current SEO strategy?

As a publisher, the growth of mobile is by far the most significant trend in search today. It has disrupted both the way that people search and the way that we produce content. Google talks about the importance of "micro moments" on mobile - reaching people precisely at the short moment they have an information need. I think it's a really helpful way to think of how search has evolved, and will continue to evolve as we grow accustomed…

2016 has been an exciting year in the world of search engine optimization and social media marketing - what are the main developments to inform your marketing?

The two fields of social media and search are constantly evolving, with plenty of changes that prompt shifts in consumer and marketer behavior. In order to succeed, you should adapt to these changes and employ the latest and most effective strategies. The following are 15 social media and search engine marketing trends in 2016 and what you should do to stay ahead of the curve:

1. Mobile optimization is a must.

Last year, mobile generated more traffic than desktop and laptop search. With virtually everyone using their smartphone or tablet to find information online, it goes without saying that business owners must cater to the needs of their mobile audience to generate leads and increase conversions. If your website still isn’t optimized for mobile, then you risk losing out…

Important lessons from the Pokémon GO phenomenon

Did you ever think you would be waiting for the lift in work, and be asked “Are there any Pokémon in reception?” Thanks to an April Fool’s prank gone viral, this may now be a common conversation among your colleagues. The newest global phenomenon Pokémon GO succeeds in blurring the lines between the physical and digital, in a way never before seen, by using a combination of Augmented Reality (AR) and GPS to bring wild Pokémon to your front door. Niantic Inc’s brainchild captured the nation’s attention way before its official release in the UK. Now that it is finally here, it has effectively created a new benchmark for enhanced user experience. Falling tentatively along the line of augmented reality and location based gaming, Pokémon GO uses an AR interface that overlays 3D digital…

How to go about transforming your business in a competitive market

We live in a time of digital Darwinism, an era when technology and its impact on business and society are constant with varying, but inevitable, degrees of both evolution and revolution. The effect of digital Darwinism is real and it’s enlivened though changes in people (your customers, employees and partners) and how markets are advancing as a result. To thrive in these times, many companies are investing in digital transformation to drive business evolution and modernization. In fact, all the big research firms and consultancies from Deloitte to Accenture to CapGemini and also my team at Altimeter Group are dedicating significant resources to study how companies are changing because of digital. For all of its exposure (or over exposure), digital transformation is relatively young and still developing with much still to understand. For example, in my previous research, I found that…

Are there any worthwhile Pokémon GO marketing applications for brands? Hell, Yes.

Like millions throughout the world I have been sucked into the hype surrounding what I now know as 'Puke-a-Mon Go'.  The web has been ‘paraflinched’ with articles lauding how the game targets ‘millennial’ aged zombies who can play Puke-a-Mon Go whilst walking recklessly across lanes of traffic or over cliffs.

In addition to brand sponsorship opportunities as described below, Puke-a-Mon Go boosts profitable in-game purchases. Not insignificant since Euromonitor International projects the 2016 global mobile in-game purchase market to grow some twenty per cent, reaching $29.8bn /£22.5bn..

Planet Earth – 7bn people – gotta catch ’em all

Puke-a-Mon Go quickly clocked up in excess of 30 million downloads.  At its peak, Candy Crush drew an audience of 20 million users. It even rivalled social network downloads.

…

Our look at the latest trends in digital media and technology and how they will impact marketing in 2016

At the start of each year, there is always a lot of interest in predictions for the year ahead and the latest marketing trends."What's Hot?" and "What's Next?" are always the most common questions when I give webinars and talks!

What are the latest digital marketing trends for 2017?

I originally wrote this post in early 2016 and, as you'll know, the digital marketing world moves fast, so in a new post, I have recommendations on key trends for 2017. Hopefully, you'll find different ideas there. This post looks at integration and the challenges of digital transformation, the new post looks at 5 different types of trends each business should consider and specific trends that should change your approach. Digital Marketing trends for 2017 : 8 megatrends affecting every business [si_guide_block id="43709" title="Download free resource – Managing…