Casino place des bornes cdiscount dans ces hypermarchés

Casino vient d’annoncer qu’il allait placer des bornes de commandes « cdiscount dans ces hypermarchés ». L’objectif ? Faire le lien entre le canal de distribution Internet, en forte progression, et l’hypermarché, endroit de trafic, mais où les produits électro ménagers sont à la peine en terme de chiffre d’affaires. Ainsi stratégiquement Casino se prépare à diminuer la surface des rayons électro ménagers, tout en proposant plus de choix au consommateur.

L’idée est bien sûr intéressante, et pour être honnête, cela fait au moins 6 ans où j’ai la vision de magasins d’electroménagers sous forme de show room, sans stock ni caisse, où les vendeurs feraient vraiment du conseil et de la demonstration et où les consommateurs commanderaient sur des bornes Internet.

Mais là où j’ai un doute sur la stratégie, c’est sur le fait que cdiscount est tout de même loin du positionnement de Casino. En effet, cdiscount est un vrai discounter en ligne, et je ne pense pas que la qualité de service soit encore en mesure de remplacer celle d’un magasin Casino. De plus, la marque « cdiscount » est loin de la marque Casino, et une convergence des deux seraient souhaitables.

Maintenant, cdiscount reste tout de même une référence dans le ecommerce en France, et Casino a ainsi un avantage sur Carrefour par exemple, qui est toujours en recherche d’un partenaire pour gérer son ecommerce en Europe.

Le groupe va proposer des borne dédiée pour commander sur Cdiscount, avec l'assistance de "quelqu'un qui pourra réconforter et rassurer le client" ainsi que lui expliquer "comment opérer sur Internet". Le groupe Casino compte ainsi amener les clients de ses magasins sur son site Internet de ventes d'électroniques et de culture, Cdiscount. Le PDG du groupe, Jean-Charles Naouri, explique que "certains clients n'aiment pas passer par Internet, notamment les clients âgés. Ils sont méfiants, notamment du paiement en ligne, à tort ou à raison".Le groupe Casino compte ainsi proposer une offre "plus large qu'en hypermarché" avec l'exemple de la dizaine de machines à laver en hypermarché Géant contre 150 références sur Cdiscount. "Nous pensons qu'il y a quelques catégories" de produits "comme le gros électroménager sur lesquels sur une longue période il y aura un glissement au détriment des hypermarchés" prévoit le PDG.Cette stratégie s'inscrit en plus de la volonté de Casino de proposer un service de "drive". Casino, à l'instar d'autres enseignes, va proposer de passer commande sur le site Internet du supermarché et d'aller la chercher en magasin avec sa voiture.

Carrefour lance Promo Libre (2)

Je souhaiterai revenir sur le lancement de « Promo Libre » par Carrefour. En effet, le système est novateur en terme de programme de fidélisation mais aussi de gestion de la relation client.

En effet, Promo Libre permet de choisir ses promotions, et ainsi, Carrefour reprend sa liberté en terme de promotions. En effet, la plupart du temps, les distributeurs proposent aux consommateurs des mécaniques promotionnelles proposées par les industriels et ainsi, ces choix ne sont pas forcément basé sur l’intérêt du client, mais plutôt sur les opportunités offertes par les fournisseurs. Maintenant, ce système est pervers, mais permettaient de proposer des offres promotionnelles très fortes, tels le « 1 acheté = 1 gratuit », qui est impossible à réaliser sans un fournisseur. Ainsi, il va être difficile de piloter la marge.

La deuxième chose qui est fascinante, c’est que ce programme soit reprise par l’ensemble des formats de la marque Carrefour : Carrefour hypermarché, Carrefour market, Carrefour City et Carrefour Contact. En effet, chaque format a ses spécificités, ses largeurs de gammes, et être capable de faire une campagne promotionnelle cross format est très intéressant. C’est certainement un exemple des synergies que Carrefour attend de ces enseignes, et la raison pour laquelle il a décidé de changer les noms des différentes enseignes.

Maintenant, il sera intéressant de voir les prochaines offres issues de « Promo Libre », pour identifier l’utilisation qui en est faite.

How To Turn Twitter Profitable ?

The latest news from Twitter is that they are working on a business model to actually earn some money pretty soon. I believe the crisis and the questions about its economic potential have driven its CEOs to speed their revenues search.
Twitter has announced they are working on a way to advertising on Twitter search pages.

A story at the Wall Street Journal's AllThingsD says that "Ads will be tied to Twitter searches, in the same way that Google's original ads were. So a search for, say, "laptop," may generate an ad for Dell. The ads will only show up in search results, which means users who don't search for something won't see them in their regular Twitterstreams.
"The ads will use the Twitter format – 140 or fewer characters – and will be distributed via the third-party software and services that use Twitter's API. The services will have the option of displaying the ads, and Twitter will share revenue with those that do.
"Twitter will work with ad agencies and buyers to seed the program, but plans on moving to a self-serve model like Google's, down the road."
That will be a dramatic change from the present advertising model, where small text adverts appear on the top right of Twitter users' home page. It is not known how much those garner in revenue - but given the low public profile of many of the advertisers there, it's unlikely to be as much as the search deals that Twitter signed on the same day last October with Google and Microsoft's Bing.
It is not clear how soon the new service would launch, though AllThingsD suggests it could happen "in the first half of the year".

Now, what the article shows out, is that Twitter’s audience is still to low to actually secure profitability. But this is a godd step toward a healthy business model. I have always questioned most of web 2.0 business plans for two reasons:
They’ve loved to show off they are not working at all on a business model. They have settled their future on the number of people which would use their service.
They’ve considered brands and advertisers as milk cows. But the advertising market is hurt deeply by the crisis, as marketing budget is most of the time the first one to be cut. Also, they might focus on main web 2.0 platforms like Facebook and Youtube, but they won’t multiply their investments on the web.

But actually, the fact Twitter is working on those projects is a good sign for the company: they start to shape the way the service will look like in the future, in a shape that will be healthy and strong.

Chevrolet Spark: Une mauvaise illustration du Glocal

L'art d'adapter une marque à un marché internationale est difficile. Souvent, plus la marque est puissante, plus il est dur a lui faire épouser les aspérités et spécificités des cultures où elle s'installe. Ainsi, Mc Donald ou Coca Cola sont de très bons exemples car partout où ils sont installés, ils incarnent les valeurs fortes des marques US, tout en trouvant ces mêmes aspérités pour accrocher le consommateur.

Certaines sociétés internationales, ayant pour ambition d'optimiser et de rationaliser leurs budgets marketing et leur image, décident de créer une unique campagne de publicité qu'ils déclinent partout dans le monde. C'est le cas de Gilette, qui le fait très bien, notamment grâce à des sports internationales connus de tous.

Mais là, depuis quelques semaines, nous pouvons voir sur nos écrans cette publicité pour la Spark de Chevrolet. Rien n'est compréhensible. On se trouve dans une situation où est mis en dérision l'absurdité du nom des produits des kings du fast food américain. Très loin des préoccupation et du mode de vie des français. De plus, le slogan "tout commence par une spark", ne veut rien dire. En anglais, Spark est une étincelle, et la "tout commence par une étincelle", cela a plus de sens. Pour moi, cette publicité copiée collée des Etats Unis certainement pour des raisons budgétaires, et un très mauvais exemple du "glocal", une communication internationale reposant sur des adaptations aux marchés locaux.

Et vous, qu'en pensez vous?

Barnes and Noble : 10% Of Sales Coming From The Internet

Internet is becoming more and more strategic for traditional retailers. Hence, during the crisis we are experiencing, most of the sales growth is coming from online activities, as ecommerce is still growing while retails are impacted by the economical downturn.

Barnes and Noble’s Internet activities count now for 10% of the whole sales. Online sales have been boosted by the release of its electronic book “NOOk”, a Kindel-like handset. It seems that this electronic book seems to be a promising market as great companies are launching their versions.

This article simply shows out once more that Internet is a very important tool for traditional retailers which are seeking for growth, in mature and highly competed markets.

Les cafetiers à la recherche d'un nouveau modèle économique

Les cafetiers français sont depuis des années, de manière régulière, touchée par la baisse de consommation du tabac. Celle-ci est générée par la hausse du prix du tabac, mais aussi par les campagnes anti tabac qui se multiplient. Ainsi, beaucoup d'entre eux ont du mal à survivre.

Mais le réel problème est que les cafetiers doivent faire face à une remise en question complète de leur modèle économique. Ainsi, il est évidemment impossible d'attendre un inversement de tendance, qui permettrait une croissance de leurs revenus issus du tabac. Il faut donc trouver un moyen de garder ses points de vente rentable, surtout que pour la plupart d'entre eux ils ont la chance de posséder des emplacements privilégiés en centre ville.

Moi je crois beaucoup au modèle "Starbucks". Un concept fort, qui véhicule plus un style de vie, une atmosphère, que la simple consommation d'un produit, qui plus est basique. Seulement, afin de pouvoir faire de la sorte, il faut que la profession se regroupe autour de corporation, pourquoi pas un système de centrale d'achat ou de commerce associé, de type Leclerc, afin de pouvoir d'une part améliorer leurs conditions d'achat, mais aussi proposer une force marketing pour pouvoir se différencier sur un marché plus que mature.

Maintenant, les cafés ont une longue tradition encrée dans la culture française, et je pense qu'il serait facile de mettre en valeur l'aspect social de ces lieux, afin de pouvoir recommencer à générer du traffic.

Maintenant, il est sûr que les buralistes et cafetiers se doivent d'accepter ces profonds changements, au risque de disparaître définitivement.

Carrefour lance Promolibre: Ou bien le début du marketing one to one dans la grande distribution

Carrefour est source de nombreuses innovations dans le domaine de la grande distribution. Il y a plusieurs dizaines d'années, il avait lancé les produits libres, soit le premier concept de marque de distributeur. Le concept a tellement bien marché que maintenant les MDD représentent dans la plupart des familles de produit un leader de categorie. Aujourd'hui, Carrefour souhaite innové avec son programme de fidélité en lançant PromoLibre.

Il faut bien reconnaitre que dans le domaine de la grande distribution les programmes de fidélisation sont souvent bien triste et peu différenciant. En effet, n'importe qui peut en posséder une, les offres et les média de communication ne sont absoluments pas personnalisés. Il suffit simplement de s'inscrire à une Newsletter de Carrefour ou de Auchan, pour voir qu'on nous propose une pression très forte et peu d'effort de segmentation.

Maintenant, le système de Carrefour semble simple: On laisse au consommateur choisir certains produits, ceux qu'il utilise le plus, afin de lui proposer des promotions sur ceux ci.

le consommateur choisit les produits qu’il souhaite acheter en promotion en fonction de ses envies, de ses besoins ou de son budget. A partir du 23 février, l’enseigne proposera ainsi chaque semaine aux porteurs de la carte Carrefour - qui sont actuellement 17 millions - de choisir, en alimentaire, leurs trois produits préférés, qu’il s’agisse de marques nationales ou de marques distributeurs, le moins cher leur étant remboursé. S’ils en achètent six, l’enseigne leur remboursera les deux produits les moins chers. En non-alimentaire, la règle diffèrera légèrement : les clients pourront choisir librement dans le rayon "PromoLibre" le produit qu’ils souhaitent acheter et obtenir une réduction de 20%.

Maintenant, le challenge est de rentre cette communication simple pour le consommateur, et aussi de le mettre en place de manière opérationnelle. Je pense que ce système de "PromoLibre" est effectivement une avancée majeur et un système différenciant pour la carte de fidélité Carrefour.

Et vous, qu'en pensez-vous?

Next Generation Kart's to boost retailer's CRM programs

Most retailer's CRM programs are based on membership and loyalty reward programs. These little plastic cards allow retailers to geyt data from customers and hence have a more efficient commercial offer, to boost sales.

But there are three different timings when these programs trigger the purchase decision making of customers:
- Prior to have entered the outlet: thanks to advertising on brochures, mailings, internet websites, emails and more and more often cell phones.
- During grocery shopping thanks to end of the aisle display, special offer stoppers, and so on.
- After the sales process. At the cashier coupons are given based on the previous purchase to push some cross selling or upselling techniques. If someone gets a
Coffee machine, you could give them coupons for the appropriate coffee caps.

But soon, we'll have smart karts that will boost even more those programs. Auchan already proposes a self scanning method: they give you at the entrance of the store a scanner and let you scan your products along your shopping. Then you don't go through a cashier, but to a specific desk where you pay.

Thanks to these new scanner, it provides data during your shopping process. And hence instead of proposing a cross selling or an upsell when you are done with shopping, you could actually gets it during the process, in a way more efficient manner.

Now this technique must be taken into consideration with caution. Indeed, the shopping experience shouldn't be packed up with a lot of those type of interference, because that would result in an horrible threshold. But I believe this would allow retailer to be more reactive and interactive with their promotion techniques.

What do you think about it? Do you already have examples about these systems?
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Facebook As A Leading Traffic Generator

Social media has now become a main stream, and hence we can now see how it has changed the way we consume the Internet. On a business prospective, I have found this article which is pretty interesting. According to the results of a Compete.com research, Facebook.com has generated more visits on main websites like AOL or Yahoo than Google.

This shows that indeed Facebook has a huge potential in terms of generating leads on the web. The only think is that I believe Facebook hasn’t been able to unlish this fantastic potential. As I have spoken with several announcers on Facebook, they seem kind of deceived by their results. I believe a lot of people are trying to figure out how to make the best out of their social media investment. Also, I believe it is difficult to control the traffic generation on Facebook. Most of the traffic generated is done by word of mouth of users, and hence, it is pretty difficult to have a clear view of Facebook campaign’s efficiency.

Now we certainly understand why Google is so eager to make of Google Buzz a success. That would also be very interesting to see how Twitter can become an important way to generate visits on a website. I believe that these new media are changing the way we use the Internet, and hence, it will change the way we advertise on the web.

Facebook now counts for 12.4% of the traffic generation for the movie related websites, 2nd in the category, and samewise, 12.7% for the video websites.

Referral Marketing: Character and Competency More Important Than Customer Experience

This is a very interesting article I found on the blog of Evan Misner, founder of the BNI, and expert in referral marketing.

just finished a survey of more than 12,000 businesspeople from all around the world on the subject of networking. One of the questions we asked the respondents was “Which of the following is most important to you when referring business to others?” The choices were:

• Knowing a person’s character.
• Knowing a person’s level of competency.
• Using the person’s product or service myself.
• Knowing a person’s success.

Not surprisingly, “knowing a person’s character” ranked No. 1 in the survey. Interestingly, “using the product or service myself” ranked third out of the four choices! This is important to understand when building your own personal network of people referring you because it shows that people are definitely looking at more than just the quality of your products and services when they think about referring you to other people.
Often, we think that the best source of referrals must be our clients, customers or patients. Although they definitely are a good source, they are not our only source. In fact, based on this survey, personally using and experiencing another person’s product or services before referring business to that person was not as important to the respondents as other factors.
What this means to you is–you need to build your credibility with people who know you (whether they’ve used your business or not). If people trust your character and competency, they are likely to refer you regardless of whether they’ve actually used your products or services.

Now if you are considering a customer relationship management point of view, this study is very interesting. Indeed, maybe your best lead of prospects might not be your actual clients, but some people that have had a good impression after a commercial, or visiting your website. And you must take advantage of this feeling, this state of mood, to drive the buzz or so. This might be actually the reason why so many companies are interested by buzz marketing campaigns, to spread the word of mouth.

That also shows that branding, and especially the story that you tell people about your brand, is a valuable asset, that might trigger people to become your customers.

What do you think about it?

Google Changing into a Multinational Company

Google as A Trailblazer
Google has evolved a lot this past decade. Since it has started its business, revolutionizing the way information is consumed and boosting the Internet use, Google has always been a trailblazers in most the activities it set.

Even though it came into a populated market, like for instance the email account market, it changed users behaviour, by empowering emails account with extensive memory capacity, a great search engine, and an easy way to connect with other services, like instant messaging.

But now the Internet market is becoming mature, especially in the 1.0 aspect, where Google is a leader, with its search engine. Now, in order to seek for fast growth, they must go on some unknown market, and most of the time, already battle competition.

Google Expanding In New Markets
This is what happened with Google Android, where the smartphone market was already existing with major actors like Nokia, Blackberry, and that has already experienced a major change with the arrival of the Iphone.

Now I have seen that Google is launching Google buzz. The idea is to create a new Google experience, that will be empowered by instant information, usable whenever needed, especially thanks to mobile devices. The main idea is to counterattack Facebook and Twitter, which main interest is based on instant and close information.

But to be honest with you, I am not sure once more Google buzz will encounter a great success. Here are the main reasons why:
Google is entering a market far from its core know how. Google knows how to search and display information, that is for sure. But Google has never been a social platform.
Google is entering a fast growing market, yes, but it is facing companies that are already well settled on it, especially Facebook. What really matters in this market, is to get the critical mass that will allow the company to become a leader. The more people are using your social service, the more interesting it is becoming. And hence, if you are late, it is difficult to get back. And Google is late for sure.

Using traditional advertising for those kind of services has never shown any kind of success. Hence, Microsoft have tried several times to market products with TV and billboards advertising, but it doesn’t seem to work, especially to convince opinion leaders that play a key role in those kind of launches.

Google Adopting New Traditional Global Companies Processes
Actually, Google has become so huge, that it has totally changed the way it does business. Hence, it becomes to have global companies processes, even with marketing. Now Google to launch Google chrome in France used a massive billboard campaign in the metro, they start TV advertising. The problem that might come with this mid age crisis, is their ability to keep their pioneer mindset, and to keep going on with innovation, and not “fake innovation”, as mature international companies” often do.

What do you think about it? Do you really believe that Google has changed?

Could Twitter become a great VRM tool ?

I like the idea of Vendor Relationship Management. The first time I heard about it, it made so much sense that I knew it had a bright future ahead of it. Vendor relationship management aims to reverse CRM, meaning that the customer claims its need of a product, and companies need to get in contact with him.

This looks like too very traditional business to business process:
• Calls for tender: This is when a company sets requirements of its needs, and hence allow companies to develop an appropriate solution that will match these requirements.
• Reverse auctions: This is a time where the buyer sorted out a short list of potential sellers. Then, these competitions participate to a reverse auction, where in a limited time, they are going to battle to provide the best price to the customer.

The ultimate goal for customers is to get a product that suits their needs and at the best price. For the company, it is to focus its commercial and marketing effort on the “first moment of truth”, the moment where the customer has decided to purchase the product. This VRM solution is suitable for long decision making process, such as buying electronics, real estate, cars, or mobile phone plans.

Now the question is how could we set up a VRM process. What tool could you use? I believe Twitter could be a great way for customers to reach companies and exposes their needs. Indeed, more and more brands have created Twitter accounts, and dedicated some community management effort to interact with people.

Hence, a Twitter empower with great search engines capabilities could become the ultimate VRM tool, allowing customers to reach the largest number of companies able to suit its needs.

What do you think about CRM? Do you think it has a bright future ahead?

Mobile Banking

Mobile banking has a bright future ahead of it. As Internet has already revolutionized the bank market, by allowing customers to access their bank account and to make action at anytime, it has changed the way customers use their money. Now that Internet is going mobile, and that cell phones are getting smarter and smarter, empowered by Internet and applications, mobile banking is going to create a new revolution.

- The Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) (www.mmaglobal.com) and its official research partner, Luth Research (www.luthresearch.com), today released highlights from the latest US Consumer Briefing, a monthly survey of U.S. adult consumers about their mobile marketing behaviors and opinions. Available exclusively to MMA members, the new survey shows that 17 percent of all adults currently use mobile banking, with interest levels suggesting that usage will grow to 22 percent within the next year.

The usage of mobile banking uses three media:

• mobile Web browser (11 percent of respondents),
• SMS (8 percent),
• Applications (5.5 percent)

I believe mobile banking could substentially grow by developing applications adapted to customers's needs. When I see what mint in the US has been able to accomplish with personnal banking and the Internet technology, I believe that the mint concept could be great on mobile devices. Hence according to the survey, half of the respondents are interested in such solutions.

Also, mobile banking might be a great way to earn marketshares for pure players, like boursorama in France, or ING, which doesn't own retails, but could be by this tool constantly in touch with customers.

My Thoughts About Dauphine's Master Prices

Lately the university of Paris Dauphine has claimed they were about to raise the prices of certain of their masters, which price range would start from 400 € to 4 000 €. This might seem cheap to most of you, especially the US audience that is used to spend tons of money to access the best university program.

Dauphine the exception

Now Dauphine is an elite school. Certain of its programs, like Finance or management, are among the best in Europe. It developed a reputation of excellence as several executives of global companies came from this school. But Dauphine is not like any business school. It is a public school, based on the French public university system. It has always had a particular status. Hence, since its creation in 60s, it had a specefic status that gave it more money, but also some privileges like selection processes other universities would not be able to use.

But Dauphine has a great challenge to face. As the globalization process speeds up, the competition is going international for universities. And owning the best professors and phds requires money and infrastructure. This is the reason why Dauphine is looking for new ways to increase its revenues, and therefore to provide the best to students.

Hence the main goal of this raise in scholarship aims to recruit professors, to boost the research effort.

I have studied in Paris Dauphine and I am proud of it. I believe Dauphine has a bright future in front of it. And actually, this raise of the cost of Paris Dauphine remains acceptable. Dauphine's master, if they cost 4000 € they are still among the most affordable ones, and it might even help those masters to increase its values by improving classes and infrastructure.

And you, what do you think about it?

Brand equity and brand story

I am currently readin the fascinating Christian Salmon's book named Storytelling. He explains the art of storytelling and how important it is in nowadays societies. Hence, storytelling is the art of creating a story around a topic, in order to help making it better, and therefore to sell it.

What is interesting, is that the author considers it is no longer enough to own a great brand equity, built on powerful advertising campaigns and great marketing budgets. What really matter, even more than the brand by itself, is the story associated with.

This is the reason why for example Apple is not the most proefficient company in term of TV advertising. It just has created a myth, a story about Apple and Apple's users, that makes it way different than Microsoft. As Apple has since the beginning inforced its image with this story, of excellence, of innovation, and of a niche market, they have been able to take a great advantage upon Microsoft.

Therefore, while managing a brand, you can no longer rely on a great baseline, nor on a powerful logo to expose the brand, you need to build and tell a comprehensive story that vehicles dream and how great your brand is.

I have just started the book, but I will probably gives you insight along the way, as the topic fascinates me.

Carrefour Targeting India

The Indian market is a fascinating one, especially for retailers. The numerous population added to the fast economic dynamism makes it a great target for fast growth. Hence, group Carrefour, the second largest retailer in the world, is aiming the Indian market. Carrefour already is one of the leader of the Brazilian, Chinese market, and after having failed in Russia, a country where Auchan is already well settled, CEO Lars Olofsson declared during the Davos world forum his will to pursue the Indian market.

I believe this will be very interesting, but risky at the same time, as the Indian government is very conservative, and therefore it will be difficult to get in the market.

Sébastien Loeb et la publicité: surmédiatisation

Sébastien Loeb est l'un des plus grands sportifs français sans aucun doute. Il a été multiple fois champion du monde de sa discipline, les courses automobiles de rallies. Maintenant qu'il a acquis ce niveau d'excellence dans son sport, il est normal qu'il essaie de monétiser ses qualités de gagnant via des contrats publicitaires et de sponsoring.

Maintenant, je ne suis pas sûr que la façon dont il gère cette nouvelle notoriété, que j'estime fragile auprès du grand public soit la meilleure. Effectivement, depuis quelques semaines, de nombreux spots publicitaires mettant en scène la star sont apparu sur nos écrans télévisés. Notamment, Citroën (ce qui me parait normal, puisqu'il court avec ce constructeur), Allianz et Mennen.

Mais pour moi, le fait qu'il y est autant de publicité avec le même acteur nuit à la fois à Sébastien Loeb, qui se trouve sur exposé médiatiquement, alors qu'il n'a pas encore eu l'occasion de réellement établir son image auprès du grand public, mais aussi aux marques, qui à travers le personnage et les valeurs incarnés par Loeb (la victoire, l'excellence automobile, la virilité) se trouve en conflit avec des marques à intérêts divergents. Ce qui est rare a de la valeur, et là, Sébastien Loeb n'est pas rare.

De même, Sébastien Loeb ne parle dans aucune des trois publicités. Comme si Sébastien Loeb n'était pas capable de communiqué, sur ces valeurs que les publicités souhaitent utilisés. Il se trouve, notamment pour Allianz et Citroën, dans une position de poupée sans âme.

Je pense qu'avant de se lancer ainsi dans le grand bain médiatique, il aurait du se concentrer sur sa capacité à vendre Citroën, son constructeur et son vrai coeur d'expertise, et développer son côté "bankable", avant de répondre à diverses solicitations, peut être plus difficile à porter.

Et vous, que pensez vous de ces spots?

Time To Market Mobile Advertising

The mobile revolution is on the way. It has been a while experts have pictured a bright future for mobile advertising, but different aspects made it difficult to rocket:

• Mobile formats are very different, upon the operating system the device use (Blackberry, Windows Pocket, Symbian, Android, among others)
• The size and type of the screen
• The way to see the information (application, website, mobile site, and so on).
• The navigation system: keyboard, ball like Blackberry, tactile technology...
• The numerous number of actors willing to benefit from the new market, between agencies, advertisers, mobile network companies and so on.

But this year, it seems it will be good. The New York Times believes that the growth of Apple and Google, with its power to create applications and innovation in the market, will give a boost to a minor industry.

Now one of the reason it remains difficult to advertise on cell phones is the disruption risk. Cell phones are a very personnal device, and each advertising program could reach a threshold fast.

Also, I believe that the application ideas, enhancing customer experience and customer relationship management (CRM) potential is a great way to use it. Now, of course, editorial content like online news site and blogs could be leverage, by providing advertising at a specific format.

We can expect a lot of innovation within next months on this market. And I really believe it will be a great year for mobile advertising.

The Ipad Presentation In Less Than 180 seconds

I found this video on the web about Steve Jobs'presentation of the Ipad. Of course, as it is introduced in the video, it is supposed to be funny. It selected only the highlights when Steve Jobs says his product is gorgious. But it is also a great example on how to use positive vocabular to tune up a presentation.

Steve Jobs has always loved to qualify his products of amazing, spectacular and so on. And by using this vocab, and because he repeats it, people tends to agree, and he creates a magical effect. He is able to boost the audience by that, and actually, I believe this is a great example that great presentator use positive words to drive enthusiasm.

Walmart Changes Its Organization To Focus on Ecommerce

Walmart has recently decided to focus its strategy on the Internet. While Carrefour’s CEO Lars Oloffson declared he is seeking for a partnership with an ecommerce leader to play a leader role in this market, Walmart is sure of its strength while speaking of online business. They have reset their organisation to focus on the ecommerce strategy.

Indeed, as the Financial Times article says, Walmart has a clear advantage upon its main competitor Amazon, as it owns a large number of retails settled all around the US.

One of the key figure of this article is actually that currently around 40 per cent of its US business is delivered to stores for pick up under its “site to store” service, which it sees as also augmenting in the future the development of smaller format stores.

The electronic goods market is clearly supported by the growth of online commerce, and therefore, there is no surprise traditional retailers must adapt their bid. Moreover, the multichannel trend is becoming more and more a challenge for both brick and mortar and pure players. Each of them need both a strong online presence and a real retail. This is also the reason why Carrefour have faith in a partnership with a pure player, as Carrefour could become a great asset for a e-retailer, to propose in store deliveries.

It is therefore determined to create a powerful ecommerce platform which would be adapted to the different local markets.

Social Media To Manage Customer Complains

Social Media gives a great powers to users, allowing them to broadcast any kind of problems they experienced with a brand. Before the arrival of social media, it was difficult for customers to be listened by companies as they had to form customer associations to have a chance to be read by a company and taken into considerations. Now with social media, any individual has the chance to make noises.

Therefore, you may expect an increase into customer complains via this new medium. There are two main ways to react about it:
You don’t want to interact with it. This is what most companies would do. As they are afraid of what they don’t know, meaning having a clear interaction with customers, they would rather ignore it to focus on the same old mass media to hide the growing word of mouth on line.
You could decide to monitor this feedback, and try to analyze it for better use. You should take this new trend as an opportunity to improve your products, your customer relationship management. Facing customer complains is the best way to avoid major problems that could cause you much problems.

I like the concept of enterprise feedback management, solutions that aims to get feedback from people whenever they get in touch with the brand, either by phone, in store or on the web. These comprehensive solutions are very interesting, and they should also focus on social media, because as a matter of fact it might be the best way to interact with customers.

Twitter To Order: A New Way To Make Business With Twitter

Pizza restaurants like Pizza Hut have recently launched their online ordering service. The idea allows restaurants to be more productive, as they don’t need someone on the phone to get and type in the system the orders. It is directly set into the production line.

But I was wondering if it was possible to get such a system with Twitter. Indeed, instant messaging is becoming more and more popular, and there is no questions that Twitter is one of the leading service. Twitter will also enables people to order on mobile devices (Twitter is used 30% of the time on mobile handheld).

I believe we could send a Tweet like @pizzahut with the name of the product, and then it could be produced. It could also be delivered thanks to the GPS location of the person. Either the IP if speaking about a laptop or a desktop, or the GPS chip if on a cell phone.

Now the challenge would be to set a payment system that would secure the transaction while tweeting. This is a great challenge because Twitter doesn’t have any expertise in this field. But it might actually a great source of revenue, to get commissions out of financial flows over Twitter.

Actually it reminds me of the service of Blippy, that proposes to link your credit card to a twitter like system where you would send a tweet whenever you purchase something. I also know people that have been working for virtualized moneys, which could also be a solution.

Anyways, I think that ordering via Twitter could represent a great opportunity for:
Customers: It would be a fast and easy way to order things from the everyday life
Twitter: It would be a new monetization opportunity for the service
Companies: It would probably creates new possibilities to cut production costs, and maybe trigger more sales by easing the ordering process.

What do you think about it? Do you think it is possible to implement such a service?

Social Media engagement to replace customer loyalty cards.

Social media is a customer relationship management medium. It is in its DNA. Allowing people to speak about brands, and interact with others gives to CRM program a brand new way to think. Now some people believe that social media engagement could replace customer loyalty cards.

Customer loyalty cards are indeed not used as they should, or at least companies are fighting to leverage the full potential. A loyalty reward program implies to create a service dedicated to data mining, to manage the information systems dedicated to it, and also people to create the appropriate message to the appropriate customer. And it is not as easy as it seems. Especially, mastering a loyalty reward programs requires a learn through experience process that could become longer than expected.

Now loyalty cards have been developed a while ago. About 20 years, and it might be the time to think about some new ways. I was reading not so long ago that companies like Directgroup and Prylos are thinking about using the mobile phone to replace the plastic gear. I believe they are right about that.
There are also a great potential in the digital ID concept: You could use your Facebook profile to use as your loyalty reward management system.

The benefit of the fan and follower systemtic is quite obvious…- You become a fan and/or follower when a brand becomes of interest for YOU as a customer- You become a fan and/or follower of your favorite brand when YOU are in a purchase process- You can check status updates on sales, discounts and promotions when YOU need them (not when the company wants to sell more products)

But in the end, it is very different to use a social media to interact with customers and drive sales. Customer loyalty reward program provides a great way for companies to analyse data.

A relationship between a customer and a brand must go both ways. While the customer gets discounts, the company gets data. And that is the key. Getting data from social software about customers behaviour is very difficult. To link a Facebook fan and its purchase in a store is nearly impossible.

I don’t think we can mix both ideas.

Marketing of the moment

More and more often what really matters in marketing and in communication is the moment. Indeed, communication is becoming faster and faster.

Now customers want everything at once. There are a lot of solliciation and they want the right answer at the right time. This is an explanation why 360° communication is so popular.

There are many trends that pushed this importance of the moment:

• Instant Messages: Twitter has based its success on the ability to provide information that happens right now. The best Tweets might be far in your thread, but actually what really matters, is the information that has been posted within the last few hours. What happens at the moment matter more than the actual value of the information.
• The First moment of truth: Advertisement on the point of sales is very important. Because a customer make his decision making process in front of the aisle, it is important your product stands out, and that you provide the accurate information at the right time.
• 
  
• This is the same thing for CRM: What really matters is when you are able to provide the information. I like the VRM concept. The Vendor Relationship Management is somehow a reverse CRM. A customer exposes his needs for a product, and the brand gets in contact with him to provide the accurate information, via social media or its website. This is the reason why community management is getting so huge.

Marketers need to pay more and more importance about the customer experience to provide the appropriate medium and message to customers in order to trigger the purchase.

My opinion about the Ipad

Of course, yesterday everybody was buzzing around Twitter about the new Apple innovation, the Ipad. Reading through my Twitter, I have seen very different kind of comments and feedback about the product. I wanted to share with you my opinion about Steve Jobs presentation and the product:

Steve Jobs presentation
It has been once more outstanding. Recently Steve Jobs has been named the best CEO of the decade due to its fantastic results with Apple. But I believe he has been able to perform so well mainly due to his exceptional skills to present and create enthousiasm. He knows how to perform in such presentations. He has been able to introduce his product clearly, creating a whole show around it.

The name Ipad.
I don’t know if the name has been properly picked. I mean, pads could have some different meanings and could create tons of plays of words. I understand that Steve Jobs didn’t want to call it tablet, because he has the will to be different and to create a brand new type of products that won’t be able to be comparable to other products. But Ipad, I am not sure.

The product by itself.
The Ipad is pretty nice. But the main critic is it could be better. It is not 3 Gs, this isn’t sure if there are automatic synchronisation, if it is bluetooth empowered, and so on.Also One of the main weakness is for sure the fact it is not multi tasking, while this is necessary as people switch very easily from applications.
The product might be nice to consult and read, but what about interacting, writing notes for example?

The market
A lot of questions remain unsolved about the Ipad’s market. Indeed, the tablet market is going in limbo. The Amazon’s Kindle seems to have promising sales, and remain alone in the competition. That was important for mac users to propose a solution. Now it remains to see how Apple will market its online library. The challenge is to transform its media users of Itunes in book downloaders. I don’t know if the target is the same, but that would be interesting to see.

The future of Ipad
I don’t see the Ipad as a revolution. A revolution is something that stands out of ordinary, and the Ipad might do. But I see in a near future some new technologies that would be 10 times better than this one. I especially think about Nokia’s Morpheus project. I believe that instead of owning such a large pad, it would be better to have something you can fold or that would be retractable. It would be easier to use as this pad is not really a mobile device.


I don’t think we can expect the same kind of success than the Iphone. The Iphone was responding to an actual demand and the product was at the top of the line of technology. The Ipad remains a large Iphone, with not even the same deep range of uses, as it is not a 3G device.

And you what do you think about it?

Offres d'emplois dans le marketing mobile

Le marketing mobile est en pleine expansion et ses métiers sont passionants. Nicolas Clairembault est un bloggeur connu qui vient de lancer sa nouvelle société, ikomobi, cherche de jeunes talents pour l'aider à développer sa société. Voici l'annonce:

Pour accompagner son développement rapide, iKomobi recherche plusieurs profils pour renforcer le pôle marketing dans le cadre d’un stage.
Missions :
Sous la responsabilité du Directeur Marketing, vous serez amené à travailler sur les sujets suivants :
- Veille concurrentielle du marché des applications mobiles et de l’achat d’espace mobile en France et à l’international
- Mise en forme de recommandations sur-mesure pour les prospects et clients de la société
- Brainstorming et formalisation d’idées d’applications et de fonctions innovantes dans un but marketing
- Formalisation de plans médias mobile/web pour les annonceurs
- Gestion/reporting/optimisation des campagnes de marketing online et sur mobile
Les missions proposées sont susceptibles d’évolution en fonction de vos compétences et de votre implication.
Profil recherché :
De formation Ecole de commerce, Maîtrise spécialisée dans le Marketing Online, e-commerce, nouvelles technologies…
Vous aimez surfer sur Internet et avez un réel sens du marketing sur les supports web et mobile.
Vous êtes curieux(se) de nature, et aimez trouver des idées nouvelles.
Vous pratiquez la veille online et êtes à l’aise avec les flux RSS, blogs et médias sociaux
Vous êtes familier des Smartphones nouvelle génération (iPhone, Blackberry, Android), et en êtes idéalement utilisateur.
Vous avez une bonne maîtrise de l´anglais opérationnel.
Vous aimez l’autonomie, la prise de responsabilités et avez envie d’intégrer une structure innovante.
Cette expérience peut déboucher sur une embauche.
Si l’aventure vous tente, merci d´adresser votre candidature et CV à l´adresse e-mail : recrutement@ikomobi.com en précisant «Stage Marketing» dans l´objet de votre message.

Date de début : A pourvoir immédiatement
Durée : 3 mois minimum
Type de contrat : Stage conventionné
Rémunération : Selon profil
Lieu de travail : Parc de la Haute Borne, Villeneuve d’Ascq

Relation client pour les fournisseurs: Programme de fidélité vs jeux concours

Lorsqu'on est fournisseur, il est souvent difficile d'établir des stratégies de relation client avec les consommateurs finaux. En effet, les vrais "clients" des Danone, L'Oréal ou Coca Cola sont les distributeurs, les personnes avec qui elles contractualisent, afin d'avoir leurs produits en linéaire. Néanmoins le client final reste la principale préoccupation du marketing de ces entreprises. C'est grâce à leurs capacités à attirer ce grand public par leur effort de gestion de marque et de communication, que les distributeurs vont décider des volumes d'achats.

En effet, les produits de marque distributeur possède bien souvent intrinsèquement plus d'intérêt que ceux des marques, en terme de rentabilité. C'est pour cela que les fournisseurs pensent et établissent de plus en plus des stratégies de relation client.

Ils se confrontent néanmoins à un mur: comment entrer en contact directement avec ses consommateurs, et surtout établir une relation à long terme avec ses consommateurs, alors qu'ils ne peuvent absolument pas avoir un fichier client complet: Les statistiques clients sont détenus par la grande distribution, qui eux peuvent comptabiliser les passages en caisse.

Cependant, les marques possèdent trois vecteurs de communication, dont un qui a le formidable potentiel de permettre ses mesures:

• La publicité: Les marques ont réussi à établir leurs crédibilités et leurs performances commerciales grâce aux publicités, qu'elles soit télévisées, ou bien en affichage par exemple. Ce savoir faire est extrêmement important
• Le packaging: Les emballages deviennent de plus en plus un outil marketing principal sur le point de vente, comme j'en avais déjà parlé sur ce blog. Et oui, il peut être utilisé à des fins CRM.
• L'Internet: L'Internet reste l'outil le plus facilement utilisable pour entretenir un fichier client viable, car il est accessible par une majorité de la population et donc de vos clients.

La pubicité et le packaging peuvent être des vecteurs de communication afin de pouvoir recruter et animer une stratégie CRM et de fidélisation. Il existe ainsi deux types de stratégies différentes afin de pouvoir recruter ses clients dans son programme:

• Etablir un programme CRM: C'est certainement l'exercice le plus difficile, et bien qu'ayant vu quelques exemples, je ne suis pas sûr d'en avoir un réellement sortant du lot. L'idée est d'établir un programme à point, ou en tout cas offrant une promesse forte, qui va convaincre le consommateur de participer sur le long terme. Cela peut ainsi être un programme objectif, avec des points et des valeurs de lots clairement défini au moment de l'inscription, mais cela peut aussi être un programme offrant plus de souplesse pour la marque, mais qui doit s'attacher à être dynamique en offrant fréquemment des promotions diverses.
• Réaliser des jeux concours: Ses jeux concours sont certainement la manière la plus simple de recruter des clients, du moment où les dotations sont attrayantes. Néanmoins, je ne vois pas sur le long terme comment cette politique peut devenir une relation client forte.

Maintenant, le défi principal de la marque reste d'évaluer les performances de son outil CRM. En ce sens, il me semble difficile d'avoir des statistiques représentatives de ce qu'apporte réellement le programme de relation client, puisqu'il est difficile d'avoir les retours d'utilisation du système. Néanmoins, sur un plan temporel, une stratégie relation client proprement préparé pourra montrer une augmentation de ses performances.

Avez vous déjà travaillé sur ces problématiques? Je serai ravi d'en discuter avec vous.

Steve Jobs Named Best Performing CEO

The Havard Business Review Named Steve Jobs the Best Performing CEO in the world.

A lot of people have blamed short-term thinking for causing our current economic troubles, which has set off a debate about what time window we should use to assess a CEO's performance. Today boards of directors, senior managers, and investors intensely want to know how CEOs handle the ups and downs of running businesses over an extended period. Many executive compensation plans define the "long term" as a three-year horizon, but the real test of a CEO's leadership has to be how the company does over his or her full tenure. This article contains a list of the 50 CEOs of large public companies who performed best over their entire time in office--or, for those still in the job, up until September 30, 2009. To compile the results, the authors collected data on close to 2,000 CEOs worldwide. They asked, Who had led firms that, on the basis of stock returns, outperformed other firms in the same country and industry? The ranking combines three measures: country-adjusted return, industry-adjusted return, and change in market capitalization during tenure. While it may come as no shock that Steve Jobs of Apple tops the list, the ranking does contains a few surprises. You'll see some relatively unknown faces at the top. The inverse is also true: Some obvious candidates based on reputation don't make the top 50. The authors' analysis of the factors that increased the likelihood that an executive would place high in the ranking turned up a few more surprises. Although one might expect context to have a big effect, they found a wide diversity of countries and industries represented in the top performers. The CEO's background did matter, however, as did the situation left behind by his or her predecessor.

The Havard Business Review hence made a pretty objective result, which makes sense. But what would be interesting is to dig to find out what makes Steve Jobs the best CEO. I have watched not so long ago the video herein, about how Steve Jobs makes great presentations. And I believe that it is first due to its passion, but also mainly because he is able to create enthousiasm. "Nothing Great has been accomplished without passion". And I believe this is what he vehicles, and how he motivates people.

What do you think? What are the reasons why he succeeded so much?

L'epub résiste à la crise?

Selon la Newsletter de CB News, l'epub aurait résister à la crise en 2009. Ainsi le taux de croissance de ce marché a été divisé par 4 cette année, mais a tout de même augmenté de 6%. Je ne suis pas sûr que le mot résisté soit le plus approprié à cette progression.

De même, pour avoir parlé à plusieurs exécutifs ces derniers mois au sujet de campagnes de publicité en ligne, et aussi de la manière de monétiser le traffic de sites Internet et de blog, la plupart ont l'impression que le marché est en train de se détériorer et que les revenus issus de cette activité ne sont plus viable. Bien sûr, il y a eu une phase de "hype", ou bien de spéculation sur la valeur de ces publicités qui a été grandissante. Cette spéculation a aussi été portée par les problèmes connus par les média de masse tels que la télévision, qui voit s'effriter ses taux d'audiences au profit de nouvelles chaines TNT et du transfert d'audience vers le web et la video on demand.

Mais maintenant le marché semble s'être calmé, et comme un produit qui arrive a maturité, je pense que la prochaine année qui nous attend va confirmer cette tendance de stagnation des revenus issus de la e publicité, ce qui va forcé certains acteurs à consolider leurs activités (via des fusions, des aquisitions, ou bien même des disparitions d'acteurs comme mybloglog, entre autre).

Mais l'epub est bien un marché d'avenir, qui a certainement connu des résultats exceptionnels ces denrières années en terme de taux de conversion et de retour sur investissement, qui ne seront peut être pas aussi avantageux dans le futur, mais qui vont définitivement prendre des parts de marché conséquente aux autres marchés de la publicité télévisée entre autre, ou de la presse.

Finalement, c'est une très bonne nouvelle, ce ralentissement de croissance, car cela va peut être motivé certains acteurs d'accordé plus d'importance à ce marché en augmentant la pression concurrencielle.

Le e-commerce continue sa progression, de même que le taux d'équipement des français en Internet haut débit, avec des offres de plus en plus avantageuses pour eux.

Et vous que pensez vous de cette nouvelle?

Auchan Launches An Iphone App

French retailer Auchan, one of the largest grocery retailer in the world, has just launched a new Iphone app, allowing customers to dictate on its Iphone their grocery shopping list. The application recognize about 260 products already preset in the system.

Auchan has been for the longest time an innovator on the hypermarket business. They have been the first ones to launche a drive thru concept where you shop your groceries on line and then pick it up at the store direct in your trunk. They also have been the first one to opt for a self scanning system, where customers get a scanner at the entrance of the store and scan products while shopping.

Auchan has clearly understand the importance of mobile devide in the customer relationship management process, providing an improved customer experience.

Twitter Case Studies: Example of Brands Usage

As 2009 was the year when companies started to use Twitter, trying to define the different usage and benefits they could get from it, some companies have already succeeded in getting some audience and results from Twitter. As a communication medium, working both ways, it is therefore a great way to improve a customer relationship strategy.

Here are some example found on the web:

• Subway: Subway’s Twitter presence, @subwayfreshbuzz, attracted more than 6,000 followers in less than six months. The sandwich shop franchise uses Twitter to interact with Subway fans two ways: sending out product and promotional news and monitoring Twitter for buzz about its brand.
• McDonald’s: McDonald’s operates two main Twitter handles. @McDonalds, which has more than 4,700 followers, is used for brand news and information as well as customer service. (Internal research shows that the company is mentioned every 10 to 20 seconds on Twitter.) @McCafeYourDay promotes the company’s line of specialty coffees.
• 7-Eleven: Convenience-store giant 7-Eleven launched its first Twitter campaign at @7eleven in September, when it created an online game to promote its Brazilian Bold coffee to 18- to 34-year-olds. A few weeks in, the game has scored about 100 followers and counting, but it has also generated a wave of buzz online and will be followed by more promotions.
• H&R Block: H&R Block uses @HRBlock, launched in November 2007, as a customer-care and question-and-answer tool more than a marketing vehicle. Although the company posts info about tax law changes or company news, it more frequently answers tax questions, solves log-in issues and helps connect its more than 3,600 followers with the expertise they need to get their taxes filed.
• Dunkin’ Donuts: In a little more than a year, @DunkinDonuts scored more than 38,000 followers by creating a place where people can share their Dunkin’ Donuts experiences. The company focuses on creating a place where people can talk about how much they love Dunkin’ Donuts products.

Of course, I have also talked about Starbucks, which in overal makes a great use of social media. By these different example you can draw three main uses for Twitter:

• Customer service: providing information about how to use products, or what to do in case you have a problem.
• Coupons/discounts advertising: Sending coupons online thanks to Twitter to your community
• Information/branding: Providing information about you and your mission statement, but also providing information that defines your positionning.

Some Thoughts About Dell's Sales With Twitter

You must remember how a Dell has grown while it announced it sold for $6.5 million thanks to Twitter the past year. Indeed, it was the evidence that Twitter could become a viable distribution channel, and it was worth developping a community management force to leverage this potential. Dell set 35 Twitter channels like this one, which speaks to 1.5 million followers (which is a $4.1 revenue per users). I have read this article relating this fact, and raising skepticism about it.

As with anything vaguely interesting or popular that grabs the public imagination, it's never long before Big Business is eyeing the prize and desperately trying to turn a buck. Twitter spam - should that be 'twam', or maybe 'spitter'? - is already clogging up the Internet and every corporation with a PR department worth its salt is tripping over itself to jump on the tweeting bandwagon.

A recent report on the übercapitalist website Bloomberg crows about PC box builder Dell clocking up $6.5 million worth of sales directly attributable to corporate tweets sent to the 1.5 million followers of its 35 channels. Even though that's a tiny fraction of the company's $61 billion in revenue last year, it's still a worrying development for Twitter and its waning street credibility.

The simple fact of the matter is that, once the corporate world gets its claws into the kind of social phenomenon that Twitter has rapidly become, those in the know will rapidly move onto the next new thing, one which has yet to be mired in intrusive advertising and corporate nagging.

Could Dell have signed the death knell for Twitter? Only time will tell, but we'll certainly be looking elsewhere for our celebrity-sourced chit-chat fix sooner rather than later.

So there is two main things about this article I would like to comment.

First, about the fact that $6.5 millions is worthless compared to the large $61 million sales Dell has accomplished in overall.There is no doubt about that. Now Twitter is young, and Dell's participation in it is even more recent. Twitter world is brand new, and brands need to create their own territory and use of the tool. This is 0.1%. But beyond figures, what has been shown is that Twitter can become a retail channel. Foremost, what I would like to see is how profitable this channel could be. Indeed, is it costly? I don't think it requires a large bandwidth and a lot of server capacity like a ecommerce website would, since it is hosted by Twitter. I'd like to know:

• The staff that takes care of these Twitter account. 35 people? I don't think so, but I'd like to know how qualify and how numerous the staff is.
• I believe they did not create new CRM/ sales software, and might use the very same one they use for their call center.

I believe the conversion rates might be high. But if you are part of this project and you read this blog, I'd love your experience to be shared.

The other part wants to say that now that companies are using Twitter, it could be referred as "Twitter spamming", and could be the edge of the death of Twitter. This is totally the opposite. Once brand and companies will be convinced of the interest of this social media, then Twitter will be able to monetize their service, become profitable, and then secure the future of Twitter. I believe actually this should be the emergency for Twitter. With other companies that have failed to monetize their large audience and the end of the web 2.0 hype, they must find partners and people who are willing to pay to use Twitter's potential. If not, there is no way Twitter will never be profitable. I believe actually that one of the weakness of Twitter and other web 2.0 services has been to believe that when they'll reach the critical mass, they'll be able to make money, whatever happens, without even thinking about how to incorporate advertising or for example premium service to their offer.

As I have said, I am not really the most optimistic about Twitter as a company by itself, because they have failed many times to deliver its service in a dramatical way, but also because they have failed to show monetization potential yet.

Anyways, Dell's contribution on Twitter is huge, and I give them a lot of respect for that.

La publicité télévisée va mal

L'industrie de la publicité télévisée va mal. Voire très mal. En effet, due à la crise, les annonceurs ont diminué leurs budgets communication, et ainsi arrêter le plus coûteux d'entre eux, la télévision.

TF1 et les autres chaines privées vont mal. Ils doivent affronter la montée du média Internet, où un réel transfert d'audience s'opère.

Ainsi, j'ai vu à la télévision la campagne suivante:

Bien qu'il est souvent de mauvaise augure lorsqu'une entreprise arrête de communiquer (le budget marketing est souvent le premier coupé, le plus facile, alors que souvent c'est celui qui est le mieux placé pour endiguer la perte de parts de marché), cette publicité sonne à mon sens comme un chant du cygne. La publicité fait sa pub?

Je pense que la publicité télévisée va devoir changée profondément. En effet, autant le paysage des médias en France a changé avec l'arrivée d'Internet, mais aussi il va se parceller. Les offres Adsl permettent d'avoir de plus en plus de chaine et donc d'augmenter la visibilité des anciennes chaines du cable. De même que la TNT a aussi apporté son bouleversement.

La télévisée n'est plus un média de masse, il va devenir de plus en plus spécialisé, et donc les messages devront être de plus en plus précis, plus en plus tourné vers le call to action, comme cela est le cas aux Etats-Unis.

Et vous que pensez vous de cette publicité?

Testing Ping.fm

PLV et technologie: Lego innove

La publicité sur le lieu de vente ou PLV a le vent en poupe ces dernières années. Elles sont ainsi parmi les meilleurs outils marketing et de communication dans la distribution, maximisant la visibilité de la marque durant le first moment of truth, mais aussi peuvent améliorer l'expérience client. Ainsi, autant je considère que le packaging peut avoir un réel impact sur la gestion de la relation client, la PLV peut s'avérer un outil très puissant. Surtout lorsque l'innovation et la technologie lui offrent une nouvelle dimension.

C'est le cas de cette nouvelle campagne réalisée par Légo.

Cette PLV est basée sur la technologie de la réalité augmentée. Cette technologie permet d'associer grâce à une caméra vidéo une image bien réel, et un élément virtuel associé. Dans cette vidéo, la réalité augmentée permet de voir le jeu tel qu'il est lorsque monté.

La PLV a pour ambition de déclencher l’acte d’achat, et il y a peu de doute que celle-ci fasse exception, il y a même tout à parier pour que ce dispositif, mis au point par Metaio, soit particulièrement efficace.

Il y a fort à parier que le monde de la PLV soit profondément bouleversé par ce type de technologies, auxquels ils conviendra d’ajouter le RFID, le Bluetooth, et de nombreuses autres pour avoir une idée de ce qui va s’abbatre sur le secteur dans les années à venir.

Je pense effectivement qu'on en ait encore au début, et que ces technologies nous réservent bien des surprises.

Best Buy: Innovating In The Pick Up Options For Optimizing Multichannel Advantages

Multichannel is becoming a norm nowadays. Either brick & mortar companies are going online, or pure players are finding ways to reach their customers in the real world thanks to pick up options. What is for sure is that multichannel is starting to become a norm.

But there is still room for improvement as the Internant and brick & mortar world are still struggling to click.

Best Buy hence has innovated:

• Customers may now pick up their products at the company's warehouses. For a national chain like Best Buy, it is very interesting to provide this service, as they may own several warehouses across country. Pick up at the warehouse may also decrease the logistic costs, as some part of the merchandise will not need to transit through the stores. The consumer electronics retailer also is letting customers pick up purchases directly from its warehouses to avoid delivery charges and scheduling conflicts for large items such as appliances, or to save time on orders that must be shipped to a store.

  Best Buy says it launched the new delivery options, which it calls Store Pickup Plus, to expand on the free shipping promotions it periodically offers online, as well as to allow consumers to avoid shipping fees, receive products more quickly, eliminate concerns about package delivery and increase confidence that products will be available.

• Thanks to a top of the line supply chain information system, they are able to tell to customers to pick up some of their orders 45 minutes after having ordered them online.

Now, I wanted to add something else about multichannel retailing. In France, drive ins are getting very popular for hypermarket chains. Some other type of retailers have started to use this system, like an optician in the north of France. But what about ecommerce? Wouldn't it be an efficient system to equip warehouses of these type of drive ins, in order to turn their warehouse into stores?

What do you think about it?