Iv’e always admired Innocent, they built a very successful brand with clear positioning even if their corporate cuteness has always been a means to end.

In April Coke significantly increased their stake in the business with a majority shareholding but unusually without operational control (for now).

Coke’s involvement with the dippy, wholesome, independent Innocent brand angered many of their hardcore advocates.  The usual ‘selling out’ stories appeared; counter argued by that in fact innocent were ‘selling in’ their ethical values (hmmm) but whilst compromised, Innocent’s brand is certainly strong enough to survive the backlash and over time its unlikely that anyone will really care.

Coke certainly helped the smoothie giants expand into European shores; an expensive business as their UK category dominance is nowhere near as prevalent in foreign fields but the full story of this relationship will be a brand one, not an operational one.

Keeping line extension in check

Coke’s portfolio includes more than 3,300 drinks but they’re notoriously narrow with their brand thinking so their effect on Innocent’s long term brand strategy will be interesting.  Innocent have talked a lot in the press about ‘expanding their business’ but moving the brand into ‘veg pots’ in late 2008 marked the first real step in potential line extension which would almost certainly jar with Coke’s narrow approach to branding.

Continued line extension will without question, threaten their UK category dominance in the long term as it will undermine their power in their core smoothie market and I’d be shocked if Coke would support this.   Unless of course they’re after a quick buck but this isn’t really their style.

So whilst Innocent have been hammered over jumping into bed with one of the biggest corporates in the world, the long term is likely to look very good for them in the UK and beyond if Coke can help to keep any line extension in check and their brand focus clear.

If Innocent continue to extend their brand over the coming years I’d be worried that one of the most focused, clear and clever brands in recent memory will lose their category leadership and follow so many line extended brands into relative irrelevance.

It seems that our adventure with ‘The Naked Office’ (June 2009) lives on. And reaches far corners of the globe too.

To Mike,

Odd as this may sound I want to personally thank you for allowing Virgin to follow your team around for the taping of The Naked Office.  It is Friday night here in Lubbock, Texas and I was wanting to rewatch the pilot for the popular American series The Office.  I got on my favorite newsgroup and a quick search yielded what I thought was it.

Five minutes later the download was complete, so I sat in my favorite spot and started the show.  Ten seconds in I realized this was not The Office I intended to download but thought what the heck I’ll give this a few minutes to see if it’s worth watching.  Now here I am typing this out to you to just say thank you!

I am a small business owner and must say The Naked Office could not have come at a better time.  I have been struggling with my business for a short period and the message I got tonight from watching your team go through the week with David Taylor was incredible.  Thank you and your staff for you’ll never know how this opened my eyes!

Nate Nale

We’re pretty chuffed about this one as onebestway’s recent repositioning as a clever, results-driven ‘Marketing and Design Studio’ is receiving industry recognition it seems.

We’re off down to Manchester to see how we do at the end of November 2009.

Good luck us!

Only 20% of businesses have a regularly-updated blog and just 37% actively manage their online reputation using sites such as Twitter and Facebook, according to a survey conducted by digital marketing agency Quba.

This is despite the fact that that 91% of respondents stated that the perception of their brand online is important to their business and 66% agreeing that using blogs and social networking sights are good ways to engage with their audience.

David Sealey, director at Quba has advised small businesses using social networking that they must invest the time and manpower to do this properly if they want to see a tangible business benefit.

David Sealey said: “There is currently a lot of hype surrounding social media and networking tools, and a feeling that all companies should be using them or risk missing out on some mythical ‘pot of gold’. What marketers need to realise is that social media is not suitable for everyone and will work successfully only as part of the existing marketing mix.
“Those that can utilise it successfully will do so in different ways and to a different degree.

“There is no magic formula for choosing the right social media tool, but like any marketing channel, it’s essential to use the social mediums which the chosen target audience actively participate in.”

http://uk-tv-guide.com/pick-of-the-day/9+July+2009/documentary-the-naked-office/

Here at onebestway and angelfysh we’ve decided to push PR for our flirtation with fame as far as it can go. It’s an illustration of how we can raise profile, on a world wide stage if necessary, for our clients too.

According to the new survey, 46% of the UK’s smallest businesses are risking low visibility by operating without a website.

Some 41% of off-line firms say they recognise a web presence would increase their sales, but they need help to establish a working site.

A further 47% of off-line companies believe a website would not benefit their business, however.

“Whilst many small companies today leverage the web with increasing proficiency, too many enterprises remain excluded,” said Oliver Mauss, CEO of 1&1 Internet Ltd, the company behind the survey.

“Every business owner should at least be aware that today a website is simple and affordable to source,” he continued. “Those sceptical of the benefits to their business have little to lose in experimenting and seeing the impact for themselves”.

Another survey of 152 similarly-sized firms with operational websites set up to promote their business suggests 80% of companies gain revenue from a business site.

To chat to Mike or Mark at onebestway to find out how your business could benefit from having an online presence please call 0191 276 4777.

Or you can email mike@onebestway.com or markt@onebestway.com

“[A company that] has the brand awareness and trust level is likely to get the appointment,” said Russ, who received the CPA Marketing Forum’s Accounting Marketer of the Year award in 2005. “This is why brand awareness is so important before the sales call, because it’s the first stage in the client’s buying cycle.”

As the marketing strategist for Grant Thornton, Russ has helped boost the company’s net revenue from $359 million in 2001 to more than $1 billion today. A multiyear brand campaign launched on his watch positioned the firm as a place where employees are passionate about their service.

One memorable ad, developed by CCFC, Chicago, in 2003, featured an accountant with a rose in his teeth and read: “Grant Thornton: A passion for the business of accounting.”

The successful campaign, which included national TV and radio spots, lifted the firm’s brand awareness to 27% from 5%.

When speaking about effective marketing channels, Russ said public relations is successful in reaching out to prospects but has a low level of personal interaction. Direct marketing, on the other hand, is effective in both reaching out to prospects and having a high level of personal interaction, thus helping to build the brand, he said.

“As a marketer, I need to find out what our target market thinks about our brand, figure out what I want them to think about our brand and get them from point A to point B,” Russ said. “And that’s all there is to build a brand.”

Source: BtoB

Twitter Partners have signed Universal Pictures, Warner Music and Paramount among its first clients, including a campaign to promote the Gorillaz documentary Bananaz, due to premiere on web TV service Babelgum on 20 April.

Twitter Partners has been founded by Peter Read, an investor and adviser to a range of digital media firms including music discovery tool Songkick, mobile content specialists Mippin and web video service Metacafe, and is a former investor in internet telephony service Skype.

The firm, which launches over the Easter weekend, is not formally affiliated with Twitter. It is the latest in a string of business ideas that have sprung up around the social tool, trying to capitalise on the intense activity and interest in the site.

Thousands of brands and celebrities have been using Twitter for marketing, promotion and out of curiosity – most notably Barack Obama, Stephen Fry and Jonathan Ross. As takeup of Twitter has grown, the 30-person San Francisco firm has become the subject of increasing speculation over how it will start to make money after raising $55m (£37m) in two years.

The site is expected to introduce a combination of premium accounts, advertising and partnerships with products including web TV. Twitter co-founder Biz Stone said last week that it would start to introduce revenue streams this year. It is understood to have 7 million regular users each month and is reported to be testing integration of its messages on Google’s AdSense network.

Twitter Partners will develop and use third-party applications and tools to help large companies monitor and promote their products and handle customer feedback through Twitter.

“Ad placements can’t be bought on Twitter at the moment,” Read told New Media Age. “But our relationship helps to broker brands onto the platform as we have detailed exposure to what works. No one has yet built an equivalent of Google Trends or Yahoo Buzz for Twitter.”Read is backed up by nearly 20 established advisers and consultants in the digital marketing space, including Latitude chief executive Alex Hoye, investor Saul Klein and Google’s head of corporate Anil Hansjee as well as the LastMinute.com co-foudner Lane Fox and Hoberman.

Read is preparing for the launch of the service this weekend but he found time to post that he had “just woken up from an intense dream in which I was a world champion pole dancer”.

Source: The Guardian

During regular “blind taste tests,” in which Microsoft asks randomly-selected consumers to score the quality of results from various Internet search engines, the quality of Microsoft’s search results have so improved that people can’t tell the difference between Microsoft and Google search results, says Mr. Mehdi, senior vice president of Microsoft’s online audience business group. But when Microsoft slaps the Google brand name on the results from Microsoft’s own search engine during another portion of its tests, users invariably score them highest.

“Just by putting the name up, people think it’s more relevant,” he says.

Mr. Mehdi discussed the Google “brand pop” and other hurdles for Microsoft on Tuesday in an interview in his office in a verdant patch of Microsoft’s campus in the Seattle suburbs. The interview was part of a plan to begin talking more publicly about its Internet search business prior to a re-launch of its search engine in the coming months–a project that bears the code-name Kiev. People familiar with the matter say Microsoft has hired ad agency JWT, a unit of London-based WPP Plc, to develop a major advertising campaign for its new search engine, though Mr. Mehdi declined to comment on that topic.

Microsoft has been relatively quiet in recent months about its Internet search business as it regrouped following a string of setbacks. Last year, the company abandoned an effort to acquire Yahoo Inc. for nearly $50 billion and the head of its online business, Kevin Johnson, left to become CEO of Juniper Networks in July. More recently, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has said he’s interested in acquiring Yahoo’s search business, a deal that could create a stronger rival to Google, though Yahoo‘s new CEO Carol Bartz has shown little interest in taking him up on the offer anytime soon.

Microsoft’s search group has stabilized since the company hired a former Yahoo search executive, Qi Lu, late last year to lead its online services business and recruited several other managers from Yahoo. Microsoft continues to invest heavily in its search business even as it makes cutbacks elsewhere in the company because of the weak economy. Even though Microsoft still finds itself in a distant third-place position in its share of the online search market behind Google and Yahoo, with just over 8% of searches by U.S. users, Mr. Mehdi says the mood in the search group is upbeat.

“It’s a very visceral feeling in the hallways,” he says.

Mr. Mehdi was cagey about discussing Kiev in depth ahead of its launch, but he offered a quick demonstration of one concept the company is testing as part of the project–a search engine it dubs Kumo.com that is currently only available to Microsoft employees. If a user conducts a search, say, on the name of a popular musician, Kumo groups together results in helpful categories like “songs,” “lyrics,” “videos” and “images.” Moves like that are part of a Microsoft focus on shaving the time it takes users to complete Internet searches.

Although improving its search technology has been a top priority, Mr. Mehdi concedes that another big problem for Microsoft has been a confusing jumble of brand names for its search efforts. The company’s search engine, available at Live.com, is called Live Search, though the brand is muddied by the plethora of other Microsoft Internet services such as Xbox Live and Windows Live. Mr. Mehdi says the company is looking for ways to “clarify” the brand for its search engine.

Even if it does that, Microsoft still faces the problem of the strong association in consumers’ minds between Google and Internet search. In theory, it’s far easier for a consumer to switch Internet search engines than it is for them to switch other forms of software. But Mr. Mehdi–a veteran of the Web browser wars of the late 90s in which Microsoft managed to overtake the pioneer in the category, Netscape Communications–says in reality it’s very hard to convince consumers to change their search behavior.

“Consumers are creatures of habit,” he says. “Habits are hard to break.”

Source: The Wall Street Journal blog

The services, some of which provide abortion information, would get airtime as part of proposals aimed at reducing teenage pregnancy and sexual infection.

The Most Rev Vincent Nichols also urged Catholics to fight more condom adverts.

He said existing condom ads “demeaned” young people by depicting “drunken” and “casual sex on the street corner”.

The new archbishop was appointed by the Pope last week – replacing Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor – and will be installed at Westminster Cathedral on 21 May.

The idea to advertise pregnancy advisory services is part of a review of advertising codes by the Committee of Advertising Practice (CAP) and the Broadcast Committee on Advertising Practice (BCAP).

The proposals also suggest relaxing restrictions on condom adverts, such as showing them before the 2100 watershed, although not around programmes aimed at children under the age of 10.

Currently, Channel 4 is the only outlet where condoms can be advertised from 1900.

BCAP said the Independent Advisory Group on Sexual Health had called for the changes after a rise in teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections.

It pointed to figures which showed more than 11,000 under-16s were diagnosed with chlamydia, herpes, gonorrhoea, syphilis or genital warts from 2002 to 2006.

Adverts for pregnancy advisory services would have to make it clear whether it referred women for abortions.

The two committees will oversee a public consultation, which closes on 19 June. The consultation is UK-wide, but any changes would not necessarily be applied across the UK.

‘Reflect reality’

Archbishop Nichols urged Catholics in England and Wales to respond to the consultation, saying that the country would not expect abortion to be advertised “alongside a packet of crisps”.

He said: “Advertisements should be truthful and tasteful.

“I doubt that any intended adverts about abortion would be fully truthful and tell the whole truth of the effects of abortion in a woman’s life.

“I seriously wonder if any advertisements for the use of condoms would be tasteful because the ones we have at the moment are demeaning of the young people of this country.

“They depict casual sex on the street corner and drunken sex. I do not think these things do anything to genuinely help young people to understand themselves in their own dignity and in the proper meaning of what human sexuality is about.”

He said while the media often claimed its role was to “reflect reality”, it also had a “responsibility to put something in front of people to which they can aspire”.

The archbishop – formerly the Archbishop of Birmingham – suspected advertising involving abortion services would present it as a “simple solution”, he said.

“But in fact it has traumatic implications in women’s lives,” he said.

Honest facts

The proposals would mean that for the first time pregnancy advisory services advertisements that were not government approved would be permitted on broadcast media.

Marie Stopes International, one of Britain’s biggest independent pregnancy advisory services, whose clinicians also perform abortions, has said it would immediately consider running adverts.

When the proposals were announced last month Simon Blake, chief executive of Brook – which offers sexual health advice and services to young people – said the move would help people obtain accurate information.

“Clear, honest, factual advertising about services which provide honest messages is clearly going to be part of shifting the balance away from this over-sexualised media,” he said.

But John Smeaton, national director of the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, said the move would “further commercialise the killing of unborn children”.

In a wide-ranging interview with the Press Association, Archbishop Nichols added that the Catholic Church’s teaching on sexual morality presented a “high ideal”. He said he acknowledged the “struggle” in people’s lives to live in accordance with “the dignity that God has given us”.

Asked about Church teaching on gay relationships, the archbishop said “respect” was due to everybody, regardless of sexual orientation.

“In good Catholic eyes a person’s sexual orientation does not matter. Where morality comes in is in their behaviour.”

The archbishop also criticised a motion to be put before the National Union of Teachers conference calling on religious groups of any faith to have “no place” in the control and management of schools.

Source: BBC News