Tag: CPG

Pinterest Narrows Ad Focus To Retail And CPG To Match Users’ Interest

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
In a bid to restructure its ad sales and focus its resources on key categories that match the interests of its users, Pinterest has announced that it will slim down its ad team support to brands in retail and consumer packaged goods. Brands in other categories are still welcomed to buy ads on its site, but only through either a self-serve interface, or a third-party ad tech platform that works with Pinterest.

What Brands Need To Do
This adjustment should come as good news for brands in retail and CPG, as they can receive more attention and hands-on support from Pinterest, therefore offering them a better chance target Pinterest users. However, for brands in other verticals that have been using Pinterest as a marketing channel, the news should serve as a prompt to reevaluate their communications strategy and ad spending on Pinterest.

Source: Wall Street Journal

How Izze Hacked Instagram To Create A Gamified Experience

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Beverage brand Izze has found an interesting new way to market on Instagram. Working with Omnicom’s The Integer Group, the brand built a choose-your-own-adventure type experience on Instagram. Users tap through multiple themed accounts, each posing a question with six clickable answers in the photos that are linked to corresponding accounts using Instagram’s tagging feature. Users will eventually arrive at one of three destination accounts based on the answers they choose. Each of the endpoints represents a special holiday recipe and a link in each account bio will redirect users to a web page with links to Amazon and Pinterest, where they can buy Izze products and kitchen goods, and find the corresponding recipes.

What Brands Need To Do
Instagram has long been a favorite social channel among marketers and brands for its visual-heavy, tailored-for-mobile aesthetic. But its restriction on hyperlinks – no links in captions or comments, only one allowed for each account, save for sponsored posts with call-to-action buttons – has left some marketers frustrated, inspiring them to come up with hacks such as this new Izze campaign and a similar one launched in July for Adult Swim’s animated series Rick and Morty. For brands seeking new ways to engage their audience and move them down the sales funnel, this Izze campaign provides a great example in doing so by building a fun and interactive experience on Instagram.  

 

Source: AdWeek

Why Sprite Is Putting Snapchat’s “Snapcodes” On Its Cans

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Sprite is experimenting with an interesting way to market on Snapchat in Brazil, with the help of IPG Mediabrands agency Cubocc. Instead of going the traditional route of advertising on Snapchat’s ad-supported Discover channels, the soda brand opts to put Snapcodes, the QR-code that Snapchat generates for its users to help them grow followers, on Sprite cans, in hopes of getting the attention of Snapchat users.

To kick off the campaign, Sprite handpicked 15 local Snapchat influencers to create Sprite-themed “Snaps” and have their Snapcodes printed on cans. The Coca-Cola-owned brand is encouraging consumers to submit their Snapcodes via a microsite for the chance to be featured on limited edition cans of Sprite. Since its launch, the featured influencers’ snaps have amassed over 1 million views.

What Brands Need To Do
While Snapchat is still looking to ramp up the ad revenues on its Discover channels, Sprite’s approach here presents a new way to leverage Snapchat’s popularity among the coveted Millennial and Gen Z demographics to increase brand awareness. By incentivizing Snapchat influencers with the promise of reaching more followers, Sprite is essentially getting those influencers to do native content marketing for free. Other brands with similar marketing efforts can learn a thing or two from Sprite’s experimental approach to Snapchat and the way it ties the digital components of its campaign to its physical product.

 

Source: AdWeek

Header image courtesy of Sprite’s promotional video on YouTube

Stoli Taps Haptics To Let You Feel Its Mobile Ads

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Stoli wants to give you the feeling of what they are selling. The vodka brand recently launched the first-ever haptics-enabled mobile ads on Opera Mediaworks’ network of mobile apps that can make smartphones vibrate to enhance the narrative of its ads. During a 20-second video spot, viewers can feel their phones shake when they see a woman make cocktails with a shaker or when a dog shakes its tail.

What Brands Need To Do
This unprecedented ad campaign from Stoli took an innovative approach that incorporates one of the native features of smartphones to enhance the mobile ad experience. Besides haptic engines, most smartphones now also have other features – such as barometer, gyroscope, accelerometer, and NFC proximity sensor – that brands can utilize to create interactive mobile ads that intrigue and engage the audience with a unique experience that cannot be replicated on desktop devices.

 

Source: AdWeek

Amazon Starts Selling Dash Buttons For $4.99 A Piece

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
The much-hyped Amazon Dash Buttons are finally here, available for all Prime members to purchase at $4.99 a piece. Back when it first launched four months ago, the bluetooth-enabled gadgets were initially offered for free to select Prime members by invitation only.

What Brands Should Do
As of now, there are 18 different branded Dash Buttons available, with nearly all of them created for household products. This means there is still many other CPG categories that could benefit greatly from putting out their own physical buy buttons to cultivate a long-term relationship with consumers that encourages habitual re-purchase. CPG brands should consider partnering with Amazon soon in order to gain the first-mover advantage.

Source: The Verge

Header image taken from Amazon’s site for “Dash Button“.

Why Amazon Is Trialling A “Drive-Up” Grocery Store

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Following the 3 pop-up storefronts it experimented with late last year, Amazon is now ready to step further into physical retail with a “drive-up” grocery store. Reportedly a new 11,600-square-foot building in Sunnyvale, this store will allow consumers to quickly pick up grocery items ordered online beforehand with a scheduled visit. Amazon has been getting serious with its same-day delivery service, especially in the grocery category, which it just expanded to U.K., the first market to receive such services outside the U.S. In that regard, the “drive-up” store could easily double as a distribution hub, should Amazon choose to further expand its same-day delivery services into new markets.

What Brands Should Do
There is no doubt that Amazon, along with other tech companies and startups, are set to disrupt the local market with the convenience of on-demand services. Therefore, retail and CPG brands need to take notes of Amazon’s rapid expansion into the space and find ways to work with it. One possible way would be to partner with Amazon to get your product featured on the “order” webpage. If Amazon can soon beat Macy’s in clothing retail, then grocery stores and supermarkets may just be its next targets to conquer.

 

Source: Silicon Valley Business Journal

Jet Challenges Amazon With “Smart Items” & Dynamic Discounts

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
A new ecommerce site Jet.com, created by co-founder of Diapers.com parent Quidsi Marc Lore, launched on Tuesday, challenging ecommerce leader Amazon with lower pricing. Lore says that Jet uses a proprietary technology engine to link certain items that cost less to deliver when purchased together, creating a dynamic discount system that reprices items based on what shoppers already have in their carts. Such items are branded “Smart Items” and promoted on Jet with a special icon, similar to how Amazon promotes the “Prime-eligible” items.

What Brands Should Do
While it is still too early to tell if Jet’s offering is appealing enough to truly compete with Amazon. It does bring something new to the ecommerce space with the “Smart Items” system that enables dynamic discounts, which CPG brands and alike could potentially leverage to increase sales on digital outlets by encouraging bigger orders.

Source: Re/code

Mondelez Seeking More Ecommerce Solutions From Tech Startups

Posted on by Lab Team

Read original story on: AdWeek

Snack giant Mondelez International announced on Wednesday a three-month program named Shopper Futures, which asks participating tech startups to pitch innovative retail solutions involving emerging technology like beacons and conductive ink. The news came on the heels of the debut of Mondelez’s “buy buttons” across its digital platforms, a collaborative effort born out of the company’s partnership with Irish marketing tech firm ChannelSight. Now with the launch of Shopper Futures, it seems like Mondelez is still hungry for more tech-enabled solution to ramp up its sales.

Here’s How Marketers Are Using Mobile At This Super Bowl

Posted on by Lab Team

Read original story on: Street Fight

The National Retail Federation estimates that the average American will spend $77.88 on Super Bowl-related spending this year. And this year, mobile, specifically location-based mobile ads, is playing an important role. Unlike the winter holidays where consumers often turn to online shopping, the bulk of the Super Bowl spending is centered on in-store CPG purchases such as food and beverages, where mobile-enabled hyperlocal marketing shines.

Besides using the data collected from devices to measure effectiveness of television advertising, mobile can also be utilized by brands to cash in on the awareness generated by a television spot by serving users more targeted ads in the days after the game.