DISSECTINGDIGITAL INSIGHTS

Digital Brand &Social WebS t r a t e g y

ImportantThoughts

and Final Takeaways

Alyssa StadeSarah Williamson

Rachel Monaghan

J 4 6 0

Section One

Takeaways

Takeaways

Strategy IsWe must recognize strategy as a complete approach.

Holistic

Strategy Is Digital is not a specialized strategy - digital is a conceptual shift that has reimagined the way we interact.

As digital natives, it is already engrained into our way of thinking. We know it- we live it.

Digital is no longer an option- it’s a mentality. And brands must embrace this mentality.

Digital has engendered major shifts in social constructs that allow constant connectivity and communication through mobile devices.

Social is not a specific channel. It is not a silo.

It’s just the way our generation communicates.

Brands must be social butterflies.

Social isn’t just a single tactic, it’s increasingly a core principal behind the marketing strategy.

“”-Ad Age

Social isn’t just a single tactic, it’s increasingly a core principal behind the marketing strategy.

Today, brand strategy must be digital and social. To be succesful, brands must consider how we behave on a digital platform and how we interact in a social era. This is all part of the strategy as a whole.

Brands areco-creating value with consumers

Brands areco-creating value with consumers

Consumers are no longer just the target for brand strategy- they are becoming an integral part of the strategy. Their insights shape the ideation process. Getting customers to talk about and share their experiences with a brand’s product or service via social media serves as a marketing tool and simultaneously offers deep consumer insights. Successful brands are working collaboratively with consumers to unveil real wants and needs. So that in turn they can be successful in the mobile technology department as well.

Customer Insights

Brand ObjectiveVALUE

“Consumers – whether or not they use social media – are ready to collaborate with retailers to co-create new products and services that meet their needs”

- IBM

The Web Doesn’t Forget“

In today’s world, brands have to operate with a much higher degree of clarity around their purpose and eliminate inconsistencies in how they deliver products and services. ”

“- Forbes

While technological advancements enrich our lives in many ways, they present serious threats to privacy. We’ve been conditioned to think that “nothing lasts forever” but that’s not the case anymore. The Internet doesn’t forget a thing. This is scary for most of us, and even scarier for brands.

Every online photo, status update, tweet, blog post, can be stored forever.

With brands embracing the digital mindset and becoming increasingly more active on social platforms, they must avoid social media mishaps at all cost— the internet is not forgiving of lapse in judgment. There is no going back once content goes public.

HUMAN CENTEREDNESSIS AT THE

COREOF STRATEGIC DESIGN

“Mobile is not the device.

Moble is the user. When building for digital platforms, we must always build for the user.”

-Dave Allen

When building for digital platforms, we must place human centeredness at the core of strategic design. Designing an engaging customer experience depends on understanding what customers want from a service or product and how they behave on digital platforms—this will essentially determine how they interact with the brand. We must understand that on the other side of technology is a human.

Experiences must be created around people, not technolgy

$EXPERIENCEIS THE NEWCURRENCY

Advertising has evolved. Advertising is no longer synonomous with successful brands. Advertising strategy is different than brand strategy. Advertising is no longer about creating advertisments to convince consumers to purchase a product or service. In fact, the best advertising isn’t advertising at all. The best advertising is about bulding great brands-- ones that solve real problems and satisfy real needs. The brands that are making a difference in our lives are going beyond simply marketing a product; they are showing how their product works within our culture and how it offers an invaluable experience.

“Brands that are able to create more personalized customer experiences will become indispensable.”

- Ajaz Ahmed CEO of AKQA

Nothing in digital is ever finished.

In digital, success is fleeting.The one and done approach will not sustain. Brands must continuously build and refine.The fast pace of the digital world necessitates less emphasis on perfecting solutions, and more emphasis on ensuring delivery. Everything in digital can be measured; brands are able to keep a finger on the social pulse of the web to elevate consumer insights and continue to improve their products. Nothing is final, nothing is finished.

“Success is not an entitlement, and we’re only as good as our next product.”

- Greg Joswiak (Director of Marketing at Apple)

Digital has empowered a new breed of consumers

Digitally and socially infused consumers are be-coming more active and demanding. We must realize that additional “push” advertising is less affective on consumers who are now equip with the tools to research and review products before making purchasing decisions. The proliferation of infor-mation online empowers informed consumers who demand transparency from the brands they love and trust. Satisfying today’s empowered con-sumer is essential for brands looking to es-tablish long term prosperity.

“They know more than ever about what they want, how they want it and who they want it from.”

- Jeby Cherian, The Hindu

Technology is allowing us

create

UTOPIAa digital

UTOPIA

America likes to think of itself as the ultimate digital powerhouse, but realistically we don’t have the population to overpower countries like Asia and Africa. Our generation must expand their global interactions, and in turn, ideas and knowledge will be multiplied. Given these tools, and used in the most effective way, we are no longer limiting our knowledge to simply location or minimal experience.

Technology is allowing us to bridge the gap between cultures and create a digital utopia.

“We have technology, finally, that for the first time in human history allows people to really maintain rich connections with much larger numbers of people.”

– Pierre Omidyar, Founder of ebay

Engaging Consumers... Successfully

Engaging Consumers... Successfully

Whether we are listening to music, watching an online TV show, or browsing the internet were bound to come across some sort of advertising. We live in a digital world, everyone is online, it’s the easiest ways to ensure people are exposed to advertisements. Advertisments tailered to our search history are now flooding the web. But brands will not grow because of inturruptive advertising, they will grow because their products are of value. The internet has made it even easier to advertise because they know what the user has been viewing and what they are inter-ested in. For instance if your facebook says “in a relationship” you are bound to see banner ads for engagement rings. So does this work? For those of us that have grown up in the digital world, we are used to it, and for others it’s distracting. Online advertising Interrupts the seamless flow consumers expect fromom digital experiences.

Section Two:

Personal Insights

Section Two:

Personal Insights

Phi Pl o l t e r

Phil’s Insights on Digital Strategy: Digital is very benificial in the advertising world. Ages 12-24 are so used to digital advertising and they use/benefit from it. But it has also just become another choice. It has added another distraction to an already fragmented world. Digital has become just another way to figure out how to reach people.

Fragmentation, Fragmentation, Fragmetation. Phil’s Advice: My advice is to not avoid digital advertising we live in a digital world now. Digital works. Having well rounded advertising works, meaning advertising that you listen to (radio), see (print), and interact with (digital).

Norquist

Ashley

Norquist

Ashley’s Insight on Digital Strategy: Digital opens so many possi-bilities for user experiences. For instance now we have “viral.” Be-fore there was no such thing as viral now advertising and ads have the possibility to travel through social media and the internet faster then ever.

Digital is who we are, we have grown up in a digital world. Ashley’s imput on banner ads: I think that banner ads have po-tential to grow. I think that they work in some instances. But, I can not stand when ads are personalized to me. I do not want to see my name on some t-shirt for instance. I do not want people to know what I am searching. I also think that the only banner ads that are affective are the ones for items such as clothing that I have already looked at. Banner ads are are repetitive and usually work fairly well.

Kristina Pflug:

Kristina’s insight on the importance of digital strategy (prior to taking Dave Allen’s class):I think it is a very obvious concept and when I think digital, I think social media. I think it is mundane that people study digital strategy because it’s so obvious. But I guess I have these beliefs because we are just the digital generation, so it comes easy to us. I grew up on Myspace and Facebook, I grew up with digital ads. Krisitna’s use of Ad Block: Yes, I use Ad Block because I think that Ads are the most annoying thing. I dont think ad banners are benificial, but even with ad block I still see banners. Are Ad blockers are even worth it any more?I want to connect with the personality of a company, more than see ads. For instance when JCP “drunk” tweeted during the superbowl. That was personality, that was great. That made me like them more. I dont think Ad blocker is worth it.

Created By: Rachel Monaghan Alyssa Stade Sarah Williamson