FUN FACTS
Questions Answered
- What will the next census, our US 2010 Census, tell marketers?
That the Average American will be missing. The most prevalent household will be married with no kids. Followed by single-person homes—married with kids will make up just 22% of all U.S. households. Gone are the days when marketers and advertisers could target a single broad demographic. At USC and CSUN my classes learn about the different ways to segment and target a market: With Geographics, Demographics, Psychographics, Technologically, and by Behavior attributes and characteristics.
In the ten largest cities in the U.S. no racial or ethnic group constitutes a majority. By 2010, white non-Hispanics will make-up 80% of the population aged 65 and up, but just 54% of American under 18 years of age. Also our country’s center is shifting with 85% of population growth occurring in the South and West. - Would you like to smell like a star?
It depends on many different marketing variables. It depends on the popularity of the person or celebrity and who has audience appeal. The list of celebrities fronting fragrances grows longer, including Britney Spears, with two scents, “Curious” and “Fantasy;” 50 Cent, with “Power;” Ashanti with “Precious Jewel;” Beyoncé Knowles with “True Star” and “Emporio Armani Diamonds;” Halle Berry with “Halle;” Sarah Jessica Parker, with “Lovely;” Derek Jeter, with “Driven;” Hilary Duff. with “With Love;” Paris Hilton, with three scents, including “Heiress;” Sean Combs, with “Unforgivable;” and Jennifer Lopez, with scents that include “Glow”, “Live” and “Still.” Plus "Celine" by Celine Dion.
And those fragrances join shelves crowded with previous star-inspired scents like Elizabeth Taylor's “White Diamonds” and “Passion;” fragrances that invoke multiple stars like Desperate Housewives “Forbidden Fruit,” which features in its ads the five principal actresses of "Desperate Housewives;" and fragrances that use celebrities as endorsers in their campaigns, which include “Chanel No. 5” (Nicole Kidman), “Very Irresistible” (Liv Tyler) and “Dior J'adore” (Charlize Theron).
In the retail marketplace and during gift buying holidays, it’s not easy standing out amid all of the clutter, is it? -
How much of our lives watching, going, listening or reading media?
Americans love their media — so much thattwo years ago they spent nearly half their lives watching TV, going online, listening to the radio (or music) and reading. That's from the U.S. Census Bureau’s "Statistical Abstract of the United States.
In 2000, Americans spent 3,334 hours consuming media — and most of that time (1,467 hours) was spent in front of the TV. Americans will spend 3,518 hours with their beloved media, including 1,555 hours in front of the TV. That means the average American will spend roughly 146 days, or five months, consuming media.
However, the numbers don't mean we're just sitting in front of our machines; we're multitasking. - Tired of waiting in line at the store?
Grocery store lines irk customers. About 25% of people polled in an AP-IPSOS survey said the grocery checkout line tested their patience more than any other location, including the DMV or the post office. But retailers can help calm shopper frustration by changing how they wait, even if they can’t change how long they wait, according to one expert. Wal-Mart has added TV sets and special programming. So have other stores. Some segments do not obey the ten items or under lines. - What’s the Official Beer of the Super Bowl XLI through XLVI?
Anheuser-Busch makes deal for Super Bowl through 2012.
Anheuser-Busch will be the exclusive alcohol advertiser for the Super Bowl through at least 2012 in deals made with ABC, NBC, CBS and Fox – each will air the famous football championship in alternating years. Anheuser-Busch has been the Super Bowl's exclusive alcohol sponsor since 1989.
- Six most profitable words in the history of business:
"Would you like fries with that?" - Waiting in a store line, who is more impatient? Men or Women? Young or Old? Richer or Poorer?
A survey on "Impatient" Americans reveals that on average, women are willing to wait 18 minutes on line at a store before losing their patience, while men lose their cool after only 15 minutes. Younger people are more patient than older people, richer people are more patient than poorer people, and suburbanites are more patient than city dwellers. Associated Press - Are you what you drive and consume?
Yes, and here’s more to think about in marketing and advertising. A company cannot serve all customers in a broad market.
- Don’t buy market share with more and more advertising or discounting against the competition. Figure out how to earn market share. Better research, planning---win market share.
- Think about the slogan "Trix are for kids." A good demographic example we use.
- The company needs to identify the market segments that it can serve more effectively.
- Many companies are embracing target marketing. Distinguish major segments, target one or more and develop products and marketing mixes tailored to them.
- "Rifle" shots versus “shotgun” approach.
- The stronger your brand image is the better off you are.
- Ever since the infamous Dodge La Femme of the 1950s, auto engineers have been trying to create car models that specifically appeal to women drivers. According to an informal survey by the Detroit Free Press, women want what men want in a car: quality, safety, convenience and comfort. Oh, and they also want it to be “nail-friendly.” (11/17/05)
- Men and Women: 99% of Ferrari owners are male; 69% of all VW Cabriolets are purchased by women; and 94% of all Dodge Vipers and Porsches.
- Ferrari drivers are: 99% male; aged 45-50 years of age—down from late 50’s; 65% are repeat buyers; 20% own more than one; 60% own a private jet and 20% own a power boat; Buyers spend $25K to customized car. (AdAge)
- You may be able to accurately predict someone’s ride from their face and body posture, according to a new survey by psychologists at Julius-Maximilians University in Wurzburg, Germany. The study found that participants could correctly link photographs of male and female drivers to their cars nearly 70% of the time. NY Times
- How many millions can you squander on a luxury brand, such as POLO jeans from Ralph Lauren?
About $355 million. Ralph Lauren the preppy-clothing purveyor paid that nine-figure sum in February ’06 to buy back his Polo Jeans brand from licensee Jones Apparel Group, and four months later said it is discontinuing it in the United States.
Marketing lessons learned: Control distribution and price to maintain a luxury brand. - How easy is it to come up with a character? How about Mr. Peanut?
In 1916, a 14-year-old boy from Virginia creates Mr. Peanut as an entry into a Planters-sponsored trademark contest. The agency and client keep Mr. Peanut alive. - How much was the commercial artist who designed the Smiley
Face paid?
Harvey Ball invented the Smiley Face in 1963 and was paid $45 for his design and he never trademarked it. By the way, the famous Nike swoosh was sold for $35. - In a study of high-performance executives, the Forum
Corp. found that the key factor in their success was:
It's not intelligence, or sense of adventure. Not degrees, IQ, or even skills. It's Attitude.
Look for innovative solutions to problems. - A 30-second spot in the 2009 Super Bowl XLI (2/1/2009) was
priced at $_______.
What pricing is being pitched in 2010?
Prices for advertising time can typically cost millions of dollars; the 30-second spot during the 2010 telecast is expected to cost $3.01 million.
NBC charged $3.0 million for 2009. For 2008, the price for each spot peaked at $2.7 million.
Our country's highest-profile advertising showcase, with 97+ million households staying glued to their screens and not using TiVo during the ads. Marketers get a huge audience, but they also face high expectations especially when the audience can judge and be a critic with the click of a mouse. With the high price tag, it’s a lot to spend if the creative is poor or dumb, lacks strategic direction, or just plain awful. The cost of a Super Bowl spot every year has been an annual contest of brinkmanship for the networks, in setting its price.
Positions in first half sell first. Anheuser-Busch is the exclusive malt-beverage advertiser for 2012, since 1989.
ABC holds the record price for an in-game Super Bowl spot, getting $3.3 million for one 30 second Super Bowl spot from netpliance.com in the 2000 Super Bowl.
On FOX in 2008: $2.7 million On CBS in 2007: $2.5 to 2.6 million. On ABC in 2006: $2.4 to 2.5 million On FOX in 2005: $2.4 to 2.5 million.
Super Bowl XXXVIII, broadcasted on 2/1/2004 from Houston, Texas on the CBS network, was noted for a controversial halftime show in which Janet Jackson's bare breast was exposed by Justin Timberlake in what was referred to as a "wardrobe malfunction". A record $550,000 fine was levied by the FCC, as well as an increase of FCC fines per indecency violation from $27,500 to $325,000. - What is a marketing mix? What are the
4 P's?
The Marketing Mix is the combination of four elements, called the 4P's:
- Product
- Price
- Promotion
- Place
9P's: I have added five more P's: Planning, Partners, People (Target Markets), Passion, and Presentation.
Creativity in Marketing
9 P's (I have a copyright for this concept, the Nine P’s, which augments the Marketing 4P’s by McCarthy):
1. Planning or Marketing Process: To develop and transform marketing objectives to marketing strategies to tactics, marketing management must make basic decisions on marketing targets, marketing mix, marketing budgets/expenditures and marketing allocations. Dividing the total marketing budget among the various tools in the Marketing Mix and for the various products, channels, promotion, media and sales areas.
2. People/Prospects (Target Market)- A product focusing on a specific target market contrasts sharply with one following the marketing strategy of mass marketing.
- Defining a target market requires market segmentation, the process of segmenting the entire market as a whole and separating it into manageable units based on demographics, geographics, psychographics and behavior characteristics.
The market segmentation process includes:
- Determining the characteristics of segments in the target market.
- Then separating these segments in the market based on these characteristics.
- Checking to see whether any of this market segments are large enough to support the organization's product.
- Once a target market is chosen, the organization can develop its marketing strategies to target this market.
- A product is anything that can be offered to a market for attention, acquisition, use or consumption that might satisfy a want or need. (Kotler)
- A service is any activity or benefit that one party can offer to another that is essentially intangible and does not result in the ownership of anything. (Kotler)
- “Product” includes packaging, as a subset of the total offering. Brand managers use packaging as a badge, enhancing the product’s value. Here’s an example: In fall 2008, McDonald's scrapped and changed its package design across 118 countries, 56 languages. Packaging can increase the perceptions about the quality of the product.
- A Product or service also should have Purpose, which is discovering the product’s real value, use, difference, reason, or function for the consumer and user.
5. Promotion: The communication element includes personal and non-personal communication activities. Activities that communicate the merits of the overall product, which includes:- Personal Selling/ Sales Force
- Advertising--Mass or nonpersonal selling: TV, radio, magazines, newspaper, outdoor/out-of-home
- Advertising is structured and composed non personal communication of information, usually paid for and usually persuasive in nature, about products (goods, services, and ideas) by identified sponsors through various media. (Arens, Weingold, Arens, 11th edition of Contemporary Advertising, 2008)
- Advertising is any paid form of nonpersonal presentation and promotion of ideas, goods, or services by an identified sponsor. (Kotler & Armstrong, 2010). Ads can be a cost-effective way to disseminate messages, whether to build a brand preference or to educate people.
- Sales Promotion--Trade deals, samples, coupons, premiums, tie-ins, p-o-p, displays, sweepstakes, allowances, trade shows, sales rep contests, events/experiences and more.
- Collateral Materials--Booklets, catalogs, brochures, films, sales kits, promotional products and annual reports.
- Direct Marketing-- Direct mail, database management, catalogs, telemarketing, and direct-response ads. Includes Interactive/ Internet
- Public Relations--Press releases, publicity. Securing editorial space, as opposed to paid space--usually in print or broadcast media. Promote or “hype” a product, service, idea, place, person or organization, internal communication, lobbying. PR involves a variety of programs designed to promote or protect a company’s image or individual products.
7. Partners: A joint partnership; the joint relationships, partnerships and alliances. The legal relationship existing between two parties; A relationship resembling a legal partnership and usually involving close cooperation between parties having specific and joint rights and responsibilities as a common enterprise. One of the heavy timbers that strengthen a ship’s deck to support a mast. Usually plural, “Partners,” not Partner.- In Kotler: Value chains, of suppliers, distributors and customers. Partnering with specific suppliers or distributors create a value-delivery network; also called a supply chain. Partnership marketing; Partner Relationship Management.
9. Passion: Intense, driving or overmastering feelings, Emotion. The emotions as distinguished from reason; A strong liking for or devotion to some activity; Deep interest in your partnership/presentation of any of the 9P’s to any target or partner.
- How many flavors does Baskin Robbins have?
More than 1,000 flavors.
Trademark list of 31 flavors, but there have been almost 1000 since the company was founded in 1940’s. Eight food technologist each come up with about 20 per year and of those 160 three to four make it in a typical year. They say it’s a fun job and they get to play with food every day. - What digital device has been described as:
"Don't understand it."
"Most amazing thing ever invented?"
"It has changed my life."
"God's machine."TiVo. More buzz, than sales.
"I've converted. It's my new religion," jokes Lee Goldberg, an L.A.-based television producer who grew up in Walnut Creek. "I was a Jew, but not anymore. I'm now a TiVo."
From Sports Illustrated… best invention since Beer, Viagra, Big Bertha, Halle Berry, Barcalounger…
"With TiVo you can watch an entire nine inning baseball game in the time it deserves…17 minutes.” Sports Illustrated 12/21/2003
Called the most amazing thing ever invented by Rosie O’Donnell
From Google “…it has changed my life." - Nothin' is on?
How many channels did Bruce Springsteen sing about in 1992?57
Average home has 104.7, as of 3/2008
Over 250 Channels and Counting! on DirecTV, as of 1/2010. - How many seats are sold to the public for the Super Bowl?
Only 1,000 tickets for Super Bowl XXXIX were available to the public, according to NFL and Sports Illustrated. The remaining 76K are distributed by teams and local organizing committee. Players and coaches can purchase 15 each. All players from non participating teams are offered two each. Players from participating teams can make $20K. - What grade did student, Fred Smith, receive on his 15-page
Yale paper proposing a reliable overnight delivery
service? Fred Smith went on to found FedEx.
Student grade of "C".
A Yale University management professor Challis A. Hall said, "The concept is interesting and well-formed, but in order to earn better than a 'C', the idea must be feasible." - Dream about the Egg McMuffin you'll have for breakfast
tomorrow. In 1970 what time did McDonald's open for breakfast?
McDonald's opened at 10:00 AM, and breakfast wasn't served until the early '70s.
Egg McMuffin was invented in Santa Barbara in 1977 and it took Wendy's and Burger King ten years to start a breakfast fare. - Leaving for work? Seems crowded? What percentage of
workers leaves before 7AM? 8AM?
Before 7AM: 30.5%
Before 8AM: 61.3%
Midnight to 5:59AM: 11.0%
6AM to 6:58AM 19.5%
7AM to 7:59AM 30.8%
8AM to 8:59AM 16.1%
9AM to 11:59AM 13.7%
Sleep. Before the light bulb people got ten hours of sleep a night. Now adults average 6.9 hours a night. - What was significant in the hanging of the Matisse’s Le Bateau
painting, at the New York Museum of Modern art?
It was hung upside down for 47 days before anyone noticed. - Women bearing fewer children. How does this research affect
marketing and advertising?
- Birth Rate dropped to lowest level since records were first kept in 1909.
- Fewer teen births; Teen births have dropped 30% in past decade.
- Average age at which American women are having their first child has climbed to record 25.1. In 1970 it was 21.4.
- The later is good overall for infant health because birth outcomes for teen moms are problematic.
- Major implications in how families are structured.
- How communities spend money.
- How nations finance retirement.
- America more a society of seniors and less of young people.
- 13.9 births per 1,000 women ages 15-44.
- Fewer children: Down 17% from 1990. LA Times
- In America today, women earn the majority of bachelor’s degrees and master’s degrees. And are projected to earn the majority of doctoral degrees in a generation.
- Are gift cards a good thing?
What will they think of next? Every time you go to the market and see those stands that have gift cards for every convenience store or restaurant, do you always think that it’s an easy gift and easy to buy with your groceries ...... WRONG!
Fraud which typically costs its victims between $25 and $500.
Just a little warning before gift giving.
The crooks have found a way to rob you of your gift card balance. If you buy Gift Cards from a display rack that has various store cards you may become a victim of theft. Crooks are now jotting down the card numbers in the store and then wait a few days and call to see how much of a balance THEY have on the card. Once they find the card is "activated", they go online and start shopping. You may want to purchase your card from a customer service person, where they do not have the Gift Cards viewable to the public. Please share this with all your family and friends... snopes.com May 2010
Time is money and money buys time. Time lets you enjoy money and money buys time.
— Anonymous