Here’s a quick round up of some of the biggest stories in marketing recently…
Apple Smash Their Own Record
You can’t fail to have noticed that Apple launched their latest iPhone model, the iPhone 6 last week. The launch was further publicised by the inclusion of free music giveaway of U2’s album, a topic of discussion on our LinkedIn group. What makes the launch even more newsworthy is the sheer volume of sales Apple clocked up over the weekend of the launch. In just 3 days, over ten million phones have flown off the shelves – smashing Apple’s previous record of nine million, which the iPhone 5S/C set. This includes the pre-order numbers, of which there were also a record amount for the tech giant.
One of the ten million new owners in particular found himself the centre of a little extra attention though, and not in a good way! The hapless customer was proudly unboxing his new purchase to show a news reporter, only to drop it live on television. See it here.
Losing Customers To Amazon? It Could Be Down To Your Website
Research from Digital River, reported on by The Drum, has shown how quickly online shoppers will change their allegiance when it comes to parting with their cash. One of the biggest statistics was that 78% of consumers would turn to Amazon if they could not buy a product from the brand’s own website. Of course, Amazon have a slick e-commerce site, and the big budget to make it so, but that doesn’t mean you can’t compete. For starters, make sure that customers can buy your products online – offering in-store purchases only certainly isn’t the way to win direct sales. Digital River survey respondents cited sites being difficult to navigate and cluttered as major turn-offs, to take a lead from that and take the simple-but-effective approach to your web design.
Adverts Are Coming To Pinterest
Pinterest has been slowly sharing details of its advertising product recently, and it certainly sounds like an interesting development for the platform. It will enable advertisers to target specific contacts using their email addresses. So, you could upload a list of emails, and Pinterest will match those details with their Pinterest users, showing your ‘Promoted Pin’ only to those people. This is a great way to be extremely targeted and personalised with messages, something which is so important in the crowded marketplace of online advertising.
Pinterest has also recognised the importance of tracking results, so have come up with a system to measure purchases made as a result of a customer viewing or clicking a Promoted Pin. The changes are due to take place next month, so if you’re planning to use the system, we’d love to hear how successful you find it!
Don’t be the ‘colouring-in department’ warns Marketing Society president
At the Marketing Society Conference in London this week, society president Amanda Mackenzie called on the marketing community to behave more ethically and work to improve its standing in business management.
Mackenzie, who is also Aviva’s chief marketing and communications officer, said the marketing industry needed to be bolder to avoid being seen as “the colouring-in department”.
Dos and don’ts for Marketing Graduates
For marketing graduates specifically, the competition can be exceptionally fierce. Due to the popularity of this career choice, marketing graduates certainly need to make sure they perform to the best of their ability in 2013 in order to ensure triumph in the job hunt.
Video CVs: A help or hindrance when applying for marketing jobs?
Today’s CVs are full of hyperlinks to online profiles, blog spots, digital portfolios and company pages. The next development – something UK recruiters are gradually seeing more and more of – is the video CV, or VCV. The marketing, PR and new media sectors are likely to see an influx of the latest VCVs during 2013 and beyond, marketing HR experts predict.
