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Campaigninindia: Nitin Jain, Rema Harish launch consultancy firm Domor |
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Monday, 02 November 2009 10:08 |
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Media veterans Nitin Jain and Rema Harish have launched a specialist consulting firm, Domor Communication Consulting. A company statement says that the idea behind launching the consulting firm was “to help advertisers and allied businesses improve marketing effectiveness.” The new venture has been established in strategic partnership with consultancy firm R3. Jain has 22 years of experience in the advertising, media and television across companies like JWT, MindShare, and Viacom. Harish has 20 years of experience across strategic planning, research and consumer insights at JWT and GroupM. “Over the past few years, the separation of the creative and media functions has caused a substantial erosion of the synergistic approach between the marketer and his brand communications agencies. This has led to less effective brand building. The problem is now exacerbated by the multiplicity of agencies offering overlapping services. Each agency offers strategic advice but not all of it connects back to the core brand values,” says Jain. Adds Harish, “The marketer is increasingly not getting enough advice on ‘what to do’ and ‘what not to do’. The focus instead is on ‘how best to do something’. Marketers are resorting to external audits hoping to fix the problem, especially in the media space. The audit ends up being a mere postmortem of what can be measured rather than being a constructive, diagnostic critique. The auditor is rarely around to either identify the problem or to provide solutions”. The agency’s gamut of services include process audits and advisory to identify areas for improving effectiveness; pitch consulting to identify and select the right agency; media strategy advisory to shift the focus from channel choice to true investment and platform decisions; ideating to build brand property, resting on core brand values and valuation and measurement of tentpole media properties.
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MediaPost: WPP: 'Armageddon' Averted, Ad Economy Grows 'Less Worse' |
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Monday, 02 November 2009 10:08 |
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Joining the major advertising holding companies in reporting especially weak third-quarter results, WPP Group nonetheless said overall conditions in the advertising economy have grown "less worse," and that an outright "Armageddon" has been averted in the media industry. "People feel better, their hearts and minds are better but it hasn't been reflected in increased spending yet," WPP Chairman-CEO Martin Sorrell told the Reuters news service prior to a call briefing analysts and journalists this morning. "But it is much less worse in the United States. The down draft is slowing." WPP attributed some of the easement to easier comparisons with tougher quarters a year ago. In the U.S., for example, WPP said its "like-for-like" revenues declined only 6.1% during the third-quarter of 2009, which compares with declines of 9.4% in the first-quarter and 11.3% in the second quarter of this year. Total worldwide revenues declined 8.7% during the third-quarter, on a like-for-like basis. However, WPP's "advertising and media investment management" operations performed relatively weaker than the company's overall revenues, "reflecting reductions in clients' traditional media spending and media deflation," the company said. WPP Group, which is the world's largest advertising and marketing services company, and the parent of media services agencies such as GroupM's Mindshare, Mediaedge:cia, Mediacom and Maxus units, reported that its advertising and media investment management revenues declined greater than the group as a whole, falling 9.8% from the third-quarter of 2008.
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TheSun: Truth pays in advertising |
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Friday, 30 October 2009 10:24 |
TRUTH and trust were the watchwords in various discussions about branding and consumer engagement, at the recently-concluded AdAsia09 congress held in Kuala Lumpur.
"The primary thing facing brands now is trust. Brands are about trust. It is important that consumers know what your brand stands for," said Interbrand group chief executive officer Jez Frampton.
"It’s all about the clarity of the brand and its purpose," said Frampton in his presentation titled Acting Like a Leader: The Art of Sustainable Sustainability.
He said trust is vital in creating and managing brand value, and the loss of trust in brands today have caused companies to reappraise their brands as consumers want to know how brands treat them and how responsible they are.
"People need to know the benefits. Make it clear why it would be good for them. We’ve also created green noise; make it seem like there’s activity," he said.
"Saying you are a sustainable brand is not enough, you need to think about the benefits you are offering the people. You need to take action and show them how your brand can benefit them too," he added.
"Brands are fundamentally business assets. Brands drive demand. Brands today are about belief, behaviour and attitude, and not just a product," said Frampton, who was of the view there is a need to change the way companies do things.
"Logos and commercials were used in the past, but today, it is less about what companies say and more about what they do. It’s not just about the product or service, but also about the consumer’s experience with it," he said.
"The financial meltdown and the stark realisation of what we are doing to our planet (climate disasters) presents an opportunity for change. Sustainability is a must-have," he said, adding that companies need to spend time refining their position by having much clearer propositions.
"This is an opportunity to listen again to consumers. Smart companies are the ones best positioned to meet needs of customers. Understand their needs and market harder, spend harder. If you have money and resources, it will put you in a very powerful position," he explained.
Frampton said with growing social pressure, brands are doing a good job of confusing everybody with thousands of trademarks registered every month globally, leaving people unclear about what they are supposed to do.
"There has also been a great amount of ‘green washing’ where companies try to fool their consumers into thinking that they are green," he said, pointing out the danger of using "green" for short-term gains as "green" is not a short-term trend.
"You can only fool consumers once. There is a significant change in consumers today; they are an aware group of consumers. If they don’t like your product, they will tell others about it," he added.
Frampton also stressed on brands being drivers of attitude and behaviour, and their ability to affect the way people live their lives.
"Brands can change behaviour. Brands also have the power to change the world, to re-educate us and to change our behaviour on consuming," he said.
"The way forward is to first set the highest standard for your industry, and then demonstrate to people that your actions have significant efforts, and measure the impact of your actions," he added.
Meanwhile, Asian Food Channel (AFC) co-founder Maria Brown told the congress that the secret ingredients to its success were originality and courage.
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TheSun: The Kuala Lumpur Declaration |
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Friday, 30 October 2009 10:23 |
WE, the representatives of advertising organisations in the Asian continent taking part in this biennial gathering of the continent’s advertising fraternity held at Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia from Oct 22-24, 2009:
» Recognise that being home to diverse cultures, the Asian continent presents a formidable challenge to the development, progress and stability of our respective societies.
» Reaffirm that the full realisation of all human rights and fundamental freedoms for all Asians is an essential element in the regional response to promote a responsible advertising culture in Asia.
» Recognise that in this Age of Responsibility for brands in Asia, growth and the overall expansion of advertising must show due concern for social responsibility, sustainability, accountability and ethics.
We reaffirm our commitment to implement the Kuala Lumpur Declaration as set out in this document and adopt the following Agenda for Action;
1. Reaffirm that concern with ethics, cultural values and advertising standards must be the mainstay of national, regional and international initiatives for the promotion of brands in Asia.
2. Commit ourselves to overcoming barriers that prevent the attainment of high advertising standards in Asia.
3. Commit ourselves also to addressing as a priority the vulnerabilities faced by children exposed to advertising, providing education to these children and their families.
4. Emphasise the need to strengthen linkages between advertising, other communication vehicles, national development plans and strategies.
5. Reaffirm our commitment to GATT and implement it in a manner that supports the rights of Asian nations to protect their indigenous religions, customs and cultures.
6. Commit ourselves to intensifying investment in and efforts towards the research and development of advertisements that promote Asian values in advertising.
7. Commit resources to support training programmes that enhance skill sets across levels in the advertising industry.
8. Encourage advertising companies and agencies, donors, multilateral organisations and other partners to develop public-private partnerships in support of research and development, and knowledge and technology transfer that will facilitate higher standards in advertising.
9. Encourage bilateral, regional and international efforts to promote knowledge and awareness of good practices in advertising.
10. Encourage the responsible growth of indigenous brands in Asia and thereby improve the sustainability and economic growth of local communities.
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Boosting demand for the Asian brand |
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Friday, 30 October 2009 10:22 |
A TOUCHING video on the legacy of Yasmin Ahmad was screened at the start of the congress meeting as a tribute to Malaysia’s most prominent creative director who had been slated to be the only speaker from Malaysia, but sadly, passed away in July.
This had followed the gavel handover ceremony where a representative from Korea – the previous host country for AdAsia – handed over the gavel to AdAsia09 Kuala Lumpur organising chairman Peter Das at the opening ceremony which was performed by 4As Malaysia president Datuk Vincent Lee.
Das later presented Asian Federation of Advertising Associations (AFAA) Lifetime Awards to five AFAA members – Shuzo Ishikawa from Japan, Vinit Suraphongchai from Thailand, Indra Abidin from Indonesia, Longmen Hu from Taipei and Senyon Kim from Korea.
An Award of Merit was presented to Malaysia’s Jacob Matthews, who is chief operating officer of Macomm Management Services Sdn Bhd.
The opening presentation was United Nations under-secretary-general Kiyotaka Akasaka with his presentation titled The United Nations and How Its Universal Values are Applicable to Asia’s Challenges and Future.
Apart from Frampton and Brown’s presentations, there were two other speakers – Nielsen Media Research Asia Pacific managing director Richard Basil-Jones and Dentsu Inc executive officer Kenji Shiratsuchi.
Shiratsuchi spoke about new ideas to change companies and society while Basil-Jones extracted lessons in global branding from the Beijing 2008 Olympics.
Meanwhile, the conference sessions on the second day were more interactive with a live talk-show-style session anchored by Aljazeera English broadcaster Veronica Pedrosa, who interviewed Zee Entertainment’s international operations chief operating officer (COO) Bharat Kumar Ranga and World Marketing Association president Hermawan Kartajaya.
There was also a panel discussion featuring Jollibee Food Corporation corporate marketing vice-president Dondi Gomez, Media Unilever (Asia, Africa, Middle East and Turkey) vice-president Rahul Welde and one of Asia’s top brand strategist Dr Sattar Khan – moderated by Media Prima Bhd business development and international COO Kamal Khalid.
Other speakers on the second day included International Marketing Partners director Allyson L. Stewart-Allen with the topic The Asia Asset: The Heritage Value of Asian Brands; Hakuhodo research and development division executive manager Yutaka Tezuka with the topic Creating Engagement: New perspectives from sei-katsu-sha insight; and Bernhard Glock Media Leadership Company president and CEO Bernhard Glock on Learning how to win in the long run.
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TheSun: A place to share, learn and build networks |
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Friday, 30 October 2009 10:21 |
APART from the conference sessions, the 630 delegates from 23 countries – South Korea, India, Pakistan, Singapore, Taipei, Philippines, Japan, Indonesia, Thailand, Sri Lanka, United Arab Emirates, Bangladesh, Hong Kong, Nepal, Vietnam, Australia, Germany, USA, UK, Mauritius, Poland, Kazakhstan and host country Malaysia – had much opportunity to network over lunches and dinners hosted by sponsors.
Tourism Malaysia hosted a welcome dinner for the delegates on Thursday and treated the participants to a traditional dance at the opening ceremony on Friday.
Meanwhile, Dentsu Inc hosted a dinner on Friday while Hakuhodo hosted a lunch on Saturday.
The three-day conference wrapped up with a farewell dinner themed India Night hosted by the Indian AA, which will host the next congress in New Delhi in 2011. Vietnam has made a bid to host AdAsia in 2013.
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WARC: US consumers embrace brands on new media |
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Thursday, 29 October 2009 21:13 |
BOSTON: Some 89% of Americans who regularly use services like Facebook and Twitter believe brands should both have a presence in new media and actively seek to interact with their customers via such tools, a survey by Cone, the strategy and communications agency, has found.
The 2009 Cone Consumer New Media Study was based on an initial poll of 1,048 people in the US, paired down to 587 "new media users", and was conducted by Opinion Research.
It found that 78% of people who frequently utilise digital platforms like blogs, social networks, video-sharing websites and online games interact with brands on these properties, compared with just 29% last year.
Some 37% of netizens also engage with brands at least once a week using new media, up from 25% in 2008, with 16% doing so on a monthly basis, and a quarter a "few times a year."
In terms of the exact channels used, 58% look to company websites, 45% to email, 30% to social networks, 24% to online games, 17% to forums, 16% to blogs, 14% to photo- or video-sharing sites, and 13% to mobile.
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Italian politician seeks to unmask YouTube commenters |
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Wednesday, 28 October 2009 21:23 |
LONDON - An Italian politician is demanding prosecutors investigate over 4,500 YouTube members who posted critical comments about him on a clip.
The clip in question features a 1991 television interview with Salvatore Cuffaro, then a local Sicilian politician, where he slams members of the judiciary and journalists over anti-Mafia operations and accusations.
Cuffaro is now a senator. He was also president of Sicily until he was forced to resign last year after being convicted of having links to the Cosa Nostra, the Sicilian mafia.
One of Cuffaro’s targets in the 1991 interview is anti-mafia magistrate Giovanni Falcone who is regarded as a hero by many Italians for his efforts to bring down the Cosa Nostra. Falcone was assassinated, along with his wife and three bodyguards, by a roadside bomb in 1992.
The YouTube clip was posted two years ago and has attracted over 1m views with 4,500 comments.
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BrandRepublic: Nokia sues Apple over patent infringements |
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Friday, 23 October 2009 19:38 |
LONDON - Mobile giant Nokia is suing Apple for allegedly infringing patents on technology for the iPhone and is demanding royalty payments for the millions of iPhones sold since the device's launch in 2007.
The lawsuit, filed in a US Federal court in Delaware, claims infringement of 10 Nokia patents that relate to technologies for wireless data, speech coding, security and encryption.
Nokia claims the patents are "infringed by all Apple iPhone models shipped since the iPhone was introduced in 2007".
The Finnish company said it has made attempts to license the technology to Apple but that it has refused to provide compensation.
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Blogging Is Dead, Long Live Journalism |
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Friday, 23 October 2009 17:38 |
Technorati's regular "State of the Blogosphere" analysis of the business is just out, and among the stats is the incredible fact that bloggers are being paid more than ever. Is it time to rethink the definition of blogging? Yes.
First, the stats. Technorati's killer finding is that among the professional bloggers they surveyed who fall into the "full time" worker category, the average salary works out at $122,222--an enormous figure. Those full-timers equate to 46% of the respondees, which means that the majority of bloggers are part-timers--but these guys still take home some $14,777 per year, which isn't to be sniffed at. That means the average blogger salary is about $42,548. The money isn't primarily coming from employers (14% of bloggers work for corporations). Nor is it pouring in from ads on self-published blog pages--the financial meltdown put a massive dent in Internet ad revenues. Instead, bloggers are leveraging their popularity and expertise into speaking engagements, "traditional media" assignments, and setting up and running conferences, as VentureBeat notes.
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