The problem, though, is that today the state of the art of social media sentiment analysis is not technologically advanced enough to provide reliably meaningful information.  Manual analysis is often still required if we want to ensure the accuracy of the result.  At a minimum, automated statistics need to be periodically spot-checked to determine how valid they are.

As an example, let’s look at a recent analysis of tweets for a major brand from one of the sentiment analysis engines out there. (I won’t mention which engine so as not to unfairly target one over the others.)  The below chart shows the first 23 tweets analyzed for “Pepsi”.  Those on the left (shaded green) were determined to have positive sentiment and those on the right (shaded red) were determined to be negative.  Next to each is an extra block with a manual determination of the same tweet.  Green blocks mean the tweet was manually determined to be positive and red negative. (Although some tweets could also be considered neutral, we kept it simpler – just positive or negative.)

The result?  Out of the first 23 tweets returned from the engine, 14 of them (60%) were deemed to be coded incorrectly!  In fact, the automated analysis translates to an overall slightly negative sentiment (.43), when in fact the manual analysis showed an overall strong positive sentiment (.78).

Also note that for our analysis, we used a brand name (“Pepsi”) that is relatively easily identifiable by automated systems.  But, had we chosen another common brand such as “Coke”, our original problems would have been compounded further.  In addition to the same incorrect sentiment classifications, we have two more problems.

• The system will incorrectly include in its analysis tweets that use the same word but not intended to refer to the brand. For example, many tweets about “coke” refer to the drug. (And of course we have to take into account all of the tweets by those in the coal and steel industries referring to “coke” as the result of processing bituminous coal. They’re always skewing our numbers!)
• The system also fails (except with a second pass) to include tweets that use other forms of the brand name – in this case, the more formal “Coca Cola”. (Pepsi is lucky in that both its shortened and full names both contain the word “Pepsi” so internet searches and analyses are easier.)

Does this mean that automated sentiment analysis should be avoided?  Not necessarily, but it does mean that they need to be regularly spot-checked by actual people until they are more consistently reliable.

Domus is a leading edge internet marketing agency that brings its full range of classic marketing expertise to its hi-tech digital capabilities. For more information on how Domus can help you accurately analyze your internet presence and develop effective strategies to further your brand, visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

Similarly, in advertising, the effectiveness of ads is primarily dependent on the content. The more captivating, interesting, memorable, identifiable, and relevant you make your ads, the more effective they will be – whether shown on TV, on the internet, in print, or heard on the radio. Look at any effective advertising campaign today, and the ads will score highly in each of these five adjectives.

Let’s look at each of these individually.

• Captivating – If something about the ad doesn’t jar your attention away from whatever else you were thinking about, and doesn’t hold your attention, then whatever message is conveyed throughout the ad will be lost.
• Interesting – An annoying ad can be captivating, but that doesn’t make it effective. Once captivated, you must also want to keep watching – and also to share and talk about it. This adjective is critical to making an ad go viral. Note that “interesting” can encompass intellectually stimulating, funny, emotional, or other.
• Memorable – For how many ads do you recall part of the jingle or visuals, but can’t remember what brand the ad was for? So ads have to be memorable both for the brand and message being communicated. However, they also have to be memorable in and of themselves. They should pop into people’s heads during the course of the day, during conversations, and especially when shopping.
• Identifiable – This is related to the above, because if the advertised brand is not immediately and clearly identifiable, then the chances of it being memorable are small. In today’s age, though, “identifiable” has more facets than in the past. For example, the brand should still be identifiable if the viewer is fast-forwarding the ad on TV with a DVR.
• Relevant – This is somewhat related to “identifiable”, but is more focused on the message. In addition to being identified with a brand, the ad needs to support and enhance the brand position.

If you are creating ads – display ads, videos, print ads, or whatever – measure your work-in-progress along these five scales. The higher you get on each, the more effective your work will be.

Domus is an exciting marketing agency, combining classic marketing principles with state-of-the-art digital execution to continually deliver effective strategies and campaigns for our clients. For more information, visit us at http://www.domusinc.com or visit our digital and social media site at http://www.domusdigital.com.

How many people are interested in getting tweets (as SMS txt messages) from their favorite vendor or brand, but have been reluctant because of the requirement to sign up with Twitter? There might well be quite a few, which means that tweeters will start seeing more followers soon.

Domus is an innovative marketing communications firm that incorporates state-of-the-art technologies and classic marketing principles into effective marketing campaigns. For more information visit us at Domus, Inc. and Domus Digital.

When ebooks were first introduced, they were relatively expensive. Both Sony’s and Amazon’s were over $300. Now there is a version of the Barnes and Noble Nook for $149 and a version of the Amazon Kindle for $139. At these price points, they’re starting to make very little on the hardware itself, but hope to make longer term profits on the subsequent ebook sales.

The major implication for the market is that dedicated ebook readers that don’t have an integrated ebook distribution system are not going to fare well. In fact, most of the ebook readers that were announced earlier this year have already folded. The only major player other than B&N or Amazon that is left is Sony and, unfortunately for them, they don’t have a (book) content distribution system that compares with the other two.

Of course, the wild card in the race is the iPad and other up-and-coming non-dedicated ebook readers. And a big wild card it is. Of course, neither Amazon nor B&N are hurt too much by the iPad because both have iPad apps that let their customers read their books on it, but it does damage their exclusivity and force more price competition on the books themselves.

The next twelve months should be interesting.

Domus, Inc. is an integrated digital and traditional marketing communications agency. For more information, please visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

Compared to the Leaf, which will also be sold in the US by the end of this year, the Volt has a lower capacity battery (40 miles vs. 100 miles) and is more expensive ($41,000 vs. $33,000 – although each qualifies for tax breaks). So, unfortunately for GM, consumers are forced to trade better electric milage and significantly more more money for the peace of mind afforded by the gas engine. It won’t be an easy sell, although it’s possible.

The Volt’s price, though, presents GM with a much bigger sales problem because of Chevy’s brand positioning. Chevy has always been GM’s lower cost, every man’s car (separate from the iconic Corvette). Virtually all of its car models have starting prices of between $10,000 and $20,000. People expect Chevy’s to be less expensive. So the Volt’s price will be its albatross – it doesn’t fit Chevy’s brand positioning. Moreover, people don’t associate the Chevrolet brand with leading edge technology and innovations, which clearly GM is trying to do with the Volt.

GM would have been much better off if they had launched the Volt under the Buick or Cadillac brand. In addition to better lining up the car with the brand’s established position in people’s minds, GM could even have raised the price a little to include a larger electric engine. It would then have a car that beats the competition on all fronts.

The time is coming soon, though, when we’ll see how well GM’s strategy worked. By the end of this year the Volt will be on the market, along with competitors like the Nissan Leaf. As an early indicator, though, consider a few interesting statistics. The Nissan Leaf is significantly ahead of the Chevy Volt in terms of internet search volume (Google Trends) and Facebook fans (Nissan Leaf Facebook page vs. Chevy Volt Facebook page).

Domus is a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

Most U.S. state lotteries enjoyed near-monopoly gaming status during their early years, with legitimate gaming competition coming only from resort casinos in Las Vegas and Atlantic City. However, times have changed and now the convenience of online gaming and the glitz and glam offered by the latest crop of gaming venues have led avid lottery ticket buyers astray.

Within any industry, the only way to thrive, not just survive, is to continuously evolve and find new opportunities to generate revenue, and the lottery is no different. Some states have joined Powerball and Mega Millions or added instant ticket vending machines. All of this is good, but an opportunity exists for more. We’re overlooking the most profitable untapped market: the get-rich-quick, money-obsessed younger generations who have money-burning holes in their pockets.

How do you target these spend-happy consumers? Simple; expand your retail footprint beyond traditional outlets to reach a wider, AKA younger, audience.

Through the proven success of retailer recruitment, state lotteries can identify, qualify and select non-traditional outlets to grow their sales pipeline and reach the 18-35 year olds that already have wish lists to help spend their not-yet-won lottery millions. Bowling centers, movie theaters, general discount stores, diners and cafes are all breeding grounds for the younger market. Why not leverage them and make their most popular customers your most popular customers?

Domus has been working on behalf of the Pennsylvania (PA) lottery for over 7 years and has successfully identified new revenue streams through non-traditional avenues to expand their retailer base and target an influx of new players including the elusive 18-35 customers. We’ve helped the PA lottery increase ticket sales by 58% in 2009, let us help you.

The questions of why the phone failed and even whether the phone failed are even more interesting, though. We’ll never know for sure, but here are some thoughts.

First, assuming the phone did fail (which we’ll come back to later), one possible reason is that Google did not pay enough attention to its four marketing Ps – product, price, promotion, and place (distribution). Let’s assume that the phone itself was good, so that leaves the other Ps.

First let’s look at the distribution channel (place). Cell phones – more than most other products – are inextricably entwined with their service provider, so attempting to bypass the service provider was already a daunting gamble by Google. Even Apple, which garnered enough interest in its phone independent of the network, still chose a service provider with whom to partner.

The cell phone distribution channel is especially important because of the marketing effort that the service providers put into their phones. First, there’s the next P, price. As everyone knows, you can always get phones for less than the retail price when you buy from the wireless carrier (as long as you accept the two-year commitment). So why buy outside of the wireless carrier? We’ve all been conditioned to think that way.

And finally, let’s consider the last P, promotion. Google didn’t just introduce a branded phone. More importantly, it also introduced a phone operating system (Android) that it hoped to induce others to use in their phones. One of those manufacturers who immediately decided to do so was Motorola. They, in conjunction with Verizon (as opposed to Google’s approach of going it alone), launched a huge advertising campaign for the new Droid phone (“Droid Does”) at the same time that Google started selling its Nexus One. With Verizon’s massive marketing push, everyone knew about Droid, everyone got a good price for Droid, and everyone associated the name, “Droid”, with “Android”. Where did that leave Nexus One? Apparently nowhere.

However, all of the above was based on the assumption that Google did fail with the Nexus One. What if, though, the primary purpose of the Nexus One was to generate enough buzz about the Android operating system to propel all Android-based phones (i.e., Google-based phones) to mainstream success? Once the buzz did its work, the Nexus could happily be retired. In that sense, maybe the Nexus One was an outstanding success. Android-based phones are quickly challening the iPhone for smartphone market share. Google never was in the physical product business anyway.

Domus, Inc. is a marketing communications agency specializing in integrating the digital and social media worlds with classic marketing principles to deliver high returns on investment for our clients. For more information, please visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

So, if you’re not already monitoring these sites and honestly addressing posted concerns, you might want to think hard about your current marketing allocations.

Domus is a full service marketing communications agency that combines classic marketing experience with digital marketing expertise to effectively deliver improved business performance for our customers. For more information, please visit use at http://www.domusinc.com.

Now, “Kinect” is actually a good name for the product, and the device has the potential to be incredibly successful, but that’s not the point of this blog post. Rather, I’d like to muse about the strategy to use one name for the many months leading up to the actual launch, and then change the name just before the launch. Microsoft has always done that with its operating systems. For example, Windows Server 2008 was referred to as “Codename Longhorn” from early 2005 through August, 2007, when Bill Gates announced its official name in anticipation of its February, 2008 release.

Although that might be fine with operating systems, especially those designed for the corporate server market, Project Natal – er, uh, Kinect – is different. It is a consumer product, not a corporate one. And 2010 is not 2005. When Microsoft announced Project Natal in 2009, it released a video showcasing its capabilities. That video has been on the Top 10 viral video charts every month since then. It has received millions of views, and virtually every gamer has heard about it. Moreover, forums and social media sites have been abuzz over it non-stop.

In other words, social media is the name of the game in 2009/2010, for those companies who know how to use it well. Microsoft certainly did use it well this past year, getting the whole gaming world knowing about and discussing their upcoming product. But they didn’t hit a home run because of their naming tactic. Some of that branding value will now disappear because the word “Natal” no longer exists for Microsoft. They absolutely can – and will – spend lots of money to imprint the new name in people’s minds, but a more nimble and cost-conscious company might have come up with the final brand name a year ago. Then they could have gotten their branding done for them without a massive advertising campaign (allowing that money to be used more effectively elsewhere).

Domus is a marketing communications agency specializing in integrating social media, digital, and traditional advertising and PR into effective brand strategies. For more information, please visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

“We’d ask that whether you’re talking to a dealer, reviewing dealer advertising, or speaking with friends and family, that you communicate our brand as Chevrolet moving forward,” said the memo, which was signed by Alan Batey, vice president for Chevrolet sales and service, and Jim Campbell, the G.M. division’s vice president for marketing.

“When you look at the most recognized brands throughout the world, such as Coke or Apple for instance, one of the things they all focus on is the consistency of their branding,” the memo said. “Why is this consistency so important? The more consistent a brand becomes, the more prominent and recognizable it is with the consumer.”

Every once in a while some piece of news leaks out that just offers so much opportunity for fun. Everyone is talking about how stupid this is. Just as a few examples:

• Do they truly think that Chevy is made or lost as a brand by refusing to use the name that most of the public regularly uses?
• Might the GM executives have considered that the inconsistency of using “Coke” as an example of why they shouldn’t use a brand nickname?
• If they wanted to tell their employees not to use “Chevy”, might they have also considered changing their web sites, TV, and other advertising? All of them still use “Chevy” throughout. (In fact, tonight every TV commercial that I saw referenced “Chevy” exclusively – not a single mention of “Chevrolet”. And the web site presented was chevydealer.com, not chevrolet.com.)

Did Alan Batey and Jim Campbell not think that in today’s internet-based social media world, their ridiculous directive wouldn’t be discussed by everyone around the world? Did they not realize that they would be mocked and that Chevy’s (and GM’s) brand image would be hurt>

Isn’t the internet fun? Too bad not everyone knows yet how to play in it.

Domus is a digital agency and a full service marketing agency that combines expertise in marketing and technology to effectively communicate brand platforms. For more information visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

Here’s one initial observation. Prior to the spill, BP’s overall reputation was generally neutral – relatively evenly split between people who had positive, neutral, and negative opinions about them. However, since the spill opinions are strongly skewed to the negative.

Also, prior to the explosion, BP had very litle presence on major social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. They did a lot of advertising (“Beyond Petroleum”), but not much engagement with the public, especially the online public.

So, whatever they have tried to do since then cannot be effective because they have no initial base of fans from which to draw help and support. As a counter example, consider what would happen if some disaster involved a company such as Starbucks. Excluding all discussions of the nature of the disaster itself, Starbucks would at least have a couple of million people with whom it has established an online relationship and who could (and would) join the discussions from an initially positive perspective.

So, one lesson to be learned is that engagement in social media is not just for ongoing brand strength; it’s also an insurance policy against unanticipated problems – even on scales much less than BP’s disaster.

Domus is a creative and digital marketing agency based in Philadelphia. We combine expertise in classic marketing, social media trends, technology, and business acumen to provide effective short- and long-term solutions for our customers’ marketing needs. For more information, please visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

For 25 years (and especially over the last 10) the brand has declined. As such it is a good business decision for Ford to cut its losses and move on. After a certain point, there is not much that can be done to revive a dying brand, no different than a dying person.

That doesn’t mean that there is no room in Ford’s line-up for another brand – Volkswagen does very well with multiple brands – but just no longer Mercury. Mercury’s demise began when it no longer stood for anything special, unless you consider replicating a Ford sister car with fancier trim as something special.

As such, hopefully Ford Motor Company has learned the importance of brand management for its future. Good brand management means that you don’t only declare and communicate the position in the consumers’ minds that you intend to hold, but that you consistently and exclusively deliver products and/or services that meet the consumers’ changing ideas of what that position means. Mercury failed to do so.

Moreover, it’s a recognition that sometimes a brand position can be squeezed into non-existence by other brand positions. Ford, Mercury, and Lincoln represented a “ladder of brands” strategy, giving people smaller stepping stones between levels of prestige. But when foreign auto makers started selling higher quality cars with more standard features at lower price points, Ford had to respond by improving its main Ford brand, which squeezed Mercury from the bottom. Similarly as Lincoln offerred cars at lower price points, it squeezed Mercury from the top. That has left no distinguishing position for Mercury.

Domus is a Philadelphia-based advertising and PR firm as well as a digitial and social media marketing agency. For more information, visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

This week Nike launched their official World Cup campaign with a new three-minute video created by Mexican director Alejandro Inarritu (Babel, 21 Grams). Called “Write the Future”, it features soccer stars like Wayne Rooney, Franck Ribery, Cristiano Ronaldo, Landon Donovan, and Ronaldinho, as well as non-soccer stars such as Kobe Bryant, Roger Federer, and Homer Simpson.

Adidas, on the other hand, won the rights to be the overall World Cup official sponsor, so it will be interesting to see who wins this battle as Adidas counters Nike’s move.

Domus is a marketing and digital advertising agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

This opens up a whole new area of online marketing segmentation. Previously, you could target people who searched for your keywords or who visited other sites, but without knowing much more about them. Or you had to wait until they explicitly entered their email address for you to contact them directly. Now you can focus some of your effort on people who, by their own actions, have clearly indicated some interest in you specifically but haven’t yet given you direct contact.

Consider the possible conversion rate performance improvements by offering something special to previous visitors. It’s not quite the same as email marketing directly to people who have left you their email addresses, but it has the potential to be more than marketing blindly to everyone who meets a generic demographic.

If you haven’t at least begun to explore Google Remarketing, you’re probably doing your brand a disservice. Check it out at Google Remarketing.

Domus is an innovative advertising agency and digital marketing agency based in Philadelphia. For more information visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

Successful brands are those that are singularly focused on delivering the best products and services in markets consumers demand. Consider companies like Apple. On top of their other successes, their iPad is on target to being the fastest product in history to reach the $1 billion mark. Although Apple invests in marketing (principally advertising and minimally in social media), it own’s the public’s perception as a company that delivers the most innovative and desirable devices. Apple is focused on product and customer first, which then enables effective communication options.

On the other hand, companies that cannot consistently meet and exceed their customers’ expectations will faulter no matter how much attention is paid to the remainder of the marketing mix. Their focus should instead be on their products and service. Once those are on the right track, companies can once again employ communication tools to regain growth.

Domus is a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia, focusing on fundamental marketing strategies that employ wide ranges of communications media and delivery. For more information, please visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

First VW started their “Fun Theory” campaign. This includes a number of experiential locations that entice people to choose a fun option that also coincides with useful behavior (walking stairs instead of an escalator, throwing trash in receptacles instead of littering, etc.). These locations have, in turn, become the basis of much local and worldwide PR. Moreover, videos of people experiencing the VW locations have been the basis of viral internet videos and other social media sites.

Finally, VW has complemented its “Fun Theory” campaign with its ubiquitous “Punch Dub” television advertising. Look at one of those commercials and one of the first words that comes to one’s mind is “fun”.

VW is successfully marrying a broad array of communication outlets with its one common brand positioning goal. They’re a textbook case study for how it should be done.

Domus is a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit our web site at http://www.domusinc.com.

In today’s world, where marketers are looking for – and expecting – immediate returns on investment on their marketing dollars, Hershey provides another example of the importance of taking a longer term view of marketing efforts. Insistence on high targets for click-through rates, numbers of fans/followers, comments, etc., is not the wisest approach for every campaign. Brand building requires time and patience.

Domus is a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

Think about how many people have been conditioned NOT to click on ads for fear that they will take them away from what they’ve been doing, bring them to a site that generates annoying pop-ups, download a virus, etc. Think about people’s trust in Apple. And think about 4 billion apps – and counting – already downloaded. This might be a massive revenue stream for Apple and App developers. But it might also be one of the most engaging ad platforms for advertisers.

Marketers should take note, though. Apple users expect something special from their Apple products, and that will include the ads that they see run on their Apple products. So, plan to advertise, but plan to make your ads a step above the rest.

Domus is a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

Nike’s new Tiger Woods commercial featuring the voice of his late father (timed for the opening of the 2010 Masters) is another good case study for that post, but with a twist. In that post, we referenced the potential response of the the competition, but in today’s social media world, you and the competition aren’t the only players in the communications game. The rest of the world – customers and non-customers alike – are also players. So, it is just as important to consider what these other “players” will do.

As it turns out Nike put out an ad showing a silent Woods staring at the camera while the disembodied voice of his deceased father asks if he learned anything. Separate from the question as to whether this ad was effective in its direct communication, I wonder whether Nike thought through the next moves of the other players, specifically the universe of consumers. Immediately after the ad aired, in addition to negative comments throughout the internet, video parodies of it started appearing. Nike might say that they hoped for this (generating buzz), but I’m not so sure that they hoped for all of it; otherwise, why are they now making youtube pull the commercial parodies, invoking copyright infringement?

Below is an original posting of one of the parodies on youtube.

Domus is a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia offering advertising, public relations, digital, and social media marketing expertise in an integrated approach based on sound, classic principles of marketing. For more information, visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

Similarly, last month, Comcast decided to rebrand itself “Xfinity”. (“Simply put, XFINITY is about offering our customers more — more HD, more speed, more choice and more control over their services…”) Or, alternately simply put, Comcast is feeling the pinch of Verizon Fios’ competition and wants to try something else to retain and gain customers.

Interestingly, in both situations a company who has faltered in delivering upon the promise of its stated brand position decides to fix the problem by rebranding itself to a new position instead of improving upon its original promise. And just as interestingly, in both situations, the faltering company is being aggresively challenged in the marketplace by a company who dedicates more resources and commitment to delivering its brand promise better and better – and correspondingly communicating its success.

It doesn’t take a marketing genius to determine the better strategy for companies to mimic – especially in this age when consumers communicate with each other faster and more effectively than any one company can do on its own. Continue to invest in your brand promise – improve your product, improve your service, improve your delivery – and then your marketing communication efforts have legitimacy. On the other hand, no matter how many times you rebrand, if you don’t have the commitment to invest in your brand promise (whatever that may be), you’ll continue to come up short.

Domus is a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia offering advertising, public relations, digital, and social media marketing expertise in an integrated approach based on sound, classic principles of marketing. For more information, visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

Although brands often offer short-term promotions, this time Burger King is intentionally making a point to compare themselves to McDonald’s, and using price as the only comparison point. In fact, they try to imply that it’s the same offering (hence, stealing the recipe), just cheaper. When did Burger King go from claiming that they offer a better product and service to being cheaper?

Domus is an integrated advertising, public relations, digital, and social media marketing agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

This highlights the difference between Apple and AT&T. Apple has always been very proactive with its product development. It’s only within the last few months that the iPhone is being seriously challenged by competing phones (e.g., Google’s Android, etc.), but they already have the next improvement ready to go out. Moreover, as the market for AT&T iPhones gets saturated, Apple will continue to grow by now offering a Verizon model.

On the other hand, AT&T has consistently been too slow delivering on their product – the network – and as such their reputation in the market reflects that.

The day Apple releases their Verizon iPhone will certainly be a major blow to AT&T. It will be interesting to see if they recover.

Domus is an advertising agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, please visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

First, Verizon marginalized AT&T’s brand position with their “they have a map for it” campaign, visually hammering their spotty coverage. In response, AT&T has tried to regain the word “fastest” in people’s minds with their own huge advertising campaign.

However, while they’ve been busy insisting that they’re the fastest 3G network, Sprint is starting to make that claim as meaningless as a horse-and-buggy manufacturer claiming they have the fastest buggy. Sprint is now rolling out its nationwide 4G network (in partnership with Clearwire), beating both AT&T and Verizon to the punch.

Sprint’s coverage is still spotty, as it tries to roll out its service in more and more cities, but it’s already available in almost 30 cities with more promised by the end of the year.

As such, Verizon’s brand position has not been damaged much – as far as they are concerned, Sprint occupies the same competitive position as AT&T – faster but with spottier coverage, and especially spotty in the high speed arena. On the other hand, AT&T’s position is significantly damaged. First Verizon made its “fastest” claim less significant by pointing out that its 3G availability was limited. And now Sprint has a fast, but spotty network; however, Sprint’s network is 4G – much faster than AT&T’s.

So what brand position does AT&T still hold? They’re the brand with not the fastest nor slowest network that is not the broadest nor spottiest in its coverage. This isn’t exactly a powerful position to hold. If I were a stock trader…

Domus is an advertising, public relations, and social media marketing agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

The entire country is concerned about the future of small businesses because of how vital they are to our country’s economic health. And despite continued attempts to revive the economy, small businesses continue to struggle with meeting their revenue goals.

What these businesses, such as retailers for instance, also need are solutions that will increase their revenue immediately, not just put more cash in their pocket that they will ultimately have to repay in the future.

One solution for them to consider: lottery sales.

Retailers earn commissions, risk free, off the sales of lottery tickets. On average, in the state of Pennsylvania, lottery retailers sell more than $375,000 each year and earn nearly $20,000 a year per location in commissions. And studies shows that 80 percent of lottery players buy an additional item when making their lottery purchase, so sales across the board increase when retailers sell lottery tickets.

It’s a simple solution to increasing revenue.

Domus is a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

There are two basic problems with this research, though. First, this asks people whether or not they are more likely to buy or recommend, but no study was actually done to see if they were truly more likely. Next – and this is the bigger problem as well as the point of this post – is that CMB confused correlation with causation. Even if people were more likely to buy/recommend, that doesn’t mean that engaging (becoming fans/followers) CAUSED them to be more likely. Rather, the fact that they became more likely to buy/recommend might have led them to also become fans, not the other way around.

Unless the survey has other components that can show causation, this has to be chalked up to yet another misleading study caused by a lack of statistical understanding.

Domus is a Philadelphia advertising agency, public relations firm, and internet marketing agency. For more information, visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

Moreover, there are effects that are almost impossible to measure. Today, if I get an upset stomach, I’d be inclined to reach for an Alka-Seltzer – not because of any current advertising campaign, but because I remember any one of several classic Alka-Seltzer commercials from 30 years ago. How do you measure that lasting effect?

Consider Bud Light. A little over a year ago they began their “Drinkability” campaign, but 2009 saw the first year-over-year sales decline in Bud Light’s history. Now Advertising Age refers to the campaign as “Bud’s Big Blunder” and the “Drinkability debacle”. But was Bud Light’s decline truly caused by the campaign even though it was correlated to it? What other correlated trends might have had more causuality? Might the deep recession have played a role? Might people’s changing beer tastes had an effect? Or, if the advertising did contribute, was it the concept or the execution?

It’s too easy to confuse correlation and causuality, and too easy to convince others that one equals the other. But marketers today more than ever must be vigilant; otherwise, we might be doing a disservice to our brands.

Domus is a marketing communications agency specializing in brand development through advertising, public relations, and social media marketing. For more information, please visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

Search engine marketers should pay close attention to this trend, if they are not doing so already. If money is still being allocated across the search engines in the same percentages as several months ago or even last month, then campaigns will probably not be optimized. And if this trend continues, then this review process should also be ongoing.

Domus is a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, please visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

As business people and marketers, we can apply those same three principles to every move we make in the market place. With every business plan, with every proposal, with every action, we only need to ask ourselves three simple questions. Does this move enhance my position/achieve my short term objectives? Does this move set me up to continue enhancing my position/achieving my objectives in the longer run? And does this move deny or invite my competition to counter me, nullifying my gains?

Let’s take an advertising situation we reviewd a while back from the perspective of attack advertising and re-look at it from this new perspective. Audi made an advertising move that directly challenged BMW. They put up a billboard with the text, “Your move, BMW.” But they never asked themselves those three questions. Did the ad achieve its short-term goal? Maybe, maybe not. But more importantly, Audi never asked themselves whether the ad set them up for a follow-up while denying BMW an effective counter.

So what did BMW do? The next day, they added the below billboard right next to Audi’s.

It truly was check and mate. BMW’s move was brilliant, but it was enabled because Audi didn’t take two minutes to ask themselves those questions.

Domus is an marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more, visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

There might be some similarities between their two situations, but there is also a fundamental difference – while Heineken has been relatively quiet in the US, Corona has been consistently advertising. So Corona’s problems are not related to its lack of advertising.

That leaves a few other possibilities – the effectiveness of the ads and the product itself being two prominent ones. Focusing on advertising, we already discussed how effective Dos Equis’ “Most Interesting Man in the World” ads are, but how about Corona’s “beach” ads? From a product positioning perspective, Corona positioned themselves to own the “cold beer at the beach” imagery in consumers’ minds, and for a while also mostly owned the “Mexican beer” position in the US. However, given that Dos Equis has been advertising strongly for several years now, the “Mexican beer” brand position is more evenly split between the two. Moreover, for the ten months out of the year when most people don’t think of the ideal beer to drink on a hot summer’s day, they’re not thinking Corona. So, although Corona might have been successful in owning the beach imagery, that also pigeon-holed them into a smaller place in consumers’ minds. Dos Equis, on the other hand, remains prominent in any season. Moreover, because of the “Most Interesting Man” ads, Dos Equis holds a more premium image, which is the segment of the beer market that is climbing.

Interestingly, in Mexico, Femsa (make of Dos Equis) has not aggressively run its “Most Interesting Man in the World” ads. Coincidentally – or not – Dos Equis’ market share has fallen significantly compared to Corona.

We’ll have to see what happens next, given that Heineken is now in the process of buying Femsa. Will they be smart enough to expand the successful Dos Equis campaign to Mexico or will they pull back on it in the US?

Domus is an advertising, PR, and internet marketing agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, please visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

For one, Heineken has had virtually television advertising for a long time (or if it has, it’s been completely unmemorable). On the other hand, since 2007 Dos Equis has been been consistently running one of the best advertising campaigns around, its “Most Interesting Man” campaign.

Yes, Dos Equis has expanded also its marketing to include billboards, print ads, a redesigned web site, and social media pages. (The Dos Equis Facebook fan page has a couple of hundred thousand fans; visitors to its http://dosequis.com web site stay an average of 7-1/2 minutes.) But how many people initially became aware of or interested in the “Most Interesting Man ni the World” from sources other then Television? Some, probably not most.

The lessons? First, television advertising still works, and works well. But as has always been the case, content is king. If the ad is ineffective, no amount of air time will make up for it, but if the ad is effective, television remains an incredible medium. Next, integrating social media naturally around an ad campaign can increase its effectiveness. That doesn’t mean just creating any old social media presence, and it doesn’t mean running a social media campaign independently of the rest of the marketing campaign. It means integrating everything together so that they are synergistic with each other.

Domus is a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, please visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.