citizenbay

V is for Very Simply Put

Alice Taylor, founder of gamer friendly wonderlandblog and builder of bridges between the traditional TV channel and the digital channels gave one one those rare conference speeches which mixed knowledge, modesty and turning complex into simple.

Sweeping through a quick tour of the world of MMORPGs (see previous posts) she shared some recent research from the US. It was found that amongst youth the average time spent on MySpace was 21 minutes whilst on World of Warcraft it was a whopping 197 minutes spent per day.

TV stations and brands are focusing so much attention on the myspace/bebo phenomenon, yet connecting with the gaming experience is still in it's infancy. Yeah, but the research was from the U.S. I hear you cry. That might be true, but in my straw poll of two (One 30something in the U.K. and a young 22 year old czech person), 2-3 hours on World of Warcraft is not unusual.

Alice herself is a big gamer, and highlighted the point that whilst many young women are gamers they get ignored as a viable market. So a missed opportunity, or will 2007 see both the gaming industry and brands review their approaches to gaming from their 'it's a boy thing' perspectives? Alice suggests that Wii has already made a move for the female gamer, so maybe things are going to change.

Alice stressed that Gaming and MMORPGs are in direct competition for the time of the young person across a number of countries. In the U.S. the average TV consumption is 28 hours per week, whilst in MMORPG households, TV consumption drops to 7.7hours per week, over 70% of TV viewing gone! Meanwhile in these MMORPG househols, playing the games takes up 21 hours per week. A sign that such gaming eats away at TV viewing time.

It is clearly time that gaming is looked at more by brands, if only to understand better how young people tick, wherever they live.

Sense from Carphone Warehouse

A very sensible move from Carphone Warehouse today to suspend their sponsorship of Big Brother in the UK, following the uproar around the treatment of one of the contestants. As Marketing Week states:

Carphone Warehouse chief executive Charles Dunstone says: "Our concern has rapidly mounted about the broadcast behaviour of individuals within the Big Brother house. We are totally against all forms of racism and bullying and indeed this behaviour is entirely at odds with the brand values of The Carphone Warehouse. As a result, we feel that as long as this continues we are unable to associate our brand with the programme.

"We had already made our position clear to Channel 4 that, were this to continue, we would have to consider our position. Nothing we saw last night gave us any comfort. Accordingly, we have instructed Channel 4 to remove our sponsorship and branding with immediate effect."

Quite right too.

The power of the National Geographic yellow frame

National Geographic is one of the rare occurrences where ‘media brand’ status belittles the company or organisation. An institution maybe, a part of the fabric of many lives possibly, a standard bearer for others too...much like the BBC.

Even for those who rarely come in contact with National Geographic (in whatever format), there is an expectation of integrity and high standards. The yellow frame stands for something powerful. We are drawn into the yellow frame because of that.

As a result, consumer expectations of any element of the National Geographic portfolio will be seen through this frame of high quality and integrity.

On so many levels, the move by National Geographic into educational toys is a smart move.

Society is questioning their leaders more and more on environmental issues. The impact of our actions on other communities is also fuelling a growing interest in what actions are taken on our behalf. Many parents are keen to find alternatives to video shoot-em-up games that provide some grounding in the global realities. So, when I saw the National Geographic toys in my local store I immediately thought ‘smart move’ along with ‘This is what I want for my kid’. So I bought the scuba diving man.

The packaging was spot on. The poster with info about sea creatures too. Yet the toy itself was a complete disappointment. Pieces are flimsy. The plastic was of poor quality and will not last very long.

This is not what I expect within the yellow frame.

So often brands that extend into new areas outside their expertise stretch too far. This feels like Nat Geo have outsourced the management and production of the toys to an extent that they have let go of the yellow frame. Have they chased the royalties at the expense of the frame, or have they just lost control of these brand extensions?

Either way, it has eroded the power of the yellow frame for me

Brand Alliances

Jordi Ferre, VP Sales & Marketing at Tate & Lyle, spoke eloquently about the opportunities when Brands build strategic alliances.

Drawing upon Tate & Lyle's success with Splenda in the U.S., he suggested a number of things to consider when entering such alliances. One tip was to accept that one partner may gain a little more than the other. It is rare for a brand partnership to see both parties gaining equally. Secondly, he suggested that brands need to be complementary, whilst barriers may arise if the objectives of the two brands are divergent.

He called brands such as Intel, Dolby and Splenda, ingredient brands. I like that one. Trouble is, the marketing of the cake is often left to the marketing team of the brand partner. Hence the need for the ingredient brand to have a clear focused strategy on how their ingredient is to be used. Without it, poor execution by the partner brand could leave the consumers uninspired and tasteless cake.