Philip Khor

I realise we have Muslim friends on this blog, so, click the Read More at your own risk :)

Sorry lah, pork is in our culture!

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When they said Man Utd had the easiest draw of the group, I agreed. But I told YW, “Yes, but we’ll be meeting the toughest opponent in the semifinals in Arsenal”. I was right.

I had a dream. No, not Martin Luther King sorta dream, but rather a weird and unconventional one. I was involved in a situation where I had to make a decision, and I backed down instead of following through. Was I easily swayed, or can we call it a rational move? I like it when a well-timed-aggression move pays off. Which reminds me:

Lukas has a good Poker face.

When I woke up, it was already the 60th minute. Didn’t see any goal action but I hear that it was from an impossible distance. Footytube.com to the rescue.

Bird Word – coined by Yap and gang, it is a literal translation of the Hokkien phrase “chiao hua”. The long running Simpsons competitor, Family Guy had a recent episode a month ago using a 60s music, “Bird is the Word”….. that goes something like… Youtube [link]

Surfing Bird – The Trashmen

A-well-a everybody’s heard about the bird
B-b-b-bird, bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a bird, bird, bird, the bird is the word
A-well-a bird, bird, bird, well the bird is the word
A-well-a bird, bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a bird, bird, bird, well the bird is the word
A-well-a bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a bird, bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a bird, bird, bird, well the bird is the word
A-well-a bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a don’t you know about the bird?
Well, everybody knows that the bird is the word!
A-well-a bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a…

Maybe we should make it our theme song! We’ll come up with a Phailed Remix ft Tiesto ;) [dreams]

We had a conference last night with Bob. I think there were 5-6 participants, and Skype technology was used. It performed well but it could be better.

Taylors Engineering Fair on Friday 8am-5pm. 30 over projects, probably 5 will be monetised. It would be fun if two parties [sic investors] were bidding for the same project. Hmmmm…. maybe I should make that happen! :P

God is great.

Introduction

Integrated Marketing Communication is a management concept that is designed to make all aspects of marketing communication such as advertising, sales promotion, public relations, and direct marketing work together as a unified force, rather than permitting each to work in isolation.

David A. Aaker of UC Berkeley argues that “the internet is the glue that holds IMC programs together”. It is a tool to use alongside traditional elements of IMC.

A typical fast-food restaurant would employ several media channels to convey their marketing message. The backbone and glue that holds all of this is a corporate website with an easy-to-remember domain name. This is the point where customers obtain further information about the company.

Big corporations such as Mc Donalds would fire in all fronts, so to speak. For smaller companies like Burger King where resources are more limited, they have to seek alternate ways to raising the same amount of industry buzz while spending a fraction of the cost of the big giants.

Advertising in social networking websites.

Facebook is a free-access social networking website that is operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc. Users can join networks organized by city, workplace, school, and region to connect and interact with other people. People can also add friends and send them messages, and update their personal profiles to notify friends about themselves.

Marketers and advertisers have trying for months on how to tap into Facebook’s Applications feature to use as an effective IMC tool. Even big companies like VISA tried their Visa Business Network program to provide a platform for businesses to exchange contacts. It failed miserable and was abused because it offers free US$50 advertising credits upon signup.

About The Internet

The internet is the largest network of computers in the world. As of December 2008, there are about 1,574 million active users worldwide. That is roughly one in four of every human being alive.

Most households in Malaysia have a personal computer capable of connecting to the internet. For those who do not, there are countless Internet Cafés in many major cities and towns that offers access for as low as RM 2 per hour.

The future is exciting for internet advertising. As more mobile phones are internet capable, the reach and coverage is growing wider. At the same time, the target audience is specific. This is possible through various technologies to track user location and demographic.

Imagine a scenario, walking down a busy shopping mall. You see an indoor poster saying “Are you hungry? Mc Donald’s ahead”. 10 seconds later, your handphone beeps. It plays a video advertisement by Mc Donalds, followed by a coupon to redeem free items with every purchase. The technology is already there, it is just a matter of time.

Internet advertisements get published quickly withstanding location and time. Advertisements can be customized to reach the specific target audience.

• To Disseminate Information
• To Create Awareness
• To Gather Research Information
• To Create an Image
• To Stimulate Trial
• To Improve Customer Service
• To Increase Distribution

Other examples of internet advertising include banner advertisements, in-game advertisements and ad links.

Not only does Facebook store your personal information, it links you to other friends that you might have. Advertisements on Facebook are targeted based on location, age, gender and likings. Consider the real-world situation of 3 friends I know.

A – Receive car modification advertisements always around the end of the month

B – Receive dating ads and cosmetic advertisements

C – Receive get-rich-quick schemes and “business opportunity” advertisements

Google employs another technology which is controversial for rights protection agencies. Their e-mail service, GMail scans each and every message for keywords. When reading the e-mail on their website, the ads on the right sidebar relates to the e-mail that you are viewing. Google claims that no real humans are reading through your e-mail, just computer programs. They then use this data for the Google Trends and sell this information for hundreds of thousands of dollars.

The Advertisements

Burger King’s objectives are to get as many people talking about the Whopper as possible. The technology within Facebook allow for such comments to be made and viewed by friends-of-friends. This form of viral marketing catches on very fast and the effectiveness rivals television, billboard and print ads combined. The cost to create both advertisements varies according to existing infrastructure.

Below is a table comparing several aspects of creating and publishing the advertisements.

Advertisements are basically used to inform, persuade and remind. Most businesses use web-sites to provide a platform for the business’ online presence. This allows formal communication with other businesses and to their clients and customers.

In Burger King’s campaign, they managed to generate a buzz and got many news agencies talking about it. Their clever idea of making Facebook users “sacrifice” or delete their friends from their list not only promotes their brand name, but it makes consumers rethink who their friends really are.

There is lack of creativity on KFC’s part, but coupons have several advantages. In tough economic times such as today, consumers are more price sensitive. By giving coupons, it encourages trial and increase consumption of established brands, such as KFC.

Target Audience, Reach and Coverage

Within 7 days of launch, there were 82,000 users who installed the application sacrificing 230,000 friends. The best part is that, on average each friend has 100 other friends, and they all get notified of the sacrifice via the user’s news feed.

Both KFC and Burger King target college students & young working adults under 30 years old both male and female. This demographic typically consumes fast food at least once a week. Fast food is popular in urban areas especially shopping malls and business districts. The target audience is likely to be interested in trying new things and willing to spend on food.

KFC downloadable coupons have been and still are an ongoing promotion. The only difference from conventional coupons is the method of delivery or, the media selected. Coupons are traditionally delivered to your doorstep by mailmen or flyer distributors. Some are inserted alongside daily newspapers while some are given in-store.

Media Scheduling

As long as the company pays for the hosting services, the advertisements can be accessible for as long as you like. In this assignment, the placement of the advertisement is on relatively cheap media such as the company’s own website, YouTube or Facebook, the social networking site. There is no need to worry about airspace and airtime. The internet is available 99.9% of the time 24/7/365!

Comparing both advertisements

Message delivery success

The Facebook ad is more successful in creating awareness. To put it simply, both companies give out coupons in exchange for awareness and personal information. This is used to tailor their products to different markets and preferences, as well as to disseminate future promotions via e-mail or SMS messaging.

In Malaysia, coupons are a big hit amongst budget conscious consumers. They are often delivered along with the daily newspaper. The discounts offers by outlets such as Mc Donalds are up to 30% off list price.

Conclusion

The internet has huge potential. Since the dot-com bust, companies have been coming up with innovative and creative ways to advertise. Clearly, the future of internet advertising lies with the social network. How better to deliver a message than to deliver it to a known customer base and hope that it spreads virally through personal web sites and blogs.

The internet has no geographical boundaries. An advertisement can reach a wide audience immediately once it has been published. The start up cost is considerably less compared to newspaper and magazine advertisements which can cost an upward of RM 10,000 per day.

As described earlier, the internet works in tandem with newspaper, billboard, radio and television. Nike aired a 30-second teaser commercial on television with a hanging ending. To see what happens next, consumers have to visit their website.

Services like YouTube makes it easier for content publishers and advertisers to publish their videos online. If the ad is creative and eye catching, people would want to view it again and share it with their friends. Modern Web 2.0 technologies like Twitter, and the “e-mail to friend” function has simplified this process. In this case, the internet is used as a media for delivering TV and interactive ads.

This assignment raises the awareness that the internet is the next big thing in advertising for years to come. The sky is the limit for the possibilities of online advertising. Traditional graphic designers and video production houses have to learn new programming techniques to keep up with the face paced advances in technology.

In the earlier years of existence, Facebook was primarily made up of college and university students aged 18-22. Since then, the demographics have greatly shifted to higher age groups as these students graduate and enter the workforce. According to Facebook themselves, the fastest growing age-group of their customer base were having a median age of 25 2-years ago but today, and 28 1-year ago. Today, this number is 35.

References

1. Eldon, Eric. (2008-12-18). “2008 Growth Puts Facebook In Better Position to Make Money”. VentureBeat. http://venturebeat.com/2008/12/18/2008-growth-puts-facebook-in-better-position-to-make-money Accessed on 08 April 2009
2. Belch, George and Michael Belch (2007), Advertising and Promotion: An Integrated Marketing Communications Perspective, 7^th edition, McGraw-Hill/Irwin
3. Shimp, Terence A (2007), Integrated Marketing Comminications in Advertising And Promotion, 7^th edition, Thomson South-Western
4. The Facebook Blog, http://blog.facebook.com Accessed on 08 April 2009

 

It has been an adventurous week this one. I started off with 2 tests, DMM (marketing/excel) and IC (IT). Contrary to what was expected, I aced the Marketing task and barely made it on the Internet Commerce test. I’m not worried, I should be happy!

I procrastinate for a total of over 72 hours before starting to *think* about the 2 assignments (advertising & networking) due on Friday. Pro-pro-pro-procrastinate.

From Thursday night til Friday night (just moments ago), I barely had 3 hours of sleep in total. I went to Mc Donalds at 5am and brainstormed for mY Advertising. Hope it work out.. I’m fairly confident.

Had a fun discussion with kate and cain. I really thank God we were able to communicate properly despite our conflicting point of views. We gave each other leeway despite our differences and in the end, I think we produced an excellent job.

My side project, http://council.taylorians.com is receiving good responses. It is quite exciting and encouraging. To add more oomph into the whole student council business, there is talk of a sponsor to sponsor the whole Student Council events.

They say, “Money does not solve everything.” however, “A lot of things can be solved by money”.

Bowling, I had 2 “off” games of 90+ each, and minusing that, I made a 120 average across 5 games! Impressed? :)

Thank you, God.

Check out my latest baby, http://council.taylorians.com

Had a computerised MCQ quiz at college. Scored 14/20. It was interesting to see human interaction, cooperation, and who stood out to be a leader. Also, who was opionated, who was rational, various emotions across the 4 hours, and the people who emerged as trusted sources. Whoa, what an exercise.

Student Council ceremony just ended. There’s this girl that’s super cute, but kinda reminds me of that Limkokweng porn I downloaded! hmmm…. ^-^