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.
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Burger King Whopper
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KFC Downloadable coupons
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Hosting & Domain Name cost
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RM 800 (2 dedicated servers)
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Minimal. Because site has been in existence for a long time
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IT Personnel
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RM 7000 (cost based on a project to create a computer code)
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No additional special skills or personnel required
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Time taken
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~4 weeks from conceptualization to going live
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3 days working with designers and making coupons available online
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Coverage
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Mainly in USA but reache to a worldwide audience
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Limited to USA
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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
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Burger King
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KFC
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Original concept. Many other similar programs on Facebook has failed but this has achieved resounding success
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Simple and traditional approach to advertising
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Arouse curiousity. When someone notices that a friend has been deleted, they want to know more. Burger King taps into the curious nature of the human kind to generate awareness and to reinforce its brand image
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Main objective is to target price conscious consumers
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The product advertised is the famous Whopper. Through this campaign, they are able to make consumers walk in to their shop and also buy other products with higher mark ups.
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In order to get the coupons, consumers have to fill in personal data like e-mail and phone numbers. This is then used for future promotions and to build up their customer database.
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Sophisticated. Well linked to social network
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Plain and simple. Print and use it.
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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
- 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
- Belch, George and Michael Belch (2007), Advertising and Promotion: An Integrated Marketing Communications Perspective, 7th edition, McGraw-Hill/Irwin
- Shimp, Terence A (2007), Integrated Marketing Comminications in Advertising And Promotion, 7th edition, Thomson South-Western
- The Facebook Blog, http://blog.facebook.com Accessed on 08 April 2009
