Billington Cartmell News

A look at the plans for Billington Cartmell in Scotland

Thu, 19 Aug 2010 10:03:00 +0100

The Drum talks to David Guy who is heading up the Edinburgh office of Billington Cartmell, to find out what the agency hopes to achieve within the Scottish market place.

Guy has also recently recruited Fiona Burton from The Union and Pamela Craig from Feather Brooksbank, working alongside clients such as pensions and finance brand AEGON UK, for which it recently launched a summer tennis campaign and Morrison's.

Billington Cartmell has been in Edinburgh for a couple of years now - what does the company hope to achieve through its Scottish presence?

Since opening in May 2008, our plan remains unchanged, combine the best local talent with a major London integrated agency to help Scottish based businesses grow and help companies grow in the Scottish market.

As the industry saw major network agencies pull out of Scotland, Billington Cartmell saw opportunities in Scotland. That's why we've developed a streamlined network agency solution for our Edinburgh office with viability at the core of how we're structured.

We make brands matter' is Billington Cartmell's primary purpose and we're bringing this approach to our clients' briefs and consumers' lives - north and south of the border.

We look for top calibre staff who can clearly show excellence in delivering campaigns for leading private and public sector clients in Scotland. Like Fiona Burton from The Union, who recently joined the team and has already provided existing BCL clients with strong local insights to help shape future Scottish campaign work.

What do you hope, Billington Cartmell brings to the industry north of the border?

We are unashamedly proud of the creative talent we have in the group and in Scotland we want to bring on fresh Scottish talent to this pool. Our group ambition, "to be the most admired creative agency, through heroic innovation" continues to inspire and challenge the agency and its people to move forward. We believe our ambition is aligned to the character of Scotland, whose brave, enlightened thinkers have changed, and continue to shape, our world.

20 years ago our founders were both senior client-side marketeers and have imbued their agency with a single-minded entrepreneurial focus. In Scotland we're bringing clients this potent blend of commercial, strategic and creative thinking.

We also hope to give clients access to leading UK creative's and planners, but with the value of a local presence to build relationships and smooth the delivery of fast-paced projects.

Our networked solution gives clients access to a deeper pool of agency thinking specialists.

You've just moved into the centre of Edinburgh and have begun hiring from some of the more well established agencies in the city. Why is this all happening now?

Being in the busiest part of Edinburgh attracted us. We wanted to re-create the buzz of the London office and clearly the knock-on effect that has for staff and client experience.

There are great agencies in Scotland, yet many are not always producing the fantastic work they have done in the past. We're finding many potential recruits share our way of thinking. New staff tell us they have more headroom to develop and freedom to express themselves. Which is great to hear as we're in the business to develop better work - and critical to that is having fired-up agency staff.

How do you hope to develop the Scottish operation over the coming months?

"If you build it, he will come", exemplifies our attitude to agency development. Our focus is on excellence for our existing clients and looking at how we go the extra mile, making time to proactively think about how we make their brands matter even more tomorrow.

What scale do you see the operation growing to in Scotland?

Over the next five years the group aims to double in size - and plans are in place to ensure that happens. In Scotland, we'll continue to focus on delivering excellent work for our existing clients and we hope to add one or two more along the way.

BCL gives more to Carte D’Or

Thu, 08 Jul 2010 14:28:00 +0100

We're delighted to announce the launch of our brand new Carte D'Or website and on-line media campaign featuring TV chef Gino D'Acampo.

We transformed the brand website www.cartedor.co.uk into a destination that reflects its premium and luxury positioning whilst providing the deeper engaging content craved by our "foodie" target audience inspired by the brand campaign idea "Give More, Give Carte D'Or".

To drive awareness of our site, we have created an on-line media campaign and series of on-line partnerships using Gino D'Acampo's love of Carte D'Or recipes as our hook. Our campaign is being seeded within our consumers' environment of 'recipe rich' websites.

Marco Gazzelloni, Group Account Director, Billington Cartmell

‘Do More’ reaches new heights

Thu, 17 Jun 2010 09:20:00 +0100

Living the Lucozade Energy 'Do More' philosophy, our very own intrepid explorer, Simon Callender has reached new heights after a whole day of rocks & rivers he's arrived at Everest base camp, 5342m. A comfy bed and fluffy pillows will have to wait a little longer, as he continues his journey to Beijing.

BCL Wins Again!

Thu, 03 Jun 2010 09:09:00 +0100

We continue to be recognised for our market leading work with another successful night at the recent ISP awards. This time we picked up a Gold for the Ribena 'Out for Lunch' promotion and a Silver for the Unilever Surf 'Twilights Sensation' campaign.

The 'Out for Lunch' outstripped some other big hitting brands such as Coke, Pepsi and Powerade to land the top prize in the non-alcoholic drinks section. Judges praised the work for delivering an innovative and humerous solution to the British workers dilema of being tied to their desk during the lunch hour.

Surf Twilight Sensations came a very close second in the Healthcare, Household, Fashion & Beauty section. It was deemed a well targeted and beautifully executed integrated campaign.

Alex Young, Director, Billington Cartmell

Peperami World Cup Campaign

Fri, 21 May 2010 17:51:00 +0100

The Peperami shouting football mascot is back for the 2010 World Cup and we're delighted to have created a truly integrated advertising campaign to shout about it. As sole creative agency, we developed advertising support for our on pack promotion across radio, press, on-line, in-store and outdoor.

Blokes' snacking and football go hand in hand so the World Cup gives us the perfect opportunity to drive trial of Peperami whilst giving punters the chance to literally take home a piece of the brand. We look forward to making the Peperami Fanimal the must have item of the summer.

Marco Gazzelloni, Group Account Director, Billington Cartmell

REACH Shoppers - 5 Steps To Shopper Success

Mon, 26 Apr 2010 17:32:00 +0100

Things were falling to earth long before an apple landed on Newton's head and the force was named 'gravity'. Similarly, humans have been shopping for some time: receiving marketing messages that guide purchase from the first thought of buying, right up to handing over the cash. So, there is some debate over whether Shopper Marketing can be called a 'new' medium - just because these messages haven't always been harnessed, doesn't mean they didn't exist.

There is less debate over the growing focus on and investment in Shopper Marketing; 21% annually according to a Grocery Manufacturers Association & Deloitte report. Driven in part by the wealth of data-driven insights now available, this growth has led to new job titles and teams indeed whole departments to gather, process, generate and act on this 'new' thinking.

It's hugely refreshing that corporate marketing structures are finally forced to acknowledge, embrace and commit spend to an area that had perhaps been the 'grubby' end of the business for many years. To those marketers with a more open (I hesitate to overuse the word 'integrated') mindset, however, this is not 'new' thinking, just thinking that has been carved up and packaged in a slightly different way and, worryingly in some cases, given a different silo.

In the eternal sales/marketing power struggle the real opportunity then for Shopper Marketing is to connect the 'silos' and take the brand right through to point of purchase in a meaningful, consistent way. (It really is a two-way street.) Those working closer to the coalface often bemoan the amount of spend allocated to 'emotive' ATL messaging and push back accordingly with harder messaging in store. The functional element is certainly important when in the shopping mindset, whether information gathering or as a purchase trigger. The average three second POS engagement window is 10 times smaller than the average TV ad slot, but there is room for a bit of both - functional and emotional benefit.

At point of purchase product messaging should always be 100% on brand, not just 100% about brand. We usually apply a 'sliding scale' approach to brand/product messaging looking to achieve an indirectly proportional relationship between brand and product the further along the shopper journey we go.

Whichever leg of the journey you are specifically responsible for, any brand looking for commercial success is always going to end up at the same place - for sale, in a store, in front of a shopper. Taking the holistic view is key to success; as the Cheshire Cat advised: "If you don't know where you're going, any road will take you there," marketers should not simply focus on making it to the next turn in the road, but where their brand needs to end up.

Billington Cartmell have built a series of principles to guide the stages of the shopper journey and an overarching model looking at the steps pre- store with the brand first entering the shopper's mind, through the store environment to the point of purchase. This can help inform the right message and media for the right shopper mission allowing us to more effectively and efficiently REACH shoppers.

R Relevance

To the shopper, to the retailer, to your business. Increase shopper awareness and affinity for your brand well before shoppers reach store. Even where the shopper is not the end consumer, we can work to understand the relationship between shopper and consumer and how we can influence this to give meaning to the shopper: happier families; easier meal solutions; greater convenience; etc.

The insights-driven approach that has been the fuel of Shopper Marketing growth should be used to identify the missions shoppers will be on, and importantly, where your brand fits into those missions. Understanding shopper motivations is key to understanding how they will digest your brand in the store environment.

Understanding which channels and accounts we should consider as 'heroes' to the business is also important. Not just those accounts which are most relevant through immediate sales, but also those that support our brand strategy and give positive exposure direct to our consumers so we are seen in the right places.

Also consider the relevance of your brand to the retailer(s) brand. What messages will appeal to them? Can our agendas be aligned?

E Emphasis

Many products will not be front-of-mind on the majority of shopper missions, plus cluttered retail environments restrict cut-through of messaging. We should seek to interrupt shoppers positively, but as often as possible on their journey: press as they plan their shopping trip over the breakfast table; local radio as they make their way to town; proximity outdoor as they make their way along the High Street or through the shopping centre and finally into store with front-of-store display through to gold standard fixture display to off-fixture and co-siting. Utilise the wealth of segmentation and basket data most retailers now hold to find the best matches (and sometimes unexpected ones.)

A Attraction

Shoppers need to be clearly led through the store, into the aisle and to the right point at fixture. This can be achieved through directional signage and/or directions at FoS.

Effective signposting will need to take account of the shopper missions to ensure the messaging, and position of PoS, is matching the shopper mindset.

Signposting alone is often not enough to drive traffic down to fixture, so seek to create positive disruption through theatre and promise of reward. Driving to aisle/category also provides a strong bargaining tool for retailer discussions.

Once in aisle the shopper will still need directing to your brand on fixture, particularly if your siting is less prominent than competitors.

Attraction can also be achieved through prompting reason to buy with need state messaging that taps into the shoppers mindset.

C Choice

Once at fixture give the shopper a clear reason for preference by reinforcing your USP and role within category.

H Hook

Don't underestimate the power of instruction. Always include a call-to-action - tell the shopper what they need to do next. This should be simple, direct and have urgency - "buy me now".

If the messages, missions and moments have been well planned and executed, giving an experience that was supportive and even beneficial to the shopper, the 'hook' stage should be extended beyond a single sale, ideally into repeat purchase and to advocacy.

The above is only an overview of the shopper journey, mainly from the shopper perspective. At each stage there are influencers and gatekeepers who need to be engaged and excited in order to secure store space and shopper head space.

We need to get "On the LIST", reaching the shopper and their influencers before they get to store.
We need to ensure we have followed the rules of engagement with the retailer (their agenda; expectations; staff) to ensure we gain display and our shopper can get the product "Off the SHELF".
Finally, we need to match the right messages for the right missions at the right moments to engage, signpost and persuade the shopper to get our brand "In the BASKET".

As surely as a falling apple will reach the ground, if shoppers can buy your product you're already in the Shopper Marketing game. Understanding and harnessing sound shopper thinking can make sure your shoppers land exactly where you want them.

The Future of Mobile Marketing - 7 Things Marketers Need to Know Now

Wed, 21 Apr 2010 18:05:00 +0100

With observations such as 'By 2013 mobile phones will overtake PCs as the most

common web-accessed device worldwide' and '33% of all Google searches are now made by mobile', it is easy to see why mobile is hailed as the key channel of the future. Indeed, the evolution of the mobile channel - from 'basic talking brick', to multi-media interface - has been impressive. (With 3000% growth in shopping searches made on mobile internet devices in the last 3 years.)

Now, phones can be used for web browsing, email, shopping, personal alarm clock, music, mobile TV, video, social networks, vouchers, micro-payments, cameras, navigation and gaming. (To name but a few functions.) To use the vernacular of the category, many marketing practitioners see 'mobile' as the 'killer app' for future growth. And with stats like those listed above, one can see why - there is huge commercial value at stake.

Nevertheless, with all the hyperbole, there should always be a note of realism. After all, if we believed everything futurologists told us, we would be using mobiles as hoverboards by now. That said, given exponential handset and software evolution, network advances and the myriad of media applications consumers now comfortably access via mobiles, we thought it invaluable to map out the trends that will really matter over coming years. Practical advice, that marketing practitioners should have acted on already (and trends that need to be firmly on their radar in coming years.)

1. Smartphones

While one should never forget the lowest common denominator handsets, the handset marketplace is definitely getting smarter. There are now 11.1m smartphones in the UK, with 70% YOY growth. All manufacturers and many consumers are aspiring towards smartphones. (NOKIA's 5800 is now the UK's most 'popular' handset - largely on the basis of aggressive contract pricing and the sleek - iPhone-esque - appearance of the handset.)

Many smartphones deliver greater connectivity over 2.5-3G, or WiFi and offer consumers genuine consolidation in terms of all their 'work, rest and play' media. (Telephony, mms, email, mobile internet browsing, downloadable apps and games, as well as video and music.) Integral GPS chips have further added the opportunity to serve location-based information, ads, or promotional offers close to point of sale.

In the wake of the iPhone, many manufacturers are optimising touchscreen interfaces to add to user experience and make 'online all-the-time' a wider reality. Indeed, touchscreen users access three times as much data as their key-pressing counterparts. Brands should be thinking not only how to harness apps - with Apple's iAd and Admob able to serve ads inside apps - but also be thinking how they can use location-based info to target compelling offers close to point of sale. Given tariffs and handset costs, smartphones are particularly relevant for 25+ adults currently and increasingly for young adults - as top of the gift wishlist over coming years.

2. Data

Historically we had the Battle of Britain, increasingly we have the Battle of Bandwidth. With tolerable operating speeds on 2-2.5G across the UK (barring rural areas), 3G is where we are gunning for in the immediate future (predicted to be circa 90% coverage in Western EU by 2014).

The next battle on the horizon, is going to be between '4G' networks and WiFi. There is likely to be a degree of merging of technologies to create a richer experience for consumers across the board. Expect to see service speeds slowly creeping up, as we edge closer towards a nation breathing 'online oxygen' to help their business and social lives thrive.

The 3GppLTE (Long Term Evolution) network is likely to deliver 4G-esque 'mobile broadband' capabilities with data serving speeds of up to 100mps. What this means practically is that video, mobile TV, multiplayer online games, instant messaging and other 'high-data dependent' mobile functions will be a real working possibility for many. In terms of timescales, 2012 will start to see cell testing, while 2015-2020 will see these LTE technologies becoming commonplace.

WiMAX (using microwave technology to extend the reach of WiFi hotspots) will make 'mobile broadband' even more of a reality. With data usage bundled and 'unlimited internet' becoming the standard mobile model, brands should be thinking about how they can best deliver to smartphone users who already - to use iPhone as an example - use 10-20 times more data than other mobile phone users. One should also not forget the use of 3G dongles on netbooks and table PCs - who use on average a sizable 1.5gig of data per month (10 times that of the average smartphone user).

The implications for brands are - a need to deliver richer experiences to consumers, and think about how commercial sponsorship could facilitate the delivery of games, apps and video on demand (VOD) to mobile. Also, brands should think about the kind of data they can receive via return paths, to further refine their mobile marketing and CRM activity.

3. Mobile Internet

As networks evolve, we will see huge numbers of mobile devices capable of accessing the internet from phones, netbooks and tablet PCs (via WiFi, or 3G dongles). Brands must be prepared to serve them properly.

The size of the prize now - stats on mobile internet:

18.9m users

1 in 10, (1.89m) have made a purchase using the mobile internet

- 81% using it once per week or more

- 46% using it daily

- 35% using it weekly

- 40% of those using it are considered heavy users

Nearly all brands should be thinking about not only an online presence, but a 'mobile online presence'. Increasingly, consumers just want delivery in their chosen channel and brands that aren't set up to do so, risk falling out of favour. 44% of users blame the brands (not the kit) for a bad mobile internet experience.

Building on this, brands should also be contemplating not just online mobile brand content, but optimising their sites against mobile search (mSEO) and also multiple call to action options e.g. order now on iPhone/order now on Android. Only if marketers are thinking in real terms about a Mobile Content Management System (MCMS), can they deliver the excellent experience consumers expect now, and the seamless experience they will expect tomorrow.

Manufacturers will make a lot of operating systems in coming years, which are meaningful in terms of their respective abilities to deliver optimal online content speedily. As infrastructure advances - both with handsets and retail - brands should consider mobile as a means to deliver sales - via scannable bar/QR codes and vouchers/promotional ticketing.

Also starting to be tested in 2010 (and becoming mainstream from 2012) are Near Field Communication (NFC) chips. These are smart chips - like the ones used in Oyster Cards for wave and pay transactions. Brands need to be aware of these - with potential application for micro-payment, one-touch social interface, Mobile ID verification and even transport.

4. Mobile Advertising

Promoting your brand through users' mobiles will become hugely important - with the market set to explode in 2010 onwards.

Mobile advertising arguably became really significant with the launch of the iPhone 3G. In 2009 we have seen major consolidation of players and techniques to make the marketplace a serious proposition for brands moving forward. This was particularly underscored by Google and Apple acquiring Admob and Quattro respectively - specifically to meet their needs for provision of mobile advertising. Given the massive growth in mobile usage, it is not surprising that Q4 2009 saw the best-ever quarter for mobile advertising - with (anecdotally) double the ads being placed, versus any other quarter so far.

Consolidation has also brought significant reductions in costs both for placement and costs per click. That coupled with development of new ad formats and functionality - such as location-based, or image search based ad serving - make mobile advertising an area brands should really be thinking about. Here are just some of the ad formats that will be likely to develop over the next two years:

Expandable banners
Flash banners
Feed integration - putting live update information into the ad space
Location-based ad serving - delivery of ads local to point of conversion
Image recognition ads - serving ads appropriate to consumers' image searches
Sponsored apps - with Steve Jobs launching iAd - sponsoring app provision is not only going to be big, it's also a commercial/consumer win-win. (It gives something to the consumer for free and places the sponsor's ad in a context where the consumer is likely to be more receptive to it.)

Brands should think about how their ads will be reflected in mobile search, and how they can use this to their best advantage. In addition, sponsored apps and location-based ad serving (mentioned earlier) are both things that should be top of mind.

5. Location Based Technology

Location based technology is particularly stand-out functionality, as it allows ads to be served based on consumer interest and location. A recent gym recruitment campaign - based on the network's understanding of the recipient's liking for exercise, and proximity to the gym chain in question - led to a 6.8% response rate. Location-based communities like 'Foursquare' - that reward micro-community ambassadors for acting as area 'Mayors' and sharing local info with other users - are also of significant note to brands.

6. Augmented Reality (AR) and Voice/Visual search

The placement of products and brands into the real/virtual world will grow rapidly, and smartphone handsets will become more capable of delivering this to the mass-market. 'Layaring' - named after the Dutch company 'Layar' (leading specialists in the field) - is probably one of the most immediate and valuable AR applications available.

'Layaring' describes AR information, layered over a real live camera street view to deliver valuable branded information, or offers, literally to the man/woman on the street.

Voice and Visual search will increasingly develop in coming years - as processing power allows - to cross-reference visual/voice input with an online database. The database will then deliver availability and pricing information quickly and easily to consumers in retail.

7. SMS

Simple will still sell - so text will still be massive. (80% of the market use it.) It's the primary route for engaging mass-market consumers - particularly older ones (55+) - and will remain so for some time.

You can also turn a simple entry mechanic into ECRM - encouraging consumers to participate further with interesting promotional stats on winners, or sharing further added-value offers. Not forgetting of course that virtual rewards (in terms of digital mobile content) could increasingly be valuable as the "plus 1000s of prizes" in future promotional marketing.

Conclusion

Ultimately, the future of mobile comes down to a beautifully integrated service for consumers and that goes for everything from handset interface, network performance, apps, and a very real value exchange.

Essentially, as with most brand interaction, forewarned is forearmed. This is a clarion call to review your mobile marketing strategy and prepare to deliver an outstanding mobile experience for consumers (before your competitors do). For further information please contact dan_machen@bcl.co.uk

Boot Boys

Wed, 07 Apr 2010 09:14:00 +0100

Having just read that 'Dr Martens uses music to build online presence' I feel for Dr Martens. Perhaps the closer a brand is to music historically the harder it is to pick up again after a hiatus.

Unfortunately, despite their exquisite vintage, Dr. Martens is probably no more associated with music by young consumers right now than any other fashion brand. Which I suppose is where this "get a newish band to record an old song" concept is meant to come in; currency and heritage combine to make beautiful music.

The trouble is "new band, old song" is a very well-trodden path indeed; Radio 1's Live Lounge is the benchmark at four top ten double albums since 2006 and a weekly Radio 1 show (DM participants The Noisettes contributed last year with an old Killers song). Recently Audi TT Remastered featured "a mix of emerging musical talents and pioneering musicians reworking 14 infamous pop tracks". I also have literally a box full of music magazine tip-ons from the past 15 years recorded under exactly the same premise. The NME/Childline "Sgt Pepper Knew My Father" in 1987 was perhaps the daddy of them all and even that was revised in 2007 with Kaiser Chiefs, Stereophonics et al re-recording the album.

Dr. Martens possibly pioneered the branded compilation; before the PRS slapped a premium on such things, their 1995 "Unlaced" compilation entered the album charts at number 9 and for many old enough to have a copy it still bookmarks Britpop. DM's sales samplers from around this time were also great sources for discovering new music pre-internet. In the late '90's the link between Dr Martens past (mods, skins, punks, bikes) and the emerging artists they were supporting through live associations was seamless and often executed beautifully.

DMs music heritage is very deep indeed, such a shame to see it squandered here with another Kareoke concept that the agency doubtless could have bolted on to countless other brands. I'm afraid that kids browsing this content on The Pirate Bay are unlikely to be struck by either the originality or heritage of the idea and all it's likely to say about this great brand is that they've been away a bit too long. I'd prescribe some better advice and a bit more of that rebellion that set the brand apart in the first place.

It’s time for more brands to think digital conversations, not campaigns

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 10:39:00 +0000

Neil Davidson believes that it's time for more brands to think digital conversations, not campaigns.
Find out why here

BCL achieves in Best Companies Accreditation 2010

Wed, 24 Feb 2010 08:49:00 +0000

Billington Cartmell has achieved a "One to Watch Status" in the Best Companies Accreditation for 2010. Jonathan Austin - Founder and CEO of Best Companies says: "We would like to congratulate Billington Cartmell on their outstanding achievement...organisations like Billington Cartmell that have kept on engaging their staff and making sure they are involved in the business will be in a good position for the future and should be congratulated for their efforts".

In it for the long haul? – the paradox of marketing

Thu, 07 Jan 2010 10:51:00 +0000

Someone is sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago - Warren Buffett said that, and the man has a very good point.

The brands that mean the most to us are the ones which have been carefully grown and nurtured over time to encapsulate a set of values that we find both appealing and relevant. Oxo has always held a knowing mirror to the family and its relationships. Kit Kat has celebrated the break through wry humour for over thirty years and, until recently, if you wanted the ultimate Teutonic driving machine then you had to look no further than Stuttgart. All these brands made continuity of personality and behaviour a valued brand asset.

For us to know a brand we need to understand what it stands for and how it will behave now and in the future - just like our friends, it's by acting consistently that we learn to trust them. Sure brands can evolve just like people do, but their central personality and values mustn't flex.

So developing brand assets and values is a job for the long term. You don't develop a deep relationship in a day; it takes time for consumers to learn and understand a brand. But marketeers aren't always focused on the long term and herein lies the dilemma.

Marketeers need to make a mark to build a career - a promotion is easier to justify if you have developed and owned an 'all new marketing plan' and its associated execution programme. It's by changing communications and 'challenging the thinking that has gone before' that marketeers build careers.

Who wants to do what the last chap did? That's not exciting and that's not going to get you noticed. So often pragmatically and selfishly the agenda for change is set.

Agencies too are all too quick to dismiss previous work even if, as is often the case, they developed the work themselves. New, it appears, is always better. This year's plan is always better than last year's plan. They are always 'building on new learnings'.

Of course evolution of any comms programme is a necessity to avoid wear out and over-familiarisation - but all too often brand teams and agencies indulge in wholesale reinvention of not just the execution, but the wider brand idea and often the brand personality too. The upshot is brands that people thought they understood and could rely on to act in a particular way are suddenly all-new, alien and 'supposedly better'.

In the real world this means consumers can't keep up - too many messages changing too often and executed across a myriad of ever-tempting fragmented media touch points.

Stella Artois - reassuringly expensive quality or an overt focus on natural ingredients? Or is that Beck's - or Carling? Actually it's all three. BMW talking about fluffy, happy 'Driving Joy?'. What happened to the precision of the Ultimate Driving Machine? (And anyway, weren't Honda talking joy three years ago?)

If these brands play fast and loose with their propositions and personalities how are we expected to know them anymore?

The way out of this constantly churning pot of messaging is to put a new and rigorous focus on consistency.

If consumers develop brand trust (and accordingly brand relationships) in the long term, then that's how we as marketeers should manage our brand assets.

Marketeers should be as true to brand personality as to brand proposition. Continuity of action is everything. Additionally, activation spaces should be identified for the long term and brand ideas selected only if they have the capability to last for years, not months.

Other brand touch points should also be audited for the long haul. A brand strapline should help consumers summarise their take-out of your brand messaging, whilst also confirming the brand source of that information. Why change it every 12-14 months?

Another reason there is so much changing of messaging and overstretching of brand personality is the time-pressured way in which strategy is developed against brand planning deadlines.

If you take away the temptation to change the communication strategy every year and focus instead on enriching a fully researched, longer-term 5-year brand idea, then the purpose of brand planning becomes more channel and execution-focused. An altogether more manageable task.

Wholesale change of proposition and/or personality should, in summary, only be entertained under exceptional circumstances and only when lessons have been learned from previous mistakes.

Change should come through the executional evolution of long-term brand ideas which develop and enrich already loved and respected personalities.

We should all be building brands with consumer-validated longevity rather than being slaves to reinvention, creating tactical pop-up offerings with familiar logos for our own vanity.

Now if you really want to make your mark - there's a real creative challenge.

Rage against the old brand planning machine

Wed, 23 Dec 2009 13:59:00 +0000

Brand planning needs to keep up with consumers

Rage Against the Machine's victory over the X Factor's Joe McElderry in the battle for Xmas number one is a fitting way to end the decade. That a rock fan from Essex can take on the might of the X Factor and win is further proof that this was the decade when power shifted from big brands to consumers, driven by the rise of 'my media', digital peer review and a massive decline in trust in brands. All this should be the final nail in the coffin of brand planning processes developed in the last century. Smart brands have to recognise that successful brand planning is no longer as simple as developing single-minded brand and campaign propositions and delivering them to the consumer neatly packaged up in a creative idea.

This doesn't mean that brand planning is dead, because successful brands still need the rigour, depth of analysis and consumer insights that it delivers. The opportunity is to hang onto the best parts of brand planning, discard the parts that aren't relevant any more and bring in new ways of working that fit new consumer mindsets and how they want to interact with brands now.

The much ridiculed brand onion and the brand key could be good candidates for the scrapheap, but the issue is more about how people use them, often as an intellectual exercise rather than a tool to get under the skin of consumers. They can still be good foundations and add rigour to brand strategies, but they have to be seen as a starting point in connecting brands and consumers, not a job to be done before leaping onto creative briefs and execution. More work needs to be done to truly connect brands with consumers, and more often.

Our approach to brand and campaign planning is to constantly ask 'what matters?' and to recognise that the intellectual leaps that come out of the planning process also have to be judged against whether they will connect with consumers – ideas have to be clever, but they also have to connect with real lives. It's also what matters at different points in the brand planning and campaign process – there are many consumer insights but what's the insight that we need to act on? There are many smart propositions but what's the proposition that comes out of the brand, is consumer-focused and is right for the context of a campaign, where it should connect with the consumer? Effective planning needs to recognise that the brand proposition is no longer enough, and that propositions need to be flexed for different contexts while retaining the essence of the brand.

Much more planning time needs to be invested in what really matters, and developing brand activation spaces is a more worthwhile approach than ever before. This is the sort of work that more time needs to be invested in during the planning process if brands want to matter in consumers' lives. There has been a big shift in power and the brand planning process has to recognise this, otherwise more brands will lose out to the mighty consumer, just like the poor old X Factor

Blogging – digital PR or strategic brand tool?

Tue, 22 Dec 2009 12:51:00 +0000

The blogging community has an incredible reach and a disproportionate influence over its audiences. It's estimated that well over 180 million people have started a blog, writing over one million posts a day and with over 350 million readers. It seems obvious that all brands should at least be considering how they tap into the power of blogging communities, but they also need to consider the model they adopt for doing this.

Blogging's success is partly due to the quality of writing, speed to publication and the clarity of viewpoints, not obscured by media owner interference. (The Huffington Post is a good example, with an estimated audience of over 45 million readers.) The success of blogging is also due to a shift in consumer attitudes, turning away from older, established conventional news sources and brands to 'my media', digital brands that they now have greater trust and belief in.

Given this shift in media power and consumer attitudes it seems strange to apply old marketing techniques to this new equation, particularly a digital PR approach. The opportunity for brands is to look at their approach to blogging in a new way, not as a short-term tactical tool, an extension to their PR strategy, but as having great potential as a strategic brand tool. Bloggers are not another digital tool to be turned on and off to fit the peak and troughs of marketing campaigns. They can be a brand's strongest brand ambassadors, but brands need to invest time, money and care into building ongoing relationships with key bloggers, essentially relationship marketing for blogging.

Stormhoek is still a great example of the power of using brand blogs to drive success. Other brands can learn a lot from it and the success of its 100 Dinners in 100 Nights approach to engaging with bloggers:

It understood, engaged with and flattered bloggers, rather than imposed the brand's worldview on them.
It acted on the insight that bloggers love other bloggers – using Hugh MacLeod as the force behind Stormhoek flattered bloggers, as it told them that they were considered to be in the same class as this top 100 blogger.
It didn't try to influence their views on your brand or product in the way that old-school PR did.
It let go control of the brand and let bloggers decide whether it was good enough.
It gave them unique content that made them look good in the eyes of their readers, another deviation from the classic PR press release approach.
They continued to nurture the relationships established with the bloggers.

The opportunity for brand owners is to think differently, engage with bloggers on their terms and then reap the rewards.

Can You Manufacture Good Character?

Mon, 21 Dec 2009 10:20:00 +0000

Despite David Mellor single-handedly debasing the Conservative's 'Back to Basics' crusade, it seems politicians rarely learn from history. About a year ago, David Cameron made a foray into the treacherous territory of political morality. Cameron criticised the political classes for "a refusal to make judgments about what is right and wrong behaviour".

But what makes people do the right thing? The answer is a mixture of our genes, our parents and our peers – these are the ingredients of character.

Character is of course a loaded term: it sounds Victorian and, if you're honest, as dull as scouting. However, a diverse range of policy makers, politicians and scholars are interested in what constitutes character on the grounds that a good society needs good people. And let's face, it society based on its current media portrayal needs all the help it can get.

So can you manufacture good character?

Over time I think you can – as long as your behaviour always supports your communicated values. Extrapolating this into the sphere of brands it's manifested in behaviour in response to pressure, be that commercial, macro-trends – eco, fair-trade etc. 'Character' being the final litmus test – the proof or otherwise of the true nature of a brand regardless of positioning or protestation.

As Abraham Lincoln said:

“Character is like a tree and reputation like its shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.” – Abraham Lincoln, 16th U.S. President (1809-1865).

M&S 'Plan A' posturing, while they still aren't focusing on seasonality, or food miles, is a manifestation of bad – if not fraudulent – character. No point looking at the shadow when the apple tree is in New Zealand.

Ecover, it appears, manifest good character as a brand in everything they do, with even the 6 sheets in the factory made from recycled posters from previous campaigns.

In these turbulent times, establishing a notion of Brand Character seems increasingly attractive. Richard Huntington's quote in Battle of Big Thinking seems to ring increasingly true - “No one is interested in your positioning, only in your position.” The difficult thing about character of course is that, beyond comms, it does require an adoption of steadfast behaviour. So if, like Ecover, brands wish to have genuine character, they do not change their tune under short-term commercial pressure, but stick to their values.

Consumers will respect them all the more for it and vote accordingly in future.

Applied Thinking - iPhone Apps 2010

Wed, 09 Dec 2009 17:06:00 +0000

"To the people who've got iPhones: you just bought one, you didn't invent it!" Marcus Brigstocke

The fact that this joke was voted into the top 10 funniest of the Fringe this year speaks volumes about the general attitude to iPhones. We know they were 'a game changing piece of innovation'; 'a phone that fell from the future'. We know that self-satisfied little look owners get as they 'tap, tap slide' their way to answers we can't hope to get off a 'normal' phone. We know we should be amazed as Shazam listens and then tells you the name of the track that's playing on the CD player. And we know that the technology is so irresistible, it apparently makes it OK to get iPhones out in the middle of a conversation.

In spite of all the hype, some in the marketing community remain reticent to join the iPhone bandwagon - perhaps because they've been burnt before. Marketeers who've never forgiven their ex digital agency for persuading them Second Life was in fact the second coming, can perhaps be forgiven at not immediately jumping at the new kid on the digital block.

As with many new marketing media opportunities such as Facebook, Twitter, iPhone, before thinking about what we 'could' activate, we might first consider whether we 'should'.

What's the commercial imperative to invest in this activity? This is where iPhone Apps and iPhone stats are becoming increasingly compelling.

Not only is the App store huge in volume terms (passing 2 billion apps downloaded this year) it's also a head turner in terms of the revenue it delivers. Pizza Hut's online ordering App generated $1m in incremental food sales. With charming functionality that lets you slide to the size of pizza you want, shake the toppings onto the pizza and then place the order directly with your nearest store. Pizza Hut also featured on the Apple ad "There's an App for that", thereby benefiting from millions of dollars of free ATL exposure. Far from being gimmicky, Pizza Hut's innovative way of connecting with early adopting consumers is benefiting the brand's image as well as the bottom line.

So whilst some brands see Apps as a serious business, why are some loath to consider them as a medium? The primary objection historically to the iPhone in the UK was the exclusive distribution deal with O2, which was seen to make the audience too limited. However, with the recent deal to extend distribution via Vodafone and Orange, the iPhone will now available to 85% of mobile users in the UK. Add to this a potential ROI of 10 times the initial investment and it makes for a compelling commercial case to fully explore the potential of this exciting new medium. A potential that, thanks to iPhones future-esque functionality, can be as inspiring creatively as it is commercially

Top Five Functionalities Exploited by Apps:

1. GPS Locator - can link virtual order to real life delivery/purchase

2. Accelerometer - can dramatize the phone being tilted

3. Touchscreen - slide and touch elements

4. Bump Phones - Dynamic Data Transfer (Bluetooth/GPS)

5. Video overlaid with Augmented Reality (3.1. Software Release)

iPhone and its Apps should therefore not only be firmly at the top of most Christmas wish lists, but firmly on marketeers' agendas in 2010. With significantly increased distribution and potential for significant commercial delivery, iPhones and Apps are much more than nice to haves.

Old marketing for new media?

Wed, 09 Dec 2009 17:00:00 +0000

How do you maximise social media's potential for your brand? It does require new skills and new ways of thinking, but the danger is in throwing away everything else and forgetting marketing principles that are not only relevant but could also help you maximise the effectiveness of social media, particularly those within direct marketing and measurement.

Let's start with best principles for maximising social media:

Make sure the business is set up for social media - Lots of organisations get this wrong and Seth Godin describes this mismatch perfectly in 'Meatball Sundae.' Social media doesn't work in the same way as other channels; you're opening up the organisation and setting up consumer expectations that you are ready to engage in dialogue in all touchpoints, not just social media. Content and social media engagement also has to involve senior players. Habitat's use of a junior member of staff to implement their Twitter strategy was a good example of the consequences of getting it wrong - and this TechCrunch's take on organisations using Facebook or Twitter as sticking plaster back this up.

Make sure your brand is really social media friendly - let's not forget that the appeal of brands is built on their personalities and some brands are the sort of people you'd like to stop have a chat with on the street and some are not, they're more functional. More emotionally engaging brands such as Pot Noodle, Ribena and Starbucks are already welcome in social media - Starbucks has close to 4m Facebook fans. More functional brands have to work much harder, or decide to stay out of that space, because amplifying what they stand for or their creative work just won't do it. Brand owners need to understand where they sit and act accordingly, or they risk a sad and underwhelming presence on Facebook. Blendtec's brand perceptions may have altered drastically because of the phenomenal success of Will it Blend? (http://www.willitblend.com/) but if it had just started a Facebook page before then it would have been a failure.

Build relationships in their space, and play by their rules - You're in their world and you need to remember why they are there and play accordingly. Even if you hold on to the belief that the brand proposition is king, not something to be negotiated with consumers, you still need to forget it in the social media space, or you'll get caught out and exposed like so many before you.

These are good foundations to start with, but many social media strategies lack something more fundamental - clear objectives. Many marketing people would admit that they're in the social media space because their CEO has said 'why aren't we tweeting?' Not a good place to start and woolly objectives always mean woolly measurement, something that much of brands' social media activity is guilty of.

Too many social media approaches and measurement criteria are based on old school brand and PR success criteria - such as the number of consumers engaged (e.g. Facebook brand page membership and YouTube downloads), the amount of positive or negative chatter about the brand, using buzz monitoring tools, or keyword search behaviour. It seems strangely old marketing for new media.

But brands should consider other 'old school' models as well, e.g. bringing more direct marketing approaches and measurement criteria into the mix. Using such a conventional approach as direct marketing and applying to social media is heresy for many, but there's a strong argument for doing this and adapting for social media:

Most social media marketing breaks the first rule of smart direct marketing - Facebook pages for brands and many of the strategies behind them are guilty of investing marketing budgets in brand loyalists, who actually need less investment than those who buy into the brand as well as other brands. Of course, the smarter brands pick out the advocates and invest in them, but not enough brands do this.

Use the value exchange principle to collect additional data, prioritise, segment and migrate to different communications streams - Absolute heresy for many social media experts, because rule number one is not to try to control the relationship, let them decide the terms of relationship and never, ever try to migrate them out of their social media space. These experts are probably the sons of marketing men who said 'why would I want a relationship with a brand?' when relationship marketing was in its infancy. If I am engaged enough with a brand in the social media space (obviously not in those cases prompted by antagonism towards the brand) why couldn't I be persuaded to tell them more about me and sign-up for dialogue outside the social media space? Once you've built these foundations you can start to make smarter considerations about where and who to reward in longer-term one-to-one relationships, even to skim off those with the greatest potential and migrate into more conventional relationship marketing.

Widen the measurement of the success of social media through ROI-based calculations, including life time value and transactional data - Isn't it possible within social media to treat those engaging with your brand in the social media space more as if they are customers who actually spend money on your brand, and setting out to estimate it, or even really measure it. Why not? Why can't you take the next step on from the value exchange principle and use social media as a relationship marketing recruitment tool and measure it accordingly? Sure, stick to all the other measures and engage and tackle brand issues in social media, but isn't it just rude, and bad business, not to move the conversation onto the next level, and measure whether they do put their hands in their pockets because of it?

Many brands are still in their infancy in putting in place their social media strategy, playing catch up with other brands. Rather than investing a lot of time and budget into catching up the smart thing to do could be taking a different approach, and thinking more around different marketing principles and models and measuring accordingly is one smart way to do it.

Billington Cartmell wins Marketing Magazine 'Agency Of The Year' award

Tue, 08 Dec 2009 15:03:00 +0000

A focus on environmental work, the addition of 21 clients and its creative thinking have helped the agency be top of the sales promotion pile for the second year in a row, writes Amy Golding.

“Billington Cartmell has proved itself again by becoming Marketing's Sales Promotion Agency of the Year for the second year running, showing the agency can succeed not only when trading conditions are buoyant.

During 2009, the agency successfully added another 21 clients to its books, including adidas, LG and Kingsmill.

To accommodate the growing portfolio, the agency has strengthened its operations and planning teams by bolstering its staff numbers and insight teams. The judges were impressed by its well-established management system, which has enabled it to consistently grow the business, even in difficult times.

The judges also praised the high levels of creativity the company continues to provide to existing clients, even when juggling its growing new-business list.

Billington Cartmell has proved it has the ability to survive during both good and bad industry times. Over the past three years the agency has gone from strength to strength. If its strong 2009 performance is anything to go by, the agency will once again be the one to beat next year.”

Marketing Magazine (Agency of the year supplement) December 2009

See some our case studies below.


Morrison's 'Lets Grow' VIEW CASE STUDY	Carlsberg 'Wembley' VIEW CASE STUDY	Lucozade 'Do More' VIEW CASE STUDY

Balance of brand and Consumer In Brand Planning

Mon, 07 Dec 2009 12:05:00 +0000

When you look back on various exams you faced over the years, there was one thing that was always delivered with unerring excellence. Something you can look back on and think, 'I really nailed that' (in all its colour-coded glory).

I refer of course to the revision timetable.

Now there is no doubt that proper planning is essential, (I'm not after a P45.) But it is also a question of balance. So often, marketers and agencies are guilty of spending so long worshipping at the perfect brand pyramid / onion / temple, that we leave precious little time for crux of what we should be doing - identifying distinct brand activation spaces and creating powerful communications ideas that inspire consumers to buy into our brand.

What is needed is a fundamental change in emphasis from what we, (as custodians of a brand), want consumers to do, to looking long and hard at what really motivates consumers. Thereby creating genuinely insightful activation space and consequently communications that really matter to consumers (in the context of real lives).

'We Make Brands Matter' is how we sum this up at Billington Cartmell. For us, it is about giving greater focus on discovering an enduring, ownable and valuable connection between brand values and consumers. This is made all the more imperative by increasingly hectic lifestyles and particularly by the revolutionary changes in communications channels. The rise and rise of digital communication gives consumers and marketeers an unprecedented number of channels and choices to communicate via - each with their own unique opportunities and pitfalls. Brands which get top marks, are no longer always about a rote 'matching luggage' answer fired off down the same old channels.

Rather, today's marketplace requires an approach that is sensitive to more consumer choice and greater potential to ignore anodyne messaging. This increasingly necessitates planning that strives to reach genuinely ownable activation spaces that define new culture, rather than follow it. (Don't surf a trend, create a tide).

'We Make Brands Matter' puts meaningful focus on the consumer and exploitation of new channels. But the emphasis is on meaningful. Many brands flag plant on Youtube, Facebook, Bebo and Twitter, but we must ask ourselves what value does the brand add to the channel and vice versa? If the answer is nothing, then you can expect a pretty robust, negative reaction. (Skittles placing its entire digital presence on Twitter without adding to user experience, was ignominiously greeted by this punchy one word tweet - "Shittles".)

We've all 'eaten the Big Fish' and 'tried the Purple Cow' - but again isn't this just more language to reassure us how clever we are? There are great principles in both books, but let's not make them our master - the consumer should be. As David Ogilvy so perfectly cautioned, "We sell...or else" and more often than not, brilliantly simple ideas sell best. Our ambition increasingly is to couch communications ideas in simple language that gives the brand and agency team a crystal clear understanding of the brand activation space and critically how that space connects with consumers. After all, if the idea's hard for us to rally behind, we won't stand a chance with consumers.

So planning is paramount, but to be successful in today's marketplace, agencies and brand partners need a philosophical shift that recognises and respects the changed nature of consumers and communications. Keep it simple, make it uniquely salient and sell. It's that simple. In the final analysis, we can have the cleverest revision timetable in the world, but it doesn't matter, if our output fails to impress our chief examiner: the 21^st Century consumer.

Morrisons Let's Grow campaign wins coveted Grand Prix at the IPA Awards 2009

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 13:03:00 +0000

"We're delighted to have played an instrumental role in the creation and activation of Morrisons Let's Grow campaign - winner of the Grand Prix at the IPA awards 2009. It's a great example of a truly integrated campaign that supports the brands proposition, delivers a genuine benefit to the local community and has achieved a stunning return on investment. We look forward to building on this success as we continue to develop the programme ".

Adrian Thomas, Director, Billington Cartmell

Celebrating the commercially-aware creative

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 12:10:00 +0000

In these times of heightened commercial awareness, it makes sound sense that our creatives should themselves be more commercially aware. So, by the same measure, shouldn't the awards we win be for ideas that deliver genuine commercial success?

Of course there are bodies that already do this - the likes of the DMA and MCCA spring to mind. But it's pencils and lions that creatives really covet, and more often than not these awards bodies - and many creatives - couldn't give a hoot how work's actually performed in the real world.

Let me say upfront that I'm not knocking ideas - quite the contrary, in fact. What I'm questioning here are the ideas that have been written by creatives for creatives, so we can sit back, slap ourselves on the back and say how clever we are - all the time ignoring the fact that a rather important person's been entirely forgotten in this process: our client, and their business's bottom line.

Maybe things are changing though. After all, there was a sign this year that the industry is starting to realise that the best ideas are ones which actually make a difference. For those of you who missed it, 2009's big winner was 'The Best Job in the World' campaign, where a team took a normal brief for a tourism authority in Australia and did a novel thing - they thought about what the client actually needed, rather than just going through the motions and using traditional advertising channels.

Now, I must declare a prejudice here - the idea was created by Ralph Barnett, a close friend and former colleague of mine. But, objectively, the reason the campaign is so strong is that it was a great idea that made a very real difference to its client.

Rather than just creating the usual poster and TV ads, they decided that people were desensitised to the traditional pieces they see plastered all over the place. So they got really creative and thought about their media before they thought about their idea. And you know what, it worked. Queensland Tourism Authority had set a measurable target of 400,000 visitors to their website over the duration of the campaign. In the first day alone, 200,000 people visited the site. And that was just the beginning.

In all, the site had more than eight million visits and 34,684 video job applications from 197 different countries. And if you combine the global news coverage, from CNN stories to BBC documentaries and Time magazine articles, the estimated media coverage is valued at more than £175million.

The onus to change shouldn't lie solely with awards though. Agencies have a duty to ensure that their creatives don't sit in an oblivious bubble. And Creative Directors have a duty to ensure the people they hire have more than a good book.

So let's start a change. Instead of simply asking my next prospective employee how many awards he's won, I'll ask how many niche brands he's built into multi-million pound accounts. I'll ask him to present the work in his book. And instead of merely admiring a campaign's art direction and copy, I'll ask if it was measurable, and what effect it had on sales.

To many agencies, this approach would seem rather radical. But is it really such a big thing - after all, aren't results what our clients pay us for?