Ever thought about going for a job somewhere but wish you could see a bit more what life is like within that organisation? Often it’s not just the words on the job description that make the difference to employees but the corporate culture, ways of doing things and the potential workmates.

So I wonder if more people will be attracted to this recruitment ad for Lastminute.com because it’s done in video form? After all, that means  you can see EXACTLY what you’re letting yourself in for….

We’ve all heard tales of people with Harley-Davidson tattoos. My Peruvian friend, who grew up in the slums of Lima, has often told me of coming across girls called “Madeinusa” because that name was written on so many labels of clothing (Made In USA) and was perceived to be a name conveying luxury and class.

But now a British couple has called their baby Kia, after her parents Tony Richardson and Sam Smyth used a Kia car to get to hospital for the child’s birth. Mum Sam couldn’t wait to reach the hospital and her baby girl was born in the back seat. The infant was originally planned to be called Tilley but the trip to hospital was clearly so memorable for the parents that they changed this to Kia.

Faced with this great publicity, Kia (the brand, not the baby) has made the best of a PR tool from heaven and gifted the couple a  2009 seven-seat Kia Carens valued at £17,995

Should I ever have children, I shall be calling them Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Lindt and Paul-A-Young-Fine-Chocolates. Brands be aware.

There is a brilliant post on the Gawker website about the Thomson Reuters logo. Some wag who claims to be from the internal creative team that designed the firm’s logo has admitted that while it was sold to the organisation on some “corporate-sounding symbolism”,  it was really inspired by “a flushing, swirling toilet”.

You can see this “confession”, which was posted on the anonymous confessions site “PostSecret“, below:

Thanks to my former colleague (and all-round ace journalist) Morag Cuddeford Jones for tipping me off about this one.

There is a nice article on AdAge this week talking about the era of “mission-statement marketing”. This is apparently not just standard old cause-related marketing (as we have known it for years and years) but a new trend.

The article claims that Procter & Gamble no longer uses their timeworn phrase “consumer is boss” only but now talk about “touching and improving lives”. Unilever too is taking the approach of talking about “Making Life Better”. Even mega-retailer Walmart is getting in on the action with its slogan “Save Money. Live Better”.

According to AdAge, 79% of consumers said they’d switch to a brand associated with a good cause, up from 66% in 1993, and 38% said they’d bought a product associated with a cause, compared with 20% in 1993, according to Cone Inc.

It isn’t just Unilever (home to Dove, the brand that promotes itself using “real women” rather than models) or Procter & Gamble (home to Pampers, the nappy supported by multiple child-related causes). The retailer Macy’s has launched a “National Kindness Day”, which claims to “reward and recognise random acts of kindness”.

Kids store Toys R Us is helping out the Toys for Tots foundation that collects toys to donate to underprivileged children. Each time someone signs up to be a Facebook fan of Toys R Us or Babies R Us, Toys R Us donates $1 to Toys for Tots. Target is selling GiftCoins that are gift cards with a charitable bonus. GiftCoins are sold in a set of five worth $5 each for a total of $25. When a consumer buys a $25 pack, Target donates $2 to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. Target will donate up to $750,000.

Meanwhile, Levi Strauss is apparently set to launch a scheme in January called “Care Tag for Our Planet”, which asks people to wash clothing in cool temperatures to save energy and also requests that the wearer donates the jeans to charity shops (it’s a partnership with clothes recycling organisation Goodwill) when they are finished with them.

But is this really a new trend? I don’t think so. As picked up by The New York Times, this is just a sign that in a recession, people are thinking more carefully about how they consume. Brands are now using this collective desire for responsibility and societal concern for their own ends. Is this the start of a mindshift within businesses?

After all, isn’t adapting to consumers’ interests and priorities simply known as ‘marketing’? Hm.

Here is some nice customer service advice from Henry Dimbleby, who runs Leon, a healthy fast-food chain in the UK.

As Leon is often cited as one of the chains getting service and products right on the British high street, it’s interesting to get a take on Dimbleby’s internal mantra.

• Try to make everyone who complains more loyal than they were before they complained.

• Don’t just offer to give them free stuff. People hate being bought off, and they don’t want you to think they only complained to get a freebie. They want you to take them seriously.

• Find out what went wrong and make sure you fix it. People who complain are doing you a favour: otherwise you would never know that something in your business wasn’t working smoothly.

• Stand by your team. If the complaint is against a particular person and you think that that person is normally great, spell out their virtues to the complainant. People like loyalty. But also make it clear that you take the problem they encountered seriously.

• Let the person complaining know what you are going to do and thank them for helping you make your business better. People love to be helpful.

• Offer them free stuff. Once you have worked out what the problem is and fixed it – and only then. This person has just helped make your business a little bit better. They deserve a freebie.

Thanks to The Guardian for this.

Sadly, I was not able to attend #140con today, the second Twitter event to be held in London in only a matter of weeks. (I spoke at another conference called Media 140 last month.)

But like a true convert to real-time media, I’ve been following the activity live on Twitter and there are a few interesting things that have emerged. The format of the day mimics the short-form nature of Twitter in that 50 speakers are presenting within 35 sessions, which means they speak for only a couple of minutes each. (Even Stephen Fry, who has a million followers on Twitter, turned up.)

For those of you also missing out, you can read a good roundup via The Guardian here.

So Sainsbury’s is following Tesco into the world of “buy one, get another later” deals. Sainsbury’s is calling the marketing promotion “Buy Now, Free Next Time”. Consumers will get a coupon at the till point offering them the chance to claim a second item during their next shop, rather than pick it out immediately as in current “buy one, get one free offers”.

The scheme will first launch as a trial in 470 Sainsbury’s stores to see if it attracts consumers using just two products – white baguette sticks and Pampers brand nappies. Consumers will have two weeks to redeem the vouchers and only four items involved in the scheme can be used per transaction. While Tesco announced it would run a similar “buy one, get one later” initiative in October, it has yet to launch its version in stores, giving Sainsbury’s the apparent visible advantage in innovating how it carries out marketing promotions.

Traditional “buy one, get one free” offers (fabulously abbreviated to the term ‘BOGOF’) have long been criticised for wastage. While many people buy items – particularly food – when it is on special offer, they are unable to use the quantity provided. This contributes to household waste. The government’s Food 2030 report in August was especially critical of retailers encouraging people to buy goods they don’t need through marketing initiatives.

Do you think Sainsbury’s and Tesco are on the right path with these “buy one now, get another later” style promotions? Or would you prefer to stick to the standard BOGOF?

Yesterday, the shock news came that luxury fashion brand Luella is to cease trading. The label, set up by designer and former journalist Luella Bartley, has lost its main financial backer, Club 21, which announced it could not afford to “invest in the relationship” any longer.

Some of my colleagues were less interested…..”Luella who?” they asked.

Well, Luella may not be a company the size of last year’s pre-Christmas collapse – Woolworths – but it has a brand that reaches beyond its relatively small corporate size. This is why the failure of her company comes as such a surprise to anyone acquainted with the world of fashion or even popular culture.

Bartley takes her place in history for helping to revive English luxury brand Mulberry. When she designed an accessories collection for Mulberry in 2002, her bags were credited for turning around Mulberry’s fortunes. Suddenly, handbags like the “Gisele” were hanging off the arms of women all over the world.

Remember the sudden wave of florals sweeping the high street over the past couple of years? That was also down to Luella. She mixed florals with black taffetta and lace, making the outfits a little more punk. Luella has been one of the core proponents of the trend in mixing the ultra-feminine with the butch over the past few years. Celebrities from Lily Allen to Gwyneth Paltrow have worn her clothes.

Bartley even won “Designer of the Year” at last year’s British Fashion Awards because of her influenc, which came after multiple nominations.

The collapse of Luella may still not raise too much interest outside fashion circles (or at least with my male colleagues), but it’s a valuable reminder that even brands seen as setting a cultural agenda are at risk in this climate.

The Observer has announced that it is ditching three of its monthly magazines – Observer Sport Monthly, Observer Music Monthly and Observer Woman. It will be retaining its Observer Food Monthly magazine and redesigning the paper to incorporate business and finance coverage into three main sections of the paper (news, sport and review);  travel will be moved into an expanded version of the weekly Observer Magazine.

To me, this is a crazy business and marketing decision. It is taking away all the elements of the paper that make it different from its rivals and instead making it a much blander, more disposable version of itself. In September, the paper was revealed to be under threat from closure, but instead its parent, GNM, has clearly decided that it would be best just to neuter it by removing all its truly exclusive content.

In this day and age, news has almost no exclusive value. I can’t remember the last time I looked at The Observer’s front page and thought “wow, that’s a story I’ve never seen before…”. The truth is that I read almost all of my news online, so when I come to Sunday, I am looking for a different reading experience – one with more indepth analysis and specialist information.

The Observer Monthly magazines were something that no other Sunday paper had to offer. Sure, most of them have some kind of magazine and The Sunday Times has its Style fashion supplement. But no other Sunday paper went as indepth into music, sport or really lengthy pieces about women’s issues, such as what makes a 21st century parent or infertility.

To me, this is a perfect example of when cost-cutting happens to the wrong part of a brand. I wonder now how many people will continue to buy The Observer without its value-adding supplements to look forward to…..

Do you agree with my views? Or am I wrong? Let me know your thoughts.

What are likely to be top trends in digital marketing for 2010?

Drew Neisser from Renegade Marketing has set out his ideas in an Olympic-themed form, which you can read below. Do you agree?

1. Social Media: A Marathon, Not a Sprint

Neisser says that a lot of brands – hoping to become fast friends with their targets – rushed into Facebook and Twitter in the last 24 months without investing sufficient time or resources. In 2010, savvy marketers will increase their commitment to social media by first listening and then offering up a steady stream of engaging content that their fans actually want.

This will be particularly true for B2B brands, only 38% of whom included social media in their 2008 marketing plans (vs. 71% for B2C brands). With one comScore study indicating that branded
social media activities can have a multiplier effect on search results, there is a quantifiable rationale for brands to up the social media ante in 2010.

2. Mash-Ups: Taking Inspiration from Biathlons

Neisser predicts that more innovative mash-ups will become standard in 2010. He recalls 2009’s campaign by E.P. Carrillo, a new cigar manufacturer, which created a  Twitter and Google Maps mash-up for its “coming soon” site that tracked cigar tweets (http://www.epcarrillo.com/) from around the world. Neisser expects to see more campaigns that glide seamlessly between personal and business, online and offline, mobile and desktop, just like consumers do all the time. Farsighted marketers will bring together formerly disparate elements into a cohesive and self-perpetuating social media experience.

3. App Happy: On Your Mark, Get Set, Go Crazy

Given the success a handful of marketers enjoyed with their “apps” in 2009, Neisser expects a blaze of new entries in 2010.  iPhone apps that provide demonstrable utility like Kraft’s iFood Assistant recipe finder, Benjamin Moore’s color matcher and Zipcar’s GPS-based car finder will continue to gain traction. Expect more apps that integrate with other social media like the Gap StyleMixer that allows you to mix and match clothes and share them with friends on Facebook.  And don’t forget the non-iPhone universe. The steakhouse Maloney and Porcelli cooked up a humorous and somewhat deviant web-based app at Expense A Steak that extrudes faux expense reports.

4. Measure Up: Track Every Second

With more dollars earmarked for social media, marketers will undoubtedly use new tools to monitor the conversations that are happening with or without them.  Neisser claims that Radian6 and Scout Labs emerged in 2009 as two of the leading social media monitoring tools.  And while Neisser says these tools are great, each requires a sizeable commitment by the marketer in time of staff.  Just ask JetBlue who manages to enhance customer loyalty daily by responding to any and every customer Tweet within minutes, following 117,000 on Twitter, and in the process generating over 1.3 million followers.

5. POV Power: Don’t Just Talk the Talk

Neisser says that while lots of brands raced into social media in 2009, few established true connections with their targets.  The reality is that consumers engage with brands that they like on a visceral level and that provide a distinct perspective on the world.  Aflac’s Duck quacks up a gaggle of quirky content, including charitable requests that appeal to over 161,000 fans on Facebook and 3,000+ followers on
Twitter.  Meanwhile, Geico’s Gecko has been left in the social media dust due to its surprisingly dry and unresponsive online voice.  Ironically, a brand by definition is a point-of-view that once clearly defined
should guide all communications, social or otherwise.

6. Expose Yourself: Win the Crowd With Honesty

Neisser argues that the emergence of several “tell all” consumer-created sites signals the arrival of a new era of honesty and transparency – especially for brands targeting those under 35.  Sites like fmylife.com,
textsfromlastnight.com and MyParentsJoinedFacebook.com reflect a generation willing to bare and share all without the least trepidation. Even the emergence of “Untag Mondays” speaks to the socially acceptable norm of posting embarrassing content that one might not want a parent or employer to see. Marketers that share this sense of honesty, that admit mistakes and address shortcomings in real-time will
find a youthful army of comrades willing to do their bidding. As Comcast discovered, this kind of honesty can even transform a PR nightmare into an industry-leading customer service.

7. Hold the Presses: Major Comebacks are Possible

Though a 50% decline in ad pages certifies 2009 as the worst year in its history, don’t write off print as a viable media channel just yet. Neisser claims that more than 80% of US consumers still subscribe to at least one magazine and 83% believe newspapers are still relevant. Experimenting with video in print publications = like Entertainment Weekly is but one of the ways certain magazine segments
will hold onto their targets and satisfy their advertisers. And while P&G shut down its 72-year-old TV soap opera Guiding Light in 2009, they are cranking up the presses with the custom published glossy, Rouge, which expects to reach a whopping 11 million North American households in 2010.

8. Go to the Video: Separate from the Pack

The emergence of viral video rankings in 2009 reflected the mainstreaming of this approach to audience engagement, claims Neisser. While everyone and their branded brother aspired to cut through with a
viral hit, surprisingly few found an audience.  In 2010, marketers will undoubtedly crank out more of the same while a savvy few will worry less about mass reach and focus more on grass roots appeal, providing content that their core target really wants.  B2B marketers in particular will find that using informative videos that transform the complicated into the comprehensible, like Commoncraft’s Plain English videos, will generate quality leads from grateful prospects.

9. Mobile Media: Catching Up at Last

Despite all the hype by this author and others, less than a third of marketers had a budget for mobile in 2009. In 2010, smart phone penetration should rise to at least 25% (from 17% in Q2 ‘09) making it a
lot easier to deliver a rich mobile experience worthy of consumer attention. Neisser says that the blending of mobile and social apps like Facebook, Loop’d and Twitter has also created a new openness towards this medium. Given the desirable demographics (18-34, good income) of smartphone owners, at minimum, marketers should give strong consideration to creating a mobile friendly website, thus allowing prospects to engage whenever and wherever they happen to be.

10. Be Positive: Attitude is Everything

Neisser says that while honesty is a worthy friend to marketers, don’t forget that almost no one wants to date a Debbie Downer. A recent poll by Adweek/Harris found “relative little enthusiasm and lots of indifference for ads that refer to the downturn.” Even if the economy is slow to recover in 2010, find the silver lining for your customers and prospects with both words and actions. Like the athletes whose positive outlooks and superior skills propel them to victory, so, too, can marketers find success with an upbeat message and an unimpeachable value proposition.

Thank you to Drew for these comprehensive themes; you can contact him at Renegade Marketing.