Few years back social bloggers like Orkut, Facebook, youtube and Twitter revolutionized the trend of friendship. People were hooked to their systems even at their work places, Thanks to the 3G mobile phones which made the sites accessable on their mobile phones too. In its early days these sites were just a mean of making friendship, sharing experiences and most importantly finding old and new friends, slowly this craze diminished and people started using these sites as a new platform to put forth their grievances.
Canadian folk singer Dave Carroll was travelling through united airlines and got his $3500 guitar damaged by the cargo handlers, Not only the airline refused the compensation but was rude to him. So he made a music video telling his experience and posted it on youtube. Three days later it was watched 500000 times and by mid august the figure reached to 5 millions. United airline was having its public relations at stake, because with this thousands of customers were coming ahead to vent their dissatisfaction. Gone are the days when companies were rude to their customers, today if a company does so, not only people will withdraw their custom but will also badmouth the company on these social media sites, But this does not stop companies from using social media sites as a part of their marketing plan.
Today hardly anyone using internet is not having any social network's account. With such a major chunk of potential customers available at one single place, Its impossible for the companies to keep themselves refrained from using these sites as a marketing tool. Almost 90% of companies use these sites to show their presence, provide information, generate sales leads and give exposure to the company. As most of the companies have realized that social media is vital for them to be successful, very few have an idea of how to analyze it. Its more than just measuring how often people have clicked their ads. Finally entrepreneurs should understand that social media are not toys to be handled by inexperienced people, they are professional and effective communication channels that needs the understanding of the technical know how to reach to a community.
Source: http://www.lexisnexis.com.ezproxy.fiu.edu/hottopics/lnacademic/
Friday, November 26, 2010
Thursday, November 18, 2010
Neuromarketing: A tool or a weapon
A survey states that 85% of the decisions are taken at a subconscious level and only 15% decisions are taken cognitively. But today researchers are developing strategies to study the subconscious mind of a person so that they can invoke the feelings or atleast stir the human emotions by advertising the products in such a way that an average human will be inclined to buy it.
Marketing majorly deals with human emotions, One example would be the retail marketing where the customers are exposed to so many products, such that after a certain limit people tend to buy products which they may never need in their life. Marketeers have started studying the techniques of capturing human emotions and their sub conscious reactions to stimuli and using them to promote products which somehow become a visceral compulsion. As said by Retail expert Paco Underhill in his interview, giant retailars like walmart and best buy uses the idea of offering consumers lot many options so much so that the buyer gets lost in the world of products which are available in every price range, attractive packagings and more or less the same use, using customer wait time or window shopping.It's a proven fact that these techniques affect the consumers at a level where they end up buying things even if they dont intend to use it.
Here the question is should we allow someone to peek inside our mind, read our thoughts and develop a scheme to sell their product? Traditionally surveys were taken of a particular population and then a marketing strategy was developed to appeal the masses but with the advent of neuromarketing critics fear that buyers will not only become more vulnerable but also intensify the marketing related diseases like anorexia or bulimia. Critics also believe that neuromarketing can trigger negative values and create an altogather different generation than it would have been, may be in a negative connotation.
Neuromarketing, If used as a tool can definately help a marketer to smoothly enter the market and then only the product quality will help to establish a significant share of market. One thing we should understand is that neuromarketing is certainly not a hypnotism where people are put under a spell forever and are made to buy things continously whether they like it or not. Its an urge created by the marketers so that their advertising becomes more effective and people somewhere can relate themselves with the advertisement to use the products.
I always thought that marketing is a science which had the art of convincing others to buy a product. Neuromarketing certainly is an advanced science but lacks creativity. Its like appearing for an exam whose questions are previously known.
Sources: Businessweek, BBC
Neuromarketing, If used as a tool can definately help a marketer to smoothly enter the market and then only the product quality will help to establish a significant share of market. One thing we should understand is that neuromarketing is certainly not a hypnotism where people are put under a spell forever and are made to buy things continously whether they like it or not. Its an urge created by the marketers so that their advertising becomes more effective and people somewhere can relate themselves with the advertisement to use the products.
I always thought that marketing is a science which had the art of convincing others to buy a product. Neuromarketing certainly is an advanced science but lacks creativity. Its like appearing for an exam whose questions are previously known.
Sources: Businessweek, BBC
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