ZDNet記者蔡宜秀／台北報導 2009/02/19 19:48:02
甫於去年（2008）底宣布加入雲端服務市場的微軟（Microsoft）已開始思考雲市場的可能獲利模式。
「微軟的起步雖晚，但不代表會一直落後，」微軟線上事業群台灣、香港暨澳門總經理朱會泳表示，微軟的想法是建立一個免費的雲端服務平台，並由各個合作夥伴至該平台上提供各種產品服務，進而吸引網路使用者的青睞、甚至是消費；至於微軟在雲市場的獲利模式，「在於構思、塑造一套嶄新的數位行銷機制。」他說。
為迎頭趕上Google與Yahoo奇摩等網際網路世界的競爭對手，微軟祭出協合作夥伴共建雲端服務；而且，為確保雲端服務不會拉垮本業─Windows，微軟也開始思考一套可在雲市場的獲利機制：整合式數位行銷。
建立新典範：微軟打算以整合式數位行銷彌補其在關鍵字、搜尋（廣告）行銷的缺席。數位行銷市場的獲利模式還未定，除了Google與Yahoo奇摩帶動的關鍵字行銷與圖像式行銷等手法外，網路服務供應商其實還有很多可以發揮的空間。
就以微軟為例，微軟之所以會從去年（2008年）開始舉辦擒獅創意論壇（Get Lions Creative Forum），即是為了讓廣告主、廣告代理商、甚至是網路使用者了解歐美國家如何呈現與操作數位廣告，朱會泳指出，「數位行銷絕不只於關鍵字行銷而已，應該是結合圖像、影音、遊戲等高互動性機制的整合式行銷。」他說。
看好大中華區的數位行銷市場，微軟計劃以擒獅創意論壇（Get Lions Creative Forum）等方式，向市場宣揚整合式數位行銷的重要性。鑑於台灣微軟去年（年）舉辦的擒獅創意論壇的成效不錯，今年，香港與大陸等地亦一同加入2009擒獅創意論壇，朱會泳指出，「為帶動整合式數位行銷手法，微軟將持續性的舉辦擒獅創意論壇。」他說。
台灣是整合式數位行銷市場的最佳試金石。「大中華地區是繼日本與澳洲後的新興數位行銷市場，」朱會泳指出，根據既往經驗，只要是台灣民眾接受的新玩意，即適用於大中華地區，相較於香港與大陸，台灣的民眾較勇於嘗試各種新的事務，如台灣一直是名列MSN Beta下載人數最多的前幾個國家等，再加上台灣的廣告代理機制極健全，因此，若台灣微軟可以找出適用於台灣市場的整合式數位行銷手法，相信該機制也適用於香港與大陸等地區。
http://www.zdnet.com.tw/news/web/0,2000085679,20136309,00.htm
http://adage.com/article?article_id=126845
Fast Feeder Notches Sales Gain of 5.4%, Trouncing Even Ascendant McD's
'Freakout': BK says prank drove sales.
By Emily Bryson York Published: May 05, 2008
CHICAGO (AdAge.com) -- Burger King is giving rivals a solid thrashing -- and marketing is getting the credit.
While other fast feeders fault the recession and housing crisis for tepid sales, Burger King posted a healthy same-store-sales gain of 5.4% in its fiscal third quarter, well ahead of even McDonald's, which reported a comparatively anemic 2.9%. No. 3 burger chain Wendy's, now in the throes of an ownership change, saw same-store sales fall 1.6% at company-run stores in the same period.
Analysts are crediting Burger King's marketing with some of the gains.
"They're doing a super job on the advertising front," said UBS analyst David Palmer. "They're clearly connecting with the super fan that is the young, hungry male."
Burger King CEO John Chidsey said, "The current macroeconomic environment did not impact our top-line performance as consumers continued to seek our quality, convenience and affordability."
'Barbell menu strategy'
He credited the wildly popular "Whopper Freakout" campaign from Crispin Porter & Bogusky with driving sales through January and kid-friendly promotions involving SpongeBob SquarePants and Snoopy, from Campbell Mithun, with bringing families into the restaurants during the quarter. He added that the chain's "barbell menu strategy," with value-menu offerings such as the Whopper Jr. and the crispy-chicken sandwich at one end and premium fare such as the new BBQ Bacon Tendercrisp on the other, is also faring well.
It hasn't been an overnight turnaround for the King; this is its fourth consecutive year of positive same-store-sales growth. But until recently, it was McDonald's that was the industry's biggest engine of growth. The chain began a storied turnaround in 2003, and while its same-store sales are still on the upswing, the trajectory is slowing. McDonald's recently put the blame on the economy.
But even as gas prices climb and the economy gets more wobbly, UBS's Mr. Palmer expects Burger King to grow even stronger through the summer. It's got more new products in the pipeline, some blockbuster summer movie promotions lined up and is just starting a "reimaging campaign" to update the look and feel of its stores, some of which are 30 years old.
Mr. Palmer said the chain is benefiting from tactics that have boosted McDonald's bottom line in recent years, including longer hours and a wider breakfast value menu. Burger King has average sales of $1.5 million per store, compared with $2.2 million at McDonald's, so he said there's room for even more growth in the future. With lower sales at similarly sized stores, Mr. Palmer said, it's easier for Burger King to boost same-store sales by an extra $100,000 per store. McDonald's, on the other hand, may have to wait until its beverage initiative has launched nationwide to see sales bumps of a similar magnitude.
Movie tie-ins
Also on Burger King's side are alliances with some of the more hotly anticipated summer films: "Iron Man," "Incredible Hulk" and "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull." For the last, Burger King is planning an Indiana Jones-themed sandwich: an Indy Double Whopper (two patties, pepper jack, bacon and Cajun mayo).
Upcoming are new-product plans aimed at kids. Burger King signed on to the Better Business Bureau's Children's Food and Beverage Advertising Initiative late last year and will roll out "apple fries" in its locations nationwide this summer. The fresh-fruit offering is simply apples cut to look like fries, employing a proprietary technology that prevents them from turning brown. Burger King will also be adding a child-pleasing Kraft Macaroni & Cheese dish to the menu.
"Actually the majority of [the apple fries side] is going out à la carte and being consumed by adults as well," Burger King Chief Marketing Officer Russ Klein said on a conference call.
Early Web Traffic Is Still Better Than That of Earlier Viral Stunt but Chain Gets Some Bad Buzz too
By Emily Bryson York Published: December 10, 2008 Burger King declined to release specific traffic
information, but said that first-week site visits to Whoppervirgins.com exceeded
the number of first-week site visits to Whopperfreakout.com.
CHICAGO (AdAge.com) -- Burger King's "Whopper Virgins" are going viral, just as the fast feeder intended. But while the cheeky campaign has yet to take off, early numbers and engagement with the videos is promising, according to an online tracking group.
It's still early, but the chain's new campaign appears to have good traction online. According to Visible Measures, a group that rates engagement for viral videos, the Burger King documentary released Monday has been uploaded more than 30 times on five different video sites. At least 80% of these placements are user-generated, meaning that the video has been copied, re-posted or remixed. In aggregate, these placements have received over 130,000 views and more than 450 comments.
Early traffic tops 'Freakout' The data does not include Burger King's traffic at WhopperVirgins.com. Burger King declined to release specific traffic information, but said that first-week site visits to Whoppervirgins.com exceeded the number of first-week site visits to Whopperfreakout.com. Whopper Freakout eventually managed to boost sales of the chain's marquee menu item.
Burger King spokeswoman Lauren Kuzniar said WhopperVirgins.com traffic was up 130% on Saturday and Sunday. She credited the teasers for the documentary's release that had run online all last week. Ms. Kuzniar added that 3% of views have been on mobile devices; this is the first time that mobile has registered in the company's data.
So while the virgins have yet to break out, the signs are good, said Visible Measures. "While the viewer numbers are still relatively small, the amount of placement activity is relatively high, particularly for 30-second repurposed TV spots," said Matt Cutler, VP-marketing and analytics. "[It's] tough to tell at this stage if the campaign will take off, but viral placement activity is an encouraging first step in the process."
Mr. Cutler pointed out that the campaign is already generating conversation, with more than 100 Technorati results and more than 500 Google results.
But to really get going, he said, it's going to take time. "You don't usually see a video with millions of views in the snap of a finger," he said. "It gets out there, it gets viewed, copies spread, word spreads behind it, and it gets copied, and accumulates views, so you see more of an S curve." Right now, he said, "we're at the base of the S."
Brand rep takes a hit?Not surprisingly, the campaign has offended some people. According to BrandIndex, Burger King has been building positive buzz since mid-October from a ranking in the mid-teens to the low-20s more recently, "but [this] campaign seems to be interrupting that positive momentum," said Ted Marzilli senior VP-brand group at BrandIndex parent YouGovPolimetrix. He added that Burger King does not appear to be reaching that many new people with the campaign, though the ones it does have been talking about the campaign -- and not necessarily in a good way.
Positive chatter has fallen from 24 on Dec. 1 to 20 yesterday and Mr. Marzilli said that women are reacting negatively to the campaign. Good buzz among the ladies has fallen from 25 to 17 over the same nine-day period. Positive buzz is up with men (which generally comprise the company's core target of "Super Fans"), but only slightly, from 21 to 23. Perhaps most surprisingly, good buzz is down significantly among young people aged 18 to 34, the company's core demographic.
"Really, you paid people for this marketing campaign?" video blogger Phil Defranco asked in a posting with more than 500,000 views. "People who their palette has been accustomed to ... rocks?"
But comments like that must still be music to the fast feeder's ears. To a provocateur like Burger King and its agency, Crispin Porter & Bogusky, the only bad buzz is no buzz.
COMMENTS:
ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!! This has got to be the worst ad campaign of the century. What in the world does it matter if people that have never seen or tasted a burger in their lives - choose a whopper over a big mac? And aside from that, isn't bad enough that fast food is causing a health and obesity crisis in the US? Now we have to sicken the rest of the world with it? Give me a break. –BOCA RATON, FL
It's a condescending, money wasting effort - another example of Crispin hubris. - New York, NY –NEW YORK, NY
Hi all: Matt Cutler from Visible Measures here. I just took a look at the latest #'s for this campaign and the view count has surged by almost 20,000 views (over 15%) in less than 24 hours. It will be interesting to watch how this trends over the next several weeks. If you're into this kind of thing, we publish viral video performance research findings on our blog (http://blog.visiblemeasures.com) about once a week. Thanks! –Boston, MA
I think it misses it's mark...but what can we expect from the same people who ran ads about "Man Laws"?? –Bend, OR
Great article. To add to the buzz metrics, Trendrr tracking shows that since Dec 5th, there are 17,000 new blog posts, 200 news articles, and nearly 70,000 new search results for "Whopper Virgin". http://www.trendrr.com/tag/whopper ...So they are doing something right.... –DENVER, CO
If your goal is to never offend anyone, you're in the wrong business. –St. Petersburg, FL
Whoppervirgins has absolutely no relevance to the target. It is nothing short of a very expensive gimmick. Shock and Sensationalism is what creative seems to be all about these days. What they don't tell you is how many of these whoppervirgins suffered from the ingestion of the king of transfats afterwards...in other words, I hope they gave them lots of western toilet paper as part of their residuals. –Toronto, ON
I thought this was brilliantly done. The production value is great, it's innovative, and it depicts its subjects in a very tasteful manner. While it's all a little tongue-in-cheek, it looks like everyone involved (taste-testers included) had a lot of fun. You should also note that a bunch of the people said that they had no preference, and the last guy even says that he still prefers seal meat. They aren't depicted as simple third world inhabitants - they come across as regular people, like us, enjoying a whopper. –Boulder, CO
EMBA雜誌 編輯部/文 2008/12/2
二○○九年一款新車的廣告詞寫著：「從什麼時候開始，東西買貴了居然是身份地位的象徵？」這款車強打新時代的豪華S.U.V.，售價不到二萬七千美元。
開架式品牌的面霜廣告標榜：「這比百貨公司裡一罐三五○美元的面霜還有效，妳只是少拿到一個高級購物紙袋罷了。」
有些企業要求拍攝廣告時，場景不要設在奢華的豪宅，而是一般民眾的住家，才不會讓消費者覺得，只有有錢人才買得起公司的產品。
是的，不景氣來臨，賣東西的方法也不同了。紐約時報指出，在這種時候，「誘惑，再見！折價券，哈囉！」
西北大學行銷學教授卡金斯（Tim Calkins）表示，比起才幾個月前，對於買東西跟自己的經濟情況，消費者現在有了非常不同的感覺。現在大家購物會先做好計畫，價格也會多比幾家，甚至能不進商店就不進商店，進入了一種新簡樸主義的狀態。因為處於不確定的年代，有著不安全感的消費者會停下來思考：到底什麼才是真正重要的？
卡金斯分析，在這種大環境下，能夠表現好的，是主打物超所值的產品。相對地，表現不會太好的產品，則是鼓勵消費者勇於追求夢想，甚至超乎自己財力即時享樂的產品。目前大多數人對這樣的訴求，比較沒有感覺。
價格說低不低、說高也不高的產品，面對的挑戰最大。卡金斯認為，以最低價格競爭的產品，要做的事情很簡單，就是專心把價格壓到具有戰鬥力，產品品質只要過得去就好。
站在光譜另一端的高檔名牌，也沒有太大的問題，因為無論景氣好壞，有錢人一直都存在，他們還是會持續購買。處於中間價位的產品最傷腦筋，因為目標顧客群正好是最受不景氣影響的人。他們很容易往下轉變為尋找最低價格的消費者。
明尼蘇達大學行銷系主任約翰（George John）也指出，當景氣往下走時，消費者不僅減少購物的數量，同時也會在購物的品質上讓步。沃頓商學院行銷教授何曲（Stephen Hoch）也表示，以前許多公司不敢過於強調物超所值，擔心品牌被平價化，具有的獨特價值會被稀釋掉，現在則不得不這麼做。
因此，一片售價十三美元的電影DVD，現在會被包裝為「在家狂歡電影夜」，以吸引消費者省下一家大小的電影票。而一輛售價六十美元的腳踏車，則會被呈現為「流行的代步工具」，以搶攻想省車錢、油錢的廣大民眾。
（Brain.com 2008-07-25）美國的「口碑經紀公司」 BzzAgent 最近進行一項名為「口碑行銷保證滿意」的計畫，要證明「口碑行銷」是最佳的行銷工具。
「口碑行銷滿意計畫」預計執行到 2008 年底，任何廣告主和廣告代理商都可參加，但條件是參與者必須同時利用傳統媒體做行銷，以作為對照組。BzzAgent 的賭注是在四項行銷指標上，也就是品牌知名度、消費者態度、購買意願和最終的銷售量，投注比傳統媒體多出 20%的行銷費用。如果最後口碑行銷沒有達標準， BzzAgent 將會把這些執行和追蹤費用，全數退還給廣告主。
近年來口碑行銷漸漸受到重視，雖然行銷人員都同意消費者口耳相傳的力量，大過企業的自吹自擂，但因口碑行銷很難追蹤、衡量執行效果，因此至今還沒辦法成為媒體主流。
主導這項計畫的 BzzAgent創辦人Dave Balter堅信，口碑行銷的效果遠大過其他傳統媒體，並願意以「保證滿意否則退費」的方式來說服廣告主。
這項計畫預計邀請 10～12 個品牌，預估共需要投入 30 萬美元的媒體費在實驗組（口碑行銷）和對照組（其他媒體）。後續的行銷指數追蹤則將交由公正客觀的第三者，也就是Insight Express 市調公司）進行。除了口碑行銷和其他行銷工具效果的比較外， BzzAgent 也會追蹤有沒有更多的廣告主在參加過這項計畫後，願意繼續採用口碑行銷。
千萬別以為 BzzAgent 是走到窮途末路才想到這招來招攬新客源，事實上BzzAgent 有將近 280 個客戶，且業績已連續六季都有成長。 2008 第一季更是比去年同期達兩位數成長。其他廣告同業對這項計畫樂觀其成，只要能增進客戶對任何新媒體的正面印象都是好事。
BzzAgent 表示，也許會有1～2家客戶的口碑行銷計畫，達不到預期的標準，但這些都不會更改他們讓客戶更了解口碑行銷的初衷。（取材自AdAge.com）