How to Use Social Influencers to Help

Keeping with the topic of social media I saw a great read on influencers and how to get their help with marketing campaigns.

In social media there are folks who act as hubs to the spokes of a tire where they have many connections and contacting them means you might be able to reach those folks as well.

Those folks are called influencers.

This article helps marketers understand how to interact with and get help from those folks.  Good read:

https://econsultancy.com/blog/69196-11-impressive-influencer-marketing-campaigns/

Here is a snippet from the piece:

Daniel Wellington is a watch brand that has chosen to completely bypass traditional marketing to focus on influencers. The brand pays celebrities for sponsored posts and gifts watches to lesser-known micro-influencers. In exchange, they post photos of themselves wearing the watch, accompanied by a unique money-off code for followers.

It’s a simple formula: beautiful images of minimalistic jewellery, which serve to promote a lifestyle as well as a product. There are over 1.3m Instagram posts using the #danielwellington hashtag, with the brand’s main account amassing over 3.2m followers. 

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

Facebook at 2 Billion

2 Billion.

With a B.

As in a big, Big deal.

So a third or slightly less of the world population uses Facebook in one form or another to stay in touch with others.  Kind of something to keep an eye on.

Read more here:

https://www.recode.net/2017/6/27/15880734/facebook-mark-zuckerberg-two-billion-monthly-users

I think Zuck and crew have their work cut out for them after 2016.  Their marketing tools can be used for insidious purposes and that really shook them. We'll see this come out more broadly soon I'm guessing but suffice to say it is possible to "weaponize" marketing through social media.  That certainly puts a lot of responsibility on Facebook to get it right doesn't it?

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

The iPhone at 10 Years Old - It Begins

We will be seeing a bunch of these articles as the 10 year anniversary approaches.

I have one phone from each major update, including a working original iPhone.  I have the Game 4 from the 2004 ALCS MLB game between Boston and New York on it that I pull up some times.

Good little read here to see how far the smartphone has come:

https://www.cnet.com/news/using-the-2007-iphone-in-2017/

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

Choose Your Own Adventure Goes Digital

Do you remember the Choose Your Own Adventure books?

Pick any theme you can think of.  Pirates.  Lost Treasure.  Dragons.  Princesses.

Pick up the book, start reading, and within a few pages you were asked to make a decision.  Something like this:
"If you choose to take the red brick path turn to page 23.
Take the blue brick path instead turn to page 37."

There were always paths to put you in a straight line to disaster, and you quickly learned through repetition which ones put you on that path, and only one "best" ending, with multiple endings.  Fun and immensely re-playable.  I used "play" because it was an interactive experience, not just a reading experience.

Fun fun!

So, Netflix is in the same game now.

Yeap.  Choose Your Own Adventure for movies and TV.

Super cool!  Don't you just love digital technology in the 21st Century?

Read more here:

https://www.wired.com/story/netflix-branching-narratives/

Happy ... Choosing,

J.W. Gant

App Marketing in 2017

Great little read that should help update your (and my) understanding of how to market mobile apps today.

Here is a snippet from the piece:

In the early days of apps, life used to be so simple. You built it, released it into the app store(s), spread the word about it and waited for the downloads to roll in. That was in the days when apps were novelty items and people were still amazed at the utility and functionality that could be coded into something they could keep on their homescreen and use whenever they wanted.

Fast forward a few years – nine to be exact – and things look somewhat different. While mobile phone OS fragmentation has eased somewhat, leaving iOS and Android as virtually the last men standing, the fact remains that there are more than 2m apps in Apple’s App Store, and another 2m+ in the Google Play store.

Here is the article:

http://mobilemarketingmagazine.com/app-marketing-101

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

Amazon Acquires Whole Foods - What Does It Mean?

When the news broke that online retailer and all-around everything super-center Amazon was acquiring Whole Foods my instinct was to get straight to my blog.  I have thoughts on this, of course, but I also knew there would be a slew of industry leaders leaning in on this deal.  So I decided to wait a bit and gather the best articles in one place.

First, my thoughts.

Clearly Amazon wants to become more like Walmart as Walmart continues to try to be more like Amazon.

If I were to look in to the future of retail and how digital will ultimately impact it I think we'll see a new normal settled upon in the very near future.  Within that normal there will be room for all kinds of players so long as they define a clear space that differentiates them from others.  Pure online, pure mobile, pure physical retail, and everything in between will be the new reality.  The largest players will be heavy in physical AND digital, while smaller players will excel at only one or the other.

So Walmart might one day be 70/30 physical to digital and Amazon might become 30/70 physical to digital.  Something like that.  You'll still see the mom & pop shop on Main Street, and the little niche mobile-only player that gets the job done too.  Great time to be a customer huh?

The Food Marketing Institute back around 2012 was predicting roughly 10% of current Supermarket business would shift online.  Most of that, 80%, would be taken from packaged center store goods that were easily shipped and often good targets for subscription models (such as diapers).  Don't see any reason this prediction was off and that means big changes for Supermarkets across the country.  They are suddenly too large for their needs.  We should see stores removing aisles to make room for more fresh and prepared in-store options.  Combined with a robust digital presence the best Supermarket chains will survive and thrive (Wegmans).

Now to it and there is a lot of reading for you should you choose to do so.

RIS weighs in with their slew of experts:
https://risnews.com/experts-weigh-amazon-snatches-organic-grocer-whole-foods-137-billion

Re/Code tell you how to keep Amazon from swallowing your business too:
https://www.recode.net/2017/6/19/15832958/amazon-whole-foods-jeff-bezos-acquisition-aws-vendor-tips-cloud-open-source

RetailDive tells us how the war between Amazon and Walmart is accelerating:
http://www.retaildive.com/news/amazon-vs-walmart-why-the-whole-foods-deal-escalates-the-war-for-the-amer/445294/

Bloomberg tells us Amazon is after every single thing you buy (which is exactly what Walmart is after by the way):
https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-06-20/amazon-s-real-target-isn-t-whole-foods-it-s-everything-you-buy

Digital Transactions tells us why Amazon is changing the checkout (payment) process with this acquisition:
http://www.digitaltransactions.net/news/story/With-Its-Deal-for-Whole-Foods_-Amazon-Could-Usher-in-Seismic-Change-for-the-Checkout

Business Insider is always a good read and they say Walmart and Kroger (supermarket) should be terrified by this deal:
http://www.businessinsider.com/amazons-whole-foods-acquisition-should-terrify-walmart-kroger-2017-6

Finally the NRF (National Retail Federation) tells us the retail reinvention is just getting started but also cautions against the belief that traditional retail is imploding (correct):
https://nrf.com/news/retails-reinvention-story-is-just-getting-started

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

Target to Incorporate Cartwheel in to their Core App

Bye bye Cartwheel.

If you aren't familiar with it, and shop at Target, you should be.  This great little experiment really opened up Target as a leader in digital interactions with customers, especially in-store.  I've also spent some time with the Cartwheel team and can say they are passionate about what they do, and do it well.

Well enough it is time to pull it up to the mothership.

Target is pulling Cartwheel in to the main Target App and will sunset Cartwheel as a stand-alone.  This was inevitable if Cartwheel were a success so I'm sure this is bitter sweet for the team.  Better for the average Target customer, to be sure.

Read on:

https://techcrunch.com/2017/06/09/target-and-cartwheel-apps-to-merge-starting-this-summer-mobile-payments-and-improved-maps-to-follow/

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

Walmart Combines its Credit Cards with Walmart Pay

Why not put it all together?

Get a Walmart Credit Card and instantly begin using it in store with Walmart Pay.

Cool right?

Anything that reduces friction between customers and ... buying things will be adopted.

Read on:

http://www.digitaltransactions.net/news/story/Wal-Mart-Entices-Credit-Card-Applicants-With-Instant-Access-Via-Walmart-Pay

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

BRotD - Entry 0252 Google's Mobile Behaviors Analysis

Best Reading of the Day

Google is out with another excellent study that is worth your time.  Here's the title:

The Consumer Behaviors Shaping the Next Generation of Mobile Experiences

Now if that doesn't sell you on the read I ... why are you here?

No reason to quote more on this one, just go read it:

https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/advertising-channels/mobile/consumer-behavior-mobile-digital-experiences/

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

Apple's WWDC 2017

The Worldwide Developer's Conference (WWDC) Apple holds every year is an opportunity for the folks in Cupertino to showcase their software work, but has recently been a source for hardware announcements as well.

I think we are seeing the end of the big event announcements from Apple as their new products have been underwhelming year after year.

At this year's conference we saw a slew of software updates such as the new iOS as well as upgrades to hardware and Apple's first new hardware in over 2 years.

I'll capture a bit of the news and provide links for further reading.

The biggest news is a great point of focus to help us see how different Apple is under CEO Cook vs. the days under Jobs.  Cook was the supply chain guy at Apple so why should we expect great creative new product breakthroughs?  Incremental work is what you'd expect from such a leader and that's what we've seen.  Take, for example, the announcement of the Apple HomePod.  This is their competitor to the Amazon and Google devices, the Amazon Echo and Google Home, that have both been quite successful.

Apple HomePod

In the old days under Jobs Apple would have been 2nd or 3rd to the market, exactly as they've done here, but they would have taken the time to learn what works & what doesn't to provide an entry that blows away the competitors.  This device is underwhelming in every way including the name.  Only in one way does it retain the Apple method of old: its the most expensive version of such devices.  This time, however, it isn't nearly worth the price.

Anything Else?

Sure.  Updates to iOS.  An incremental set of changes to the iPad Pro that make it more like the Microsoft Surface tablets (yet still well short).  A super expensive MAC and new MacOS.

Anyway, to read on check out the folks at Re/Code.  As usual their write-up is excellent:

https://www.recode.net/2017/6/5/15740882/wwdc-2017-need-to-know-apple-ios-watchos-mac-ipad-siri

You should read this piece on why one analyst misses Steve Jobs:

http://www.zdnet.com/article/i-miss-steve-jobs-and-his-reality-distortion-field/

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

The New Wave of Retailers

There is some tech news in this as well as pure retail news.

We are seeing eCommerce 2.0 happening everywhere as smaller niche players fill vaccums Amazon hasn't taken.  One is for pets.  The company's name is Chewy and they are now nearly a $1B company 5 years after launch.

Here is a snippet on that one:

The online only pet food retailer operates a 365-day 24/7 help service and offers hassle-free returns. Forbes reported in January 2017 that Chewy employed '416 of its 3,400 staffers to answer phones and texts in round-the-clock shifts'.

But its commitment to customer love is most impressive when you look beyond the numbers at how Chewy treats its customers.

Those few that receive a mistaken or damaged order are told they are welcome to donate the order to a local animal shelter and Chewy will send a new order straight away.

Read the entire story here:

https://econsultancy.com/blog/69136-six-emerging-retailers-with-effective-strategies/

A common thread in these companies is their responsiveness to the needs of their customers.  Welcome to retailing in the early 21st Century.

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant