ThinkNoLimit Marketing Coaching

Notebooks and Netbooks are hot and mobile broadband is the arena that PCCW and Smartone-Vodafone both want to have a share in. It's funny that Telcos are quite into competitive advertising. But this Smartone-Vodafone does have a point and strike right on the weakness of Netvigator Everywhere. Netvigator is not "everywhere" per se. At home, you use fixed line broadband. Out of home, you need a device to connect to either WiFi, HSDPA or 3G. I mentioned it's self-defeating in my post last year. Seems Smartone-Vodafone people have been reading my blog. LOL.

It's a pretty thought provoking ad. This is a version talking to ladies and there is another version for men. While you can spend your money on buying a lot of shoes, why don't you consider investing for the future ? It's a quite a strike to the head, right ? Just too bad that the ad doesn't spell how it can help you invest for the future.

Do you believe in international marketing ? People say think global, act local. It's like a cliche but it's absolutely right. The fundamental of marketing is about segmentation, targeting and positioning and we formulate a marketing mix to satisfy the needs of the target segment(s). It's almost impossible to come up with a single marketing mix to address a wide variety of segments, geographical segments. Look at McDonald's, I suppose it's really a global company that thinks global and acts local. There are waves of new foods that suits local HK people's taste. It uses local celebrities for advertising and gives away Hello Kitty. It's like a local company just carrying a global brand.

I have talked about Eee Box in my earlier post . In its last advertorial, it was trying to sell to young lady users. It was commented that it could have picked the right target segment based on the small size and the very basic performance standards. To my surprise, in its next ad, it tries to sell to business customers based on energy saving. There is nothing wrong with selling to two segments, only if we know what it takes. Channel, price and promotion strategies need to be different. Do we have enough resources to kill two birds with one stone ? Given limited resources, we need to make trade-off decisions. Just a coincidence that I clipped another ad of Megaman that talks about energy saving. Sold at HK$19.90, this energy saving light bulb is said to save 80% of electricity. Would it be more motivating to spell how much money it could help save as the support ? I mean just like what ASUS Eee box does above.

Sex always sells. Trichoderm has long been using "womanizing" as the platform for selling hair growth serum. Bald head won't get you girls and here comes the need for hair growth serum. It's really pushing the platform by tying sexuality with hair this time round. Two thumbs up ! The visual of the print ad is so sexy. I'm thinking it would be interesting if it uses the same thing for advert sing in MTR. There must be awful lot of talkabouts and free publicity (there will be complaints too).

See more. Learn more. The Art of Commercial show will be on again in Dec and Jan. Check it out. I will definitely go. We may bump into each other !

A friend forwarded this TVB newsletter to me. In view of the financial tsunami and the on-going down trend of share of spending among other media, TVB has been trying to promote TVC as the most effective media vehicle. "Experience the power of TVC". It has taken the HKBB as the example. HKBB has produced 18 TVCs (!). Although they are all funny TVCs to enjoy, most advertisers must think that HKBB is an exception as they have so much money to burn. Will advertisers really rethink their budget allocation to TV because of this newsletter ? No kidding.