What’s New In Marketing This Week — Marketing News February 3rd Week 2022
“Good marketing makes the company look smart. Great marketing makes the customer feel smart.” — Joe Chernov
I love this quote. It makes perfect sense.
However, it doesn’t cover two critical areas.
Firstly, the area of experimental marketing. Some of might be considered as bad while many of them help a company & industry progress.
Secondly, a lot is happening in the background. Thanks to increased transparency, we have access to more of that now. That sneak peek allows us to see how the machine works. And figure out which parts of the machine need updating.
For example, the first marketing news February 3rd week is a clear sign to dig deeper behind the scenes.
Marketing News February 3rd Week: A Marketer’s Socio-Economic Background Influences How Much They’d Earn
A marketer from a working-class background can earn ~15% less than what marketers from the middle-class or upper-class earn.
Marketing Week’s 2022 Career and Salary Survey also revealed that the marketing is still mostly middle class — with 2 out of 5 marketers coming from a middle-class background.
The study also revealed that a lower percentage of marketers from working-class backgrounds reach senior levels like Senior Manager, Director, or VP level.
What this pay gap means
It’s a great first step to identifying the problem.
The next step should be understanding the reasons and addressing them. An increased level of diversity will only foster more creativity.
Marketing News February 3rd Week:Coca-Cola Rolls Out “Starlight” — A Limited-Edition “Space Coke” That Imagines How Outer Space Might Taste
Building on the “Real Magic” platform, Coca-Cola has announced an innovation platform called Coca-Cola Creations.
The platform, co-created by marketing, tech, design & creative, will launch a series of new limited-edition flavors and experiences spanning “physical & digital worlds”
And Starlight is the first entry from that platform.
“We collectively knew for each of these creations the first thing we had to do was to unlock the flavour, unlock those tastes, because those would be the centrepieces around which we’d build the larger creative experiences,” explained design director Josh Schwarber.
What Starlights mean to the Coca-Cola ecosystem
The Real Magic platform targets to cover the world of gaming, sports, and music.
While music and sports can cater to all age groups, gaming is more skewed towards younger audiences. Coca-Cola must have identified those age groups to be of utmost importance. We have seen in their first Real Magic campaign that they targeted that group too.
It seems with Creations & Real Magic, Coca-Cola is aiming to generate excitement around this long-standing brand and make it younger. In some markets (Indian subcontinent), Pepsi has stayed relevant for the younger audience for decades. Coca-Cola might be trying to break that mold.
Marketing News February 3rd Week:A Surprising & Successful Shift From Performance Marketing To Brand Building
Performance marketing has taken the front seat in the last decade or so.
Most companies look for immediate results — which brand building can’t usually offer.
It was good to see Airbnb taking the opposite route. Since 2019, they started expanding their brand-building activities.
And guess what!
The company has reported the strongest ever fourth-quarter results. Its net profit reached $55m in this quarter — which is amazing when compared with a net loss of $3.9bn in Q4’2020.
Even the net revenue increased by 38% over 2019 (pre-pandemic levels).
Airbnb’s CFO Dave Stephenson said on an investors’ call —
“In 2019, before the pandemic, we shifted our marketing strategy to be more brand-driven and even less dependent on search engine marketing”. He continued “Wemade that shift and it has proven to have been the right shift, not only in 2019 but in 2020 and 2021.”
What this means for brand building
Brand building usually takes patience and support from key stakeholders.
If top management is not aligned, companies usually don’t want to spend time and resources on brand building. It’s great to see Airbnb doing the opposite and getting strong results.
Let’s face it — brand building creates lasting results. We love Nike or iPhones due to the consistency of their brands, not any specific sales promotion.
Final Thoughts & Next Steps For You
It’s great to see pay disparities are being highlighted — from both racial & socio-economic backgrounds points of view. This will make it easier for future marketers to make their mark.
Additionally, Coca-Cola and Airbnb reinforce two evergreen lessons. Firstly, innovation is mandatory for all businesses. And secondly, brand-building still works wonders.
Learn what’s happening in today’s world, but don’t forget what worked earlier. A combination of present & past knowledge can open the doors to the future.
See you again next week. Check out last week’s marketing news here.
