Branding

          Branding is a big deal in marketing. Often times consumers might even forget the product all together but remember the pitch or the celebrity whom endorsed it. I have noticed the trend with retired athletes, celebrities, and even ones still working. Of course one of the biggest names that immediately comes to mind is Michael Jordan, and his shoes. Research shows that the Jordan brand grossed over $100 million dollars in 2015. This is just off the sale of his very popular shoes, not including his clothing and or his athletic gear. When those figures are added in Forbes estimates Jordan's' brand at over $1 billion dollars.
         Jordan's branding includes his icon logo of himself jumping with a basketball in hand. Now although Jordan did not invent shoes or clothing. He necessity that people must have, clothes and shoes, and capitalized on it big time. His deal to partner with Nike was the biggest deal in its time Nike offered Jordan a record $500,000 a year for 5 years and put many stipulations on this deal. Jordan would eventually over come all of the stipulations and become the household name that he is now, and arguable one of the most recognized brands in the world. Not only does he had record sales he has also created a 'cult' following with consumers lining up to get each new pair of his shoes ad 'collecting' them. 
        So if every company could follow Jordan's every move marketing and branding would be all a company needed. But there is no 'playbook' to Jordan's success. Some say it is simply everything he touches turns to gold.

Inventions before there time

             An idea that has been on my mind is inventions that were ahead of there time. I read about how many years ago Apple had the idea for the Ipad tablet. As I researched this, some reports say that apple had invented an Ipad prototype some 10 years before the Ipad first hit the market! Its hard to say when the right time is to release a product. I know there is research, study groups, and surveys that can be conducted. But how does one fully know when is the right time? I think if you have a great marketing team and flood the market with the product it could be successful. I can relate this to the idea of Tide Pods. Tide was the first company to invent the pods. They marketed it to not only women but men. Their slogan was "take the guess work out of laundry". They successfully convinced audiences that anyone could do laundry just add one tricolor pod and it had all the detergent, the pre-treater, and the stain remover in one and add it to  the laundry. I remember when they first hit the market we even received a small 5 pack sample in the mail to try along with a coupon for $4 or $5 off. (Of course now it would be unheard of to find a coupon for $5 off. But Tide hung in their and had great sales. I think partly due to the fact that the target audience was male and female. After some time of being the only pods on the market. Now when I walk down the laundry isle nearly every brand has pods. Nearly each brand offers a liquid, a powder form, and the new pod forms of their detergent brand. Five years ago who would have ever guessed that we would simply throw a small pod into a load of laundry and walk away? But Tide's research and development team did. Then they had a great marketing strategy.  Even now I still see the Tide pods advertised everywhere. This invention followed our new busy lives. The washing machine and dryer have become one touch and energy efficient and the laundry detergent has become one drop. Now if we could just get someone to market a way to fold the clothes! (which is my least favorite part of laundry) 

impulse items

               One topic we could write about was impulse buying. An example of this is the items at the checkout counter. I see items like this all the time. As we stand in the long checkout lines we see the candy, chips, and cold sodas. As we stand there we impulsively want these sweet, salty, and cold items. Which most of the time never have a price tag on them. 20 ounce sodas in my area are $1.79 each, but if I were to visit the drink isle, a whole 2-liter soda is only $1.00. The same with the chips the medium sized bags are $1.49 but a whole huge bag is only $2.50. Often times there are more than just food items there. I have noticed that lately there are toys and coloring books for kids. Some isles even have the latest TV infomercial items. 

             

Capitalizing on an experience

            I picked 'write about an experience and how you can capitalize on it', as my topic. An experience that I have had several times that I think I could capitalize on is the experience at Subway and other similar restaurants. I would be very interested in changing the whole dynamics of the sub-sandwich market. Today's world is so fast paced that I feel like walking into a sandwich shop is too time consuming. Although I am not sure I think it effects sales. I have never been in a sandwich shop that was crowded. In fact its always the opposite, I might be the only one inside. 
         If I had the resources I would open one of these shops with a drive-thru window. I would also add on a Sonic like experience with a pull up and order service. But with customizable screens where customers can pick which topping to add to their sandwich and how much of each. Which includes an automated screen which shows the customer what their sandwich will ultimately look like. I am not sure why this idea hasn't been invented already.
 

Focus Groups

                 I picked the topic of how a focus group can help with marketing. I think a focus group should be part of any marketing plan or idea. I think focus groups help to understand and know your target market. Focus groups can help determine what is or isn't working for your product. Also what is appealing to certain age groups or demographics.
            I think that having a focus group can save money in the long run. A focus group allows time to be put into research and development. It would be detrimental to a company to launch a product or service without some type of focus group. What if all the money was spent on the product and branding it and marketing it but none on research. Then the product is just asking to fail and money gone down the drain.
          We have all read or heard about the stories of McDonald's using focus groups for new items. Some of which where homeruns and are still on the menu today and others that were total flops. With all that being said a focus group can not 100% determine what the product will do when it hits the market but it should be a step in every marketing matrix. Even McDonald's has suffered when focus groups have liked certain items then when they hit the market the item doesn't do so well. I do fell like it is a necessary risk that every company should take.

Where I keep my ideas

           I definitely have a journal where I keep all my million dollar ideas. I got the idea from a class that I took in my first semester of college. The class focused on successful inventors and people of that nature and how they had several ideas. How they would carve out time to do nothing but think in a quiet room for 30minutes a day. It talked about how famous inventors we know such as Thomas Edison to Bill Gates and lesser know people had several failed attempts before and after they created the inventions they are well known for. The class taught me so much, mainly never to give up. There was one inventor who jotted down something and it didn't work 10 years later when looking at the journal it still didn't work for what he needed but turned into something else the invention was the sticky note and the glue for it. The class also taught me to periodically look back at the journal to see if there is any new way I can tweak an idea. I learned that the best way to come up with an idea or creation is first to look at a service or product and figure out what's wrong with it. So for instance I could look at the laundry detergent pods that are all the craze now and see how I could better fix or tweak the product by looking at how they don't work in my life or in my friends life.
             Now I do take out the 30  minutes everyday and write ideas in my journal. I go through life now looking at how to change it or make it better. There have been times I have been away from my journal so I ill jot an idea down in my phone, and save it for when I get home, and transfer it over. I have also taught my son how to use and I encourage him to write in his creative journal everyday. I know that somewhere in there I have already created the next best thing!

     Marketing then vs Marketing now  

           After researching ads and doing some reading on the topic, marketing has come a long way since its early days. Depending on how far back we look early marketing involved things like an ad in local newspaper, or an ad on the radio at prime time. In early days especially pre-internet days, marketing was much more localized. Consumers could open a newspaper and see an ad for a local grocery store or a local good and or service. Even into the early 90s when not everyone had a computer in their home or if they did it was the slow dial up internet. Catalogs were very popular. This gave consumers access to products worldwide. I even remember tearing out the order form and mailing it in and having to wait 6-8 weeks for a product! I also think that in the previous decades of marketing, that the target audience was the mother and or father of the home.

         Now that the makeup of what constitutes a family has changed, marketing has followed suit. Television ads are geared more towards kids and teens, whom studies show have a tremendous effect on their parents spending, and trends. Marketing has become more mainstream. I noticed a new trend about a year ago. It seems that all the ads whether tv, radio, or print all have hip hop or urban music attached to them. Many ads include several different races of people. But everything seems to have urban vibes and settings to it. I caught my grandmother singing a song and when I inquired where she had heard it she had to think and replies "its always on the tv, I didn't even realize I was singing it, frankly I hate the commercial". Marketing now is big, loud, bright, and its everywhere! Nevertheless I am excited to see where marketing will be in 5 or 10 years. Where do we go next and will we finally be able to advertise on our flying cars?