Jennifer Morozowich

Jennifer Morozowich has spent the majority of her career working on brands we love. For 14 years, she worked on culture-defining campaigns from such clients as Apple, Nokia, Absolut Vodka, Labatt, Canadian Tire, CIBC and Microsoft. Jennifer has worked with some of Canada's top advertising agencies as well as with integrated, brand activation shops. Jennifer is passionate about social media trends and understanding how consumers think. Jennifer joined The Marketing Store in 2007 as Director of Strategic Planning to provide strategic guidance and consumer insights to assist in the development of campaigns designed to entertain, engage and motivate consumers. The Marketing Store is a global ideas company that helps conventional brands succeed with unconventional thinking.

To QR do us part

By now you have all heard about QR codes (Quick Response). Although Canada is taking what feels like forever to adopt the technology, QR codes are practically everywhere in Japan. They are used on everything from fortune cookies to escalator handles.

Now, I think Japan has taken it a bit too far. Japanese gravestone maker Ishi no Koe ("Voice of the Stone") recently announced plans to begin selling gravestones with the two-dimensional bar codes embedded into them.

By simply snapping a shot of the tag with their cellphones, visitors will be able to view photos, videos and other information about the deceased. The device would also keep a log of each time the code was scanned so family members can keep up to date with when other relatives last visited the site.

In the future, Ishi no Koe hopes to use this technology to develop a new way to pay respect to the dead that wouldn't require you to actually be at the cemetery in person. The company sees this as an alternative especially fitting for today’s younger generation.

I wouldn't be surprised if brands begin advertising via QR codes on gravestones - "did your husband pass away? Try our new dating site to find a new one"

What are your thoughts?

Have we really come that far?

My mother was a single mom with two young kids. It was the 1970’s and she had to face the consequences of gender inequality. Life for her wasn’t easy. Back in those days, women needed their husband’s approval in order to get a credit card and men weren’t obligated to pay alimony or child support. I can remember the countless number of times my mother was “ripped off” by car dealers, harassed in the workplace and taken advantage of by lawyers and other so called professionals. This blog isn’t about my mom (although she deserves a blog just for her). It’s about women’s spending power and the gender inequality still recognizable today.

Fast forward to 2008. We have certainly progressed over the years but we’re not there yet. Did you know women still earn only 78 cents on the dollar compared to men yet women make over 80% of all household buying decisions?

The catalyst for this blog is based on an experience I had this year when purchasing new appliances for my home. Like most women, I did my research. I found a company offering the appliances I wanted for less money than the competition. I was excited to make my purchase and asked my boyfriend to accompany me to the store. Let me recount the customer experience I had at this particular store. As soon as we entered, the male sales person quickly introduced himself to my boyfriend. I introduced myself to him and asked him questions to which he answered to my boyfriend. If the price wasn’t such a steal, I would have walked right out the door. The deal was closed. The sales person wrote up all of the paper work, turned to my boyfriend and asked “how will you be paying for this today?” I was furious. What made him think the purchases weren’t mine for the house that I purchased myself? I whipped out my bank card and placed it in front of him with conviction. I wanted to tell him to read Marti Barletta’s book “Marketing to Women” so he could see how immense women’s purchasing power actually is. We have large wallets. Women account for 53% of investment purchases, 55% of consumer electronics, 60% of home improvements and 60+% of new car purchases.

Who is better at demonstrating gender inequality and alienating women? NOooooBODY.

So long Speedy

So long Speedy.

Last week, I felt this strange sensation. For the first time in many years, I felt like I was nothing. I spent copious hours online trying to research the reasons for my despair. It suddenly dawned on me. Speedy the Muffler King was closing down.
The company was the country's second-biggest auto-repair chain and used the slogan, "at Speedy, you're a somebody." Without having Speedy around to validate my self worth, I felt hopeless.

Seriously though, I would like to bid farewell to a well-known and loved brand. We should all take a moment to recognize Speedy’s successful marketing efforts. I don’t own and car and have never used Speedy’s services however I know who they are (were), what they stand for and what they offer. Well done. Speedy. RIP

Social Advertising?

We are all familiar with the impact of word of mouth marketing. People are social creatures and they talk about brands all of the time. There is no greater influence than a recommendation from a friend. According to some studies, in one capacity or another, the average person may mention various brand names up to 50 times a day. Just think about it – how many times do you hear the brand “Starbucks” mentioned in your office each day?

Just yesterday, Facebook announced that in a twist on word of mouth marketing, they will sell ads that display people’s profile photos next to commercial messages that are shown to their friends about items they purchased or registered an opinion about. For example, if you rent a movie on Blockbuster.com, you can choose to broadcast your movie selection to all of your Facebook friends. The kicker – your friends can’t opt out of receiving that message from you. They are calling this “social advertising”.

According to Facebook, many of their 50 million active users already tell friends about products or brands that are special to them. The difference now is those communications will now include ad messages from brands.

From a marketer’s perspective, I’m incredibly excited. Marketers have been struggling with how to capitalize on social media for quite some time now. This would catapult social media into the marketing mix, blurring the line between traditional media and “new” media.

I appreciate how Facebook will allow consumers to be advocates for brands they love. Facebook believes this type of marketing would make the site feel less commercial because the marketing messages would be accompanied by comments from friends.

From a user’s perspective, I believe this will either be a huge success or will fail miserably. It will be successful if they do it right. Some suggestions for success are: allow the user the chance to opt out of receiving the message, provide promotional content with your marketing message and make the message beneficial to the consumer by providing them with added value.

Social advertising will fail miserably if the user feels she/he is blatantly being marketed to. They will begin to delete their friends who have signed up for the program and will eventually leave Facebook completely for the next hot social networking site (and I’m sure one will be along shortly).

This is a critical time for social media. Let’s see how Facebook paves the way.

I would love to hear your thoughts about this.

Nuit Blanche

September 29th was a very special night. If you logged on to Facebook that night, I bet you saw the same status over and over - so and so is...at Nuit Blanche.
http://scotiabanknuitblanche.com/

I joined the hundreds of thousands of people that evening. Although some of the installations were not quite my taste, I was most impressed by the record turn out. The city has never been so alive. There were people everywhere; all thanks to Nuit Blanche's sponsor, Scotiabank.

I have to admit. I'm a bit biased. I've been a Scotiabank customer for over six years. I've always been impressed by their life stage based marketing and services. The event on Saturday put them over the top. Imagine, a big bank giving back to the community without asking for anything! Sure, Scotiabank had information booths set up so you could learn about their products and services but the focal point of the evening was all about independent artists. It was an inspiration to see. I'm sure the event was a success in terms of brand awareness and likeability for Scotiabank. Kudos.