The world that we live in today was dominated by technology, the internet,… Marketing also affected by that trend. Follow that the e-Communication term was created, that term includes any tool which will become the future of marketing industry such as online PR, Online partnership, Viral marketing, Opt-in e-mail, Interactive ads, Search marketing. This Blog will discuss those tool and success example.

1/ Online PR

This kind of tool is mention of brand, company, website, product, service on any other side such as blog, social platform. A very great example of this it campaign of Singapore Airlines to advertise “Singapore Girl” which is become the icon of Singapore Airlines. This campaign use image of the female attendant as the let more people know about Singapore Airlines. This campaign was very success, a lot of travel vlog, travel magazine always mention about “Singapore Girl” and Singapore Airlines.

2/ Online partnershis

The advantage of the internet was created the online partnership which new kind of partnership. The booking.com or agoda.com is an example of it. Both that website it the hotel booking platform, hotel cooperate with them to have the more customer also to marketing because customer nowadays tends to decide based on any review on some platform which they trust. Fee for that kind of cooperate is commission based on revenue. Agoda and Booking.com also run any advertising for a hotel which cooperates with them.

3/ Viral marketing

Viral marketing is term very familiar in the last few years when the popularity of the internet and social network increases. Viral Marketing is that which can generate interest and the potential sale of a brand or product through messages that spread like a virus, in other words, quickly, and from person to person. Viral marketing brings to marketer the cost efficiency with high reach. Dove which brands very successful in using viral marketing, the campaign is “ Real beauty sketches” which are shown by a short video. In this video, the portrait was drawn a base on stranger description always more beautiful by themselves description. That video sends to all women in the work the message about their real beauty. That has a huge effect on all women around the world that campaign become once of a most successful marketing campaign of Dove also Unilever  

4/ Opt-in e-mail

Opt-in e-mail is kind of direct mail marketing but this has the allowance to do it. Hence, this kind of mail marketing has a higher reach, that means also have a better interaction between customer and company. Many brands or company do that kind of e-communication marketing. Such as some clothing brand, car brand or travel agency. They will give to a customer who comes to their website discount or any voucher if customer type in e-mail and allow received e-mail from them.

Harry Phan.

Nowadays IoT technology became very popular so that kind of technology impact many industries also impact consumer behavior. Digital marketing also has a huge impact on IoT technology.

Follow the increate of IoT is big data. In the side of marketing, the big data is the huge potential database which very helpful to understand the customer. For example, big data can help marketer easier to catch the consumer interest when the product starts, their buying journey until they decide to purchase. The advantage of IoT also the big data can help marketer generate more campaign which is most cloth with consumer or can be personalized for each customer form their data. However, the growth of big data brings the issue form the legal of privacy data.

The market research will be enhanced, that result of advantage of IoT technology. Even data gathering, processing, and analytical are quite complicated but the IoT still help market research for digital marketing become bigger better also easier. The develop of IoT also create a big amount of data which will allow a marketer to improve their processes and reach the target audience in new ways. Moreover, the IoT and cloud technology can give for marketer the real-time data which can help them predict the customer wants or need correction.

In addition, IoT does not only access information that consumer share it public on any platform or any information about their lifestyle. Nowadays IoT device is around people from a coffee maker, air conditional, the smart home system also any wearable device such as apple watch, that kind of device is a part of many people life. In the marketer view, the data about lifestyle is mean they have all information about how, when and why any product or service was used.

Finally, IoT has a huge advantage for marketer also consumer but once again have to mention, IoT has a strong impact on privacy and security. The interesting thing is big data which take data from a customer it is a part to make consumer data is more secure, that is the result of many internet security companies use big data to research the consumer behavior and from that, they improve any software to protect the consumer. However, still have any negative impact of IoT and big data but in my opinion, the value it brings for the consumer also the marketer is heavier than the negative part. How your opinion about ethic to collect personal data in internet space?

Harry Phan.

The digital era has brought a massive media consumption shift. Majority of people are spending time on the internet through mobile devices, research conducted in 2018 has revealed that approximately twenty percent of worldwide media consumption is from the use of mobile internet. Singapore has a very high rate of people use mobile phone for internet, up to 95% Singaporean use phone for browsing the internet. That fact was shown how big potential in mobile marketing in Singapore. However, the question here is How to maximization that potential. Here is some tool to adopt that target.

1/ Mobile marketing base on location service

That kind of marketing aim to delivery the right messages to the appropriate audience, that increase the efficiency of marketing. For example, give some suggestion about some destinations for people who just come to Singapore base on their location. Moreover, the marketing base on location service is open the new opportunities and giving high personalized shopping experience to the customer. Many examples of success in location-based marketing such Klook they use this type of marketing to reach their target customer, Skyscanner who use marketing base on location to suggest customer the discount fly ticket,… The mobile marketing base on location service not only bring advantage for a marketer but also bring for the customer the new experience in shopping.

2/ Mobile application

People use a smartphone is large so the opportunities for marketing based on a mobile application. Mobile apps give access to full branding, personalization, customization, data insights, and branding. This is the reason that big brand businesses are investing in mobile commerce sites. Such as Starbucks, they have created an app which connects with loyalty and member card of Starbucks. This app gives the customer the new experience while they can top-up money in an account and use that for order and earn reward also receive many benefits. Starbucks app can be considered the same as a new type of loyalty program. Another example of success in marketing by mobile application is Tripadvisor, the application change the behavior of customer by they will search for feedback or review of travel service, hotel, airline,… and this app also helps them booking hotel, restaurant, flight,… and many more service. TripAdvisor is app same as social network platform where customer can share their experience while TripAdvisor can offer for the customer any service they need.

The mobile marketing nowadays has become the trend of marketing industry because have a huge amount of audience, can reach some special target audience which can not do by tradition marketing type. However, mobile marketing still has some risk such as legal or people now are too sensitive with privacy data on the internet or mobile phone. Mobile marketing has large potential or it just the trend and can be changed by others?   

Harry Phan.

Word of mouth (WOM) was know as the most valuable marketing. WOM mean use current customers to promote and recommend brand or product to other people, that effective because people have tend to trust recommendation from people who they know more than paid advertising. That become the challenge for marketer but also the huge chance because follow the Nielsen report up to 92% consumer trust recommendation from friend and family.

WOM bring so much advantage than other marketing form. WOM is not advertising but it s through till growing the sales also create the loyalty customer who will bring for brand more revenue than a new customer, in the estimate of Bain & Company 5% increase in loyalty customer can push company profit by 75%. Moreover, up to 92% consumer trust recommendation from friend and family that fact was showed the brand which recommended was created the brand trust with new customers.

After the all advantage and benefit from WOM but How to create the WOM?

Firstly, the quality of product must be most focus part, make the impression for customer through product quality or the benefit they have. That kind experience is convince customers sharing product or great experience with their friends, family also review on social platform.

The customer service also a part of experience which can make customer willing to share and recommendation. Such as, Emirates Airlines if customer call for them by registered phone number they will answer by the language which you chose when interact with them before and say hello by your name, that make customer feed customer service is customize for them. That kind of customer service make strong impressive with customer.

Further more, WOM also create via the unique service or product. Creating some product totally different and never seen before also the way to convince people share about brand such as Tesla when they announced their smart car is become some this is very special and many people or journalists share about that car. Other example is Dollar shave club which chose the old product a shaving razor but they sell in a new type via subscription monthly and grooming packages with that kind of sell they have 12.000 customers in just 48 hours

Finally is the feedback, brand which want to use WOM have to convince customer to review product or service such as offer 10% discount, give small gift, voucher,… for customer who write feedback or review. Because According to BrightLocal, up to 85% customers trust online same as personal recommendation.

Harry Phan .

The result from digital influence lab showed up to 85% of Singaporean use smartphone higher than computer and tablet, that is results of the increasing dramatically of technology especially in the handphone industry. Handphone nowadays was become the same as cloth because people almost can not go out without handphone. Since, the handphone now not only for call or message but also include credit card (Apple pay, Samsung pay,…), storage many personal information also can use as same as the device to use the internet. Therefore, in Singapore 34% of people are switching internet usage to mobile. That change in user habit makes a website, platform, app,… the developer has to catch up and create app, website, platform which are mobile-friendly. That is the challenge for a company now because they have to develop or manage their work on many version (version for mobile, computer, tablet,…). However, the change in user behavior for motive to reach more information by an easier and faster way, that motive is the chance for many firms who need to reach their customer. For example, the flight booking app Sky Scanner become the best app for flight booking because they were created a very good app which is very friendly for mobile also for the user also give many options for the customer.

Moreover, Sky Scanner also place customer can compare the price of a ticket, that function catch many customers of that app. Because in the research of digital influence lab have 42% Singaporean use internet for compare choices ( price, performance, promotion,… ). That kind of trend is the same with the retail shift in the world, that shift means customer now use the internet more to compare choices and looking for a product they think suitable with them. In the world have many websites for this kind of habit, In Singapore have pricepanda.com.sg (Price Panda). That website is placed customer can compare price also can take some great offer, that creates value for people who use Price Panda. In e-business model of Michael Rappa, the model of Price Panda is combine of brokerage and advertising model because Price Panda is space where connect the buyer and seller but they revenue do not come from the transaction fee, the revenue comes from advertising for brand or retail chain posting on there so that kind of model combines model.

In the end, the change in user behavior and consumer trend ( device shift and retail shift ) is the chance for many new types of business such as Price Panda, Sky Scanner and many more. But that change only have an advantage for customers or both customers and firms? Do firms face the challenge in this kind of trend? Can Sky scanner or Price panda’s business model become a trend in the future?

Harryphan’s Blog

Singapore nowadays is a country which has a very high internet penetration rate up to 82% while the global rate is 50%. Follow the report of We Are Social was showed, Singapore has 4.4 million active media users that mean about 77% of the population in Singapore use at least one platform social media. All the number that is evident to show how big social media in Singapore (Smart Insights (2019). However, social media can become the channel for companies to reach their customer or advertising? The domination of social media is the chance for companies who need to reach or interact with more customer especially SME. Because social media marketing is low cost but it not free, that kind of marketing strategy needs to spend many time and effort. Therefore, the failure rate of a start-up in Australia is increasing because they were spending so much time on social advertising and forgot which is important.

To success in social media market, the companies should know the trend of social media in their countries. In this case is Singapore, the Instagram users of Singapore is about 44% of people who have a social account (Global web index) and that percentage is 70% for Facebook. However, the trend in the future is Instagram because the Instagram story ( new feature of Instagram ) and that become a trend especially in young people. Instagram story create the difference between Facebook and Instagram and that make Instagram stories increase 400% the volume of brand posting on it (BEN-ITZHAK, 2019). Even Instagram has a smaller amount of users than Facebook but they more interaction. For example, Singapore Airlines (SIA) has an advertisement on both platform Facebook and Instagram but the interaction in Instagram much higher than Facebook (3.8m vs 2.5m)

Moreover, influencer marketing also can be a trend in Singapore. Since, the estimated spending for influencer marketing can be reached about S$13.8 billion by 2020, that is a result of consumer would like to read content which authentic from people they trust. However, that kind of marketing can be hard for firms because influencer advertising impacts too much in influencer so the firms have to choose influencers carefully, they have to match with product or service and their fan must be target market of the company.

In the end, in Singapore have 7 in 10 people are using social network, up to 41% purchase is online, that means the chance to reach customer is high but it not easy because internet or social media is widely open so many competitors can use it and companies which want to use social media as the marketing strategy should put as much as effort and time to do it efficiency. 

Reference

BEN-ITZHAK, Y. (2019). Biggest social media trends of 2018: Rise of Instagram Stories. [online] The New Paper. Available at: https://www.tnp.sg/news/views/biggest-social-media-trends-2018-rise-instagram-stories

Chaffey, D. (2019, April 12). Global social media research summary 2019. Retrieved July 18, 2019, from https://www.smartinsights.com/social-media-marketing/social-media-strategy/new-

Ngu, T. (2019, April 05). Social Media Landscape in Singapore (2019). Retrieved July 18, 2019, from https://hashmeta.com/blog/social-media-landscape-in-singapore-2019/