- Let’s swing into this month by first revisiting one of last month’s exciting tech revelations – Google Trips. We promised to test it out and we can now confidently confirm that the application is a Super App, sent to save us Google-Earthlings from mismanaged travel chaos. Threesider Lauren Allen volunteered to be our app-testing guinea pig this month, here’s what she had to say, “I LOVE IT!! It is integrated with your Google account, so as long as you use that account as the booking confirmation email, it will pull the info from your email inbox into the app. You can setup your trips based on location and date travelling and within that, it will categorise your travel and accommodation reservations automatically. It creates past trips too (which was really nice as a reminder / reflection). Highly recommend as a digital travel organiser.” … Sounds like it’s time to jump on the Google Trips bandwagon after all.
- The UK has made a big move towards becoming the truly Gender United Kingdom of the planet, by introducing a ban on all advertising containing “harmful” gender stereotypes. You know those age-old – women are bad at driving, men are never the depicted stay at home parent, a 1950’s wife cleans the house as her lazy husband sips on an ice-cold beer – advertisements? Well, they will no longer exist in the motherland as of this month, (or fatherland, because it can be anything it wants to be in June 2019). It doesn’t stop there though, even scenarios that perpetuate any sort of gender-stereotypes surrounding children’s potential career ambitions will be disallowed.
From our end, we think anything that moves towards equality in society is a positive, whether it be making little steps to update marketing regulations or big jumps towards change on a wider social scale.
- Unfortunately, our third point is not charmed this month. Our beloved “not happy Jan” advert and now classic Aussie catchphrase, has been reinvigorated and reintroduced in Darrell Lea’s most recent advertisement. In its own twist, the confectionary giant has made a new ad using the line “no worries, Jan” as our beloved Deborah Kennedy enjoys a chocolate bar to calm her once perpetual unhappiness, at the hands of Jan. In all fairness, the phrase was first used to promote the old form Yellow Pages. Which, unless you’re living in the stone ages, is only really useful in 2019 for aiding our vertically challenged friends in reaching the top shelf– so perhaps the phrase was fair game now? Nope. While in most aspects of life, the old-school Yellow Pages can be recycled without a second thought… The imitation has caused some dismay amongst the Yellow Pages corporation, with their Executive Manager noting that the ad may have misled customers, “It’s clear on social media that a number of people believe Yellow Pages has endorsed this campaign which is not the case.” Boy, they really are not happy with no worries Jan.
This is perhaps a lesson to all marketers. Although you may have the best intentions for breathing life into an old classic, if you’re going to take the idea from someone else – just ask first!
- Australia’s outdoor media industry is investing $1.3million to come up with a new metric to measure Digital Out of Home (DOOH) signs. The board of MOVE (Measurement of Outdoor Visibility and Exposure) has said the money will go towards developing a neuroscience study, that will help to better assess audience engagement with digital and traditional OOH across formats, environments and travel modes. In the words of Homer Simpson, we think this will be more of a “Woohoo!” move than a “DO’OH!” for the industry, with opportunity for more diverse and creative outdoor marketing opportunities becoming further attainable as the format develops. We look forward to seeing what happens next in the “outdoor world”.
- The global leader in social media management, trusted by over 18 million customers around the world (including us, we are your number one fan), Hootsuite – recently announced the launch of a Google My Business app integration into their platform, alongside its new Google Preferred Partner status. With this launch, customers who also have a Google My Business profile will now be able to more easily create new posts and respond to customer reviews and questions, all within the Hootsuite dashboard. We’re all for anything that makes life easier in the world of social media marketing. We can’t wait to see what the update brings to the table over the coming months.
- It’s happening, as we somewhat predicted last month in the wake of Game of Thrones very painfully being removed from our screens… The Pay Tele-pocalypse may now truly be upon us. PwC’s 18th annual Australian Entertainment and Media Outlook was released this month, it indicates that your beloved traditional pay TV is set to be bowled over by Netflix and other key video streaming platforms in the near future. Streaming platforms are predicted to grow by 13.7% over the next four years, while Foxtel is anticipated to fall by 2.9%. It doesn’t stop there though, the streaming market is set to become even more competitive with US entertainment giants like Disney aiming to launch direct-to-customer platforms in Australia very soon. Before Disney takes the “Mickey” out of Foxtel though, it appears the platform is set to respond to the change in customer preference with the launch of its very own sports streaming platform – Kayo Sports. Will it be enough? Will this whole thing change the face of television and digital video marketing? We wait with bated breath and eager marketing ideas, to respond to the change.
Concerned for the fate of your TVCs or have broader marketing queries? Don’t fear, that’s why we’re here!
And that’s a wrap! Watch this space each month for up-to-date marketing insights.
