What I've Learned In Marketing

Last Blog about Marketing

Introduction:

I've learned a lot throughout marketing this semester. I have learned that there is much more that goes into marketing than just the simple commercial, marketing really is the biggest part of a successful company. I would argue this because I blogged about Ben Davis Clothing, Ben Davis Clothing has absolutely no marketing at all and can anyone honestly say they have heard about Ben Davis Clothing Company? I didn't think so, and this is my point. Ben Davis Clothing founder was the original Levi Jean Co-founder. Once Levi Jeans became Ben Davis left and tried to start his own company without any marketing strategies. Just a motto of a great product. Well clearly this goes to prove that if you do not do basic marketing tactics, you company will not just succeed. Another point the Dollar Shave Company has ingeniously advertised there product, or I guess product/service, to infiltrate the razor market. And now they own the market by a huge percentage. Markets know what we want before you want it. In doing so, the best marketers can sell anything.

Thinking About Marketing Now:

After taking this class, some lessons I will take with me forever. Such as I am watching a commercial, and now I am looking for product placement, always looking for who else or what else is being advertised. I'm look to see what there target market is, see what type of psychology strategies they are using. I find that extremely unique from any other class. Marketing is key and essential for businesses to succeeded, but if a business is good enough it can almost advertise and sell anything.  

Video:

Conclusion:

Marketing is so much more than just a simple idea that a "1-800-877-cash now." The people who make that song have that jingle, that rhyme to it obviously know that we are going to hmm it for the next 30 minutes.The placement where the video was taken, companies will take into huge consideration. Without marketing, business would never succeeded. 

 

Steph Curry With That Shot Boy

How Stephen Curry Is Changing The Game

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/ddyb_Lt91M4/maxresdefault.jpg

Introduction: 

Anyone that follows basketball knows about Stephen Curry. Even those who don't follow basketball probably have heard of this basketball stud who hits a lot of 3 pointers. This is because Steph Curry is becoming a household name. Five things to know about Steph, one, his net worth is around 14 million dollars according to Heavy.com. Second, Curry signed a 4 year, 44 million dollar contract. Third, and the topic I'll be focusing on the most is that Curry extended his endorsement deal with Under Armour. Fourth, which ties along with the third topic I talked about, he ranks 9th in NBA endorsement income. Lastly, Curry is ranked the "most likable" athlete in all of sports according to research company Repucom.

Curry's Market: 

Curry's market has imploded, and in return so has Under Armour's. Steph Curry was the NBA MVP for the season and now everybody that considers themselves a basketball fan wants to have the Curry 1's. Now looking at the basketball shoe market, Nike owns 90 percent of the basketball shoe market. But this last quarter, according to CNN Money, Under Armour is leading the basketball shoe market. Not by much, 40 percent of the market while Nike is hovering above 20 percent and Adidas along with other basketball shoe companies finish up the percentages. This is a big deal because Under Armour shoes have never been big in the market ever. They took a chance on Stephen Curry and it has cashed in. Every little kid wants to be the next Steph Curry. And in order to be the next Steph Curry, you got to wear his shoes. Under Armour understand all of this to well and re-positioned themselves into how hard Steph worked to get there. If you want to work hard, Under Armour shoes are for you is the motto Under Armour is taking. Strive to be better. As an athlete myself, and a former Nike shoe user, I am switching over to Under Armour, and the Curry 2's. Under Armour has played their marketing strategies perfectly with how successful Curry has been.

Stephen Curry Commercial: 

Conclusion:

Stephen Curry has single handily made Under Armour force to be reckoned with in the basketball shoe market. Under Armour took a chance on Steph with there endorsement deal, and oh has it paid off for them. The statistic that is mind boggling is how much of the market was owned by Nike. What makes this possible was what I talked about in the intro, Steph is ranked as the most likable athlete in all sports. By Steph being the most likable athlete, and being one of the most electrifying athletes that this world has to offer, it makes since why his market is taking off! 

Highlights:

Work Cited:

http://heavy.com/sports/2015/06/steph-curry-net-worth-shoes-contract-salary-endorsements-money-under-armour-jersey-sales/

http://money.cnn.com/2015/07/23/investing/under-armour-earnings-basketball-shoes/

Ben Davis Clothing

Introduction:

Ben Davis Clothing Company is a U.S based work clothing line. It was founded in San Francisco, CA. Ben Davis and his father, Simon Davis created the clothing line in 1935 and has stayed in the family ever since. The iconic logo of Ben Davis Clothing is the smiling gorilla to symbolize extra large clothing as well as being tough and rugged. Ben Davis Clothing does a great job with there trademark and branding by being unique and easily recognizable. The use of the brand name along with the trademark makes for very strong branding.

Marketing Strategies:

Ben Davis Clothing has been a company since 1935 by founder Benjamin Franklin Davis. Ben Davis' grandfather Jacob Davis was an instrumental part in the creation of the original Levi Jeans. Ben Davis essentially has no advertising, yet is extremely popular in the music industry. Especially on the West Coast, people such as Dr. Dre, the Beastie Boys, Ice Cube, and in the video below Eazy-E. The reason Ben Davis has such strong brand loyalty is because it's a sturdy, rugged, and high quality product. It was originally marketed towards construction workers but in 2010 went through a complete product re-positioning and now is trying to target college kids to young adults ranging somewhere from the ages of 17-27 years old. Ben Davis Clothing definitely has a lot of potential to grow and I think a key aspect of that is by marketing there product. The only reason I know of Ben Davis Clothing is because I was board and googled my name. The coolest fact about Ben Davis Clothing is that it is extremely popular in the music industry, and more specifically NWA.    

Video:

In this video that Ben Davis Clothing produced, it is very clear they are trying to re-position there product by using kids on skate boards making fun of the dressed up, proper, business people in the world. They want to be rule bending, fun, and trendy clothing company that provides a durable product.

 

Conclusion:

Ben Davis Clothing Company is, simply put, an interesting company. With absolutely no advertising put in, they have relied on word of mouth and brand loyalty. They caught a break with rap stars wearing there product in music videos which made Ben Davis Clothing become a little bit more popular. Some positive things that Ben Davis Clothing have been doing is changing there target market towards trendy college kids to young adults. They also have very strong branding in there trademark alone. But there are huge areas of improvement that Ben Davis Clothing needs to take care of if they want to become a "household brand." I put household brand in quotations because I don't mean that they are a brand that everyone has, but more along the lines of a product that is on display at local stores. They need to invest some money into promotion or else this company will go out of business.

Works Cited:

http://bendavis.com/our-brand/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLjSdbEYYRc

http://www.indeed.com/cmp/Ben-Davis-Company

Under Armour

Introduction: 

Under Armour is a top of the line sporting and lifestyle company. They provide superior products such as clothing, cleats, and other day-to-day apparel. For example, there thermal wear is completely unmatched. I can say this convincingly because I know when I am practicing outside come October and November, I wear "under armour." Now this is a problem because when we start to refer to the Trademark as a product that can lead confusion. It is key for Under Armour to make sure that consumers are not confused about there product. In my opinion, I think that it is a good thing that consumers say "Let me put my under armour on," when referring to Under Armour's thermal wear. I would back this argument up by saying that this is great brand awareness, everyone knows about Under Armour apparel. I think where Under Armour is trying to improve is there footwear and everyday clothing. 

Marketing Strategies:  

Under Armour's four P's are Product; clothing market fitness sector, footwear (which is extremely recent), and all season gear. Price; the price range of Under Armour is larger than most brands. It can go from really low to the highest of prices. Place; based in the United States, distributed worldwide, and partners with 37 fiftyone companies. Promotion; personal and impersonal promotion and community involvement.

nikevsunderarmour.wordpress.com  

This is an incredible marketing mix, especially because Under Armour is trying to compete with other top competitors such as Nike and Adidas who have a huge market share, and brand loyalty. If Under Armour is able to penetrate this market, I think they have a huge chance to take over as the main sporting and lifestyle company. To back this argument up, Under Armour has signed top athlete to endorsement deals. These players are Stephen Curry, Cam Newton, Jordan Spieth, and Tom Brady. This is extremely important because having Stephen Curry, a household name, along with your brand provides a positive brand image. If you have a positive brand image you are more likely to gain more customer value.

Video:

Rule Yourself

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ikmd-vtRCqo

Conclusion:

Under Armour has worked extremely hard on there brand image. There vision statement is "empower athletes everywhere." For me that motivates you, I don't know what will. There mission statement sums up everything that I have been explaining about Under Armour, "make all athletes better through passion, design, and the relentless pursuit of innovation." That is an incredible mission statement because they are targeting all athletes through passion and design and innovation. The one place of possible improvement and a target market they have yet to branch out into is the Soccer market. Basketball, baseball, and football are all markets that they are doing or will be doing very well in. So the only question I have is can Under Armour target soccer, and if so, can they do it effectively?  

http://www.underarmour.jobs/why-choose-us/mission-values/

Tesla

Introduction:

Tesla Motors was founded in 2003 by a group of engineers in Silicon Valley. According to Tesla Motors, there goal was to prove that electric cars could be better than gas powered cars.They wanted a car that had every feature of an exotic car, with out the emissions into our environment. They believe that after 100 years of the invention of the combustible engine that should be able to make a car that can run without gas. The dependency on gas is scary so Tesla's group is trying to prove to not only themselves but to the world they can create something revolutionary. But a fair question could be will Tesla gain any traction?

Marketing Strategies:

Tesla has a very unique way of marketing there product, first they do not have any dealerships. There are no commissioned sales people, all transactions are done online, there is no inventory (it is all built to order), you can't test drive a Tesla unless you put 5,000 dollars down, and lastly if you want the new luxury brand Tesla Motors builds it from scratch. If that is not the most unique way to market a car, let alone a product, I don't know what is. Tesla Motors is trying to change the entire market by going a completely different rout than everyone else in the car industry. They get orders from there website online and build to that. That way they can keep all costs down, and never get to far into the red. This is a creative but at the same time quite risky way of marketing their cars. At the same time, Tesla may be on to something in the since that this way they could possibly penetrate the market by keep there cost of production low.

Conclusion:

Tesla has created an incredible and revolutionary idea, and there marketing ideas are just as creative. They start off with a great product. If they can have a great product, word of mouth and social media will market their product for them. Second, Tesla started high and now are working there way down. What I mean by that is that it is much easier for a start up company to sell a 100 thousand luxury car and then work there way down to a much more affordable car. Third, turn the auto industry strengths into weaknesses. What Tesla does that is the complete opposite of the other luxury car companies do is Tesla markets success through technology. Luxury cars market through performance. This is Tesla's plan, they are attacking the performance part and saying, okay but look at our technology, it can do everything your luxury car does, but better and more efficient. Lastly, have the media lose words for how great the car is. Tesla's mission is to make the "best car ever." And they don't just mean electric cars, they mean any car on the road, they want to have the best product. And I think that Tesla is very close to accomplishing that.
http://scienceofrevenue.com/tag/tesla-marketing-strategy/

PlayStation 4

How Does Sony Do It?

Introduction: 

Sony creates, among other things, the PlayStation gaming system. The PlayStation has been incredibly successful and is now a household name. A good question would be, how in the world did they come into an already competitive market, with Nintendo and game cube, and take over to become the most popular gaming system? According to Street Dictionary, "They simply always amaze the world with their new invention which people long for. The CD technology in the PlayStation range of products has enabled the games to hold more information. And bigger space allows bigger and better games." As the PlayStation came into the market, it was far more successful then Sony had ever imagined. Again citing Street Dictionary, "The PlayStation 2 was so powerful that Japan initially imposed export restriction on the PS2. The PS2 was even said to contain parts, especially its powerful graphics hardware, which could be used to simulate the effects of military ballistic missiles. No wonder it became so popular." Summing it up, the PlayStation came into an already competitive market, but with the right technology and the proper marketing techniques, Sony made a top notch product.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLQL8CZEu60

Marketing Strategies:   

To start off with Sony's marketing strategies with the PlayStation we have to understand their competition. And the only real competition Sony has in with Microsoft with the Xbox. I myself am a PlayStation owner and have been one since the PS1. So why did I choose the PlayStation over whatever Microsoft was putting out? It's simple, the commercial's that Sony were using for the PlayStation were far more effective to me. Sony made me feel like they cared about the gamer aspect, and that was what I was looking for.Xbox just seemed like a gaming system that was a "Jack of all Trades." And I wanted something that was going to be top notch, best gaming graphic ever. And as there years went on, PlayStation continued to produce better games, and gaming system. Now the PlayStation 4 is out selling the Xbox 1 by over 36 percent in the market according to Geek Wire. Watching this ad that Sony put out shows why PlayStation owns the market.

Conclusion:

There are many reasons why PlayStation has taken over the gaming market. Reasons such as the top of the line games, better advertisement, and overall better customer service. PlayStation has created ways for the gamer to figure out quick what is wrong with he or she's PlayStation. They have an app now that you can quickly click on to check if Sony's network is down or if there is something wrong with the PlayStation itself. Sony does a great job of keeping the gamer informed and up to date.  

Simbliminal Messages

http://www.divinecaroline.com/entertainment/its-arrow-famous-logos-hidden-images

Marketing With Subliminal Messages:

What companies use subliminal messages? I should probably rephrase that question to what companies don't use subliminal messages? And to answer that, the number would be pretty few companies don't. For example the picture that I have right here, FedEx. A nice simple logo, two eye appealing colors, nothing really behind it... But wait a second, take a closer look, between the E and the X, what is that? Is that an arrow? Yes it is, and don't think that FedEx didn't come up with this ingenious idea. Take this little excerpt out of an interview from Matthew May with Lindon Leader, the creator of the logo. 

"A handful of the other designs contained arrows, but none were hidden. I thought, 'Okay, there's nothing really compelling about an arrow, it's overused and rather mundane.But I thought we could build a story around it. The arrow could connote forward direction, speed, and precision" 

(http://www.fastcodesign.com/1671067/the-story-behind-the-famous-fedex-logo-and-why-it-works).

Lindon then said the game was one when some of his own designer didn't even see the arrow between the E and the X. From this simple looking logo, it has won over 40 different design awards as well as it is brought up in every graphic design class around the world. The use of negative space can change your logo and make it one of the most recognizable designs in the world.

Why?

There have been many scientific studies that prove that while we are sitting down, with not much going on and just watching T.V our unconscious mind picks up on subliminal messages. According to Visual Mediation Online, many doctors have done different brain tests to prove this. 

• Martijn Veltkamp (PhD-student), demonstrated that you can motivate people to do things that already had the intention to do them, using visual subliminal stimuli [2]

• According to Professor Benjamin B. Wolman, author of more than 40 books on psychology, conscious thought can be influenced by stimuli outside of conscious awareness. He adds, with reference to Silverman (1967), that Freud’s study of consciousness “assumes that a subliminal input raises the activation level of existing unconscious motives” [3]

• Dr. Norman Dixon, a psychologist at University College London, has done extensive research on subliminal learning. In his scholarly work Precociousness Processing he cites 748 references to studies on the effects of subliminal communication, with over 80% showing positive results [4]

• Dr. Eldon Taylor, director of Progressive Awareness Research and a Fellow in the American Psychotherapy Association, firmly believes that subliminal information when presented in an appropriate manner, is processed, retained, and acted upon.

• The research of Dr. H Bahador Bahrami, a neuroscience at the University College of London, using brain scanners showed that the brain absorbs subliminal messages when not too busy.

 http://visualmeditation.co/subliminal-messages-how-they-work-and-how-they-affect-us/

Video:

Conclusion:

To conclude on subliminal messages and how they do affect us we have to look at our daily lives, what we watch, and how busy our head is. If we are being lazy and don't have a lot of stress, subliminal messages are more susceptible to being taken in by our unconscious mind. The people creating these ads know fully that they can capture our attention by creating an ad(s) that include something that we may not pick up on right away. Just like Landon Leader said about the FedEx logo, "Your daughter will always point out the logo, they might not know why at the moment, but it is because of the design"

(http://www.fastcodesign.com/welcome.html?destination=http://www.fastcodesign.com/1671067/the-story-behind-the-famous-fedex-logo-and-why-it-works). 

Great marketers use great subliminal messages.