Can brands still use social networks?

As all the previous articles show it, it has become indispensable for brands to use social networks to create a relationship with their customers.

However, more and more studies seem to proof a saturation of the commercial use of social networks: using your Facebook page to say "our products are great, why don't you try them ?" is not enough.

A few figures: 

- Only 15% of French customers consider social networks as a good platform to buy online products.

- 60% of worldwide Internet users don't want to be disturbed by brands on social networks

(Source: study "A digital life" 14th December 2012, TNS Sofres)

My question: what can brands do in this context? Can a brand still create a real buzz online?

Yesterday, I went to the great inaugural conference of the Week'Up conference cycle at EDHEC business school, where Michel et Augustin (represented by Christopher, communication) and Faguo Shoes (represented by the co-founder Nicolas) were present. And, according to them, there is still a place for social brands in the communicational strategy of brands.

- Michel et Augustin's use of social networks is particularly interactive; users love the brand and the atmosphere on the Facebook page is very lively.

Lastly, Michel et Augustin launched a competition in which users had to find four golden cows (one hidden in one of their products- a giant cookie, one hidden in Paris, another one hidden on their website and still another one that was hidden in their building) to win a ticket to travel with Michel et Augustin to New York. I followed the reactions of the Facebook-users during that chasse, and everyone seemed to help each another. 

Moreover, the contents published by regular Facebook-users are not censored and left as such: no censoring for Michel et Augustin, it's all about having an open dialogue with their customers. Users regularly comment on the taste of the products, about their last culinary discoveries and their love of the brand. To give an example, each time Michel and Augustin publish content on their page, at least 20 users "like" it, and, which is unusual and the signal of an excellent Facebook-relationship, it is quite frequent that more people comment than like the content. 

At the conference, Christopher gave a clear answer to my question: yes, brands can still use social networks. Especially if the values of the brand are to create a real proximity relationship between the brand and its customers.

The main role for social networks: enabling customers to participate to the Michel et Augustin adventure. 

- Faguo Shoes

For the story, Facebook was a key-ingredient in the success of Faguo shoes, a 3-year-old brand, created by two students while still studying in a parisian business school. The first sale events of the brand were created on Facebook.

Nevertheless, the use of Facebook users of the Faguo shoes page fan is different from that of Michel et Augustin. Even if the content created by the page is viewed and liked by around 10/20 people per post, there are not many comments. 

Likewise, Nicolas saw Facebook as a way to communicate with customers about which products they would like. In other words, Facebook is a direct tool for asking customers what they want, and getting a quick answer. Customers also interact with the brand in that way: most comments posted are about where to find Faguo products. Sometimes, users post pictures of themselves with their Faguo shoes on, a nice way of creating a direct relationship between both parts. 

My conclusion: the future of commercial uses of Facebook belong to the brands close to their customers, brands who take the time of answering as many customers as possible and who want a relationship with their customers. It is not enough to use social networks as a commercial tool, there should be a real will to create a community of lovers of the brand and to animate that community. 

Are you Cadbury or Milka ?

Since Cadbury was bought by Kraft Foods in 2010, both brands compete in the same group. Lots of similarities between Cadbury and Milka: the basic products (milk-chocolate based), the packaging (purple background, round font), and the love of consumers.

My question is : how do they make themselves different from each other? How can they co-exist without eating each other out? And, which has the best communication ?

First of all: their products are not that similar.

• These last years, Milka has developed its range of products towards more luxurious products. For example: chocolate mignonettes, and biscuit products. They have also developed more elaborated products, close in idea to Lindt's famous chocolate. For example, the tender moments, with chocolate mousse inside the chocolate squares.

• Cadbury, besides being the "only company in « sweets» to commercialize products from organic agriculture and fair trade" (according to their website) has a more festive range of products than Milka. But isn’t this also linked with the British sweets market, on which you can find lots of these types of products ? Cadbury is also present on the biscuit market, with yummy products such as Fingers or Cadbury luxury cookies.

A different positioning
• Milka: tenderness (their slogan is "dare tenderness") VS Cadbury's "pump it up" attitude. These two different attitudes are very well conveyed in their publicity.

Cadbury's eyebrows

Milka's marmot

Milka’s publicity is at the image of their positioning: tenderness, always and always. Even if they use humour, humour is not at all the central value of their ads.

Last year, they tried a new type of publicity by creating the “Milka dance”. I found that ad quite deceiving: lots of clichés, a bad music, and it’s not at all like Milka to do such an ad.

Maybe my opinion on the Milka dance is biased by my personal musical tastes, but I  think it could have been used differently (especially on the official clip of the milka dance, below)

Official clip of Milka Dance

Those dance steps were also relayed to Milka teams (specially ski animation teams) and they are quite an odd example of communication.

You can see on the following video some ski animators doing the milka dance, so I’ll let images speak for themselves. 

Milka dance - ski version

• A commun element: sports communication

Both brands promote sports but in different ways. Milka: the existence of an official milka ski team “milka ski stars”. A team which exists since and has had quite a lot of sportive achievements (11 Olympic medals for example). When you ski, depending on the resort you’re in, you can see milka cows, or even “milka slopes” (violet coloured slopes)

Cadbury is the official treat provider to the London 2012 Olympic Games and has launched a humongous campaign to support the British team for Olympics.

Keep GB team pumped up

In support for their campaign, they created a dedicated website : www.keepourteampumped.com where you can see the official videos sponsored by Cadbury. A very dynamic staging of interactive marketing: on the website you can “sing along” to the different songs (“Final countdown”, or ) and, as they say “add your voice to the next production or grab some friends and start a karaoke session”. This device is also subtle in encouraging consumption. And it does keep you (or get you) pumped up. In short : a great communication.

• Social media ?

Both brands are present on Facebook, but neither of them has a globally unified communication. In the case of Cadbury, fan pages are organized around either products (2 051 226 fans for Cadbury crème eggs) or countries (65 384 fans for Cadbury Malaysia). On the other side, Milka does have an official global page (944 032 fans). But there also exists other un-official pages, at least 10 of them, and all of them are named "Milka". Quite difficult then to find your way. 

Only Cadbury is present on Twitter, again by product/country division. I also noted the presence of a “Twitter Cadbury friends” which shows how much people love Cadbury chocolate.

• Applications and games ?

Milka's use of applications is approximate for the moment, I didn't find (yet) any really inventive applications.When searching for application, I first found a Spanish one (Milka oreo, which I understood as a promotion tool), then a Russian one (Milka game). And after the third trial a French application: Milka Snax buddy. The principle is the following: you turn on your computer camera, and start chewing. In the same time, the Milka cow will start chewing.     

On the other side you have:

 Cadbury' spots v stripes

What’s the principle ? I’ll let Cadbury talk : “So how do you take part? First, pick the side you want to play for - Spots or Stripes. Then whenever you play a game against someone from the opposing side, the winner scores a point for his/her side. All the points will be logged right here and updated live on our Score’o’tron. Score enough points and you could even become one of your side’s all-star heroes.”.

An internet website counts all the points you added up for your team during a real game, to which you can add points by playing games online.

The prizes you can win are of course tickets for London 2012

My conclusions ?

I both love Milka and Cadbury as products but I think that their communication is not equal. Cadbury's communication has clearly taken a turn with the 2012 London Olympics, which have dynamized their use of dedicated websites, applications and social media. 

Milka's communication around tenderness and a certain point of view on humour could be well transmitted through their communication. For now I have been quite critical of their current ads and tools but I think they have the potential of taking a step further into new technologies devices. The question is: will they do it?

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Would Tintin use a smartphone ?

These days, when walking in the streets, listening to the radio, shopping, you might be overwhelmed images of Tintin, especially in France.

Triggered by the release of the cinematographic adaptation by Steven Spielberg of Tintin (The Adventures of Tintin – Secret of the unicorn : the first of a trilogy of movies).

This love for Tintin is not a new phenomenon, far from there (the blond reporter’s first appearance dates back to 1929) but only this year has Tintin started to invade the communicational sphere.

McDonalds, Pitch (Pasquier Group), Carrefour, media : many are those who take advantage of the character to promote their own products.

Did firms use traditional communication devices or an innovative, 360° degree, communication ?

Two examples : 

• Pitch's treasure hunt.

The aim is here… Well what is the aim ? I went on to search for clues, but the internet website is useless (no information telling us what is the treasure hunt all about).

All we understand is that Pitch (mainly brioche type pastries) used the image of Tintin to promote its products.

They have a nicely designed website : http://www.pitch-tintin.com/ , but not interactive at all. You can fill up a form to participate to the “treasure hunt”. A treasure hunt which is merely the possibility (by filling up this form) of wining prices (amongst which a trip to Belgum). But that’s all.

Most shocking of all : Pitch is not even on Facebook ! Even if the entry on social networks is difficult for a brand (between giving too much or not enough liberty to consumers, the right balance is find to hard), taking them into account and using them is vital to create a real relationship between brand and customer.

• Carrefour's "Mille milliards de promos" (translated in English by "billions of blistering promotions"– a word pun on the famous Haddock swear expression "billions of blistering blue barnacles").
This is quite a traditional campaign (disposal of advertisement posters in which characters from the movie are featured). An effort to note was the creation of a dedicated website (http://www.les-aventures-de-tintin.carrefour.fr/ ) to promote the operation. But the content doesn’t enable a full participation of lovers of Carrefour. 

The principle of the operation is the same as Pitch’s: possibility of wining prices. In addition here: the possibility of collecting Tintin figurines available in Stores. But once again, no interactive device (no Smartphone application, and absence from social networks, even if a Facebook share button and a Tweet button have been added at the bottom of the website. 

My conclusions: TINTIN WOULD NOT USE A SMARTPHONE. Tintin-centered campaigns are quite disappointing: lack of innovativeness, lack of use of new technologies (no smartphone application found yet)…

What's even more shocking is the lack of use of 3D, nevertheless one of the arguments for the innovativeness of the new movie !

These campaigns are more the less deceptive that Tintinology (collecting Tintin-based products, and the adventures of Tintin themselves are a symbol of adventure, and of the search for experimentation). 

Know more

For those who are interested on previous ads using Tintin as a promotion argument, see It’s not the first time that Tintin has been used for publicities (see http://pubenstock.wordpress.com/2011/09/24/les-aventures-de-tintin-dans-la-publicite-2/ for examples)

What’s Next ? For a successful 360° communication, wait for my next article “Timberland and CSR : how new technologies are the best way of selling recycled products”
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