The Fourth Year of Amazon Prime Day Discounts

For the fourth consecutive year, the gigantic online retailer Amazon is celebrating Prime Day, a members-only sale that rivals Black Friday in the number of special discount deals.

To increase anticipation in advance of this sale, Amazon put a count-down clock on its home page. Here's what the clock looked like on 12 July. Despite the name, Prime Day takes place over more than 24 hours, as the clock indicates. According to one evaluation, Prime Day UK's average discount in 2017 was 21%.

In addition to deep discounts on cameras and other electronics, Amazon is also promoting discounts on its own brands, including Amazon Basics. The company's private brands have been attracting customers and increasing revenue year after year.

Currently, Amazon markets 80+ private brands such as Mama Bear, Echo speakers, and Happy Belly bottled water. In 2017, the top-selling product during Prime Day in the UK market was, in fact, the Amazon Echo speaker. Electronics and kitchen products were also strong sellers.

New this year: limited-edition products and new products launched especially on Prime Day.

Based on reports from previous years, bargain-hunting UK shoppers are likely to make Prime Day 2018 the most successful selling day of the year--again. UPDATE HERE

Primark continues Primania

Primark, a master at marketing low-priced fast fashion, continues to engage price-conscious brand fans via its Primania page of consumer-generated fashion content. Want to see how other Primark customers accessorise a special dress or wear the company's newest tops? Browse more than 16k images uploaded by brand fans, subject to the marketer's content guidelines.

Founded in Dublin in 1969, the company now markets under a variety of private brands, including Young Dimension and Ocean Club. In addition, Primark partners with groups to market special product collections. Its recent LGBT+ Pride collection is in partnership with Stonewall, a nonprofit that promotes equality, and a portion of each purchase benefits the nonprofit.

Primark operates more than 350 stores in 12 countries. Its US stores are doing well, but the company is awaiting long-term analysis before expanding there. Unlike nearly every other retailer on the planet, Primark does not sell online, only in physical stores.

Yet its social media presence is impressive. Primark has nearly 6mm Instagram followers, 98k Pinterest followers, 225k Twitter followers.

How will Primark use marketing to celebrate its 50th anniversary in 2019?

This post updates the "Marketing at Primark" feature in Chapter 1 of Essential Guide to Marketing Planning, 4th edition.

Update on the UK chocolate market

The UK chocolate market continues to grow, with more competition than ever and new products attracting attention. Consumers in the UK eat more chocolate per capita than consumers in any other nation. Seasonal products are leading the way, as are niche products that represent social responsibility commitments.

Tony's Chocoloney is a company that markets ethically-produced chocolate products. Based in the Netherlands, and already selling to the US market, Tony's plans to launch its first chocolate bars in the UK next year.

For a niche marketer, the company has a solid social-media following (more than 100k Facebook likes, for instance). Its ethical-source mission resonates with many consumers who seek out brands with purpose.

The upmarket company Hotel Chocolat continues to expand. It operates 103 retail stores, some with cafes attached, as well as a sustainability-based cocoa plantation. The company recently reported higher earnings.

Hotel Chocolat recently repaid thousands of bond-holders who invested in its so-called chocolate bonds, providing funding for the firm's sustainability projects and more. The firm recently prevailed in a dispute with Waitrose, saying that the grocer appeared to have copied the company's signature slab chocolate products. Waitrose stopped marketing the chocolates and the CEOs of both firms planned to sit down and chat over a cup of cocoa.

This post updates background information in the "Lost Legends Luxury Chocolatier" sample marketing plan, in the Appendix of my Essential Guide to Marketing Planning, 4th edition.

HSBC's marketing for growth

HSBC Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HSBCUK/

UK-based HSBC bank has a new CEO and a new growth strategy, supported by new marketing.

John Flint, the new CEO, aims to expand HSBC within the UK market and market mortgages more aggressively.

Technology investment is key to the bank's future growth strategy. Meanwhile, recently appointed group head of marketing Leanne Cutts is looking at HSBC's traditional roots for connections to the bank's marketing future.

As shown in the illustration from the bank's UK Facebook page, HSBC's traditional red-and-white logo is being reimagined for the digital age. 'Most of our transactions with customers are digital, so having something easily recognisable is incredibly powerful. It helps the customer to cut through the clutter', Cutts explains.

The same logo is shown on HSBC's YouTube channel at this time, as well as on its Twitter account. The bank uploads not only adverts to YouTube but also videos about how to use its mobile banking app and other topics of interest to bank customers.  The bank has thousands of followers on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and LinkedIn. HSBC is now reviewing agencies for its social media activities, which means changes as the bank positions its marketing to support future growth.

Unilever improves transparency in influencer marketing

Unilever, which markets such famous brands as Magnum, Omo, Luxe and Lifebuoy, wants more transparency in the world of influencer marketing (marketing mentions by celebrities and social-media stars who have many followers and who serve as opinion leaders).

When a major marketing power like Unilever takes a stand, the advertising and social media ecosystems take notice.

Unilever's chief marketing officer says the company's brands will neither buy followers nor have a marketing relationship with influencers who buy followers. The company is also prioritising relationships with digital platforms that promote transparency.

The background: Unilever respects and appreciates the close, organic connection between influencers and their followers. After all, that's why these influencers have an influence on consumers. So Unilever wants brand fans to know it will not be associated with those who buy followers to boost their numbers on social media.

This is the next step in Unilever's initiative to increase trust and integrity in influencer marketing whilst also reducing 'toxic content' online. Read more about Unilever's pledge to improve transparency here.

Burberry leverages the power of social media

https://www.instagram.com/burberry/

Social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter play a central marketing role for the UK fashion brand Burberry. Its marketing strategy actually relies on four distinct pillars: product, communication, distribution and digital. About communication, the company explains: 'We are evolving our communications to be led by product and made for social media'.

One study found that Burberry topped the list of 20 most valuable UK brands using social media in 2017. Fashion industry publication WWD says Burberry had the best-performing social media strategy during February's 2018 London Fashion Week. This is actually nothing new for the brand, which has long put special emphasis on social media and ecommerce: CampaignLive hailed Burberry's savvy social media strategy during London Fashion Week in 2014.

By cultivating tech-savvy consumers, Burberry has amassed an Instagram following of more than 11 million people. Its Twitter account is followed by 8.7 million people. More than 17 million people have clicked to like its Facebook page. In short, Burberry is leveraging the power of social media to reach and engage style-conscious brand fans who buy in stores or online or both.

This post updates the Burberry example in Chapter 8 of my Essential Guide to Marketing Planning.

Latest marketing strategy for Merlin

https://twitter.com/LEGOLAND_CA

Families with small children are the target demographic for Merlin Entertainments and its Legoland theme parks. The company recently opened a Castle Hotel next to its Legoland in California, a hotel that looks built from Lego bricks and features theme decor. 'It’s like painting the story and making you feel like you’re living inside a medieval castle', says a Merlin executive.

Some rooms are decorated for knights, others for wizards...a fun, magical theme-park feeling for families that stay overnight. The hotel is differentiated and memorable, definitely not a bland, ordinary place to stay. This supports the brand image, as well.

Of course, Walt Disney is the market leader among theme park marketers. Given the intense competition within this industry, Merlin is pouring on the marketing magic to attract families during the all-important summer holiday period. In fact, Merlin drew a record 66m visitors globally in 2017.

Now Merlin is focusing on building hotels next to Legoland theme parks to capture more revenue and increase profits. It will not invest as heavily in its Madame Tussauds attractions. Nonetheless, in London and New York, Madame Tussauds recently installed wax figures of the new Duchess of Sussex, a good way to stay in the public eye after the royal wedding.

Tesco fine-tunes retailing strategy

UK retailing giant Tesco continues to fine-tune its retailing strategy, both on the store side and online.

As shown above, it recently announced the closing of Tesco Direct, the company's profitless e-commerce initiative for non-food products. (Tesco.com is the company's grocery website.) Fulfilment is costly, maintaining an online shopping platform is costly and the company saw no way to profit from this venture. Most likely, competition was also a factor, with Amazon and others offering so many of the same brand-name products that were sold on Tesco Direct's site.

Yet Tesco continues to invest in physical stores. It opened a new supermarket in Dublin that features eco-friendly features such as energy conservation systems and recycling facilities.

The Tesco Clubcard is a major competitive strength, enabling the retailer to communicate with loyal customers and personalise offers. And Tesco will need this strength as it faces the soon-to-merge Sainsbury/Asda combination.

Bringing together well-known food and beverage brands

www.facebook.com/pretamanger/

Thirty-two years ago, Pret a Manger opened its doors in London. Ten years ago, the fast-growing chain of coffee/food shoppes was sold to a private equity firm. And now, Pret a Manger has another new owner.

The new owner, JAB Holdings has acquired a number of well-known coffee and food brands. These include Krispy Kreme, Douwe Egberts, Tassimo, Panera Bread, Dr Pepper Snapple and Keurig Green Mountain.

With 530 shoppes in the UK, US, China, Hong Kong and France, Pret a Manger has a loyal customer following, in person and on social media. Will JAB, the new owner, co-brand shoppes or products, given the high profile of its pantry of products? Will the new owner use the shoppes (Panera Bread and Pret a Manger, for instance) as a distribution channel for other brands in the company's portfolio? Lots of possibilities for strategic synergy!

Is Ryanair's 'Always Getting Better' strategy working?

The low-price, no-frills airline Ryanair implemented a strategy for improvement, 'Always Getting Better,' in 2014. Is this strategy working?

In a word, yes. The airline recently announced record profitability. Despite glitches like last year's pilot roster problems, the airline is attracting passengers because of its cheap, cheap flights. In fact, most flights are nearly full, which means finding room for carry-on baggage can be a hassle.

But the 'Always Getting Better' strategy helps keep Ryanair competitive by focusing the company on affordability, punctuality, sustainability and expansion of connecting flights.

Recently, Ryanair announced a refund offer for customers who book early and then find a lower airfare elsewhere. Not only will Ryanair return the airfare paid, it will credit customers with €5 to their Ryanair accounts. In other words, it's telling customers to go ahead and buy tickets without worrying about overpaying.