Burt's Bees Speaker Prep

Strategic Issue

            Burt’s Bees has recently introduced a new line of products, a hydration line.  Though the products are all natural and health products, they are a far cry from lip balm.  Burt’s Bees has also fired their old ad agency, and has hired a new agency, Baldwin&.

Customer/Consumer Perceptions

            Consumers seem to love the product.  On their Facebook page, even on posts about upcoming competitions, people are still commenting how much they enjoy and regularly use the product.  They have a lot of twitter followers, and I really like how they have a “Meet ________” campaign where they showcase a Burt’s Bees user.

Questions

Has the new agency you’ve hired lived up to your expectations? Have they revamped the lip balm line the way you wanted to?

Is the hydration line taking off or is it selling a little slower than anticipated?  Did the creative dry skin billboard increase sales?

Sources:

http://www.facebook.com/burtsbees

https://twitter.com/BurtsBees

http://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/186049/burts-bees-deflakes-with-billboard-video.html

Publicis Speaker Prep

Strategic Issue

           In my research, I found that Publicis Groupe recently acquired the Amsterdam based digital agency LBi for 540 million dollars.  In the article, it discussed a prospective strategic issue in an otherwise beneficial deal.  LBi makes much of its profits in Europe.  Europe is currently struggling economically and is experiencing “stagnate ad spending.”  Could this be troublesome for Publicis down the road?

Customer/Consumer Perceptions

            From the Facebook and Twitter pages of Publicis, it seems that consumer perception is positive.  I couldn’t understand much of the Facebook page because it was in French.  But I was able to find the Publicis USA twitter page and they have a vast amount of followers and their Twitter presence is high.  They tweet frequently and their content is consistent.

Questions

Do you believe that the acquisition of LBi had anything to do with keeping the agency out of the hands of Omnicom, who were looking to purchase?

When acquisitions take place, does it ever occur that the acquired company and an existing division within Publicis hold contracts for competing brands?  If so, what is protocol in this situation?

Sources:

http://adage.com/article/agency-news/publicis-groupe-acquire-lbi-540-million-deal/237342/

https://twitter.com/PublicisUSA

http://www.facebook.com/publicisgroupe?fref=ts

Creative Brief Debriefed

I was really blown away in class yesterday about the power of the creative brief.  Dr. Machin seems to preach about the power of a proper brief and the creative call to action it can deliver.  After briefly (no pun intended) running through a NikeID creative brief, Brandon opened my eyes to what a brief can do.  Not only did it completely capture my interest (which is difficult to do that early in the morning), it made me want to get out there and make something happen.  For some reason, the first thing I did when I got home was get on NikeID.com and start fiddling with creating shoes.  I didn't do this because I'm in the market for a new pair, the brief just captivated me and made me want to start being proactive in a campaign I have no affiliation with.  I was truly surprised by this.  I guess there is a difference in hearing about briefs in class and actually being a part of one.  I now have the utmost respect for the people who put these together, and I hope that my UNIQLO brief can live up to the hype.  I guess this is just another aspect of marketing I have fallen in love with and it reminds me of what captivated me in the first place.  Well done marketing, well done.