Mark Kilgour

The social media transformation process: curating content into strategy

Purpose – Social media is an engaging area of research that is rapidly evolving. The purpose of this paper is to focus on how corporations should effectively utilize this new media as a marketing channel. The key to any successful communication strategy is matching the message to the target audience and achieving customer engagement. Two important target audience variables were identified as crucial when determining an organization’s social media communications strategy: the level of brand relationship, and the level of category involvement. Design/methodology/approach – Depth interviews were initially employed, followed by questionnaires, and then computer assisted content analysis was performed on 723 online media articles relating to social media marketing to identify semantic and conceptual relationships. Findings – Research from both a customer and corporate perspective led to insights into how organizations can develop their social media strategies in order to transform their brand message from bein...

Tourist Growth and the Implications for Retail Marketing Strategy: Insights from Japan

ABSTRACT Japan is experiencing significant growth in inbound tourist numbers, with this expected to continue. This research examines the effects of this increase on the Japanese retail sector. Tourist survey data are examined, and the level of interest and tactical marketing activity from the retail sector in targeting tourists is analyzed using a content analysis of national press sources. These findings are viewed through the lens of the literature on tourist shoppers and implications for marketing managers are discussed. Findings suggest retailers need to become more sophisticated in their marketing strategies in order to effectively meet the needs of inbound tourists.

Build touchpoints and they will come: transitioning to omnichannel retailing

The purpose of this paper is to provide an analysis of a major retailer’s transition to omnichannel retailing (OCR) from an existing multichannel retailing (MCR) base. Using the illustrative case of Seven & I (S&I) Holdings, the paper positions OCR in terms of its goal to provide added customer value through a seamless brand experience.,The research uses a case study methodology, based on a series of in-depth interviews. Executives at S&I were interviewed as the core of the case, and supporting interviews were carried out with executives at Yamato Transport, Inditex Japan and Rakuten. Data collected in interviews were cross-referenced to industry and trade press reports, providing an illustration of the motivation and strategic decisions behind the transition to OCR, and of factors that have direct impact on the implementation of the model.,The results illustrate the difficulty in achieving OCR in terms of unifying customer experience across multiple channels. The case demonstrates the potential for cross-channel integration through multiple, but integrated touchpoints, and the leveraging of existing multichannel retail infrastructure and systems. In addition to confirming previous conceptual understanding of the transition process, the core findings demonstrate the importance of the strategic implementation process, the importance of the retailer’s brand portfolio and brand management, and the need to adjust and leverage existing facilities and infrastructure.,The study is limited by the single case employed, although the complexity of OCR implementation does not take away from the practical implications in a broader sense. It could be argued that the Japanese retail industry has some differences to other markets, but the customer-orientated nature of S&I’s implementation, and its aim to leverage existing infrastructure, is illustrative for similar strategies of retailers elsewhere in the world.,The study has value to both researchers and practitioners as a structured synopsis of an actual case of transition, and adds to the literature that relates to OCR and to Japanese distribution. It demonstrates not only the need for robust supply chain, logistics, IT, marketing and retail infrastructure, and integration across distribution systems, but also the importance of the retailer’s brand portfolio, which may need significant adjustment to best promote added customer value. The success of S&I is predicated on both the high population densities, characteristic of the Japanese market, and a strong, longstanding MCR base. Similar systems and implementation issues apply to other markets that operate under similar conditions.,The social implications of the paper relate to the fact that, although the transition to OCR may be a difficult, costly, and time-consuming proposition for a retailer, increasingly consumers are coming to expect both informational and purchasing options for brands to be available as, when and where they want them. The 24-7 nature of omnichannel also generates significant challenges in terms of work volumes and environmental impact. These issues are touched upon this paper.,This paper provides a case of a major and well-known retailer and the transition process towards an OCR model, of which there are currently few case studies available. It also adds significantly to the body of literature relating to Japanese distribution and provides insights into strategy not generally known in the English-speaking world.

Assessing the Quality of Self-reported Measures and the Reliability of Empirical Findings: Exploring Creativity Differences across Worldwide Agency Creatives and Managers

Research often emphasizes that creativity is the most critical element for advertising effectiveness in the marketplace (Ang et al., 2007; West et al., 2008; El-Murad and West, 2004; Smith et al., 2007). Given its importance it is not surprising that there has been an exponential growth in creativity research (Sasser and Koslow, 2008a). This research includes influences on audience members’ processing (Goldenberg and Mazursky, 2008; Ang et al., 2007; Smith et al., 2007; Pieters et al., 1999), creative template techniques (Goldenberg et al., Solomon, 1999), remote conveying (Rossiter, 2008) or other approaches (West et al., 2008; Kover, 1995). Social environment impacts on advertising creativity (Li et al., 2008), and client organizational influences on creativity (Sasser and Koslow, 2008a; Koslow et al., 2006) have also been studied.

How to Achieve a Social Media Transformation

In the consumer decision making process there are four sources of information consumers use to assist in determining which brands they will consider for purchase; commercial, social, experiential, and public sources. Organisations have the most control over the commercial sources, but this information is usually viewed as the least credible from a consumer perspective. In contrast, experiential sources are usually the most reliable type of information, except in situations where a social source, such as a friend, is also an expert in that product category, in which case this social source may be perceived as more reliable. This chapter looks at how well planned content creation can blur the lines between commercial and social sources of information in this new social media environment.

Applications of social media for medical tourism marketing: an empirical analysis

ABSTRACT Medical tourism has grown extensively over the past decade. Although social media is perceived to be an effective communication channel for both tourists and tourism providers, empirical analyses of how social media are used for medical tourism marketing are rare. Based on the “6Is” Social Media Monitoring Framework, this study examines how medical tourism providers distribute information, engage with online users, and influence the travel decisions of potential medical tourists. Findings indicate that medical tourism providers performed well in maintaining customer intimacy, although could do more to stimulate customer involvement, interaction, and gather customer insights. The study discusses ways to improve social media marketing.

Drivers of Creativity Within Advertising Agencies: How Structural Configuration Can Affect And Improve Creative Development

ABSTRACT There has been a surprising dearth of research that investigates the effects of structural elements on creative outputs in an advertising agency context. This article explores how structural elements may be applied to achieve different flavors of creativity via their effects on originality and strategy. The study examined 554 campaigns in a field study of Australia- and New Zealand-based advertising-agency professionals from Sydney, Melbourne, and Auckland. Findings suggest that agencies can deploy their service-level resources flexibly, but not all structural configurations lead to the best outputs, depending on the client context. Managerial implications, limitations, and directions for future research are discussed.

Co-Creation of Award Winning Advertisements

Creativity awards have been used by agencies, clients, and academics as exemplary creative work and if the campaign is a winner, everyone has a hand in the co-creation process. However, there is surprisingly little research as to what co-creation elements they actually represent and the agencies functions needed to make this happen. Key agency executives were selected to assess their own campaigns in terms of originality and strategy, and were also queried about whether those campaigns would win creativity, and effectiveness, awards. Findings show that the campaigns deemed worthy of wining creativity award recognition are usually highly original. Yet most valued award winning work is rarely regarded as being highly strategic. These results are then used to better understand how co-creation elements within agencies can be managed to achieve different creative outcomes.