Our international marketing expert, Alison Humphries, updates us on the latest news stories from around the globe, including strategic partnerships, connected cars and successful marketing strategies for gaming.
International Marketing News: Strategic Partnerships, Emerging Export Markets, Connected Cars and Successful Gaming Marketing Strategies
What's new, important and interesting in international marketing? This week we look at unusual strategic partnerships emanating from the pandemic, the importance of aligning the delivery proposition to the changing requirements of the target market, the emergence of new export markets, integrating connected cars in the Digital promotional strategy and taking the learnings from the successful strategies of gaming Marketers and applying these to your target sectors.
SURPRISING PARTNERSHIPS EMERGE IN RESPONSE TO COVID-19
The closure of borders and lockdowns around the world have created a huge disruption to the day to day operations of the travel and hospitality industry. The question hanging in the balance is how comfortable people will feel once they are able to travel again. Econsultancy reported that travel and hospitality brands have formed partnerships with CPG brands in an effort to reassure consumers that it will be safe to travel again.
United Airlines and Clorox are collaborating on improving the airline’s cleaning processes to re-evaluate the disinfection procedures and provide consumers with facilities to ensure safer travel.
In North America, Hilton and Lysol have created ‘Hilton CleanStay’ to put guests’ minds at ease that their rooms have received a deep clean with Lysol products.
Clorox and Lysol are the amongst the largest suppliers of cleaning products and have grown even wider brand awareness through the peak in demand for disinfectant at the peak of the virus - thus making them ideal candidates to partner with travel and hospitality companies to promote the message that they have consumer health and wellbeing at heart.
The partnerships go beyond the sole usage of Clorox and Lysol products and involve collaboration with health experts like Cleveland Clinic to determine how safety can be improved for consumers’ journeys. United, for example will be increasing the use of contactless technologies like touchless kiosks int the Boarding procedure and Hilton are bringing cleaning processes in alignment with hospital hygiene standards.
It is unlikely that partnerships of this nature will stop with the travel industry, and retail may also follow suit due to heavy concern regarding the safety of going into stores, which could spell heavy growth for cleaning materials suppliers.
SPEEDY AND INNOVATIVE DELIVERY BOOST CONSUMER SATISFACTION THROUGH THE PANDEMIC
eMarketer outline the important role that frictionless – fast, free and reliable – delivery is playing in the consumer purchase decision. Same-day delivery can be critical when it comes to groceries and pharmaceutical goods.
Walmart and Target have matched Amazon Prime like-for-like in extending the coverage of same day and next day delivery options across their product range over the past year. This has led to logistics service providers like FedEx and UPS stepping up their game to offer greater last mile capacity resulting in a streamlined, faster nationwide delivery.
Amazon Prime has become the go to retailer of choice for millions of US consumers due to the speedy, free delivery service, according to a recent survey by Convey.
Amazon’s elevated commitment to providing next and same day Prime delivery has sought to fulfil the urgency to get the product into consumers’ hands the same day that only brick and mortar stores could previously provide. Grocery products naturally sit at the heart of this, with 41.8% of eMarketer respondents purchasing groceries online for the first time, Amazon has been the majority retailer of choice due to their ability to provide a frictionless delivery service and meet the urgent consumer demand for these products.
An additional layer to add to frictionless delivery is contactless, which has sparked a wave of innovation to bring delivery via drone closer, a concept currently being piloted in the US and several other countries. Though limited by weight, speed is of the essence with drones capable of reaching up to 80 miles per hour.
The optimisation of Amazon’s delivery service to meet consumer changes in demand is a key learning curve for other retailers to review their delivery proposition to become quicker with more options at the point of delivery of the goods in order to remain competitive and grow market share.
UK FOOD AND DRINK EXPORTERS REACH NEW TERRITORIES IN Q1 2020
Recent Food and Drink Federation Q1 20 analysis show a YoY 17.4% decline in sales to EU markets, as quoted by The Institute of Export and International Trade. However, sales to non-EU markets like Australia, US and China have grown.
The reduction in demand is due to the temporary closure of businesses operating in the travel and hospitality sector across Europe. Yet a growth in demand has emerged from non-EU markets like Canada, Norway and Singapore, each seeing growth of 10%. In addition to almost one third of branded exports going to non-EU countries with a 4.5% YoY growth for Q1 20.
A 12% YoY increase in demand for baked goods like tarts, pastries, pizzas etc. from Australia resulted in an overall food export growth of 3.5% for the quarter YoY. The sale of alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages to the US increased by 6.9% and gin, infant food and bottled water exports to China grew to £34m in Q1.
Carrying out research into the export market sales for your sector for Q1 could uncover new export market opportunities emanating from the current changing trading environment.
HOW COULD CARS BECOME INTEGRATED IN THE DIGITAL PROMOTIONAL MIX IN THE FUTURE?
The integration of vehicles in the IoT (Internet of Things) with the potential to serve personalised ads is becoming an ever more realistic concept, according to eMarketer.
The arrival of 5G could set us on a path towards smart cars (not the existing micro car variety) through heralding the connection of all elements of the IoT paving the way for everything to become smart.
Initial interaction with connected cars could be in the form of recommendations on changing driving habits to improve the wear and tear of the car e.g. easing off the throttle to save brakes and tyres. But how could this transpose to your advertising strategy? Ads will need to go beyond alerting you to the nearest KFC Drive Thru – as you may not like chicken, it will need to understand your dietary preferences and recommend you visit the Taco Bell 2 miles away, as you are a fan of their vegetarian 7 layer burrito.
Right now, our Smart devices are centred around the Google and Apple operating systems; yet vehicle manufacturers are currently in a battle with tech giants to develop software to connect cars with your eco system. The quicker route to market may be to form strategic partnerships with both organisations to synchronise the OS in your car with your other smart devices.
Can the recent success of game marketers translate across to other sectors?
Google believe key learnings can be taken from the gaming sector to enhance Marketing strategies across the wider economy.
Searches for online games have doubled over the past year. Findings from Nielsen indicate the heavy contribution of gaming in the huge upswing in live streaming through the lock down period and YouTube searches for games are close to double the previous year. Moving ad spend into ads run through mobile gaming apps could help to capitalise on the growing interest in online gaming.
People naturally connect through gaming by sharing tips on YouTube, and this behaviour could be encouraged more widely through creating communities around your brand’s offering. A recent survey by Edelman indicated that 83% of respondents are keen for brands to connect people to bring them closer emotionally.
Resonate your messaging with the requirements of the market. 89% of the respondents in the same Edelman study like to see brands offering free or low priced goods to health care workers. Game developer Playdots created an in-app Charity Treasure Hunt in their Two Dots game to encourage players to donate to Frontline Foods, a charity with whom they are partnering to purchase meals from local restaurants to deliver to medical workers.
To sum up, here are some key actions for marketers across all sectors include:
- Rethinking ad strategies
- Updating and repositioning messaging
- Build communities around your brand
If you’d like to discuss any of the latest international marketing news included in this update, book in a conversation with our experts today. You can also tweet us @clickthrough.
