Blog

By Antti Öhrling

Yesterday, I had the pleasure to speak at the Marketing Society Annual Conference “Winning in the Downturn”. The organisers assembled a very interesting group of people for the day… and the topic? What could be more on the pulse. And yet, still, we all hate downturns, or do we? Is there an opportunity, when the scared ones stop spending in their brands, for newer and braver ones to gain market share and build long-term brand equity?

Although in the current world where everything is driven by quarterly results, most of the decision makers that make these big cuts in their marketing spend today, don’t have to see the havoc they caused in the years to come. They take the short-term gains and future CEOs will pay the price.

Blyk really fits the market today. I shared the story of Blyk starting from the business idea – uniting young people and brands with free communication. With our 200,000 members, member-get-member (being the fastest growing channel), high Net Advocacy level (on par with Facebook and MySpace), 25 percent unparalleled response level in the more than 2,000 campaigns we’ve run and nearly 200 brand on board already – it’s all working, and working really, really well. And the audience seemed to agree. If you can get a 25 percent response and spend 50 pence per response (much lower than any other digital or direct media), why wouldn’t you agree? It’s all about the 100 percent opt-in audience and engagement. Advertising is good, when it is relevant.

Key highlights from the day include:

David Taylor from Brandgym opened the session by addressing the audience with 5 tips to survive in the current economic situation: 1) Brand everything 2) Stand out 3) Kill the small line extensions 4) Cut the costs, not corners 5) Never mind the “emotional” advertising.

Les Binet and Peter Field gave 10 tips (we’re improving) on the same issue:
Don’t panic
Cut the right costs (not marketing)
Cutting Share of voice cuts your future
Cutting SOV causes long term damage
Cutting SOV outs your brand at risk
A recession is a marketing opportunity
Promotions are not the solution
Emotions are the key, even when times are tough
Aim for the fame
Harness the power of multi-channel media approach.

Gayle Troberman from Microsoft shared her experience from the “I’m a PC” campaign. Ordinary people are interesting… also for other people. That was their learning. You must ask, listen and continuously adapt in your campaign whilst you are running it. And create a lot of digital assets.

Will Whitehorn from Virgin Galactic was sharing the exciting prospect of space tourism and the revolutionary opportunities associated with it. They have built a solid business case around an innovative idea.

Nick Vermont shared some lessons learned from McCain Foods over the recent years, namely how to recover from a “health scare” driven by tabloids. They have done a brilliant job by becoming open, approachable and doing the good thing.

Sir Keith Mills talked about how an integrated media solution is the most efficient one – a very important point. The era of TV as a mass medium is over. You have to be clever by combining media to achieve the best results. And you need the ability to pick yourself up when the times are tough, the same way the best athletes can do.

Levi Roots took us through his extraordinary story of Reggae Reggae sauce – the big success of the year – and his passion to bring Jamaican food to a wider audience. And he sung and the Reggae Reggae song which really delighted the audience.

Sir Matthew Pinsent was talking about winning margins and shared his story when preparing for the Athens Olympics – a true thriller! No wonder he has become one of the UK’s most successful and highest profile athletes of all time.

Simon Clift from Unilever gave interesting viewpoints of building real brands for real people. He claims that environmental sustainability will be the centre of consumer behaviour. He made us think about all the millions of kids dying from diarrhea every year due to poor hygiene which put the current recession in the right perspective.

Jill McDonald from McDonald’s shared with us how they have made a complete brand turnaround which was a good description on how to improve your position during hard market conditions.

Tony Juniper / Kelvin MacKenzie / Jo Kenrick had an interesting discussion about various aspects of morality and brands. In hard economic times, will consumers go ‘more green’ or will they just go ‘more mean’? A nice juxtaposition from viewpoints resulted a vivid and interesting discussion.

Big thanks to chair Andrew McGuinness, host Krishnan Guru-Murthy and entire Marketing Society for the interesting day!

New media partnering approach with operators is the core of expansion strategy

Helsinki, Finland and London, UK, 18 November 2008 - Blyk, the free mobile network for young people funded by advertising today announced an additional €40 million investment to support its ongoing operations and international expansion.

“The advertising industry and operators have expressed a strong interest in bringing Blyk into new countries and €40 million in additional funding demonstrates the commitment by investors to the Blyk media model.” said Pekka Ala-Pietilä, Blyk’s CEO and Co-founder. “However, we like everyone else are feeling the impact of the world’s financial situation. As a result, in parallel to securing the new investment, we’ve taken decisive steps to cut costs and streamline our organization.”

By launching a new media partnership strategy, alongside organizational realignment, Blyk will gain greater flexibility and speed to capitalize on new growth opportunities and global demand for its media model.

Blyk launched in the UK in September 2007 where it has achieved major successes both in member growth and advertiser usage. In its first year, Blyk achieved a milestone of over 200,000 members and has run over 2000 campaigns with an average response rate of over 25%. With 180 brands on board today, Blyk is well on track to hit its goal of 200 brands using the service by year-end.

“We have a winning formula which makes Blyk attractive globally. The Blyk media model, which is based on highly relevant messaging, has proven to be an extremely effective form of advertising to the youth audience.” said Antti Öhrling, Blyk’s Co-founder and Executive Director. “Blyk’s new partnering strategy will make this powerful model available for operators, brands and young people around the world.”

By Timo Ahopelto

“The Blyk concept works,” said Emeka Obiodu, senior analyst from Ovum, yesterday at Blyk’s second analyst roundtable where more than 30 media, telecoms and advertising analysts and experts attended.

Throughout the day we shared, discussed and debated some of Blyk’s recent developments including:

• Blyk marks its first year in the UK with 200,000 members, doubling the amount forecasted after 12 months in operation.

• Blyk connects brands with “The Recommenders” – young people who are first to try, talk and share new things, and then pass them on to their friends.

• Blyk members love the Blyk concept and are building Blyk through word-of-mouth. Overall, 6 out of 10 have joined because of a friend’s recommendation.

• As researched by Millward Brown, the “net advocacy score” – defined as those who would recommend the service minus those who would not – is the highest among most UK mobile networks (on par with 02) and just behind the likes of Facebook and Youtube. For us at Blyk, this is the most important metric because it shows that Blyk creates unique value to young people’s lives.

• Blyk media works for a broad range of communications needs including awareness (example: EFD Semi Pro), engagement (example: Living TV), sales (example: Lucozade) and insight (example: Brylcreem).

• Blyk media is effective: for example, Blyk spurred 35 percent of special offer redemptions with only a one percent investment for Lucozade.

• Blyk members are responsive. Response rates to advertising are maintained high across industries, a good example is the 64 percent response rate for the Penguin Books campaign to promote ‘Slam.’

And lastly, Blyk and attending analysts yesterday discussed a major question on the industry’s mind: when will mobile advertising take off? In our view, the industry will need to shift its focus from mobile and technology to media solutions that meet brands’ communications goals while creating real value for the consumer.