"The way peoples' behavior is changing intrigues all marketers," says Keith Weed, global chief marketing officer at Unilever, who attended Mobile World Congress in full force with his team this week. "To us, of course, this is a source of connection with people, but also a potential source of entertainment."
While many brands have embraced a 360-degree approach to marketing, wherein brands aim to surround the customer with content across every screen or medium available, Weed says he's now pushing Unilever to foster something he calls 365. "Our approach much more now is about 365, every day, 24/7. How can we provide content that really engages people?" he says.
"Not only are we interested in leveraging opportunities in this area through media, but we're also interested in investing in companies so we can scale in market," adds Weed. "One of the things an advertiser has to do is break through the clutter."
Because Unilever is an international conglomerate of many brands in vastly different cultures, Weed is driving his team to test new ideas that are more culturally and sociologically relevant to its target customers in each local market.
In India, for example, Unilever discovered that the act of making a call and hanging up before the receiver picks up is widespread because it helps people avoid charges but still reach out and connect with someone. So the company played off that cultural reality and developed a campaign where users could call a number displayed on the packaging for Omo, a laundry detergent, have the call immediately disconnect after one ring and then receive a callback with a pre-recorded message from a Bollywood start. The branded callback feature also offered customers varying amounts of free airtime depending on how many times they purchased the product and placed the initial call.
"I'm only interested in delivering good value for our dollars," he says. If a campaign doesn't deliver a worthwhile return on investment, Weed is likely to abandon the idea and move on. "I think the important thing is to setup expectations up front," he continues. "Measurement is key because at the end of the day we want to make sure we're spending good money."
"You really have to define the measurement for the task," he adds. "The ROI we're getting on mobile is indeed very interesting, and it certainly justifies the money we're putting into it."
As for how much money Unilever is committing to mobile, Weed declined to provide specific numbers, but he shared some other anecdotes to help indicated how important the area is for the CPG company. "We don't give out the percentage we spend on mobile, we don't even give out the percentage we spend on digital," he says. "As far as I'm concerned, I fish where the fish are... All I can say is that it's a number that is growing very fast."
Thursday, 28 February 2013
Wednesday, 27 February 2013
Sustainability, environment are high on the priority list for Unilever's Keith Weed (The Economic Times, By Ravi Balakrishnan)
Chances are that even the better travelled among us haven't put in a stop at Gunga, a village in the Berasia taluka, near Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh. It however figured in the itinerary of Keith Weed, chief marketing and Communication Officer officer at Unilever on a recent trip to India. It's a visit that has left Weed with a new appreciation for the resilience of the Indian consumers and the primacy of mobile phones in their lives.
He says, "In the
village I visited, there were incredibly low income consumers — eight people
living on less than a dollar a day. But they had a mobile. As we went to the
backroom to look at the stove, they used the mobile as a torch to show me the
way. We have always been talking about how TV is mass coverage. But as you
know, in rural India there are media dark areas that are not mobile dark."
However, a mobile phone
doubling up as a torch is more footnote than main event in Weed's visit. Among
the principal reasons is a status check on one of his pet projects, launched
with considerable fanfare at the Cannes Lions Festival in 2012. In a meeting
with Brand Equity a few hours before the launch at Cannes, Weed spoke excitedly
of his intention to toss back a glass of water from Mumbai's Powai lake on
stage. The water would of course have been treated by one of Unilever's Pureit
purifiers. While those plans got scuppered, Waterworks, collaboration between
Unilever, non-profit organisation PSI and Facebook, generated a fair amount of
excitement on launch. It was seen as one of the first attempts by a large
multinational to harness the power of social networking for societal good.
Waterworks is a Facebook
timeline application that allows users to make a daily contribution towards
communities in dire need of potable water. Their donations will enable PSI's
onground staff, the Waterworkers to educate the most deprived people in rural
India about the importance of clean water and distribute Unilever's Pureit
units. The payoff for the people who choose to help? The satisfaction of doing
good. And perhaps an equally important motivation in an increasingly
narcissistic and self obsessed age — photos of the families they helped will
be posted to their Facebook profiles.
Eight months down the
line Waterworks does not boast the impressive million plus numbers of other
'brand' pages on Facebook, with a modest 9,285 likes so far. Asked if this is
as per his expectation, Weed explains, "It's still in beta testing. There
are two ends we are working on. The Facebook engagement and making sure we deliver
water into the hands of people who need it the most, in a cost effective
way."
He admits there are
lessons to be learned before the project scales up and that even its promotion
on Facebook has been kept deliberately low key. With the initial target of 15,000
met, the tweaks are specifically in the area of getting the units to the most
needy. A contemplative Weed says, "It was incredibly moving. You see
people in rural India, struggling with some of the basic things. It makes me
more determined to sort out a scalable model." However his visit also
fills him with confidence. Of the 600 houses, 220 have Pureit units.
Weed says, "Watching
the Waterworker take a photo of the person who received the unit and uploading
it on Facebook and to have that appear on the page of someone in Europe or the
US: this is the future of the world. The use of mobile is going to transform
our lives and marketing." The Waterworks project ties in with one of
Weed's obsessions. Unilever has been working to a stated objective of doubling
its business while halving its environmental footprint and increasing its
social impact. The first of these Weed admits is a fairly basic ambition, one
that's probably shared by any good company. The second has a profound impact on
marketing. Weed says, "We could have put together a plan with targets we
knew how to achieve. But I don't think that would transform the business to the
degree we are aspiring to."
Sustainability, environment are high on the priority list for Unilever's Keith Weed (The Economic Times, by Ravi Balakrishnan)
Chances are that even the
better travelled among us haven't put in a stop at Gunga, a village in the
Berasia taluka, near Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh. It however figured in the
itinerary of Keith Weed, chief marketing and Communication Officer officer at
Unilever on a recent trip to India. It's a visit that has left Weed with a new
appreciation for the resilience of the Indian consumers and the primacy of
mobile phones in their lives.
He says, "In the village I visited, there were incredibly low income consumers — eight people living on less than a dollar a day. But they had a mobile. As we went to the backroom to look at the stove, they used the mobile as a torch to show me the way. We have always been talking about how TV is mass coverage. But as you know, in rural India there are media dark areas that are not mobile dark."
However, a mobile phone doubling up as a torch is more footnote than main event in Weed's visit. Among the principal reasons is a status check on one of his pet projects, launched with considerable fanfare at the Cannes Lions Festival in 2012. In a meeting with Brand Equity a few hours before the launch at Cannes, Weed spoke excitedly of his intention to toss back a glass of water from Mumbai's Powai lake on stage. The water would of course have been treated by one of Unilever's Pureit purifiers. While those plans got scuppered, Waterworks, a collaboration between Unilever, non profit organisation PSI and Facebook, generated a fair amount of excitement on launch. It was seen as one of the first attempts by a large multinational to harness the power of social networking for societal good.
Waterworks is a Facebook timeline application that allows users to make a daily contribution towards communities in dire need of potable water. Their donations will enable PSI's onground staff, the Waterworkers to educate the most deprived people in rural India about the importance of clean water and distribute Unilever's Pureit units. The payoff for the people who choose to help? The satisfaction of doing good. And perhaps an equally important motivation in an increasingly narcissistic and self obsessed age — photos of the families they helped will be posted to their Facebook profiles.
Eight months down the line Waterworks does not boast the impressive million plus numbers of other 'brand' pages on Facebook, with a modest 9,285 likes so far. Asked if this is as per his expectation, Weed explains, "It's still in beta testing. There are two ends we are working on. The Facebook engagement and making sure we deliver water into the hands of people who need it the most, in a cost effective way."
He admits there are lessons to be learned before the project scales up and that even its promotion on Facebook has been kept deliberately low key. With the initial target of 15,000 met, the tweaks are specifically in the area of getting the units to the most needy. A contemplative Weed says, "It was incredibly moving. You see people in rural India, struggling with some of the basic things. It makes me more determined to sort out a scalable model." However his visit also fills him with confidence. Of the 600 houses, 220 have Pureit units.
Weed says, "Watching the Waterworker take a photo of the person who received the unit and uploading it on Facebook and to have that appear on the page of someone in Europe or the US: this is the future of the world. The use of mobile is going to transform our lives and marketing." The Waterworks project ties in with one of Weed's obsessions. Unilever has been working to a stated objective of doubling its business while halving its environmental footprint and increasing its social impact. The first of these Weed admits is a fairly basic ambition, one that's probably shared by any good company. The second has a profound impact on marketing. Weed says, "We could have put together a plan with targets we knew how to achieve. But I don't think that would transform the business to the degree we are aspiring to."
Tuesday, 26 February 2013
Big data is transforming mobile opportunities, says Unilever CMO Keith Weed (The Drum, By Jessica Davies)
The role of big data in the mobile industry is
driving new opportunities for marketers and consumers, according to Unilever’s
chief marketing officer Keith Weed.
Speaking at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona
today Weed said the role of big data behind mobile is what makes the medium
most "exciting" and is helping transform the business and consumer
environment.
“We can tell by a person's location if they
are walking in a park and then if it is a hot day, we can direct them to the
nearest place to buy a Magnum with a coupon – these are things we can already
do now - all the kind of stuff you can’t do on TV,” he said.
However, Wood stressed the importance of
establishing proper metrics when determining what budgets to allocate to
mobile. “Measurement is key and it is important to understand the rules of
measurement before embarking.
"We have 600 market researchers around
the world and one of their main tasks is to define the right approach to mobile
for ROI. We are getting very interesting ROI on mobile and it certainly
justifies our investment there.
“Not so long ago everyone was striving for
360-degree communication. We're now shifting from that all-round planning of
integrated channels to a 365 days-a-year, always-on approach…
“I want the best mobile marketeer in the world
to be Unilever – and the way we will do that is through experimentation and
measuring what we do and then repeating it at scale,” he added.
Unilever is on the lookout for more partners
with experts in mobile-related fields to create mobile experiences for
consumers, according to Weed.
Unilever's Keith Weed: four steps to connecting with a mobile world (Marketing Magazine)
Ahead of his keynote speech at Mobile World
Congress, Unilever chief marketing and communications officer Keith Weed
reveals four steps marketers must take to be mobile savvy
Connectivity – first through telegraphy and then through the telephone – transformed the world. Before this, people rarely travelled or met others outside their own towns and villages. Afterwards, they lived in an interconnected world that was suddenly 'global'.
In the 80s, I was at a party in London, where I met a girl called Kate for the first time. Before leaving, she ripped a piece of paper from the Yellow Pages by the front door and wrote down her number with lipstick. Remarkably, I still have that piece of paper, and that woman is now my wife.
Today's dating game is quite different. In Japan, for instance, people can go into a bar and, without even speaking, scan the QR codes on singletons' T-shirts in order to check them out on Facebook. Only then do they decide whether they want to speak to them. How different that first meeting with my future wife would have been, if back then we had the technology we rely on today. How can you resist phoning a number that has been written in lipstick?
Reaching out
Mobile is changing so much of our behaviour, even our face-to-face interaction. How many parents of teenage children have been baffled by the texting, tweeting and Facebooking that goes on in front of the TV? Isn't one screen, one activity, one flow of information enough?
It isn't.
Mobile is the biggest enabler of social media, as your handset is rarely more than a metre away. More than half of all activity on Facebook and Twitter now happens on a mobile device. Hence Facebook's decision to purchase Instagram, a company with 13 employees and zero revenue, for £1bn.
Moreover, while it may seem as if mobile is something just for the developed world, where smartphones and expensive devices proliferate, I have seen greater growth and more use of mobile in developing markets than in Europe.
A couple of weeks ago I was in Bhopal, India, where mobiles are a central utility for people in this developing market. The locals there have no toilets, chimneys or even electrical light in their huts, but they do have mobile phones, which have various uses beyond communication, from a means to transfer money to a source of light by which to cook.
In fast-growth markets such as India, where there is a population of 1bn people with nearly 900m handsets, the reach of mobile is greater than that of television. Mobile is the primary way consumers in these markets connect to the internet. In addition, since many of these places are 'TV dark', mobile is the primary way a company like Unilever engages with consumers. Here, TV is being usurped by mobile as the mass medium to reach consumers.
Mobile is affecting the way consumers engage with the world; it is therefore only natural that it has changed the way we engage with them, and the way we do marketing. In my view, there are four shifts that we must make to address and capitalise on this.
360 to 365
7bn to 1
0 to 5km/hr (walking pace)
1+1=3
360 to 365
1. Not so long ago, everyone was striving for 360-degree communication. How quickly things change. We're now shifting from that all-round planning of integrated channels to a 365-days-a-year, always-on approach. Instead of rolling out big marketing campaigns three to four times a year, brands are reaching out to consumers 24/7 via mobile and social media.
Crucially, it's about always-on entertainment for the consumer. Returning to India, exponential population growth means the opportunities are ripe. The lack of electricity (only 55% in rural households) means the entertainment options are limited, but mobile penetration is 66%, thereby providing the channel through which to give people the entertainment they want. Incidentally, most handsets there are feature phones, so providing interesting entertainment is, in many ways, more challenging than running a campaign on a smartphone – and more rewarding when it works out.
7bn to 1
2. Every day, 2bn people use a Unilever product across 180 countries. While the numbers are big, people have individual access to technology, individual access to content, and individual access to our brands. Therefore, we must address the 7bn people in the world by personalising content designed for the masses, but tailored to the individual.
Targeting content for individual consumers in an intimate way builds relationships. Done well, it cuts down the clutter of unnecessary communications – my children are teenagers, I don't need nappy ads on my phone.
Big data is transforming the business and consumer environment. It should even make people's lives easier: we are already able to tell a consumer when he's walking in the park (we know his location) on a hot day (we know what the weather is like there) where the nearest place is to buy a Magnum and send him a code for a discount.
Just think of what we might be able to do in five years' time.
0 to 5km/hr (walking pace)
3. Consumers are on the move. As a result, companies like ours need speed and immediacy of data just to keep up with the consumer. People want information now, they want to interact now, they want to buy now; and they want all this on the go.
The concept of immediacy has transformed mobile into a tool of action and transaction in a single swipe, click or tap. Our communication must take into account that whenever we reach a consumer, he or she will talk not with their feet, as we used to say, but with their fingers – and unless we are ready to capture that action, then we will be missing an opportunity.
1+1=3
4. Since mobile requires a different way of working, planning and engaging with consumers – and because it is by no means a one-size-fits-all formula – we have found that working in partnership with experts in different mobile-related fields is as necessary as expanding our own understanding of the opportunities.
We are working with mobile and content providers – gaming, for instance – to unlock the magic of our brands by leveraging mobile and social together, to explore innovative ways to co-create content, and to achieve distribution at scale.
Mobile does require a different type of consumer engagement and way of working, but I, for one, am very excited by it.
Connectivity – first through telegraphy and then through the telephone – transformed the world. Before this, people rarely travelled or met others outside their own towns and villages. Afterwards, they lived in an interconnected world that was suddenly 'global'.
In the 80s, I was at a party in London, where I met a girl called Kate for the first time. Before leaving, she ripped a piece of paper from the Yellow Pages by the front door and wrote down her number with lipstick. Remarkably, I still have that piece of paper, and that woman is now my wife.
Today's dating game is quite different. In Japan, for instance, people can go into a bar and, without even speaking, scan the QR codes on singletons' T-shirts in order to check them out on Facebook. Only then do they decide whether they want to speak to them. How different that first meeting with my future wife would have been, if back then we had the technology we rely on today. How can you resist phoning a number that has been written in lipstick?
Reaching out
Mobile is changing so much of our behaviour, even our face-to-face interaction. How many parents of teenage children have been baffled by the texting, tweeting and Facebooking that goes on in front of the TV? Isn't one screen, one activity, one flow of information enough?
It isn't.
Mobile is the biggest enabler of social media, as your handset is rarely more than a metre away. More than half of all activity on Facebook and Twitter now happens on a mobile device. Hence Facebook's decision to purchase Instagram, a company with 13 employees and zero revenue, for £1bn.
Moreover, while it may seem as if mobile is something just for the developed world, where smartphones and expensive devices proliferate, I have seen greater growth and more use of mobile in developing markets than in Europe.
A couple of weeks ago I was in Bhopal, India, where mobiles are a central utility for people in this developing market. The locals there have no toilets, chimneys or even electrical light in their huts, but they do have mobile phones, which have various uses beyond communication, from a means to transfer money to a source of light by which to cook.
In fast-growth markets such as India, where there is a population of 1bn people with nearly 900m handsets, the reach of mobile is greater than that of television. Mobile is the primary way consumers in these markets connect to the internet. In addition, since many of these places are 'TV dark', mobile is the primary way a company like Unilever engages with consumers. Here, TV is being usurped by mobile as the mass medium to reach consumers.
Mobile is affecting the way consumers engage with the world; it is therefore only natural that it has changed the way we engage with them, and the way we do marketing. In my view, there are four shifts that we must make to address and capitalise on this.
360 to 365
7bn to 1
0 to 5km/hr (walking pace)
1+1=3
360 to 365
1. Not so long ago, everyone was striving for 360-degree communication. How quickly things change. We're now shifting from that all-round planning of integrated channels to a 365-days-a-year, always-on approach. Instead of rolling out big marketing campaigns three to four times a year, brands are reaching out to consumers 24/7 via mobile and social media.
Crucially, it's about always-on entertainment for the consumer. Returning to India, exponential population growth means the opportunities are ripe. The lack of electricity (only 55% in rural households) means the entertainment options are limited, but mobile penetration is 66%, thereby providing the channel through which to give people the entertainment they want. Incidentally, most handsets there are feature phones, so providing interesting entertainment is, in many ways, more challenging than running a campaign on a smartphone – and more rewarding when it works out.
7bn to 1
2. Every day, 2bn people use a Unilever product across 180 countries. While the numbers are big, people have individual access to technology, individual access to content, and individual access to our brands. Therefore, we must address the 7bn people in the world by personalising content designed for the masses, but tailored to the individual.
Targeting content for individual consumers in an intimate way builds relationships. Done well, it cuts down the clutter of unnecessary communications – my children are teenagers, I don't need nappy ads on my phone.
Big data is transforming the business and consumer environment. It should even make people's lives easier: we are already able to tell a consumer when he's walking in the park (we know his location) on a hot day (we know what the weather is like there) where the nearest place is to buy a Magnum and send him a code for a discount.
Just think of what we might be able to do in five years' time.
0 to 5km/hr (walking pace)
3. Consumers are on the move. As a result, companies like ours need speed and immediacy of data just to keep up with the consumer. People want information now, they want to interact now, they want to buy now; and they want all this on the go.
The concept of immediacy has transformed mobile into a tool of action and transaction in a single swipe, click or tap. Our communication must take into account that whenever we reach a consumer, he or she will talk not with their feet, as we used to say, but with their fingers – and unless we are ready to capture that action, then we will be missing an opportunity.
1+1=3
4. Since mobile requires a different way of working, planning and engaging with consumers – and because it is by no means a one-size-fits-all formula – we have found that working in partnership with experts in different mobile-related fields is as necessary as expanding our own understanding of the opportunities.
We are working with mobile and content providers – gaming, for instance – to unlock the magic of our brands by leveraging mobile and social together, to explore innovative ways to co-create content, and to achieve distribution at scale.
Mobile does require a different type of consumer engagement and way of working, but I, for one, am very excited by it.
Unilever's Keith Weed: four steps to connecting with a mobile world (Marketing magazine)
Ahead of his keynote speech at Mobile World Congress, Unilever chief marketing and communications officer Keith Weed reveals four steps marketers must take to be mobile savvy
Connectivity – first through telegraphy and then through the telephone – transformed the world. Before this, people rarely travelled or met others outside their own towns and villages. Afterwards, they lived in an interconnected world that was suddenly 'global'.
In the 80s, I was at a party in London, where I met a girl called Kate for the first time. Before leaving, she ripped a piece of paper from the Yellow Pages by the front door and wrote down her number with lipstick. Remarkably, I still have that piece of paper, and that woman is now my wife.
Today's dating game is quite different. In Japan, for instance, people can go into a bar and, without even speaking, scan the QR codes on singletons' T-shirts in order to check them out on Facebook. Only then do they decide whether they want to speak to them. How different that first meeting with my future wife would have been, if back then we had the technology we rely on today. How can you resist phoning a number that has been written in lipstick?
Reaching out
Mobile is changing so much of our behaviour, even our face-to-face interaction. How many parents of teenage children have been baffled by the texting, tweeting and Facebooking that goes on in front of the TV? Isn't one screen, one activity, one flow of information enough?
It isn't.
Mobile is the biggest enabler of social media, as your handset is rarely more than a metre away. More than half of all activity on Facebook and Twitter now happens on a mobile device. Hence Facebook's decision to purchase Instagram, a company with 13 employees and zero revenue, for £1bn.
Moreover, while it may seem as if mobile is something just for the developed world, where smartphones and expensive devices proliferate, I have seen greater growth and more use of mobile in developing markets than in Europe.
A couple of weeks ago I was in Bhopal, India, where mobiles are a central utility for people in this developing market. The locals there have no toilets, chimneys or even electrical light in their huts, but they do have mobile phones, which have various uses beyond communication, from a means to transfer money to a source of light by which to cook.
In fast-growth markets such as India, where there is a population of 1bn people with nearly 900m handsets, the reach of mobile is greater than that of television. Mobile is the primary way consumers in these markets connect to the internet. In addition, since many of these places are 'TV dark', mobile is the primary way a company like Unilever engages with consumers. Here, TV is being usurped by mobile as the mass medium to reach consumers.
Mobile is affecting the way consumers engage with the world; it is therefore only natural that it has changed the way we engage with them, and the way we do marketing. In my view, there are four shifts that we must make to address and capitalise on this.
360 to 365
1. Not so long ago, everyone was striving for 360-degree communication. How quickly things change. We're now shifting from that all-round planning of integrated channels to a 365-days-a-year, always-on approach. Instead of rolling out big marketing campaigns three to four times a year, brands are reaching out to consumers 24/7 via mobile and social media.
Crucially, it's about always-on entertainment for the consumer. Returning to India, exponential population growth means the opportunities are ripe. The lack of electricity (only 55% in rural households) means the entertainment options are limited, but mobile penetration is 66%, thereby providing the channel through which to give people the entertainment they want. Incidentally, most handsets there are feature phones, so providing interesting entertainment is, in many ways, more challenging than running a campaign on a smartphone – and more rewarding when it works out.
2. Every day, 2bn people use a Unilever product across 180 countries. While the numbers are big, people have individual access to technology, individual access to content, and individual access to our brands. Therefore, we must address the 7bn people in the world by personalising content designed for the masses, but tailored to the individual.
Targeting content for individual consumers in an intimate way builds relationships. Done well, it cuts down the clutter of unnecessary communications – my children are teenagers, I don't need nappy ads on my phone.
Big data is transforming the business and consumer environment. It should even make people's lives easier: we are already able to tell a consumer when he's walking in the park (we know his location) on a hot day (we know what the weather is like there) where the nearest place is to buy a Magnum and send him a code for a discount.
Just think of what we might be able to do in five years' time.
3. Consumers are on the move. As a result, companies like ours need speed and immediacy of data just to keep up with the consumer. People want information now, they want to interact now, they want to buy now; and they want all this on the go.
The concept of immediacy has transformed mobile into a tool of action and transaction in a single swipe, click or tap. Our communication must take into account that whenever we reach a consumer, he or she will talk not with their feet, as we used to say, but with their fingers – and unless we are ready to capture that action, then we will be missing an opportunity.
4. Since mobile requires a different way of working, planning and engaging with consumers – and because it is by no means a one-size-fits-all formula – we have found that working in partnership with experts in different mobile-related fields is as necessary as expanding our own understanding of the opportunities.
We are working with mobile and content providers – gaming, for instance – to unlock the magic of our brands by leveraging mobile and social together, to explore innovative ways to co-create content, and to achieve distribution at scale.
Mobile does require a different type of consumer engagement and way of working, but I, for one, am very excited by it.
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