Gift Giving

By Omid on 03:52

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My Definition:: A voluntary person to give presents such as .chocolates, flowers, clothes, toys from one individual to another without wanting anything in return.

Definition:In the social sciences, a gift economy (or gift culture) is a society where valuable goods and services are regularly given without any explicit agreement for immediate or future rewards.
Marcel Mauss (1925), The Gift: The Form and Reason for Exchange in Archaic Societies.

When you give a gift, what are the usual reasons why people give gifts to someone? Sometimes, gift are given as an expression such as of love or friendship, as an expression of gratitude for a gift received or of something else, expression of piety, in the form of charity, as an express of solidarity in the form of mutual aid, and many more.



Why do people give gifts?
* A Birthday where the person who has his or her birthday gives cake, etc. and/or receives gifts


* Christmas where people give each other gifts, often supposedly receiving them from Santa Claus


* Saint Nicholas Day where people give each other gifts, often supposedly receiving them from Saint Nicholas (other than Christmas, Saint Nicholas Day is celebrated mostly in European countries.


* A wedding, where the couple receives gifts and gives food and/or drinks at the wedding reception


* A wedding anniversary where couples celebrate their wedding anniversary by giving gifts with each other. Gifts may vary between cakes and material gifts.


* On funerals where the visitors bring flowers

, the relatives of the deceased give food and/or drinks after the ceremonial part


* To celebrate a birth where the baby receives gifts, or the mother receives a gift from the father known as a push present

* Father's and Mother's day where parents would receive gifts from their children
* Exchange of gifts between a guest and a host, often a traditional practice


Click HERE!

Gift giving is a nice thought as it expresses people's feelings for one another. I personally think making gifts is a nice way as you spend your own time and is not manufactured. Also customised gifts are nice for example last Christmas i got a personalised robe it was very nice.


How much are you spending on Christmas?

Young people say they're spending more money on Christmas than last year, despite the recession - are you?


Newsbeat's survey of almost 500 people from 16-34 found that on average they are planning to spend 11% more on presents than last year.


Fifty-two per cent of them reckon they will spend less than £150 and 10% think they'll shell out more than £450.
Danielle Parsons said she'll probably spend about £800 and added: "Everyone's going out and buying presents, I think it makes them feel happy."
How much are you planning to shell out on gifts? Is it more than last year? Why do you think young people are spending more this year?
http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/thread.jspa?forumID=7341&edition=1&ttl=20100430115055
Published: Monday, 14 December, 2009, 10:07 GMT 10:07 UK




Final Reflection on Blogging

By Omid on 16:07

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Ok let's get this last blog over and done with.


From blogging this year I feel that it has helped me research more by after having lectures I would look at the notes then search around the internet to see the subject so much more or even a book if I was in the library. Blogging has improved the way I write it now is more freely more expression in the way I write. By blogging it has shown me how easy it is to review online as I only review on the website imbd which stands for internet movie data base which when I watch a film I would rate it by stars but now I have the conference to type a review.

The subjects was good to study as there was a lot of information about when I never use to research so it made my research skills better and hopefully my grammar. My favourite blog has to be the experiment as it was fun to go in class try the same foods but different quality then writing about brands which concluded on another blog.

The only problem about my blog was that i had account issues with logging on which came an issue but then got sorted and I was happy typing away again.

OVERALL I liked doing blogs but I don't think I would start my own if I wanted to I would write reviews but not blogs. I hope you enjoyed reading my blogs and got information that you never knew about. Hey maybe you will put one my posts up one day on your page who knows. Any ways I am signing out and going back to Facebook. Many Thanks........

First impressions

By Omid on 15:02

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This will be my first impressions on blogging at the end of the blogging period I then after would do my final thoughts about blogging.

The Course
The course is about understanding the customer yeah that's about it....okay lets put it in detail what I will be talking about in my blogs as you shall be reading them. So let's see what I understand as a customer to understand what I am writing about these blogs.... Baffled a bit?
-How customers choose their products why they choose them. Also what business in the target markets the people who they do it from different age groups different groups ect.

-Different meaning of advertising relating to the specific target group. How they liked to see the advert what makes them buy the product. 

-The different advertising groups and markets for example you would not sell a emo a Hip-Hop CD!

-The different groups and class of people and how businesses differ when advertising specifically to them. For example lower class can't afford Waitrose and Upper class would not shop at Lidl.

-The different use of languange and images in order to stimulate different groups of people and genders. To show the groups of a more understanding.


What are blogs?
A blog is a website that allows users to reflect, share opinions, and discuss various topics in the form of an online journal while readers may comment on posts.


What I want from my blogging experience?
For me I people to see my views and it will show what kind of person I am my likes dislikes....My strengths my weaknesses I want to see. I also like reading reviews so this gets me inform for the next DVD I will by on the internet I shall know how to review as I am reviewing this subject in this blog. Maybe I'll make my own Twitter after this as Facebook is boring now days.


Famous Blogs
Well I don't know any famous blogs but I tell you that I follow celebrity's blogs to see what concert or if a new music video is out so I can watch when I am bored as I am into music but there is no career for me in music.


So what will make my blog successful
-Write frequently and are well written
-To have consistency
-To have an easy to read and well designed blog
-Easy to use
-Have varied topics which too need to make sense
-To be open
-To be responsive
-to be aware of its audience
-To be Honest
-To be funny


Why do people blog?
Many people blog for hobbies as its fun and get feedback with your friends or fans of your site. sharing opinions as people could be shy to say one on one. People could also blog because of they can't get a job at the moment so they blog which sponsors will give them money to advertise on their site as the company see's this person is becoming successful.


Business Blogging
I only know two blogging websites which are Twitter and Gizmodo. As I have already talked about Twitter I will talk about Gizmodo. Gizmodo is a technology weblog about consumer electronics. for example. The new Iphone got leaked on that website and millions of people was on their site signing up wanting to see this and will comment that will make their website hits go up! So if they are smart they could sell the site before Apple will sue them but hey its been a couple of days so I thinks its good bye Gizmodo....And its bye for me for now!


PS this is the new iphone:Iphone




Family purchasing

By Omid on 06:16

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Marketers in the US have begun to recognize the increasing power of teenagers both as individual consumers and as active participants in family purchasing (Gill, 1989; Asinof, 1990).There is also evidence that teenagers’ greater economic influence affects other countries as well as the US (Sellers, 1989). This apparent change in family purchase roles suggests that international marketers seeking to reach teenagers and/or families as purchasing units will need to gain a greater understanding of how teenagers’ purchase influence varies in foreign markets. A knowledge of both commonalities between countries and of any factors explaining differences in family purchase roles and behaviours will help managers formulate global marketing strategies, particularly those related to marketing communication. Most of what we know about family purchase decision making has been obtained through studying nuclear families from the US. There has been little investigation of whether these findings might be applicable to other societies. A few cross-cultural family studies have found differences in how husband± wife dyads view family purchase decisions (cf. Douglas, 1979; O’Connor et al., 1985), but the role of teenagers in influencing such decisions has rarely been examined.

Next i will be breaking down how family decides on purchasing....
Holidays- Depending what wealth/social class you are and also the age of the children. that families will want something for everyone.
If you are lower class you might find to go to somewhere like pontins from a promotion deal from The Sun newspaper.The Sun Holidays







Working class will go arboad but to cheap countries like Turkey! The reason why they go here is the heat and it is a cheap and fun holiday to go to.










Upper Class will be an expensive all incluive holiday for example a cruise holiday across europe. This would be a holiday for that family becuase its all laid back paid for and going lots of nice places.









Food Is the next subject!
Lower class willl shop in supermarkets like Lidl as it is cheap and good quality food for the price. So famlies who are lower class and has couple of kids they will go here as it is advertised to them.

Working class will go to the big supermarkets such as Tesco and Asda as they are also can be cheap and expensive as they have value prices and also a finest range. This will apeal if they are on a budget one week or one week they have more money then last week.

Upper class will go to waitrose becuase of its fine food that has a price. You pay for quality no rubbish 100% chicken for example no fat water injections to make the chicken look bigger.




Segmentation Targeting Positioning

By Omid on 06:30

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Definition: Building the right relationships with the right customers.

Market segmentation-To identify the bases for segmenting the market.
                                        -develop segment profiles.

Target Marketing-Develop marketing of segment attractiveness.
                                 -Select target markets.

Market Positioning-Develop positioning for target segments
                                    -Develop a marketing mix for each segment.


Market segmentation is dividing a market into distinct groups with distinct needs,characteristics, or behaviour who might require separate products or marketing mixes.

Segmenting customer markets
Geographical segmentation-tries to divide markets into different geographical units: these units include:

• Regions: e.g. in the UK these might be England, Scotland, Wales Northern Ireland or counties or major metropolitan areas
• Countries: perhaps categorised by size, development or membership of geographic region
• City / Town size: e.g. population within ranges or above a certain level
• Population density: e.g. urban, suburban, rural, semi-rural
• Climate: e.g. Northern, Southern

Geographic segmentation is an important process - particularly for multi-national and global businesses and brands. Many such companies have regional and national marketing programmes which alter their products, advertising and promotion to meet the individual.

Demographic segmentation-consists of dividing the market into groups based on variables such as age, gender family size, income, occupation, education, religion, race and nationality.

As you might expect, demographic segmentation variables are amongst the most popular bases for segmenting customer groups.
This is partly because customer wants are closely linked to variables such as income and age. Also, for practical reasons, there is often much more data available to help with the demographic segmentation process.

Here are the demographic segmentations narrowed down!

Age
Consumer needs and wants change with age although they may still wish to consumer the same types of product. So Marketers design, package and promote products differently to meet the wants of different age groups. Good examples include the marketing of toothpaste (contrast the branding of toothpaste for children and adults) and toys (with many age-based segments).

Life-cycle stage
A consumer stage in the life-cycle is an important variable - particularly in markets such as leisure and tourism. For example, contrast the product and promotional approach of Club 18-30 holidays with the slightly more refined and sedate approach adopted by Saga Holidays.

Gender
Gender segmentation is widely used in consumer marketing. The best examples include clothing, hairdressing, magazines and toiletries and cosmetics.

Income
Another popular basis for segmentation. Many companies target affluent consumers with luxury goods and convenience services. Good examples include Coutts bank; Moet & Chandon champagne and Elegant Resorts - an up-market travel company. By contrast, many companies focus on marketing products that appeal directly to consumers with relatively low incomes. Examples include Aldi (a discount food retailer), Airtours holidays, and discount clothing retailers such as TK Maxx.

Social class
Many Marketers believe that a consumers "perceived" social class influences their preferences for cars, clothes, home furnishings, leisure activities and other products & services. There is a clear link here with income-based segmentation.

Lifestyle
Marketers are increasingly interested in the effect of consumer "lifestyles" on demand. Unfortunately, there are many different lifestyle categorisation systems, many of them designed by advertising and marketing agencies as a way of winning new marketing clients and campaigns!

Psychographic segmentation- Lifestyle, social class, and personality-based segmentation.
It considers a number of potential influences on buying behaviour, including the attitudes, expectations and activities of consumers.  If these are known, then products and marketing campaigns can be customised so that they appeal more specifically to customer motivations.


The segments for psychograpic:


Lifestyle – different people have different lifestyle patterns and our behaviour may change as we pass through different stages of life.  For example, a family with young children is likely to have a different lifestyle to a much older couple whose children have left home, and there are, therefore, likely to be significant differences in consumption patterns between the two groups.  One of the most well-known lifestyle model.

  • Dependent (e.g., children still living at home with parents);
  • Pre-family (with their own households but no children);
  • Family (parents with at least one dependent child); and
  • Late (parents with children who have left home, or older childless couples).Each group is then further According to income and occupation.


Click me!


Enterprise Week!

By Omid on 07:17

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As the university hosted an enterprise week from the 17th November 2009 onwards for 2weeks I had attend 2 of the events that was advertised to me. The first panel was a group on graduates which they talked about what happen life after university and what they recommend us to do in the situation we are in at this moment in time studying. The panel was free to answer any question for us but I didn't get involved as I knew most of the stuff they was saying like how to study what to do with your CV ect.... nothing new there... It was enjoyable as I did learn how much money roughly I will be getting when I graduate :)


The next panel was the Pro's the Professional the one's who has been in the business for some time with the experience I was very interested in this as they took their own time for them to talk to us on a respective level.




The topic was the industry and the discussion was primarily about marketing comms and where the future for the market is leading. 
Meet the panel: Sue Elms Executive Vice President, Global Media Practice Millward Brown,Sue Unerman, Chief Strategy Officer Mediacom UK,George Hutchinson, Chair and Managing Director Public Affairs, Burson-Marsteller UK,Rik Haslam, Group Creative Architect WWV Rapp and Matthew Chapman: International Service and Systems Innovation Director Billetts

The panel discussed about PR and advertising . The advertising part Was interesting as the panel said they think the media of advertising is coming to all digital and social networking...Advertising  for such websites as Facebook to advertise on the is big as has so many users on the website and so many people checking the website daily.

The other discussion the panel discussed was about brands! How it can bring communities together. Branding are important to us it is a trust we have when we buy a brand it gives a relationship and a trust between the customer and the company....



At question time the candidates started talking about the advertising industry one candidate said “advertising plays a role not a leader” This was talking about the role that you have to me good at what you do to make the cut.
Rik said “A brand is to add a value” and Sue Elms also said “Target control brands still work”
Sue was talking about how in the 21st century targeting brands at people still works as an advertisement for example advertising a brand which is doing well to get new customers.
Then the board was talking about in the 21st century how many people use the internet. There was a show of hands and everyone hand was up then they ask do you use such websites such as Facebook and Twitter most hands still was raised. The panel went along by saying the way we are watching adverts are changing by the new generation are using the internet not watching TV also using mobiles more. So there is a change in this century threw TV to media mobile and internet. The reason why is because of social networking websites bringing committees together.









A brand is the idea or image of a specific product or service that consumers connect with, by identifying the name, logo, slogan, or design of the company who owns the idea or image. Branding is when that idea or image is marketed so that it is recognisable by lots of people each day, and identified with a certain service or product when there are many other companies offering the same service or product. Advertising professionals work on branding not only to build brand recognition, but also to build good reputations. Brands are usually protected from use by others by securing a trademark or service mark from an authorised agency.

All in all it was interesting what both the panels had to say and was taken on board for use of the future!


















The public buy brands because they trust in what they have brought before if it was a good product last time they brought it then it would be this time. They would also buy a brand because it has a high reputation so you won’t be disappointed in the product. The public would not by a product that is not known as the product might not be trustworthy.


Generation Marketing...Over 50's

By Omid on 05:10

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Introduction: The over 50's are a generation that are very choosy of what they want to have and what they will like and dislike. As most pensioners have time they watch TV this means the media have to also advertise to the older generation too. 


THE MARKET OPPORTUNITY







For years, marketing to the over 50's was highly comical to those outside that age bracket. Support tights, colostomy bags, retirement homes and chair lifts were the order of the day. In the last few years, a significant change has taken place. 






Lets face it, only direct marketing can profitably address the very many different and complex targeting issues within this enormously attractive target sector. 
Companies of all shapes and sizes, from all market sectors, have identified the lucrative potential of the target market. And, what's more, they have diverted serious chunks of marketing budget into this area. 
But, in general terms, the vast majority of those companies have completely failed to understand the market place and its complexities. 
To start with, it's not a single marketplace. 

It is in fact, a target market, sub-segmented into close on 40 different types, which demand to be spoken to individually. These types are determined by the mental persuasion of the individuals within them, overlayed with other discriminators such as age and wealth, lifestyle and sex. 
For example, we all know individuals, say, between 50 and 60 years of age. There is a dramatic difference between some of them. The way they walk, talk and dress. And, more importantly, the way they think.
 
Some 50 year old these days are 51 going on 35. They are computer literate, style conscious, knowledgeable about contemporary music and, probably more 'groovy' than grey. Remember, both Mick Jagger and Paul McCartney to name but two, are now the wrong side of 50. They consider themselves to be in the 35 year old marketplace. However, there are others in that same segment that are old before their time and it shows in everything they do. 
For marketers, of course, this is a great problem. 

Talk to those two different type examples in the same way and you'll probably alienate both of them. The former type wants to be recognised and addressed as a youthful over 50. The latter is mentally older, is happier in that shell and wants to receive messages with an older 'feel' and relevance. 
This of course represents another nail in the coffin of image advertising and a further attraction of direct marketing.

Funny ad



Secondary research
According to a recent TGI survey, the Third-Agers can be divided into five lifestyle groups: 

'Thrifty Traditionals', accounting for 17% of the age group. They are not well off and budget for every penny, are heavy TV viewers and read down market tabloids. 

'Outgoing Fun Lovers' contribute another 20%. They are magazine oriented, enjoy travelling, eating out, entertaining and are above average viewers of TV. 

'Astute Cosmopolitans' account for 18% of the age group. These are the ones with most money, read broadsheet newspapers, specialist and lifestyle magazines. They enjoy foreign holidays and are light TV viewers. 

'Apathetic Spenders' for a further 22% of the group. They take on debt through credit cards and do not like foreign holidays. Favoured newspapers are the tabloid press. 

'Temperate Xenophobes' make up the remainder. They love the Radio Times, most definitely do not like foreign food or travelling abroad and are heavy TV users.
THE ATTITUDE OF THE MARKET 
In the last decade, we have witnessed the arrival of the sceptical and cynical consumer. No one believes anything anymore. 
We have over four decades of television advertising to thank for that. 
The over 50's are far more receptive to modern methods of communication than their counterparts of 10 years ago and understand its ways, its methods and its tricks. 
Some were teenagers in the magical times of the late fifties and sixties and are well- versed, well travelled and very street wise.

DISLIKE OF ADVERTISING INCREASES WITH AGE 
The over 50's are traditionally regarded as heavy users of financial service, health and leisure products, with a high emphasis on travel both UK and overseas. They are also heavy consumers of toiletries and cosmetics, drinks and gardening products. Some recent consultancy research identified that the Third-Agers in certain markets, showed a propensity to be a marketers dream. 
For example: 
Financial Services 

27% More likely than average, to have stocks and shares 

61% More likely than average, to have unit trusts 
Travel 
10% More likely than average, to take 3 or more holidays per year 

42% More likely than average, to have been on a sea cruise within the last year 
Drink 
52% More likely than average to drink Scotch Whisky 
10% More likely on average, to drink Gin 
Most recently retired people ARE better off than their counterparts were 20 years ago. 







Most recently retired people have paid off the mortgage and have the opportunity to sell their property and move to somewhere smaller or nicer in the country. A lot have shares in the major utilities which they have seen rise in value, timeshare properties they purchased during their years of highest earnings and possibly, even some collections they have built up.

ADVERTISING LIKES AND DISLIKES 
Some companies are already heavily investing in campaigns to the Third-Agers. Travel operator and magazine publisher Saga has been targeting retired people for close on 40 years, with great success. 

Significantly, in recent times, it has lowered its age parameters from 60 to 50, to take full advantage of the trend of retiring early. 
Car Insurance companies have also produced specific policies for the 50+ marketplace, as they represent the safety and security conscious individuals that are very attractive. 
But, by and large, companies are either ignoring the sector or marketing to it, very badly. The differentiation that's required to connect to the specific target segments within this group is being totally ignored. 


REFS:
http://www.tgisurveys.com/freedata/




Consumer Behaviour: A European Perspective

by Michael R. Solomon (Author), Gary Bamossy (Author), Soren Askegaard (Author), Margaret K. Hogg (Author)
Financial Times/ Prentice Hall; 3 edition (21 Jun 2007)








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