I was watching the Gruen Transfer tonight - anyone else watch it? The show tonight discussed KLM and their random acts of kindness.... random? I think not.
These random acts involved searching through social networks (primarily twitter and facebook) for any mention of their brand, to determine who's sitting at the airport waiting for a KLM flight. Personally, I think that's great, but it's the next step that I think is kind of creepy... their marketers then delve into their account history to find out more about the person so they can personalise a "random" gift to "randomly" give this person at the airport.
There were mixed opinions on the show. Some experts mentioned the words "best practice", "the way forward". Is this really where social media marketing is heading? Or, are you like the other half, and think it's creepy that a brand is delving into your past?? I'm undecided, but I am trying to work out how I can try it at work!
Here's an article mentioning some other brands jumping onto these "random" acts bandwagon... and below a video of what Nokia tried overseas:
Does anyone know of any local brands out there doing this? And, what do you think about it? Creepy or best practice???
Not creepy I don't think, just good research and response. Thanks for the remind about Gruen too, think I'll watch on iView later tonite.
ReplyDeleteI like the idea of random acts of kindness. Think it is a really effective way of spreading the word about your brand. Sure a lot of people may know you are doing it purely because of the chances, and others will know it is set up by the company, but still, these people still see the brand name and think about it.
ReplyDeleteRoss
Interesting post. This simply fuels the argument that the more content and communication you share in social media, the more material and information you are giving marketers to exploit. Personally, there is a slight moral objection to what these companies doing... it's a little too sly. But hey, that's marketing! ha
ReplyDeleteI saw this before somewhere on the web or on TV. I think it is a very great idea for using social media for random acts of kindness, but how long can they do this for? Giving gifts to a bunch of people for loyalty? :D Would be interesting to see how much people have tweeted after knowing there's this kind of surprises, where everyone thinking that they may be the Lucky one! However, it is a way of branding and improving loyalty and marketing after all, so i do think that KLM may have had a good strategy.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThe KLM campaign achieved some pretty good results - and they only used information that people were happy to have in the public domain so I think this one falls into the 'not creepy' basket. I think these sorts of activities are good as a lot of what people want when engaging with brands is the 'what’s in it for me' factor. While the KLM customers were surprised, the Nokia example is set up, much less random and dangles a pretty good looking carrot.
ReplyDeleteGreat post Amity! I tend to agree with Craig...if you're putting the information out there into the social media sphere (and particularly if the company is only using info in what is probably the most 'ethical' way as you said KLM did) then I don't really have a problem with it. It's just a further extension of market research from my point of view. Talk about a personalised freebie!
ReplyDeleteGreat posts - thanks for your comments guys! I'm starting to think of it as less creepy and agree that the information is in the public domain, so why not use it!
ReplyDeleteI agree that if you put your information out there you should know that it will be used for something. Maybe what we consider to be creepy will be the norm in a few years time since we're almost constantly online. Personalisation of services will be on steroids soon since we are leaving 'footprints' online every day...
ReplyDeleteI'm with @Amity - not creepy at all, as the customers' posts were public in the first place.
ReplyDeleteI'd love to see more innovative campaigns such as this one. Please let us know if you give something a try!