Carlton-Bates was recognized at this year’s Channel Marketing Awards. The annual event is sponsored by the National Electronic Distributors Association (NEDA) and CBC took home two awards.
In the Web Promotion category, www.carltonbates.com received a Gold. This new site is intended to serve as a “bridge” site until a complete e-commerce site launches next year.
For the Integrated Marketing category, the Platinum winner was CBC’s Energy Industry Campaign. It was an internal campaign sent to employees to excite them about the company’s potential with customers in the energy industry. Included was an eight-page brochure, microsite, a CD of high-energy music and energy bars and drinks.
Congratulations, Carlton-Bates, and thanks for letting us create award-winning work for you. We really get a charge out of it.
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
Almost Human
In the fast-paced, quickly outdated world of smart phones and other cellular gadgetry, one thing has remained the same over the past two years – Apple’s iPhone is all anyone seems to talk about.
And we’ve noticed there’s a reason for that. An outstanding product on its own, iPhone’s consumer-targeted marketing efforts have created a substantial amount of hype and garnered the phone immense popularity. Upon its release, its slick touch interface and clean overall design dominated others in its category. But looking past these dominant features, Apple may have done the smartest thing of all for its phone by only making one – one device, one name, one operating system and one place to buy it. To this end, Apple never had to be branded as another cell phone company; it merely projected its already stellar image on to a phone.
This new, singular offering, brought something entirely new to the table, where other cell phone companies tender devices of every size, shape and color imaginable. Further contributing to this marketing madness, many providers offer the same phones, but under different names. With this sort of confusion all around, thoughts of the iPhone dominate consumers’ minds, though it has only a 2% share in actual cell phone sales.
One company hopes they’ve found a way to fight back. Hot on the heels of “There’s a map for that” ads bashing AT&T’s seemingly inferior coverage, Verizon introduced a series of eyebrow-raising, “iDon’t” ads, criticizing the iPhone for its shortcomings and touting two phones running a whole new operating system from Google called Android. The Motorola Droid and the HTC Droid Eris are two Android-based smart phones made by two completely different manufacturers. By running the same operating system on these phones and others, Verizon has the ability to brand multiple phones under one recognizable name. Google Android is free to any cell phone maker who wants it, so it will turn up with more providers eventually, but Verizon is the first company to take these steps toward a more unified offering.
Every phone manufacturer and service provider has been looking for the elusive “iPhone-killer,” but have fallen short without the ability to brand one device. However, AT&T and Apple might finally have some competition if this line of Droid-driven phones proves half as good as its branding effort.
The lesson we learn from this and hope to apply with our clients is the need for brand simplicity and consistency. Consumers are being bombarded with too many competing messages to give them any reason not to remember your brand. And the fewer brands you have, the fewer brands you have to support. Not to mention, the more likely you will be to create brand awareness, understanding and, hopefully, preference.