Mention the words green marketing at a management meeting and you’re either labelled pony-tail wearing bunny hugging whale saver or you’re told to put it on next month’s agenda where serious consideration will be given to environmentally friendly packaging! It’s another Journal Debate and as Jeremy Maggs facilitates the debate some of the interesting points from the morning include:

Simon Gear – Green Business Consultant, SDB Consulting

• Green Marketing is getting to a stage where it is becoming more mainstream but it’s not enough
• Eskom doesn’t do any Green Marketing it’s more Crisis Management. But they are extremely transparent about their carbon footprint.
• In terms of  Sappi the reality is that a tree farm is not a forest
• You do things properly inside your company and then you tell that story

Jacques Brent – VP Marketing, Sales & Service, Ford and Mazda

• Transparency is driven by competitive disclosure. Use the good to build your brand up but you rarely make active disclosure of the negative if nobody else is doing it in your industry. This is one of the problems.
• Education is key, the more it gets spoken about the greater awareness and the quicker the change should come.

Maseda Ratshikuni – Head: Cause Marketing, Nedbank Affinities Marketing

• The truth is South Africa is behind in terms of sustainability.
• Surprisingly 53% of people are Green supporters in this country. But Green is like religious. You have to live it.
• More responsibility to ensure people is educated and informed. Green is not something that happens out there, we need to start internally. And we need to make sure that our business accept the strategy of being green.

Bernhard Riegler – Marketing Director, Sappi Fine Paper

Latetia Venter – Marketing Manager: Demand Side Management, Eskom

• Eskom has an energy efficient program that has managed to save over 2000 Megawatts.
• Eskom launched an internal program where we started for energy efficiency to get our employees to be brand ambassadors.

Deon Robbertze – Creative Director: Ogilvy earth South Africa

• Green marketing is about sustainability, and there are three pillars, social, financial and environment.
• Consumer knows everything about your business, fixed what’s wrong don’t shout about what’s right.
• You have to implement sustainability from the top down. You have got to get people in your company to believe that change is going to happen.
• Sustainability is intuitive, it’s not rocket science.  We need to reach the age of transparency. It has to become part of the brands DNA.

From this mornings debate one thing is clear, it’s really important that we get to grips with issues like this. The conversation has provided food for thought and attendees walk away from another successful morning.

Join us for the next Journal debate. Book now…

How should existing and potential costumers be spoken to, what are the optimum methods of communication, what role is technology playing in the dynamic? Jeremy Maggs as always keeps everybody on their toes, with some of the highlights from the session this morning including:

Andrew Ambrogioni, CEO (Action Ambro’s)

• The system or technology we use doesn’t build the relationship it’s how you apply those date insights into your creative communication.
• Social Media is great as a service level tool. It’s opening up a new channel for constant content upload. Instead of a push strategy it’s becoming a pull strategy.
• You can create promotions online and ask customers to engage with you. Utilize it to create more focused campaign.
• The way we communicate, the way we design, way we approach the customer needs to be looked at far more closely. Touch the heart and then reach into the pocket.

Etien van Loggerenberg, Territory Sales Manager- Africa (Maximizer Software)

• It’s all about understanding the customers, what makes them tick. Profile them and communicate in a way that they understand. Track the effectiveness of how you are communicating.
• In terms of Reputation – you have to priorities on how to respond to messages and have the tools and people to do that.
• Measurability is key in order to drive your business forward.

Bridgette Ward, Sales Manager (AdvanceNet Group)

• Getting adoption of the system is key, people don’t always understand the systems. But you have to integrate this throughout your business in order for this to be successful.
• Key need to be looking at  a client in a 360 degree view.
• Social Media can now start pushing information into your relevant information into your space. More on the networking side
• We need to be building the system to take us to the next sale
• CRM is a culture, you are creating transparency in the business

Michelle Perrow, Strategic Director (Lesoba Difference)

• Have to get the basics right, which is:  good service, answer the phone on time, speak to customers correctly, speak to customers on the channel that they require, adding value at the same time.

• There are very few organization that have the web or call centre interaction linked into the CRM. Various reasons for this, lack of support, internal politics etc.

• Direct Marketing Association is the champion in challenging the legislative regulations. The opt- in, opt- out discussion have been reversed so that we are now only talking about opt out.

• We need to self regulate. 17 pieces of legislations that cover CRM at the moment and you need to be aware of this and implement this.

   

   

   

Once again another interesting morning with diverse opinions on this topic.

For more on this event make sure you get a copy of the next edition of The Journal. Also don’t miss out on the next Journal of Marketing Debate talking about Green Marketing.

On the 6 May 2010, The Journal of Marketing will host another one of their illustrious Breakfast Debates titled “Customer Relationship Management [CRM] – An overused acronym or a Marketer’s Secret Weapon?”

Mention the three letters CRM and marketers generally fall asleep or have a spam attack. But unless you’re engaging one-on-one with your loyal customer base and looking to add to it, you might as well quit and go farming. CRM is a marketer’s most important weapon, but can also be the greatest curse.

The debate will discuss how should existing and potential customers be spoken to; what are the optimum methods of communication; what role is technology playing in the dynamic, and how do you execute and quantify the results of a cost-effective CRM campaign. And, once you’ve done all that stuff, the debate will discuss how it all fit in with bigger issues like sales, distribution and overall brand development.

Hosted by Jeremy Maggs, the debating panel will include:

Fraser Lamb – Group CEO, Y & R Brands SA
Michelle Perrow – Strategic Director, Lesoba Difference
Andrew Ambrogioni – CEO, Action Ambro’s
Prakash Patel – Head of Digital, Draftfcb Johannesburg
Etien van Loggerenberg – Territory Sales Manager – Africa, Maximizer Software Ltd
Bridgette Ward – Sales Manager, AdvanceNet Group

To book: email Marcia Minnaar at marcia@netactive.co.za 

Date: Thursday, 6 May, 2010
Time: 07h00 for 07h30 – 09h00
Venue: L’Incontro Ballroom, The Michelangelo Hotel,
Nelson Mandela Square, West Street, Sandown
Cost: R395 (subscribers to The Journal); R495 for non-subscribers (prices ex. VAT) includes breakfast and parking

It’s the first Journal of Marketing breakfast and Virtuosa once again are here giving live updates through Tweeting and Blogging to bring you all the news firsthand. Moderated by Jeremy Maggs this morning we are talking about Radio and why this medium is still relevant. The panel consists of Lance Rothschild (Media Consultant & Radio Commentator, Opportun(at)e), Norman Gibson – (GM, Radio Advertising Bureau) Omar Essack (Executive Director: Broadcasting, Kagiso Media) Andrew Smythe (GM Radio Sales & Alternative Revenue, SABC, Terry Volkwyn (CEO, Primedia Broadcasting).

Interesting for me is the panels diverse opinion around what role digital should be playing in radio stations. Some seem to be of the opinion that internet access in South Africa is not high enough to warrant really investing into it. I find these opinions surprising. Others on the panel recognise that digital is exploding and see this as an unique opportunity to offer an integrated approach to their listeners. What’s clear is that there is an uncertainty on how best to integrate digital with their offering and how to  manage the communities that are developing around the station and especially the websites.

If you want to read more about what was discussed during this morning session be sure to get your hands on an issue of the next Journal of Marketing.

Virtuosa will be at the event doing live Tweeting and blogging so get all the details here if you can’t be there on the day.

For those of you who couldn’t join us at today’s Mega Brand Forum you really did miss out! It was a great event, with wonderful insights and engagement from the Brand custodians and the Brand Champions.

There are however two more events coming up this year presented by The Journal of Marketing, so make sure you book early to avoid disappointment.

• 29 October: Retail Brands: How they stay on top
• 26 November: The annual conference

Suzanne Stevens is the General Manager: Marketing Services at Discovery Health and highlighted this about the brand:

• Discovery is a brand that has started in a product environment, 1993 company was established.
• We are in fact a very young brand.
• Using the discovery qualities to evolve our business
• At the core of everything that Discovery deliver is a clear vision, purpose.
• Our reason for being is to make people healthier and enhance our lives.
• We are extremely aware of the emotional and direct impact that we have on peoples lives.
• Nature of our business is that it reaches people at a critical point in peoples lives.
• Constantly listening and monitoring to what our customers are telling us.

Question from the audience: How to you deal with the fact that by not settling peoples claims you are perceived as thieves?

Suzanne: This really is a very complex industry and people don’t really understand how health care work. We pool peoples money and the way we pay out claims are regulated by very strict rules and regulations. Also you need to consider that there are really various stakeholders from the doctors /medical staff to the patients, it’s not that simple.

Enver Groenewald – GM Advertising Revenue @ Strategic Communications, Avusa Media LTD:If the Vitality program for some reason stopped to exist would your brand still thrive?

Suzanne: Absolutely Discovery can stand on its own two feet. In every dimension we track ourselves, on financial level, service level and product level.

A great and impressive speaker Xoliswa Ndungane, General Manager BMW Brand (South Africa) quickly made an impact on her audience. Here are some of the highlights:

• We have a manifesto at BMW that says we are here to bring joy, on the back of this three letter word we build a company. We are the custodian of emotions, we are the joy of driving, no car company can rival our history, rival our passion or see our vision.
• Innovation is our backbone by joy is in our hearts.
• We will give the world the keys to joy , others promise many thing we only make one promise and that is joy

Andy Rice – Chairman, Yellowwod Future Architects: How do you manage a  local market strategy with such an international brand?

Xoliswa: We have input in that strategy, we are not all the same target audience and especially in South Africa that is very true. So we can take global strategy and apply to local markets but we have to add what the local market is looking for. We have always tried to make it our mission although we follow the global strategy it needs to apply and appeal to the local market.

Dr Thomas Oosthuisen – BrandWealth: Your Product design has fundamental impact on your brand, why is it so that difference between Mercedes and BMW is becoming less?

Xoliswa: At BMW we have always been about performance, we don’t built cars for sissy. The reality is that this is a very male brand. But our competitors focus more on elegance. And the fact of the matter is that we rather see it as they becoming closer to us rather than us becoming closer to them.

Some key point from Wayne Duvenage, Chief Executive of Avis-Rent-A-Car during his time in the hot seat:

• Brand principles are very strong, driven by ambassador program. You can ask anybody in our organization from the tea lady to top executives and they will all be able to tell you.
• Our Brand promise, are you trying hard enough? People have to step up to the plate…
• Our Brand is very consistent,
• It’s important for us to listen to our customers, we have a culture of working hard and playing hard.
• Spend 2 and a half million a year to measure our customer service, all across the board from sales, reservations etc.
• We want to make sure that our Customer Service Index is moving to 90% and is constantly there
• Differentiating factor for us is our people, they are our ambassadors of our brand

Enver Groenewald – GM Advertising Revenue @ Strategic Communications, Avusa Media LTD: Anything you have done differently for international visitors coming for 2010?

Wayne: 2010 is going to be a sell out, but it’s also going to be a tough period for us because we can’t buy extra cars for just 6 weeks. But our focus is really on brand awareness for our international travelers. Making the whole experience quicker and more effective. There will however be a slight  25% price increase over the 2010 period, and we wont be able to offer any specials.

Jeremy Sampson – Group Executive Chairman, Interbrand Sampson Group: How do you as an international brand connect with the local market?

Wayne: We spend a lot of time understanding our markets, building our databases, we identify new markets all the time. The fact is most of our product innovation happens in South Africa.

Andy Rice – Chairman, Yellowwod Future Architects wants to know: Why after 26 years still so much confusion between Sun International and Southern Sun brands?

David Coutts-Trotter, Chief Executive (Sun International): There remains some confusion I agree but we are trying to create some strong association to the Sun brand. I think within the trade there is good knowledge, but the general public remains a challenge.

Jeremy Sampson – Group Executive Chairman, Interbrand Sampson Group: Do you have a post 2010 strategy?

David: I think it is one of our big challenges, but I believe we have strong locations and we are confident that we can fill them. We do believe that after 2010 you will see more international visitors in South Africa that will be great for the industry in general.