2) Anticipated Events:
Brands should prepare for external events which are anticipated beforehand. Events such as the birth of Prince Williams and Duchess Kate's son.
Ex: HBO had no idea how many Emmy's it would win this year so they made social media content for all possible eventualities and the 'right' content went live in real-time.
3) Predictive-Analytics based:
The flood of Big Data today enables smart brands to push products, services or coupons to customers based on insights gathered from the data trail customers leave whenever they shop online. This is a field expected to grow exponentially in the near future as it becomes easier and easier to analyse Big Data.
Ex: Amazon, ever the pioneer, uses data analysis to offer customers recommendations, based on their browsing and shopping history.
4) Customer Interaction:
Customer interaction can take many forms: Right from complaints, redressal, customer suggestions, crowd-sourcing ideas for new products to community interactions on social media platforms. The public, visible and possibly viral nature of customer interactions these days has turned it into a marketing opportunity.
Ex: Pretzel Crisps listens for people on Twitter who claim to be hungry. They are then offered Pretzel product samples for free in real-time, bringing in new customers to the brand.
5) Breaking News:
The riskiest and also the most rewarding form of RTM may be in responding to unanticipated Breaking news where-in the brand has to leverage the said event in a way which is beneficial to the brand, but more importantly stays relevant to the event. Since advance preparation is almost impossible, a sufficient amount of spontaneity is called for along with some caution.
Ex: Coca-Cola Philippines announced that they were suspending all local advertising for a month to donate the money towards the Typhoon Haiyan Disaster Recovery Fund. This message of Coke donating $2.5 million towards a cause earned Coke significant mileage, respect and recognition around the world no amount of advertising could have gathered after they chose to use Real-Time Marketing through their social media channels to maximise the impact of their noble announcement.
Conclusion
Brands should understand that it is not just the big news stories which will make or break your brand but how you casually enter into everyday conversations that will differentiate you and make a lasting impact over the long term, so much so that your Brand becomes a trusted voice of opinion, a witty smart alec with the most awesome comebacks or the first source of information for your consumers, whatsoever you desire your Brand to be.
As we end, I leave you with the one time, Oreo , the erstwhile king of Real Time Marketing, were left with a taste of their own medicine when AMC Theatres in the US came out with a killer comeback to Oreo's provocative taunt!
S Abhishek
Institute - SCMHRD,Pune
20
FMS Scholastic Council