Scott Shu

Made a visit to TOMS world flagship store in Venice, CA. Meet with the strore manager to discuss about their store concept and experiential marketing.

(This is what happened when we talked about food during a night class...)

Got a chance to meet Mr. Tim Murphy et al. from Siltanen & Partners (S&P) last week. Interesting view into their work for Panda Express. Here are some fun facts:

Panda Express is NOT a franchise: over 1,500 stores are all owned by the Chinese couple!

38% of Panda's sales are from Orange Chicken

Before S&P, the brand never used Panda in their marketing campaigns

It's amazing to look at the scope of work that S&P does for Panda, from  typical ads to branding and overall strategy. They shared some of their most recent effort in transforming Panda from typical QSR/fast food to fast casual delivering natural, friendly and authentic customer experience. We went over the promotion of Panda's new dish - Samurai Surf & Turf. One key point made loud and clear to me was that product must go along with the promotion and strategy. As they are transitioning into a more premium feel fast casual, the product, Surf & Turf (premium tender marinated shrimp combined with premium juicy Angus Top Sirloin), perfectly echoes the strategy. 

Pleasure to meet Mike from KSL Media. We talked about Media Research and (then) Targeting.

Two key questions we should ask ourselves when we aim at targeting: 1)who am I trying to reach? 2)How can I reach them effectively. In order to answer these questions effectively, research is way to go. I was introduced to syndicated research. In comparison to Customized Research, Syndicated Research is a single research study conducted by a research company with its results available, for sale, to multiple companies [citation: Google]. Two major providers are Simmons and GfK. With quantitative data and information on Product, Behavior and Demographics, we can generate the Cross Tab Report, which gives us percentages and index ratings. From there, analytics go in and conduct Consumer Segmentation.

All of that may sound super complicated, and it is in fact pretty complicated. But wait for the but. In essence, it is just the process of converting Data into Information and eventually Business Intelligence. It provides insights into the mass consumers and that is invaluable from a strategist's perspective, account planner for example. During the team project for UGG, we successfully identified our target audience by extracting insights from 473 rows of data, which then enabled us to  come up with strategies accordingly and develop tactics specifically to them.

Watched a TED talk video featuring Elon Musk, the founder of Tesla, Paypal, SpaceX and SolarCity. Impressed by his boldness and futuristic vision.

Those ideas are noble indeed but more importantly, they all coming from a core cause. Whether it's the sustainable transportation and energy source for tomorrow or a faster, safer yet easier for electronic transactions in the digital age. With that in mind the product that came out that's already distributive and unique, while other companies are busy figuring out strategies to differentiate themselves from the competitors according to Porter. Though many would say what Elon is doing with Tesla is about improving the current automobile industries, to me Elon is reinventing it, or simply inventing a whole new category. Different from conventional car makers like Honda, Toyota, Nissan and VW etc, instead of improving the engine efficiency, Elon started from scratch - essentially, any parts you can't see is differently engineered. Combined, it is reaching Elon's goal of "building not just the best electric car, but the best car overall". 

#Web 2.0 #Search #Youtube #Google Glass #Android #Nexus #Google Maps #SEO #Gmail #Chrome #Google Earth #Street View #Google+ ...

This is the company only magic can describe. This is the brand associate with the best innovation on the planet earth and incredible goodwill. This is Google.

I feel so blessed to visit the famous binoculars Google LA office (former Chiat/Day site). After signing a NDA, we jumped right into the insightful session. We went over various google ad tactics and products in 5 different areas: SEARCH, DISPLAY, VIDEO/YOUTUBE, MOBILE and SOCIAL. I won't go into more details of those because of the NDA I signed, but I'd love to just drop some personal thoughts.

OK, Youtube is (still) one of the most potential products I see across the digital landscape. Potentially, it could be much bigger for advertising than Google Search, which google is known for, in the near future. Essentially,  Youtube is an search engine (actually the 2nd largest search engine according to market research, much bigger than MS Bing and Yahoo). One key difference/advantage to Google Search is that it hosts/owns all of its content/results. This is huge considering YT as a content provider. With the fast development in telecom technology (ex. LTE) and the rocketing mobile adoption rate, video watching is becoming a bigger part of our lives. (TV) "Spots" have been undoubtedly losing its value for advertisers; "dots" are too boring and stagnant. Thus, with easier access in the very near future, videos have the opportunity to formalize its stance in advertising.

One thing about Google that always impresses me is their vision and long-term strategy. With proper conversion tool and "push" at the right time, video advertising is likely to have an astounding growth. The behind-the-scene visit to Google really amazed me with how much strategic thinking and analytical research that goes in - to be magical is more than just magic. (Sounds familiar?)

"Not ______ enough"

Met with Angela Pih from SelectNY as the mentor for the TV dinner reinvention project. Very inspiring and helpful. 

Much thorough thinking was inspired by the way Ms. Pih constructed her questions. Most importantly, together we discovered some human truth behind our target audience - young professionals a.k.a. "Urban Slaves".

As entry-level employees (most likely), they are fully occupied by various events throughout the day. Take assistants for example, they'd probably spend their day busy taking care of all kinds of tasks from their bosses (whether work related or not). In the mean time, they have to stay sharp and proactive, because a good assistant not only performs assigned tasks well but think in the boss's shoe and anticipate possible events -  being an assistant that GETS IT!

During this early but crucial stage of their career, food becomes a nice addition to them, not necessity like it used to be, especially healthy/good food. Now that's where our reinvented TV dinner finds its place - the product that takes care of you (young professionals) while you are busy taking care of others - a product that gets you. We understand your struggle with healthy eating; understand why you scarifies your lunch to do some extra unassigned work; we understand what you want from having a meal and we understand your lifestyle - we'll take care of you. With the saved time and energy (opportunity cost), you can have the flexibility to do greater things at work, to change your entree for tomorrow, to send a free meal to your friend or a connection you want to re-connect, to take a walk outside...

Sometimes what you really need is Listen.

What a fun session with Guto Araki, Associate Creative Director at TBWA\Chiat\Day LA!

Breaking the norm, we started off working on a creative project for Gatorade Sports drink. Each team was asked to develop their own creative campaign, whether it's a print ad, TV spot or digital. 

Our team of four decided to adopt the brainstorming methodology learned at Deutsch LA, which individually we will throw out ANY ideas on a sheet of paper for an intense five-minute period of time, come together and have mini pitches to the group and combine all the good points mentioned into a comprehensive plan - sort of like a concentrated orange juice with all the goodies.

Then we pitched to the room with our big idea: a social mobile app where our audience can snap "Vine" like looping videos of them playing sports and share with others (friends, followers and sports celebrities). Studies have shown that there're currently more active users on Vine than Facebook among high schoolers - and they are exactly the target audience for Gatorade. In the creative brief, the underlying role of Gatorade I captured was being the essential fuel. Thus, we envisioned this app to be the fuel, to encourage and motivate people to go out and exercise, to show off their athletic skills, instead of sitting on a couch and mess around with their smartphones (to me, that's becoming a disorder of our generation).

To achieve that, we had to understand the truth/real reason/why people use Facebook alike social media sites - Accountability and Unity (thanks Rad). It goes way beyond just a functioning website where you can post text, photos, videos and share them. It's about your brand, your image and status. Vine goes a bit further by adding emphasis on the fun element and motion capture capability. 

Having the "why" question figured out, it's time for the "Why not" question (thanks Dietmar)! Why not leverage both and synergies the project? Thus, we went on into more details in developing our campaign with key factors, such as #social #mobile #gamification #interactive #engaging #celebrity influences, in mind (buzz words after all, that's what # is for).

Anyways, it was a real pleasure to work with Mr. Araki, my team and my mind. Many interesting campaigns by other teams and inspiring showcase of successful and "unsuccessful" work for Gatorade and Adidas straight from Chiat/Day creative team!

"Sometimes I’ll mention Don Draper and Mad Men when I try to explain what I do. Being a creative director is little bit like that minus all of the smoking and drinking and cheating."