Ypulse Guest Interview: Zia Zareem-Slade & Paul Dawson, EMC Conchango
Posted by meredith on 06-30-2009
Today’s Ypulse Guest Post is from Alexandra Suhner a London-based trend forecaster who sat down with Zia Zareem-Slade and Paul Dawson from UK tech agency EMC Conchango. If you work in youth media or marketing and have an idea for a Ypulse Guest Post, feel free to email me.
Ypulse Interview: Zia Zareem-Slade and Paul Dawson EMC Conchango
Late last year I attended the Drapers’s Record conference in London, and one of the most interesting talks was from Zia Zareem-Slade, Head of Experience Planning at EMC Conchango. She talked about how brands can use social networking effectively with some very interesting case studies and success stories.
I managed to track her down in London, and she agreed to answer some of my questions about the work they do at EMC Conchango. Paul Dawson, Experience Director at EMC Conchango, made some interesting points as well.
Ypulse: Can you tell me how Conchango approaches social networking or online marketing strategies aimed at tweens, teens, and young adults?
Zia Zareem-Slade: I think this will be obvious to anyone who works in youth marketing, but it’s critical to look hard at what the audience already does in this space. This is the most connected generation ever and their attitudes and approach to technology are vastly different to the generation even only 5 years older than them.
If you already thought that it was important in youth marketing to stay on top of trends, then this digital world moves even faster still. While many companies were coming to grips with MySpace a few years ago, pretty much a whole generation of early teens in the UK migrated pretty much overnight to the social networking site Bebo, and the brand advertisers wondered where their audience had gone.
Ethnographic research is key here. Not simply getting the latest trends analysis, but participating in the communities they inhabit to get a real feel for how they work. This is the approach that we would take before determining what will be the best strategy for a given medium, or how best to reach particular groups.
The group we are most on top of at any time is the ‘Millennials’, the group that grew up with the internet and mobile telephone through their [formative] years, and we have to challenge ourselves often not to be assumptive that the behaviors and attitudes exhibited by this group are common in the generations below them.
Paul Dawson: Interestingly, we still talk in terms of Gen X and Gen Y, but we’ve really discovered that we now have to think much more in terms of “micro-generations” where we segment up into much tighter behavioral groups based on which point in their lives they began to be exposed to these technologies.
YP: Tell us about a successful campaign you have worked on recently, and what made it work?
PD: First, it’s important to understand that we’re not a campaign driven agency. Everything we do is around consumer engagement, driving acquisition, brand and loyalty but we do this through creating things that are functional and fit into people’s lives much more permanently than a campaign. The concept of “brand as utility” is one we hold dear. It’s far more likely you’ll generate emotional engagement with people when you do something that genuinely they find useful and enjoyable every day of their lives.
ZZ: A good example of this would be when we worked with River Island, the High Street fashion retailer, who are very much a part of [British] teen life these days.
For them we had an ongoing process of “Experience Planning” where we got out into their customer base and probed around not only their attitudes and behaviors with River Island, but more widely about the context in which these interactions happen. In other words, what tools, technologies and media are they using to support those interactions. You quickly discover not only the dozen or so “I love River Island” Facebook groups, but also how they are using tools like Windows Live Messenger, to swap ideas and recommendations, or to get peer input and approval on their fashion choices.
It’s this contextual analysis that helps us formulate web and social media related strategies that ultimately resulted in a new eCommerce website that will be launched later this year, that we know will fit well with the behaviors and attitudes of their audience.
YP: Which social networking tools are the most effective in terms of marketing new products? What about generating brand awareness? Do you have any tips for brands who are new to using social networking?
PD: It’s important to remember that you have to start giving and proving your worth before you can start taking. This generation is cynical about marketing. They simply don’t believe the hype, and they expect to talk directly to brands; and they expect to be listened to. So spend time listening and observing, and then when you’ve worked out how you can add value, start participating in a contributory fashion. Only when you’ve got the trust and credibility in the community can you begin leveraging it for marketing and promotion.
What is clear is that brands or products that people don’t like simply don’t do well in social spaces. Social media in itself is not going to save your brand or product. Unless you can get people to love it or you first, you’re doomed from the outset. It is very possible to overturn brand perceptions in social spaces, but you have to be working from a solid base of confidence in your product. If you’re not confident in that product, then the best way to use the social space is to ask that community for help. Acknowledge quickly that you know that they don’t like you, and ask how to make it better. But again, there has to be value in return. They won’t do it just because you ask, you’ve got to give them something to believe that this is worth doing – and it’s not 20% off their next purchase!
YP: Are there any new or upcoming social networking/online tools that brands should be looking out for?
ZZ: This is an environment where these tools and brands come and go very quickly. You do not have to be first in to make something work, so don’t go diving into brand new initiatives with huge investments until you see how they pan out against others. What you absolutely have to do though, is take the time and effort to look at and play with all the tools that come about. But don’t just do it once and think you’ve got the measure of it; the community can dramatically change what a particular social tool does.
PD: For example, take a look at how Twitter has been transformed by the way people use it. On Twitter in 2006, there was no concept of an “@ reply.” What happened was that people began simply “directing’ their Tweets ‘at’ someone using the convention of ‘@username’.” It was only when Twitter themselves and the people who develop Twitter clients cottoned on to this, and began using the @username to filter the public timeline that the “@reply” was transformed from a thing that a few people did, to a built-in part of the Twitter operating environment, leading Twitter to become much more conversational than the original broadcast medium that it was.
ZZ: Twitter may not be how you engage your own audience, but it’s a hugely valuable source of buzz to help inform you about where you should be looking next. And by the way, @poleydee and @ziaz will help you too!
More on Alexandra Suhner
Alexandra Suhner is a London-based trend forecaster, marketing consultant, and creative director seeking new appointments within fashion or creative companies. She specializes in cultural, marketing and lifestyle trends, with a focus on youth culture and European geographies and also teaches 16 to 18 year old students at a fashion vocational school in London. She writes a blog for Fashion Trendsetter.
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Categorized under: International, Youth Marketing