By S. A. Habib, founder of Locomotion Creative in Nashville, Tennessee,

Roughly 86% of respondents in a survey conducted by Locomotion Creative in Nashville say they expect social media to impact the way companies do business and generate sales. Additionally, 64% believe their competitors are probably incorporating social media into their strategic plans.
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by Sarah Crawley-Boevey, Brand Republic.

Mobile marketing is set to take off as major brands look to invest in the platform over the next five years, according to an independent survey commissioned by O2.

The survey shows brands will have increased their spend on mobile marketing by 150% come 2013 and do not anticipate any impact on budgets as a result of the economic downturn.

The survey, which was carried out by Vanson Bourne in May this year and included marketing and IT directors at 100 leading brands, also found that the personalised nature of mobile marketing campaigns means they generate a higher response rate than traditional advertising.

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Mozilla, the company behind the Firefox browser, has released technology that helps websites detect the physical location of computers. The system will allow users, for instance, to find local restaurants when they travel to a new town.

The Geode project is an experimental add-on ahead of a full blown launch of geolocation technology in version 3.1 of Firefox.

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How do you build brands post-Google? As the recession begins to bite, brands are finding that getting through to customers is tougher than ever.

Offline advertising is showing diminishing returns. McKinsey predicts that by 2010, traditional television advertising will be one-third as effective as it was in 1990.

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Interesting article relating to the use of communication and digital technology used to support the race for the presidential election written by Andrew Mernin, The Journal and Herb Kim, Codeworks, the North East’s Centre for Digital Excellence.

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Back in the 1950s, the advertising agency JWT had a client, Kraft, that wanted to sell more processed cheese. But rather than create an ad campaign that told people that cheese tastes great, or is good for them, JWT invented the cheeseburger.

By Michael Nutley, editor-in-chief of NMA (Original Article)

At least, that’s the story. And there are other examples of this kind of agency thinking; JWT again, tasked with selling more high quality flour, invented the Mr Kipling brand and sold the flour in the form of cakes.

Sometime between then and now, the advertising industry changed. It went from being the preserve of generalists who solved their clients’ business problems, to specialists who made ads. But in the digital sector at least, that’s changing.

This was one of the key themes that emerged as I was working on the introduction to NMA’s Top 100 Interactive Agencies guide, published on 27.09.07. Agency heads across the spectrum of creative and media talked about clients asking for a different kind of work.

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SOME of the sharpest minds from the worlds of technology, media, mobile, culture and science wowed an audience of 400 delegates in North East England recently.

The Thinking Digital conference, which took place at the Sage Gateshead on 21-23 May, featured a hugely eclectic line-up of speakers – including a biologist who believes we can actually cure the ageing process, and one of the world’s leading inventors.

For more information please visit www.codeworks.net, www.thinkingdigital.co.uk or read the full article here.

Anyone who missed the event can catch the highlights on a special edition of Sky News’s ‘Technofile’ technology programme. Check it out at http://video.news.sky.com/skynews/video?videoSourceID=1317150&flashURL=feeds/skynews/latest/flash/technofile_240508_1000.flv

Better Brand Agency, based in North Yorkshire, has launched providing web design and website development services.

The agency based in The Springboard Centre, in Stokesley, significantly improve how businesses talk with their audiences across their marketing channels through our Brand, Design, Marketing, Social Media, Web and Digital services.

We have big agency capability with small agency hunger and customer focus.

Our core business is brand and digital communication. The team at Better Brand Agency are ‘Core messages specialists’, skilled practitioners with 30 years of accumulated experience positioning brands, aligning marketing channels with audiences and providing brand clarity.

We offer a powerful mix of industry experience that encompasses strong blue chip brand marketing and a deep knowledge of web technology and social media.

For more information about our services please visit our Brand, Graphic Design, Marketing, Social Media and Social Networking,  Web and Digital pages. If you would like to get in touch please give us a call or drop us an email. Alternatively, you can submit our short Contact Form and we’ll get back to you.

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