International Marketer’s Blog

Mobile telecoms companies in India are predicted to spend highly on advertising this year to achieve their global brand ambitions.

The roll out of 3G technology, global objectives and new brand communications mean that the telecoms sector will be spending heavily, with advertising and marketing agencies in hot pursuit.

As the telecoms sector enters a new phase of expansion, brands have to be refreshed and tailored to meet new market conditions.

In a year that has seen some aggressive 3G spectrum bids, industry giants Reliance Communications and Airtel have sought new agencies as part of rethinking their marketing processes.

Airtel, India’s biggest mobile services provider, has had to reposition for global brand consistency in the wake of international acquisitions. While advertising had previously been inspirational and patriotic, Airtel must now craft new campaigns to build its global brand image. (more…)

Taiwanese smartphone maker HTC has moved into the Chinese market this week, with the introduction of a series of models under its own brand name and partnerships with two key Chinese firms.

In a bid to develop market share in the world’s largest mobile phone market, the company is joining forces with China’s largest mobile operator China Mobile and Gome Electrical Appliances Holding, China’s largest electronics retailer, to market HTC phones.

An article in the Financial Times yesterday, highlights the fact that despite Taiwan’s proximity to China and a shared language and culture, HTC chose to launch first as a brand in Europe, followed by the US, before introducing itself to Chinese consumers.

According to the FT, there are a number of reasons why the company has thought global first and local second. The challenge for Taiwanese tech players has been to find global brand solutions, in order to turn themselves from contract manufacturers, operating on slim margins, into global brands. Some Taiwanese companies have tried to operate all retail outlets themselves, or relied on national-level operators. In a country the size of China, provincial networks and outsourcing are more effective. (more…)

Unilever has struck a multi-million dollar global deal with Apple, which will see it become the consumer goods presenting sponsor on the new iAd platform.

The move marks the FMCG giant tapping into what it sees as the two most significant current marketing trends: globalisation and mobile digital media.

To date, Unilever has used online marketing tools on a country-by-country basis. This deal will enable the company to expand its digital work on a truly global scale.

The first iAd campaign will be for its Dove Men Plus Care range, which is already sold in markets across the US, Europe, Asia and Latin America, but other Unilever brands are tipped to follow, including Axe, Lipton and Ben & Jerry’s.

Mobile media is what makes this deal significantly global. According to AdMob (Google’s mobile ad network), more than 60% of iPhones and over 55% of iPhones, iPod Touches and iPads are outside of the US.

“We completely believe mobile is going to be the way the vast majority of the world gets online the next few years, especially in developing and emerging markets,” said Babs Rangaiah, Unilever’s VP-global communications planning, who led negotiations on the deal. “Given our footprint in India, Brazil and around the world, that’s very important to us.” (more…)

Mobile communications brand BlackBerry is poised to launch a series of global campaigns developed by a new advertising agency, The Next Door.

The Next Door, led by a bevy of ad industry names (former Lowe creative director Greg Milbourne, former global planning director for IPG Team Nokia, Kieron Monahan and Pete Atherton, former director of Inferno), has just launched with Jamie Oiver Pasta Sauces another founding client.

Its owners claim that the agency will reflect clients’ changing needs, particularly in terms of procurement. To this end, The Next Door will charge creative, planning and account handling fees without mark-ups or extra charges for production or outsourced services.

Recently, ISBA president Mark Hunter stressed the need for transparency of marketing campaign costs and a system of payment by results.

The Next Door team will lead on ideas and strategy, working with a network of “complementary, non-competitive, specialist partner companies� called The Neighbourhood’, that will offer specialist knowledge and enable global campaign implementation.

Greg Milbourne commented on the changing advertising landscape:“Clients want great ideas and sound advice on how best to maximise the impact of their campaigns. But traditional agency structures, with competing specialist business units each concerned about their own bottom line, often distort thinking across disciplines, meaning great creative ideas lose their potency. (more…)

Yahoo and Nokia have struck a deal to strengthen their mobile internet offerings, a partnership that will let both companies broaden their global reach, particularly in emerging markets. The move comes in the face of fierce pressure from competitors Google, with its Android operating system, and Apple’s iPhone.

Yahoo will provide its email and instant messaging services on all Nokia handsets, where they will be integrated into its Ovi Mail and Chat services. This will be branded ‘powered by Yahoo’.

Nokia will supply its Ovi Maps service onto Yahoo’s online and mobile pages, which will be branded as ‘Yahoo Maps, powered by Ovi’, a move to help Yahoo stand its own against Google’s mapping applications.

For Nokia, the deal means access to content that will bolster its applications. Mapping services have been the company’s strongest asset since it acquired Navteq, an electronic map company, for $8.1bn (£5.6bn) in 2007. As reported earlier this month on the Freedman blog, Nokia is the world’s largest mobile phone manufacturer, but has lost market share since the launch of the popular iPhone and Android services. (more…)

Finnish mobile phone manufacturer Nokia has appointed its first global head of digital marketing as it turns to online marketing tools to help re-establish itself in the high-end smartphone market and to improve the performance of its international marketing efforts.

Craig Hepburn, former e-commerce head at STA Travel is to step into the newly-created role, which will involve overseeing the brand’s entire digital media activity, leveraging new channels to invigorate the marketing process. He will report to Carol Soriano, the brand’s director of marketing activation. According to a report in New Media Age, Hepburn has said he will focus on increasing brand visibility via social media platforms.

Nokia continues to roll out a range of global campaign executions, in a bid to battle fierce competition from the likes of Apple in the fast-growing market for high-end phones which double as mini computers. Although Nokia is the largest mobile phone manufacturer, with a 36.4% market share globally in 2009, according to Gartner it has lost ground since 2007 with the launch of Apple’s iPhone and various Android devices.

Hepburn’s appointment is just part of a far wider structural and managerial shake-up designed to improve the brand’s performance in this fiercely competitive landscape. “We are working hard to reclaim leadership in high-end smartphones and mobile computers,â€� said CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, who has also admitted that Nokia is facing rising competition from Chinese manufacturers at the lower end of the market. (more…)