WPP’s Group M slashes UK adspend forecast to just 1.5 per cent – if we’re lucky
WPP media buyer Group M has slashed its growth forecast for total UK adspend in 2011 from 3.6 per cent to just 1.5 per cent. It says UK TV growth will be just one per cent (from a previous forecast of...
View ArticleFacebook cost per click price up 74 per cent, display rates up 45 per cent
Facebook may still have its doubters as an effective advertising medium but that hasn’t stopped a tidal wave of big brand ad money flowing into the social network site. New research by Facebook...
View ArticleUK adspend drops back but it could be worse (and probably will be)
Adspend levels in the UK declined for the first time in more than a year during the second quarter of 2011, according to the latest Advertising Association/Warc Expenditure Report. Ad revenues fell by...
View ArticleBlacks’ demise shows why strong brand values really earn their keep in...
There exists conventional wisdom in business that in a recession there are winners and losers. Some businesses can do very well during a downward cycle. Also I’ve heard and read many times over the...
View ArticleGratterpalm’s Simon Kendrew: why retailers need to make a friend of technology
Simon Kendrew is digital director of Gratterpalm, the Leeds-based UK retail advertising specialist whose clients include Asda, Greggs, Office Depot, Arla Foods and Morphy Richards. Here he explains why...
View ArticleCreative agency Holler wins Liam Gallagher’s fashion brand Pretty Green
Former Oasis singer Liam Gallagher’s fashion brand Pretty Green has appointed Holler to handle its digital communications and other promotional work. Holler will work alongside brand agency Neighbour....
View ArticleWhy FCUK has turned into a brand iceberg for French Connection
Several times in the past I’ve written about the challenges of managing brands from the top of companies, in particular in a turbulent trading environment like the one we find ourselves in. According...
View ArticleBuy an IKEA bed and have it away in Thailand
And now for something in the great tradition of Opel cars that break down, but only in Spain – and Pepsi Cola that brings your ancestors back from the grave, if you’re Chinese. The IKEA Redalen bed, on...
View ArticleHigh street retailers are disappearing – and so will marketers if they don’t...
I got a bit of a shock wandering around Barnes High Street last weekend. Where are all the shops? For those who don’t know London, Barnes is a well-heeled, leafy, village-like community, just south of...
View ArticleThe key to managing big data for marketers is the proper use of tag management
For marketers to take advantage of the power of data, they are increasingly turning to more seamless integration with vendor partners via advanced tag management argues James Sandoval (left), managing...
View ArticleWhat do fashionable Milan and ‘live well for less’ Sainsburys have in common?
Travel broadens the mind, as they say, and I certainly benefited from this mind-developing effect after a trip that included a few days in Milan. The broadening of the mind was nothing to do with the...
View ArticleWhy the time to worry in business is when your research says you’re doing...
With all of the worrying news on the UK retail scene (Comet, Jessops, now HMV) it makes me wonder to what extent management of these companies genuinely listen to what the great unwashed actually...
View ArticlePure signs up ais London to help cashmere go digital
The fashion business, by and large, has proved remarkably resilient in the recession. Some big names, Aquascutum and Jaeger, have hit the buffers but such brands always seem to live on under another...
View ArticleWPP goes fishing to land digital agency Salmon
We often muse in these pages about quite what sort of company WPP is and, more pertinently perhaps, what sort of company it intends to be. For years the assumption was that founder and CEO Sir Martin...
View ArticleWH Smith’s sure-fire recipe for success: scandalous prices and poor service...
I was glancing through a few year end results and spotted WH Smith, a retailer I have a grudge with. The bottom line is sales down, margins up. Sounds like a miracle in retail at the moment. So how do...
View ArticleThe new M&S advertising won’t turn this fading star’s graph from decline to...
Over the last year or so I’ve compared the advertising output of M&S and John Lewis several times; last Christmas I gave a thumbs down for M&S and thumbs up for John Lewis. Neither was an...
View ArticleGeorge Parker: how Thanksgiving became ‘Black Friday’
In case you missed it, today is Thanksgiving in the US, which is one of the very few days workers get the day off with pay, unless you’re in retail, but more on that in a moment. As I have written in...
View ArticleB&Q new broom Moss turns to old chums at WCRS
Giant UK D-I-Y retailer B&Q has moved its £45m account to WCRS after dumping Karmarama before Christmas, a move which won’t surprise anybody very much. WCRS pitched for the account against...
View ArticleTaj Sohal: people show more brand loyalty shopping by mobile – and they tend...
With the continued rise of the internet people are changing the way they research, purchase and interact with brands. Convenience and the need to do things on the go have led to mobile apps and...
View ArticlePaul Vallois: Will this Christmas be another missed opportunity for digital?
The clocks may have only just gone back, but the Christmas lights are already up in London’s Oxford Street, Selfridges’ Christmas shop’s tills have been ringing for months and the first Christmas TV...
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