Being a brand in the digital age is tough. Whether its being the first to new platforms, organizing and executing for “real-time marketing” or just being funny on social, companies have a lot to live up to these days.
Our favorite brand stories from this past year highlight these challenges — and offer some marketing guidance from unlikely sources, like comedians and street artists and a certain frowning feline. Here are five editors’ picks from Digiday:
1. Grumpy Cat: From Feline Meme to Brand Purrrfection
“In just under a year since having her photo first uploaded to reddit, Grumpy Cat has morphed into a full-fledged celebrity – and profitable brand. She is the new face of Friskies and has graced the pages of The Wall Street Journal and landed on the cover of New York Magazine’s ‘Boom Brands 2013’ issue, which estimated her net worth at $1 million and growing.”
2. The Banksy Guide to Modern Marketing
“Whatever your thoughts are about his art, Banksy is undeniably a brilliant marketer. In the ADD age, he flirts with controversy and polarizing topics in a smart way.”
3. The Louis C.K. Guide to Marketing
“If there’s one thing that’s apparent from C.K.’s messaging and his approach to his products, it’s that he respects his customers. Marketing emails from him are rare, the checkout process for purchasing material on his site is simple and easy to use, and he’s completely transparent and honest about where the money is going.”
4. #Brand #Hashtags #Will #Never #Die
“Hashtags have been around for almost six years now, and while you might think their ubiquity would render them less effective as a marketing tool, many brands appear to believe otherwise. Brands are still gung-ho about using hashtags for organizing conversations and pushing campaigns.”
5. Brands Try for Some Personality
“[F]or brands to sound human and make sure every word they put out on social media is approved and fits in with the brand voice is clearly the opposite of how humans talk and use social — unless you are some kind of personal brand nazi. But brand execs don’t think being human is impossible.
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‘We need an ad exchange for identity’: Overheard at the Digiday Programmatic Marketing Summit
Brand and agency executives discussed the state of cookieless identifiers, ad tech firms attempting to become one-stop shops and the extent to which ads should and shouldn’t be personalized.
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Five years in, the GDPR has had a double-edged impact on the ad market
When it launched in 2018 the GDPR was hailed as a privacy superhero of sorts. It set the rules for how companies handle personal data, making sure they couldn’t just grab it without someone’s permission.
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SponsoredHow enterprise-grade CDPs are enhancing data processes and improving customer experiences
Produced in partnership with Marketecture The following article highlights an interview between Martin Kihn, Salesforce’s senior vice president of Marketing Cloud, and Ari Paparo, founder and CEO of Marketecture Media. Register to watch more of the discussion and learn how brands are making the most of enterprise-grade CDP technologies. As brands expand across channels and […]
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GroupM’s JiYoung Kim calls for programmatic innovation and cites creative as an area in need
During a session at the Digiday Programmatic Marketing Summit, the agency executive cited ad creative as one specific area in need of innovation.
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Digiday+ Research: Agencies choose contextual targeting over first-party data in post-cookie era
Three-quarters of agencies are actively preparing for the end of the third-party cookie, and 70% said they're doing so by spending more on contextual targeting campaigns.
