June 22 2016
Big Ideas
Author: Stewart Moffatt, Dan Nicholson, Myles Barr & Whitney Dencklau
On the second episode of Sherpa’s Talking Shop Podcast the
Sherpa team has a round table discussion on a few interesting topics. They discuss
Drakes marketing presence, Tim Horton’s recent commercial and end off with a
monthly marketing tip that is linked to the popular topic about concussions.
You get to hear insight from Sherpa’s Account Manager Stew Moffatt as
he hosts the podcast. Then here our three guests’ perspectives, Dan Nicholson
as our Digital Marketing Specialist, Myles Barr as our Junior Account Manager and
our last guest Whitney Dencklau as she offers her American outlook on the
various topics.
What’s Hot
1. Drake/Snapchat
Drake
is constantly blowing Sherpa away from a marketing perspective.
Recently Drake stood out from the crowd with his unique Snapchat
filter. The lens was a great marketing
tool to introduce his new album “Views from the 6” that was released the day
the filter went live on Snapchat. One of
our Sherpa employees even interacted with the filter without even knowing it
was for his new album. This filter
helped spread awareness and kept people talking about the new album release. It was a very unique filter choice that allowed
user to interact with the product and apply it to their daily life. Can’t ask
for better engagement from your core market then this technique.
Snapchat is a
powerful tool, it is getting more and more popular. The social media platform has a lot of reach,
each time a user shares a story they are sharing with all their peers. A filter like Drakes would have reached a
mass amount of people. Even at Sherpa majority of us are avid Snapchat users
and we love the chance to share a visual representation of what we are doing. Like they say a picture is worth a 1000 words
or in Snapchats case a 10 second video.
2. Instagram
Instagram is offering a new advertising method which features a video roll on their sponsored ad. When
you swipe right on the video you will be able to view another video. This new ad can roll out five separate videos
in one single ad. Giving the marketer five
minutes of ad space as each video can be up to 60 seconds long. This will be an exciting new feature that
will grab the viewers’ attention on Instagram.
In recent news another popular conversation that has
received a lot of attention is the new logo and rebrand that Instagram released. Here at Sherpa we have been asking the
question “why would you make a new modernized logo when your old logo was so
recognizable?” Sherpa has noticed the
new logo blends in when looking through your phone. This dilutes the Instagram brand since the
old logo could be spotted out easily from anywhere. This has Sherpa asking the question “Why
change something that had such a strong brand presence?”
Even though there are many negative thoughts about the
rebrand this new brand logo has received a lot of attention from marketers
across the world. Everyone noticed the
drastic change and continue to talk about it. This is one way to get people talking about
Instagram even if it hasn’t been in the most positive light.

3. Heat Assault
Check out the new Heat Assault website created by Sherpa Marketing. Heat Assault manufactures the most powerful
bed bug heating equipment on the market. The unit produces jaw dropping
temperatures of 140F and is a 100% people and pet friendly eradication method.
Heat Assault’s new site combines modern design with
impressive functionality. Sherpa crunched five years of bed bug incidence data
to create a demand breakdown map and built a profit calculator to allow pest
control companies and prospective entrepreneurs to project monthly incomes.
Heat Assault’s site has seen an increase in web traffic and Sherpa has
integrated Heat Assault’s CRM system with the website database to ensure that
all website conversions are tracked accordingly. We are very happy with the results of this
project, check out the difference between the old and new website below.
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New Website
http://heat-assault.com/
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Q & A?
What does Sherpa
think about the NBA putting Advertising on their Jerseys?
Starting during the 2017-18 NBA season teams will be allowed
to sell a 2.5-inch-by-2.5-inch space for corporate logo to go on their jerseys,
the NBA is referring to this as the “patch program”. This will make the NBA the first of the four major
US sports (NBA, MLB, NFL and NHL) to put advertising space on their regular season
jersey. The program is estimated to
bring in $100 million a year and the money will be split with the league and
the players on the team. Nike will be on
every jersey of the 29 league teams after taking over from Adidas after their
11 year contract ended. But after
hearing this news we still have a lot of questions about how this will look and
so do other NBA viewers out there.
·
How will they decide on advertisements for the
team if they are competitors of one of the player’s endorsements?
·
Would a top performing team influence where you
advertise? Or is location more of a
factor?
·
Will it be one ad per team, or multiple? How will the layout look for this advertising
piece?
From a marketing perspective, the first couple years is when
you would want to get an advertisement on the NBA jerseys. The first few years is when people will take
notice of them and be talking about the new change. The NBA has made this a 3-year pilot program
to see if this new system will in fact work out. It would be beneficial to position yourself
based on performance. If you have your
logo on a top team it would be seen a lot more based on viewership alone. This advertising will be great for companies
targeting the NBA market, especially with the decline of people watching live television
which means they are completely missing the commercials. These brands can spend less money on
television ads and use this new advertising method as an opportunity to connect
with their consumers. We are intrigued
to see how this will be executed and which brands will be involved.
How to get better
performance out of E-blasts?
People often look at E-blasts as an outdated medium, but
they get the greatest results time and time again with their click-through
rates. This medium receives higher success
because you are going straight to the individual and with the popularity of smart
phones people are constantly in their inbox all day. Here are a few of the tips we use at Sherpa
to get the best performance with our e-blasts:
·
Integrate
Video: In Sherpa’s experience on a recent campaign we used the integration
of video into our e-blast and we saw a huge response back. It is an easy way to
incorporate a short message that your audience will actually view.
·
Creative
Headlines: It is important to use a creative headline. The more you can do to stand out and get
attention the better. Viewers will be
more likely to click on the email and read it if you catch their eye with a
great headline. Disruptive titles have
been very successful for companies in the past as they draw in those
click-through rates.
·
Follow-up
with another email: A personal follow-up email will help your response
rate, it makes the reader feel the personal connection.
·
Timing of
Emails: The Sherpa Team has noticed the timing of emails is a huge factor in
open rates. It is valuable to analyze
the analytics as open rates will vary depending on the industry you are
emailing.
·
Focus on
specific Segments: If you send your e-blast to a targeted group it allows
you to share content that is more relevant to the reader. They will find more value in your email and
they will reach out for further business.
Best and Worst Ads
of the Week
BEST: Airbnb
At Sherpa we really enjoyed the Airbnb ad. This ad focuses on what their brand is about and
not primarily on the product or service they are trying to sell. During the ad they are stressing the
experience and the emotional connection you build while traveling which really
draws in the consumer. Airbnb did an
amazing job of setting themselves apart from their competitors. In their ad they showed travellers that you
don’t have to stay on the hotel strip to see the country, you can have a more
enriched experience by living with the locals and actually experiencing the
country from a local perspective.
WORST: Tim Hortons
The Tim Hortons commercial was not a favourite of ours as we
found it very unrealistic. We believe the concept of the commercial doesn’t make
sense as collecting used coffee cups are not commonly saved as memories. The emotional connection they were aiming for
was lost as we could not relate to this concept. We are more likely to have a collection of
photos or memorabilia for those important memories. In summary the ad has been played one too
many time, and it is safe to say that we are ready for something new.
Sherpa’s Monthly
Tip
Topical Content Marketing
Being active with topical content will boost social
engagement because you will be hitting on those current events. Using custom artwork to compliment your
social media posts will really set your posts aside from the rest, especially when
everyone is talking about the same topic.
A great example of a topic that got everyone talking was the magazine
cover featuring Kim Kardashian known for “breaking the internet”. Many companies took
this trending topic and put their own spin on what they thought breaking the
internet was. This is still a commonly used hashtag on Twitter.
Another trending topic that has been on the rise is the
topic of concussions and brain injuries.
One of our clients Riverview Health Care has piggyback on this trending
topic on their social media as it part of their business. We noticed movies popping up such as My Beautiful Broken Brain on Netflix
and the movie Concussion with Will Smith. This topic spread on a large scale and caused
a lot of conversations on the subject.
It is great to be alert on what people are talking about and it gives
you the opportunity to piggy back on that subject if it is relevant to your
business. This also gives you the chance
to use third party articles and put your own outlook on them. When everyone is pushing out the same content
on a specific subject you are bound to take notice.
Thanks for reading and listening to Sherpa’s Talking Shop. Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn to
hear the latest news and don’t forget to subscribe to our podcast.