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Our weekly digest of marketing-related news will keep you up to the mark on everything from FMCG to brand strategy, loyalty programmes to fashion marketing.

  • Facebook to launch UK news service

    Having launched a news service in the US last year, Facebook now plans to introduce one to the UK over the next few months. It already pays US publishers for content which comes from over 200 outlets and thousands of local news organisations. Publishers are concerned that they will lose out on advertising as readers move away from their own websites and apps to consume content on Facebook. There are already concerns over Facebook and Google’s dominance of the ad market and their control of publishers’ distribution.

    marketingweek.com, 26 August 2020

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  • Achieving behavioural change

    It is difficult to change behaviour through public health messaging, especially when it comes to trying to persuade people to wear masks. Mistakes in communication can lead to the undermining of trust and credibility which could have disastrous implications for getting people to have a vaccine when one finally becomes available. Here are some lessons for communicating health messages in the pandemic era. An important one is to “sell” the story by putting yourself in your customer’s shoes, as any good salesman would do, because one must understand why people might be resistant. After all, “When barriers are understood, they become addressable”.

    prdaily.com, 20 August 2020 (Goodman)

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  • Virtual water hackathon

    Three water companies ‒ Anglian, SES and Welsh Water ‒ have organised a hackathon to try to better understand consumers’ water consumption behaviour and habits. The five-day online event, which takes place over two weeks, explores four main areas, including helping customers to save money. The overall aim is to reduce water usage. Data from Discover Water show that water consumption has been declining for 2019 to 2020 but is still well above the national target proposed by DEFRA in its National Framework for Water Resources.

    utilityweek.co.uk, 6 August 2020 (Williams)

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  • People like ads to make them laugh

    Funny ads are becoming harder to find, according to Dom Boyd, Kantar UK MD for insights. He argues that people don’t want ads reminding them of how tough things are. People are hardwired to respond to humour. It not only gives brands a chance to stand out, it is also one of the most powerful ways of creating an emotional connection which in turn triggers memory associations. Laughter is also one of the best medicines in times of crisis so brands should be bold and not be afraid of making people smile and laugh!

    thedrum.com, 27 July 2020 (Boyd)

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  • Strategies for sales and marketing alignment

    Sales and marketing alignment or “smarketing” can be hard to get right. The author has talked to various marketers about their experiences in this area but found that none of them had the same advice or used the same processes. She decided to compile a set of best practices. Here she proposes a few alignment strategies before providing ten of the best tried-and-tested “smarketing” tips.

    blog.hubspot.com, 23 July 2020 (Samsing)

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  • Marketers use of social listening

    For a long time now, marketers have been turning to social media to gauge sentiment and respond to people, but the current pandemic has made it more important than ever to listen to consumers. Research by Gartner back in March found that 51% of marketing leaders around the world used social listening platforms to keep abreast of consumer needs during the coronavirus.

    emarketer.com, 16 July 2020

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