Welcome to my personal blog (usually about viral marketing but this occasion calls for a special post)! This should be a convincing list on why Target and I would be a perfect fit:
# 10. LOVE
9. I am young, full of enthusiasm and new ideas, and I need a career that will give me an outlet for that; Target radiates energy, Target encourages sharing new ideas, and Target gives respect and responsibility to students entering the business world.
8. I need a career that will challenge me everyday; Reba states that in her 15 years working at Target, not a day has gone by that she hasn't been challenged or learned something new.
7. I won't stop bugging you Target recruiters until I at least get an interview to prove all these claims I am listing =)
6. Environmental pollution and destruction gives me anxiety; Target has deferred 34,000,000 plastic bags from landfills since they launched their reusable-bag program. Now that's a company I would be proud to work for.
5. I want to be able to help people through my job; Target supports their local communities by donating 5% of their income...THAT'S $3 MILLION A WEEK!
4. I love numbers. (Yes, I obsessively monitor and analyze this blog on Google Analytics). Isn't that a great quality to possess to be hired as a Business Analyst?!?!
3. Target's company culture embodies what I value; contagious energy, empowerment to innovate, create, and find solutions, and emphasized individualistic strengths within a team environment.
2. It's a fresh new day and you possess the influence to give someone (ME) the opportunity of their (MY) lifetime; to share with another person the incredible opportunities and experiences at Target.
#1 Reason why Target should hire Courtney Stinson: You are impressed with all other 9 reasons and I have already convinced you to share my resume with other decision makers and to CALL ME! Refer to resume to obtain my number (I don't want to publicly post my number or else everyone would be calling me!)
I was reading an article titled "The Problem with Viral Branding" from the Harvard Business School. The article essentially states that viral branding and marketing does not support building an iconic brand. Here is my take on this idea:
By using viral marketing to establish a brand, the brand is unable to control the core message that will come to intrinsically represent their brand.
Case study: Snapple
Snapple began branding itself in a haphazard manner ranging from product endorsements by personality-conflicting celebs (Howard Stern)...
...to random ads featuring product mispronunciations and "Wendy the Snapple Lady".
Snapple enjoyed quick success based on brand awareness and recognition but they ran into greater problems. Starting out as a small company, Snapple was admired by consumers for their misaligned and random advertising efforts. But as the company grew and Coca Cola took over, marketing personnel ran into difficulty when their strictly-run and highly organized marketers tried to continue the randomness of the early days of Snapple. It was difficult to portray the same sense of not trying, while actually trying really hard. In addition, what were marketers trying to communicate to consumers anyways, since Snapple had not really established a core brand identity that would have been created by their consumers in the viral process. There was no bottom, no base, no core to Snapple's message.
The virality of Snapple's success was based on the idea that any repeated and shared communication is good for the initially building of a brand.
But what really matters is an intrinsic feeling, an emotion, a connect to a brand that is not just retold and shared,but never forgotten. By missing this point and allowing the consumers to brand Snapple (in which consumers did not create an intrinsic message), Snapple enjoyed short-lived success from skyrocketing sales of $700 million in 1994 to the loss of $1.4 billion when is was sold.
***Don't get me wrong, I wholeheartedly embrace, encourage, and enjoy viral marketing.*** But viral marketing should be implemented by established brands with a clear core message to consumers. That way, their message cannot be misinterpreted or even just plain missed.
Here are some examples of great viral advertising done by established brands:
3D projection is a really cool new technology that has created huge buzz for some brands. I found this on the ViralBlog and had to blog about it myself. The 3D projection mapping can be fit for nearly any architectural building.
Here three of my favorites:
H&M in Amsterdam's city square for their grand opening
Sony
Samsung in Amsterdam
I've never seen these 3D projection videos and I wonder how they would look live and in person. Why don't we have UNI do one on the CBB to honor and congratulate their graduating seniors!?!? It would create publicity for those students who are still job searching and would impress potential employers; "Hey! I want to hire one of those UNI business students who implemented that 3D projection video on their business building! How creative!"
