Superbowl ads affecting America

From watching and observing the 2008 superbowl ads, I believe the U.S. is still made up mostly of people who like Hip-hop, drinking Beer and looking at beautiful woman. Almost all the ads featured one or more of these categories in their campaign. Although advertisement this year for the Super-bowl was more expensive than last year, I felt like the ads weren’t as good. Some of the most popular brands that were featured this year included Pepsi, Coke, Bud light and Budweiser. This year Pepsi included a commercial that brought cultural awareness to America. The commercial was about two deaf guys trying to find their friend’s house. As they arrived at the correct neighborhood and without knowing which house their friend (Bob) lived in; they quickly came up with a solution to solve the problem. They honked the horn several times and soon all the neighbor’s woke up and turned on their lights. The only house that did not wake up because of the honking was ideally Bob’s house. This commercial by Pepsi, shows America that, we need to start thinking outside the box and realizing who our real neighbors are. The commercial also send the message that says “If we can’t deal with our own American neighbors, how can we be ready for the world of globalization?”
Despite the fact that our country is still influenced by Hip-hop, Beer and woman, overall I believe the commercials this year show us that America is truly influenced by a more diverse population and is truly changing to become more globalize country.


-GY

Well-Dressed Travels Well

My article, which is come from New York Times talks about dress codes for men and furnishes information all about men’s fashion. This article provides fashion tips from many fashion editors’ opinions about how to choose business clothes using the clothes in their closet and suggest useful and creative ideas to men who are considering their fashion for their business wear. It is kind of useful tips for lots of men and gives interest to the readers.

Nowadays, men are also having great interest in fashion and they also wants to be more fashionable. Fashion is one of the most important considerable factors to the business people because it influence to first impression of a person. Therefore, almost business men are trying to be look nice in their working position, like high-class or rich people. Those things lead men to be more interest in fashion to give great impression to the people.

To be more fashionable, almost men think and research about runway-fashion, and then they are giving up fallowing the trend. That is the main problem of the men and this article was point out this for the first. Through this article, men can be informed about how to prepare for long business trip for diverse looking with limited amount of cloth.

Key point of the article is that not only the beauty, but also the practicability. Generally, people, especially men do not need to worry about the high fashion trend for their daily life’s cloth. They only need to pursuit to be practical and simple style for their business wear for long business trip with few clothes. Standard or basic color and design’s clothes can be the great source to match and interchange almost all clothes in their closet, even they are buying some clothes, accessories and bags. Conservative clothes can be the good choice for business men. However, it should not be confused with unattractive or cheap, just understandable clothes. Editors of some men’s fashion magazines from this article said that “the simple the better”. In addition, they are recommending that for professionals in a creative field, their pragmatism can be great with nice looking.

It can be interesting article to men and women who have interest about men’s fashion. If you have interest, check this article at New York Times.

"Tuna Sushi Crisis"

Lately, Tuna has been tested and found to have extremely high levels of mercury. Some stores and restaurants that were tested in Manhattan showed mercury levels beyond what was normal under the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) regulations. Some experts also believe that regardless of where the Tuna is sold, the mercury levels may very well be similar. The highest mercury concentration found during the testing was, 1.4 parts per million, found in tuna from Blue Ribbon Sushi. The lowest however was, 0.10 parts per million, found in tuna bought at Fairway. The owners were quite shocked and was left with no option but to find new fish with lower mercury levels.

The major problem with mercury is that, high volume of mercury could lead to undesirable diseases. In the past Woman who might become pregnant and young children were warned by the FDA (food drug administration) and EPA; only to consume small portions of canned tuna because the mercury could damage their newly developing nervous system.

Mercury can be found in all fish, as the larger fish eats the smaller fish, the mercury level of that fish only increases, leaving us humans who consume large portions of fish venerable to diseases and other unnoticeable factors.

Overall, this problem not only affects the consumers who eat Sushi, but it also affects the owners and workers of Stores and Restaurants who relied heavily on Tuna as their cash cow. Due to the increase level of mercury found in Tuna, profits may decline rapidly leaving the Tuna economy unsteady and venerable. As the Stores and Restaurants decline, it may very well cause a domino effect, hurting the fishing industry along with the boating industry.

-GY

Indian Car Culture

- Fastest-growing car market in India -


Hello…

Nice to meet you guys again in class and Professor Sanghvi.

It is the first update of my blog for new CRS 481 class.

For this week, I tried to find an article, which is related with countries, China, India and Brazil.
I found an article from New York Times about a country, which is India.
During the last semester, Professor Sanghvi showed about India’s traffic jam without any signal on the road. In addition, during the first day of class Prof. Sanghvi said about the car company, Jaguar was sold to Indian company with financial problem. Those things made me to curious about the India, so I tried to find article about India to read and get many ideas about the car market in India.

Finally, I found an article from today’s New York Times newspaper, the title of the article is Indian Car Culture, which was so interested to me and I thought that I could get many ideas about the country. Through the news, I could know the country with culture and city life via the 10 different pictures from the New York Times.

To brief the article, now the India is one of the big emerging markets to introduce the car with low-cost cars to get attentions from the Indian people. As one of the fastest-growing car market, India is expected to pass China with great car sales in this year.

During this week, car expo was held in New Delhi and low-priced cars were introduced during the expo with great dollar spending on the promotion of the new cars.

According to the sales and use of cars in India, so many people got driver’s license last year. It represents that ingenuity of Indian and feat of bureaucratic efficiency.

Old city of Delhi is so crowded, especially during the rush hour. Therefore, police directly control the traffic in the morning. As the means of movement, Indian uses those kinds of things, pedicabs, bicycles, scooters, motorbikes, cars etc. In the morning, those different kinds of vehicles are come out to the old city of Delhi and causes serious traffic in there. Moreover, elephant is also adding traffic in the road.

It was interesting article from the New York Time. If you want to know more about the article, check those at http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2008/01/10/world/20080111INDIA_10.html

RCS 362 Integrated Marketing

If you are interested in marketing and advertising, RCS 362 is the perfect class to take! Professor Sanghvi is the instructor for this class and she does a wonderful job teaching it. Prior to teaching this semester at UNCG, she was working for "Leo Burnett", one of the top ad agencies in the world. She always comes to class prepared and full of new ideas, be prepared to be amazed in class and out of class. The material taught in this class is far beyond other marketing classes you will ever take.

This class is about marketing, advertising, and managing. There is a lot of group and class discussion as well as projects; however, the work load and grading system is rather fair. Whether you are a CARS student or just interested in marketing, this would be the ideal course to take.

I highly recommend this course to those of you who are wondering which electives to take. I assure you that by the end of the semester, you will be able to brand yourself and differentiate yourself from other students. You will also never look at products and brands the same way again. After taking this course, every time I see a brand I automatically think: what is the target market, what is the positioning, what pricing strategy are they using, how can I sell this product if given the chance, what is the brand identity and what is the best media choice for marketing this product.

This course not only strengthens your knowledge of marketing, it teaches you how to brand yourself and be different from other students. This is one of the best courses I have taken at UNCG. Get ready to be amazed and overwhelmed.


-GY

Green Marketing

Consumers' Green Fatigue Due to Lack of Awareness, Economic Worries:

Survey By: GreenBiz.com

KNOXVILLE, Tenn., Oct. 10, 2007 -- The economy may be having its way with the burgeoning green economy: as consumers' fears about slowdowns in the housing and other sectors increase, their willingness to pay a perceived premium for environmentally friendly or energy efficient products is on the decline. That's the message from Energy Pulse 2007, the third annual national consumer market study conducted by the Shelton Group, which were released yesterday. For instance, respondents to the survey were over 16 percent less likely to buy an energy efficient home product this year than they said they were last year. Although much of the drawdown can be blamed on fallout from the sub-prime mortgage loan scandal, Shelton Group CEO Suzanne Shelton said that economic concerns are only half the equation. "In the past few years, consumers have been bombarded by the marketing messages of companies jumping on the green-friendly bandwagon," Shelton said. "People are becoming much more inquiring about the bill of green goods being sold to them -- not only in terms of 'is it as green as what they say it is?' but also 'does it matter enough to me to pay extra?'" "Fewer consumers seem willing to put the up-front cash into a green or energy-efficient purchase despite how much it may save them in the long-run or how it might assuage their guilt about the environment," Shelton added. "Marketers should take notice with respect to the content and credibility of their messages. Prices matter, and consumers may be growing weary of companies that appear to tout 'green' merely as a marketing ploy." For eight different kinds of energy efficient home products, this year's Energy Pulse survey found that consumers are on average 16 percent less likely to go green, with 11 percent saying they're less likely to buy CFL or halogen light bulbs, 15 percent less likely to buy special insulation, and 19 percent saying they're less likely to buy an Energy Star certified home appliance. The survey wasn't entirely gloom-and-doom for the green economy: consumer interest in renewable energy for their homes is at an all-time high. Over 54 percent of respondents said they were likely or very likely to participate in a green power program through their utility, up from 44 percent last year. But despite the growth in consumer interest in these programs, the survey found that actual participation in green energy programs is at a standstill: over the last three years, the number of consumers saying they already participate in these programs has actually dropped slightly, from 3.4 percent in 2005 to 3.2 percent this year. Sheldon chalked this up to poor promotion and marketing from utility companies. "Utilities that fail to initiate and sustain strong, consistent marketing support of green power should expect continued low response levels due to the extra effort required of consumers to participate in most programs," Shelton said. "In addition, it's not just the existence of marketing programs that's important -- it's the targeting of these programs. Not everyone is a good prospect for green power. Utilities should target customers who both have the means and the interest to participate. A mass-market approach isn't appropriate."

PR & Promotions

Today we talked in class about PR & Promotions. We simply watched a video on S-Club 7 and how they were being promoted through some chaotic situations. Our professor also challenged us to think about, whether all forms of promotions are considered to be good promotions? After taking some time to digest the question, I think when you are a celebrity; all forms of promotions should be considered good promotions. Whether you’re Britney Spears, going crazy and having babies or Angelina Jolie, adopting foreign babies; it’s all considered PR and it creates a story for your name. Whether it is good or bad, fact or fiction, it still gives the people a story to read about and it keeps your name in the "world of fame."

In addition, we were also challenged to ponder about, whether fame should come before one's talent in the music industry. For this question, I think it can go either way. For example, Paris Hilton, she was famous first and now she has her own clothing line, music album, TV shows, in movies, Hardee's advertisement and others. On the contrary, you have Kelly Clarkson who became known for her music first, through American Idol; now she can be seen in ads, movie, music, on tour with Reba and has become, one of the newest young stars of our generation. Overall, I believe either path can lead to success, however, I feel that being famous first will give you more lead way, to branch into any industry you so chose. If people know who you are, regardless of what you do, they will more than likely support you.

-GY