Mediaboss Marketing

Wander Beauty, like many other beauty brands, often seeks out customer feedback for its product development process. But with its latest eyeshadow palette launch, the brand took a more in-depth approach by co-creating it directly with consumers.

The brands new Wanderess Escape palette is the first eyeshadow palette that will remain in the companys assortment; previous products were special editions. After prolonged requests from customers, Wander Beauty opted to make a permanent version by soliciting customers for help. It began the process at the end of April 2019 with an NYC pop-up where customers were asked to bring photos and other pieces of inspiration to create a large-scale mood board through June. The brand also created a dedicated email and landing page to receive additional suggestions between April and July, before ultimately narrowing down the shades to 10. The company drove to the page in social posts. Wander Beauty sells through Sephora, Nordstrom and Birchbox, and approximately 50% of its sales are DTC. It grew its net revenue by over 100% between 2018 and 2019, said Divya Gugnani, Wander Beauty co-founder and CEO.

Social media has changed the game for brands because you have direct communication with your customer any time you want, said Lindsay Ellingson, Wander Beauty co-founder and creative director. Why not use the data we have and our conversations with them in our product development? Instead of hiring an influencer or celebrity [for product collaborations], we believe in co-creating with customers.

The companys core DTC customers are between 25 and 54 years old, and concentrated in New York, California, Texas and Florida. On average, the brand receives between 300 and 500 direct messages, emails or phone calls a day from shoppers. For the Wanderess palette, the brand received thousands of submissions, said Ellingson, but was uncertain of a final figure. The customer service team compiled submissions into an Excel spreadsheet, and the 10 shades determined were chosen based on a mix of intuition and customer feedback based on past limited-edition palettes. For example, the team knew customers wanted to see more matte shades in the next eyeshadow palette, so four of the 10 shades are matte, said Gugnani.

Being a predominantly DTC brand, we have an even deeper understanding of exactly who our customer is and what products she is responding to, and we get to interact with her daily through the additional customer service channels, Gugnani said. For brands that are retailer-reliant, they only get a filtered snapshot of that additional information.

After narrowing down the 10 shades between August and October 2019, the brand reached back out to its customers via social media to solicit names for the individual shades. The brand has historically surveyed people every week through Instagram polls regarding product names, shades, beauty pain points and more. The company also retains a select group of over 100 women who are frequent customers, makeup artists and influencers to receive products and provide more thorough feedback. This subset of shoppers received the shades between January and February to provide their thoughts on the quality and color of the eyeshadows.

By February, Wander Beauty began working on the marketing materials for Wanderess, which was linked back to the 10 women whose shade suggestions were chosen. Seven of those women came into the office to help film video content, and the other three filmed at home, said Ellingson. Between photos and videos, approximately 30 pieces of content have been created for the latest campaign.

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How Wander Beauty co-created its latest product with customers - Glossy

Starling Bank has signed on as the official banking partner of Team GB ahead of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, a move its brand director says reflects its push beyond early adopters to enter the mainstream market.

Starling is one of the fintech unicorns vying for a share of burgeoning space. As the third-largest neobank behind Revoluts eight million customers, and Monzos 3.3 million, Starling Bank has been pursuing a more affluent audience between 25 to 44 since it launched in 2014. In 2020, it is looking to double its customer base to two million by investing heavily into its marketing and adopting a brand-led approach.

As part of this strategy, the fintech firm now supports Team GB, one of four Olympic Associations in the world run without state backing and instead dependent on commercial partnerships with the likes of Starling Bank, Purple Bricks, Aldi, British Airways and DFS.

Kerrone says: "Team GB is one of the brands Britons are most proud of, behind only the NHS. We are a British born bank, and we choose the company we keep very carefully. Pride in what we do is absolutely key.

"This announcement isnt about just putting the Team GB logo on our marketing materials, or pushing our product features and benefits; its about unifying two proud British brands and celebrating national spirit and a belief in the extraordinary.

"We have first-hand experience of the hard work and dedication it takes to succeed, so feel a genuine connection with our athletes as they prepare for the games."

As part of the deal, more than 350 athletes have been gifted a Starling retail account with 100 deposited. Kerrone is particular about how she defines the deal.

"Were very keen to avoid calling this a sponsorship. Sponsorships often lack authenticity and can seem quite self-serving. At Starling, we were keen to build a partnership portfolio built on meaningful relationships with like-minded brands.

"Throughout the past few months, weve worked incredibly closely with the British Olympic Association team to find out how Starling can genuinely help athletes. The 100 incentive was borne out of those conversations."

There's more activity to come, currently being brainstormed before the games. One such feature coming to the app will be a Team GB medal tracker. Kerrone adds: "There are lots of opportunities for Starling to support the athletes both during but also after the games."

Late last year, the bank acknowledged the need for brand building in its growth strategy and embraced TV advertising.

In 2019, it grew by 500,000 to 900,000 accounts. New avian branding was embraced to help make Starling a household name Rachael Pollard, Starling Bank's head of growth, said at the time. The goal was to accelerate the marketing strategy to "stop being one of banking's best-kept secrets". The brand, she described as a "gangly teenager, was to lean into its Britishness, a clue for what lies ahead with the Team GB partnership.

It has its own Olympic pedigree too. Its chief banking officer Helen Bierton was a former British Olympic archer and knows from personal experience how valuable these partnerships are. "It taught me just how important the support of sponsors is when youre trying to prepare for the Games in the right way, perform to the best of your ability and win medals," she tells The Drum.

For Kerrone the objective is to increase UK brand awareness. "By increasing awareness and trust, more people will consider us as their bank.

"Overall we want to differentiate ourselves - both in what we do, the company we keep and our creative executions. Standing out and being bold about what we believe in is massively important for us as a brand."

From a content perspective, it will look to tell the stories of the athletes, many of whom remain unknown to a wider audience. For Starling, the lion's share of work will run through digital out of home advertising with Team GB partner Ocean outdoor, and on social media with some help from influencers.

Starling's deal with Team GB comes as big events like SXSW and the Six Nations are being cancelled or disrupted by Coronavirus. Toyko 2020 is certainly under threat, with sports federations even floating the idea of the tournament being held behind closed doors.

Of course, any disruption will throw up a myriad of issues for sponsors and Kerrone is monitoring the situation.

"We are speaking daily with our contacts at Team GB, who are keeping us fully up to speed with the situation.

"Should the games be postponed, we would still remain the official bank of Team GB - the timings would just differ. We have contingencies in place from a campaign perspective, but the most important thing is that we are positively supporting our athletes whatever happens."

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What to expect from Starling's Team GB deal: 'We're unifying two proud British brands' - The Drum

write on the money:WITH NATSAI MUSARURWA

In the top three key sections of your business plan is the market analysis. Last week we talked about defining your target market and that information is going to come in handy here. Knowing information about your target market will help tailor your market analysis to only include relevant points instead of just throwing in anything and everything, which is sure to make your potential investors lose interest while reading your plan.

Lets start by looking at the purpose of the market analysis. The market analysis is supposed to give investors a full picture of the market you operate in, both at an industry and macro level. This section should inform the investor about any factors that can affect your businesses and their investment, either positively or negatively. The information in the market analysis should give as clear a picture as possible of the potential of your business and also outline some of the potential risks.

There are many ways of doing your market analysis, just make sure the method you choose achieves the above stated purpose. At Amras Communications we like to use the PESTLE Analysis, Porters Five Forces Analysis and a competitor analysis table, the components of which Ill talk about shortly. The reason these are my go-to market analysis tools is because they adequately cover all the factors that need to be considered. So today Im going to go into a bit more detail about these tools, if these arent your methods of choice perhaps you can still pick up a thing or two.

I like to look from the outside in, i.e. look at the macro factors which affect multiple industries first then when I have an understanding of the larger environment, I can make sound deductions about the specific industry. For the macro analysis I use PESTLE.

PESTLE is an acronym for Political, Economic, Social, Technological, Legal and Environmental. Under each title you look at the factors that are important to your business. With political factors you would assess the political environment of the country or countries you operate in such as stability and policies.

Politics have a cascading effect on the other factors that follow so although you can start anywhere with the PESTLE Analysis it may be helpful to begin here.

Economic factors include GDP, inflation, interest rates, unemployment, etc. These factors give investors an idea of where the country is and where it may be headed. Ive also found that this section helps businesses identify opportunities and gaps within the market. There are a lot of economic factors you can consider, however, as much as you want your investor to be as well informed as possible, only stick to whats relevant.

Now the third set of factors, Social, is where knowing your target market will be most useful. Relevant social factors depend a lot on the demographic characteristics of your customers. Here you would look at aspects such as age distribution, cultural factors, or lifestyle trends that could affect demand for your product or influence how you sell it. Again, remember to only include whats relevant.

Technological factors, which is self-explanatory, looks at technology such as innovations that could boost your business, adoption of technology, penetration rates of technology, etc. With this analytical tool some choose to stop here, making it a PEST analysis. That isnt to say there arent any Legal and Environmental factors to consider but their impact or relevance may be null. Examples of Legal factors, however, include employment or contract laws and Environmental factors include climate conditions.

Whatever tool(s) you decide to use for your macro analysis remember to be specific. If youre talking about inflation, give actual figures, just saying inflation is increasing wont be sufficient. Additionally, when you give this information explain how and why it would affect your business. Dont make the investor have to figure it out.

Now taking a step inwards we have the competitor analysis and Porters Five Forces, which look at the specifics of the industry. I use a table for my competitor analysis which outlines information such as what the company does, their marketing strategy, market share, strengths, weaknesses, etc. This analysis not only helps you see how you rank competitively against other businesses but it can also help you identify gaps that competitors are not filling that you can leverage. Only keep the analysis to five companies at most, even if there are one hundred competitors, and make sure they range in size, location, etc. so your sample is representative.

Building off your competitor analysis, the Porters Five Forces Analysis looks at your industrys environment in the context of competition. The five forces are; degree of competition, threat of new entrants, threat of substitutes, bargaining power of buyers, and bargaining power of suppliers. I like to rank each of these factors from very low to very high but you can use what suits you. I wont go into detail about this analysis tool, as Ive said in previous articles you can find great resources that explain this online. One thing I would like to point out, however, because so many people get it wrong, is that bargaining power of suppliers refers to your suppliers, not you.

This isnt the most exciting section of the business plan to write. A lot of research will be required to properly complete the analysis, but please dont take short cuts, its very important. If you find it a bit overwhelming to do on your own, Amras Communications (hopefully by now you know who we are) also offers market research reports which you can integrate into your business plan.

l If you have any questions or need some guidance on your market analysis, feel free to contact us on +263787722016 or at info@amrascoms.com. We are committed to your success.

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Business plans that win investors (Part 4) - The Zimbabwe Standard

LUCKNOW, India--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Pregna International Ltd. announced the launch of its Freedom for Life campaign for Eloira (Hormonal IUS) during the 63rd edition of AICOG (All India Congress of Obstetrics & Gynaecology) 2020 at Lucknow, India.

The Campaign assures lifetime benefits to all those who choose Eloira.

Hormonal Intra-Uterine systems are one of the most effective methods of reversible contraceptives available to women. Earlier, there was a single brand available in India which made the product unaffordable to many. In 2013, Pregna launched Eloira in India, benefiting thousands of women. However, there are still millions of women who are unable to access to their desired contraceptive needs as Hormonal IUS is perceived to be very costly, needing to be replaced every 5 years. Pregna wants to break the barriers in the minds of doctors and women that Hormonal IUS is unaffordable. Once a woman uses Eloira, she can return to her doctor after the completion of the products life (5 years) and get another Eloira free of cost, for the rest of her life! says Manmohan Taparia (Marketing Manager, Pregna International).

In the past 30 years, more than 100 million women world over have supported Pregna by using our IUDs and placing their trust in us. Its time we give back to the society and share with them the benefits of a highly effective contraceptive method. Freedom for Life is a small way of saying Thank you, says Mukul Taparia, Managing Director of Pregna International.

Copper bearing IUDs have been around for many decades. Device combined with the hormone Levonorgestrel is commonly called as Hormonal Intra-Uterine system (IUS). The hormone is released at a very slow rate inside the uterine cavity and the localized effect of hormone not only helps in preventing pregnancy but also in treating other disorders such as abnormal uterine bleeding. It is considered to be one of the most effective forms of contraception (effectiveness > 99.8%).

A large number of women in India (18%) who visit their Gynaecologists are seeking treatment for Abnormal Uterine Bleeding as per a research article.

NICE guidelines and FOGSI guidelines consider the Hormonal IUS as an effective alternative to hysterectomy and a treatment for endometriosis, heavy blood loss, and painful menstrual cramping, says Dr. Sharad Singh (Medical Director, Pregna International). Anaemia is extremely common in women. Hormonal IUS can be used easily by such women and may help them in increasing their Haemoglobin levels.

Pregna is a leading Contraceptive Solutions Organization and has been serving women since 1991. Pregna is spread across 140 countries globally, partnering with social marketing organizations as well as private distributors in the area of Intra- uterine devices.

Pregna is the largest IUD manufacturer in the world, having served over 100 million women worldwide.

Learn more at http://www.pregna.com

Learn more about Eloira at http://www.eloira.in

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Pregna International Ltd. Marks Its 30th Anniversary With the Launch of "Freedom for Life" Campaign for Eloira - Business Wire

Facebook is introducing its brand new corporate Facebook and Instagram accounts with the handle @facebook, while flaunting its new corporate branding. It is also launching a new public relations Twitter account for Instagram called Instagram Comms for reporters to reach the communications team faster. In a tweet posted on 29 February, Facebook said it created a Twitter account for Instagram because it has often received news happening on Instagram and looks to make it easier for people to hear from the PR team directly in real time.

All of the changes come as it looks to incorporate rebrand that began late last year. Its original Facebook page will be Facebook App with the handle @facebookapp. This comes after Facebook unveiled a new company logo in November 2019 to set the branding of the parent company apart from its social media app.

The new corporate accounts use its initials "FB" enclosed in a rainbow circle as its profile pictures, instead of the original logo (the iconic blue letter 'f'). The accounts also have the description "At the Facebook company, we are constantly iterating, solving problems and working together to connect people all over the world through our apps and technologies", accompanied by a link to its corporate page. The company's Facebook page has over 2.5 million likes, and its Instagram account has 5,841 followers at the time of writing.

Facebook has also uploaded its first Instagram post last week, showing the different colour schemes of its new logo for its respective platforms. The post has garnered 5,540 views at the time of writing.

In November 2019, Facebook updated its company branding to be clearer about the products that come from Facebook. As part of this new identity, it also introduced a new company logo and further distinguished the Facebook company from the Facebook app. According to Antonio Lucio, chief marketing officer, the brand change is a way to better communicate the companys ownership structure to the people and businesses who use the services to connect, share, build community and grow their audiences.

Read more:Facebook's halt on WhatsApp ads: A step to build more trust?Facebook combats coronavirus misinformation and boosts factual updates on its platformsFacebook's APAC ad revenue jumps 33% but rise in expenses leads to fall in stocks

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Facebook revamps its social media look as part of corporate rebrand - Marketing Interactive