March 2018

B2C Marketing And Advertising Expo 2018

The B2C Marketing & Advertising Expo is a leading, interactive and engaging exhibition and conference specifically designed to showcase the very latest and ingenious developments within consumer marketing and its future trends.

Held at the Excel in London, the 2 day event was jam packed with 700 exhibitors and the agenda was brimming with 500 exciting seminars and 200 masterclasses. Delegates were really spoilt for choice.

After previously being a delegate at this event, this year BAM decided to take part to share our knowledge and expertise. Here are the highlights:

B2C Marketing Expo

We had the safe, did they have the code?

At BAM we are renowned for our engaging concepts and interactive activations. So at this years B2C Expo we wanted to showcase a simple yet enticing game.

Inside a perspex safe lay an array of prizes from luxury easter eggs to exquisite champagne. Delegates could see the prizes, but could they win them? To try their luck, delegates exchanged their details in return for a code. They entered their code into the pinpad in the hope they would hear the safe unlock.

We had endless delegates wanting to crack the code and throughout the two days we had many winners who opened the safe and took home their prizes. The aim of this interaction was to show businesses just how easy it is to attract attention and engage with your audience.

When it comes to the student market, students want to see a value exchange and are much more attracted to a prize that is tangible. We are experts at bringing campaigns to life through gamification, interaction and engagement. Ideas and concepts are endless, we pride ourselves on understanding a brands image and objectives in order to find the best route to market.

Until next year

It was an action packed 2 days and it is safe to say the B2C Marketing & Advertising Expo was a truly insightful event. We hope to see you there next year! But in the meantime if you want to find out more about the student market or how BAM can help your brand achieve marketing success, get in touch with our team of experts.

The highlights from the YMS 2018

In it’s 8th year, the Youth Marketing Strategy (YMS) returned to deliver the world’s largest youth marketing festival.

In the heart of youth culture at The Old Truman Brewery, Brick Lane, delegates were spoilt with two days of cutting edge insights, creative masterclass sessions and the opportunity to network with some of the biggest experts and brands in the field.

The agenda was the perfect mix of two key concepts; youth trends and youth marketing strategies. The keynote presentations and panel discussions focused on understanding the young people of today providing delegates with direct insight on engaging with these powerful consumers of tomorrow.

BAM were proud to be Key Sponsors of such a renowned event and we had a full on schedule ourselves, here are some of our highlights:

Team BAM

BAM puts reflexes to the test in our beat the buzzer interaction

At BAM we constantly talk about the importance of interacting and engaging with your audience. To put proof in the pudding we created an interactive stand where delegates were challenged to beat the buzzer. Counting down from 10 seconds, delegates tried to get as close to zero as possible. We can all count right? Well we can, but pressing the button to a 100th of a second was not as easy as it sounded.

Delegates competed to top our leader board but only one lucky winner succeeded. Dom from Social Chain showed us he had the most acute reflexes hitting the buzzer on exactly 0 seconds. Congratulations Dom, very impressive!

At BAM we just love bringing campaigns to life through gamification, interaction and engagement. With a plethora of ideas and concepts out there, we pride ourselves on deciphering the best route for our brands to truly connect with the youth market.

YMS 2018

Lifting the lid on effective student marketing – Tim Bodenham takes the stage

Taking centre stage Tim Bodenham, Managing Director lifted the lid on effective student marketing sharing unique insights and trends with his eager audience.

Tim revealed how important it is for brands to strike this market in the key first 100 days – the mighty Freshers period. This is when students are at a key milestone in their life, where they are open to new experiences, where they are more than willing to try something new and so this is the perfect window of opportunity for brands to truly connect with the student market.

But Tim also stressed the need to execute an effective strategy not just for Freshers but throughout the student’s life at University and beyond. For brands to turn students into life long customers they must not only speak to them in a way which resonates with them but they must also continue the communication throughout the academic year to strengthen the bond formed in Freshers.

What you communicate is also key, students want value exchange. Brands must give students something they want and need to overcome any demotivators they may have to buy. We often find that brands think being the cheapest is the best way to attract students. Now whilst students love a discount and expect special treatment for simply being a student, there must be a distinct value exchange. If brands get the value exchange right, cost is not a demotivator for students.

The key to getting this right is understanding your audience. Tim advised any brand to do their research. How can you increase your student audience if you do not know what proportion of your current customer base is students? How do you know what students want from your brand if you do not ask them? Conducting pre and post campaign research will not only provide brands with lucrative insight but it will also provide them with the evidence to justify the money and time spent in this market, revealing its true potential.

If you would like to find out more from Tim’s keynote presentation, please get in touch.

YMS 2018

Making the unsexy sexy – Mark Hodge hosts an intriguing discussion

Mark Hodge hosted an inspirational panel session that discussed “Building Brand Love in an Unsexy Industry”. On the panel were brands from industries such as finance, healthcare and insurance. Brands that don’t always scream youth market, but who have successfully built brand love amongst young people and engaged them using clever campaigns.

The discussion was insightful and thought provoking with real life examples of how these brands became more attractive to the youth market and how they achieved their engagement objectives.

Want to know how you can build brand love? Check out our latest blog – “Making the unsexy sexy: A guide to building brand love”.

Want to see some examples of brands being awesome? Take a look at some of our latest case studies.

Mic Drop

So that concludes the Youth Marketing Strategy for another year.

Want more? Can’t wait till next year? Get in touch with our team. We are industry experts and can provide you with all the help, advice and guidance you need to crack the youth market.

In the meantime thank you to everyone involved… until next year!

Will the Facebook scandal affect you?

By now it’s likely that you’ve heard about the Facebook data privacy scandal. You may even be considering permanently deleting the platform, but how does this leak actually affect you, and what does it mean long term to the everyday Facebook user?

After a week of unclear information and wild speculations, its been confirmed that a data mining company based within the UK gained access to data on as many as 50 million Facebook profiles as a result of Facebook’s somewhat over generous and outdated data sharing policies that were set back in 2014. It was this set of data that was then allegedly used to help map out voter behaviour patterns throughout 2016, using this information for both the UK Brexit campaign and the US presidential election.

Facebook’s most valuable asset is how well it knows you. It knows every page you follow, every post you like and every friend you make. It is because of this that advertisers and businesses alike pay Facebook for these personal insights into the behaviours and habits of its users and as a result ensure their messages reach the right audience. In this case the company used the data brought from Facebook to help build psychological profiles of users, helping create better politically based campaigns, designed to potentially sway the users views.

In 2017 Facebook made 98% of its revenue on advertising, that’s over £28 billion pounds last year alone. However as we have seen over the past week, things can go wrong when this data falls into the wrong hands (Yurieff, 2018).

It’s no surprise that people are angry. Facebook collecting data on your personal habits and behaviours can’t be avoided if you’re using the platform, neither can this information being passed on be stopped, but it is undoubtedly the fact that Facebook knew about this harvested data since 2015 that has ruffled the most feathers.

So what action should you actually be taking?

Unfortunately there’s no way to know if your data has been used, however, the good news is that the information that is available for the taking is technically public information. If it’s on your profile, it’s up for grabs. If you want to avoid Facebook knowing everything from your favourite foods to the last concert you attended, you may want to start thinking twice about the content you share online. However, being caught up in a data sharing scandal of the future shouldn’t cause you sleepless nights.

It’s 2018 and by now you should be well aware of the growing levels of propaganda on the internet. Companies using your online information with the intention of changing your opinion is continually on the increase, in fact it’s becoming almost impossible to avoid being targeted in some way as a result of your Social Media activity. Therefore the only way to stop this growing influx of ads and information reaching your screen is to switch off completely. But is going cold turkey really the answer here?

Companies may be trying to reach you and showcase their views on your home page, but you don’t have to buy into it. You know your mind, you know your opinions and you know your views, one or two timely Facebook posts may make you stop and think for a minute, but they shouldn’t brainwash you.

They key is to be aware. Don’t delete Facebook just because you don’t want to be part of a statistic. Everything you see online has a purpose. It’s been created and published for a particular reason, take everything with a pinch of salt, think before you buy and think before you share.

Contact our expert social media team for more information, help and advice!

Yurieff, K. (2018). Fed up with Facebook? Here’s how to protect your data. Available: http://money.cnn.com/2018/03/20/technology/how-to-protect-facebook-data/index.html. Last accessed 25th March 2018.

Should small brands market to students?

You may be thinking that targeting students is only for big brands and high-street names, but you couldn’t be more wrong. Regardless of your size, structure or your brands longevity, if you have a product that you believe will appeal to this growing demographic, you need to draw them in!

Students love small businesses. The Millennial generation have made this very clear. Compared with generations before them, this demographic have been seen to champion, indulge in and be increasingly gracious to todays small businesses (Segal, 2017).

But why exactly do students back these businesses and brands?

Location, Location, Location

You may be thinking that when it comes to location the only reasons students like to shop locally is out of convenience, think again. Contrary to their outdated ‘come and go’ reputation, students today have a strong sense of community, and more than ever before like to feel a connection to the products and services they purchase.

We won’t deny that convenience doesn’t still play a part in their purchasing decision, but their sense of community is now a large driving factor. It is the desire to be a part of this student neighbourhood that is the reason they’ll consider spending that little bit more at the shop down the road, rather than the cheaper chain store choice!

An added bonus of this local student spending is that the money is kept within the community. “Studies show that when you buy from an independent, locally-owned business, more of your money is used to make purchases from other local businesses” (SustainableConnections, 2016). Encouraging students to invest in your small business is therefore not only beneficial to you, but their spending will continue to strengthen the economic base of the area you live in.

Customisation is key

By now it’s no secret that students are drawn to anything that can be customised or personalised, and even though they are, students don’t want to feel like just one of the masses. Their desire to feel uniquely targeted and to have their voices heard while shopping is continually on the increase. This is where customisation is key, and this is also where smaller businesses excel!

When you’re a smaller business it’s unlikely you’re producing your products on a mass market scale, therefore you can afford to get personal. What better way to encourage students to buy your product than to show them it was designed just for them!

Getting behind a cause

We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again, students love nothing more than getting behind a brand with a cause at its heart, and let’s be honest, if you’re a small business you’re bound to have one of those!

However, if you don’t have a cause or message behind your business, it’s not too late to get one! Big brands are no longer afraid to wade into controversial topics, debates and conversations, so you shouldn’t be either! With today’s student population feeling empowered with a stronger sense of influence and pride they are now on the lookout for new, upcoming and most importantly, smaller businesses and brands that promote a positive message that can be championed among their peers.

Want to know more on how you can target the student market? Get in touch with our team

Segal, C. (2017). 10 Reasons Why Millennials Love Small Business and How You Can Win Their Business. Available: https://www.inc.com/cox-business/10-reasons-why-millennials-love-small-business-and-how-you-can-win-their-business.html. Last accessed 12th March 2018.

Sustainable Connections . (2016). Why buy local? Keep your money where your mouth is. Available: https://sustainableconnections.org/why-buy-local/. Last accessed 12th March 2018.