Yeah I know ... lots of chatter about Employee-Generated Media (EGM) on the blog recently. There just happens to be a rash of instances lately. Here's another interesting example from QVC. (Yes, the home shopping channel.)
QVC recently launched an ad campaign centered around trying to own the letter "Q."
[SIDEBAR: I always smirk when I hear us marketers make such grandiose statements like we are going to own the letter "Q." At Starbucks we used to focus some of our marketing efforts to "Own Coffee." I always had to bite my lip whenever I would say something like, "This re-introduced coffee passport program will help enable us to "'own coffee.'" Starbucks doesn't own coffee. Never has. Never will. Coffee isn't ownable by anyone.]
Back to the post ...
QVC is putting a lot of energy behind their customer-facing campaign to own the letter "Q" ... a new, bolder logo ... lots of stylish billboards ... an overhauled website. All this activity is focusing on the QUALITY aspect of hyping the QVC experience of Quality, Value, and Convenience.
Turns out this focus on owning the letter Q began as an internal marketing initiative in June 2006. All 13,000 QVC employees were given a logo t-shirt and given the challenge of getting the most spectacular product placement. The winning employee would get $10,000.
I'm not a fan of doing gimmicky stunts to capture customer attention. As a marketer, I much prefer to garner customer intention more than capture customer attention.
However, this Product Placement employee contest from QVC is a fun idea to tap into the creativity and ingenuity of employees. According to the New York Times, one QVC t-shirt wearing employee had their picture taken with Donovan McNabb, Philadelphia Eagles quarterback, and that picture found its way on the Eagle's website.
QVC employee Peter Fey, brother of writer/actress Tina Fey, had his famous sister plug the t-shirt and QVC during an appearance on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. (Watch the Tina Fey/QVC video clip here.)
The winning QVC t-shirt product placement came from an employee who organized a belly flop contest for an autism charity. Each contestant wore the QVC t-shirt and a local TV station did a live stand-up from the event.
Fun stuff. I hope more companies entrust and encourage their employees to do similar things.
SOURCE: New York Times article | Sept. 21
Give me back my Q, I use that a lot in Italian ;-) Yes, I've seen the ads all over the place in Philadelphia. I must say while the ads don't excite me, the internal employee campaign as you describe it here does.
Posted by: Valeria Maltoni | September 25, 2007 at 09:31 AM
This is appealing for its inventiveness, I have to say. It's also fun to watch for product placement gone wrong, such as when the suspect in a perp walk is wearing a logo.
Posted by: ouija repairman | September 25, 2007 at 09:40 AM
John... You own "Marketing Blogs"...
Posted by: Pat Nerr | September 25, 2007 at 12:06 PM
"Pat Nerr" ... one of my funniest SBUX marketing memories is when an outside agency came in and waxed elaborately on how Starbucks "owns" the green straw like Levi's "owns" the red tab. This "owning" the green straw story still makes me smile today.
Posted by: johnmoore (from Brand Autopsy) | September 25, 2007 at 12:53 PM
Jeebus... that's right up there with Ken Mooney being called "Pod Boy"... and then announcing himslef as "Pod Boy" on every VM update...
Posted by: Pat Nerr | September 25, 2007 at 03:44 PM
First, let me say I love that sentence, "As a marketer, I much prefer to garner customer intention rather than capture customer attention."
Second, I like the new QVC logo and I love the internal employee campaign. I have to agree that I dislike gimmicky promotions, so that aspect of the QVC doesn't appeal to me. However, from an employee motivation and inclusion standpoint, it's a great idea. I'm sure it helped boost internal moral.
I'd be curious to find out how many of the employee product placements helped to communicate the QVC brand image and promise and how many did the opposite. Either way, it's a fun employee motivation program that probably generated a great deal of publicity for QVC.
Posted by: Susan Gunelius | September 25, 2007 at 08:08 PM
I second that emotion! "I love that sentence, 'As a marketer, I much prefer to garner customer intention rather than capture customer attention." Trust that my team will hear that at the next marketing retreat! Made me forget about the QVC story, which by the way was a smart tactic.
Posted by: jo | October 03, 2007 at 07:10 PM