How to Successfully Market on Reddit [Webinar Recap] by @dantosz
If you have considered marketing your brand on Reddit, you have likely heard the horror stories. The AMAs gone astray or the sad attempt Pilot made at using a meme to promote their own brand. The horror stories are enough to scare away many a marketer. Here’s the thing – you CAN market on Reddit. But only if you approach the audience the way they like to be approached. This week, our SEJ ThinkTank webinar series welcomed back Brent Csutoras, the Chief Social Media Strategist for SEJ and a Redditor of more than a decade. If you are looking to succeed […]
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Android Pay says “hajimemashite”
The next time you pop into your local “conbini”, your Android phone will be all you need to take with you. Starting today, Android Pay — the new digital wallet for Android smartphones — is available in Japan, helping you pay for things and earn loyalty points quickly and conveniently when you are on-the-go.
We are launching with Rakuten Edy, so you can use Android Pay at over 470,000 locations in Japan that accept Rakuten Edy eMoney – including shops like Bic Camera, Family Mart, Lawson, McDonald’s and Yodobashi Camera.
To start using Android Pay, download the app from the Google Play store onto an eligible Android smartphone running Kitkat 4.4 or above. You can create a new Edy card in seconds directly in the app, or, if you already have a mobile Rakuten Edy, you can also enable it in Android Pay. Adding money to your Edy card is quick and easy in Android Pay – you can top-up instantly in the app with your credit card, or at any local store that supports Rakuten Edy top-up.
To pay, just tap your phone to the eMoney reader and see your balance update. It’s easy to keep track of your purchases, with a long-term transaction history viewable right in the app. You can also add your plastic loyalty cards for supported point programs like Rakuten Super Points.
And there’s more to come. In 2017, we plan to continue working with FeliCa Networks to support more eMoney providers and are working with payments companies like The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, Ltd., Visa and Mastercard in many new ways – such as helping you speed through checkout with Android Pay in your favorite apps. Stay tuned for more announcements.
Get started with Android Pay in Japan today: download the app on Google Play, create a card and start shopping. And, as an added bonus, for a limited time, new users will receive a 400 yen sign-up gift when they create a Rakuten Edy card in Android Pay. It’s as easy as Tap. Pay. Done.
The Ultimate Guide to Account-Based Marketing: 6 Key Steps
There’s something kind of cool happening in the world of marketing.
Actually, there’s always something cool going on here. But as you may have recently heard, people are paying a lot of attention to something called account-based marketing (ABM). After all, over the past year, there’s been a 21% increase in the number of companies that have a full account-based marketing program in place.
And yet, it seems like account-based marketing is a fairly new concept to many people. A big part of that has to do with a lagging alignment between marketing and sales within many organizations — while this number is almost double what it was last year, only 60% of businesses say they’re “somewhat” or “tightly” aligned with sales.
But account-based marketing — and its success — is somewhat rooted in that very alignment between marketing and sales. And as you’ll see, it’s highly useable, if you know where to begin. That’s why we’re here to help.
But What Is Account-Based Marketing?
ABM is essentially a form of strategic business marketing. An organization takes an individual prospect or customer account — these are companies, not individual people — and treats it like its very own market, or a market of one.
So, in that context, it’s really just what it sounds like — marketing that’s based on a given account, existing or prospective. It’s typically done by enterprise-level sales organizations, and is mostly relevant to B2B efforts.
Why is that? Well, ABM is a particularly useful for organizations with multiple buyers or stakeholders. Part of its goal, says HubSpot’s Corporate Marketing Manager Sam Balter, “is to address the needs of organization by connecting with all of the stakeholders within it. That’s one reason why it works so well in B2B — oftentimes you have to work with five or more stakeholders in a given sale.”
That might seem a little tricky — especially, says HubSpot’s Senior Product Marketing Team Manager Jeff Russo, “from an execution standpoint.”
But it really boils down to six essential steps, which we’ll flesh out and tie back to inbound marketing — because while they’re two different concepts, they can truly complement each other.
Where ABM + Inbound Marketing Meet
Inbound marketing and ABM are, on the surface, a bit different in theory:
Inbound marketing primarily focuses on creating great content to bring prospects to you.
ABM puts the emphasis on individual prospects or existing accounts.
But they absolutely complement each other — in fact, we use them in tandem here at HubSpot. “Our sales team uses ABM and inbound marketing,” Balter explains. “They have a set list of target accounts, and use inbound marketing leads to supplement those accounts.”
You might notice that many of the above-outlined steps incorporate pieces of inbound marketing principles. And really, says Balter, that’s how ABM can be used “to build better relationships with target accounts.”
These days, customers really don’t enjoy feeling like they’re being sold to. That’s why it’s crucial that your marketing — even when account-based — provides value, and doesn’t push products. Emails, websites, and calls-to-action all have to be personalized for each target, especially when you’re trying to aid their discovery of your brand.
So let’s break it down. With a little help from HubSpot’s team of ABM experts — Sam Balter from above, Product Marketing Manager Ari Plaut, and Head of Corporate Sales Ryan Spillane — we’ll illustrate the steps you can take to implement and execute ABM.
The Ultimate Guide to Account-Based Marketing: 6 Key Steps
1) Identify your target.
Finding your target audience is a fundamental piece of successful marketing. Remember, we’re dealing with organizations here, not people — so don’t get this step confused with developing personas.
Rather, identifying your target accounts should be a collaborative effort between marketing and sales, since it’ll require data from both areas — firmographic data, which consists of things like industry, company size, location, and annual revenue, as well as strategic factors, like market influence, likelihood of repeat purchase, and expected profit margin.
While market research is a very valuable tool in determining this list, some of it is qualitative — that is the kind of information you’re able to contribute using intuition and experience.
2) Research your accounts.
Once you determine who your targets are, they goal is to treat those companies like big, organization-level personas. Remember — we’re not trying to develop personas for individual people here. However, it can help to have that detailed information and representation of your ideal business customers.
Being familiar with elements like the company structure and who the critical players are can, in turn, dictate how you convey your product or service to those targets, especially if you know who the decision-makers and influencers are. Sometimes, this information might already exist in-house; perhaps someone on your team previously researched this target, but didn’t complete the ABM process of reaching it the right way.
But if you don’t already have that information on hand, manual research might be required to get it. We find that LinkedIn is an excellent way to uncover that data with a fairly simple advanced search.
Let’s say someone was trying to figure out who the staff writers are on the HubSpot Marketing blog. Start by opening up an advanced people search.
Then, enter the name of your target the “Company” box. If you’re trying to find out who fills a certain role within the organization, put that in the “title box.” Be sure to set both the company and title to current.
3) Create your content.
Now that you’ve got the names of the key players within each account, you’ll want to create new content for them. That content should speak not only to the pain points of those specific employees, but more to those specific businesses.
Remember — at risk of sounding like a broken record — the ABM strategy is less focused on individual personas, and more on casting a wide net for new business. For that reason, this content should be focused on the single deals you’d like to make with each specific organization.
With this step, you might start to see how ABM and inbound marketing are able to work together, as it’s clear that quality, compelling content plays a role in reaching your account-based targets.
Not sure where to start? Check out this guide to creating useful content.
4) Choose your channels.
Even with the best content to reach your accounts, it won’t be very effective if you don’t use the right channels to promote it. It’s important to choose the right channels to deliver it, based on what’s most effective for a given organization or role.
Here’s where it might be helpful to know where the specific people within each target “live” online. The Pew Research Center Demographics of Social Media Users does an excellent job of profiling the users of five major social media platforms — Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Twitter. That should shed some light on which channels the people within each account are mostly likely using, and how they consume the content you’re custom-creating for each of them.
5) Run your campaign.
At this point, you’ve selected your targets, built out the specifics of their respective compositions, created content, and selected the channels you’ll use to promote it. Time to execute! Right? Well, kind of.
Running your campaign will require some care. You’ll have to coordinate your messaging across the various channels — you don’t want to send different signals to the same person within a target account.
That’s a big problem for many B2B marketers, according to Demandbase: “Unlike consumer marketers who have millions of potential customers,” reads its Account-Based Marketing: Fundamentals Every B2B Marketer Must Know report, “B2B marketers have a limited number of potential buyers.”
Perhaps that’s why, according to the same report, 82% of visitors to B2B sites aren’t even actual prospects. So choose and leverage the right channels properly — to target the right accounts, and to make sure the messaging isn’t repetitive or conflicting.
6) Measure your results.
A surprising number of CMOs out there have trouble proving the ROI of their marketing efforts — 67% of them, in fact. Every campaign needs to have its results measured properly, especially with methodologies that are somewhat new.
Ask the right questions when you’re measuring the results of an ABM campaign. According to our aforementioned team of experts, these might include:
Are we growing our list of known individuals within the target account?
Have there been any changes to the way these accounts are engaging with our brand and its content?
How much revenue have we generated from these target accounts?
There are also some tools available to help evaluate your marketing ROI. This guide, for example, explains how to measure your marketing campaigns using the HubSpot Sources Report.
Ready to Get Account-Based?
When it’s broken down into a few steps, account-based marketing seems a bit less overwhelming. In fact, as we covered, it’s not so different from inbound marketing, and works quite well with some of the inbound principles that we hold so near and dear.
Just like we said above — find those targets. Then, with inbound marketing, help them find you.
How are you using account-based marketing? Let us know in the comments.
Creating an Indispensable Welcome Email (Infographic)
More than 40% of brands forget one of the best performing marketing campaigns there is: the welcome email. This marketing campaign must-have generates, on average, 33% more engagement with your brand than your average email marketing campaign.
Are you forgetting about your welcome email? Or are you looking to make your welcome emails even better? Below is an infographic from InboxArmy about The Indispensable Welcome Email. In it, you’ll learn how to:
Showcase your brand
Generate interest in your products/services
Integrate your other channels (social, etc.)
Develop the welcome email content to establish the foundation for customer relationships
Take a look at the infographic below:
About the Author: Steve Johnson is the Marketing Manager at InboxArmy.
How to Create an Annual Marketing Plan [Free Tool]
Do you take a good, hard look at your team’s marketing strategy every year?
You should. An annual marketing plan helps you set your marketing on the right course to make your company’s business goals a reality. Think of it as a high-level plan that guides the direction of your team’s campaigns, goals, and growth.
Without one, things can get messy — and it’s nearly impossible to put a number on the budget you’ll need to secure for the projects, hiring, and outsourcing you’ll encounter over the course of a year if you don’t have a plan.
Of course, this type of planning takes a lot of time and effort. So if you’re strapped for time before the holidays, give our new Marketing Plan Generator a try. This tool simplifies yearly planning and lays your strategies, initiatives, and goals out in a template so you can identify what’s most important for the coming year.
Once you’ve filled in your information, you’ll come away with a plan that helps you:
Outline your annual marketing strategy
Identify your most important annual initiatives
Nix the projects that won’t help you hit your 2017 goals
Track the right metrics throughout the year
Align your team through a common mission
Pro Tip: The best way to set up your 2017 marketing plan is to start with quick wins first, that way you can ramp up fast and set yourself (and your team) up to hit more challenging goals and take on more sophisticated projects by Q4. So, what do you say? Are you ready to give it a spin?
You can find our Free Marketing Plan Generator right here.
Learning about the ho-ho-holidays with Google
The holidays are a time for celebrating traditions. Year after year, we tell favorite holiday stories and sing favorite holiday songs, whether for Christmas, Hanukkah, or Kwanzaa. This season, you can help your students discover some of the history and heritage of popular holiday icons with two new Google Expeditions, which add a virtual-reality twist to learning. The first Expedition whisks students off to the Victorian London of Tiny Tim and the Ghost of Christmas Past, while the second takes them to the snowy world of Kris Kringle. For Hanukkah, students can also take a virtual museum visit to view photos and artifacts highlighting the richness of Jewish traditions from around the world.
Take a virtual visit to the Charles Dickens Museum
Many readers consider Charles Dickens the greatest novelist of the Victorian era. His beloved 19th-century books include “Oliver Twist” and “A Christmas Carol.” The brick house at 48 Doughty Street is now the only remaining home in London where Dickens lived as an adult. His two eldest daughters were born here, as were some of his most important novels.
Now the Charles Dickens Museum, the house contains thousands of artifacts related to the author and his era. With the Charles Dickens Expedition, you can explore the house, learn the stories behind items on display, and discover what life in Victorian London was like for Dickens and his family. English teachers can lead students on a virtual visit while reading his classics to help students gain a greater appreciation for the life and times of the man who created Ebenezer Scrooge and other vivid characters.
Learn the science behind Santa
Mystery and wonder have always surrounded the jolly, bearded man who makes the holidays bright for children around the world. Now the Santa’s Journey Expedition offers lessons in some of the real science, technology, and ecology involved in this annual tradition. Students will marvel at the electrically-charged Northern Lights, glimpse at the camouflage and hibernation of Arctic wildlife, and learn why Santa really travels in a sleigh.
This Expedition will also delight students with five colorful panoramas of holiday moments, which teachers can use in conjunction with the lesson plan available on TES. They’ll see how different people and myths have contributed to making modern Santa, visit the wooden kota he calls home, and learn about his very own post office in Finland. They can peek into the stables where the nimble little Svalbard reindeer live, explore the great warehouse where elves make millions of gifts while playing international games, and learn how Santa achieves his incredible feat on Christmas Eve thanks to physics and technology — an unexpected science lesson that any kid will enjoy.
Teachers and students exploring the history of Judaism this Hanukkah can pay a virtual visit to Google Arts & Culture’s online exhibit of Judaica artifacts from Moscow’s Jewish Museum and Tolerance Center. It showcases a fascinating array of items from the everyday lives and holiday celebrations of Russian Jews dating back to Peter the Great. The exhibit serves as a history lesson on how Jewish culture and traditions in Russia have been sustained across generations and centuries despite major migrations, wars, and geopolitical changes.
As we wrap up our year and look forward to a new year of learning in 2017, our teams here at Google Expeditions and Google Arts & Culture wish everyone joy and happiness this season!
15 Brilliant Examples of Holiday Marketing Campaigns
Every year, as soon as Halloween is behind us, it seems like the floodgates open. Without warning, there are holiday marketing campaigns everywhere, with countless businesses rushing to cash in on a spending frenzy. There are holiday emails, social media posts, and TV ads — oh, my.
It might seem like holiday marketing is out of control. But some brands do it very, very well.
How? Well, these brands create campaigns that actually delight customers instead of adding to holiday “noise.” They evoke emotions and promote sharing, sometimes even connecting people with their loved ones, or partnering with a charitable organization. 
Great holiday marketing campaigns come in many different shapes and sizes. Check out 15 of our favorites below, and use these ideas to fuel your own holiday marketing ideas.
15 Brilliant Examples of Holiday Marketing Campaigns
1) Coca-Cola Canada: Peace on Earth … Or at Least in the Mall
When it comes to shopping malls during the holidays, it seems that people are highly divided. There are some who can’t get enough of the buzz and the decor (guilty), and some who want to stay as far away as possible.
Wherever you stand on the topic, Coca-Cola Canada found a clever way to brand the “mall-during-the holidays” experience by showing how our favorite beverages can bring us all together, even during tense times. Here, the company uses a video — shared across social media — in which two people fighting over a jacket are able to find peace by enjoying Coca-Cola products together.
Here’s to peace on earth. Or at least in the mall. #TasteTheFeeling
This installment is just one of the latest in the Coca-Cola company’s legendary holiday marketing campaigns — I mean, who doesn’t love the annual debut of the Coke-drinking polar bears?
2) REI: #OptOutside
Last year, REI made waves with its announcement that it would close the doors to its retail locations, headquarters, and distribution centers on Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving in the U.S. Instead, REI invited its community to join employees in taking Black Friday off from work — and from shopping — to do what they love most: being outside.
This year, REI is back with the #OptOutside campaign in full force. It’s getting attention from some pretty big names, including the National Parks Foundation, which is putting its own spin on the #OptOutside movement.
The campaign is even motivating other brands to add a charitable element to the movement. Outdoor Research, for example, will donate $10 to Paradox Sports for every Instagram post containing both the #OptOutside and #OutdoorResearch hashtags.
Source: Outdoor Research
3) WeWork: #wwgiftguide
It might seem tricky for B2B brands to pull off delightful holiday marketing. But WeWork, a provider of co-working and office spaces around the world, has disproved that perception with its #wwgiftguide campaign.
It kicked off with an article in Creator, WeWork’s magazine for entrepreneurs, titled “Holiday Gift Guide: Best Gifts with a Personal Touch.” Over the course two weeks, there were four segments of the guide published, each with a different theme — “gifts with a personal touch,” “gifts to get the party started,” “gifts for the family,” and “gifts for the digital nomad,” to name a few.
Our favorite part? Each gift guide features products from WeWork member companies, helping to support the community of creators for which it’s known. And to help promote the campaign, the stories have been shared across social media with the hashtag #wwgiftguide, encouraging people to share what they’re gifting this holiday season.
Source: creator
4) HotelTonight: Visit, Don’t Stay
During the holidays, time with family is inevitable — whether you like it or not.
But HotelTonight has a plan to help, by making it easy for holiday travelers to visit family without staying with them. The solution? An easy-to-book hotel room, using the brand’s website.
The campaign is widespread across social media. First, there’s a Facebook contest, in which followers can share a story of their worst/funniest holiday family memory in the comments.
Then, followers on Twitter are invited to participate in the conversation, using the #HotelTonight hashtag.
Ready for the holidays? Grandma’s inflating your air mattress & checking it twice. Maybe this year you should visit, not stay. #HotelTonight pic.twitter.com/gWZUU8T8qg
— HotelTonight (@HotelTonight)
November 22, 2016
The campaign also uses quirky, chuckle-worthy print and audio ads, like this gem that invokes nostalgia of our own wacky relatives.
Source: AdWeek
One of our favorite parts of this campaign is that it’s multi-faceted. It takes a single idea — that we aren’t crazy about some of our relatives, but can’t be rude about it — and executes the message across a variety of formats.
5) Dollar Shave Club: Holiday Shave Set
Sometimes, we enjoy some good, snarky marketing. Maybe that’s why we can’t stop giggling at this video promoting Dollar Shave Club’s Holiday Shave Set: the gift that other gifts can’t handle.
It’s a great example of a simple, funny video perfect for social media. This snowman on a sweater was too jealous to handle the awesomeness of the Holiday Shave Set — hence, the hair dryer. It shows how brands can incorporate the familiarity of cheesy holiday traditions like wearing ugly sweaters into their own marketing, while simultaneously demonstrating how their products or services can spice up the standard holiday monotony.
The DSC Holiday Shave Set is such a perfect present, other gifts can’t handle it.
6) Hinge: See What We’re Thankful For
This holiday season, what are you thankful for? Back in November, dating app Hinge sent around an email posing the same question to its members, using the opportunity to talk about its recent rebrand and subsequent growth — something for which Hinge itself has enormous gratitude, according to the email.
The timing for this sort of marketing is impeccable. The holidays are notorious for the sentimentality they invoke among the masses, and the desire to spend them with “someone special.” (In fact, ads that capitalize on sentimentality have been shown to score 50% higher in emotional appeal, no matter what the season might be.)
Hinge used this email to harness the holiday spirit and redirect attention to an app that helps people find meaningful relationships, instead of, well, shorter-term alternatives.
[Click here to see the full email]
7) Lagavulin: Nick Offerman’s Yule Log
This one is an oldie but a goodie. Actor, writer, and humorist Nick Offerman loves his whisky. He’s sung about it before, and last holiday season, he joined his favorite whisky brand, Lagavulin, to film a 45-minute video of — wait for it — Offerman sitting in a leather chair next to a crackling fire, drinking whisky and looking calmly at the camera. Where do we sign up for that gig?
“This is smart branding on Lagavulin’s part,” Kristina Monllos wrote for AdWeek. “Creating an extended ad that can serve as a conversation starter — should consumers swap the traditional Yule Log video for Offerman’s at parties — will also get everyone talking about the brand.”
Since the video was initially released, a new 10-hour version of it became available. Consider it our gift to you.
8) BarkPost: Yappy Thanksgiving Eve
Holidays are traditionally a time to be spent with family. For many of us, that includes our dogs.
BarkPost is no stranger to marketing campaigns that help “dog ruvers” include their furry friends into day-to-day life. In November, the pet-friendly brand showed how to do that at Thanksgiving, with a clever email that included holiday-themed cartoons and videos, feeding safety tips, and other holiday survival techniques — which, of course, involve your dog.
Plus, check out that adorable call to action at the bottom of the email: “Stop getting cute dogs in your email. Unsubscribe.” I mean, who would want to unsubscribe from that?
9) Edeka: Wihnachtsclip – #heimkommen
Remember that sentimental value of holiday marketing that we mentioned earlier? Well, here’s a tear-jerking example for you from German supermarket Edeka. Its 2015 holiday TV advertisement “Wihnachtsclip – #HeimKommen” — which translates from German to “Christmas Carol – #Homecoming” — is all about realizing what really matters around the holidays: spending time with family and the people you love.
In the ad, an elderly man prepares to spend yet another Christmas alone, since his kids usually cancel their planned visits last minute. Then, the ad shows his various grown children receiving letters saying their father has passed away. When they arrive at home, though, they’re surprised to be greeted by their very alive and very healthy-looking father. He says, “How else could I have brought you all together?”
Other than the delicious-looking meal they share at the very end, there’s no hint that Edeka is a supermarket — but you can bet the video is emotional and shareworthy. The ad garnered 33.5 million views on YouTube within a week of posting.
This year, Edeka is at it again with its “#Zeitschenken — EDEKA Weihnachtswerbung” ads (which translates to “#Time — EDEKA Christmas Advertising”), this time showing how the frenzy around holidays can keep us from remembering the most important thing of all — spending them with the people we love.
10) HubSpot: #HolidayHub
Microsites are a great way to highlight a specific campaign or target a specific buyer persona. Here’s an example of a holiday-themed microsite HubSpot created, highlighting our #HolidayHub campaign and targeting ecommerce customers. (Check out a few more ingenious microsites in this blog post.)
The site is filled with holiday marketing resources, which isn’t a far cry from the type of content we publish to our normal website — except this time, it’s themed. Plus, who doesn’t love a countdown?
The animated snow effect was created using HTML5 Canvas and JavaScript. You can learn how to implement an animated snow effect on HubSpot’s Design blog. Alternatively, you could create an animated GIF to create a feeling of animation — Here’s a beginner’s tutorial for creating an animated GIF in Photoshop.
11) Samsung Galaxy: Unwrap The Feels
Samsung has had a bit of a tumultuous year. But now, the brand is seeking to bring some holiday cheer to the masses with the gift of its Gear VR.
We’ve anticipated that virtual reality would become an increasingly important marketing device, especially when it comes to brands creating an experience for consumers. With technology from products like Gear VR, people can create their own experiences from the comfort of their own homes.
Samsung is building on that for the holidays with this video that shows relatives gifting their loved ones with the freedom to experience anything — and the feelings that come with it. Watch as the different recipients show a broad range of reactions, from elation, to shock, to wonder.
Samsung also incorporated a social media sweepstakes into the campaign. For a chance to win a Galaxy S7 Edge and a Gear VR, Twitter users were invited to tag a friend with the hashtags #GalaxyS7edge, #GearVR, and #sweepstakes, along with a few words on why that person deserved the gift of virtual reality.
Tag a friend + why they deserve a #GalaxyS7edge + #GearVR w/ #sweepstakes. You both may win. Happy holidays. Rules: https://t.co/hNpt6Onhlz pic.twitter.com/cukTVfg82j
— Samsung Mobile US (@SamsungMobileUS)
November 21, 2016
12) Sonos + Spotify: #PlaylistPotluck
One great way to celebrate the holiday season is with an event. And with events typically come music. Spotify is aware of that tradition, which is why it created #PlaylistPotluck.
It started with a partnership with Sonos. The brands got together to turn playlists into something like a potluck in which everyone contributes something to bring the event together (the tagline of the campaign is “One home. One host. Everyone brings a dish.”) Only, instead of contributing food or drink, everyone contributes a tune to a collaborative playlist.
Oh, look. That feature is available with Spotify!
The idea is delightfully interactive. Instead of using traditional invitations, guests RSVP to the potluck by adding songs to the collaborative playlist. And the cherry on top? Both brands also partnered with the PBS series “Mind of a Chef” for a televised holiday special, in which various celebrity chefs will be using the feature for their own meals.
What we love about this campaign is the fact that it incorporates several different elements and media formats to make it cohesive — a speaker system, a music-streaming app, and a televised special. Plus, if you participate, you’re entered for a chance to win your very own dinner party, hosted by a world-renowned chef. Bon appetit — and rock on.
13) Google: Santa Tracker
While Google’s Santa Tracker has been around for a few years now — and we recommend checking out the back story here — its features have evolved over time. This year, for example, “Santa’s dashboard,” a virtual display of the technology that powers his global travels on Christmas Eve, will debut.
It’s hard to narrow down what makes the Santa Tracker so delightful, but if we had to summarize it, we’d say this — it combines the holiday wonder of a belief in Santa with real-life technology. What a wonderful way to teach kids about the web, while also allowing them to be kids. (Although, we adults certainly appreciate it, too.)
This year, Google has even introduced a B2B element of the Santa Tracker by sharing the code with developers and releasing other elements of the tool as open source. Why make all of that information public? To inspire developers to create their “own magical experiences based on all the interesting and exciting components that came together to make Santa Tracker,” writes Google’s Developer Programs Engineer Sam Thorogood.
Up until Christmas Eve, visitors can have a peek at the “North Pole,” to see what Santa’s elves are up to as the holiday approaches.
14) John Lewis: #BusterTheBoxer
When U.K. department store John Lewis debuted its 2016 holiday ad, Buster the Boxer won the hearts of audiences around the world. (My colleague, Karla Cook, wrote more about the ad here.)
What really delights us about #BusterTheBoxer — which was turned into a promotional hashtag — is that John Lewis didn’t stop at a TV commercial for its holiday marketing. By dedicating an entire section of its online shop to Buster and his friends, the brand created an interactive experience.
Check out the video below. It provides a 360° user experience to explore Buster’s garden, where the very trampoline being promoted in the original ad was installed. We’re looking forward to seeing more 360° video used in marketing — this season, and beyond.
15) H&M: Come Together
One look at H&M’s YouTube page, and it’s clear that this brand knows how to use video marketing to its advantage. H&M’s holiday marketing is no exception. Its latest holiday video, directed by Wes Anderson and starring Adrien Brody, made headlines almost immediately upon its release. Twenty-four hours after its premiere, it was still the #1 trending video on YouTube.
The video takes viewers through the experience of a train conductor and passengers faced with severe weather-related travel delays. Nineteen minutes after the conductor calls in a request for an emergency supply of festive materials, the passengers — all donning H&M apparel, of course — make way to the cafeteria car, which has been transformed into a winter wonderland.
We’re particularly fond of this ad’s subtlety. Rather than screaming, “Here are the new winter items in our catalogue,” H&M managed to incorporate its fashions into the storyline of a video that had very little to do with apparel. Remember: Holiday marketing doesn’t have to be in-your-face as much as on-brand and memorable.
Go Forth and Be Merry
Out of all the things that we appreciate about these campaigns, there might be one thing we like the most — the fact that they put the fun back in holidays. This season, don’t let the stress get to you. Have a laugh or a cry with these examples, and please, be merry.
From our family to yours, happy holidays.
Editor’s Note: This post was originally published in December 2015 and has been updated for freshness, accuracy, and comprehensiveness.
What are your favorite holiday marketing campaigns? Share with us in the comments.
Upgrading SMS for Rogers customers on Android
Many of us rely on SMS every day — to make plans, confirm an appointment, or stay in touch with friends. But even as smartphones have become more powerful and the apps we use on them more vibrant, SMS hasn’t changed a lot. It’s still just plain text. We believe this standard messaging experience should be better, so through a mobile industry initiative called RCS (Rich Communications Services), we’ve committed to working with carriers and manufacturers to upgrade SMS to a more enhanced messaging experience for people everywhere.
Last month, we announced our first carrier supporting this richer messaging experience. Now we’re bringing RCS to even more people by working with Rogers Communications to launch RCS messaging to their Android customers in Canada.
Rogers customers will have access to enhanced features — including group chat, high-res photo sharing and read receipts — as part of their standard messaging experience on Android. You can access the upgraded messaging experience by downloading the Messenger app for Android devices from the Google Play Store, and the service will be powered by the Jibe RCS cloud. We’re beginning to roll out the enhanced messaging experience today, and it will be available to all Rogers customers soon.
Next year, Rogers intends to preload Messenger as the standard messaging app for new Android devices. We’re excited to provide a better messaging experience to Canadians, and look forward to launching RCS with more partners in the coming months.
Sharing National Security Letters with the public
In our continued effort to increase transparency around government demands for user data, today we begin to make available to the public the National Security Letters (NSLs) we have received where, either through litigation or legislation, we have been freed of nondisclosure obligations. We previewed this back in October when we updated our Transparency Report.
As we have described in the past, we have fought for the right to be transparent about our receipt of NSLs. This includes working with the government to publish statistics about NSLs we’ve received, successfully fighting NSL gag provisions in court, and leading the effort to ensure that Internet companies can be more transparent with users about the volume and scope of national security demands that we receive.
In 2015, Congress passed the USA Freedom Act, which allowed companies like Google to make more granular disclosures about National Security Letters they receive. In addition, the Act restricts the use of indefinite gag restrictions that prevent providers from ever notifying customers or talking about the demands. The Department of Justice (DOJ) must now regularly review disclosure restrictions in NSLs and lift those that are no longer needed. The United States Attorney General approved procedures to do this, and as we mentioned recently, the FBI has started lifting gag restrictions on particular NSLs.
We are now making copies of those NSLs available. Our goal in doing so is to shed more light on the nature and scope of NSLs. We minimized redactions to protect privacy interests, but the content of the NSLs remain as they were when served. We are also publishing the correspondence reflecting the lifting of the nondisclosure restrictions. We have links to the documents below. In the near future, we will establish a more permanent home for these and additional materials from our Transparency Report.
Redacted NSLs and FBI correspondence
NSL-10-272979 (FBI notice)
NSL-13-375880 (FBI notice)
NSL-14-394627 (FBI notice)
NSL-14-395838 (FBI notice)
NSL-14-396103 (FBI notice)
NSL-14-396300 (FBI notice)
NSL-15-417535 (FBI notice)
NSL-15-418313 (FBI notice)
While we are encouraged by this development, we will remain vigilant in opposing legislation that would significantly expand the universe of information that can be obtained with an NSL.
Steve Biko Google doodle honors anti-apartheid activist & founder of the Black Consciousness Movement
Biko spent his life fighting South Africa’s apartheid policies and racial injustice.
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