Why KFC’s Marketing Is Admirable…

KFC’s UK CMO believes that its response to the ‘chicken crisis’ is a testament to the strength of its relationship with its digital marketing agency and shows a brand that is confident in its identity and place in a modernising fast food market.

In response to the crisis that saw stores across the UK run out of chicken – probably the worst thing that could happen to a fried chicken restaurant – Meghan Farren (CMO of KFC UK) chose wit and humanity instead of the usual apologetic response. In a PR campaign, KFC chose to reverse their logo and rearrange the letters to instead say ‘FCK’.

Farren said “You want me to write FCK on our bucket? You want me to turn our brand into a swear word?!” and was incredulous at the start, but after a humorous response from lawyers and other company managers, she realised the good humour and human error behind the PR stunt.

She also said “We had nothing to hide or spin. We just wanted to get answers to everyone’s questions as fast as possible and match the tone to the tone of public sentiment. That’s one of my biggest lessons; it’s very easy when you are a business that is internally under immense pressure to forget that that context is not the context of the public.” Their marketing company really did wonders here to restore public faith and a public apology from one of the UKs biggest fast food brands.

The response really highlights the importance of employing a marketing agency that really understands their clients. Seeing agencies as ‘real business partners’ has been key to the success of the relationships between businesses and marketing companies. Their agency also brought back The Colonel into their UK advertising for the first time in 40 years.

Agencies are responsible for creative, almost none of which KFC does in-house. “We rely on agencies a lot because we have a super lean team. We own the direction, vision and strategy, with input and challenge from the agencies because it’s collaborative.”

KFC has obviously made a smart decision when it comes to their marketing. If a PR disaster comes about, it is essential to have a marketing team on side to help restore your brand rapport! If you would like to learn more about what PIXAFUSION Digital can do for you, then get in contact today.

Why Instagram Will Escalate Customer Satisfaction

Attracting new customers is always the goal but satisfying the needs of your current customers is
even more important! But how do you make sure you are keeping your customers happy? The best
way to know is to receive feedback from them…

Asking for their opinion offers valuable insights into their expectations, needs and wants. But getting
them to share this information with you can be the difficult part. This is where social media platform
Instagram can come in handy. Instagram Storie’s polls allow followers to vote on key questions asked
by your company and will allow a quick and uncomplicated way to make positive changes.

Most of your customers are likely to have an Instagram account and the more they interact with
your stories, the more likely your posts are to show up in their feed! Instagram Stories feature has
more than 400 million accounts. Users are ready to interact with brands and engagement rate is
much higher than on Facebook or Twitter and at least 30% of users have bought a product they first
discovered on Instagram.

Using Instagram Storie’s polls is easy. You will need to create a new story post, and it should be
related in some way to the poll topic. Think of a suitable question and all your followers need to do
is to respond ‘yes’ or ‘no.’ It’s a very simple way to get followers to engage with your brand. It will
help them to feel like part of your community.

If you don’t have the resources for focus groups and extensive surveys, polling votes will give you
more idea about what products your buyers love, and that may even influence your inventory
volumes. It’s an effective way to let customers know that their opinions are important to you and to
create publicity for your brand.

Your followers will be impressed if their votes are used to influence the actions you take. If you want
to hold an event, you could ask them to choose between two different venues. When you talk about
what they voted for, they’ll feel invested. Show your customers that you care about their opinions
by using polls and at the same time receive useful insights that can further improve their satisfaction
and contribute to the success of your business.

Stats To Kick Off Your Monday!

We arm you this week with all the numbers you need to know to make sure you Monday starts with
a bang!

1. Three in five marketers are not confident in budget allocation…

Three in five (60%) of marketers are not very confident in their team’s ability to effectively allocate
marketing budget, with 68% confessing to using the previous year’s budget and either increasing,
decreasing or level-funding it. Another 20% set budget once a year and don’t change it, with 63%
saying it’s difficult to determine marketing spend allocation across tactics that will drive maximum
ROI. More than half (57%) rely on internal spreadsheet-based analysis to estimate the impact of
possible marketing budget allocations, rather than software or external analysis. And 5% don’t
estimate the impact of marketing budget allocations.

2. 42% of all the UK display ads were not seen in Q2…

Just 58% of banner ads in the UK in the second quarter met minimum viewability guidelines, down
one percentage point from the first quarter. Compared to other markets, the UK ranks in the lower
half of the table with the best viewability rates seen in Austria (73%) followed by Sweden (64%). The
international average is 61%. However, UK consumers view display ads for five seconds more than
the international average, typically watching for 26.2 seconds in Britain.

3. Brands to increase spend on influencer marketing despite concerns over fraud…

Two-thirds (65%) of brands plan to increase spend on influencer marketing during the next 12
months despite concerns over lack of transparency and fake followers. The main aim of the
investment is to boost brand awareness (86%), reach new audiences (74%), and improve brand
advocacy (69%). When asked what ranks at the top of brands’ selection lists when deciding who to
work with, 96% of respondents regard the quality of followers as “absolutely essential” or “very
important”. Concerns were mainly focused around four areas with consumer trust and blurred lines
cited as “very concerning” and “concerning” by 64%. The other three were legal and financial risks
(60%), reputational risks (64%), and brand safety risks (59%).