The popularity of dogs and cats on YouTube and Instagram is now being leveraged by brands as more of them use furry friends to represent them. The best example of this is Choupette, Karl Lagerfeld’s white Birman cat, who has an impressive 51,000 followers on Instagram and has inspired two accessory lines from the designer. As Choupette became a celebrity in her own right, she inspired other brands to use personal pets to capture the interest of consumers, and not just in the field of fashion.

Fairmont Hotels has a number of canine hospitality ambassadors who promote its thoughtful and welcoming service at various locations, including Smudge, a seven year-old Golden Labrador Retriever who lives at its hotel in Edmonton. Travelers missing their own pets or looking for a companion while taking a walk can bring along the resident Fairmont dog for extra security and the comfort of home.

With the low-cost and high-reward of creating animal ambassadors, more brands are expected to join this trend that can create an instant emotional bond with consumers. Just make sure that the brand remains the hero of the story, with the pet playing a supporting role.

Low-cost brands own an important position in the marketplace and there are two strategies to promote these brands:  cheap vs. affordable.  A slight difference of semantics, you might say, but an important one when it comes to brand equity.

A low-cost product targets consumers who are looking for the cheapest option in that category. The brand offers nothing beyond price and therefore doesn’t build equity.  Think of Suave shampoo and Payless shoes.  On the other hand, an affordable brand strategy focuses on the combination of value and quality at a lower cost. These brands are positioned as best value and are able to build equity.  When the brand value is clear, the price becomes one of many secondary, or supporting, features and not the brand story headline.  In short – successful, affordable brands are not defined by price.  Gap, Honda and TJ Maxx all use value positioning. Smirnoff takes it further and mocks pretentiousness with the Exclusively for Everybody campaign.

To sum it up: the best strategy for a low priced, affordable brand is to be competitive via a mix of quality and pricing.

There is a growing trend for people craving simple connections with others, and pure uncomplicated fun. There has been a steady rise in book clubs, board game meet-ups and even cereal cafés, as consumers are craving pleasure in the simplest form; a shun from being constantly connected to the digital world. This thirst for simplicity  is often quenched by pop ups and summer events, but I’m noticing a rise in permanent spaces with completely dedicated fun in its purest form, proving that simple pleasures are here to stay. Life’s too short to waste it on a screen 🙂

How are customers perceived when they enter a luxury boutique store wearing gym clothes? How about a business person wearing red sneakers? Good news for nonconformists everywhere! A forthcoming article in theJournal of Consumer Research demonstrates that your nonconforming behaviors can cause others to confer on you higher status and competence. ”The Red Sneakers Effect: Inferring Status and Competence from Signals of Nonconformity”, by Silvia Bellezza, Francesca Gino, and Anat Keinan, also identifies situations where nonconformism works the other way.

Can your employees think in more innovative, creative and entrepreneurial ways?

Here are a few suggestions on how to establish your corporate entrepreneurial culture (some we did and some we didn’t):

Organisation operates on frontiers of technology.

New ideas encouraged.

Trial and error encouraged.

Failures allowed.

No opportunity parameters.

Resources available and accessible.

Multidiscipline teamwork approach.

Long time horizon.

Volunteer programme.

Appropriate reward system.

Sponsors and champions available.

Support of top management.

Keep in mind though, this is a process that must be actively managed and nurtured.

Customer Engagement Is Key For 2013 | Beneath the Brand.