Category: Brand Evolution

Vodafone is the first phone operator in the Netherlands to introduce a ‘widget’ with which prepaid customers can buy extra credit through internet banking. Once customers click ‘add to Google’ on a Vodafone web page, the personal Vodafone box from then on appears in the completely personalized Google home page (am, Dutch). Brands get less and less opportunities to enter the lives of consumers. They will therefore put more and more effort into getting people to introduce them in their world. For example by really offering added value. This widget is an example of that. Earlier or later we will gather our favorite brands in one place, which together give a summary of our lives. Thus Google (or a similar brand) forms the cockpit, and our favorite brands are the meters. This is a small step in that direction.

Dutch Volkswagen customers from now on can get route, traffic and weather information through their mobile phone.  The service is free for customers (via em, Dutch). Thus Volkswagen adds more (virtual) value to the (physical) car. Now for free, but in the future there will be so much added service that customers are willing to pay for it. Then the service will always be available in the car, through the mobile phone but also through every other screen. Then we will be able to look into error reports from the car, and make a service appointment with the garage in one click. Then we will always have the most up-to-date maps in the car, worldwide, we will be recognized in any Volkswagen we enter, and our favorite temperature will automatically be entered. This is only a small step away…

Ciao Shopping, one of the biggest and fastest growing comparison sites in Europe, has members earn money through reviews (50 cents per review), and by getting other new members. They can earn a 50% bonus on all review earnings of the new member for the first half year of his or her membership. Participating in market research also brings in money: up to 5 euros per research (em, Dutch). Thus new brands show what a thin border there is between employees and consumers. People who are more involved, make more money. Even in times in which they are less active themselves, when others who they recruited are more active. Regular brands more and more start using multi-level marketing mechanisms. Or the mission work with which churches were successful in the past. It depends on how you want to see it. This anyway is an example of how it can be successful.

Mier3000 (Ant 3000) is a new little brand that nestles in your Windows Live Messenger (formerly MSN Messenger) contact list, and that searches the (Dutch) national telephone guide and yellow pages for you. When you add mier3000@live.nl to your contact list, you can directly start asking questions. The dialogue is still simple, although it already can answer questions like ‘I’m looking for’, ‘I want the phone number of’, and even ‘gimme a pizza place’ results in a list of hits. In Messenger’s right screen (the activity screen) the results then appear on a map. Anybody who registers gets a personal ant. People can even nominate their ant to be the work-ant of the month.

Thus the dialogue further develops. Any human being, any brand and any other organization: we will only (literally) have to call their names and we are directly connected to them. Through speech (and image) with a real person, through a website or through an artificial brand agent. Ant then can become our personal secretary, a virtual personal brand instance of our personal contact brand. This is a small step in that direction.

Ex tennis player Boris Becker here demonstrates an interactive shopping window of fashion brand Ralph Lauren. At this life-sized screen people can browse through the collection (ut) Now we browse through the collection. In the future we will be able to virtually walk around in the shop, to get an idea and maybe even make a choice. Now we still have to stand outside, later we will have shops with lots of virtual fitting and feeling rooms (feel the fabric), in which all our senses are stimulated so we feel comfortable while ‘fitting’. It is also possible to do that 24 hours a day, a little less comfortable. You have the choice. This goes that direction.

On this screen called MegaPhone, it is possible to play games with lots of people at the same time. You connect to the game by calling a number, after which you can immediately start the game without downloading software. Just by touching numbers at your phone. See the video below. It is also possible to give speech commands (ug). And thus all screens and display slowly but surely all get connected. Now through special applications, in the future we will be able to get all content on our display by just pointing our mobile phone to it, and giving a spoken command. And should the display be too small, we just rummage about for the content with our hands, and ‘throw’ it onto a bigger screen. Until we are happy. We are in charge.

SalesForce, supplier of web based CRM-software, a year ago started Idea Exchange, a website on which users can leave ideas for product improvements. Users can vote for each others ideas by simply clicking ‘promote’. The most popular ideas thus appear on top of the list. Meanwhile a lot of experience has been gained with this. SalesForce discovered that ignoring these suggestions can be very bad. The most popular ideas you need to adopt, or negative attention will be your share. In the latest version of the software, 42 ideas from Idea Exchange have been incorporated (em, Dutch). Brands experience a brand coming out. Brands become more open, more transparent, and the border between consumer and producer completely disappears. The involvement with the brand gets much bigger. Bigger than ever before. This is a great example that shows the way for all brands.

Cinema owner Path now also offers the possibility to reserve films, watch trailers and see what movie is shown where, through your mobile phone. When you send the text message FILM to 4443 (in the Netherlands), Path Mobiel sends a link to an application which can be installed in one click (em, Dutch). Brands will be available on demand. Now we still have to send a text message. In the future we will call ‘Path’, and we will directly be able to ask Path our question while sitting in a restaurant: ‘are there any good movies shown in the neighborhood within the next hour?’ ‘Good’ then will be interpreted based on personal preferences, ‘the neighborhood’ is determined based on the mobile phone and your GPS location, and the system in itself will add: ‘and which still have seats available.’ Now still in an application, in the future it will be supported by the most important visualization of the brand: the brand agent. Thus, slowly but surely a real dialogue comes into being. This is a small step in that direction.

Vodafone started offering landlines in the Netherlands this week. This is part of the development in which telecoms operators and cable providers transform from service providers (telephone and televisions) to access providers: transaction brands which connect devices, whether business or private, directly to the virtual world. Big screens, small screens. Displays in the car, displays in the office, displays in the walkway. Our home network, our car network, or personal area network. Access providers connect it to the world. Once a device has access, literally everybody can use all services like speech, video, or gaming. Paid or unpaid. Who we get our services from, a totally different story, can come from anywhere in the world. In the future we won’t have a wire giving us access to services: through a wire (or a wireless connection) we will have access to one big virtual world in which we can do anything we like. Vodafone anticipates this development.

French newspaper Les Echos after a pilot is the first newspaper in the world to offer a subscription on e-paper, electronic paper. This ‘paper’ is in a thin holder, the iLiad, made by Dutch company iRex Technologies. It is sharper than paper, and it doesn’t use energy once the page is loaded. This device has a wireless connection to the internet, so that it can be updated continuously. A year subscription to L’Echos’s service, including an iLiad, costs 769 euros (am, Dutch). Thus a new display providing access to the virtual world grows. Now it is still expensive, later we will only have the e-paper in our hand, we will fold it and put it in our pocket, and it will be very cheap. Now it is aiming at news, later we can do anything through this thin display. Now in black-and-white, later very sharp in color. Slowly we will see this display appear in our surroundings more and more. It now starts in France.

Alice is the new provider for Internet and calling (dc, Dutch). Brands more and more often use personal names and (sometimes real, more and more often artificial) characters to give their brand a brand personality. A personal name strengthens this feeling. This is an example of that.

Users of the new iPod Touch will automatically see an icon ‘Starbucks’ when they enter an outlet of this coffee chain. When they click the icon, they can see the latest play list, and directly download a song or album through online music store iTunes. This goes over the wireless network standard available at Starbucks, which is automatically recognized by iPod Touch (mf, Dutch). And thus iTunes further develops as a personal music brand. Now just through iPod, later through any mobile device. Now you still have to download a play list, later iTunes will directly recognize the music you are listening too. Then you can say: ‘that song they played at least three times that night! That song.’ iTunes then always listens along, and can directly recall every auditive experience. Wherever in the world, no matter how long ago. This is a small step in that direction.

Google News now provides access to original press releases of press agencies. Among them are American press agency Associated Press (AP), French Agence France-Presse (AFP), British Press Association (PA), and Canadian Press (CP)(dc, Dutch). Now it is limited to a handful of countries, but this will lead to direct consumer access to all press releases that have ever been made. Thus the quality of web log postings will increase, as they can easily cite the original piece, and link to it. And the amount of postings will increase too. In the end personal news brands will help us, based on our personal preferences, to make a selection of all news items available in text, audio, or video. Google News is a personal news brand in development.

Comparison site Kieskeurig.nl gets a print version: Kieskeurig Magazine. The paper version of product and price comparer Kieskeurig must ‘inspire’ consumers to make online purchases. The magazine is targeted mainly to women and is sent along magazines of Sanoma, Kieskeurig’s mother company (em, Dutch). Online communities become leading, print is just a copy. Whether the company has its history in print or online, it all goes the same direction. In the end print will disappear too, to make place for e-paper. Then the role of the readers (or do we call them members) will be even more dominant. This is just a small step in that development.

Music channel TMF starts the ‘kweekvijver’ (breeding ground). Here artists can upload their music and promote themselves. Through their activities they save credits for their own TV campaign or online campaign (mf, Dutch). This way personal music brands develop more and more. This type of brands stimulate, facilitate, and distribute music. Music we will in the end hardly pay for. The most important function will then be creating a live experience in the physical world or the virtual world. That is what people will pay for. The rest is just promotion. The time in which artists could earn big status is over for good. Making music is going to be just like the other arts, and like before will be an activity by and for the people, which is really hard to make good money of.