Adam Larter, strategy director at brand strategy and content creation agency Studio Black Tomato, and the team, share their findings on consumers emotional experiences during a flight and how airlines can reinvent the experience to meet consumer demands.

When travelling by plane, why is it that so many of us look forward to the destination, but dread the journey? Often associated with higher levels of fear, anxiety, a lack of personal boundaries, or even excitement, the range of feelings that air travel generates can be vast. Is there a way the airline experience could be rethought taking into consideration these emotions?

These wonderings led Studio Black Tomato to conduct a piece of research exploring how people react to flights as emotional human experiences. As the larger travel industry is evolving to better answer consumer demands, the flight experience often feels like it’s lagging behind. The research aims to answer why that is and how it could catch up.

Following a series of interviews with frequent flyers and travel experts, Studio Black Tomato mapped out a set of 48 common emotions, sorted from most to least commonly experienced during a flight. The result was a research report titled Heightened Emotions – An analysis of how we feel when we fly, which offers some recommendations on the way airlines could rethink the overall experience to taking passengers emotions into further consideration. These recommendations are set out in the main points below. You can sign up here for your copy of the full research report.

COMFORTING SERVICE

Our research shows that many airline practices seem at odds with passenger’s needs and expectations. There is an opportunity to start from scratch. Particularly with service – the first airline to change this could win dramatically. The embarrassment around flying is also linked largely to the ‘us’ and ‘them’ service dynamic. Overall service is still aligned with an old-fashioned approach to luxury where cabin crew wear uncomfortable uniforms, the experience is rarely bespoke and is often intrusive.

Service should be more visible, having the cabin crew more present will allow introverted and embarrassed passengers the opportunity to talk to cabin crew – it will create less of a barrier with the service and could create a less stressful atmosphere for cabin crew who have to be “on show”.

TRANSPARENCY IN COMMUNICATION

Uber is a useful case study in showing the importance and success of gamified transparency when it comes to travel. In the Uber app, passengers can see the price, length of journey and any ‘surge charges’ that might be applied before selecting a car. On top of this, they can watch the car coming towards them on the interactive map. Gamified transparency in this way mitigates against potential anger and anxiety that come with the traditional taxi booking process: is the traffic bad, will I get there on time, when is the driver arriving, will I be overcharged, will they have a card machine? Airlines should move in a similar direction, easing the potential for negative reaction by being transparent throughout the overall process. This should begin pre-flight (what passengers need to organize in the lead-up) and during the flight (detail on arrival time, delays and what to expect upon arrival).

EMOTION LED DESIGN

Airline design from decades gone by was something beautiful. Patterned wall-papers, designer curtains. Today you can pay more than you would for a new car to get a seat in an airline and the interior design is less appealing than that of a high-street chain café. While refitting airlines is an expensive task it is one that will ultimately pay off and dramatically improve the experience. If airlines took the same approach to emotion led design that hotels do with their social spaces, then the whole airline experience would benefit.

INTROVERT, VS EXTROVERT EXPERIENCE

Each airline should be auditing from the point of view of an introvert and extrovert. What things will make you anxious in the experience? What do you do if you are scared of pushing the button? What do you do with people who want to spread out or talk? How does this affect the journey? This will give a more realistic and ultimately better experience.

AIMING FOR CONTENTMENT, NOT JOY

Airlines should look for moments to address anxiety whilst we also look for opportunities to respect people’s special me-time. Instead of a flight representing an elated sense of excitement and surprise, passengers are looking for a baseline level of contentment. A moment when they can simultaneously revel in their own company but also be comforted and reassured that their fears and anxieties are in hand.

The airline experience is a hot pot of differing emotional experiences. In this rare setting, there is a fine balance between the collective airline experience and the individual passenger experience. Ultimately, unlike other consumer interactions, the airline experience renders all passengers on the same page. It is near impossible to surprise or delight everyone – nor should this be the ambition. Instead, it’s about creating a baseline of comfortable contentment.

If you would like to find out more about the full research report or Studio Black Tomato, get in touch with Lucy@blacktomato.com

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Molly Harrison, Account Executive at Black Tomato in the Promotions Team, explores campaign loyalty and long-term success over the festive period.

Christmas is traditionally a time for giving, which is why it is the busiest time for prizes and promotions. With so much activity over the festive period, how do you stand out from the crowd and deliver your message effectively? Today, it is more about what brands do rather than say.

So, at this time of year more than any other, ‘prizes with purpose’ are the best way to leave a lasting impression, as well as foster true brand loyalty. Not only do they elevate you above the competition, but they also win fans.

As much as cash prizes and instant wins can pull in the punters, they rarely leave you with any kind of legacy. These types of prizes don’t represent a brand’s values, they don’t engage with the consumer on a deeper level, and they don’t leave a winner with a true understanding of what the brand is trying to achieve. That’s why the most impactful option is to create an incredible experience that will forever be linked to that brand in their mind.

A great example of a ‘prize with a purpose’ done well, is Air Canada’s ‘Gift of Home’ campaign. In 2014, the airline surprised Canadians living in London with round-trip tickets back home to spend the festive season with their loved ones. Not only did this generate some incredible PR, but it demonstrated the airline’s true emotional connection with its customers. It’s highly likely that as a result of this kind gesture, not only were the lucky winners of the airline tickets more than likely to use the airline again, but the heart-felt content likely appealed to new customers as well.

[youtube url=”[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r5YvVB1FJrs&feature=emb_title]” width=”500″ height=”300″]

A recent example from our own back catalogue was Kinder’s ‘Open the Magic’ campaign. This was a great instance of an experience that didn’t require a big budget. Yet it still provided that all-important wow moment and lasting impact. Children wrote in describing their Christmas wish and our job was to make it come true. The more creative, the better. The winner wanted to meet real Christmas Pirates, so that’s exactly what we delivered. From buccaneers with a talking parrot, in branded colours of course, to snow cannons and a pirate ship in the garden, we pulled out all the stops. While Kinder were able to provide a unique and incredible experience that was true to their values and genuinely engaging. To bring it all together Rowan was gifted with the ultimate Kinder hamper as a little reminder of the experience and the brand.

As Air Canada and Kinder demonstrate perfectly, experiences are more memorable than a cash prize and have the power to truly distinguish a brand from the competition, creating lasting memories, promoting brand loyalty and generating great content.

And what brand wouldn’t be happy with that as their Christmas gift this year?

If you would like to find out more about Black Tomato, get in touch with Molly at Molly@blacktomatoagency.com

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Adam Larter, Strategy Director at Studio Black Tomato, explores a possible internet without advertising and what this could mean for brands. 

Can the internet be governed? Or do we have to fundamentally change how it works?

I hold an opinion that the internet would benefit greatly from having all advertising removed.

It feels weird to think about that. After all, it’s the internet we have known since its inception – but parallel discussions happen in printed media all the time. The Evening Standard, Timeout, and other such free publications were very different before they were free. Because the conversation is not just – do you want advertising? The conversation is what is the advertising? Where is the advertising and does the advertising affect the editorial?

It is fair to say the internet is a beautiful, glorious, unpredictable mess and a benefit to humanity, but it being a place where the lines between public and private are blurred is not a good thing. The events following the Cambridge Analytica fall-out drew a lot of attention toward the misuse of data and how advertising works on the internet. As targeted advertising becomes more advanced, as fake news grows, as the role of the influencer continues to change, this scrutiny and debate is something that will only continue.

Personally, I look for ways to hide from advertising and paid content – I read the news on the BBC, I use ad-blockers, I turn off all data on social media sites, I look to use VPNs and Mozilla to limit the data being collected and therefore limit the targeting coming my way. I also enjoy paid music streaming (with Deezer) and paid video streaming (Netflix) so that I avoid advertising there. But even then, the internet is impossibly linked to marketing. The videos my friends share, the articles my parents read, that cat’s Instagram account; they are all part of an ecosystem that is held up by advertising. Wikipedia, Reddit, Bitcoin – all these beacons of a radical free-speech internet are just life-rafts floating on an ocean of paid content, advertising and tracking pixels.

BUT IS IT POSSIBLE TO HAVE AN INTERNET WITHOUT ADVERTISING?

The sliding doors moment of the internet is arguably Ethan Zuckerman’s creation of the pop-up banner in 1994. This marks the point where internet advertising became an easy-to-use and viable model which has developed and evolved since then – from pop-up banners to programmatic advertising, to PPC and affiliate advertising.

The creation of an advertising reliant internet is well covered in the Reply All episode “We Know What You Did”

The alternate reality we can imagine without Zuckerman’s pop-up is the world wide web being accessed in a pay-per-use model – this world means that the payment goes straight from the user to the content provider and it means that there is no need for advertising revenue.

Critics of this argue that this model decreases the “randomness” of the internet. If there is a paywall in this way, small and inventive businesses would have not been able to exist and therefore, no Facebook, no Amazon, no dancing hamsters.

Advertising in all its different shapes and forms allows anyone to have a website and anyone to use the internet. It is an egalitarian approach with the occasional pop-up ad being all the price is to pay.

But the internet has changed dramatically.

Ads don’t just pop up on a site, they follow you everywhere. Advertising and content are now interchangeable. What has been paid for by a brand and what has been created independently can sometimes be difficult to tell apart.

YouTube, Search engines, Maps, reviews… Everywhere is a revenue opportunity – which sounds like a cynical hyperbole – but Grumpy Cat had a net worth of $100 million. In contrast, Wikipedia, the Guardian, and many other news sites are continuously asking for donations.

It seems that keeping free speech alive on the internet is a costly business. Think about the cost alone of being on the first page of search results on Google. What was once an egalitarian system where the most searched for brands rose in the rankings, is now purely about those who invest the most.

THE CUTE CAT THEORY

This theory also comes from Zuckerman and states that people will follow the lowest common denominator on the internet. If intellectual content becomes hard to reach, oppressed, ruined, attacked, people won’t kick up much of a fuss and will simply look elsewhere (or maybe even just offline). If people’s ability to share a cute-cat is affected then things will change.

By this (very sound logic) social media will lead the biggest change in the direction of the internet.

Social Media is at a point of flux. YouTube are trying to push people toward a paid model and are increasing their advertising, Facebook are under scrutiny for how they use data and advertising. As for Spotify, Twitter, Pinterest, they all seem unlikely they will continue in the same way in the coming years.

A PROPOSAL FOR A PAID INTERNET

Imagine Netflix introduced a social networking site, so that alongside the streaming you are paying for you have messaging, networking, file sharing without any kind of advertising. Netflix wouldn’t want to advertise to you, as you place a value in them not advertising in the first place. This is what you are paying for. There would potentially be more impartiality and less tracking, because this is less important in a world where cookies don’t follow you everywhere.

This is just as possible as a state-paid for model. Imagine the UK government add on an internet license to our TV license tomorrow. This would mean free social media and free video streaming sites. Put simply, it would become a BBC-style YouTube without any of the ads, like what they already do for radio. Only this streaming site would be for short videos of cats.

However, this is the Leviathan of the internet – a large body that governs content, that is paid for, that creates international rules, independent rules and allows social media to be a clean and clear system. While this seems to be “restricted” this actually is closer to the utopia that many envisaged the internet would be.

Some would say – how is this egalitarian if it is so tightly managed and controlled? But I would argue that’s not what we have now, with so many brands vying for attention, following you around the internet, buying and selling your data and designing the internet towards e commerce then you are being constantly in a state of manipulation and with the internet being all encompassing (IOT / Roaming data) then that has very dangerous implications.

If this is controlled – then that means a whole chunk of your work and home life is suddenly a safer, more enriching experience.

This means all music and video is without advertising. All news without advertising. All social media without advertising. Messaging, file sharing. No more advertising.

It’s entirely possible – but it also starts to create the internet as a country and a governing body of its own – arguably more powerful than the UN.

Could this be a good thing? Is that the birth of absolute democracy? Is it the birth of true freedom of speech?

The argument against this would be the same argument about any state-run media – it’s never going to be fair. It’s going to have to cater for the many and won’t allow in minority points of view. But at least this model has a more visible governance, it has an intention to be impartial – rather than an intention to sell. And I personally think that’s a good thing.

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The Black Tomato Travel Group has launched a new interactive video service, BLACKWIRE, a joint venture between its content division, Studio Black Tomato, and leading interactive video technology company, WIREWAX.

Studio Black Tomato is a content creation and marketing agency which produces content and media campaigns for some of the biggest brands in the world. Black Tomato Travel Group also owns a multi-award-winning incentive and motivation travel company, Black Tomato Agency.

The BLACKWIRE platform combines Studio Black Tomato’s expertise in shooting video content which brings destinations, and the properties and experiences they offer, to life, and combines it with WIREWAX’s leading interactive video technology.

BLACKWIRE integrates calls to action and hotspots within videos that viewers can touch, click or interact with, allowing them to switch camera views and uncover real-time insights or determine the video’s path and outcome. The two partners claim BLACKWIRE can provide grants brands with “a more subtle, authentic marketing approach” which enriches content and interest, rather than trying to control the user’s experience.

The result is a content offering where viewers can uncover details beyond the images they see on screen. It means they can discover more about destinations and book experiences within the video they are watching, without having to leave the video player.

For example, built-in geo-intelligence and live pricing could allow audiences viewing a video of a travel destination to simply hover their cursor over a hidden hotspot and discover live weather data on a destination, prices and hotel availability, as well as uncovering behind the scenes details.

The two partners say that live interaction of this sort can bring brands to life, double dwell time and produce more memorable long-term results than the short-term benefits associated with a traditional non-interactive video.

Tom Marchant, co-founder of the Black Tomato Group, says “The immediacy of interaction opens up incredible opportunity and there are hugely powerful benefits here for our clients and their consumers”.

Dan Garraway, co-founder of WIREWAX, observes: “Viewers have come to expect to touch every screen they use and this new partnership with WIREWAX and Studio Black Tomato truly maps the landscape for how brands can monetize in meaningful, creative and experiential ways with their consumers.”

WIREWAX is an award-winning technology powering 90% of the world’s interactive video. WIREWAX helps brands, agencies and broadcasters take ordinary videos and make them interactive.

Black Tomato Agency is a member of the Institute of Promotional Marketing, the owner of www.promomarketing.info.

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Great marketing campaigns don’t happen without clients willing to risk going out on a limb, says Andrew Rae of The Black Tomato Agency

My cousin and I share a long running joke. Whenever we see an off-the-wall advertising campaign, hear the ludicrous name of a new band or are told the plot line to a forthcoming farfetched film, we look at each other and say: “Imagine the faces in the presentation when this was pitched!”

For example, imagine the convincing and coercing you would have to do to get ‘Snakes on a Plane’ off the ground…

Or, for an example from the advertising world, imagine ad agency VCCP’s pitch to the Compare the Market marketing team for the ‘Compare the Meerkat’ TV campaign. TV ads featuring an aristocratic Russian meerkat called Aleksandr Orlov, annoyed because people were visiting their site – www.comparethemeerkat.com – when they were really looking for car insurance?

Yet Aleksandr and his family and friends have become the backbone of one of the most successful marketing campaigns in the financial services sector ever – and the promotional element has seen more than a million meerkat toys handed out to people as rewards for taking out a range of Compare the Market insurance products.

The Meerkat campaign launched in 2009; within a very short period of time, comparethemarket.com was ranked as the fourth most visited insurance website in the UK, up from 16th in January 2008, while the site’s overall sales doubled. By 2010 the site had increased its market share by 76%, where competitors’ share had fallen by up to 30% over the same period. 700,000 Facebook fans, 22,000 followers on Twitter, Coronation Street sponsorship and rumoured record deals later it is widely regarded as one of the most successful campaigns of the last 10 years.

But can you imagine the faces in the presentation when this was pitched?

VCCP has won huge numbers of industry awards for the Meerkats; but in reality should we be thanking someone else for giving us Orlov? I think we should. Hats off to the client.

To have the absolute vision, the trust in a supplier, the confidence, the ‘arm-chancery’ to throw caution to the wind and completely commit to someone’s else’s wild creativity is where the real credit should lie.

Anybody who, like us, has won their fair share of industry awards will be very, very aware that the real winners are the clients. They are the ones who allowed us the free reign to be creative, to suggest untried techniques, to do what we do best.

We work with some of the biggest names in their industry sectors; it is widely believed that the larger the brand, the more risk adverse they are and the harder it is to guide them out of their comfort zone. But that is exactly what our role as agencies and suppliers should be – to convince our clients that we can help them by doing something unique and different and that they should trust our ideas.

Think back 11 years to 2007. A TV ad starts with a close-up of a gorilla. Phil Collins’ “In the Air Tonight” plays in the background. The camera pulls back to reveal the gorilla is sitting in a music studio. It sniffs. It rolls its neck, loosens its shoulders… And then it starts drumming.

It is hard to forget the impact that the Cadbury’s Gorilla ad had in 2007. But just imagine that client pitch. Created to convey the message that “all communications should be as effortlessly enjoyable as eating the bar itself,” the ad was the centrepiece of a £6.2 million campaign. And in 2016, it was voted the UK’s favourite ad of all time in a poll conducted by Campaign magazine.

This is quite possibly the best example of a brand taking a massive (albeit calculated) leap outside of its comfort zone.

But did it change behaviour, and was it a success?

The commercial was uploaded to video sharing website YouTube shortly after it first aired, and was viewed over 500,000 times in the first week. As of November 2007, it has been viewed over six million times. Cadbury reported that sales of Dairy Milk had increased by 9%. A YouGov poll showed that 20% more people looked favourably on the brand in the period after the advert’s general release than in the previous period. It won a host of awards, including Pica d’Or for Film 2007, the Grand Cristal at Festival de la Publicité de Méribel and Gold at the British Television Advertising Awards 2008.

Wonderbra even created their own version of the film, with the Cadbury slogan, “A glass and half full of joy,” being replaced with “Two cups full of joy.”

To use a phrase that has now become common parlance, the point I am making is ‘simples’. Creative campaigns are nothing without the progressive attitude and confidence of our clients. Confidence in a) being bold and setting themselves apart from their competition and b) confidence in their suppliers to make it happen.

So next time you see the results from a prestigious industry awards scheme – like the IPM Awards – or you see a brillant piece of creative marketing, make sure you credit the clients as well as the people who put the campaigns together. They’re the ones whom deserve the applause, because they’re the ones who put their brands on the line.

Without courageous clients, our greatest ideas will always remain just that – ideas.

Andrew Rae is Head of Promotional Marketing at the prize and rewards specialist The Black Tomato Agency, which in 2017 won Gold, Silver and Bronze in the Prize, Reward and Incentive category of the IPM COGS Awards for the second year running. The Black Tomato Agency creates unique, brand-relevant travel incentives and reward programmes around the world, tailored precisely to the client’s audience and specific needs to obtain maximum ROI.

The Black Tomato Agency is a member of the Institute of Promotional Marketing, and Andrew Rae was elected to the IPM’s Board in December 2017.

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Andrew Rae of incentives, rewards and prize management company The Black Tomato Agency argues for the value of rolling out the red carpet to attract and retain key customers.

There are relatively few great mysteries left unsolved in the world today. We know how the pyramids were built, we’re pretty sure that the Loch Ness Monster doesn’t want to be found and we are certain that the retention of clients is paramount to business success.

Nowhere is this more apparent than in the FMCG sector, where the sheer volume of available options means that brands have to do their utmost to achieve two crucially important goals: the first is to immediately, at the point of purchase, distinguish themselves from their competitors. The second is to do what you can, at all costs, to foster brand loyalty. Account teams across the land are constantly set the challenge of turning a consumer into a fan.

In the incentive and rewards industry, we are regularly asked the same two questions: “what can we do to retain our customers?” and “how can we stand out from the crowd?”

The second question is relatively simple for us to answer; the former is more of a complex beast. Does brand loyalty still play a part in your customer’s purchasing decision? Are customers too cynical and time-poor to be swayed by incentives?

Reward to Retain

The conventional offers or rewards that are given to new customers are in general fairly similar and, dare we say it, not particularly engaging. The desire to keep on directing the customer back to the product with a voucher or money-off coupon is almost too alluring to move away from.  And in the right space, it is the perfect incentive.

But the question remains, if everyone is employing the same tactic, are you offering your customer the right incentive to choose and stay with you?

If you are confident that your product is the best around (which I’m sure you are, and I agree!), then make sure that confidence comes through in the sales funnel and reward the loyal with unique and remarkable experiences instead.

The sheer fact that your product offers the chance to win a tailored and unique experience is enough to automatically give you shelf appeal and set you apart from the crowd.

We recently handled prize creation and prize management for a client who was launching a product with a ‘Fire and Ice’ theme and wanted to create an experience intrinsically linked to the campaign messaging.

The objectives were, firstly, to set them apart from the crowd and, secondly, to reward their existing, loyal customers.

We created an experience where the winner was flown to Iceland to stay in the ION Adventure Hotel, and rode in a private helicopter over a live volcano before transferring by Super Jeep to another (dormant this time) volcano where a bespoke private dinner was laid out – within the magma chamber…

The effect was immediate and the impact tangible. By engaging with their customers in such a unique and remarkable way, their loyalty was rewarded and their custom retained.

However, sometimes the old methods are just as important – which is why we took the step of leaving a hamper of branded goodies in the guests’ room as a welcome gift. With a personal message included, it reaffirmed the brand message and reminded them of why they were there in a unique, personal and engaging way.

This method of rewarding or engaging customers by offering the chance to win experiences can be seen in a variety of different industries, not just FMCG.

Take Harley Davidson for example; they are currently offering potential customers the chance to win ‘The Tour of a Lifetime’ if they take a test drive. Now, more than ever, brands are seeing the benefit of experiences as incentives for customer acquisition and retention.

Creating a VIP Community

Moving on from the world of rewarding the individual, there is an increasing interest in the value of VIP community events and the opportunity for an elite few to share an experience with others in a similarly prestigious position.

In the same way that a private members club creates a sense of intrigue that sparks interest in those on the outside and pride from those within, a private VIP member’s community in the FMCG market can have an incredible impact on loyalty.

Many luxury brands have already taken this approach to rewarding VIP customers including Bentley, Rolls Royce and Johnnie Walker. They are increasingly using group experiences rather than more traditional gifting initiatives.

An event offers a brand an incredible opportunity to amplify its values and core message through creative and well-curated experiences helping the members identify with the lifestyle association of the brand.  What’s more, a reward that is shared by a community brings into play a unique dynamic that focuses on the human need to share experiences with others and a sense of pride in being recognised as one of an elite group by their peers.

Through effective pre- and post-event, as well as on-site, communications, the value of any event can have far wider reach and offers an incredible opportunity to create a legacy and drive significant longevity for each experience, thereby maximising Return on Investment.

Collateral such as images, videos and sound bites from these events can be repurposed to give those aspiring to be in the VIP club a glimpse into this exclusive world (and thereby encourage them to work towards this).

The combined budget of a group event can allow for otherwise unachievable experiences to be accessed and created.  The buying power of pooled reward budgets can often enable a group to negotiate the very best deals and open doors otherwise closed to the general public.

For a VIP group event, the challenge is always to create a ‘money-can’t-buy’ experience that is quite literally a ‘once-in-a-lifetime’ opportunity.  In recent years, we have organised everything from a complete buyout of Richard Branson’s Necker Island for a VIP group to camping in Alaska in search of bears and a supercar rally through the UAE.

So whether you are looking for a prize promotion to influence the purchasing decision at the point of sale, or thinking of engaging with a community of loyal brand advocates, always think of how you can Reward to Retain.

Andrew Rae is Head of Promotional Marketing at The Black Tomato Agency, which designs and manages award-winning experiences that engage with customers.

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Prize promotion specialist The Black Tomato Agency has added another new hire to bolster its team with the appointment of Ellie Clarke as Fulfilment Manager.

Andrew Rae, Head of Promotional Marketing at The Black Tomato Agency, says: “Winner fulfilment is at the very core of our service offering. The hard work initially invested in a campaign from a plethora of different agencies, all responsible for varying touchpoints of the promotion, can be undone with anything but perfect winner fulfilment.”

Clarke joins the team with years of experience already under her belt, gained from working in Melbourne for corporate events and leisure specialists Encore Journeys and, prior to that, in consumer insight. Rae says that her knowledge of how to deliver intricate, group experiences as well as tangible ROI reflects the kind of brief that Black Tomato are more regularly delivering.

Rae observes: “We are seeing an increase in brands wanting to deliver more complex itineraries, multi-centre experiences and those that reward groups of people, not the standard ‘trip for two’ prizes. Ellie’s experience and contacts, and the in-house expertise The Black Tomato Agency has with its sister agencies, means we have an unparalleled access to the skills required to deliver ‘remarkable experiences that inspire’.”

The Black Tomato Agency is part of The Black Tomato Group, a collection of innovative teams – Promotions, Agency, Leisure and Studio – headquartered in Shoreditch, London. under one creative roof. The Black Tomato Agency creates, manages and fulfils prize experiences and curates and delivers ground breaking group travel experiences all over the world on behalf of some of the world’s top brands, agencies and companies. It won Gold, Silver and Bronze in the Prize and Rewards category of the 2016 COGS Awards, an industry first.

The post Black Tomato Agency New Hire appeared first on IPM Bitesize.

Prize Promotion specialists The Black Tomato Agency have bolstered their team with the appointment of Chelsea Gurr as Business Development Manager.

Riding high after their success at the 2016 COGS Awards (the service provider recognition scheme administered by the Institute of Promotional Marketing) where they won Gold, Silver and Bronze in the Prize and Rewards category (an industry first), Black Tomato have sought to refresh their new business strategy, supported by this latest appointment.

Chelsea Gurr will be driving all new business and comes with a rich and varied client-focused background. Having been responsible for all new business at Buyapowa, the referral marketing software provider and Pearlfinders, the market intelligence platform, she has an unparalleled understanding of client needs and the most relevant solutions to their requirements.

As The Black Tomato Agency offer a range of services to agencies and brands alike, from prize creation to reward scheme management, an immediate understanding of client requirements and delivering against those needs are more important than ever.

Andrew Rae, Head of Promotional Marketing at The Black Tomato Agency says: “We have experienced a significant increase in work since the success of the COGS Awards and having Chelsea on board to help land and expand these opportunities is a great help.”

This most recent hire is a sign of the agency’s continuing drive to ‘create remarkable experiences that inspire’ and is in line with Black Tomato’s intent to hire creative and diverse talent from varied backgrounds in order to provide their clients with the most current and unique experiences available. Chelsea, a professional Trapeze artist and DJ, will bring something more than just business development skills to the Black Tomato family.

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Andrew Rae, Head of Promotions at The Black Tomato Agency and an expert in all things relating to prizes and promotions, answers the latest topical questions from industry insiders.

How can I create a Valentine’s promotion while avoiding clichéd prizes?

Valentine’s Day can be a minefield of trips to Paris and couples’ massages at your local hotel. It can also offer a real opportunity for you and your brand to create some genuinely eye-catching promotions which help your campaign stand out as truly unique amongst its heart-shaped cushion and chocolate equivalents.

Why not try adding a twist to the established tropes of romance?

“Show your partner how much you care – submerge them in a cage in the South Atlantic Sea and invite a Great White Shark to join your Valentine’s Day” or “Test your love for each other as you spend Valentines Night in the Skylodge Adventure Suite, a glass hotel secured to the side of a cliff in the Sacred Valley of Cuzco”.

Alternatively, if you are going romantic, be a bit more creative and give Paris a break from the lovers. How about a chef’s table at one of San Sebastian’s many Michelin starred restaurants, or a night under the stars in a Glass Igloo in Finland?

Let’s reclaim Valentine’s Day as an opportunity for unique campaigns and put the personalised singing teddy bear back in the drawer.

We want to go ultra-romantic for our Valentine’s Day promotion. What could you suggest for a true Money Can’t Buy Experience?

On a professional level, I do take umbrage with the term “money can’t buy” – but I understand it sums up best what promotions need to represent in this day and age.

Valentine’s Day does give us the opportunity to be super-creative, however. You could embed a diamond ring into the walls of a retreating glacier in Iceland, meaning you will literally be the last people ever to experience that spot. Our sister company, specialist travel agency Black Tomato, did just this for someone recently (and the Sunday Times wrote it up…).

Head West and you could have your partners name spelled out by cheerleaders at the half time show at an NFL match. For the more conservative budget, but no less unique, why not take a private stroll through the backstreets of London on a Graffiti Tour with a local artist, and finish with tagging your partner’s name, or a suitably romantic message on a special wall for all to see?

Are there any golden rules to maximising the effect of a prize trip?

Agencies and brands are under pressure to demonstrate ROI on their competitions, more than ever before. A good way to show how effective your campaign was is through UGC (User Generated Content).

Every prize winner is a budding photographer/travel writer/film maker so harness their desire to be creative. Something as simple as a GoPro, selfie stick or a lightweight laptop gives winners the tools to document their trip, giving the brand free and rich content that it can use after the prize has been awarded, either to drum up chatter for the next promotion or simply to show how much fun the winner had.

How can I pack a big punch with a small budget?

The best ideas don’t always have to be brought to life with the biggest budget. It is the unique and thoughtful elements that leave a lasting impression. Look for ways you can add a little bit of magic to an existing package.

A trip to London for two nights can be transformed from something perfectly nice into something that lives on long in the memory of a winner. Why not speak to the hotel they are staying at and ask the bar, just for the night the winners are there, to name a cocktail on their drinks board after the winners? Mr. and Mrs. Smith pop down for evening drinks to see a really special ‘special’ on the board.

A tiny touch, but one that will massively increase the “punch” of your prize.

Andrew Rae is Head of Promotions at prize management specialist The Black Tomato Agency, which designs and manages boundary-pushing prize experiences at home and abroad. With an in-house team of prize management experts and award winning travel operators and working together with top marketing agencies, FMCG brands, media owners, film studios and radio stations, promotions are brought to life and perfectly delivered in an on-brand and innovative way.

The Black Tomato Agency is a sponsor of the IPM Awards 2016 and will be supplying prize experiences for the event.

The post Q&A with Andrew Rae appeared first on IPM Bitesize.

COMMENT: Andrew Rae, Head of Promotions at The Black Tomato Agency, looks at the growth of prize promotions where the reward has an element of social responsibility.

Brands and agencies alike are becoming aware that competition entrants want more. Sometimes they may want to be challenged when entering, so proving their worth. And sometimes they want the prize to be something more than just a reward for them personally; they are looking for something shareable and, dare I say it in reference to a competition prize, something worthy.

Creative teams and prize management agencies are being challenged to create prizes that offer more. This could be via the mechanic, for example winning the prize for another person or being asked to demonstrate why they should win through a charitable action or perhaps a video, all the way through to the prize experience itself.

Big brands have generally led the way with community-related prizes, relying on their access to talent (and funds) to give their campaigns substance and clout.

Mars tapped into the community spirit in 2002, when the prize experience was focussed around the town helping to rebuild the winner’s local clubhouse. This trend has been repeated with other, mainly sport related campaigns.

The opportunity for a star to surprise a local club and pass on their words of wisdom, or simply becoming a water boy for the day, provides rich and eminently shareable content.

Charity-linked promotions are also on the rise. In the US, Johnson & Johnson recently ran a promotion where for every participant that purchased $20 of the company’s FMCG products, the company doubled its donation to USO, a non-profit organization that supports US troops.

The promotion used technology provided by Snipp Interactive, innovators in mobile-led receipt validation technology, and consumers could easily email, text or upload their receipts onto the brand’s website. An immediate result and an immediate interaction.

Adam Doran, MD of Snipp Interactive in the UK, says: “By using our Mobile Receipt Validation technology and promotions platform, brands in the US have been able to drive sales of their products, link to a charitable cause and enable consumers to quickly and easily donate just by submitting their receipt via their mobile – a ‘win win’ for all involved. By taking the ‘heavy lifting’ out of participation for the consumers means higher engagement levels and the removal of the need to print costly on-pack codes for the brands means a larger pot to be donated.  Having a direct link to sales, either quantity or spend based in one transaction or over time, is the final piece that makes these types of programmes viable for the brand and why we are expecting similar activations in the UK market.”

Big hitters Kenco and Andrex have effectively used the charitable angle in their promotional campaigns.

Kenco’s Coffee vs. Gangs campaign rewards your coffee drinking loyalty with the opportunity to save Honduran children from gangs by offering them an alternative, a new future as coffee farmers.

The traditional Sales Promotion tactic is still there – swap your points for a family day out or shopping vouchers – but the message of supporting local communities is undeniably the star of the show.

Interestingly, Kenco has since managed to do something rather unique with the name “Coffee Vs Gangs”, emblazoning the logo on merchandise which can also be won, meaning the message outlives the duration of the campaign.

Andrex take the personal route to another level with its Cause Related Marketing and, using its traditional Guide Dogs relationship, allows consumers to swap loyalty points for specific training items such as leads for a dog of their choice. A great campaign made even more personal with the chance to pick your pooch.

Brand teams are now increasingly seeking to create a more altruistic feeling around their promotions in order to stand apart from the crowd.

One excellent current example is the ‘Chain of Betters’ promotion being run by Western Union. Consumers are invited to submit ideas for using $1,000 to help people anywhere in the world. Every month, the five best ideas, as judged by a panel including the client, receive the money and the support to make the idea become a reality.

Recent winners have included a scheme to buy chickens for Syrian refugees in Turkey, to support a cinema for the blind in Hungary and to provide mosquito nets for villages in Malawi.

So will traditional holiday experiences as prizes die out altogether? No. Cars, cash and holidays still top the bill for the most popular prizes. However, we are seeing more and more promotions where the reward helps other people.

We recently ran a prize campaign for Malta Guinness where we brought one lucky Nigerian winner to the UK to experience the life of a Premiership footballer. This was the meat of the prize, the hook that got the entries flooding in, including a day’s private training at Charlton Athletic, an FA Training Course and a private London Bus tour to name a few elements.

The CSR element came with the chance for the winner to pass on the benefits of his experience, including what he learnt on the course and the wise words from the professional footballers he met, to his local club in Nigeria and to win some top of the range equipment for it. Not to mention the completely unexpected offer from Charlton Athletic Chief Executive Katrien Meire to provide financial and business support to his home club, and you have the perfect ingredients for a ‘money can’t buy’ prize with CSR at its heart.

Innovation in prizes and campaign creation is more important than ever. The clever consumer demands more and the brands that innovate and reward with this in mind will be the ones that truly connect with the consumer and stand out in a saturated market.

Andrew Rae is Head of Promotions at prize management specialist The Black Tomato Agency.

The Black Tomato Agency designs and manages boundary-pushing prize experiences at home and abroad. With an in-house team of prize management experts and award winning travel operators and working together with top marketing agencies, FMCG brands, media owners, film studios and radio stations, promotions are brought to life and perfectly delivered in an on-brand and innovative way.

The Black Tomato Agency is a sponsor of the IPM Awards 2016 and will be supplying prize experiences for the event.

The post Comment: Responsibility as a reward appeared first on IPM Bitesize.