Carnival & Delta monetize their Facebook fans

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Recently Carnival Cruise Lines and my employer Razorfish announced the launch of a new Facebook application that makes it possible for people to collaborate with their social network to plan vacation cruises. Cruise enthusiasts can explore different types of vacation options and involve their Facebook friends in the planning and booking of a cruise. Interestingly, the announcement occurs days after Delta Air Lines said it would start selling flights on Facebook.

The Carnival and Delta announcements show how companies are linking social media to commercial transactions — and also how brands can mine customer data gathered on cloud computing platforms like Facebook. It’s one thing for companies to build brand awareness and consumer goodwill by making use of the conversational power of social. But Carnival is looking for a way to tap into its 251,000 Facebook fans (and counting) for transactional value, not just brand appeal, as is Delta with its 39,000 fans.

Moreover, there is a subtle but crucial difference in the approaches taken by Delta and Carnival. Delta aims to keep its customers on its Facebook app for the duration of the booking process. But Carnival directs consumers from its Facebook page to Carnival.com to complete a booking. Both approaches have their advantages. While Delta’s approach is more self-contained, Carnival can expose consumers to branded content on Carnival’s own turf. Consequently Carnival seeks to take more ownership of its social experience.

Forrester Research data suggest that both Carnival and Delta are making the right moves by building upon their Facebook pages. According to a July 28 report written by Henry Harteveldt, 26 million leisure travelers in the U.S. began using social media over the past two years. Seventy two percent of U.S. online travelers (nearly 100 million people) participate in social media at least once a month. In the report, “How Travel eBusiness Can Engage Conversationalists, the New Social Media Group,” Henry urges travel companies to add a booking engine to their social network pages.

Razorfish helped conceptualize, create, and design the Carnival Facebook app (a first of its kind in the cruise line industry).

Have you embraced immersive marketing?

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Forrester Research analyst Shar VanBoskirk recently asked whether the future of marketing might be “immersive marketing,” or creating an all-encompassing brand experience across any channel where the consumer lives. The answer is a definitive yes.

My employer Avenue A | Razorfish completed a Digital Consumer Behavior Study in 2007 that examined consumers’ media consumption habits. The study found that consumers are snacking on niche content across the entire digital world to interact with consumer brands, whether reading blogs or sampling videos.

The implication is that marketers cannot afford to simply design better websites or banner ads in isolation. Instead, we need to design immersive brand experiences for the “everywhere consumer” — across websites, search, banner ads, blogs, and mobile devices.

So who knows how to do that?

Continue reading

Have you embraced immersive marketing?

ambrielle3.jpg

Forrester Research analyst Shar VanBoskirk recently asked whether the future of marketing might be “immersive marketing,” or creating an all-encompassing brand experience across any channel where the consumer lives. The answer is a definitive yes.

My employer Avenue A | Razorfish completed a Digital Consumer Behavior Study in 2007 that examined consumers’ media consumption habits. The study found that consumers are snacking on niche content across the entire digital world to interact with consumer brands, whether reading blogs or sampling videos.

The implication is that marketers cannot afford to simply design better websites or banner ads in isolation. Instead, we need to design immersive brand experiences for the “everywhere consumer” — across websites, search, banner ads, blogs, and mobile devices.

So who knows how to do that?

Continue reading

Carnival calling

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Carnival Cruise Lines once again shows why it’s the travel industry’s most savvy marketer. In July 2007, Carnival worked with my employer Avenue A | Razorfish to launched Funship Island, an immersive world where you can get a virtual taste of a real Carnival vacation experience, such as sliding down the iconic Twister slide on the Lido deck. Now Carnival is bringing the vacation experience to Times Square through an innovative mobile marketing campaign appearing on the Times Square JumboTron starting 5 November 2007.

Each time a commercial for Carnival runs on the billboard, pedestrians see a short code with a playful call to action, such as “Text the word ‘cruise’ to 445566 to receive a mini-vacation wall paper.” Pedestrians can send the text message and receive a link to download the wallpaper image of, say, a glorious vacation beach on their mobile devices.

The campaign runs through 1 January 2008. The campaign was developed by the Avenue A | Razorfish Ft. Lauderdale office, which also helped Carnival launch the travel industry’s first social networking destination, CarnivalConnections.

Carnival calling

carnival-cruise-lines-lg.jpg

Carnival Cruise Lines once again shows why it’s the travel industry’s most savvy marketer. In July 2007, Carnival worked with my employer Avenue A | Razorfish to launched Funship Island, an immersive world where you can get a virtual taste of a real Carnival vacation experience, such as sliding down the iconic Twister slide on the Lido deck. Now Carnival is bringing the vacation experience to Times Square through an innovative mobile marketing campaign appearing on the Times Square JumboTron starting 5 November 2007.

Each time a commercial for Carnival runs on the billboard, pedestrians see a short code with a playful call to action, such as “Text the word ‘cruise’ to 445566 to receive a mini-vacation wall paper.” Pedestrians can send the text message and receive a link to download the wallpaper image of, say, a glorious vacation beach on their mobile devices.

The campaign runs through 1 January 2008. The campaign was developed by the Avenue A | Razorfish Ft. Lauderdale office, which also helped Carnival launch the travel industry’s first social networking destination, CarnivalConnections.