Latest / Marketing Shed / Is Amazon Prime Actually a Loyalty Scheme?
Transcript
- Paul Duxbury: Good morning Paul, how you doing? Yeah, very good, very good. It's nice to see you. How are you today? Yeah, I'm good, thank you, I'm good. It's hard to believe we're in May now, isn't it? Time's flying by. Time is flying by, you are right. Yes, yes, very excited to be in May, not least as I'm on holiday from tomorrow for a week. Very nice, very nice. Well it is that time of the year isn't it and like recharging the batteries is there. No, no, the battery is, the body battery is okay, but yes, I think you're right. I think a bit of recharging will be handy. Good, good. And so what have you been up to this week then Paul? Have you been out and about? Where have you been? Have been abroad? Where have you been this week? ⁓ gosh, well since we last spoke, been at a brilliant time in the Netherlands, visiting couple of universities as part of my responsibilities for EDCOM. That was marvellous seeing students ⁓ addressing student challenges, work related challenges. One of which was how to market ⁓ a new service that on the cards, it's not yet in action, but where a major airline can your suitcase without you having to have a baggage tag. It uses artificial intelligence and based on a photograph you take of your suitcase, it tracks your suitcase and gets it to your destination and you to it, which is amazing. Wow, that's incredible. That is very reassuring to know, because I've been, it's all been in that position. Yeah, that's true. Yeah, that is true. Because there is a good chance it won't, right? Well, it's, it'll be reassuring if it works, but so, so it's a good, well, well, yeah, I guess that's why they're testing it. ⁓ I wouldn't want to be the test person, but that's, that's why it's a good marketing challenge. ⁓ and so that was immense. And then the last week I've been super busy doing something unusual for me, which has been repeat training. I've been training people. Yeah. Yeah. I'm from a ⁓ very large how to tell stories with data. ⁓ I've been literally training the whole business. So I've done, gosh, 16 sessions on the same topic over the last 10 days or so. ⁓ And it's interesting how you find different ways ⁓ to the same thing and keep it interesting. ⁓ Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But been good. It's been very good. So yeah, ask me any question about storytelling with data and I can talk on that topic for an hour and a half. So yeah, it's been good. How about you? Get out of the Maybe there's a future podcast thing, storytelling with data. Yeah, good with me Paul. I have been doing lots of, we've done a lot of in-person meetings at my organisation lately and some sort of macro thinking, sort of strategy, KPI building work. So we've got together as a team in person in real life. Yeah. and just sticking Post-its on walls and boards to kind of really get some shared KPIs across our teams for the year. So really valuable. And actually got me thinking, is there anything better for cross collaboration than a Post-it note? You just can't be putting Post-it notes on walls, can you? You know, you can have virtual Miro boards and whiteboards and things. I still don't think it does the same job as being in person with a Post-it note. Personal preference maybe, but it's the real value. ⁓ Yes. No, think, well, think you're right. I enjoy good post-it note and there's nothing than, you know, moving them around and looking at them and voting on them for getting people engaged aligned. But what I've found really is that it kind of does work virtually, not as well, but it does work virtually and... A virtual whiteboard still better than, ⁓ don't know, a non-whiteboard in-person session because you get that creativity and flexibility. I would agree with that. I definitely agree with that. If you can do a virtual session with a virtual whiteboard of some kind, it's definitely better than being in real life and not having any sort of tools or apparatus you can use to kind of shuffle or force around. So 100 % agree. Yes, and it's really weird by extension. was thinking about this, you know, you've got ⁓ obviously have that purpose for brainstorming ⁓ being flexible and working together and collaborating. And then you've got PowerPoint for when you're presenting a recommendation, you've got the Word document for when you're getting deep into something and perhaps forming an opinion. It's fascinating when you think about the different tools we've got for different scenarios and how they play. ⁓ play different roles. Yeah, it is. And I suppose we're all quite used to them and embedded with them, aren't I? we're quite used to that. Not many people probably want to deviate from that in terms of what they use. So, yeah, it's interesting whether that is the right tool still. I don't know. Interesting. But yeah, it was just really nice to be in person. We have got a good balance at the moment of in person and kind of being able to get your head down and get on with it. Yeah. Yeah. Don't know. good actual work as well. yes, good. Good. And what have you seen? What have you been seeing in the marketing world then, Paul? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, today's topic is prompted by a couple of recent findings the Advertising Standards Authority. ⁓ as know, marketeers in the UK have to conform to ⁓ the advertising standards. in most cases, not all, but in most cases, that's done retrospectively. So Mmm don't have to clear things in advance ⁓ many cases, but if member of the public, whoever, reports advert and says they're not happy with it, then you have to be able to make it stack up. ⁓ And the examples, which are different linked in a way, are from a user in Face cream by Barsdorf, the big healthcare ⁓ and Inn owned by and both of them had ads pulled and the reports out just in the last week or so but for different reasons. So I thought it might be worth just digging into those a bit. ⁓ Have you seen rulings, Warren? I haven't actually, so I'm very interested to see this. Yeah. Okay, well let's take Usarin. So Usarin, I hope I'm pronouncing it correctly, I don't use it. But Usarin put ⁓ poster ⁓ on the tube, I think elsewhere, and claim was, let me get this ⁓ right, got the rulings up ⁓ on computer. The claim was they showed a picture of a, we'll try and get the picture up on ⁓ the podcast. We had a woman with an area of her face highlighted and large wording said, look up to five years younger. And the smaller text said product in use has been tested. And then the text beside the bottle said clinically proven. the claim was that using this cream would make you appear five years younger. And somebody complained and the complaint was upheld. And then we had Premier Inn, where Premier Inn said that basically you could get a hotel room in Edinburgh for 35 pounds a night. somebody complained and said, well, I've tried to do that and I haven't been at all successful. So that's not really a fair reflection of prices. Now, what was really interesting, really interesting was let's take the Premier Inn example. How many rooms what percentage of Premier Inn rooms in Edinburgh do you reckon are available at £35 a night in a year, in a given year? ⁓ is my estimate, by the way, based on the information that Premier Inn shared with the advertising services. percentage of rooms of all the rooms I've got in Edinburgh that are priced at £35 across the whole year. Yeah, because the example with the complaint was for the Edinburgh advert. I've no idea if I'm honest, I'm gonna go for it. 30 % spread it out there, yeah. Tell you what, okay, put it another way. Okay, so what percentage do you think it would be reasonable for you to say, well, that's fair enough? given that they're advertising ⁓ I was going say 100 % from £35. 60%, 70 % more. Ha ha. 60%, 60%. That sounds high to me, but I suspect it would be higher than the reality. And this is my estimate based on a guess about the rough size of the hotel in Edinburgh. Well, what I can tell you for a fact is that Premier Inn said there were 112 days in the year up to 4th of November, 2023. Yeah. when you could book a hotel room for 35 pounds a night, 112 days. So that means there were over 200 days in the year when you couldn't book a hotel room in their hotel for 35 quid a night. within those 112 days, there were approximately three rooms a night at that price. And by doing a bit of guesstimation about the number of rooms they've got, it's about 1%. Right. of their available rooms in the year were at £35. And the ASA decided that that was insufficient for them to be able to advertise that they could provide rooms from £35 a night. Because they're saying a reasonable consumer, a reasonable consumer would expect to have a better chance of getting a room than 1%. So, yeah. Yeah. that's fair. I love that. I love that they pulled, I love that someone questioned that and then they pulled that. Yeah, but interesting factually, Premier Inns were correct. You could get a room for 30 pounds, 35 pounds a night. Factually, they were correct, but the advertising standard said in reality, in real life, you can't make that claim because it's not a reasonable claim. Now, if we take UsurIn, UsurIn quite interesting because they basically, the person in the streets take out of their ad is probably UsarCream. Yes, true. and a substantial number of women who've used it in agreement that you'll look five years younger. What do you reckon about that claim? How many people have they surveyed? What was the score? 160 I think they had surveyed. 160 people have used it and out of that how many people said that they looked five years younger? let's have a look. It's quite a lot. They gave quite a bit of information. it was, I think it was certainly, certainly they could back it up. There was, there was a time where, where women had used the cream and said, I think I'll look about five years younger. so they could back it up and I'm thinking, you know, we all know the deal with this stuff. It's all kind of subjective. ⁓ you know, ⁓ you know, old do you think I look and how odd I think you look, you know, it's all, it's all. next Yeah. subjective. Yeah. in the eye of the beholder. Seems fair enough, you know, they've asked a bunch of people and they've kind of said, yeah, we look a bit younger. The problem, the problem with, with Usarin was that they put in the ⁓ the phrase, I'm to find it out, clinically proven. ⁓ you've got to be really careful when you're raising the bar to that height. Cause if you're saying it's clinically proven, you've got to provide. Yeah. Uhhhh Yeah. Yeah. clinically, quality level assurance. So you've got a blind tests with a representative sample, know, reviewed, et cetera, et cetera. So they set the bar too high. So there you've got, I think in my view, a claim that a lot of people would probably say, it's kind reasonable, but they set the bar too high ⁓ and the that got Yeah. couldn't meet that bar, it could meet a lower bar. So if they'd been a bit, bit, bit, bit more careful, they probably could have continued with that, that advert. But the point being, I think, I think there's two points really. One is that it's great. We've got the advertising standards authority there to keep advertising trustworthy, which is super important. And the other is that Yeah. Yeah. as marketeers, we've really got to think these things through carefully and apply, I think, apply human reasonability check one, also apply a factual check ⁓ to sure that we meet both it's reasonable and we can evidence it before we can make the claim. Yeah. Yeah, I totally agree, love that. And also, correct me if I'm wrong, but with the advertising authority, it's down to someone complaining, right? So someone has to make complaint about a specific advert for it to be challenged or taken down. But if someone doesn't see said advert and doesn't complain about it, those two adverts could have carried on existing, right? There's no one checking them. Yeah, so. Yeah, yeah, that's my understanding. Yep, yep, yep. So the other lesson for me is sure we challenge these things as well as ⁓ Yeah. ⁓ Yeah, I think so. And look, as marketers, put yourself in the shoes of a consumer, what they might challenge, ask what they might challenge you ⁓ it up there. you know, ⁓ take that care because ⁓ reality is both Premier Inns ⁓ Eucer Inns are going to take a little bit of a hit or a hit on as result of this. It may not be major, but you know, it all stacks up. So obviously best avoided. And they've wasted money on Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. running campaigns that need to be ⁓ binned the case of use or adjusted at least and that's to involve time and money. Very interesting, I love that. a great couple of examples there of really through how you, yeah, you your ads out there and the perception of those ads. And you can what the brands are thinking, right? You can see that they're putting them out there to make these bold claims that are gonna help sell the product. But all marketers are thinking about what that line is, right? And when they put out an ad, that's got the cool hook that's gonna bring you in. But have to be really careful about what you're claiming and how you read it right. Love that. Yep. Yeah. Yeah. Totally. that's this week's insight. How about you, Warren? What have you seen in our wonderful world of marketing? Great. Well, I've got to ask you question. So you're an Amazon Prime member? ⁓ I had a free trial which expired about three days ago. Great, yeah, I've done that before as well. And do you think, and this is thrust to debate a little bit, you think Amazon Prime is a loyalty scheme? I'm going say, yes, I do think Amazon Prime is a loyalty scheme. ⁓ Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah, so I never thought of it like that in a way, but I think obviously it is, isn't it? So on the one hand, you've got what you get with Prime is you pay, I think, £7.99, £89 a month and you get next day delivery. So I must admit that is a game changer for us as parents when we're doing birthdays and all that kind of thing. just it makes the convenience of that makes our lives a lot easier when we need stuff for kids. Mmm. probably a whole separate conversation. ⁓ there's that, right? And then you get access to Prime Video, I think, through the subscription ⁓ well. ⁓ with adverts, yeah, with adverts. But ⁓ what is the value of that TV subscription? Is it as good as the others? I don't know, but it sounds good on paper, right? When you sign up, you're getting additional access to this. But on the other hand, my wife... with adverts, but yes. Mmm. tried to, but we we order these protein shakes right every sort of five to six weeks we have them, it's our breakfast, getting an insight into my life So we have protein shakes in the morning ⁓ we order them about every five to six weeks and so Rach, my wife went on to order the next batch and price was a lot higher than what we normally would order so it was about fifty pounds compared to sort of the thirty to forty pound mark. ⁓ So what she did was she logged out of her Prime subscription and just went in kind of anonymously to Prime and the price for the same product was lower. So 35 pounds I think. pounds ish. So my question is actually does know the frequency of when it does quite obviously knows how often you're purchasing these things knows when you're the demand's gonna be higher from you to order. And actually, it comes to ordering that, you ⁓ potentially being charged more because it your user behavior than if you come to that anonymously and it's trying to reel you in. So is it? So just made me question the whole program a bit. Actually, are we benefiting from it from a price point of view? And are other people experiencing that as well? I did do a little bit of kind of Googling around it and there does seem to be some other people saying this as well on Reddit forums and things like that. But yeah, it's just interesting. What is the perceived value of joining Prime? Obviously you can get next day delivery, you get access to a TV subscription. But are you benefiting from a point of view? It's just one to watch. And I just wonder again about... Yeah. You're wondering if you get the best prices because you're a regular customer, so you're not getting the potential customer deals basically. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, basically, I think that's it. But you are getting access to this kind of instant delivery where you'd be paying 5.99 extra to get that, right, usually, or more maybe. So, yeah, I just wonder about the whole perceived value of something. So we all kind of come to that and think, oh yeah, brilliant, we're getting next day delivery, we get access to Prime. I mean, we probably never really watched the TV stuff, if I'm being completely honest with you. does the convenience of getting something next day, actually you think in your head, you'll perceive value of that is great, greater than actually what it is. Actually, if we didn't do that and we operated in a normal world where we were kind going onto the stores where the we we get the brand, if we go on the website for that and actually order there and prepare ourselves. Well. would we actually get a similar experience? I don't know. No, well, my my look, look, you this is interesting. My my expectation with Amazon is everybody gets the same prices. And maybe I'm naive. And and maybe you've discovered something that, you know, changes that thought. But if I if I discovered, I can't I have to I'm believing that Amazon wouldn't do that. Because if that was the case that you got a higher price, Okay. by dint of being more loyal, then you know, we'd be exiting in our droves. So maybe that was a glitch in the Matrix, but let's find out. Let's see if people have got similar ⁓ Yeah, maybe. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And actually maybe it is just a one-off or, you know, it could be, couldn't it? It's interesting. But I I was just comparing it to sort of, I guess it's slightly different because it's a competitive market, supermarkets and laundry programs there where you scan your card and you get your membership price, right, for specific products. don't, it doesn't feel, obviously you get the next day delivery with Prime, which is an absolutely brilliant benefit, but. Yeah. Yeah. Is it doing enough? I don't know. It's a question. Yes. What you doing next week then, Paul? It's an excellent question. Let's see if we get any evidence to suggest it might be going on. Fascinating. Next week, I'm doing nothing at all to do with marketing because I'm on holiday. But funnily enough, I was on a hike yesterday and I was chatting to someone and they said, oh, I know nothing about marketing. And I said, well, what's your favorite brand? And they said, Hello Kitty. They love Hello Kitty. They're a sucker for anything with Hello Kitty on it. And I said to them, well, let's talk about that. And we had a good chat about how Hello Kitty might work and the licensing and the fact there's marketing behind that and how. fact it's an interesting thing and it's a good thing and it you know marketing is bringing her something that she loves and enjoys so ⁓ I won't be doing marketing because be ⁓ motorcycling the ⁓ Picos Spain but inevitably the conversation and my thoughts will turn to marketing. How about you? you Everyone's a marketer, right? Everyone can do it. Yeah, just a busy, very busy week. There's lots going on at our organisation at the moment. just trying to, lots of projects are coming to a head at the moment. cool part of the project is having my head in all those spaces, but also trying to give yourself a head space to think around them as well. think that when you have big projects all coming to a head, it's easy to get sucked into day to day, day to day and not see the wood through the trees, right? So... Hmm. I'm trying to kind of, where I can, create some space around it to kind of sit back and think how these things come together and how we make sure we get the most out of them. This next period is a crucial period. Love that, well good luck with that and we will catch up in a couple of weeks and see how you've got on with those big decisions. I'm sure it'll go fine. Yes. Have a good holiday Paul. Have a good one. Cheers mate. Bye. Thanks mate, take care.