Web 2.0 offers corporate advertisers numerous options for reaching specific target groups. One example is “engagement marketing”, which uses tools such as user-generated content, competitions, and user voting. Panasonic Germany has successfully used this advertising strategy online to boost the image of its Lumix digital cameras.

Online photo competition increases brand awareness
 
“Engagement marketing” refers to dialogue-based advertising strategies that motivate users to engage with a topic related to the advertised product. Initially, the product itself is in the background. In the foreground is the added value for the consumer, above and beyond the actual advertising message.
This can be achieved through specially-written, topic-related features that embed the product in a comprehensive offering of content: uploads and downloads, forums, blogs, competitions, background information, tips and services. The goal is to reach consumers via their interests, to encourage them to engage, and thus increase their involvement and identification with the brand or product.
At the same time, advertisers can occupy product-related topics or trends, position themselves as experts, and so build up brand awareness and brand image. Also, interactions such as discussion forums, uploads or competitions can provide valuable data about the target group. This can later be used for further dialogue-based marketing measures.

The Panasonic Germany team in Hamburg is responsible for the sales and marketing in Germany of high-quality consumer electronics and professional business systems. The electronic experts’ marketing goal was to increase brand awareness for their Lumix digital cameras, to anchor the Panasonic brand in the target group’s ‘relevant set’, and to expand the existing address database.
In 2007 for the third successful year, Panasonic used an engagement marketing concept based on their target group’s enthusiasm for photography. Partners included InteractiveMedia, T-Online.de, and National Geographic.InteractiveMedia, a leading online marketer of digital advertising in Germany and Europe, developed an engagement marketing concept for Panasonic in the form of a cross-media digital photo competitionthat focused on three areas.

First, the competition targeted hobby photographers who could enter their best digital photos in the categories “People and Emotions”, “Nature and Animals”, and “Architecture & Technology”. The competition ran on T-Online.de, Germany’s most-visited portal, for ten weeks (20 August to 29 October 2007).
In tandem, the competition was integrated into a specially-written feature at www.t-online.de/lumix, which offered a range of tips and tricks for digital photography, daily photo shows with the best pictures, and a photo simulator. The photo simulator allowed users to practice getting the right picture composition and lighting (including backlighting).
A special judging panel, made up of representatives from the T-Online portal and Panasonic, and chaired by the chief editors of National Geographic Germany, nominated the winners of the individual categories at the end of October. The winners were announced online on 29 October 2007. In January 2008, the winners will appear in National Geographic Magazine.

The second piece allowed for a peer-to-peer interaction in which users could judge the art of other users.  Photography hobbyists could submit entries for the “Users’ Prize”, which was adjudicated by registered T-Online users. The main prize in each category was a trip for two to South Africa. For eight weeks, the public could allot points and vote for their favourite pictures in a special vote organised by the T-Online photo department. A supporting newsletter kept registered T-Online users updated each week on the current status of the vote, and notified them of upcoming events. The eight winners of the weekly users’ vote then went head-to-head in a final playoff. There was something in it for voters, too: those casting votes for their favourite photos also opted into a further drawing to win attractive prizes.
Finally, a comprehensive online media package with attention-grabbing forms of advertising was published on www.t-online.de/lumix to strengthen the long-term perception of the Lumix product range.

The photo competition was a successand put the high-quality Lumix series of digital cameras in the right light.  For the digital photo competition 2007, over 20,300 photos were uploaded onto the T-Online portal, generating over 25 million page impressions and several thousand subscriptions to the Lumix newsletter.

“The cross-media digital photo concept on T-Online.de, developed jointly with InteractiveMedia, is the ideal marketing strategy for our product line of Lumix cameras. We attribute the measurable success to four factors: being authentic, being relevant, involving the consumers, and co-operating with optimal partners,” explains Thomas Dobberstein, Manager Digital Communication at Panasonic Germany. “Also key to the concept’s success was the high consumer activation, achieved through opportunities for interaction and dialogue, user-generated content with added value, and targetgroup- specific topics and forums.”

Author: Daniela Jasenko