Nike SB Custom Serie

I started skateboarding 23 years ago, at some I had a decent level but after sereval broken bones. Skateboarding to me became more like something to fart around between snowboarding and surfing.

Nonetheless in all those years I saw many brand rising and falling. So when I started seeing Nike SB getting into skateboard I knew it would not be easy as Nike represents everything except skateboarding.

They had some big flops but since 2005, Nike SB has been rising and I would say one thing was sponsoring major skaters like Paul Rodriguez but also they original approach in their ads.

So here is the new Custom Serie 3, the theme is all about Skateboarding on cars. As far as I can remember I always saw car in skate movies and that is what Nike is trying to get: legibility.
By using innovative and historical theme, Nike can become progressively legit.

I am not a big fan of Nike, but those ads are killers.

Interruption Marketing

Each year $1,000 is spent on every single American (adult, kids, grandma) in the States. I often say and also experienced from my past experience in a Marketing department, that while we all agree to say " I don't really know how effective is the ad but we better be in the mag as all our competitors are". Good chance that your competitors are thinking the same way you do.

That is the reason why so much money is spent on Interruption Marketing. To be effective, companies thing they need to in as many mag as the competitors. and if they do more coverage, they think they have a better grab on their potential audience.

But the conclusion is that the more we interrupt, the less people pay attention. The first reaction companies do, ads don't work as well so we need to place more ads to become effective and here goes the vicious circle.

to compete in today's market, one must be innovative

I grew snowboarding, skateboarding and surfing. Every month I get in the mail my favorites mags. I love to read cool articles about the lifestyles, trips,etc... but something that bother me is that half the mag are loaded with ads.

I think it just become a routine, I briefly look at the ad but frankly if you ask me later what ad I saw I may only remember an ad with Kelly, Taj, Parko or Bruce. Most surf brands think it is enough put the face of a pro surfer and a nice surf picture.

How am I going to believe that X sunglass print ad is going to help me in my surf. My two cent of advice is think outside the box: to compete in today's market, one must be innovative.

So my award for the only ad in mag that have sparked my interest is Insight, they are unique and creative which then make me think that there stuff is like their ads. Clearly it seems I am not the only one appreciating their work, because the result sparked a 50% increase in clothing clothes sales.

“We wanted to do something different,” says Insight Marketing Director Jesse Faen. “Most companies simply sponsor athletes or add their logos to action photos. Our company is not so much about an individual surfer as about a mentality. The response to our prop campaign has been incredible. We’ve had a lot of attention from international surf magazines. Across the world, our accounts were blown away by the originality. Most importantly, our customers have gained a deeper appreciation for what Insight represents.”

Marketing Plans

A lot of companies don't have a marketing plan.A product (or service) should be targeted to a specific target market, fill a need, something that is unique in the market place. But too often companies are producing a mere copy of innovative products, hoping to grab a piece of market share by doing "me too" products.

While market research and product development are certainly expensive for a company, reward can be big; see how the iPod saved Apple from bankruptcy.

Only few companies out there are true innovators and too many just want to do the same products, hoping that a different name brand will make a difference. While this mentality reduce your research costs, it reduces a company’s chances to capture high market share for a profitable product.

It’s surprising to see how many companies don't have any, or at least a good marketing plan. It should be written for a single product and specific to the life cycle it is aimed at.

First of all, it is a necessity to do an external audit. What are the competitors? What is the market share, revenue, locations, mission, and positioning?

Then S.W.O.T (Strength, Weakness, Opportunities, Threats) analysis should be written. Too often it is about features and benefits. It is very narrow minded to think of consumers that way, emotional connection plays an important part in the buying habits and including critical success factors can better respond the psychological behaviors. Drawing from the Apple example, the brand delivers an emotional status and the location or support provides added value.

After doing a market segmentation and analyzing where is the potential for growth, the following should be done:

-Selection of one or two target market that the product is aimed to.

-Write a product positioning

-Write a plan for each of the 4 P's (Price, Product, Promotion, Place) in correlation with market cycle life, and the product cycle life to prevent inaccurate sales forecast.

Finally marketing strategies and tactics should be focused for the next three years. The vision of the market, budgets, advertising mix, additional features are key to success.

A well thought marketing plan helps the whole company. A big idea from R&D is only a successful product if it fills consumer needs; Sales need information on the life cycle of the market and product for accurate forecast; Advertising needs information on what the consumers are looking for as a Brand.

I see a marketing plan as the strategy that will make the positioning statement becoming a reality, unifying all departments within a company to move toward the same goal: consumer satisfaction through innovation,communication and teamwork.

Web Marketing: Nixon's website

As I discovered in my previous job, Interactive Agency can sometimes be misleading and it is important to know what need to be done for a good emarketing campaign and to make sure the image online is the same than on the street.

1. User Interface
A website needs to be intuitive in order to provide an happy path for the users, i.e get what they are looking for with the less click as possible.
Nixon’s website has Flash animation which makes it pleasant to look at, however several steps could be improved:

-AJAX could be used for the Drop-down function (good example is Apple’s website). This will allow a better interface without removing the Flash Video.

-Nixon’s website has a masculine feel; women are more detail-orientated, the goal would be to highlight the experience they would get if wearing a Nixon’s watch. Maybe the home page could be divided in two sections: male / female, each will redirect you to a more customized page (here at I took the burton example).



-Women are buying watches as accessories and imagine with what clothes they could go with...As an example the Ivy/ Joy Bryant picture evokes elegance, class, dressed parties, while the skyline or the Loft seems to go more with professional clothing who are looking for a creative/ art deco flair to stand out. More women pictures would help highlight the beauty of the watches and show them how they could stand out from the crowd.

-Nixon’s men watches used to classify their watches as Elite, Business, Sport,etc....However in the women watches page, it is not obvious for a first time user what the models stand for and why they are divided in 4 main columns with 7 columns total.


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U.S watch market / Nixon watches

Market Analysis
During my research, I have segmented the watch market into four classes.
-Mass market Watches(less than $50)
-Middle-Market Watches($50-$300): women’s watches are 56% of sales
-Upper Middle-Market Watches ($300-$1000): women’s watches are 33% of sales
-Luxury Watches ($1,000- Plus): women’s watches are 41% of sales

U.S watch sales at totaled approximately $7.6 billion in 2006
The sales of Middle-Market watches totaled approximately $3 billion.

How does Nixon stand in the market?
From January 27, 2006 to June 30th 2006, Nixon contributed revenues of AUS$21.6 million and net profit of AUS $5 million to the Group.
Global sales of Billabong were at AUS $1.02 billion in 2007 and Nixon contributes 5 to 6% of Billabong International group sales.

Women Market Analysis
Here are some quotes from top executives heading the world’s leading watch brands:

“Women are much more detail-orientated. They have a different set of eyes, they look at the aesthetic beauty of a watch, they look at the different metals, they think about the colored straps that will go with the watch...they really examine all the external details of a watch because they want it beautiful.” said Randi Shinske President of Maurice Lacroix

“Unlike men who collect watches for their complexity and want to conserve them, women collect watches for the occasions and they are wearing different watches for different events”said Poulit-Duquesne.


Empirical Research
I conducted one on one interviews as part of my research with female subjects between 20 and 27 years old, they were college educated, working professionals, sociable and outgoing. What they loved about Nixon was the wide selection of colors and the price point below $200. Their number one reasons were that they had more options for fashion coordination. The subjects also noted they bought Nixon watches as gifts for their significant others or male family members as Nixon watches serve as a status symbol of unique quality and distinct styling.


Brand Spirit
The spirit of Nixon was created by board sport community who desired quality with a graphical edge with functionality in the life of a surfer or board rider. The spirit now translates into more of a fashion forward, indie flaired design to appeal to others who do not necessarily relate to the lifestyle, but seek inspiration from the board riding culture’s distinctive style.

It could be said that Nixon’s namesake derived from the American president relates to the attitude of the sixties when the spirit boundless, love was free, and a blatant rebellion against conformity were the decade’s major themes.