IMC Hawks Blog

Tag: IMC

  • Going Green, Brings Green

    Brands can promote themselves through almost any medium nowadays. Pens, stickers, posters, billboards, you name it, you can put your brand on it. Planet Earth Promotions is a company that is designed to help brands promote themselves in an eco-friendly way. There is constantly increasing awareness about environmental protection and a greater consciousness about how important it is to protect these environmental and natural resources. Planet Earth Promotions is leading the way for this “EcoSmart” promotional item trend.

    Planet Earth Promotions’ mission statement indicates that their “goal is to help companies and corporations around the nation proactively enhance their brand through the use of environmentally conscious and educational promotional items”. They have certainly delivered in this respect. This company has been ranked #1 in promotional advertising for the past ten consecutive years. Not only are they paving the way for other companies, they have become a greatly successful brand that is little to no impact on the environment. Planet Earth Promotions has built a successful brand on a trend that is becoming increasingly important as time goes on. This brand is very strong considering they have remained at the top of the list from Arizona Magazine for the last ten years and they are here to help other brands.

    They are able to offer many alternatives for companies to help cut back on environmental damage by providing recycled goods, information about recycling and environmental days in the USA and tips to bring pollution down. With so many companies shifting focus to being the “EcoSmart” companies and LEED (Low-energy electron diffraction) certified, it is a challenge to stay on top. Planet Earth Promotions has paired up with other environment-friendly companies such as AWEA (American Wind Energy Association) and Women’s Business Enterprise to built a very powerful and successful brand and continue to pave the way for other companies looking to create environment-friendly products and solutions for all varieties of businesses.

    – Julius Roberts, Leanna Marshall, Leslie Tyler and Bryce Koonts

  • Just Calling to Say “Happy Earth Day!”

    LG and Sprint have made celebrating Earth Day a little easier this year with the release of their new mobile phone with eco-friendly features.  The LG Optimus Elite will be available through the Sprint 3G Network on Sunday, April 22 through sprint.com and will be Sprint retail stores on May 18.

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     The LG Optimus Elite is the third eco-friendly device launched by Sprint and LG this year.  The company released their first environmentally device in 2010 and continued with the release of two other cell phones earlier this year.  Sprint’s Vice President of Production Development, David Owens, released a statement saying “As a leader in environmental responsibility and sustainability, Sprint continues to expand its portfolio of eco-friendly devices and services by providing consumers with strong device choices,” while continuing to call the LG Optimus Elite “a dynamic and affordable green option for customers who want to go green without sacrificing the latest features”.  The company is thrilled that the release of this phone is happening on Earth Day, which reaffirms the company’s move for sustainability.

     The LG Optimus Elite is sleek and stylish while still exhibiting eco-friendly attributes.  This new cellphone even has UL Environment Platinum Certification, which is the highest level of

    environmental performance recognized by sustainable requirements.  The certification is established by UL Environment and Sprint.  The phone is protected by a casing made of fifty percent recycled plastics, is RoHS compliant, meaning it is free of any hazardous material, and includes a charger that exceeds the EC Code of Conduct on energy efficiency and only consumes 0.03 watts of power when plugged into a wall socket without being connected to the phone.

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    Even the packaging to this phone is eco-friendly: the box is made from fully recycling packaging, printed with soy inks, and contains over 85% post consumer paper.

    Sprint is a corporate leader in sustainability and is ranked the third in Newsweek’s 2011 greenest companies.  The company is committed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, committed to renewable energy, and encourages cell phone recycling.  In addition, Sprint’s policies and practices showcase their strong efforts in being eco-friendly.

    So how should you celebrate Earth Day this year?  By buying the brand new, eco-friendly LG Optimus Elite!

    -Christina Stevenson, Mollie Berthold, Dorothy Conley, & Laura Simmons

  • An “Augmented” Look Into the Future of Advertising

    Last week Google unveiled Project Glass, their latest developmental project set out to design and build augmented reality eyeglasses. Google upload a video to YouTube entitled “Project Glass: One day…”, which shows viewers what Project Glass could potentially look like. Project Glass would allow you to communicate with friends, schedule appointments, get directions, take pictures, and even hold video conferences all by using the augmented reality interface and voice commands. While this technology is in the earliest stages of development, Project Glass has the potential to be a realistic and marketable product in the future.

    While the announcement of Project Glass is only a week old, there is already concern about user privacy and advertisements. Google already uses search terms to customize advertisements, and are even beginning to push ads based on your location, so just how far would Project Glass go? Would advertisements pop-up in front of you if you are close enough to a store? Could marketers use where you go and what you look at throughout the day to better understand what type of consumer you are? The parody video below shows how pop-up ads with Project Glass might look if they were implemented:

    While this idea of “forced advertising” seems a bit extreme, it’s already happening with several other projects. Twitter now adds Promoted Tweets to your timeline, which are sponsored announcements from businesses that merge together with the other tweets from people you follow. Pop-up ads are common with free Android and iPhone apps, and some applications even send ads as a notification. Amazon sells discounted Kindle e-Readers with “special offer” advertisements that appear on your screen. It seems that with every new piece of technology, the first idea that is addressed is how to advertise on it. With Project Glass, the possibilities for customized advertising are much more personal. How will marketers adapt to changing technology? Will consumers be willing to sacrifice their privacy and accept interruptive advertisements in order to use Project Glass? Only the future will tell.

    -Hunter Wilson, Joshua Vester, Ashley Oliver, Molly Jacques

  • TechKNOWLEDGEy

    Changes in time catalyze changes not only in society but in the tools we use to connect with one another. From the telegraph to instant messaging our advancements in technology are so rapidly developing that some struggle to stay up to date. It has been a little over a century since the telephone was invented, and in that time we have managed to transform what we used to call a telephone into a device called a smartphone. We’re looking at you, iPhone. Not only have we managed to globalize communication in the last century but we have wrangled the use of the internet to help businesses communicate with their customers and allow friends to stay in touch. It is no wonder that with everything changing and developing so quickly that companies are turning to IMC consultants to help them keep up with the new technologies.

    As mentioned before, changes in time demands a change in tools. If a company can not manage their image there are people in public relations and integrated marketing communications that are fluent in the tools of social media and gauging the power of search engines. A smaller, local company may weaken if their consumers can’t access them as easily as others. Almost every business needs a website to maintain credibility and to inform the consumer of their services and locations. If it weren’t for technology, jobs for IMC and PR consultants wouldn’t have evolved into what they have become today. The more outlets for customer interaction the more roles that are needed to ensure a coherent brand message is being sent out and maintained through all possible points of contact. We are in constant change and with technology on the move it is imperative for a company to be able to communicate with its consumers by utilizing  the appropriate medium. Seriously, when was the last time you thumbed through the yellow pages to find a business? If you need to find something, you get on Google, enter your desired search and click on the best match that Google provides.

    For companies, staying relevant with modern technology is essential to creating a presence for your brand and technology today is allowing them to do so by employing multiple media outlets so that people can communicate with their brand. As the semester begins to draw to a close, a new crop of graduates will be entering into the job market, it’s imperative to keep in mind the true impact of the role of modernity. A company’s mastery of technology and multimedia tends to correlate with their success, in a time where “that was so five seconds ago” actually holds some truth. It is vital that businesses continue to make exponential progress, but unfortunately, this also means that like your now ancient VHS player and WalkMan, your brand new iPhone will soon be considered passe. Siri will be a thing of the past, something that the next generation will mock at throwback parties while rocking a Snuggie and some skinny jeans, poking fun at what lies in the past while riding the technological wave towards the future.

    By: Kacy Cox, Alexis Kapczynski, Sara Kaloudis, and Josh Bowman

  • Learn about Communication Studies at COM Studies Day

    When Communication Studies majors share their idea with others they are often met with a variety of  questions. These questions often range from “what is Communication Studies” to “what on earth are you going to do with that?!,” and can leave the student wondering just why exactly did they pick this major in the first place. Fortunately the UNCW Communication Studies department is hosting its annual Communication Studies Day this Friday and will answer many of these questions.

    The Communication Studies Day  will have panel presentations of UNCW graduates from the major discussing their careers and experiences since college. Students will be able to hear from individuals who are currently doing things with their Communication Studies degree that they are considering doing after graduating, such as marketing, graduate school, broadcasting, and public relations. Many of the panelists graduated recently and will be able to relate to the students attending the presentations as they only recently were in the same point of approaching graduation and having to decide what they wanted to do and how to go about it. There will also be networking sessions for students to speak with faculty, friends and alumni. Another aspect of Communication Studies Day is the Dress for Success fashion show, in which attendants will get to see outfits of business casual and business professional attire. Attire is an important component of a professional image and many students are unsure about how they are expected to dress for a successful career.

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    Communication Studies Day is not just an event that is simply put on by faculty and that students can show up to if they want to. The event is being  coordinated and marketed by UNCW Communication Studies students. Dr. Persuit’s IMC II class will be tweeting, posting photos, and sharing information about the event as it is occurring on this blog. Individuals can learn more about the event by following #DressForSuccess2012 and #COMStudiesDay on twitter.

    ~Molly Jacques, Josh Vester, Ashley Oliver and Hunter Wilson

  • What’s Your Unique Brand Style?

    UNCW’s Communication Studies Day includes an informative Dress for Success Fashion show for college students of all ages and levels. The fashion show will also include skits demonstrating the importance of an elevator speech, professional attire, portfolios, and how necessary it is to be prepared for interviews. This year the theme, “Will You Make the Cut?” is based upon the Food Network show “Chopped.”

    One idea about IMC manifested in this fashion show is that company image and brand management is very vital for growth and success. Individuals, as well as companies, have always had their own image and have to manage their own brand. It is sometimes hard for college students to transition from a student image that they have had for the past 13 years to a business professional image. The great part about the fashion show is that it shows students how to transition from their current image and brand to something more professional.

    Whether people realize it or not, we are branding ourselves every day through the types of clothes we choose to wear in professional or unprofessional settings. Your unique brand style can be a description of who you are in a job interview setting. It is very important to make interpersonal connections with job interviewers through your developed style and authenticity that will make you stand out from others. Branding yourself when looking for a job is very similar to branding a product. Basically, you are selling yourself as a product to your potential employer with the goal of standing out amongst the rest. Are you casual business, formal business, chick, trendy, preppy, classic, or a hybrid of several?

    By: Laura Simmons, Mollie Berthold, Dorothy Conley, Christina Stevenson

  • Where to go, Where to go.

    I’d like to tell you a story about “My Friend”. My friend is a senior enrolled at UNC-Wilmington, and though he is very low on funds, he really wanted to enjoy his final spring break. After some consideration, he decided to make the short drive to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina with his girlfriend where they could live it up like true college students. After my friend returned from his 4 day trip he took a few moments to relive his getaway and came to an abrupt realization. When he was in Myrtle Beach, his schedule consisted of very few things that couldn’t have been done right here in Wilmington. He got up at the break of noon, spent the afternoons lounging on the beach, the evenings relaxing at the local eatery and the nights chilling at the local pub. So if all of these things could have been accomplished in Wilmington, why didn’t my friend just stay in Wilmington? More importantly, why don’t other college students from all around flock to Wilmington to celebrate their time off?

    After some consideration and a little observation, I think I have discovered the answers to these questions: college students don’t come party in Wilmington because Wilmington doesn’t want them to come party here. Wilmington, and more specifically Wrightsville Beach, consists of well-developed (expensive) beach houses and family friendly entertainment offerings. If flocks of college students flocked here every spring then Wilmington could potentially become a less desirable location to bring your family or spend your retirement. It almost comes to a point where a city that is blessed with the kinds of attributes that make it a destination must choose what segment of the population they want to be a destination for. Though the marketing of geographic locations is often not as aggressive as that of traditional businesses, it can be an important decision in the life of a city.