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Walmart Leads List of the Top 25 Solar Brands in the United States

walmart solar energyFor the second year in a row, Walmart took the top spot as the most solar brand in the United States as part of the annual Solar Means Business report released by The Solar Energy Industries Association and The Vote Solar Initiative. The report ranks the U.S. businesses that are the leading corporate solar users, and in total, Walmart has almost double the solar capacity of any other company.

The top 25 solar brands, according to the Solar Means Business report, come from a variety of industries. Each company has prioritized sustainability initiatives and together, they’ve rolled out more than 445 MW of solar energy at nearly 1,000 facilities across the United States. According to the report, the top 25 companies combined produce enough power on their own to power 73,400 American homes.

The top 25 solar brands in the United States in 2013 (based on “installed capacity”) are:

  1. Walmart
  2. Costco
  3. Kohl’s
  4. Apple
  5. IKEA
  6. Macy’s
  7. Johnson & Johnson
  8. McGraw Hill
  9. Staples
  10. Campbell’s Soup
  11. U.S. Foods
  12. Bed Bath & Beyond
  13. Kaiser Permanente
  14. Volkswagen
  15. Walgreens
  16. Target
  17. Safeway
  18. FedEx
  19. Intel
  20. L’OREAL
  21. General Motors
  22. Toys “r” Us
  23. White Rose Foods
  24. Toyota
  25. Dow Jones & Company

Individually, these companies have shown their commitment to sustainability and solar energy isn’t just corporate rhetoric. Companies like IKEA and Walmart have been promoting their corporate goals to switch to 100% renewable energy in their operations for years, and the data in the infographic below shows you just how much these companies are actually doing to make those goals a reality.

Solar_2013_Infographic_0

Corporate sustainability initiatives are not only important for the world but brands can also use them as powerful marketing tools. In a press release from SEIA, Rhone Resch, SEIA President and CEO, identified several key benefits to going solar for companies and brands:

  • Decrease reliance on outside energy sources
  • Create jobs
  • Boost the economy
  • Improve the environment
  • Reduce operating expenses

Each of the benefits listed above are good for companies and consumers and can easily be turned into effective brand messages. More and more companies are launching sustainability programs, including solar energy strategies, every day. It’s only a matter of time until consumers expect companies to actively support full-scale sustainability programs. At that point, initiatives like the implementation of solar energy in daily operations won’t be as much brand differentiators as they’ll be brand necessities.

Until that time, promote your company’s sustainability initiatives to ensure consumers know that you’re actively making a difference in their communities. They’ll reward you for it by talking about your programs, company, and brands, and ultimately, they’ll start purchasing from you.

Image: Walmart

3 Steps to Identify Influencers and Consumer Moments of Influence

influencerWho are the people who influence your customers as they make the journey from awareness of your brand to purchasing it? Influence has become a fundamental part of branding in recent years, particularly as it relates to social media and content marketing. Traackr, a social media and influence company, released an ebook, “Help! Who Are My Influencers?” which offers an easy-to-follow and easy-to-implement three phase process to identify influencers.

The ebook also explains how to identify key moments of influence during the purchase process, so you can connect with consumers to create the right kinds of influence and push them closer to buying. It’s also filled with useful worksheets to help you create a audience overview as well as customer journey and influence matrices.

Step 1: Understand Your Customers and Define Your User Profiles

First, you need to determine who you want to influence. What do they want and need from your brand? Who do they get information from when they need to make a purchase decision for a brand like yours? The Traackr ebook provides an Audience Overview worksheet, which includes Customer Types section to identify core and extended audiences as well as a Customer Baseball Card section to create a detailed description of specific users.

Step 2: Map the Customer Journey and Identify Influencer Touchpoints

Using the user profiles you created in Step One, identify your customers’ paths to purchasing. Record the types of questions they ask along the way, and again, capture who the influencers are at each stage. These are the people who your customers rely on for information along their journey to making a purchase.

The Traackr ebook offers both a B2B and B2C Customer Journey Influencer Matrix, which you can use to map the customer’s journey through the four primary stages in the purchase journey: unaware, aware, deciding, and purchasing. You can also answer important questions about the customers’ journey and who influences them at each stage.

Step 3: Derive Topics for Each Touchpoint and Find Influencers by Topic

Finally, you need to find the influencers who are guiding your target customers throughout their purchase journey and identify topics that you can use to engage those influencers as well as your customers. Not only is it important to identify the right topics and the right people, but you also need to make sure you learn the right terms, keywords, and phrases to have effective conversations with them.

As the Traackr ebook explains, “By going bottom up, starting with your customers, their areas of interests and concerns, you’ll be able to find people who are important to their decision-making at every point.”

Next Steps

If you’re not already identifying influencers and communicating with them as they’re actively offering information and advice (directly or indirectly) to your target audience of consumers, then you need to start doing so immediately. The worksheets in this ebook are very handy whether you’re just starting to implement influencer tracking and communications into your brand marketing strategy or if you’ve already been connecting with influencers but need to refocus your efforts for better results. You can download it for free using the link at the beginning of this article.

Image: Barun Patro

Five Myths of Remote Interviews

online-interviews
There’s no reason not to be embracing all the potential that social media tools like Skype, LinkedIn and Twitter offer those in recruitment and they are immensely useful not just for generating interest in a recruitment process, but actually delivering it too. True to form, we’re seeing more and more social media being slipped into the interview process as well and now almost all Top 100 recruiters are incorporating some kind of remote interview – whether it’s Skype, Facetime, Twitter or even just a good old phone call – as a part of their recruitment process.

There are obvious cost saving benefits to conducting an interview remotely; it cuts down on travel costs and their environmental impacts and it also eases the pressure on booking out client rooms, but can it really stand in place of a good old-fashioned face-to-face interview? Here are five things you probably didn’t think about when conducting your last remote interview…

It’s less intimidating online…

We all know and probably have an online persona that isn’t quite like us and, in most cases, it’s a slightly improved version of ourselves! However, some of us react the opposite way and video calls and even typed online interviews are very often more intimidating than meeting face to face.

So much of our communication methods are non-verbal and the difference between an answer (or a question) being taken as a joke or being taken seriously can be just a wry smile. If your connection is lagging you can expect that to be totally lost and this plays in the subconscious of many interviewees.

It’s all off-the-cuff…

The one great drawback of the Skype interview is that it’s completely possible to be looking up information while you’re being asked a question. Sure, you can hear the keystrokes, but a bright interviewee will have several windows of good notes open and will be more than prepared to flick between them as you’re questioning them.

Equally, unlike a face-to-face interview where you can see if your interviewee is taking notes or paying attention, it’s a little harder online. Make sure your interviewee is listening and answers the questions you asks, not just issues a prepared speech.

Everyone uses Skype these days…

Most of your interviewees will use Skype and perhaps it’s even an indicator of their good IT skills, but don’t expect your interviewees to be forthcoming in arranging a way to get in touch. If you want to hold a remote interview, you need to prepare the software and make sure your interviewee is happy with the connection.

Unfortunately, a bad connection can really spoil what someone is trying to say. Even if it’s clear for you, an echo at their end can really be off-putting. Don’t let this spoil a good candidate’s day, just pick up the phone instead.

They’ll have done this before…

Though we hear a lot in the press about how many interviews graduates are having to go to before getting a job, it’s not true that everyone will be extremely experienced in online interviews. You shouldn’t let this fact get in the way of what could otherwise be a very productive interview.

We’ve all been on that call when someone has mistakenly walked into the room or the cat jumps on the camera. This isn’t always bad preparation, sometimes it’s just bad luck so you can afford to forgive these errors.

They’ll open up straight away

A remote interview is usually still used as a pre-cursor to a face-to-face interview and candidates know this. They might not know, however, that you won’t be conducting the face-to-face interview and therefore they might be reluctant to give away all their good information at once for fear of having nothing left in person.

The best way to counteract this is to have a section of web capital devoted to the interview process. Be clear about the protocol, let them know if you’re looking for competencies or key values and just check they know the process before you bombard them with questions. Treat the remote interview as if it were final.

We’re sure to see remote interviews taking more precedence over the next few years and as they get more common our techniques should become more refined. Until then, forgive the technical errors, do your best with bad connections and slow typing and make sure your put your (probably very nervous) interviewee at ease.

9 out of 10 Brands Will Increase Video Advertising Budgets in 2014

euro growth chartHow big is your brand’s video advertising budget for 2014? If you’re keeping up with digital advertising trends, your brand’s video advertising spend is going up next year. That’s according to Adap.tv and Digiday’s Q4 2013 State of the Video Industry report.

According to the survey results, 86% of brands plan to increase their video advertising budgets in 2014. They don’t just plan to spend more on video advertising next year. They plan to spend a lot more. The average increase is expected to be 65% more video ad spending in 2014 compared to 2012.

Video advertising budgets in 2014 will also show an increase in programmatic buys and mobile video ads, but most are buying mobile video on mobile phones (25%) while just 17% are buying mobile video ads on iPads.

Finding the Money for Video Advertising

With the increase in budget dollars going to video advertising, the next question is where that money will come from. For 33% of brands responding to the Adap.tv and Digiday survey, video ad spending will not steal budget dollars from other advertising channels. Instead, video advertising spending will use incremental budget dollars. Another 31% of brand respondents believe the required money will come from broadcast TV while 30% believe it will come from display. Only 19% believe video advertising budget dollars will come from print.

Video Advertising Problems

Despite the growing investment in video advertising, 65% of brand marketers are still not satisfied with the metrics available to them related to audience guarantees. However, their dissatisfaction stems from several problems:

  • Lack of support for cross-screen measurement of audience = 36%
  • Lack of confidence in audience measurement methodologies = 47%
  • Lack of support for deeper audience measurement beyond age and gender = 15%
  • Lack of consistency between alternative methodologies and providers = 15%

Video Advertising Trends

Based on the research findings, the Q4 2013 State of the Video Industry report identifies four trends for 2014:

  • Buyers will demand better metrics and inventory
  • Sellers will push mobile
  • Programmatic buys will increase
  • Big events (such as the 2014 Winter Olympics) will be hot for both video advertising buyers and sellers.

You can view the full report in the SlideShare presentation.

Are you increasing your brand’s video advertising budget in 2014? Leave a comment and share your thoughts on video advertising trends.

Image: Bartek Ambrozik

Clean Up Your Application Form

clean-up
The job application is something that becomes pretty familiar to most final-year students and the volume of forms the average graduate completes is quite outstanding. Given that the average form requires around seven questions to be answered in four or five hundred words and that students could write ten forms, the application form can quickly become more of a burden than a dissertation! In fact, a bad application form will usually just result in a potentially very interested applicant closing the browser and going elsewhere.

So how should you navigate the minefield that is the application form?

Make It Simple

Most interview processes are pretty gruelling as it is and time-pushed applicants won’t respond well to complicated, multi-part questions that require hours of technical research. Ask questions that are easily answerable and personal; simple questions like “why did you study your chosen degree subjects?” or “what are you passionate about?” can tell you plenty about a candidate without burdening their time.

Equally, it’s so common for an application form to be hidden away in the bottom corner of a UK-specific website, on a page only accessible if you’ve clicked through the ‘Contact Us’ link. Make it really, really simple to find a form with plenty of cross-links or, be assured, your applicants will give up!

Leave Room for Creativity

So many application forms really stifle the applicants personality and asking questions like “were you a member of any sports teams?” or “detail your work experience below” is both ambiguous and leaves no room for the imagination. In this market, almost every graduate has a wealth of extra-curricular activities to talk about and most will have some work experience.

On the other hand, if your questions are rivalling an Oxbridge entrance interview for abstractness, you need to be prepared for abstract and, possibly, obscure answers. Something like “detail your most rewarding experience at University” will help you glean plenty of concrete information but allows candidates to be a little selective with what they tell you.

Set Out the Parameters

Lots of application forms are ultra-interactive and rely on an embedded system, but there are just as many that are a simple A4 form. Whatever format you chose to use, make sure what you expect is clear. If you leave HTML forms unrestricted and infinitely long, expect 1000 word answers. If you don’t state you want bullet points or a .pdf file of your CV, you won’t get it! Be absolutely clear about these aspects of your form.

Also be very clear on time and deadlines. Set out an absolute final deadline—candidates will work to this—and remember to date everything with the year. Search engines are miraculously good at bringing up old .pdfs and you could find a mixture of prior years documents in your inbox if you’re not careful.

Branding and Investor Relations

binding strands together
Investor relations professionals constantly struggle with a key question:

How can I help investors form a coherent, long-term investment thesis about my company?

The branding concepts of marketing can help answer this question by tying together the various strands of a company’s operations, values, culture, financial position and market perception into a single financial brand. Attention to these concepts can help elevate discussions about the company from mundane quarter over quarter earnings comparisons to more meaningful discussions of long-term goals.

Much of what is done in investor relations tends to be tactically focused: quarterly reporting, press releases, speeches and conferences with associated presentation materials. Often, the messages conveyed by these communications are one-off in nature, with no attempt to express and describe the company’s longer-term value proposition.  Even annual reports, which used to be the place where a company could spend more time showing itself to investors, have in many cases been pared down to the bare minimum. In the United States, the use of 10-K wraps for annual reports limits general discussion about the company to 8 – 12 pages. When you subtract out the pictures, listing of officers and directors, and other various matters, very little room is then left for delivery of a comprehensive overview of the company.  The result of all of this is a somewhat disjointed message – people may know what industry you are in and something about your financial performance, but it may not be immediately obvious why your company’s stock represents a viable investment thesis.

In today’s investing environment, where fewer and fewer analysts are covering more and more companies, a company can easily be lost in the crowd.  Branding can help people understand and remember a company. This is done by creating a financial message that sums up a company as a whole and presents it in a way that is instantly identifiable.

Brands resonate with people, and contrary to common belief amongst investor relations professionals, analysts are people too.  The more analysts can understand a company as a brand concept, the more it will help them flesh out the longer term opportunities to the company and get them to focus less on the short term ups and downs that every company experiences.  For example, everything that Wal-Mart does is driven by trying to achieve lower prices for their customers.  Once an analyst understands this, they can see how the “brand concept” drives sales, expense controls, the store experience, corporate culture and many other aspects of the company’s performance.

Not all companies are quite so clear-cut in their outlooks; however, all companies seek to be unique in some aspect.  This is where financial branding should focus.

While I would like to make the assertion that financial branding will enable a company to gain a premium to its stock price, that ultimately depends on its long-term financial track record and the market’s perception of its future prospects.  In the long run, markets are relatively efficient.  Where financial branding plays a role is in making a company’s story stand out from the crowd and be more understandable. This then, will attract the attention of more investors.  And the more investors that know and follow the stock of a company, the more efficient the market will be at placing a fair valuation on it.