The answer is "yes" according to a Nielsen/Facebook study.  Nielsen studied more than 125 Facebook ad campaigns and concluded that:

...earned media and social advocacy made Facebook users more likely to notice ads, absorb their content and make purchases." 

And just how well did the combination work?

While brands still try hard to "crack the Social Media code," most seem to understand consumers no longer find the prospect of being friends with a brand more engaging than the single click it took to fan the brand page on Facebook. After all, what's so novel about the thought of a friendship with my butter? Precisely, nothing.

His brand didn't tank because he smashed his car on a residential street he'd driven hundreds of times before or even because there was something fishy about the whole incident; it changed because he stonewalled.

Great retailers know they must be in the rhythm of societal trends. We know how contemporary Apple stores, Abercrombie, Sephora's, and Coach stores feel. But I want to talk about plain old grocery shopping.

Like a CSI episode, where the evidence at first is invisible but then magically becomes apparent to the talented investigator throughout the crime scene, the forensic evidence about what people want from retail and what keeps them up at night is right there in their shopping cart.

A recent survey from the 4As reported that advertising agencies with more than 500 employees bill their clients $964 per hour for their chief creative executives. And Art & Copy, the recent documentary about the advertising industry, quoted that 80% of all advertising in the U.S. Read More »

Last month, Procter & Gamble laid down the law for all its advertising agencies, explaining that If a marketing idea doesn't connect back to the store and impact shoppers at the point-of-purchase, they aren’t interested in pursuing it. The “store back” program was a clear declaration of the importance of the shopper.

Here are three approaches that we’ve successfully put into practice at partners + napier:

A little more than two years ago, just when online research had become a major source of data for marketers looking to keep their fingers on the pulse of consumers, Procter & Gamble’s marketing research leadership dropped a bomb.

A reality check from Tina Turner for brand managers: most customer/brand relationships are marriages of convenience not finding a soul-mate. There are plenty of annulments, divorces, and lots of sleeping around.