Kenya Coconut Production Presentation by Dr. Lalith Perera
Task 2
1. CompareTheMeerkat.Com – Marketing Media and PR (Case Study) Task 2
In terms of advertising and marketing, some companies use celebrities as a way to endorse their
products or service and as a way to get noticed in the media, as these celebrities will have their own
fan base and with that comes more profit.A company that have used this to their advantage and a
good example would be
comparethemeekat.com which is a website
in which the public can compare car
insurance, which through the years as
slowly developed with there ideas and the
mascots that are involved in these adverts
which have become a familiar face on the
television which both adults and children
can remember and interact with.
Developing these characters into other
merchandise which is now available
includingmaterial including imagery of
meerkats which are not related to the
company, however, the actual animal has
become a product of the mainstream market, where it has gained a lot of popularity simply from the
advertisementwhich has nothing to do with meerkats, which makes it an effective piece of
marketing. Also, they are also very up to date and creating adverts appropriate to what is happening
at that this whether it is the season or a specific event in the calendar.
Furthermore, with the idea of anthropomorphic meerkats, merchandise has been created as an
extra piece of marketing. They also are very well known for their television advertisements on a
regular basis, creating new and humorous pieces that can be
appropriate for all ages from children to adults, giving it a ‘family feel’.
One way they have promoted PR is by getting Gary Barlow involved
with their broadcast advertisement campaign found on ITV which
sponsors ‘Coronation Street’. There is also a northern feel to
theiradvertising, as ‘Coronation Street’ is a show that is iconicof
England and is a significant part of our British culture. This form of
promotion will really help to benefit the company, due to the fact they
have chosen a family show to sponsor appeals to both the older and
younger generation. Persuasive advertising techniques are used as a
way of getting children to ask their parents for a meerkat plush toy, as
the catch is that you have to purchase the car insurance from
‘compare the market.com’ in order to receive a free teddy. It is an
incentive that will encourage some people to get the insurance just for
the mere piece of merchandise.
The car insurance company have utilised a clever marketing tool in the form of their inclusion of the
term ‘Compare the Meerkat’, which sounds similar to that of the name of the company. As Gary
Barlow has been used within this campaign, it shows that the company want to include celebrity
endorsement as a type of a ‘promotional’ feature. Also, the fact that ‘Compare the Market’ has a
2. download/purchase link to Gary Barlow’s new album is effective, as it raises the profile of the
celebrity. It is notable that since the advertisement featuring Barlow was posted along with the emedia link, his song went to number one in the iTunes chart upon its release, which means that this
type of marketing factor worked efficiently and it enabled Barlow to receive a large amount of good
publicity. On the other hand, this popular campaign has received its bout of negative publicity in the
past, where pet meerkats do not live up to the expectation of the consumer and are difficult to
manage. To back up this statement, Pam Mansfield of the Exotic Pet Refuge in St James said "Before
the advert they were selling for £200 each. Since the advert they've gone up to about £400” ¹in a BBC
interview.
On the e-media platform, the website has taken an important role in the advertising. The webpage
includes an interactive game which gives the public a chance to compare different meerkats, which
is targeted mainly at children, with many links to social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter and
Google + which one of the most recent developments in social networking as a way of interacting
with other people and sharing information similar to Twitter, as well as merging with sites such as
YouTube that is a statement in the world of social media, as YouTube is seen as a place for the
company to place there adverts for more
people to be seen. Even though the website
for compare the meerkat is less focused
around its actual purpose there is a small link
at the bottom of the website to then go over
to the website comparethemarket.com. The
interactive, e-media feature appeals to a
younger audience, which contrasts with the
broadcast and print platform in which the
company uses, which is targeted towards an
older audience. Therefore, the campaign is
directed towards a wide age range of individuals, as opposed to a select group. Andrew Goodfellow,
the senior publishing director for the Ebury Press stated in an interview with The Guardian “In
AleksandrOrlov you have a fantastical but utterly convincing comic hero whose struggles we can all
identify with. His ability to achieve his hopes and dreams despite himself are something to raise an
unfettered smile whether you are eight or 80."²
The company have instigated a form of ‘Brand Promotion’ through their other pieces of
merchandise, which include Halloween costumes, as well as the number of books (that have been
translated into other languages) which have proved popular, as the fictional main character of the
advertisements ‘AleksandrOrlov’ had a book released about him, which sat at number 92 in
Amazon’s 100 Best-Selling Books list in 2010. Other forms of merchandise include ringtones,
voicemail messages, wallpapers for smart phones and PC’s and digital versions of the books. In terms
of figures, the ‘Compare the Meerkat’ website has had around ‘3.6 million’ views, as well as
gathering 700,000 likes on Facebook, as well as the primary character, Aleksandr, collecting over
22,000 followers on the social media website, Twitter. Hence, this shows the sheer success of an
advertisement that has blown up in the media and initially, the fictional character of AleksandrOrlov
(the main meerkat) has become a household name.
