Kosher products thrive on quality, not religion
Christians, Muslims, Jews and atheists alike are helping fuel the robust market for kosher foods, as the No. 1 reason people buy kosher is for food quality (62 percent), according to Chicago research company Mintel. The second-most common reason people say they purchase kosher food is general healthfulness (51 percent) and the third is food safety (34 percent). This contrasts sharply to the 14 percent of respondents who say they purchase kosher food because they follow kosher religious rules. Another 10 percent buy kosher because they follow some other religious rules with eating restrictions similar to kosher.
“Kosher food has gained the reputation of being more carefully produced and thoroughly inspected than non-kosher food,” says Marcia Mogelonsky, senior analyst at Mintel. “With recent food-safety scares causing people to rethink even the most familiar food products, we can expect more adults to turn to kosher food as a way to ensure food safety and quality.”
The market for kosher food is strong and growing in the U.S. Sales of kosher foods totaled $12.5 billion in 2008, a 64 percent increase since 2003. Furthermore, Mintel’s survey revealed that 13 percent say they intentionally purchase kosher foods. Over one in four (28 percent) new food and drink products launched in the U.S. during 2008 bore a kosher symbol. Kosher has been the top individual claim on new food and drink in the U.S. since 2005. For more information visit www.mintel.com.
Doritos’ Super Bowl ads paid off in brand-improvement points
In a post-Super Bowl survey, Reston, Va., researcher ComScore asked respondents whether the various ads improved, damaged or left unchanged their perception of the advertised brands. Doritos scored the highest net improvement score of 42 percentage points, followed by Bud/Bud Light (40 percentage points) and Denny’s (39 percentage points), whose offer of a free Grand Slam breakfast to everyone in America on Tuesday, February 3, apparently resonated with the public.
GoDaddy.com had the highest brand damage score (15 percent), which resulted in the lowest net brand improvement score (13 percentage points). In fact, GoDaddy.com was the only advertiser with a brand damage score higher than 6 percent. Nevertheless, GoDaddy.com registered the third-highest ad recall (53 percent of respondents), trailing only Bud/Bud Light (72 percent) and Doritos (59 percent).
Prior to the game, when asked which three companies’ ads they were most looking forward to, respondents demonstrated a strong preference for beverage brands. Specifically, the most anticipated brand’s ads were those from Bud/Bud Light (76 percent of respondents), followed by Coca-Cola (48 percent) and Pepsi Co. (43 percent).
When asked post-game which ads they would like to see again, respondents selected the same top five advertisers from the most-anticipated list, though in a slightly different order of preference. The dark horse of the Super Bowl ad race turned out to be Doritos, which proved even more popular than its high expectations, with 34 percent of respondents indicating they would like to see the brand’s ads again (second only to Bud/Bud Light, 42 percent). For more information visit www.comscore.com.
The money’s not gone, just hiding
Contrary to the current thinking that the pool of money available for consumers to invest has dried up, a new study from Target Research Group, Nanuet, N.Y., shows that one out of five Americans has moved from stocks and mutual funds into more liquid safe havens (e.g., checking accounts, savings accounts, CDs and money markets). The study also revealed that consumers are less concerned with return and more interested in safety.
“Financial decision makers in some 90 million homes have transferred assets to safe havens. Considering the average amount transferred per household, we estimate some $7.5 trillion has created a pent-up demand for new investment and credit products. Despite the gloom and doom one hears every day, companies that can meet consumers’ demands with low-risk products should be able to take advantage of this opportunity,” says Greg Spagna, Target Research Group.
Among all credit card owners, the main financial goal is to pay down/off debt (28 percent). In addition, when the data are viewed by those who are Credit Worthy (the 40 percent of households, as defined by Target Research Group, who have no trouble paying their balances) and Credit-On-The-Edge (the 60 percent who would be challenged to pay off all balances), the Credit Worthy are most interested in providing for retirement (38 percent). This number has increased by 11 percent from pre- to post-crisis. Of those who are Credit-On-The-Edge, 47 percent want to pay off their debt, and this number has increased by 25 percent over the past year. For more information visit www.targetresearchgroup.com.
Big spenders want a tailored ad experience
Thirty-nine percent of consumers overall are more likely to click on an ad if it is personalized, while that number rises to 58 percent among those who shop online at least several times a month, according to research from ChoiceStream, a Cambridge, Mass., research agency. The survey finds that the bigger the spender, the greater the interest in personalized ads. Half of those spending more than $250 online over the past six months indicate that they are more willing to click on ads that are personalized, compared to only 32 percent of the smallest spenders.
Consumers are surprisingly savvy about online advertising in terms of its effect on their behavior. Seventy percent of consumers admit that their purchase decisions are at least sometimes influenced by having seen an ad for an item, and a smaller percent of consumers admit that they are influenced by brand advertising as well, with 39 percent admitting that they are more likely to buy from vendors or retailers that they have seen advertised than from unrecognized sources. In both cases, the bigger the spender, the more likely he or she is to admit to being influenced by advertising.
A full 60 percent of shoppers are aware that retailers use information about their online shopping behavior to target advertising to them.
Additional findings include: 78 percent of consumers are interested in receiving personalized ad content, namely in music, books and DVDs; 71 percent of the consumers believe that personalization would improve their experience in social networking by introducing them to other members with similar interests and preferences; 72 percent are interested in personalized advertising distributed through their television; 73 percent are interested in online distribution of personalized advertising; 35 percent are interested in personalization on their mobile device; and 45 percent of consumers reported receiving personalized recommendations that were a poor match based on their tastes and interests in 2008. For more information visit www.choicestream.com.
WOM rampant among loyalty reward members
Sixty-eight percent of word-of-mouth (WOM) champions in customer loyalty reward programs will recommend a program sponsor’s brand within one year. Generally speaking, consumers who are loyalty reward program members are far more likely to be WOM champions for their favorite brands than non-members, and the more active their program participation, the more likely they are to exhibit WOM behavior, according to The New Champion Customers: Measuring Word-of-Mouth Activity Among Reward Program Members, a study from Colloquy, a Cincinnati research company.
Reward program members are 70 percent more likely to be WOM champions (defined as customers who are actively recommending a product, service or brand) than the general population. Fifty-five percent of reward program members are self-described WOM champions, but only 32 percent of non-reward program members are self-described WOM champions. Actively-participating reward program members are over three times more likely to be WOM champions, and reward program members who have redeemed for experiential rewards are 30 percent more likely to be WOM champions than those who have redeemed for discounts.
Colloquy also examined the motivations of WOM champions, asking why they engaged in WOM activity regarding their favorite products and brands and what categories of offers and information they were most likely to pass along to others within their networks. The top five motivations of WOM champions were to tell manufacturers what I think (73 percent); to get smart about products/services (68 percent); to be the first to discover new items (68 percent); to get free product samples (63 percent) and to share my opinion with others (61 percent). For more information visit www.colloquy.com.
Age is the greatest determinant of online banking
Among individuals who are active online, 80 percent are now enrolled in their bank’s online service, and the proportion is much higher among online users age 18-34 (89 percent) than among those 55+ (71 percent), according to a survey from Morpace, a Farmington Hills, Mich., research company.
“No other demographic variable - including income, gender, marital status or ethnicity – is as predictive of participation in online banking as is age,” says Tim Taylor, vice president, financial services practice, at Morpace. “While the fact that younger online users are more likely than older individuals to use online banking is to be expected, it’s the extremely high level of online banking penetration among younger online users which is so noteworthy. It’s conceivable that close to 100 percent saturation may be achieved eventually in the younger demographic. That has large implications for banks as they consider investments in physical assets versus virtual ones.”
The biggest barrier to becoming an online banking customer revolves around identity theft and security of account information - concerns expressed by 47 percent of those age 18-34 and 57 percent or more of those 55+. “As banks try to draw more customers online, particularly those in older demographics, special attention must be given to security concerns,” Taylor says. For more information visit www.morpace.com.