The record company claims it established the Relentless musical brand years before Coca-Cola and has been trying to solve the issue for some time without recourse to legal action.

By Steve Mullins

“We have made the decision to change our service branding from Ovi to Nokia,” says the company’s chief marketing officer Jerri DeVard. “By centralising our services identity under one brand, not two, we will reinforce the powerful master brand of Nokia and unify our brand architecture.”

OK, got it. But wait, there’s more.

“The reasons for this decision includes the fact that Nokia is a well-known and highly loved brand the world over,” DeVard says. “Our mobile experiences are tightly integrated with our devices – there is no longer a differentiation. For example, if consumers want the best mobile navigation experience, they know it’s a Nokia that they can rely on.”

We understand. Though we can’t quite wok out why just last week the brand announced its new Ovi Store operator app store concept for France’s Orange and Germany’s Deutsche Telekom. This gives the operators a familiar branded channel on Ovi Store for new Symbian devices including the Nokia C7, Nokia E7 and Nokia N8, apparently.

“In addition to the store-in-store advantages, operators can leverage Nokia’s local support to create relevant offerings and easily publish apps through the ever-growing Ovi Store,” says Marco Argenti, Nokia’s svp, developer and marketplace.

He meant ‘Nokia Store’, of course.

“Brands are saturating the top 10% of bloggers based on readership while possibly overlooking smaller, niche blogs that are quite influential and carry loyal readerships,” says Wendy Scherer, partner at The Social Studies Group.

Reward is important, though, with the vast majority of bloggers only interested in working with brands for some form of compensation. But social good matters too, and campaigns including an element of this increase trust levels for 56% of bloggers surveyed.

Seventy percent of respondents trust a brand more when that brand is promoted or recommended by someone they know from a blog or social media. Brands such as Purex, Disney, Kraft, Silhouette, Proctor & Gamble, and CSN were given high marks for their blogger relations.

Proposals also include allowing sponsorship of city events, pouring rights for drinks brands, plus upping paid advertising on city property via billboards and flat screens.

“There was a time when the tax base could support everything that folks were looking for,” Councillor Mark Taylor told CBC News. “That day has come and gone, and now we have to make sure we’re capitalising on every other opportunity.”

The City of Ottawa currently earns about C$5 million a year through sponsorship and advertising and officials are hoping for a C$3.4 million spike by 2014.

FanGager’s tech, which uses Facebook and Twitter APIs, has been enhancing social media interactions between Israeli consumers and brands such as Nokia, American Express, Red Bull, and the Big Brother TV show. The company says that after two months of activity, Nokia’s engagement with fans on Facebook has more than tripled.

“Simply collecting fans and followers via Facebook or Twitter isn’t enough to successfully enhance a brand and drive revenue,” said Eran Gefen, CEO of FanGager. “Companies have to learn how to manage those followers and actively encourage them to engage with the brand in the long term.”

Consumers don’t expect product placement to have much of an upside for protagonists, either – 70% of respondents believe that seeing a brand in a TV show or film will not change their perceptions of it.

Thirty percent of respondents say ITV is the most appropriate channel for product placement, closely followed by Dave (29%). Deemed least suitable are MTV and Discovery, with only 9% and 8%, respectively, in favour.

“What, where when and how product messages are placed will be key, and marketers need to be cautious of alienating rather than attracting potential brand advocates, and of overt intrusion into the viewing experience,” says Adele Gritten, head of media consulting at YouGov. “However, consumers accept the commercial realities of the day and the currently planned changes are unlikely to detract from viewer enjoyment overall. Time will tell as to which brands get the correct channel/programme fit and which ones nurture the right kind of relationship with their viewers, rather than simply bombarding them.”

There’s a chapter on branding from Graham Hales, one on social marketing from Paul White and Veronica Sharp, another from Philip Sheldrake on digital marketing… and more. Further information on The Marketing Century here.