Research - Informed by my argument made in the dissertation a variety of primary research was made, looking at alcohol brands on social media and areas focusing around marketing and responsibility.
Alcohol Adverts:
The discussion in Chapter 3 of my dissertation made it clear that alcohol responsibility adverts tend to use two particular approaches. They either use role models in an attempt to try and make people model their behaviour - drink responsibly if their role model is. Or, they show a rewarding quality to make people identify a positive outcome with responsible drinking. Two examples of this can be seen below.
Whilst this is true for many ads, some adverts use different approaches; however, I have yet to find a responsible drinking advert that visually explains the dangers of drinking through the use of infographics and visual facts. Drinkaware's website, later analysed, is fantastic at explaining responsible drinking in this sense; but, they have yet to put the information on their site into an advert. This is one aspect that informed some of the initial ideas.
The discussion in Chapter 3 of my dissertation made it clear that alcohol responsibility adverts tend to use two particular approaches. They either use role models in an attempt to try and make people model their behaviour - drink responsibly if their role model is. Or, they show a rewarding quality to make people identify a positive outcome with responsible drinking. Two examples of this can be seen below.
Whilst this is true for many ads, some adverts use different approaches; however, I have yet to find a responsible drinking advert that visually explains the dangers of drinking through the use of infographics and visual facts. Drinkaware's website, later analysed, is fantastic at explaining responsible drinking in this sense; but, they have yet to put the information on their site into an advert. This is one aspect that informed some of the initial ideas.
Facebook Pages
In my written dissertation I analysed the social media pages of the top 10 valued alcohol brands in the UK to see whether there is a similar trend in terms of responsibility messages shown. As seen in the images below, only 5/10 companies included ‘drinkaware.co.uk’ on their graphics (indicated by purple arrows). Overall, the type size is very small in comparison to the brand names and slogans. Whilst they include a reference to ‘drinkaware.co.uk’, they do not actually define or encourage responsible drinking through their graphics at all. The other 5/10 brands do not include ‘drinkaware.co.uk’ or anything linked to responsible drinking at all; their graphics are purely promotional. James Nicholls supports this, highlighting how 'no Facebook post explicitly recommend[s] moderate or responsible drinking.'
The message and visual clearness of drinking responsibly is one aspect that I identified to be clearly lacking on social networks. As alcohol brands encourage consumption they should aim to put more of an effort into ensuring their consumers are drinking responsibly. This prompted further research into marketing methods online and the tools alcohol brands have access to on their social media pages.
Marketing Methods That Aren't Being Used:
As the social media usage of alcohol brands has been briefly analysed in my written dissertation and earlier practical research, it has been identified that a variety of social media marketing methods have not been used to promote responsibility. There are numerous new marketing methods that could be used by brands to possibly improve the responsibility of consumers and users online. These were found from primary research and experience with marketing my music online.
Chatbots
On some business pages, an automated chat is opened between the user and the company when the user clicks 'message'. Detonate, a music festival, has been used as an example. When clicking 'message' on their page, a chat opens. From here, you can click 'Get Started', which leads to an automated message with options being sent to you. Once an option is clicked, another automated message is sent, and the process continues. This is one way to improve interaction with users and is much more effective than suggesting to visit a website through cover photos.
No alcohol page uses such feature, which is surprising as they will have access to use it. It could be used to encourage automated conversations about drinking safely with users online.
Sponsored Post CTAs
Call-to-action buttons on Facebook are widely used when sponsoring a post. They direct users to another page and are a great way to link the post/advertisement and consumer with the product. A few of the example posts found from primary research on Facebook and Instagram use 'Follow', 'Learn More' and 'Book Now' (seen below); yet, there are many other options available.
Looking through Stella Artois and Smirnoff's Facebook pages (the top 2 UK brands), none of their posts utilise CTA's. This may be because they are not sponsored; however, no links to responsibility messages or Drinkaware have been made. This could be easily improved by utilising Facebooks existing CTA options.
Custom Page Tabs
Custom page tabs are great way to add extra sections to your Facebook page. All Facebook pages come with the standard set of tabs, including 'Home', 'About', 'Photos', 'Videos', 'Notes', 'Posts' and 'Community'; however, companies have the ability to add their own custom sections in Facebook's settings.
You can display pretty much any content that you'd like inside a custom Facebook tab. You do this by creating a web page outside of Facebook. The contents of this page are what you'll tell Facebook to display within your custom tab.
Looking at the rules tab, there is a lot if information. Yet, despite it all, there is still no dedicated responsible drinking information section. The Drinkaware section simple lists the website and 'for the facts' below.
As none of the pages have tabs for Drinkaware, this could be one aspect that is explored in the idea generation stage, as it could make the facts easier and more direct for users to find.
Custom page tabs are great way to add extra sections to your Facebook page. All Facebook pages come with the standard set of tabs, including 'Home', 'About', 'Photos', 'Videos', 'Notes', 'Posts' and 'Community'; however, companies have the ability to add their own custom sections in Facebook's settings.
You can display pretty much any content that you'd like inside a custom Facebook tab. You do this by creating a web page outside of Facebook. The contents of this page are what you'll tell Facebook to display within your custom tab.
Taking a look at the top 5 UK alcohol brands, only 2/5 use custom tabs - Smirnoff and Carlsberg. Out of the 2, only Carlsberg displays the 'House Rules' clearly. This is essentially the rules that Carlsberg have set for their users involvement with the brand online.
Looking at the rules tab, there is a lot if information. Yet, despite it all, there is still no dedicated responsible drinking information section. The Drinkaware section simple lists the website and 'for the facts' below.
As none of the pages have tabs for Drinkaware, this could be one aspect that is explored in the idea generation stage, as it could make the facts easier and more direct for users to find.
Drinkaware Website:
The Drinkaware site has a huge range of information on it, explaining the health risks associated with drinking and much more. It has a calculator to find out whether you drinking too much and the entire site is clearly sectioned into various areas and topics.
Drinkaware have managed to break down a lot of the information regarding how much you should drink per week into clean, colourful and simple infographics. Their calculators all follow a similar style and are very easy to use. Interestingly, Drinkaware have not made any adverts that focus on the health risks of drinking or the weekly limit. This inspired one of the ideas in the idea generation stage.
As outcomes needed to link directly with Drinkaware, an analysis of their graphics was made in order to keep consistency with their current style. By looking at their website and YouTube videos, I was able to identify their logo, breakdown a colour scheme, determine the typefaces they use and judge the overall style of illustrations. These aspects were used to inform digital designs made later in the process.
The Drinkaware site has a huge range of information on it, explaining the health risks associated with drinking and much more. It has a calculator to find out whether you drinking too much and the entire site is clearly sectioned into various areas and topics.
Drinkaware have managed to break down a lot of the information regarding how much you should drink per week into clean, colourful and simple infographics. Their calculators all follow a similar style and are very easy to use. Interestingly, Drinkaware have not made any adverts that focus on the health risks of drinking or the weekly limit. This inspired one of the ideas in the idea generation stage.
As outcomes needed to link directly with Drinkaware, an analysis of their graphics was made in order to keep consistency with their current style. By looking at their website and YouTube videos, I was able to identify their logo, breakdown a colour scheme, determine the typefaces they use and judge the overall style of illustrations. These aspects were used to inform digital designs made later in the process.
What Appeals To Younger Audiences?
To find out what appeals to young people on social media, some primary research was made. Firstly, I asked a group of 18-21 year olds about what they think is current and grabs their attention on sites such as Facebook. The feedback given highlighted that bright, high-contrast colours, fast transitions and high-quality videos are the most popular aspects of content. In terms of videos people said that the visual content is much more important than aspects such as the typed descriptions and audio. This informed many of the design choices and ideas in the following stages.
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