Monthly Archives: March 2010

Can a brand that exists since 1837 have one of the most inventive website? Yes, Hermes can. It has succeeded to manage a perfect balance between very important criteria: heritage, entertainment and highly innovative user-interface.

The website is built around two parts:

First, “Les ailes d’Hermes”, which is dedicated to the brand awareness. It displays more artistic pictures of the products. It also explains the techniques that the Hermes craftsmen use. This carries the Hermes heritage in a very modern way.

It is also a place where the brand can be “bolder” and interact with its customers. As we said, the website offers very entertaining pages and it’s very easy to flick through those without seeing the time flying by. It exploits the new trends of fashion such as above “customization” of one of its flagship product. A product that you will be able to download, to customize, to print and then to glue in order to create your own paper bracelet.

The second part of the website is the online store which has been ranked in the 100 hot 2010 best retail websites by the Internet Retailer. (http://www.internetretailer.com/article.asp?id=32584#hermes)

Although it doesn’t offer all that you could find in the brick and mortar boutiques, the offer grows every month. The products are always presented with a water-color drawing which displays the very lifestyle of Hermes and make the products less cold.

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As more and more traditional mega brands tap into the power of viral marketing (now even Walmart is doing it), I have to think back to the first viral campaign for an old-fashioned consumer product that really knocked me out: Cadbury’s 2007 spot for its flagship plain Dairy Milk Chocolate product. Featuring a massive gorilla seated behind a massive drum set, the ad builds around the opening verses of Phil Collins’s 80′s hit, In the Air Tonight. As the song progesses towards the point where the legendary drum section kicks in, the tension rises, with the gorilla closing its eyes, taking deap nostril-flairing breaths. Then, baba-baba-baba-bum, he comes in just on time, beating his drums in an intense (and comic) moment of release and solitary pleasure. Check it out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TnzFRV1LwIo

The ad, which features virtually no branding except for a brief image of a chololate bar at the very end, had most traditional consumer goods marketers sniggering and scratching their heads. But it worked: not only was the clip viewed by over 5 million people, it generated 91 per cent awareness among British consumers, breathing life into a dusty brand and boosting Dairy Milk sales by a whopping nine per cent. Now that’s return on investment.

F. Patrick Busse
Marketing & the Internet

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