Cadbury controversy, the US election and why the majority of the S&P 500 may be inaccurately valued.

Welcome to Paragon Workplace Solutions The Creative Digest, your weekly update on the world of marketing and the creative workplace.

Each week, we'll share key insights, reports and research to keep you in-the-know on the latest marketing news, trends and updates.

Easter Egg uproar

Another festive season couldn’t pass by without some sort of backlash. This time, a Cadbury store has been criticised by a Christian campaign group for advertising chocolate eggs as ‘gesture’ eggs. The Cadbury’s brand said it had no involvement in the Lincolnshire outlet shop promotion, which is licensed to the Freshstores Limited. Cadbury owners, Mondelez International, said: “Cadbury has used the word Easter in our marketing and communications for over 100 years and continue to do so.” References to Easter were restored by Wednesday this week, but not before social media entered a debate about the perceived rebrand – an interesting lesson in brand control.?

Testing your cultural relevance

McDonald’s USA and NielsenIQ are teaming up for a Cultural Resonance ad-testing module. By analysing the role and effectiveness of cultural factors in content, they hope to help advertisers deliver ‘impactful and inclusive ads’. The offering aims to provide indicators for content that isn’t landing as intended, as well as being able to gauge performance against industry standards. The module is a quantitative solution ‘built from extensive explicit and implicit human insight’, validated by neuroscience metrics.

Green be gone

Asda, Boohoo and Asos have been forced to change ‘green’ claims in advertising after a probe by the Competition and Markets Authority. The brands have been told to change the way they ‘display, describe and promote their green credentials’, in a benchmark ruling for the retail fashion category. The retailers will now ensure key information is prominent and in clear language, with specific and clear environmental claims. This includes attention to phrases such as ‘organic’ and ‘recycled’, while the terms ‘eco’, ‘responsible’, and ‘sustainable’ cannot be used without further explanation. Limits have also been imposed on imagery, such as leaves or green icons.?

Inaccurate values due misunderstanding?

New findings suggest that 67% of companies in the S&P 500 may be inaccurately valued because business brand growth and earnings potential aren’t always reflected in a company’s public share price. Interbrand has identified a ‘powerful driver’ that changes investor understanding and brings earned value back to a company’s share price – the company’s brand. The research places company outcomes in four distinct categories – consistent / inconsistent overperformer, and consistent / inconsistent underperformer.

Marketing headwinds for elections

Forrester Research highlights four marketing headwinds to watch as US election season heats up: from rising media costs to political allegiances changing brand loyalty, into the use of deepfakes and evolving regulations for AI in political and non-political advertising. 82% of marketing execs at consumer-facing brands in the US expressed concern about marketing during an election year. Check out these top tips on how to approach the election season, from locking in deals on premium programmatic spaces, and knowing thyself before embarking on any purpose-driven marketing narratives.?

Got AI-anxiety?

A new CIPD study referenced in Marketing Tech News suggests there are ten top challenges facing marketers in 2024:

1. Search engine updates and volatility – 17%?
2. In-house skills and upskilling – 16%?
3. Anxiety of being replaced by AI – 16%?
4. Landing media coverage relevant to target customers – 15%?
5. Attribution and ROI – 15%?
6. Maintaining and growing visibility on search – 15%?
7. Lack of understanding about how we could use AI – 14%?
8. EEAT content, search rater guidelines and sourcing credible, trusted experts – 14%?
9. Market and competitor activity – 14%?
10. Integration of teams to deliver integrated/omnichannel marketing – 14%?

Super Sunday records

Latest data from Nielson finds that TV usage declined in February following the end of the NFL playoffs. The Super Bowl LVIII attracted 123.7 million viewers – the largest TV audience in history (no wonder competition for advertising slots is fierce!). It also seemed to satiate sport needs as viewing dropped 66% in the wake of the NFL playoffs, with drama content picking up viewers.

Inflation 2024 vs Covid

Inflation began spiking during Covid-19 pandemic, reaching double digits in some countries – Visual Capitalist has produced an infographic on how inflation rates compare. The UK itself has seen prolonged inflation and rising interest rates, reflected in rising food, mortgages, goods and energy prices. Argentina’s inflation rate has continued to go up since the pandemic ended, largely due to printing money to compensate for government overspending.

70s bedrooms and anti-hacker tech

Cloudflare revealed that a wall of lava lamps in their San Francisco office is used for cryptography – the generation of unpredictable and random numbers. To achieve true randomness, Cloudflare developed LavaRand, to safeguarding computer networks around the world. The lava flow itself is unpredictable, therefore providing random data as an input to a camera, feeding into their cryptographically-secure pseudorandom number generators?(CSPRNGs). And that’s how 70’s bedroom décor became a modern crypto mechanism!