I recently stumbled upon this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9ahiHpM3yQ. Turns out Barbie vlogs…and she’s been doing it since 2015.
Most companies have a youtube channel. If not, then at least one other social media platform like Facebook, instagram, or Twitter in order to reach consumers. Businesses are quick to hop on any pop culture trend, where even using memes as a marketing technique have suddenly become adopted.
Historically Barbie’s origins can be traced to the 1960s, during a thriving job market. The new suburban lifestyle and purchasing power gave birth to the Barbie doll. A post world war II economy meant that America was experiencing reconstruction and with more income, families were growing. The baby boom had produced a new demographic: the kids. Their huge population meant companies were targeting them as the audience, where the emergence of TVs in households opened up as a medium for consumers to be marketed to. This advertising platform helped further brand Barbie’s name and mainstream their product, with kids nagging their parents after watching it.
However, in more recent years, smartphones and the internet have superseded the TV. Barbie has forced to abandon ship and swim to a new platform to reach their demographic, as well as other companies.The toy industry has moved from tangible objects to embracing the future of technology through digital interactions. We saw that from Pokemon cards being traded for Pokemon Go, ripsticks being twisted into boosted boards (the electric skateboards powered by remote controls), and play-doh being molded into the Play-Doh Touch Shape to Life Studio app that allows you to scan or take a photo of your creation to bring it to life.
When the company started failing to be relevant, Barbie got a makeover: “The new 2016 Barbie Fashionistas doll line includes four body types (the original and three new bodies), seven skin tones, 22 eye colors, 24 hairstyles and countless on-trend fashions and accessories. Because With Barbie You Can Be Anything!” In order to avoid shutting down, continuing to cover fixed costs, and compensating financially for losses, companies have to step up their advertising game and adapt their product—even if it means transforming the business model.
In a purely competitive market, businesses are a price taker so survival depends on renovation. It’s renovate or die. You have to be able to keep up with the shifts in consumer desires and platforms otherwise you’re missing out huge demographics and a potential audience you can sell to.
To me, it's strange to see companies that have are mainly physical toy makers are needing to to add a digital aspect to their toy in order to stay competitive. For example, LEGO has been making video games and movies based off of their legos to stay competitive in the toy market. Something I'm curious about is whether or not this would change would have happened if there was an oligopoly or monopoly in place that wanted to keep their business model.
ReplyDeleteI've stumbled upon the Barbie blogs before as well, so I enjoyed reading an explanation of them. I was interested in going more in depth in how vlogging, specifically, is a good marketing strategy. For people and for dolls, vlogging seems personal and, therfore, creates a bond between the consumer and the product. We learned about this earlier, when brands wanted people to have an emotional response to their products. This bond would make demand less elastic, since to consumers the product became not just whatever it actually was, but also a way to elicit emotions. Similarly, brand social media accounts that post casually garner more attention and followers because they seem more personal, and the consumer becomes invested in them (this doesn't always work of course, a lot of people make fun of these accounts and their attempts to relate to teenagers).
ReplyDeleteI think that this idea also applies to the way that many brand will have social media accounts, and interact with other people on social media, like the Wendy's twitter account. The brands want to stay relevant, and if they people see them as a funny twitter instead of a huge corporation, they are more willing to eat there. Also, because many people use social media every day, seeing Wendys or Burger King might remind someone to go to those restaurants. These companies were forced to adapt, and did so in a really smart way.
ReplyDeleteVery interesting post Aditi! I like that you discussed how demand changes through the Barbie example. Robert also mentioned Legos, and how LEGO is changing their advertising to match the new media of today. When I read about those two examples, it struck me that perhaps they're struggling to keep up with the changing demand. Children today simply aren't as interested in Barbies and LEGOS, not when there are video games and Youtube. Technology has changed even the forms of entertainment that children partake in, and it seems that brands like Barbie and LEGO, by taking to social media, are trying to catch up. I wonder what the toy industry will look like in a decade or two, when technology has fully integrated into society. Will companies like Barbie and LEGO survive? Or will changing tastes phase out the toys that we played with in our childhood?
ReplyDeleteI liked the idea you went into. How you started with a popular toy and explained how it got popular and how the time period changed the perception of them. I think you could into more why the Barbie died down, maybe how the change of Barbies appearance changes the demand or supply of Barbies as a toy. I think that it was more than just the smartphone and the TV that changed the demand children had for Barbies. I think that in the new age, morals and ethics changed over time which also changed the perception of Barbie. I think you could relate this to the documentary we watched about Disney and how over generations these Baby Boomers thought of Barbie as their childhood and passed that to their children or why they didn't.
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