Introduction to the Advertising & Branding Module.

Last week was the first advertising lecture and workshop of the year. We were introduced to marketing tools such as SWOT Analysis and Perceptions Maps in the lecture and had a chance to practice them the following day in the workshop.

Joanna Montgomery a graduate of Duncan of Jordanstone came in to talk about her company ‘Little Riot’ and its first product ‘Pillow Talk’. 

In our groups we identified the Strengths Weaknesses Opportunities and Threats that faced this product and produced a list of ways in which ‘Pillow Talk’ could be improved. A few ideas we came up with were; having an option when shipping to send the pillows to two different addresses, customise pillows so they’re a bit more colourful, and allow the user to pre- record a message for their loved one to listen to when they get to bed. Also we thought the product would go down well with parents who may want to listen to their child sleeping or who may think it’d be comforting for the child to hear their parent’s heartbeat. I enjoyed hearing the feedback from the other groups, one group mentioned that as there’s a lot of interest from army wives in this product a donation should be given to ‘Help for Heroes’ every time a ‘pillow talk’ is sold. I thought this was a clever idea as it would gain publicity for ‘Little Riot’ and the product but also allow Joanna to give back and thank her customers.

My favourite part of the workshop was Joanna Montgomery being recognised by one of the exchange students in our class. It was a good example of how the internet can make you known all across the world. ‘Pillow Talk’ is not yet for sale but the student from China knew all about her and her product from the internet. Have a look at the video of our workshop here and see the action!