Kiss Insight

11 CRUCIAL TRENDS FOR 2011 11 May 2011

At Kiss Confidential we love to know the latest trends, be that in music, fashion or gaming. It's no suprise then that one of our favourite websites is trendwatching.com – a one stop shop for new, hip and happy happenings from around the world. This week we've been reading all about the world of trends in the worls of broader consumer research. We thought it would be nice to share with you the top 11 trends that they see as crucial for this year. To read the full list in more depth please go to trendwatching.com/trends.

1. Random Acts of Kindness 

This is all about companies responding to their customer’s needs and rewarding them at random giving the company a more personal touch. In a world where most people comment quite freely on social networks if they’ve had a good or bad brand experience the savvy brand owner can search on Twitter and Facebook and engage or reward their customers accordingly. Social networks also allow people to let their friends and family know how well they’ve been treated. Examples of this include Interflora’s social media campaign designed to brighten up the lives of people on Twitter who may be having a bad day and could do with  getting some nice flowers.

Other examples include Dutch airline KLM’s ‘How Happiness Spreads’ Foursquare-based campaign employed a ‘Surprise Team’ to give passengers tailored, unexpected gifts at the airport. Throughout November 2010, as soon as someone checked-in at a KLM Foursquare location within its network of airports, the Surprise Team went online to find more background information about the person, decided upon a suitable gift and gave it them before they flew 

It’s not just big brands doing this as a gimmick though. From a personal point of view my wife and I recently ate at Hache, a small burger restaurant in Camden. My wife mentioned to a friend on Twitter what a good meal it was and then received a tweet from Hache thanking us for coming and how they were looking forward to seeing us next time.

2. URBANOMICS

As the name suggests this is all about the increasing move to all things urban. Urbanization remains one of the absolute mega trends for the coming decade.

Here's just one telling stat: “Today, half the world’s population – 3 billion people – lives in urban areas. Close to 180,000 people move into cities daily, adding roughly 60 million new urban dwellers each year.” (Source: Intuit, October 2010).

This will impact on the consumer arena in two ways. Firstly urban consumers tend to be more daring, more liberal, more tolerant and more prone to trying out new products, Secondly keep an eye out for something trendwatching.com calls ‘Urban Islands’. Just 100 cities currently account for 30% of the world’s economy, and almost all of its innovation. For global companies catering to these city specific folk in these vast urban centres requires a local dedicated approach in products, services and campaigns that mirror if not surpass the typical country specific approach.

4. MADE FOR CHINA (IF NOT BRIC)

With the emerging economies being in places like China, India and Brazil it makes sense for companies to go where the money is. Couple this with the fact that in a lot of those markets Western brands are perceived to have an extra kudos an desirability and you can see why companies are starting to tailor their brands specifically to countries like China.

• Levi's dENIZEN Jeans brand, targeting Asians/Chinese consumers with slimmer fits.
• Dior's very expensive Shanghai Blue Phone, only available in Shanghai stores.
• Hermès’ new Chinese brand, Shang Xia; its luxury stores sell ready-to-wear and decorative arts inspired by Chinese culture.
• Chloé’s limited edition Marcie handbag to celebrate their fifth anniversary in China.
• BMW’s limited edition, orange metallic M3 Tiger to celebrate the 25th anniversary of its M3 model in China, which coincided with the Chinese lunar calendar (the year of the tiger).

Last but not least, and the inspiration behind the naming of this trend: Apple's Shanghai store employees started wearing red t-shirts with the slogan 'Designed in California, Made for China' written in Mandarin. The message is a play on the words that are found on the back of all iPhones: 'Designed by Apple in California, assembled in China'.

5. ONLINE STATUS SYMBOLS

In the next 12 months, you can’t go wrong supplying your (online-loving) customers with any kind of symbol, virtual or 'real world' that helps them display to peers their online contributions, interestingness, creations or popularity. Indeed, one extra element to watch out for is new status symbols that straddle the 'real' and 'online' worlds. From physical manifestations of digital status (think personalized Facebook and Twitter memorabilia), to online recognition of physical activities (status updates or badges based on real-world visits), consumers will seek to display their online status symbols in all arenas. Some fun (yet telling) examples:

• Twournal enables users of Twitter to transform their tweets and pictures into a real-life published journal. In addition to creating their own 'books', users can also buy and sell publications from other users.
• US based CrowdedInk offers an app that allows users to generate mugs filled with pictures of their Facebook friends or Twitter followers. Users only need to enter their username and a preview of the mug is automatically generated in minutes.
• Location-based social game Foursquare awards members with badges for performing tasks, including the Supermayor badge (awarded when someone is mayor of 10 different places at once),or even the Last Degree badge (awarded when checking-in at the North Pole ;-).

6. WELLTHY 

As good health is now as important to some consumers as having the biggest, newest or shiniest status symbols, growing numbers of consumers will expect health products and services to prevent misery if not improve their quality of life, rather than merely treating illnesses and ailments. Some signs of the times:In the next 12 months, count on even more monitoring technologies becoming portable or even wearable, as well as getting cheaper (the smartphones held by many consumers are now more advanced than most dedicated medical devices).

Also, the 'consumerization' of health means that more consumers will choose products with embedded health benefits that are actually well designed, desirable, accessible, fun, tasty, interesting or storied. Some examples:

• The Strollometer is a device that tracks all aspects of a new mother's strolling routine. Once the strolling session is over, moms can then enter their data on the Fit4Mum.com website and see their results in terms of calories burned.
• Sleep On It is a mobile app that allows users to track their nightly sleeping patterns. Sleep On It allows users to track the length and quality of their sleep, as well as time spent snoozing and mood to see how sleep impacts their overall health and quality of life.

7. SOCIAL-LITES AND TWINSUMERS

In 2011, word of mouth and recommendations will be even more dependent on P2P dynamics. If TWINSUMERS* (consumers with similar consumer patterns, likes and dislikes, and who are hence valuable sources for recommendations on what to buy and experience) are all about improving 'search curation', SOCIAL-LITES are all about discovery, as consumers become curators; actively broadcasting, remixing, compiling, commenting, sharing and recommending content, products, purchases, experiences to both their friends and wider audiences.

So, consumers will talk more about brands this year than ever before, and opportunities for brands that create engaging content that consumers want to share, or that have personalities that actually engage consumers will also be bigger than ever. Making it easy for SOCIAL-LITES to retweet or 'like' this content is of course requirement number one. Examples:

• Gogobot is an online travel community with a social lens. Users ask questions about destinations (think 'Where's a fun restaurant in Paris?'), not just to the Gogobot community but also to their Facebook and Twitter networks. Gogobot collates the answers, and includes pictures and links to all of the places mentioned.
• Levi's has integrated its online store with Facebook, allowing shoppers to socially interact with friends and create a 'like minded shopping' experience.
• Amazon now enables users to integrate their Facebook and Amazon accounts.
• US based Mombo analyzes Twitter feeds from users all over the world and assigns ratings on movies based on the collective opinion of Twitter users, with each tweet being analyzed by the site's 'sentiment analysis' engine.

8. EMERGING GENEROSITY

Brands and wealthy individuals from emerging markets (yes, especially China) will increasingly be expected to give, donate, care and sympathize versus just sell and take. And not just in their home countries, but on a global scale. It's a profound cultural change and a consumer demand that their counterparts in mature markets have had a few years to getting used to.

Some fun stats:

• 86% of global consumers believe that business needs to place at least equal weight on society’s interests as on business’ interests.
• 78% of Indian, 77% of Chinese and 80% of Brazilian consumers prefer brands that support good causes, compared to 62% of global consumers.
• 8 in 10 consumers in the India, China, Mexico and Brazil expect brands to donate a portion of their profits to support a good cause. (Source: Edelman, November 2010.)
• The number of millionaires in India in 2009 grew 51 percent, to 126,700. (Source: Merrill Lynch, June 2010.)

9. PLANNED SPONTANEITY

With lifestyles having become fragmented, with dense urban environments offering consumers any number of instantly available options, and with cell/smartphones having created a generation who have little experience of making (or sticking to) rigid plans, this new year will see full-on PLANNED SPONTANEITY

For consumers, knowing where they are and what's / who's around them is the key to PLANNED SPONTANEITY. That's about to get a whole lot easier, as geo-location becomes a key feature of social networks and web apps (from existing providers adding location information, such as Facebook's Places, Twitter's locator, and Google's Hotpot, to dedicated services like Foursquare, Gowalla and Brightkite). Examples:

• Geomium takes data from local review sites like Yelp and Qype, and combines it with social information to not only allow users to both see which of their friends are nearby, but also to find nearby event and venue information and deals.
• LikeOurselves lets individuals with shared interests find each other via mobile groups. The service also allows users to quickly create a group and locate members within 20 miles of their location, enabling on the fly meetups.
• Fast Society is a New York-based startup that has returned to Twitter's roots, aimed at simplifying communication between friends on-the-go. The service is SMS-based, and groups last between 3 hours and 3 days, increasing the spontaneous nature of the offering.
• Unsocial aims to be a facilitator for people to meet others that share the same profession or industry. Unsocial works using a location-based algorithm - by opening the app and logging in a user is able to press the 'People' button, after which the app will display relevant matches nearby.

10. ECO SUPERIOR

The number one challenge for governments, consumers and businesses (recession or no recession) remains the quest for more environmentally sustainable societies and economies. When it comes to 'green consumption', expect a rise in ECO-SUPERIOR products: products that are not only eco-friendly, but superior to polluting incumbents in every possible way. Think a combination of eco-friendly yet superior functionality, superior design, and/or superior savings

Expect to see a number of leading brands switch from purely marketing their products' sustainability and eco-friendliness (with its niche reach) and taking aim right at the heart of traditional alternatives: stressing the superior quality and design, increased durability and/or lower running costs of products in ways that will appeal to even the most eco-skeptic, self-centered or financially-challenged consumer.

ECO-SUPERIOR examples?

How about the Ovopur, a well-designed natural and environmentally friendly water purification device, or the Stealth Toilet, which contains a flushing system that only uses 0.8 gallons of water per flush - saving the average family approximately 20,000 gallons of water each year, or the Renault DeZir; a 'green' concept supercar that travels from 0-60 in five seconds, or Philips' 12-watt EnduraLED bulb.

11. OWNER-LESS

This is all about sharing, borrowing, buying into for a short period of time but not owning. For consumers, the appeal is obvious:

• Traditional ownership implies a certain level of responsibility, cost and commitment. Consumers looking for convenience and collecting as many experiences as possible want none of these things.
• Fractional ownership and leasing lifestyle businesses offer the possibility of perpetual upgrades to the latest and greatest, the ability to maximize the number and variety of experiences, and allow consumers to access otherwise out-of-reach luxuries.
• Owning bulky, irregularly used items is both expensive and unsustainable, especially in dense urban environments where space is at a premium. With more consumers having mobile access to online systems, it becomes easier to book items whenever and wherever they are needed (see PLANNED SPONTANEITY).

Now, this could be the year when sharing and renting really tips into mainstream consumer consciousness. Two key developments:

Expect to see more and more big brands getting in on the action. Take for example car sharing, one of the great successes of the OWNER-LESS trend, with car clubs springing up all around the world: Zipcar is the market leader, but similar services can be found everywhere from Australia (GoGet) to Brazil (Zazcar). Big brands, having seen the success of these smaller startups are increasingly getting in on the action: Hertz launched their car sharing service Connect back in December 2008. In July 2010, Peugeot launched its Mu 'mobility' service in the UK after successful launches in France, Germany, Italy and Spain. Customers can rent cars, scooters, vans or even bicycles.

Local authorities are finding that shared solutions allow them to expand their services at a lower cost, and in a sustainable manner. Public bike programs have been the global hit of 2010. Now, governments are exploring new forms of transportation, with Paris (who pioneered bike sharing) launching Autolib, an electric car sharing scheme in September 2011, and the New York City Department of Transportation announcing in October 2010 that they had partnered with Zipcar.

Source: www.trendwatching.com. One of the world's leading trend firms, trendwatching.com sends out its free, monthly Trend Briefings to more than 160,000 subscribers worldwide.