UAE well-represented in LinkedIn's 100 Most InDemand employers for EMEA 2015

Source: LinkedIn blog.

LinkedIn has unveiled the 100 Most InDemand Employers for Europe, the Middle East, and Africa in 2015*. The rankings reflect the most sought-after organisations across the region and are calculated based on analysing billions of interactions between professionals and companies on LinkedIn, the company said in a blog post.

Nine of the top 100 hail from the UAE, the only Middle Eastern country to be mentioned. At No. 6 is Emirates, No. 15 Saudi Aramco, No. 20 is Etihad, Emaar is No. 27, and Etisalat at No. 30. Qatar Airways is No. 54, while the Jumeirah Group is No. 68. At No. 73 and 74 are the National Bank of Abu Dhabi and Mashreq Bank respectively. Dubai Islamic Bank is No. 79, and the luxury firm Chalhoub is ranked No. 98.

More than a quarter of the list (27%) are retail and consumer goods firms, with the next-most popular industry being oil and gas (18%). Technology firms were in third place, accounting for 15% of the list, but were well-represented in the top five with Apple, Google and Facebook at the No. 1, No. 2 and No. 4 positions respectively.

Microsoft is at No. 14, Huawei Technologies is at No. 33, while Twitter comes in at No. 39. In 43rd place is Oracle, while Amazon and Yahoo are 55th and 56th respectively. Dell is No. 62, followed by Cisco at No. 63, Asos at No. 64, Airbnb at No. 71, Honeywell at No. 75, and Uber at No. 84. Adobe is No. 93, HP is No. 94, while EMC is at No. 95.

*The InDemand list takes into consideration:

• Member awareness of a company on LinkedIn (for example, how many members have viewed your employees’ profiles, or connected with them, in the past year)
•  Member engagement with a company on LinkedIn (for example, how many members follow your company’s Company Page or have viewed your Company Page or Career Page in the past year)
• Member interest in Jobs on LinkedIn (for example, how many members have viewed or applied for your jobs in the past year). This year LinkedIn added a new measurement: views or applications to a company’s jobs posted on LinkedIn, including limited listings.

Gen X identifies Singapore's Influential Brands

The top Influential Brands in Singapore have been selected by the upwardly mobile Generation X (Gen X) in a consumer choice-based award programme driven by Brand Alliance*. 
 

Source: Brand Alliance. Brand Alliance handed out the 2013 Influential Brands awards on November 2013. The 2014 Influential Brands conference will be held on 10 November 2014.

The survey has revealed that there are more than 100 Top Influential Brands in Singapore. More than 20 new brand categories were created in 2014. The new 

categories may reflect the challenge of Gen X in finding a balance between discretionary and necessity spending. 

The new categories in 2014 relevant to the Gen X consumers include:

1. Budget airlines 
   
2. Dental clinics 
3. Electronic retailers
4. Full service airlines
5. Furniture shops 
6. Health and life insurance 
7. Milk powders
8. Online platforms 
9. Preferred credit cards 
10. Preschool centres
11. Property agencies 
12. Property developers
13. Tuition centres
14. Vitamins and health supplements 

Brands which have captured the hearts of both Gen Y** in 2013 and Gen X in 2014 include household names such as ToastBox, NTUC FairPrice, DBS Bank, Gong Cha, Old Chang Kee, Din Tai Fung, Clinique and Watsons among others. 

According to Brand Alliance, Gen X consumers in Singapore value convenience despite being price-sensitive. They tend to make brand decisions based on ease of obtaining a product or service, weighing elements such as location, accessibility and user-friendliness of online platforms when making decisions.

They are less influenced by recommendations when making brand decisions for the categories surveyed, unless they are making decisions about property.

Singapore Gen X consumers say they will consider recommendations from trusted sources from contacts when making property decisions, with one in five likely to consider recommendations when making a decision on property developers or property agencies. 

While print is still highly relevant as a source of news for Singapore's Gen X, online and social platforms are rising to be their preferred news sources. “With increasing shifts in consumer behaviour driven by technology and digital platforms, both local and international brands are communicating with a distracted group of consumers. 

"The window to capture attention and purchase decisions has shifted from traditional retail to include alternative platforms and this spells opportunities for brands to increase conversion for online platforms or increase engagement through multiple channels at various points of a consumer decision journey,” commented Jorge Rodriguez, Director of Strategy at Influential Brands.

Some of the 2014 Top Influential Brands are below.

Electronic retailers	Foodcourts	Facial Centres
Best Denki	Food Junction	Bella Skin
Challenger	Food Republic	BioSkin
Courts	Kopitiam	Citispa
Gain City	NTUC Foodfare	Jean Yip
Harvey Norman		New York Skin Solutions

*Brand Alliance surveyed more than 3,000 Gen X respondents in Singapore between ages of 34 and 54 years old in the first half of 2014 about their preferred brands across industries. 

**Gen Y would be the cohort born after Gen X, roughly aged 13 to 33.

APAC well-represented in Warc's top 100 marketing campaigns

Marketing intelligence service Warc has launched the inaugural list of Warc 100, a global ranking of marketing campaigns based on performance in effectiveness and strategy competitions.

More than 30 entries were from the Asia Pacific region, and one from the UAE. Australia was the second most-represented country in the Warc 100 after the US with 11 entries.

Campaigns from the Asia Pacific region in the top 10 (Title / Brand / Agency / Market) include:

Source: It's more fun in the Philippines website.

3. 'It's More Fun in the Philippines' / Philippines Department of Tourism / BBDO Guerrero / Philippines

5. 'Overstay Checkout' / Art Series Hotels / Naked Communications / Australia

7. 'Smoking Kid' / Thai Health Promotion Foundation / Ogilvy & Mather / Thailand

8. 'Old Parts for New' / ORBIS International / Ogilvy & Mather / Hong Kong

10. 'Car Creation' / NRMA Insurance / Whybin\TBWA / Australia 

'Fakka', an Egyptian campaign for Vodafone by JWT Cairo, topped the benchmark for commercial creativity that drives business performance or changes consumer behaviour. Vodafone introduced Micro Credit Recharge Cards for low-income Egyptians, and developed a new distribution channel by turning the cards into a form of low-denomination currency that could be used by shopkeepers in place of small change.

"The growing number of effectiveness and strategy awards around the world shows how important it is to prove marketing can make a difference," said Louise Ainsworth, CEO of Warc. "The Warc 100 will rank the best of the best. It will help brands and agencies keep up to date with strategies that have a commercial impact, and to benchmark their own performance against their peers."

Speaking about 'It's More Fun in the Philippines', the top-ranked campaign from Asia-Pacific, Tony Harris, CEO, BBDO Guerrero, commented: "Tourism has been called 'the people's business' and the success of 'It's More Fun In The Philippines' has come about because it used the connectivity of Filipinos to spotlight the country on a global stage. We are hugely proud that this has been recognised as the 'smartest' campaign in Asia - for us, our client and of course, the nation".

*The Warc 100 has been developed to reflect the growing importance of strategic thinking and measurement rigour in marketing. It will showcase the best work, and will help raise awareness of the leading cases. To compile the rankings, Warc tracked more than 1,700 winners in 75 different competitions. It assigned points based on the awards won (for example, Gold, Silver or Bronze), then weighted those points based on the competition's rigour and prestige in the global industry. Warc has developed a proprietary methodology to weight competitions in consultation with Professor Douglas West, Professor of Marketing at King's College London. More details of the methodology are available on the Prize website.