The Blog

Chiming In

By on September 10, 2020 in Blog, General, Thoughts

The changes ushered in by COVID-19 have shown just how quickly consumer’s interests and purchasing behaviour can shift. Businesses small and big alike have had to adapt their marketing strategies in real time to respond to the current climate of the world.

My team and I are very passionate about supporting businesses throughout these unusual times. I have been personally reaching out to talk to new brands every day concerning how they’re adapting their plans and adjusting their digital advertising. I hear a mix of things – some brands are at a standstill, still on total pause-mode, while others are using this time to actively plan and pivot in their marketing efforts.

Despite this, one thing has stayed the same – video is trending. We’ve been seeing some really great results from the brands we work with who have been brave enough to stay in the market at this time. These results have been seen across all channels due to the increase in time spent online by consumers and the decrease of competition.

The Chime Digital team believes that video content is more important than ever, as people view it as a welcome distraction from day-to-day life. Have a peek below at a YouTube survey that asked consumers to rank the reasons why they watch video content:

Consumers primarily watch video content to “relax and unwind”. Survey participants also reported that they watch videos because the content makes them laugh, inspires them, or helps them to forget about the world around them.

While there is no doubt that it is important to adjust communications to be mindful and empathetic of the times, it is also apparent that consumers are looking for videos that distract them from the current state of affairs in the world. Consequently, people are spending more time online than ever – I can vouch for this myself. However, these unforeseen times have reminded me that feeling productive and feeling like we add value to the world is one of the most meaningful things that we can do during a time like this.

So, how can we help your brand educate, entertain, or inspire people stuck at home all day? Your brand can provide value to people even if your product doesn’t directly help folks deal with the quarantine/COVID-19 crisis. As long as you keep the focus on helping people, your marketing doesn’t have to stop.

Chime Turns 5!

By on February 11, 2020 in Blog, General, News, Thoughts

Chime Digital launched in February of 2015 and we are now upon our five-year anniversary!

The first word that comes to mind is GRATEFUL.

I am so grateful, first and foremost, to my team; an incredible group of like-minded industry veterans. I am also extremely grateful for all our wonderful clients who trusted us to bring their brand vision to life and develop custom programs with their precious marketing dollars.

Over the last 5 years, we have run campaigns for over 50 brands and have received positive industry press. We are so proud to be a part of these campaigns, from driving donations for CNIB’s Phone It Forward program to working with notable influencers to drive awareness for Yves Veggie Cuisine and creating an innovative campaign to fuel the plant-based movement for Iron Vegan.

Running Chime Digital for five years has had its ups and downs. Clients have retired and all that business retired with them. We have poured our hearts into RFPs that have been well received and even voted favourite, only to lose to another company because ultimately our creative ideas were considered “too risky.” We have had our creative ideas completely stolen, only to find out by seeing them come to life and featured in multiple news outlets with no mention of Chime. I have been ignored. Ghosted. Stood up. There have been days when opening a taco stand on a beach somewhere seemed like a really good idea.

Despite this, I truly love what I do. I love meeting new people and I flourish throughout the creative process.

In Brené Brown’s recent talk, “The Call to Courage”, she mentions a quote by Theodore Roosevelt that altered the course of her life and changed her outlook on everything. So many things from this talk resonated with me, but these are my favourite takeaways:

– This quote has everything to do with vulnerability – which at the end of the day, is not about winning and not about losing – it’s about having the courage to show up when you can’t control the outcome.

– I made the choice to live my life in the “arena” – I decided I’m going to be brave with my life. I’m going to show up. I’m going to take chances. And here’s what I can tell you for sure – if you choose to be brave with your life, if you choose to live in the arena, you’re going to get your ass kicked. You’re going to fall, you’re going to fail, you’re going to know heartbreak. But it’s a choice that I make. Every day. Before my feet even hit the floor, I will choose courage over comfort.

– If you are not in the arena, getting your ass kicked on occasion because you were being brave, because you were “daring greatly”, you will never know either victory or defeat.

My daughter recently read a book on launching and growing new business ventures and the stats showed that 85% of start-ups survive the first year of business, 70% the second year and 51% make it to five years. We took an evening out to celebrate our five-year anniversary and she says to me, “Mom, you made it to five years! You had 50/50 odds to get here and should be proud of the business woman you are.”

I am so proud of what we have accomplished. We were brave, we took a chance – I still remember starting out with a simple “Let’s call it Chime” and not knowing where we would go from there. I have learned to stay focused, stay positive through the set-backs, and above all, to continue to get up each day and live in that arena – and I am so thankful I did.

I thank everyone for their support and trust in us as a young company with ambitions to do big things.

I would like to give special thanks to my daughter, Sydney, who has been with Chime since day one. Her steadfast determination, amazing attention to detail and passion for our client’s success has, without doubt, been a huge part of Chime’s milestone. I am also so fortunate to be working alongside my talented and creative sister, Karen, and her partner, Matt – founders of our sister company, Door Knocker Media.

Here at Chime Digital, we love meeting new people. If you want to chat about some of the projects we’ve worked on or discuss ideas for your brand, give me a call!

Why Emotion Matters

By on June 5, 2019 in Blog, Thoughts

Ads that influence people to share and buy can usually be summed up in one word: emotional.

In fact, research on advertising (using neuro-imagery scans) has proven that the emotional response to an ad influences consumers’ intention to buy much greater than the ad’s content itself!

One of our favourite reads, Unconscious Branding: How Neuroscience Can Empower (and Inspire) Marketing notes “Our feeling brain serves as the primary driver of behavior and the seat of our value judgements, while our rational mind acts as a backseat observer that more often than not goes along for the ride.”

Emotionally-charged storytelling causes a rush of dopamine to flood the brain, like a neon sign telling your brain “remember this!” The Ted talk “Storytelling, Psychology and Neuroscience” by Amanda D’Annucci supports this notion – she discusses how storytelling engages the entire brain, including the amygdala, our memory centre. There is no doubt – emotion makes stories stick!

“The best marketing doesn’t feel like marketing,” said the famous “Marketoonist” Tom Fishburne. Does it feel like marketing when you watch a poignant advertisement and connect emotionally with the subject?

At Chime, the goal for every campaign we take on is always clear: “Let’s make people feel things.”

We loved seeing comments like “I usually skip advertisements but I had to wait for this one to finish. I’m actually crying, this was beautiful.” on our #ShareBeauty campaign with Shiseido.

Emotional connections happen because we’re human; we’re built for these responses, wired for them, and rely on them to live a rich, meaningful life. Chime continues to see that marketing by appealing to raw and genuine human emotion is essential, smart, and pays off.

Still looking for more data to become a believer? Just take a look at the top brands out there in the market place. The most intimate brands, those with the rare ability to elicit an emotional response in their customer, are better business performers than brands that lack that bond. The Brand Intimacy Report, conducted by brand agency MBLM, found the leaders in that category generated an average of 5% more revenue growth and 11% more profit growth – equal to an average of $33 billion a year in revenue for the top brands, and more than $9 billion in average annual profit. Not only this, but they continue to see that consumers are more willing to pay a premium for highly intimate brands than they are for brands with lower levels of intimacy.

“Intimacy is rare”… – “only a quarter of companies can claim it,” says managing partner at MBLM. “If you have an intimate brand, you are probably performing well.”

The digital age is a new and exciting era for reaching your consumers in a highly targeted way – but just because an ad achieves an impression, does not mean it has made an impact. Something that is top of mind is not the same thing as being close to heart. Developing a new creative concept is an opportunity to create a transfer emotion with your potential customers, because at the end of the day, we buy with our hearts.

The more emotional intelligence a brand has and the more intimate of a connection they are able to nurture with their customers, the better they will do with conversions and ROI. So, it makes perfect sense then, that we help the brands we partner with to leverage storytelling and make an emotional and psychological impact to keep consumers remembering their story, and therefore their brand. We don’t just find ways to make people click, we find ways to make people care.

Interested in developing an emotionally-charged campaign to help your brand stand out and cut through the clutter? We’d love to “Chime together”!

Our CNIB “Phone It Forward” Campaign

By on October 19, 2018 in Blog, News

Chime is so excited to have partnered with the CNIB Foundation for the launch of its newest program, Phone It Forward, the first program of its kind in the world that refurbishes smartphones to benefit someone who is blind.

Because 46 per cent of Canadians who are blind do not own a smart phone, lack of access to smart technology is one of the biggest priorities among Canadians with sight loss. The Phone It Forward program will put smartphones, after they are refurbished and loaded with accessibility apps, directly into the hands of people who need them. With millions of smartphones gathering dust each year as users upgrade to newer models, Phone It Forward gives Canadians a unique opportunity to donate their old phones, receive a tax receipt and empower people who are blind in the process.

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The Latest on Programmatic Native Ads

By on August 7, 2018 in Blog, General, News

Are you incorporating programmatic native ads into your online advertising mix?

Some recent findings shed some light on the benefits of this tactic and why it adds a unique strategic layer to your campaign’s success.

We all know display ads are a very effective tactic in generating straight conversions if you’re looking to sell a product. However – in comparison to display prospecting – case studies have shown that native ads truly shine when it comes to driving traffic and boosting brand engagement in the long term.

Don’t get us wrong; we love display ads. Display is a great way to keep your brand name out there. But with the rising popularity of incorporating storytelling as part of marketing strategies in this content-driven age, advertisers should really make better use of the goldmine that is programmatic native!

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What makes a hit?

By on May 29, 2018 in News

What makes a hit?
— How do we succeed in the age of digital distraction? —

The fundamental variables of hits can be broken down to include the following: familiarity, surprise, emotional resonance, and distribution strategy.

These are not fixed variables — for example, the property of familiarity changes every year. The sound of guitar-led rock ’n’ roll in the U.S. was considered weird in 1950, mainstream by 1960 and old-fashioned by 1970.

In our desperate search for simplicity, people want success to work like a garage door opener, where a 4-number code springs the lock.

But culture is not a keypad, and people are not doors. Our codes are ever changing in reaction to our environment. Just like Chimes, forever changing in their reaction to their environment.

There is no universal formula. But we do know that it all begins with a big idea. And through our wealth of experience — and always staying in tune with our environment to pick up on the latest trends — our creative track record shows that we know how to create content that moves others. We know how to make people feel.

As we like to say: leave the emotion to us!

Let’s get creative. #LetsMakeAHit

The Diabetes Canada “Declutter and Donate Challenge”

By on April 18, 2018 in Blog, News

– Chime Digital and Diabetes Canada launch spring cleaning campaign –

Have you started clearing out your cupboards of all of your unwanted items yet? This is the question posed to Canadians through Diabetes Canada, in partnership with Chime Digital’s new marketing campaign encouraging Canadians to let go of whatever used clothing and small household items they can, just in time for spring cleaning! Diabetes Canada will go to the residences of Canadians and collect unwanted items for FREE. Got an old rice cooker laying around that’s cluttering up your kitchen? Donate it, advises Diabetes Canada.

The Chime Digital and Diabetes Canada campaign challenges Canadians to meet a goal of 5 million pounds in donations. Proceeds raised by the program support world-leading diabetes research, education, programs, services and advocacy.

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2018 Marketing Trends

By on March 26, 2018 in Blog, News, Thoughts

Another year—and more breathless change for us to learn about! We’re seeing a faster trend evolution than ever, given the pace of technological change these days and the global nature of our digital networks. Brands and marketers are now navigating an increasingly sophisticated consumer landscape.

After attending the 2018 Marketing Evolution Summit recently, here is just a small snapshot of a few of the most interesting trends, themes and phenomena to keep on your radar:

  1. Here come the Xennials

What will adulthood look like in 2020? A new generational cohort is emerging – one that marketers can’t ignore. Xennials, also known as New Adults, are a micro-generation, aged 30 to 45. They are older than typical millennials, but younger than generation X.

In advertising’s rush to woo millennial consumers, their older counterparts often feel overlooked, or alienated. An article featured in New York Magazine discusses: “For the good of both us old millennials and our young millennial siblings and friends, let’s stop acting like we’re all in the same boat.”

Having spent the last decade on the roller coaster started by the financial crisis, New Adults are now upending all the traditional markers of adulthood. The generation that popularized much of today’s hipster culture still seeks brands that are edgy and relevant but, today, they increasingly want a more refined and “adult” experience.

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How to Make Facebook’s Algorithm Change Work for You

By on January 23, 2018 in News

Turn a crisis for other brands into an opportunity for yours.

On January 11, 2018 Facebook announced a major change to its News Feed algorithm that will profoundly impact brands’ ability to reach people on Facebook through organic distribution. The change prioritizes interactions between friends and family over company-generated posts, meaning that content consumed directly from business pages on Facebook will shrink and content that is shared & talked about between friends will grow.

In particular, posts that generate “interactions” such as comments and shares will be weighted more heavily than posts that generate just likes or reactions. In addition, posts with longer comments will be weighted more heavily than those with short ones.

We believe that the January 2018 update to Facebook’s News Feed algorithm is good news for brands who are engaging with their customers and producing quality content. Based on what Facebook is saying, we can expect “click bait” posts to decrease in volume, which frees up space for higher-quality content that generates interactions to be surfaced. This means that fewer brand posts will be seen overall, but the ones that are seen will be the ones that generate more meaningful interactions between people. Although more difficult to create, the upside is that these types of posts are of higher value to both the person and the brand.

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What Do You Stand For?

By on December 13, 2017 in Blog, General, News, Thoughts

In today’s day and age, “cause marketing” has become both a norm and an expectation – potential customers who visit your website and see your advertising want to know that you share their desire to make this world a better place. Studies show that more Canadian consumers than ever care about how companies are supporting social causes.

In fact, when quality and price are equivalent, social purpose is the number one deciding factor for shoppers. The high volume of consumers who say that they would switch from one brand to another if the other brand were associated with a good cause has climbed to 87%.

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Anat Barzilay

Anat Barzilay

Founder & Digital Campaign Architect

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