5 in 5: connected counties, IKEA in cars, AR in Cosmo, lemony leaps of trust, meditation with the Colonel

Each week, Padilla’s Insights + Strategy team stands at the intersection of people, culture and brands to bring you five stories that you can read in five minutes.

1. 6 degrees of Facebook friends.

This week, The Upshot (a brand within the New York Times) released research and multiple visualizations illustrating connectivity of each American county to the rest of the country. To capture this, they measured the likelihood by county that an individual would have Facebook friends in a particular county in the United States. Why should you care? One, it’s fascinating. Two, it is done incredibly well. Three, and probably most importantly, this gives us extraordinary insight into the natural communication networks that exist in the United States. Word of mouth is the most powerful form of communication and Facebook has provided a megaphone, among other tools, to amplify how we communicate with one another. This analysis allows us to see how individuals, states, regions, and counties are connected or separated by forces like geography, political boundaries and history. This peek into these networks enable us to better theorize how messages may be transmitted across the country to create more targeted messaging. So, we’ll want to be sure to keep this away from Russian trolls. [The Upshot]

2. Leisurely living in autonomous cars.

Space10, IKEA’s “future living lab” in Copenhagen, has just released designs for autonomous cars. Instead of focusing on the details of that whole driving part, they are instead focusing on the stolen time we will all get back when we no longer worry about driving. Why should you care? While many may talk about how autonomous cars will change everyday life, IKEA is showing us and  maybe trying to carve out some future market share in the process. Although a little premature, such forward-thinking ensures that IKEA ill be well positioned to be the top-of-mind design brand for autonomous cars. [MIT Technology Review]

3. AR instead of free samples?

Cosmopolitan magazine has introduced a new feature, where with selfie app, YouCam, readers can virtually try on selected cosmetics advertised in the magazine and purchase them from Macy’s. Why should you care? It isn’t news to anyone that printed magazines are always looking for ways to retain their audiences in a world that is increasingly digital. Using AR to test cosmetics also isn’t new. The value lies in bringing them all together. This new partnership between Cosmopolitan, YouCam and Macy’s is smart because it uses a desirable digital format (AR) to solve a consumer problem (they want to try on the products they see in magazines before they buy them), without diminishing the value of the printed magazine. [The Current Daily]

4. Paying like nobody is watching.

Dirty Lemon has opened a shop called “Drug Store” in Manhattan’s Tribeca neighborhood where customers can buy their products (expensive “lemon-flavored” drinks) by sending a text to the company. Why should you care? No one is manning this store. There is no cashier, no cash register. They simply trust customers to text them to pay for their drinks. If their experiment works, that could change how certain companies look at their necessary labor costs. However, this mind-blowing idea of just leaving the store open and trusting your customers could also simply be a marketing ploy as the store is designed to encourage selfies. If so, provided the math works out, that is just as smart – drive customers to your product, get them to advertise for you and, as most of them pay for your product anyway, eliminate the need for free samples, all while getting coverage in the New York Times for a radical idea. [New York Times]

5. Meet your new guru, Colonel Sanders.

For National Mindfulness Day, KFC in the UK launched a campaign called “KFChill” featuring three 60-minute recordings of “frying chicken”, “sizzling bacon” and “simmering gravy” to help customers unwind. Why should you care? KFC continues to illustrate mastery in the art of not taking themselves too seriously. This campaign just feels right for them: taking an obscure holiday and making it even quirkier. It feels appropriate because of the solid foundation they’ve laid over the past couple of years as they’ve given their brand a mildly eccentric personality that allows for a playful interpretation of just about anything. [Adweek]

For more insights on communication and brand strategy, industry trends and more, subscribe today to the Weekly Buzz here.

Related Posts: The Power of Purpose and Authenticity For Mature Brands – Like KFC and McDonald’s – Is Going ‘Back to the Future’ the Right Move? 5 in 5: meditation, modern manuscripts, Budweiser, 20 questions, language learning 5 in 5: CGI Colonel, Lush limits social, lip gloss graphs, salvageable sneakers, singing about skincare 5 in 5: dream gap, Pride flight, homelife, biometric marketing, translation troubles Long Distanced Relationships During COVID-19