Monthly Archives: July 2014

Why Apple and IBM Will Not Work.

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I don’t like the IBM-Apple partnership. It will benefit IBM but not Apple. Apple is the device owner. That’s its art. When we start to hear co-marketing phrases like “big data analytics down to the fingertips” it feels like Apple is being relegated to an end-point not the design marvel we know and love. It begins to imply that the data, analytics, the cloud – read the big machine – is more important than the amazing living breathing organ Apple puts in the hands of consumers.

Tim Cook and Apple like the fact that they will now have access to IBM’s huge salesforce and that it will sow the iOS operating system into businesses with gale force winds. But Apple iPhones and iPads are already in 92% of the Fortune 500. And frankly, in the hands of the influencers, not the unwashed tech masses. Masses who are not part of the Apple franchise. Masses who may fly to the next big thing, when and if it suits them.

What has made Apple such a strong brand over the years is it unique design, form factor, software and intense user community. The IBM move will get IT involved at corporations and will put emphasis on the pipes, data and iron (big machines), and RFP – not where Apple has typically done its best work.

When I put on my prediction hat, my “beyond the dashboard” visor, I see this partnership breaking up in 30 months, if not before. Mark your calendars for 2017. Peace.

 

Microsoft Is-Does.

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Satya Nadella, Microsoft’s new CEO, went on record yesterday in an internal memo saying the company is going to double down its focus. His implication is that the company needs to move faster, smarter and with less layers. Some read that is layoffs are coming — having just assumed 25,000 employees brought on with the Nokia purchase. (You’d think with 25,000 employees they could make a mobile phone with a working speaker. I am “0 for 6” with Lumia 928s.)

If focus is what Microsoft needs, it may be a little hard based upon Mr. Nadella’s explanation of the business he’s in. As quoted in today’s NYT, Microsoft is “the productivity and platform company for the mobile-first and cloud-first world.” I’m sure this started out as a fine Is-Does, but somewhere along the way team members, investor relations and business line leaders bolted on language to make it a bit of a porridge.

I never liked the word “platform” in an Is-Does.  It’s such a catch all. Productivity platform may have worked but not “productivity and platform.”  Semantics I know. Then you have the words mobile and cloud. Whoosh, was that a truck driving through.  Plus how can both be first?  This is a smart man no doubt.  That said, it’s hard to be focused and hyper-productive with a broad Is-Does.

Peace.

 

Help, You Need Somebody.

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People like to help.  Ask any mother-in-law.  People also like to be helped, but there is social stigma about being helped too much. Ask a teenager or the under privileged. But helping and being helped are the two most important motivators in marketing. Selling is not helping. Helping is helping.

If a brand planner doing my job from a wheelchair, is it likely I’d be more effective at getting consumers to open up? Yep. It’s human nature. If I was a brand planner suffering from depression, would I have the same chance at getting someone to open up? Not unless I looked particularly sad.  

Overt selling is overtaking helping in marketing and consumers are shutting down.  Why do you think students writing papers can get through on the phone to executives, but researchers can’t? We are a helpful people. Why, in a recent study on homeless in NY (I think ideated by Droga5), did moms and dads walk right by family members on the street dressed as homeless? People want to help but are inured to the scale of the problem.

So as you think about your brand planning rigor for your day, think about helping – bidirectional helping. Not selling. Create an environment where consumers can really hear you and then you can begin the steps to a sale. Peace.

 

Do Good…By Doing.

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doug e fresh

There’s a great effort going on around the country through which kids are being educated about healthy eating and the scourge of obesity. It’s happening in urban settings and the educators are rap artists. The non-profit responsible is Hip Hop Public Health. I am guessing that when Easy A.D. or Doug E. Fresh go into a charter school and do a little PPT and a song about calories, salt and high fructose corn syrup, it is fairly well received. Perhaps even acted upon. But when the same songs are performed at lower income public schools, ah, not so much.

Spitting and rhyming better-for-you eating advice smells like school. And what word rhymes with polyunsaturated anyway?  I love the intent, don’t get me wrong, but as we say there is showing and telling and this program seems a little heavy on the telling. If Doug E. Fresh did a set while eating some grapes – now that would make a difference. There is a fine line here and I’m glad we are beginning to cross it but good marketers know there is claim and there is deed. It’s not enough to say veggies are cool. Heroes need to eat them. For real. Not for show. Kids have school-dar. Radar about teaching.

I love this program and it will work. But for it to work with a big whoosh, it needs more deeds and a side of rhymes. Peace.

The Bizarre Bazaar That is Selling.

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Have you ever been to a bazaar or Souq? I have not but imagine it to be a barrage of sight, sound, aroma and cacophonous selling. I’d expect a souq to be somewhat organized. Food arrayed in one area, household goods in another, spice and carpets sellers bunched elsewhere. But maybe not. Maybe it is first come first served – laid out and paid for based upon most trafficked areas. The answer is not on Wikipedia so I may have to get out more.

However the souq is organized and depending on its size there are lots of goods from which to choose. A dizzying amount. And that’s not unlike selling today. Consumers are overwhelmed with choices. And tools. And shopping options. Ads fill our lives just as the rows and rows of goods at the souq. So how do companies use ads to set products apart? What does insurance look like. By volume of advertising a Martian might think it looks like a lizard. What does a product taste like? Smell like? What value does it bring to daily life? Once all that is out of the way, why is one product better than that in the next stall? Price? Experience? Recommendation?

If given 30 seconds or a few thousand pixels to convey all of this, how does one package all that info? Apple is finding out. Apple is reported to have 1,000 people on payroll at the company creating ads and marketing materials. They have this massive group, presumably, to save money. A piece I read yesterday suggested the TV ads prepared by the Apple’s in-house team were smoked by the TBWA/Chiat/Day team ads (in consumer testing.)

It’s a big world out there. With lots going on. And massive, massive messaging. Maximize the effectiveness of your work. Get a strategy, be strategic and hire expert sellers. Families in the souq have been there thousands of years. Peace.

 

The Idea. The Performance.

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Anything Elizabeth Hurley does I like. No really, anything. In this Droga5 ditty for Newcastle Ale, there was an idea, great copywriting and a compelling performance. It made me thirsty.

elizabeth hurley

Great work contains 3 things: an idea, proof of idea and performance. Ideas without proof may take hold but don’t really impact sales. Ironically, ideas without proof are called selling. Claim, claim, claim. When someone is claiming or selling we shut down. Ideas supported by proof have the most sales impact.

In the Droga5 spot, there is an idea: America would be quite different if Britain won the Revolutionary War (#ifwewon). There is proof: the funny examples of what would be different in America today — which makes us smile, nod and even empathize. But the performance of Elizabeth Hurley takes the work to a higher level.  The performance of the idea is what brings it to life.

Smart ad agency people understand this — they are paid to excel at it. Performance is a little lacking in the digital agency space, but there, it has more upside. More breadth. And I’m not talking acting here, I’m talking performance of the idea. Performance of the proof.

Think about the performance, don’t stop at strategy, creative and production. Peace.

Brand Strategy Conundrums.

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I do a lot of research in preparation for writing a brand strategy. I interview people, read blogs and social posts, search out secondary research and create primary research. All of it goes into the stock pot for the boil down. (Actually, I use Microsoft OneNote, a repository of links, pics, text and videos.) At some point I need to stop collecting and start organizing the thoughts into patterns.

For one of my engagements, a new online art gallery, I came upon a way to begin the boil down that was actually quite contrary. The initial fact-finding client presentation was called “The 8 Conundrums,” identifying behavioral opposites or contradictions that were part of the market. For example: “Art is very subjective” versus “People who admire art also like their tastes validated.”

So what does one do with market and behavioral conundrums?

First, understand them. Then attempt to see the macro patterns. Detect the commonalities. And finally, be the solution. In the case of the art gallery, this first cut on findings was used as a lever with the clients — to see where their heads were from a product and delivery standpoint. (It was start-up.) The discussion and debate was critical. It also helped identify if concept testing was in order.

So try it some time. Especially with difficult or complicated markets. Surface and share the conundrums before citing the solution. Planners don’t have the answers remember, they help uncover them. Peace.