Monthly Archives: March 2015

Deconstructing brands.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

Brand planners go about their business in a number of ways. If you’ve planned on 500 brands and identified 1,000 insights, it’s hard to go all tabula rasa on a new assignment. To quote a friend and colleague Faris Yakob of Genius Steals, there’s a lot of recombinant culture invading the planner’s work day. And this can be a bit of a problem.

Etsy is going through a bit of a hub-bub because some artisans are thought to be mass producing products and passing them off as artisanal. When brand planners do this, it also taints the work.

Brand planners look to two places for insights. The product and the consumer.  If we think of the product as comprised of natural resources — all natural, all built with different DNA, different chemicals – it’ hard not to see it as unique. Deconstructed, these unique resources bring forth insights and features from which the brand strategy flows.  A pizza parlor may look like another pizza parlor, an accounting firm may look like another accounting firm, but they really are all different. And by happenstance or design, those differences appeal to consumers in special ways. That’s the big “find” of the brand planner. And never forget we are creating disposition to purchase, not just packaging.

Brand planners find product uniqueness, decide if it is business-winning, then turn it into a brand strategy. (One claim, three proof planks.)

Off the shelf solutions don’t work. Every snow flake is different. Peace.

 

An insight about brand planner insights.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

“Insight” might be the most used word in the lexicon of the brand planner. If art directors and writers work in “creative,” planners practice the craft of insights. We may write briefs, manifestos and decks – but insights are the brand planner’s money shot.

I recently came across a chart outlining nine type of insights: consumer, cultural, future, product, brand, market, purchase, usage, and owner. To this I immediately thought of 3 others: jealously, success and re-use (and that without giving it much thought). So it’s safe to say insight work is rich. But here’s the thing, the best strategies are singular. Planners play in all of the listed insight areas, then chose one. One. The one at the nexus of what consumers want most and what the brand does best. The insight must “feel” organic, not forced. It must provide massive stimulus to the creative department (the makers of the messages, deeds and experiences). Because remember, an insight is not an ad. It’s not even a brief. It’s bedrock for the idea.

Really good planners wade through insights, be they 9, 12 or more, and land on one. Then they milk it until it flows free, clean and rich with protein. It is then turned into a strategic idea (claim) and proof array, before being handed off to the makers, business owners and the managers.

Remember, campaigns come and go, a powerful brand idea is indelible. And insight powered.

Peace.

 

New Pepsi Challenge Flat.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

I was just reading about the new Pepsi Challenge. It will take place primarily in social media, using Usher, Serena Williams, other personalities and web denizens. From a strategy point of view the only thing I can glean is that the goal is to blend “social responsibility with social culture.” Forgive me but isn’t this “Pepsi Refresh” 4 years later? This time just with expensive spokespeople? Packaged using an old campaign line from twenty years ago?

It almost feels like they rushed the story to market half-baked to beat some Coke announcement or poor earnings report. The effort is going to cost millions globally and, no doubt, will do some good. It may even sell a few cases. But the whole campaign feels very social media bandwagon and derivative. More importantly, it’s non-endemic to the product. Something McDonalds could easily do.

I’m not feeling this marketing effort and suspect it will be nice window dressing for the Pepsi corporate offices and its ad agencies; as for taking a chunk out of Coke’s hide, not going to happen. What’s the Idea?

Peace.

PS. For WTI posts on Pepsi Refresh, click here. 

 

One Plus in Streaming Services

By
Steve Poppe
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0

As HBO Now is about to launch and the whole “cord-cutters,” “cord nevers” segments assert themselves, companies like Netflix and HBO are innovating in cleaver ways. One such is the shared password (let a friend watch) behavior. 

We have Amazon Fire TV. Cool as shit. But if we were just allowed to watch Amazon Prime movies it would be a yawn after one weekend. But ‘cessa (our daughter) lent us access to her Netflix account so we are streaming there. Our son, through some sort of trade deal with a friend (don’t ask) has access to HBO GO, opening up lots of other content so we are truly rich streamers.

This sharing of streaming service log-ons is the “idea to have an idea.” It’s the spark for marketing packages we haven’t quite figured out yet. Just as MCI’s “Friends and Family” telecommunication plan changed telephone billing and pricing, this BFF stream sharing thing will turn onto a big marketing idea. Service providers will, no doubt, police it better, but the notion of allowing multiple sign-ons per account will be an interesting battle ground. And it may get complicated. Especially, if it generates data for the data nerds. BFF’s are a dime a dozen. One pluses on a streaming plan, now they are true friends.

Peace.

 

 

Google’s Insurance Foray to Impact Ad Revenue

By
Steve Poppe
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0

Google is getting onto the car insurance business. It’s called Google Compare. Near term they will act as the search engine for best cost policies. When they eventually roll out the program nationally (it’s been tested in England and launches in California), it won’t need much of a national TV ad budget. They are Google after all. We use Google 5 times a day. And more importantly, everybody knows Google is search. It’s not a massive behavior change.

Insurance is one of the bigger national advertising categories thanks to Geico, AllState and Progressive. When Google gets in to the mix and doesn’t need to spend huge money on ads there will be a great price advantage for them. If they siphon off car insurance business from the big guys, the ad budgets of the big guys will diminish. (Thank you Jesus.)

Many checks that used to go to newspapers, magazines, radio and TV stations are going Google these days. And as Google funds new businesses like insurance, it will put even more strain on traditional and digital revenue. Wait this they start underwriting insurance. They have the appetite for it. It’s the future.

Peace.

 

Reputation Vs. Brand Value.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

I do a good deal of work with corporate brands and they are way harder than consumer brands to package, yet I approach them the same way. The brand strategy for a corporation is the same as for a packaged good — one claim and 3 proof planks. Corporate proof plank arrays are rich and deep while those for, say, an energy drink or break-and-bake cookie are few and shallow. (For CPGs you make actually need to create proof where none existed before.)

It is because corporate proof arrays are manifold that The Reputation Institute has made such a nice and successful living. They mine attributes and values customers feel are business-winning, then track them through quarterly quantitative studies – measuring key careabout movement versus competitors — packaging it as reputation. Brilliant.

But in B2B, reputation is just a lovely generic way of saying strategy. They are measuring strategy. Multiple strategies. And if you looks at some of Reputation Institute studies you will see they cluster values generically: product values, innovation values, governance values, ETDBW (easy to do business with) values, etc. These are market research-centric studies. Brand-centic studies look at the proof based on the unique brand strategy of the corporation, organized by brand plank.  Not multiple generics. This is how we measure ROS (return on strategy.)

When companies like Undercurrent and Altimeter Group talk about more responsive organizations or disruption, they are (and often may not know it) thinking about a brand value paradigm for organization, not a generic B-school paradigm. Stay tuned.

Peace.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What Does A Brand Brief Cost?

By
Steve Poppe
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0

At What’s The Idea? a brand brief costs $17,500. List price. The people willing to spend that type of money know it’s s steal. Having an “organizing principle for product, experience and messaging” makes every act of marketing easier. Compare $17,500 to the cost of a newspaper ad, website take-over, or a radio flight. It’s peanuts. Sadly, the word brief, in advertising and marketing has been reduced to an instructive piece of paper telling creative people what not to do. Ish.  They are often poorly written, almost all interchangeable, and not given much heed. But brand briefs – they are different story.

For a robust brand brief I need weeks. A month actually. A good brand brief requires interviews, fieldwork, research and brain steep. If we’re talking about a brand brief for a billion dollar company there may be lots of qualitative and quantitative testing as well. Up goes the price. And money well spent.

Done well, a brand brief informs all areas of business. If CRM is marketing template, the brand brief is its architecture. If PR is a communication template, a brand brief is its measure of success. If customer journey is a template, the brand brief is the bread crumb trail.

If you are in the business of selling things, raise your hand. If you don’t have a brand brief you are a simple fisherman.

For examples of brand briefs, showing claim and proof (brand tangibles), please write me at Steve at whatstheidea.

Peace.

 

 

From Whence Comes Poor Marketing?

By
Steve Poppe
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0

When I first went to work in the advertising business on the AT&T account, word was, the huge company didn’t know how to market. Prior to the breakup of the Baby Bells, AT&T was one big monopoly. You either used their service or you didn’t. Deregulation came along and competitors (MCI, Sprint) raised their heads. The initial spanking AT&T took was quite a wake-up call.

Then I moved into the healthcare industry. Word was, they didn’t know how to market either. Healthcare systems and big hospitals were physician-driven, physician run. They knew nothing about brand as a marketing principles, though they did understand the power of brand. Participating in an era when large healthcare companies began acting more like consumer packaged goods companies was exciting. And the fur flew.

One of the last bastions of poor marketing these days is the area of education. That is changing somewhat thanks to the introduction of technology products, services and devices to the class room. Education orgs. suffer from a similar fate of the healthcare industry; they tend to be run by academicians and teachers. Not a marketing hot bed for sure. Thumb through the pages of education newspapers or teaching and learning magazines and the level of creativity and salesmanship you see is juvenile. That said, education company Amplify is beginning to do some nice work. So hopefully .edu is pointing in the right direction. Oops, and there’s the Bell.

Peace.

 

The Biggest Problem For SMBs.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

Small businesses need to think small but they don’t. Retail businesses tend to focus more, though not all of them. (A friend started up a deli and hedged his bet by putting in pizza oven.) Business-to-business organizations are notorious for lacking focus. The easiest way to see this is to visit their websites. Sometimes you can read the home page and the About Section and still can’t tell what they do. What the hell does a “collaboration company” sell? How about a “communications company?” These descriptors suffer from broad taxonomy.

The opposite of the too-broad-to-be-meaningful approach is the “10 pound bag” approach. Rather than focus, these SMBs over-focus, over-explain. So a benefits company also becomes a financial services, wealth management, property and casualty coverage and retirement and executive plan company.

The anecdote to this is what I call the Is-Does. What a company Is and what it Does. One simple statement of product and benefit. If you can’t get your Is-Does right, you need to find someone who can. And don’t expect a web development company to do it. Or an SEO company. They get paid by the pixel. They make more money the less articulate you are.

Focus and articulation is a small or mid-size company’s best friend. Especially on the web. Insert your Yogi Berra quote hear. Get the Is-Does right and you have a great beginning.

Peace.        

 

 

 

Why I like brand planners.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

Brand planners are always observing. Always willing to learn. They crave learning. Part anthropologists – students of mankind – brand planners are also creative; it rubs off on them being around art directors, writers and creative directors. In addition to learning about consumers they must learn how to eroticize ideas for creative people.

margaret meadBrand planners are always on. They can’t afford to be depressed. They love brands, the lifeblood of commerce. They are always friendly, even in the face of haters. There are lessons to be learned from hating. (Brand Spanking, in fact, enables negative discussions.) Brand planners are good lovers. They’re exocentric – caring about others. They are not academics. They are humanists, realizing it’s not always about being right…more about being. Environments are of great interest to planners. Stim in any form.

Brand planners are paid to make money (for others) but are not motivated by money.

I didn’t know it at the time, but seeing Margaret Mead speak at the American Anthropology convention as a college kid, cast the die.

When was the die cast for you? Peace.

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