Google Buzzed?

    Total Immersion.

    Brand Planning

    Yahoo’s Going to Get its Exclamation Back!

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    I would not be surprised to see Yahoo sold to Jerry Yang and the Texas Pacific Group (TPG) fairly quickly. Yahoo, with lots of schmutz on its shoes, is still one of the top 5 tech brands in the world. And what is a brand but a vessel into which we poor meaning. Organized meaning. Yahoo’s fix requires an Is-Does. What a brand Is and what a brand Does.

    Is it a portal?
    Is it search engine?
    Is it an advertising company?
    Is it a web content publisher?
    Is it a technology company?

    Does it provide news?
    Does it provide entertainment?
    Does it provide organization?
    Does it provide results?

    Yahoo needs to retrench and make tough decisions — and that will only happen if the property is sold. A public company with lots of shareholders, Yahoo will get its Yahoo! back with new leadership, some old leadership, tough love, and a brand plan. And when I say brand plan I don’t mean a new logo, new color palette and an replacement agency for Goodby, Silverstein and Partners.  I mean an organizing principle for marketing.  A plan that inform every decision made by the company — from hiring to firing to what new mobile services to launch.

    When dimensionalized through obs and strats, a brand plan creates marketing clarity. TPG doesn’t speak like this, but they know how to make it happen. It’s about time. Peace. 

    Under Armour’s Lost Opportunity.

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    There has been a lot of coverage lately about how Under Armour has lost its way. After many years of  20% growth, it was reported today that sales were up less than 1% in the most recent 9 months. I’m a fan of Under Armour. Their training and sport apparel business reinvigorated the sportswear scene. But when they decided to get into footwear I dinged them. And after a good long run, it looks like my initial thoughts may have been correct. You can’t be a master to two kingdoms.

    Sneakers are off-piste for a clothing company. Parse the brand name…it’s called Under Armour.

    The current trend that Under Armour could have leveraged is Athleisure; an easy evolution from core apparel products. Men’s joggers are one of the hottest men’s wear products around, mirroring the explosive growth women’s yoga pants/leggings. By spending way too much time carving up the sneaker pie, Under Armour lost sight of its core business. The business upon which it built its brand.

    Markers have to understand how important focus is — especially in brand-sensitive and brand centric categories such as clothing.

    Under Armour cut a new swath in fashion with functional sportwear. Had it stuck to its knitting I’m convinced it may have innovated the legging and jogger categories. It may be too late, but not for what comes next. 

    Peace.

     

    Broadcast vs. Face-to-face.

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    Not sure why, but I have a fascination with Fashion Week and the Milan and Paris fashion shows. Okay I know why, but let’s not go there. From an academic point of view, fashion is a “beyond the dashboard” pursuit.  That is, the best in new fashion designs must feel fresh. Unseen. And stimulate the senses and taste glands.  During fashion week a designer’s brand name may carry lots of water but the designs themselves are what everyone, especially the buyers, are there to see. The attention and vibe of the audience is the center of gravity.

    kim karashian at heatherette

    I remember being at a Richie Rich and Traver Rains show in NY when a crazy buzz and hum developed.  The din turned into “That’s Kim Kardashian walking.”  Everyone knew who she was at the time but me. That’s live buzz. Perhaps for the wrong reason but that’s what designers are looking for. For an artist to perform in front of a live audience is perhaps his/her most important form of expression.  Looking into the eyes of your target while performing provides the most visceral of feedbacks.

    Much advertising and market are done via broadcast. One to many. You can’t look into the eyes of your customers when broadcasting an online display ad. Click or no click. The best marketers and brand planners get this. They seek out and soak up live impressions. Live is better. Find ways to do your selling live. Peace.

    Showing Up Isn’t Enough!

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    Bob Gilbreath, chief strategy officer at Possible Worldwide, wrote a book a year ago called Marketing With Meaning. It’s a counterpoint to Woody Allen’s quote about “90% of life is just showing up.”  Bob suggests embedding your message (and offer) with something of value.  Not mere boast and claim — something meaningful and fulfilling. The book is a must read.

    I created a brand plan for a health system a number of years ago designed to move the dial on about 9 attributes that make for a successful hospital experience; things like: “best doctors,” “leading edge treatments,” “improved patient outcomes.”  If you can answer yes to these hospital qualities, it is likely you will want your procedure done there.

    When I see work in this category today, sometimes I wonder if marketers are trying to be meaningful at all.  One NYC hospital spending a lot of money is doing it the Woody Allen way, just showing up. Doing “we’re here” ads. One word headlines and pretty pictures.  And the system that once had the nine meaningful measures?  It must have listened to its ad agency and now only measures “first mentions.”  That’s a research term for a telephone poll indicating what consumers answer when asked, “Name a hospital or hospital system in your region.” That’s measuring the media plan and the budget, not the communication of the work.

    The best politicians are those who have a vision, are true to it, and allow the populace to experience that vision.  Process that vision. The worst are those who read opinion polls and change direction at will.  Similarly, the best brands have a plan that creates meaningful differentiation and organized claim and proof to consumers.  And they stick to it. Peace!

    Fear, Uncertainty and Dismal Doubt.

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    FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt) drove billions of dollars of B2B marketing communications in the 90s and was the brainchild, so I’ve been told, of IBM.   “Nobody ever got fired for buying IBM” was the quiet mantra of IBM sales team and ad agencies.  With proper and subtle brand management, this notion was acculturated into the IT departments across American and beyond.  I’m not aware of any IBM ads ever mentioning FUD.

    Digital Equipment may have been the company IBM was trying to scare people from; Apple at that time certainly wasn’t a factor. The strangle hold IBM had on business during that period, thanks to FUD, was broken by Dell when Michael Dell opened up the computer and showed us it was a bunch of simple parts — worth a good deal less than the white shirts at IBM were offering. Plus Dell took advantage of a technological breakthrough – the US Postal Service – to change the game by selling direct to the IT dept. For those old enough to remember, Dell boxes were flying in and out of IT depts. across the country.  It was Christmas every day for techies.  The fear was gone. Fast forward a few years and IBM sells its PC business and does some serious brand retrenchment, tossing “the fear” in favor of a more positive “building good systems” approach. IBM is crazy back.

    Strategic planners need to understand fear, but they shouldn’t use it. Leave it to Disney and Comcast and CBS to deliver our required dose of fear. (NBC…Grimm? Really?) Plan strategy using the end-game of hope and deliverance and well-earned reward. Those are things in which it is worth investing. Peace!

    Brand Plan as Immune System.

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    immune system

    Always on the lookout for metaphors that help marketers understand branding, I’ve come upon a new one: the immune system.  When a marketing entity has a brand plan (defined in my practice as one claim and three support planks) it has created an immune system designed to deflect all non-essential forces. Maintaining a healthy immune system takes work. It must be cared for and fed.  If the immune system has to work overtime, because the brand is constantly being attacked by outside forces, or it is spending time on off-plan activities, it weakens the immune system.

    And let us not forget the immune system is a system. It is not separate unrelated functions or activities. Brand planks, discrete parts of the value proposition working together to increase brand meaning and loyalty, are not always organically aligned. Too much price message might negatively impact the quality message, say. Too much focus on tasty, may impact the healthy message.  Each brand needs its own balance because every brand is different.  But the quick story here is that “a tight, focused organizing principle for product, product experience and messaging” can create an impervious barrier for your brand to ward off evil.  

    What are the parts of your brand’s immune system? Peace.   

    Backstory.

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    I know it may be sacrilege but I’m not the world’s biggest Beatles fan.  The Stones were my thing growing up. Perhaps less controversial, I was not a fan or follower of Queen. So shoot me.  But let me say this, having seen the movies “Yesterday” and “Bohemian Rhapsody,” I am a big Kool-Aid drinker now.  Could it be that I’m older and more accepting — more Zen-like? Maybe.  But the amazing backstories and cinematic storytelling driving those two movies turned everything for me.  In fact, I went to the see “Yesterday” thinking I wasn’t going to like it — the trailer not being its greatest sales piece.  In both cases the movie-making craft, the backstory was brilliant.

    Those in the business of selling things and building brands need to understand the craft of backstory.  Not just story. But contextual backstory. If we jump straight to advertising, you might correctly argue it’s hard to do backstory. Especially in a :30 spot or page of print. But the good ones try. And the good ones can deliver deep context quickly.

    If you want to convince someone of something new or change their opinion of something old, you can’t spend your time selling. You have to deliver some humanity. Some subject empathy. True thought stimulation. Make the viewer a participant, not a consumer. That’s what backstory does.

    Peace.

     

     

    Inciter or operational?

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    Who is more dangerous an inciter or someone who is operational (a doer, in other words)?  According to American anti-terrorism law, operational is more dangerous. In marketing it’s the opposite. Of course marketers aren’t really dangerous.  No one gets hurt. 

    People who create strategies to alter consumer demand are inciters. Those who develop the strategies through which consumers prefer one product over another are inciters. Inciting is what strategists do. Retail channel people — people at the point of sale — are operational. That doesn’t mean they aren’t important – they can be.  Creative people — the ones who write the copy, create the pictures and edit together the selling story–  they, too, are operational. Influential at the point of communication yes, but operational nonetheless.

    Good inciters touch consumers and operational people. Great creative product typically has powerful inciter behind it.  In brand planning, we often talk about insight. We should be talking about incite. Puh-zeace!