Yearly Archives: 2014

Elevator Speech Vs. Is-Does

By
Steve Poppe
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0

A term of art in branding these days is “elevator speech.” It is a reference to a concise explanation of purpose. David Belasco, a great theater impresario, once said “If you can’t put your idea on the back of a business card, it’s not a clear idea.”

The thing about elevator speeches is that they can be poorly constructed. They can meander. They also can be incomplete. Last week I met someone who referred to herself as an educational consultant, when in fact, she counseled high school students selecting colleges. I thought she provided consulting services to K12 and universities. Poor elevator speech.

I get around this by coaching clients to think about their Is-Does: What a brand is and what a brand does.  In this day and age of tech start-ups, it is sometimes hard to know if you are dealing with a company, service, software, hardware or some combination thereof…often referred to as a platform. You are likely to find a company’s Is-Does in the first sentence and “About” paragraph of their press releases. Also on their website About section. But even there, they are not always clear. Not always succinct.

Undercurrent’s Is-Does: “Strategic partner for the 21st century” is a good one. Pregnant with meaning. My Is-Does for What’s the Idea?: “A brand consultancy” is good one, but lacks a benefit a la for the 21st century reference of Undercurrent — read innovation.  

A good way to judge your Is-Does is to think of it as you would a 5 second radio sponsorship. Fill in these blanks. This program brought to you by Brand X, the ________, that ________. Hmm. Maybe I should change Is-Does to The-That.  

Get your Is-Does right…so others can. It’s the first step in good branding. Peace. 

 

Whither the marketing data nerd?

By
Steve Poppe
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0

data nerd

When hired as director of marketing at a company selling interactive whiteboards and professional development to the K12 education sector, I was very excited to build a department for the new digital economy. We already had digital peeps: a coder, a manager, an applications developer, all of whom were smart and proficient.  Also, they were excited to learn how to use the web for marketing good.  

One of the things I wanted to introduce to the department was a data nerd. It was in my plans but not a top priority — not until I got the brand plan right. And not until I had begun the process of enculturating the company (and especially the marketing and creative dept.) with the strategy.  The company, BTW, had over 100,000 records of past customers, with which it was doing nothing. The records were in various forms: paper, Excel, SharePoint, and a few other databases. This was an asset I’d seen at very few companies of this size. The nerd, was to be the cherry on the sundae.  Didn’t happen, my failure, and the company suffered. 

My first data nerd was a grandfatherly scholar at a huge health system. He was the “insight” that drove the brand strategy. He once told me in the catchment area surrounding one of the system’s more up-market hospitals, 50% of the woman gave birth via C-section. Come se convenience?  There was little this dude didn’t or couldn’t know. And he is still killing it 15 years later.

All big dog marketers get the data nerd concept.  When SMBs get it and invest in it, there will be an amazing whoosh in marketing effectiveness. Now, wash your hands an make me another 2 for 1 Tweet.

Peace.

 

Plumbing and Mining the Consumer.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

Over the years, obesity has been a subject I have studied quite closely. I’ve endeavored to understand and strategize obesity surgery, weight loss programs, post-surgery protein drinks — and I even wrote the brand and marketing plan for a physician-supervised weight-loss modality launch in the United States.

Understanding the personalities and influencers involved has always been part of the deep dive. The obese, their family, physicians, other care providers – even payors (insurance approvers) are all part of the picture. It is an emotional, layered, personal condition with lots of psychological underpinnings. (Guess what the word “salad” means to an obese person?)  And sadly, the weight regain recidivism rate for the obese is higher than prison recidivism. Much.

The ability to submerge oneself into a target, to know the targets’ sensitivities, cues, tells and thoughts is what brand planners do.  As a kid in the business, making ads and taking names, I hadn’t a clue about the target. Today, the target is everything.

When explaining brand planning I say it is a process of understanding what customers care about and what a brand is great at. The hardest part of the process is the plumbing, mining and prioritizing of consumer careabouts.

The payoff?  Better brands, better marketing and better, more humane brand planners. Puh-eace!  

Brand Planning. The Clarity Cure.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

claim and proof

In meetings I love to say “I am a simple man.”  Not sure how much good it does me, but it is me nonetheless. My whole brand planning shtick is tied to the simplification of branding. Readers know that means a brand plan is One Claim, Three Planks. The claim is not a tagline, it’s the strategy that drives business. The planks are the array of proof that give consumers permission to believe the claim. Simply put, a brand plan is a coming together of what consumers want most and what a brand does best. Period.

I love brand planners, but some are so wound up in inside baseball terms and theory, they lose sight of the goal: Creating an idea in the mind of consumers that predisposes (and post-disposes) them to a sale.

A brand plan is an upstream thing. Once done, all the follow-on expression of the plan – the tactics – need to be planned as well.  And that, too, is the provenance of the planner. However in all of my travels in the space, I’ve yet to come across one SlideShare presentation, one Plannersphere deck, one Planning Salon video, one Planningness talk that simplifies the upstream brand plan into this 1+3 recipe. So either I’m tripping or we haven’t found the clarity cure yet.  

One claim, three planks is the cure, he said humbly. Peace!

 

Guns, Sex and Drugs.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

A question I always have in mind when doing brand and comms planning for clients is “Who is going to lose the sale you are making?” Often we think of competitors but sometimes, especially with start-ups and tech companies, it is money made in another category.  A carbonated soft drink loss might be won by a cold pressed juice company, for instance.

While reading an item last week and seeing that in 7 large NFL-size cities over $2.4B is being spend a year on guns, sex and drugs I began to think about business opportunities that might siphon off some of that cash.  This data point BTW was from 2007 so I’m sure it has grown considerably. And this number didn’t even include NY, LA or Chicago.

I suspect there won’t be an app for this replacement product, but there could be. What do all 3 of these pursuits have in common? If we say that guns are about protection, aggression or hunting then the motivation is about the self. As are drugs and sex. So this replacement behavior, this replacement product, needs to be similarly positioned. Plastic surgery? Clothing? Exercise? Diet? How about we invent a completely new sport?  How about a sport for the ageing population? Something that might be more fun and active than say walking or the elliptical machine? Something that generates some endorphins? Help me out here.

Hmmm. This one is going to take a while. Any thoughts?

Wren Brand Idea.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

Sometimes I enjoy watching ads and trying to back out the brand strategy. While watching the viral video from clothing retailer Wren, entitled “First Kiss,” the desire to figure out the strategy never popped up. The idea was too wonderful, too perplexing; getting total strangers to kiss on video camera for the first time.  Shot in black and white pretty much from the waste up, the video showed the discomfort and comfort of this most intimate act.

first kiss

Watching the video you spend most of your time looking for visual cues as to the couple’s affinity, e.g., their looks, nerves, sexual attraction, etc. Then you start to asking yourself about the act of kissing itself? Is it an act of love? A greeting? Something strangers should share?  Is it alive? Meaning, can it begin one way and end another? You debate the culture of kissing. Fascinating.

And after all of these thoughts, only then do you really notice the clothes…and the style. And stylish many of these people are. (The stylist for the shoot was wonderful.)

Maybe the next day you think about the brand strategy — when you’re back to work.

My take on the the selling idea? It shows how one can make the uncomfortable comfortable. Through intimacy. Through trust. The idea felt like a game of dare…a game of spin the bottle. Wear clothes you like but also clothes that make you feel a little uncomfortable. And to me that’s the brand idea.  Wren…if it feels good.

Peace.                          

     

 

 

Searching for the next bean or nut.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

coke

Yesterday I posted The Coca-Cola Company should head to South America looking for the next Kola nut (or coca bean), perhaps something with healthier-for-you qualities, around which they can create a new soft drink. Easy for me to say from my typing chair. “Exactly how, Mr. Poppe, should we go about this little hunt?” they might ask.

First, visit some exotic places and explore local eating and drinking habits.  Look for products and beverage that have been around for hundreds of years. Anthropologists and researchers should speak with older people who go back generations in the area, perhaps visit some museums and look at old artifacts. What did they use in the mortar and pestles?  What beads were on the necklaces?  Check out old art to see what people were consuming. Talk to botanists? Ask older physicians. (Remember the healthier for you value prop?) Gather nuts and berries, for goodness sake.  

Find the top ten ingredients from 5 or 10 countries and come home to Atlanta and start coding.  Give your chemists and beverage engineers and tasters 3 months to create some drink options. Get marketing involved at this point and leaks some information to the masses via social media. Build buzz.

We know which way beverages are moving. Why is Coca-Cola Company ceding control of product development to others?  (Why is Coca-Cola Ventures and Emerging Beverages sending MBAs across America looking for companies to buy?)  If anyone can find the next kola nut it should be Coke.  Peace.

,

Go South Coca-Cola.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

I tweeted to the Coca-Cola Company last week that they should begin exploring in the jungles of South America for the next cola bean – something around which they can build a new soft drink.  Coke will continue on for decades to come but it is definitely in harvest rather than growth mode (in the U.S.).  So take a million or two from the budget and go to southern climes in search of the next big ingredient.  

I suspect you should search for an ingredient that offers health qualities. Something that has a unique taste. Perhaps even an acquired taste.  Remember your first Coca-Cola?  It should also be a bit exotic and have a fun name. Or you can make the name up.

Hopefully, you’ll find the ingredient in a stable country, with a nice port nearby. Perhaps a country that is not a big fossil fuel burner or located on a seismic fault. Lot’s to think about, I know.

This approach is called a plan. Call it capacity planning. Call it load management. Call it stock holder value planning.  Right now there is a finite amount of consumer money being spent on beverages. Investments in Core Power, teas, coconut waters and the like are really just back-filling the carbonated soft drink hole that grows in the sale portfolio. Rather, you should find an elixir with some health properties to grow the overall size of the beverage market. Or if not that, at least take revenue from, say, the pharmaceutical industry.

So get out your machete’s and go south. Then report back.

Microsoft Word Edit Tracker. BAD.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

I was in a writers group as a kid (okay, okay stop laughing) and we followed a writing principle espoused by Peter Elbow. Basically Mr. Elbow said the best way to write, the best way to break writer’s block, is to write. Stream of consciousness. And if you can’t write for 20 minutes straight, keep writing “I can’t write, I can’t write…”  Something will pop up. Often what pops up is the beginning an idea; perhaps even the logic for an idea.

I just received a lovely piece of writing from a friend about a topic I now I’m going to love – she’s really smart and someone I admire in the brand planning space. But the writing was deliver as a Word file, with “edit tracker” lit up in its full glory. DOH.  Can’t read it. Can’t. I’ll have to force myself.

Edit tracker is the bane of my existence.  Sometimes it pops while I’m writing and I can’t figure out how to turn it off.  I cold reboot, I go to help, click in the tray.  It won’t go away. Sometimes it stays for minutes even scores of minutes. I’ve never been caught doing you-know-what by my mom as a kid, but I’m sure it’s a mood breaker. That’s what tracker is for me.

I’m all for editing, but sometimes in the creative process it’s better to scrap and start over. There’s something to be said for flow.

Lawyers and engineers may need edit tracker, but in the creative and strategy business the function needs to float away on an iceberg. Peace.

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