Random

    Brand Planning

    Venture Capital and Clean Air.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    NY venture capitalist Fred Wilson of Union Square Ventures posted yesterday about how venture firms often follow the herd.  If social networks are hot, VCs look for a new good one. Mobile apps? They find someone second to the party, but who tells a fine story.  Mr. Wilson believes this is too safe and in being too safe it is not safe at all.

     Mr. Wilson is, drum roll, successful.  He is because he “fails harder” as Dan Wieden of Wieden + Kennedy says. Or “falls forward fast” as Joe Nacchio used to say.   Mr. Wilson is smart, hard working but most importantly unafraid to look to the future. He goes where the herd will be. Where the herd is is a little stinky –albeit an active breeding ground. Mr. Wilson looks for clean air.

    Brand Planning.

    Good brand planning and good VC investment share this “ahead of the herd” mentality. When I present a great branding idea there is often an odd look in the eyes of the decision maker.  It’s part smile, part fear.  The smile connotes I get them.  The fear can result from a few things but usually it’s the unknown.  When presenting to Newsday the brand idea “we know where you live,” they thought it too intrusive, maybe a bit creepy. But it was their differentiator. They added a little water and bought it.  For a health care system the strategy “a systematized approach to improving healthcare” felt cold and calculating.  Finally they agree as long as we didn’t use the “s” word, we were good.  They came to grips with the fact that they were a system. Herds are safe. Bold wins out. Peace!

    Yahoo. A Portal and Pages Strategy.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    Carol Bartz was let go yesterday and not a moment too soon.  A smart lady out of her element – she, a good enterprise tech blocker and tackler – Ms. Bartz in the near term will be replaced by an army of herself.  An army of bankers and financial advisors that will chase the numbers — chase and plot the lines of business.  An army that will evaluate global growth, sales, competitors whiles using Wall Street formulas to predict market capitalization.  Not one Carol, 20 Carols.  And while this is happening the call will go out to high level search firms and tech recruiters.  The board of directors, headed by adman Roy Bostock, will do some trail covering and soul searching and become a story in and of itself. This is how we do-oo it.

    But what needs to be done here, as well, is a brand audit and a brand plan. A brand plan is an operating principle guided by consumer needs…delivered in the form of the product experience, marketing and messaging. People think a brand plan is about messaging alone and they are wrong.   

    All the financial work the numbers consultants will do is important. The CEO hire is important, but what Yahoo IS and what Yahoo DOES (for consumers) is more important. This is called the Is-Does.  Right now Yahoo IS a Portal. And what it DOES is serve web pages.  Yahoo wants to be an innovative content company, but hasn’t delivered.  If consumers can’t pass the Is-Does test, it’s a fail.  Right now Yahoo’s Is is weak. And the Does doesn’t.

    My prediction:  in 12 months there will be a new CEO, a new logo, a new campaign (Yahoo would be smart to keep ad shop Goodby), and no brand plan.  Brand diaspora, brand diffusion is what kills great companies.  Stop the madness. Peace!

    Coen Brothers.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    A.O. Scott in his New York Times review of the new movie “Inside Llewyn Davis” today nicely captures what makes a Coen Brothers movie a Coen Brothers movie. Says Scott, they offer a “brilliant magpie’s nest of surrealism, period detail and pop-culture scholarship.” To me this description means their work a magnetic, unusual and blasting through context. The Coen’s attention to period detail is another reason I love these guys. Como se “True Grit?”  And pop-culture scholarship just suggests their storytelling is human and humane(ish).

    It strikes me that these are qualities that also make for a great brand strategy.  

    I often find a little tension when presenting brand strategy… and it tells me I’ve done a good job.  

    • “We know where you live” a brand strategy for Newsday, was a thought a little creepy.
    • “A systematized approach to improving healthcare” for North Shore-LIJ, a bit cold.
    • “We crave attention” for a women-owned PR firm, a smidgen gender-sensitive.

    Just as good advertising creative makes you think, feel and do something, so should a strategy. Sometimes, for the squeamish, the do something is ask me “Do we have to use that one word?”  My answer is always “No, it’s a strategy, not a tagline.”

    I’m no Ethan and I’m no Joel yet my work aspires to staying power. To muscle memory served up as product value. A great brand plan is an organizing principle that sticks to your ribs.   Peace.

     

    BlitzLocal and brand planning.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    Dennis Yu CEO of BlitzLocal is a smart dude.  He did a presentation about BlitzLocal, Facebook, data, and marketing futures last night at Hofstra University and it was eye opening. (What is Hofstra’s brand idea, by the way? Something with a right pointing arrow?) Anyway, a number of cottage industries have popped up over the years to help people market on Facebook and BlitzLocal is a good one. As is Involver.

    Sitting through the preso I was wondering what kind of company BlitzLocal was — never having heard of them. My take?  It’s an analytics company.  The BlitzLocal Is-Does?  A Facebook analytics company (Is) that implements and optimizes Facebook marketing programs (Does). 

    Mr. Yu started the evening with some really heady talk about brand building and how promotional giveaways  are a blight, then he segued into data capture, tools, and the raw power of the Facebook platform.  As an admin on a brand account, he playfully posted an offer to see how many people wanted a free pair of jeans and in minutes had 4,000 hits.

    So how does this type of real time analytics stuff rub a brand planner like me – someone in search of the big positioning ideas and planks that and drive long term value?  Well, I’m a believer and will add these tools to my arsenal.  I rail about tactics-palooza, but the insights derived from a BlitzLocal engagement are too important to cast off. This kind of data, especially at the high order level, needs to go into the boil down. One more important loci for the plan. Right brain, left brain. Yin and Tang stuff.  Can’t wait to play. Peace.

    Best Definition of Branding.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    Were I to guess, I’d say 90% of people who use the word “branding” misuse it.  Designers use it to define packaging. Art directors to describe “look and feel.”  For P&G brand managers it’s a reference to budget size. Direct marketers think it means synergy with general advertising. Copywriters don’t really know what it means. The digiterati try not to use it. And agency principals think it is whatever makes the bank deposits flow. 

    Noah Brier while a head strategist at the Barbarian Group once asked me “There are lots of definitions of brand plan, what is yours?” That’s a question every marketer who hires an agency should ask. There would be a lot of Rick Perry answers, me thinks.

    Branding is an organizing principle. Locked onto the right organizing principle one can build a brand with ease and sharp measurement. Brand strategy as an organizing principle can guides all the other strategies you will hear during the course of the marketing day: the product strategy, sales strategy, retail strategy, channel strategy, pricing strategy, media strategy, messaging strategy.  I could go on.  

    The organizing principle defines how a product is built, cared for, presented and nurtured. It’s one simple piece of paper that organizes the others. It organizes leadership, employees and the hard to manage consumer. 

    I always wanted to create an ad agency named Foster, Bias and Sales. It’s where the rubber meets the road in marketing. But without an organizing principle to guide these steps to a sale, you are simply a tactics jockey.   

    Italian Leather Branding.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    I’m thinking of changing the name of my business to Italian Leather Branding.  I don’t know why I believe Italian leather is better than any other leather but I do.  Someone, somewhere planted that seed in my mind and it wouldn’t surprise me if you felt the same way. Italian leather is softer. More supple. The most beautiful tan color. And most important of all, it’s worth double maybe triple the price.

    That seed that someone planted — that’s branding.  It’s what all brand planners aspire to. To create an image in the mind of a consumer that pre- and post-disposes one to purchase. Or to prefer.  I did buy some Italian shoes one time.  Most expensive shoes I ever bought. And you are not going to believe it but they squeaked. Swear to God. My local shoe maker, Gaspar, suggested soaking the soles in water and guess what? Italian leather leaches. I didn’t know that. Water-stained Italian shoes…ouch.

    But here’s the thing, it wasn’t the shoes’ fault.  Couldn’t have been the Italian leather.

    Feel me?

    Peace.

     

    Margaret Mead and Marketing.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    I was lost at college until I found anthropology:  The study of man.  In college I loved reading how sexually repressed we were and how other cultures found sex with someone other than your spouse healthy.  Primitive?  I think not.  Have I ever cheated on the wifus?  I think not. Freakin’ culture!

    Who knew anthropology would end up shaping my career 30 years later?  I certainly didn’t.  My senior year I went to Washington D.C. on Rollins College’s dime to the annual convention of the American Anthropological Association where I had the absolute privilege of seeing Margaret Mead.   I could tell she was one of those special earthlings, but didn’t then conceive she would impact my career, unless I worked in a museum or became a teacher.

    After years in account management, I became a brand planner. Planners care about culture. Not brand culture, people culture.  Good planners must assess the product. They need to understand how it’s made, of what it’s made, where and why.  Then they must map that learning into patterns — trying to find the love.  Where culture comes in is delving into how consumers and non-consumers intersect with the product. Deeply understanding the how, when and why. Becoming intimate with the feelings, needs, and the fulfillments. Weighing these intersections, culling, then prioritizing them.  

    What comes out at the back end is a brand plan.  A brand plan has two things: A brand idea or claim.  (The claim doesn’t have to be unique, it just has to be true.) And 3 support planks or proof planks.  The organizing principle for proving the claim. When combined, these three planks must be unique.

    The brand plan is the way forward. It guides future product development, creates the map for marketing, and allows employees to understand product culture. I’m not sure Margaret Mead would approve of me name dropping in a marketing blog but I bet I could get her to buy something. Peace! (On that she would agree.)

    Downward Lulu.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    lululemon pantsThe first time I heard of Lululemon I was on a weekend marketing retreat with a number of women at the invitation of Nfinity, a wonderful women’s athletic footwear company.  I was a last minute replacement for a woman who had to beg out.  Most of the ladies were aware of Lululemon and sang its praises. They loved the category (yoga), styles (great looking, great fitting) but what they spoke most about was quality. I’ve never done downward dog in my life, but to hear them talk I was ready to buy. 

    Come Christmas, off I went to buy the wifus some Lululemon yoga pants. Trying to explain hip size using your own hips to a young, comely salesperson is uncomfortable. But successful I was and I opted for a yoga mat too, hedging my bet. Hee hee.

    As I read about Lulu’s quality problems today, which include previous grievances about material pitting, seam unraveling and color bleeding, I see how far the company have come. Backwards. Even with sales and revenue up  thirty plus YOY, someone has taken their eye off the ball. (Not sure if their equity partners or public stock offering put undue pressure on the company, but quality has faltered, even as the brand had grown.)

    Quality is a tough brand plank to build around.  It’s most important in categories where it’s not common. Otherwise, quality is the price of entry.  But in yoga, where stress and strain and exertion are part of the experience it’s not a bad play. Lululemon needs a quality facelift. And fast! Peace.

    Voice. Tone. Personality.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0

    This may be sacrilege in the brand planning community but I’m not a big fan of tone, voice and brand personality.  I believe those are words born of ad agencies not true brand strategists. Tone isn’t a strategy.

    Tone and voice are the domain of the creative agency. Of the campaign.  That’s not to say those things aren’t important, they certainly are. Tactically.  So long as they advance the brand strategy: “an organizing principle for product, experience and messaging.”

    Brand strategy defies what is business-winning in the market pursuit. Creativity in delivering that strategy is what agencies do. Making the claim and proofs original. Interesting. Captivating. And those pursuits may require a change in tone and voice from time to time.

    George W. Bush once used a phrase I loved talking about cowboy wannabes. “All hat and no cattle.” My brand planner take on that when disparaging a marketing campaign would be “all voice no strategy.”

    Peace be upon you.

     

     

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