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    Branding is a brainer.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    One of my finer moments in advertising occurred in a new business pitch when I told the North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health System that their current tagline, developed by the previous ad agency, was spectacular. I later learned that was the reason we won the business. The tagline was “Setting New Standards in Healthcare.” 
     
    As the lead planner on the business, I told NS-LIJ that every time they spent a dollar promoting themselves, the message should contain an example of Setting a New Standards In Healthcare.  “If I come to you with and ad,” I told them, “that does not demonstrate an improved standard of healthcare, send me home.”
     
    It’s been a while since I have worked with North Shore, but living in their market area I do see some ads, and it really hurts to see that they have fallen into the “We’re here” trap. The latest ad I read told consumers that one of the hospitals has a neurosciences institute. The copy goes on to say they have state-of-the-art facilities, smart doctors, blah, blah, blah. We’re Here! Buried deep in the ad, though, were some actual new standards in neuro care for the community, but you had to hunt for them. The headline said  something doofy, like it’s a no-brainer, or some such.
     
    Somehow the easiest ever branding idea was misplaced by a smiling person with a black bag of ads, who didn’t follow the brief. 
     

    Doing evil to the evil, from the “do no evil” company.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    I don’t mean to pick on Google – in fact, I couldn’t live without them – but as a marketing geek I often look at where they’ve come from, what they do well, and try to see where they’re going. It’s getting harder.

     
    Google started in search and kicked butt. They moved into video — a huge move — but it, too, was a search effort: searching for video. Google’s newer applications targeting Microsoft users are free web-based word processing, spreadsheet and presentation software. As a lay person, all I see here is a move toward Microsoft-busting, or doing evil to the evil, from the “do no evil” company. I’m not quite sure where this one fits in.
     
    Google’s next move was to get into the advertising business buying DoubleClick, so they can put their hands on the controls of “monetization” grail. And today, a story was leaked to the New York Times that Google plans to offer open source mobile software within the year that will compete with Microsoft Mobile and help Google own cell phone apps, including advertising.
     
    Once Google lost its master of search mantle, I lost my understanding of who they are. Now they are just a big, brilliant company on a mission to make money in as many different ways as possible.    
     
    When creating the brand plan for Zude (our company’s social computing platform) our chiefs were driven by one thing: giving the “people” web pages and making it easy for them to publish. Our technology is meant to free users from hard-to-use web publishing tools. Zude is about freedom for all Web users. Sound noble? It is. It’s a mission. And as a single mission, it keeps us focused. People root for us.  Google had a product mission — search — and a rooting section, but once they moved off that mission some fans have started trickling out of the stadium. 

    Neutered Agencies

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    Gavin O’Malley, in his MediaPost column today, talks about Open Source in the marketing and advertising world. Those who know the provenance of Open Source trace it to the technology world where Open Source software is software available to all, with no intellectual property restrictions. Linux was an Open Source phenomenon years ago and it hurt Microsoft’s business. In the advertising world, it simply refers to a marketer and its agencies sharing intell. 
     
    Because agencies are competitive animals, they are always looking for advantage. A general ad agency doesn’t want to lose budget to the direct agency. The direct agency doesn’t want to lose budget to a digital agency. None of these want to lose money to a promotional agency….
     
    Well, what if the marketer and agencies were able to aggregate their best learning, best research, best practices, and share it with one another? In other words, if all agency partners had access to the same code? Would this Open Source marketing world be more effective? Would the ideas be stronger? The process more streamlined?
     
    Nah!
     
    It’s up to the client to share what’s most important with its agencies. The marketer needs a tight product, a tight brief, and lots of consumer insights. Also, it needs proper budgeting and budget allocation to meet the objectives of the business.
     
    Making all agencies play nice neuters them. Agencies that work well together, will. Otherwise, let them do their own thing. Who needs neutered agencies?

    Arenas and Adidas

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    Gilbert Arenas a nasty-good basketball player for the Washington Wizards has been blogging for Adidas. But in a recent post he let loose that the second Gilbert Arenas Signature Shoe is a major dud. In fact, he stated it looks like a ballerina slipper and he wouldn’t wear it. 

     
    What a mistake! Or not?
     
    Sure it would have made great sense to have Mr. Arenas on board before the shoe went into production. Duh. By a strange twist of fate though, this approach may actually work for Adidas, but only if they recognize their folly and redesign the shoe to Mr. Arenas’s specification. It could become another New Coke debacle that turns into a positive. The player vs. corporation. If Adidas puts the power in the hands of the player, to really design a cool shoe, how much is that worth? Like a basketball game that has its ebbs and flows, Adidas need to go with this.
     
    Stay tuned.
     

    Far from the mADdening crowd.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    There’s a wonderful black and white EOS Airlines ad in the Wall Street Journal today. Their tagline is “Uncrowded. Uncompromising.”   The ad is simple and direct. It doesn’t try to do too much, so you won’t wade through piled-on features and benefits.

     
    The headline “Uncrowded in a crowded world” sits beneath a big logo and a crowd shot of what appears to be a tennis match.  Dead smack in the middle of the stands, however, is an area roped off by velvet, measuring about 20 x30 feet, in which sit two spectators. They sit beside a little table with an iced bucket of champagne and a server in white uniform.
     
    The line from the copy which is the branding idea is “Travel between New York and London on the world’s only fleet of 757s outfitted for just 48 Guests, you’ll never want to fly the crowded way again.” 
     
    Thanks for not showing the reclining seats Eos. Nice job once again.
     

    Radio Free Music

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    You gotta love the digital marketing world. As record companies experiment with pricing and piracy, Radiohead has decided to test market a very unusual concept.   You know how people use the honor system when buying rural tomatoes? Take a basket and leave some money in the cash basket?  Well, Radiohead is allowing its fans (and prospective fans) to decide what they will pay for the new album entitled “In Rainbows.” Fans can also just buy or download for free single songs if they like.
     
    If you want to pay $10, that’s fine. $2, fine too. Want it for free, just download it. Talk about letting the market decide pricing! Talk about market research!
     
    Where they are really smart is in selling an “expansive” package of material which will include 2 vinyl LPs, a CD with extra songs, photographs and other media of interest. This version, available over the website, will retail for about US$80. This is the equivalent of playing spectacular free concert, then selling CDs and tee-shirts in the lobby. I love it. This “expansive” package supports the market maxim (which I just made up) “that which costs is of value.” When the actual CD of these 10 songs is released next year, I’m betting there will be some serious sales. Just enough to fund Radio Head’s next big idea.
     

    Are you ready for some OOH?

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    The best creative I’ve seen in a long time is an Out Of Home effort currently running in the NY market on buses and billboards.  It’s for Monday Night Football and it celebrates all the great personal memories associated with Monday Night Football over the years.  My favorite Monday Night Football memories were in college, sitting on tables and the edges of over-sized chairs in my fraternity The Guild.  Kegs in the corner.  Rooting for the home team of some brother or another.  Men, men, men, men.  Women, women, women, women. And all on a Monday night. 

    The ad has a 4 word headline, logo and no visual. It’s compelling because it is contrary.

    IS IT MONDAY YET?

     

    It’s called private for a reason.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    There is a digital phone company out there, the name of which escapes me, that will serve up ads based upon the content of your phone conversation. If you are talking about going to a movie on your “celly,” when the call completes you might have a movie ad poop (sic) up on your screen. 

     
    This is going a little too far. Even for Advertising Week.
     
    What’s next? In-home audio surveillance to drive direct mail programs? Garbage truck scanners that spit out coupons? An chip in your EZ Pass that reports shopping center propensities?
     
    Privacy (I love the way the Brits say it) is going to be a major, major issue in a year or two. It’s only a matter of time before some bonehead company oversteps its bounds, and brings down the wrath of consumers and advocates.
     
    I smell a bonehead.
     

    We the people.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    I do my very best not to make a running commercial out of my blog. But as they say, if you love what you do… 
     
    Today, I read with glee of a new social network for geezers. I’m a “geeze,” so please don’t take offense.  Don’t mention AARP is the motto of this new community, called TeeBeeDee, which stands for To Be Determined.  This may be a smart business decision for its builders and investors and I wish them well, but I am so happy not to be in the community building business. 
     
    Zude, you see, is a platform not a community. We don’t build Levittown’s and ask people to move in. We give them the hammers and materials and ask them to build their own residences. Because Zude allows users of any technical ability to build and customize their web presence, we have lots of 50 year olds and 15 year old users.  And they are all getting along just fine, thank you. There are no social barriers on Zude or neighborhoods gerrymandered by age, education, sex or ethnicity. It’s just a place where people “feel free” to express themselves. It’s like Queens, NY — the world’s greatest example of happy, healthy diversity. 
     
    We built a platform…the people are building the rest. All the people. Thomas Friedman would be proud. We are flattening the world.      
     

    Shhh. Nike earnings are in.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0
     
    In the New York Times today was a one-column by three inch story about Nike earnings. They are up 51% for the quarter. To be exact, Nike reported “a 51% increase in fiscal first-quarter net income on Thursday, helped by higher revenue and future orders as sell as favorable currency exchange rates.” Did I mention the item was buried at the bottom of the page? FedEx’s revenue for the quarter was up 8% and their story was an 1/8th of a page — with a picture.
     
    If my company revenue was up 51%, I would be shouting it from the tops of buildings, yet Nike seems almost apologetic. Is it possible that they let the news release out at the 11th hours after the paper forms closed down?
     
    I’m thinking Nike is amazingly embarrassed that they are raking in the cash on the backs of foreign labor which pays a dollar a day. Shhh. Quiet.

     

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