SEPTEMBER 24, 2009

A colleague recently sent around a very interesting BusinessWeek piece about the efforts companies are making towards restoring public trust in their brands. It was, I thought, a great look at how McDonald’s, American Express, and Ford are tackling the core problem of distrust in an era when largesse, recklessness, and complacency among major corporations have led to a financial panic and recession.

While McDonald’s and Ford have primarily improved their public standing by actually improving their products, American Express’ story, I thought, was more interesting because its products aren’t exactly tangible. It, primarily, is in the business of moving money around - a valuable, essential service - but the extent of the average consumer’s interaction with AmEx involves swiping a card at the grocery store and paying up at the end of the month.  The same is true of all credit card companies, really.

So traditionally credit card issuers have competed at the margins. Credit cards are more or less functionally identical, so companies had to lure new customers by touting perks like the security of their cards (AmEx “Blue” cards),  the quality of their customer service (AmEx platinum cards), or the ubiquity of card-accepting merchants (Visa). AmEx even benefited from a false underground rumor of an exclusive “Black” card issued only to celebrities; in response to the rumors, the company actually started issuing a similiar “Centurion” card in 1999. Rewards like cash back and airline miles are other competitive battlegrounds for issuers.

But given the new austerity of the recession and the leeriness of consumers punch drunk from commodity bubbles,  financial panics and record unemployment, AmEx needed a new marketing tack. So it turned to the stalwart of American business mythology - the yeoman entrepreneur, repairing bikes and baking bread in once-vacant storefronts across the nation.

As someone with an entreprenurial bent, I love the ad. I really, really do. I’m incredibly inspired by stories like these, where an economically beleaguered place like Detroit, thanks to plummeting costs of living, attracts artists, entrepreneurs and other risk-takers to rebuild the city. My escapist fantasies usually revolve around moving to places like Baltimore or Cleveland and participating in their ongoing rebirth.

AmEx is right to run campaigns like these on two levels: first, as an emotional matter, I think most Americans are kind of like me - we envy the freedom and the boldness of entrepreneurs, and alignment with those virtues is never a bad thing. But on a more substantive level, the only surefire way to improve America’s moribund corporations is to enable small businesses to mount challenges to their dominance, and American Express’ fate is directly tied to the health of the broader corporate sector.

I would have liked to see more substance in the campaign, though. What concrete actions is the company taking to improve small business’ access to credit? Is it working with Chambers of Commerce in places hard-hit by the recession to offer business tips to would-be entrepreneurs? How else is it promoting OpenForum, its online resource for small businesses? Is it working with governments to remove barriers to business creation? You never find out.

So, big business - if you want my trust, don’t try to align yourself with my values, or sell me on your brand image. I want to know exactly how you can help and what you’ll do in the event you fail to help. Information that doesn’t accomplish one of those two things just isn’t particularly relevant.

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JULY 22, 2009

Last year I saw a cool story on how Nintendo was using a unique approach in marketing their gaming consoles to women. They held “Nintendo parties” where groups of women got to play games, drink some wine, and munch on some hors d’oeuvres. I thought it was a cool idea, targeting groups of women in a low key social setting has been done to sell everything from tupperware, to make-up, to even sex toys.

Recently my friend LiLu over at Live It, Love It got to throw such a party. She got an e-mail from Brand About Town and next thing you know she and 25 of her friends were off to a “Girlfriend’s Guide to Gaming” bash. They got to try out the new Nintendo DSi and ended up receiving one to take home and enjoy.

What makes this such a great move for Brand About Town and Nintendo is natural buzz that followed afterwards. It only took a couple of days before all of our friends were talking about it. My blogger pal Liebchen attended the party and couldn’t put the DSi down all night:

“Before I knew it, it was almost 9pm and I was still bent over the little device, trying to get to the next level of Dr. Mario. God help me when I finally get more games on this thing; someone might have to stage an intervention. For instance, if I were to get Mario Kart…I used to think that video games were something that you grew out of. I’ve never been so happy to be wrong.”

This is the kind of word of mouth you want surrounding your product.

What makes these events so valuable is the chance to connect with the consumer in a casual, low-key setting and allow them to test drive your product. Liebchen didn’t fully realize what the Nintendo DSi was all about until she picked one up, “I still liked playing other people’s games, but didn’t figure I needed one of my own but the DSi…it was just fun the games were fun; the camera; all of the capabilities I didn’t really know how much it could do.”

A great way for Nintendo to reach out to those outside the typical video gamer demographic, in fact I could easily see this model transferring over for different kinds of products. The key is to keep it casual, make it fun, and make it about the consumer.

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FEBRUARY 4, 2009

My Pittsburgh Steelers won Super Bowl XLIII on Sunday in quite thrilling fashion. While I usually split my time during the game evenly between nachos, beer, football, and advertisements, this year was special and I expended all my energy watching the game and hollering at the top of my lungs at the slightest of provocations. That means I didn’t get to spend as much time as I’d normally like mining the ads for every sliver of pop culture gold - I was too busy yelling terrible words I’d never ordinarily say at Cardinal wide receiver, Larry Fitzgerald, and defensive lineman, Darnell Docket.

So I spent some time yesterday perusing the ads at the office, and I quickly found my favorite of the night - the Hulu ad with Alec Baldwin as 30 Rock’s slimy executive Jack Donaghy. Check it out:

According to the tongue-in-cheek Baldwin, Hulu “beams TV directly to your portable computing device.”  Ah, Alec, if only it were that simple - there’s nothing “beaming” about the United States’ internet infrastructure.

In fact, United States broadband speeds lag behind almost every industrialized nation. According to a recent study done by the Communications Workers of America, U.S. broadband speeds rank 15th in the world, with the fastest speeds available only in major metro areas. Japan, for instance, enjoys broadband download speeds several orders of magnitude faster than those in the United States. Broadband speeds in much of America are such that many users likely cannot take full advantage of Hulu’s features, including streaming HD video.

We aren’t just talking about seemingly-frivolous things like streaming video here. Broadband is increasingly becoming a prerequisite for any serious brick-and-mortar business, and is also opening up new opportunities for online entrepreneurs. “Always-on” internet access is also quickly becoming a part of our emergency infrastructure, with the use of technologies like Twitter becoming a standard element in emergency response. And finally, the more things that can be done on a computer, the less that have to be done in a car, which means less carbon in the atmosphere.

Now, a lot of this discrepancy has to do with the geography of the United States. Any network, whether it’s a transportation system or communications infrastructure, is going to be less effective over long distances. That’s why, according to the speed map generated by the CWA study, rural Americans have dramatically less access to fast broadband than their suburban and city-dwelling counterparts. It also explains why places like Japan and South Korea, with very high population densities, can enjoy much faster internet - bits and bytes have to travel far less to get to their destination in those countries.

But it also speaks to our collective unwillingness to deal with the issue. There has been essentially no will on the part of the federal government to make meaningful changes to the way our broadband infrastructure is run. Broadband speeds have been an issue in the United States for quite some time - why hasn’t any concrete policy action been taken to correct the problem?

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JANUARY 21, 2009

While scanning one of my favorite marketing blogs, YPulse, I came across a marketing campaign from Burger King and Facebook called the Whopper Sacrifice.  Have you heard of this one yet?  It’s a Facebook application that challenges users to sacrifice ten friends after which they receive a free Whopper.

It makes good marketing sense for the two to partner on a project like this.  It conveniently engages people where they are - online - and gets people to use both companies’ products, which makes them money.  What baffles me, however, is why Facebook would want users to have fewer friends.  If Facebook is trying to promote itself - just as Burger King getting people to enter their stores, eat their food, and most likely spend money on something else while they’re there (have to wash that greasy burger down with something, and, dang, those fries smell good!) - then shouldn’t Facebook be encouraging its users to find and add more friends, connect more and not less?

I’d expect that Facebook asking users to unfriend people would result in failure, not success.  More friends mean more connectivity, which means more activity.  Perhaps the fewer friends ploy signals a shift in the purpose of Facebook, urging people to use it to find and keep only significant relationships. Quality over quantity.  Or, perhaps the ploy is simply that: just a quirky, yet questionable, strategy to get people’s attention.

Nearly a week after Whopper Sacrifice launched, Facebook did ask the developer to disable one functionality of the application - its ability to notify the friend who was being sacrificed for a Whopper via news feed. Facebook claimed this action violated an expectation of privacy since users are not normally notified when someone removes them as a friend. Rather than adjust to this restriction, Burger King and the developer chose to conclude the campaign.

If nothing else, this marketing scheme has certainly piqued my interest, consequently getting me to visit these two websites and get to know the companies better (a step closer to me choosing either of their products).  And if that was their only goal, then I say “Well done!” to both companies. These days, breaking through a saturated marketplace and gaining the attention of consumers is success in and of itself.

What’s your take on the Whopper Sacrifice?

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DECEMBER 17, 2008

Have you ever left a store and suddenly found yourself singing a song that you don’t remember hearing – perhaps one that you haven’t heard in years? “I got soul, but I’m not a soldier / I got soul, but I’m not a soldier…”

What about in the morning, after you’ve hit the snooze button a dozen times and finally dragged yourself out of bed and into the shower: do you ever start humming a familiar tune, but have no idea why? “I used to rule the world / Seas would rise when I gave the word… Dum, dum, dum de dum dum dum.”

Well, chances are that The Killers’ 2005 hit song, hypothetically speaking, was actually playing in that store you were in - your conscious mind was just too busy searching for a smaller size to take notice. (Meanwhile, your subconscious mind was having a jam-session with itself!) In addition, Coldplay’s latest single was likely one of the first songs your radio/alarm clock played when it first woke you up this morning. You just weren’t quite awake enough to realize it consciously .

Remembering something without being aware that we are remembering it is a consequence of priming and implicit memory- two relatively harmless psychological phenomena. But a problem arises in the artistic world (music, film, literature) when an artist subconsciously adopts someone else’s work while believing it was actually a product of his/her own creative powers.

Earlier this year, for instance, musician Joe Satriani accused Coldplay of lifting elements of his song “If I Could Fly” for Coldplay’s hit song “Viva La Vida.” Immediately, I was inclined to believe that Coldplay’s Chris Martin (creative genius) may have subconsciously copied the beat, chords and melody of Satriani’s song. As Wired’s Eliot Van Buskirk explains, it’s not uncommon for musicians to hear something and “regurgitate” it later without realizing it. Considering all of the songs we have access to in the digital music era, I would have to agree with Van Buskirk.

To complicate things further, however, it appears that videos depicting similarities between the two songs have been disappearing from YouTube, courtesy of Coldplay’s label, EMI, which claims that the videos infringe on its copyright.  (One of only a few surviving videos can be found here.) A legitimate claim on the part of EMI, or a clever attempt at a cover-up? You decide.

Either way, Van Buskirk finds it interesting that EMI is using copyright as a way to remove one version of a Coldplay song while allowing other versions to remain online.

It’s a useful reminder of the ways in which copyright law can be used for purposes other than thwarting the infringement of copyright. In this case, it’s a somewhat useful tool for downplaying plagiarism accusations directed at one of the world’s top acts.

We already know priming agents can influence cravings and the consumer decision-making process - that’s been the aim of marketing and advertising gurus for years. In an over-saturated society, however, I wonder: have priming and implicit memory lost their touch, or are their influential powers yet to be tapped?

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NOVEMBER 25, 2008

In 2004, vintners and wine store owners commonly referred to the “Sideways effect,” whereby the Oscar-winning film directly influenced consumer impressions and purchases of pinot noir, a once relatively obscure red wine.  According to ACNielsen, sales of pinot noir reached an impressive 370,000 cases between October 24, 2004 and January 15, 2005, an increase of nearly 16% from the same period a year earlier.

It still came as a surprise last week, however, to learn that the “Sideways effect” may have actually reached Japan. Seriously. In an article in Variety magazine, I read that Fox Japan and the Fuji TV network recently announced the details of their joint Japanese remake of Alexander Payne’s 2004 hit movie.  “Wait,” I thought.  “Japan remaking Hollywood?  Usually it’s the other way around!”  This time, though, it wasn’t.

Curiously, as Cinematical’s Peter Martin reports, Japan doesn’t have a native wine culture equivalent to that of the United States, mostly due to weather and soil issues, not to mention a scarcity of land.  In the past year, however, California wine imports have significantly increased in Japan.  Martin writes, “And the comic Kami no Shizuku (translated as The Drops of God; pictured) has become a phenomenon over the last couple of years, read by 500,000 Japanese weekly, according to Telegraph (UK), and sending wine sales skyrocketing across Asia.  The series details a young man’s quest to identify the 12 wines described in his father’s will.”

Set to release in Japan next fall, the remake, which is already shooting on location in California’s Napa Valley, will likely spark a new Asian interest in American wines.  And, if I were a Napa Valley vintner or wine seller, I would already be personalizing my website and my shop for the massive wave of Japanese tourism that is sure to seek my business next winter.

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NOVEMBER 24, 2008

There’s no question that the pizza industry is clamoring for our business by creating new ways for us to order and promotions to entice us to choose their pies.

TiVo in your pizza order from Domino’s

Order online from Pizza Hut and get free music

Friend Papa John’s on Facebook for a free pizza

However, getting pizza online by text message or through TiVo seems a little overboard. Call me old school, but I actually prefer looking up the the nearest pizza place and phoning in my order. I wonder if the chains are giving us what we really want, or are these just gimmicks that will soon go away? I’d choose lower prices and better quality over convenience any day.

Have you ever ordered pizza in any of these non-traditional ways?

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NOVEMBER 18, 2008

When I was in high school, I shopped at the Gap… a lot. Most of the kids in my high school did.  It was actually considered a “hip” store in 1995.  I’m not exactly sure when or why I stopped shopping there – maybe it was because my style changed over the years and Gap’s didn’t – but, apparently, I’m not the only one.  A recent article in The New York Times discussed the troubles Gap is facing, and questions whether the clothing company, famous for its holiday commercials, has lost its edge.

I think that Gap’s troubles extend beyond losing its edge; it appears to have lost its focus too. One thing is for sure: when I was a Gap shopper, the chain was not attempting to sell $6,000 Vespas or $500 bicycles!

Last year, Gap partnered with Vespa to offer consumers the “Crazy Stripe” Vespa LX50 for $6,000. And this year, I suppose in an attempt to be “greener”, it decided to partner with Electra bikes and sell “The Gap Argyle Cruiser” – an actual bicycle with a blue argyle pattern – for $499.  Wait…what?!  I don’t get it.  I mean, I’m all for companies branching out, reinventing themselves, and being open to change, but this just doesn’t make sense to me.  A bicycle does not scream “logical extension of a clothing brand” to me.

At TMG, we believe that the most important thing a company can do is listen to consumers, in order to design and offer products and services that meet their wants and needs.  I’m not so sure that Gap is listening. What do you think?  “The Argyle Cruiser” - good idea or bad idea?

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OCTOBER 9, 2008

WARNING!  Your computer has been infected with a Trojan virus.  Critical files could be lost.  Click HERE to download an anti-virus program that will fix your system!

This is just one of a slew of pop-up warnings that spyware and malware creators use to try to mislead unsuspecting Internet users into downloading potentially harmful software.

A new study by researchers at North Carolina State University shows that most Internet users are still unable to distinguish genuine pop-up warnings from fake ones – even after repeated mistakes.  (Is there a Pavlov in the house?)

The study examined the responses of undergraduate students to real and fake warning messages while they conducted a series of Internet searches on a personal computer.   The real warning messages simulated local Windows operating system warnings, whereas the fake messages were from an external source and designed to trick users into downloading a harmful virus or malicious software.

Participants were fooled by the fake messages 63 percent of the time, hitting the “OK” button in the message box when it appeared on the screen despite being told that some of what they would be seeing would be fake.

“This study demonstrates how easy it is to fool people on the Web,” says study co-author Dr. Michael S. Wogalter, professor of psychology at NC State.

Most telling of all, however, was that, after interviewing the participants, researchers found that the students were so eager to get the pop-up boxes out of the way that they clicked right through obvious warning signs.  In other words, after being saturated by so many advertisements and marketing tools, the students had become too desensitized to notice the actual risks - and perhaps even the benefits - associated with the ads.

You should know that the most prevalent scareware program in circulation today is called Antivirus XP 2008.  Often installed on a PC without proper notification, the software bombards victims with fake security warnings, trying to convince them to buy worthless programs that sometimes even harm their PCs.

The good news is that Microsoft is working with the state of Washington to sue companies that exploit Windows to deliver these misleading popups.  Microsoft, after all, has a strong incentive to curtail spyware: about 50% of its customer-support calls come from spyware-related crashes.  A few times a year, I too am forced to spend an uncomfortable evening resolving a spyware problem.  What about you?

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OCTOBER 6, 2008

Technology is awesome – and at the same time, technology wears on me.

Most days I am grateful for all the ways I’m connected — however, there increasingly more moments lately when, like Gayle with her email, I’m ready for a break. Tools meant to make my life easier leave me feeling overwhelmed; social bookmarking is amazing, but I tag more articles and posts than I could ever read, and my Google Reader is overflowing with unbelievable art, can’t-miss events, insightful stories and statistics - if only I could get to all of it.

Which is exactly why this advertising campaign by Dentyne is brilliant.

It’s not very often that I see an ad and want to put it on my wall, but when I saw the entire collection for the first time on AdFreak, I immediately wanted a copy of them. Something about their straightforward simplicity perfectly captured exactly how I felt.

Several years ago I wrote a post about wondering if my generation, Gen Y, would eventually shift away from technology and into lifestyles that do not revolve around constant connectivity. I’m certainly not the first or only person to ever suggest that too much technology might lead a generation to say we’ve had enough, but several reactions to this campaign brought me back to that post from three years ago. And others, like Columbia grad student Kate Rosenbloom, are wondering if the ads might be an indicator of that larger phenomenon:

[T]he ads and the reading do make me wonder if we are reaching a saturation point in terms of people’s willingness to embrace the idea that technology equals progress. What does it say about the state of American minds today when the advertising industry, which has been so eager to embrace new technology, is encouraging people to ‘log off’ and ‘power down’ (and chew gum)?

I feel like I know more and more people who are refusing to join social networking websites, use instant messaging services, or text message friends. Could these Dentyne ads be just another sign of an impending backlash?

And while we’ll have to wait and see if this larger shift materializes, this thought-provoking campaign has one major shortfall.  MediaBistro hits the nail on the head when it wonders how Dentyne could create a campaign encouraging people to connect offline, and then support it by creating a website:

[W]hy didn’t you just go all real world? Do nothing online. Perhaps you create flash mobs of hugging via snail mail. Perhaps you hold spontaneous concerts on college campuses or bike rides though small university towns at midnight. How about a real world choose your own adventure game?

Dentyne may not be perfect in its execution, but it did successfully create a series of ads that captures my sentiment of the moment. I’m tired of technology controlling my life… and this company beautifully acknowledges — and encourages — my life beyond Facebook. I only hope balancing it all turns out to be as easy as buying a pack of gum.

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