Monthly Archives: August 2016

How to Build a Business With One Idea.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

I’ve never really parsed the brand name of my consultancy “What’s The Idea?”  While developing the company, which actually started out just as a blog, I wanted to name it What’s The Big Idea?, but I chose against it for URL and simplicity’s sake.  A big idea is better than an idea, one might think, yet it also seemed a big self-aggrandizing. So What’s The Idea it was.

What’s neat about the name is that it is a call to action. If a brand manager or stakeholder can answer the question, it probably has an idea. If the idea can’t be put into a succinct explanation, then un-uh.  If you have no brand idea you have no idea how hard it is to convey value to the consumer world.

Most sane women and men who are captains of industry would respond “How can I maintain a business beneath one idea?” The answer is “By using proof planks.” Proof planks (3 in total) drive business value, consumer value and shareholder value.

You want metrics, I’ll give you metrics. Write me. Steve at Whatstheidea.

Peace.

 

Droning on To a Point.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

I read Farhad Manjoo’s tech piece in the NYT today about Amazon’s drone plans. He seems to be coming around to believing it will happen. Drones will be delivering goods in the next 5 years, reports Amazon in the article. Certainly in the wilds of Africa.  

I was at a wedding the other day and the bride and groom decided a drone’s eye camera angle would be a nice-to-have during the outdoor vows. Have you ever hiked in the woods on a humid day? ‘Nough said.

I’m no geeze when it comes to tech but drones over Babylon or Bumpus Mills are not going to happen as envisioned.  For safety reasons (read security, etc.) home deliveries are not in our future. Not for a couple hundred years.  Perhaps there will be designated delivery posts or lots, like PO boxes, where we can pick up drone deliveries but drones will not be buzzing around our hoods and cities at all hours of the day and night. The idea to have an idea will work in this case. Drones will happen. We just haven’t quite figured out how they will contribute to “last mile” delivery. I’m guessing the last half mile will be more like the 1970s paper boy than a drone drop-off.

Peace.   

 

 

An Educational Idea for Successful Learning.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

In 2012 I worked on a brand strategy for a company in what I called the “educational development” space.  The company sold classroom technology and professional development – in effect teaching the teachers how to use the technology. It was one of the coolest companies I’ve ever worked for. For those unfamiliar with my brand strategy framework, it comprises one claim and three proof planks. One of the proof planks in the brand strategy had to do with changing the paradigm in the “student-teacher relationship.”

During the  engagement Mark Zuckerberg announced he was going to donate $100 million to the Newark, NJ school system.  Throwing money at teaching and learning sounded like a good idea at the time; it was not.  As far as I can tell, Newark ain’t no Mooresville, NC.

Today, Mr. and Mrs. Zuckerberg are championing, along with Facebook, a new learning management system with Summit Public Schools, a charter school partner, to reinvent the student-teacher relationship. It’s a software system and that lets students direct their learning roadmap and pace supported by intense one-on-one mentoring.  It is the student teacher relationship plank in action. And it is already paying dividends in Oakland.

It seems to me allowing Newark to design its own learning plan with a pot full of money doesn’t work but allowing students to do so, with some newfound supervision and software does. Ms. Carmen Farina, are you watching?

Peace.

 

Lose the Walmart.com brand.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

I don’t begin to know the complicated ins and outs of Walmart.com’s business model. Jet’s or Amazon’s either for that matter. But I do know a thing about brands and brand focus.  And it is my opinion that Walmart’s purchase of Jet.com was a smart, smart move, however, the idea to keep the two brands separate is a colossal mistake. Jet CEO Marc Lore will now run both companies, offering him economies of scale and scope which will improve supply chain performance.  But he’ll be doing double duty in his customer facing job. Way too much work.

Walmart.com has to go away and Jet.com needs to be the face of the single entity. The Walton family needs to let go and allow Jet to really ramp up. Mr. Lore will sleep better at night, he’ll dream better on weekends and his employees will have one team to play and root for.  One of the stupidest things I did as a parent was to think my two teenagers could share a car.  Two brands can’t share a business.

Rip off the Band-Aid Mr. Lore and Walton family. This is Amazon you’re trying to take share from. This ain’t no Mudd Club, no Sears or Macy’s.

Peace.                                              

 

The new OS.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

Riddle me this. When does an operating system really become an operating system?   When it truly delivers a digital assistant that manages all devices by voice activation. As Amazon’s Alexa intends to do.

Operating systems today are made up of software that undergirds other software and applications, e.g., iOS, Windows, and Android. In 20 years voice commands that direct “ons,” “offs” and other device and system activations will be the operating systems.  These assistants will compete with each other for supremacy.  There will be systems by Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet and one or two start-ups. None will integrate (at first) but mark my words, these are the operating systems of the future. Because they operate real life things…including cars.

These operating systems will be the battleground of the next 50 years. Will they be free?  Will they be as expensive as cars? Will consumers be paid to use them? Time will tell.

Peace.

 

Strategy Bounty.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

I’m in a hurry this morning. Heading to Orient Point for a ferry to Connecticut then on to see Pearl Jam at Fenway Park in Boston, MA, It’s great being human.  Anyway, I will only post a short one today (as if they aren’t all short.) 

Apple has decided to offer bug bounties to hackers for any software glitches found in their software. Very contrary to Apple’s position of bug-free software it has been lauding over Microsoft for so many years. Still it’s a good move.  

I’m going to riff on the idea and ask companies to offer “strategy bounties” to brand planners. I’d love to look at a brand strategy for a company and ID any anomalies for money. Who will my first payor?

Peace.

Itty Bitty Data Club.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

So what’s up in marketing strategy these days? Two words: BIG DATA. I’m okay around big data but am much more facile around LITTLE DATA. I use data often in planning: sales, margins, target penetration, adds, moves and deletes but I loves me some little data. Info that  resides between consumers’ ears. What they say they like. What they don’t say they like. What they dislike and why. And, of course, the culture into which products and services fits. This is the softer side of planning.

My two previous posts were about “proof.” One might think that proof, evidence and tangibles are not the softer side. Sometimes they’re not. But honestly, new unexpected proofs can be found while delving into the softer side. Contrary, market-busting proofs.

mike piazza blond

There was a cultural moment 15 years ago when the Mets Mike Piazza stepped out of the dugout with blond hair — giving permission to 100 million American men to color their hair — effectively doubling the size of the hair color market. That was a softer side or little data proof. Something that could have made a big data woosh had it overcame cultural stasis. It did not happen and here the hair color market sits.

Don’t overlook the itty bitty data club. As Yogi might have said, it’s big.

Peace.

 

 

Brand Strategy for Start-ups..

By
Steve Poppe
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0

Yesterday I wrote about the role and importance of mining proof as it relates to creating a brand strategy.  But what does one do if working for a start-up – a company with no past? A company with no product?  Certainly that makes things tougher.

I’ve been-there-done-that and there always is a past. There is always some kernel of a product or service. In previous posts it’s been mentioned to “follow the patent.” In most start-ups there is a patent or a patent filing paperwork. There must be proof in there. Normal brand planning discovery looks at two things: customer care-abouts and brand good-ats. So for a start-ups, you’ll find it easier to rely on care-abouts. Always a good place to start.

While the director of marketing at Zude, a start-up in the social computing space, knowing what customers cared about helped form the brand idea which, then, informed product development (noun and verb). The Zude brand strategy claim was “the fastest easiest way to build a web page.” The idea came from the brilliant underlying drag and drop technology. With that as the North Star, everything moving forward became easier. For everyone – even the lawyers.

Start-ups think of brand but not brand strategy. Pity.

Peace.

 

 

Residue of Claim.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

In my ongoing effort to define brand planning and share my framework for building strong brands, the word “proof” comes up a lot. No matter what type of brand I study, no matter how many insights rise to the top of the discovery effluvia, proof provides path to a successful strategy. “Proof of what?” you ask. That’s not only the question, it’s the answer.

pick axe

As a student of brands, marketing and advertising I’ve decided that 80% of the promotional side of marketing is baseless claim. Generic terms like “reliable,” “great taste,” “low cost,” and “best service” are ported to market by every marketer on the block. Listen to the claims in a pod of TV advertising and the claims are the same from one brand to the next. So consumers shut them down.

That said, it’s the “proof” of those claim that we hear. The evidence of those claims. Vestiges and residue of the claims is what remains. What is left for the mind to grasp after we’ve told people how great our product or service is.

PROOF is everything is brand planning. Insights may be the sexy side of planning, but mining and organizing proof toward a brand claim is how you build a brand.

Peace.

 

 

Content Creation Gone Wrong.

By
Steve Poppe
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0

mass production

I am a big fan of content creation, the new marketing meme sweeping the nation. Content creation has been around as long as the written word. As a tool to promote and sell it has been around since Bass Ale invented its mark and the Sears Catalog was the Amazon of its day.  But the words “content creation” in this age of Google and iPhone movies has taken on, at least for me, a strong commodity meaning.  A creative-by-the-pound activity measured in attention then, maybe, sales.

I am a brand planner who measures success not by hits or vague engagement activities but by sales. And future sales. Sure I’ll write a speech on “web accessibility” for an agency trying to score points at a client’s annual marketing meeting, but I don’t want giggles, attaboys and future invitations, I want new customer contracts. Content isn’t oration, it’s selling.

So the brand planner in me thinks that content creation or content marketing ungoverned by a brand strategy (one claim, three proof planks) is wasted effort. Every act or action that marketing achieves needs to motivate a sale in one way or the other. If you are doing content creation and it doesn’t move a customer closer to a sale, you likely don’t have an articulate brand strategy.

Peace.         

 

 

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