Facebook Instagram X Youtube
    Latest

    Marketing

    Wither Yahoo?

    By
    Steve Poppe
    -
    0

    When was the last time you actually typed dub dub dub yahoo.com on your keyboard? Thought so. How about thumbed those keys on your mobile? Thought so. Yahoo needs a big shot in the ass. A story to break. A reason to visit. Now that it’s football season, I actually do spend some time on the Yahoo — on the Fantasy Football site. And I love their streaming Fantasy Football Live program Sunday mornings – but even that has been dinged by some silly heavy handed gimmicks called Daily Fantasy Price, moving them into the gambling business. But at least it’s a try. It’s something.  As for the rest of Yahoo: “ugotz.”  An Italian idiomatic phrase meaning nothing.

    It’s hard to innovate when you don’t innovate. It’s hard to create best in class web content (which is just content now) when you don’t innovate. It seems that Yahoo if just putting its toys in a vessel and shaking them up.  It needs new toys. Yahoo needs to make news by making interesting new technology than becomes content. Look at the home page. What do you see?  I see the ’90s.

    Peace.

     

     

    Logos and Brand Strategy.

    By
    Steve Poppe
    -
    0

    I was at a meeting yesterday with someone who used to work in marketing at neurosurgical practice in the NY area. She told how this band of brain surgeons decided they needed a new logo and spent $350,000 for it – using a smart boutique in NYC. For years, I’ve been saying that new logos and names cost about $250,000 from the big guys. The Landors. The Interbrands. The Brand Unions. I guess I’ll have to revise my data upward. The storyteller was flabbergasted that a new mark could cost so much.

    Naming and design are big business. Especially for companies with deep pockets. A large health system in the midst of a name change recently explained the new name this way “It’s a beacon of our future. It’s unique, simple and approachable and better defines who we are and where we are going.”

    New logo design and naming need to have a marketing objective. A measurable objective. If you are going to change your name or your mark, start with a brand brief. Something that gives direction to designers and creative people. Something that gives approvers a reason to approve. Strategy starts with words on paper. I’ll trade you two simples and one approachable for a brand strategy with a measureable objective.

    Peace.          

     

    Podcasts and Care-Abouts.

    By
    Steve Poppe
    -
    0

    WNYC, a NYC public radio station, just announced it will open a new $14 million facility to create and distribute podcasts. It’s a brilliant marketing idea. I’ve always had a soft spot for radio and podcasts feel like a smart new media content play. The brilliant investigative series “Serial” by Sarah Koenig last year sparked the podcast movement.

    Podcasts are also a good content play in the marketing arsenal. Companies create lots of words and video to hanging off their websites to drive traffic, action and sales — a tactic mostly born to feed the Google Algorithm. And lately content has been championed by ad agencies looking to make more creative buildables. Podcasts have been overlooked.

    Smart companies will begin to delve into podcasts. What’s the Idea? has been recommending podcast creation to clients for years.  Here’s how it works. The brand planning rigor at What’s The Idea? drives clients to care about what their customer’s care about. The nexus of customer care abouts and brand “good ats” (Thanks Robin Hafitz, for the wordsmithing) drives the organizing principle that is the brand plan. And the care abouts are where we mine for podcast development.

    When you create content people find interesting (versus content about yourself), you connect. People found “Serial” interesting. If you are in the tooth whitening business how do you decide what consumers are interested in? How do you keep it fresh? How do you make deposits in the brand bank? These are good, tough questions. Questions with answers. Questions for a new medium.

    Peace.

     

     

     

     

    Charlene the Meme-alist.

    By
    Steve Poppe
    -
    0

    Charlene Li, a great business mind, recently sold Altimeter Group to Prophet, a long standing brand and marketing concern. Charlene is, and has been, a great meme-alist. She comes up with big business ideas and memes them. These memes helped put the Altimeter Group on the map. Each meme, a mini brand, constitutes a “proof” of her innovative business approach.

    Now at Prophet, however, she seems to be doing things a bit differently. Next week she is hosting a webinar on improving employee engagement. No doubt it will be a good one, because engagement has become big business these days. (Back in the early 80s my dad Fred Poppe used the word in a number of Ad Age thought pieces, giving him national cred.) That said, engagement has become a pop-marketing term and the title of Ms. Li’s talk feels a bit “early majority,” perhaps even a little “late majority” to use Geoffrey A. Moore’s framework.

    What I love about Ms. Li is her “beyond the dashboard” approach. She needs to settle into her new office before mad redecorating. I suspect she will be back on her game shortly. Then watch out!

    Peace.

     

     

    Is Amazon Making Unfriends?

    By
    Steve Poppe
    -
    0

    amazon handmade

    Everyone loves Amazon. Mostly, everyone. We all feed at the Amazon trough. I bought twice from them yesterday. Once, only to find out the non-Prime product would be delivered in close to a month — which I then cancelled — and a second time a few minutes later when the same product popped up with free delivery in 2 days.

    Amazon is loveable, but beginning to make some enemies. With its launch yesterday of Amazon Handmade, direct competitor of Etsy, it made some unfriends. I once accused Google of a “culture of technological obesity.” Amazon, seems to on track for a culture of retail obesity. Why? Because it can. In March Amazon added Amazon Home Services, to compete with Angie’s List and others. Amazon Business, nee Amazon Supply, is an effort to compete with MSC Direct, Grainger and Global Supply. More unfriends.

    And let’s not even get into margins. If you sell a product on Etsy to give them 3.5% of sales, plus a minimal listing charge. If you sell on Amazon Handmade you give up 12%.

    These new business segments will indeed make extra m/billions for Amazon. But it’s a technology play. Etsy owns the heart. Angie’s List owns the heart. Amazon needs to stay away from retail gluttony. Remember Amazon, business people are consumers when they go home. Don’t go overboard on your overdog status.

    Peace.

    Cognitive IBM and Ogilvy.

    By
    Steve Poppe
    -
    0

    Ogilvy launched a new ad campaign and idea for IBM yesterday. And in Ogilvy fashion it was big. Big media, big idea, big investment. The campaign idea is Cognitive Business. Copy pays of the claim with “A new era or technology. A new era of business. A new era of thinking.” The platform is IBM Watson, the mega computer that attempts to rival Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories biggest iron. The specific products are 28 APIs (application programming interface) that can be built into one’s digital business to crunch numbers that deliver insights and new processes….drum roll please…to create solutions for a smarter planet.

    Campaigns come and go, a powerful brand idea is indelible.

    Cognitive Business is Solutions For a Smarter Planet writ small. Same idea, new creative envelope. More productized envelope. To me it feels like an idea IBM marketing directors can more easily cozy up to. Cognitive Business is a little advertising retro but a strong evolution.

    Brand ideas work best when combining “what customers want most” with what “the brand does best.” The most effective ideas, however, always favors the consumer. This idea and its support planks feels a bit too IBM focused: cloud, infrastructure, security. But it’s only day 2 let’s give it a chance. Glad to see some movement around Watson. Peace.

    PS. Two really great TV ads here and here.

     

     

     

    Jack Dorsey. America’s Newest CE…Leave the O Off for Savings.

    By
    Steve Poppe
    -
    0

    I’m sure Jack Dorsey is superman. But this whole dual CEO thing makes me a little crazy. Not a fan. It’s hard enough to run a prosperous company as a single person — but to split time between two companies with one public and under intense pressure and scrutiny? It’s not a recipe for success. Mr. Dorsey must know this. Perhaps it’s an ego thing. Even if his brain is two times bigger than the average executive, he’d be better off focusing his full attention on one company…as he did as when helping found Twitter. Leave Square to someone else for a few years.

    Twitter is way more than a technology company. It’s a learning company. A news company. A comms company. An earth flattening company.

    Part of the problem today for Twitter is earnings. That’s what happened to public technology companies. As an advertising medium Twitter is average at best. It wasn’t built for advertising. Imagine shutting down the emerging America railroad system before it crossed the country because it couldn’t sell enough ads on the sides of trains to pay for the rails.

    Let’s all take a breath. Rushing Mr. Dorsey into accepting half-a-job and putting pressure on him to deliver revenue before its time is a mistake. The outcome won’t be pretty long term. (Hope I’m wrong.)

    Peace.

     

    A New Marketing Leader.

    By
    Steve Poppe
    -
    0

    Eliza Esquivel, an executive marketing lead at Mondelez, spoke at Google Firestarters-NY earlier this week. This lady can ball. No marko-babble from her.

    I really sat up when she used what seemed an inside term of art “Building Memory Structures.” It warmed my self-taught heart to hear this because I’ve built a similar framework but never put it so elegantly. I often speak and write of “building muscle memory” and doing so using “1 claim and 3 proof planks,” but these words from the Mondelez camp explain why it’s a company to watch. And why Ms. Esquivel will someday be Ad Age’s Marketer of The Year.

    In this Fast Twitch Media world, filled with more Pasters than Posters, Google brand planners (planner who rely on Google only for insights), in a country where every business owner feels s/he is a marketing expert, it’s nice to know there’s are some marketing 30 somethings coming up with big eyes. A generation not smitten by shiny ephemeral tactics and automation technology. Ms. E has some serious vision and a lovely sense of control.

    It’s going to be fun watching her career.

    Peace.

     

     

     

    Master and Commandee.

    By
    Steve Poppe
    -
    0

    Last night at Google Firestarters, Chet Gulland, head of strategy at Droga5 NY, mentioned “1 idea, 50 briefs.” For another Droga brand he spoke of 30 briefs. (The topic of the event, as you might imagine, was the brief.) The brief is what keeps agency planning departments in business. Each project should have a brief. It should outline the task, opportunity, problem and provide a solution spark. The more insightful and powerful these briefs, the better the work…so goes the logic.

    An undercurrent at Firestarter and an undercurrent about briefs in general (check out this exceptional video) is that briefs are better seen not heard. Shorter is better. Problem-focus is important. Agile and open are also key.  One panelist, in fact, suggested no brief is the best brief – but he was from a product development/innovation company.

    I completely agree with Mr. Gulland though I might word it a little differently. One brand brief, 50 creative briefs. At What’s The Idea?, the idea (claim) is the brand strategy. It is supported by 3 proof planks. Any creative brief, developed by any cohort, must be on idea. The actions, experiences and programs used to generate sales, guided by individual creative briefs, should all celebrate the idea (claim) and support one of the proof planks. Claim and proof.

    The brand brief and the many creative briefs it sires will keep planners busy for years to come.

    Thanks to Google, Ben Malbon and Abigail Posner for another wonderful event. Eliza Esquivel of Mondelez was exceptional too.

    Peace.

     

     

     

    Brand Strategy Licensing Fees.

    By
    Steve Poppe
    -
    0

    I was talking to a colleague last week, a newly minted consultant, who asked my opinion on licensing brand strategy.  I suggested once a brand strategy is sold, it makes sense to put an annual license fee on the strategy, for as long as the company uses it. A nominal amount. Rather than simply sending an invoice each year, the fee should come with value. And that value is an open-ended offer to the client to share work with me for validation – so they know it’s on strategy. The fee would also cover an annual refresher or training course on the brand strategy – one which new employees or agencies should attend.

    One of my biggest regrets with What’s The Idea? is that I often finish a brand strategy then sail into the sunset; leaving the brand and marketing managers to deal with compliance. At mid-size, small and start-up companies marketing directors typically don’t have these skills.

    My friends at Brandtuitive are good at this. They make sure training is part of their engagement. The notion of making a company pay a recurring annual fee for training and compliance, albeit a small one, makes lots of sense. But is has to be more about compliance than a license of the idea. (And remember “Campaigns come and go, a powerful brand strategy is indelible.”)

    Thought?

     

    1...596061...208Page 60 of 208
    © Newsmag WordPress Theme by TagDiv