Brand Autopsy

Motivated by Seth's post on the difference between PR and Publicity, I excavated this juicy marketing quote from a vintage Brand Autopsy post (circa May 6, 2005).

”Advertising is when you tell people how great you are.
PR is when someone else says how great you are.”

— Guy Kawasaki —
THE MACINTOSH WAY
(HarperPerennial reprint, 1990)

In a cost-saving move, Starbucks no longer requires its stores to have brewed Decaf coffee ready-to-serve after 12 noon. (You can read all the hubbub on StarbucksGossip here and here.)

Dunkin' Donuts is again sniping at Starbucks. This time, Dunkin' is chiding Starbucks for its cost-savings Decaf decision with a creative print ad that includes this brilliant line, "We don't work around our schedule, we work around yours."

(Ouch, Starbucks. Ouch.)

In July, I ranted about how there isn’t a faster way to commoditizing a brand than using unemotional and uncreative language. The example I used was Starbucks and this billboard:

I wasn’t knocking the billboard tactic as OOH advertising can be used effectively. I was knocking the fast food mentality of the copy used in the billboard.

Communicating a new and improved position is totally of the fast food mindset. And, to feel the need to say BETTER COFFEE is off-putting to me. (Shouldn't the Starbucks cup automatically convey Better Coffee? After all, the "Better Coffee" angle should be the culmination of everything Starbucks has strived to communicate to customers since its inception.)

The other week I noticed a new Starbucks billboard execution going eastbound to the Austin airport. It’s being used as a directional guide to support a just-opened Starbucks location nearby.

Kudos. The language/tone isn’t unemotional and uncreative. It’s (somewhat) interesting and functional. In other words … Better Billboard. Fresher. A marked improvement.

I’m not as unsettled about Starbucks selling smoothies as I am about Starbucks approving this billboard:

As marketers, we know there is not a faster, better, or cheaper route to commoditizing a brand than using unemotional language like: Faster … Better … Cheaper.

Back in the day, Starbucks marketers were coached to: (1) NEVER communicate like a fast food company; (2) NEVER convey a new and improved mindset; and (3) NEVER allow a tactic to take priority over the company’s heritage and personality.

Today is a different day. However, if Starbucks is to truly transform itself back to what in once was … it needs to also transform the language it uses.

I'm figuring some of you can help Julia. She's looking for the "worst ad campaign" from last year. If you have any suggestions, leave them in the comments section. Thanks.

Here's Julia's email:

"My name is Julia, and I am a marketing student doing my undergrad at McGill University. I am currently in an Advertising Management class, and we have been assigned to take what we think was the "worst ad campaign of 2007/2008" and pretty much fix it. I was wondering if you may have any bad ad campaigns in mind."

We all know cough syrup isn’t the best-tasting medicine. That’s why medicine companies have been introducing better-tasting concoctions loaded with sugar to help the medicine go down.

Not Buckley’s.

For years Buckley’s Cough Mixture, available in Canada since 1919, has been highlighting the fact their cough syrup tastes horrible, but it works. Print headlines in the past have been: ** People swear by it. And at it. ** Made with oil of Pine needles. What did you expect it to taste like? ** Your cough won't know what hit it, neither will you. **

Buckley’s is finally entering the US market and they aren’t backing down from their “tastes awful” positioning. TV spots include faux taste tests with blindfolded consumers asking them to tell the taste difference between Buckley’s vs. Used Mouthwash, Buckley’s vs. Trash Bag Leakage, Buckley’s vs. Public Restroom Puddle. Seriously. Click on the above links to watch the short commercials.

Here’s a snippet from one of Buckley’s radio spots:

"If you are inquiring about your cough mixture tasting like expired milk, trash-bag leakage, a postpedicure foot bath, a state fair porta-potty, decomposing meat fat, monkey sweat, used denture soak, New Jersey, or hippie-festival runoff, please hang up. Your cough will be gone shortly."

Buckley’s is also into the Consumer-Generated Media game asking people to submit videos of their first sip of the malicious cough mixture with their Bad Taste Tour contest. Troll YouTube and you’ll also see videos of people trying Buckley’s for the first time.

I applaud Buckley’s for accentuating the hate with their cough syrup. The easier path would have been to reformulate the cough syrup to taste better so as not to turn off customers. But by turning off customers, Buckley’s turns them on. Kudos to Buckley’s.

And Kudos to the Wall Street Journal for the heads-up.

Lenore Skenay, of Ad Age, introduces us to Ben Passikoff, a 17 year-old high school student, and his recently published book, THE WRITING ON THE WALL. Ben has captured the fading remains of advertising’s past with his coffee table book of photos and stories from New York’s vintage painted building billboards.

(FYI ... Ben’s book started out as a high-school project but has ended up as a glossy coffee table book.)

There’s something ultra-cool and ultra-authentic about these fading painted billboard ads. As Lenore puts it … “The lesson one gleans, however reluctantly, is that whatever seems absolutely immutable, isn't. Not what is advertised. Not how it is advertised.”

Ben’s photos clearly tell us that old advertising doesn’t die … it just fades away.

Jay Ehret, small business marketing specialist in Waco, TX, shares a story about a car dealership that spends $3,000 a month on flying balloons but refuses to spend $1,200 a month to send a newsletter to existing customers. >> READ MORE

Yeah, I’m agnostic about advertising. I also think brands that advertise during the Super Bowl have a lot in common with singles looking for a one-night hook-up at a cheesy meat market dance club. Despite all that, I , along with a few others, shared some HMOS (hot marketing opinions) on the Super Bowl ads with Angus Lotun of Inc. Magazine. READ IF YOU WISH.

As I mentioned earlier, MADE TO STICK could be the breakthrough business book of 2007 for creatives, marketers, and anyone else responsible for communicating ideas and/or messages. (Anyone else includes … writers, teachers, lawyers, salespeople, project managers, pastors, rabbis, etc.) Communicating ideas that get people to not only understand you—but follow you—transcends whatever leadership role you are in. We can all learn to be better, more compelling, and more effective at communicating our ideas, right?

The authors of MADE TO STICK, Chip & Dan Heath, "… believe the best ideas have most of these traits: They are simple, core messages; they are unexpected; they are concrete, credible, and emotional, and they are stories.” [source: Inc. Magazine | Jan. 2007]

According to Chip & Dan, those traits form a checklist for creating ideas that stick. Simple Unexpected Concrete Credentialed Emotional Stories stand a better chance of sticking with people than do ideas presented in some willy-nilly, off-the-cuff way. To learn more, read this shorthand explanation of the MADE TO STICK checklist ...

SIMPLE
“It’s hard to make ideas stick in a noisy, unpredictable, chaotic environment. If we’re to succeed, the first step is this: Be simple. Not simple in terms of ‘dumbing down’ or ‘sound bites.’ What we mean by ‘simple’ is finding the core of the idea. ‘Finding the core’ means stripping an idea down to its most critical essence.” (pgs. 27, 28)

UNEXPECTED
“The most basic way to get someone’s attention is this: Break a pattern. Humans adapt incredibly quickly to consistent patterns. Figure out what is counterintuitive about the message—i.e., What are the unexpected implications of your core message? Communicate your message in a way that breaks your audiences’ guessing machines.” (pgs. 64, 72)

CONCRETE
“Abstraction makes it harder to understand an idea and to remember it. It also makes it harder to coordinate our activities with others, who may interpret the abstraction in very different ways. Concreteness helps us avoid these problems.” (pg. 100)

CREDIBLE
“How do we get people to believe our ideas? We’ve got to find a source of credibility to draw on. A person’s knowledge of details is often a good proxy for her expertise. Think of how a history buff can quickly establish her credibility by telling an interesting Civil War anecdote. But concrete details don’t just lend credibility to the authorities who provide them; they lend credibility to the idea itself.” (pgs. 138, 163)

EMOTIONAL
“How can we make people care about our ideas? We get them to take off their Analytical Hats. We create empathy for specific individuals. We show how our ideas are associated with things that people already care about. We appeal to their self-interest, but we also appeal to their identities—not only to the people they are right now but also to the people they would like to be.” (pg. 203)

STORIES
“A story is powerful because it provides the context missing from abstract prose. This is the role that stories play—putting knowledge into a framework that is more lifelike, more true to our day-to-day existence. Stories are almost always CONCRETE. Most of them have EMOTIONAL and UNEXPECTED elements. The hardest part of using stories effectively is make sure they’re SIMPLE—that they reflect your core message. It’s not enough to tell a great story; the story has to reflect your agenda.” (pgs. 214, 237)

... in closing...
“Those are the six principles of successful ideas. To summarize, here’s our checklist for creating a successful idea: a Simple Unexpected Concrete Credentialed Emotional Story. A clever observer will note that this sentence can be compacted into the acronym SUCCESs. This is sheer coincidence, of course. (Okay, we admit, SUCCESs is a little corny. We could have changed ‘Simple’ to ‘Core’ and reordered a few letters. But, you have to admit, CCUCES is less memorable.)” (pg. 18)

When posting comments about THE LOVEMARKS EFFECT, I promised to also post some worthwhile Money Quotes and worthless Baloney Quotes. Considered posted. Access below …

RSS Readers ... access the Money Quotes here.

RSS Reader ... access the Baloney Quotes here.

It seems to me … Lovemarks is having a greater affect than effect with marketers. Meaning, it’s affected our thinking more than it has effected our marketing. Some folks love it while other folks loath it. (Hmm … is someone working on a Loathmarks book?)

Those that loath Lovemarks seem to have difficulty in separating the messenger from the message.

The messenger, Kevin Roberts, does come off as a narcissistic, fanciful word spewing caricature of an advertising executive. Ain’t no doubt about it … he thinks very highly of himself. (And I’m sure he would tell you just that if you asked him.)

But this messenger’s core message is very smart and very relevant to marketers today. At the heart of the Lovemarks message is the idea brands evolve to a higher level when they earn respect and love from customers. Roberts uses a fanciful word, Lovemarks, to describe the state of when a brand evolves to the next level.

According to Roberts, when brands earn respect and love from customers, they can forge loyalty beyond reason. And when that happens, brands transcend from being just a brand … into being a Lovemark.

Dismiss the name Lovemarks all you want as being a creatively clumsy word. But, you’d be challenged to dismiss the notion that all brands are not equal with some brands playing on a different, more emotional level. Apple and Gateway are both brands but clearly, Apple plays on a different, more emotional level than does Gateway. Whole Foods Market plays on a much different, more emotional level than does Kroger. (Right?)

While reading THE LOVEMARKS EFFECT, it became blatantly clear to me that Roberts is desperate to make Lovemarks a Lovemark. And according to this Ad Age interview, the future of Saatchi & Saatchi depends on Lovemarks becoming a Lovemark.

Roberts tells how the Lovemarks concept is now Saatchi & Saatchi’s secret sauce. Its their company’s unique point of view on what the Saatchi & Saatchi brand aspires to become. Its what will hopefully make clients loyal beyond reason to Saatchi & Saatchi’s ideas. Its something Saatchi & Saatchi needs to make the company more endearing so clients will form a heart over head relationship with them.

I reckon Roberts hopes the affect of THE LOVEMARKS EFFECT will positively effect Saatchi & Saatchi’s present day and furture day business.

I’ve just finished reading THE LOVEMARKS EFFECT from Saatchi & Saatchi ceo, Kevin Roberts. It’s a continuation of his Lovemarks ideology. According to Roberts, when brands earn respect and love from customers, they can forge loyalty beyond reason. And when that happens, brands transcend from being just a brand … into a Lovemark.

THE LOVEMARKS EFFECT still reads like an advertising agency capabilities PowerPoint pitch deck on steroids. But when you strip away the thick advertising agency varnish, you’ll uncover some super-smart marketing thought. (You can sample some of T.L.E. by perusing this PDF.)

On page 93, Roberts talks about the importance of gaining inspiration from allowing customers to mash-up, mix-up, and redesign products. He says we marketers might not always like what we see, but we’ll probably find a germ of idea from which to build upon. Roberts closes with this super-smart marketing thought …

Steven Colbert provided the inspiration by creating the word Truthiness. Gary Stein parlayed Truthiness into Trustiness. Now, Michael Wagner gives us the Truthiness about Trustiness …

“Trustiness is that ‘not quite sure I am being told the facts’ feeling clients have just before they write the check or open their pocketbook. It’s the alarm bell going off in their minds which produces the inner dialogue, ‘I’m not so sure this is a good idea, but the salesperson seems to be telling me the truth.’”

“I suggest you skip both truthiness and trustiness and go straight to telling the truth and earning trust.

READ MORE from Michael Wagner

There’s lots of worthy chatter riffing off of ad agency honcho David Jones’ strident take that brilliant marketing ideas must come from ad agencies and not from everyday people (i.e. Citizen Marketers).

Former Brand Autopsy blogger Paul Williams refutes my take with his take and I return volley with more musings. Troll the comments section for more sharp musings from a slew of smart-thinking marketers.

And Spike Jones, from Brains on Fire, stokes the conversation with more fire which elicits more smokin' comments on the super-worthy Marketing Profs Daily Blog. In his post, Spike directs us to a blue flame Ad Age blog missive from another ad agency pro deriding the passions of everyday people who are compelled to create amateur marketing messages. The comments in this blue flame are priceless. Enjoy the fodder.

CITIZEN MARKETERS: When People Are the Message is the much anticipated follow-up business book from Ben McConnell and Jackie Huba. I’m an unabashed McConnell/Huba fan which began when I read their first book, CREATING CUSTOMER EVANGELISTS, back in December of 2002.

CITIZEN MARKETERS looks to be right on trend as a continuation of the CREATING CUSTOMER EVANGELIST message. After all, it’s the customer evangelist turned citizen marketer that’s driving much of the social media we are exposed to on YouTube, MySpace, podcasts, and blogs.

However … not everyone in the marketing biz is thrilled to see the rise of the citizen marketer. One such citizen marketer-hater is David Jones, global CEO of Euro RSCG.

At the recent IDEA CONFERENCE put on by Advertising Age, David Jones blasted the concept of everyday people creating marketing ideas. Instead, he steadfastly believes it’s the advertising agency that must be the entity to create brilliant ideas and that consumers should consume the ideas agencies create rather than try to create marketing ideas of their own.

Money quotes from David Jones’ address at the IDEAS CONFERENCE
include …

“Our industry cannot delegate the creation of brilliant ideas to consumers. That has to be our job.”

“What’s been quite a prevalent trend in the lazy agencies over the last two years is to go, ‘I know. Consumers can now create ideas so what we'll do is get them to come up with the idea.’”

“If you look at and go play around on the ‘YouTubes’ and ‘MySpaces’ … well, there are a few entertaining things there but there is so much utter crap there. There are only so many times you can watch someone dance in a crazy way or mime badly to a song. And so firstly, consumers aren’t that brilliant at it and secondly, what they will do is not all that relevant.”

And since I’m going to be out of pocket for a few days, feast on more of David’s diatribe by reading this article and watching the accompanying video clip. Or, you can simply click below and watch a hastily reproduced version of the video clip uploaded to YouTube.

I’m agnostic about advertising but I always pay attention to the Jack In The Box (JITB) television spots because they are clever, savvy, original, and authentic. I’m also a believer in Evolutionist Word-of-Mouth and not Creationist Word-of-Mouth. [For more, watch this YouTube presentation.]

The Evolutionist WOM mindset is about generating talk with and between customers by designing products/services that are worth talking about. Marketers believing in Creationist WOM would rather create conversations with and between customers through outrageous attention-grabbing antics which may or may not have any connection to the advertised product/service.

And it seems like Jack is also a believer of Evolutionist WOM thought.

In a new JITB commercial, a JITB marketer is seen pitching Jack on a variety of attention grabbing antics to promote their latest Ciabatta burger. One of the great ideas the marketer pitches to Jack is to name the baby of a pregnant woman (seen in Jack’s office) after the new Ciabatta burger. The JITB marketer also pitches Jack on other Creationist WOM marketing ideas.

But Jack abruptly cuts the marketer off and says something like, “Hey, I have an idea … let’s have our new Ciabatta Burger advertise itself.”

Yep … Jack is an Evolutionist WOM guy.

Word-of-Mouth, Viral Campaigns, Product Placement, and Branded Entertainment are all the RAGE in marketing today. Is Traditional Advertising dead? Can advertisers really create Word-of-Mouth? Has Product Placement become passé?

Wide ranging topic, eh? Well, I put together a presentation which addresses all that and a little more. A collage of a few sample slides are below and you can also download a low-res version of the presentation by clicking on the download link at the end of this post.

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Video Links