Marketing Thingy

The “C” Word of Marketing

Nader Ashway1 Comment

conversation_blog

No, no. Not that “C” word.

In the old days, (you know, as far back as the 1990’s,) marketing was largely a one-sided enterprise. Brands created campaigns that were directed outward to the consumers (large blocks of them) and then waited for the cash registers to ring. When that didn’t work, they just re-tooled the campaign, and tried it again. There was never any inclination to change the model.  Just a tweak in the creative, or a new account manager, or a line extension, and let’s tee it up again. Those days are over, for many reasons – but mostly because the “campaign-as-the-thing” approach stopped working.

The new word of the day in marketing has to be CONVERSATIONS. Because, more than ever, brands need to listen and respond in near-real-time in order to stay relevant. Consumers are in control of the messages they receive, when they receive them, and (Jeez, Louise!) on what devices they will be receiving them!

Is it the Internet’s fault? Yeah, probably. But the Internet just streamlined a distribution system for brands that brands always desperately wanted. Note to industry: be careful what you wish for. The system begets bugs. The system creates a new set and style of preferences.

And let’s be mindful that this is not a tipping of the scales – it’s actually a market correction. It’s only natural for the consumer to be in control when the basic DNA of marketing is choice. Because there’s competition – multiple entities vying for attention and striving to achieve the perception of superiority – the consumer is naturally in the driver’s seat…weighing benefits and making choices based on any number of criteria. (Whether they’re sound or not, mind you. With choice comes caprice.)

So, if you’re a brand, how do you have conversations?

Listen.
As with any conversation, listening is the best way to engage. You’ll learn, you’ll understand, and you’ll be able to exchange ideas with context. For brands, this new paradigm is an information gold mine. No more expensive focus groups, no more really expensive segmentations, no more super expensive risks. Today, you can publish content, and consumers will tell you in about 4 and a half minutes whether or not it’s crap. The brands that listen – and pay attention – seem to be the brands that excel.  Listening is why we have conversations – you already know what you are and what you know.  The goal, of course, is to hear other perspectives.

Inspire your audience to try something new/other.
Even if your audience is already buying your stuff on a regular basis, it’s worth deepening the relationship.  Ask them to try something new. Drive a new route. Try a new approach. Write an essay. Post a photo. Ask them to do ANYTHING but “buy our shit.” When you do that, you cheapen the opportunity to continue the conversation, and you make just about everything that follows suspect.

I’m not suggesting that marketers use diversionary tactics to engage audiences. I’m rather insisting that you find something ELSE to talk about than yourself.

Seed new conversations.
One of the “things” marketers can do is to seed new conversations. Sure, they can be contextual. They can even be categorically obvious. But let them be true, two-sided exchanges between parties where both parties participate, both parties are heard, and both parties have the opportunity to come out having learned something. (Here’s the dirty little secret: brands can do this over and over with zillions of people, and really really learn some things.)

Want to know what your next flavor should be? Want to know where to build your next location? Want to know what kind of features you should put into your next expensive piece of technology? Want to know whether you should wear those dopey throwback uniforms? Start a conversation, and listen. You’ll be amazed at what you find, especially if you’re in a position to act on that information.

What happens in the sky might be solved in the cloud.

Nader Ashway2 Comments

aviation_image

At this point, nearly two weeks after the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines flight 370, the only certainty is the source of the next conspiracy theory.  We’ve heard every theory from hijacking to pilot suicide to computer hacking terrorism.  There’s no plane.  There’s no physical evidence.  There’s no group claiming responsibility.  And the worst part – there’s no concrete data to tell us where that plane was, where it was heading, or what might have gone wrong.  Some of the best thinking, not unsurprisingly, is being forwarded on WIRED.com.

Why is that?

It turns out that, as astounding an engineering feat it may be to get 30 tons of aluminum aloft and cruising at 500 mph, there really is not that much new “technology” in aviation.  Sure, there are on-board computers, there are advanced avionics systems, there’s radar and so on.  But in terms of how planes are tracked, the systems are still pretty crude.

In the United States, for instance, there can be upwards of 50,000 aircraft flying through the skies on any given day.  These are tracked through the air route traffic control centers (ARTCC) using basic radio frequencies.  A plane flying from New York to Los Angeles, for instance, is simply “handed off” from one ARTCC to the next, until it’s close enough to talk to the air traffic control tower (ATCT) at Los Angeles.  Along the way, they’re instructed on basic parameters:  what altitude to fly at, what heading to take and so on.  And flights heading across oceans don’t even have real-time contact:  they’re given a heading, an altitude, and they simply “check in” via high frequency radio with control centers that can be sometimes thousands of miles away.

When a plane crashes (a rare occurrence, in terms of probability,) or disappears (even less likely,) the investigation usually focuses on finding the “black box.”  The black box houses a flight data recorder and a cockpit voice recorder.  These record all kinds of information about the flight, including the mechanical data, and the conversations between the cockpit and the towers.

Why not modernize the flight data recording and cockpit voice recordings into a more technologically advanced system?  For instance, why doesn’t every commercial flight have a real-time data stream to the cloud?  From the time a plane is at the gate, through takeoff and climb, flight routing, approach and landing, EVERYTHING can be uploaded in real-time to the cloud.

This would be big data indeed.  On the receiving end, interested parties (from the airplane manufacturers to airline system executives to airports,) can monitor that data for all kinds of information BEFORE anything happens.  Think of the advances that might be realized:

  • A real-time data stream can tell the pilots and the airline about on-the-ground conditions, such as tire pressures, tire wear (heck even your basic automobile can do that,) hydraulics systems, power systems, computer systems and more.
  • In-flight data streams can inform on other conditions like rate of burn on fuel, weather-related data (triangulated with the aircraft’s current heading and velocity,) best altitudes for certain legs, engine efficiency and diagnostics and even act as the precursor to ATC at arriving airports for more streamlined trafficking.  Every interested party could tap into segments of the data set for relevant and actionable information.
  • Imagine – if the real-time data recording detects any glitch whatsoever, the awaiting airport can have the appropriate crews ready to remedy the problem and get the plane back in the air sooner than later.  That’s good for the airline, and for impatient passengers.
  • With big data providing in-air information, manufacturers like Boeing and Airbus can have access to a wealth of information about their aircraft, providing a post-sale, ongoing flight test to make longer-term observations and in turn, inform their engineering teams with an up-to-the-moment feedback loop.
  • With big data, we could probably streamline airport efficiency as well. (Yay!)

But mostly, the benefits of big data center around safety.  Big data is, at worst, informative.  And at best, it’s predictive.  If we could predict when issues might arise (even at the probability level,) we could keep pilots, crews and passengers safe, and probably avert any more, um, disappearing aircraft.

But why isn’t this done on a global scale?  There are drawbacks to such a proposal, to be sure.

  • Any system that can be built is eventually at the risk of being hacked.  Duly noted.  So we build in the world’s most sophisticated security (like every government/defense/space program has,) and find ways to packet, encrypt and protect.
  • There’s the sheer heft.  We’re talking storage in the yottabytes and a data center the size of Topeka.
  • This most likely hasn’t been done because it would be prohibitively expensive.  To the tune of tens or even hundreds of billions of dollars to craft, build, deploy and maintain a data system of this magnitude.  And then there’s the storage/archiving issue.

But think about it:  that cost could be amortized by every airline, manufacturer and aviation association in the world, and if it carries with it the promise of improved safety, greater efficiency, and predictive analytics, who wouldn’t be in favor of that?

We have entered the age of the Internet of Things.  Our homes are warmed by “smart” thermostats that are remotely controllable.  We have “smart” TVs and “smart” dishwashers and “smart” refrigerators to enhance our entertainment choices and the temperature of our water. So why not a smarter aviation infrastructure?

But who could build such a vast and predictive data center?  I don’t know for sure, but it might rhyme with Froogle.

Super Bowl 2014: Grins and Groans

Nader Ashway4 Comments

First off, condolences to the Denver Broncos organization and their fans. That’s what we call a rough day at the office. And for those of you who are fans of Super Bowl advertising, it was kind of a rough night on the couch. Again.

Last year, we had a few “wows” interrupted by a lot of mediocre. Sadly, that trend continued through 2014. And at $133,000 per SECOND, that can mean some rough Mondays for some advertising executives.

SINGLE GRINS:
Radio Shack – good for them for poking fun at themselves as they make their re-rebrand statement. (Remember “The Shack” attempt from a few years back?) Best tweet of the night I read said something like “Radio Shack had to close 10 of their 12 stores to pay for that spot.” At least they’re trying.

Heinz – after sitting on the sidelines (yes, all puns intended,) for 16 years, Heinz returns with a feel-good spot to the tune of “If you’re happy and you know it…” Solid, simple, reminder advertising. The right message for a brand that already owns the category.

Wonderful Pistachios – for a brand that is trying to make hay in a highly commoditized category, Wonderful Pistachios made a strong statement for themselves with two :15s wrapped around the H&M David Beckham spot. They did a great job of getting out of the way, and letting Colbert be Colbert. Especially poking fun at themselves about a “lack of branding.” Really fun, really light, and memorably goofy.

DOUBLE GRINS:
T-Mobile’s Tim Tebow spots were absolutely hilarious, and I thought the most on-target/on-focus advertising of the night. Perfect symmetry between his situation (a national figure without a contract) and their basic brand position (mobile network service with no contract necessary.) He’s a good sport (yep, another pun) for poking fun at himself, the ads had high production and camp value, and I think this was a touchdown. (Ugh, that was shameless.)

Doritos brought high value humor to a crop of commercials that were otherwise meh. Add the fact that the spots were created by contest entrants, and you add a level of intrigue. Congratulations to Ryan Thomas Anderson for the winning entry and the $1 million prize. A second level of kudos to Doritos for matching good advertising with strong social activation, and (you may have missed this) an absolutely cool in-stadium activation: recordSetter got 30 people to don orange ponchos to create “the world’s largest human Dorito.” Pretty effing cool.

BIGGEST GRIN:
Chrysler 200 with Bob Dylan
So this was one of the (very few) spots that was not leaked or teased prior to the game, and it really paid off. Chrysler has embraced Detroit/Americana as a stand-in for the brand, and they have wrapped a powerful message around it. (Remember Clint Eastwood’s “halftime in America” ad? And the Paul Harvey “God made a farmer ad from last year for Dodge?” Yeah, same idea.)

They encapsulate this idea in the statement “Detroit made cars. And cars made America.” Overly patriotic? Sure. A tad pandering? Maybe. But powerful advertising? You bet your ass.

The best part is the finale of the 2:00 triumph, (delivered incredibly by a surprisingly articulate and pointed Bob Dylan,) with this: “Let Germany brew your beer. Let Switzerland make your watches. Let Asia assemble your phones.” Dramatic pause. Cut to Dylan in a pool hall talking directly into camera. “We. Will build. Your car.” Touchdown. Two point conversion. Game over. (Yeah. I went there.)

And now for the GROANS.

WTF GROAN:
Maserati introduces its new Ghibli sedan to America with an overly produced spot about “unleashing monsters” or something. Sure, I get that you can make a “big splash” with a Super Bowl ad…but wasn’t there ANYONE in the room saying “this might not be the best media buy?” And who named “Ghibli?”  If you’re going to introduce a “more approachable” brand extension (the Ghibli starts around $67,000) to an otherwise unattainable line, shouldn’t the spot be more, um, approachable?

SLOW GROANS:
Kia takes a target demographic couple on a spin through the Matrix with Laurence Fishburne in full Morpheus mode. Um, what? Or, rather, why?

Bud Light – Now here’s an instance where the social media leadup was better than the ads themselves. Bud Light’s three and a half minute brand film around the “up for whatever theme” was great. The two spots that got edited out of it…a little disjointed.

Beats Music Service introduces its “we’re better than Pandora” intuitive music service. Sounds like a cool idea. They made a nice spot, riffing on the Goldilocks folktale. Except they chose Ellen DeGeneres. Hmmm…is SHE the target? (Highly doubtful.) Is she RIGHT as being appealing to what we would imagine the target to be? (Still no.) So…why Ellen?

BIGGEST GROAN:
AUDI just completely missed the mark this year with “Doberhuahua.” After such an incredible showing last year with their “prom” spot, they go for the dopey CGI-laden humor trick of a Doberman cross-bred with a Chihuahua. They took their potshots at sappiness with knocks at kennel shows and Sarah McLachlan, and tried to wrap this around the idea that “compromise is scary.” It is. Especially in advertising.

End notes: Other hits and misses…
GoDaddy tried to capitalize on the “real time marketing” concept with a spot where a woman (Gwen) quits her job on live television. Interesting. And better than that gross makeout spot they ran last year. Wheeeew!

H&M’s ad with David Beckham was the first to be truly interactive…for a limited few. Turns out, if you have a Samsung SmartTV, you could have ordered product live through your television. Great strategy for the 327 people who actually own that tv.

Volkswagen’s “Wings” ad starts out as a really smart quality claim. Dad tells daughter that every time a Volkswagen hits 100,000 miles, a Volkswagen engineer gets his wings. Cut to German factory, where white-lab-coat-wearing engineers start sprouting wings. Funny concept, well executed. Major problem with this spot: NO FEMALE ENGINEERS. Not a one. Except that young lady in the elevator who slaps the other engineer. Wrong message to send to the world’s young girls, Volkswagen.

Until next year – keep grinning!

This article first appeared on Technorati.

What were YOUR favorite spots? Post in the comments below.

Bolton, Burgundy and Cheeky Buzz – Auto Marketers Set a New Tone

Nader Ashway4 Comments

If you’ve seen the recent round of spots (they ran throughout the fourth quarter of 2013) for Dodge Durango featuring the fictional character Ron Burgundy, you know how good they are.  Crazy good.  (Kudos to Wieden & Kennedy.) They’re stupid funny, with an offbeat wit that perhaps only Will Ferrell could channel in this character composite, a mashup of 70-‘s into 80’s d-list celebrity relics.

Here’s just one of the many spots that were filmed (likely loosely scripted and then ad-the-hell-libbed-out-of by Ferrell) for the campaign:

What’s more intriguing, of course, is that the spots were wildly effective.  According to this article in Autoblog, Durango’s sales were up a staggering 59% in the first month of the campaign. Similarly, after three months of leadup, (the Durango spots were a marketing tie-up to promote the movie inasmuch as they were car ads,) the movie – who some have said didn’t live up to the hype – has raked in more than $108 million dollars at the box office (as of the weekend ending January 5, 2014) against a $50 million production budget.  That’s a profit, yo.  And it might have something to do with the more than 20 million views the spots have received on YouTube.

In a strange coincidence, another auto marketer (Honda) aligned with its own interesting character to help bolster holiday sales.  In the fourth quarter of 2013, Honda ran a campaign of spots under the “Happy Honda Days” theme featuring Michael Bolton, a bit of caricature himself, something of a mashup of 80’s/90’s pop stardom realism.

In the spots, the VO asks, “what does it feel like to get a great deal at Happy Honda Days?  Cue the Bolton.”  (Cheeky, right? Ri-ight?)  And then Bolton appears, singing wintry feel-good lyrics, like “Spread some cheer, the holidays are here…” and “now that the snow is falling down baby, my love is calling your name…” and the more heavy-handed “It’s a winter wonderland, and the snow is gonna blow.”

Take a look:

All these songs were written specifically for the spots…and they’re goofy, but with a deceptively catchy feel that’s very, well, Bolton.  That’s pretty neat.

But what’s really neat (and perhaps where Honda has out-cheeked Dodge in this strategy,) is the social component that’s wrapped into the spots.  Here’s how the program worked.  In late November, there was a 5-day window when people could message their friends via Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or Vine using a hashtag #XOXOBolton.  Here’s “The Bolton” setting the stage himself:

Then a bunch of lucky winners did indeed get personalized songs from Bolton, and THOSE were really funny too: Check one out, delivered to the difficult-to-pronounce Erdle:

So, major props to Rubin Postaer (sorry, now known as RPA) for taking a good idea and going a few really creative steps further.

In comparing these two campaigns, (Dodge and Honda,) how would you crown a winner?  Is it the quality of the idea?  The production value?  Or the reach?  Dodge and Ron Burgundy rode a wave of laughter all the way to the bank, (for both brands, it turns out.) Honda went the whole way, integrated the celebrity endorsement (and really carried the joke through) in a rich and fun social media activation.

Honda wins on extending the activation and driving engagement.

But at the end of the day, we have a job to do.  And in this inter-office smackdown, Burgundy and Durango win hands down for moving the needle way over into the profit redline.

So…who’s next on the cheeky auto endorsements?  How about Alice Cooper and Verne Troyer for Mini Cooper?  Huh?  Whaddayasay?

Just spitballing here.

I know a good spot when I SMELL one.

Nader Ashway2 Comments

No, no, no.  This is not about some crazy new scratch ‘n sniff technology.  It’s about the latest television commercial for Nationwide Insurance, simply called “Baby.”  It comes from the agency McKinney (Durham, NC & NYC.) I like this spot a lot.  And you’ll see why in a minute.

Here’s the spot:

While this spot may not win a Gold Lion, it is perfectly and productively creative.  It also embraces virtually all of the classic conventions of good, solid advertising. I’ve developed a simple acronym/meme called SMELL to outline the five primary points of enumerating the creative approach through this process.  [Not the most elegant thing in the world, but hey, it works.]

This spot is Simple.
It’s a very concise idea.  The man in this spot thinks of his brand new Mustang as his “baby.”  He cleans it, treats it with care, makes sure it doesn’t get hurt.  Then when something does go wrong, he gets it fixed, and both he and baby are happy again.  No fancy tricks (except the enlarged baby effect,) no special lighting, no explosions.  Just a straight metaphor idea, simply executed.

Even the copy (voiced over by Julia Roberts) is simple:

“In the Nation, we know how you feel about your car.
So when coverage really counts, count on Nationwide Insurance.

Because what’s precious to you is precious to us.
Just another way we put members first.  Because we don’t have shareholders.

Join the Nation.”

Note:  I don’t quite get the “because we don’t have shareholders” bit, but it must have been a mandatory in the creative brief.  Oh well.

This spot is Memorable.
It’s hard to get this idea out of your head.  Once you see the car equated with “baby,” you get it, and there’s no need to explain it any further. Plus, because there’s a clear narrative thread (man loves car, man protects car, man hits fire hydrant with car, man gets car fixed and all is right again,) it’s easy to remember the story in context of the baby image.  That happy baby playing with a tire in the auto shop is super cute!  (And super cute is super memorable.)

In addition, the jingled slogan “Nationwide is on your side” is also memorable.  The line, developed by Ogilvy, Benson & Mather (now Ogilvy Worldwide,) in 1964, was sung to the distinctive 7-note jingle in 1973 and hasn’t changed since.  Consistency aids memorability.

This spot is Emotional.
One of the most important aspects of marketing is that it appeals to the emotions.  Brands create bonds on the emotional level, not the intellectual.  We start by desiring them, then come to trust them, and in some cases, we become deeply bonded to them.  That’s not rational – it’s pure feeling.

By humanizing the car (and with a cute little baby, no less,) this spot plays to emotions.  We see it happy, then we see it sad (after the accident,) then we see it happy again.  An emotional up-and-down within 30 seconds.

This spot is Likeable.
One of the key aspects of this spot is that it’s easy to like.  The main character is likeable, (he waves to the neighbor while washing his baby,) the baby (unless you’re an alien) provides likeability, they get Ms. Likeable herself Julia Roberts to do the voiceover, and they use the classic “Love is Strange” song from Mickey and Sylvia (from 1956) to provide the soundtrack:  a wailing wooing and cooing “baaaaaa-by!”  I like that.  It fits.

To lend some fairness to the conversation, the spot is NOT for everyone.  There are a host of dissenting opinions on this spot, (some people find it creepy, or weird, or just plain silly,) and I found a thread that sums it up here: http://www.commercialsihate.com/aahits-a-giant-babynationwide-stop_topic16598.html

This spot is Lasting.
Perhaps the most important thing about this spot is that it has a timeless quality to it.  This spot could have been released 10, or 20 or even 30 years ago.  I suspect that it will be relevant in 10 or 20 or 30 years from now.  That’s because there’s no “inside joke” being used, no “markers” of the current era (except for maybe the model year of the car itself,) and no descriptors in the copy that would be out of place years from now.

Because the ad taps into universal truths (babies are cute, we love our cars, sometimes we get into accidents, etc.) it has a quality about it that allows it to be relevant for a long, long time.

On second thought, maybe it should win a Gold Lion?