Marketing is no Longer Hollywood
Small Conversations not the Big Idea
85% of brands are defined in everyday interactions: a friend talks to her friend about a brand; she sees a review of Youtube; she walks into the retail store.
Brand Happens.
What defines brands isn't the Hollywood style glitz of Mad Men and the ad world but simple, innocuous daily conversations and interactions that brands are struggling to get to grips with.
We no longer control brands like we once used to.
Winning Awards not Customers
A generation ago, the success of your brand came down to the ability of your marketing manager to choose a good agency. That one campaign could make our break your brand.
* The Pepsi Generation
* Diamonds are Forever (DeBeers)
* Tony the Tiger (Kelloggs)
A generation ago, brands were defined by agencies.
A good ad agency could create a story about your brand by creating an emotional experience that transcended any physical qualities of the product itself. We learned that Starbucks wasn’t about selling coffee but lifestyle and community. Nike no longer sold sneakers but an active lifestyle engendering all aspects of competition and success. Pepsi sold an identity and a voice for a generation of urban teenagers.
We experienced the brand through these powerful stories and the best stories won awards.
A generation ago, you could measure the effectiveness of an ad campaign not by its long term impact on the brand and market share but by peer recognition. The best marketing managers and ad agencies weren’t measured in terms of how they lifted company KPIs but in the number of Cannes Lions they scooped.
As Jerry Della Femina (the legendary "mad man" who gave us Meowmix "so good cats ask for it by name") wrote,
"It all goes back to us wanting to be in Hollywood. We all want to win Oscars."
Marketing is no Longer Hollywood
If you look at brands that successfully defined Customer Experience today - brands like Amazon, Zappos, South West Airlines, Lush, Lego, Monster Energy and GoPro you find brands that invest heavily in daily interactions with their customers.
Rather than crafting narratives that win big glitzy awards, these grass-roots brands invest in the less glamorous touchpoints - service, retail, customer feedback and other grassroots activities.
And although we may realize a shift in mindset is inevitable; that the era of Martini cocktails and Cannes Lions is coming to an end; we have a lot of money, relationships and interest sunk into the success of the old model.
If you look at how we consumed video content a generation ago, we consumed the content of the major TV networks and movies studios. Today, however, more than 50% of the content consumed by 18-30 year olds is on sites like Youtube, the vast majority of which has little to do with traditional players.
When Brand Happens
When brand "happens" you need to be prepared.
One of the themes in my writing I'll reiterate here is:
Dialogue is out there whether you like it or not.
Which means, customers define your brand through their everyday conversations. Accept you have little control over this environment and develop a strategy to roll with it.
As the old military adage goes, "no plan ever survives the enemy". Rather than operate from a base line of rigid brand templates and management structures we need an environment where the brand empowers voices at all levels - from the Fans right up to the marketing department.
Embracing the shift requires a few tough decisions to be made:
* Taking responsibility for brand strategy internally rather than outsourcing it to creative agencies
* Moving from a strategy of brand management to one of brand curation
* Understanding that the official brand narrative is just one voice in the crowd and that alternative customer versions are as valid, if not more valid than the ones crafted by the agency.
------------------------
If you liked this post, hit the FOLLOW button below. I post regularly on Digital Anthropology, Social Technology and Customer Experience
Global President The World Economic Forum For Asia-Africa (WEFAA) & Global President -International Non-Olympic Committee-INOC & Group Chairman -ISE Cards India India Ltd
10yThe International Non-Olympic University has decided to recruit National Brand Ambassadors (NBA) in each Country of the World, The INOU need a very popular person from your country and you can recommend for other Country too, who can become National Brand Ambassador for International Non-Olympic University as we have already appointed in South Africa and Egypt, and we are process of appointing Morocco, Philippines, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, and Sharjah etc.,. We would request you to please recommend personalities from (a). Extra Ordinary achievement in the Education fields-men or women? (b.) A top businessman/Industrialist-men or women? (c.) A top political personality-men or women? (d.) A top NGO head-men or women? (e.) A top Sports Person-men or women? Who can give good boom to INOU in his/her Country and further they can establish National Non-Olympic University (Online and Regular University) and can open colleges and do many collaboration and tie-ups for our University, and he/she can run UNDP and other social Global NGO programs into Education Sector under INOU Charter. We would urge you to visit these two links to know more about NBA. ; 1 -- http://www.inou-edu.org/bamessage.html 2 -- http://www.inou-edu.org/news.html Send CV at: [email protected]
Yes! Marketing is all about relationships. I love telling people about Flir.
Realtor - Investor - MultiFamily Expert - Women's Advocate
10yBeing the mother of a teenage girl, I have to agree with Graham. We have to evolve with the times.
Chief Operating Officer at OWNER
10ymarketing is hollywood bothways. it is your attitude enjoyed the blog MLGUPTA A CAREER CONSULTANT AT PUNE INDIA MOB 9561532575