Madison Avenue

The "SuperSized" Economy; There is no "value added."

2010-08-19T09:01:00.000-07:00

We're headed for more bad economic times. It's not a question as if we're asking, "Are we headed for more economic hardships?" It's a fact. We are. And here's why.
We're headed for more bad times because there's no way to "add value" to the economy the way marketers "add value" to soft drinks by replacing sugar with cheaper high fructose corn syrup. The economy is chock full of artificial ingredients and the only way to return to solid ground is to subtract the "value added" components of the economy that got us in self-induced trouble in the first place.

For example, General Mills "added value" to Wheaties in the 80s by replacing "whole wheat" with non-descript "whole grain." As consumer pull-through diminished retailers began delisting the brand. General Mills had hoped no one would notice the change the same way no one noticed when Coke replaced sugar with HFCS - consumers just drank more because Coke could sell larger quantities (20 ounce bottles vesus 12) for fractions of a cent more. Supersizing was a great way to get a larger share of stomach. But it didn't work with Wheaties. General Mills never gave consumers more product for just a little more money. That was Steve Sanger's fault as inextricably linked to companies such as ADM and Cargill as he is. By repositioning the brand as "whole wheat" again Wheaties increased distribution 24% and won Advertising Age Magazine's recognition as "The Year's Best Repositioned Brand.

The bottom line here is that we've already "SuperSized" the economy the same way McDonald's "supersized us. We found out it was unhealthy. Food scientists are just wonderful.

California Governor's Election - Let's Delist The Candidates

2010-08-17T14:08:00.000-07:00

Who do you vote for when there's no one to vote for? The front runner is front runner simply by means of having the largest budget. She has no political experience outside of the CEO and corporate ladder's suite. The other two ... well ... they're the other two candidates. So what would happen if everyone meaning the popular voters simply did not take part in the election? What if we vote for no one? I know voting is a right and a duty. That makes it more than a privledge. But what does one do when their is no choice and your choice is simply the lesser of three evils? Like a delisted brand in a grocery store voters should delist the products by not voting and blindly following the herd on election day. If we keep doing what we've always done we're going to keep getting what we've always got ... and that's not good for Californians. Are we waiting for newspapers to proclaim THE POLITICAL CRISIS the same way American's had to await for someone to tell them they were creating an economic crisis. Let's start thinking for ourselves people. If anything, vote for someone who's not running. Vote for the reluctant candidate. The guy that really doesn't want the office. Shucks, vote for yourself as a write in candidate What would happen if 36,961,664 voted for themselves? Wouldn't THAT send an appropriate message? What was that line in the movie "Network?" "I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore!"

What business are you really in?

2010-07-12T14:26:00.000-07:00

My friend Ray Baird is President of RiechesBaird, one of the world's top B2B ad agencies. Ray publishes a great blog called GigaBrand. Go there. Ray always asks great questions like "What business are you really in?" Now Ray focuses on technology, and in this case he's focussing on ERP technology. Enterprise resource planning (ERP) is an integrated computer-based system used to manage internal and external resources including tangible assets, financial resources, materials, and human resources. It is a software architecture whose purpose is to facilitate the flow of information between all business functions inside the boundaries of the organization and manage the connections to outside stakeholders. Built on a centralized database and normally utilizing a common computing platform, ERP systems consolidate all business operations into a uniform and enterprise wide system environment.

So it's easy to see why Ray asks this question. ERP can easily become a commodity. Now Ray argues that mispositioning can put you in the wrong category and thus retard sales, buyer perception and hence PROFIT. But I say if you sell technology you sell that technology. iPads are selling iPads. If you're selling corneal transplants you're selling corneal transplants. If you're selling ERP you're selling ERP. But look at iPads. As a category they may be the emerging thin clients cloud computing's been wanting to make popular. In the end all human/technology interfaces will be thin clients. But you're still selling iPads. That's your category even though iPads are mostly used for fun. Now that you're in the category, the question is differentiating yourself within the category. Here's what I said.

Exactly Ray, Toss out all quadrant or matrix position systems quant jocks employ. They’ll throw any product, company, brand or category off track because it gives brands nothing they can own or use to differentiate. This is how categories become composed of highly price driven commodities in every category. So we discovered a company, product, brand or category’s reason-for-being best defined by finding it’s Special User Effect.

As General Motor’s proved, you can target exciting fun family products (Pontiac), versus family value products (Chevrolet) but GM killed Pontiac. It’s matrix quadrant was irrelevant to car buyers even though corporate strategy thought it viable. In reality, the division never knew what consumers wanted. It just made what they wanted then told advertising we needed it. That’s bass ackwards. The Pontiac Division never had a “consumer” reason-for-being. Same with brands I turned around like Folgers or Pampers. Though heralded as the second coming of CHrist by quant jocks and market research consumers perceived pre-ground convenience, flavor and aroma as “me-too” cost-of-entry sensory parameters so the agency direction of “Mountain Grown” to support the contention that Folgers was the richest kind of coffee NEVER moved the needle even though my client spent $100 million that year domestically to support the message. The SPECIAL USER EFFECT we found was “stimulation.” Stimulation was a “brand ownable” differentiator versus the “category generic” sales drivers of ‘convenience’, ‘flavor’, and ‘aroma’. To the 23% of heavy users who account for 87% of category volume annually “the best part of [their] waking up is caffiene [Folgers] in their cup.” To them, Folgers is in THE STIMULATION business. With this insight we turned a $300 million brand into a $1.6 billion business by stealing all that share from Maxwell House, MJB & Hills Bros who could not take off their matrix driven “category consumption” blinders. Great post Ray Man. So is the real question, "How should an ERP client best differentiate themselves in a highly price-driven commodity category."

By the way, was speaking to Kraft’s Beverage President Bob Levi who oversees Maxwell House for Kraft Foods. Though he knows all this he still just launched a new flavor and aroma campaign that bounced off the market like spit wads fired at an M1 Abrahms Tank. No impact against the 47 to 14 share lead stimulation gave Folgers…and only Starbucks once came close to hitting our competitive strategy on the head with their “Think Earlier” campaign. Anyway, the same thinking works regardless of what business you’re in.

How do you tell a brand's story? Marketing: Is your brand telling a great story or telling a story greatly?

2010-06-29T16:45:00.000-07:00

How do you tell a brand's story?

Contrary to popular belief most brands tell a great story. At least that's what they believe. In reality they're telling a story greatly. What's the difference? Well, brands that tell stories greatly tend to say the same thing their rival does ... their advertising agency just says it differently. Brands that tell great stories have identified a product based selling dimension that dramatically differentiates themselves from competitors.

What are examples of brands that tell their stories greatly? Well, any category composed of heavily price driven commodity brands such as alcohol (beer, wine, ale, spirits), paper (paper towels, bath tissue, disposable diapers, napkins) or personal care products (shampoos, conditioners, oral care, etc.) ... some of the largest categories in consumer products utilize positioning strategies that converge on the same position as their rival ... they just have ad agencies that say the same thing differently. Detergents all claim to clean better and faster. All alcoholic beverages address the need state "to party" or "to relax." There isn't a single toothpaste (sensitive teeth being the exception) that doesn't trade on one of the five category attributes that account for all consumer perceptions in oral care - whitening, cavity prevention, breath care, gum care and tartar control. Year after year the message gets stale and only updated with new copy and actors ... not product based differentiators. Consequently, their ad spending drives category consumption rather than brand selection - ergo the saying, " I know that at least half of my advertising budget works ... I just don't know which half."

What are examples of brands that tell a great story? Well, Pampers recognized that 'fit' and 'dryness' were generic category cost of entry story parameters. Identifying an infant and toddler's 'development' finally enabled Pampers Phases Developmental Diapers to grow the business (ownable by Pampers) rather than the category by $1.2 billion per year for a decade, better relate to the emotional rewards of parenting and arrest toddler migration to arch rival Kimberly-Clark's Pull Ups. And for a fraction of the previous brand budget. Just one word, "development" made all the difference.

Now that's telling a great story, not telling a story greatly.

Another example of using a product-based selling dimension for the first time no one has seen to tell a great story? Back in the day the big three GRC (Ground Roast Coffee) brands - Maxwell House, Folgers and Hills Bros/MJB all thought people bought their product for convenience, flavor and aroma. Not true. These "me too" cost of entry parameters did not enable the brands to connect with their customer's lifestyles. For example, New Englanders did not spend their Sunday mornings with the New York Times and Maxwell House because of the brand's flavor and aroma. They bought the brand because the best part of their waking up is/was caffiene in their cup. The active product based selling dimension is 'stimulation' not flavor or aroma. This realization turned $300 million Folgers into a $1.6 billion brand and left Maxwell House standing in the dust.

Not long ago I was speaking with a Kraft Foods Marketing Director running the Gevalia Business. He wanted to know if I had any coffee experience. The conversation ended with his exclamation, "So you're the son of a bitch that did that to Maxwell House!" "You need to speak with Bob Levi." Bob is President of Kraft Foods Beverage Business. Having called Bob he listened then said, "Well I've been working for Kraft 22 years and I've never heard of you." And I said, "Well I've been working for Kraft for 35 years and I've never heard of you either. Would you like to hear what I've worked on at Kraft?" He "harumphed" and said I'd never worked at Kraft. I guess he'd better go ask, Karen Scott, Eric Strobel, Bob Morrison, and about 50 other functional line management and C-suite execs who welcomed me to the company to work on their brands. Needless to say I wasn't going to get a chance to work on Maxwell House or for Bob Levi though I've been pitching Maxwell House for about 40 years. Then I saw new advertising for Maxwell House. Same flavor and aroma crap. Bob Levi was so busy putting up walls and protecting his turf he hadn't heard a thing I said.

Now that's telling a great story. Not telling a story greatly.

Forbes Columnist Sramana Mitra features OraQuel on April 15's 1M/1M Strategy Round Table

2010-04-20T09:57:00.000-07:00

Forbes Columnist Sramana Mitra covered my OraQuel and OraQuel's Heart Smart Oral Care positioing on her weekly 1M/1M Strategy Roundtable April 15. I was honored to be selected as the show's opening presenter. Sramana's counsel is that OraQuel is essentially on track and that we need to keep doing what we are doing. Take a listen to the broadcast here. Listen to April 15's Round Table. We like her! Follow up: We were informed that the OraQuel segmant of the broadcast generated more public chat during the chat live segment of the show than any other Round Table business covered to date. That makes us happy too!

About Sramana Mitra

1M/1M Strategy Roundtables for Entrepreneurs

As part of the 1M/1M initiative, Sramana Mitra offers free weekly online strategy roundtables for entrepreneurs looking to discuss positioning, financing, and other aspects of a startup venture. Up to 1,000 people can attend each session, but only the first five who register to pitch will be able to present their business ideas. All attendees are able to join in on the conversations via a live chat.

Sramana Mitra has been an entrepreneur and a strategy consultant in Silicon Valley since 1994. Her fields of experience span from hard core technology disciplines like semiconductors to sophisticated consumer marketing industries including fashion and education. Her current focus, however, is primarily in the realms of Web 3.0 and Enterprise 3.0, and related infrastructure. She has a particular interest in Media and Retail companies and their transition to a Web-centric world.

As an entrepreneur CEO, Sramana founded 3 companies: Dais (Off-shore Software Services), Intarka (Sales Lead Generation and Qualification Software; VC: NEA) and Uuma (Online Personalized Store for selling clothes using Expert Systems software; VC: Redwood). Two of these were acquired, while the third received an acquisition offer from Ralph Lauren which the company did not accept.

As strategy consultant, Sramana has consulted with over 70 companies, including public companies like SAP, Cadence Design Systems, Webex, KLA-Tencor, Tessera, Mercado Libre among others. Her work has also included numerous startups and VCs, and she played Interim VP Marketing roles for 7 such ventures. Sramana has a proven track-record in turn-arounds, both small private companies and divisions of larger companies. She has also created major growth strategies through new market penetration, M&A, Industry Roll-ups, etc.

Writings from Sramana’s popular strategy blog are syndicated by Seeking Alpha, Yahoo! Finance, PaidContent, ReadWriteWeb, Cadwire, Emergic, GigaOm, and many other high traffic online business, finance, and technology publishers. Sramana is also a colmnist for Forbes and the author of Entrepreneur Journeys (Volume One).

Sramana has a Masters degree in EECS from MIT and a Bachelors degree in Computer Science and Economics from Smith College.

Specialties- Positioning.

- Strategic Planning Programs.

- Product strategy, Market strategy, Channel strategy, M&A, Funding, and Exit strategy.

- Business Development, Deal structuring, Negotiation, Opening and Closing deals.

- Communication, Category Creation, Media/Analyst/Investor/Customer/Team facing Messaging.

- Fund raising.

- M&A Deals.

- Turnarounds.

- Strategic Re-engineering and Catalyzing Change.

Official Google Blog: A different kind of company name

2010-04-01T19:00:00.000-07:00

A nice test of brand elasticity. Official Google Blog: A different kind of company name

OraQuel Toothbrush Sterilizer versus VioLight, DenTek and SonicCare UV (ultra violet) Toothbrush Sterilizers

2010-03-09T12:49:00.000-08:00

Ten years ago people scoffed at the notion that links existed between oral infection and heart attack or cardiovascular disease. Now everyone from the American Heart Association to the American Dental Association talk about the onset of plaque and tartar buildup leading to childhood gingivitis leading to heart attack later in life as fact. Eighty-four percent of Americans fail to remove plaque and tartar from our teeth while brushing. This leads to unseen and unfelt gingivitis and according to the American Heart Association the arteries in 72% of heart attack victims are blocked by oral plaque; not cholesterol and fat as all the big pharmaceutical companies want you to believe.

So I'm a big fan of products that draw attention to these facts. Back in the 50's and 60's when I was a child we all gathered around the TV on Sunday evenings to watch Bonanza, Disney (with Walt) and the Ed Sullivan Show. We were all told by advertising to get great dental check ups and to prevent cavities with Crest. Then more oral care brands decided they wanted a share of our toothbrushing occasions and decided that we'd brush our teeth to whiten and brighten, freshen our breath, prevent cavities, take care of our gums and eliminate tartar. And that's the way we've been brushing our teeth for the last 30 years. The current category leader, Colgate Total, took the top spot away from Crest long ago by putting all of these category attributes under one umbrella - theirs. So nothing's changed much right?! Wrong!

There's a new battle for oral care supremacy and it all has to do with providing "Heart Smart Oral Care" as touted by OraQuel; the leading brand in the toothbrush sterilizer segment. Toothbrush sterilizers!? Yes don't get me wrong. Apart from killing germs on a toothbrush toothbrush sterilizers are promoting awareness for the need to change our oral care habits and practices. Now most companies do what they can do. If you are an appliance manufacturer then you want to jump into this game with a toothbrush sterilization appliance - but toothbrush sterilization appliances have a lot of drawbacks: 1) the category (sales) action isn't in killing germs, 2) appliances are expensive, 3) appliances are unable to remove solids like toothpaste residue, food, mucus, blood or tartar that rinsing with water leaves behind, 4) and if I remember from my Gillette Hot Foamy Shave Machine Days - people don't want another appliance cluttering hard-to-keep-clean bathroom countertops that collect water and soap scum stains, hair and anything else.

So why is OraQuel different - or better - than the VioLight, Dentek, SonicCare (UV - ultra violet units) and the steam driven Germ Terminator? Well, usage has to be "interactive" to change consumer habits and practices on a large scale. OraQuel isn't an appliance, it's a spray - and when you (especially children) spray OraQuel on a dirty toothbrush it foams to tell you it's working. Kids love to see it work. So children with OraQuel in the house tend to brush their teeth as much as 33% more often and 20% longer. Delivered to the Good Housekeeping Institute in late 2003, OraQuel won the affection of the Good Housekeeping Institute's Director and staff who all took bottles home for their families. OraQuel was tapped as 2004's Best New Product for Product Innovation in Oral Care.

So how does OraQuel protect your heart? Well, by brushing more often and longer, children do a better job removing the plaque and tartar that promotes gingivitis and that heart attack later in life. Appliances don't generate that type of consumer interest, involvement and excitement (interaction). :) Also, and perhaps more importantly, wetting your toothbrush with OraQuel prior to brushing boosts any toothpaste's ability to cut through that film of plaque and tartar that formed on your teeth overnight while you slept (morning mouth), or during the day while you work. So I put my money where my mouth is and bought OraQuel. Beyond removing plaque, tartar and germs that reinfect every time a toothbrush enters your mouth OraQuel is "Heart Smart Oral Care." I like the company's slogan/positioning. No one else targets this territory.

Germ Terminator Versus OraQuel Pro Oral Health Toothbrush Cleaner

2010-03-07T06:10:00.000-08:00

If there's anything I learned during my days working with personal care companies such as Gillette and Oral-B it's that no one wants another "appliance" cluttering hard to keep clean bathroom counter tops. So along comes the Germ Terminator, yet another appliance, that harkens back to the day of those old Gillette Hot Foamy shaving machines. Appliances tend to cost more, and once you put them away because company's coming you forget to get them back out and use them. And no one would want to buy a used toothbrush cleaning appliance at a garage sale.

Now I don't have a problem with the idea of promoting a clean toothbrush. Afterall, we tell our kids to wash their hands several times everyday and those guys over at Purell have made themselves a nifty fortune with their hand sanitizer. But hey! Isn't there a better way to clean your toothbrush. I mean it needs to be done. You wouldn't eat breakfast with a fork or spoon you only licked clean after dinner, right?

OraQuel Pro Oral Health Oxygenating Toothbrush Cleaner is an engaging and interactive easy-to-use spray. What makes OraQuel so engaging and interactive is the fact that it foams when you spray it on a dirty toothbrush. And it won't foam on a clean one. Kids love to watch OraQuel work; and in in-home placement tests children using OraQuel tended to brush their teeth 33% more often and 20% longer. What parent or dentist would argue with that! Which is why The Good Housekeeping Institute tabbed OraQuel "Best New Product 2004" "for Product Innovation in Oral Care."

What's the big hype about all this toothbrush cleaning? Well on the surface (no pun intended) the plaque and tartar layer that builds up on teeth leads to gingivitis now liked to heart attack and coronary disease. Plaque from the infection builds up in arteries starting in childhood and potentially results in heart attack, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, even low birth weight babies later in life. This gingivitis is present in 84% of Americans who can't see or feel it and 72% of blockages in the arteries of heart attack victims is found to be based on oral plaque, not cholesterol or fat.

To this end OraQuel has a couple of advantages or product features going for it. 1) Children with OraQuel in their household brush more often and longer; better removing plaque and tartar to eliminate gingivitis. 2) OraQuel contains the most effective ingredient against plaque, tartar and gingivitis. So wetting your toothbrush with OraQuel before you brush enables any toothpaste to do a better job breaking through the plaque and tartar barrier constantly forming as a hardening film on your teeth. 3) Because OraQuel is interactive it is easier for children not to forget to use. Children get excited about using OraQuel because they want to see it working on their dirty toothbrush; and they want to see if their toothbrush IS dirty or clean. Consequently, OraQuel is a better product for sanitizing a toothbrush and promoting the better oral care habits dentists and parents applaud. For my money I'd choose OraQuel. It's better "Heart Smart Oral Care."

BrandWash - The Economics of the Marketing Department's Plagiarism

2010-03-01T13:42:00.000-08:00

BrandWash: A SPECIAL REPORT
- The Economics of Plagiarism in Marketing

Drawing on 40 years of experience and the fact that I've created the 10 most successful new products in the consumer packaged goods industry I look back in perspective and decide to write a book called BrandWash - The Economics of Plagiarism in Marketing. Now plagiarism isn't allowed in school. They flunk you out. And a great deal of time is spent on plagiarising business plans in business ethics courses so I began wondering (and here is where I'd like your feedback) why is it so that I can't find a detergent brand that doesn't promise to do the cleaning job better and faster; why can't I find an air freshener from Glade to Fabreeze that doesn't promise to make my house smell sweet; why can't I find an orange juice brand that doesn't have that blasted straw stinking out of an orange or a hand reaching from field to grocer's shelf that doesn't promise to taste most like the orange; why does every Leo Burnett ad seem almost the same; why does every shampoo and conditioner promise women model perfect hair; what analgesic doesn't promise to relieve pain better and faster and so on and so on. You see, I've worked in all these categories, and did so successfully, because we were able to give each category's founding member a highly-differentiating, highly-consumer-desired and highly-differentiating "product based" reason for being - like Claritin's CLEAR DAY. It's kept every other rival at bay for decades and it accounts for 67% of Schering-Plough's profits. ADVERTISING & MARKETING STRATEGY FOR IDIOTS! At one time all ground roast coffee from Maxwell House to Chock Full 'O Nuts that heavenly coffee promised consumers rich taste and aroma completely missing the reason why 20% of the GRC audience (heavy users) account for 85% of category volume. It's not flavor and aroma. IT'S STIMULATION. The best part of waking up is caffiene in your cup. But we couldn't sell a drug so we had to substitute the word Folgers for caffiene and hope it would work. I guess taking a $300 million brand to $1.6 billion on 1/10th the budget of Mrs. Olsen's Mountain Grown did the trick. Differentiated the brand. So Folgers took and sustained a 37 to 14 share lead over Maxwell House overnight. And Maxwell House IS STILL talking about flavor and aroma. Come on BL! Wake up! Hello, is anybody home? No wonder 87% of 6,973 CEOs in an exclusive Boston Consulting Group poll said they were disappointed in their innovation return on investment. There is no innovation. Too much strategic plagiarism going on in just about every conceivable category by marketers who are unable to meaningfully differentiate a brand or product. And just to back that up; Al Ries, Partner of Jack Trout (remember Trout & Ries? The guys who wrote POSITIONING: THE BATTLE FOR YOUR MIND says marketers walked away from positioning their brands on product based dimensions decades ago. Not even Al Ries (father of Laura Ries if you subscribe to her blog (recommended) Ries' Pieces) thinks he can reignite the olympic positioning torch! Today's marketers don't know what they've lost, and it's gone. Grew up knowing who lived in a pineapple under the sea but couldn't say who lived at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Oh well, they got bigger fish to fry like tagging the next social media opportunity hoping if they throw enough "creative" against the glass some of it might stick. That's not creative. But it is a reason nearly 7,000 CEOs in a recent Advertising Age Poll opted in that ad agencies had become commodities. Yet CMOs continue to do today what they did yesterday so they can keep on doing it tomorrow. AND THAT'S THE ECONOMICS OF PLAGIARISM IN MARKETING. Companies like McDonald's, Procter & Gamble, Unilever and Kraft all lose more money than they make each year and companies like Coke, because they can't generate big ideas in house outsource new products to Mergers & Acquisitions who overpay for brands like Vitamin Water without a chance of ever recovering their $4+ billion investment.

McDonald's Leverages Wi-Fi

2010-02-07T08:19:00.000-08:00

In it's best marketing decision since Dick and Maurice McDonald put hamburgers on the menu and the Speedy Service System in place McDonald's has given America Free Wi-Fi at 11,500 of 14,000 locations ... an event equally rivaling America's first lunar landing in terms of being able to Socially Engineer or change consumer habits and practices.

McDonald's has long been the bastion of the very young (moms with kids) or the very old (on fixed incomes). It was all they can afford. Now McDonald's has become the McDonald's for "the rest of us." While the maxim CQCQ means that McDonald's will continue to consistently put out the same products, the same way, no matter where you are; free wi-fi access means it's now OK just to go there and hang out. So will you?

I stopped into a neighboring Starbucks. Six laptops paying for wi-fi access and one woman with a brand new laptop from the Best Buy next door desperately trying to log on (newbie). A gentleman delicately explained that you had to pay for the privledge here with AT&T, but the McDonald's down the street had it for free. So I had to pack up my MacBook and head down the street to see.

Yep. Same old crowd and not a laptop in sight. So I ordered a dollar McDouble, sat down and got to work while starting to observe. Within minutes the manager was out at a table (coincidence) with her charts obviously preparing for a meeting. A few minutes later the franchise owner walked in (guess I was right about the meeting - going over numbers). Beaming at me as he walked by came the question excitedly, "So how's the Wi-Fi working!?" "Excellent," I said wanting to assure the man he'd made a wise decision; or that he was lucky for having been tapped to offer free wi-fi. He proceeded with his meeting while I chilled for the next hour and a half.

Same old crowd. No laptops walked in the door, but hey! Guess I'm an early adapter this time around. Find out if McDonald's offers free wi-fi in your community. Go to McDonald's Wireless Connectivity and check it out. Nice move McDonald's. I'm lovin' it! And by the way, the ad in this post is made entirely of french fries. Courtesy of Leo Burnett?

Rave Praise for OraQuel!

2010-01-26T08:55:00.000-08:00

Hi Martin,

This is fanatastic 12 years ago I was the Head of Marketing For Bayer Professional Dental product (now owned by Hereus Kulzer) we knew these facts then but advised people to chuck out toothbrushes etc etc. Your OraQuel products really address the problem straight on.

Your range and innovation sounds fantastic, where can we buy these products in the UK ? Are you looking for distribution here? Do heart specialists here know about the range?

Kind regards

Louise

On Corporate Creative Comas

2010-01-21T21:56:00.000-08:00

Did you know that no one in the consumer packaged goods industry has launched a successful new product that's topped $319 million in sales (within the first year) in at least the last 30 years? I mention this particular number (for Frito-Lay's Baked Lays Potato Chips) because it is the least successful (#10) of the top 10 most successful new products of the past 57 years tracked by companies such as my own Calle & Company, IRI, NPD, ACNielsen and others.

So why do many consumer packaged goods companies miss the big ideas and consumer cultures? I mean companies like Miller Brewing, surfing upon the fame of post-High Life Lite Beer have not been able to internally develop another major brand since the introduction of Cold-filtered Miller Genuine Draft - the number two brand behind Lite in their portfolio - and I assisted on the delivery of that one. And then there is Coca-Cola who can't come up with a big idea on its own to save its life. So they outsource all of their new products to mergers and acquisitions - way over paying for brands like Vitamin Water.

So here's a story called "The Smuggler" describing how easy it is for big companies to miss the big think.

A clever smuggler came to the border with a donkey. The donkey's back was heavily laden with straw. The official at the border was suspicious and pulled apart the man's bundles till there was straw all around, but not a valuable thing in the straw was found. "But I'm certain you're smuggling something," the official said, as the man crossed the border.

Now each day for ten years the man came to the border with a donkey. Although the official searched and searched the straw bundles on the donkey's back, he never could find anything valuable hidden in them.

Many years later, after the official had retired, he happened to meet that same smuggler in a marketplace and said, "Please tell me, I beg you. Tell me, what were you smuggling? Tell me, if you can."

"Donkeys," said the man.

Is This A BRIGHT IDEA?

2010-01-20T10:01:00.000-08:00

Hi Everyone! My name is Martin Calle. I've invented a lot of successful consumer products including Baked Lays Potato Chips, Tylenol Gelcaps and Cold-filtered Miller Genuine Draft. I've also turned around sleeping giant brands for companies like Procter & Gamble turning $300 million Folgers into a business worth $1.6 billion; I've also grown Pampers by $11 billion over the last 10 years. Now I've launched my own company to make ORAQUEL®. ( http://www.oraquel.com/ ) I invented the name, the concept, the formulas, the whole works. ORAQUEL® is "HEART SMART ORAL CARE" because ORAQUEL® stops "ORAL PLAQUE HEART ATTACK." That's right. The AMERICAN HEART ASSOCIATION has conducted studies showing that the plaque found in the arteries of 72% of heart attack victims is oral, not arterial plaque. The accumulation begins in childhood and culminates (or should I say “terminates”) when you are an adult. There are three products in the ORAQUEL® line. OraQuel® Oxygenating Toothbrush Cleaner - which "cleans toothbrushes better than water" to remove the plaque, tartar and gingivitis linked to coronary disease. And OraQuel® foams on contact to tell you it's working - an important visual reinforcement that you need to do this. There is also the fact that using OraQuel® causes children to brush their teeth 33% more often and 20% longer because they like to see it work (no parent or dentist has ever been able to accomplish that!) which is why THE GOOD HOUSEKEEPING INSTITUTE tapped OraQuel® as "THE BEST NEW PRODUCT" for "INNOVATION IN ORAL CARE" in 2004. I also manufacture OraQuelAC® After Care promoted to younger audiences passionate about tattoos, body adornment and body modification - they want to use the product to "prevent tongue piercing infections, keep their mouth clean and promote rapid healing"; and OraQuel Lypht®, "THE LIQUID TONGUE SCRAPER" to help those who gag on solid tongue scrapers. Hey! I was a skeptic too until I figured out that manufacturers actually sell enough tongue scrapers to keep them on the shelves at drug stores such as Rite-Aid, Walgreen's and CVS. My fourth product, LIQUID FLOSS® is also available now. Why did I pick oral care? Well, tobacco, alcohol and paper goods are the top three sellers in chain drug and grocery stores and their costs of entry are too high. The forth largest catergory is personal care or what used to be called health & beauty aids (H&BA). There, the top sellers are first shampoos and conditioners (of which there are too many) and oral care. The cost of entry in oral care is much lower and there are far fewer relevant competitors. The big guys like Colgate Total and P&G's Crest only focus on the five category attributes I defined for them years ago as to why we brush our teeth. (For cavity prevention, breath freshening, gum care, tartar control and whitening of course). Now I'm not big enough to compete against them so I had to find a different avenue and that route is called ORAQUEL®. Please try my products! Check out my web site http://www.oraquel.com/ - it's really different (at least when compared to every other dental and oral care site out there. Thanks!

General Motor's Cultural Autism and Intimacy-Deficiency Disorder

2009-11-30T21:36:00.000-08:00

Is it any wonder that General Motors so dutifully displays it's intimacy-deficiency syndrome in ads for the Buick LaCrosse that claim IT is another reason for Lexus' relentless pursuit of perfection? Do you also find it laughingly unbelievable that Howie Long can schill for Chevy then throw in that in comparisons to Hondas Chevy doesn't make lawnmowers? Not to GM: When you are so far down a hole you have to climb up a ladder to get to the bottom you don't go around parading your cultural autism: a complete disregard for the consumer's cultural intelligence. Socially awkward does not even begin to describe General Motor's turnaround face. Chevy's still called "the volume" brand with no hope of catching the brands that so better move consumer culture into and back out of their organization. General Motors was and is the kid in school everyone percieved to be an outcast. Mean yes. True? We'll, their the ones with the self-inflicted wounds. As GM sheds brands GM remains...completely delusional in the way it views itself.

I find the concept of Cultural Autism in business interesting. And with Google returning only 4,500 some odd results on the topic, it is not very well explored. With Grant McCracken's release of his new book, Chief Culture Officer, no book or subject could be more timely for GM.

I found this webcast on cultural autism. I hope it provides food for thought in your own business. Today human interaction has been reduced to text messages, Facebook pages, computer screens, and mindless television. Parents are merely chauffeurs for their children’s endless activities away from home. Neighbors are strangers on the other side of a high, strong fence. Many families don’t even share meals together. What is the price of this modern living? The price is deep loss -- of real connecting intimacy, of family cohesion, of social graces, of a sense of community. These are fading away into the distant memory of our collective psyche, replaced by sterile cultural autism (disregard for external reality), masquerading as genuine intimacy. We will be discussing the emotional deficiency disorder at the heart of our high-tech culture-- lack of deep, profound relating with one another.

Will the androids running GM ever feel real?

Move Over George Winston, Windam Hill. Make Room for Shannon Stephens.

2009-10-18T21:54:00.000-07:00

Over at indie artist music site stereogum you'll not only find great free mp3 music downloads, you'll also find artsist Shannon Stephens and she's good. Really good. Like Carly Simon good. Like Carole King good. Like Joni Mitchell good. If you're in to artists like George Winston, especially his Autumn album and the entire Windam Hill record label Shannon Stephens is, was and forever will be one of your favorite artists. She's spent time in Holland, MI, like me. And I wonder if she's ever been to Pentwater? From The Breadwinner album on Asthmatic Kitty Records video by: Zack Bent additional support: Gala Bent featuring: Jillia Pessenda & Jim Bovino. Her release, In Summer In The Heat is what they say is to die for. Good stuff. Here it is. Courtesy of YouTube.

The World's Most Successful Marketer

2009-10-06T16:46:00.000-07:00

He's not Bill Gates. He's not Steve Jobs. He doesn't even work for Procter & Gamble. But the world's most successful marketer thinks a lot like the executives at The Coca-Cola Company and Pepsi. The one thing these companies abhor is excess capacity. If you leave a bottler or fountain account with excess capacity your rival will rush in to fill it. And that's where the bulk of Coca-Cola and Pepsi's business lives. So sometime after WWII someone figured out that non-working housewives represented excess economic capacity. Potential wage earners that could, if nudged, dramatically increase the size of the US consumer economy. Ultimately, to migrate from a cash/gold standard based economy to one in which we lived on something yet introduced to be called "credit." Was the world's most successful marketer a politician, a staffer or a Madison Avenue guru? No one knows, but one thing's for sure. He or she was one smart cookie. In 1958 Diner's Club cards got a wobbly start then American Express checked into the market with a gold card that became the first green card - giving consumers permission, like a visa, to live beyond their means.

The tool? Slick positioning. The feminist movement. By mobilizing women out of the home children no longer had a strong family base. We called them latch key kids and consoled ourselves with advertising to women that said "I can bring home the bacon and cook it too." No. You couldn't. Divorce rates hit 50%. School performances dropped. Gangs rose. Families crumbled. Dual income families didn't raise..."families." Now we have single mothers. Things called alternative families. Made politically correct by children's shows such as Sesame Street. Worse. It's not right.

So who is the world's most successful marketer? Who is the man or woman responsible for Socially Engineering of the demise of American families and values? Who was it that could not leave well enough alone? Who was it who had to have America's excess capacity go to work (now, just to make ends meet)?

The world's most successful marketer brought on the financial crisis. The world's most successful marketer drove Wall Street to financial excess and put pressure on the short term gain. What did regular marketers do? They followed. They adapted to trends. They did not stand up and represent themselves. They bent. And helped the world's most successful marketer promote his or her evil. And so the world's most successful marketer launched a top-two box intent to purchase new product that brought America to its knees.

So who is the world's most successful marketer? Drop the blame on anyone you want here.

Saturn: The Long Good Bye

2009-10-01T10:26:00.000-07:00

What do Saturn and the movies "Ghost" and "The Sixth Sense" have in common? The stars (heros: Patrick Swayze, Bruce Willis, Saturn) were dead and didn't know it. Saturn wasn't born a brand with special needs. Saturn was stillborn. Conceived in 1985 to be "A different kind of car. A different kind of car company" Saturn never had a reason-for-being. (Go to CNN article) Former GM CEO Roger Smith (of Michael Moore movie "Roger & Me" fame) wanted to start over with Saturn. Instead he stuck the automaker with another dud. Disagree? Well let's split hairs and remember that no car buyer ever said they wanted "A different kind of car. A different kind of car company." They only said they didn't like "the US auto dealership experience." So GM, in typical fashion jumped to conclusions before they jumped to the facts. When consumers said they didn't like the dealership experience they didn't say they wanted a whole new car company. They said, "fix the dealerships." But that was hard to do because people cling to their ideas more tenaciously than their most prized material possessions. No one wanted to mess with the channel guys who also held sway over each year's advertising - and what do car sales guys know about strategy?!) So, to not piss off their prima donna dealer network GM just decided to start a whole new car company with no strings attached. Fatal mistake. The start of the long good bye.

What's the back story? San Francisco's Stouffer Hotel (the one right below the Mark Hopkins and across from the Fairmont) used to be a class act. It was the hotel that hung Maxfield Parrish's "The Oak" by the elevators. And if you're a creative and don't know Maxfield Parrish you've got a lot to learn. Anyway, the Stouffer is now a Renaissance Hotel and Parish's famous "The Oak" is gone.

But there I was in 1985, gliding past The Oak and entering the elevator with Saturn's agency head Hal Riney. Hal had just won the Saturn account with his touchy feely emotional strategy for the brand. Oh great! Now consumers had an even slipperier slope to cling to. A strategy with nothing they could sink their teeth into. No product-based selling solutions. No special user effects. Just buy us because we're warm and cuddly. A different kind of car (never defined). A different kind of car company (ill defined). Hal had pulled a page from research fueling Washington Mutual's here today and gone tomorrow customer base. "We're the nice guys that wear flannel shirts and blue jeans." We're not those take your money and run American auto dealers. Remember: early Saturn floor sales personnel always wore khaki pants and unbuttoned blue oxford shirts. They never approached you unless you approached them first. Very good on paper. Very trustworthy. Very...

And I was trying to convince Riney and GM that this wasn't going to work. Remember: Saturn, as a division, has never turned a profit for GM. It has always operated in the red and has never been able to pay it's own way. So no wonder other car manufacturers wouldn't want to jump to the brand's rescue and no wonder Penske backed out of the deal. The house never had good bones to begin with. But how did I know this? The same way I knew that Philip Morris would reduce it's dependency on tobacco profit 56% by acquiring Kraft. The same way I knew Saturn would never make it. The same way Buick agency McCann-Erickson used to position and advertise the Buick Regal as "The fine line between sport and sedan." When was the last time you ever overheard the man on the street rub his chin and say aloud, "I want the car that's the fine line between sport and sedan." No one ever asked for it. People don't TALK like that! Advertising minds gone mad. As Hal Riney's pointless work for Saturn. Advertising? Yes. It aired. Success? No. The patient died. No today. At birth.

So how should the campaign have run? What reason for being should have been communicated? Something that provided a product-based reason for being. Something that differentiated the product based on it's attributes rather than the ill-directed hopes of a management whose cognitive bias created errors in judgement that led them astray.

“Today’s disappointing news comes at a time when we’d hoped for a successful launch of the Saturn brand into a new chapter,” G.M.’s chief executive, Fritz Henderson, said in a statement. What a pitty. Had Mr. Henderson stopped to consider the fact that his Division's reason-for-being had never been properly Socially Engineered? No! The company and it's strategic partners (dealers and ad agency) simply shot from the hip and ran with it never realizing that they'd first need to have their intended customers first sit down and match themselves to the brand based on over 500 dimensions of product compatibility that GM and Hal Riney did not possess. That process would have worked much like eHarmony for Saturn and would have done more to ensure the brands success. But GM and Hal Riney were much smarter than that. Instead of doing their homework they tried to wing it. Well, in all fairness, they did do their homework, with me. They just choose not to listen. Cognitive bias. They wanted to hear themselves speak. They didn't want to tell consumers what consumers said they wanted to hear about a new car brand.

They said they wanted products that "didn't look 10 years old before they were new." Good for Saturn but a definite slam to other GM divisions. So how would history be different today had GM played THAT hand and consequently forced the other divisions to shape up? Consumers wanted "To own a car that says smart things about me." Which is the reason why all those Honda Accord and Toyota Camry buyers say they buy Accords and Camrys. A far better tagline than a different kind of car, a different kind of company because it answers/answered the question, "What's in it for me?" That's important when you consider that Honda and Camry sell about a million vehicles a year while it would be a surprise if Saturn on whole ever sold more that 65,000 units a year. By the way, the two product-based advertising/positioning solutions we developed scored off the hook for top two box intent to purchase while Hal Riney's work never tested top two box intent to purchase above just below 12.3 percent probably/definitely would buy.

So there I was in the Stouffer Hotel elevator arguing logic with Hal Riney and GM executives who like Burger King wanted it their way. And look what they got. In closing I'd like to recall some emails I traded with Cultureby author Grant McCracken who reminded me that it's a shame that corporate memories of their histories and what they've learned or not learned are so short. Here's one more vote that GM add the position of Chief Culture Officer (Grant's group on Ning) before it's entirely too late. Because if they don't the words that I'd hear from the real change agents that hired me before they folded their hands at GM will ring true. "No one's going to save GM single handed."

In the end Saturns were too much the same and not enough "smart cars." And when GM found a savior in Marketing Director Mark Hans Richter what did they do? They let him go. Proof again that working to drive scads of traffic to your sites won't necessarily bode sell for your corporate career. My predicted future again for GM? That GM sell it's brands to Toyota or Honda if they want them. Let Toyota or Honda build and sell the names. Then GM can just end the long good bye.

Cadillac & General Motors: The limitations of needs based selling

2009-09-29T09:54:00.000-07:00

Charles H. Green's Trust Matters blog is always a good read. And the relevance of his post on the limitations of needs based selling remains fresh two years later when you read it and contrast his views against the efforts of companies in financial crisis attempting to affect turnarounds. My case in point? General Motors.

A company's advertising is its mouthpiece. And no where else will one find greater expression of needs based selling than in a company's advertising. And nowhere else can one find greater evidence that absolutely nothing has changed within a company than in the way they express "our" needs - for this is how they "see" us.

Look at General Motor's advertising for Cadillac's SRX Crossover. It says this "is the Cadillac or crossover vehicles." IS THAT my need? I thought MY NEED, if I currently had one, was to see signs of life from General Motors! Proof that someone was listening! Not "proof" from Ed Whitacre that when he came to GM he "liked what he found." Ed's just not my "needs" barometer.

So once again GM offers evidence that even though someone is home no one is "listening!" Like the scene in The Hunt For Red October where the Soviet Navy is banging away with their sonar so hard they couldn't hear a submarine if it was right under them; GM isn't listening to my needs. As Charles Green says, GM is trying to drive me (like cattle) to my needs.

GM and Cadillac are still my grandfather's brands. Telling me I need "the Cadillac" of crossovers just doesn't cut it. I look at the vehicle and see a design that "looks 10 years old before it was even new." The SRX is not "a product that says smart things about me." And in all of the advanced strategy research I did for GM that GM ignored and continues to ignore, these two needs still rate higher in GM's turnaround efforts than do money back guarantees. Who wants a money back guarantee if I'm not going to consider buying the car anyway!?

Cadillac is not my gold standard. There are just soooo many other luxury crossover and SUV brands that anyone over and under the age of 54 would rather have. So how does Cadillac address this? General Motor's Cadillac Division must Socially Engineer® a reason-for-being - the posuitioning strategy - that proves the brand is once again relevant to me. Social Engineering® is a process that matches consumers via "Culturally Influential Consumer Groups®" to products based on over 500 dimensions of product compatibility GM does not possess. Social Enginnering® is not accomplished using judgement for here we see General Motor's and it's partner's cognitive bias at work: advertising based on errors in judgement brought on by the false positives of old thinking.

Being "The Cadillac of Crossovers" is a claim without substantiation. Like "branding," it's something the lawyers say you can say when you don't have anything to say. As legendary UCLA basketball coach John Wooden says, "It's what you learn after you know it all that counts." So I'd welcome a fresh round of calls from executives at Cadillac and General Motors. Just don't ask me to wait 120 days to be paid like last time. Your needs are not being met by your existing roster of vendors and strategic suppliers. They have not helped you worship at the alter of effective needs based selling.

Personal Branding - The Companies Headhunters Blackball

2009-09-25T11:13:00.000-07:00

Why no consumer packaged goods company has been able to market a new product more successful than the least successful new product ever created by product development expert Calle & Company and Martin Calle remains a mystery. Baked Lays Potato Chips, created by Calle & Company for Frito-Lay sold $319 million in it's first ten months. That's roughly double 2008's most successful new product conceived and developed some other way, Gatorade's $159 million G2. Can't compare salty snacks to beverages you say? Only if you want to close your eyes and believe "you" are the "knower of all things." And that's the problem with personal branding. You build alters to yourself.

Not to promote but Calle & Company's product developments have topped the charts at IRI, NPD and ACNielsen now for 57 consecutive years. And why? Because outward-looking forward-thinking executives reach out to them while straight-forward, linear-thinking problem-solvers do not. For example, while Calle & Company was working with highly talented cross functional teams at Frito-Lay to determine what consumers wanted next, others at Frito-Lay were busy pushing "supplier" concepts like Wow! Chips with Procter & Gamble's Olestra championed by Pepsi CEO Indra Nooyi. And Wow! Chips with Olestra was barely able to fill the pipeline with $29 million worth of product.

So how do you NOT end up behind the 8 ball while making your company one that headhunters respect? And what's the difference between hitting a home run and striking out? That's a good question. Many acquaintances in the human resources industry tell me they attend conferences where the main topic of conversation is the fact that even though they hire the top talent, top talent fails to deliver growth. Visiting McKinsey & Company's website one also finds in McKinsey's assessment of the consumer packaged goods industry that, "despite solid balance sheets and healthy bottom lines executives still wonder where growth will come from. So apparently, McKinsey's consultants don't have the answers either. On the internet, especially at sites like LinkedIn, one can find a host of professional organizations dealing with marketing, marketing research, innovation, social media, social networking and branding. Yet in the market research groups, especially the "Next Generation Market Research" group one finds post after post and discussion after discussion addressing my grandfather's market research techniques. If this is indeed "The Next Generation" then why are they using my father's and grandfather's marketing research tools? There's nothing "next generation" about it.

So having covered those three aspects, consider the impact of working in these companies on your efforts to personally brand yourself. Afterall, this is, was, has been and will continue to be the era of "brand me."

On September 3, 2009 Business Week published The Companies Headhunters Avoid: Recruiters are in surprising agreement as to which companies they avoid when looking for executive talent. Companies such as The Coca-Cola Company figured prominently in the article and were I The Coca-Cola Company's Senior Vice President of Human Resources Cynthia P. McCaque I'd be concerned. The Coca-Cola Company has not launched a new product that ranked in IRI, NPD or ACNielsen's top ten annual pace setters for at least the last 25 years. The article details the inability of longtime Coca-Cola veterans to manage other companies effectively, including some of The Coca-Cola Company's prior luminaries.

According to the Business Week article, "The conclusion among headhunters is that the very attributes that make Coke a great company—an iconic brand and an unmatched global distribution system—also make it too easy for young managers to rise without having to develop the entrepreneurial skills necessary to compete in other arenas." "Granted, working at Coke can make you comfortable—the stock has yielded a 24.8% total return over the past five years, vs. a 2.4% return for the Standard & Poor's 500-stock index—but recruiters say it may not make you management material anywhere else."

But read the entire article at Business Week and remember two things. It's what you learn once you know it all that counts, and, stay humble, there's always someone better right behind you. Reach out!

A New Job for The Marlboro Man

2009-09-22T11:57:00.000-07:00

I have been given the task to repurpose/retask/reinvent or otherwise Socially (Re)Engineer® the Marlboro Man. I can't tell you by whom but I can tell you that I always thought Ralph Lauren or Stetson should launch a new fragrance for men called "Smoke" just in time for the holidays. The ingredient? That "liquid smoke" you find in the grocery store.

The Use of Images in Market Research

2009-09-18T13:30:00.000-07:00

Over at LinkedIn.com I've been tracking an interesting discussion on the use of images in market research among members (myself included) of the Next Generation Market Research Group started by Ricardo Lopez, President of Hispanic Research, Inc. We've confronted the use of images in research since 1953 finding that whenever you use images you tend to cement images and emotions in place rather than promote discussion beyond those bounds and any advertising agency would agree; and so we switched to "written" creative and stimulative materials finding that they better enabled the respondent's mind to wonder/wander, the way reading a good book forces you to use your imagination and imagine a scene based on individual perceptions and frames of reference to discuss rather than have it presented as a done deal long ago. And with better business building results.

But what is the risk of using images to present ideas? Both Washington Mutual Bank (once the biggest bank west of the Rockies) and Kahn's/Hillshire Farms presented images to respondents to get a bead on how to present their brands to consumers. Both WAMU and Kahn's/Hillshire Farms showed people pictures of farmers dressed in blue jeans and flannel shirts, and scientists dressed in stached shirts and lab coats. There were a range of other images. Obviously, being based in Seattle with lots of rain, forest and hippies, WAMU was perceived to be the "friendly" bank while arch rivals Bank of America and Wells Fargo were perceived to be "those evil starched shirt corporate guys not to be trusted." Similarly, Kahn's/Hillshire Farms products were percieved to be made by honest "farmers" while Swift-Eckrich products were percieved "made and processed" by corporate food scientists in stainless steel by men wearing starched white lab coats." So which image is more appealing? And is this really insight? I think not.

Using this data, though accurate, did not move either business ahead. For friendly WAMU and Kahn's/Hillshire Farms; neither grew their customer base, sustain growth nor were they any more effective at retaining customers. That usually happens when you show people what they want to see. The wisdom of crowds it is not. WAMU got bought out by evil Chase due to its inability to weather a financial crisis and Kahns/Hillshire Farm was sold to the evil white coat guys - erasing all the research time, money and advertising spent on work that went down the drain. What a waste of career time.

Anyway, why does the practice of using images in research persist? And why do academics promote such? Because pictures in research promote what people in the medical community (doctors) call "SEARCH SATISFACTION." A condition where the care or answer givers simply stop looking for better answers when they find one that "works." So should images really be a part of Next Generation Market Research? Well?

Laura Ries Dishes on GM at Ries Pieces

2009-09-16T10:50:00.000-07:00

If you haven't read Laura's posts at Ries' Pieces get a move on! Her current installment on GM, called "GM & The Implication of the Opposite" hits the mark and commenting readers are posting interesting follow ups. Now, my chief strategic problem with GM's promotional money back guarantee is that it doesn't build positive business OR brand perceptions, it tears them down due to one immutable law of marketing, advertising, branding and sales. When one trades on price, your brand equity sinks so low you have to climb up a ladder to get to the bottom. This strategy is installing the "Kill Bits®" in people's minds and perceptions that depress their response to advertising, marketing, branding and sales efforts - a far cry from correctly Socially Engineering® the company and brand's turnaround. We're observing Fall of Rome calibre strategy at GM because they really don't understand their consumer and they are unwilling to listen in the ways required to give them what they want.

Tired of High Fructose Banking

2009-09-14T12:37:00.000-07:00

Pre or post financial crisis meltdown have you gotten tired of high fructose retail banking? You know the type of banking I mean. The one where all the ads say we're the bank for you and all the fees say the bank giveth and the bank taketh away. Well, why do I bring this up? Because the best answers in marketing, branding, advertising and generating the social influence that changes consumer habits and practices and changes consumer behavior and attitudes on a large scale are always "abstract." These solutions "are so obvious they're not obvious."

In 1971 The Coca-Cola Company commissioned me to "identify future consumption drivers in soft drinks" because no one knew what people really wanted next. By removing high fructose corn syrup from soft drinks we created a new category of beverages called New Age Soft Drinks technically defined as soft drinks with no corn syrup consumers perceived more healthful and thirst quenching aka today's Vitamin Water.

So, "abstractly," what would you have if you removed all the corn syrup from banking? Would Wells Fargo really be able to "take you to the next stage" (terrible "branding" and proof that branding is something you do when you don't really have anything important to say).

Washington Mutual was advised by me to pursue a "Give a man a fish and he can feed himself for a day, but teach a man to fish and he can feed himself, and others, for a lifetime" strategy to 1) address opportunities presenting themselves via pre-crisis banking industry deregulation, and 2) to attact depositors with higher disposable incomes to fuel growth. Because their free checking for life strategy only appealed to bottom feeders who didn't have disposable income to fuel the banks growth Washington Mutual fell to America's financial crisis - finally swallowed by Moby Chase. Score: Straight-forward, linear-thinking, problem solvers 1 / Forward-thinking, outward looking executives 0.

One hopes the current and post crisis banking industry will not pursue the airline industry's nickle and dime approach to serving customers. It's so PC - and that does not stand for "politically correct." It stands for those great Apple ads where Apple lets Microsoft skewer itself with its own PC. One hopes retail banks will eliminate the corn syrup. Of course, if the banks regard their business as does The Coca-Cola Company, they really won't give a rats ass about you and me because the bulk of their business, like Coke's is in the commercial business, or high fructose corn syrup segment. Maybe that's why Coke's got a guy whose only claim to fame is launching his own $ 7 million frozen novelty line before he took over running Coke's global innovation business. How's this JV entrepreneur supposed to impact consumer behavior in a business where one share point is worth over half a billion dollars? Well, he doesn't - which is why the carbonated business has been in decline for 4 years and Coke outsources all of its innovation to the JV start up businesses they acquire. It's like setting up an inexperienced Tom Cruise to take on high powered Jack Nicholson in the movie "A Few Good Men." We're not supposed to win. But we can still rant like pawns.

A fructose free retail banking system would find me among their depositors in a heartbeat. I wouldn't look at their brick and mortar tellers like car salespeople. Why? Because their product, though a commodity, would remain unchanged, their "message" would exert greater social-cultural pull over my decision making processes. Of what benefit is this? The strategy, in computer programmer terms, would negate the "kill bits" that depress my response to their advertising, marketing and branding.

Grant McCracken & The Chief Culture Officer

2009-09-12T14:25:00.000-07:00

What do you do when you find a gap in the way companies do business? Well if you're Grant McCracken, an exceptionally bright guy and publisher of the blog Cultureby, you do something about it. Much published Grant's written Chief Culture Officer due in December at Amazon. In Chief Culture Officer Grant argues for the position of CCO in the corporation and the role culture plays in how to create a living, breathing corporation shaping decisions that make companies more valuable. Or not. There are plenty of examples of how abscence of a chief culture officer, or the knowledge that outside, outsourced utility can bring, essentially signs death warrants for companies such as General Motors or Chrysler. I exclude Ford here for they did not need a bailout. Hence their collective culture officer must have made strikingly different decisions. That alone is enough to prove Grant's premise for billions of dollars are at stake to be won or lost by the US auto industry and the having, or not having, of a Chief Culture Officer. In my mind what is the greatest challenge for a newly installed Chief Culture Officer? Getting there and actually finding a mechanism in the company that will accept your input. How can you promote the concept of the Chief Culture Officer? Join Grant's Chief Culture Officer Community.

What's my personal spin on getting culture into and out of a corporation? Getting people to use it. I'd sold the use of our "Culturally Influential Consumer Groups®" for purposes in market research to corporations such as General Motors for years. My biggest supporters in GM's top tier strategic office promoting this work and their roles of Chief Culture Officers were on one assignment Paula Travenia who had communications research oversight of Buick and agency McCann-Erickson and Marina Shoemaker who had strategic communications oversight for all of GM's brands. They liked the work and hired me again and again...but alas, no one was going to save GM single handedly (and that caveate was provided time and again by Marina who kept building her arsenal of Cultural Influence Knowledge on her brands). Should their resume or CV cross your desk you will find yourself in contact with two of the sharpest Chief Culture Officers on the planet.

Another early adapter of getting cultures into and out of a corporation was Procter & Gamble's Paper Division President, Dick Nicolosi who hired us to get a better "cultural" handle on the Pampers brand. Pampers thought the only reason people purchased disposable diapers were for reasons of ‘fit’ and ‘dryness.’ You had to ‘fit’ the baby better and keep the baby ‘drier.’ And as retailers began dropping Pampers from their shelves, P&G executives wondered what they could do to retain distribution and reverse the downward trend in the company's share of the disposable diaper market. Calle & Company’s proven Social Engineering® process enabled consumers to turn Pampers into the ‘developmental’ diaper brand. Pampers, re-launch as Pampers ‘Phases’ Developmental Diapers convinced moms that being a toddler was just another ‘step’ or ‘stage’ in the ‘development’ of their infants and newborns. By Socially Re-Engineering Pampers as “the developmental brand” Pampers arrested toddlers migrating to rival Kimberly-Clark’s Pull-Ups, sustaining distribution and gaining $11.2 billion ($1.2 billion per year) in diaper sales over the next ten years.

Now THAT'S being a Chief Culture Officer. And why do I single out THIS example? Because I always thought that a corporation's MOST effective CCO SHOULD be the CEO. How many times had I called a company asking for the person most interested in better understanding their product's customers; or asking for the person in charge of innovation driving the growth of their business in the "packaged goods" industry only to be shunted to some guy named Phil in packaging design? "Oh, I see. Phil in packaging design is the person in charge of innovation driving the growth of your business." Give me a break.

The concept for Chief Culture Officer has GREAT merit. My hat is OFF to Grant McCracken for so well hitting the nail on the head. Now, how do we drive it into the corporation? And more importantly, how do they put it to use for the only thing that matters? How to create more successful established brands rather than milking them with line extensions; and how to create more successful new products. I know Social Media's now all the rage, but it's not the communication channel that reaches consumers with the most import. It's the message that connects with the culture. Thanks Grant. You are a good think! I only hope the the homogenaity of the mob, the commoditization of social communities or the wisdom of crowds don't drown us out. Every crowd, mob or social community is still composed of hundreds of interactive "Socially Influential Consumer Groups®" (for a list of 500 SICGs® to consider for your business email me - use the link on the blog - if that fails, post a note here) who think their own thoughts regardless of overwhelming social pressure to conform. GM is good at ignoring cultures, making what they want then telling us it's what we need. That model no longer works. The working model is; find out what cultures want, and give it to them; and better, before they no they need it for if you only collect and gather data in real time, by the time you act you will only be reacting, a day late and pound short behind the consumer rather than the necessary procative step ahead.

The Fly In General Motor's Ointment

2009-09-09T21:12:00.000-07:00

I have no beef with General Motor's use of eBay as a means to move vehicles, but as a reason to buy vehicles the strategy misses the mark.

It's no secret GM wants to get rid of dealers. Work for GM's strategic top office confirmed the need to remove dealers from the loop as long ago as the late 70s and early 80s. Why? Because consumers hate the dealer experience and perceive interaction with a dealership's salesforce about as appealing as spending time with a brick and mortar bank teller. The experience really doesn't get your juices going. Bank and manage your accounts online. Also, dealers contracts are long and expensive to maintain. So, long ago, GM was clued in to pursue dealer free channels. Hell, here's my platinum card. Let me pick up my Accord or Camry at a Costco. And there's the rub.

Camry, Accord and Taurus are perceived commodities...and that's a good thing. For this strategy to work consumers need to perceive that purchasing a GM product means that you are going to receive a product that represents the coin of the realm...and consumer's benchmarks....still an Accord, Camry or Ford Taurus in the high volume bread and butter segments are not met by GM product perceptions. So casting your lot with social media maven will not impart a healthier glow to the troubled brands.

GM and it's brands need to be Socially re-engineered to change consumer habits and practices and consumer perceptions. This is not something accomplished simply by handing your account to a traditional, social or digital agency. It is a proprietary process that matches consumers to products based on over 500 deeper dimensions of product compatibility (almost like eHamony) we alone possess, coupled with interviewing or viewing these product dimensions of compatibility through the eyes of the correct Socially Influential Consumer Groups - not just demographic, attitudinal or behavioral segmentations. They are far too crude for even though we are twittering our ways to being one community the community is composed of Social Influence segments holding their own in this universe.

People say they want to purchase automobiles "that say smart things about me." A Honda does, a Buick does not. People say GM products "look like they're 10 years old before they're even new." And after seeing the new Transformers styled Bumble Bee Camaro I went out to look at a new Corvette. Did you know that in comparison, in my mind, that new Corvette now depresses me? It looks more like the last Generation of Camaro rather than next year's gotta have. Now Corvette looks 10 years old before it's new.

So if you don't have the product, no amount of new channel distribution or social media exposure is going to work...effectively. I'll bet I'm right. I mean, who wants to tweet up Cadillac? Ooppps, wrong audience, wrong generation. And Saturn? Those ads about "what pundits say (pundit is a social online word - get it?" ...and the fact that "they've gotten it right all along?" Then why does the ad follow up in the very next sentence state the company has 5 entirely new models, like the old models missed the mark? That silk shirt's kind of icky too. Not a TRUST builder. Gotta go. 1+1 doesn't equal 2 with new management at GM which is why the company still is not a member of my social economic forecasting index.

Alexa

2009-09-06T22:11:00.000-07:00

I want to validate or claim my Blogger Blog. I understand that because it is a Blogger Blog this has to be done manually with Alexa. There's no way to provide an email address that will work or to place an info.txt file in my root. Would you mind helping me? My Blog is called MADISON AVENUE. The Journal of Social Influence Marketing & Branding. I'll repost this and title it Alexa on my blog. Here's the info:

url: http://advertising-age.blogspot.com
site_owner: Martin Calle
address1: 18881 Patrician Drive
address2:
city: Villa Park
state: CA
country: USA
postal_code: 92861
phone_number: 714 244 9511
display_email: future@callecompany.com

Thank you!

Is Your Brand Subject To " Phantom Relevancy Syndrome?"

2009-09-02T11:09:00.000-07:00

In the medical world amputees are subject to phantom limb syndrome: The perception of sensations, usually including pain, in an arm or leg after the limb has been amputated. The brain still gets messages from the nerves that originally carried impulses from the missing limb. Phantom limb syndrome is relatively common in amputees, especially in the early months and years after limb loss.

So as your brand relevancy diminishes are you subjecting yourself to phantom brand relevancy: the perception that your brand is still relevant even though it is not? Now many businesses are facing diminished relevancy today and there isn't a lot of hope that they'll bounce back. So what is it that goes on in the mind of the people running these businesses that they refuse to admit their business is fading away? Is it the fact that the USPS still does over a trillion dollars a year even though it's relevancy can't compete with email and text messaging? Is it that newspapers still get away with charging people for subscriptions even when radio is free and the internet delivers the same news a day earlier? Why do these brands refuse to reengineer themselves socially even though they're following in the same steps of greatly diminished brands such as Polaroid or Kodak who became commodities in the age where we now capture and transmit our memories digitally? And what of Microsoft's Bing Search Engine or Zune MP3 player - also rans that are 10 years over the hill before they were even new. Like General Motors chasing that dying aging midwestern audience - only that audience still process images in a way that once gave these businesses the lion's share.

So is it that managers cling to their ideas more tenaciously than their most prized material possessions that prevents them from effecting change? Is that the syndicated knowledge from which they draw insights fails to accurately map the future...or continues to lead them down the path that if they just keep coming to work and doing their thing everything will be allright? Are they playing ostrich and just hoping for a sustained miracle turnaround? Or is it that a few hybrid vehicles, while still a brightspot at General Motors have not been enough to do the trick? Of course I've been preaching this is the flaw in GM's relevancy for years. Before people will respond to a cash for clunkers deal at GM, GM has to establish the bread and butter market currently dominated by Ford, Honda and others. In short, you have to build more quality into your product.

But now I drift from my purpose, to promote comment on phantom brand relevancy syndrom. K-Mart's on the cusp, as is Sears, as is Starbucks as was Pabst Blue Ribbon Beer. One step in the grave and no one's willing to admit it. How do these managers console themselves for one more day that everything is all right?

New Dominos Pizza Pasta Bread Bowl Promotion Contributes To American Obesity

2009-08-11T16:56:00.000-07:00

What could be more fattening than a warm pasta bread bowl for $5.99 followed by a free lava crunch cake dessert. Is there another carbohydrate combination that could possibly pack more inches around America's middle? Domino's Pizza gets my nod as a brand butchering the health of Americans. Irresponsible social engineering.

General Motors Launches The MonteMaro

2009-08-10T16:04:00.000-07:00

With the adolescent that good looks lacking the sophisticated styling most of the market seeks and expects today General Motors once again misses the mark with the new Camaro - a throwback to what looks like a combination of the uber salesman's rental Monte Carlo and the Duke's of Hazard's Dodge Challenger. When will GM ever pay attention to seminal research done on its behalf wherein consumers said, "I want a car that says smart things about me." The new Camaro it isn't. GM products are still fulfilling consumer perceptions that, "Their products look like they're 10 years old before they're even new!" Where are the "drifters" that would at least tell Japanese auto execs to look out and maintain a low profile? Pony cars like this...wait...is that category still alive? Nissan just repositioned a segment of its business as "MOBILE DEVICES." Now that's KEWL! Who's in charge of mobile devices at GM - or do we still think that title pertains only to cell phones, text messaging and On-Star?

A New Found Respect For Ford

2009-07-04T16:03:00.000-07:00

Just because Ford avoided making the decisions that led the other two American car companies down the wrong path. When people at the other two car companies picked directions to pursue someone at Ford must have said, "let's go the other direction."

Why New Products Fail To Make Big Money

2009-06-08T16:54:00.000-07:00

Because new products that lack creativity are just line extensions. Case in point? 2008's most successful new product was Gatorade G2. It sold $159 million in the first 12 months. The last successful new product launched by anyone in the consumer packaged goods industry that sprinkled the effort with creative thinking was Frito-Lay's Baked Lays Potato Chips. It sold $310 million in it's first 10 months. No other new product has surpassed this level of first year sales in the consumer packaged goods industry for at least the past ten years. There's a lot of creativity not going around. But there sure are a heck of a lot of underperforming line extensions. You know Chunky Soup was going to be an extension of the Campbell's Brand. They were going to market it as a stew. Then creativity turned it into the soup you eat with a fork. It was the product that first pushed and sustained the Campbell Soup Company at over a billion dollars in sales way back in 1970. Why is this type of creativity so few and far between? Now there's a question.

Brand Me, Brand You and the Decline of New Products

2009-05-26T22:24:00.000-07:00

In the days before all the self-promotion brand me and brand you gurus marketers were far more curious; and new products frequently topped half a billion in sales in their first year. Then came the rise of brand me and brand you; brought to you by all the self-promotion gurus who made killings while the companies in which all the mes and yous worked saw declines in new business. As McKinsey reports, CPG execs [still] wonder where new growth will come from. The rise of the MEs was about the time everyone at companies like General Motors replaced the title on their business card with a new title that read, "Knower of all things." Hence systems were devised in companies like General Motors that deflected all responsibility away from individuals. You couldn't put your thumb on anyone for being responsible for anything. Thus began the commoditization of syndicated knowledge. Let's hire the people who tell us the things we already know rather than the people who can tell us things we don't know. What I already know is just easier to manage. We're doing fine. Hell, even at the end General Motors still owned 20% of the market. Hell, nothing to worry about here. Even in failure we have a way to convince ourselves, the brand MEs that GM's stunning failure is a success. The bar for excellence has dropped so low we can go to the head of the class just by showing up...or keeping some dealerships open. Forget Bruce Almighty. It's GM Almighty. Failure is the new black. And that's what the rise of brand ME or Brand You has brought us. Anyway, with the rise of brand me and the decline in outward looking forward thinking the impact of new products began to dwindle. Hell, they've damn faded, and the guys running the companies are being conned by a new nemesis called social marketing. Now we're touting the success of new products brought to us by a new messenger: social media. Companies like P&G and Del Monte Pet Products have new products generated by social media. The "community" created it. I took no risks. Yet none of the growth topped $100 million and not one social media product will top this year's or next year's top 10 most successful new products. Guaranteed. In 2008 the most successful new product anyone launched was Gatorade G2 at $159 million. The least successful new product I've ever conceived working with those pre-ME curious execs was Baked Lays. It sold $310 million in its first 10 months. I'm fairely safe in my contention that Del Monte's Breakfast Snacks for Pets will not move the needle past $60 million. But that won't stop others from following suit. Just no original thinking left in those MEs and YOUs. That's the greatest risk to new products. Now I'm not pooh, poohing new channels for product development but without doping people's thoughts with creativity before they create something you're just not going to get that $400+ million winner that comes from creating new knowledge that's never previously existed to be perceived, mapped or measured.

Calle & Company New Products Top IRI, NPD & ACNielsen 2008 Most Successful New Product Pacesetters for 56th Year

2009-05-14T09:23:00.000-07:00

I've said it before. My name is Martin Callé. I run Callé & Company, the most successful new products development company in the consumer packaged goods industry. Once again, our new products topped the best of IRI, NPD and ACNielsen’s most successful new product pacesetters for the 56th year. The least successful new product we ever conceived, Frito-Lay’s Baked Lays Potato Chips sold $310 million in its first 10 months. 2008’s most successful new product, Gatorade’s G2 sold only $159 million in its first year. So if our least successful new product beat their most successful new product conceived some other way, doesn’t that tell you that their best practices aren’t the best practices?

Data from market research companies like IRI, NPD and ACNielsen typically drive new product development in companies such as yours. And no one using that knowledge has been able to launch a more successful new product than ours in 56 years. In fact, ACNielsen has not launched a more successful new product since their founding in 1923. NPD has not launched a more successful new product since their founding in 1967. And IRI has not launched a more successful product since their founding in 1979.

We know companies want a better grip on consumer behavior than NPD provides. We know companies want new products to fly off the shelf faster than those piloted by IRI. We know you want to own and sustain a #1 position for ACNielsen to track. But IRI, NPD and ACNielsen data won’t take you there alone. For example, IRI, NPD and ACNielsen all thought Crock Pot Classics was a great opportunity for ConAgra. Slow-cooking was on the rise. More than 80 percent of US households owned slow cookers and 20 percent of families used slow cookers weekly. Yet Crock Pot Classics ended 2005 10th among 10 at only $71 million - well below Calle & Company’s average best in packaged goods benchmarks.

Higher functioning Calle & Company new products are ever present, yet never twice the same. They're creatively built upon consumer-conceived new knowledge that’s never existed to be mapped or measured. IRI, NPD and ACNielsen can’t do that. So when I say, “Callé & Company is the most successful new product development company in the consumer packaged goods industry,” I mean it. It’s true. So grab yourself one of our better performers. Let’s meet to discuss what everyone else is missing. Got 30 minutes? Let’s talk!

Southern California Sonic Boom

2009-04-07T13:43:00.000-07:00

Big one! 12:17 PM this afternoon. Anyone know what it is/was?

How Marketers Define "Convenience"

2009-04-03T08:50:00.000-07:00

THE CONVENIENCE BACKLASH

Marketers, always ones predisposed to put a positive spin on things, define "Convenience" a major attribute in packaged goods categories as, "time saving." Sounds good and irrefutable right? Well, at least we've all been conditioned to believe that this is true.

As SIEMENS defines convenience: Convenience enables the automation of the routine functions around the home to improve your comfort and enhance your lifestyle. Sounds like Siemens intends robots to take over every humanly function so that our brain cases become gelatinous gobs of goo. Insidious.

The truth is, "convenience" has conditioned us all to become "lazy" and poor "time managers." Why exercise those muscles when I don't have to. I have these "convenience" items to get me over the hump?

Everyone that's truly good at what they do has a mentor that makes them better. Donald Trump found a mentor when he wanted to air The Apprentice in founder/director of Reality Series Survivor - Mark Burnett. Tiger Woods found a mentor in his father. Each was a time manager.

Hey consumer, you can't do it alone, so don't rely on marketers. If you are a consumer find products that make you work your physical, emotional and mental muscles, that make you manage your time. Make your family your mentors. Take time, make time to bake those cookies from scratch. By forgetting how to use these muscles, the products that champion convenience made us weaker time managers, weaker organizers, weaker, weaker. And that's what's ruined the American economy today. Weak Americans bred by America's spin doctoring convenience marketers. Bad medicine.

We don't have time to relax. We don't have time to relax because we don't use our time wisely. It's relaxing to mix up a cake batter - from scratch. It's relaxing to make a meatloaf. Buying it premade in the refrigerated section of the grocery store only makes you rush on like you don't have time to the next thing. Get convenience, get relaxed, make it from scratch. Quality living and time management is the best convenience. And it's not so hard once you try.

Marketers, look out for the trend against "convenience" in the growing age of responsibility and accountability. Time, is the only commodity we can't get back - consumers want to spend it wisely, so make it a quality time experience. A good opportunity if you're someone like Gold Medal Flour.

What's Wrong With Marketing

2009-04-02T10:25:00.000-07:00

Perception. Self-Perception. Everyone has a way of convincing themselves they're number one in some way shape or form. But that's not true.

The managers managing brands think they're OK even if they're not number one. They think OK of themselves. They come to work today to do the same thing they did yesterday and what they will do tomorrow.

Avis tried harder for a long long time. Never made it past number two. And rifled through managements faster than you can shake a stick at. So, unable to come up with a better idea (lack of abstract problem-solving skills) the linear thinking problem solvers simply buzzed their We Try Harder into a famous campaign. Famous? Yes. Memorable? Yes. But that never translated into enough rental units moved to become #1. Memorability does not always equal more SUSTAINED sales. Neither does generating impressions, celebrity endorsements by Oprah or Tiger, etc.

Apple is not a brand name that slithers off the tongue. The Ps get in the way. But Avis is even more a brand name that slithers off your tongue. A man, and most travelers were men back in the heyday of car rental advertising ordered a Hertz...it almost sounded like a beer. Shemales rented an Avis. Now, the industry is so dominated by linear thinking cost cutting problem solving managements that it's a heavily price driven loyalty driven category that spends relatively little on advertising.

Well, when someone at one of these companies comes up with something important to say I guess they'll stop "branding" (It's what you do when you don't have anything important to say) and start "differentiating" themselves with a product-based reason-for-being communicated via traditional and electronic advertising.

Hell, General Motors wasted billions on shemalish advertising every year. All those people thought well of themselves and that they were doing the right thing everyday. Now look at 'em. Problem is/was, they design(ed) and build(t) products to rental car fleet standards. So what did that say about the people who bought their sedans on their own? Not much. I can hear what the neighbors are thinking. "Jesus! He/She bought a rental car." Bye bye GM.

How To Create A Brand Name

2009-03-31T16:40:00.000-07:00

Forget who you're targeting. Say what you do. That appeals to the broadest audience with a call-to-action AND a reason-for-being. Vaseline INTENSIVE CARE Lotion, COLD-FILTERED Miller Genuine Draft, BAKED Lays. Well. You get the point. Drop the letters, V, S, A, Z and any other letters that slither off your tongue. They make your name sound soft like a shemale. "What do you drive?" "I drive a Venza." Sounds like you have an STD. "What do you drive." "I drive a Versa." Brand names with soft letters (V & A) just don't sound like they work or would last a long time. Use lots of strong letters like R, M, L, F, G, D, C, N, etc. Folgers sounds like coffee that will wake you up. It's also the #1 brand of ground roast coffee. MGD; Miller Genuine Draft is the most successful brand launched by Miller Brewing in the last 25 years. Chanel just sounds like it will make you sexy.

Free at last. Free at last. Thank God Almighty. General Motors is free at last.

2009-03-30T09:31:00.000-07:00

It's not that General Motors product management ignores new product ideas that have a 97% top two box intent to purchase score among import-minded and domestic car buyers in bread and butter and higher margin luxury segments. It's not that they ignore those ideas even though they were presented with enough lead time to address current market conditions. You knew General Motors is/was really in trouble when letters on the subject sent to CEO Rick Wagoner went totally ignored. When those letters never reached his desk. When those letters were redirected by staff to underlings powerless to do anything about them - and who didn't have a care in the world about addressing company saving information further. But more importantly, you knew Genberal Motors is/was really in trouble when you followed up on those letters and you were told to call back because it takes Rick Wagoner's or any staffer's office five days just to acknowledge receipt of that letter. Way too slow in the information age and marketplace. If it takes five days just to log in a letter, imagine how slowly the organization responds to doing important work - like developing and properly marketing the products people want.

The answer isn't cost-cutting, delaying health benefit and pension plan disbursements or renegotiating union contracts and worker pay. Those are all the solution of linear thinking managements. The answer, rather than ignoring what people want and making what GM wants is to make what people want, not what trend forecasters say will sell. That's how GM and Detroit got stuck with all those SUVs. The problem is the results are , well, just too general. Not creative. Not abstract and interesting. Like one ex-head of GM strategy told me time and time again, "No one was/is going to save General Motors single handedly." Wagoner's ouster verifies that; but does it? He's been with the firm since 1977; steeped in the corporations culture so deeply that he never stood a chance. And that's the problem for other insiders. So if I were President Barak Obama, I'd bring in an outsider like Jim Sinegal who knows how to get things done at the speed of Kirkland as the CEO of Costco. Humble, efficient, a cracker-jack manager and he knows how to sell pallets of product everyday. Just the kind of volume General Motors needs. And you know what? American consumers are predisposed to want to buy cars a new way. We knew that 20 years ago. And GM didn't like the dealers either - always looking for new ways to eliminate those lengthy obligations, Abandon the dealers, streamline the pipeline and let people just order cars the way they shop for any other consumer good. Here's my credit card. Here's my down payment and my permission to automatically deduct each payment over the next 36 month. Kind of gets rid of the people with the bad credit and the whole finance infrastructure. Not needed to make the second most expensive purchase in your life today.

Why not take Saturn and make it the Kirkland brand. That'd be an interesting test! Then of course, there's my other solution for GM. Stop building cars altogether, lease the brand names to Toyota and let Toyota make the products in exchange for a payment on each and every sale to GM. What then to do with GM? Easy! Clean slate. Start over. Invent new product lines and brands. Sound hard? Not at all. At one time American's only had sticky paste and roll-ons as antiperspirants and deodorants. Then we invented a new form; Mennen Speed Stick; the first solid antiperspirant and still the most popular item in the category today. Just takes a little abstract thinking to determine what people want before they know they need it; then give it to them. Plenty of people happy to get paid $48 an hour to build cars since receiving their pink slips from the Japanese auto companies too.

The Relevance of Motown

2009-03-28T00:52:00.000-07:00

Not the record company. The Motor City. That's the question Detroit and the Big Three General Motors, Ford and Chrysler need to ask. What's the relevance of Motown? Obviously, their ridgid adherence to styling queues didn't do enough to set Oldsmobile apart. Oldsmobile's now extinct. So why'd they stick to portholes at Buick? Same reason. Dogma. Which is why portholes are still potholes at Buick. And when you see those portholes glued to the front quarter panels of some old import car you know they've given your brand equity the kiss of death. So what is the relevancy of brands such as Buick? Hopefully, the news of the auto maker's brands demise is premature. But the answer isn't in price. Once you trade on price your brand equity sinks so low you have to climb up a ladder to get to the bottom. And the US auto industry habitually throws promotions all the time - further decreasing their value. Now we can't get the credit even if we wanted to make a purchase. Quality, dependability, design and styling, J.D. Power Customer Satisfaction Surveys, Road & Track, Car & Driver and other media recognition, annual auto shows, all hype. And the only junkie who's hooked is our own US auto industry who continue to believe they can make what they want and use advertising to continue to convince us it's what we need.

Detroit's real salvation is in the identification of a Product Potential so relevant and meaningful to consumers that we'd mortgage our homes to buy their products. It's merely not sufficient to trot the "buy American" motto back out of mothballs. We've been there and done that. But as Procter & Gamble learned through Folgers it is possible to kick the habit. As all food and beverage manufacturers believe, we buy their products for taste, or flavor and aroma. Sometimes convenience. But that bar's too low. Of course you taste good. Otherwise I'll become a trier/rejector. But what is more relevant to heavy ground roast coffee consumers is "control." The best part of waking up is that stimulant in their cup. It helps them think earlier. They take flavor for granted.

And that's what Detroit needs to do. Realize that everything it says and does is taken for granted. Now give us a selling dimension that's more relevant to the US car buyer. It's all a matter of seeking out and finding that answer through the process of Perceptual Innovation. How you change the way we all think. Another "halo" new product just won't cut the mustard. We take 'em for granted.

And if they can't do it maybe they should hire Motown Record's founder Barry Gordy. At least he can identify a hit. He didn't make black music. As he said the other night, he makes music for everyone.

The Problem With Advertising

2009-03-26T08:25:00.000-07:00

The problem with advertising today is that it informs rather than sells. And there is a difference. Every time an ad informs it conveys the manufacturer's or provider's thoughts on a subject. A slice of thinking or tangent not relevant to all. As Simon Cowell would say on AMerican Idol; "an indulgence." That is different than focusing on a well-reasoned and highly differentiating reason-for-being for a product or service. The information ad only appeals to those who think like a minority - you - the ad or marketing manager. The ad that sells a reason-for-being makes the product or service relevant to a much larger audience. Examples on request.

MyStarbucksIdea.Com

2009-03-19T11:26:00.000-07:00

Does MyStarbucksIdea.Com actually make Starbucks a more valuable company or materially improve the value of the company's stock? Or is this just another self-pat on the back by those who email us singing the site's praises. It says it's been a year and 70,000 ideas later. But other than oatmeal for breakfast we have seen little. The company value/stock meter has not moved anywhere near the $22 lows it would hover before rebounding to thye $40s during the company's rapid growth phase. So who's still working on the real problem Starbuck's needs to address? "What do you do when the strategy that at one time made you all powerful has now rendered you a commodity? Obviously the solution will not be found by incumbent straight forward linear thinking problem solvers. As always in these situations the answer will be found in the realm of Perceptual Innovation that once again changes consumer habits and practices. A new product won't fix this. It's a consumer perception/positioning issue where the best answers are always abstract and so obvious they're just not obvious.

Memo from General Motors

2009-01-30T08:54:00.000-08:00

I received a note the other day from Maria at General Motors asking me to go visit GM Dealer showrooms and see if that doesn't cause me to reassess my position on the troubled car company, at present, living solely on borrowed time. Here is Maria's letter:

I work for GM, and wonder if you've visited a GM dealership recently? If not, I encourage you to test-drive award-winning vehicles like the Chevy Malibu, Buick Enclave and Cadillac CTS. Take a look at the photos of the upcoming Buick LaCrosse, Chevy Equinox, Cadillac SRX and the Cadillac Converj concept shown at the Detroit auto show last week. Vehicles like these have been extremely well received by the media and consumers, and are created for people who care deeply about beautiful design, reliable performance and fuel efficiency.Your reasoning suggests that if you're not number one, why bother. So should Pepsi slink away into oblivion because it hasn't caught up to Coke? By the way, GM led the U.S. auto industry by 750,000 vehicles in 2008, and is No. 1 in China, the world’s fastest growing market. But, eh, who’s counting, right?

So Maria, it sounds like you are another one of those corporate "younglings" (isn't that what George Lucas dubbed young Jedi in training in Star Wars - heads down, eyes covered, weilding light sabers blindly?). Maria, save yourself and don't deliver the same line I've heard from every generation of management at GM, and many other companies, for each of the last 40 years. The cars are no different and the ads all sound the same - perfect evidence that nothing's changing at GM, Ford or Chrysler. Yesterday I heard an ad about how I should buy a Cadillac because it's the product President Barak Obama is driven in.

Maria, do you have one of those coffee cups on your desk with the handle inside the mug? If you do, you will find the words "bass ackwards" imprinted on the inside bottom when you finish your coffee or tea. GM (and Ford and Chrysler) you've got it all (as Sean Connery would say in the Hunt for Red October) all wrong. You don't make what YOU want then use dealers, PR and advertising to tell us it's what we want. It's bass ackwards and all wrong.

How easy it is to turn potentially bright minds to the dark side and away from the force (known as Common Sense)

Thanks Maria. But I did visit GM dealerships yesterday anyway, and what I found did nothing to change my mind. I am what you now call a trier rejector. All I found was this year's version of last year's news - which for example is why portholes remain potholes at Buick and why Pontiac's positioning continues to suffer from pubescent development lag disease. (Pontiac is still making cars for adult teenagers who never matured mentally. In terms of age they may be adults but in terms of what appeals to them, they are old tweens. The experience? Completely uneventful. And no wonder. It takes about 5 years to get a car from concept to production/3 years on the fast track. Since GM was on the skids, a position well hidden back then, what's on the floor now and for the next couple of years will be, well, ho hum. Guaranteeing that the government bailout money will run out well before GM effects a turnaround - making it even dumber for ex-President Bush to give them some pocket change in the first place. I'd start sending out my resume Maria.

What's GM's best option? Stop manufacturing cars. License the names Toyota wants to Toyota. Let Toyota manufacture and market the cars and GM can collect a fee. This way, GM can cancel all the union contracts and the workers can earn a decent $48 an hour working for Toyota rather than the $78 at GM. Let GM and Mr. Goodwrench snap up hundreds of Jiffy Lube locations across the country and provide maintenance services. Like the name says, General Motors products are well, just too general, but I think they can do repairs on commodity vehicles very well. I've always liked their service and parts people anyway. GM hasn't done much to devastate my perception of them.

What's my solution for the US auto industry Ford, GM and Chrysler? Lump the three companies together in one company, get rid of the CEOs and Boards, bring in Costco's Jim Sinegal to manage the companies and make certain that the products offered meet Kirkland's brand standards. Sell the cars through Costco as well. No one likes dealerships anymore. By the way, Sinegal isn't a payroll hog either. He's quite humble and effective. And no, I'm not Jim Sinegal's talent agent.

General Motors Pisses On Consumers Again

2009-01-22T10:05:00.000-08:00

As part of the agreement made by Ex-President Bush to give General Motors part of an industry $17 billion bailout The Associate Press reports General Motors has yet to clean house of dunderheads who forget to engage brains before opening mouth.

According to an Associated Press article which sites GM's loss of the number one auto sales position to Toyota GM's Executive Director of global market and industry analysis Mike DiGiovanni downplayed the significance of the drop to number two saying the automaker is focused on profitability rather than sales volume. "I don't think being number one in vehicle sales means all that much at all to the American consumer. I think what matters most to the is consumer is strong brands and strong products..."

Jesus Mike! How do you have strong products and brands if you're not number one? Those are the strong products and brands! This statement is about as intelligent a move as your CEO flying to DC on a private jet asking for a handout. Seriously. It's in the same league. Did your PR department approve this statement before you let fly? Are your advertising agencies reviving an Avis like "We try harder" campaign? Mike, this type of thinking is why GM stock was trading around $3.50 yesterday. Oh, that's right Mike, I forgot. It's OK to say stupid things that influence consumer perception by telling us being a winner isn't important. Or did you never learn that Americans love winners? Your excuse for being stuck on stupid? ...GM is a penny stock company and penny stock companies don't employ the best, the brightest or those with much common sense. That's why they're penny stocks instead of corporate leaders. I won't even have to look today to know GM stock selling even lower.

But this type of gaff reminds me of another GM story years ago when GM hired a Deputy Director of the US Census named Vince Barabba to come in and give the company "a voice of the consumer." Vince met me in his office to explain he believed there was "a market for people who wanted cars that didn't look good." I had to ask Vince to repeat the objective of that new product assignment before I graciously declined to participate. I left. Vince stayed. Vince didn't last long at General Motors and neither did his Chevy Lumina.

If GM was Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz do you think they and CEO Rick Wagner wake up each morning tapping their heels together saying, "It's not about sales. It's not about sales."

Let The US Auto Industry Fail

2008-11-18T10:32:00.000-08:00

Failure. It's the price General Motors, Ford and Chrysler will have to pay for decades of making what they wanted then trying to make us believe it was what we needed. Don't bail them out. Like children, they got what they wanted every time they asked and they never learned to fend for themselves. There is a book on this called Cornucopia Kids. It's about why so many college graduates end up living back at home.

Many times I presented what domestic and import car buyers said they wanted only to watch the Big 3 go in completely the opposite direction with their ad agencies as strategic partners. Before many a c-suite presentation the head of strategy would whisper in my ear how many friends I had in the room, but that no one was going to save these companies single-handedly. Now there's the death knell of an arrogant corporate culture.

Through many product launch failures these companies had plenty of opportunities to begin again more intelligently...isn't that what Henry Ford said? Instead, they just kept letting history repeat itself and loosing became a habit.

Could You Predict Obama's Victory?

2008-11-05T20:03:00.000-08:00

Were you a pre-election McCain supporter yet working in new products, consumer insights or strategic innovation? My opinion? If you could not predict Obama's victory as clearly as Jedi Master Yoda can see the future you need to ask yourself if you are in the right business. If you needed polls to keep track of where either candidate ranked, you are definitely in the wrong business.

MARKETERS: You're SOLVING the WRONG problems?

2008-09-05T10:37:00.000-07:00

Stop! You’re solving the wrong problem!

(A bed time tale) At one time you could create new products based on consumer want and need. Brand relevancy was easy. You were one of a kind. Then the pool of easy-to-see wants and needs dried up. Copy-cats tom, dick and harry converged on the same position doing the same thing with their own new products. Categories got crowded. Unable to better differentiate products, marketers resorted to pre-conceived strategies developed on their own. Boiler plate templates like price value propositions or recipe dissemination. Suddenly directly-connected consumers lost contact with original brands and became distant cousins. Heavily segmented price-driven commodity categories ensued due to self-inflicted wounds that sliced and diced categories until consumers strongly sought price-driven quality brands like Kirkland instead. The once powerful ‘brand’ began trading on price. As new generations of management moved in, consumer’s ability to relate weakened. We had so many things no one could put their finger on what they wanted. Purchases were not reasoned; with plenty of free credit people impulse-purchased even high ticket items. Brand equity sank so low it had to climb up a ladder to get to the bottom. As modern CMOs leveraged ever-proliferating media and networking solutions to reach smaller and smaller audiences to deliver watered down strategies generating only awareness and recognition, finding highly differentiated product-based growth solutions to secure sales took a back seat. But, doing the homework to find highly differentiated growth solutions to stir sincere consumer emotions, perceptions and purchase motivations remained easy. As more brands set up tents in categories crowding out older tenants we retained the original ability to find unique product-based selling solutions that create more space in densely populated neighborhoods. The only difference today, as then, is that the best new answers are so obvious they’re not obvious. They’re abstract, and exert a stronger pull on consumer’s hearts and minds than anything you could imagine. Since the dawn of categories, seeing unique business solutions requires Abstract Creativity®.

The Relevance of Brand Relevance

2008-09-04T12:03:00.000-07:00

Why is it that people running brands ranked 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th or 7th in a category can convince themselves that their brand is relevant. The same might also be asked if you were number two - say Anacin versus Tylenol or Advil. The same might be asked if you were a little brand like E.E. Dickenson's Witch Hazel or Gold Bond Powder. Why wouldn't they like to be a billion dollar brand instead of a couple of hundred million.

I never was one who thought much of that Avis, We try Harder shtick to justify being number two. Avis was just less relevant. Same goes for Adidas versus Nike or Maxwell House versus Folgers or Kraft Mayonnaise versus Hellman's/Best Foods, etc. So who wouldn't want to take that also ran brand and turn it into number one? When I used to run sales competitions first place would get a great prize, third place would get the same great prize and second place got a buck. Why? To drive home the point that no one remembers second place. In terms of relevance - that brand and the ones that followed were somehow wrongfully (or fatally) hitting the target between the eyes.

IAC/InterActiveCorp (IAC) & Ask.Com To Close Bloglines?

2008-08-21T10:55:00.000-07:00

For those of you who don't know Bloglines is a FREE online service for searching, subscribing, creating and sharing news feeds, blogs and rich web content. Bloglines offers (so they say) "the most features for people who like their online news to be fresh. It’s the most popular website of its kind, indexing millions of new online articles every day."

So many popular bloggers, including myself, submit their feeds to Bloglines making it easier for readers to find valuable content. But there is a catch. When submitting your feeds as a publisher you must "claim" your feeds and await "authentication" from bloglines. To date, my feed status for "authentication" has been "pending" for two years. You do so much work on a blog that you tend to let things like this go back burner. So recently, I checked in with Bloglines again only to have found the problem still unresolved. So I made it my mission to resolve this situation.

Within the last 48 hours I have discovered that no matter how hard you try to "claim" your feeds, you can't. The user id field is prepopulated with a user name that is not your own...so you can't log in...and you consequently never can receive or re-request the "verification" email required to complete the process. Checking with the online support links I did find someone say the situation could be resolved by using the new Bloglines beta, but that doesn't work either.

Since I couldn't log in I resubmitted the "lost my password" form. You don't get a response because they say they don't have your email address on file.

If you try to resubmit your blog with your email and password they say that account already exists (but as I said, it's inoperative).

So I started making calls to Barry Diller's office. He's the head of IAC in Manhattan. I found out a guy named Eric Engleman is Blogline's General Manager. Eric Engleman's phone number is 510 985 7744. (From my due diligence - trying to fix the problem on my own - I found lots of us are having the same problem - so hey guys, this number's for you!) Additionally, Bloglines general phone number for Oakland (they're apparently no longer in Campbell, CA as the web site says) is 510 985 7400. They also have a useless customer service number that practically says we won't call you back - 510 985 8119. I just called IAC HQ in Manhattan again learning there is another Bloglines customer support number 510 985 8114. I'll try that next. (oops. just tried it. don't waste your dime. just a recorded message that sends you back to the (useless) help forums).

I spent the day yesterday resolved to correct this situation. I called IAC HQ in New York at 212 314 7300. The reception operators generally draw a blank when you ask for Bloglines. They don't know what it is (are you getting the sense there's no leadership here?) ... so you have to tell them what it is and that it operates (to my knowledge) as part of ASK.com (which is having its own obvious problems). At least that generates some recognition. They give you an IAC Customer Applications & Portal help number...914 826 2000, but when you call (and they are nice people) they disavow any knowledge or assitance with Bloglines.

So kind of like Mission Impossible, that's what I've learned to date. Is Bloglines working or not working. I don't know. But I do know I tried it and didn't like it so I probably won't buy it again...and niether should you. If you have any knowledge, please contribute. Thanks! I thought this could have been a short-term Bloglines maintenance issue, but two years?

What do you think of the new Starbucks promotion

2008-08-20T11:29:00.000-07:00

Here in my sunny southern California stores they don't sell the afternoon drink for $2. They give it to you for free after 2PM with a morning receipt. Observed net impact; a shift of consumer behavior; an influx of pairs-traffic at 1:55 followed by freebies delivered at 2:05 according to local Starbucks baristas. Not sure that helps. But it sure is hard to hold off that morning purchase until early afternoon.

The Power Of Mind

2008-08-18T15:42:00.001-07:00

The power of one mind is magnificent. The power of multiple minds on the same problem is exponential.

Consultant's Trained Brains, Consumer Creatives and Brand Ambassadors

2008-08-18T15:27:00.000-07:00

In how many ways do consultant's trained brains, pre-selected consumer creatives and brainstorming brand ambassadors provide false positives skewing direction and slowing the expansion of brands and the success of new products?

Questions

2008-08-18T12:43:00.000-07:00

Of what good are questions if your mind is not inspired beyond those things of which you are already aware? Hence the saying, "You can't ask a question you don't already know the answer to." This is the classic consumer packaged goods bottleneck in strategic innovation, consumer insight, brand expansion and new products. To stop your ideas from going up in a cloud of smoke, such as what would it take to increase brand IKEA's relevancy, you must stimulate all minds, marketer and consumer, beyond all current frames of reference.

KRAFT UNREAL?

2008-08-14T10:29:00.000-07:00

If arch rival Best Foods/Hellmanns Mayo is so well entrenched as the "Real" Mayonaisse, why doesn't Kraft Mayo, long the category's also ran who uses Miracle Whip as its Halo-Crutch just stick their tongue in cheek? "Unreal" is such an exclamation of so many incredible things! I can see the spots now with hungry teenagers ripping into sandwiches slathered with Kraft Mayo nodding their approval, skateboards in tow. "Unreal dude." A sign of approval. And let's not forget, younger kids always want what the older kids have.

Automotive Agenda

2008-08-13T17:17:00.000-07:00

Here would be an interesting metric for the auto industry.

I was thinking about ways using metrics creates job security and insulates one from doing anything that actually makes a significant impact on the business when I had this thought.

What percentage of a new car's price or value should go into its repair and maintanence over its lifetime?

I'm sure the auto industry has that number, and wouldn't it be an interesting number to see on new and used car stickers. Bet it would drive down the cost of dealer repairs and shake other things up - and it should be there right next to the mpg sticker. But I'm still thinking of the benefits that would accrue to the end user - you and me.

ANALYTICS IS SO POPULAR IN BUSINESS BECAUSE

2008-08-13T09:47:00.000-07:00

Analytics and metrics are so popular in business because business men and women believe trends are things that stare up at you dead and lifeless from a slide on a microscope that's easy for us to move around. With the keyword being easy. It's dead. It doesn't move. Anyone can do it. And anyone who drives their business with this information is bound to end up roadkill, or existing on the artificial life support of today's media. Takes massive amounts of infusion to keep "the brand" out there.

So studying the past in a petri dish won't engage the future - otherwise every brand, manufacturer and ad agency would be doing a whole lot better. It's a hostile environment in which to create new products or turnaround brands not doing well. No matter what anyone says, you can't measure your way to a breakthrough. Trends that pop out of numbers are like studying an earthquake, by the time you analyze the data, the event will be long past.

BRAND DOPING ON RISE AS OLYMPICS CONTINUE

2008-08-11T12:56:00.000-07:00

Are you doping brands?
doping refers to the use of performance-enhancers forbidden by organizations that regulate competitions. Doping is mostly done to improve performance.

Increase in marketing performance for several brands triggers probe. Prosecutors widen investigation into use of illicit creative steroids; tampering with established CPG category brand positions.

Cincinnati (AP) Prosecutors investigating C-level brand management practices at Procter & Gamble today confirmed use of performance-enhancing creativity to dope brands. Use of Abstract Dimensioning® (known on the street as AD), and other forms of banned creative stimulants manufactured by Calle & Company under the names Multi-Dimensional Consumer-Creativity® and Culturally Influential Consumer Groups® are all practices forbidden by key trade organizations that regulate competition including the 4 As, Marketing Research Association and the Grocery Marketing Association. Each has denied the practice of brand doping exists despite unusual performance spikes attributed to many once flat-selling brands. Prosecutors said they would expand their search immediately to other high profile incidents in consumer packaged goods, auto, retail, restaurant, financial and pharmaceuticals. Facing stiff penalties for illicit tampering with category positioning and new product innovation, unnamed Procter & Gamble executives with a promise of immunity defended the company’s use of performance growth stimulants (such as BGH – brand growth hormone) citing dramatic increases in brand strength and rejuvenation of older slower moving brands.

In a stinging retort to allegations that his brand and team had been using the illegal creative steroids marketing superstar Lance Brandstrong said yesterday that all accusations are without foundation. "We had permission to bring every performance-enhancing product we could envision to use. We do it by the book. We get everything authorized. We seek only unique selling propositions and have no idea what that guy was talking about when he pitched us on identifying new Special User Effects® as the underpinning to every great breakthrough.” In addition he said, “I have never injected or ingested any consumer information that I didn’t already know and I have never engaged the services of Calle & Company’s Consumer-Creative® Assays® to audit something that I did already know or suspect. I would never do that.”

Prosecutors believe the practice of brand doping providing an unfair marketing advantage over rivals, in markets and with consumers to be widespread - but the practice is hard to pin down because brand people don’t apply the illegal creativity to all of their brands all at the same time. “You have to wait for one brand in one category to unexplainably make a significant leap forward overnight. That’s our first clue” said a high-ranking source wishing to remain anonymous.

Companies under investigation in the widespread brand doping and market position corruption scheme include Kraft Foods, Nestle, ConAgra, Unilever, Colgate-Palmolive, Campbell Soup, Gerber Baby Foods, Pepperidge Farm, Entenmann’s Bakery, Brown-Forman, Miller Brewing, Ferrera USA, The Coca-Cola Company, Frito-Lay, Pepsi, Mead-Johnson. Janssen Pharmaceutica, Johnson & Johnson, McNeil, Schering-Plough, Bristol-Myers Squibb, GlaxoSmithKline, The Mennen Company, Chesebrough-Ponds, Clairol, L’Oreal, Noxell, General Foods, Lehn & Fink, The Drackett Company and more. And aggressive young prosecutors looking to make a name for themselves want to land indictments against other companies soon. A Federal Trade Commission spokesman said the agency is investigating the use of banned Abstract Dimensioning® and other forms of breakthrough creativity marketed by Calle & Company. (OK, I admit it. I've been doping brands with enhanced creativity for years. Like Nixon, I just got caught.)

To report suspected brand doping:
Brand Doping Hotline
714 244 9511
Category prosecutors are standing by to take your call.

OraQuel® Toothbrush Cleaner - Heart Smart Oral Care

2008-08-08T21:36:00.000-07:00

Would you eat breakfast with a fork you only licked clean last night?

The Anacin Syndrome

2008-08-08T17:06:00.000-07:00

Is your business suffering from The Anacin Syndrome? And what is The Anacin Syndrome? The Anacin Syndrome is my metaphore for all that has to do with the dropping of standards. During the 50's, when brands like Anacin were at their peak, words like "competent" meant that you were just one step above moron. Now the word competent means you practically own a Ph.D. Well these days being "average" has gotten so bad that you can go to the head of the class just by showing up. But why did things change? How did these lax standards come about? Well, about the time brands like Anacin were popular, moms had just started going into the workforce for the first time. They'd come home tired, stressed and hungry - and still faced a home and family to manage! Hence Anacin's most memorable ads. Moms snapping at little children! Close up on mom: hand to forehead: Voiceover: "Sure you have a headache. You're tense and irritable. But don't take it out on her!" Why if you ran that ad today you'd be accused of depicting child abuse. Back then it was just reality TV. Well, more moms and dads are working today than ever before. They don't have time for all this. Hell, I've even had marketers tell me I'm damn good. But the problem is, I make them think. Too hard. They don't have time for this. I maintain that all great minds like a good think. They just don't exercise the muscle often enough to maintain its competency.

Hence the current trend to hurry up the maturing of kids faster - or the growth of brands. As workers, we don't have the time to correctly nurture the majority of children or brands. Well nurtured children and brands are now in the minority. Hence, Vanessa Hudgins posing nude for Disney when just 18. Miley Cirus partially nude at 14 or 15. You get the picture. Pretty soon you could run the same Anacin ad depicting 13 year olds in place of mom! "Sure school's tough. You're tense, your irritable. But don't take it out on your little brother!" So many people self-prescribe, who would stop the kids? And that's why companies can't fix themselves.

And that's what's happened in marketing. We no longer sell brands. It's too hard to find an ownable brand specific reason for being that substantively differentiates one product from another. Though I have the know how I can't find a brand in any category that says anything different than their rival. They just say it in a different way. Guess it's called commoditization and it's the price brands pay for not taking the time to do their homework. As a result we are inundated with category sells and not brand sells. It's too hard to find something different to say about your product - so we invented branding - it's what you do when you don't have anything important to say. Sure Starbucks has a headache. Howard Schultz is tense and irritable, but don't take it out on the business! And that's The Anacin Syndrome.

ARE YOU YOUR COMPANY'S BOTTLENECK?

2008-08-05T14:53:00.001-07:00

LEADERS ARE READERS So make certain you take the time to read the things that come in from people and companies you don't know. They're excited about what they do which is why they are calling with something you don't know. Don't have the time? Consider this. It takes General Motors five days just to acknowledge receipt of a letter to head honcho Rick Wagoner. Look at the shape General Motors is in. And casual indifference to new thinking is killing Starbucks.

WAS PRESIDENT BUSH A BOY SCOUT?

2008-08-05T14:32:00.000-07:00

IS HE LEAVING AMERICA BETTER THAN HE FOUND IT?

PRUNE YOUR THINKING

2008-08-04T11:10:00.000-07:00

Marketing strategy: Prune your thinking to promote new growth.

There is a saying among leaders (anywhere) that you have to give up to go up. And someone just asked me what that meant. The hardest things to give up are our ideas and beliefs; like what drives a business, but overall it means 'sacrifice' and in the broadest sense acting in others best interest before you act for yourself, "when you help others get what they want, you get what you want," which is sure a pure thought that it is like the perfectly cured medium rare T-bone steak because if you help more people buy your product, just by pruning your thoughts to promote new growth, you win!

In business to sacrifice and help others get what they want, like a higher stock price or more consumer traffic, it has always proven the most expedient and effective device to prune your thinking. Yes, you have to prune your thinking to promote new growth. Sounds easy, but in business, and in marketing that business, people don't like pruning their thinking to promote new growth. As sales guru Zig Ziglar said, "People cling to their ideas more tenaciously than their most prized material possessions. The Chairman or CEO of a company will get a new lease on a new vehicle or give up his or her home and move, but the thoughts stay in place.

Now there is a thought that you have to tell consumers the same thing over and over again to build a number of impressions, but in the case of brands like Folgers or categories like OTC remedies, the thoughts have remained the same for decades...while consumer thinking changes at the pace of the next internet article read.

Distilled Intelligence - What's your DQ?

2008-08-03T23:14:00.000-07:00

I’ve always had a penchant for distilled intelligence, and now I have another reason, Sweden’s vodka. The latest to tickle the palate is Nordic Spirit, the first publicly owned vodka manufacturer to emerge in Sweden since the government's monopoly on the spirit’s production was disbanded. I want the account of a company that thinks this abstractly! What a great new product!

Nordic Spirit professes to be one of the purest premium vodka on the international market. Under the moniker, DQ (meaning ‘distilled intelligence’), this luxury spirit has been in development for the last 10 years. What a great positioning; like that short lived 'think earlier' print campaign for Starbucks which sold caffiene, just like the best part of waking up is Folgers in your cup..

DQ is distilled in the government-protected Malmköping springs, a feature which formed almost two million years ago. The water is naturally soft, filtered and fortified. In the Nordic Spirit bottling plant, a connecting pipeline to the natural springs allows them to blend their distilled DQ spirit with this purified water, close to the source.

Even the method of wheat production is steeped in tradition, with seeds planted in autumn and allowed to mature during the eight winter months, making the grains of superior quality.
The result is an ultra smooth, complex vodka that slips down as gently as a shot of pure spring water. The bottle is an appropriately sleek mix of Italian glass and brushed aluminium, topped off with a specially developed nozzle that maintains the quality and freshness within. A must for any discerning drinker. What's your DQ?

THE SIMILARITIES OF EARTHQUAKES, MARKETING AND KNOWLEDGE

2008-07-31T17:00:00.000-07:00

Marketing. knowledge and earthquakes have a lot in common. By the time you model and analyze the data the event has already happened. Working after the fact, reactions are behind the curve. And no matter how hard you study the past, it will not give you all that you need to know for the present. You can plan and anticipate, but it can not predict the next event. You can only fall back on everything you know about earthquakes and/or your business - and that resides within knowledge of established habits and practices. In marketing to consumers, only the ability to create new knowledge, that which does not yet exist (so it can not be gathered and measured) can put you in control and position you ahead of the curve to jolt an industry, business, category, segment or brand like the image here.

TURNING SPARE CHANGE INTO STAR BUCKS

2008-07-31T10:03:00.000-07:00

I allocate a lot of time to Starbucks because it is a classic example of the rise and fall of a great brand - and because I was one of the company's early adapters in terms of product usage and portfolio holdings. And it all happened in one of the shortest times on record, so it is a great example of what not to do. Time was, you could go into Starbucks with a buck or a buck twenty five and get a great cup of coffee, then expenses and overhead went up as the brand "grew" to become more things to more people. Rather than a great place to go for some quality time that didn't cost an arm and a leg Starbucks became a planned distination for which one had to determine if a stop at an ATM was necessary before dropping by. The beginning of the end.

Now no one believes that recipe dissemination, a few novelty fro-yo drinks, closing stores, trimming the payroll and soliciting user-generated input via an online portal will affect Starbuck's turnaround. The cost reductions are a technical mandate, but the rebuild of unit sales and dollar volume requires the creation of new consumer knowledge (as in tell me something new about yourself) to raise the bar and get foot traffic flowing in the door again. Why not target a number like 400 customers per hour on any given average hour? Why not? That's what Costco does. And why do this? Because every decision Starbucks now makes is based on established consumer habits and practice. And Starbucks already knows what that gets them. I think their stock is trading around $14 a share.

SAVING STARBUCKS

2008-07-30T16:15:00.000-07:00

With every cut more water is pouring into the hold of the Titanic. Why would you want to fire all those people and let all that experience go to a competitor - just because you couldn't find a better answer?

Everything the past, present and future team at Starbucks knows about its business is based on established consumer habits and practices and no matter how hard you study the past it will never tell you all you need to know for the present. The demand to create new consumer knowledge, that which has never existed to be gathered and measured is essential for Starbucks to immediately generate significant incremental unit and dollar volume sales. And I'd like to demonstrate how that worked at P&G on Folgers and Pampers, just to prove it works everytime to those who think it's impossible to generate incremental AM usage occassions. It is the most immediate way to impact a brand and business. No layoffs, no store closures. Nobody quits when you're making money. So what's to loose?

ARE YOU TARGETING THE NEW AMERICAN UBER CLASS? THE BUDGETEERS

2008-07-30T10:17:00.000-07:00

Yes, as the name implies, the new American super segment to target is the Budgeteers. Much like Disney's original Mouseketeers these current financial American innocents are adults in age only when it comes to managing money. And what would you expect? Since the invention of the credit card in 1958 these financial innocents have been encourage to constantly indulge and dip their hand in the financial cookie jar (it's irresistible) to live far beyond their means so the credit pimp (finance industry) could live well. Hence, America's current financial crisis.

To put a positive spin on Budgeteers would be to think that they are frugal people and manage money well, reading Money Magazine and always putting their money in the accounts that pay the most interest and employ credit cards with the lowest interest rates. But that's not true. That is the minority. The Budgeteers are a much larger vaster segment..."Cornucopia Kids" bred by campaigns like "Life Takes Visa" (and decades of similar before) to consume more than they bring in. They live at the intersection of "can just barely get a credit card" and "I'll never be able to pay all this back." Hooked by the purchase pimp these finance-children, with their hands in the credit and finance cookie jar take out jumbo loans with no doc or easy doc applications, they lease vehicles to have more than they can actually afford, and when they turn leased vehicles in, (more than 70% of the vehicles on the road are leased) the auto industry finds it difficult to dispose of them, which hurts the auto industry. And these are the people who came from the homes that run our finance and mortgage industry today! No wonder it finally got all fouled up. The day of reckoning arrived and it's time to go to the woodshed. It's all illusionary wealth and we blanket ourselves each night in the illusion of financial security while the simmering financial stress drives us to seek Tylenol PM and therapy for attention deficit disorder children unhinged by little more than watching their parents create a daily atmosphere of monetary paranoia and financial misery. That's insecurity. It would be hard for me to pay attention in such a household too.

The smart Budgeteers will learn from this experience and adjust their priorities advancing to middle school. They are the minority. The rest of America's Budgeteers, captured by the financial pimp will continue to be held back in financial elementary school earning their C- and D+ on their report cards. We're a long way from Ray Bradbury's blissful 24th Century Star Trek utopia where human-kind no longer needs money and lives in pursuit of improvement.

We would have a much kinder, gentler and more fiscally responsive America if retailers did away with credit cards and loyalty programs. Just offer good products and friendly service. That would be an incentive for management to get back in touch with employees. Would these businesses, like Home Depot shrink? Of course they would. Down to their "reality" size rather than their credit inflated illusionary bottom lines.

HUGE EARTHQUAKE JUST HIT ORANGE COUNTY, CALIFORNIA

2008-07-29T11:48:00.000-07:00

Hi. I was just working in my office and an enormous earthquake just hit here in Villa Park, CA in central Orange County, just by the City of Orange, south of Los Angeles. My entire office shook! No camera to play video but the walls rocked. It was a back and forth. Went on for almost 30 seconds. Going to inspect for damage now. Real biggy. More updates if aftershocks occure. Thanks. Sure scared me. Floor moved enough that I stumbled trying to get out. Aftershocks happening now. Dogs barking before. They sense it. Deep. Continuing.

STARBUCKS...HOW SAD

2008-07-29T11:11:00.000-07:00

Did I die at Starbucks and wake up in Aunt Gloria Jeans Tea Room? Selling frozen novelty yogurt drinks called Sorbetto at Starbucks is a clear signal the coffee purveyor's brand equity compass is way off track. This isn't even making Howrd Schultz look good if he's trying to stabilize the company for a sale. Selling non coffee drinks at Starbucks, especially frozen yogurt novelties is like Campbells Soup Company selling Chunky Soup as a stew in a can instead of "the soup you eat with a fork." That's how you biuld the equity of a soup company as a soup company. Starbucks. Desperate. The company hasn't even taken coffee 20% of where it can go, and they're already turning in non-coffee directions. And, not to be critical, but those Pepto-Bismol colored splats placed on Starbuck's store floors look like some sick kid yakked. Then people walk on it and it's even more revolting and unappetizing. Looks like some stores in-need-of-repair restrooms. Rating: Thumbs down. Coffee loyalists, Turn around and walk out. Newly [re] appointed marketing head Michelle Gass has her work cut out.

THE AIRLINES - GOOGLE'S LEAST LIKELY EVOLUTIONARY RIVAL

2008-07-28T11:25:00.000-07:00

As commodities, heavily price driven US airline brands are going the way of the old Greyhound Bus Lines and dodo bird. What needs are actually served by physical travel save sentiment? If an airline's overhead is so great that it cannot sustain itself, then what should or could an airline become without its hardware and overhead...and what prescient Chairman or CEO is asking this question? With baggage fees bringing in no more than beer money airline marketing seems missing in action. Sure airlines stand for travel, but what does travel stand for? Communication? Enrichment? and how can that be served by communication without travel? Who would be the first airline to compete with Google? And how unlikely would that be? With the first chinks appearing in Google's armour, could an airline remold itself into the next travel/search/communication engine? Is it more likely that this new business entity replace the Face Book? And with a slight twist of wrist revolutionize social marketing and networking? And how would that occur? Where are the Special User Effects that are the underpinnings of great unique selling propositions? (like the identification of 'development' that took Pampers $1.6 billion in annual sales beyond 'fit' and 'dryness') Where are the reasons to try an airline, and if I try it and like it to fly it again? When the industry needs direction most Madison Avenue too seems MIA. Awareness and recognition pap like Fly the friendly skies isn't going to cut the mustard here or impact consumer habits and practices. There is a clear need now for a market share war and not based on price. Two things, 1) when you talk price it spooks those already facing shaky personal and professional budgets; 2) when you talk price (like Chrysler's $2.99 a gallon gas promotion) your brand equity sinks so low you have to climb up a ladder to get to the bottom. Christ! Sell your cars based on their substantiated reason's for being. Cars, airlines = modes of transportation = for business or pleasure. Tell me something I don't know. That's what the brand doctor orders here!

BACKSEAT DRIVING WITH HARVARD'S CLAYTON CHRISTENSEN AND DISTRUPTIVE TECHNOLOGIES

2008-07-22T11:06:00.000-07:00

Innovation starts in the mind, not in the laboratory - so without stimulating R&D and innovation execs minds beyond their current frames of reference, innovation becomes the next best thing - supplier or vendor ideas, packaging and delivery system evolutions, etc. You can't start in the lab and work backward. You have to start in the mind and go forward.

TOILET PAPER FOR DIETERS

2008-07-19T16:28:00.000-07:00

One of the fun things about my job is that I get to have new product thoughts no one else has ever had; And the best part about the best ideas is that they always seem to draw connections between two things that have never been connected before, or that have no reason to be connected in the first place...like toilet paper and dieters. Knowledge is the by product (no pun intended) of my unique job in the consumer packaged goods industry (and believe me, I've learned more from the crappy ideas than from the billion dollar winners) - while everyone else is busy scurrying around gathering and measuring data, I create new knowledge for purposes of strategic innovation, consumer insights and new product concept development - quite a number of which have fallen into the 'heavy-hitter' category over the years, and more into the toilet bowl.

But you want to argue with the notion that no one has ever had the idea of "toilet paper for dieters" before? Maybe someone has - so go ahead and Google it because I couldn't find it. And why shouldn't Americans have the right to purchase "toilet paper for dieters." There's an obesity epidemic in America, so a lot of solid material from over consumption is getting flushed down the bowl while we simultaneously try to eat less. It's like a daily good cop bad cop routine. I stuff my face, then feel guilty about it convincing myself that one less leg of fried chicken or one less Pillsbury dinner roll is going to make a difference. I've been drinking Lite beer for years and it hasn't changed my waistline. I flog myself for a lifetime. Yes, one of my clients has been Jenny Craig.

But back to TP for Dieters. You snicker it's a silly idea. Oh yeah!? You wouldn't if you saw it rolled out by P&G and Charmin or KC and Scott Paper. After all it's been A LONG TIME since anyone innovated in the toilet tissue category. A roll of paper has been a roll of paper for since before your grandfather. People used to laugh at the idea of just having a second cold symptom remedy relief product. Everyone used Dristan and incredulously asked why they might need something else. Then we turned their tablet into a liquid. Prototypes were perceived to do a better job of providing night time tranquility. The day before every Consumer Packaged Goods executive laughed at the idea of segmenting the cold symptom relief category. The day after, they had NyQuil. They stopped laughing because NyQuil took nearly 70 share from Dristan overnight and opened the door for the flood of symptom relievers that followed. We just blazed the trail.

So is TP for Dieters a worthwhile idea? Probably not. Because it is the byproduct of my own mind and not that of consumers, and unless consumers say "make it so" the product has no reason-for-being. But if they did want it what might it be like? Would it be slippery or coarse, thick of thin, smooth like Lays or ridged like Ruffles? And why does it have to be flat? Can it be inserted? Would it change color like pregnancy tests to indicate carbohydrate versus protein metabolizing. How about indicating stool moisture content? (And they said I'd be embarrassed speaking with women about their daily hygiene needs for Maxi Pads and Tampons.) I THINK TOILET PAPER SHOULD BECOME DIAGNOSTIC. There'd be a great market in hospitals alone. Would there be different TP segments for people with different weight loss goals? People who want to loose 20 pounds this year versus 40. Is there a competitive segmentation for dieters on TV - Reality Shows like America's Biggest Loser? And then again, there isn't a single toilet paper that gives me a sensual pleasure. Why shouldn't there be one? Sure would make me feel better about over eating. I wonder if the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex ever looked into this? Probably not because that's not where young executive minds go. But if a guy from IU can go there I'm sure P&G can too. But maybe again, the idea isn't worth the paper it's written on, and then again, maybe it is. Sure are a few technology patent ideas here if someone in innovation at Procter & Gamble or Kimberly-Clark isn't too busy. Googled that too. No patent filings to date. And they say agency creatives have all the fun creative ideas - or the humanists at companies like Ideo or Frog Design. How many've gone here? I bet zero. Because it's not something you can observe by observing existing consumer habits and practices - so that's where they and Clayton Christiansen's theories of disruptive technologies fall short. You have to be able to envision behaviors that have never previously existed and that is what we alone do with our Abstract Dimensioning Mental Processing.

Let's go on. Please help. Comment!

THE CONSUMER FREQUENCY

2008-07-18T09:59:00.000-07:00

Most marketers are busy crunching numbers today, like they did yesterday, and the day before, and as they will tomorrow. What they are analysing are minute changes in business performance based on standards driving businesses that have not changed in decades. We all drink beer, wine, ale and spirits to address the need states of "to party" or "to relax." There are no other reasons. When our wives had babies we bought disposable diapers that had to "fit" the baby better and keep the baby "dryer." The entire industry remained flat until the revelation that a diaper brand such as Pampers could actually capture toddlers by extending its foot print to "development" sold an incremental $1.6 billion worth of Pampers that year while all the nay sayers suggested there was no way to generate an incremental disposable diaper consumption occasion - but those were not the forward-thinking outward-looking execs.

So to what frequency do consumers tune when dialing in your business? Are you broadcasting a frequency only they can hear? That sure would cut clutter! Why ask this question? Because we all operate with our own definitions of positioning, insight, branding, ad nauseum. And they can't all be correct. There is an overburden of clutter, commoditization and desensitization to ad messages in the marketplace. So how do you tune into that one frequency that reaches that one person (thought leader, early adapter, whatever) that you want to hear your message?

About 24 million consumers ago (that's about how many consumer panelists we've intereacted with face-to-face/not online in the last 40 years) we determined that the insight you want to target is called a Special User Effect. It is not a generic emotion of the sort generated by Hal Riney for Saturn. That division still operates in the red. A Special User Effect is consumer-created (not Madison Avenue or client created) and it is the result of a process that creates new consumer knowledge that has never previously existed to be mapped, gathered or measured. It is not the product of your own mind, my own mind or insight either.

This places the bar higher. That's where "development" came from for Pampers, which grew the business by $1.6 billion that year (now that's an insight). It's also the way the oral care business determined the five category attributes that account for all consumer perceptions in oral care. So I don't really care which agency you are or you hire. Every insight they have will in some way shape or form be somehow inextricably tied to one or more of these five attributes unless you create new breakthrough knowledge. We only brush our teeth for reasons of whitening, breath freshening (includes germ killing), gum care, tartar control and cavity prevention.

Why do I make such a hard line stance and draw my line in the sand here? Because my goal is higher. I don't just sell more product with garden variety insights. I control the definition of categories with the proprietary ability to create new knowledge from the minds of consumers. That's consumer-creativity and it is not the same as merely soliciting user generated input from websites where provided input comes only from consumer's existing frames of reference. Companies only do that because it's cheap. No matter how hard you study the past [that way] it can never give you everything you need for the present.

A brand IS fewer things to fewer people. That is what causes the early adapters to glom on. The novelty is what gives a brand an allure. Then they 9the numbers crunchers and insight hounds) try to make it more things to more people and you can kiss it goodbye. Everyone else is just a follower. A brand IS something that someone started that caught on. The rest of us are merely members of the herd. How do you resurrect a company like GM or a brand like Starbucks? It can only come from the creation of new knowledge. Closing 600 stores, recipe dissemination, a few novelty fro-yo drinks and a MyStarbucksIdea website will not improve Starbucks fortune. They are merely stabilizers and are only preparatory moves to Howard Schultz making another kind of decision, like cashing out.

The frequencies of insights are deafening. There are so many so inconsequential insights echoing against the fundamental building blocks of categories - any category - that we tune them out - noise - commodities we take for granted - which is why agencies and managers get hired and fired all the time. The insights that matter are those that fundamentally change perception in a category and substantively alter consumer habits and practices to a desired goal, solving problems. To that end, there can only be one insight - the rest are all peasants.

WHY BRANDS NO LONGER SWAY US

2008-07-17T17:13:00.000-07:00

So if a brand is something that a rancher puts on his cattle so that other ranchers or rustlers don't steal them why do CPG companies brand their products? So competitors or brand rustlers won't steal them. Yet in many ways products (cattle) in most categories (pastures) are the same - commodities - and like cattle heavily price driven categories at that, ground roast coffees, disposable diapers, edible oils, etc.) So if the rancher (cattle owner) wants to sell more of his cattle (brand) at auction (chain grocery and drug stores for example) what must he or she do? Make a better product? A steer is a steer. Meat on the hoof is meat on the hoof. And a better product would screw up the margins. I believe that legendary UCLA basketball coach John Wooden had it right when he said, "It's what you learn after you know it all that counts." These ranchers (marketers) have been raising cattle (brands) the same way year after year. The feed (gathered and measured data) comes from the same vendors year after year. It seems to me that the only thing that would make a difference would be to create new knowledge - knowledge that has never previously existed to be gathered and measured. After all, most gathered and measured (cattle/brand feed) data comes from consumer survey panelists who answer questions for points and prizes - they don't even get cash anymore. And if it's done online, you can't even look the panelist in the eye to see if he or she is telling the truth (suspect data). That feed could be anything! I believe creating new knowledge, that which is yet to exist to gather and measure would sire an uber brand. (It made Folgers worth $1.6 billion when auctioned to a brand rancher in Orrville, Ohio. Then everyone else could once again rush to converge on the same position (pasture) saying the same things about themselves (branding) their own way. The symbol (brand) might look different, but the meat inside is pretty much the same (commoditization). To continue doing things the same way would be illogical because no matter how much you study the past (entrenched or shifting consumer habits and practices or beliefs) it will never give you everything you need for the present. Does anyone actually believe that closing a thousand stores, recipe dissemination, a few novelty fro-you drinks and user generated input from MyStarbucksIdea.Com is going to turn Starbucks around? No. It's just trimming the fat to get ready for an auction where Starbucks is the cattle and rancher Schultz can cash out. “A leader is one who sees more than others see, who sees farther than others see, and who sees before others do.” That way the auctioneer (Costco) can't tell the rancher (P&G) how to breed the cattle (Tide). It's called differentiation, which today, can only come from new knowledge. Jeez, I think I've been hanging around CPG companies too long. Starting to sound cynical.

Is making the customer "Believe" in your marketing proposition, a necessary and sufficient condition of a successful sales pitch?

2008-07-17T12:12:00.000-07:00

No. You need to identify a Special User Effect which is consumer-created and the by-product of a new knowledge creation process. That way, the belief is already built in. Everything that has come before, via the utilization of assumptions and old knowledge is contrived and less effective.

IS YOUR BRAND SMARTER THAN A FIFTH GRADER?

2008-07-17T10:40:00.000-07:00

Did you know that the New York Times is written at an elementary school level? That's because that's the average intelligence level of an adult in America today. They've already forgotten more than they've learned simply because they don't use it every day. And for that reason the muscle gets flabby and weak. Have you ever actually seem a contestant win the Jeff Foxworthy game show Are You Smarter Than A Fifth Grader? Not in my memory. So why are you entrusting the future growth of your business or brand to the input and responses of Americans? To Americans who answer the countless questions and who provide the user-generated input solicited by corporations? Even worse, the use of online research where companies get panelists to respond for points and prizes. You can't even look them in the eye to see if they're telling the truth! Smarter people would only respond for cash! Obviously the airlines, Starbucks and General Motors are listening, and look at the results. And that's the problem. No one is creating new knowledge to take your fifth grade customers to the next level - the level where you want them to be.

By creating new knowledge that has never previously existed to be gathered and measured you could gain a proprietary advantage over rivals and markets in the areas of strategic innovation, consumer insight and new product concept development to invigorate struggling brands and businesses. Does anyone actually think that recipe dissemination, a few novelty fro-yo beverages, closing a thousand stores and a http://www.mystarbucksidea.com/ website that does not give consumers the latitude to respond beyond their current frames of reference is going to solve Starbuck's problems? (every question or category in which to respond mimics a store as it exists today. How is starbucks to improve if the existing model is the baseline? All that can be expected are very small incremental...not even evolutionary steps. And that's not the material of a turnaround.) Why create new knowledge? Because no matter how hard you study the past, by asking consumers and customers questions, it can never tell you all you need for the present. How would you expect them to respond? They can only respond within their current frames of reference within long established habits and practices. Without the stimulation required to identify new product potentials and the bigger consumer persuasions beyond, companies have no recourse but to look for bailouts and new merger and acquisition suitors as solutions. That's strike 1,2 and 3 against inbound organic growth. No forward-thinking, outward-looking executives here. Just Pavlov's respondents running large businesses. Knowledge creation is why our clients hit more home runs in more categories than any other.

What's wrong with struggling companies and brands? They know everything there is to know about their business...and nothing new.

GM's TurnaWhat

2008-07-16T13:43:00.000-07:00

Do you remember that old Hot Tuna rock album You Can Tune A Piano But You Can't Tune A Fish (or was that REO Speedwagon)? Any way - Wagoneer GM CEO Rick Wagoner is up to his same old tricks again slashing jobs and cutting costs in a bid to save GM and keep his "turnawhat" on track. Isn't this what Wagoner does everytime GM's "turnawhat" hits a speedbump? Does he not know that doing the same things the same way and expecting different results is the definition of insanity? Calls to Rick's office went unreturned soliciting the company's need and ability to create new knowledge rather than gather and measure information regarding GM's future new product development efforts. (Hint: unless you come up with bread and butter vehicles like Camrys and Accords GM is going to be SOL. Gone are the days when a Corvette's or Solstice "halo" could save you. And you can also forget the goodwill or excitement of auto shows and good press. That's just stuff you're supposed to do.) Based on latest inquiries we were able to ascertain that it takes GM at least 5 days just to acknowledge receipt of an email or letter to Rick Wagoner. Apparently the earth is slow, but the oxen are patient. I did not invent that line - I stole it from Tom Selick and Bess Armstrong in the movie High Road To China. Well, insider wisdom has it that no one at GM is going to save GM single handedly. How's that for an insider unity statement. When Wagoner turns around to look I'd like to know who he sees following.

Now I've been waiting for GM's turnaround throughout CEO Wagoner's reign, but like the problems facing Starbuck's head Howard Schultz, all I've seen are a lot of "turnawhats". Closing stores, recipe dissemination and throwing a few fro-yo new drinks into the equation will not quite cut the mustard at Starbuck's "turnawhat" either. There's got to be a sale or merger discussion going on in there somewhere - that's what these leaders always do. Just no inventiveness or creativity can be seen galloping to the rescue. (No pun intended with George Gallop or all the other pollsters and information harvesters currently selling data to GM and Starbucks.) Without the ability to create new knowledge to lead the company away from the brink what else are the straight forward linear thinking problem solvers to do? Can I trademark that term (TURNAWHAT) like Pat Riley's "Threepeat?"

Join Scour - Get Paid for Searching & Googling

2008-07-15T15:06:00.000-07:00

Join Scour and get paid for search. Scour is a peer-to-peer file sharing exchange that aggregates Google, Yahoo and MSN results. By adding the social component or ranking - you - get paid for doing something you already do dozens of times a day. Scour aggregates the search results of Google, Yahoo and MSN - the big 3 - all on one page. Scour is a new search engine working to evolve search and deliver a much greater value to the User. Make Scour your home page and start using it.

While Google, Yahoo, and MSN are incredible search engines, Scour brings all of their greatness together! With Scour, all three engines are searched all at once for you, with the results returned quickly on one page. Every Scour member is able to vote each listing up or down based on its relevance to their keyword as well as comment on their experiences with the site. By blending user feedback with proven search algorithms the Scour community helps shapes the Scour brand of results. Why would you want this aggregation? Because different search engines deliver different results.

Contribute

Ever spend time searching only to find that the results you need are buried under irrelevant ones? With the Scour voting and comment system, the goal is to introduce the human element of searching allowing you and all other Scour members to speak up and help shape the results with every search. See a result that doesn't match your search? Vote it down? See a site that is exactly what you wanted? Vote it up and tell us all why you liked it. After enough votes, the listings will move down in rank, placing the relevant ones where they should be, at the top! When using Scour you can read user reviews about websites based on your keyword taking a lot of the guesswork out of searching and getting to you destination quicker.

Reward

The top search engines make billions of dollars a year in advertising revenue, wouldn't it be cool if the users got a piece of that too? Enter Scour Points! Every member is awarded one point for every search, two for a vote and three for a comment with a maximum of 4 points a search. Once you aggregate at least 6,500 points you can cash them out for a $25 Visa gift card... it's more than you currently make from searching, right? On top of that, we offer referral points for the friends you introduce to Scour where you can earn 25% of the points they make. So if you invited 25 friends that used scour regularly in addition to yourself, that's an easy $125 in your pocket for a year of what you already do! Check out how much you could earn with the Scour Points Calculator. This isn't a pyramid scheme and we're not trying to get you rich quick, we just think it's a good idea to share our success with those who help make it possible.

Play a part in the Scour community and get rewarded for what you already do!

(This copy - for the most part - borrowed from the Scour.com site. They said it better than I could.) Go to MarketWatch for more information. http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/search-socially----social-search/story.aspx?guid=%7B700B5CFC-3651-41D2-892F-EA8D4F508E10%7D&dist=hppr

My closing comment...the first chink in Google's armour. Time to cash in your stock. Scour is not "it" but the next breakthrough in online search is coming. Scour is a transition - evolutionary. If Microsoft and Yahoo can wait out their merger the affair might become meaningless. The next great thing will happen while they sit on the sidelines like two injured all stars.

Bush - Capades

2008-07-15T09:23:00.000-07:00

Why is the United States (or General Motors) a country of people who like to run with scissors? Because there is no adult to tell their leaders not to.

I read an article in this morning's Nation/World section of the Orange County Register suggesting that President Bush will blame the Democratic Congress for continued high gas prices if Congress does not approve his bid to open offshore drilling. Why is this wrong? And what's wrong in general today?

Lack of leadership. Just because execs like Bush or Wagoner have the title doesn't mean they are the leaders. Leadership guru John Maxwell calls this "the myth of position". There is no gas or oil shortage. Lack of confidence in President Bush's National/Global leadership is what is fueling rampant oil price speculation. There is no gas/oil shortage (we don't need any new wells) because if we were running out of oil you'd see oil and gas companies diversifying into non-oil and gas businesses. That's what Philip Morris did when tobacco became taboo and they acquired Kraft. That isn't happening.

What's wrong with companies like GM? Simple. It takes 5 days for GM just to acknowledge receipt of a letter to company head Rick Wagoner. Small things like this add up into a behavior pattern that caused one writer yesterday to call GM a "pointless" company. How is a company to reap the benefits of becoming forward-thinking and outward looking if receptionists at companies like GM and Starbucks are not even allowed to identify decision makers when asked? The knowledge conduit gets capped by the operator.

Regarding business intelligence in America. It is as suspect as the no doc/easy doc loans that got the mortgage/credit industry in trouble. Any research that does not cause an executive to make direct eye contact with an end customer should be suspect.

George Bush, Rick Wagoner. They have a lot in common. What is America's stock price right now? That is what fuels speculation and high gas prices - so if you are a Democrat or Nancy Pelosi (and I'm Republican) don't fall when running with these scissors.

Why are good insights so hard to find?

2008-07-14T16:40:00.000-07:00

You know, I just love LinkedIn - the professional online community. Not only is a great place to connect with colleagues, but it is also a great place where smart people ask incredibly interesting questions like, "What is an insight?" Which got me thinking - what is an insight and why are great insights so hard to find given that in my industry - consumer packaged goods - there are thousands of experts looking for them. Are they finding them? I don't know. Based on McKinsey & Company's assessment I think not. McKinsey says, "Despite solid balance sheets and healthy bottom lines CPG executives wonder where their new growth will come from." Since CPG companies are probably most active in the insight field, I then wonder why important insights are so rarely discovered. A while back the rumor circulated that men around the age of 34 shopping for diapers in grocery stores after 8 pm also purchased Budweiser - but that was no biggie. InBev just swallowed them up without even chewing.

Very often, managers view any product, service, idea, technology, or process that is new (to them) or different as an insight or innovation. (Well just because it's new to you doesn't mean it's new to the rest of us) (An old mentor tipped me off to this type of behavior chastising me for being too busy learning everything all over again for the first time) So I think quality insights are so hard to find because we don't know how to find them. Most companies have reliable resources in place to 'gather' and 'measure' data, but gathering and mining data is only a reflection of current consumer habits and practices and no matter how hard you look at the past it will not deliver what you need for the present. So what do you need instead? Why a knowledge creation process of course! Something that can create new consumer knowledge that has not yet existed to be gathered and measured. That's how you improve consumer behavior and take your highly saturated and penetrated category and take it another quantum leap forward - the same way Pampers learned to take disposable diaper's 'fit' and 'dryness' for granted and put the brand on the much larger 'development' footprint back in the early 1980s. Or the same way Folgers went from generic 'sensory' advertising (Mountain Grown/Richest Kind) to 'control's' best part of waking up is caffiene in my cup - recently sold to JM Smucker for $1.6 billion. That stuff sure does help me work and play well with others - especially in the AM! Now that was an insight!

Why else are good insights so hard to find? It's a matter of exposure. The rule of thumb is "The more you expose yourself too the more likely you are to succeed." But apparently you can't expose yourself to a whole lot by gathering and measuring data. And companies don't want to take on additional external resources. Sounds penny wise and pound foolish!

So if business managers are running businesses and making decisions based on gathered and measured data and have not exposed themselved to knowledge creation processes could that be the reason so much of American business is only managed to meet the numbers? Kraft can predict it's sales based on predicted birth rates over the next 5 to 10 years. Doesn't take many if any profound insights to pull that off. Is that the kind of business management that's going to bail Starbucks or General Motors out of a jam? Is this why technology is king in the new creativity economy? Well, lets forget about technology and product design. It's too easy to reverse engineer and copy.

So what is an insight?

An insight is the realization of value from a new solution to a problem that rewrites the rules of the game. In order for something to qualify as a true insight

It must engage a creative process,
It must be distinctive,
And it must yield a measurable impact.

Chrysler's $2.99 Gas Guarantee

2008-07-10T10:19:00.000-07:00

People want to buy products that say smart things about them - but how can American car manufacturers address that need when the price of a company's stock, like General Motors, sells for less than $10 a share? That's not smart - and I don't care how many sharp looking "strivers" and "achievers" you throw into those Cadillac ads and positioning statements under the heading "brand character." Do you want proof that a company's management jumps to conclusions before they jump to the facts? Do you want proof that a company's management does no homework before engaging their mouth? Just look at Chrysler's $2.99 Gas Guarantee promotion. Not only does Chrysler find it difficult to sell cars. Now they're selling gas instead. And once you've sold price your brand equity sinks so low you have to climb up a ladder to get to the bottom. But wait. That's where Chrysler already is. Where is the dramatic turnaround shift? Talking about Chrsler's wonderkind CMO let's quote Casey Stengel who once asked, "Is this all there is, or is this all you got?" Why doesn't each product line have a unique selling proposition instead of generic segmentation? Is it not true that doing the same things the same way and expecting different results is the definition of insanity? Do basics, adventurers and other socio-economic classes of consumers actually see themselves in Wranglers and Cherokees when the stock of American car companies like GM sell for less than $10 a share? The purchase just says, "You're dumb." Years ago my research for GM found people want "to buy products that say smart things about me." Sure, the economy and the housing/mortgage/credit crunch are excuses in combination with the high price of gas - but it's only an excuse - and excuses have to be corrected. I am certain that everything management knows about how to market its vehicles and leverage its brands comes from fine market research processes that gather and measure data. But the trouble with quantifying yesterday is that it does not tell you anything a company needs to know today - at present. As Captain Kirk did in the Kobiashi Maru simulation at Starfleet Academy - Chrysler needs to create new knowledge that does not yet exist to be measured to alter consumer habits and practices and to change the rules of the simulation to win. Except slow moving inventories are not a simulation. Look at this lot. Everyday, we drive past auto malls jam packed with slow moving inventories. Banners proclaim fantastic deals, yet day after day we see the same lots. Why doesn't a dealer get smart and one night after closing remove 80% of his inventory from sight. The next day most of us would think, "Wow! Something's going on. Either there is a blow out clearance sale or the dealer's going bankrupt." The sharks would swim in looking for the deals smelling blood in the water. What a perfect environment and buyer mindset to close the sale. That's what sales people call Jonesing people.

When a good business goes bad

2008-07-08T15:07:00.000-07:00

What are the outwardly visible warning signs that a good business is going bad? How can you tell when a rapid growth company is turning the corner to becoming a mature earnings company and you can kiss all those lucrative stock splits goodbye?

Hired by Leo Burnett, the EVP Client Service asked me what I thought of rumors that Philip Morris might buy Kraft. I said I thought Philip Morris was preparing to reduce their dependency on tobacco profits from 96% to something in the range of 46%. No one believed me, so no one went after Kraft's new business except me, landing the Kraft BBQ sauce business for myself and not Leo Burnett. And there followed a string of Kraft account work resulting in Kraft's most successful growth period with brands turning in results well beyond anticipated category norms. I made a bundle and so did Kraft.

During that time Starbucks also took off. It was time to buy stock. I'd buy at $22, watch it rise to $44, split, then repeat the process again and again. So how did I know when to get out? When Starbucks launched milder dimensions coffees in a bid to become more things to more people. That was the beginning of the demise of Starbuck's brand equity. It was also the last time the stock grew and split. Starbucks had actually succeeded by being fewer things to fewer people. You had to love that dark roast taste or you didn't. Today my broker told me Starbucks dropped to $14. That's off $4 from four days ago.

What brings my attention to these matters? The price of gas. At nearly $5 a gallon I've come to realize that there's actually no gas shortage. How do I know this? Because when we are really out of gas, the oil companies will begin to diversify into non oil and gas businesses. Then it will be time to worry. Sounds like Philip Morris all over again.

My Top Ten Brands

2008-07-02T22:50:00.000-07:00

The other day I recieved a poll question from a leading advertising industry trade magazine asking "What is the most genuine brand." I was given the choices J&J, Google and UPS. And I thought "Christ! What's the point of THIS question? Is someone feeling uncertain as to their authenticity (which is just another flavor of the "genuine" selling dimension)?

So I got to thinking. This question is irrelevant to these three, but in my lifetime, what have been my Top 10 Brands? That is, over the last 40 years, when I look back at every consumer good I've ever purchased, which 10 brands have I always purchased - and never purchased a rival? Interesting question right? Well here are my 10 based on product performance profiles.

Q-Tips (feel as good as sex when you use them)

Band-Aids (they stick well)

Neosporin/Polysporin (never bought anything else for scrapes)

Hellmann's Mayo (thank Laura Ries for pointing out REAL)

Coke (and only Coke) (never tried Diet/Zero/New/Vanilla, etc.)

NPR (National Public Radio is the best)(The Christian Science Monitor was a close second)

The Beatles (ok, I do like other bands, but not with the same total immersion)

Walter Cronkite/Chet Huntley/David Brinkley (great news anchor brands - after them, the news became, well, not news)

Acura (biggest bang for the buck - my 91 Legend is over a quarter million miles without a single repair issue. Have only changed the fluids, tires and brakes - still runs like new)

Maxfield Parrish (one of a kind great graphic artist)

As far as any other consumer good or category goes, I must admit, I have accepted substitutes, misplaced my loyalty and shopped on price percieving your brand to be a commodity.

So what's your top ten brand list? Post it here. Do you have an imaginary brand list for new products not yet invented? Mine starts off with Vel-Close and ends with OraQuel. What are they? I'll show you mine if you show me yours. Thanks!

About those airline baggage charges

2008-07-01T00:26:00.000-07:00

Ever hear the saying about someone being so far down a hole they have to climb up a ladder to get to the bottom? How about the rule that once you trade on price your brand equity sinks so low it has to climb up a ladder to get to the bottom? Once you go price consumers think thrice! Nothing like training another generation of price sensitive travelers! P&G learned that with EDLP (everyday low pricing for the layman). Now Costco tells them how to make Tide or they'll plug the pipeline. So who is in charge of brand equity innovation at American, United, Delta and all the other price wielding baggage charger busways of the skies? If on Madison Avenue "it's all about the strategy" as Eduardo Bottger says at Hispanic agency of note al punto - What ad agency is riding to the rescue with a strategy that gives one of these brands a reason-for-being (that matters)? (Please no more platitudes that failed to move me in the first place) What evidence is there that straight forward problem solvers might listen to an abstract thinker that pinpoints new selling dimensions that are more relevant and resonant to core travelers? And how does that strategy resolve the newly forming habits of meeting online instead? Sounds like a job for Superman. Or maybe American should just sell all of its hardware assets and operations and become the world's first motive conference or motive visit network. Move into Kodak's memory space. What can be logged and filed solely on line. Can I charge for information transfer by the pound? Isn't that what business travel is for? How about tiered pricing for travel purposes? Do we charge a lot less for a trip to grandmas and a lot more to discuss Kraft's brand management? Now that would be some exploratory qualitative answering the questions what could an airline become. What are the future consumption drivers in "travel?" Does travel mean I have to "go" somewhere physically. And how would one "own" that? Just musing. Apologize for incomplete, incoherent or disconnected thoughts. Where's a good no baggage airline when you need one? This is all just taking shape. At some point it will just be cheaper to buy a couple hundred dollars worth of clothes and toiletries once I get to the other end. Could spur whole new terminal retail. And of course, what hotel chain is going to win me over with baggage charge rebates or credits? And why aren't they doing this instead of me writing about it? Get Tom Boddett or those guys from freecredit.com to sing a song and solve the travel woes.

The Closed-Minded Innovator

2008-06-19T14:41:00.001-07:00

Being an innovator and being closed-minded seem to be an oxymoron don't they? Yet that's what I just ran into...an innovator who says their company innovates all the time...so I ask, "on what level is your company innovating all the time?" It's about a $307 million company according to Hoovers.com. "Wouldn't you like to grow it by $300 million?" I ask. I've created new product concepts like Baked Lays that did at least that well in their first 10 months for Frito-Lay. So maybe I should go knock on the door of Marvel Mystery Oil instead. Maybe they're hungrier. So back to the flippant comment, "Our company innovates all the time." (Interpreted as, "We don't need you.") I'd like to quote leadership guru John Maxwell, and I quote; "You can find plenty of smart, talented people who can only take their business so far due to the limitations of their leadership and vision." So if all that is required to grow the business is to change the way you think (which costs nothing) why wouldn't you want to employ (or learn about) a proven innovation thought-leadership system of creative invention that could double or triple the size of your company? The ego of a young territorial executive too busy learning everything all over again for the first time muddies the water. But as the National Enquirer used to say, "Inquiring minds want to know!"

Just what is "THINKING OUTSIDE OF THE BOX?"

2008-06-19T11:05:00.000-07:00

Pharmaceutical companies today are developing hundreds if not investigating thousands of new products each year - many of which go OTC. So I began thinking, "How many would ultimately converge on the same positions, just saying the same things about themselves the way their different advertising agencies want to?" Now the agencies like to say, "It's all about the strategy!" lol So just what does it mean to think outside of the box in oral care where there are only five category attributes that account for all consumer perceptions in oral care: whitening, cavity prevention, breath freshening, tartar control and gum care?" I can hear the advertising exec selecting the new advertising agency now! "I don't care what you talk about, just talk about one of those five things." So when it comes to new product development, the same thing happens. Consequently, there is no thinking outside of the box. which is why McKinsey & Company reports that over the last 45 years, despite solid balance sheets and healthy bottom lines CPG execs wonder where their new growth will come from. New technologies still converging on the same positions? Withdrawn FDA approvals?

The same happens in all categories. Show me a laundry detergent or household cleanser that doesn't promise to do the cleansing job better and faster. Show me a shampoo and conditioner that doesn't promise model-perfect hair. Show me an allergy technology that doesn't promise to relieve symptoms better and faster. Show me an orange juice that doesn't promise to taste most like the orange.

Yes. Commoditizations besets every new product launch like the plague. Hastening copy cats and capping each new technology's rapid growth phase because they do not insultate their businesses by discovering and communicating the proprietary Special User Effect no other rival can own.

Tell me about other categories in which "thinking outside of the box" beats or sucumbs to commoditiztion - but be careful before you dispute me - you can't be in "a category" unless you are converging on the same position as your rivals. So here's how you'll get a leg up on first place, or get there if you didn't launch first.

My beef with online research

2008-06-08T23:00:00.000-07:00

You can't quick and dirty half billion dollar ideas. Plus the fact that none of the information collected elevates brands beyond current laddering study data arresting the additional growth of product and brand sales.

My innovation beef with market research

2008-06-05T08:28:00.000-07:00

Why don't I like asking consumers questions? Because I've been exposed to almost forty years of the best and brightest market researchers at companies from Procter & Gamble to Pizza Hut who ask questions. In all that time, the answer to every question only reconfirmed things we already knew - basically reinventing the wheel, which, if I was to focus on advertising is why so much advertising bores or desensitizes us. I found that no one could ask a question they didn't already know the answer to. When new generations of managers asked questions at these companies it was so they could learn everything again for the first time. In companies like Leo Burnett Advertising in Chicago, I've actually seen senior client service executives collect, secret and destroy the work of predecessors to protect their current position from better answers found before their time. I found that when you ask questions, you don't get the voice of the consumer, you get the voice of the inquirer through the question being asked - a form of bias that has led companies from General Mills to General Motors astray, or at least slowed or reduced their innovation return on investment. The root of all this doom and gloom? The fact that none of this question-asking ever stimulated respondent's minds - be they client or consumer - so that they could respond in surprising ways beyond their current frames of reference to hasten the pace of successful innovation and generate a consistent stream of important new disruptive technology and manufacturing patents and consumer new product concepts. So where's the beef? That is, where is the answer found? In processes that proactively stimulate consumer and client minds rather than those methodologies that reactively collect and measure data. In processes that create new knowledge, rather than in those that pre-ordain and then sell syndicated or predefined trends (i.e. Cocooning - let's write a book as a self proclaimed guru then go sell the answer to everyone so they can pull the trigger at a target at point blank range and go nowhere) data such as the existence of new subcultures of our population such as Thrivals or Basics or Adventurers - all those psychobabble social and behavioral target audience definitions that have put the brakes and blinders on so many brands by limiting their appeal through their contrived application (i.e.: Type A Strivers shilling for Cadillac). Or all those touchy-feeley product design firms who observe the here and now creating new Swiffers that do nothing more than replace old mops and refrigerators. Making the old look new. That's not innovation.

Creation's Conundrum: The Qualitative Quantitative Conflict

2008-05-28T16:44:00.001-07:00

What is it about clients that insist on the use of qualitative firms who also quantify their own work? Way back in the early days of pioneering qualitative research this was considered a big no no - you were letting the fox watch the hen house - if you did this no one would hire you. Now, clients want convenient one stop places to shop and don't care about this conflict of interest - let alone the burden to objectivity. Maybe this is just another reason why McKinsey & Company reports that despite solid balance sheets and healthy bottom lines consumer packaged goods executives worry where their growth will come from. How long can you stand the target wherever you want it, and then fire at point blank range? It's like predefining a new trend or psychographic/attitudinal/social marketing target audience, then telling everyone to go shoot at it. You artificially arrest the extent of your business. Hitting the bulls eye becomes a no brainer - with sales results that match. Do yourself a favor and learn all of the tricks you you can skip the mistakes.

This image courtesy of Dee's Liberature. http://bdee.wordpress.com.

Airline Marketing Hits Rock Bottom

2008-05-27T14:19:00.000-07:00

Didn't yo momma tell you that the instant you trade on price your brand equity's so low you'd have to climb up a ladder to get to the bottom? Has average gotten so bad that an airline thinks it can get to the head of the class by charging for your baggage? I don't know about you, but given the choice of no baggage charge versus a baggage charge, I'll choose free. Still sitting smug thinking their positioning strategies and messaging reaches captive business travelers, how long will it be before some airline wakes up to the magic of abstract creativity? Of positioning their stew as a soup you eat with a fork (Chunky Soup); of finding abstract selling solutions the way Pampers took 'fit & dryness' for granted (business travelers) and found that more diapers (and airline seats) can be sold on a 'developmental' brand platform? Hmmmm? United, "the developmental airline." What could they develop as a campaignable idea that would make all the charges worth it? Business relationships, personal relationships? There are so may Special User Effects still to fulfill - an airline (like American Airlines) could go a lot longer on one tank of creativity.

Topping Google

2008-05-16T12:38:00.000-07:00

You know the word "topping" has a lot of connotations. If you're 'topping' someone you could be going them one better; you could also be holding them down, like topping a tree. It cuts them down - like the Hickory Hilltopper's in that great Gene Hackman movie Hoosiers. But I am writing this post because I am tired of all the talk about Microsoft's attempt to buy Yahoo in a bid to, dare I say, 'top' Google? - Or is it more 'just to keep pace and stay abreast so that Google does not get too far ahead. To slow them down.

Google, like Starbucks is starting to show frays in it's cuffs. So let time take its toll. Now all the talk is about investor Carl Icahn (sure has the name for it - iCahn, iKahn, ICON-great new brand name for a Google topping search engine) and cronies such as Microsoft's Steve Balmer reigniting their takeover bid. Hey guys, listen up. All of this takeover action is proof that the guys working the problem don't have the ability to out-invent a new Google. Something better that grows not from pure technology, but from the creation of new knowledge from consumer minds, that by perceptual innovation would discover that knowledge required to change consumer habits and practices with ideas rather than ownership of a rival.

It sure is a lot cheaper , and only takes about six weeks to find that breakthrough idea that would snuff Google's mass appeal. I've done it before. Why not just treat the problem like a new product concept development exercise and invent a real google competitor from scratch for $200,000 or so rather than the $37 billion it would take to buy a Yahoo that's always going to be, like Avis, number 2. Of course, this advice comes from someone who knows how to do this type of problem solving strategic innovation. I don't do those garden variety line extensions.

I think the real problem believes this can't be done. "The cost of pioneering" would bee too high." But it would still be far, far less than what would go into Yahoo's acquisition. Imagine just what you could do if you were a successful new product person with several multi-billion home runs under your belt and someone gave you $37 billion to play with. I'd reinvent the entire consumer packaged goods industry including it's distribution channels.

The Banality of Selling Consumer Products

2008-05-12T10:34:00.000-07:00

I like the saying, "Branding is something you do when you don't have anything important to say." However, the banality of advertising today, what products and brands are saying about themselves, to sell themselves, borders on absurdity. Now I know that marketers don't want to stick their necks too far out on the line. And they'd rather be safe than sorry, especially in a rough economy. But it also reminds me of the saying, "Ships in a harbor are safe, but that's not what ships were made for."

I make special note here of the new advertising being done to sell 7-Up. Now with real, natural flavors. Who cares! It's a soft drink. I got through all these years with artificial flavors, so what strategic rocket scientist at Cadbury-Schweppes decided this was the best way to go? Reminds me of Procter & Gamble days where the soaps and surfactants division toyed around with the idea that washing your clothes "sanitized" them. DOH! Who cared? My clothes were clean.

Last year, Cadbury Schweppes beverage division, including Snapple and 7-Up was up for sale. And nobody bought. So there's been little growth in the division, and no one wants to buy the division. Don't you think it would be time for a little creative thinking and strategic innovation? This effort isn't picking the high fruit from the tree. As a matter of fact, it isn't even picking up the dead fruit from the ground.

Reality Vesus Actuality: A Construction of The Truth

2008-05-06T12:08:00.000-07:00

Reality has swept America. Reality TV that is. Is it real? So quickly the lines blur in one night's viewing. I no more need watch The Apprentice to know that I can make better decisions. But I do not get a better job, or a raise. And gas still costs $4 a gallon. An expense to my quality of life that is needless. That's Actuality. Disney was the first painter of reality. He is the grandfather of reality. He did not paint actuality. No one would watch - no one would come. Disneyland is a study in an idealized America that never existed. But now we watch shows and immerse ourselves in a reality that is not actuality. I do not want to escape. I do not want a shot at love with Tia Tequila.

So those of us who are not so numbed by the barage of reality - wonder about actuality. Are you marketing to actuality? Because that's where the people with disposable incomes are in a crappy economy. They're dealing with Actuality. They're not frittering away their dreams on reality.

Washington Mutual is marketing to reality. They've borrowed billions to remain solvent, and to mask the actuality, tell us they are the bank that makes you say, "Whoo Hoo!" The Germans call that "dreck." Please don't deposit your marketing waste in my Actuality bin. WaMu is using "reality" strategy to mask the fact that it is really the bank that lacks actuality management, and could very well make depositors cry Boo Hoo - if they had a run on the bank and had to lock the doors. Yes actuality fans, disaster at WaMu is really that close.

But as long as we can immerse ouselves in reality, know one will take accountability. And as soon as the credit crunch is averted - because that's what reality helps us do - we'll have dodged actuality again and life will go on taking Visa.

What happened to gold standards.

So in what camp are you placing the future growth of your company, your strategic innovation? Reality or Actuality?

Advertising Campaigns with Zero Thought Profiles

2008-05-02T20:00:00.000-07:00

So absurd. Why do companies take their names, shorten them, then use rhymes as advertising campaigns? Washington Mutual. WaMu. Whoo Hooo. Adult minds actually concieve and sign off on this crap. What is it's intent other than to misdirect depositors to think that everything's OK at the bank in spite of having to borrow $10 billion to keep its doors open these past few weeks. Sure they don't want a run on the bank - BUT - There isn't any problem at a company that can't be fixed by a good product, and standards. And I'm not talking about free checking from those friendly, flannel shirt clad bankers in Seattle. It just doesn't sell. Why redirect consumers fears? Why not do something that brings in sound money during a crappy economy? That works. That's marketing. But they told me it hurts their heads to think that hard. That's not smart.

Mitsubishi. Mitsu. Trying not to be Japanese. What's next, Mhoo Shoo?

Why Not Ask Questions?

2008-04-15T06:14:00.000-07:00

Everyone else is doing it. Asking questions that is - in focus groups, quantitative research, qualitative research, strategic planning and innovation. So why not ask questions? Because if you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always got. Which is answers that do not substantively move your business forward. Answers that confirm the things that you already know. Answers that move you closer, like gravity, to the same strategies all of your competitors are using coverging on exactly the same positions, only saying the same things differently. No gain.

So what do you do if you are Staples and the strategy that once made you all powerful now threatens to turn you into a commodity. Kodak, Starbucks can all ask the same thing. But the last thing they'd want to do is ask their customers questions. Sounds ridiculous right? Opps, that's a question.

You don't want to ask your customers questions because without additional positive mental stimulation, they will be unable to answer your questions from beyond their current traditional frame of reference and knowledge, They will only say what you and they already know. Further, you can't ask any questions you don't already know the answer to. It's kind of like a self-fulfilling prophecy. Why should Starbucks introduce $1 cups of coffee and who said that would impact their business? Are they doing it because there are now so many competitors Starbucks is becoming that commodity? So why respond with a dollar cup of coffee? It's not like going to Starbucks is out of the way, they're everywhere. They're not going to steal share and they're not going to stem trial of rivals products - so the move is an example of Starbucks running scared. I never heard of a Starbucks customer complaining about the price of a cup of coffee. Starbucks price is what made their product part of one of my aspirations. So now you're ripping the guts out of your brand by trading on price!? When you trade on price you go so low in terms of perception and brand equity (P&G learned with it's EDLP - everyday low price strategy) that you later have to climb up a ladder to get to the bottome or is that bottom? (I knew that)

And lastly, when you ask questions you don't get the voice of your customer, you get the voice of the inquirer through the question being asked - a form of bias that will lead you astray. So questions are dead you say? Yes! OK smarty pants - so why do attorneys ask questions and win cases with them? Because they are trying to prove a point in law, a static point, that already exists. It does not move. And to grow business you must. And why don't more people stop asking questions and start probing minds with proactive materials that stimulate activity to a higher level? Because they don't know how. They were bred from birth to ask questions. It's as easy as breathing - which is why everyone does it. Getting ahead without questions is much harder. It is the road less taken - which is why it wil take you farther than you need to go.

So don't ask questions. Look what happened to the joker.

Marketing to Germphobic Societies - Turning next generation men into residential mice.

2008-04-07T11:00:00.000-07:00

Or should it be the other way around - turning today's residential mice into men. Years ago the Boy Scouts of America started watering down the Boy Scout Handbook, and in my mind easing qualifications for advancement in rank in an effort to remain competive with the abundance of activities competing for a share of young boy's time. This is not a condemnation. What I'm saying is that less information is provided in more detail in today's scout handbook than I had in mine related to sheer survival skills 40 years ago. Now granted I'm an Eagle Scout and can survive with just a knife in the wilderness, even caught and ate a squirrel on my Order of the Arrow Ordeal. But never have I seen this more in evidence than in a scout outing with my son's new troop this weekend. Granted all the boys in his patrol are young, and less than "experienced" scouts - all are still working on tenderfoot or second class requirements. But the first thing I saw plopped on a table as the tents went up was a bottle of Purell. Now that in itself is not bad, but what I found disturbing was the boy's need to pump that bottle every time they touched a dirty stick, played in the fire, picked up a rock or gathered firewood. More, rather than be the example of what the boys should be doing (ie: demonstrating the Boy Scout way to prepare meals over an open fire, one dad showed up with Lunchables in his knapsack to feed himself. Self reliance has gone to hell in a handbasket here and I'm going to turn it around! It isn't that the parents attending were doing anything wrong, admittedly they'd never been scouts. So I started teaching scout skills. When I was a scout the challenge was to be able to build and light a fire with just one match. And if that match went out, you were SOL - and in a real life situation probably dead. When done, I challenged the boys to gather their wood, build their fires and then we'd have a competition to see who could light a fire with one match. An indignant parent stepped forward suggesting that that was too much pressure on his child and that he should have all the matches and chances he wanted. I asked him if he thought if in a survival situation that was realistic? - I was trying to teach the boys that in a survival situation they needed food, shelter and warmth. What was his child to do to provide warmth, if he did not even have a match? This is the Boy Scouts for Christ sakes and I'm trying to teach the boys to BE PREPARED. One dad slept in the back of his mini van instead of his tent anyway - guess comfort is king. The demonstration went on without a hitch. I lit two fires, each with one match - still not too rusty after 37 years away from my scout experience. I admitted that it took me 20 campouts before I could light a fire with just one match. Just one problem. I assumed the boys knew how to use matches. They didn't. So it's back to square one on the next campout and before we move on to the different types of fires: cooking, signaling, etc. More on turning boys into men later. One thing for certain, those boys thought the challenge was cool, and they all had lots of questions. Good men!

OraQuel ® - Lowers the incidence of heart disease

2008-04-02T22:04:00.000-07:00

OraQuel ®
Toothbrush rinse lowers the likelihood of heart disease.

(OraQuel® is not a drug, over-the-counter or prescription pharmaceutical) Every time you brush your teeth you increase the liklihood of heart disease and arterial damage. The effects are cumulative over a lifetime. Medical studies link heart disease, arteriosclerosis and the oral plaque that accumulates in arteries and on heart valves (as a result) to poor oral care habits, gingivitis and periodontal infection. Deposited on arterial and heart valves and walls, the majority of oral plaque comes from gingivitis and periodontal gum infection.

OralQuel® lowers the incidence of daily gingivitis and periodontal infection by assuring you a clean toothbrush. Directions: To lower the incidence of reinfections, shake excess water from toothbrushes immediately after use. Pour approximately a half-ounce of OralQuel directly onto toothbrush bristles, assuring penetration to root of bristles. Wait 1 minute. Product may cause slight foam to form between bristles. Rinse and store your toothbrush as you would normally.

OraQuel®, is a new product from CalLabs, the research and development arm of Calle & Company. To order OraQuel® (16 oz.) send $19.95 (+$3.95 S&H) (cash, check or money order) to Greenwich Marketing, Inc. 18881 Patrician Drive, Villa Park, CA 92861. Make all checks payable to Greenwich Marketing, Inc. Please include your name, address, phone number and email address. Get 10% off orders of four or more. All transactions in USD. Returned and NSF checks subject to all fees and $15 handling charge. International customers please add $9.95 shipping and handling.

Find out more about OraQuel® at www.OraQuel.com

OUT OF GAS. How to Know We Are Really Out of Gas

2008-04-02T14:08:00.000-07:00

I find Energy Marketing an interesting subject. With gas hovering near $4 per gallon and a barrel of crude running $111 consumer confidence hits an all time low every time one looks at the gas guage - your constant daily reminder of how things are. Now, the oil companies say that profiting $20 billion per company per quarter, or $120 billion over all last year is in line with what other companies make - and given the cost of exploration and development, it seems oil companies may not be making enough. So here I am on their side.

But where I am not on their side is when they raise the price of gas because they say they have a "fear" that something "might" happen - that we pay through the nose retail because of their lack of confidence. That's a leadership issue and it lands squarely on Washington's dinner plate. Of course the middle east enjoys the $111 a barrel scenario because it funds the massive infrastructure construction projects going on in Dubai and elsewhere. Is Washington building itself a retirement community, a VIP Leisure World in the middle east at American's expense?

But I'm off point. My point was, "How will you know when we're really out of gas?"

Back in the day I was brought in from outside to save several accounts at Leo Burnett. The term they used in my offer letter was to "bring a breath of fresh air" to accounts such as Kellogg, Philip Morris, Nestle and McDonald's. A rare opportunity given that Burnett is very well known for not hiring outside the company. Anyway, early on, I was asked what I thought about Philip Morris' pending purchase of Kraft by EVP Client Service William Lynch. I told him my read was that tobacco was becoming politically sensitive and that PM was preparing to reduce its dependency on tobacco profits. I was scoffed. But sure enough, within 5 month Philip Morris had acquired Kraft. Vindication sure tastes sweet. PM dependency on tobacco profits plummeted from 96 to 56 percent, with the acquisition of Miller dropping that figure to around 46 percent.

So how will you know when America is really out of gas? When the oil companies start buying other companies. They'll be in a scramble to reduce their dependency on oil profits.

But right now there is no sense of urgency. And that's because the oil companies know they have years of oil profit ahead. That's also why they've only dumped a paltry $3.5 billion into alternative energy. Just enough to keep the pliable liberals and global warmers happy. So what's the conclusion? Right now there is no gas shortage, we are overpaying at the pump, face time with Congress buys Big Oil a little more time while we idiot pawns feel vindicated Big Oil's getting its wrist slapped by Congress - they are the actors and we are the audience. Will you applaud, or ask for a refund?

The Grand Unified Theory of Creativity

2008-04-01T13:33:00.000-07:00

I am approaching 40 years of experience mumbling and working with Madison Avenue ad agencies and their clients, finding strategies that invigorate the sales of products, brands, categories and industries. Beneath the surface I've sought what I call The Grand Unified Theory of Creativity - what is it that would give a client the single most comprehensive yet concise view of all product and positioning potentials available to their business. While this search with my clients has allowed me to amass many career's worth of experience in less than a lifetime, I still wonder why more people don't get it - knowing as I do that they can go farther than where they are, expanding their product or strategy's Viability Envelope, by just tipping the creative tea cup a bit further - in the same way shifting from 'fit' and 'dryness' to 'development' dramatically expanded Pamper's industry footprint?

Letters back from companies such as Starbucks and their Senior Vice President of Category Management state they have plenty of specially designed resources available for the gathering and measurement of the required data - never realizing that you can never measure your way to where your business can go. Again I ask, "So why don't they get it?"

No one is talking to Starbucks (or any company) about The Grand Unified Theory of Creativity (google "the grand unified theory of creativity" in quotation marks and you will find I am one of only two people on the planet thinking about it, and the other guy wants to be a western writer.) And Starbuck's 'gathered' and 'measured' data is doing nothing to reverse the fact that the strategy that once made them most powerful is now being copied handily by every other Tom, Dick and Harry coffee purveyor.

Strategic Innovation, and The Grand Unified Theory of Creativity is about Multi-Dimensional Creativity. Another one of those terms that companies such as Starbucks tells me is provided by their ad agencies (really?...so if you google the term "muli-dimensional creativity" why don't any advertising agencies pop up in results?)? Multi-Dimensional Creativity is about that comprehensive/concise justaposition of which I spoke earlier - looking at fractions of millions of strategic options in the blink of an eye. That's just to get the linear thinkers out of the starting blocks. It doesn't come from the user-generated input websites touted by Chrysler to get them closer to their customers. It's the Abstract Creativity, The Abstract Dimensioning that ensues that makes the obvious special. (and that's not covered by any ad agencies or strategic innovators either).

So say you are Staples, and the strategy that once made you so powerful, and the first to consolidate office supply acquisition, is now so copied that you've become little more than a commodity; what do you need to shift your business strategy from strategy maintenance to strategic creation mode? You need to visit a fine tailor and get your new grand unified view of creativity custom tailored to fit you.

Making A New Run At Strategic Innovation

2008-03-31T11:32:00.000-07:00

Conversation Starter:
Making A Run At Strategic Innovation

What do you do when the very breakthrough strategy that once made your business uniquely powerful (Staples, Home Depot, Starbucks) now threatens to turn you into a commodity rivals find easy to copy? Whenever I get an assignment from a client shifting from strategy ‘maintenance’ to ‘creativity’ mode I employ Multi-Dimensional Creativity to lift an industry or brand past previous benchmarks.

Creativity Is Not Just An Ad You Watch, See & Hear

MULTI-DIMENSIONAL-CREATIVITY® - To redefine an industry’s original breakthrough strategy, define new underpinnings and to get tongues wagging again (or to invigorate a brand, create a new product or envision a new category) we first sit down and list out over 500 product dimensions concerning that product, brand or industry that in every way shape and form impact and influence consumer perception and purchase behavior. Under each dimension; sensory, form, function, usage, image, attitude, price, packaging, delivery system, segmentations, transitions, escape, reward, heritage, trust, tradition, affluence and hundreds of other dimensions only we know of, Partners bullet point another 500 short phrases per dimension that in every way shape and form may potentially positively impact and influence consumer perception and purchase behavior in that industry, category or segment. When done we will have amassed about 250,000 phrases - many times the number of ideas an advertising agency or company brings to the table in their brand's lifetime. From this list we hand-select 500 to 1,000 phrases that we put in front of consumers so that consumers can select the phrases that best motivate them to try a product once [again] and if they try it and like it to buy it again. We employ this Consumer-Creativity® via our comprehensive Creative Stimulus Packages as the foundation for the highly-differentiating and salable new breakthrough business strategy concepts that result.

Has your brand become a heavily price driven commodity? Do you manage business strategies that compete in heavily price driven categories? Dot coms Expedia, Travelocity, Priceline, Orbitz and Hotwire are great examples of heavily price driven commodity brands. And as Procter & Gamble discovered with EDLP, once your consumer sets their sights on price your equity sinks so low you have to climb up a ladder to get to the bottom – enabling retailers (Costco) to finally get a leg up on P&G and call the shots on core brands like Tide.

In this environment, Callé & Company has demonstrated a consistent track record of reversing the effects of mature business strategy lifecycles – of turning mature earnings companies back into rapid growth businesses. We ask consumers no questions so they can tell us no lies. We prefer our proactive Creative Stimulus Packages to reactive market research to create new knowledge - once again leapfrogging existing frames of reference, and competitors, with strategies rivals will find difficult to copy. P&G’s Paper Division employed our process, shifting Pamper’s strategic focus from ‘fit’ and ‘dryness’ to ‘development’. Repositioned as Pampers Phases Developmental Diapers the brand arrested category migration to rival Kimberly-Clark’s Pull-Ups, providing a much broader base from which to develop the paper business and net an incremental $1 billion in disposables sales each year. K-C never caught up.

Callé & Company does not cut and paste strategies from one industry or company to another. I have no canned answers as do the experienced advertising agencies on Madison Avenue. If you would like to determine optimum future business strategies, let’s meet.

Tarney Spencer Band

2008-03-29T20:44:00.000-07:00

The world's most underplayed one hit wonder - No Time To Loose. Potential Ad uses. Analgesic advertising, 30 day promotion music. Sense of urgency.