And they say advertising is dead. So not true. Thank you to my friend Sarah Dryden for finding and sharing this. It’s one of those live ads that are just so cool. Not sure if they sold any new phones that day, but it was some major brand building and drove tons of traffic to their youtube page and probably other campaign pages. As Sarah put it “Thank you T-Mobile, and Saatchi & Saatchi for making life joyous, even when you’re trying to sell something”
I also really enjoyed the “Making Of…”
My thoughts:
I love how it starts with just one person and slowly spreads. Out of the 400 hired dancers, I would say 100 more joined in spontaneously. And like most things in life, what seems to natural and graceful involved a lot of practice, patience and hard work. I also love the documentary style it was shot in. Very different feel than the xbox commercial I posted a in Sept. I hope Saatchi & Saatchi have a good campaign to back up this great piece.
Flying into work yesterday morning I was surprised to see Zappos at the airport. More specifically, in the shoe/stuff tray at the security line. I snapped a photo on my phone after I got through security, yes the officer looked at me a little funny.
I really like this, it fits into Zappos’ brand personality. It’s fun and a little quirky. Also perfect for the holiday season.
Given the current recession, I’ve been indulging my affinity for economics. So I’m going to try to talk about marketing in the context of this economic shift and in the context of changing macroenviromental trends. Marketing did start off by branching away from economics. Only makes sense to go back every once in a while.
This is a ’slide resume’ inspired by the Meet Henry format. In the neverending quest of differentiating yourself on the job hunt, here’s one more tool at your disposal. It can help you on LinkedIn, but you can also add it to your blog, online portfolio or personal website.
Seth’s uploaded his Tribes presentaiton onto SlideShare. It’s a bit long but you should check it out (at least humor me and peruse).
Seth’s examples are indeed exceptional, but they are becoming more and more commonplace everyday. ((I think these people would have been successful in almost any context. But today’s interconnected world and social media definitely help.)) A lot of these tribes are now giving away what companies would try and charge for. The Open Source movement is a good example. It’s easier to lead, but the line between leading and monetizing is still a bit blurry.
CEOs of small companies and start ups like to say they have no competition. No one else is doing what we’re doing. Or we have no direct compettion. Sometimes it is just a line fed to the press. There’s nothing more annoying than having great press about your organization also mention your direct competitors.
However, often times indirect competition is overlooked. Those making tri-colored carbon paper met there demise not from a familiar foe, but rather the indirect competitor Xerox. Fax machines makers lost out to a better, faster fax machine model, but rather to e-mail.
So if you’re a journalist, don’t buy the “we don’t have any competitors” line. And if you’re at a start-up, you ALWAYS have competitors. And often times, the ones that kick your butt are the ones you never saw coming.
I’ve been fascinated with the Obama campaign’s remarkable marketing abilities. The attention to detail is remarkable given the geographic spread and extended time frame. I’m also fascinated with the positioning and counter positioning that comes along with the election year. It seems that the McCain has been positioning Obama as risky, unknown and unproven. His campaign even threw in terrorism to the mix.
So if you’re the protector of the Obama brand, how can you keep yourself afloat? I’m going to suggest a subtle way of changing the perception of your brand. It is more of a long term strategy, so the Obama camp wouldn’t get the most bang for your buck by implementing it quickly before the election.
However, an interesting way to change the perception of your brand is to sponsor events that have attributes you would like your brand to associate with, but where people would never expect to find your brand. The Gay and Lesbian fun of Colorado does this with a lot of very moderate and traditional outlets (including the local NPR station). This helps them promote the idea that their cause isn’t so weird or out there.
You could easily do this with say, Gardenburger or another veggie patty. Let it sponsor a Red-Bull type of event. Can you imagine a Gardenburger Air Race? Or what about an Obama sponsored church event? Obama & name-your-church-here Festival would definitely turn some heads. If you just slap you name on an event, you don’t have credibility. If you put serious thought and effort and show off your brand at multiple events, you can change some minds.
If Obama were to do this, he wouldn’t necessarily need to show up in person. You just need a good group of passionate supporters (passionate both about Obama and the event) to show up. It’s hard to be fearful of a pack of people passionate about something you also love. It would be hard to blow off Obama after that.
The blocks of cheese example I used earlier works pretty well because up to the point of purchase, there is no real difference in convenience for the customer. You manage to lower your price at the supermarket, and push off the inconvenience until after the customer has bought. If you make your product cheaper, but less convenient before the sale occurs, you may have the wrong type of convenience in mind.
If you’re selling the exact same cheese for half the price, but I have to visit another store completely you may lose my business. I might not even know about this other store.
Now by pushing convenience off to a later time may lower your returning customers, but it certainly lowers the barrier to entry. I believe more people will realize slicing or grating cheese isn’t all that difficult anyways. And in economic downturns people are more prone to changing their habits to begin with.
Have you noticed that ice cream packages are smaller now?
Yes ice cream is smaller now. Companies have been finding ways to cut back while the economy is a bit tumultuous. It is an interesting way of essentially lowering prices without having to change the price tag. However, I haven’t really seen any companies try too many other tactics other than going smaller.
So I’m here to suggest one. How about less convenient? Now this doesn’t work for every company or every industry. However, people are now more willing to hunt for bargains or clip coupons or even, slice their own cheese.
Yes, instead of offering fewer slices of cheese, perhaps Kraft should start promoting blocks of cheese. Blocks of cheese have always been cheaper, but most people don’t consider that option. I wonder what the tiniest bit of promoting could do to bring this option to people’s minds. If people don’t even think about blocks of cheese when they think of cheese, they definitely are going to have a hard time choosing to buy it.
When Mozzarella Fresca was growing, the first product additions they added were smaller sliced mozzarella. In a growing economy, as people became more aware of mozzarella (and delicious Caprese Salads–Insalata Caprese) they were willing to pay more for some added convenience. It makes sense that it could work the other way as well.