This isn’t about politics. No. The just concluded election turned the corner on how America communicates and in the process opened the door to the new face of marketing that’s savvy, smart and hip.
Reporting in the October 13, 2008 edition of Powersports Business News, editor Neil Pascale singled out brand consultant Paul Leinberger’s comments from the Suzuki national dealer meeting in Las Vegas. Ready? “The most important thing you have at your dealership is your web site.” Continue reading
We’re on the side that says the jury’s still out on Pepsi’s latest logo revision. Gone is the 3-D look, as is the all caps logotype that’s been in use since 1962.
Pepsi’s revisited their image 11 times over their century plus history of serving a frosty alternative to That Other Cola. Cost to revamp, according to Ad Age, is $1-mil plus for the design, but implementation will likely be well in excess of two hundred million by the time all the signage and applications are accounted for and delivered.
The lesson here is that shareholders wouldn’t sit still for an instant if the revamp didn’t have a dollars and sense basis. In other words, logos aren’t carved in stone these days. It’s pixels and plastic and the right look means more cha-ching at the end of the day.
To paraphrase, marketing makes strange bedfellows. The Assoc. of National Advertisers named presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama Marketer of the Year at their annual meeting in Orlando, FL two weeks ago.
Though not unanimous, Obama’s 36-percent of the votes cast by the 750 CMOs in attendance eclipsed runner-up Apple’s 27-percent. Nike, shoe retailer Zappos and Coors were also in the mix, while the McCain campaign managed a 4.5-percent showing. (One thing’s for sure: after this election you’d better have a grasp of e-mail knowledge and computer literacy.
There’s a lot to mull over when T. Boone Pickens starts pushing his part public service, mostly private profit plan for achieving energy independence.
What I like, aside from the mostly common sense approaches to a rational energy policy, is the sophistication of the site itself.
Public relations? This campaign defines the genre. He’s out to change the way our country thinks, and he’s having some success.
Web design? Over the top. Clever and sophisticated without seeming elitist, the modules are quick to load and nothing short of brilliant in execution.
Our followup to POP Part One, which features background on structural merchandising elements, continues the theme of how best to use point of purchase materials to boost sales and manage brands.
The opportunities to utilize POP are endless, but the most popular applications include banners, pop-ups and counter mats. We examine all three for effectiveness and ROI.
Head over to the main web site for an inside view of the fascinating world of POP.
Ad Age reports Battle Creek cereal maker Kellogg has broken the digital ROI marketing code for it’s Special K brand. With a combined ad/promo budget in the general zip code of $1.3B, that’s a lot of return.
Notwithstanding the excellence of the Shark helmet itself, corporate marketing to North America follows a different metric than that followed by Coke. Or Yugo, for that matter.
We’re not going to beat the French up for this particular instance of bizarre imagery, not when that country is head and shoulders above us in using perkily great topless billboards to sell what you got.
But whoever’s behind this latest in a series of just plain goofy juxtapositions needs a hard shove out the door. (When they added a Canadian distributor a few years back, the event was accompanied by umbrella booth girls clad in, wedding dresses, followed by print ads as something slightly less sophisticated than The Club for cars.)
Now it seems as though “Protect Your Crotch!” is all that’s missing from the wordless lips of Mr. Crash Test Dummy and his androgenous package sidekick. The cruel irony here is that suddenly the universal refrain uttered by women everywhere – that all men think with their appendage – may, in fact, be the real inspiration behind this messy message.
PR Week reports on what’s surely the tip of the iceburg – the hijacking registration of a major corporate brand by an imposter “employee”.
Twitter, the social flavor of the week site that’s attracted a huge following and is now closely followed by corporate America – just ask Comcast – began issuing tweets from ExxonMobil, registered on their site by someone called Janet.
Imagine the surprise when the corporate cats at the real ExxonMobil found out after the brandjacking was first reported in the Houston Chronicle a few weeks ago. A quick petition to Twitter and control of the account name reverted to the real owner, no damage done for now. But it doesn’t take a genius to figure out how bad the mischief could have been.
The lesson’s probably this: if you’ve got a brand worth protecting, it’s your responsibility to perform the due diligence required for policing the internet and making sure everything said in your name is, in fact, something you meant to say.
Hello! What’s this? Decades of caramel colored soda showing through green glass is out, aluminum bottles with ultra-fresh graphics is in. Or at least alongside, for now.
Design firm Turner Duckworth’s responsible for the who’d have guessed red sells best brand makeover that just won the Cannes Best Design Gold Lion Award.
When it comes to brand projection – and it does – the perennial member of the world’s most identifiable top ten brands list shows it’s not afraid to throw the dice. We can just see this combo as an end capper that draws crowds in the wire cage locked horns battle for soda surpremcy.
With all the current industry buzz about branding, you’d think we’d see a bit more imagination. Like this urban “squareheads” event by artist and photog Dan Bergeron at Fauxreel, part of a sleek, sophisticated effort from Dentsu/Canada for Vespa/Canada (our work>vespa S>guerilla) that’s as entertaining as it is smart.
Take a while to camp out at Dentsu’s site and don’t miss a peek at their New Media work for Vespa (our work>vespa>new media). When the Harley owner says he’s ditching his ride for a Vespa you can’t help but smile.
Oh yeah, scooter sales are up 300 percent over ’07 – that’s the power of unfettered and focused professional creative.