The hardest thing to do as a creative director is to develop a product that looks at building a creative solution within the same environment instead of asking the user to change. Imagine having to enter into somebody else’s domain, understanding it well enough to develop a creative solution for a problem that could not be solved by domain experts.
Paul Bennett, Creative Director at Ideo talks at TED about how design need not necessarily be found only in blatant, highly visual/artistic forms. Design is in the details.
At one point, Paul talks about how peripheral vision is important to recognize creative solutions. The same goes for opportunities. They are everywhere. It takes practice, experience and smartness to spot one.
I remember way back in time, 6 years ago, I used to subscribe to your service in Chennai. You were not good. The signal strength was particularly bad, but what the hell! You were cheap. I could send International messages for free. So, we all continued to subscribe to you. Then, I moved out of Chennai.
Today, Im in Bangalore and a subscriber of Aircel. You seem to have forgotten that 5 years ago, your price advantage might have worked. But today, there are other providers who are way cheaper than you. So your price advantage is clearly out. Let me tell you my story. I subscribed to Aircel because the retailer did not ask me for my proof of residence, which was a blessing! Exactly 2 weeks from then, my connection got cut without any intimation. I was told at the Aircel office that my details have not been received (which is NOT my problem). Without a fuss, I gave them my id proof and a ration card along with an outstation form. Two days later, I get a call saying ration card is not ok! How, I mean HOW can a ration card not be ok? So, I gave you guys my passport copy and activated that DND service from your site. Apparently, that do-not-disturb was mistaken for please-call-me-at-all-odd-hours. I used to receive atleast 10 calls everyday from four different numbers with recorded promos. And, you ensure that I get the calls when Im in meetings.
I called your customer service and asked the woman on the line to please STOP these promos and messages and calls right now because I receive more calls from Aircel than clients. And that is irritating. She very sweetly said alright. I will stop all Aircel promo calls right away. I am thinking she must have been upset with me calling and yelling because the next morning, when I was at a seminar hoping to make a very important call, I realised I have no balance. Because, that customer care employee has cut my credit and given me a caller tune that I did not ask for. Ironically, that seminar was on “how to use service as a competitive tool.” Since there were no participants from Aircel, I thought I must enlighten you about customer service from a customer’s point of view.
In todays world, telecom is a very competitive industry and if you dont serve me well, I have other options. Many times cheaper and better options.
If you think you can get away with dissatisfying me, you are wrong. Some of us can do harm. Im writing a post and will make it my business to tell at least a few more people about your service. There are other people who can do more harm, like the guy on the video. I am a musician, dont make me do this. Todays customers TALK.
You can screw up, but admit it when you make a mistake. We are considerate people. We forgive. But don’t commit something and go back on that. Worse, if you try revenge.
Even if your signal strength and products are absolutely great and unique (which is not), you cannot afford to ignore service. The entire customer care team might have been outsourced, but they are your front end people. I get to talk to them, NOT your engineers. So please TRAIN them well.
I owe this post to two readers who wanted to know what branding is all about, sans the jargons and theories.
I believe that a brand is the personality of a product.
Take two soap boxes. Turn them around. Check out the ingredients. You will find an uncanny similarity between them. Yet, Camay is priced significantly higher than a Medimix. The personality of the product justifies this. You are paying extra, simply because you want to be a Camay user.
The personality is set at the beginning by the brand manager. And then, it is allowed to evolve with continuous monitoring. A lot of money is spent here because this sets the tone of the product in the market. It also provides the base for all communication strategies. The personality set is also sometimes called, the brand vision.
Brand Vision
The brand vision is very important because that decides when and where is the product going to travel. What sort of people are going to try the product and who does it want to hold on to.
Some brands make their presence felt among us. Some are so well integrated within our lives, that we do not realise their importance till they are gone. Here’s an attempt of my brand map based on usage from 6 am till 12 pm:
Some of the brands from above, exercise a lot of importance. I am very particular about my fila tracks, adidas shoes and nescafe. Others like post it and firefox have been integrated into my life to an extent where I will miss them if they are not available. The ones that are important are chosen by the user based on their personality. There has to be a fit. If I drive a Mercedes and drink the best wine, the Van Heusen would be replaced by probably Armani. This is the brand positioning that all brand managers aim to create.
Brand Positioning
Brand positioning is an impression of the product that brand managers want to establish. The impression / position is important as people use that as a tool to associate with the product.
Q: What do you eat for breakfast?
A: Quaker Oats all the time. I work out so hard everyday that this seems to be the best healthy morning food!
Thats the position that Quaker Oats wants to create and they did it. The trick here is to ensure no other oatmeal owns this position already. And, if they do, its time to work something bigger and better to throw the competitor off. Or find another position to occupy.
Q: What shampoo do you use? The hair looks great!
A: Its always been L’Oreal. It makes me feel so good.
L’Oreal with its “Because we’re worth it” rides on the feel factor.
Brand Vision and Positioning are two most important concepts that provide the basis for the subject. Thanks for the questions on branding. Keep them coming!
Awards, music topping the charts, talk of the town and a HUGE fan base. Lady Gaga has done it all. And, she’s just 23. For those, who do not follow her, here are some quick facts:
Twitter followers: 2.8 mn
Facebook : 5.2 mn fans
This woman gets social media and has managed to revolutionize the music industry. She has brought in a great business sense to it. She’s in constant touch with her fans, continuously updating them of her daily routine and gigs.
“Lady Gaga isn’t the music industry’s new Madonna. She’s the new business model”, says Forbes. Here’ s a question: Is this business model built to last? Is this a fad? Well this, sure has helped her land a job with Polaroid as the Creative Director and inventor of specialty products. She’ s a popular face now. People love her attitude. She gets to endorse fancy products.
And I think this is short-lived. Great business sense. But lack of passion. She’s the big thing now, because she’s different. Not her music. Classic case of how the product which is normal, being packaged great. Awesome communication strategy but where’s my benefit?
A business without any emotion driving it wont last long. Keeping in touch with fans and reaching out to them via social media, is in vain if your core product (music) does not reach out to people.
Its interesting to find out what will be left of Lady Gaga once the storm has calmed down. She’s still a very very rich and famous 23 year old. If paparazzi is what she’s after, well done!
My recent obsession has been brand archetyping. The basic idea behind brand archetypes is:
1. look at a brand in a social concept and
2. the set of patterns and ideas tend to repeat.
This becomes easier to understand how consumers connect with brands better. Harley falls under the non-conformist category. To achieve freedom through defiance and being a rebel are the characteristics. This is decided. The branding has been so strong that even a soft boy-next-door feels the strength while riding a Harley. The connection is known and evident. The question is, can all brands be placed under categories like this?
Here’s a great presentation on brand archetypes put together by Jon Howard
Here is an excellent slide show put together by Abhishek on Avatar and digital marketing. Taking instances from the movie, he has very clearly put forth lessons to be learnt in the digital marketing space. There are 15 lessons in all. Three are my personal favorites, and I swear by them.
Vodafone. Try this. Ask ten people what they remember about Vodafone. The zoozoos seem to have taken precedence from the pug. I would attribute 70% of their success to their viral campaigns. They did everything right. Excellent mix of online and offline communication.
Of course, Vodafone budget is not for everybody. So here’s another lesson for small budget social media clients -
Lesson #1:
Brands that are handicapped by small marketing budgets, Welcome to social media!
Ever heard of the small Italian cafe in Limerick. The one that serves great Italian home-food. This little cafe has employed social media to reach out. When your business is small, there’s little or no scope to grab media attention. This is when social media comes into the picture.
What began as an accident has actually turned into a big business move. Some of the outposts that they use include twitter, facebook and blogging. With campaign ideas like “Italian Facebook Cookalong”, its a little wonder that they have more than 2000 friends. To get more people involved, they post happy faces of their customers enjoying the food. Also, a great way to share recipe secrets, possible menu comments and more.
Lesson #13:
When marketing online, choose media vehicles that bond with your customers.
Be fancy only if you are meant to be fancy. There’s no point in trying to be someone you are not. The brand personality cannot change. There’s a lot to learn from Walmart’s failed facebook campaign. When the brand is all about affordability and discounts, their fb page screamed style. Brand truth once formulated cannot be changed.
There are 12 other lessons that are equally inspiring and interesting. Thanks Abhishek for this wonderful presentation. Looking forward to more!
Here’s a thought. If Nike decided to remove the swoosh from the outside and engrave it on the inside, would you still buy a pair?
I owe this thought to a friend of mine, who called two days ago. He wanted my take on consumer insights about shoes in the Indian market. Lets take Nike for an example. Quality is, of course the most important criterion. The swoosh, in Nike, is extremely important and has a lot of emotions attached to it. But, here’s something more! A pair of Nike with the swoosh on the outside is 10 times more likely to be purchased than a similar pair, offering equal levels of comfort with the swoosh engraved on the inside. With more than 50 responses, I have listed below a couple of points that became full fledged discussions (Thank you guys!)
Q: If Nike decided to remove the swoosh from the outside and engrave it on the inside, would you still buy a pair?
Respondent 8: Hey! They charge me a lot and Im paying premium for the swoosh. It better be on the outside.
Analysis – During the entire conversation, there was no mention of the product attribute at all. Has the visual identity taken over core characteristics? Also, is the premium paid for the swoosh or for brand promise (which is definitely beyond a coolness quotient). The brand Nike can be associated with world class quality. Now, this seems to be taken for granted. Vanity sure is important. But, at the cost of what?
Respondent 15: This is similar to you paying your one year salary on a Louis Vuitton bag. Would you buy the bag without LV logo?
Analysis – Good point. But I still think Nike and LV are poles apart. I wear my Nike shoes to the gym every morning because they are so comfortable. My size 3 feet dont hurt when I run with them. The main purpose is not for other people to notice. Au contraire, I carry my Louis Vuitton for people to notice and talk about. Vanity is the main purpose here. If I was to use it as a bag, I would carry it everywhere. My LV is reserved only for parties where I want to show off.
Respondent 18: Comfort reduces my dissonance, but the swoosh is for people to see and relate.
Analysis – For all the non-MBA-jargon-folks (respect!) the dissonance referred to here, is called post purchase cognitive dissonance. This is the “have I spent too much?”, “Is it worth it?” syndrome that remains in the head after purchase. Product attributes like comfort (“Of course they are worth it. They are so comfortable, it was a great buy”) help reduce the dissonance. Personally, this response is my favorite. We have now come to the level of looking at the core product attribute as a reason to feel good and not a reason to buy!
Respondent 34: I am buying Nike for the product, not for the swoosh.
Analysis – Very very few people are on this side. One of them replied, “As long as the shoe meets my exacting standards, I dont care. I still know it is a pair of Nike.” This set hunt for brand experience and attributes. They go beyond the face value and brand loyalists can be carved out of this lot.
What about you? If Nike decided to remove the swoosh from the outside and engrave it on the inside, would you still buy a pair?
Recently, I reviewed the Windows 7 ad here. Going cute seemed so wrong for a brand as powerful as Microsoft. But, here’s an ad that brought tears to my eyes. Words have to be coined, to describe something so pathetic.
The story opens with an average looking Indian woman in a typical bollywood setting. Her hair flying all over the place, she stands in the middle of a road that leads nowhere. Our hero (one of the wannabe tough/rough “dude”) drives past in a flashy car and stops while the woman asks for a lift. She gestures to him and says “ME”, he checks out her laptop (and its pink), replies “Me for you”. She gets into the car and they drive away. This is one of the four incidents that are shown in the ad. I assure you, the other three are worse than this.
In case you are still guessing the product, save it! This is a laptop called “ME” (I swear) manufactured by HCL. In case you are still staring at the screen in disbelief, do check it out.
2010. Its the beginning of another new decade. Over the past few months, I have had many thoughts for this site. In 2010, some of these are going to be translated into reality.
Long term goal
A couple of years from now, I want Brand Touchpoints to become a successful brand consulting company.
This is one of the most brilliant tech innovations. Adidas has created a virtual 3D world – all from a sneaker!
Go to the Adidas site and hold up your sneaker, which has a code embedded in its tongue, in front of your computer webcam. A virtual world then pops out in front and you can navigate it using your sneaker as a controller.
Now if you want to buy clothes online, try them on, and decide! You can log on to the site, set your web cam right, and voila .. see yourself wearing the clothes you want to buy, with accessories too.
True augmented reality is cool but over using it is killing it. Here’s Adidas using augmented reality as a natural extension. A virtual world has been added as a layer to the real world. This magical fantasy world allows one to play games. Adidas plans for three augmented reality games developed by xForm in the coming months: a skateboard game, a Star Wars-like game and a music-based game.
If not increase sales, Im sure it will atleast shift preferences toward Adidas.
