WHAT COMES FIRST: the “Perfect Ad” or the “Perfect Brand?”

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:  A logo DOES NOT EQUAL a brand, and a marketer DOES NOT EQUAL a graphic designer. A marketer is paid to use their college degree and years of experience to execute your companies strategic long-term goals.  A graphic designer is paid simply to make things pretty to the client.  Both are important.  But if these two are not working together or if you are treating them as the same thing, you will find yourself off course in the near future.

[ BRAND: A "brand" is what your logo represents once it is on  something.  Changing a brand is much harder than changing a logo.   A logo is simply a visual representation of your company.  A brand, however,  is what people have come to learn over the years about the products/services on which you have your logo. ]
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Our story begins…
A mediocre men’s fashion designer decides he would like to expand his business.  His goal was simply: gain more clients and increase production.    He approaches the best marketing guy in New York, George Lois, and turns him loose on the project.

The Marketer’s Hurtles:
Obstacle 1:  At the time, no one had ever heard of the brand “Tommy Hilfiger.”
Obstacle 2:  The product was not unique or exceptional in anyway.
Obstacle 3:  The client was insecure and didn’t know who he was or what he wanted.
Obstacle 4:  Getting people in the industry to care or even read the ad.

The Marketer’s Delimma:
Almost every client approaches marketing with fear and insecurity.  They say that want people beating down their door, but in truth,

1) their business structure couldn’t handle that and
2) they want 100% success with 0% risk
3) the only statement they are willing to make is “I am only a little better than my competitor, but I can’t tell you why.”

So, what is the marketer’s goal?  Is it to make the client happy and feel safe and just spend his money?  Or should he/she push the client to do something bold, unsafe, risky and defining?

The Ad:
Below is the teaser ad campaign that almost never happened.  It was the perfect ad to overcame all the obstacles.  Ultimately, it would launch Tommy Hilfiger into fame as a top designer, but not without a fight.

TOMMY’S RESPONSE:
When Tommy saw this ad, he refused to use it.  He felt it was an insult to these great men to put himself in the same category.  He didn’t see himself as a fashion innovator or even having a product of that kind of quality.

Thankfully, his business partner overrode his decision.  The ad ran.  

Who was right: the marketer or the client?  
Both!  The ad was a sensation. It launched Tommy Hilfiger into huge success. demand increased globally.   But, Tommy’s insecurity got the best of him.  He apologized to all his peers and competitors stating that He didn’t see himself or his product this way but he was overruled in the decision to run the ad.

Tommy Hilfiger’s Defining Point
Tommy now had a decision to make.  Would he shrink back into oblivion in embarrassment, or would he use this new fame to his advantage?

It took humiliation, but Tommy rolled up his sleeves and became the designer that matched his new globally recognized brand.  He worked tirelessly to become a fashion innovator.  He upped the quality of his product.  He BECAME the designer in his ad.  He became the designer his marketer knew he could be.

LESSONS:
 > Success doesn’t come without risk.  
 > Success doesn’t come without work.  
 > A brand is something you become.  What will your brand be? 
 > The best companies in your industry started where you are at.
 > A good marketer will push you beyond your comfort zone; because that is where success lives.
 > A good marketer believes its decietful to let clients dictate work and then get paid for it.
> Ad campaigns have to be “SEEMINGLY OUTRAGEOUS” at first you think its outrageous but then realize its on the nose.  

Recession/Depression…Growth?

When the economy goes south and money starts getting tight, the first thing people do is normally cut expenses.  Mistakenly, marketing is usually the first thing to be cut.   The biggest crime in this scenario is looking at Marketing as an “expense” when it is actually and “investment.”   Marketing isn’t something you do because you have extra money lying around…it is an investment to make more money:

“it takes money to make money.”
Marketing IS the money it takes to make money.

Even since The Great Depression of the 1930′s, companies that out-marketed, out-sold, and out-promoted gained market share and long-term profitability over their competition.  Studies by the STRATEGIC PLANNING INSTITUTE, the Association of Business publishers, McGraw-Hill, Cahners, and Nielsen all show that marketing investments are MORE critical during a downturn.

MERCER CO. studies showed that, 70% of companies that simply cut cost in a slowdown, failed to make profitable growth FOR FIVE YEARS!

Here are PROVEN SUCCESSFUL IDEAS for turning around the effects of a “recession”:
1. Hire newly available talent
2. Let go of consistent underperformers
3. Maintain or increase employee training
4. Redeploy your most capable people into the field to sell
5. Cut customers’ costs. Show customers how your products reduce waste, save time, improve warranties
6. Take advantage of the fact that customers have more time to see salespeople and greater incentive to cut cost
7. Partner with customers to develop and launch new products
8. Rush new products to market
9. Invest in web projects to cut administrative costs and reduce bureaucracy.
10. Target customers of weaker or weakened competitors, especially those competitors that pull back and reduce their visibility.
11. Have top managers make sales calls on end-use customers.

REMEMBER: Recessions are market share growth opportunities!  Because many business mistakenly cut marketing…that means a lot of business is up for grabs.  If you don’t grab it, someone else who is reading this article will.  :)   The marketing term for this is “advertising noise.”  When other companies are silent, your message will stand out and be heard!

REFERENCE: “How to Become a Marketing Superstar” by Jeffery J Fox;  2003

How to sell Diamonds in the Depression.

At one time in American history, diamonds were just another precious jewel.  But it was a much different scene than we see today.  Today, diamonds are synonymous with romance and love.  How did that happen?

In 1938, N.W. Ayer’s market research revealed that the depressed state of the economy created a 50% decline in diamond sales and an even greater decline in their dollar value. Knowing they couldn’t do anything about depression, they determined to reposition themselves in the market.  After a few rough years, the son of the De Beers dynasty met with his ad agency to create a campaign to combat this trend.

The goal was to shift society’s thinking about diamonds.  De Beers wanted to position their product as a “gift of love.” This marketing firm set them on a campaign that would change history forever.

The word “Diamonds”  and “forever” became forever linked in our culture. And what is even more remarkable…the way they positioned themselves as a benchmark of love, they reversed the dire trends.  Diamonds were more valuable than ever.

Still today, men are expected to pay about 3 months salary on an engagement ring.  These rings are passed down from family to family as symbols of a love that stood the test of time.  Consequently they made it an essential benchmark for men to show women they are loved.

Lessons to be learned:
Economy doesn’t have to be the death of your product.
Price has less to do with what people buy than you think.
It’s not what your product is, it is what your product says.
LOVE can add warmth to even marketing a cold hard stone.
“Sex sells” today, but marketing LOVE ensures your place in the market forever.
Tie your product to the most important things in life, and you will be fine.

References: Business Insider:War Room, Advertising Age, Photo by house-of-francheska.co.uk

QUICK TIP: Successful Managers/Leaders

“The most successful managers and executives become even more open and interactive in their leadership styles and even more analytic in their thinking styles as they progress in their careers.”
-HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW

If you are not familiar with HBR –  all of their articles are rooted in comprehensive field studies. They research, interview and study successful and unsuccessful cases to determine the common denominators of success.

It is easy to progressively become more and more closed off, paranoid and protective over our positions in a company.   By doing this, you:

>  are hurting the company/movement
>  will not be open to growth in your field
>  will become dated and obsolete
>  will pass on non-collaborative traits to your subordinates

I heard Rick Heil of Sonicflood.com used the word “IMPARTATION” the other day.

IMPARTATION: the act of imparting something, or the thing imparted

Let that word be your motto as a manager/leader…but only if you want to be one of the “most successful” manager.

What is your ad budget?

If you are like most businesses, you probably don’t even have a marketing budget established.  You may wait for a student to approach you for yearbook ad space and toss them $25.  Then you might even pay whatever the yellow pages tells you is necessary (don’t get me started on this racket!) and call it a year, then wonder why your phone isn’t ringing.

Let me bottom-line it for ya…MARKETING IS A NUMBERS GAME.  The more numbers you put in, the more you get out.  Aside from investing your advertising dollars in the best media possible, and making your ads stand out among the competition, it comes down to how much you spend and how you spend it.

So how should you come up with this figure?
First, let’s look at what we know:
1. how much were your sales last year?
2. how much was your cost of occupancy last year?
3. what is the average markup on your products?  (your cost/sell price)

If you HAVE given Ad budgets any thought, you probably never heard of thinking about markups and cost of occupancy.  Most “do-it-yourself” marketing plans just throw a figure at you like %5 -6% of sales and you’re done.   But if you do not consider these numbers, you could be greatly malnourishing your company.

LOCATION LOCATION LOCATION:
The more you pay for a location, the more visible it is.  This visibility can save you on advertising.  (you just need to concentrate on making your facility more attractive to the traffic going by you.

MARKUP:
Why should you even consider this?   If your cost/per item is low, than you have more income to spend on advertising.  Not to mention the bigger the gap, the higher end the product, the more advertising it takes to reach the perfect customer.

SO HOW DOES THIS HELP YOU?
Well, I have created a google spreadsheet that will tell you exactly how to figure your own ad budget–just by filling in a few blanks.  You can thank me later!

SUBSCRIBERS:  Go directly to the spreadsheet HERE

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*References: “Secret Formulas of the Wizard of Ads” by Roy H. Williams

FAILURE 101: A Prerequisite to SUCCESS 101

Okay, I spent years in college and this is not a class that was offered.  And–let’s be honest–if it was a book, no one would want to pick it up.  Matter-of-fact, in college all I learned were the rules of the game and how to stay as far away from failure as possible.

DID YOU KNOW: Donald Trump, Mark Twain, Larry King are just a few of the millionaires/billionaires that have had to file bankruptcy at some point or another.  Anything worth doing is worth failing at a few times first.

What has me thinking of this?
I was sitting at a roundtable with four other successful industry leaders and business men and women.  (I know what you are thinking:  why where you there–at least that’s what I was thinking.  The only thing I can attribute to my presence at that table is that I recognize and pray to the Giver of All Wisdom.  And, as I hear that voice guiding my thoughts, I speak up and tell it in faith. ) As we went around the table with introductions they each told their stories.  None of these stories were, “I was brilliant and made alot of money.”   Instead, they were stories of how they spent their lives working hard, lost it all, then built it back up from nothing but God’s guidance.

You can’t spell SUCCESS without RISK:
Okay…maybe you can, but wouldn’t it be cool if that analogy were as true as the concept?   ANYTHING worth doing has a greater possibility of failing than succeeding.  Otherwise, someone would have beat you to it.   It is how we learn to deal with failure that will make us succeed.  Look at each failure as a plateau that gets you closer to success. You will never in life have to step down from that plateau unless you quit.

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It kind of reminded me of the story of Joseph in the Bible.  Everyone always looks at that story and says “poor Joseph.”  But when I read it, I see the resourceful, loving hand of God that was teaching him how to be a leader–one failure at time:

1. Brothers selling him into slavery: Learn to be gracious, humble and loving with the gifts God has given you.  And learn not to tell everybody everything.  Sometimes God gives you a Word just for you–not to blab or brag.

2. Potiphar: Learn to do everything with all your heart, soul, and strength–as unto the Lord.  Potiphar’s love and deep respect for Joseph was probably the only thing that saved his life.  In that culture, if Potiphar had truly believed Joseph was capable of what he was accused, instant death would have no doubt been his fate.

3. Potiphar’s Wife: Learn to stay out of compromising positions, no matter how flattering and innocent they seem.

4. Getting Out of Prison: (see 2)  When you help make other people successful, they will help make you successful.  Human nature is selfish that way, but if you are going to manage people, you will need to learn this to get everyone working toward one goal and purpose.

5.  Saving his brothers: Learn that every bad experience with someone is not a cause to write them off.  It just reveals to you who they really are and what their heart is.  Take that knowledge and learn how far you can trust someone, and build a relationship (however shallow or deep)  around that.   Sometimes we are called to protect people from themselves.  That is what forgiveness is.  We can forgive and forget consequences and personal hurt, but we can’t forget the failure and struggle of the other person.  Otherwise, we become an enabler that aides in their sin against God, men and themselves.

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Lets do something HUGE with our lives!  Lets look at failure as part of success, so we can be a part of the 99th percentile that make a difference in the World.

You Get What You Pay For…

The story is told that Pablo Picasso was dining at an elite restaurant in New York when a woman recognized him and initiated conversation with him.  She began gushing about his work and how she loved his style.  He graciously accepted her comments which gave her the courage to ask him to draw a sketch for her.

He grabbed some paper, a pen and a pencil promptly sketched the scene of waiters passing trays of food.  As the woman reached for the sketch, Picasso said, “Madame. That will be $10,000.” Shocked she replied, “But that only took you five minutes.”  ”No, madame, it took fifty years,” he replied.

Picasso priced his product to its value, not to its cost of manufacture.  He priced his product to its investment value, not the sum of the cost of the paper plus the ink plus some hourly wage rate.  A painting with the name “Picasso” is worth more than a similar painting with the name “McGillicuddy.”

LESSON: Determine your product’s economic value to the customer and price the product to that value, not the manufacturing cost.

APPLICATION: I hear this in my business alot, “Well so-and-so down the road can do it for half that.”  I am sure you hear it too.  And it is easy to get discouraged.  But one thing I can guarantee is that I spend probably 3 times more time on my work than anyone else.  I can also guarantee that I have invested YEARS in experience to do what I do.  REMEMBER you want to attract the “RIGHT” kind of client and everyone that comes in your office will not fit this mold.  The “Right” client is someone that knows “you pay for what you get.”  They can see the difference in what you do.  They aren’t shopping for a bargain, they are shopping for results.  Don’t undersell yourself.

REF: “How To Become A Marketing Superstar”  by Jeffery J. Fox, 2003

Core Values: A Vital Exercise

Okay…back to “Articulating a Vision”
(see post Will-your-company-be-extinct-in-5-years )

THE FIRST STEP…in creating a vision is establishing your CORE VALUES.  These are the essential and enduring tenets of an organization.  They require no external justification.  They are convictions of those inside the organization.

>For example, Walt Disney Company’s core values of imagination and wholesomeness stem not from market requirements but from the founder’s inner belief that imagination and wholesomeness should be nurtured for their own sake.

Wow.  Think about companies today. Think about the “sex sales” mentality.  Pop stars are getting younger and younger and wearing less and less.  Now look at Wall Street.  Look at the banking executives who even took bailout money to pay themselves and felt entitled to that money–even though their greed helped put the country in that situation.  What we find is a lack of CORE VALUES.  We see companies doing whatever it takes to make a buck today at the expense of the future.

I heard and briefly met Mitt Romney in Nashville a few months back and something he said really stuck me.  ”Liberalist are thinking about today and what they can get.  Conservatives are thinking about the future and what they can give.”  Oh how we need companies to look beyond today.  HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW puts it this way, ” It’s not what a company’s CORE VALUES are, but that a company has them at all.”  Lets talk about guidelines in establishing CORE VALUES for your company:

WHAT ARE THEY?
These are values that are so strong within the fiber of a company, that it’s founder would rather not operate without them.

ARE THESE OBVIOUS?
No.  This is not the place to just throw ethical words around. A high technology company decided not to put “Quality” in their list of VALUES because he could see a world where technology makes “Quality” irrelevant.     But they did include “Innovation” because that is what they want to lead the industry with.

HOW MANY?
A company should have no more than 5 CORE VALUES

WHO SHOULD ESTABLISH THESE?
Your company should create what is called a “MARS” group.  If you had to pick the best and brightest and diverse of your company to send to mars to recreate the BEST version of your company for the future.  This is who should be a part of this group.

DISCOVER YOUR CORE VALUES?
I have prepared a worksheet to help you  and your MARS TEAM to discover your CORE VALUES:
CORE VALUE WORKSHEET (subscribers only)
-or-
SUBSCRIBE HERE (get access to my private google documents by filling out this form)

REFERENCES: Harvard Business Review on Change, 1998; Virtus.

Taking the Hocus Pocus out of Harry Potter’s Success

Harry Potter has been a huge product success…no one can deny.  The success of this series has been attributed to magic, witchcraft and spells, but from a marketing standpoint, it is just a great product combined with a great marketing campaign.
There are 5 things we can learn from the success of Harry Potter’s brand and apply to our businesses. No, you may not have the multi-million dollar brand success that comes with international distribution that J.K Rowling received…but you can apply these points to position your company for long-term, sustainable growth.

1. A Good Product
Yes, a skillful salesman can sell a refrigerator to an eskimo, but he won’t be able to do it as a sequil or a trilogy. If the product did not match the hype, all the word of mouth advertising would have come to a hault.   Your marketing HAS to meet expectations for it to succeed.

2. Emotional Involvement
Consumers will remain emotionally distant to your product, business or brand until they feel confident you can provide the 3 “S’s” of consumer loyalty.  That is, creating feelings of stability, sustainability, and security. Without that kind of emotional involvement, consumers will not feel confident to stay with your product much less refer their friends to you.

READ THE FULL STORY by signing up to my “private google documents”

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Will Your Company Be Extinct In 5 Years?

Know who you are FIRST!

Smith-Corona: For Decades, this company was one of the leading typewriter manufacturer.  Unfortunately, they fixated their vision on there product. When the world began to change toward personal computers…they denied this would effect their business.  They insisted that Typewriters would always be relevant.  Because they refused to grow and change, their business collapsed.

WHERE THEY FAILED:  The founders of Smith-Corona did not establish a proper vision for their company.  A great “vision” will lead your company to ALWAYS focus on your customer’s needs…that means changing somethings but keeping others the same.  What would have happened if they realized that they were in the business of helping customers create documents instead of producing typewriters?

CHANGE IS PART OF SUCCESS: If a company is going to stay on top…they are going to HAVE to embrace change.  Just in my life time I remember creating ads by taping clipart and text onto a page and “xeroxing” it.  The quality was horrible.  That was before I knew what JPG, RAW, TIFF, EPS, CDR, PSD, PDF, or FTP was.   But that is just one small facet of my business, now think of everything else that has changed.  I went from typing book reports in school on a typewriter to saving documents on a floppy disk in college.  To now blogging my thoughts to be stored on the internet.

NOT CHANGING IS AN EVEN BIGGER PART OF SUCCESS! The only thing more important than change is knowing WHAT NOT TO CHANGE. If you change with every new fad, your customers never learn for what they should come to you.  It is so easy to focus your attention on your product and be identified with that.  But, what happens when your product is no longer relevant?  Your business goes south. Because every one knows you as the typewriter store, when what they need is a PC.

How will a proper VISION help your company?

I am reading a book right now that was written by a marketer in the sports industry.   He has bounced all over the country saving teams and arena on the brink of failure.  Story after story, his greatest credit was teaching this industry that there weren’t in the “sports” industry afterall!

Sports Marketing:  Are they marketing “sports” or “entertainment?”   If they market sports, they will lose their crowd when their team is doing poorly.  But if they market entertainment then you will have a crowd no matter how your team is doing.  That is why you see so much pageantry and hype at games.  Win or lose…your experience is a WIN/WIN.  Now they know how to market what they do!

LET’S BEGIN THE PROCESS OF DEFINING WHO YOU ARE AS A COMPANY:
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References:
Harvard Business Review on Change, Copyright 1998.
Marketing Outrageously, Jon Spoelstra, Copyright 2001