Do Not Read This Post Without the Express Written Consent of the NFL
Washington’s in a funk.
The type of malaise that’s easily recognizable to Beltway insiders as a Redskins-induced trauma. This time, they’ve gone and lost to the woefully inept Detroit Lions, a team that wins ballgames with roughly the same frequency as Nancy Pelosi wins Republican support.
Yet fans will continue to support the team. Sure, they’ve had 19 head coaches in the past six years. Sure, their shockingly racist moniker is now being litigated in the Supreme Court. Sure, Dan Snyder is one of the worst football minds in a generation. But he’s a damn good brand manager.
And that’s what a sports team is, a brand.
Steve Bisciotti bought the Baltimore Ravens in 1994. But what exactly did he buy? The logo, the NFL license, the practice equipment? I was thinking: if Tom Brady, Bill Belichick, and the rest of my Patriots heroes all changed teams, would I still support the Pats?
I think I would. And a lot of it, I honestly believe, is due to the damned inconvenience of switching brands.
So here I am rooting for, essentially, a corporation. With the emotion and passion that sports uniquely draws out of its core (male-skewing) demographic.
It’s not an unexplained phenomenon. Kraft pays for it. So does Snyder. Advertising, public relations, grass roots, sponsorships. Hail to the Redskins galore.
We could learn a lot from the worst team in the NFC East.
Just not anything about football.
“Wave” has a new meaning
The Wave doesn’t just stand for a hand gesture, a movement of water, or a sports stadium crowd activity anymore.
Wave is Google’s new online tool for “real-time communication and collaboration,” and all of the online communications world is buzzing about it. Some people anticipate the tool, which is expected to come out in less than 24 hours, to redefine e-mail and web communication.
Not only is Wave the name of the tool, but the actions you make on the tool are referred to as waves. According to the website, a wave is:
- Equal parts conversation and document
- Shared
- Live
Still don’t get it? Yea, it didn’t do a lot for me, either. From what I understand, people on the same wave can discuss and edit content together quickly thanks to the real-time “see as they type” feature and in an organized fashion.
My interpretation is: let’s say you are working on some site copy or a bylined article with a team of 3 or 4 people. Normally, you may circulate different versions of the document around and each person would make their changes (and you hope they turned track changes on!) or send back emails with their thoughts until eventually you got it right. In a wave, the same group of people could collaborate in a real-time email thread and you can all edit it together and see the edits as they happen.
Still don’t get it? You are not alone. There are the really excited people, the skeptics, and then the majority… the confused. You can try to learn more here but perhaps the best way to know whether this will really be the “wave” of the future or a giant flop is to try for yourself. I tried getting a preview today but was directed to this page to get on a waiting list.
I wonder, is it because the demand is already so high? Or is this a tactic on Google’s part to create the illusion of exclusivity, thus creating more anticipation and interest?
Will you do the wave?
A Client’s Website: Before and After
What is it about the Before and After concept that we love so much? As a culture, it seems as though we spend an inordinate amount of time comparing how people and things looked before and after a certain event. One needs only to look at the online photo montages that surrounded Michael Jackson’s death, the popularity of shows that show the renovation of a home, a look down technology’s memory lane and even the popularity of Conan O’Brien’s “If They Mated” segment. Wait. Is Conan O’Brien still popular?
In any event, it seems as though everybody loves to see how both things and people can morph and develop over time. The same is true for a company’s website. We recently helped a client complete such a transformation – from what was a static, outdated-looking, underwhelming website into one that is interactive, user-friendly and dynamic.
With so much of a company’s identity, and potential business, coming from the Internet, it is important for organizations to have a web presence that defines who they are, what they do, and why they do what they do better than their competition. Based on the Before and After images of our client’s website, it is clear that optimizing an company’s website should be a priority for any organization.
- This is how the old website looked.
- This is how the website looks now, after TBG worked on it.
Avoiding The SBA 8A Graduation Trauma: Preparing Your Brand for Higher Valuation
Remember that feeling of accomplishment you had receiving your college diploma? “I’ve made it,” you probably thought. “I’m finally ready.”
Then came the sobering discovery—the realization that post-graduation life has its own challenges and impediments.
It’s the same story for SBA-certified minority-owned companies, designated 8(a). Once they’ve graduated from the SBA program, they find themselves competing in a different world. Their revenues drop; key employees get poached; worst of all, buyers use “comparables” to consistently undervalue their company’s true worth.
According to Merrill Advisory Group’s June 2009 study, the three critical components of Government Contractor Valuation are Business Focus, Financial Operations, and Unique Characteristics.
But what are Unique Characteristics? That’s the question most minority-owned government contractors aren’t prepared to answer. Assuming all things are equal (including past performance, business focus, and financial operations), what makes your company worth more than your competitors’?
Often, the answer is rooted in a company’s Strategic Brand Management (SBM), or lack thereof.
SBM, like marketing in general, may sound superfluous to government contractors. But you’ll find it’s intimately and inextricably linked to your company’s growth post-graduation. Buyers and investors have many names for it, “Good Will,” “Intellectual Property,” and “Reputation with Customers, Suppliers, and Partners,” to name a few.
When stakeholders visit your Web site—your digital brand identity—what will they find? User experiences, thought leadership pieces, and collaborative technologies that demonstrate your unique value proposition? Or a hollow, unconvincing mission statement bootlegged from a competitor: “We’re the only company that’s truly customer-focused,” or “We deliver solutions!”
Few 8(a) companies have invested the proper time to position themselves for optimal value. The same IT systems integrator can be perceived as an “Architect” (highly skilled strategic partner), or as “Mr. Fix It” (low-cost vendor). Savvy entrepreneurs know that brand equity and the art of strategic communications can make or break perceived value to both Federal customers and potential buyers.
Often, we hear 8(a) graduates lament that they can’t afford marketing, advertising, or public relations. It’s the equivalent of bemoaning the need to buy a suit for your first real job interview. Image matters, particularly when you’re building your company for higher valuation. And that, 8(a) graduates, is the bottom line.
What’s the big idea?
Ever wonder what the next big thing is going to be in the creative world? I’ve noticed that it tends to go from one extreme to another. Everything from interior design to graphic design. Take for instance fonts. One year it is all sans serif, lowercase fonts. The next it is all caps, serif fonts. We see it on both web and print. I’ve had clients even ask me what is the popular current trend. It is easy to simply jump on the bandwagon with the latest craze, but is that what we should be doing? Following the leader? The answer is no. I personally think it is good to see what is out there and then do your own thing–different.
Some more examples I have seen: First there was the collage of photos done in Photoshop, then came the single large photo, then it was the typography as the star, up front and center with no imagery. One leader that many seem to be copying is Apple. Everyone wants to look current, not outdated. So they start to design like everyone else.
What’s the big idea? I believe the best designs are those that stand out, are unique, and get results. So what is so unique about the latest fad that everyone is emulating? Maybe the answer is to see what is hot now, and do the opposite…or maybe we can just think for ourselves and use other channels of inspiration. The challenge is on!
Toyota vs. GM – This Will Never Be a Fair Fight
Ignore the cars themselves. It’s tough, I know. But pretend for a second that all things are equal. Pretend that we’re in a parallel world where GM actually manufactures competent automobiles.
Oops, they’re going bankrupt here too.
One of the best campaigns this year has been for the Toyota Prius. Beautiful, elegant, original, iconic, arresting, memorable—all the adjectives that you want consumers to associate with your automobile.
One of the worst campaigns this year has been for GM, with Ed Whitacre (really?!!) walking around a soundstage, seemingly at random. Boring, implausible, suspicious, anemic, sad.
That’s an imperfect comparison, because Prius is a product and GM is a company. But the larger point still stands. GM hasn’t the first clue about how to sell cars in a global free market.
So what have they done? They’ve decided to try to circumvent the whole marketing battle. Their new tagline: “May the Best Car Win” is basically a pleading time-out from the world of advertising and product positioning. Too bad you can’t actually do that, GM. Too bad you’re losing ground every day by ignoring the realities of a media-based economy.
So instead of pretending that you’re fighting a marketing-neutral product war (which you’re not), or that you’d even win such a war (which you wouldn’t), it’s time to start thinking about a tangible, plausible value proposition that actually has relevance in today’s market.
Here’s a hint: your pathetic satisfaction guarantee ain’t it.
Marketing a Publishing Blockbuster
The big talk earlier this month in the book industry was the release of Dan Brown’s The Lost Symbol. I will admit that I was excited to pick it up, and although I am only about 100 pages into it, I love seeing DC get the same conspiracies at every turn treatment that European capitals received in his previous two Robert Langdon novels.
Yes, I am excited to read the book. However, both Jonathan, our ACD, and I agree that being in an industry where we use language to craft compelling messages for our clients, and knowing good from bad language is a key component, admitting that I am excited to finish this book is akin to catching Good Will Hunting staring down at the multiplication tables.
In discussing Dan Brown’s writing style last week, I told our ACD that my favorite thing about Dan Brown’s style is how he tries to cram encyclopedic knowledge into regular conversations – with plenty of awkward sentence structures and italics to boot. I came up with the following fake exchange of dialogue between two potential Dan Brown protagonists:
“I will not like to go to the Norbious Vektor.”
“You mean the top secret Norbious Vektor that was founded by Swiss Guards in 1117 as a critical defensive weapon for the Church to use against the Hohenzollern Empire?”
“Yes. It was believed to be lost for all eternity after the agreement of the Lateran Council that proclaimed the Vatican to be a separate, independent city-state within the geographic boundaries of the Eternal City: Rome.”
Like all of his previous books, The Lost Symbol’s key selling point is not that it is an engaging example of stellar word-craft. Rather, his books are fun, quick reads. And that is where honesty in marketing and messaging come into play. His books are not selling themselves as classics, as “Literature” or as anything that should appear on a college syllabi. The messaging around the book seems to be: “You know you want to read this book. You will read this book. And likely enjoy it.” Coming up with the right strategy and the right message for the right product is key in publishing as well as in the B2B and B2G space.
The Triangle Represents Synergy
Modern logo design has become something of an embarrassment.
Reports vary, but most people who study these things seem to think business logos first appeared in the thirteenth century among traveling merchants and tradesmen (I’ve also heard they were first used as tavern markings).
The point is, they had one purpose and one purpose only: not to build brand equity, not to leverage cultural mores — simply to differentiate goods.
Perhaps we’ve forgotten this, because now virtually all logos look alike (particularly in the B2B world). Most have some sort of swoopy curve, or boxy parallelogram, or some combination of the two.
Why? Because this is what we think corporate logos are supposed to look like. Never mind that they don’t perform the ONE job that logos are actually supposed to do—-look different!
It’s just another symptom of corporate hackery. Companies that can’t decide whether they want to stand out or blend in.
Honestly, even if your logo is a bloody severed head with ants crawling out of it, you’re way ahead of these guys.
Friday Laboratory Roundup
This Week:
- Chris McGurn exposed the seamy underbelly of the Danish tourism industry — a little more than kin and less than kind.
- Carlyn Kelley infringed on an EMI music copyright in order to make the case for agency performance evaluations.
- Jonathan Katz discovered the small, metallic mastermind behind Honda’s marketing empire, then took an Axe to the benefits of creative advertising.
- And Michael Johnson discovered further proof of Google’s imminent world domination, then plugged his Entertainment Weekly into a wall socket.
CEO Junction Roundtable: Business Development Strategies for Today’s Economy
Earlier this week, I attended a very lively and informative panel discussion sponsored by CEO Junction. The topic was how to grow and develop business in difficult economic times – re: today’s economy. The panel consisted of four experts who discussed different BD strategies: Gregory Caruso discussed how mergers and acquisitions can be a successful development strategy for both the buyers and sellers of companies. Catherine Read talked about the importance of social media as a key component of business development, Kim Guarino detailed why marketing strategy is so important for a company’s development goals and Mark Slatin spoke on the importance of customer loyalty to grow a business.
The audience seemed to be most interested in the social media and marketing components of the panel. Since that is part of what we do at The Borenstein Group, I had the opportunity to speak with many of the attendees about how, and why, social media is a key component of strategic, integrated communications strategies and why such strategies are crucial for successful business development.
I tweeted the whole event. Much of the audience is yet to adopt social media, and was impressed when I told them that I captured the whole event via Twitter. It presented a great opportunity to tell people about the platform, how easy it is to use, and how it can help keep a record of meetings, forums and other events. If you would like more information on what topics were covered and what insight was gained, my Twitter notes can be found here.
Thanks to Art Medici and Bill Campbell of CEO Junction and all of the panelists and attendees for making this such an engaging conversation with a lot of great information.