———————————–

Obama Halves Chrysler’s Planned Marketing Budget

Task Force Agrees Automaker Needs Advertising — Just Not $134 Million Worth

By Jean Halliday

Published: May 11, 2009

DETROIT (AdAge.com) — Chrysler wanted to spend $134 million in advertising over the nine weeks it’s expected to be in bankruptcy — the U.S. Treasury’s auto-industry task force gave it half that.

So if GM, which is wrestling with the possibility of a Chapter 11 filing itself, is wondering how much influence the task force will have over marketing, the answer is: plenty. However, transcripts from the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for Southern District of New York, where the Chrysler case is being heard, proved for the first time that the task force at least understands that advertising is a necessary expense — even if it doesn’t think Chrysler needs $134 million for nine weeks of car ads. (continued after link)

————————————————-

So it’s come to this. Anything worth managing is worth MICROmanaging – at least in the ObamaNation. Now I may not be Presidential timber, but I am a marketing guy – and a thinker. I’m not defending Chrysler (Lord knows), but there’s only one group that I can think of that could run Chrysler further into the ground than they already are – and that would be the U.S. Government.

Here’s the problem. If you cut advertising you lose mindshare. It’s as simple as that. This is NOT the time for Chrysler to cut advertising in half. If anything, it’s time to double down on their media buy. (Of course, it would help if they got some ads that were appealing rather than appaling.) If this doesn’t make you think we’re carreeening down a path to create the U.S. version of Yugo, you’re not paying attention.

Speaking of the Chrysler ads, if I were them, I’d take a page from the playbook of Lee Iacocca, when he faced the scandal of Chrysler running back odometers head-on. My recommendation for a new ad would star Bob Nardelli, the lame-duck CEO, and it would go something like this:

Hello…I’m Bob Nardelli, CEO of the Chrysler Corporation. As you’ve heard, Chrysler faces some real challenges as we reorganize, merge, and recreate our company so we can be competitive in the future. What you may not have heard is that Chrysler has some great cars, trucks and SUVs now – and we have more on the boards for the future.

Don’t get me wrong…we realize that we’ve made some mistakes. And we are committed to fixing every one of them. But we have some outstanding vehicles that we’d like you to consider when you’re ready to buy your next vehicle.

Take our Jeep division – did you know that the award-winning Jeep Wrangler and Wrangler Unlimited have both been judged “best in class” by countless auto experts, magazines, and pundits? How about the Dodge RAM trucks? We launched a redesigned RAM for the 09 model year, and it’s been met with acolades around the nation. Or the Chrysler minivans – the original and still the market leader.

We’re committed to turning our company around. And with your help, we’ll restore the Chrysler, Dodge and Jeep brands to where they belong – at the pinnacle of the U.S. automobile industry. I invite you to stop by one of our showrooms today, and see for yourself the great vehicles we have to offer.

Now obviously, one ad’s not gonna win the hearts and minds of the public. But a little frank honesty would go a long way towards convincing the public that Chrysler management actually has a clue, and a chance of rebuilding. Unfortunately, the ObamaNation seems to think they can micromanage Chrysler better than Chrysler, and they are Hell-bent on a penny-wise/pound-foolish stratagem that will virtually insure that Chrysler is destined not for rebuilding, but for the trash heap of history.

]]> http://blog.grokmedia.com/2009/05/13/the-marketer-in-chief/feed/ 0 http://blog.grokmedia.com/2008/11/24/a-marketing-experiment/ http://blog.grokmedia.com/2008/11/24/a-marketing-experiment/#comments Mon, 24 Nov 2008 20:04:15 +0000 admin http://blog.grokmedia.com/?p=219 If nothing else, this blog exists so that I can both talk about marketing – and put my marketing knowledge and theories into practice. I’m happy to say that we’re now averaging about 250 readers per week, and that’s enough visitors to start thinking towards ways I can monetize the blog. 

Why monetize? Frankly, I don’t expect to make a lot of money on this puppy…but I wouldn’t complain if I did. I’ve had friends suggest that I start charging for content. I’m convinced that charging for content would be the fastest way to kill this blog. Hey – if the Wall Street Journal can’t make a pay-for-access model work, how successful do you think I’d be?

That leaves underwriting and advertising. Since I’ve yet to find a corporate sugar daddy that is interesting in paying me to ramble, all that’s left is advertising.

Fortunately, Google’s AdSense program makes it ridiculously easy to become a corporate sell-out – sign up, add the code to your site, and you’re suddenly running ads, with the bonus of (potentially, anyway) generating some income.

That’s where you come in. 

In order for my master plan to work, people have to click on the ads. Now I’m not trying to skew the results, nor am I willing to twist anybody’s arm, but I’m keen to find out if I’ll make dime one off these ads. The deal is, I don’t have any real control over what kinds of ads they run, so I’ve no way of knowing how interesting or relevant the ads will be to our content. So what I’d like to ask you to do is to click on the ones you find interesting, and ignore the rest. I’ll report back regularly to let you know what kind of money I’m generating with AdSense, and my overall feel for how it’s going. 

So stay tuned…and hit me with some clicks.

Things have changed.

Today I can blow off the concept of color seps entirely. I send out a PDF file (usually over the web) and the printer either sends it to a plateless, digital press, or makes the plates from the PDF. No need for color seps, and I seldom have to deal with Match prints or color proofs. (Granted, I don’t do a huge amount of exacting color print work right now – most of my business has moved to online work.)

Of course, online work brings a whole ‘nother set of challenges. No end-user calibrates their monitors – nor would even understand why that’s important. Browsers interpret HTML, CSS, and JavaScript differently, as do different operating system platforms. Consistency? Fergettaboutit. There is no way to build a website that looks and works the same way on every browser/platform, short of doing the entire thing in Flash, which opens up different – but equally as daunting – cans full ‘o grief. Add PDAs and palmtops to the mix, and you’ve got some Excedrin-sized nightmares.

So it seems things haven’t changed all that much, at least as far as the headache part.

What interests me from a marketing perspective, is that the media may have undergone a huge, tectonic shift, but the need to communicate the message has not. Fundamentally, all of marketing can be distilled down to telling a compelling story to enough people to make a difference. That’s it. The whole enchilada. No story, no marketing. No marketing, no sales. No sales…well, you get the picture.

When we talk about what’s changed, you really have to divide that into two groups – tools and techniques. Tools have changed so much that an artist trained in 1970s techniques would be lost – or useless – today. How we use those tools hasn’t really changed that much – but perhaps it should.

Take TV. The advent of the DVR (a.ka. “Tivo”) has revolutionized the way we watch television. To date, however, it hasn’t done much to change the way marketers use television to advertise. Thus, TV has become a much more expensive medium, CPM-wise, because so many are skipping the commercials.

How about radio? Terrestrial advertisers answer to the satellite revolution was to go online. That caused conflict with talent, who wanted to be compensated for the additional exposure – and overpriced themselves out of the market. The result is that advertisers have to buy space on the air AND online, and never the twain shall meet. Double your anguish, double your costs. Ouch.

Newspapers? Magazines? Readership is down, and if you believe all the “top of mind” hype they try to push at their clients and prospects, I’ve got a bridge in Brooklyn you might be interested in purchasing.

Online? It can be effective, but most of the traditional advertising tools – you know, “bigger, louder, more annoying” – just don’t work online. Social networking sites and Instant Messaging are the Brave New Worlds to conquer for advertisers…if only they knew how to reach people without annoying them or losing all credibility.

What’s vital to understand is that what we are witnessing is a change from one era to the next, in the same magnitude (and with the same results) of the change from the eras where dinosaurs ruled the Earth to the one where they dissappeared. It’s not just the tools that have changed. It’s how we will have to use them in order to be effective marketers.

So let me pull out my crystal ball and see what I can see for the future…

TV. Wow. Big changes here. I predict a lot more annoying promotions at the bottom of your screen. Perhaps desperate networks (there’s a great name for a dramady!) may even try to pump ads into the space. Continually. Hopefully, they’ll stop covering up the story with their ads, and relegate them to the letterbox bars. Don’t hold your breath. I think product placements are the trend of the future here. Only the well-heeled need apply. TV spots as we know them today are an endangered species.

Radio: Local radio will be forced to evolve, and become more…well…local. Not much point in local radio if all they’re gonna do is to broadcast nationally-syndicated shows, when you can get the same thing – only better – from your satradio. Advertising won’t change that much, other than trying to find a metric that will let you know what’s working.

Print: Good luck. Newspapers are dying. Magazines are becoming much more the realm of narrow, specialized interests. That’s good news for targeting campaigns – but bad news if you want a generalized reach. There will always be a market for print, but it’s heyday or dominating the world of advertising is over, unless some global EMP shuts down electronics for good.

Email: Dead man walking. I wouldn’t suggest an email campaign to a client for any amount of money. Spam has all but killed the usefulness of email as a marketing tool – EXCEPT if you’re into permission-based marketing.

Instant Messaging: If anybody figures out how to SPAM phones, this will quickly become this year’s email…in other words, soon to be coming to a “useless technology” seminar near you. Until then, it’s great for permission marketing.

Websites: Few use the web to its fullest advantage. Websites should be targeted at specific user types. Don’t force users to figure out how to get info from you – figure out how they prefer it, and serve it up, fresh and hot to them. Lots of room for growth and innovation here.

Viral: This is the gold mine. Right here. Figure out how to grow your market by giving your clients respect, and allowing your market to grow through word-of-mouth. Figuring out how to use the tools we have available to accomplish this feat is the question of the new age.

Outdoor: The rules remain the same – it sorta works, depending on the client, and of course, location, location, location. Unfortunately, unless you’ve got a big honkin’ budget, the big guys get the best seat at the table.

Other: Advertisers are constantly looking for new ways to get their messages before the public. Shopping carts. Supermarket floors. Automobile wraps. Hot air balloons. You name it. If it works, do it, but keep in mind, the more ads there are, the more visual clutter results. Hard to cut through that clutter when everybody else is screaming just as loudly as you are.

The Secret: I dunno. Wish I did. My best guess is that it’s going to involve a lot of hard work, reading tea leaves, trial and error, and trying to build relationships with customers, instead of treating them as some generic demographic. Which is to say that, the more things change…

In recent years, we’ve seen spin that would make a top envious from organizations like the tobacco growers, automobile makers, and scads of politicians (who virtually invented spin). Last night, I saw a TV spot for a group that has decided to take spin to a new level, proactively seeking to change the hearts and minds of the great unwashed before they even get their hackles up regarding the group’s product.

Know much about sweeteners? If you like sweets, sodas, bread products, or cereals and think sugar (cane sugar or beet sugar) is a major part of your diet, think again. Most foods today use what’s called High Fructose Corn Syrup (a.ka.: HFCS) as their sweetener of choice, instead of cane or beet sugar. Why? It’s cheaper and easier to transport than cane or beet sugars. Recently, a number of groups have raised questions about HFCS and health issues. These concerns have not yet gotten a lot of traction in the media or penetrated the conciousness of the general public. Which makes the nationwide TV/Web campaign currently being mounted by the Corn Refiners Association really interesting.

Before we go any farther, let me get a couple of things out of the way, in the spirit of full disclosure. I love soft drinks. I don’t drink diet drinks (I hate the after-taste), and while I try and watch what I eat (sort of) I’m not a crusader against food additives, genetically modified foods, irradiated foods, or anything else. If there’s something to concerns about HFCS, I’d like to know about it, but until I see some proof, I’m not up in arms about this. I’m not concerned about HFCS, aspartame, Olestra, saccharin, or anything else the scaremongers would have me believe will kill me.

Having said that, my big gripe about HFCS is that it doesn’t taste as good as cane sugar, at least in my vice-of-choice, Coca-Cola. In fact, I’ve taken to buying what we refer to around here as “Mexican Cokes” – Coca-Cola that’s bottled South of the border, where for some reason, they still use cane sugar.

Cane sugar has a ‘bite’ to it that HFCS just doesn’t have. Cokes made with HFCS taste better. Given that they are also more expensive, I drink fewer cane sugar Cokes, which is a happy thing for me and my wasteline. (Pun intended. A waist is a terrible thing to mind.)

Since I hit my fifth decade on Planet Earth, I’ve begun paying more attention to what I put in my body. I’m a believer in the idea that the less you screw around with additives and processing, the better off you are, at least in general. Given that cane sugar Cokes taste better, drinking fewer HFCS Cokes was an easy decision. What’s somewhat worrisome for me, though, is that some of the groups hitting the alarm button (including the USDA) claim that studies show that HFCS could be contributing cause of the increase in reported cases of diabetes. Since I have a number of friends that have been stricken with diabetes (and if you count all the diabetes products commercials on TV, I’ve got to believe that diabetes control is a growing business), this is worrisome. Of course if you want to eliminate HFCS from your diet – good luck. Fountain drinks aren’t available with cane sugar. Cake mixes, breakfast cereals, and thousands of other products are made with good old HFCS. You can run from HFCS, but I don’t think you can hide.

HFCS is big business for “Big Corn.” Aside from the windfall from the recent, misguided push towards using corn to make Ethanol, corn growers make big bucks from crops destined for HFCS production. (For every winner there must be a loser – sugar producers are taking it in the shorts as manufacturers move away from cane sugars and towards HFCS.)

So I suppose it’s logical that the Corn Refiners Association has come out, guns blazing, to convince people that HFCS is a beneficial, safe way to sweeten foods. And what better way to do so than with a TV campaign rife with a wholesome girl-next-door, a somewhat dense and inarticulate boyfriend, and a phallic symbol?

In the spot entitled “Two Bites,” we see a young, attractive couple on a picnic. The girl (we’ll call her “Eve”) proffers a juicy, red Popsicle to her guy. He resists, saying “that’s got high fructose corn syrup in it…and you know they say about that!” She smiles her knowing smile, professes ignorance of what “they” say. He fumbles about for a bit, not able to recall what “they” say, either (but he knows it was bad). In her best Socratic manner, asks “What? That it’s made from corn? That it has the same calories as sugar, and honey, it’s fine in moderation!” The guy (we’ll call him “Adam”) responds, “You only brought one?,” and happily accepts the treat, dripping with HFCS and symbolism, from his temptress girlfriend. The spot then ends with a tagline: “Get the facts…you’re in for a sweet surprise.” along with a URL for SweetSurprise.com, where you can learn “factual information about common sweetners like sugar, honey, and high fructose corn syrup (HFCS).”

The spot accomplishes a number of things you learn in P.R. 101:

1. Confront the problem – HFCS is starting to get a bad rep. The spot acknowledges this.
2. Don’t give credence to the problem by explaining it – The spot cleverly mentions the idea that HFCS is somehow ‘bad’ – but never offers any details or evidence that it is, thus discrediting it by discrediting the person in the spot espousing that opinion.
3. Explain your position/state your claims in a simple, factoid fashion – The spokesbabe cleverly works her three talking points into her answer – it’s natural (made from corn), just as sweet – and no sweeter – than (cane) sugar, and okay to eat in moderation.
4. Offer a tease/call to action to provide more ‘facts’ to buttress your argument – the URL and tag line lead the viewer to believe that they’ll be ‘rewarded’ when they learn the ‘truth’ about HFCS.

The site offers a number of things – a quiz, access to the media campaign, and a FAQ that is heavy on pro-HFCS data, but conveniently skirts any mention of a connection between HFCS and diabetes.

Is HFCS a danger to public health and a cause of diabetes? I dunno. I’m not a scientist. However, I’d like to know more – a lot more – about this, and not just take the word of an organization that has a vested interest in convincing me that HFCS is a safe alternative to cane and beet sugars.

In the spirit of providing as much information as possible, here are some links I found by searching Google for “high fructose corn syrup”:

The Murky World of High-Fructose Corn Syrup

WestonaPrice.org article on the “Double Danger of HFCS

Mayo Clinic article on HFCS

LA Times article on HFCS

WaPo article on HFCS

SF Chronical article on HFCS

www.sprol.com

http://www.sweetsurprise.com

I’d suggest you read what you can, and then make up your own mind HFCS. No matter what you hear, or who you listen to, remember that everybody has an agenda. (Mine is to talk about marketing and how it relates to the world in which we live.)

Getting back to the matter at hand, kudos to the lobbyists, PR team, and marketers behind Big Corn. They’ve crafted a campaign that doesn’t miss a trick, and worked proactively to try and shut down the arguments against HFCS before they get enough play in the news to become a danger to their profits. That’s the way to use marketing effectively. Is that an ethical use of marketing? I don’t know. If HFCS is proved to be safe – yes, it is. If not, there’s gonna be a whole bunch of marketers burning in Hell, come the judgement day.

I never met Don in person, but I had the opportunity to work with him on some TV spots, and I know his wife, Anita, well. (She’s from my hometown of Shreveport, LA, and my Dad wrote the arrangement she used of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” to go to the Miss American pageant, as Miss Louisiana.)

By all accounts, everyone that knew Don called him a great guy. My cousin (who visited Don and Anita in California a bunch) tells me he was witty, with a wicked sense of humor, and not at all pompous or distant in the way that celebrities can be. I can attest personally to the fact that he was generous to a fault, and was willing to “put his money where his mouth is” when it comes to causes he would support.

It’s hard for me to think about Don in the past tense. While there are other voiceover artists that mimic’d Don’s style and delivery, there will never be another Don LaFontaine. My heart and prayers go out to Anita and their kids in what must be a very difficult time. Please keep them in your prayers.

In a world of advertising, where too few voiceover artists have the ability to create a distinctive sound, Don LaFontaine will be missed.