Pepsi Throwback: An idea who's time has come...and gone.
I admit it. I love colas. Far more than I should. In fact, when I wanna lose weight (which is most of the time), I swear off them (or swear at them), as it’s a great way to eliminate empty calories from my diet. But oh, what I lose when I do so…that rush I get with the morning’s first intake of caffeine! The bite of the cola as it trickles across my palette. The joy of cola, indeed.
But since I was a kid, colas – virtually ANY colas – have become a mere shadow of themselves, thanks to bottlers’ ever-changing formulas designed to save a buck. I speak of the vile change from the traditional pure cane sugar to the concoction known as “high-fructose corn syrup,” A.K.A.: “HFCS.” If you have a can or bottle of your carbonated sugar water beverage of choice at hand, feel free to take a gander at the ingredients. I’ll wait… Read the rest of this entry »
As a creative guy, I love coming up with creative ways to market things. Nothing jazzes me more than to come up with an ad concept, a slogan, or a logo that will resonate with the public. But I’ve learned something about successful marketing over the years – repetition is the key to turning a great idea into effective marketing.
Repetition. Sounds simple. Just create your message, and repeat it, ad nauseum, until it works. Think of it as the marketers version of the Rinse, Lather, and Repeat instructions you find on shampoo bottles. Of course there’s more to it than that. If your message doesn’t resonate, it will get lost in the noise. But it’s easy to lose sight of the fact that if you don’t repeat your message enough, even the best marketing simply won’t work.
I can’t tell you how many clients I’ve had that either don’t commit to a big enough media buy, or they get bored with their spots and want to change them before it’s appropriate to do so. When you see a commercial enough to get bored with it, you’ve just witnessed marketing penetration. Everybody wants to run commercials or ads that get people talking, but successful marketing is not built on a momentary “buzz” (i.e.: “did you see that new ad for ________”), but on effective ads that are repeated over and over.
Another point that may have escaped your notice is that in life, everybody is a marketer. I’m dealing with a situation in my personal life right now that has brought that lesson home. Just like what the world learned in WWII, if you repeat a lie often enough, it becomes indistinguishable from the truth. Having the truth on your side is nice, but it’s no guarantee that you’ll prevail. No, I’ve learned that repetition of a marketing message can overcome the truth, even when I have the truth on my side.
I’d love to tell you that truth will win in the long run. I’d love to tell you that if you have a superior product, or a message that resonates, you’ll win. But while being right or building a better mousetrap is good and important, remember that it’s no guarantee of success. Without repetition as a key component of your marketing, you’re fighting a battle where you are, effectively, an unarmed combatant.
Yes, today is my birthday. Nothing remarkable there…everybody’s got one per year. For those who don’t like birthdays, consider the alternative. I’ve had some bad birthdays before, but never one so bad I’d consider death as a way to avoid another.
Since this is a marketing blog (and I’d like to get back to enjoying my “special day” [insert ironic pause here]), I’ll simply remark that I find that the leaders in one-to-one marketing seem to be…online forums?
Yep. That’s right. Online forums. When you sign up for one of these online forums, they routinely ask for your birthdate. The software then obligingly kicks out a “happy birthday” email automagically. Nice. It’s a great way for the board to remind you that they exist, and a nice thing for the recipient, even if you know it’s not the thought, but the programming that counts.
Honorable mention in the birthday email sweepstakes: Jack in the Box. I received a “personal” email from Jack Box today, along with a coupon for a free desert. Way to extend your brand – and your tongue-in-cheek marketing attitude to Jack-lovers around the country. Nice job, Jack!
If you’re a regular reader of this blog, then you know I love Jack in the Box ads. (I admit it…I’m a fanboy.) The latest Jack ad has attracted the attention of the media – specifically Bill O’Reilly. Here’s the ad – sans editorializing on my part. It strikes a little too close to home right now…and I’m too busy laughing.
That’s the word that General Electric has coined for it’s public education campaign regarding their efforts to change health care for the better. Or not. GE is waging a huge public relations campaign – and an even more expensive lobbying effort behind the scenes to change both health care and energy policy at the Federal level.
Wait a minute…what’s one got to do with the other?
Pay attention, campers, because I hope, by the end of this post, to have opened your eyes to how marketing – innocent little marketing – is being used as both a tool to change the hearts and minds of the public, and as a club, to force the government to support policies that will benefit GE financially. Read the rest of this entry »
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)
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So it’s come to this. Anything worth managing is worth MICROmanaging – at least in the ObamaNation. Read the rest of this entry »
One of the most effective things you can do when you work a tradeshow is to sit down after its over and figure out what worked, what didn’t, what you wish you’d done and what you learned from the experience. I’ve not had time to really clarify my thoughts on all this yet, but I wanted to share with you my initial impressions, while they are still fresh in my mind. Read the rest of this entry »
Most men lead lives of quiet desperation. Film at Eleven.
- Reuven Frank, NBC News
As I write this, every cable news outlet is providing wall-to-wall coverage of the tragic mass-shooting New York state. While it’s natural that any tragedy of this nature is newsworthy, I can’t help but wonder, is the amount of coverage more about ratings and pandering, than it is about communicating valuable information in a timely fashion? Read the rest of this entry »
My kid loves BAND-AIDs. She believes that, any time she’s wounded, a BAND-AID strip will make it better. I’m not talking about bleeding, here – I mean, if she sprains her finger, the dog steps on her foot, or if she has a stiff neck – a BAND-AID will fix her right up. My apologies to the fine folks at Johnson & Johnson, but that ain’t necessisarily so. Don’t get me wrong…adhesive bandages serve a useful purpose in the healing process, but they are not the one-size-fits-all, universal cure that my daughter would have me believe. (If they were, I wouldn’t mind our anual expenditures for BAND-AIDs, which seems to be a significant portion of the family debt, since she’s taken to putting them on EVERYTHING…)
But this is not a post about medicine, except as it relates to marketing. Too many people look at marketing as a kind of BAND-AID for their branding, their advertising, and their sales. And far too many take a BAND-AID approach to marketing itself. Read the rest of this entry »
I’m writing this from a hotel room in the bustling burg of Henrietta, Texas. Henrietta, for those of you without access to Google Maps, is just SE of Wichita Falls, which is an hour or so NW of Dallas. I’m on a combination Spring Break trip and business trip for my Guitar Furniture venture. I’d be in Dallas tonight, but for what appears to be a broken fuel pump. Inconvenient, but it’s not a show-stopper. However it did throw a sizable monkey wrench into the works, at least for a day.
The reason I mention this, is that I realized that a lot of what happened today makes for some pretty good fodder for marketing discussions. Read the rest of this entry »
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My kid loves BAND-AIDs. She believes that, any time she’s wounded, a BAND-AID strip will make it better. I’m not talking about bleeding, here – I mean, if she sprains her finger, the dog steps on her foot, or if she has a stiff neck – a BAND-AID will fix her right up. My apologies to the fine folks at Johnson & Johnson, but that ain’t necessisarily so. Don’t get me wrong…adhesive bandages serve a useful purpose in the healing process, but they are not the one-size-fits-all, universal cure that my daughter would have me believe. (If they were, I wouldn’t mind our anual expenditures for BAND-AIDs, which seems to be a significant portion of the family debt, since she’s taken to putting them on EVERYTHING…)
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