By now, we're all aware of the global financial crisis, and few people seem to have the answers to make it all seem better again. While there was a short burst of advertising that seemed to be in complete denile of the impact on consumers, within the last few months we've seen companies go to exceptional lengths to incorporate it into their messaging in advertising efforts.
Like all things in communications, this can have both strong positive and negative impacts on what they're trying to say, and lessons to be learned in each.
The "we know you're broke" approach-
Months ago, I was watching TV when an advert for Qwest, a major phone company, came on. As anyone who has followed my blog knows, I believe that Qwest has had a history of near-misses in their advertising, and while its nice that they want to acknowledge what's happening in the economy, this approach is by far the worst way to attack consumer worries. The general concept is somewhat simple. It shows everyday folks in the process of "cutting corners", whether it be using magazine perfume samples to freshen themselves up or using the windshield squeegee provided by most gas stations to clean their car. The conversation then diverts into cutting their bills by switching to their service. (a clip doesn't seem to be available. Sorry!)
The problem here is that you're calling out the consumer so heavily and making them regret their own financial efforts from the top. Essentially, you're calling people cheap and then asking them to give you money. Its a contrasting philosophy which seems lacking to me.
The somber approach -
A step up from the "we know you're broke" approach comes the somber approach. The commercial that comes to mind is a savings company spot that features a very motley crew of family members, spanning several generations, sitting around a large table and eating dinner together. They are laughing softly, and the atmosphere is very relatable to most families. Then the father, a gruff looking man asks for everyone's attention. He explains that things at work have been difficult, there have been layoffs, and they're not sure what's going to happen. Then he asks everyone to understand and help in tightening their belts a bit. Then he says "but we're going to get through this together", and as the spot fades to black, the company logo comes up, reitterating his message. It is very serious, and yet it feels truthful and compassionate, which are both good signs. Sadly, they decided to forego any real company messaging, and as you can tell, I remember the spot a lot better than I remember the company's name. Still, it is effective... but not as effective as it could be.
The "comeback" approach -
This is a recent addition to the recession advertising pool, and is probably one of the more effective. The first I can remember for this style was a few months ago when Ford asked the nation to "put on their rally caps", offering this as a challenge to be overcome, apparently in a Ford with your baseball cap turned inside out.
Now, I can appreciate the idea behind it but for the large population of people who don't watch or don't like baseball, the idea is completely lost. Still, the spirit is right, empowering both the consumer and by proxy, the car company.
Then within the last week, Southwest Airlines raised the stakes of the approach with their commerical campaign "It's on".
Though considerably more open than a baseball reference, the simple challenge and confidence of two small words asks the consumer to rise to the challenge, and that the airline will help them get there. To me, this is extremely strong in terms of the right kind of attitude.
The "money where our mouth is" approach -
While some companies are willing to simply talk a good game in hopes to inspire future purchases, others have stepped up to the plate with deeper advertising that includes financial benefits to the consumer. Whether it be the Denny's Grand Slam breakfast giveaway, KFC's great grilled chicken giveaway through Oprah, or Hyundai's continual efforts to "reward the customer", with efforts that include payment protection, vehical value protection, and most recently an offer of paying the buyer up to $500 a month because they advertise for the company simply by driving the car, the idea is to offer an investment in the consumer in hopes the consumer will inturn invest in you... and I think that's brilliant.
Nothing in advertising is ever going to be as sexy as free stuff, and positioning it as being in this tough time together is brilliant. Even the most prideful of folks have a hard time turning down a free meal, and for a company to do it in the spirit that they care and want to help only fosters positive images of the company. Even after the vast underestimation of the turnout for KFC's deal, thousands have now tried the chicken that wouldn't have otherwise, and even in that, the campaign was successful.
So what does it all mean?
We're in tough times, for sure. Everyone knows it, and we're done pretending that the worst is over or that the problem doesn't exist. Still, successful companies have come to realize that this is NOT the time to cut back advertising, but rather, it is a time to retool their messages appropriately. With companies going under every day, their must be renewed emphasis on driving the consumer to choose you, by almost any means necessary. Understanding your consumer has always been a cornerstone of effective promotion, but it may be more important now than it ever has before. By offering the consumer a sentiment they can relate to, an inspiration to rise up, and maybe even offering them a hand, you can help guide them to your company in a time when these choices may be the hardest to make.
It's advertising in a recession, and it is an art.
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
Monday, May 4, 2009
Anti-social media
In the brave new frontier of marketing online, there are difficult lines to walk. Business are currently blogging, facebooking, tweeting, podcasting, vlogcasting, and using just about any other social medium they can get their hands on, which is great. One of the basic rules of advertising is that you have to be where your customer is, and let's face it, nearly everyone is online now. Add to that the enticement of how many web-based social mediums are "free", and for many companies, the idea looks like a goldmine... but there can be issues if one isn't smart about it.
For me, the issue comes when you focus on simply making impressions, with little thought given to the medium you're using or the customer expectation. Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, and other sites were born of a complete social intention. People join to socialize, whether finding old friends, discovering new bands, or let everyone else know the small inane details of your life through 140 character mini-blogs. It is meant to socialize from anywhere to anyone.
Sure, various forms of company promotions have always lurked in the corners of these sites, be it through paid banner ads or company profiles, but the average user isn't into that. Banner ads are distracting bits of fluff that no matter how targeted, can still get on the users nerves more than they can educate them about a product or business, but despite its shortcomings, it can still be a useful tool in advertising that users have come to accept.
But the hot button issue as of late has been using social media to advertise directly. Companies, colleges and universities, musicians, artists, actors, talk shows, and others have begun to use these very popular sites to promote their activities through traditional profile use, and this is where things can get sticky. The problem being, there is little attention paid to the intent of the networking site, and a larger emphasis on just getting stuff out there.If not handled thoughtfully, your company's online social blitz can end up hurting your business more than helping it. Those using social sites may end up categorizing your advertisements with bad offers for prescriptions by mail and porn websites, and typically, this might not be the company you want to keep in the hearts and minds of potential customers.
So what do you do?
It is my belief that you CAN effectively use these social networking sites if your company is capable of obeying a few rules of the road.
Rule 1: Be honest. Don't claim that you're just a random guy who really likes some major conglomerate when in truth you are a major conglomerate and that's the only reason you are there, and all you intend on talking about. The online user has become instinctually suspicious and will find out the truth. It is better if a person walks away having no impression of you than if they walk away feeling lied to and betrayed... and yes, many will take it personally. Instead, just speak truthfully, and don't try to hide your angle.
Rule 2: Find your voice. This is trickier than it might sound. Even if you have a well-defined brand personality, the voice you choose to use can shift depending on the site you're using. Sites with blogging capabilities, like myspace, may allow you to be more expository in your entries, where Twitter caps your entries at 140 characters. Facebook, for instance is a little trickier. Certain capabilities, like notes, allow you to write all you want, but that doesn't mean you should. Those who would even look for your updates will only see the first few lines, and if they're bored by what those lines have to offer, they'll never know anything more. And remember, even if they know you’re a company, they're still there largely to socialize, and if you're not playing along, you're out. Remember that you're upright business letter voice may simply be really boring, and that doesn't help anyone.
Rule 3: Respect the site. It is highly recommended that you don't try to build or voice a company profile until you've tried to maintain a personal profile. If nothing else, it's a quick way to learn all the ways you can fail in connecting. Tweetblasting a story because their just weren't enough characters to cover the subject in one can be considered a major taboo, and once it happens to your page, you'll understand why. Another Tweet taboo is simply doing it too much. No matter how interesting you are, no one wants to read 10 new updates in 7 minutes from you. You can also learn how many apps are too many apps, or what sort of junk mail wall posts are acceptable and which are simply really annoying. Remember, the intent is to connect, not blitz.
Rule 4: The Golden Rule. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Expect to give if you want to get. Mutual Twitter followings and Facebook friendings are to be anticipated. These things can be difficult to maintain, since especially online you may not want to be judged by the company you keep, but not reciprocating actions only makes you look like you're anti-social, and no one wants that.
Rule 5: Remember life exists beyond the online. If you try to hole up with social networks, people will eventually fail to see the benefit of staying connected. Try to connect to real, tangible pieces of life where you can. Musicians post pictures of shows. Companies host giveaways, authors offer written snippets of unreleased work. Unless you are "Tom" of Myspace, the owners of Facebook, or the inventor of some other social network innovation, your business is NOT social networking, so connect the dots for those who don't know you.
Rule 6: Be prepared to adapt and change. It is the online world, and it is moving fast. Most of us simply do our best to ride the tides of online connection trends, and that's fine. Just realize what you have now may not be the right fit in six months, and you cannot get complacent.
Rule 7: Mistakes happen. So your tweet has a misspelling. If it doesn’t ruin the meaning of the tweet, get over it. Others may disagree with you or post thoughts that are better than yours. That’s OK too. But the more rigid you get, the more likely you are to seem disingenuous, and that’s about as bad as you can get. In fact, it may be healthy to offer some dissent within reason.
So there it is.
Remember, in the end, you have to keep social media sociable if you want it to connect and succeed.
For me, the issue comes when you focus on simply making impressions, with little thought given to the medium you're using or the customer expectation. Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, and other sites were born of a complete social intention. People join to socialize, whether finding old friends, discovering new bands, or let everyone else know the small inane details of your life through 140 character mini-blogs. It is meant to socialize from anywhere to anyone.
Sure, various forms of company promotions have always lurked in the corners of these sites, be it through paid banner ads or company profiles, but the average user isn't into that. Banner ads are distracting bits of fluff that no matter how targeted, can still get on the users nerves more than they can educate them about a product or business, but despite its shortcomings, it can still be a useful tool in advertising that users have come to accept.
But the hot button issue as of late has been using social media to advertise directly. Companies, colleges and universities, musicians, artists, actors, talk shows, and others have begun to use these very popular sites to promote their activities through traditional profile use, and this is where things can get sticky. The problem being, there is little attention paid to the intent of the networking site, and a larger emphasis on just getting stuff out there.If not handled thoughtfully, your company's online social blitz can end up hurting your business more than helping it. Those using social sites may end up categorizing your advertisements with bad offers for prescriptions by mail and porn websites, and typically, this might not be the company you want to keep in the hearts and minds of potential customers.
So what do you do?
It is my belief that you CAN effectively use these social networking sites if your company is capable of obeying a few rules of the road.
Rule 1: Be honest. Don't claim that you're just a random guy who really likes some major conglomerate when in truth you are a major conglomerate and that's the only reason you are there, and all you intend on talking about. The online user has become instinctually suspicious and will find out the truth. It is better if a person walks away having no impression of you than if they walk away feeling lied to and betrayed... and yes, many will take it personally. Instead, just speak truthfully, and don't try to hide your angle.
Rule 2: Find your voice. This is trickier than it might sound. Even if you have a well-defined brand personality, the voice you choose to use can shift depending on the site you're using. Sites with blogging capabilities, like myspace, may allow you to be more expository in your entries, where Twitter caps your entries at 140 characters. Facebook, for instance is a little trickier. Certain capabilities, like notes, allow you to write all you want, but that doesn't mean you should. Those who would even look for your updates will only see the first few lines, and if they're bored by what those lines have to offer, they'll never know anything more. And remember, even if they know you’re a company, they're still there largely to socialize, and if you're not playing along, you're out. Remember that you're upright business letter voice may simply be really boring, and that doesn't help anyone.
Rule 3: Respect the site. It is highly recommended that you don't try to build or voice a company profile until you've tried to maintain a personal profile. If nothing else, it's a quick way to learn all the ways you can fail in connecting. Tweetblasting a story because their just weren't enough characters to cover the subject in one can be considered a major taboo, and once it happens to your page, you'll understand why. Another Tweet taboo is simply doing it too much. No matter how interesting you are, no one wants to read 10 new updates in 7 minutes from you. You can also learn how many apps are too many apps, or what sort of junk mail wall posts are acceptable and which are simply really annoying. Remember, the intent is to connect, not blitz.
Rule 4: The Golden Rule. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Expect to give if you want to get. Mutual Twitter followings and Facebook friendings are to be anticipated. These things can be difficult to maintain, since especially online you may not want to be judged by the company you keep, but not reciprocating actions only makes you look like you're anti-social, and no one wants that.
Rule 5: Remember life exists beyond the online. If you try to hole up with social networks, people will eventually fail to see the benefit of staying connected. Try to connect to real, tangible pieces of life where you can. Musicians post pictures of shows. Companies host giveaways, authors offer written snippets of unreleased work. Unless you are "Tom" of Myspace, the owners of Facebook, or the inventor of some other social network innovation, your business is NOT social networking, so connect the dots for those who don't know you.
Rule 6: Be prepared to adapt and change. It is the online world, and it is moving fast. Most of us simply do our best to ride the tides of online connection trends, and that's fine. Just realize what you have now may not be the right fit in six months, and you cannot get complacent.
Rule 7: Mistakes happen. So your tweet has a misspelling. If it doesn’t ruin the meaning of the tweet, get over it. Others may disagree with you or post thoughts that are better than yours. That’s OK too. But the more rigid you get, the more likely you are to seem disingenuous, and that’s about as bad as you can get. In fact, it may be healthy to offer some dissent within reason.
So there it is.
Remember, in the end, you have to keep social media sociable if you want it to connect and succeed.
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Don't spill your guts.
When trying to explain branding, many people choose to compare a company to a person. The brand can then be equated to what a person chooses to wear, how they style their hair, how they choose to speak, and what they are most anxious to talk about. It is what can draw someone from the outside world to interact with you, and part of what encourages them to choose to spend time with you, even to the extent of investing themselves.
I like this parallel, but over the last few months I've noticed a disturbing trend in this line of thought. Spilling your guts.
Since the beginning of the recession, many people have demanded that companies become more transparent in their dealings. And that's fine, especially for stockholders or those embroiled in the political process, but it can be a little much for the average consumer.
Think of it in the realm of the person parallel. There is a clear line that should be drawn when you're trying to pull people in to determine what is appropriate and what is not. Here are some examples of how to think of it in the personal parallel...
Your company realizes that people don't trust you because your former management has made bone-headed choices that have become very public.
To tell them: "We're commited to you, and we got new management and CEOs who will stick by you." is roughly the equivalent of saying "I know I betrayed you before and stole your car, but I had brain surgery and won't do it again."
It's disturbing and way too much information. It does nothing to actually validate how a person feels about being betrayed before.
Instead, a smart message might be: "We're commited to you, and to prove it we're offering to back you up with this exclusive warrenty in case you come upon hard times." which is pretty much the same as saying "I know I screwed up before in borrowing your car, but I'm going to be your personal chauffeur until we get this all sorted and I earn your trust back." There is less personal information offered and it becomes about projecting outward, not on bothersome inward issues.
Let's face it, we've all known that person who doesn't seem to know when it is appropriate to stop sharing information. You ask them how their day was, and though you're not that close, they go into every small detail from their most recent medical proceedure to the rotten apple they bit into at lunch yesterday. It is not the person most people are drawn too in a social situation. That being said, it might be important information if you're thinking about marrying them... but the important idea is that you have to identify what level of sharing your consumer might be comfortable with... and most consumers are self-involved. If it isn't really about them, then it is hard to hold their attention.
A Colorado commercial icon, American Furniture Warehouse, has aired commercials starring owner Jake Jabs for years. In them, he has always shown off the latest furniture deals, and usually somehow ended up wrestling a tiger or riding a water buffalo through a showroom. They've been airing spots like these almost my whole life. But a couple of months ago, they changed.
Jake Jabb got on the air to assure people that American Furniture Warehouse was going to survive the recession, and then took it a step further in mentioning they were more likely to survive because they were privately held, didn't have a board of directors, owned all of their property, didn't have a private plane, and wouldn't be putting their name on a NASCAR racecar.
The people equivalent of this is Jake Jab coming up and saying, "Hi! I hope you'll let me work for you, and I'm not going anywhere if you don't want to. Why? Because I'm healthy!" At which point he begins removing internal organs from his body and slapping them up on the counter to demonstrate just how healthy he is.
That's called spilling your guts, people, and no one wants to see that. It doesn't sell anything, it doesn't calm anyone's mind enough to encourage them to purchase something, and quite frankly, its disturbing and unforgetable.
So the next time you're trying to figure out how to drawn in stakeholders, think carefully about the person they would most want to be involved with, and communicate with them on that level. Do not overshare.
I like this parallel, but over the last few months I've noticed a disturbing trend in this line of thought. Spilling your guts.
Since the beginning of the recession, many people have demanded that companies become more transparent in their dealings. And that's fine, especially for stockholders or those embroiled in the political process, but it can be a little much for the average consumer.
Think of it in the realm of the person parallel. There is a clear line that should be drawn when you're trying to pull people in to determine what is appropriate and what is not. Here are some examples of how to think of it in the personal parallel...
Your company realizes that people don't trust you because your former management has made bone-headed choices that have become very public.
To tell them: "We're commited to you, and we got new management and CEOs who will stick by you." is roughly the equivalent of saying "I know I betrayed you before and stole your car, but I had brain surgery and won't do it again."
It's disturbing and way too much information. It does nothing to actually validate how a person feels about being betrayed before.
Instead, a smart message might be: "We're commited to you, and to prove it we're offering to back you up with this exclusive warrenty in case you come upon hard times." which is pretty much the same as saying "I know I screwed up before in borrowing your car, but I'm going to be your personal chauffeur until we get this all sorted and I earn your trust back." There is less personal information offered and it becomes about projecting outward, not on bothersome inward issues.
Let's face it, we've all known that person who doesn't seem to know when it is appropriate to stop sharing information. You ask them how their day was, and though you're not that close, they go into every small detail from their most recent medical proceedure to the rotten apple they bit into at lunch yesterday. It is not the person most people are drawn too in a social situation. That being said, it might be important information if you're thinking about marrying them... but the important idea is that you have to identify what level of sharing your consumer might be comfortable with... and most consumers are self-involved. If it isn't really about them, then it is hard to hold their attention.
A Colorado commercial icon, American Furniture Warehouse, has aired commercials starring owner Jake Jabs for years. In them, he has always shown off the latest furniture deals, and usually somehow ended up wrestling a tiger or riding a water buffalo through a showroom. They've been airing spots like these almost my whole life. But a couple of months ago, they changed.
Jake Jabb got on the air to assure people that American Furniture Warehouse was going to survive the recession, and then took it a step further in mentioning they were more likely to survive because they were privately held, didn't have a board of directors, owned all of their property, didn't have a private plane, and wouldn't be putting their name on a NASCAR racecar.
The people equivalent of this is Jake Jab coming up and saying, "Hi! I hope you'll let me work for you, and I'm not going anywhere if you don't want to. Why? Because I'm healthy!" At which point he begins removing internal organs from his body and slapping them up on the counter to demonstrate just how healthy he is.
That's called spilling your guts, people, and no one wants to see that. It doesn't sell anything, it doesn't calm anyone's mind enough to encourage them to purchase something, and quite frankly, its disturbing and unforgetable.
So the next time you're trying to figure out how to drawn in stakeholders, think carefully about the person they would most want to be involved with, and communicate with them on that level. Do not overshare.
Monday, March 30, 2009
What’s in a name? Sometimes, it’s everything.
When it comes to brand equity, nothing carries as much weight as the company name. Second to that is usually either the product name or a tagline. At my last job I was fortunate enough to participate in several tagline sessions and one naming session, where the top minds available would work together to come up a small set of words that were at once catchy, informative, memorable, and accurate.
But in coming up with these words, each group took on an inherent risk. Good or bad, the way these phrases were to be interpreted would be linked to much of the marketing success of the company involved, and through a very thoughtful process, we had never hit an unfortunate speed bump. But this isn’t always true in the marketing world, and sometimes what seems to be a brilliant name or tagline can end up having an unfortunate impact on a company’s bottom line.
I had originally intended to write about the attempted image overhaul of dishwashing products Electrasol and Jet-dry into a single product line called “Finish”. It struck me as strange that a company might attempt to abandon the equity established in the product names so quickly, and even though they are doing a pretty complete job of addressing the change-over, it still struck me that it would take a lot of time, energy and money to rebuild the strength of such recognizable names.
But then something even more unfortunate happened, and I realized it would make for a much better story.
In Denver, TV station KWGN has been named and renamed several times in the last dozen or so years. First it was known simply as “Channel 2”, but then it was bought out by Warner Brothers and became known as “WB2”. Eventually the WB backed out of the venture, and it eventually gave rise to “CW2”, which seemed fine enough, except for an ever-revolving door of logos. But within the last month, plans were revealed to launch a new name for the station. Commercials featuring the local broadcasters tried to build excitement for the name, constantly reminding (perhaps warning) viewers of a key phrase…
“The Deuce is coming”.
Yes, KWGN will now be known as "The Deuce". Now, while it’s fair that the word “Deuce” is simply another word for 2, the station probably should have investigated more heavily into the possible interpretations of the world. Some people may infer poker reference from it. Others may simply see the number two. But another popular slang usage of the word means poop, and for some people with a less mature sense of humor, that’s going to be the interpretation that sticks. Suddenly certain catch phrases that the station tries to lob into advertising takes on a very bad meaning. I’ve already seen spots promising that “The Deuce is coming”, “The Deuce is going to be hot”, and that “The Deuce is going to be huge”. Suddenly people are snickering at the simple request to “Watch The Deuce”, and while you would wish people would just grow up and get over it, there isn’t enough marketing dollars in the world to constantly evade the… Deuce storm… that will inevitably arise.
Let’s face it. Poop jokes may not be classy, but they do have a lasting quality in the minds of certain stakeholders.
The point being, renaming may seem an easy way to generate new interest and excitement for your brand, but it has to be done carefully, first considering what you could lose in the way of dropping the old name, and second with a very complete examination of what the new name can mean.
Even now as I am reconsidering my re-entry into the marketing work force in favor of continuing my education, I am forced to reevaluate the purpose and worth of this blog. While it’s something I enjoy doing, it simply may not be achieving the goals I have set forth for it, and if I am to step away from marketing as the primary drive behind this blog, I will have to consider its name and aim.
Fortunately “Jason’s Creative Strategy” is something that applies to all walks of my life, and therefore, no matter how the emphasis may evolve, the bolg may retain its name… for whatever value it may have now.
But more to come on that later.
But in coming up with these words, each group took on an inherent risk. Good or bad, the way these phrases were to be interpreted would be linked to much of the marketing success of the company involved, and through a very thoughtful process, we had never hit an unfortunate speed bump. But this isn’t always true in the marketing world, and sometimes what seems to be a brilliant name or tagline can end up having an unfortunate impact on a company’s bottom line.
I had originally intended to write about the attempted image overhaul of dishwashing products Electrasol and Jet-dry into a single product line called “Finish”. It struck me as strange that a company might attempt to abandon the equity established in the product names so quickly, and even though they are doing a pretty complete job of addressing the change-over, it still struck me that it would take a lot of time, energy and money to rebuild the strength of such recognizable names.
But then something even more unfortunate happened, and I realized it would make for a much better story.
In Denver, TV station KWGN has been named and renamed several times in the last dozen or so years. First it was known simply as “Channel 2”, but then it was bought out by Warner Brothers and became known as “WB2”. Eventually the WB backed out of the venture, and it eventually gave rise to “CW2”, which seemed fine enough, except for an ever-revolving door of logos. But within the last month, plans were revealed to launch a new name for the station. Commercials featuring the local broadcasters tried to build excitement for the name, constantly reminding (perhaps warning) viewers of a key phrase…
“The Deuce is coming”.
Yes, KWGN will now be known as "The Deuce". Now, while it’s fair that the word “Deuce” is simply another word for 2, the station probably should have investigated more heavily into the possible interpretations of the world. Some people may infer poker reference from it. Others may simply see the number two. But another popular slang usage of the word means poop, and for some people with a less mature sense of humor, that’s going to be the interpretation that sticks. Suddenly certain catch phrases that the station tries to lob into advertising takes on a very bad meaning. I’ve already seen spots promising that “The Deuce is coming”, “The Deuce is going to be hot”, and that “The Deuce is going to be huge”. Suddenly people are snickering at the simple request to “Watch The Deuce”, and while you would wish people would just grow up and get over it, there isn’t enough marketing dollars in the world to constantly evade the… Deuce storm… that will inevitably arise.
Let’s face it. Poop jokes may not be classy, but they do have a lasting quality in the minds of certain stakeholders.
The point being, renaming may seem an easy way to generate new interest and excitement for your brand, but it has to be done carefully, first considering what you could lose in the way of dropping the old name, and second with a very complete examination of what the new name can mean.
Even now as I am reconsidering my re-entry into the marketing work force in favor of continuing my education, I am forced to reevaluate the purpose and worth of this blog. While it’s something I enjoy doing, it simply may not be achieving the goals I have set forth for it, and if I am to step away from marketing as the primary drive behind this blog, I will have to consider its name and aim.
Fortunately “Jason’s Creative Strategy” is something that applies to all walks of my life, and therefore, no matter how the emphasis may evolve, the bolg may retain its name… for whatever value it may have now.
But more to come on that later.
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
More acts of self-promotion
In classical thinking, it's good to have a product before you begin promotion. After all, what's the point of generating a buzz if you have nothing to offer the consumer directly? But in this day and age, the rule doesn't always hold true. In fact, for many products to see the light of day, companies have to see if it is capable of generating a buzz first.
As some people might know, I have spent the last few months not only monitoring trends in marketing and advertising, but also producing a book. It's a full length novel with a new take on vampires that I've been kicking around for years but only recently finished. As such, I'm now staring down the business end of the book, hoping to find the appropriate resources to get it to the next level... and one of those steps includes practicing my ability to talk about it.
As such, I getting infront of the microphone tomorrow for an interview on the Metro State radio show "Issue at hand". We'll be talking about my book "Forever Falling", and maybe a few other topics.
If you're curious to hear about it, you can stream the broadcast online at metradio.mscd.edu and we'll be on a 2pm MST.
Then feel free to drop a note here and let me know what you think.
Here's to shameless self-promotion, and being the buzz!
As some people might know, I have spent the last few months not only monitoring trends in marketing and advertising, but also producing a book. It's a full length novel with a new take on vampires that I've been kicking around for years but only recently finished. As such, I'm now staring down the business end of the book, hoping to find the appropriate resources to get it to the next level... and one of those steps includes practicing my ability to talk about it.
As such, I getting infront of the microphone tomorrow for an interview on the Metro State radio show "Issue at hand". We'll be talking about my book "Forever Falling", and maybe a few other topics.
If you're curious to hear about it, you can stream the broadcast online at metradio.mscd.edu and we'll be on a 2pm MST.
Then feel free to drop a note here and let me know what you think.
Here's to shameless self-promotion, and being the buzz!
Monday, March 2, 2009
The NFL, PR and some of my other favorite abbreviations
This week marked the opening for free agency in the NFL. As an avid fan, especially of the Denver Broncos, I have paid close attention as the signing period can have a major influence on the following season. For those who are less familiar, it’s an even bigger deal in Denver this year because long time coach Mike Shanahan was released and replaced by former New England Patriots offensive coordinator, Josh McDaniels. Such a change in the leadership of an organization leaves many questions to be answered, and free agency is one of the earlier peeks into what a new coaching regime is going to bring to the table.
By now, some of you may be saying “Jason, this is a blog on marketing. Where are you going with this?”
Well, the answer is simple. The NFL, in the end, is a business. A franchise’s success depends largely on the revenue it can generate, and as such, the sport also faces many of the same problems businesses face. Yes, the players bloated salaries may not reflect anything of the common employee, but the basics are still the same. And if a team is not careful, it can fall victim to common business problems.
The Denver Broncos are now falling into such a problem. Last weekend, the press (which has become more and more intrusive into behind closed door dealings, as is true with any industry) got wind of story that involved the Broncos possibly trading away their quarterback, Jay Cutler. Cutler has been breaking records and was recognized for his accomplishments with an invitation to the NFL Probowl last year. Many Denverites saw him to be a continuing fixture in this team, and so the word that he may be traded came as a blow to many, including Cutler himself. The trade did not end up happening, and the level of the Broncos interest in actually going through with it remains a large matter of speculation, but the damage was done.
This is where the marketing issues came in.
The sensational idea of this story was enough to inspire the imagination of writers around the league. Rumors began to spiral out of control, and the fans (the NFL’s key stakeholders and primary target audience) were impacted. Denver fans in particular felt a large amount of anger, confusion, and disappointment in the new staff members, their confidence in the new management obviously shook. Add to that, Jay Cutler began to issue comments to the press that he still felt like the team wanted to do away with him and that he was hurt by such a ploy.
A visit out to the Denver Broncos site yielded no information from the team itself, and both Coach McDaniels and General Manager Brian Xanders only made passive statements to the press that they were not going to trade away Cutler. It is also worth mentioning that many season ticket purchases become finalized on the opening weekend of free agency. This means big business for the franchise, but having such controversy cannot possibly help the bottom line.
And here lies the key. The time of passive PR in any business is over. News agencies are equally content to publish speculation as they are facts, bloggers with wild opinions and unjustified credentials are now being quoted as “quality sources”, and still, these points of view can and will impact your bottom line if not addressed in a pro-active fashion. Everything in your organization can find its way to the public spotlight in a matter of moments. It’s the new way of the world, and from the White House’s stimulus package to small business ventures, we see that “transparency” is the key buzzword, but more than that, it is a form of public representation meant to curtail the tidal wave of speculation that can rule the airwaves now and damage a company’s credibility and profitability.
Someone once told me “Be willing to speak your own truth, or someone else will speak it for you”, and those words seem to ring true now. While I remain hopeful that my favorite team will work out its own problems, the fact is, a bad business decision of not handling the press directly will continue to haunt the team through the off-season, and perhaps beyond. Investing a little effort into a more open PR structure could have saved the team some money, and a lot of internal and external anguish.
Go Broncos. I hope.
By now, some of you may be saying “Jason, this is a blog on marketing. Where are you going with this?”
Well, the answer is simple. The NFL, in the end, is a business. A franchise’s success depends largely on the revenue it can generate, and as such, the sport also faces many of the same problems businesses face. Yes, the players bloated salaries may not reflect anything of the common employee, but the basics are still the same. And if a team is not careful, it can fall victim to common business problems.
The Denver Broncos are now falling into such a problem. Last weekend, the press (which has become more and more intrusive into behind closed door dealings, as is true with any industry) got wind of story that involved the Broncos possibly trading away their quarterback, Jay Cutler. Cutler has been breaking records and was recognized for his accomplishments with an invitation to the NFL Probowl last year. Many Denverites saw him to be a continuing fixture in this team, and so the word that he may be traded came as a blow to many, including Cutler himself. The trade did not end up happening, and the level of the Broncos interest in actually going through with it remains a large matter of speculation, but the damage was done.
This is where the marketing issues came in.
The sensational idea of this story was enough to inspire the imagination of writers around the league. Rumors began to spiral out of control, and the fans (the NFL’s key stakeholders and primary target audience) were impacted. Denver fans in particular felt a large amount of anger, confusion, and disappointment in the new staff members, their confidence in the new management obviously shook. Add to that, Jay Cutler began to issue comments to the press that he still felt like the team wanted to do away with him and that he was hurt by such a ploy.
A visit out to the Denver Broncos site yielded no information from the team itself, and both Coach McDaniels and General Manager Brian Xanders only made passive statements to the press that they were not going to trade away Cutler. It is also worth mentioning that many season ticket purchases become finalized on the opening weekend of free agency. This means big business for the franchise, but having such controversy cannot possibly help the bottom line.
And here lies the key. The time of passive PR in any business is over. News agencies are equally content to publish speculation as they are facts, bloggers with wild opinions and unjustified credentials are now being quoted as “quality sources”, and still, these points of view can and will impact your bottom line if not addressed in a pro-active fashion. Everything in your organization can find its way to the public spotlight in a matter of moments. It’s the new way of the world, and from the White House’s stimulus package to small business ventures, we see that “transparency” is the key buzzword, but more than that, it is a form of public representation meant to curtail the tidal wave of speculation that can rule the airwaves now and damage a company’s credibility and profitability.
Someone once told me “Be willing to speak your own truth, or someone else will speak it for you”, and those words seem to ring true now. While I remain hopeful that my favorite team will work out its own problems, the fact is, a bad business decision of not handling the press directly will continue to haunt the team through the off-season, and perhaps beyond. Investing a little effort into a more open PR structure could have saved the team some money, and a lot of internal and external anguish.
Go Broncos. I hope.
Monday, February 23, 2009
Here's to the storytellers...
While watching the Oscars last night, I was struck by something said. No, it had nothing to do with the pronouncement of winners (though I have my own questions concerning that). During a montage leading up to the award for best documentary, a director (I believe it was Werner Herzog who was nominated for “Encounters at the End of the World”, but don’t quote me) indicated that modern technology had enabled almost anyone the ability to shoot a film, so as time continues on, it becomes ever so much more important that you have a good story.
I couldn’t agree with him more, and I’m afraid this sentiment isn’t limited to film industry. With the ever continuing trend of technological innovations allowing an end user to become more effective and professional looking with minimal background and training, the resulting marketplace “noise” has increased by leaps and bounds. Anyone can endeavor to make their message and work heard, and so the actual ability to connect effectively has invariably become diminished.
On the other end of this train of thought is the current economic climate. Businesses struggle to make it through their own budget requirements, and this has resulted in a belt-tightening across the board. As I’ve mentioned in previous blogs, it’s almost inevitable that when budgets are being reviewed, one of the first areas people look to hack into is marketing and advertising. Since it is seen by many as a secondary product of their business, promotion dollars are easily pulled to the side in an effort to maintain more “primary expenses”.
This logic, of course, is flawed. The fact of the matter is, no product or service is capable of selling itself. In an increasingly competitive marketplace, one has to get out there, and be heard in a manner effective enough to sell. But this brings me back to the earlier point that with any individual now being empowered to reach out and touch the world, the resulting cacophony your ads are competing against means that there is a larger chance to be drowned out. So there is a chance that even if you maintain advertising dollars, they won’t be effective in the modern landscape, and you’re not only competing against direct competition, but every other bit of fluff, personal rambling, "clip of the day" and of course, the corporate giants who can spend more for a single ad than you’ll have available in an entire flight. Targeted advertising only helps to a degree, but even there, your competition is doing the same. So what is one to do?
The key is in your story.
This may or may not mean your company history, or a list of accomplishments and attributes. What it does include is a consistent, well-focused voice, and messaging able to cut through the surrounding muck to connect with the person who is willing to buy. Despite the overcrowding of the various media, there is a rare portion of the population that is truly able to tell that story effectively. If you can’t easily think of who that person is in your employ, or have one under contract, then it won’t matter how much money you throw into advertising. Effective communication, and by proxy, effective communicators are becoming a commodity in a world where everyone can have a voice, and most people have increasingly little to say.
I couldn’t agree with him more, and I’m afraid this sentiment isn’t limited to film industry. With the ever continuing trend of technological innovations allowing an end user to become more effective and professional looking with minimal background and training, the resulting marketplace “noise” has increased by leaps and bounds. Anyone can endeavor to make their message and work heard, and so the actual ability to connect effectively has invariably become diminished.
On the other end of this train of thought is the current economic climate. Businesses struggle to make it through their own budget requirements, and this has resulted in a belt-tightening across the board. As I’ve mentioned in previous blogs, it’s almost inevitable that when budgets are being reviewed, one of the first areas people look to hack into is marketing and advertising. Since it is seen by many as a secondary product of their business, promotion dollars are easily pulled to the side in an effort to maintain more “primary expenses”.
This logic, of course, is flawed. The fact of the matter is, no product or service is capable of selling itself. In an increasingly competitive marketplace, one has to get out there, and be heard in a manner effective enough to sell. But this brings me back to the earlier point that with any individual now being empowered to reach out and touch the world, the resulting cacophony your ads are competing against means that there is a larger chance to be drowned out. So there is a chance that even if you maintain advertising dollars, they won’t be effective in the modern landscape, and you’re not only competing against direct competition, but every other bit of fluff, personal rambling, "clip of the day" and of course, the corporate giants who can spend more for a single ad than you’ll have available in an entire flight. Targeted advertising only helps to a degree, but even there, your competition is doing the same. So what is one to do?
The key is in your story.
This may or may not mean your company history, or a list of accomplishments and attributes. What it does include is a consistent, well-focused voice, and messaging able to cut through the surrounding muck to connect with the person who is willing to buy. Despite the overcrowding of the various media, there is a rare portion of the population that is truly able to tell that story effectively. If you can’t easily think of who that person is in your employ, or have one under contract, then it won’t matter how much money you throw into advertising. Effective communication, and by proxy, effective communicators are becoming a commodity in a world where everyone can have a voice, and most people have increasingly little to say.
Monday, February 9, 2009
My blog, revisited…
Last week, I wrote about the Super Bowl headache maker known as the Sobe halftime 3-D craptacular. I called out brand guru and director Peter Arnell for his involvement in the unfortunate spot, and left it at that, but upon further investigation, I discovered that he was also responsible for a set of spots that struck me a brilliant over the Super Bowl weekend, and so I figured it was only fair to give credit where credit is due. In fact, I figured it might be wise to revisit some of the things I’ve mentioned earlier, and bring the blog up to speed.
The set of successful spots was for Pepsi, who appropriated the recent Saturday Night Live skit, MacGruber. For those who don’t know, MacGruber is similar to MacGyver, in that he’s supposed to be a genius who gets out of sticky situations using household materials. Every skit has roughly the same premise, placing MacGruber and companions in a locked room with a bomb that’s about to go off and only he can disarm. The problem (and the humor) is that he’s usually preoccupied with something more trivial, such as a mid-life crisis or being hung up on office place gossip, and he never gets around to diffusing the bombs. Well, on the Saturday before the Super Bowl during the SNL broadcast, MacGruber became a bit too preoccupied with Pepsi.
They looked and felt like the SNL skits that came before, but they had one major difference. They were actually commercials. Many viewers might have been fooled a bit by this bit, since SNL has made believable spoof advertisements in the past, and these ads and their placements could have been more of the same.
But on Super Bowl Sunday, another MacGruber (now to be known as “Pepsuber”) was aired.
The fallout wasn’t just exposure for the product in a humorous and memorable ad, but a flock to the internet to find out if the spots shown on SNL were actually skits or a commercial. This is impressive because creating this sort of intrigue generates action on the part of the consumer, and helps invest them in the product. Unlike other Super Bowl commercials that may only be able to point to impressions to justify the cost of the spot, Pepsi could actually measure certain actions, and they didn’t even have to ask directly. It was well done, and for that, I have to give it up to Mr. Arnell and his team. I guess there is a reason he’s a CEO and widely regarded branding genius and I’m… blogging. Also, excellent call in having Richard Dean Anderson reprise his role as McGyver.
Speaking of pretty good ideas, I wrote previously of Warner Music pulling it’s recording artist’s videos from Youtube in an effort to renegotiate profit systems, and how much that can stink for quality musicians like Amanda Palmer who relies so heavily on the net to communicate with her audience. Well, apparently this has been resolved (see the press statement here) in what they call an innovative partnership. Really, it’s not as bad as having the music removed altogether, but it’s still allowing for very heavy restrictions which limit the consumer’s ability to interact and consume the media openly, in hopes of protecting the record label’s interest. But that’s the way it has to be, right?
Well, not exactly. In my blog “Shared music and big results”, I wrote about how the band Nine Inch Nails album Ghosts I-IV had managed to rank as the top grossing MP3 album on Amazon for 2008, even though the songs were held under a creative commons license which allowed free sharing and consumption of the music with relatively few restrictions at all. Well, thanks to my friend Steve, I came upon this presentation by Techdirt's Mike Masnick, which is a brilliant summation of how the TRULY innovative marketing and distribution techniques used by Nine Inch Nails might be a preview of where marketing is likely to go in the next few years. Please enjoy.
The set of successful spots was for Pepsi, who appropriated the recent Saturday Night Live skit, MacGruber. For those who don’t know, MacGruber is similar to MacGyver, in that he’s supposed to be a genius who gets out of sticky situations using household materials. Every skit has roughly the same premise, placing MacGruber and companions in a locked room with a bomb that’s about to go off and only he can disarm. The problem (and the humor) is that he’s usually preoccupied with something more trivial, such as a mid-life crisis or being hung up on office place gossip, and he never gets around to diffusing the bombs. Well, on the Saturday before the Super Bowl during the SNL broadcast, MacGruber became a bit too preoccupied with Pepsi.
They looked and felt like the SNL skits that came before, but they had one major difference. They were actually commercials. Many viewers might have been fooled a bit by this bit, since SNL has made believable spoof advertisements in the past, and these ads and their placements could have been more of the same.
But on Super Bowl Sunday, another MacGruber (now to be known as “Pepsuber”) was aired.
The fallout wasn’t just exposure for the product in a humorous and memorable ad, but a flock to the internet to find out if the spots shown on SNL were actually skits or a commercial. This is impressive because creating this sort of intrigue generates action on the part of the consumer, and helps invest them in the product. Unlike other Super Bowl commercials that may only be able to point to impressions to justify the cost of the spot, Pepsi could actually measure certain actions, and they didn’t even have to ask directly. It was well done, and for that, I have to give it up to Mr. Arnell and his team. I guess there is a reason he’s a CEO and widely regarded branding genius and I’m… blogging. Also, excellent call in having Richard Dean Anderson reprise his role as McGyver.
Speaking of pretty good ideas, I wrote previously of Warner Music pulling it’s recording artist’s videos from Youtube in an effort to renegotiate profit systems, and how much that can stink for quality musicians like Amanda Palmer who relies so heavily on the net to communicate with her audience. Well, apparently this has been resolved (see the press statement here) in what they call an innovative partnership. Really, it’s not as bad as having the music removed altogether, but it’s still allowing for very heavy restrictions which limit the consumer’s ability to interact and consume the media openly, in hopes of protecting the record label’s interest. But that’s the way it has to be, right?
Well, not exactly. In my blog “Shared music and big results”, I wrote about how the band Nine Inch Nails album Ghosts I-IV had managed to rank as the top grossing MP3 album on Amazon for 2008, even though the songs were held under a creative commons license which allowed free sharing and consumption of the music with relatively few restrictions at all. Well, thanks to my friend Steve, I came upon this presentation by Techdirt's Mike Masnick, which is a brilliant summation of how the TRULY innovative marketing and distribution techniques used by Nine Inch Nails might be a preview of where marketing is likely to go in the next few years. Please enjoy.
Monday, February 2, 2009
Super Sunday, not so super spots... now in 3-D!!!
Super Sunday
It’s well known that the NFL Super Bowl has become one of the most widely watched television events each year, with a heavy viewing audience not only coast-to-coast, but around the world. This is part of the reason why companies would spend 3 million bucks for a 30 second slot… and in some cases that doesn’t even begin to touch the cost for the spots themselves.
Over the years, we’ve seen some really great ads come through, and though most spots are more flops than successes, it’s been enough to keep the eyes of people who don’t even like football stuck on the screen.
Again, this year's ads offered a handful of greatness, a giant spoonful of OK, and some ads that left a lot more questions than they did the inspiration to purchase. I’m going to try and keep this blog simple and not try to break down every nationally aired spot. That would be rude and largely unreadable. Instead, I’ve decided to focus instead almost exclusively on a single issue that came up for me.
In this blog, I have attempted to communicate that creativity is often king, but if it’s not backed up with a sound strategy, it is bound to be more of a failure than anything. This was shown in the advertising fizzle that was the 3-D halftime extravaganza provided in partnership by Sobe, NBC, and Dreamworks pictures Monsters vs. Aliens. It seems that 3-D is all the rage again, and that’s fine, save for one major issue. Most of us don’t have 3-D glasses lying about.
The concept probably started strong. 3-D, while not a new invention, hasn’t really been used in a while and is likely to draw many viewers to the small and large screens. The horror romp My Bloody Valentine probably found much greater success in offering up the scare and gore in all three dimensions than it could have ever found based on storyline alone. Add to that the future releases of Monsters vs. Aliens and Pixar’s Up, and you’ve got the possibility of a real phenomenon on your hands. It’s a nice place to start. The problem then isn’t in the initial thinking, but in the execution. The lead-up to what could have been a truly super Sunday event was vastly under-promoted, leaving many would-be viewers in the dark, or "in the flat" as it were. I had only managed to come across one TV ad promoting the 3-D showing in the days before the Super Bowl, and the mention of where to get the needed glasses was incredibly brief. Offered at Sobe display cases nationwide the day before the game, or with the purchase of a specialty pack of Sobe Lifewater, the window to get in on what could have been a major event went largely unnoticed by the larger population and left the majority of viewers feeling cross-eyed. Then there were the spots themselves.
The preview of Monster’s vs. Aliens was pretty straight forward, offering those with the glasses only a brief taste of what was to come from the full length feature, which is fine except the old “paddleball coming at you” trick probably didn’t justify the effort of getting the glasses for many.
Then there was the Sobe addition to the mix. Last year, Sobe left many viewer questioning what the hell they had just seen. A team of lizards not promoting “Geico” danced to Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” with a model. This year, director Peter Arnell opted against trying to make any sense at all and featured football players dancing ballet poorly, animated lizards wearing shoulder pads or spinning records at a DJ turntable, and characters from “Monsters vs. Aliens” popping in and out as time would allow. The 60-second period of madness hit a crescendo as the lizards, Monsters and fedora-adorned Ray Lewis starting dancing in a choreographed number, the music having evolved from a classical piece to some unmemorable original bit of music which asked the listener to “SoBelieve”.
And then… Ray Lewis turns into a lizard.
It felt like the ideas were picked by securing fractions of thought to a dartboard and then throwing those darts while blindfolded and drunk, but knowing you'd have to involve Ray Lewis. It had all the chaos of Careerbuilder’s screaming, crying, seal-riding, koala-punching romp without any of the absurd humor.
And Sobe’s spot was only in 3-D for a small percentage of the viewing population, making it twice as likely to evoke migraines.
Again, this all had the makings of a great idea, but without a proper lead-up, a coherent message, a quality concept, and appropriate event management, a great idea doesn’t mean much. For Sobe and friends, let’s hope it’s worth the 6-million plus dollars spent.
My suggestion is that next year, they should look for something really innovative options… like Miller Highlife.
It’s well known that the NFL Super Bowl has become one of the most widely watched television events each year, with a heavy viewing audience not only coast-to-coast, but around the world. This is part of the reason why companies would spend 3 million bucks for a 30 second slot… and in some cases that doesn’t even begin to touch the cost for the spots themselves.
Over the years, we’ve seen some really great ads come through, and though most spots are more flops than successes, it’s been enough to keep the eyes of people who don’t even like football stuck on the screen.
Again, this year's ads offered a handful of greatness, a giant spoonful of OK, and some ads that left a lot more questions than they did the inspiration to purchase. I’m going to try and keep this blog simple and not try to break down every nationally aired spot. That would be rude and largely unreadable. Instead, I’ve decided to focus instead almost exclusively on a single issue that came up for me.
In this blog, I have attempted to communicate that creativity is often king, but if it’s not backed up with a sound strategy, it is bound to be more of a failure than anything. This was shown in the advertising fizzle that was the 3-D halftime extravaganza provided in partnership by Sobe, NBC, and Dreamworks pictures Monsters vs. Aliens. It seems that 3-D is all the rage again, and that’s fine, save for one major issue. Most of us don’t have 3-D glasses lying about.
The concept probably started strong. 3-D, while not a new invention, hasn’t really been used in a while and is likely to draw many viewers to the small and large screens. The horror romp My Bloody Valentine probably found much greater success in offering up the scare and gore in all three dimensions than it could have ever found based on storyline alone. Add to that the future releases of Monsters vs. Aliens and Pixar’s Up, and you’ve got the possibility of a real phenomenon on your hands. It’s a nice place to start. The problem then isn’t in the initial thinking, but in the execution. The lead-up to what could have been a truly super Sunday event was vastly under-promoted, leaving many would-be viewers in the dark, or "in the flat" as it were. I had only managed to come across one TV ad promoting the 3-D showing in the days before the Super Bowl, and the mention of where to get the needed glasses was incredibly brief. Offered at Sobe display cases nationwide the day before the game, or with the purchase of a specialty pack of Sobe Lifewater, the window to get in on what could have been a major event went largely unnoticed by the larger population and left the majority of viewers feeling cross-eyed. Then there were the spots themselves.
The preview of Monster’s vs. Aliens was pretty straight forward, offering those with the glasses only a brief taste of what was to come from the full length feature, which is fine except the old “paddleball coming at you” trick probably didn’t justify the effort of getting the glasses for many.
Then there was the Sobe addition to the mix. Last year, Sobe left many viewer questioning what the hell they had just seen. A team of lizards not promoting “Geico” danced to Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” with a model. This year, director Peter Arnell opted against trying to make any sense at all and featured football players dancing ballet poorly, animated lizards wearing shoulder pads or spinning records at a DJ turntable, and characters from “Monsters vs. Aliens” popping in and out as time would allow. The 60-second period of madness hit a crescendo as the lizards, Monsters and fedora-adorned Ray Lewis starting dancing in a choreographed number, the music having evolved from a classical piece to some unmemorable original bit of music which asked the listener to “SoBelieve”.
And then… Ray Lewis turns into a lizard.
It felt like the ideas were picked by securing fractions of thought to a dartboard and then throwing those darts while blindfolded and drunk, but knowing you'd have to involve Ray Lewis. It had all the chaos of Careerbuilder’s screaming, crying, seal-riding, koala-punching romp without any of the absurd humor.
And Sobe’s spot was only in 3-D for a small percentage of the viewing population, making it twice as likely to evoke migraines.
Again, this all had the makings of a great idea, but without a proper lead-up, a coherent message, a quality concept, and appropriate event management, a great idea doesn’t mean much. For Sobe and friends, let’s hope it’s worth the 6-million plus dollars spent.
My suggestion is that next year, they should look for something really innovative options… like Miller Highlife.
Monday, January 26, 2009
Some people just aren't creative
There are dozens and dozens of books published every year where some guru tries to promote ways that the average business person can delve into creative work with more success. They offer methods of looking at a creative campaign from off-center angles and allowing yourself the ability to feed the creative voice through a step-by-step process of understanding. I’ve read many of them, but will not mention the titles here for fear of slandering them. You see, I think most of them are frauds.
The primary problem I have with them is that when one tries to provide a set methodology and path to be creative, you’re still making it into something that can be rationalized and diagramed… something that I believe is detrimental to a creative process. Creativity is in part chaotic, but always individualized. No two creative processes will ever look exactly alike. It is often emotional and even a little bit irrational in nature. Yet these books and seminars put out a call that every left brained point-to-point business person feel they can rally behind, and every artist shudders to hear… that everyone can be creative.
It is my experience that this is simply not true. But this shouldn’t be frowned upon. It’s OK to have shortcomings. From an outside perspective, it should make as much sense for business manager to be helping pick design styles as it would for a photographer to be crunching numbers. Sure, there are those that can reach out across those lines, but for the best possible outcome, each person should be aware of their specific skill set and allow those who are better suited for other functions to do that. The best purpose for these “How to be creative guides” in my opinion is to simply open bridges of dialogue. As a creative personality, I spent years honing my ability to explain and rationalize my efforts to those who wouldn’t normally get there themselves, and help each campaign gain a “business sense” of sorts. Those guides did help some with that, and they can also bridge the gap in the opposite direction in giving a non-creative language to “get it”. But I don’t think it’s wise to believe that being able to talk about something is quite the same as finding success in doing it.
Say it with me now. “Some people are not creative.”
In the age where specialization in the marketplace is giving way to cross-training, it’s important to remember that some people are just better at some jobs than others, and there is nothing wrong with that. Truly successful campaigns happen where the chaos of creative and the order of business can meet. It involves trust and communication on both ends and a healthy individual sense of self-knowledge. It involves insightful management of a project where one knows where to draw lines, and where it is called for, to simply trust the artist.
It’s not a philosophy that will sell many books, but it is one that will really benefit your marketing.
The primary problem I have with them is that when one tries to provide a set methodology and path to be creative, you’re still making it into something that can be rationalized and diagramed… something that I believe is detrimental to a creative process. Creativity is in part chaotic, but always individualized. No two creative processes will ever look exactly alike. It is often emotional and even a little bit irrational in nature. Yet these books and seminars put out a call that every left brained point-to-point business person feel they can rally behind, and every artist shudders to hear… that everyone can be creative.
It is my experience that this is simply not true. But this shouldn’t be frowned upon. It’s OK to have shortcomings. From an outside perspective, it should make as much sense for business manager to be helping pick design styles as it would for a photographer to be crunching numbers. Sure, there are those that can reach out across those lines, but for the best possible outcome, each person should be aware of their specific skill set and allow those who are better suited for other functions to do that. The best purpose for these “How to be creative guides” in my opinion is to simply open bridges of dialogue. As a creative personality, I spent years honing my ability to explain and rationalize my efforts to those who wouldn’t normally get there themselves, and help each campaign gain a “business sense” of sorts. Those guides did help some with that, and they can also bridge the gap in the opposite direction in giving a non-creative language to “get it”. But I don’t think it’s wise to believe that being able to talk about something is quite the same as finding success in doing it.
Say it with me now. “Some people are not creative.”
In the age where specialization in the marketplace is giving way to cross-training, it’s important to remember that some people are just better at some jobs than others, and there is nothing wrong with that. Truly successful campaigns happen where the chaos of creative and the order of business can meet. It involves trust and communication on both ends and a healthy individual sense of self-knowledge. It involves insightful management of a project where one knows where to draw lines, and where it is called for, to simply trust the artist.
It’s not a philosophy that will sell many books, but it is one that will really benefit your marketing.
Monday, January 19, 2009
Marketing shapes the world again: Welcome, President Obama
In the complete Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams talked about a race of people called the Golgafrinchan who lived on a doomed planet (or, in a very Douglas Adams way, not that doomed, but a story concocted to rid the planet of the least useful third of the population), and in an effort to further its people (works in either story), sent up three giant rocket ships, or the space Arks, each carrying they’re own class of people according to the work they were responsible for. Scientists, teachers, craftsmen and other more noble professions were housed together in the first two ships. The third Ark, carrying the least necessary peoples included hairdressers, telephone sanitizers, and yes, marketers.
The joke is pretty obvious. Marketing in his opinion, and perhaps rightfully so, is seen as peripheral to societies’ needs. But tomorrow morning we will see the culmination of one of the greatest marketing efforts in the modern world during the swearing in of Barack Obama.
Think what you will of his politics, but the truth is, when most people voted for President Obama, they did so because they bought into a brand. He’s likeable, sure, and he gives a mean speech, but it was the marketing over the last two years that sent him from ultimate underdog to the top office in the United States, a position which is largely decided by popular opinion.
To break down the complete success and every tactic of the campaign would be far too long to sum up in a blog, and is likely to one day evolve into a book for some enterprising writer, but here are what I believe to be key points.
First, Mr. Obama established his personality. He’s a top-notch speaker, seems to be pretty affable, forthright, and he doesn’t fit the typecast of most of Washington in that he’s young, black, and for the lack of a better word, cool. He was doing press circuits to promote his book before he launched his bid for presidency, familiarizing the nation with his face on appearances on Conan O’Brien and the like. He built an excitement around the possibility of him running before he began. The entirety of these personality traits could be summed up into a single promise that would be key to his brand: Change.
Second, when he began his bid, he targeted the disenfranchised voter populations rather than trying to compete for the mainstream. This meant the young voters, minorities, and others who didn’t fit into the classical image of a voter in the democratic party were being championed. This was risky in that if these people weren’t enough to make his bid seem legitimate, he could be shut down by the party, but they were, and as time went on, more traditional audiences became swept up in the excitement of his promise. This was only furthered by the fact that the nation was so disappointed about the current state of our nation that the single promise of change was an easy call to buy into.
Third, marketing efforts went to where the consumer was. The multilayered online aspect of the campaign was one of the first points built, making it easier for those interested to find out more. Becoming involved with Barack became more and more of a social event. People took up the campaign's seeming tagline "Yes, we can" as a personal banner, and like many effective tags, the seemingly vague statement became one of great meaning to the individual stakeholder.
Fourth, the campaign did not simply sit on the good will it was receiving, but bought into it. It asked for participation by its stakeholders, which is so essential to successful marketing efforts today, and in any means possible. Small cash donations were met with great applause, and frequently mentioned as a strong point of fundraising. Grassroots level advocates got training and talking points sent to them. It became a campaigned OWNED by the advocate, not simply endorsed by them.
Fifth, messaging was crisp. This should be expected from political campaigns to an extent, however, many politicians have been caught in a trap of being branded from the outside (read up on it, Microsoft). Instead, even when the most outlandish and obvious attacks were thrown his way, the response wasn’t to jump back and be defensive, but instead to remain on strategy. This was even true when in locations where to step back on the key points would have been very crowd pleasing for the moment, such as when he was asked on his opinion of abortion laws while sitting before a group of fundamentalists, Barack instead stayed on the messaging he had maintained throughout. For the moment, it was unpopular, but it was true to his brand.
Sixth, partnerships and public endorsements were chosen wisely, as they are in all campaigns, but with an interesting twist. “Unofficial” endorsements were greeted warmly and dismissed slightly, but only enough that they couldn’t be applied directly to the campaign, but that they could reach the public eye. The universal appeal of Oprah’s endorsement was used frequently, while part of the effectiveness of Will.I.Am’s “Yes we can” video partially came from the fact that he made it clear he was not a part of Barack’s campaign, but as an interested individual he felt the need to promote the candidate in his own way. It humanized the buy-in effort of a celebrity without looking like anyone had “sold-out”. It was enough distance to make the effort seem both widely appealing and still within the perception that it was part of a counter-culture movement.
Finally, when the campaign was at its utmost height, the competition scrambled for a response to combat the momentum of the campaign, the response was minimal. The competition started to claim they were true voices of change, rolling out the word “Maverick” with an overwhelming consistency and offering a VP nod to someone who might compete with Barack in simply being different from previous political offerings. But at that point, Mr. Obama’s campaign already owned that marketplace, and so such efforts were regarded as little more than amusing.
The true ask of the election, for people to simply vote, was at hand. And it worked.
Yes, there were many aspects to this campaign, some tried and true, some were incredibly innovative and responsive, but the success of the campaign at its core was simply the establishment, maintenance, and consistency of a single brand. It tapped into a specific market, created buy-in, then involvement. It also recognized trends without falling victim to them, and treated competition in its own back yard as a non-threat. It was modern marketing and advertising as never seen before.
Now, this isn’t to say I didn’t buy in either. Just because one recognizes the business doesn’t mean they’re immune to it. The truth of any brand is that there also must be a quality offering at its core, or it will fail. Modern consumers aren’t stupid. But as we welcome in the new President tomorrow in an atmosphere of a modern Woodstock and watch for the world to change, I have to think back to Mr. Adam’s opinion and laugh a little. Peripheral my hide.
However, upon further evaluation, I have been reminded that the third ship might (or might not) have settled upon the earth and gave way to humankind. So maybe he had a point there as well.
The joke is pretty obvious. Marketing in his opinion, and perhaps rightfully so, is seen as peripheral to societies’ needs. But tomorrow morning we will see the culmination of one of the greatest marketing efforts in the modern world during the swearing in of Barack Obama.
Think what you will of his politics, but the truth is, when most people voted for President Obama, they did so because they bought into a brand. He’s likeable, sure, and he gives a mean speech, but it was the marketing over the last two years that sent him from ultimate underdog to the top office in the United States, a position which is largely decided by popular opinion.
To break down the complete success and every tactic of the campaign would be far too long to sum up in a blog, and is likely to one day evolve into a book for some enterprising writer, but here are what I believe to be key points.
First, Mr. Obama established his personality. He’s a top-notch speaker, seems to be pretty affable, forthright, and he doesn’t fit the typecast of most of Washington in that he’s young, black, and for the lack of a better word, cool. He was doing press circuits to promote his book before he launched his bid for presidency, familiarizing the nation with his face on appearances on Conan O’Brien and the like. He built an excitement around the possibility of him running before he began. The entirety of these personality traits could be summed up into a single promise that would be key to his brand: Change.
Second, when he began his bid, he targeted the disenfranchised voter populations rather than trying to compete for the mainstream. This meant the young voters, minorities, and others who didn’t fit into the classical image of a voter in the democratic party were being championed. This was risky in that if these people weren’t enough to make his bid seem legitimate, he could be shut down by the party, but they were, and as time went on, more traditional audiences became swept up in the excitement of his promise. This was only furthered by the fact that the nation was so disappointed about the current state of our nation that the single promise of change was an easy call to buy into.
Third, marketing efforts went to where the consumer was. The multilayered online aspect of the campaign was one of the first points built, making it easier for those interested to find out more. Becoming involved with Barack became more and more of a social event. People took up the campaign's seeming tagline "Yes, we can" as a personal banner, and like many effective tags, the seemingly vague statement became one of great meaning to the individual stakeholder.
Fourth, the campaign did not simply sit on the good will it was receiving, but bought into it. It asked for participation by its stakeholders, which is so essential to successful marketing efforts today, and in any means possible. Small cash donations were met with great applause, and frequently mentioned as a strong point of fundraising. Grassroots level advocates got training and talking points sent to them. It became a campaigned OWNED by the advocate, not simply endorsed by them.
Fifth, messaging was crisp. This should be expected from political campaigns to an extent, however, many politicians have been caught in a trap of being branded from the outside (read up on it, Microsoft). Instead, even when the most outlandish and obvious attacks were thrown his way, the response wasn’t to jump back and be defensive, but instead to remain on strategy. This was even true when in locations where to step back on the key points would have been very crowd pleasing for the moment, such as when he was asked on his opinion of abortion laws while sitting before a group of fundamentalists, Barack instead stayed on the messaging he had maintained throughout. For the moment, it was unpopular, but it was true to his brand.
Sixth, partnerships and public endorsements were chosen wisely, as they are in all campaigns, but with an interesting twist. “Unofficial” endorsements were greeted warmly and dismissed slightly, but only enough that they couldn’t be applied directly to the campaign, but that they could reach the public eye. The universal appeal of Oprah’s endorsement was used frequently, while part of the effectiveness of Will.I.Am’s “Yes we can” video partially came from the fact that he made it clear he was not a part of Barack’s campaign, but as an interested individual he felt the need to promote the candidate in his own way. It humanized the buy-in effort of a celebrity without looking like anyone had “sold-out”. It was enough distance to make the effort seem both widely appealing and still within the perception that it was part of a counter-culture movement.
Finally, when the campaign was at its utmost height, the competition scrambled for a response to combat the momentum of the campaign, the response was minimal. The competition started to claim they were true voices of change, rolling out the word “Maverick” with an overwhelming consistency and offering a VP nod to someone who might compete with Barack in simply being different from previous political offerings. But at that point, Mr. Obama’s campaign already owned that marketplace, and so such efforts were regarded as little more than amusing.
The true ask of the election, for people to simply vote, was at hand. And it worked.
Yes, there were many aspects to this campaign, some tried and true, some were incredibly innovative and responsive, but the success of the campaign at its core was simply the establishment, maintenance, and consistency of a single brand. It tapped into a specific market, created buy-in, then involvement. It also recognized trends without falling victim to them, and treated competition in its own back yard as a non-threat. It was modern marketing and advertising as never seen before.
Now, this isn’t to say I didn’t buy in either. Just because one recognizes the business doesn’t mean they’re immune to it. The truth of any brand is that there also must be a quality offering at its core, or it will fail. Modern consumers aren’t stupid. But as we welcome in the new President tomorrow in an atmosphere of a modern Woodstock and watch for the world to change, I have to think back to Mr. Adam’s opinion and laugh a little. Peripheral my hide.
However, upon further evaluation, I have been reminded that the third ship might (or might not) have settled upon the earth and gave way to humankind. So maybe he had a point there as well.
Monday, January 12, 2009
Shared music and big results
A friend recently directed my attention to an interesting article about the top selling albums of 2008 recently, most notably the top grossing MP3 album of the year being Nine Inch Nails’ “Ghosts I-IV”.
As the article points out, this album was issued under a creative commons license, allowing a looser rights management for consumers who have been burdened by rights management issues through major labels and music outlets, such as Apple's iTunes. This right's management even allowed "anyone to use or rework the material for any non-profit purpose, as long as credit is provided and the resulting work is released under an identical license". So, share and share alike.
I’ve already mentioned in this blog, and I believe it to be true, that in order to know where the business of online consumption and business is going, one should look to the music and film industry. It has been the battleground of some of the most important questions in online business development, and NIN has always been one of the trailblazing groups in helping pushing that envelope, but few, if any experts could have foreseen that by allowing music to be shared and redigested in mass could have equaled out to a top grossing effort
Well, I have a couple points of reason that I think contributed to it.
1. Brand loyalty – Like it or not, NIN is a brand in themselves, and over the years of making music, they’ve gained one of the most stalwart fan bases in the world. Their fans want them to succeed, and so even when presented with the option, as they were with the first volume, they chose to pay.
2. Customer education – Trent Reznor and those who work with him have worked hard to educate their fan base to what they hope to achieve, and the possible pitfalls. Their mantra has been largely to further art first while trying to operate within a business. Educating their fans to the difficulties and pitfalls of the business enables the consumer to choose to promote the art themselves.
3. Customer loyalty – NIN rewards fans for caring. It plays heavily into the first point. This even went so far as to the band asking fans to contribute visuals through the band's youtube page to further invest them in the project.
4. Convenience – The album was made available on Amazon, where people are already shopping for music, as well as smaller, less trustworthy sites. You must be where your customer is.
5. Quality – The album has received critical and fan base rave reviews, including Grammy nods. By not diluting their product, the album became something worth choosing to pay for.
6. Distribution options - The first volume, Ghosts I was available for free download. Other options of getting the album were made available, including the full set on Amazon, or collector's editions up to $300.
As time goes on, many places are going to face challenges of effectively competing in the digital world. As time goes on, it becomes more and more apparent that customers are not stupid, and if motivated correctly, will choose to support you.
I believe the strongest point in this is that in order to succeed, you must allow your consumer to participate with you brand directly. By investing in them, you make it easier for them to invest in you.
As the article points out, this album was issued under a creative commons license, allowing a looser rights management for consumers who have been burdened by rights management issues through major labels and music outlets, such as Apple's iTunes. This right's management even allowed "anyone to use or rework the material for any non-profit purpose, as long as credit is provided and the resulting work is released under an identical license". So, share and share alike.
I’ve already mentioned in this blog, and I believe it to be true, that in order to know where the business of online consumption and business is going, one should look to the music and film industry. It has been the battleground of some of the most important questions in online business development, and NIN has always been one of the trailblazing groups in helping pushing that envelope, but few, if any experts could have foreseen that by allowing music to be shared and redigested in mass could have equaled out to a top grossing effort
Well, I have a couple points of reason that I think contributed to it.
1. Brand loyalty – Like it or not, NIN is a brand in themselves, and over the years of making music, they’ve gained one of the most stalwart fan bases in the world. Their fans want them to succeed, and so even when presented with the option, as they were with the first volume, they chose to pay.
2. Customer education – Trent Reznor and those who work with him have worked hard to educate their fan base to what they hope to achieve, and the possible pitfalls. Their mantra has been largely to further art first while trying to operate within a business. Educating their fans to the difficulties and pitfalls of the business enables the consumer to choose to promote the art themselves.
3. Customer loyalty – NIN rewards fans for caring. It plays heavily into the first point. This even went so far as to the band asking fans to contribute visuals through the band's youtube page to further invest them in the project.
4. Convenience – The album was made available on Amazon, where people are already shopping for music, as well as smaller, less trustworthy sites. You must be where your customer is.
5. Quality – The album has received critical and fan base rave reviews, including Grammy nods. By not diluting their product, the album became something worth choosing to pay for.
6. Distribution options - The first volume, Ghosts I was available for free download. Other options of getting the album were made available, including the full set on Amazon, or collector's editions up to $300.
As time goes on, many places are going to face challenges of effectively competing in the digital world. As time goes on, it becomes more and more apparent that customers are not stupid, and if motivated correctly, will choose to support you.
I believe the strongest point in this is that in order to succeed, you must allow your consumer to participate with you brand directly. By investing in them, you make it easier for them to invest in you.
Monday, January 5, 2009
The art of the personal brand
It’s the time of year when resolutions are usually made, where we take the time to think about our strengths and weaknesses, and the lessons of the year past. In essence, it’s a very strong equivalent to a brand analysis. This may seem a little belittling to some people, because a brand represents a product or a business, and an individual is considerably more complex, but our personal brand is communicated every moment of our lives. It shows itself in the way we interact with one another, how we approach the world, the jobs we take, and how we choose to entertain ourselves.
Much as any corporation, there are certain basics which are key in determining your brand. I, for instance, am an optimist. I see reality, but I cast it in the most positive light. I am an introspective over-thinker with a large drive to care and protect the people I surround myself. My truest product is what I write. These basic facts play into the essence of who I am, or my brand essence, and whatever I choose to do or how I present myself, these things are going to have to be part of it. For me to try and forward another image, such as to show myself as a shallow braggart or try and look too “emo” and depressed stands in contradiction to my essence, and will create not only a conflict in how I am perceived by others, but in turn how I am treated, creating a sort of rift and difficulty in myself.
Now, there are elements, say, if I have a beard or not, or whether I post a blog this week are smaller issues. They can be adjusted and tuned to my current goals and interactions. The clothes I might wear can change dramatically whether I’m going to a coffee shop, a bar, or a job interview. These are simple executions of my personal brand, and they become more pliable depending on my goals at the time.
I think as one contemplates their New Years resolution, it’s important to go through a mental checklist. I’ve compiled some of the self-branding questions I like to ask myself. If you decided to follow suit, remember a few key points. First, be honest; and while it helps to be optimistic, be careful not to cross the line to delusional. Second, try and be brief in answering. If something is taking paragraphs, it’s not going to be easy enough to remember and apply in real life. Aim for a sentence in part 1, and only stretch it as needed further on. Third, remember it’s more important to know what you want than to list what you should want. As they say, the road to hell is paved with the best of intentions. The most important thing to remember is the order of things. There are three sections. Once Part 1 is answered, everything in Part 2 should be able to stand being filtered through it. Everything in Part 3 should make sense when filtered through both Part 2 and Part 1. Remember, few things can be more damaging to your personal brand that a personal paradox.
Jason McCormick’s Personal Brand Questionnaire:
Part 1:
Who am I? (Keep it brief)
What does my background say about me?
What does my current environment say about me?
What do I really enjoy about being me?
If I were to sum all of that up in one sentence, I would say that “I am…”
Now you’ve got a sense of your essence.
Part 2:
What do I want to achieve?
What resources do I have available to me?
What am I lacking?
That’s going to help zero you in on where you’re looking for your path to lead you. Many resolutions are born out of this second set. But then you have to put them into action…
Part 3:
To achieve the above goals, I must present myself as:
My best method of communication is:
I must learn to:
I must eliminate:
What can I positively associate myself with:
What should I stop associating with:
This section is more about the direct application, sort of a game plan to achieve goals.
I hope this sheds some light in how I believe a personal brand can start to be built, or at least help focus some of those New Year’s resolutions. I’ve always believed that understand the want to do something is more important than the act itself. It’s not so much about wanting to lose weight or quit smoking, but why you want to lose weight or quit smoking. It’s in understanding that “why” that you can find the true motivation to make it happen.
I wish everyone a very happy 2009.
Much as any corporation, there are certain basics which are key in determining your brand. I, for instance, am an optimist. I see reality, but I cast it in the most positive light. I am an introspective over-thinker with a large drive to care and protect the people I surround myself. My truest product is what I write. These basic facts play into the essence of who I am, or my brand essence, and whatever I choose to do or how I present myself, these things are going to have to be part of it. For me to try and forward another image, such as to show myself as a shallow braggart or try and look too “emo” and depressed stands in contradiction to my essence, and will create not only a conflict in how I am perceived by others, but in turn how I am treated, creating a sort of rift and difficulty in myself.
Now, there are elements, say, if I have a beard or not, or whether I post a blog this week are smaller issues. They can be adjusted and tuned to my current goals and interactions. The clothes I might wear can change dramatically whether I’m going to a coffee shop, a bar, or a job interview. These are simple executions of my personal brand, and they become more pliable depending on my goals at the time.
I think as one contemplates their New Years resolution, it’s important to go through a mental checklist. I’ve compiled some of the self-branding questions I like to ask myself. If you decided to follow suit, remember a few key points. First, be honest; and while it helps to be optimistic, be careful not to cross the line to delusional. Second, try and be brief in answering. If something is taking paragraphs, it’s not going to be easy enough to remember and apply in real life. Aim for a sentence in part 1, and only stretch it as needed further on. Third, remember it’s more important to know what you want than to list what you should want. As they say, the road to hell is paved with the best of intentions. The most important thing to remember is the order of things. There are three sections. Once Part 1 is answered, everything in Part 2 should be able to stand being filtered through it. Everything in Part 3 should make sense when filtered through both Part 2 and Part 1. Remember, few things can be more damaging to your personal brand that a personal paradox.
Jason McCormick’s Personal Brand Questionnaire:
Part 1:
Who am I? (Keep it brief)
What does my background say about me?
What does my current environment say about me?
What do I really enjoy about being me?
If I were to sum all of that up in one sentence, I would say that “I am…”
Now you’ve got a sense of your essence.
Part 2:
What do I want to achieve?
What resources do I have available to me?
What am I lacking?
That’s going to help zero you in on where you’re looking for your path to lead you. Many resolutions are born out of this second set. But then you have to put them into action…
Part 3:
To achieve the above goals, I must present myself as:
My best method of communication is:
I must learn to:
I must eliminate:
What can I positively associate myself with:
What should I stop associating with:
This section is more about the direct application, sort of a game plan to achieve goals.
I hope this sheds some light in how I believe a personal brand can start to be built, or at least help focus some of those New Year’s resolutions. I’ve always believed that understand the want to do something is more important than the act itself. It’s not so much about wanting to lose weight or quit smoking, but why you want to lose weight or quit smoking. It’s in understanding that “why” that you can find the true motivation to make it happen.
I wish everyone a very happy 2009.
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