Marketing Memos

Your brand stinks when even terrorists disassociate from you.

Such is the fate of the fast fading Al Qaeda franchise, whose violent tendencies led to market backlash, a CEO who was abruptly dismissed/dispatched, and a rapid drop in brand equity. So much has the Al Qaeda brand been tarnished that entire regional divisions are spinning-off in order to avoid their own public images from being destroyed, and perhaps their own leadership from being prematurely retired.

What does a terrorist have to do to get a little respect?

Often a brand itself becomes negative, be it Al Qaeda or Microsoft. Since a brand, per Silicon Strategies Marketing definition, is what people think and feel about you, then a negative brand becomes an organization-wide anchor in deep water. Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula has dropped Al Qaeda from it’s name, something that Microsoft can’t do (rumor has it that Steve Ballmer was distressed to learn that his first choice for a hip, new corporate name was already taken, forcing him to chose something other than “Buggy Whips R Us”). In recent political times, a corrupt organization named ACORN rebranded itself after being caught facilitating prostitution via subprime mortgages. Sometimes a brand can be so poisonous, nothing short of vanishing and rebuilding will help.

Let’s hope Charlie Sheen doesn’t figure this out.

Early recognition of a damaged brand is essential to avoid a painful and expensive rebuilding project. Microsoft was late in recognizing that people were increasingly hateful of their operating systems (though they were surprisingly nimble at moving past the Vista fiasco). They have been less successful in their ham-handed attempts to portray Microsoft products as cool. Apple, recognizing a near universal disgruntlement over Microsoft operating system flakiness, attacked with authentic hipness and humor in the now legendary Apple vs. PC advertising. Microsoft has yet to recover, and might not given how tablets, integrated cloud cross-platform services and other modern conveniences have raced ahead.

A brand can survive if the negative aspects are recognized early and the core problem is dealt with effectively. Failing this, little more than braking-up the franchise is possible. The marketing lesson here is that CMOs need to make brand measurement a routine activity, which given the Internet and social media can be perpetual and affordable. CMOs must also convert bad brand news into bottom line projections, and force the issue at the board room table.

A lesson OBL learned a little too late.

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It is odd to encounter plain spoken and seemingly honest politicians.

Being a professional cynic, I doubt nearly everything. Having been a political animal my entire adult life, I’m doubly cynical about anyone who campaigns to achieve power. To be disappointed in broken political promises is a sign of naivety. To believe any political brand shows trust where there should be none.

So to witness a handful of governors and other candidates speaking bluntly, without equivocation, and taking positions normally considered poisonous … and then watch their poll numbers rise … is both a lesson in marketing and possibly a sign of the Apocalypse.

Authenticity matters in all matters. If you could not take your spouse’s word, then your marriage would be destined for the dumpster (which always makes me wonder about Bill and Hillary). When corporations promote products that do not deliver, the acquired lack of authenticity becomes fatal. If Charlie Sheen were to sober-up, nobody would talk about him because his acting chops are not Grade-A. In instances of marriage, political promotions, product pitches and even behaving badly as a brand, authenticity is essential.

Authenticity mechanics are interesting for marketers. If a business remains authentic in its operations, then it creates no net negatives. New customers, having never heard bad words about the offering, are more apt to give it a try even if there are no significant positive recommendations. That alone tends to advance a product once competitors begin to over promote or under-deliver. I once ran marketing for a company whose lead product was ugly, had no GUI and required training to use. But it always worked and there was always someone on the other end of the phone to help, which created in the market an interesting perception of stability, which IT buyers liked.

I have seen the opposite apply. When inexperienced marketers promise more than the product can do, they lose authenticity. When the product performs poorly or is unstable (ala Microsoft Windows), it loses authenticity. When tech support doesn’t, you lose authenticity if it were promised. Political warfare is largely composed of destroying an opponent’s authenticity (Herman Cain was building a brand of authenticity before unsubstantiated rumors of sexual improprieties arose). If Charlie Sheen were spotted praying at a church altar, not only would his brand be destroyed but I suspect the church would be as well via a well placed lightning bolt.

Social media enforces authenticity, and there is nothing you can do to stop it. No degree of smart copywriting, aggressive PR or slick advertising will wash away the ruminations of one angry ex-customer. Betray your brand or product promises and you will be portrayed as unauthentic in digital public squares. Engagement with the masses, participating in social media, reinforces authenticity and may be the new normal for PR.

Authenticity above all else. Otherwise be unelected by customers.

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A local Sprint store sale punk demonstrated Siri on the new Apple iPhone 4S by saying “Siri, I’m drunk” to which Siri relied “There are 15 taxis in the vicinity …”

This demo would kill Steve Jobs.

Other customers on the sales floor were a mixture of amused and offended, though before the demo all had come cash-in-hand to see the new iGizmo. Each now wore a creepy expression on their mugs ­– similar to the ones they likely wore upon discovering the Santa Myth (which is not to be confused with the Santana Myth which claims that Carlos can sing). The iPhone’s image had been tarnished by a frat boy stunt in a place trying to sell iPhones.

Apple’s G-rated brand was slammed with an R-rated demo, and nobody left that Sprint store with a 4S.

Growing or preserving a brand through channels is slightly more difficult than balancing the federal budget. Not impossible, but prone to failure because channel managers do not exercise the same degree of care vis-à-vis branding that your sales force does. Yet the channel is your differently-paid sales force and needs to communicate your brand with approximate fidelity. Scraggly bearded Sprint sales drones shouting “I’m drunk” into a handset was never part of Apple’s branding strategy.

Key to channel marketing and branding is to educate your channel as well as you would your own sales teams. This takes resources, though in our wired world it is increasing cost effective. Only after everyone in a partner organization knows your brand can you even attempt to enforce their individual behaviors. Given how the other Sprint store clerks responded, they had not received Apple brand training either.

If your go-to-market strategy relies on channels, then assure those partners are appropriate brand ambassadors. Otherwise your brand will be slowly chiseled away.

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A cult is a religion with no political power.
— Tom Wolfe

Cults are good in the context of marketing, though not so much in real life. Religions are slightly more respectable, though each views the others as large cults. Yet the mechanics of cults, religions and matters of faith are informative in shaping a corporate brand.

The difference between fanbois and followers is thin.

In the early iPhone era, Apple customers were called a cult. Early adopters of iPhones were evangelical to the point of annoying. Regardless of personal motivation, iPhone fans fawned and proselytized the new portable computer. While their numbers were small and their zeal was large, the cult moniker was apropos. With relatively no market (political) power, the iPhone faithful were as bedeviling as Jehovah’s door knockers.

Today, iEverything is a religion because the masses have adopted most, and sometimes all of the doctrine.

Cults, religions and brand loyalty are all based on faith. Granted, good products build faith through experience, but it remains an article of faith about the value delivered by the product. To build brand religion requires first cultivating a brand cult, then establishing enduring doctrine concerning core values. It is impossible to leap from and unbranded product to a brand religion without first forming a brand cult.

Attempting it will brand you as a false prophet, and we know what happens to those folks.

Harley Davidson is an example. For whatever reasons, post WWII soldiers lacking domestic thrills rivaling shooting Nazis sought motorcycles, whiskey and women. These were the early bikers, who were positively tame compared to today’s MC members. They preferred Harleys and no “real” biker would be caught riding a Triumph or Indian, and mentioning Honda, Yamaha or Kawasaki with reverence would get you beaten. Thus, images of people who shunned societal conventions and lived on the wild side were Harley’s first cult. This cult image was amplified when the American Motorcycle Association claimed that 99% of all motorcyclists were law-abiding citizens and the “real” bikers started calling themselves the one-percenters.

Later in history, aging baby boomers who could afford a Harley without spending their kid’s college fund donned biker garb and hit the highway. These Rolex Riders expanded the Harley brand cult into brand religion. Yet potbellied CPAs would never have given Harleys a second glance had not the mystique of the one-percenter cult driven the Harley brand image.

The marketing strategy here is tricky, but if you understand the brand-cult-religion progression, it is manageable and can be expedited. New products often have identifiable early adopters who are anxious to promote your wares. Identifying all their drivers – but most importantly the values that have deep emotional bases – is your starting point. Cull from the short list of deeply emotive cultish motivations those that appeal to the wider population. These become the core values of your brand. Saint Peter may have preached many things, but saw that the doctrine of a loving God was more marketable than the ornery fellow found in the Old Testament.

Peter found the common value that took Christianity from a cult into a religion.

Brand religion is the marketing strategist’s Holy Grail. To obtain that blessed state you must cultivate your cult, find what the fanatics have in common that also applies to the wider population … and pray.

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Novell knew how to murder brands.

A recent lunch with a long-term friend and SuSE Linux leader reminded me of the problems faced with messaging and branding in both commodity and fragmented markets.  Linux is a commodity, and was intended to be such.  The lack of differentiation in the core product was Linux’s primary selling point to shops that stayed stuck on one or another UNIX derivative or even proprietary operating systems.  Creating unique brands for commodities can be tough, though we did have success with SuSE’s brand before Novell diluted it.

The Linux market is becoming even trickier as advances in deployment and scalability expand.  Today’s global content start-ups are rushing to EC², RackSpace and RightScale in order to avoid growing pains while chanting hadoop and nosql.  Less data-intensive operations use traditional clustering or stand-alone servers.  Some people need real-time Linux, and a few folk want stripped-down distros for shipping their own appliances.

Tough to bridge a brand across all of the above.

Multi-segment messaging and branding is difficult, but has an elegant angle.  Marketers need to know that each segment and whole product may well need its own brand, and thus its own messaging, promotion and budget.  Yet CMOs must document the product line brand and enforce it company wide.  The secret in brand, message and value proposition alignment across all segments is to find the intersections.  For each of the aforementioned elements, there is overlap.  One or more items that are important in segment #1 are also important in segments #2, #3 and #infinity.  Your global brand, headline and homepage value proposition as well as lead message should always be where there is unity across segments (click to enlarge graphic).

Only when there are no (or very disjointed) commonalities should you break brands apart.  But that is a different topic for a different day. For now know that if you are vending into multiple segments and are not tying together the common value/message/brand elements, then you have no broad brand, which is a Bad Thing.

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