Tom Asacker

Charles W. Eliot on beliefs

"All business proceeds on beliefs, or judgments of probabilities, and not on certainties."

The results of two recent consumer inquiries caused me pause. The first one confused me, so I’m hoping an informed reader of this blog can set me straight. The second one confirmed something I had always felt (and have pointed out in the past), which made me wonder how the self-interested and invested blogosphere will "deal with it."

The first bit of data daze fell over me while perusing the results of a survey sponsored by BrandWeek Magazine and Brand Keys, Inc. called the 2006 Brand Keys Customer Loyalty Leaders Index. The survey marks the tenth annual assessment of consumer purchasing behavior, evaluating brands within industry segments to gauge which consumer values are driving future purchases and loyalty in the category.

Here's how Brand Keys describes their methodology:

About 16,000 consumers were surveyed by Brand Keys in New York on 35 categories during the first quarter of 2006. After they identified the brands they used most, respondents were asked to identify what they expected of those brands and, crucially, what those brands actually delivered, across a range of motivational "drivers." The answers were assigned scores. Because the categories are different - loyalty to a car brand is different than loyalty to a soda brand - the scores were indexed to allow comparison. The index thus reflects how well a brand delivers on the expectations of its most loyal consumers. There is no maximum or minimum score, but in general a higher score indicates the brand is coming closer to meeting (or even exceeding) expectations. A word of caution: The index ranks brands only by statistically significant results. Therefore, scores that appear to be close together on the index - 110 and 111, for example - actually have a significant distance between them (the full survey is available for purchase from Brand Keys).

Now for my confusion. I was scanning the list of the top 25 brands with the most loyal customers across all categories, and noticed just one soft drink, Diet Pepsi, holding steady at number eighteen from the previous year. Being a Diet Coke guy, I was a little put off. "Interesting," I thought. "If Diet Pepsi is reportedly the soft drink brand with the most loyal customers, then it should be the product leader." Right? I'm no polster, but if people "feel" stronger about a frequently purchased brand of soft drink shouldn't that translate to greater sales and marketshare today? I guess not. Diet Pepsi isn't even in the top three (Coke, Pepsi, Diet Coke).

So somebody please tell me: what am I missing?

The second piece stopped my in my tracks: "Online brand buzz is mainly hype, claims report." Hype. Advertising. Ballyhoo. Brouhaha. Plug. Promotion. Puffery. Razzmatazz. Can you believe it?

According to WARC News, a report released today by WPP Group research agency Millward Brown, not only challenges the relentless hype propagated by online lobbyists, but also indirectly calls into question the commercial wisdom of several recent, massively expensive acquisitions made by global media giants.

A study of consumer attitudes to brand advocacy, conducted among 1,000 consumers in the USA and a similar number in the UK, refutes a widespread belief among marketers that that blogs and viral marketing are vital components in an effective communications mix.

Such a belief is not supported by the survey data, which reveals that relatively few people (11 % in the US and 10 % in the UK) use informal sources of online information - such as chat rooms, blogs, online message boards and online contacts - to guide their purchase decisions.

Instead, an overwhelming majority of shoppers (74% in the US and 63 % in the UK) turn to friends, neighbours and colleagues for advice. In both countries, personal opinions are considered to be 'very convincing' - more so than online sources (57 % in the US and 52% in the UK), an impact that only narrowly betters company-led communications like websites and salespeople.

In terms of the relevance of the information obtained, online sources are ranked lowest of all (34% in the USA and 45 % in the UK) and are most likely to be disregarded when deciding what brand to select.

Observes Fergus Hampton of Millward Brown Precis: "In the past eighteen months, there has been a tremendous amount of hype about digital networking, blogs and consumer-to-consumer communication facilitated by the internet and the power of these channels to make or break brands.

"Our study shows clearly that personal contacts such as family, friends/neighbours, and colleagues are still a much stronger influence on brand choice. This is as true for big ticket items such as holiday destinations, digital cameras, mobile phones and cars as it is for everyday purchases such as toilet cleaners and cold and flu remedies."

So somebody please tell me: what are they missing?

Recent brief interview

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And as recorded at Brand ManageCamp 2006.
Click here for the virus free Windows Media file.

GuruBBQ

On this week's show we visit India, Iran and Venice; we grill airport security, General Motors and Eric Clapton; and we take a look at some cool product placement. Also, do you look like your dog? Give us 5 minutes (or 6) and we'll give you a mid-week laugh or two.

Jose Ortega y Gasset on metaphor

"The metaphor is perhaps one of man's most fruitful potentialities. Its efficacy verges on magic, and it seems a tool for creation which God forgot inside one of His creatures when He made him."

The Wall Street Journal ran a revealing piece about corporate culture on the front page this past Friday: Winning Metaphors. At Office Retreats, Tales of Adversity Fire up the Staff. Tiring of CEO's Triumphs, Bosses Book Speakers Who Beat Blindness, Paralysis.  Here are a few excerpts:

Companies such as Goldman Sachs & Co. and Wal-Mart Stores Inc. are booking speakers who have survived farm accidents, muggings or other tragedies . . .

Bosses hope these speakers can cut through a fog of cynicism and complacency, getting people fired up about their jobs.

"You need to build passion," Ms. Baderschneider (procurement chief at ExxonMobil Corp.) says.  "These speakers get people's juices flowing.  They make us realize that our challenges are nothing compared with what they have done."

For the record, I too enjoy listening to these inspirational speakers.  But I wonder: How does hearing a touching story of overcoming personal adversity translate into business insights and long-term behavior change?  How does it cut though the cynicism and complacency created from a lack of meaning and purpose in one's work?  Do people really connect with the metaphor and equate it with providing superior customer and coworker experiences? "Heck. If a blind guy can climb Mount Everest, than I can certainly innovate for the benefit of my organization."  I don't think so.

Emerson wrote, "The man of genius inspires us with a boundless confidence in our own powers." That's the way to cut through complacency.  Inspire each individual.  Show him how he is truly at the heart of the brand and the company's success in the marketplace.  Teach him to see clearly, to empathize deeply, and to bring people together for the benefit of others.  Encourage him with candid conversation, asking for his help, and really caring about his success and well-being.  The secret ingredient for building an engaged organization is not a sprinkling of inspiration.  It's passion, insight and a heavy dose of social intelligence.

Unknown on insight

"Insight is in the mind of the beholder."  Okay, I just made that up.  But it's true.

I'm on my way to Orlando to present at the Association of National Advertisers Masters of Marketing Annual Conference.  In order to better empathize with my audience, I picked up a recently released book that is referenced frequently by ANA members and staff: What Sticks - Why Most Advertising Fails and How To Guarantee Yours Succeeds.

It's an okay read.  I didn't experience any metaphorical light bulbs illuminating over my head, except when I read this, from the foreword by Steven Levitt of Freakonomics fame:

     Two kinds of problems exist in business: messy ones and neat ones.  Inventory forecasting is an example of a neat problem.  You can go in and count the inventory in the morning, then count it again in the evening and calculate the depletion and replenishment needs, model inventory and data, and become more efficient.  It might not be easy to develop the tools for optimal control of inventory, but at least the problem is well defined and everything is easy to measure.
     Then there are the kinds of problems I like: The messy ones where it is hard even to know what the right questions are to ask.  And once you ask the right questions, figuring out how to answer it isn't easy either.  These are the kinds of problems that people tend to fall back on conventional wisdom to answer, but these are also precisely where conventional wisdom is most likely to be wrong.
     Marketing falls into the messy category. It is messy because there are lots of variables such as competitive spending, unobserved fluctuations in demand, and a complex array of intersecting media.

Sounds reasonable, right?  But it's not. And it's not, because the author is comparing an outdated paradigm called "inventory control" to another outdated paradigm called "advertising." Let me try to explain.

Once upon a time, companies used to employ various statistical methodologies to attempt to predict and, thus, plan for inventory needs.  Since many variables exist which effect those requirements, like inventory lead times, fluctuations in customer demand, shrinkage, and other "messy" ones, companies eventually changed the way they looked at inventory; a paradigm shift (actually, the Japanese changed the paradigm by necessity, and everyone else followed their lead. But that's another blog post for another day).

So here's what stuck: Instead of trying to predict and control inventory by pushing it onto the shelves, companies got as close as they possibly could to the customers' real-time needs and let them pull it into the manufacturing plants and shopping baskets.  This "Just-in-Time" strategy resulted in many benefits; huge reductions in inventory which freed up capital for more prudent investments, reduced obsolescence costs, improved quality, speed to market, etc.  Just ask Michael Dell.

So even though the inventory forecasting problem appeared to be a neat mathematical one, a radical shift in thinking substantially eliminated it.  The same kind of paradigmatic shift is required in the field of marketing (it's starting to happen in the online world).  Instead of pushing advertising at people, and developing ever more sophisticated methods for modeling and measuring its effects, we need to get closer to our customers and help them pull us towards them and their needs. 

Levitt has it wrong: people don't simply fall back on conventional wisdom to answer hard problems. They fall back on conventional wisdom to answer every problem.  That's why it's called "conventional wisdom." Don't look for breakthrough insights in outdated processes like "inventory control" and "advertising."  Instead, study those businesses that actually broke with conventional wisdom and discovered new ways to get closer and closer to the customer.  And for the record, I am not saying "don't advertise."  Not advertising is like winking at a beautiful girl in a dark room.  YOU know what you're doing, but she hasn't a clue.

Daniel Goleman on marketing

"If your emotional abilities aren't in hand, if you don't have self-awareness, if you are not able to manage your distressing emotions, if you can't have empathy and have effective relationships, then no matter how smart you are, you are not going to get very far."

My friend Ann Handley blogged a great post over at MarketingProfs about humor and how it "goes a long way to stir interest in an otherwise 'disengaged community.'" (Do check out the insightful comments as well).

Her post helped clarify a feeling I experienced after reading a couple of military-related emails yesterday.  The first email was from a deeply spiritual, long-time friend.  Here it is:

Tom---here is a photo slide show, while we sit in our offices……

mb

I know mb very well and respect his opinions so I clicked the link, tolerated the long download, and started moving through the PowerPoint presentation.  And after about three or four slides, I became disengaged. Read it again: I wasn't simply not engaged.  I wanted to free myself from it. So I did.

There's nothing repulsive about the show: It shows the harsh realities of war and contrasts the lives of our of military men and women, to our blessed American life of freedom and comfort.  Here's just one on the many slides (click to enlarge).

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Later in the day I received another email from a relative stranger (sorry ecummings), regarding the same subject matter.  Here it is:

Subject: Long deployment video

This squadron had a long, quiet deployment...and a video camera.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqaWdkdFb3Y&mode=related&search=

Not only was I engaged and compelled to show it to everyone I know, each time I view it tears well up in my eyes.  So I started thinking about it.  Why am I so touched by this silly little video, but not by the cold, harsh realities of the PowerPoint presentation?  And yes, I know that video is much more powerful than static images.  But it was much deeper than that.

Here's what I think is going on in my subconscious mind (I don't have a lot of time to reflect on this right now, so if you want to chime in I'd really appreciate it).  The first piece of attention solicitation distanced me from the troops.  It made me feel different from them and, in fact, bad about myself.  So I did what any self-centered, pressed for time human being would do when his or her esteem is getting dragged down: I tuned it out.

But the second piece had an entirely different affect.  I felt myself deeply empathizing with our military men and women.  I could viscerally connect with their sacrifice.  Why?  I'm not sure.  Perhaps because the video humanizes them.  Perhaps because I have a sense of humor (or at least I believe that I do), and, since they also have a sense of humor, that makes me like them. Or as Virginia Postrel wrote in The Substance of Style (and I'm paraphrasing): "I like them.  I'm like them."

What's this have to do with marketing and branding?  Think about it, because I really don't have time to elaborate. It reminds me of the story about the late, great ad man David Ogilvy (and again, I'm taking liberties here):

During one of his morning walks to work in NYC, Ogilvy encountered a man begging with a sign around his neck.  The sign read: "I am blind," and, as evidenced by his nearly empty cup, the man was not doing very well.  Ogilvy removed the man's sign from around his neck, pulled out a marker and changed the sign to read, "It is spring and I am blind." He hung the sign back around the beggar's neck and went on his way.  The money poured in.

Have a great weekend!

Garrison Keillor on comedy

"God writes a lot of comedy... the trouble is, he's stuck with so many bad actors who don't know how to play funny."

Not us. :)  Our latest show has been rated the funniest yet!  Check it out:  www.gurubbq.com.

Richard Feynman on theories

"It doesn't matter how beautiful your theory is, it doesn't matter how smart you are. If it doesn't agree with experiment, it's wrong."

Happy October!  I'm getting ready to hop onto a plane and head to Denver to give the opening keynote, and present my theories, at Brand ManageCamp.  I'm really looking forward to meeting my fellow presenters (Ben McConnell, Scott Williams, Steve Denning, Lyn Heward, et al.), to listen to and examine their views on brands and branding, and to reflect upon and reexamine my own.  Check in during the week at the Brand ManageCamp Blog for highlights and podcast interviews.

My sincere hope is to gain a few pearls of wisdom from this very experienced group, which will help me revise my thinking and, thus, my approach to this very complex and challenging world of business, brands, media and marketing.  I'm reminded of a passage in Richard Lanham's excellent book, The Economics of Attention, where Professor Lanham describes how "revisionist thinking" emerged from the rhetorical educational system:

"It taught its pupils how to revise not only speeches and texts but also attitudes and human relationships.  It linked style and behavior; they were part of the same system.  The rhetorical educational system taught a way to hold knowledge: tentatively, aware of your motives in holding it, aware of your audience and of the arguments that oppose your own.  Aware, above all, that under different circumstances, you might be arguing the opposite case.  Such training in rhetoric as has survived into our time usually justifies itself by arguing that you need to learn the methods of argument to defend yourself against your opponents.  But, more important, it allows you to defend yourself against yourself, to cultivate an interior countercheck.  The more odious you might find that opposing opinion, the more you should seek to know what would make someone hold such an opinion.  And the more you should examine the grounds on which you hold your own.  This self-examination is, and ought to be, a humbling experience."

Here's to being humbled!