Innocent not so fresh?

David Taylor, a well known marketing author and blogger, writes regularly about Innocent, the smoothie brand. He is a fan. We all are, right?

Well, perhaps not.

This week David points out that their sales were down 20% in 2008. He warns that they may be losing focus with their recent brand extensions. Another possibly reason is that their communications are not as fresh as they used to be.

Personally I can't help but think the recession might partly explain the drop in sales. I'm still a fan.

Award winning Ad by director Sam Mendes

Sam Mendes is one of my favourite directors. Revolutionary Road was just ok, but both Road to Perdition and American Beauty are two of my favourites. Here's an award winning Ad he directed for HBO.

Worth a watch.

Sit back and wait to be overwhelmed

I presumed everybody knew about Kiva. I was wrong. I met a few marketing guys recently that had not.

So I want to mention it - as it must be one of the most interesting, powerful and truly amazing uses of the internet I have come across. Kiva is a micro-finance company that allows ordinary folk like me give small loans to help budding entrepreneurs get out of poverty.

Meet Lilly Toa. She is 41, has 7 kids and sells coconuts in Taufusi, Samoa. Like many entrepreneurs, Lilly needed cash to grow her business - harvesting and selling coconuts in the marketplace.

She didn't need much cash though. Just $850 in total. My contribution? Just $25.

What makes Kiva wonderful is how close it brings the person giving the loan with the individuals receiving it. I didn't give Kiva a loan. I chose Lilly from a list of individuals to loan my $25. Evidently I chose well. She paid back in full and her business is thriving.

How do I know this? Because Kiva sends me regular updates from Lilly.

I suspect I could write all day about how good this model is. And how charities, banks and other companies could learn from this. Instead, I suggest you pop over to Kiva, whip out your credit card and give somebody less fortunate a small loan.

Then sit back and wait to be overwhelmed.

Nice outdoor ad. Very nice.

Via AdsoftheWorld

Need an office manager?

Know anybody that needs an office manager / administrator? If so, please drop me a mail. I know somebody that is looking for work either part-time or full time. She has some marketing experience. She is pretty good too.

Great if anybody can help.

Strategy in the real world

Image courtesy of fabuleuse

Strategy is generally thought of as a linear process. Set and agree objectives. Work out strategy and execute. Job done. This understanding of how strategy works, is what we are comfortable with. It makes sense.

If only it were this easy.

Karl Weick uses an interesting story to explain how strategy might actually work in the real world...

During some military maneuvers in Switzerland, a unit of soldiers got caught in a snow blizzard in the Alps. They went missing for several days. Completely lost. Just when their lieutenant, back at base, was convinced that they were dead, they walked in the door.

How did they find their way back? One of the soldiers handed the lieutenant a map, explaining he'd found it in one of their bags. This had saved their lives. Looking at it, the lieutenant realised that it wasn't a map of the Alps, but of the Pyrenees.

When you are lost, any map might do.

As with strategy, when confused, any strategy plan will do. Surely not? Well, he suggested that strategic plans get people thinking and doing - "Once people begin to act, they generate tangible outcomes in some context, and this helps them discover what is occurring, what needs to be explained, and what should be done next".

The leader may know the map is wrong but he or she needs to instill some confidence in the team. Get them moving and at least understand where they are now.

Some recent books on digital marketing

The Project 100...Countdown to Connect!

View more presentations from Nojacketreq. (tags: connect social)

If you're in marketing and feel digital is your achilles' heel - I'd recommend you read everything you can find on the subject.

Where to start?

There is clearly loads available online. But if you like to tuck into real books, here's a few recent ones on digital marketing that I'm juggling at the moment: Grown Up Digital by Don Tapscott, What Would Google Do? by Jeff Jarvis and Understanding Digital Marketing by Irish blogger Calvin Jones and Damian Ryan. I'll share my thoughts on these in more detail over the coming weeks.

The above slides are for another digital book launching this April. 'Connect. Marketing in the Social Media Era' is a collection of one-page essays written by 100 authors. All profits from the book will go towards breast cancer.

I wrote one of the essays...but don't let that stop you from buying it when it comes out:)

Clever press Ad

'Super Absorbent'. Press Ad for Scott Towels. Simple and clever.

Via AdsoftheWorld

Your arm's broken. Your back's wrecked. And all you can think is...

Press Ad for Liberty Mutual Insurance, by Hill Holiday.

The insightful copy on the left page reads - Your arm's broken. Your back's wrecked. And all you can think is 'Getting my car fixed is going to be painful'

Can a brand name be a substitute for superior product?

Nobody doubts that companies that can bring some emotional appeal into their brands can strengthen their position. But can a strong brand name be a substitute for superior functional benefits?

Hamel & Prahalad believe that the reason Porsche's US sales plummeted from over 30,000 in 1986 to just over 3,000 in 1993 was because it was living off their brand name far too long and the cars were not up to scratch anymore, compared to Japanese models.

Adrian Ho has some wonderfully insightful slides where he explains that United fired their agency and decided to "invest in airline seats, not advertising". In product. Not brand image.

As all marketers know, Innocent Drinks have mastered the art of bringing a personal, friendly face to their drinks. There has been loads written about them and their tone of voice. But Innocent are quick to point out themselves that while this is important, it would be foolish to think that clever, witty copy on their packs is a substitute for superior smoothies. They are adamant that they have the best product available.

But I suspect they have enough loyalty to buy them time if another brand caught them off guard with a new superior product.

Paul Feldwick shares a good example in his excellent book What is Brand Equity Anyway. Cadbury's Smash was the UK leader in the instant mashed potato market. You might remember their Spash laughing Martian's advertising, with tag line "For mash, get Smash". They had built up a good reputation over some years.

But in the early 1970s, a competitor, Wondermash, arrived onto the market with a clearly superior product, which would take a fair bit of time to imitate. However, because of the loyalty that Smash has built up, Wondermash had difficulty persuading consumers to trial their product. Which gave Cadburys time to improve their product without losing market share.

So can a brand name be a substitute for superior product?

Not in the long term. But possibly yes, in the short term.

Latest Barry's Tea TV Ad

"Don't forget" - latest Barry's Tea trailer-style TV ad.

Whenever I remember, I like to bring a few Barry's tea bags with me when I go on holiday. The ad was created by the folks in Irish International. Not sure what their plans are, but would be nice if they could bring the story online, like Nokia did with their wonderful "My phone knows everything about me" tv ad.

Thanks Andrea for sending on.

Create a GPS iphone app for aircoach?

I'm a big fan of aircoach. As I said before, it is definitely a brand I'd miss if it disappeared.

They come regularly. The drivers are polite. The bus is always clean and comfortable. And is decent value. More expensive than CIE bus but a lot cheaper than a taxi. It has my businesss for the foreseeable future anyway.

But while I always use aircoach on my way home from a trip - I don't always get it to the airport. I'm generally in a hurry to catch a flight. The aircoach may arrive on time. But I can't take the risk. So I often get a taxi out.

But if aircoach had a GPS app for my iphone, this would eliminate the risk.

If I could see, on my iphone, that my aircoach is already in Donnybrook, I could calculate how long it would take me to walk to, say, the Leeson St stop and be on the bus.

My dad's response would be to "just leave 30 mins earlier and you'll be fine". He would be right of course. But that's not the point. The reality is I never leave earlier. And am always rushing to the airport. And I'm guessing I'm not the only one. And the important part is - if there were an app, aircoach would have more of my business.

Anybody know how to create one?

P.S. I did see a link for 'live position' on aircoach's site but couldn't access it on my mac or iphone.

Why Irish Ad agencies should blog. Three practical reasons...

Image courtesy of athena

Why don't Irish marketing agencies blog?

A few do. Brando, Bloom, Cybercom and a few others have embraced it. But most do not. I'm not sure why they choose not to. Loads of good UK agencies blog.

But here are 3 practical reasons to start:

1. Blogging allows clients and potential clients to know and understand you. Your culture. What excites you. And most importantly, how you think. You are in the ideas business. Let us hear your insights and ideas.
   
   
2. The practice of blogging keeps you alert. Finding interesting new content every week is not easy. Creating original regular content is harder still. But planners and creative folk are good at this stuff. So it forces you to stay current, which is a good thing. For you and your clients.
   
   
3. The blogging community is growing. Becoming more and more influential. Some are receptive to promoting products. Some are not. (See Damien Mulley's and Piaras Kelly's posts about recent PR/Blogger discussions.) Either way, bloggers have a voice and there is little debate these days that they can influence our perceptions of brands. Being a genuine part of the blogging community is the first step in building relationships with bloggers. Unlike other publishing media, you can't just arrive on a blog, get out your wallet and start talking cost-per-thousand.
   

I posted before that I believe clients should blog too. For different reasons. Mostly to understand customers, open up conversations with them. Hopefully we'll see more of this soon. And I believe we will.

For a more insightful view on ad agencies and possible reasons why they don't blog, drop over to Nick's blog and ask him.

Purely out of curiosity...

Purely out of curiosity, I've added a video thumbnail in the sidebar. Saw something similar on Scamp's blog and thought it was an interesting way to feature an ad or a slideshow for longer than a single blog post. Not sure if I'll keep it. We'll see.

If this slows down the page loading in any substantial way at all, please let me know.

Another case of losing focus: Coors

Pepsi is not the only good company that spread resources too thin and suffered.

In 1975, Coors was only available in 11 states. All in the west of the US. Despite this, it was the market leader in terms of share in 10 of these 11 states. All was good. But then Coors tried to attack a raft of other segments at the same time - light beer, dry beer, red beer, ice beer, non-alcoholic beer, extra-gold beer....

The result? They lost their No. 1 leadership position in every state.

More on focus here. Source and highly recommended book here.

I am part of a lost generation

Thought this was clever. Via Paul Isakson

Best tv ad I've seen this year...

Best TV ad this year (with the possible exclusion of Cadbury's eyebrow dance).

Via Scamp

Very nice ambient

Quick dry nail polish. Nicely demonstrated.

Via AdsoftheWorld

Restaurant use twitter when not busy?

Image courtesy of disneymike

Are any Irish restaurants using twitter to fill tables when evenings are quiet?

I wonder if it is worth trying. Would it canabalise sales? Possibly. Would it piss off fellow customers? Again, possibly.

But I think it's worth more thought. It's not that different to lastminute.com. If I need to book a table in advance, I'm willing to pay full whack. But if I'm at home, on twitter, and see a last minute deal for a restaurant nearby, I might decide to throw on my jacket and head over.

I eat well for less. Restaurant covers some of its fixed costs. Everybody is happy.

I don't really use twitter. Although I did sign up to follow Southwest Airlines last year to see how a really customer-centric company uses it for customer service.

But think I'd follow some Dublin restaurants on twitter if they were willing to play ball.

Thoughts?

A beautiful lawn deserves respect

Copy reads "A beautiful lawn deserves respect".

Found via AdsoftheWorld

When you break a golden rule of strategy...

Image courtesy of Fabio


A lot of business competitive strategy is derived from military and war strategy.

One rule is focus. Focus your resources. Don't fight too many battles at the same time. Don't spread yourself too thin. Makes sense. And really does sound obvious. Yet many smart companies have broken this golden rule and paid the price.

Pepsi did - and suffered.

At one stage, Pepsi was fighting three major battles at the same time; (1) Against Coca Cola in soft drinks. (2) In the snack food market, Pepsi owned Frito-Lay and was competing against both Proctor & Gamble and Mars. And (3) in the fast-food market, it owned Pizza Hut, Taco Bell and Kentucky Fried Chicken - so was competing against big players, McDonald's and Burger King.

And even though Pepsi was bigger than each of its main competitors, it performed worse. Of course it was able to sell Pepsi Cola and Frito-Lay snacks in Pizza Hut and their other fast food outlets. But the flip side is other restaurants preferred to buy Coca Cola as they viewed Pepsi as a competitor.

They may even have lost customers because they didn't stock Coca Cola in their fast food restaurants. I remember as a teenager, choosing McDonald's because Burger King served Pepsi, not Coke and I never liked Pepsi.

Eventually Pepsi sold off its restaurant business.

More on focus here. Sources here and here.

Marketing Exec Rap

I didn't actually understand this at first. I enjoyed it but didn't get it.

But after a bit of digging, I figured out that they've been banging out ad executions on their 'Stay Smart' idea for a good while and his pay off line "I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night" is well understood in the states.

I think - and happy to be corrected - they are showing that smart, intelligent, skillful people choose to stay at Holiday Inn Express - therefore this must be a smart decision. More here.

The ad agency is Fallon.

Found Via ToddAnd

Marketing contractor available for project work

I offered last week to post any marketing jobs going or any marketers looking for work.

Shira asked me to mention her. She works in marketing communications and tends to work freelance or project based. Shira's area of interest and expertise is brochures, website content, white papers, newsletters and writing copy.

I haven't worked with Shira so don't know her personally but you can look at her latest website content here. And you can contact her at: s_h_i_r_a@yahoo.com

Audi Chase - 2009 Superbowl ad

2009 Superbowl Audi ad. Taking a nice little dig at Mercedes and BMW. Think I prefer the 2008 one.

Via TheInspirationRoom

Words are important

Image via Greg Gladman

I have over 70 feeds in my Google Reader. I don't read them all. I'd like to. But don't have enough time. Instead, I tend to flick through them - at lighting speed - and stop at the articles or posts that grab my attention.

As a rule of thumb, the blog posts that grab my attention have title headlines that interest me. Sounds obvious but how much effort do we put into our post headlines?

They often have striking images too. I really like this one by Greg Gladman. But personally, my decision to read on is often determined by those first few words in the post title. So for example, I suspect more bloggers would have stopped to read this post in their RSS reader if the headline shouted "One simple way to increase your blog readership today" instead of "Words are important". (I didn't use this headline because I thought it was an overpromise and it also sounds a bit naff.)

So chances are, I probably miss loads of interesting, insightful posts because I don't get beyond the title headline.

I think it was David Ogilvy that once said that the "headline is the ad for the ad'. The most important part of a press ad was the headline. And therefore requires the most effort, work and thought.

Words are important. And the words we use in our title headlines can make a difference.