Avoid Botching Exposure: No, we still don’t know BDO

BDO, a global accounting, business and financial consultancy, is wasting millions of dollars on its current advertising campaign, “People who know, know BDO.” In their advertising, they could tell you who they are, but they don’t. They could tell you what problems they solve for you, but they don’t.    They could tell their target audience when to contact them and why, but, alas, they don’t.  It’s painful to see such a great introductory opportunity go to waste.

Rather, they do tell you that the people who already are aware of them and know what they do (presumably anyone but the audience) are knowledgeable.     So they are talking only to people who already understand and use their services.     This is a great example of everything you don’t want to do in your advertising.

Sadly, they repeat the strategic vagueness on their website as well (At least the campaign is consistent).

To avoid this, take these simple steps:

1.   Clarify your brand proposition – Who are you, what problem(s) do you solve, who is your target audience, and why are you superior and unique.
2.   Determine your advertising goal – Are you trying to attract new users?  (like BDO is attempting, but failing to do)  Convince current customers to buy/select/consume your brand more frequently?   Are you trying to improve your brand image?    If you are not clear about the purpose of your advertising (or any marketing investment), you can count on meandering advertising, unless your marketing partners are clairvoyant.
3.   Assess your advertising from the consumer’s perspective – What do they know about you now?  What do you want them to know about you after they have been exposed to your message?    Make sure you are giving them a persuasive message, in their language, based on what you know from your consumer research.     Again, BDO makes a common error of crafting advertising based on their internally focused, prideful self-assessment.     It’s a missed opportunity to tell potential customers of who they are, why they’re a superior service, and how they will solve the customer’s problems.
4.  Pre-test your advertising – There are several great advertising effectiveness evaluation methods, including MSW ARS and IPSOS ASI, that will give you unbiased, quantitative and credible feedback on if your advertising campaign is persuasive and has achieved your marketing goals.    These are small investments that can be done while the campaign is in the idea phase, prior to wasting money on producing or airing ads that do little to grow your business, or even may do harm.

by Tammy Katz

Super Bowl XLVIII Ad Rankings: Budweiser, Doritos (and Seahawks) Blowout

Budweiser and Doritos were the uncontested winners in last night’s Ad Bowl, as measured by USAToday (popularity),  Brand Bowl (social media buzz) and Katz Marketing Solutions (effectiveness).   Both brands had two exceptional spots (Budweiser: Puppy Love and Hero’s Welcome; Doritos: Cowboy Kid and Time Machine) that nailed all the essentials of great advertising:   enhances brand equity, persuasive, resonates with the target audience, compelling main message, brand integral to the story, and the Super Bowl ‘wow’ factor for entertainment.   Doritos spots were particularly outstanding – the story line is the quest for the coveted product.

Kudos to several highly effective campaigns that clearly communicated a persuasive sales message (oh – – remember that?) such as Radio Shack (visit our contemporary stores), T-Mobile (no contract carrier), and Volkswagen (durability).     These are the companies most likely to reap the best returns on their +$4 million per ad Super Bowl investments.

While the lovable animals remain timeless, increasingly grating are the formulaic ‘sex sells’ ads, sorely lacking in reasons to prefer their brands.    Sure, they ‘made ya look,” but we doubt H&M, Oikos, or SodaStream need to run out and up their production forecasts.

Lastly, we applaud two brands’ continued respect for diversity:  Cheerios and Coca-Cola.      While Coke’s song choice and multilingual approach pushed the edge with some consumers (a fairly low 57% positive sentiment score), it placed an enviable #5 on BrandBowl’s social media ranking with +33,000 tweets.

As for the worst:  the cringe worthy attempts to be funny, contemporary and cool.    Better luck next year Wonderful Pistachios, GoDaddy, and Beats Music.

Here are the winners (and worst) from three marketing mavens – USAToday’s AdMeter (panel popularity), Pointslocal and Boston.com’s Brand Bowl (twitter volume and sentiment), and Katz Marketing Solutions (effectiveness).

USA Today – AdMeter                              

Best:
1.   Budweiser (“Puppy Love”)

2.  Doritos (“Cowboy Kid”)
3.  Budweiser (“Hero’s Welcome”)
4.  Doritos (“Time Machine”)
5.  Radio Shack (“Phone Call”)

Worst:  BudLight “Cool Twist.”   Good reminder that great advertising requires risk taking.

Pointslocal and Boston.com’s BrandBowl

1.  Budweiser
2.  Doritos
3.  Cheerios
4.  Pepsi
5.  Coke

Worst:  Staples

Katz Marketing Solutions

1.   Budweiser (“Puppy Love”)
2.   Doritos (“Cowboy Kid”)
3.   Doritos (“Time Machine”)
4.   Cheerios (“Gracie”)
5.   Radio Shack (“Phone Call”)

Worst:  GoDaddy

by Tammy Katz

Super Bowl XLVII Ad Winners and Atrocities

No spectacular ads last night (except for the Beyonce brand), but several excellent ads that were well worth the $4.0 million investment for the ad time, pre- and post-game public relations and social media legs.     Super Bowl advertising with strategically sound brand communications that focused on persuading consumers to buy and garner a return-on-investment, rather than sophomoric – or just lame – humor at the expense of a selling message.   Budweiser, Tide, Doritos, Skechers, and Milk Processors most of the car ads were particularly effective at keeping their products central to  the main message (vs. prop ‘afterthought’) and told engaging stories about the quest for the brand.

But some spectacularly cringe worthy ads too:   GoDaddy (disgusting, patronizing and unclear message) and Samsung (fatal flaw: inside jokes about how advertising is developed amuses no one except those who made the ads and unclear message).

Special kudos to Oreo’s brand team and brilliant agency, 360i,  for their nimble Oreo ‘You Can Still Dunk in the Dark’ mega tweet  (over 10,000 tweets) which was created on the spot during the power outage (and depleted chicken wings).    Another bravo to Beyonce’s breathtaking performance (done gratis, but 13 minutes is worth $104 million in advertising).

Here are the winners (and worst) from four marketing mavens – USAToday’s AdMeter (panel popularity), Mullen and Radian6’s Brand Bowl (twitter volume and sentiment),  us (effectiveness), and AceMetrix (Persuasion and Watchability)

USA Today – AdMeter                              

Best:
1.   Budweiser Clydesdale (horse and trainer reunited) 

2.   Tide (Miracle Stain)
3.   RAM (farmers)
4.   Doritos (fashionista Dad)
5.   NFL (Deion Sanders returns)

Worst:  GoDaddy – So awful it doesn’t deserve a link – get domains at 1and1, just in protest.

Mullen and Radian6’s BrandBowl

1.  Volkswagen (get happy office guy)  

2.  Bud Light (voodoo)
3.  Calvin Klein (guy in underwear)
4.  Audi (prom)
5.  Taco Bell (viva young)

Worst:  iRobot

Katz Marketing Solutions

1.  Tide (Miracle Stain) 

2.  Coca-Cola (security camera)
3.  MILK board (Rock running)
4.  Budweiser (horse and trainer reunited)
5.  Skechers (cheetah race)

Worst:  GoDaddy

AceMetrix

1.  Budweiser (horse and trainer reunited) 

2.  MILK board (Rock running)
3.  Coca-Cola (security camera)
4.  Jeep (home again)
5.  Doritos (goat 4 sale)

Worst:   Calvin Klein

by Tammy Katz

5 Ways to Maintain Brand Growth and Relevance: StarKist’s Revitalization Strategy

StarKist‘s marketing strategy is a rich example of maintaining brand relevance and accelerating profitable growth.    Despite having some significant brand challenges:  a mature category, a mature brand, dated brand equities, and pricing challenges, their strategy is spectacular and effective.

Here are the 5 brand revitalization best practices they’ve nailed:

1.   Maintain a clear, consistent, and relevant brand positioning  –  StarKist’s brand’s positioning is the best brand of high quality, nutritious tuna.   This has been a virtual constant for over 60 years.   Consistency is relatively easy, but maintaining relevance over time is more difficult and even treacherous, if you don’t do it.    They have brilliantly adapted, but not radically changed, the brand positioning to ‘the best brand of high quality satiating nutritious tuna.’     That transformative “tweak” moves pre-packaged tuna from dated and increasingly irrelevant, to a brand that is contemporary, appealing and compelling for today’s consumer.

  

AZO Advertising is Amiss: Talk to your Consumer

The AZO campaign features a fatal flaw that can kill the effectiveness of any advertising:  it’s not clear.   While AZO is advertising a compelling and effective urinary pain reliever, the commercial uses “company speak,” not consumer language.  

Throughout the spot, AZO is presented as a solution for UTI’s.  That’s great if you are a doctor or work for AZO and know what that is.   Sadly, however, most consumers don’t know that they mean ‘urinary tract infection.’

It’s a tragically common, and avoidable, mistake in marketing communication.   Companies get caught up in their own knowledge and internal language and forget who they are talking to.    Remember, when you do any marketing communication, you must talk to your consumer in THEIR language, not yours.

So, sadly, this commercial only reaches and persuades a fraction of their potential audience.    Make sure you keep it simple and avoid wasting money.  Keep it simple and talk directly to your consumer.

Lessons Learned:
1. Keep your target consumer at the forefront of all marketing communications. Talk to them in their language, not yours.
2. Before you produce anything, double-check that your communication is clear with unbiased consumers, or even internal employees  who are not involved in the marketing or technical development.   They are often too close to the process to stay unbiased.
3. Stay flexible.   If you happen to overlook an important, fixable issue like this, fix it!    In this case, the small cost of changing the words (with a new audio recording), would dramatically increase the effectiveness and sales impact of this advertising campaign.

by Tammy Katz

Ad Bowl 2012: Return to Sanity

While there were no must-see, spectacular ads last night, there were many excellent ads that were well worth the $3.5 million investment for the ad time, pre- and post-game public relations and social media legs.      Super Bowl advertisers returned to their senses with strategically sound brand communications that focused on persuading consumers to buy one return-on-investment, rather than misguided attempts to win on entertainment and humor.   Doritos, Oikos, Skechers, H&M and most of the car ads, just to name a few, had their brands central to the storyline (vs. prop ‘afterthought’) and told engaging stories about the quest for the brand.

Special groans for Chevrolet’s dark and tasteless Silverado apocalypse ad.     Visuals of tragic wreckage, in which the guy in the Ford perished.    Disgusting and a terrible statement, if any, about the brand.

Here are the winners (and worst) from three marketing mavens – USAToday‘s AdMeter (panel popularity) and  USAToday’s Facebook AdMeter (FB popularity), Mullen and Radian6’s Brand Bowl (twitter volume and sentiment), and us (effectiveness).

USA Today – AdMeter                              

Best:
1.   Doritos (dog bribes cat owner)

2.   Volkswagen (dog gets fit, Star Wars)
3.   Skechers (dog in sneakers wins race)
4.   Doritos (sling baby)
5.   M&M/Mars (Mrs. Brown)

Worst:  GE (turbine workers make energy)

Swanson’s Inclusive Advertising: Stirring Sales Growth

Kudos to Swanson brand and parent company, Campbell Soup Company for its outstanding, inclusive print advertising campaign. The campaign features great chefs using, and providing recipes for, their delicious broths… and a delicious, authentic respect for diversity. While many companies are wisely striving for, but often struggling with, diversity, Swanson’s work is exemplary. They are elegantly appealing to caucasion ‘traditional families’ – AND the roughly 50% of the U.S. population that isn’t – appealing to millions of consumers that others overlook.

Gee Gatorade, what are you selling?

Good marketing fundamental: be clear. If consumers understand what you are selling and what it can do for them, they can buy some from you. Common sense, right? The problem with common sense is, sometimes it’s not that common. The new, incomprehensible “What’s G?” campaign for Gatorade violates this basic rule.

Levi’s’ Lame Advertising Campaign: Provocative and Pathetic

Levi’s current brand advertising and communication are fabulous examples of ‘what not to do.’

Here’s a classic case of an advertiser and their agency who are so desperately trying to “break through the clutter,” that they forgot that good advertising is supposed to sell more stuff and enhance the brand’s appeal. But wait, the concurrent viral ‘Unbutton Your Beast’ campaign is even worse. Both communication efforts give the consumer absolutely no performance or emotional reason to go buy a pair of Levi’s. And they do nothing to enhance the brand’s image, and quite a lot to tarnish it instead. What’s the message? Levi’s is for amorous pathological liars? Millions of dollars gone badly astray. Meanwhile, Levi’s reports disappointing sales and profit performance globally, and in particular, North America. Cause and effect? You bet.

Wendy’s Is Waaaay Better: Truly Effective Advertising

Wendy’s advertising has improved dramatically – and their same-store sales trends prove it. They’ve done a great job getting back to basics by touting their brand’s superior quality. Kudos to the Wendy’s brand marketing team and their advertising agency, kirshenbaum bond + partners, for bringing superior quality to life with the ‘Waaaay Better’ campaign. It’s no secret that Wendy’s has struggled since 2002 to replace their legendary Dave Thomas campaigns, including the tragic guys-in-wigs misfire last year. Wendy’s advertising is waaay better indeed. Same-store sales, the most important business indicator for restaurants, have steadily improved for the last few months.