2010 in Review

The year started off on a high with the very successful Vancouver Winter Olympics. We watched every-day Canadians challenge themselves and the world as they rose to become Olympians. Over 14 gold medals where bestowed on Canadians. While the snow was slow in coming it finally did and the winter raged on then turn to rain…lots of rain.

The earth surprised us once again with its ability to literally shake us up with devastating earthquakes in Haiti & Chile. I also collected more scrabble words like “Eyjafjallajökull,” “Wikileaks”, “defriend”, “Glee”, and “Catastrophizing”.

In 2010 golf changed forever and so did Tiger Woods life. Oh another new word from Tiger was “priapsm”. You will have to look it up. You will also see it referenced in the advertising legal lines for Vigara. I digress.

The rains still came in summer. What summer you say. It never really appeared in Western Canada.

We saw a number of corporate brands mismanaged and damaged such as Toyota, Oilsands and BP (Big Problem) and others who keep messing up our environment.

Another word that was overused this year was “Green.” Ever brand seems to be trying to wrap themselves with the latest green fashions. In my day, “going green” referenced what you wore once a year to the Irish pub. And in those terms, sustainability was also know as alcoholics.

There was also winning brands in 2010. Technology continues to drive the appetite for consumers with the likes of Apple with their new iPad, Blackberry (I am happy user) with its smart phones, Amazon with its Kindle e-reader (I have one and I love it!), Google with its Android smart phone, Facebook and the movie didn’t hurt the cause, and sadly McDonalds.

In difficult times this means that McDonald gets a second wind with people only able to afford a Big Mac as their main food souce. In contrast, Gold reached a new frenzy price of over $1,400. China continues to drive the market and sustain commodity prices. The USA is still trying to buy their way out of disaster. Will they succeed? If so, it will be short lived – as they will have to eventually pay for the surmountable damages.

And I now find this long-winded blog coming to a close and wondering aloud, “how did I get to this point?” I guess a lot happens in a year and it’s important to reflect on it, not matter what.

Thank you for making 2010 another unique year. If I could wrap the year in to comment to pay homage, it would probably be in this short song:

“Ain’t no Eyjafjallajökull too high, ain’t no catastrophizing event too large for me to ever Wikileak your priapsm issues online with glee; as to defriend you, would be a tragic thing.”

Happy Holidays and a prosperous New Year.

The Nike - Woods Ad – Brilliant or reckless opportunism

I had to come out of blog writing retirement to comment on Nike’s new Tiger Woods television campaign. I am fascinated to understand how Nike sold this concept to Tiger (or did money do all the talking). But I am more confused about how this advertising builds on the Nike brand essences of “authentic athletic performance” that has been translated into a number of slogans such as “Just do it!” and “I can.” On the surface this seems more like being opportunistic and trying to capitalizing on a situation for pure awareness sake. Benetton the Italian clothing retailer comes to mind with their outrages, shocking and provocation advertising for the pure purpose of getting noticed. There are some benefits to be controversial. Some brands make a living pushing the boundaries of free speech and defining what is or isn’t acceptable like Benetton, Calvin Klein, Jerry Springer and Howard Stern. But where is the line? How does a brand built on celebrating physical success with positive human emotions sink to the stark image of Tiger Woods being judged by his dead father? When does this type of advertising start pushing people away or at least start the conversation of whether this brand fits their image. Maybe Nike is going somewhere some people aren’t willing to go. The judgment is still unclear as to whether this campaign is brilliant or just reckless opportunism.

O Canada, my home and native land was recently ranked second behind Australia in a survey of the best national brands, according to tourism and branding experts FutureBrand. The ranking is based on establishing a reputation as a safe, friendly destination for families. Having lived most of my life in Canada, I can only clearly understand the brand from a distance. Seeing your country from another country demonstrates the difference. At the end of the day, I do love my country and its brand promise. Eh!

Score - 91

Losing Brand Focus – Change for the Sake of Change

This is always a brand steward’s nightmare. Boardrooms talk about the importance of innovation to keep the company vibrant and ahead of the game. Yet many companies translate this into change simply for the sake of change. Without clearly understanding the brand relationship with the customers change can be fatal to a brand.

Wendy’s is an example of how a brand lost its way with the sudden death of its founder, Dave Thomas, in 2002. The company continues to struggle to find its brand voice without Dave leading the way. This is often a problem when the owner/founder of a company is also part of the brand.

The biggest dilemma facing many brands is internal boredom. The desire to change the look and feel of a brand. The need to make it new and modern. The aspiration for brand managers to put their own mark onto the brand. Make sure the purpose for making changes to your brand is clearly understood and doesn’t attempt to change the brand’s DNA.

Pizza Hut has been struggling trying to find its brand positioning (a very costly way of understanding how the brand is connecting with its customers). Unfortunately, they keep changing the messaging and executions in the hope of connecting to their customers. They should spend more time and money on understanding their relationship with their customers than continually changing their advertising direction.

Brand line extensions are another brand folly. There are some natural and obvious line extensions and there are some ambitious attempts to get customers further embracing the brand. Virgin Group Ltd., the parent company’s to the over 200 Virgin branded company under the control of its billionaire founder, Sir Richard Branson, has shown that a relevant brand position can extend beyond many business sectors ranging from mobile telephones, to transportation, travel, financial services, leisure, music, holidays, publishing and the list goes on. If you visit the Virgin Group website they state that “Virgin stands for value for money, quality, innovation, fun and a sense of competitive challenge.” It is through these brand values that allow the Virgin brand to transcend across a multitude of businesses as a unique and distinct brand. While BIC pens brand promise didn’t allow them to extend their brand into pantyhose (what where they thinking!). They did successfully extend the BIC brand to water sports equipment (go figure!). Whoever heard of disposal surf boards?

The more unique, relevant and credible the brand promise is, the greater the chance its brand extension will be successful. That’s why Paul Newman’s food products succeed and Willie Nelson Biodiesel Fuel and Lance Armstrong's LiveStrong mutual funds failed. Consumers may love Nelson's music and respect Armstrong for his many “Tour de France” cycling races; their brand promise has no connection with consumers concerning car engines and finance.The moral of this story is don’t mess around with a successful brand unless you truly understand the brand connection with its consumers. The Virgin Group’s example shows how a brand promise is bigger than a product (a plane, cell phone etc) but is intricately linked to the core values that drive the entire Virgin group of products. This brand promise connects each product strongly to the brand and to the consumer. A Virgin medical centre may not succeed.

Las Vegas – “What happens here stays here!”

“Sin City” is everything decadent with a dark-side that an obscene amount of money brings. Converged on a dessert street is everything that makes America great and everything that makes it ugly. The opulence and the grandeur is overwhelming, I am reminded how sad this projects humanity. I don’t necessary like Las Vegas but I am drawn into the glitz and glamour of it all.

It’s like driving by an accident with the uncontrollable urge to look. There are nuances of this brand that are inviting and stimulating; yet uncontrollably, you quickly seem to over indulge and leave less rich on all levels. All that being said, it has a strong and clear brand promise.

Score – 96 (69 would be more fitting!)

Branding a City is No Small Task

New York City is one of the great cities in the world that has successfully branded itself. What is the first image that comes to mind when you hear the name New York City? “The Big Apple,” I hope.

Tourism is big business in attracting affluent travelers to spend money in your city. In 2007, New York saw over 46 million tourists come to see, shop, eat, sleep and be entertained. If each person spent $1,000 (which would be cheap in Manhattan) that would equal $4.6 billion. So branding big cities is big business.

But how do you create a brand image for such a complex beast? Remember a brand is part personality, part single mindedness. What you want to do is own a place in the consumers mind. How do you take a city and boil it down to one simple and relevant thought? Well, many cities have done it. The most romantic city is? The city where what happens there stays there? Or how about a city fit for a queen. Then here is the city within a city that rules Catholics around the world. Which city is the fashion capital, the fine dining capital or the music capital of the world?

The hard part is boiling a massive city down to a simple sentence or words that articulate its promise. The hard part is finding that one thing that defines a city because most cities have many attributes and landmarks: symbolic buildings (Eiffel tower, the White House, CN tower, Sydney Opera House, Roman Colosseum), icons (a white wooden sign, a white cross, a orange bridge) and unique environmental characteristics (beach, mountain, river, waterway). But remember, a brand is owned by the consumer so when you show them a gondola with a gondolianer they will think Venice or maybe Las Vegas cheap imitation. A city eventually gets defined by what is the most memorable feature or collective customer benefit. The clearer the feature or benefit the stronger the brand.

How would the city of Sidney, Australia be viewed today with out the Sidney Opera House and Crocodile Dundee? Not only are the city attributes important, but the peoples’ lifestyle and the dynamic quality of energy is vital in building a vibrant and engaging city brand. Sometimes this can be kick started by a global event such as the World Expo, FIFA World Cup or the Olympic Games. The FIFA World Cup soccer event can attract over 28.8 billion viewers over the month. The more concentrated Olympic Games can catapult a city to the global stage. The coverage so far on Beijing, China is staggering. On the Beijing Official 2008 Olympic website it states that “over 300 channels broadcasting the Athens 2004 Olympic Games to 220 countries and territories, 35,000 hours of dedicated coverage (2000 per day), to over 3.9 billion people (unduplicated).” This was the strongest Olympic broadcast ever.

As globalization continues to make the world smaller, the competition between cities has increased tremendously for tourists, investors, businesses and major events, so maintaining and building a city brand is paramount.

The Anholt-GMI City Brands Index, is an annual survey which measures the strength of a city’s brand. The Index was co-created by branding expert Simon Anholt and global market research solutions provider GMI (Global Market Insite, Inc.) The Index is unique because it demonstrates how we respond to city brands in exactly the same way as when we're shopping for cars or clothing brands.

Anholt-GMI City Brands Index Top Ranking

1. London
   
2. Paris


3. Sydney


4. Rome


5. Barcelona


6. Amsterdam


7. New York


8. Los Angeles


9. Madrid


10. Berlin


11. San Francisco


12. Toronto

Olympics - hope, perseverance and endurance

This is a highly charged and vibrant brand that flourishes every two years. The Olympic brand explodes with emotions from both the athletes and spectators from around the world. There are winners and losers and many surprised outcomes as the magic of the Olympics spurs on new world records and personal bests. Since 1896 this enduring brand came alive every fours years both winter and summer, but most recently the brand has adopted a two year interval alternating between the winter and summer games.

I was fortunate enough to have a first-hand experience with the Olympics as an escort runner in the 1988 Winter Olympics Torch Relay in Canada. I ran for four days through small towns and large cities in Ontario. My first experience was running into London, Ontario one cold winter’s night. The streets were lined three people deep. Many people waving flags and lit candles to mimic the torch. I was amazed how the torch mesmerizes the audience as if it was the holy light of life. As I proceed into the city an old lady broke out from the crowd and came towards me with open arms, she hug me and said “god bless you” then returned into the crowd. I was stunned by the experience and truly understood the emotional power of the Olympics…it is about hope, perseverance and endurance – all based on human capability and drive (plus any steroids). This is a unique brand that is savored on special occasion not unlike a great bottle of champagne.

Score - 91