Brand Rants

What I learned at the Cannes Lions

EVERYTHING IS CHANGING ...

Each year ad agencies and clients from around the world gather in the south of France for the industry's premier event: The Cannes Lions. It is 7 intense days of seminars, workshops, award ceremonies and parties. This year many of the seminars and workshops focused on life in a Web 2.0 world.

Overall, the Web 2.0 seminars and workshops I attended were  more cliché than content. Speakers would take 30 minutes to say: "With Web 2.0 it's no longer a one-way message but a two-way conversation with the customer" then spend the remaining 15 minutes predicting the downfall of agencies and clients who don't adapt. Case studies were sparse.

Chuck Porter (Crispin Porter + Bogusky) brilliantly summed up 7 days of Web 2.0 lectures in one sentence "Everything is changing and you are so screwed."  I wish he had spoken earlier in the week, then I could have spent my days on the beach instead of a dark auditorium. However, there were some brilliant exceptions (his presentation included) that made sitting through a week of non-stop lectures worthwhile. Here would be my  bronze, silver and gold lions for excellence in the Brand 2.0 presentation arena.

Bronze:
Fredrik Hjalmers, Nordic Category Manager - Pepsi
for More Champagne And Mobile Relations Workshop
No, this did not win because they served Möet and croissants at 9:00 AM. It won because of Fredrik Hjalmers' unbridled enthusiasm over integrating mobile communication into his Pepsi campaigns. He was one of four presenters at More Mobile Relations' workshop. He presented an impressive case study in the Nordics backed by great advice for those of us who are making our way into the mobile space.  His advice for integrating mobile in campaigns was to use mobile to spread elements of the campaign that struck a nerve with the target. Or, as he put it “Use mobile to fuel what’s on fire.” Thank you Fredrik and More Mobile Relations.

Silver:
Nick Moore, EVP, Chief Creative Officer - Wunderman
for Don’t Create An Ad, Start A Conversation!
Although Nick's premise was the same as most of the Web 2.0 speakers he brought the message to life with excellent analysis, clear examples and practical advice. He praised P&G for transitioning from the world's best shouter to the best listener and shared some insights into how they made the transition. He made the point that you can’t control both sides of a conversation and urged ad agencies to forget about “making ads” and focus on “saying the next interesting thing in the conversation”. I left inspired to hone my conversation skills.

Gold:
Stefan Olander, Global Director for Brand Connections - Nike
and Bob Greenberg, Chairman/CEO/Global Chief Creative Officer - R/GA.
for R/GA And Nike Present ...Three Ideas
If the Web 2.0 world is about discovering what’s important to your customers and facilitating them in a relevant way, then I can’t think of anyone who is doing a better job of that than Nike. Together with R/GA, they showcased the most awesome display of digital mastery and seamless brand integration at the event. Truly inspiring. Ideas about how to best use social media were backed with examples from existing Nike campaigns along with previews of what's in the company’s digital pipeline. Plus I won a Nike+ Sports Band for guessing the number of kilometers logged by the Nike+ site thus far (OK, Stefan did prompt the audience with "It's less than 100 million but greater than 98 million").  Thank you Stefan and Bob.

Cannes-fusion: Advertising's identity crisis

YOU'RE IN ADVERTISING - GET OVER IT.

The Cannes Lion's is arguably the most celebrated event in the advertising industry.  The brightest minds in the business meet for a week of education, networking and inspiration. But for all its inspiration, the Cannes Festival has always reminded me of just how confused our industry is over its own identity and role in society.

Take the "festival" itself. Created in the 1950's it is, in essence, an industry trade show shamelessly fashioned after the world's premier film festival.  A transparent attempt to elevate advertising into the realm of art by association. And it works. Many advertising professionals insist they are artists.  And every time I meet one of these artists, I'm always reminded of the scene from the movie Nothing In Common when David Basner (Tom Hanks) explains his job as a copywriter to a bunch of creative interns. He asks them to look through his desk and reminds than that no matter how hard they look they won't find a draft of the novel or screenplay or poetry he's working on because that's not what he does for a living. He's a copywriter and he uses his creative skills and story telling ability to connect products with consumers.

This confusion was evident in a workshop sponsored by Accenture on the first day of the festival. The point was to foster a heated debate over whether creativity, technology or measurement is more important. You might as well debate if your heart, lungs or liver are more important. Its a mute point because without any one of them you're history. 

Even Sir Martin Sorrell quipped today  "We're in show business, not real business" during the Cannes Debate. If anyone in advertising is in real business it is surely Sir Martin.  But his comment reflects a perception that seems to be common place among advertising people.  Historically the most coveted awards in our industry focus almost exclusively on the entertainment value of the communication we create rather than its ability to build brand equity or sell product. This is a trend that I predict will slowly be reversed as the internet continues to make it easier and easier to quantify the impact of communication. 

I for one would like to see an end to the perpetual soul-searching that we hear at events like this:  Are advertising people artists or business people?  Is it all about the big idea or is it all about ROI? Should advertising focus on emotions or numbers? Is creativity more important than results. Is it story telling or technology. Are we in the entertainment industry or marketing services?  

I've listened to this tired debate in various incarnations for over two and a half decades now and its always based the absurd assumption that the different left-brain/right-brain elements that make a successful ad campaign are mutually exclusive. I think at our best, we as advertisers and marketing professionals deliver on both ends of these equations. We can create communication that is beautiful, moving, or entertaining  that also achieves a very clear and measurable business purpose. It's not easy to achieve,  but that is why we are paid so well to do it.

So my six words of advice for the artists in your agency: "You're in advertising - get over it." Personally, I can't think of a better industry to work in. The advertising and marketing services industry provide the unique ability to apply artistic skills such as writing and the visual arts to complex business problems. It allows you to be at the forefront of new developments in society and to play a small part in shaping them. It allows you to work with some of the sharpest and most creative minds of your time. And, as if that wasn't reward enough, it also allows you the opportunity to travel to the south of France each June to meet up with old friends and celebrate your passion for communication and business.

Brain image source: http://www.ideachampions.com/weblogs/archives/2008/02/right_ways_of_w.shtml

What Apple learned from NASA

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN RELEASING AND LAUNCHING NEW PRODUCTS

The new iPhone will continue to gain traction in our collective imagination until it goes on sale next month.  For my part, I missed Steve Jobs keynote and haven't seen the ads yet. But on July 11th I'll be at the Apple Store on Boylston Street anyhow, credit card in hand like thousands of other people around the world. Why is that? Because this product is being launched like a rocket not released like a butterfly.

How about your company? Do you really launch your products or do you release them? When it comes to new product introductions, many sales-centric organizations still focus on simply getting the news out to customers once the product is available. A few companies, like Apple, attend to the greater opportunity a new product launch presents to lift not only the new product brand but the company as a whole.

Releasing a product is pretty basic. You put it on sale and explain features and benefits to potential buyers in the hope that they will approve and buy. Maybe you have a sales force that can twist some arms. Perhaps you create a sales aid and some ads. Sales start slow and gain momentum over time with the ongoing sales push. Many brand managers refer to this lackadaisical activity as a "launch". I'd call it a "release". The two terms are not synonymous. Here's why.

A true launch is characterized by a catapulting effect that defies gravity in markets and rockets sales to a sustainable altitude. It comes by concentrating energy in a systematic way to maximize the potential that lies within each product across its entire lifespan. That means working with all four Ps to create an explosive combination of product, price, place and promotion. It steepens the sales curve at the introduction of a product on the market. It helps ensure the product does not fall short of its potential sales level. And near the end of the life cycle it eases the angle of descent.

With a release, sales drive demand. Marketing activities are initiated on or near the release date. A release focuses on sales alone to combat the gravity of the market. A launch is just the opposite. When a product is really launched, demand drives sales. A launch monitors and fuels demand as needed to help elevate sales and maintain altitude far in advance of the launch date. By the time launch arrives demand is already high and sales shoot up to close the gap. 

We're experiencing this right now with the launch of the latest Apple iPhone, as we have with the launch of most Apple products. It's not just the product or the price or place or the promotion that is causing the sensation. But it the skillful way in which all four of these elements are orchestrated in the launch strategy that makes the offer seamless and irresistible. They make it look so easy we forget its marketing and simply accept it as a law of nature: apple sells. There are ads for the iPhone that will help expand their market, but I reckon they would still have pretty impressive sales without a single ad. Another reason to love Apple.

What is social media?

A BACK-TO-BASICS EXPLANATION.

Everyone is blogging about social media these days.  So much so that one would assume that the whole world is familiar with this term. But every once in a while I'm brought back to reality by some astute client or colleague looking at me funny and saying "Sorry, what's web 2.0?" or "Social media, isn't that's some fad with kids?"  It happened to me today so I thought I'd spend a few paragraphs on the basics of "social media" and, particularly, how the term differs from "social networks".

"Social media" refer to the entire landscape of new web applications (websites) that have been developed over the last few years. These new types of web applications were such a clear departure prom previous applications that internet trend-spotter Tim O'Reilly collectively dubbed them "Web 2.0".  This name makes sense because it indicates a whole new generation of internet applications. 

And what is it that makes Web 2.0 sites so different from Web 1.0 sites? In a word: collaboration.  Social media are web applications that are powered by people. They tap the wisdom of crowds and depend on interaction between people to shape content and provide value. This content can be words, pictures, chat, maps, audio, video, recommendations, ratings, or a mix of all of the above.

Social media applications are finding there way all over the net wherever collaboration can add value. And that's just about everything: from buying a book on Amazon, to sharing sites that interest you on StumbleUpon, sharing news stories on DIGG or photos on Flickr, sharing your musical interests on Last.fm, reading blog posts about web developments on TechCrunch, posting a video on YouTube, posting a profile on Meetic, editing an article in Wikipedia, collecting the news that interests you on Reddit, publicizing events on Upcoming, or getting tips from locals on TripAdvisor.  All these sites differ from the anti-social web 1.0 because they are all interactive and involve the visitor in shaping content.

Then there are social networks like MySpace, FaceBook, Orkut, Hi5, Bebo and their 3D counterparts like Second Life or Cyworld.  For many people, these are the first sites that come to mind when they hear "social media". But social networks are just one type of social media. Other types of social media include those mentioned above like video sharing, event sharing, news aggregation, blogging, photo sharing and bookmarking. There are dozens more categories of social media and new ones being invented every week.

I think the name "Social Media" itself is causing some of the confusion. While there are a lot of websites for socializing, like FaceBook, Meetic, or SecondLife there are a lot of sites that are not social in that way but are still "social media" because they depend on collaboration. That's probably why a lot of people confuse "social media" with "social networking" sites. For that reason, I feel the term “social media” is misleading.  A more clear label for these type of sites would be “collaborative media”.  Collaboration is the one thing all social media sites have in common.

But that train has left the station, so I guess we are stuck with the name "social media" and with trying to help clients and colleagues understand that all social media media sites are not necessarily about socializing so much as they are about collaboration.  Hope this helps.

Diagram Image Source: http://strivepr.com/wordpress
Logos Image Source: http://jaxinteractive.wordpress.com

Direct to consumer drug advertising is good for you.

NEW STUDY REVEALS DTC ADVERTISING INCREASES DIAGNOSIS AND COMPLIANCE

In 1997 the FDA relaxed regulations on the use of broadcast media to advertise prescription drugs to consumers. Since that time there has been a  lot of debate over the merits of allowing prescription drugs to be advertised on TV alongside spots for beer, car insurance and washing detergent.  The US and New Zealand are the only two countries that allow it.

The effect of drug advertising on sales was predictable. A study that correlated drug sales to advertising between 1999 and 2000 found that prescriptions for the 50 most advertised drugs rose about 25% over that year compared to the average growth of 4% for all other drugs (1). This is good for the drug companies but what about the general public?

 Since the drug industry has done such a spectacular job at soiling its own reputation, anything big pharma does is treated as suspect from the outset. So its not surprising that most of the debate over direct to consumer (DTC) drug advertising has been negative. However, a recent study has shown that the public may actually benefit from pharma's DTC advertising.

The study was published in The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy (vol 8, issue 2, article 4) by Chad Meyerhoefer and Samuel Zuvekas from the US government's Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. They set out to see what effect direct to consumer advertising of antidepressants had on consumers by examining data on antidepressant advertising spend and sales between 1996 and 2003.

Their analysis of the advertising showed that the antidepressant campaigns did little to highlight differences between the antidepressant options on the market. However, the advertising did increase awareness of the condition and the possibility for treatment.  They concluded that this increase in awareness was beneficial in two ways.

First, it tended to increase the total number of people who were diagnosed and prescribed antidepressants. The implication being that more people sought help for their depression as a result of seeing the TV spots.  Since depression is considered to be widely under-treated in the US this is seen as a positive development.

Second, DTC advertising seems to fuel refilling of prescriptions among those who have already been diagnosed. So there is a compliance argument as well.

The authors suggest that this effect may not be limited to antidepressants:

"Although pharmaceutical firms may seek to increase market-share through consumer advertising, the available evidence suggests that the primary effect of DTCA is to expand the overall market instead (Iizuka and Jin 2005b, Iizuka 2004). There are two principal mechanisms for this market expanding effect. First, by alerting consumers to the symptoms of depression and other mental disorders treated with antidepressants, and the availability of potentially effective treatments, DTCA likely increases the number of consumers seeking treatment. Second, by serving as a constant reminder to consumers, DTCA increases the likelihood that people on antidepressant therapy continue to refill their prescriptions, commonly referred to as treatment compliance or adherence, further increasing sales. Wosinska (2005) finds that DTCA increased compliance for 2 out of the 3 heavily advertised cholesterol-lowering medications studied. Bradford (2006) provides additional support for increased compliance for these drugs. Armantier and Namoro (2006) similarly find evidence that DTCA increases compliance for glaucoma medications. Specific to antidepressants, Donohue et al. (2004) find evidence of both effects for DTCA."

While it is doubtful that this evidence will dissuade the critics, at least all you antidepressant DTC advertisers can hold your head a little higher knowing that your marketing program is also serving a public service.

See also:
DTC Defined
PLoS: Disease Mongering in Drug Promotion: Do Governments Have a Regulatory Role?
BMJ: Selling sickness: the pharmaceutical industry and disease mongering.
Pfizer's policy on DTC advertising
FDA: The Impact of Direct to Consumer Advertising
NEJM: A Decade of Direct-to-Consumer Advertising of Prescription Drugs
FTC: DTC Advertising is it Helping or Hurting? (PDF)

Sofa Image Source: http://www.bethesdachiropractic.net/newsletter.html

Heroin Image Source: http://www.neatorama.com

1: Statistic from National Institute for Health Care Management Research and Education Foundation, Prescription Drugs and Mass Media Advertising, 2000.  November, 2001.  www.nichm.org