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What's So Mysterious About Business Creativity?

2/23/2015

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PictureImage © by Brian E. Faulkner

Creativity is for people who do creative stuff, right? Artists, who paint and sculpt, write, dance, act and make music. 

“But not me!” you might say, “I’m a business person -- and definitely not creative.”

I recall a client who thought that way.  Said he could hardly draw a straight line so was not creative.  Yet, this man was the most creative businessperson I’ve ever encountered (although I've yet to meet Elon Musk). He thought in odd angles and perceived the future with clarity. He also could share his vision, and in a few short years of very hard work grew his  business from a handful of people in a small office to a national brand that dominated its category.

Is there a connection between creativity and business success?


A 2014 study commissioned by Adobe suggests that “creative companies … outperform in both revenue growth and market share.” The study surveyed more than 300 senior managers in a variety of large global firms and found that “58% of respondents from creative companies (those that encourage creative perspective, practices, and culture) said their revenues have strong growth (10%+ year-over-year) while only 20% of less creative companies reported strong revenue growth. And creative companies are 50% more likely to report a commanding market leadership position."

Clearly, one must be cautious in interpreting findings like this since other success factors also may be at play in these organizations. But it stands to reason that leaders who encourage people to color outside the lines and explore the outer edges of opportunity will foster innovation and growth – and also be great places to work, as the Adobe study also found.

Sure, some folks seem to have more "creative" genes than others, just as some people have more innate ability to play sports -- or a musical instrument. You can learn how to play baseball or piano, for instance, and even though you might do a fair job at it, there's not much you can do with your skill beyond enjoy it. But even a kernel of creativity can sometimes lead to big things. I recall Colonel Sanders from time to time and his creative approach to preparing, cooking and selling chicken. He started experimenting with his "secret recipe" during the 1930s in Kentucky by offering chicken to patrons of a gas station he owned (at age 40). A variety of learning experiences, several failures and 20 odd years later, he hit the road to sell restaurants on purchasing franchised rights to chicken done his way. Even his gravy was a cut above, enough to make you want to "throw away the durned chicken and just eat the gravy." By the time he set out to sign up franchisees he was nearly broke, but he persisted -- and found not only that people liked his Kentucky Fried Chicken (which was pressure fried instead of pan fried) but that it also boosted sales for the restaurants who chose to buy in. Today, Harlan Sanders' creative approach is the basis for one of the world's most successful brands. 


So how can you put creative thinking to work for your business? 

Kenichi Ohmae, a long-time managing partner with McKinsey & Company, recommended in his Mind of the Strategist that to get a fresh look at a problem or product it helps to break it into bite-sized bits: features, benefits, base assumptions, competitive advantages, market perspective, etc, then reassemble the bits in new ways -- and question everything (a more non-linear approach to S-W-O-T discussions). The mere act of decoupling yourself from predictable thinking can open up new worlds of possibility, as long as you recognize that false starts and frustrations are a valuable part of the process - along with the courage to see your way through.  If that sounds like old-fashioned anything-goes brainstorming, well … it is.  It’s about opening yourself to new thinking based on the knowledge and experience of others.

Edwin Land, of Polaroid fame, observed that most major discoveries at his company were made by people able to take a “fresh, clean look at the old, old knowledge.”  Like a client I consulted to recently, which turned out to have a revolutionary product benefit hidden deep within their story, an uncommunicated competitive advantage with the potential to make a hugely profitable difference to their customers.  It was there all along but just took fresh eyes to see.

Another way to take a clean look at things is through peripheral visioning: looking beyond your normal field of vision, searching outside your comfort zone for fresh perspective … and possibly even enlightenment.  If you run a grocery store, study the machine tool business.  If you’re in the service business, learn all you can about the marketing of consumer products. If you’re a retailer, get to know how non-profits think. If you've been in business practically forever, get to know a few unrelated startups. Read all you can about them. Get curious!  You’ll be surprised how much of what you learn can be applied to your business – that is, if you’re willing to risk leading the way through unexplored territory. If you’re not comfortable doing this yourself, seek out professional creative thinkers and ask them to help (or hire one to think inside your company, as one of my clients did). Wrap people from businesses with different problems and perspectives into your brainstorming, and it won’t be long before you find yourself immersed in a mindspace where stale, predictable thinking gets transformed into creative new possibilities.

My definition of creativity is looking at the ordinary in extraordinary ways (playing off those odd angles).  It's a lot like daydreaming, something society encourages us not to do. Some of my most fruitful ideas come during long drives with my mind in idle.  A twenty-minute nap gets results, too, although it has taken me a long time to get over the guilt of interrupting a “workday” for a brief snooze. But when you consider that business ideas precede success, spending a chunk of your valuable time thinking seems less crazy to those more accustomed to working inside the box. People once thought powered flight was crazy, but two bicycle repairmen brothers from Dayton dared to imagine otherwise.

Albert Einstein once called imagination “the preview of coming attractions.”  So why not get busy imagining your coming business attractions?  Not creative?  

Don’t believe that for a minute! 

TakeAway:  Take the risk of seeing, thinking and learning outside your comfort zone.  The dividends can be extraordinary.

Content © by Brian E. Faulkner




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Brand Names Mentioned in THIS Blog To Date:

2/20/2015

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Search brand name mentions above:

3M
AFLAC
Affordable Care Act
Alcoa
Alamo Rent A Car
Allegiant Air
amazon.com  (2)
American Airlines
Andy Boy
Apple (7)
AT&T
Audi
Avenir
Bali
B&H Photo-Video
Ben & Jerry’s
Best Buy (2)
BMW  (3)
Bosendorfer
Budweiser
Buick   (2)
Burger King
Cadillac  (4)
Camaro
Camry
Campers Inn
Carvana
CBS
Chevrolet  (4)
Chrysler / Chrysler Corporation  (3)
Chrysler 300
Chipotle Mexican Grill
Clarion
Coca-Cola (3)
Coach
CoachNet
Colorado (pickup truck)
Corvette
Comcast
Costco  (2)
Craftsman
D’Arrigo Bros. Company (2)
Datsun
Delta Airlines
Democrat Party
DeSoto  (2)
Discover
Disne
Dodge  (2)
Dunkin’ Donuts (2)
Earth Fare
eBay
Ehrenberg-Bass Institute of  
   Marketing Science
Energizer Holdings  / Energizer
   Bunny  (3)
FedEx  (4)
F-150
Food Lion
Ford  (6)
Fox News
Frontier Airlines
gawker.com







G.E.
Geek Squad  (2)
GeekWire
GEICO  (2)
GM, General Motors (4)
GoDaddy  (2)
Godiva Chocolatier  (2)
Goodman Millwork
Google
Grand Bohemian Hotel
Greentoe.com
Hanes
Harry’s Razors
Honda
House of Cards
Hyundai  (2)
Impala
Interstate Batteries
J. C. Penney (2)
Jos. A. Bank
Joyce Farms
Kenmore
Kodak
Krispy Kreme  (2)
Kohl’s  (3)
L’eggs
Lincoln  (2)
Linkedin
Lowes Foods
Lowes
Marriott  (2)
Martin & Co. 
Mason & Hamlin
Maytag
McKinsey & Company  (2)
Men’s Wearhouse
Mercedes-Benz  (5)
Merchant & Gould
Mercury
Microsoft  (3)
Modern Quik-Ship
Mountain Dew
Music Trades
Mustang
Neilsen North America
NCR
Netflix  (2)
Nike
Nikon
Nissan
Olympus
Orbitz
Oreck  (2)
Package Containers  (2)
Pepsi (2)
Plymouth (2)
Pontiac
Porsche
Poulet Rouge
priceline.com
PTIA (Piedmont Triad International Airport)
Publix  (2)


Ratto Bros., Inc.
Ram
REI
Republican Party
Ritz Crackers
Sara Lee  (2)
Sears
shopsmart.org
Silverado  (2)
Silvercar
Sony
Southwest Airlines  (2)
Sprint
Squidoo
Starbucks (7)
State Farm
Steinway & Sons (6)
Stuart Weitzman
Super Bowl XLIX
Target
Taurus
The Center for Media Research
The Colbert Report
The Kessler Collection
The Masters
The Weather Channel
Thunderbird
Tiffin Motorhomes
Time Warner Cable  (2)
TIMCO
Toyota  (3)
Tractor Supply
Trader Joe’s
U.S. Airways  (2)
USA Today
Vero Fashion Outlet
VW
Wachovia Bank
Walmart  (2)
Wegman’s
Whole Foods Market  (5)
Wikipedia
Winnebago
Wired
WordPress
Yahoo
Yamaha
yelp.com
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Price! Price! Price!

2/16/2015

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Tags:  Greentoe.com, Priceline, Consumer Reports, Nikon, Canon, Olympus, J. C. Penney, B&H, B&H Photo, online discount cameras, smartshop.org

Have you ever thought about the difference between price selling and selling price?


Price selling is discounting.  It’s lazy marketing.  And having sale after sale after sale not only takes a bite out of profit but could be a long-term trap (just ask J.C. Penney).

Selling price is price-as-product. 

An intriguing example of price-as-product popped up on my screen this morning: Greentoe.com.   Their ad snagged me because I’ve been fishing around online for cameras and lenses.  So I clicked through to their site, where they immediately offered “the lowest prices available” on brands like Nikon, Canon, Olympus, etc.

“People like you are saving big on photo gear,” claimed the big green headline (the shade of money).  “Set your price and save up to 20%.  Brand new products.  No grey market.  Authorized retailers.  USA warranty included.” 

Does the advent of Greentoe.com mean I’ll no longer have to contend with my local Best Buy’s lackluster camera department?  (http://tinyurl.com/nywuxcx)  Does it mean I won’t have to risk ordering my next camera from one of those slippery big city camera discounters?

Maybe …

“Greentoe.com is the first and only website that allows you to name your own price for products in five categories: photography, appliances, musical instruments, baby items, and home theater,” reports shopsmart.org, an online Consumer Reports “best deals” resource.   They’re doing for consumer products what priceline.com has done for air travel and booking hotel rooms.  And it has the same sort of intrigue.  Will they accept my bid?   Will it be soooo much lower than the price somebody else paid?

Greentoe’s process is simple: 

(1) Submit an offer, on “thousands of products” (and give them your payment info).

(2) “Hundreds of retailers” then are notified of your offer (a green, orange or yellow gauge helps you determine how likely they are to accept – similar to Priceline).

(3) The first retailer to accept gets the sale; the transaction is between buyer and seller. 

If you know precisely what item you want, Greentoe.com may be your cup of tea – that is, if their retail partners have what you’re looking for.  The site’s selection of musical instruments and pro audio equipment is far from comprehensive, but it’s not meant to be.  They know that brick-and-mortar stores always have aged merchandise or overstocks they need to sell, so greentoe.com matches them up with customers who live hundreds or thousands of miles away.   Same for TVs, appliances and other products.

Their customers don’t have to be lucky or do the legwork, the company states in its well written and informative blog
, they “just have to have a little luck to find that deal.”   Greentoe provides the luck.

There is something else.   Once you’ve punched in your payment card numbers, there’s no turning back, so if you’re at all queasy about things like that – or don’t make purchase decisions easily (like me), it might be best to buy elsewhere. 

Heretofore, the place I most likely would have picked to buy a camera is New York’s B&H Photo-Video, especially if I needed help choosing the right one.  B&H has it all:  vast selection, attentive service, technical expertise, free advice and competitive prices.  And, if you live anywhere nearby or are visiting Manhattan, you get to handle the goods before making a purchase decision.  Walking into their 70,000 square foot their store is like entering a dream world of professional photo, video and audio goodies.

You can buy cheaper than B&H, but probably not as well. 

To be sure, there are other excellent purveyors of professional photo, video and audio products – online and off, and some may have as compelling a presentation as B&H, but the positioning of that big store at 34th & 9th has always fascinated me.   They’re not only the largest independent (non-chain) photo-video retailer in America, they also communicate their competitive advantages clearly and set price accordingly -- unlike all too many businesses that only play the price card.   B&H.com appears to command a slight price premium over some other online camera sources, and if so, they more than earn their margins with their compelling added-value.

Greentoe.com’s selling proposition also is compelling, however, so I will keep them in mind when it comes time to buy whatever camera I decide on.  Who knows?  My bid price just might outweigh the loyalty I feel to B&H for sending me all those informative catalogs over the years.  But then again, during the time in my life when I sold audio equipment, it always rankled me when I helped educate a prospect only to see him buy from some discounter instead of me. 

It’s so easy to discount, which is the unfortunate first impulse of many businesses.  In most situations, price selling is mind-numbing, profit crushing and unnecessary – unless, like Greentoe.com, price is your product.

TakeAway:  Does your business or brand have competitive advantages that will attract more qualified customers and allow you to command better margins?  Or are you content to sell principally on price?

Content © by Brian E. Faulkner

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"Cathect" Branding.

2/11/2015

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PictureImage © by Brian E. Faulkner
Some years ago, another marketer and I sat looking out the window of his Lower Manhattan office while we discussed how much time it takes for a buyer to make a brand decision.

“Seven seconds,” I said.  He said much less – and today he’d be right.  In this age of massive digital impressions, deciding in favor of a brand could be nearly instantaneous, at least for brands that have successfully embedded themselves in people’s minds. Think about Fox News or The Colbert Report. Mention either brand and you get an immediate, almost visceral, reaction. The same for Coke and Pepsi (but with less intensity).  If you’re a cola fan, you’ve already got your mind made up. 

The brands have done their jobs.

However, a research brief cited today by The Center for Media Research suggests that “the average consumer spends 13 seconds purchasing a brand in-store” and 19 seconds more online.  The research originated with the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute of Marketing Science (“Shopping Takes Only Seconds”) and was commented on in the article by Randall Beard, president of Nielsen North America. Beard suggests that most consumers don’t “engage” with the vast majority of brands as much as they just buy them, giving marketing execs an “unrealistic and overly brand-centric view” of their brands’ importance in people lives – although he makes exceptions for a “limited set of high involvement categories and brands.”   Like expensive cars but maybe not soap.

“People’s lives are already full,” the article noted, “and most people simply don’t have the time or energy to engage with brands in any meaningful way. These consumers most often default to making purchase decisions based on simple habit (previous purchase or ‘instinct’)”.    

My take on this is that if marketers have done an effective job over time, a positive “thought” about their brand will have become stuck to the shopper’s mind, making the pathway to “Yes!” nearly instantaneous.  Sure, call it "instinct".

The example they used was GEICO, which is said to have good “mental availability.”   But the Energizer Bunny offers an even better example.  He lives in my mind (and no doubt other minds) with a clear connection to product benefits, unlike the GEICO gecko, who is a pitchman for the product but does not inhabit it like the Bunny does.  By the way, when was the last time you saw the energetic pink bunny “going and going” on TV compared to the nearly omnipresent green lizard?  

It may simply be that people love the Energizer Bunny but only like the GEICO gecko.  The Bunny is “invested with mental or emotional energy” (another definition of cathect) whereas the Gecko is merely entertaining.  The word cathect comes to mind (in psychoanalysis: to concentrate psychic energy on a particular person, thing, or idea).   

Apple is a great example of cathect branding because of people’s emotional or mental connection to both its products and its brand.   So is Mercedes-Benz, which occupies prime mental real estate in the luxury sedan market.  Cadillac used to be called the “Standard of the World” -- and yearns to be so again.

APCO Insight has identified eight emotions that connect people and brands.  They include understanding, approachability, relevance, admiration, curiosity, identification, empowerment and pride. 

“The best brands are those that build a strong, enduring emotional attachment with consumers,” says Byran Dumont, president of the research consultancy, “in addition to acting as a highly predictive tool for consumers’ purchase choices.”  Their findings, presented as the 100 Most Loved Companies, were gathered from surveys of more than 70,000 people over ten years about 600 of the world’s largest corporate brands in 15 international markets.  (http://tinyurl.com/madelmz)

American brands In the top 10?  

  #1 – Disney:  the brand has a strong emotional link  

  #2 – Yahoo:  despite its troubles, devotees understand the brand and find it approachable    

  #3 – Google:  people take pleasure in buying into the brand

  #4 – Sony:  respondents are curious, want to know more about the company 

  #7 – Netflix:  plays a meaningful role in people lives  

  #8 – Whole Foods:  is admired by its customers (Publix was #43, Kroger #52). 

  #9 – Apple:  shows empowerment and brand admiration). 

#10 – Lowe’s:  customers are comfortable with this home improvement store 

The Home Depot is #54.  Interestingly, Target is #21, but WalMart apparently didn’t make the cut.   Discover (#51) and CBS (#83) are the only TV channels in the Top 100.  The sole hotel chain?  Marriott.  Starbucks?  #96!

So it’s more than mere brand awareness that drives these placements – that’s all too easily stoked with media dollars.  There’s something else at work here.  These Top 100 brands are … loved!  It’s a heart thing -- people get them.  And that takes only half a microsecond.

TakeAway:  Do customers connect to your brand?  With their heads?  Or their hearts?

Content © by Brian E. Faulkner

Tags:  Fox News, The Colbert Report, Coke, Pepsi, The Center for Media Research, Ehrenberg-Bass Institute of Marketing Science, Nielsen North America, GEICO, Energizer Bunny, Apple, Mercedes-Benz, Cadillac, 100 Most Loved Companies, Disney, Yahoo, Google, Sony, Netflix, Whole Foods, Apple, Lowe’s, WalMart, Discover, CBS, Marriott, Starbucks



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Brands Are Not Your Friends ... Sometimes.

2/10/2015

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Tags:  gawker.com, Twitter, Coca-Cola, Coke, AdWeek, Pepsi, Mountain Dew, Maytag
The provocative headline “Brands Are Not Your Friends” popped up on my iPad yesterday evening.   So I had to check it out.

The gist of the article (from blog site gawker.com) was that people should not be sucked into treating brands as “Friends” on social media, because brands “exist solely to distract, deceive, and manipulate us out of our money.”

Their example was Coca-Cola’s “MakeItHappy” Twitter campaign aired during the Super Bowl.  According to AdWeek.com, the brand’s goal was to encourage Twitter users to “mark negative tweets with the #MakeItHappy hashtag. Then, Coke turned those words into cute art images using ASCII lettering code.”

All well and good … creative and harmless you might say, and very much in line with the frothy, friendly good-time image Coke likes to project.   But Gawker apparently was nearly struck dumb with the perceived idiocy of the campaign, which they presumed was designed to “trick you into buying more Coke,” although company marketers likely would not have put it that way. 

So Gawker, which appears to trade in provocative takes on celebrities and media, came up with some digital skullduggery, which I will allow AdWeek’s writer to explain out of my fear of inaccurately describing something I barely understand:

“Gawker created a Twitter bot, @MeinCoke, which tweeted (quotes from) Mein Kampf at Coca-Cola to see if the brand would turn lines from Hitler's autobiographical manifesto into art.”  It worked, and Coke quit the campaign.

“It's unfortunate that Gawker is trying to turn this campaign into something that it isn't,” a Coca-Cola spokesperson told AdWeek. “Building a bot that attempts to spread hate through #MakeItHappy is a perfect example of the pervasive online negativity Coca-Cola wanted to address with this campaign."

All this collective mindlessness got me to thinking about brands and whether they are, in fact, our friends.  And my conclusion is … sometimes.   Is Coca-Cola my friend?   Not really.  Their product does not nourish and even may be harmful, given the 800 cans of soft drinks that American males consume every year, according to recent stats.  Consumption by both males and females reportedly has been rising since the ‘70s. 

My point here is not to make trolls out of Coca-Cola or any other soft drink marketer; we are free to make, sell and consume most anything we want here in this country.   And if we consider some products to be harmful, we also are free to not consume them.

In synch with what I have termed Marketable Truth in blog posts on this site and in my consulting work, it may be useful to have consumers decide whether brands actually keep their promises.  If somebody sells you a tool and it breaks, their brand claim is not authentic – but if it lasts for 25 years like our Maytag washer did, it earns a high score.  If a retailer claims great service but doesn’t deliver, they get a low score, which may prompt them to improve. 

So why not place brands on a “promise continuum”?   Call it the Brand Performance Index (or the Real Thing Index, should you prefer) – and you be the judge.  

Products like fresh fruits and vegetables likely would score high, except maybe for broccoli if you’re under 10 or are George H. W. Bush.  Soft drinks would score low -- or would they?   They might score high if people believe they’re getting the refreshing promise they expected from their Coke or Pepsi or Mountain Dew, or even a lifestyle boost.  Same goes for my favorite single malt whiskey!

So it’s up to us to decide, not some marketer … or even Michael Bloomberg.  Brand promise is best measured by consumer experience.

TakeAway:  How would your brand score on the Real Thing Index?

Content © by Brian E. Faulkner




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Budweiser Scores With Super Bowl Ad.

2/2/2015

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I’m not one for gushy ads, so when I watched Super Bowl XLIX yesterday, I looked for spots with solid strategic bite.  Not lifestyle stuff.  Not cuddly cute.  Not outrageously obscure (there was more than a few of those). I was on the lookout for ads with a clear benefits story -- although, like most everybody else on the planet, I did enjoy watching the Budweiser puppy find his way back home.

Yeah, yeah … I know it’s all about entertainment and ego, but Tom Brady and company provided enough of that to even satisfy my dad, a dedicated Patriots fan who’s been gone nearly four years now. Wherever he’s hanging out these days, I’d bet that last minute interception by Malcom Butler raised him and inch or two off his recliner! 
I didn’t see ALL the ads, no doubt, given several beverage refill breaks and more than a few old-man visits to the smallest room in the house.  But there were several spots that caught my marketer’s eye, especially Brewed the Hard Way, one of two other Bud ads that ran during the evening.

“Brewed” popped up in the third quarter as viewers were wondering which way the Tilt-A-Whirl game was going to go.  By then, we’d been served more than our share of emotionally-saturated spots, some truly inexplicable ads and a few that tried hard to sell something it was not – that means you, Toyota Camry.  And things had pretty much come back to earth after Katy Perry’s 12-minute entertainment extravaganza.

With a hard-driving fuzz guitar underlay and shots of Bud being made -- and enjoyed, flashes of text declared Budweiser a “macho beer, not brewed to be fussed over”, a brew for “drinking, not dissecting.”  Bud, the spot declared, is for “people who like to drink beer brewed the hard way.  Let them sip their pumpkin peach ale.  We’ll be brewing us some golden suds …"

“This is an affirmation of what Budweiser is, not an attack on what it isn't,” Brian Perkins, Budweiser’s VP of Marketing, told Robert Haynes-Perkins of the NY Drink Examiner.  “We're hoping to touch a chord with the person who wants the truth about how we make Budweiser and why it's great.

“We love craft beer” (and Anheuser-Busch acquires and sells some),” Perkins told the reporter.  "I think that the prevailing dialectic is that small must be better, and big must be bad.  That's the generally accepted trend. For us, big is good. It's not arrogant, it's just saying that it's great to brew a beer that so many people enjoy … it doesn't mean there's less care, less quality or less passion from the people who make it."

That’s tapping into the brand's Marketable Truth©.  And even though it scored only 5.15 (out of 10) on USA Today’s Ad Meter, I thought the ad was a strategic touchdown with its Brewed The Hard Way tagline.

There were a few other Super Bowl ads with solid positioning (of those I actually saw). 

GM’s new Colorado truck ads scored in my book by telling a story that revealed the cool truck guy vs. the less cool compact car guy.  The benefits story was subtle, but it worked -- although it only placed #39 on USA Today’s list.

I also like Sprint’s “Apology” ad (#34) because it directly called out the other carriers for being “really expensive,” offered to cut people’s wireless rates in half compared to Verizon and AT&T and gave them a way to make that happen.  They also used a whiny goat and a braying donkey to make a visual point about their competitor’s pricing.

And then there was GoDaddy’s “Working” spot (#55), which presented a direct, no-nonsense benefits story vs. the in-your-face, sexually charged approach they’ve used in previous Super Bowl ads.  It didn’t score very well with the public, however, which no doubt would like to have gazed upon Danica Patrick one more time or scored a smooch from Bar Rafaeli.  

Clearly, the ads I appreciated for their strategic punch were not favorites in the eyes of viewers who were more interested in being entertained than being convinced on the spot to change their mind about a product or buy something on the strength of product benefits.  

Fortunately for Budweiser, the public will be seeing more of “Brewed”. 

TakeAway:  In the long run, benefits-laden, positioning-driven advertising wins over creative fluff – unless, of course, a spot has both, like Apple’s famous “1984” MacIntosh ad during Super Bowl XVIII.   Little did anyone viewing that game know how much the world was about to change.


Content © by Brian E. Faulkner              

Marketable Truth © by Brian E. Faulkner

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    sample blog:

    This is a sample blog  for writer Brian E. Faulkner.  It presents stories about brands that do (or don't) communicate competitive advantage effectively. Stories have been gleaned from the business press, personal experience and occasional interviews. New articles are added from time to time, and every so often there will be a post of general interest -- about things like success, passion, social trends, etc. 

    Author

    Brian Faulkner is a writer and strategic communication consultant who helps business clients explain their competitive advantage in compelling and enduring ways.
     
    He also is a five-time Emmy award winning Public Television writer & narrator for a highly-rated and well-loved magazine series.

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