I blame Marketing!

There's an interesting article in Advertising Age that places some of the blame of today's economic conditions on marketing. Before that sounds too far fetched, I think Rance Crain has a point, certainly in the example of General Motors he used. I think many of us have made these points with all of our clients at some point in time only for them to fall on deaf ears.

The money quote:

Citigroup wanted consumers to buy as many of its financial services as possible. But from a marketing point of view, this was impossible. Consumers didn't associate any of those financial services with a "bank." The perception Citigroup tried to create in consumers' minds was at odds with what a consumer perceived a bank to be.

General Motors tried to create an auto supermarket in every Chevrolet dealership. Any kind of car or truck a consumer might want to buy, they could find in a Chevy showroom.

Even worse, every other GM brand tried the same strategy. Any kind of vehicle you might want, Pontiac had for sale. So did Olds. And Buick. And Cadillac.

Both of these two companies had fundamental disconnects between their product strategy and their marketing strategies. In GM's case, they needed to crank out millions of cars to help pay for their investments in things like engines and powertrains. But instead of creating unique vehicles for each division, they made a few tweaks here and there and shoved a new nameplate on them. Of course consumers are not morons and saw right through it.

In my mind a brand is a promise. What makes Pontiac's promise any different than Chevrolet if they essentially offer the same thing? How does one buying one's insurance from Citibank benefit the consumer?

Ironically I have a bad feeling about Toyota. I've always been surprised at how willing they have been to mimic the former Big Three. The brand's reliability has managed to keep it out of trouble. But it doesn't take anything more than one well-publicized incident to cause a problem.

Illegibility and empathy

The Futures Company – the rebranding of the combined Henley Center, Yankolovitch and Headlight Vision – has a email newsletter they publish throughout the year. The last issue of last year was titled 'Managing in a downturn.' In it, Will Galgey discussed a few key issues for brands to watch. One of them ties into a topic I blogged about a few weeks ago – empathy.

His point is that in a downturn, brands need to be outspoken in taking the consumer's side and be empathetic to their trials and tribulations. This means making their customer's priorities the brand's priority. If people are spending wisely, talk about how your product supports that. 

Of course, this effort extends past the marketing message. Many packaged goods companies have been caught with their finger on the scale, discretely increasing prices by packaging less for the same amount. Consumerist.com calls it the 'Shrink Ray' and has a long and growing archive of offenders. To me, this is a perfect example of brands acting in an illegible fashion; the brand's actions work against the customer in an opaque way. While I understand the motivation for these packaging machinations, actions like these can really weaken long-term trust in the brand.

Radical de-centralization

I've been thinking about the media business a lot lately, especially the slow but steady demise of newspapers. I ran across a new way forward being chartered by the Oakland Press Institute in California. They are opening a classroom that trains citizens to be journalists. What an interesting way of formalizing what news brands have started doing – carving out a roll for the everyday person. 

This got me thinking about the structure of our economy, bizarrely enough. What if decentralization accelerates to include many of the large companies / brands that we know today?

An example from the Proctor and Gamble world would be – under the Pantene brand is a very specialized hair treatment that is sold by a one woman shop in the Atlanta area. The Pantene brand gets the 'serious haircare' halo while offering its customers a brand experience that is unique and local. Using General Motors, with the advent of one fuel cell based platform, micro-factories throughout the country could build custom cars. 

Admittedly, it's not exactly a new model. Technology companies have been acquiring and integrating small fry for a long time. The fashion industry works in a similar way, using licensing to offer unique brand experiences in different forms. But if applied to the likes of GM and P&G, what would this model do to the established norms of brand building and manufacturing.

I'm still working on this idea but I thought I would share while I work through it. Comments are most welcome here.