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PUBLICATIONS FINANCIAL FIRMS GOVERNMENT/NGO
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AUTOMOTIVE Chrysler Motors Corp. General Motors Mercedes-Benz NA Mercedes-Benz USA Mitsubishi Motor Sales Nissan North America Volkswagen of America Harley-Davidson TECHNOLOGY ENTERTAINMENT CONSUMER PRODUCTS
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The other day I was speaking to an agency management type who was lamenting on the current state of affairs in agency/client relationships. She was taking me to task about our recent evangelizing about what we have identified as Adaptive Branding. She told me that I wasn't helping matters any by "throwing the baby out with the bath water," as she put it. Her concerns were mirrored by a number of other readers who took issue with the entire aspect of being meaningful to the audience. In their world the 30 second commercial is still the only way to define brand personality and everything else comes a distant second. Well good luck with that argument. As agencies all across the nation are looking to retread their business models, there are still legions of agency management types who think this is all just a fad and in time it will blow over. They said the same thing about the diversity issue. And they were right. Why should this be any different? Well I'll tell you like I told them. I'm not here to help anybody sleep better at night. Believe. Don't believe. Accept. Don't accept. The market will sort it out at the client's discretion. I'm here for the hundreds of undergrads at Stanford, Carnegie, Kellogg and the University of Illinois, who want to know what to expect when they get out. So today's discussion is all about the job we need to be doing if we intend to keep our jobs. The job of engaging the audience. If you have been following our theories on the practice of Adaptive Branding then you already know that the bottom line is all about determining what is meaningful to the audience and then using that sphere of influence to engage in the first steps of building a relationship. The Apple iPhone figured it out brilliantly. People want to take their laptop, desktop web interface experience with them. So be it. Plus here is a bunch of other cool things you can hang out with. and by the way. It's also a phone. By what terms can you best engage the interest of the audience? That is the question. No matter what technology-based product I had to sell this year, I would be leading with the question, "Can your kids keep up with the changes brought on by technology?" As a parent, that's what keeps me up at night. I see the booty-ass computers in the classrooms at the LA Unified School District and I know there is no way my daughter Jasmine will ever set foot in a public high school class. You hit me with a way I can deal with this issue and I don't care what you're selling, I'm all ears and listening. For others it's fear of heart failure or the rising cost of gasoline. One thing is for sure. Nobody, but nobody is loosing sleep over whether their laundry smells like lemons or eucalyptus. That subject is only engaging to women who populate the make-believe world of TV commercials and focus group panels. Real moms are more concerned about their sons and daughters being sent home in a body bag from High School or Iraq. REAL MOMS WANT TO KNOW WHY THEIR ANCIENT SUV COST $25 TO FILL UP WHEN IT WAS NEW AND $50 TO FILL UP TODAY. They don't have bandwidth for the next product to be brought to them through the technology and genius of a squeeze bottle. Mom's want to know how to keep their husbands from killing themselves from all the stress and conflict on the job. Especially the ones with Boomer aged hubbies and college aged kids. Scented toilet bowel fresheners need not apply. These folks would be much more captivated by a mortgage calculator that told them what they had to pay into their home equity accounts to pull out enough money to send two kids to school as soon as their acne clears up. The list goes on and on, but you get the point. Engagement of the audience is going to be the only thing that matters come this time next year. You either know how or you don't. But the 30 second TV crack habit most agencies can't seem to shake loose from will be dragging them down, even as they send their tuxedoes out for cleaning in time for the 2008 Clio Awards. And I'll be right there to tell them "I told you so." Or maybe I won't.
Stay tuned.
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