PSFK Author:
Scott Lachut

Rob Walker over at the NY Times calls attention to an interesting study conducted at the University of Maryland recently, tracking what is being called “incidental brand-consumer encounters.”  Essentially, the research was meant to determine what kind of effect, if any, brands have on us in the context of strangers.  With all of the advertising bombarding as we walk down the street, the ones with the most impact might not be traditional advertising at all, but rather subtle cues picked up from the people around us holding cans of Coca-Cola or wearing a T-shirts emblazoned with an easily identifiable logo.

In one study, each subject was shown 20 photographs of people in various situations and instructed to focus on facial expressions. Afterward, each subject was offered a bottle of water from a selection of four brands. The experiment had nothing to do with facial expressions and everything to do with which kind of water they chose: the subjects had been divided into groups, based on how many of the photos they viewed incidentally included a bottle of Dasani water. Among those who looked at Dasani-free pictures, about 17 percent chose that brand. But about 40 percent of those who viewed a group of pictures that included 12 with a Dasani presence made the brand their pick. Since subjects who actually noticed the brand in the pictures were eliminated from the results, that spike in popularity evidently came from exposure that the subjects weren’t even aware of. “In essence,” Ferraro says, “we have these brief social encounters fairly regularly, and they may have an impact on our choices.”

Walker uses the Ralph Lauren logo as a telling example of a company’s ability to create a lasting, recognizable logo that has been so seamlessly incorporated into their product line that rather than reaching a level of cluttered ubiquity, has almost been rendered invisible - but not really.  And that might be the very reason that it’s so successful.  Recognizing this fact perhaps, Ralph Lauren has smartly allowed the iconic image to play its influential role in public, while leaving it absent from their advertising campaigns.  An interesting lesson in out-of-box marketing and brand positioning, especially given out turbulent economic times, proving that less is sometimes more.

[via Rob Walker at NY Times]

Herman Miller’s heir apparent to the Aeron Chair, the Embody series, is a design that promises to promote clear-minded thinking by lowering the stress placed upon the body while sitting. With that in mind, they’ve created a microsite called Thought Pile that invites users to participate in an ideas forum by answering weekly questions that are meant to provoke conversation and innovation. The results are displayed visually in a mind map on the screen, the circles displaying individual concepts growing in real time as the audience votes. Interaction can be as simple as clicking agree or disagree based on an opinion to the responses or by writing comments that further the discussion within the community. At the end of the week, the person whose solution or thought has received the most positive reactions will be awarded an Embody Chair.

Fast on the heels of what many are heralding as the most successful presidential campaign ever staged, folks everywhere are hoping to be the first to uncover the valuable lessons that made this historic election possible. Those in the marketing industry choose to look at the Obama campaign from the perspective of “effective sales pitch to the entire nation,” able to cross all demographics with a single message. However, maybe this is view is too narrow and fails to see the broader implications as we move forward.

To that end, Gawker offers five realistic takeaways that paint a bigger picture of our country:

1. Facebook doesn’t mean shit - Social networking is still emerging as a tool. Online activity still doesn’t guarantee real life action.

2. TV is still king - The internet continues to grow, particularly as a communication tool, but TV is ubiquitous and still the best method for reaching the widest audience.

3. The candidates matter - Likable equals electable, no matter who you are.

4. Elections ride the swinging pendulum - In light of the past eight years, America was ready for a change.

5. Campaign tactics are always evaluated in retrospect because the media has no idea what it’s talking about, mostly - Until the public’s reaction can be gaged, it’s all pure speculation.

[via Gawker]

PSFK is excited to announce Steve Roberts, CEO and Founder of ShopText, as a speaker in our Good Ideas in 2009 Salon. Steve will be participating in our first discussion surrounding ideas and innovations in the Mobile space on the morning of Tuesday, November 18th.

ShopText has developed a technology that brings the shopping experience directly to the cell phone, enabling consumers and brands to interact via text message. This new model literally takes retail anywhere, to a point where brick and mortar stores and even internet connections are no longer necessary.

Steve Roberts launched ShopText in November 2006. Prior to ShopText, Steve’s marketing and internet experience includes COO of McCann Erickson’s $200 million relationship marketing company MRM Partners, CFO of McCann’s $650 million marketing services companies and CFO of Modem Media (acquired by Digitas in 2004), where he led the company’s IPO in 1999, and drove its profitable growth to a run rate of $160 million in revenue. Prior to Modem Media, Steve held several global and international P&L management positions at United Technologies. Prior to joining UTC in 1990, Steve structured debt financing for radio, paging, cable and newspaper acquisitions and leveraged buyouts in the Corporate Finance Group of Continental Bank (now Bank of America). Steve has an M.B.A. from the University of Chicago and a B.A. from Middlebury College.

Tickets for this and all other Good Ideas in 2009 Salons are available for purchase here.

PSFK is happy to include Alistair Fulton, Senior Manager in Deloitte’s Telecommunications, Media & Technology practice, as a speaker in our Good Ideas in 2009 Salon. Alistair will be participating in our first discussion surrounding ideas and innovations in the Mobile space on the morning of Tuesday, November 18th.

Alistair has over 15 years of experience in customer and brand strategy, product development and performance transformation in the wireless space both in an advisory role and in industry. Prior to joining Deloitte Consulting he served as SVP of Strategy & Business Performance for O2, the largest wireless operator in the United Kingdom. In this role he was responsible for leading the development and execution of O2’s transformation strategy post de-merger from British Telecommunications in 2001, including the development and implementation of O2’s customer and product strategies, underpinned by the development and launch of the O2 brand.

Hear more from Alistair at our Good Ideas session this coming Tuesday. Tickets for this and all other Good Ideas in 2009 Salons are available for purchase here.

Allison Mooney, friend and Contributing Editor to PSFK, will be moderating our first Good Ideas in 2009 Salon on Tuesday, November 18th. The discussion will surround ideas and innovations in the Mobile space as we look ahead to next year.

Allison Mooney has been working in media and marketing for six years and was part of the launch team for Mobile Behavior, a new Omnicom Group company. As the Director of Trends & Insights, Allison manages the group’s R&D lab, NGT, leads behavioral research efforts, and guides thinking on youth trends, mobile innovations, and consumer behavior. She also started and currently runs NextGreatThing.com, which now has readers in over 400 cities around the world. Prior to Mobile Behavior, Allison was the Director of Trends & Research at Fleishman-Hillard. She currently sits on the YPulse Advisory Board.

Hear more from Allison at our Good Ideas session this coming Tuesday. Tickets for this and all other Good Ideas in 2009 Salons are available for purchase here.

Eschewing the prevailing theory in advertising that one should never mention your competitor’s product, many companies are taking a page out of the political campaign season and going with attack ads or in the parlance of the industry, “comparative advertising” that do just that.  The trend towards negative marketing is being attributed to the downturn in the economy, forcing businesses to compete for a smaller pool of consumer dollars.

Although a dangerous proposition with plenty of potential to backfire, agencies tasked with creating these campaigns have found injecting humor to be the best method of ensuring success.  Additionally, the charges being leveled against the competition need to be well-researched and not simply anecdotal. Advertisers shouldn’t underestimate the savvy of their customer base by pushing unsubstantiated claims, simply to move a few more units.  The risk outweighs the reward in these instances, given the the web’s potential to reach a wide audience if any fallacies are uncovered by the public, thus alienating the very people they were attempting to court.  At the same time, a poorly conceived strategy opens the door for the competition, allowing them proper justification to employ undercutting tactics of their own.  The real question seems to be how much tit for tat can we collectively stomach before everyone walks away a loser?

“It’s very tactical, it’s very short-term, but today marketers are thinking short-term,” said David Melançon, the chief executive of the Ito Partnership, a brand identity consulting company in New York.

Other examples of negative product pitches include a long-running campaign from Apple that mercilessly mocks the PC operating systems sold by Microsoft; a campaign from the Fox Business Channel cable network, which deridesJim Cramer of CNBC; ads for Burger King that take on other fast-food chains like McDonald’s and Wendy’s; and a campaign for a new variety of Campbell’s soup, Select Harvest, that berates Progresso for selling soups with ingredients like monosodium glutamate.

[via New York Times]

Taking a page from their customer friendly food service model, Burger King recently took “Have It Your Way” into the realms of D.I.Y. fashion.  A collaboration between 5 designers and artists tasked with reinterpreting elements of Burger King’s icons and logos culminated at an event held in Chicago on October 24th.  The gathering invited participants to take part in the studio creation process by silk-screening the final designs onto their own clothing in any combination they chose.  Essentially, a clever form of marketing that allowed Burger King to subvert their own image, while at the same time maintaining recognizable aspects familiar to their wider audience.  The company has also pushed this idea a step further with Burger King Studio, a site that takes the hands-on experience and introduces it to the online space.  Users have the ability to design their own T-shirts using the same details from the out-of-home event with additional levels of customizable options available, promising the uniqueness you want without fear of “getting ink all over yourself.”  Additional happenings have already been scheduled for November 7th and 21st.

MySpace and Viacom’s MTV Networks announced a deal that will partner them with Auditude, a technology firm that has developed a means of identifying whether uploaded video clips belong to a particular TV Network by recognizing unique electronic signatures.  Auditude approached these two companies with this technology, marketing it as a means of incorporating advertising.  Essentially, any content appearing on MySpace belonging to MTV Networks will be tagged, allowing either business the option of inserting ads.

This represents a significant change in attitude for both companies.  In the past, MySpace TV, the second largest video site behind YouTube, might have blocked this pirated material completely, while traditionally Viacom has attempted to keep its material from being posted without their permission.  It will be interesting to see if viewers will embrace these expanded freedoms even as their rights to commercial-free content are taken away.

“Now the shackles are off our users,” said Jeff Berman, president of marketing and sales at MySpace. “They are fully empowered, and the media companies get to monetize and get all the data from this. They know what is actually being consumed out there and get the benefit of the viral promotion.”

“We’ve been empowering consumers to use our content in new ways for a while now, and allowing uploads of our content has been a goal for us,” said Mika Salmi, president of global digital media at MTV Networks. “MySpace and Auditude were the first partners we found with the right technology, business model and user experience to do it right.”

[via NY Times Bits Blog]