Opus Creative. Be Creative. » Branding

Human nature at the Internet Strategy Forum.

Meg Kaczyk — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 15:45:33 +0000

There were strikingly common threads from the speakers at the Internet Strategy Forum at the Governor Hotel in downtown Portland last week. Social media of course the pervasive topic, but there is a return to understanding social is just one piece of integrated marketing. Two main themes most of the speakers touched on were over-arching and human in nature:

Theme 1: Trust your friends

Customer reviews are the most powerful influencers in brand awareness, loyalty, and purchase decisions. Even bad reviews positively affect the conversion-to-buy numbers. (Katherine Durham, HP)

Listen to what people are saying about your product, let that influence product manufacturing (not just marketing). Intuit requires all employees to “follow a customer home” once a week and they use that input to influence product development and marketing.
(Sheila Tolle, Intuit)

The social network is like a town square, and is a revolutionary democratization of content creation (Johan Jervoe, Intel)

Friends trust friends opinion of product, more than companies’ version of product worth, more than media version of product/brand worth. Most trusted: friends/word of mouth. (Sheila Tolle, Intuit)

If content is king, context is queen — friends give product/brand content context. (Jeremiah Owyang, Forrester)

Syndicate all comments, good/bad, from/to disparate/competing sources (Katherine Durham, HP)

Theme 2: Work Together

Everyone needs to be at the table together, no more silo-ing of marketing, product development and business operations. (Chris Dill, Blazers) (Lisa Welchman, Welchman/Pierpoint)

Fish where the fish are: corporate sites need to fragment into the social community ecosystem. ( Jeremiah Owyang, Forrester)

Get the younger folks/social media users into the C-suite. There is a leadership deficit in web knowledge. (Lisa Welchman, Welchman/Pierpoint)

All areas (Ads, sales, direct marketing, web) need to ask “then what happens?” Do not measure your success within your silo’s benchmark. Ask, what happens next? (even if it crosses into another silo or challenges accepted success metrics) (Diane Shultz – Xerox)
So, strategic marketing comes down to very human roots, no matter what platform or technology powers it. The methods by which we embark in these human endeavors may change, but the needs are basic and abiding. I love that about our work. At it’s best, it responds to our human-ness.

Augmented Reality

keith.gerr@opuscreative.com — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 16:11:03 +0000

Though only available on the Android phone and in the Netherlands, Layar has done a nice job pulling together GPS, camera and web data into one app. But I think augmented reality apps will take-off once they allow for greater personalization. It’s one thing to pick up on the latest house for sale and quite another to allow for personal filtering like overlaying the digital notes/thoughts/recommendations from a friends previous ramble through Amsterdam. Or for that matter, enabling real-time augmentations.

- Keith Gerr

Viral Fabrication

keith.gerr@opuscreative.com — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 18:51:11 +0000

The objective of the RepRap project is to give away the designs for a machine that anyone can use to make many of the goods that we all have to currently buy and anyone can use their RepRap machine to make more RepRap machines for other people.

Keri Collins, Narrator

RepRap from Adrian Bowyer on Vimeo.

Will the trends of self-reliance and re-generation spur the viral growth of the RepRap movement? Could the spread of home manufacturing with fossil-fuel based materials prove environmentally detrimental as people will fabricate more stuff than they need? Will this take humanity into new levels of conservation innovation? Desktop manufacturing is a game-changer – for the good or bad remains to be seen.

- Keith Gerr

PS – 3D printing for new tissues and organs? chekit

The Sovereign Consumer

keith.gerr@opuscreative.com — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 20:02:03 +0000

Politics, economics, culture, technology, health, environment, religion, sexuality – We are living in a tsunami of change. Top-down power is giving way to bottom-up power. Individuals over institutions. Dialogue over monologue. Transparency over privacy. Sharing over hording. Regeneration over landfill. Love over hate.

Some believe it’s an enlightened period that leads to collective, empathetic goodness. Some predict it’s just another nail in mankinds coffin.

Others, like me, aren’t so sure. But that’s no excuse to not to try and make sense of it all – especially in a professional marketing capacity. Because, afterall, marketing is about knowing the consumer. Being able to stay in-step and one-step ahead so that needs are met and value is delivered.

In an effort to develop empathy for the average consumer, a collaborator of mine (Mo Morales) and I took a deep dive into the human experience. Not a quantified study, but a wide-eyed, open-minded quest. Our conclusions brought us to the Sovereign Consumer. This person is:

Extremely Cynical – does not trust the media and increasingly less trustful of brands

Technology Enabled – wired, fired up and aware of his ability to influence friends and the world around him through networked devices and applications

Needs Community – seeks influencers from whom to learn and peers with whom to share – all in the name of staying perpetually relevant

Owns Self-Determination – determines factors (e.g. value, loyalty) on his own terms

Promotes New Social Contract - growing expectation for institutions to embrace ethical and responsible practices in the pursuit of profit

Commercially Engaged – continues to define himself by brands he selects and rejects

Privacy Disabled – fears loss of personal control of incoming messaging and outgoing information

Needs Anti-Community – defines himself by who he is not

Suffers Status Anxiety – constantly aware of his place in society, ability to ascend, as well as how far he can fall

Ethically Ambivalent – selective application of personal values

It’s just the take of a couple dudes – we don’t claim the above to be science nor the archetype to be complete. Though we do claim to be honest with our thoughts. What’s your take?

- Keith Gerr

Fundamentals of Social Media Marketing

keith.gerr@opuscreative.com — Tue, 26 May 2009 16:57:05 +0000

Social media has become a compulsory element to the integrated marketing mix. Marketers can no longer afford to keep their brands outside of the social arena because quite simply – your brands are being spoken about/mashed-up with or without your participation.

Opus has been stewarding our clients through the social media space. The preso below highlights our learnings on how to strategically approach social media – value proposition, consumer usage data, properties, platforms, data on how other marketers are budgeting for social media, planning model and other experienced tips.

Social media is simultaneously advertising, customer service and research.
Keith Gerr, Director of Strategy

Social Media Overview
View more Microsoft Word documents from opuscreative.

Word-of-mouth meets word-of-network. As much energy as you put into social media, is as much energy as you’ll get out.

- Keith Gerr

Best Buy CMO Has Become An Ad Unit

keith.gerr@opuscreative.com — Tue, 12 May 2009 21:32:52 +0000

As the digital universe increasingly becomes interoperable and personalized, marketers find themselves swimming in messaging outlet/format choice and complexity. Reaching consumers (B2C or B2B) is now about delivering personalized offers/products/services via the channels where the audience is organically present. Digital is a favored channel by both consumers (always on with wifi and broadband) and business (low-cost delivery mechanism compared to broadcast and print). Best Buy’s CMO, Barry Judge lays out the case for digital marketing fairly well in the video below. One always has to be weary of corporate propaganda vids like this – but he seems to be speaking in HIS voice based on quotes like this:

We don’t really have an official regulated policy around that – we encourage it.

Barry Judge, CMO Best Buy on how Best Buy employees use Twitter and Facebook to discuss what’s going on inside the store

Nicely done, Barry. By being real, you’ve become the ad unit. More CMOs and marketers should follow the lead. Have a point of view, syndicate it, repsond to your loyalists and detractors and slowly wane yourself off of that expensive media buying habit.

- Keith Gerr

Mobile APPetite

keith.gerr@opuscreative.com — Thu, 07 May 2009 22:26:04 +0000

Some interesting data about mobile application consumption has come out this week. O’Reilly published an iPhone App report and Compete issued its Smartphone Intelligence April 2009 report. Here’s a few highlights:

People are wanting to do more with their smart phones as 73% of users have downloaded at least one app to their device
Of the top five categories of apps (Games, Music, Entertainment, Weather and Navigation) iPhone users are by far and away downloading more apps (compared to RIM, Palm and Motorola users)
In Gaming downloads alone, iPhone users were at 79% with RIM at 26%, Palm at 44% and Motorola at 33%
iPhone has a strong lead in those users downloading 6+ apps
The majority of recent iPhone apps being developed have price tags (78% paid vs. 22% free)
The fastes growing iPhone app category is Books (making up 11.9% of downloads and experiencing 285% growth as compared to Q1)

From a marketing perspective, mobile has been touted as the next big thing for years. But that’s because the marketing world looks at mobile device adoption through the ”how/when can I serve an ad on it” lens.

A more strategic approach is to look at smart phones as extensions of ones life – a platform to enhance or bridge experiences. This covers everything from the mundane (gaming in between subway stops), to utility (mapping directions) to social (geo-locating friends) to practical (creating biz docs). The rise of app consumption proves this out (regardless of provider) – 73% of smartphone users have downloaded an app, compared to 53% clicking on ads.

People want the PC experience in their hand – not a bunch of clever ad intrusions. This is not to say ads wont have a place in the mobile-info-stream (pre/post roll video comes to mind), but brands that fundamentally approach mobile from an advertising and not utility perspective will find stiff competition from the mobile app development community.

- Keith Gerr

Begock! It’s Chicken War!

keith.gerr@opuscreative.com — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 17:15:11 +0000

I’m diggin the challenge thrown down by El Pollo Loco against rival Kentucky Fried Chicken. I’d like to see more brands stand on their defensible attributes (in this case it’s El Pollo’s grilling method versus KFC “griddle” method).

I’m not so sure what impact this will have, but it sure is fun to see brands getting down and dirty with one another.

- Keith Gerr

Is your brand authentic?

keith.gerr@opuscreative.com — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 18:36:04 +0000

Last week, I was invited by the University of Oregon School of Architecture and Allied Arts to speak on the topic of “Authentic” brands. Zara Logue, Adj Asst Professor/Design Community Liaison is leading a class of 5th year seniors into examining “the term authenticity and how it relates to authorship, architecture, art, and design.” Everything from communication design to the designers role in crafting products is being scrutinized against the ever-elusive definition of authentic. I say ever-elusive, because authentic has different meanings for everyone. To some, authenticity means simply staying true to oneself. To others, authenticity implies personalization or playing a positive role in the community. While I don’t claim to have a universal definition (and self-admittedly skeptical that any brand can remain authentic), in my presentation I try to convey a number of behaviors brands can adopt in an attempt to be authentic.

It all begins with adopting the attitude that brand is behavior – it is much, much more than logos, color palettes and slogans.

Authentic Brands, Design Thinking and Wicked Problems
View more presentations from opuscreative.
My thanks to Zara and the rest of the class for bringing me into the conversation.

- Keith Gerr

Game Developers Conference: 5 Impressions

keith.gerr@opuscreative.com — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 16:18:57 +0000

A few folks from Opus recently attended the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco. Here’s a quick-view deck on their experience:
GDC 2009 Impressions
View more presentations from opuscreative.