The Colours of Crisis: Optimistic or Not?

What visual face will the crisis have? Will we all turn to downgrade colours and turn away from bling - or instead be overtly optimistic and turn to the bright side of life in order to cheer up?

This piece from naked NY does a really nice review - so take a peek. It reminded me of a line that I heard many years ago, I think it was a joke in a statistics class: in crisis the skirt lines go up. Ha, let's watch out if it is possible that we can really classify in specific crisis style and tone of voice in our ecclectic times where style and fashion patterns are so complex.

I also wonder how advertising or brands in general will answer to the crisis in their visual approach. Will it affect tone of voice or product concepts and package design? What do you think?

Optimism Part 2: From the Coke Side to Open Happiness

Both AdAge and the Wall Street Journal have written on it:

"Open Happiness" is the title of the new Coke campaign that will be on air in the U.S. from next week on. It is going to replace the "Coke Side of Life" that has been running since 2006.

The quest in weather Coke is tailing Pepsi with their JOY campaign is as AdAge points out a bit weird as the brand has been tapping into the Optimism issue since the 70s hilltop campaign and as I feel the "Coke side of life" campaign has summed that brand theme up really nice (after a lot of campaigns that felt more tactical and that had lost the core of optimism). The "Happiness Factory" has written Optimism all over it and I can only imagine the new campaign to add to this with new facets, new stories and a new (and I think weaker) claim.

Claims that focused on the Coke Optimism are plenty: Open Happiness (2009), The Coke Side of Life (2006), Life Tastes Good (2001), Have a Coke and a Smile (1979), Coke Adds Life (1976), I'd Like To Buy the World a Coke (1971)

But we also remember the rather product focussed ones: Drink Coca-Cola (1886), Delicious and Refreshing (1904), The Pause That Refreshes (1929), Things Go Better With Coke (1963), It's the Real Thing (1969), Coke Is It! (1982), Red, White and You (1986), Can't Beat the Real Thing (1990), Always Coca-Cola (1993).

The new campaign is oviously part of making marketing more efficient. Coke's cola volume slipped 3.5% in U.S. supermarkets, convenience stores, drug chains and similar venues during the first nine months of 2008, according to Beverage Digest. That continued a years-long decline amid competition from newer drinks like bottled teas and enhanced waters. Coke Classic's U.S. volume fell about 16% from 1998 through 2007.
"Open Happiness" should also offer a global campaign that does not need endless adaptation work in local markets. At the same time the European agencies will be reduced from 20 to 4 in order to create a more efficient "Coke Red European Network". (Never thought that they still work with more than the mentioned ones as W&K and McCann). As the Portland based W&K is home of the "open happiness" campaign we eagerly wait to see what they will air during Super Bowl - it is said to feature "a remix of an Elvis song, is expected to illustrate how people don't really talk anymore, thanks to gadgets like BlackBerrys. In the spot, a boy enters a diner and sits next to an ogre. The two reach for a Coke and, suddenly, the ogre turns into a pretty girl" as the WSJ quotes someone that seems to have seen it already.

Tyranny of the short term

In this NY Times piece, Michael Lewis, also a contributing author at Vanity Fair, writes a clear summary on the financial crisis and the systemic problems on Wall Street that caused this. As it all comes down to long term interest vs. short term gain, the need for consistency in carrying out one strategy, not hopping from one executional idea to the next, and the difference of blind-folded risk taking vs. true courage it i not only gives a clear explanation on the crisis background but also offers a nice analogy that brands and people can learn from. To me it was a very clear reveleation on what was and still is wrong with the U.S. financial system.

Brand "Me" - part 1: "Executing Me 2.0"

The aspect of "Brand Me" has been going around my mind for a while. When I took seminars on business coaching I got the idea to mix the thoughts on personal development, definition of life objecives, personal ressources, change of believe systems etc with all what I know about branding. This does not simply mean to "pimp your personality" and sell better within the job market. But it should include these issues as well.

I want to share my thoughts on this frequently with you - from defining what differentiates you as a personality and setting your objectives to how to execute and communicate your personal brand. There is some literature on this but to me a lot of this seems a bit stale and old-school.

This will not be "in order" starting with defining your personal core, working out a strategy and then defining comms strategy and the needed channels - I will just put the posts up as I please.

As times are tough and I just stumbled across a nice piece on this I will start with the rather executional part: how to communicate your personal brand using social media.


http://mashable.com/2009/01/05/job-search-secrets/


Dan Schwabel (more by him can be found here: http://personalbrandingbook.com) has summoned the 7 secrets on how to involve social media in communicating your personal brand to find a new job. An issue that a lot of people in advertising and marketing might be facing right now.

And even though we deal with brands all the time it often seems to me that we miss the point to understand ourselves as a brand and integrate technology in communicating it.

Schwabel to me is not the greatest example when it comes to "personal branding" regarding outer appearance (see online video of him) - as I feel he lacks a bit of authenticity in his speech as well as I am not sure what he means by the jacket-and-shirt combination. But he shows great expertise in how to engage the web when launching and supporting your personal brand. This might especially work well in the U.S. or countries that have strongly embraced technology already. But I think a lot of the hints will also work in Germany or Europe in general.

Commitment vs. Campaigning

Just want to share this very clear presentation by Paul Isakson of 150 here with you. Still love the brand clouds by J.Grant that he refers to. And that it all builds the brand. Rich conversation needs to be complex but not confusing. Well - just have a look.

Modern Brand Building

From: paulisakson,
3 months ago

Modern Brand Building

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: deepspace space150)

This is the presentation I shared at our (space150's) Deepspace event on Modern Brand Building. Dion Hughes of Persuasion Arts & Sciences and Adrian Ho of Zeus Jones shared some excellent thoughts on this topic of well (search for their presentations here too). Campaigning isn't quite the right term for what I was trying to say, but some good discussion followed the presentation, so it wasn't totally off. I'll be working to improve this, so if you have any thoughts, please share.

SlideShare Link

Logo Trends 2008

The "Logo Lounge" has put together a cool overview on the trends in brand logos for the last couple of years. The above link leads you to the stuff of 2008 - it is a couple of months old but a great overview on what's hot - and maybe also what to avoid in order to stick out. It gives a clear indication on the stuff that I have been feeling when looking at certain re-works or new logos. Somehow nice, but haven't I seen that before?

e.g. the "infinity loop" seems to be quite popular with a lot of people....

Great Collection of Creative Brief Formats

Richard Huntington has posted a great collection of Creative Brief Formats in his adliterate blog last month. You will find stuff from BBH, Naked as well as a lot of big network agencies around the globe. It is a growing collection and I find it a fabulous idea to put this online. Take a look how other agencies are tackling the format issue. Submit your own format. The trend seems to go towards using less formats and some agencies have even taken the route to have a clean sheet of paper with the logo only. I guess this can work for very experienced planners. It truly helps to get an overview as well as the assurance: a format is only a crutch that can help structure thinking - in the end it is up to you to come up with good content. Something that a format alone will not inspire.