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1. Xerox CEO Anne Mulcahy. At a time when many CEOs are haughty and disconnected from business reality, Mulcahy appeared not only connected but insightful and straight-forward. Her keynote was a definite highlight of the show.

2. Marketers feel as lonely as the Maytag repairman. Attendees were hungry to talk to other marketers to share ideas, problems, solutions and to just talk. Many work in smaller marketing departments and feel isolated in their places of work, so they are anxious to bond.

3. Mplanet as a stop on the road to the Super Bowl. More than one attendee told me his or her next stop would be Tampa for the Super Bowl and marketing activities their companies had planned there. The big game being only an hour and a half drive from Orlando likely contributed to the good Mplanet turn-out.

4. The emphasis on innovation. Rather than tell marketers to get conservative in this bad economy, speaker after speaker said this is the time to be bold and try new things; nice to hear. You can read more about that in Marketing News’ post-Mplanet coverage in an upcoming issue.

5. All the beef. I’m not talking only about keynote speeches here, but also the food served during Mplanet lunches and evening receptions. I’ve never seen so much top sirloin and beef tenderloin offered at a conference. I’m wondering if the hotel’s chef shops at Costco, known for its good tenderloin prices. There also were mini-éclairs, another Costco staple.

Posted by John at 4:05 PM | Permalink

By all accounts, President Barack Obama and his team can be considered brilliant marketers. They established their "product's" brand identity early, crafted and delivered a strong brand message right from the start, connected with consumers wherever and however they wanted to be reached, and, most importantly, stuck to it all.

Larry Grisolano, who served as senior communication strategist for the Obama campaign, told the Mplanet audience this morning that Obama's consistency throughout the presidential election helped to carry him right to the White House.

Yes, he stood for Change with a capital "C." But he never changed his message.

From the moment he announced his intention to even consider running for president, he and his team stuck to their message-- admirably and successfully so. No one doubted who he is or what he wants to stand for. They got it. They understood and internalized the brand.

Good lesson for marketers. Grisolano also shared a few other tips he gleaned from focus groups that the Obama campaign held throughout the country that he thought would be particularly applicable to marketers, regardless of their product or offering:

1. “Talk to us like adults.” Don’t pander to your audience, he said. Treat them with the respect they deserve.

2. “Tell us what you’re going to do and how you’re going to do it.” The straightforward approach works.

3. “Be real.” Authenticity counts. Present a genuine message.

4. “Take responsibility.” Walk the talk, in other words. “People are obsessed with accountability and responsibility,” Grisolano said, so marketers have the opportunity to differentiate themselves by stepping up to the plate and accounting for their actions.

5. “Do what’s best for the country,” he said. “I think there’s a renewed sense of national community. … Obama has given people permission to come together again.”

Posted by Elisabeth at 3:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Sitting through diverse Mplanet presentations today from leaders at Tata, Coca-Cola, YouTube, and others, I noticed one key ingredient that came up again and again: emotion.

An emotional connection may seem like marketing 101 to most of you. It’s a crucial component to many successful marketing campaigns, so crucial, that it came up in presentations about B2B customer engagement, connections with new consumers, and brand building across the world. And yet, it’s difficult to attain that genuine emotional connection.

I was struck, in speech after session after speech, by how some of today's top speakers were using emotion in their message.

First up - Tata. One of the most unique companies in the world, the Mumbai-based corporation has holdings in everything from coffee and tea to hotels to the steel industry to Jaguar. R.K. Krishna Kumar, Chairman of Tata Coffee and Vice Chairman of Tata Tea and Indiana Hotels, Tata Sons, Ltd., was representing the company. The question came up over how a company with such a diverse array of holdings can incite a unified satisfaction from Indian consumers.

Kumar explained how a charity foundation, paid for by members of the Tata family, was set up, and in partnership with another trust, equated to two-thirds of the stake in the holdings of Tata Sons, Ltd. Despite such a wide array of services, an emotional bond was established, because, Kumar argued, many citizens realized that the company was investing back in the country and its people.

"They are partners in an enterprise," he said. "It's an invisible partnership, but it's still a partnership."

Later that morning, I went to a session called "Successful Customer Engagement Strategies in B2B Markets." The standout among a group of distinguished presenters was Archie Massicotte, President of Navistar Defense, LLC.

Navistar was established more than 175 years ago, but the truck and bus manufacturer opened up a defense arm just six years ago. In 2008, the new branch sold military vehicles in six countries and scored an astounding $4.3 billion in business.

The marketing message behind Navistar Defense, said Massicotte, is that the company's vehicles protect those who protect us. "It's more than a contract. It's a privilege," he said.

Massicotte mentioned how they get letters from grateful soldiers about the trucks the company provides. With that idea in place that these products saves lives, it inspires the company to do its best to place vehicles in the right hands and offer emotional engagement with end-users to help generate appeal when it comes to sales.

Last up for the day was an outstanding session called "Beyond Segmentation: Connecting With Emerging Consumers."

Emotion was a key ingredient for Coca-Cola North America, said Reinaldo Padua, Assistant Vice President of Hispanic Marketing. One of the sodamaker's most successful campaigns tied the brand to a popular novela, essentially a Spanish soap opera, which was beloved by a large number of Hispanic mothers seeking escape from their own hectic lives. YouTube's Jeben Berg was also there, and he also said that emotional connection standouts amidst all the video clutter. One of the top reasons people turn to YouTube - music content - is popular for that very reason.

But Donna Sturgess, Global Head of Innovation for GlaxoSmithKline, was a real champion for the emotional cause. She argued that marketing tools that quantify emotion may play a big role in marketing in the future.

Segmentation as it is may not be the most accurate way to understand a consumer, she argued. For instance, a woman could splurge on Prada shoes, but still shop at Costco.

But emotions at the core don't segment across the standard, potentially misleading, lines.

"Working with emotions, we are not focused on differences," she said. "We are focused on what's similar among us."

As an example, she mentioned her company's diet pill, Alli. Weight loss as a sector triggers a great deal of emotion, she said. So many have tried diets that will not work, and are ashamed of their weight and appearance. And there are already so many weight loss pills out there confusing the marketplace.

So GlaxoSmithKline tried to stand out, by tapping into the emotions of its customers. In addition to a warm marketing message, Alli pills come with a specially designed small carrying case, that when held, feels to the consumer as if they are holding someone's hand.

This emotion-based marketing plays into a new book called Buyology, written by Martin Lindstrom. GlaxoSmithKline actually sponsored some of the research, Sturgess said. Recently, fellow Marketing News writer Elisabeth Sullivan interviewed Lindstrom. Look for that content in an upcoming issue.

That's it from me from Mplanet. I'm leaving Orlando sun for Chicago snow - but taking some lessons along with me.

Posted by Piet at 11:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Gearing up for a new day of sessions and speakers, including R.K. Krishna Kumar from Tata and Larry Grisolano, Senior Communication Strategist for Obama's Presidential Campaign.

Just a heads up - you can get more of your Mplanet fix by checking out the official Mplanet blog, and the Mplanet 2009 Twitter page.

We'll be checking in soon!

Posted by Piet at 6:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Mplanet delivered three full hours, but stimulating hours, of B2B marketing seminars Tuesday afternoon, chaired by experts from convention sponsor the Institute for the Study of Business Markets.

Session One: Leveraging B2B Brands to Increase Growth and Profitability.

The most intriguing method that stood out to me was an "I scratch your back, you scratch mine" sort of take. A classic example mentioned of a business utilizing its brand with another business was Dolby - where the company said it wanted its brand name and logo on stereo equipment, or else its customers would have to pay more. That takes, um, a lot of gumption, but hey, Dolby Surround Sound is now a distinguished symbol to consumers, and in turn, the business clients Dolby works with now have to seek out Dolby technology so they in turn can showcase the goods to their own consumers.

You can run into a chicken and the egg sort of scenario, acknowledged one of the guest speakers, Kathy Hall from Microban. The company she works for, which specializes in antimicrobial protection in everything from humidifiers to footwear, says her company has gained awareness by 27 % since 1998. But in the beginning, when Microban awareness was minimal, the trick was showcasing to clients that the company was the undisputed leader in its field, and convincing clients that a Microban product can help distinguish a client's own product from its competitors, just as Dell and Intel worked hand in hand to stand out from the rest of the computer competition.

The second session I hit: Why Most B2B Segmentation Fails and What to Do About It. Speakers Gary Lilien from ISBM and National Analysts CEO John Berrigan stressed that when it comes to segmentation, you need to execute it right, and that in turn requires that a company stick with its plan. Berrigan used Sprint as an example - after three failed segmentation attempts, the company evaluated the process, came up with a stronger set of key components, and stuck to a two-year plan. While two years is a long time - too long for some higher-ups to accept - Sprint eventually doubled its revenue at half the cost, Berrigan said.

Also speaking at the session was Brian Berg, General Manager of Marketing for The Timken Company. What Timken did was big, bold, and controversial - so much so, that a few Timken employees who did not agree with the company's new segmentation methods left, Berg said.

In 2005, the Ohio-based company, primarily a manufacturer of steel bearings, realized that despite strong sales, the shareholders were earning less than what Timken's competitors' stockholders were making. So Timken invested a lot of time and energy determining how much money it was making - or losing - from clients. Some of them were seen as big accounts by the sales team, but Berg said that those deals were actually costing Timken too much money compared to earnings. Essentially, Timken fired some of its own high profile clients to maximize dividends.

Executing that, in addition to rebranding the company overall to capitalize on other high growth areas in need of steel, led to some stunning results. By 2008, sales at Timken were ahead of the industry instead of behind it. And the year over year EPS growth rate for third quarter 2008 versus third quarter 2007 was up an astounding 216 %, according to the company's financials on MSN Money.

Fascinating lessons, all, and more to be had at Mplanet tomorrow.

Posted by Piet at 6:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

American Express Chief Marketing Officer John Hayes gave one of the best speeches at Mplanet today, in my personal opinion.

Here are a few of my favorite quotes:

“This generation will be defined by how we answer the economic hurdles that we face, how we respond not only to our current difficulties, but how we prepare our future generations for security, wealth and prosperity. It’s our time to step up. I don’t care if you’re 25 or 52. It’s up to us.”

“The only one who truly knows who we are is the consumer. The consumer is going through a massive shift in their behavior. People are redefining what’s possible, what’s real and what’s next.”

“We create hope. We create a better tomorrow.”

Hayes' advice:

1. Establish new customer listening posts, and engage with customers on as personal of a level as possible.

2. Don't just cower. Have the courage and perspective to bring about a positive change.

3. The world, and business, will move on without you if you're not constantly innovating.

Posted by Piet at 5:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The major message that marketers should take away from the successful Obama presidential campaign is that Americans want genuineness and substance in marketing today, said Larry Grisolano, the director of paid media and opinion research for Obama for America and Obama-Biden 2008. “People want to be communicated with, spoken to, like adults,” said Grisolano, who is now with political media firm AKPD in Chicago. Grisolano spoke with Marketing News during AMA’s Mplanet conference Tuesday.

Marketers today must seek to satisfy genuine consumer needs and bring meaning to the messages they deliver about their brands, Grisolano said during an interview at the Mplanet Studio in Orlando.

The Obama campaign team sensed a dissatisfaction with politics and politicians in America and so decided to define its campaign as a different sort of political effort, he explained. Once the Obama brand had been defined as one standing for change, subsequent decisions – such as not engaging in negative campaigning – flowed directly from that brand definition, Grisolano said.

Asked by a marketing blogger what lessons the campaign had in regard to targeting younger consumers, Grisolano advised speaking to younger consumers in their own language and again came back to genuineness, saying “keep it real with a young audience.”

Posted by John at 5:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

"Today, as we take a look at the landscape, what we see is a very rocky terrain," the American Marketing Association's CEO, Dennis Dunlap, said at the start of his presentation this morning at the AMA's Mplanet conference in Orlando.

The economy is, well, what it is, and marketers now face challenges ranging from increasing globilization and a burgeoning competitive landscape to the convergence of old and new media and the growing need for marketers to prove their worth in their organizations. It's a wild and woolly world out there, and marketers sure could use some guidance.

Thank goodness for those adventurous marketers who've gone before us, who can serve as guideposts to help us navigate this new "marketsphere." This morning's Mplanet speakers shared insights, ideas, experience and best practices to help marketers chart their own courses.

Dunlap headed up the morning's sessions by presenting an overview of the findings from AMA research conducted last year by Decision Strategies International on a very consequential topic: The Future Role of Marketing in the Organization.

The research unearthed 80 different forces-- both trends and uncertainties-- that might shape marketing's future role and honed in on the two "key meta uncertainties" that will have a hand in shaping marketers' roles:

1. System-wide resources for marketers
2. Organizational structure

We'll have more on the findings later, but for now, let's touch on some key points made in two of the sessions that followed Dunlap's presentation this morning.

Anne Mulcahy, chairman and CEO of Xerox Corp., kicked off her presentation on "Getting Heard in a Sea of Information" with an appropriate nautical metaphor: "What we used to call the hurricane of information has now become a tsunami," she said. There are hundreds of emails in our inboxes, thousands of blogs created each day, hundreds of millions of Web sites vying for our attention. How can a marketer craft a message that will stand out?

Easy, Mulcahy said. Make your message personal. The holy grail of marketing-- one-to-one communication-- "is finally within our grasp," she said. Marketers have so many tools at their fingertips with which they can listen to their customers, understand their needs and solve their problems. And if marketers do listen, really listen, they can make every customer touch point count-- for both the marketer and the customer.

"We look at every customer-facing document as a potential revenue producer," she said. When a message is so personalized that it services the customer in a relevant way, "that is the kind of communication that's breaking through the clutter."

Mary Dillon, EVP and global CMO of McDonald's, followed up on customer-focused strategies in her presentation, "Building Strategic Advantage in Global Markets." McDonald's restaurants are located in more than 100 countries around the world and serve approximately 58 million customers each day, Dillon said, and yet McDonald's strives to make every single experience that global customers have with the brand relevant.

That said, McDonald's worked to create a consistent, well-defined brand identity and brand promise that it could make good on at every location around the world. "We put a stake in the ground and we crystallized what we stand for, our brand promise," Dillon said. Your brand promise needs to be a part of your company's DNA so that it's genuine, but also it must be aspirational, she said. ""It's your brand on its very best day."

For McDonald's, which measures success by how well it meets its goals of quality, service, cleanliness and value, the brand promise is this: "simple, easy enjoyment."

"Think about your brand promise as a beacon that guides your actions," Dillon advised.

I'll be back with more insights from Mplanet later today, but in the meantime, please feel free to chime in and tell us how you're listening to and connecting with your customers, and fulfilling your own brand promise.

Posted by Elisabeth at 11:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The recession will put a damper on the use of digital marketing in the near-term, but within three or four months, organizations will turn to digital as they seek ways to make money in these difficult times, predicted Julie Fleischer, vice president of digital agency Digitas, in a talk she delivered to a digital workshop at AMA’ Mplanet conference Monday.

Digital is still in its infancy, so Fleischer advised questioning all assumptions about measurement and other aspects of campaigns.

One way for agencies to show the value of digital is to do campaigns for smaller non-profits willing to experiment, noted Stephen Wayhart, managing director of BrandMill, a Pittsburgh agency. during audience participation in Fleischer’s talk, Wayhart explained how he worked with his former high school and a fraternal organization on digital first.

Successful campaigns with them gave him results he could show other clients considering digital, he said.

Posted by John at 3:49 PM | Permalink

Amidst a flurry of networking, Twittering, Facebooking and feasting on oversized pretzels, a few marketing reps enlightened a few hundred of their peers Thursday at a blogcouncil-sponsored BlogWell event.

The afternoon seminar in Chicago showcased eight different presentations of how major companies, and even the Mayo Clinic and US Coast Guard, were using cheap social media to spread positive word of mouth campaigns. Key speakers included reps from the blogcouncil (a group of corporate marketing execs in charge of social media), who in turn represented companies and brands such as Procter & Gamble, The Home Depot, Allstate, H&R Block, Sharpie, and Molson Beer.

Hearing interesting beer facts from Molson's Adam Moffat, such as why a frozen mug isn't best (he says it oxidizes beer, causing it to go stale), was certainly a highlight. But from a business standpoint, the two presentations I found most interesting were put on by the Mayo Clinic and Sharpie. Both of those presentations talked about some of the expenses behind remarkably low-cost social media campaigns. And of course low-cost is key to marketing this year.

Mayo's Aase showed off a tiny Flip Video Camcorder, which can plug directly into a USB drive. Aase claims that the audio from a video segment was good enough for a CBS News radio program, and a video interview was embedded with a Wall Street Journal story the day after being filmed. The Mayo team also use it to create content for the clinic's own YouTube channel and for videos on its blogs, such as the brand new feelgood Sharing Mayo Clinic blog, which showcases patient and employee stories. And Aase says the camera only costs $150 to $200.

Sharpie's in the beginning stages with its social media campaign, but its off to a promising start. They just launched a sweet-looking blog on the main Web site, which showcases Sharpie fan art and celeb Sharpie sightings. Sharpie's Susan Wassel said she manages the blog totally on her own in addition to her regular marketing work. The overall additional company cost for this new blog - less than $2000, most of it spent on designing the masthead.

The BlogWell event was a pretty sweet scene, but a much bigger shindig approaches. Come Monday I'll be abandoning my much loved but mighty freezing Chicago homeland for sunny Orlando. AMA's Mplanet event is next week (finally!) and yours truly will be there to soak it all in. Keep an eye out on the Marketing News blog next Monday through Thursday for updates from myself, John Frank and Elisabeth Sullivan. We'll also be posting on the Mplanet blog and the Mplanet Twitter page.

Enjoy the weekend!

Posted by Piet at 10:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Forget all the Obama-related marketing ploys. The most interesting marketing tactic this week (aside from my free Inauguration-related Krispy Kreme doughnut) had nothing to do with our new President.

It happened the night before Barack Obama was sworn into office.

I was nestled on the couch watching one of my wife's favorite shows, ABC's reality dating series "The Bachelor." Hunky single pop Jason had just gone on a date with friendly single mom Stephanie, culiminating in a helicopter shot of a beach at sunset, set to a typical non-descript reality show soundtrack.

The next image: a helicopter shot of an anonymous woman windsailing over a body of water. That "Bachelor"-esque music picks up again. Then all of a sudden, the woman addresses the camera, and starts talking about Claritin.

Without even knowing it, I was watching an ad.

ABC and Claritin had teamed up to make a DVR-proof spot, at least for a few seconds. Typically on reality shows like this, there's a "coming-up" montage that plays before the commercial break. And if you're like me, that's the exact moment you pick up the Tivo controller and bdup bdup your way past the commercials to the next scene.

But in this example, there was no preview of scenes to come, and the sequence of images and sounds blended seamlessly from show to commerical. Before I even knew what happened, I was out of "The Bachelor" and in the clutches of Claritin.

As soon as I knew I was in a commercial, instinct kicked in, and I skipped the rest of the ad. But I was nevertheless intrigued by ABC and Claritin's new way to beat the DVR system, which arguably has had a negative impact on television advertising and network revenue. Chances are more people saw the first few seconds of that Claritin commerical than any other during the two-hour broadcast.

Which brings me to this point - Could this "deception" sabotage Claritin's efforts to make a positive impact? I can safely say that if I wasn't a writer for a magazine obsessed with marketing trends, I would be pretty annoyed by this ploy. But then again, Claritin did stand out compared to all the other commercials that aired during the broadcast. To tell you the truth, that's the only one I remember (partially) watching that night.

Thoughts, anyone? Do you think this sort of tactic helps or hurts a brand? And will other networks and advertisers follow its example?

Posted by Piet at 4:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Next week's inauguration of President-Elect Barack Obama has spawned a shadow market of products for sale--T-shirts, bottled water, posters, buttons--so much so you'd think his campaign to win American votes was still on. Here in Obama's adopted hometown of Chicago, the newspapers are already featuring special sections on inauguration, still a week away.

Today's Chicago Tribune featured an article on the various products that are selling like hotcakes and the food section of the paper featured recipes that highlighted Obama's heritage, including an odd Spam-made sushi thing (no thanks).
But it's not only Chicagoans that are finding a seat on the Obama bandwagon-marketing vehicle. The Hollywood Reporter writes that MSNBC.com is attaching its name to the inauguration by booking 27 movie theaters to show the parade and ceremony live on the big screen free of charge, but tickets require registration at MSNBC.com. For a news outlet, it'll make great impact with word of mouth.

On a fun note, Paste magazine lets you make the Obama madness personal. A knock-off version of the red, white and blue illustration poster designed by Shepard Fairey and used during the campaign can now feature YOU!
Are you taking advantage of the marketing phenom that is Obama? Maybe throwing an office party with Obama cupcakes? Tell us about it!

Posted by Allison at 3:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

As if gratuitous nudity and violence, in 3-D no less, wasn't enticing enough for horror hounds, Lionsgate is encouraging attendants of its new horror flick "My Bloody Valentine 3-D" to get drunk before catching the upcoming fright flick.

I stumbled across a new banner ad for the movie while reading up on the Golden Globe winners over at the Chicago Tribune site. Methinks devotees of "Slumdog Millionaire" and Kate Winslet movies would go nowhere near a schlock flick like "Valentine," but I suppose the film's pickax slinging serial killer has widespread cinematic appeal?

Anyway, the ad's tagline reads: "It's Actually '4D' If You're Wasted!" Here's the link to the Trib web page, although chances are the ad may not pop up for you there. You can see a variation on the ad at this blog.

Now advertising sex and violence is nothing new for horror flicks - and "Valentine" has been doing just that in the TV spots. And naturally it's trumpeting the 3-D gimmick - although only about 900 theaters will actually be able to show it in 3-D, according to The New York Times. But for a film's marketing campaign to actually go out and advocate for public intoxication at a theater seems like trouble to me.

While there's nothing illegal about a movie's depictions of decapitations - tasteless though it can often be - public intoxication at a movie theater is illegal, and drunk driving to and/or from the theater is illegal and dangerous. And I'm sure theaters and theatergoers don't want to deal with unruly, drunken guests.

So why is Lionsgate promoting drunken viewings? I suppose to hype up "Valentine" as the ultimate party film. And perhaps to create a little controversy and buzz. I'm blogging about it, aren't I?

Then again, will the ad actually inspire mass drunkeness at "Valentine" screenings this weekend? It's unlikely, and here's hoping so, since the tag line is still being sparsely used, and nowhere to be found in the much more visible TV spots. At least, for now.

Posted by Piet at 3:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Happy 2009 Marketing News Blog readers! I'm Piet Levy, the new writer on the Marketing News staff.

First off, to answer the question everyone asks me: my name is pronounced P-yet. Allegedly it's the French pronunciation of a Dutch name. I'm not Dutch, but my Dad is French, and both my parents are big fans of the artist Piet Mondrian, and clearly Mondrian's first name.

I've been doing the journalism thing since 2001, my first year at college, and have covered a wide variety of newspaper beats, from pop culture to religion to police reporting to health. But many of my favorite pieces, like this feature for the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, have had a marketing component to them, so I'm thrilled to be writing and blogging about marketing full time.

Starting right now.

So watching TV New Year's Eve while waiting for the crystal ball to drop, my screen was suddenly awash in a flash of bright colors and cheery words like "Optimism," "Joy" and "Hooray!" And at the center of it all - Pepsi's revised logo, the tell-tale sign of a new marketing campaign. See the spot below:

I talked to my editor John Frank about the ad yesterday, and he said exactly what I was thinking the moment I saw the spot - he thought it was a Barack Obama ad.

The similarities are striking - so much so that the Obama logo will instantly pop up following a Google search for "New Pepsi Logo". For starters, there are the campaigns' sense of unyielding optimism, so apparent in the Pepsi spot that the word is spelled out across the screen. The Obama logo and Pepsi logos both are reflective of the letter "O" - in the Pepsi ad, the logo actually fills in for the "O"s in words like "Joy" and "Hooray." There's the red, white and blue color scheme, featured in both logos, and the layered colors in both spots are at an eye-catching slant.

The difference though - really the only one I could spot - was that the Obama logo color scheme, top to bottom, is blue, white and red. Pepsi has the blue and red flipped for their logo, which traditionally has been the case. That, and the fact that Pepsi didn't opt to use the popular Obama catchphrase, "Hope," in the first spot. (The comparisons would have been way too obvious if it had).

Nevertheless, it seems that Pepsi is borrowing very heavily from the Obama playbook, or so says the blogosphere (self included). But while the iconic Obama logo and upbeat marketing message seemed to work for our next president, will the elements translate into a positive Pepsi campaign? Or will the targeted millennial market reject the Pepsi campaign as a mere copycat of the original Obama way? Time will surely tell, but as always we're interested to read your thoughts. Feel free to post away!

Posted by Piet at 9:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

The National Hockey League, with its renewed marketing prowess, put on a fine show yesterday at the 2009 NHL Winter Classic.

The league's second-annual outdoor hockey game took place at Wrigley Field, home of Major League Baseball's Chicago Cubs, and featured the latest match-up in the long-standing rivalry between the Chicago Blackhawks and the Detroit Red Wings. The crowd most certainly was more representative of both teams' existing fan bases than of new hockey fans or fans of other teams, but by design, the league took center stage.

Events like the Winter Classic are integral elements in the NHL's new marketing strategy to push hockey fans beyond their tribal mentality and to drive interest in the league as a whole. It seems that the league accomplished its goals yesterday, as Blackhawks fans-- though understandably gloomy following their team's loss-- were cheered by the overall uniqueness of this hockey experience.

And if the action on the ice situated in Wrigley Field's shallow center wasn't novel enough to hold the boisterous crowd's attention, the marketing extras sure were.

Anyone familiar with Wrigley Field knows that sponsors' signage long had been restricted to the concourses and the famous rooftops surrounding the park. Recently, the team consented to adding a few sponsors' logos on the famous ivy-covered walls, but brands and logos still are scarce in the historic ballpark.

Yesterday, though, while an ice rink and a thin layer of snow covered all but the field's pitcher's mound, the place was transformed. Logos for sponsors including Reebok, Bridgestone, Bud Light, Verizon, XM and McDonald's encircled the rink's boards in normal hockey fashion, ran along a false wall of ivy-imprinted banners that stood in front of the actual brick of the home run fence, and popped up on digital boards here and there throughout the park. [Even Miller Light changed its billboard (situated across the street from the park but visible from the stands) for the occasion to "T-T-Tastes G-G-Great."]

Of course, the NHL also scored on the marketing front with heavy news coverage leading up to and through the game, as the very existence of this event is a powerful PR tactic.

Happy New Year, indeed.

Posted by Elisabeth at 12:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)