By Robert Wheatley

Generational shift ushers in new era

With uncertain market conditions, upheaval in traditional communications channels and consumer behavior in a constant state of flux, it simply doesn’t pay to assume what you did this year and the “rules” that governed your strategic thinking, should remain unchanged in the year ahead.

Continued expansion of niche markets and the evolution of sub-segments of consumer “tribes” will remain as a constant. The product development world still favors mass customization and segmentation in nearly every category. Consumers also show an unrelenting desire to congregate socially in communities of shared interest.

That said there are over-arching trends that should be considered as we look towards communicating effectively in 2009. Roy Williams had an insightful post in November at his Monday Morning Memo blog that built off a book titled Generations, published in 2003. The book chronicles a curious behavior in Western society the authors assert is as predictable as the sunrise and set: a generational pendulum swing that moves back and forth between an Idealist mindset and a Civic perspective.

Baby boomers (I am one of them) may have been one of the most obvious examples of this collective attitude shift when, in 1963 a new era of Idealism was introduced. Says Williams – “By the end of 2008 there won’t be a Baby Boomer left in America. The last reluctant holdout will finally admit that Woodstock is over, Kennedy is dead and the Idealism of the 60’s was a wistful dream.” Williams makes the case the final move to the other side of the pendulum swing, — to a Civic point of view — will be complete at the end of this year.

This new global mindset should be factored into communications and selling strategy in the year ahead. Here in summary are several of Williams’ recommendations:

Efficiency is the new service

With busy lifestyles getting busier and communications technology allowing for instant access to information on what products to buy and where, consumers will be looking for a combination of quality, price and quickness. In this scenario, efficiency in customer interaction wins out over high touch, relationship selling.

Authenticity reigns supreme

Today’s consumer comes equipped with the most highly refined bullshit detector ever devised. It is sensitive, accurate and always on. So in today’s era of “conversational” marketing and consumer control if you don’t or won’t admit a mistake or misstep, they may not believe the other things you have to say. Keep it real!!

Horizontal connectedness

Gone now are the days of defined and categorized vertical social worlds. Labels like white collar, blue collar are not salient. The new American dream isn’t about pulling ahead of others, it’s about being a productive team member. Winning is less important than belonging.

The new mass media is… word of mouth

Technology is empowering. It is also unforgiving in its ability to facilitate radical change. Now we have instant access to everything. Viral marketing was not created by an agency. It is an outgrowth of a horizontally connected world where people share their discoveries, and work to help each other avoid mistakes.

Stop boasting

Talk is cheap. And as we’ve said repeatedly in this blog, actions speak louder than words. Telling people what you believe is not the same as showing them. What are the “proofs of claim” in your communications? How can consumers experience these things for themselves? Messaging about how great you are is less compelling.

So here’s the call to action for 2009: what higher strategic purpose can your brand align itself with that transcends the obvious “I’m trying to make a sale here” interaction with consumers? How can you be more genuine, authentic, credible with consumers who expect brands they prefer to be a reflection of their own needs and passions?

Says Williams – “In the words of Bill Bernbach, I’ve got a great gimmick. Let’s tell the truth.”

Can “Value Attribution” Confound Brand Communications?

Note: forgive the long post, but this stuff was too interesting not to pass along…

For the most part we operate as marketers and communicators day-in and day-out with a built in assumption that consumers listen to us, understand us and act accordingly. Of course, there’s ongoing debate about the real level of listening. Well, it also seems there’s the possibility that our messages are misconstrued or misunderstood or misinterpreted due to some funny ways humans operate to process information.

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Mexican Beer? What brand is first in your head?

For many it would be Corona, the leading Mexican import and share leader of the entire import beer category. People buy categories first and the top of mind brands within those mental brackets. Energy drink: it’s Red Bull. Heavy motorcycles: it’s Harley. European style coffee drinks: it’s Starbucks. And so on. In the February 19th edition of AdAge, marketing guru, Al Ries, has a wonderful column on category creation and its central role in successful brand and business strategy. His example is Nintendo’s runaway success with Wii - not a better or more powerful video-game console, a different one that represents development of a new category in the digital gaming battle.

“There is no best auto company, there is no best car. You’re really competing now to be unique. One can still be a large company by meeting a very well chosen set of needs. Whole Foods is not trying to be a great food retailer. It is trying to meet the needs of a certain set of customers. Those customers view the 183-store chain’s eco-friendly ethos as representative of a healthy, socially responsible lifestyle they want to identify with.” Michael Porter, Harvard Business School.

The driving force behind uniqueness can be best expressed as the search for different. The outcome of that search most certainly can be the launch of a new category where a brand rightfully claims its innovation and leadership mantle. As Ries said in his column: “Marketing is a battle of categories…Creating a category and then branding that category in such a way that your brand is perceived as the innovator and leader is the essence of marketing today…The brand is only a marker for the category itself.”

So often the conversation in branding circles is about being better. Who is going to argue with continuous improvement, right? But the battleground has changed with product proliferation (too many products chasing too few consumers) and commoditization forces working to turn brands into blands. The first order of business these days is no longer just differentiation — it’s radical differentiation. And the end game is the development of new categories that a brand can be number one in.

This is the ultimate re-definition of thinking outside the box — by creating new boxes that in turn become the mental shorthand for consumer brand selection and preference.

In yesterday’s New York Times, Louise Story has done a wonderful job discussing media saturation and excess. Her take on the issue is the increasing use of what’s called “alternative media” or perhaps better put: crazy places for a product message. In an effort to be distinctive in a world rapidly being commoditized by sameness in every form of communications execution, the answer from many corners in the persuasion game is literally to secure brand exposure on any available two-dimensional surface: shopping carts, floors in supermarkets, airline tray table liners, men’s urinal wall-scapes, doctor examination table paper liners. To the point of conducting a form of sensory invasion, an absurd kind of siege on consumer eyeballs.

The answer, it appears, to ad and communications clutter — yes here it is folks (pause for dramatic effect) is…more clutter. One ad exec quoted in the article opines that “ubiquity is the new exclusivity,” be it an ad, promotion, online channel or any other turn in the media space. Media is now re-defined to mean anything, anytime, everywhere - including, but not limited to, foreheads. Yes, there’s even an agency touting forehead marketing as the new buzz generating solution.

This occurs despite mounting evidence about what consumers are doing in reaction to the senseless sensory overload. They are just working harder to tune out, to ignore, to pass over and eliminate one-way push style messages from sources that by definition lack relevance and engagement - let alone credibility.

Fighting fire with gasoline

Faced with more messages in more venues coming from more products in more categories that clamor for limited mental attention — often in the same media vehicles — the temptation is to raise the brand voice even louder in an effort to be heard above the din. Worried about the decline of audience numbers in conventional media outlets, concerned about the splintering of media generally as special interests siphon off audiences, looking for an answer with TIVO-ing that anoints the so-called “target audience” with a sinister form of avoidance control? The answer, as in gas on a fire, is not to fight the problem with more of the same.

In his excellent book on brand strategy called ZAG, author Marty Neumeier maps the clutter calculus - in 1960 there were 8,400 magazine titles, 440 radio stations, and six TV networks. Today there are 12,000 magazines, 13,500 radio stations, 85 TV channels (probably conservative), and 25,000 Internet broadcast channels. In 1965, there were an average 20,000 items in supermarkets to choose from - now it’s more than 40,000. In 2005, 195,000 book titles were published. That same year 40 billion product catalogs were published. More financial transactions are conducted in a day now than occurred over the course of a year in 1965. The point is: product clutter, ad clutter, message clutter, media clutter - all occurring at once. The human answer to this media saturation tsunami is simple: erect mental barriers and ignore most of it.

Engagement and relevance: the new paradigm for permission to enter

The answer isn’t toilet seat messaging or other forms of invasion, rather it’s about relevance to the lifestyles of the consumer you’re trying to reach. It’s about educational forms of communication that can carry information and ideas of intrinsic value to the audience. For P&G it was parenting information and advice at their overhauled web site for Pampers. This is by definition an unselfish kind of outreach intended to establish a relationship and a conversation - not just polish a sales message. Marketers spend money on communications with a purpose in mind: to affect changes in behavior, to cause an action most often described as a purchase. Yet, we’re now operating in a world where the consumer is in charge and votes daily on what will be let in and what will be kept out.

Doesn’t it make sense then that understanding the lifestyle interests and concerns of a brand’s audience, and looking for ways to help consumers realize their personal passions is a better idea than chasing them around the room with an even bigger media gong. More than at any other time in the history of marketing, our challenge as experts in the field is strategy. Looking for the unique coalescence of brand and consumer interests. Our job is to serve these interests and in doing so to earn our way into their confidence and trust. One thing is for sure, you can no longer just buy your way in through sheer tonnage in media.