Ideo: Not a case of shoemaker's children syndrome

The global design and brand consultancy, Ideo, recently turned its brand- and business-building attention on itself. A recent post at fastcodesign.com looks at the rebranding process the firm used to focus on "intent, not just presence":  "The brief the [Ideo] designers received that morning didn't just ask them to come up with a new identity system for Ideo. It asked them to come up wit a new way of thinking about corporate identity altogether."

The process set up by Ideo is interesting for at least two attributes. First, it started out with an acknowledgement that it's almost too easy, with the digital technologies available today to designers, to express variation and contextual change -- but harder to articulate an enduring, yet "responsive identity." Second, the one-day, multi-office kick-off project for the rebranding was a kind of selective crowdsourcing; results of this phase will be subjected to a smaller, perhaps more conventional review and decision-making.

The Ideo rebranding process is also profiled at core77.

"UCONN" -- it's offical

brandchannel reports today that the University of Connecticut has re-branded itself using the name by which it has been known for some time.

Why BIC is not an online degree

David Brooks
Columnist, The New York Times

David Brooks at The New York Times wrote on April 5 a column on "The Practical University."  He writes, " . . . universities are places where young people acquire two sorts of knowledge . . . technical knowledge and practical knowledge. Technical knowledge is the sort of knowledge you need to understand a task -- the statistical knowledge you need to understand what market researchers do, the biological knowledge you need to grasp the basics of what nurses do. Technical knowledge is . . . the sort of knowledge that can be captured in lectures and bullet points and memorized by rote.

"Practical knowledge is not about what you do, but about how you do it. It is the wisdom a great chef possesses that cannot be found in recipe books. Practical knowledge is not the sort of knowledge that can be taught and memorized; it can only be imparted and absorbed. It is not reducible to rules; it only exists in practice."

Brooks notes that online education has proven to be as effective as sitting in class lectures -- and that's a good thing.  Good (great) lectures from the best professors in the world can now be available to anyone with an internet connection. We need more, not less, online study and academic resources.

But for practical knowledge you need, well, "practice" -- your own and the examples of others (this sounds like the Buddhist or Yogic terminology of "having a practice" -- contemplation, physical discipline, etc.  You just gotta do it; talking or reading about it isn't enough).

The new Master's program in Branding + Integrated Communications at CCNY will provide young marketing communications professionals with the information and data that they need for success in the industry today. But we will also be providing BIC students with the practice -- in the classroom and in the workplaces of communications enterprises -- of marketing communications today.

Bad girl branding

Marian Salzman
Chair, Havas PR

Marian Salzman, chair of Havas PR since 2011, wrote at Forbes this week about bad girl branding.  Salzman summarizes key points from Nancy Shenker, founder of the business development consultancy theONswitch.

Some advice if you want to brand yourself (or your company) as a bad girl (boy):

Don't be afraid to be the weird kid.

No one has ever been fired for innovation.

Confront bullies.

Use logic, facts and statistics to sell your ideas.

Be a big provocative in your choices of words and speech.

Bribing people with food and other treats always works.

Rise above the gossip, bitch slapping and emotional crap. It's not personal . . . it's business.

Even services need a brand

David Johnson, CEO of Strategic Vision, LLC in Atlanta, posts at CommPRO.biz about the necessity for service companies to be concerned about their brand and their customers' brand experience.  He writes, "Sadly, we see way too many 'service oriented' companies out there that say their brand is all about integrity and reliability, or some other overly used and vapid term. Please understand this just positions you and makes you sound all the more like a commodity." He's certainly right -- think of the greatest service brands -- Amazon (after all, they just provide services -- selling and delivering to you other peoples' stuff: "We seek to be Earth's most customer-centric company for four primary customer sets: consumers, sellers, enterprises, and content creators"); McKinsey  ("Our mission is to help our clients make distinctive, lasting, and substantial improvements in their performance" ), IBM (see John Iwata, IBM's SVP Marketing and Communications, discuss the IBM brand, here).

Weber Shandwick stakes out content creation territory as its own

Jason Wellcome, EVP Digital
Weber Shandwick

PRNewser followed up on March 28 its previous reporting on PR firms grabbing hard and fast onto the content creation model for a reconfigured agency services biz model. Weber Shandwick's digital EVP, Jason Wellcome, makes the agency's own brand claim -- 'every agency client becomes a media company /publisher, and the new Weber Shandwick divison, Mediaco, has assembled the talent and skills to deliver the new model.'

AdAge positions it a bit differently: "Weber Shandwick Sets Up New Unit to  Capitalize on Content Creation Craze."

Branding + integrated communications business models at the big agencies

PRNewser reported today about how major agencies (McCann, WeberShandwick, Edelman) are adapting their business models to provide professional services that straddle the ad-PR divide and the traditional-digital media divides. The topic, of course, isn't new; it just gets reformulated as the technologies continue to reconfigure how consumers gain information, form opinion, and fulfill transactions.

These are the kinds of enterprises at which our future BIC graduates will build their careers.

2013 best retail brands

Interbrand has released its 2013 report on Best Retail Brands.  Biggest gains in reputation this year are shown by Macy's and Amazon -- each in its own way demonstrating it is "best in class" with consumers.  Perhaps significant, brands with more specific positioning -- in some ways more distinctive in product offering -- fared much worse: examples are Abercrombie & Fitch and Toys R Us.  Forbes magazine coverage, here.

Inside the FutureBrand - American Airline rebranding

PRNewser posted today an outline of the decision making process that led American Airlines and FutureBrand to the new logo and airplane design.

IBM: brand as -- only as -- corporate character

Jon Iwata, SVP Marketing and Communications (left)
with Harris Diamond, Chairman and CEO, McCann Worldgroup
at the 2012 Global PR Summit

Jon Iwata, IBM Senior Vice President, Marketing and Communications, narrates a new  2 1/2-minute video, "IBM on Brand."

Jon makes the assertion that IBM has never defined its brand -- and it certainly has never defined its brand by products it has made (otherwise, we would have our minds cluttered up with associations to IBM of things like punch-cards, Selectric typewriters and ThinkPads. Which they don't make anymore. Which are not IBM).

Jon says: "We do't try to manage the IBM brand, we try to manage our character as a business."  If we're not going to define our brand by what we make, what defines us? ... and it comes back to this notion of our corporate character, our belief system, and our purpose and our mission. And what makes us "Us."  If we take care of that, the brand takes care of itself."

CCNY MCA's new Master's program featured in Ad Age

Belle Frank, EVP-Global Director
Young & Rubicam
and BIC Adviser

A new Ad Age feature on the necessity for aspiring advertising professionals to hone their data analytic skills cites the creation of CCNY MCA's new Branding + Integrated Communications Master's program, and quotes our adviser, Belle Frank, EVP-Global Director, Strategy & Research, at Y&R.

What's that advertising professional of the future going to be like? "The next-generation advertising exec will be a data geek with the soul of an artist, the business acumen of Warren Buffet and the storytelling skills of Don Draper "

News on the hipster branding front

Just in case you're not following it -- PRNewser is keeping us posted on developments in hipster branding.

Harris Poll 2013 Reputation Quotient puts Amazon on top

Online pollster Harris Interactive released in February  its 2013 Harris Poll Reputation Quotient for corporate America in February showing the public taking a more pragmatic and positive view of corporate reputation -- generally rating corporate America more positively. The top five companies in America are Amazon, Apple, Disney, Google, and J&J.  The bottom of the list?  Financial services giants, Halliburton, and American Airlines.

Tech companies have an edge in getting the good reputation scores from Harris.  The research company also asserts that to "play a valuable social role" is a key driver of reputation -- a theme reported widely, such as here by PRMediaBlog.

Google discusses Art, Copy & Code -- a partnership with brands to develop state-of-the-art digital ads

Google, one of the most powerful channels for advertising today, is also maneuvering its way into creating ads. Last week, the Google | Official Blog posted about its new project, Art, Copy & Code -- "a program to partner with advertisers and agencies to re-imagine how brands tell stories in a connected world. . . . a series of projects and experiments to show how creativity and technology can work hand in hand . . . through a whole range of digital tools."

The project (wouldn't you know) even has its own trademarked slogan: Advertising Re-imagined.

The post goes on to give a preview into its first project for Volkswagen.

Art, Copy & Code was presented at SXSW yesterday by a panel consisting of Aman Govil, Product Marketing Manager, and Ben Malbon, Managing Director of the Creative Lab at Google, along with Kevin Mayer, VP Marketing from Volkswagen and Winston Binch, Chief Digital Officer at Deutsch Advertising.  Engadget, among many others, announced over the past few days.

You can subscribe for updates on Art, Copy & Code, here.  Facebook page, here.

Bad news for Detroit brands

Consumer Reports' auto top picks for 2013 have the Japanese brands leaving Detroit in the dust.

This, from Automotive News, says it all: "For the first time in several years, Detroit automakers did not claim the top spot in any vehicle segment, continuing their longstanding struggles in the magazine's rankings.

"Consumer Reports, an influential shopping guide with 8 million magazine subscribers, said the six lowest-rated brands were Buick, Chrysler, Ford, Lincoln, Jeep and Dodge."

GfK on tech trends of 2013

Global market research firm, GfK, has published "Tech Trends 2013" which explores several ways in which technology is helping brands know consumers (and vice versa) in more powerful ways. A PDF can be downloaded here, and a short video on "The brand of me" provides an intro.

GfK has a suite of brand research offerings packaged as Brand Value Optimization.

Supply chain and waste stream as fashion brand attributes

Do you know where your leather comes from?

Lucy Siegle reports in The Observer about how Gucci and other fashion brands are beginning to acknowledge their responsibility and influence over the whole supply chain -- in her example, particularly, about how quality leathers and other materials are sourced and processed sustainably and safely. On their own initiatives and in cooperation with NGOs such as the Green Carpet Challenge (GCC), brands are working "to raise the profile of ethics in the global fashion industry."

Willie Nelson and Emmy Rossum help launch
H&M's global recycling program
at Global Green's 10th annual Pre-Oscar party.
Photo: EnergyDigital

In a related story, H&M announced on February 21 a new garment recycling program which includes in-store discounts for consumers who bring in a bag of garments to be recycled.

So God made a designer

David Brier,
Chief Gravity Defyer, DBD International

Fun -- and insightful -- video, ripping off the Dodge Ram Superbowl ad. DBD International's brand identity specialist, David Brier, produced the video and blogged about it at Fast Company.

Latest dispatch from the cola war

Marc Jacobs-designed Coke cans

brandchannel provides a report on the latest dueling videos from Coca-Cola and Pepsi, as well as previews the new Marc Jacobs-designed Coke cans.

(Historical note: CCNY alum David Finn and his partner, Bill Ruder, created the their first company, Art and Industry, Inc., (later to become Ruder Finn, Inc.)  to provide a link between well-known artists and designers with commercial product manufacturers to -- well, to do what Coke and Marc Jacobs are doing 60+ years later.)

Best practices for branded content

Rob Norman, Chief Digital Officer, GroupM

Rob Norman, GroupM Chief Digital Officer and long-time friend and supporter of CCNY Media & Communication Arts (Tumbler: On Demand), recently provided some great, succinct insights in an interview on Beet.TV about "best practices for branded content."   (Full disclosure: The American Miniature Schnauzer Club is not a client.)

BIC Summit BIG success

On January 23, 2013, The City College of New York new Master's program in Branding + Integrated Communications was launched with a Curriculum Summit that was attended by over 70 guests from Manhattan advertising, branding, digital, PR, and research firms along with academics.

It wasn't just great to see new faces and good friends, but to hear the buzz of exciting ideas. After getting caffeinated and hearing a brief presentation on the BIC launch, working groups got together in ten tables of six to explore the big challenges facing the communications industry today and what types of leaders will shape the future. 

Also check out the BIC Summit Gallery on the navigation bar, above.

L to R: Eric Weitz, Dean of Humanities & the Arts, CCNY;
Nancy R. Tag, Chair, Media & Communication Arts, CCNY;
Donna Rennella, President, ABW Solutions, Inc.

Belle Frank, EVP, Global Director
of Strategy and Research, Young & Rubicam
welcomed guests at the BIC Curriculum Summit

Barri Rafferty, CEO North America, Ketchum;
Bill Murray, COO, Public Relations Society of America

Rob Norman, Chief Digital Officer, GroupM Global (center)

Janice Rotchstein, Chief Quality Officer, Edelman PR;
Prof. Lynn Appelbaum, Director, Advertising/PR Program, CCNY

Hayes Roth (center), Chief Marketing Office of Landor,
leads a BIC curriculum discussion.

CCNY Media and Communication Arts faculty members,
Gerardo Blumenkrantz (center) and
Lynne Scott Jackson (right)

Social Media Week begins -- globally -- today

Social Media Week, February 2013, begins Monday, February 18 -- from Copenhagen, Hamburg, Lagos, Miami, Milan, New York, Paris, Singapore, Tokyo, Washington DC and . . .

Check out the schedules, get the mobile app, watch live streaming from around the world, get the hashtags and FB pages, etc. all at the SMW website "How to Follow & Share SMW13" page.

Follow the New York news feed / blog here.

The case for a "fluid brand"

Jose Martinez-Salmeron
Executive Creative Director
social@Ogilvy

Jose Martinez Salmeron, Executive Creative Director at Social@Ogilvy, blogs at SmashingMagazine.com about "the practice of branding . . . undergoing a deep transformation."

Salmeron makes the case -- perhaps counter-intuitively for the some -- against brand consistency. He quotes from a 2012 HBR blog by Grant McCracken: "'The consumer now appears to believe that the brand should earn its public attention the way all of us must. Say boring, repetitive stuff and you suffer the punishment that every bad conversationalist faces. First, we ignore you. Then, we exclude you.'"

Salmeron makes the case, variously, for "fluid brands," "dynamic rebranding," and, in general, a bit of playfulness -- or "the brand as an ecosystem of interactions . . . brand identity definition is no longer a one-way street."  He shows with several recent re-branding efforts that "Beyond formal considerations, a brand is also defined by experiential parameters (and now more than ever): how and where do customers interact with a given brand, online and offline."

Challenges of a mobile-only audience

Cory Bergman, General Manager,
Breaking News

Cory Bergman, GM of Breaking News, a mobile-first start-up owned by NBC News Digital, last week posted on Poynter.org about the business -- and, by extension, branding -- concerns of news organizations facing an increasingly mobile user. Check out the full post, here.

A few of Bergman's insights:

"There’s a huge gap in advertising yield between desktop and mobile experiences: $3.50 versus $0.75 in average CPMs, according to Kleiner Perkins’ Mary Meeker. Mobile is growing so quickly, the explosion in available inventory is depressing advertising rates. Ad agencies typically lag demand, which means this gap won’t be bridged anytime soon.

"As audiences shift, the industry will be faced with more revenue pressure unless news organizations can create new mobile revenue streams to compensate. In many ways, this is similar to the shift from print to the Web. Just porting one business model to the other isn’t the solution. Traditional display advertising on mobile devices makes up a very small, declining fraction of total revenue

" . . . simply extending a news organizations’ current coverage into mobile isn’t enough. We need to solve information problems for our users and drive measurable revenue for our advertisers. Mobile is not merely another form factor, but an entirely new ecosystem that rewards utility. Flipboard is a classic example of solving a problem (tablet-based content discovery) while The Daily is an example of a product that did not.

"'When the Web was new, many of us went online with creativity and energy,” says Regina McCombs, who teaches mobile at Poynter. “Now, faced with even bigger potential and pitfalls for developing — or losing — our audience, most of us are getting by with as little investment as we can. That’s scary.'"

The consequences of inventing "frappuccino"

Fast Company looks this week at how brands manage new terminology into existence -- and thereby dominate the mindspace for whole product categories. Mark Quinn, VP of Marketing with Leggett & Platt, blogs about how brands can create hybrid language and terminology to own a concept and hold market share.