Hledá se poctivý makový závin

Mám takový zvláštní pocit když čtu všechny ty dva odborné tituly a brouzdám na webu, že je to se zdejší úrovní marketingu obdobně, jako když si dáte ke snídani makový závin (koupený ve vašem nejbližším supermarketu). Spousta "vaty" okolo, zato téměř žádný mák uvnitř. Nějak to stagnuje. Celkově myslím. Jak s tím závinem, tak s marketingem a komunikací obzvlášť. Kvalitativně, hodnota-tivně. Blbě se to žvýká, ale, pravda, zasytí to...

Se vzděláváním v marketingu je to obdobně. Vlastně to s tím úzce souvisí. Nemyslím teď naše školství, bůh chraň, to tady není proto, aby vás něco o marketingu naučilo. To vám dá pouze čas pro to, abyste se vše naučili a nastudovali sami. Mám namysli četnost a úroveň odborných vzdělávacích programů jako jsou odborné kursy, semináře, konference, workshopy atd. Jste hladoví po nových znalostech? Chcete diskutovat s kolegy z branže? Hmm, nemáte moc na výběr. Všude ti stejní lidé, ty stejné case studies, ta stejná paradigmata a filosofické úvahy. "Hlavním imperativem marketingové komunikace dnešních dní je integrovaná komunikace." nebo "Marketing není pouze záležitostí marketingového oddělení, ale je to o myšlení celé firmy." nebo "nacházíme se v turbulentním prostředí doprovázeném hyperkonkurencí." Paráda. Furt dokola to samé, už několik let.

A přece se nám tady letos rýsuje jedna moc zajímavá akce, a tou je Londýn v Praze - 11. října. Info o této jednodenní konferenci jsem našel před časem na blogu Jaroslava Círa (Unilever) zde. Event je to po hříchu tak ojedinělý, vlastně první svého druhu v ČR, že účast na něm je jaksi pouze pro vyvolené. Samozřejmě navíc není zadarmo, takže budete-li pozváni jedním z "odborných poradců" této konference (seznam jmen tady). Jinak si myslím, že účastníci se mají opravdu na co těšit. Konečně svěží vítr, konečně jiné tváře, nové myšlenky. Supr příležitost pro ty z vás / nás, v jejichž popisu práce není "pouze" plácání se na našem domácím písečku, ale ovlivňování či vytváření komunikace také za hranicemi domácího trhu makových závinů. Třeba se tam potkáme :)

TG

P.S. Doporučuji trochu si zainvestigovat a jít zejména po 2 jménech - Richard Seymour a John Kearon (oba účastníci konference Londýn v Praze).

P.S. II - Pokud má někdo tip na značku makového závinu, který se dá pořád ještě jíst, tj. obsahuje skutečný mák a obsahuje jej v množství větším než malém, tak jsem jedno velké ucho.

Některé sázky se nevyplácejí

Pozor - Achtung - Uwaga
světová premiéra druhého Roomster spotu - Lyžování-exkluzivně zde na tomto blogu. Stačí scrollovat níže...
---
...slyšel jsem to za poslední týdny už tolikrát (viz nadpis), že jsem tomu začal sám i věřit. Toto léto nám všem - naší agentuře, produkci, mě i mé přítelkyni - sakra rychle uběhlo.
V rámci možností - časových i jiných, jsme se s tím snad všichni nějak poprali. Výsledek můžete ohodnotit sami. Nová taktická kampaň Škoda Roomster běží v médiích od 7.9. do konce října. Takže klasicky ve stylu Škoda standard - nova, čt, prima (zřejmě s výjimkou Domažlicka..:-), plus navíc trošku óčka, k tomu všemu jsme přimíchali printy, web, rádio a spešl web microsite projekt. Tři spoty, tři printy, jeden kreativní koncept. A spoustu kafe a šedivých vlasů. Jo a taky jedna zrušená kooperace s jednou nejmenovanou kapelou (teda..spíš s jedním nejmenovaným bubeníkem této nejmenované kapely). Ale o tom snad někdy jindy. Můj guru říká: "if the work speaks for itself, don´t interrupt."
Ať se vám nová kampaň na Roomster líbí.

Roomster Autumn Promo Campaign Credits:

Agenturní tým:
Tereza Svěráková (creative dir.). V Tereze jsme objevili zcela nové a před tím nepoznané vlohy pro to, dělat lidem psychoanalytika. Patří jí velký dík za svatou trpělivost a za ty hodiny na telefonu s "klienty" (pozn. - nemyslím sebe).

Ruth Arban (account dir.). Razance s jakou Ruth vlítla do svého prvního velkého projektu a shootingu po nástupu do Leagasů byla impozantní. Jen tak dál. (a hlavně příště nezapomenout objednat u cateringu nějaké ty okurky..).

Jana Pokorná (account manager). Jana Pokorná přišla díky produkčnímu timingu a změnám na posl. chvíli o svatbu. Ne svoji naštěstí... Příště máme aspoň co zlepšovat!

special thanks to Leo Savage (hlavně za to, že jsme jej při natáčení spotu Myčka vytáhli o půl noci z postele a donutili jej přijet na set, abychom "pořešili" ty naše oblíbené Roomster car angles).

Produkce: Dawson Productions
Režie: Tomáš Mašín
Kamera: Karl Oskarsson
Hudba ve spotech: Southpaw

Média: Míša Náhlovská, mediacom

Díky kolegům z našeho marcom týmu Škoda Auto. Jste nejlepší! "Raději tomu věřte".

A na závěr díky mé přítelkyni Zuzce. Za to, že se mnou pořád ještě mluví.

TG

A nyní - první ze 3 spotů v Internetové premiéře: Myčka.




...a také slibovaný 2. spot - Lyžování - světová premiéra :)

Sir Ken Robinson On Creativity

You gotta see this video. It´s funny, it´s involving, it´ll blow your mind. I have found this on David Taylor´s wheresthesausage.com blog. Sir Ken Robinson makes an entertaining and profoundly moving case for creating an education system that nurtures creativity, rather than undermining it. Robinson is author of "Out of Our Minds: Learning to be Creative", and a leading expert on innovation and human resources.



With this Robinson guys it looks like I´ve strucked gold.. Never heard of him, but it seems there´s WAY MORE stuff on here as well as on other places on the web. Let me explore it a little bit to see how resourceful the mining shaft is...

TG

More On Ries And Ries Tandem

I realized Al and Laura Ries do deserve a bit more publicity because no matter if you´re a marketing pundit or a marketing ignorant, their impact on today´s marketing world has been significant. And marketing, as I see it, is what fuels the modern capitalism as we know it.

The Ries tandem is known for having their own simple and focused positioning strategy - as marketing consultants to some of the best known and respected US companies (ranked in Fortune 500). They´re not generalists. They just try to do, act, behave the same way they have built their key marketing preachings upon. In other words, they´ve become a perfect example of their own theories. Al got first in the mind of the world´s business public when he published a book called "Positioning - The Battle For Your Mind." The book, co-authored by Jack Trout, landed in the market in 1981 and almost immediately became a huge success. "It shook up the world of marketing with all the force of a 20-megaton bomb", claims the publishing house in the 20th anniversary edition of the book. I´m not an expert in nuclear physics, however, I tend to believe the book must have been a big hit... (later, the book was chosen by Advertising Age as one of the 75 most important moments of the last 75 years).

While the Positioning book was still groundbreaking, it probably didn´t raise so much controversy as some of the latest Al´s books, especially those ones written with his daughter Laura: The Fall Of Advertising And The Rise Of PR (published in 2002) and their latest book The Origin Of Brands (published in 2004). Whereas the former was, from my point of view, deliberate move by the authors who were trying to win some more awareness as marketing consultants duo, the latter was built on a more solid ground and attempted to connect with a title called Focus, published in the ninetees. The Origin Of Brands, however, was a true masterpiece. The book was applying Charles Darwin's concept of divergence to marketing and inevitably led to them becoming marketing kings of FOCUSED branding strategies based on relatively simple and easy-to-understand, yet powerful techniques.

You may meet Al and Laura Ries on their internet pages www.ries.com where you´ll find all the basic teachings of these two including details on their books, articles, papers, speeches etc. Furthermore you can debate with Laura on her personal blog www.originofbrands.com which is a place where Laura is fearlessly pounding every brand or company (inc. Apple and their lastes over-hyped product - the iPhone) that has somehow gone off the right track with the principles of divergence (see my last post). Rieses have exposed themselves even more on www.riesreport.com where you can watch short videos of both gurus. The riesreport web page is a bold and brilliant move by them and you should definitely give it a try if you´re serious about yourself working in marketing these days.

Tip: play the video called Japanese desease and find out why the Japanese companies make everything..except MONEY.

TG

Laura Ries Harsh About The iPhone

You may have already read a comment about Laura Ries and her personal blog The Origin Of Brands in the last Petr Váňa´s post. Petr mentioned Laura in connection with the way she´s been pounding the iPhone and the hype that´s been revolving around this new "all-in-one" cool device by Apple.
Having read Petr´s post, I realized it was about time to introduce Laura Ries and her blog in a broader view and also drop down a few notes on her father Al Ries - arguably one of the most recognized branding gurus of the modern marketing era.

But let´s take a closer look at Laura now. She describes herself as marketing guru, consultant, bestselling author, and speaker. She is president of Ries & Ries, an Atlanta-based marketing strategy firm that she runs with her father Al Ries with whom she have consulted with many Fortune 500 companies. The father-doughter tandem have also written four highly acclaimed books: The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding (1998), The 11 Immutable Laws of Internet Branding (2000), The Fall of Advertising and the Rise of PR (2002) and The Origin of Brands (2004). So much for Laura´s bio.

Lara´s blog is, in my opinion, one of the best branding related places you can find on the web, containing some damn good exercise stuff for a marketer´s brain. Under one focused theme -- branding is about divergence and simplicity, not about convergence and complexity -- she keeps a high quality of her posts which are being read and spread among hosts of marketing pros and enthusiasts around the globe. No wonder, when one of her favorite hot topics, especially in the last days, has been giving a hard time to Apples´s newest product - the iPhone. She´s already posted several articles, trying to cool down the incredible iPhone hype we all have been witnessing in the last weeks and months. Of course she´s going after Apple because if iPhone succeeded and met its ambitious sales objectives (Steve Jobs announced he wanted to sell 10 mil. iPhones by the end of 2008), the Ries and Ries big theory of divergence would take some deadly fire, and, eventually, would demean both branding gurus in the eyes of marketing experts. And that would be no good for their own Ries and Ries father-doughter "brand", not mentioning their own business, would it?

TG


Here´a few bulletpoints with Laura´s main iPod´s counter-argumentation:

- The iPhone is the opposite of the iPod. The iPhone is a convergence product. It tires to combine multiple functions into one device. It is also nothing new. There have been many convergence devices in the past and all have been failures. Including: ROKR, N-Gage and the Nokia Communicator.

- Convergence products capture the imagination of the media and public but the devices can never deliver on their promise of nirvana because all convergence devices are doomed by compromise.

- iPhone is not really the Jesus phone, the iPhone is just another smartphone. It is not even the first smartphone (the way the iPod was the first high-capacity music player.) It is not different, just dressed up a bit.

- Apple has brought us many revolutionary products over the years from the Apple II to the Macintosh to the iPod. Unfortunately, I don’t think the iPhone will be one of them.

Now Why Don´t You Get a Mac

There´s been some big stories making big headlines in June. And one of them claimed the following: Apple Inc. “Get a Mac” Named Most Successful Marketing Campaign of 2007. Now, where did this particular news came from? Surprise, surprise, it was the Effie 2007 results introduced on 8. June. Say Wow! :-)

...and check out the Apple Get a Mac website to see SIMPLICITY in its most beautiful substance. The Get a Mac Internet campaign, created by Media Arts Lab/TBWA, proved that simplicity can deliver the most astonishing results including market share growth of more than 42%, record sales and even cultural influence.

“After much spirited discussion, the jury unanimously awarded Apple the Grand Effie for its portrayal of the Mac/PC rivalry. They managed to do it with humor, class, and honesty without falling into the trap of overtly negative competitive advertising,” said John Butler, Co-Creative Director of Butler Shine Stern & Partners and the 2007 Grand Effie Jury Chair. (source: effie.org)

The campaign, as I see it, succeeded and helped Apple to burnish its positions especially in the US market (where the company is doing more than half of its Mac business) from the following reasons: the campaign is conceptually brilliantly simple (as already mentioned above), perfectly executed (means understandable to the consumer), and still highly entertaining (means you won´t go like “Hm, I had lots of fun. But what was the name of the product?”). It doesn´t make the consumer run to the nearest Apple store to buy a Mac, but it makes you think about it. It draws your attention to a choice you´ve probably never thought of. So, who knows, your next PC could as well be...Mac.


TG
Written on an Asus notebook :-)

About the Effie Awards

The Effie Awards honor the most significant achievement in the business of marketing communications: ideas that work. Known by advertisers and agencies globally as the pre-eminent award in the industry, the Effies recognize any and all forms of consumer engagement that contribute to a brand’s success. Any marketing medium is eligible for an Effie, as long as results are proven, including Print, TV, Radio, Outdoor, Internet, Guerrilla, Digital, Package Design, Events, Street Teams, PR, Paid or Unpaid Media.

Just Fallen In Love With Audible

Hello Internet freaks! Not sure if you´ve heard about it or now, but there´s a cool Internet service for those who either don´t like reading books, or don´t have time to do so. It´s called Audible.

Audible, a brand that originated in US in 1997, is now the leading Internet provider of spoken Infotainment on the Internet, specializing itself in spoken experience, providing digital audio editions of books, newspapers and magazines. The company (Audible Inc.) is not only the Amazon´s exclusive download partner (since 2000), it´s also iPod / iTunes compatible.

These days you may find audio stuff from a wide range of categories including business, comedy, drama and poetry, erotica and sexuality, religion, self development, sports, history, and many more.

Audible is also offering a membership programm with some reasonable discounts and benefits. However, as the US dolar is quite affordable currency, you don´t have to be afraid of paying too much for a service like that. It depends on what you´re interested in. Naturally. For instance a 5h book on "how to deliver a speech like JFK" will probably cost you more than a 30 min. quick, fresh article on "ending the war between marketing ans sales" by some strange guy called Philip Kotler... Never heard of him.. 8-/

Search capabilities are quite sofisticated (means customer friendly), payment options limited to several types of credit cards. With secure payments I shouldn´t forget to add... Well, hopefully, as I´ve just order my first 4 digital audios :-) The payment was done in 3 days from the day of my bank order. Then it took cca 1 more day for Audible to process my payment and make the chosen audios available for stream and/or download - as you wish. You may download the stuff directly to your PC/Mac and burn it on a CD, or you may download it directly to your MP3 player. And you can download your audios how many times you wish, you just need to log-in and help yourself.

For the download itself, you need either iTunes or Audible´s easy organizer-software to be installed on your computer. Like I said - overall it´s pretty easy and fun to use. Check it out!

TG