What agency vets can learn from students.

I spent the last two days being inspired about my profession by college students who would walk through fire to get a shot at a similar career.

The occasion was AdFed's District 10 National Student Advertising Competition in Shreveport, where I served as a judge.  Students from 20 universities competed as full-fledged agency teams on a live case given to them by Nissan.  Their assignment was to help the automaker increase its share among multicultural millennials, and they did so by conducting their own primary research, developing positioning strategies, creating fully integrated creative campaigns against a $100m media plan that they researched, priced and designed.  The teams had been working on this assignment since last fall, and it showed.

I was in awe of their poise, their professionalism and their fearlessness.  They rocked it.

During my two days I couldn't help but think that agency professionals – those who already have the careers these kids covet – could learn a lot from these students.  This goes for me, too.

They did their homework.  They knew their content and exuded confidence in their points of view.  Too many times we see agency professionals "wing it" due to lack of prep time or sheer laziness.  This is apparent in meetings where it's often easy to spot the person who read the executive summary versus the individual who took the time to probe, dig and validate.

They showed passion and enjoyment.  They exuded the feeling that they had fun working on the assignment.  Clients love this, but too many times are left wondering whether or not the agency team actually likes the client's product or company.  (Think how that must feel.)

They behaved as an ego-free team.  Although they had their account director, media director and creative director, these were merely titles, not dueling fiefdoms.  They came across as one team with one dream.

They presented with confidence.  Granted, they had a lot of rehearsal time.  But it is often shocking how many times we see agency professionals unable to present.  We are in the communications business, and one that sells at that.  Presentation skills should be a given.  

They took risks with their ideas.  They behaved as if they had everything to gain and nothing to lose.  This mindset liberated them to present ideas that were unexpected and bold.  They weren't trying to play it safe or make people happy.  They played to win big.

This summer will mark my 30th year in the business, from when I started as an Assistant Account Executive at Ogilvy in New York.  Three decades later I am still passionate about what I do.  I love the left brain/right brain nature of the job.  I love that advertising sits at the intersection of business, art, pop culture, entertainment, anthropology, psychology and technology.  I love the smart, passionate and rebellious people this industry attracts.

My hope is that these kids will say the same thing in the year 2042.  Between now and then, I hope they never lose the traits they displayed this week, and that our industry embraces this next generation.  We need them more than they need us.  As I've written about before, the Millennial Generation has the skills to help save and reinvent Madison Avenue.  Let's give them their shot on their terms.

Lands' End chooses BD'M.

The best way to celebrate our five year anniversary is by adding a dream client to our roster.  We're thrilled to have been selected by Lands' End after a heavily contested review against some of the country's best shops.

The creative opportunities are boundless, particularly since the company was launched by a former advertising copywriter (see, ad folk can grow up and get a real job!) and cherishes storytelling and wit as part of its brand voice.  (By the way, I'm not putting the Lands' End apostrophe in the wrong place – it was born as a typo in the very first catalog and became part of the company's lore).

This latest victory helps mark our five year anniversary with continued momentum, adding to recent wins from Wagner, Dell and Medtronic.

Five years ago this month we launched BD'M as the agency creating the beautifully distinctive Rhapsody in Blue campaign for United Airlines.  Today, BD'M is a multi-faceted agency:

• We work across a diverse range of categories, including technology (Dell, Medtronic), DIY home improvement (Wagner), lifestyle (Del Webb) and now fashion (Lands' End).  
• We are creatively diverse.  In addition to creating award-winning print and TV for our clients, BD'M is deeply immersed in app development (Medtronic), mobile and interactive (Dell), events and promotions (Del Webb). 
• Lastly, through our alliance with Tag: Worldwide, we are also geographically diverse, with teams in Shanghai, Delhi and London serving our two global assignments with Dell (Public Sector and Large Enterprise).

Not bad for our grown-up, start-up.

#Leadership Matters.

I have on my desk a quote that a very dear friend of mine gave me years ago when I was President of Y&R in Southern California:  "Those on top of the mountain didn't fall there."  I've kept it there for the past seven years as a reminder that it takes a lot of hard work to get lucky.  And lucky I've been!

I recently revisited a speech on leadership that I gave to the Executive MBA program at the University of California Irvine's Merage School of Business.  I shared with these executives what I've learned about leadership through observation, trial and (much) error.

Here's a summary of some of the core beliefs I've developed over the years:

• The role of leadership:
• Great leaders don't create followers – great leaders inspire more leaders to achieve things that matter.
• Great leaders define the organization's inspiring "why."
• Telling employees what to do is management.  Showing employees how to do it better is direction.  But inspiring people to make a difference is leadership.
• CEOs need to be the Chief Talent Officer.
• The traits of great leaders:
• Leaders communicate a short list of priorities that remain consistent over time.  They get the organization to accomplish these goals by prioritizing alignment over consensus; by driving the mission deep into the organization through "line of sight" goals"; by providing people with the necessary resources and support; and by establishing accountability through clear measures of success.  
• Leadership is about credibility.  Words and actions must be in sync.  If not, why should people follow your words?
• Leadership is about humility – "we > me." 
• Leading change:
• When attempting to inspire change in an organization, leaders need to understand the "Principle of the 20th Row."  The average employee seated in the Town Hall Meeting wants to be sure that this is not another "lucite block" exercise.  They need to hear what leadership will begin doing differently before they themselves decide to work differently.
• Great leaders earn their reputations during the dark days, not the glory days.  As Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. said, "The ultimate measure of a person is not where they stand during moments of comfort, but where they stand during times of challenge."
• How leaders fail:
• According to Ram Charan, leaders tend to fail for the following reasons:  They lose touch with what is going on the marketplace; they don't confront reality (hope is not a strategy!); they don't make things happen; they don't take action on poor performing direct reports.
• Employees don't measure a leader by the greatness they advocate.  They measure the leader by the mediocrity they tolerate. Again, words, values and action must be in sync.

I am reposting the slides in the hope that it might just inspire one other future leader.

#Leadership Matters (updated)

View more presentations from David Murphy

What's true in real life is true in marketing.

I’ve embraced a simple truth when it comes to brand planning:  what’s true in real life is true in brand building.  Over time and across categories, I've observed that the ways in which people form personal relationships mirrors how they form brand relationships.

Forces such as empathy, experiences, energy and endorsement help shape our real life relationships.  Think about the people with whom you enjoy your most lasting relationships.  It’s likely those individuals who “get you” because you share the same values, sense of style, point of view or sense of humor; these same people are likely those with whom you've enjoyed truly memorable experiences; people who always seem to be up to something new and interesting; they are likely the people you trust most because their reputation is consistent.

What’s true in real life is true in brand building.

These same human dynamics –  empathy, experiences, energy and endorsement – create a clear and actionable planning model to help marketers create more customer-centered brand platforms.

Empathy

Empathy is persuasive because it is seductive – by creating a common ground, empathy draws people closer to you.

If empathy is how we bond with each other, it stands to reason it is how customers bond with brands. We gravitate towards brands that get us.  Empathy occurs when customers project onto your brand their own feelings and attitudes.  Define a brand's source of empathy with its customers and you'll find its essential truth.  What's the basis of your relationship with your customers?  What is it you share in common on a deeper level?  What are your shared values; your shared dreams; your shared sense of style?  

Empathy isn’t a squishy measure.  We find its surrogates in the leading brand equity research models.  Brand Asset Valuator, one of the world's largest and most robust brand equity tools, identifies personal relevance as one of its leading indicators of brand health.  Research International’s Equity Engine measures affinity as a key measure of brand equity.  We also find empathy in B2B research in measures such as understands my company's needs and trust.

Experiences

Like people, brands are ultimately judged by what they do, not just by what they say. We tend to believe something after we have experienced it first hand.  

Building awareness only goes so far.  Successful marketers orchestrate immersive experiences to turn perceptions into deeply held beliefs and behaviors.

Long term success is no longer assured by the quality of the product or service – it's about the total experience.  Every interaction defines the brand, e.g., the craftsmanship of the packaging, how the phone is answered; the quality of the customer service team (are they brand ambassadors or employees?); the online experience; events; the trade show booth; mobile gaming.  You name it, the list goes on.  Why?  Because experiences turn perceptions into beliefs.

Again, this is not a soft measure.  The 2011 Brand Keys Customer Loyalty Engagement Index shows that customers are increasingly defining value through the total brand experience, and that experiences have a strong impact on customer decision-making.

Energy

Energy is a powerful force.  We’re drawn to its heat and light like moths to a flame.  Energy casts an aura of infectious momentum that people often interpret as being successful, innovative or popular.

Again, what’s true in life is true in brand building.

Think of those friends in your personal life who never stand still – those rare individuals who actually have an interesting answer when you ask “what’s new?”  We enjoy having these people in our circle of friends because the relationship never gets stale or predictable.  They inspire us.

Just as we desire this in our friendships, we seek this from the brands we choose.

Brand energy can be channeled in many ways.  Richard Branson is a master of using PR stunts to create news for Virgin.  Hyundai has gained share through a steady cadence of new product launches and bold customer service initiatives. Marketing practitioners know full well the attention-getting power of the words “new” or “introducing.”  Most often this comes through well-sequenced product introductions, in which every 6 to 12 months we are re-inspired to explore what the brand has to offer.  Most marketers are good at planning launches.  Maintaining energy requires that we think through what happens in the months after a launch to project a sense of ongoing momentum.

It is the absence of energy that causes otherwise loyal customers to get bored; to flirt with other brands; to spice up their life by trying something new and interesting.

Endorsement

Building empathetic brand relationships, immersive experiences and an aura of energy and momentum will fall short if word-of-mouth runs counter to personal perceptions.

Word of mouth didn’t begin with social media.  We thrive on the opinions of others.  From our earliest years to adulthood we learned to seek and follow the opinions of friends, embracing what’s popular at the moment.  Social media simply put on steroids what used to happen on the playground and at the proverbial water cooler.

If brands are built on empathetic relationships, then we must acknowledge that the relationship is now a menage a trois.  In a social media environment, brands are increasingly defined by the relationship that exists between the product and the customer and the other customers who also use the product.  (This observation is why I coined "wikibranding" at an ad:tech panel years back.)

Many marketers assume that customer advocacy is a way to convert others in the customer’s circle of friends.  While this is often true, advocacy can also serve a bigger goal, because giving customers channels through which to share their experiences is also a customer loyalty strategy.  When a customer advocates a brand, they are deepening their commitment to the brand by putting their name and reputation on the line. 

What's true in real life is true in brand building.

The true power of this planning approach is in mapping out the "4Es" as a holistic strategy. Each of these dynamics – empathy, experiences, energy and endorsement – can inspire specific, integrated and measurable tactics.

Social TV: second-screen viewing

Since my recent post on how the Super Bowl mainstreamed Social TV, I read the announcement that Turner Entertainment is creating companion apps to enable second-screen viewing for its hit shows like Conan and Big Bang Theory.

These apps will use audio-fingerprint technology, similar to Shazam, to offer viewers deeper content and offers that correspond with the action in the program.  The trend toward second-screen viewing recognizes that TV viewers are increasingly watching TV with the remote in one hand and the smart phone or tablet in the other.

The dream of interactive TV is alive and well.  However, unlike the early prognostications that viewers would interact with the TV screen through their set top box, the interaction is likely to take place through the ever present smart phone.

The mainstreaming of Social TV.

The 2012 Super Bowl set a new high water mark for Social TV.

TV has long been a personal experience, perhaps shared in real time by one or two fellow couch potatoes in your den or the following morning with co-workers.

Social media has changed that.  Now TV is shared in real time with friends and strangers who share your passion for Grey's Anatomy or SNL. This trends blows up during major events.

According to Bluefin Labs, the 12.2 million social media comments during and after the Super Bowl represented a 578% increase over last year. During the final three minutes, tweet volume was about 10,000 tweets per second.  There were 985,000 comments about the commercials alone. (That's wikibranding in action.) H&M/"Beckham", Chrysler/"Clint", and Doritos/"missing cat" led this conversation.

A couple of smart marketers recognized this by integrating a social aspect into their Super Bowl promotions. Chevy offered an app to use during the game as part of a real time car giveaway. Coke let viewers stream the Polar Bowl and watch the bears react in real time to the game and the commercials.

Social TV requires that we plan a conversation, a social experience, not just a campaign.  Yes, we want to reach our audience. But then what?  Enable the conversation with social tools.  And, as always, inspire the conversation with a killer creative idea.

Stop piracy, not liberty.

Show your support.  Let Congress know your point of view on SOPA and PIPA.

Medtronic selects BD'M

Medtronic has selected BD'M to help tell is corporate story, and what a story it is.  From two guys in a garage in 1955, the first pacemaker, to a $16 billion leader in medical technology.  And what's rare about them is their culture – they haven't changed a single word in their mission statement since it was written in 1960, and every employee can recite it by heart.  You don't usually that in companies of this size.

Gaming as a form of strategic marketing.

We've all seen the brief: raise awareness, shape new customer behaviors, launch a new product and generate revenue.

Historically, this brief has been answered through an advertising campaign.  But in a world in which collaboration and experiences often trump one way communications, gaming is fast becoming a bankable marketing strategy.

A while back I attended a thought-provoking presentation by Dr. Jane McGonigal, a leading game designer and researcher, about the social benefits of gaming.  Dr. McGonigal believes that gamers exhibit four personality traits that are essential for problem solving:

• urgent optimism
• social collaboration
• blissful productivity
• epic meaning

Perhaps inspired by Albert Einstein's quote – "Games are the most elevated form of investigation." – her work focuses on ways to harness gamers' collective intelligence and creativity to solve societal challenges, such as imagining a world without oil, or new ways to bring water to sub-Saharan Africa.

Now companies are embracing gaming as a business strategy.  Within the past few months I've witnessed B2B gaming initiatives from IBM, Cisco, GE, SAP and Microsoft.  Each is using gamification to engage customers in a deeper brand narrative, or to train sales people.

BD'M used gamification to help United Airlines sell its new suite of Travel Options.  We designed a game around each Travel Option – e.g., Line Jump Hero, Legroom Legend, Mileage Ace – that could be played online or on smart phones.  After being played over nine million times and generating millions of dollars in incremental revenue for United, The Mobile Marketing Association named the Optathlon games the best mobile promotion in 2011.

This new presentation by PSFK provides a thorough and clear case for gaming as a business strategy.  Gaming has the potential to communicate; to teach; to solve; to alter behavior; to raise money.  It does so through its unique ability to tap into peer competition and one-upsmanship; stakes and rewards; exclusivity and access.

PSFK Future of Gaming Report [Preview]  

Marketing to the 66%.

A big issue confronting marketers is the shrinking middle class consumer.  Let's call them the 66%, after accounting for the famed 1% and the 33% of Americans living near or below poverty levels (an even bigger issue).

The middle class, a core target for most marketers, is hurting because technology and process-driven productivity increases is eliminating middle management jobs in manufacturing and service industries.

In 2011 marketers witnessed what the WSJ calls the "Barbell Effect."  Marketers catering to wealthy consumers fared relatively well.  Sales at Saks and Nordstrom were strong, as were sales for Mercedes, Land Rover, Porsche and BMW.  At the other end of the "barbell," sales at dollar stores and discount chains spiked as the middle class traded down, causing marketers such at Heinz and P&G to focus on discounting and bargain brands.

What should marketers do?  I'd suggest CMOs look at what Hyundai has done over the last few years to drive a remarkable surge in sales.  Several years back, Hyundai began addressing the fundamental issue depressing sales -- FEAR. The vast majority of consumers are not facing layoffs or home foreclosures, yet they curtail spending because they're understandably anxious about the future.

Hyundai launched its Assurance program, allowing consumers to return their new car within a year of purchase if they lost their job. (Sales jumped 14% that month while the industry was down 37%.)  The company followed that by sweetening the program by offering to pay the vehicle loan or lease for 90 days while the owner looked for work.  Moreover, Hyundai has also made buyers feel smart – another way to alleviate fear – through its warranty program, styling and quality.

Looking back on my recession-themed posts (a topic I look forward to not writing about in the future!), the strategies suggested at the outset of this recession remain applicable today:

• Reduce anxiety by making consumers feel smart; 
• Appeal to consumer's need for emotional security and "cocooning";
• Get closer to your best customers through true loyalty incentives and CRM; 
• Consider tiered pricing and value options; 
• Invest in innovation – "new" is still a powerful lure; 
• Finally, don't let a good crisis go to waste – refocus and reprioritize all elements of your product portfolio, marketing and media mix.