Investing in “Je Ne Sais Quoi” … It Pays To Be (Perceived as) Cool.

Check out this screengrab of the website of Rentokil Initial. I circled one of their news items. It is THEY who are announcing that they will be using a vendor’s product (in this case Google Apps). Often vendors fight just to even be allowed to mention that somebody is using their product… but when a customer perceives that an association with a vendor brings them something… even if it is a certain “je ne sais quoi” … that makes the vendor’s life a lot easier, more efficient… and makes marketing a lot cheaper. The implication is it’s worth investing in a little “je ne sais quoi”. It pays to be (perceived as) cool… or cutting edge.. or i don’t know, something!

Vendor's Dream

Tweet This Post

Editing Engineers

I had a frustrating meeting the other day with a very engineery startup. They are making some of the coolest stuff I have seen in a while. I just couldn’t convince them they need an editor to help make their technology more understandable… accessible… market-friendly.

I won’t say who they were… but I do run into this a lot. The way many companies describe themselves makes it really tough to go from seeing how cool their stuff is to figuring out what problems it will solve. Mostly because the examples they give are so incredibly technical and theoretical. Editing the examples will make a huge difference.

Sometimes it reminds me of my first job after college. I was a reporter for a community newspaper. I had an actual editor who taught me a lot. But perhaps my most important editor was the guy who ran IT. He was transitioning several newsrooms from an ancient publishing system to a new one using PCs and standard desktop publishing software. Because I had worked during college in the desktop publishing department at a Copymat (helping people format their resumes etc.) the IT head recruited me to help sell his new system internally. He asked me to create examples of the graphics that were possible with the software for a presentation he was to give to the board of directors. I excitedly created a slew of squiggly lines and shapes and patterns. No go. The IT head said “nice squiggly lines, but this will have no relevance to the board.. we need to show clear examples of how the technology can save the company money, make the company more nimble and efficient…” I was geeking out.

The IT guy (an engineer, BTW) was editing me.

One ironic thing about my recent frustrating meeting is that the CEO is a huge (gushing!) Apple fan. A fan of their technology.  He seems to miss that they are a great company ALSO because they are brilliant communicators.  Look at the picture of the Mac at the top of this post. An engineering-only company might have written what engineers are trained to write when they create a new program: “hello world”

Somebody edited the engineer.

Removing one word made the computer friendly, human, approachable.

BTW… here’s another post about how important one word can be. It also happens to be about Apple. And if you’re into the idea of editing, here are a couple more posts: Where Blood Tasted of Blood and Honey of Honey and Less is More.

Tweet This Post

The Swimmer and the Water Pipe

The photo ran in News of the World

Michael Phelps is apologizing for appearing in a photo a few months ago with a bong. The apology feels fake… like his mom did his homework for him.

“I engaged in behavior which was regrettable and demonstrated bad judgment. I’m 23 years old, and despite the successes I have had in the pool, I acted in a youthful and inappropriate way, not in a manner that people have come to expect from me. For this, I am sorry. I promise my fans and the public — it will not happen again.”

It feels like this was a hastily thrown together response. Audiences can handle (and want) something more nuanced and interesting and honest than this. It’s “boardroom fear” that causes this sort of thing to be “wordsmithed” and said. I know it’s tough when so much money is at stake in the short term, but long-term brands need to have more soul than this.

This episode reminds me of the scene in the documentary “Shutup and Sing” when the Dixie Chicks return home from the UK after Natalie Maines made her comments about George W. Bush and Texas — and the band sits around a table with a consultant for one of their major endorsers. It was an awkward scene. The band, ultimately, chose to go in an open, honest and VERY soulful direction. And the film itself (which chronicles this very struggle about being famous and human, independent and not) became a great communications piece for the band.  Do check it out if you haven’t.

One really nice thing (and smart move) is that Phelps’ statement was made on his Facebook page (where he has just shy of two million fans).. and the 714 comments (so far) are very human in their response.

Humans give brands a soul. In the case of inanimate brands (like, say, a cereal, for example) the humans are the managers and the creative people they hire — and the customers who respond to the brand. It’s no different with brands that are actually people (like, say, a swimmer, for example). With this apology, it seems, the managers are trying to keep the Phelps brand soulless. His audience is giving it soul — per the Facebook comments.

It will be interesting, and nice, to hear from the swimmer himself at some point.

This isn’t a case of Shutup and Swim. This kid should be seen AND heard.

Tweet This Post

Hmmmmm. Track Web Analytics in Real Time and Then Get on E-Mail

I got this email yesterday. It was a little invasive, I guess, but I didn’t really mind. In fact I think it’s pretty smart. Though perhaps a tad more subtly in the language/approach would have worked better. The names have been changed to protect the innocent.

On Dec 10, 2008, at 7:12 PM, _____________ wrote:

Hi Barak,

I just saw that you did a password reset for your ________ account and I wanted to send you a quick email to see if there was anything that I can help you with.

_____

__________________
Sales Development
___________, Inc.
______________
New York, NY 10010
Office: (212) ________
Skype: ________
________@________.com

http://www._______.com

Tweet This Post

Marketing Doesn’t Get More Targeted Than This

The “Winston Smoking Zone” in Munich’s airport. The only thing that would have made this a more “perfect” “placement” would have been if the announcements on the loudspeakers that said smoking is only allowed in designated areas mentioned Winston by name.

Tweet This Post

Bud Light Offers Up a Nice Viral. Cheers

Viral marketing is a hits business… like the movie business, the venture capital business, or possibly most businesses. You have to try things. There are no guarantees.

When it works, it is a beautiful thing, you end up with a many people engaged in your brand. You pay for the creative work and webhosting (if it takes place online) but you don’t have to buy media, e.g. TV time or print ads.

The “viewers” become the “media”. Nice!

Bud Light’s Making Faces is a good one. You can animate canned photos of people or animals—or upload your own—and make the picture say what you want it to via text-to-voice software. Profanity etc. is filtered.. but you can defeat the filter by deliberate misspelling. In fact you sometimes need to misspell words anyway to get the text-to-voice to work really well for you.

The technology behind Making Faces is called Veepers and it’s from dotcom survivor Pulse in San Francisco. Check your Pulse.

Tweet This Post