It’s been a long time since I wrote something. The only reason is because I have learned the essence of “priority”. Full time studies and almost full time job forces one to focus.
I have a notebook full of things. I just hope that I can priorities to that extent so that I can find a minute to write here.
Fingers crossed – PLEASE!
I could have written my notes that I had scribbled down while reading this book, but after realizing that I would actually be copying most parts of the book, I decided to simple say: Read it!
Though it might not teach you THAT much on the subtitle topic – What makes them click? However, there are a lot of facts that one can use, apply, or just throw around to sound smart and cool. And I must say that I learned a thing or two concerning how a web store works, but the info I will bring with me is far more than that. It is how I function in purchase, as well as social situations.
My go-to-guy when it comes to Finance, Richard Quest, takes some time to talk about why Apple does to be so profitable.
I meet up with an old student affiliate at dinner today, he was in Oslo for business and pleasure, and he was kind enough to ask if I wanted to meet up with him.
The dinner was nice, but the conversation was an eye opener on many levels.
I asked him about how he managed to score his trainee position at Unilever, and he gave advises that I had never thought of, but also some that confirmed what others have said.
Thank you Peter, it was great to see you. Please send a signed photo of you on that boat, I’m not gonna do anything bad to it – promise!
Reed Hastings, CEO of Netflix, is interviewed in number 18 of the European edition of Forbes. The article tells us that Netflix have, using a cash prize of $1,000,000, made findings concerning movie grading and peoples’ movie watching habits. They can, more accurately than their competitors, suggest movies to their customers that are similar to those that their customers have graded. This means that a person who likes Action movie A and Chick Flick B will probably like Horror movie C.
To describe the problem, Mr. Hastings says that:
The trick is finding problems in your business that you can package cleanly, where you can provide a sample data set and a very clear evaluation metric.
What the cash prize of $1,000,000 gave the company was a discrete math problem that will predict future movie ratings using past movie ratings. A must add to the prize itself, is that it was given to a group of people, who many of them, had never meet. Someone started out with a solution, posted it on the Internet, got help from someone else. So it continued until they had solved it, and they all got their share of the dough.
Reed also gives a short glimpse at the future and says that they are now working on is to determine the movies that will appeal to a customer who don’t rate movies online, at all.
Imagine that this was your company. What would you use this form of information to?
Could you use it to test whether or not a certain product would be a fail or not, or maybe which demographic it would be best fit for.
How about the way the solution was thought up, using several different people, who might not even live in the same country, know each other, or might not even meet, to help you with your development.
Interesting thoughts came up while listening to the Podcast Brand Fast-trackers with Peter Hirshberg, Co-Founder and Chairman of The Conversation Group.
Or, maybe not as much thoughts as a “my creator, he might be on to something here” experience.
They conversation concerned that companies must work hard to keep their brand updated to the ever changing market. Though this is a not new finding, what struck a chord with me was when Peter Hirshberg said that too many companies are now updating to Web 2.0 and will soon understand that they need to use Marketing 2.0 (applying social media in their marketing) as well. However, what a company must do while doing all this, is to update their company to COMPANY 2.0.
I never heard anyone talk about it, and that might be the reason for why I became so excited. It is easy to say that one should update to web 2.0 and marketing 2.0, because that only means to exchange one part of the company structure or plan, for another. The old marketing plan can be changed of the course of a month or maybe a long weekend at some hip resort.
But, can your company take all this? Does your customer get all this, or will they be lost because too much of what they once knew about your company are now lost due to all of this.
Think of your company as a computer that you bought in the year 2000. Think about the design, the size of the hard drive, the processor, the CD-ROM and all other features.
Now think of the same computer today. To make it work, you have probably updated the hard drive to get more size since files are bigger, and you need more data. You have bought more RAM to operate the huge programs you are running everyday. This means that you have probably update the programs, and the operating system.
The only thing that is still what it was is the shell that surrounds all this.
You might work or started your own company a few years ago, and up until now you have done these changes that one have to do. When the market grew, so did you – more people being hired, and you had to get educated on how things that you ones knew by heart, work in today are setting. The company has a website, if you are a hip company you might have a Facebook group or a blog that is used to communicate to your customers. And right about now, it is time to operate the marketing plan as well.
The problem is, that no one of your customers sees this, or the market. They just see the same company that ha been there for many years. Same CEO, same theme, same logo. The attributes that forms the structure of the company are still the same, and people might find that as negative.
IBM found themselves in a situation were their company was not needed anymore. They had changed everything INSIDE the company, but to really make that leap that they needed, they had to change the outside, the shell as well.
It is easy for a author, researcher or mr/mrs Know-it-All to use expressions as “2.0″. But what about the ones who are supposed to do all this, the companies? It is time that some one stopped talking about “all the cool” things, and focused on what this means for the market.
For more on this subject, read these posts from other blogs, Carl Rosenberg & Passionate.
I took my Saturday night off from studies and friends to consume some lectures found on iTunes U. Randy Pausch’s “Last Lecture” – discussed here – inspired Western Carolina University to have one with political science professor Don Livingston. I won’t talk too much about his character – his southern dialect, he humbleness towards he’s statues, knowledge, and for his speech on receiving a teacher’s award. A tear or two might have fallen from my eyes when he explains that the best day’s work he ever did was when he married his wife. A true inspiration, that’s all I can say.
I will, however, talk about the things he brought up concerning friendship, kindness, and business – and I will try to apply it to marketing and branding.
For more information on Don Livingston, please visit his page on Western Carolina University.
Podcast can be downloaded via iTunes – here
From the lecture
”If you find a turtle on the top of a fencepost, chances are it did not get there by itself”
Quote by Bill Clinton – told to him by a relative.
If you see someone who has reached far, chances are that this person has received a lot for help getting there. Few make it to the top alone.
When you have a successful company to manage, or you are seeing a sudden change in your brand value, changes are that it is not you, or your small team of people who made this happen. People helped you, so make sure to find as many of these people as possible and reward them.
Example could be of Apple giving one free song to every customer who has bought a computer the last three years. The company has a good cash flow, and a lot of people buy many products out of the Apple portfolio. It’s a small thing, but as a small token of appreciation.
“It is a huge difference in using one another, and abusing one another.”
Everybody USE someone – to get a name on a resume, maybe a recommendation for a job. That is okay. Make sure to thank those who help you – or else they will feel abused.
“People matter – And people count“
Obama knows this! And one unsatisfied customer might make a bigger difference than you can imagine. The customer is the one who buys the product, make sure to listen when they are not satisfied, they might give you more if you ask for it.
“We can learn something from anybody, even an axe murderer – ask how s/he sharpens his/hers axe!”
You might know how your customer thinks and acts, but sometimes you might need to go far away from your perceived market to find a missing piece. Don’t be afraid of new things or updating it.
Nice tips for the road!
“Cheerfulness & Optimism are contagious”
- Ronald Reagan
“Courage is when you are scared to death, but still saddle up!”
- John Wayne
“Showing up is half the battle – being prepared is another quarter!”
“An environmentalist sees a hill top and says that s/he thinks that we should preserve this beautiful thing. A lumberjack or an industrial investor sees something else. It’s nothing wrong with that – just make sure that you respect the others’ opinion”
Prof. Eric Olson gave us four articles to read concerning sponsoring, and it touches upon something I have written about before, namely here.
Here’s my question that I asked for the class, with some-what of an answer. I will come back to this later, since this will be part of my master thesis.
By introducing two forms of sponsorships, one time or ongoing, could companies receive maximum out of sponsoring?
Question will be answered by using all four articles, plus an additional doctorial thesis by Fredrik Törn, How established brands can enhance their strength, interestingness, and vitality”. In his report, he conclude that incongruence in sponsoring might work better than if there is a connection between the brands, however, this only works once since the person who views the commercial a second time then has had the time to make a connection, thus won’t react the same once again. This is a slight opposite finding than the Cornwell et. al. article.
This lead me to think that an event could have two different kind of contracts, depending on how the actual sponsors that are plausibly related to the sponsored property, are more likely to be correctly identified an recognized. Fredrik Törn uses the example of Red Bull, the energy drink, sponsoring a Shakespeare play. Though there is no connection between the formats, nor would an avid Shakespearian viewer bring a Red Bull to the play, this would work as an eye-opener for a viewer, thus earn Red Bull more brand recognition, than if they were to sponsor another sport event.
Thus, at a sport event, sign a contract with a company that will give them mayor exposure at one particular time, but make it clear enough that people will recognize it. At a Baseball game, put a sign for ballet classes, at the ballet, why not for a WWE match on pay-per-view? Then, as mentioned in the Johar et. al. the more a person watches the commercial/ad the more likely is it that the person will recognize the company as a true sponsor. Therefore, one should have another contract that companies can sign if they wish to get a lot of exposure but for a longer time, in case of sports an entire season, etc. Ad this to the Olson et. al. 2009 about different spots to have the company logo and the connection to the event.
Those who ever had the pleasure of drinking with Japanese people, and with Swedes, know that they are two cultures that are on each side of the scope. Japanese people drink saké with 20% alcohol, slow, and very quietly. Swedes, we drink high content alcohol, fast, and we love to sing.
During a most wonderful lunch at Aquavit in Tokyo, me and my friend Tommy took it on our self to introduce a Swedish drinking song for the Japanese business men who enjoyed their food. So, the song was done to suite their culture.
Ladies and Gentlemen, I give to you, the Helan Går!
Now, what do I want to say with all this. Well, the week in Tokyo has been wonderful, I have meet wonderful people, I have seen places that I couldn’t have imagined a few days ago, and I have learned a lot of life lessons.
But also, when communicating with another culture it is important to understand how you come out. A western country makes one type of noise, the Japanese another. So we have to understand the other cultures noise, adopt it to our way of thinking, and send it right back, without changing the core values.
…it’s just something about it that makes me want to throw all the knowledge I have ever learned in marketing & branding, and rethink everything.
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