Category Archives: Marketing Strategy

Jul 11 2012
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Advertising, Insight, Marketing Strategy, Planning, Strategy

The Seven Characteristics of the Great Concept

I think many advertising problems are mainly problems on having a common language.

People talk about same terms, but everyone has a different meaning attached to them. The most alerting situation is when there is not an unified vision of the most basic advertising terms within the agency. When people do not share the same ideals while speaking about strategy, concept, insight & idea, you end up doing disoriented work. That work does not answer business problems and it does not touch the target audience in relevant ways. I think one of the most misused terms is concept, so I wanted to share my views about that particular term.

The Seven Characteristicts of the Great Concept

1. There should not be ever such thing as a bad concept.
I believe in quantity when it comes to ideas. I rather come up with 999 ideas to be happy with the one brilliant one, instead of doing five rather good ones. The concept is build on the great ideas. And upon the killed ones at well. When you are moving from ideas to concepting phase, you should not be medling anymore in mediocrity. That should be scrapped along the process. Bad ideas might help to make good concept, but you cannot turn bad concept into a good one. Be ruthless when evaluating which makes concept.

2. The concept is integrated by nature.
TV ad is not a concept. Website is not a concept. Funny stunt is not a concept. Still I bet that everyone has encountered (or even provided) ideas, which might be fairly good ads but could not be leveraged to work properly and fluently across all the channels. If someone says: “We have a good concept, but it does not turn to mobile/tv/internet/outdoor/inset whatever channel here”, you really do not have a good concept. Good concepts rise above the media channels. In good concepts all the touchpoints work together to build the greater campaign. So even though coming up great concepts is hard work, the executions in different touchpoints should come quite effortlessly.
There is always a need for great conceptual thinkers in this industry. That conceptual thinking ability is what separates the truly great from a mere wordsmith or visualist.

3. The concept has potential to live long.
We live in fast world, which is just getting faster everyday. Even the really brilliant concepts have less time in market than before. However, with good concepts you sense the potential that it is more than just an one-off. You can see the opportunities to carry and nurture it for years and years to the future. The common mistake is to change winning concept too fast. Brand representatives and advertising agencies get tired of the concepts more faster than general public does. Many times you see that fully functioning concept has been replaced with a new mediocre one, just for the sake of it being new. New is not always equivalent for better.

4. Concept fullfills strategy.
Strategy is about identifying the most pressing business problem/opportunity for the customer and finding the most straightforward answer to it. Concept is the creative path to the consumer mind, action & wallet fulfilling that strategy. If strategy is wrong, you will not be able to come up with great concepts. That is why agency should really spend more time kicking around the customer´s main business problem (and not just just planning department). Whole team has to believe the strategy and be behind it. If there is reason of doubt or resistance among the team, the end-result will again be a lackluster campaign.

5. The concept is scalable & flexible.
Because of the channel-agnostic nature of great concepts, you have much more flexibility in terms of production. You get better results with an excellent concept under tight budget, compared with mediocre concept pumped up with big production money. The scalability goes other way as well, the more resources you can put into concept the better it gets.

6. Great concept pushes the envelope
You have to fight for the great concept within the agency and with your client. Mediocre and small-minded people will always try to find reasons to prevent groundbreaking and highly effective work to come out. Good concept pushes the boundaries and goes against the category conventions. This does not necessarily mean controversial work, but if your concept is not highly differentiating, it will not work.

7. Great concept is simple at its core
No matter how complicated or how many phases in the initial campaign will be, the core of the great concept is usually explained easily in a couple of sentences. The answers to questions “Why” and “What” should be as simple as possible, the “How” might be more pages or presentations. The craftmanship, rigor and the time invested to actual production based on that brilliant simplicity will make miracles. There is no shortcut for perfection and many times the final extra mile makes all the difference.

“When working in agency, we have to speak the same language both inside and to outside as well”

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Jul 04 2012
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Advertising, Business, Insight, Marketing Strategy, Planning, Strategy

Kicking the Habit: Five Tips to Capture the Habitual Shopper

“We knew that if we could identify them (pregnant women) in their second trimester, there’s a good chance we could capture them for years”
-Andrew Pole, statistician (Target)

One of the most thought-provoking articles I have read this year  was “How Companies Lean Your Secrets” by Charles Duhigg. Besides that it is quite unbelievable feat that you can actually track from data when your customer is in her second trimester, it had me also to think about power of habit and habitual purchases. When our conscious thinking and habits collide, usually the habit will win. Just ask anyone trying to stop smoking!

We, consumers, do not spend enourmous amount of brainpower to make everyday buying decisions. When we stroll in the aisles in our grocery store and pack our shopping carts, we usually think totally other things. We are guided by certain buying rules and only thing which might change our shopping behavior is that certain product is over. Especially when working with FMCG, the habitual buying processes are something which you cannot ignore when crafting your marketing strategy and tactics.

Five Tips to Capture the Habitual Shopper

1. Identify the habitual cues
Although consumer might shop in autopilot mode and does not really think about what he is buying, he is guided with certain habitual cues to make his selection. Certain people might make their selection based on price, others with brand and others just to minimize their walking in the store. Nielsen gives following examples of common Omega Rules:

“I always buy brand X …unless guests are coming!”
“I buy the cheapest brand on special, as long as it’s not X!”
“Brand X works for my family, but if Y is on special, I buy that!”

It is crucial to identify what is your product´s main habitual cues and rules of buying. Because if it is mainly price, even a slightest price increase might make your customer think other alternatives. And if it is not, you actually have a good opportunity to raise prices and customer will continue business as usual.

2. Avoid making the customer think during the autopilot phase.
Advertising might even be countereffective, when dealing with habitual shoppers. When customer starts to think actively about your category, he starts to also think about the competitors as well. To simplify things: if you are market leader in your category you should try to actively encourage the autopilot. If you are challenger you should try to disrupt the habitual buying process. Also advertising is crucial for the new products, because only way besides price-dumping is to get people to interested about it and buy it because of the buzz.

3. Identify the events when the habits change
Why Target is so interested about the state of pregnancy of their customers? Within certain life events, even the most permanent habits of people might change. For example these events can be the following (but not limited to): moving, having a child, changing job, getting married or divorced. Not surprisingly these are also the most stressing moments of your life. Although you have decided that you never change your morning cereal brand, when encountering above-mentioned changes, it might not be that big deal anymore.

4. Remember that customer is not always in autopilot
Consumer might be totally different shopper during weekdays compared to weekends. On weekdays we stroll like zombies trying to get our shopping done as fast as possible, but when saturday comes we might be actually seeking variety and inspiration within the same aisles. Some might also say that finding something new is also habitual behavior for humans. There are at least the following motivational segments when buying:

Bargain: You are looking for the best deal. (The weapon of choice: Discounts)
Buzz: You are excited to find certain product because of the recommendation, advertising, product placement or news mention. (The weapon of choice: In-store promotion to ensure that the first buzz does not die off)
Variety-seeking: You are actively looking for new experiences. (The weapon of choice: Trials in the store)

Important to notice is that people might shift through these different motivational ways. Also your product can be bought from many motivational standpoints. It is essential to find the main motivational cue for majority of your customers.

5. Customer satisfaction does not mean a thing for habitual purchases.
Average customer satisfaction is usually 75-85 on the scale of 100. Company might think that they are scoring well, but actually that result is just average. Other shocking statistic is that customer satisfaction explains only 8% of repurchase*. With mundane every day products, when conducting a customer satisfaction survey you actually trigger totally artificial thought process. Consumer starts to rationalize his habitual shopping behavior and basically just starts lying.

So habits are strong factor of our buying behavior. If you do not recognize that, you might do fatal mistakes as a marketer.

Recommended reading
Charles Duhigg: The Power Of Habit
Neale Martin: Habit: The 95% of Behavior Marketers Ignore*
Nielsen Deltaqual

“Recognize and leverage the power of habit and identify the opportunities to try to alter it”

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Jun 30 2012
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Advertising, Insight, Marketing Strategy

Best of Cannes: The Most Popular Song (JWT Puerto Rico)

The Grand Prix winner in PR-category was definitely one of my favourites this year:

Three reasons why this resonates:
* Grounded on the deep understanding of the culture (both popular & national).
* Succesful integration of the channels (Not just 360 but more of 365: great example how the different touchpoints compliment each other)
* Story-telling mode (The story started with a bang, had the interesting middle part and then ended with another bang)

Many times there is awarded advertising which can only be categorized as a stunt. This shows that you can go much deeper than just being a stunt, being a part of popular culture and being a movement. Making the leap from making advertising to making movements is a long and hard road. It is still the only road to take in 2012.

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Jun 29 2012
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Advertising, Marketing Strategy, Planning, Strategy

How to Lose a Pitch?

If I would be a client, I would not have traditional pitch process. I would instead meet couple of agencies, which seem interesting to me. Have a long discussion with them to see how they view your business and the strategy. These discussions should happen with the potential core team that would be working with you (not just figureheads). This way I would ensure that the chemistry was right and their thinking is sharp. I think the best way to assess the ability to do good work is by evaluating the actual work the agency has done for their existing clients instead of the circus with usually is involved in the traditional pitches. If past cases appear satisfying then it boils down to the chemistry.

That being said, I love those NB (new business) pitches. They usually require plenty of work, fights with the team, all-nighters, panicking, plenty of killed ideas and lots coffee. But when you win them, it is one of the best feelings you can have in this business. Also other way around, the announcement of losses have driven me to the depths of depression. Then the only cure is to get back to the saddle and win the next one.

I have never believed someone who says that he has flawless track-record with pitches. That just means they are lying or just participating in small-time competitions. On the top, the difference is small. No matter how good you are or what you do, sometimes you just lose. And that´s part of the game.

There are certain mistakes, which I have seen doing repeatedly in pitches (and over and over again).

How will you surely lose the pitch?

1. By Being afraid of losing.
Usually when someone says “we have to win this”, everyone starts stressing. Yes, you always have to be serious about winning, but it is better to gamble than play safe. If you are afraid to be daring in pitch presentation, you usually will not be daring when doing the actual work. You do not change your agency philosophy to win pitches. Or you shouldn´t do mundane middle-of-the-way crap to make sure that you do not offend anyone. Or you should not be playing safe. The pitch is not only about client reviewing you, it is also about you reviewing the client. The cost of having difficult or bullying client who is not a right match for your agency will always be unprofitable on the long run.
2. By not doing your best work.
It is a false belief that the agency who does the best work always wins. Too many times the initial decision is much more actually about the politics. Or the client is just too damn scared to do the right thing. This should not prevent from always delivering the best work you can. There are two valid reasons to lose a pitch in my opinion:
* The work was too daring (This usually means that the client does not really want a real strategic partner, which pushes the creative envelope)
* Your agency was too expensive (This usually means that the client is a cheapskate)
3. Underestimating the value of the personal relations.
This does not mean that the pitch is about cabinet politics. However, sometimes you might have lost the pitch even before your presentation because the decision-maker is a fishing buddy of your rival agency head. Try to maximize the time you spent with the potential client to see are they really setting up a fair game.
4. Playing by the rules.
I have been part of winning pitches where we have only presented the strategy. Or where we have presented over 100 print ads. Or where we have presented ready-made film. Or where we have just shown the showreel and had couple of talks. This just illustrates the fact that you always have to set up different game plan for the different pitches.
Other thing is that you should take the pitch brief with a grain of salt. You should not present what client asks, but what he really needs. You might increase your risk of losing, but also maximizing the differentation from others. So usually if you are forbidden to change the logo or tagline, you should at least evaluate the possibility. And if you can improve them, go ahead.
5. Not knowing your enemies
Always make sure who are your opponents in the pitch. If the client does not say it straight, use your contacts in other agencies to find out. This way you can set up your game plan. Certain agencies have certain style, so you have to maximize the differentation from them. Also because other agencies are doing the same thing, I stress the importance of the 4th part. Do surprising moves, so your opponents cannot anticipate them.
6. Not putting a good show.
The pitches are many times more about showing that you care than showing that you can. That is why different stunts work well in NB-context. It is not because the clients choose you, because you have decorated your meeting room the resemble aeroplane (in airline pitch) or that everyone is wearing custom-made sports-sneakers (for sports client). By having a good show, you demonstrate that you really care.
8. Not putting anyone at charge.
The common pitfall of pitch is that there are too many egomaniacs in the same team (typical problem in every ad agency meeting room) and no one is really leading the group. This results in absurd fights about who is presenting and in what order. There has to be a designated leader for every pitch, who makes sure that the best work is to be done. He makes the final decisions. He also has to make sure that the presentation is done at time. Plenty of great work has been flushed by toilet just by last-minute panicking. At certain point your presentation is ready and you should always make time for also the rehearsing it. If you are presenting disorganized great thinking you will just seem disorganized, not a great thinker.
9. By going overboard
It is one thing to show that you care compared to showing that you know. It is usually always better to present less slides and leave room for conversation, than try to bore your audience to believe. The pitch is surviving of the fittest: you present only things which are essential in that you win. You do not present things, which are nice add-ons. So leave room for the presentation and do not go overtime.
10. By stressing
I have seen great presentations collapsing because the technology does not work. I think it actually the only thing you should take for granted in every office setting: video projector never works. So prepare for the projector meltdown. We will be assessed by our reaction to that event as well. If you are having nervous breakdown for a mere keynote crushing, how will the client assess your ability to cope in really disastrous situation?

So relax, do your best and kick some butt.

The best way to win pitches is straightforward: Maintaining good personal relationships and having a good reputation. This is achieved by doing damn good work every single day for every single client you have.

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Jun 27 2012
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Advertising, Marketing Strategy, Planning

Great Insight: Balancing Between Obvious & Obscure

“In the advertising business,a good idea can inspire a great commercial.But a good insight can fuel a thousand ideas,a thousand commercials”
-Phil Dusenberry

No matter what anyone says, finding good & relevant insights is hard work. And I think it is getting more difficult all the time. The audience getting more & more fragmented, products been around longer, new medias emerging all the time etc. However in combination with audience behavior, they are still out there. You just have to work harder to find them.

Obvious-A Great Insight–Obscure
A great insight is not totally obvious. For example that women are the main decision makers in grocery retailing is hardly a groundbreaking insight. Or that men like beer. If you would found out that men contribute actually much to buying certain items in grocery stores, or you found common characteristics of the women who like beer, you might be onto something.

Pitfall of the obvious: Everyone has already used it.Lacks to surpring and differentiation.
Pitfall of the obscure: It does not touch enough amount of target audience. Lacks the human and business relevance.

There is now shortcut or proven formula to find the insights. Probably every planner has its own method. I believe in combined “gut-instinct” and “rational deduction”. Usually the difference when winning pitches or doing groundbreaking stuff is that you are confident enough to trust your own point-of-view when doing final decisions. When checking for the strategy I usually try to tick the following boxes. These are not necessarily in order and you might not always need to check out all of these (although it would be preferable).

Insight Check-List
– Simplicity: Is it simple enough? (Best insights are usually told in couple of sentences)
– Surprise: Does it bring new angle to the category? Does it really help to differentiate us from the others.
– Action: Does it make people to act (buy, share, try, comment, give their contact details, go to the store etc. This is especially crucial in digital campaigns)
– Business relevance: Does it drive existing customers to buy more? Does it bring new business? (The best insights are those which tackle these challenges)
– Human relevance: Does it reveal some human truth? Can people familiarize with the insight?
– Brand: Does it benefit the brand in the long term? Is it in the brand?

And although it might seem that I only present sports brands in here, I have to share this nice little retail activation that Puma did. Especially strong in simplicity, action and business relevancy (got also Silver Lion in Cannes for Promo & Activation):

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Jun 21 2012
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Advertising, Marketing Strategy

Do we need advertising awards?

As Cannes Lions is still on the full swing, it is time for the annual debate of the significance of advertising competitions. Those, who have won actually something, stress the importance and the correlation between awarded works and the business success. Those, who did not got awarded, categorize competitions as mere beauty competitions which awards only artsy-fartsy scam work.

Although never won in Cannes (yet), I still tend to fall more in the favour of competitions for the following reasons (including certain caveats as well):

1. Advertising awards are mostly internal rewards
We advertising people appear to be self-absorbed, self-confident and full of ourselves. The reality is that we are self-bashing, self-critical and always unhappy with our work. Many times we need someone from the outside to tell that work is sometimes quite ok. And there is nothing wrong in getting recognition once a year from the hard work you have done.

Of course, we should always remember to tell our colleagues when they have done good job as well. And for the managers: it is good to give raises for your best talent also before they threat to leave your company.

Competition is always competition. For certain types of people that competition brings out best out of them. Also for certain people, the competition is the best motivation. Not for the all though.

2. The events are a good way to strengthen the client relationship.
Majority of clients could not care a less about trophies you have. The awards are part of the reputation you have, but not even the main part of that. Awards are not the new business tool that many claim they are. However being on those events is a good opportunity to strengthen your client relationship. It is nice to be in more relaxed setting and celebrate your annual achievements.

If you happen to win, remember that big part of the victory is because of the client. Without daring client you are not able to do daring work. Remember to give respect to the client as well.

3. Truly groundbreaking work gets always recognition.
I do not believe in making work to win awards. First of all,that approach probably will not win any awards. Second, if you do that, you are totally in the wrong business. At the end of the day we are in the business of seducing consumers to buy more stuff from the brands we work with. If you do not get kick out of that, I recommend changing jobs.

I believe in making work to solve client´s problems in the most effective & creative way. And there is high correlation between those ways. If you aim for that and keep pushing the envelope, the fame will follow eventually. I bet that there will be no weak work in this year´s list of Titanium Lions winners. At least last year all the awarded work was outstanding. You should concentrate your efforts on doing work like that. Making scam work or trivial non-profit campaigns just gets you further away from the real mastery.

Not all the good work gets awarded though. Nearly all the advertising competitions tend to favor certain types of creativity. This might make you live in an illusion, that it is the only type of creativity there is. As a planner, I always try to find the most effective solution for the consumers. Sometimes the best solution might be so straightforward and simple that it is not awarded because of that. Then your reward materializes on the cash register.

However, if you always concentrate on solving the brand problems on the most relevant & creative way possible, you will get plenty of opportunities to win awards along the road.

4. Competition entry requires marketing talent
It requires talent to make your entry pop out among thousands of other entries. You have to engage during the first seconds of your case video. You have to be simple and make your point across fast. You have to delight the jury with great insight and sparkling creativity. Also you have to make sure your PR works before the competition. If people recognize your work, it has much more better changes to succeed in the competition.

All the things mentioned before are part of the capabilities good agency should have and be selling to its customers. If you cannot do enticing case video, can you do good marketing?

Advertising awards should be reward for doing groundbreaking work, not the ultimate goal.

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Jun 18 2012
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Advertising, Marketing Strategy

Professional Madness

What separates advertising industry from every other business?

We are not duplicating our previous successes.Instead of consulting company who finds a good way to work around certain problem and then duplicates it to the other clients as many times as possible. The business model is that the every new iteration of the same project requires much less working resources, but the selling value is quite the same.

Like John Hegarty said, we do not have a warehouse full of great ads. We start from the scratch every single time.Your past successes only prove that you have had success before. It is not an indicator of the future success.

That is why you seldom get bored in a good advertising agency. Every project is a completely new challenge and you are trying to come up with something completely new. It is challenging and rewarding. It is also one of the reasons why even the best agencies do not hit home runs every single time. Coming up with a typical solution is similar as failure.

From traditional business perspective it is complete madness, of course.

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Jun 17 2012
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Digital Strategy, Marketing Strategy, Strategy

No Digital Strategy

I had this presentation couple of months ago in Finland talking about the need of having digital in the core of your business and not as a separate unit.
Actually this presentation has quite bittersweet tone for me because the organizer of the event went bankrupt and I only got like 30% of my speaking fee. First time that ever happened.
Well hopefully you enjoy this:
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Jun 16 2012
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Marketing Strategy, Planning

What is Stand-up Strategy?

First of all, I am quite sure that I have not come with the term myself. I must have heard it somewhere. Do not remember whom, so I just stole it as a name for my blog. If you are offended, then poor luck. This is advertising after all.

Stand-up strategy does not mean that it is necessarily funny, although you have to have certain kind of humor to be in this business.

Instead for me stand-up strategy is about these five things:

1. Standing up instead of sitting down.

Marketing strategists and planners have got themselves in trap.

We, as a profession, have been on a road to just become poor man´s management consultants. We have tried to complicate things, instead of simplifying them. We have estimated our value of the number of slides we have made or how thorough creative brief we have done. Those things do not matter.Only thing that matters is the quality of the work and the bottom line of the company.

We have to get out from the computer to meet the people, find the insights and understand the behavior of the people who might someday be the customers.

So get of your seat and start doing things.

2. Intuition and point-of-view is what separates you from others.

Google has replaced the average planners.

There was a time when information was scarce and planner could make himself worthwhile by just having the access to information. Those days are long gone. Information is abundant and nearly everyone has the access to the same information channels.

That is why the Planner has to stand up and tell also what he feels and what is his point-of-view.  Not saying that there is a shortcut for digesting all the information. We have to do our homework more than ever.

Read blogs, magazines, books.Watch movies, tv & documentaries. Talk with colleagues, peers, consumers & influenceres.

But those are just starting point. Having the information is only about competitiveness of today´s planner. Competitive advantage comes from your point-of-view. That is the biggest asset you have and you have to cultivate it.

After careful evaluation of all the information & data, act on your gut-feeling.

3. Planning is translating business to creativity.

Planning is a service function. You provide the springboard for creatives for the creative leap. You help account executives to sell more. Only thing tangible what is left from our work is well-performing company financially and creatively. People can live with incomplete creative brief, but they cannot leave with incomplete creative product.

Good planner is a bipolar person. He gots kicks out of creativity. He also gots kick out the business side of things. Usually he has had a hand on both of these crafts. Planning is the most rewarding but the least-respected craft in advertising. Are you ready to take on the task?

Do not trust planner who has not sold a project or not done an ad. 

4. Combining insight & behavior is the key to the success.

How many fresh new insights have there been in beer category lately?

It is still crucial to find the soul of the brand and go as deep to the customer´s head as possible. However, you cannot just push your message nowadays and hope to spark some kind of emotion. You have to lure your brand to everyday life of the people. I do not understand the separation between traditional and digital planners. If planner does not understand digital channels nowadays, he or she should be out of job. And same goes to otherwise, knowing all the latest social media channels is worthless if you do not have the knowledge of the good old art of persuasion. Even though technology has evolved we as a people are driven by quite simple things. Such things as sex, greed & jealousy.

You have to know how customer feels and how he behaves.

5.We have to reinvent this whole ad agency stuff.

I hate silos. That is why this whole departmental thinking of account-creative-planning is quite absurd for me. Our business is quite simple if you think about. We are on the quest of finding the emotional connection of the brand and consumer, which on the long run will concretize in the cash register.

Lee Clow put it great:

“We’re supposed to be a creative business, but I think we have been probably the least creative industry in the history of the world in terms of figuring out how to get paid.”

We have to think about deeper how we operate and how we make profit in the future. The collaborator who works closest with the brand, will be succeeding in the future. Will it be an advertising agency is left to be seen?

Learn the history, to know all the rules you are going to break.

These are my rules and if you do not like them I have some others as well.

From this standpoint I will be writing my observation from the industry and the future of planning and advertising as well. Welcome aboard.

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