Making P&G New and Improved

Procter & Gamble is a place you'd look for wash-day miracles, not management revolutionaries. Yet A.G. Lafley, CEO since 2000, proved otherwise. He drove relentless change at the famous but once flailing company. In The Game-Changer, written with management guru Ram Charan, Lafley explains how P&G flourished by organizing around customer-driven innovation. He talked with TIME's Bill Saporito.

Time Magazine

Don't Try This At Home.

Tried & True > New & Different

Understanding, however, has lagged behind spending. It's often impossible to separate the impact of what marketers buy, such as in-store TV and radio or shopper circulars, from what they really hope to get for their money: special displays that can pay off big but often aren't explicitly purchased.

Unilever Finds That Coupons, Signs Beat In-Store Tech

Brand Obama Update

But the Obama endorsements seem not simply expressions of support, but of something more like fandom. Dan Ariely, a behavioral-economics professor at M.I.T. and author of the recent book “Predictably Irrational,” has gone so far as to compare it to romance, citing research about the early stages of dating as a comparison point: “When we get partial information about others we tend to fill in the gaps optimistically; we assume that they are wonderful, just like us and that they share our exact values and preferences.” He figures part of Obama’s charm may be the way fans are filling in the blanks.

The Art of Politics

2nd Logo for 3rd Place

This is the second time in three years Starbucks has trotted out the brown mermaid, inspired by a Norse woodcut. Back in 2006, she was resurrected to mark the chain's 35th anniversary. This time, she is a messenger for Chairman Howard Schultz, who is trying to restore some of the goodwill and warm feelings for the brand that have gone by the wayside because of increasing coffee prices, machine-made lattes, and bad press.

Starbucks' Retro Logo

Book It.

Co-authored with management consultant Ram Charan, The Game-Changer: How You Can Drive Revenue and Profit Growth with Innovation focuses on how innovation has been the cornerstone of P&G's turnaround and on what lessons business can draw from Lafley's experiences. Admittedly, a huge amount has been written on innovation—so much that the very term has become a business buzzword. But The Game-Changer stands out thanks to its concrete explanation of P&G's method and the rich company examples that Lafley provides. As in other Charan co-productions, the authors employ a tag-team approach, with Lafley taking us inside P&G and Charan providing external management analysis. Still, Lafley's voice comes through clearly. "We were trying to do too much, too fast, and nothing was being done well," he says of the mess he inherited.

How P&G Pampers New Thinking

Whut, Whut.

The launch of TAG Records is part of an initiative to cultivate relationships with the urban community through the development of programs that provide opportunities for aspiring hip-hop talent, P&G said.

P&G has funky hip-hop plan

TREND: Status Stories

STATUS STORIES: As more brands (have to) go niche and therefore tell stories that aren't known to the masses, and as experiences and non-consumption-related expenditures take over from physical (and more visible) status symbols, consumers will increasingly have to tell each other stories to achieve a status dividend from their purchases. Expect a shift from brands telling a story, to brands helping consumers tell status-yielding stories to other consumers.

April Trend Briefing

Yes, We Can ... Brand.

The fact that Obama has taken what we thought we knew about politics and turned it into a different game for a different generation is no longer news. What has hardly been examined is the degree to which his success indicates a seismic shift on the business horizon as well. Politics, after all, is about marketing -- about projecting and selling an image, stoking aspirations, moving people to identify, evangelize, and consume. The promotion of the brand called Obama is a case study of where the American marketplace -- and, potentially, the global one -- is moving. His openness to the way consumers today communicate with one another, his recognition of their desire for authentic "products," and his understanding of the need for a new global image -- all are valuable signals for marketers everywhere.

The Brand Called Obama

Grillin' and Chillin'?

Kentucky Fried Chicken customers will be greeted eventually by lighted "Now Grilling" signs, starting in coming weeks in select U.S. cities. Storefront signs will be altered to promote the new product -- called Kentucky Grilled Chicken. Even the brand's ubiquitous chicken buckets will get a makeover.

"This is transformational for our brand," said Doug Hasselo, KFC's chief food innovation officer.

KFC Cooks Up Grilled Chicken

There Goes M&M's Business

The ardor of the ad business to adopt the technical tools of biometrics — measuring brain waves, galvanic skin response, eye movements, pulse rates and the like — is increasing as consumer spending, the engine of the American economy, slows.

In other words, in hard times ads must work harder to move the merchandise.

“Instead of hypotheses about what people think and feel, you actually see what they think and feel,” said Joel Kades, vice president for strategic planning and consumer insight at Virgin Mobile USA in Warren, N.J.

“I’m not such a huge fan of ad testing,” he added, but measuring biological responses is “absolutely useful.”

Is the Ad a Success? The Brain Waves Tell All