Brand U

“While a traditional approach to brand building works for products that have identical characteristics, it is difficult to apply to service organizations, and other non-profit organizations that benefit from their complex characteristics. If we follow this view with respect to colleges and universities, then we understand the necessity to get as many people within the organization as possible involved in creating experiences that provide meaning and benefit.”

Two Schools of Thought on Branding Education

Aroma-Sell Fresh

"Female study participants in a room with a hidden chocolate-chip cookie scented candle were much more likely to make an unplanned purchase of a new sweater -- even when told they were on a tight budget -- than those randomly assigned to a room with a hidden unscented candle (67 percent vs. 17 percent)"

Aroma Of Chocolate Chip Cookies Prompts Splurging On Expensive Sweaters

Book It

"Smart managers will focus on innovation during the tough months ahead and come out swinging by the end of the year. This is what Apple tends to do so look to Apple—not for its products—but for its strategy."

10 Best Books On Innovation To Get You Through The Recession.

Auto-Rad

"Brown emerged as a luxe stand-in for black in the early 2000s, when Valentino, Donna Karan, and Yves Saint Laurent, among others, showcased suits, ball gowns and knits in saturated chocolate, toffee and caramel shades; the color recently filtered into automotive preferences. In 2007, 25% of Buick Enclaves sold were painted 'Cocoa Metallic,' and BMW AG's 2009 Mini Cooper Clubman will soon hit the streets in 'Hot Chocolate,' a warm brown."

How Clothes Make the Car

We're All a Little Misunderstood

New logo? Copy.

"Xerox and Interbrand, a brand consultancy that is a unit of Omnicom Group, spent more than 18 months interviewing some 5,000 people across the globe about their associations with the Xerox name. Then they set about figuring how they could best retain the nice things it stands for (dependability and stability), jettison the not-so-nice (formal, somewhat stodgy) — and, most importantly, add in such attributes as modern, innovative and flexible."

Xerox Hopes Its New Logo Doesn’t Say ‘Copier’
Xerox, The Very, Very, Very Shiny Company

Green Bee Gone?

"Today, the couple’s quirky enterprise is owned by the Clorox Company, a consumer products giant best known for making bleach, which bought it for $913 million in November. Clorox plans to turn Burt’s Bees into a mainstream American brand sold in big-box stores like Wal-Mart. Along the way, Clorox executives say, they plan to learn from unusual business practices at Burt’s Bees — many centered on environmental sustainability. Clorox, the company promises, is going green."

Can Burt’s Bees Turn Clorox Green?

Boxed In

"Andrew S. Grove, the co-founder of Intel, put it well in 2005 when he told an interviewer from Fortune, 'When everybody knows that something is so, it means that nobody knows nothin’.' In other words, it becomes nearly impossible to look beyond what you know and think outside the box you’ve built around yourself."

Innovative Minds Don’t Think Alike

Under New Management

"Mark Serrianne, owner and CEO for the past decade of Cincinnati's Northlich, is stepping down and selling the agency to longtime Chief Operating Officer Kathy Selker."

Northlich Ownership Changes Hands but Stays Independent

Now About That Resolution ...

Navigating New Waters

"In Roberts' formulation, the brand navigator devises an overall message, then subcontracts the work to the relevant people--interactive shops, direct marketers, and so on. He is attracted to the concept, in part, because Saatchi would get paid based on the performance of the entire campaign rather than on the hours spent making ads. That would help him extricate the agency from the flagging traditional ad business. Roberts isn't the only advertising executive scrambling to reposition his agency as a brand navigator. Big names like TBWA, BBDO, and Ogilvy & Mather are doing so, too."

Struggles of a Mad Man

ShiftHappens

Provoking thougts for a new year.

Your Moment of Zen

Finding Religion?

"While True Religion is part of a new iteration of premium-ness, it faces a very old luxury dilemma: how to keep revenue growing without undercutting that 'aspirational' image."

Outlet for Exclusivity

Snapple Re-do

"As I mentioned earlier, these bottles and the logo are slick — this is half compliment and half condemnation. Everything is very well considered and composed, from the textures in the background, to the fruit imagery, to the typography, but in everything that they have gained in execution they have lost in attitude. And, as I see it, these new bottles are perhaps a bigger reflection of an overall slump in the delivery of the Snapple we have grown accustomed to."

20 Degrees of Separation

Some Experience Required

"In this environment, P&G CEO A.G. Lafley's investment in design as a differentiator in product experience will be put to the test. Lafley has placed much emphasis on retail considerations—what he likes to describe as the "first moment of truth" with consumers. And for national marketers like P&G, point-of-sale consideration is taking on new urgency as they compete in a proliferating retail universe of SKUs (stock-keeping units) and the increasing credibility of store brands. And the company doesn't stop at packaging. Lafley has set out to make P&G as much about design as technology or price point. "

'Product Experience' Drives Performance

Color Me Blue?

"AT least one color authority, Pantone, has taken the plunge and announced its favorite color for 2008. To be sure, this news doesn’t seem as delectable as People’s Sexiest Man Alive or as snugly affirming as Time’s Person of the Year. You probably did not even know that chili pepper red was the color for 2007."

Pantone's Color of the Year Is...

Music is my Bag. Or not.

"But only the best bags make the cut. So stores, sensing a marketing opportunity, are racing to transform bare-bones bags into lavish, thick ones that will become free advertising."

Never Mind What’s in Them, Bags Are the Fashion

A Creative Approach to Education

"In fact, even within the taught arts is a hierarchy that regulates some of the arts to a lower level of importance than others. A dangerously crazy condition when we stand back and measure the importance of creative ideas in our access-flattened world."

Connecting the Dots

Rage Against the Machine

"This is no small challenge for ad agencies, particularly megasize ones like Publicis, which were cobbled together during a wave of consolidation premised on the idea that scale, not precision, was the key to success. Now Lévy and his ilk are watching smaller, nimbler shops -- especially those built around interactive work -- routinely chip away at accounts they long thought secure."

A Mad Man Gets His Head Together

TAG ... you're not It

"However, as the onslaught of holiday ads hit, there are likely to be less of these familiar refrains as many marketers are using their taglines sparingly or not at all."

Advertising: Taglines Lose Their Starring Role In Ads

So Fresh and So Clean (clean)

Some very cool new work from Pemberton & Whitefoord for new Tesco grocery Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market.

www.p-and-w.com

Power Couple

"Kathman, who has led the world's largest employee-owned brand design firm (formerly known as Libby Perszyk Kathman) for a decade, says the design business 'is a small, but global industry.' That means he and his wife - they recently marked their 25th wedding anniversary -are frequently on the road and not together. Grubow, who has led brand identity programs for Olay, Pantene and Herbal Essence, makes six trips a year to China."

Look Who's Talking

Extractable Presidential Units

Reading Tea Leaves and Campaign Logos

Wait For It ...

The 10,000 Hour Question

"The thing I find myself worrying about is 'expertise in what?'. What have I spent 10,000 hours learning? As I do more and more stuff that's not advertising I think I'll start to find out just what it is I've learned. I'm looking forward to that. But, more importantly, what are we asking people at the start, or in the middle of their careers, to spend 10,000 hours doing? Will it be any use to them 10,000 hours later? Are we making them experts in something that won't be around 10,000 hours later, or are we giving them expertise in something that will last? That seems like an important thing to wonder about."

chicken-sexing, expertise and 10,000 hours of something

TAXI!

If the new NYC Taxi logo does not seem to be the smoothest work of design, that may be because it traveled a bumpy road on its way to more than 26,000 yellow cab doors.

Reviews Trickle In for New Taxi Logo

Globally Relevant

"Ford was once one of the 10 most valuable brands in the world. They're no longer on that list, but Toyota now is. How did Toyota—and the other nine companies—do it? There are 5 characteristics that all top global brands have in common."

Why Global Brands Work

When In Doubt, Simplify. Then Simplify Just a Bit More.

"'Keep it simple, stupid.' That's the advice every executive has received on how to share strategy with employees. The subtext is often, 'Keep it simple, because your people are stupid.' But you don't need to embrace simplicity just so your people can comprehend your message. The point of simplicity is more fundamental: Simplicity allows people to act."

Analysis of Paralysis

This Would Never Happen on my Watch

Redesign of the Week

A BusinessWeek for a Busier World

Persuading the Functions

"Clearly, the job of building a design practice that spans a global enterprise like HP is at least as much about management as it is about design. Lucente has taken on the task with a deft political hand. 'At HP,' he says, 'it's all about persuasion -- making our best effort and then letting people decide whether they want to take us up on it.'"

Streamlining HP

Connecting Beyond :30 Intervals

"Many large marketers are taking huge chunks of money out of their budgets for traditional media and using the funds to develop new, more direct interactions with consumers — not only on the Internet, but also through in-person events.

"Adventurous companies like Nike have been experimenting with these alternatives since the 1990s. But now, even the most conventional marketers are making these alternatives a permanent — and ever bigger — part of their advertising budgets."

The New Advertising Outlet: Your Life

2007 MoD

Fast Company Masters of Design

Designing a Better Manager

"RitaSue Siegel, a headhunter who has placed myriad designers in upper management and executive positions, insists that all major corporations offer executive training programs to high-potential employees, including designers. She points, for instance, to Procter & Gamble (PG) where 'designers get training in memo writing, giving winning presentations, and finance for nonfinance managers.' As an example, she singles out Jon Denham, a former associate director of design for P&G hair care, whose broad business training helped him land a job as first-ever vice-president of design at another major consumer products company (a move soon to be announced)."

Wanted: VPs of Design

Onslaught

New Bravia Ad Multiplies Like Bunnies

When Bad Names Happen to Good People

A few words of advice for what not to do...

Seven Deadly Sins of Company Naming Changes

Fascinating Web Site ...

...for all design geeks. Brand New dissects corporate and brand identity re-designs. With an active roster of catty commenters, it can be a bit addicting. For a truly guilty pleasure, check out the reaction to the new 5/3 work.

Also great for case studies.

Brand New

Take Two

Chicago's Rising Star

Como se dice?

"The estimate worked up by the Association of Hispanic Advertising Agencies for 2007 is $928 billion. Those are dollars spent inside this country by Hispanic consumers, American-born citizens as well as green-card residents and the undocumented, on things they want or need: batteries, iPods, laundry soap, lawn chairs, motor oil, Bulova watches, new-home loans, Volvos, takeout pizza, cellphones, power saws, swimming pools, deodorant, airline tickets and plasma TV’s. It’s $200 billion more than was spent two years ago. Propelled by continuous immigration and larger family size, the dual factors that are making the Hispanic population multiply faster than any other in the United States, the spending figure is expected to top a trillion dollars within the next three years."

How Do You Say ‘Got Milk’ en Español?

Hey, Who Hi-Jacked My Brand?

"Throughout the day we asked three key questions: 1) What does it mean to no longer have creative control of your brand? 2) How does social media enable new forms of co-creation? 3) How can your customers become your biggest allies in the creation of new ideas? There were no easy answers, but two consistent and valuable themes surfaced."

Feeling Trashed on the Web?

Today in Logo Tweaks

NFL to revamp shield with redesigned logo

Your Moment of Zen

Almost, but Not Quite

Archives of history reveal failed uni designs

Design Matters

"There is, however, compelling evidence that in the aggregate, companies that excel in design kick some serious butt in the market that matters most to investors: the stock market. The data comes from the London-based Design Council, a publicly funded research organization that promotes the role of design in Britain. The Council reports that over a ten-year period, from 1995 to 2004, 61 "design-led" businesses outperformed the Financial Times Stock Exchange 100 by more than 200%."

Proving Design Moves Markets
The Value of Design Factfinder

Tone it Down

"It's possible to take this Brand Voice thing too far, to the point where it feels like you're in some dodgy sci-fi movie (The Fifth Element? Total Recall?) where, to establish that we're in the future, when the hero wakes up in the morning in his futurepad, everything from his alarm clock to his coffee machine talks to him in a Star Trek computer voice."

could your brand voice please shut up?

Sign o' the Times

"The Federal Highway Administration granted Clearview interim approval in 2004, meaning that individual states are free to begin using it in all their road signs. More than 20 states have already adopted the typeface, replacing existing signs one by one as old ones wear out."

The Road to Clarity

The Limited

"It might seem strange to kill off a product at the peak of its popularity. But for Pepsi, Ice Cucumber was largely a marketing stunt: a way to generate buzz for the brand in what is arguably the world's most cutthroat beverage market."

Fad Marketing's Balancing Act

Gangsta

More PUPPET AGENCY!

Seller's Market?

"Procter & Gamble Co. delivered the goods by hitting its top-line growth target and beating analyst earnings projections by a penny last quarter, but it isn't yet delivering big divestitures of slower-growing brands some analysts have been expecting."

P&G's Slowing Sales Growth Fuels Calls for Divestitures

OOH ... in Your Ipod

Plan B?

"Not long ago, planners were the undisputed rock stars of the agency business. But they're now mere mortals in "the middle of the maelstrom of everything going on"

Account Planners at a Crossroads

Survey Says ...

The Top 100 Brands

Chasing Technology

"That's why Continuum, IDEO, ZIBA and other design/innovation consultancies and being drawn into the brand business (IDEO just opened in New York, the land of the brand). With their deep roots in design tools and methodologies that are ethnographic and anthropological, they have a different way of connecting to the consumer ... What ad agencies need to learn is how to do this. They have to connect their clients to their customers, not the latest technology."

Are Big Ad Agencies So Clueless That Corporations Should Avoid Them?

So Much for the 'Seafood Lover in You'

"Kim Lopdrup, president of Red Lobster, says that the marketing initiative is part of a three-stage effort to revamp the brand. The first phase involved improving operations so that customers got what they ordered and did not have to wait too long. The second phase is aimed at changing the public image and perception. The third part will be dedicated to increasing sales at existing restaurants and perhaps adding locations."

In the Kitchen and on the Airwaves, Red Lobster Gets a Makeover

Fo' Sizzle

Find more videos like this on AdGabber

Think Like a Tiger

"This psychological puzzle starts with the research of Stanford's Carol Dweck. Her latest book, Mind-set: The New Psychology of Success, should be on every business manager's bookshelf. Dweck has found that individuals succeed or fail based on how they think about intelligence. She says people have one of two mind-sets on the matter."

Leadership Is a Muscle

Feature Creep and the Modern Brand

"To judge by marketing hype and iPhone mania, most people live in perpetual anticipation of the next super product: a bigger plasma-screen TV, a sleeker BlackBerry, a more shock-absorbing running shoe. But the truth is, many consumers bemoan the incessant rush of innovation that pushes manufacturers to tamper with products the consumers feel are already perfect"

I Love It, It’s Perfect, Now It Changes

Name Game

"When the results came in, one consensus was certain: The best new brand names are clear and simple. Easy-to-associate names like aloft, Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide's new hotel brand, stole the spotlight from more abstract monikers like Andaz, the new luxury hotel chain from Global Hyatt."

What's in a Name?

PUPPET AGENCY!

Episode 1: Junior's Advice


Episode 2: 20 Hours


Episode 3: The Network Logo

More on that Crazy London Olympic Logo

"The word I heard associated with it was hideous, and I'd have to go along with that. For the life of me, I can't imagine how you'd turn this stylized design into something people would want to wear, or use for navigational purposes or for a Web site."

Hideous -- or intriguing?

Is Apple's Architecture Troubled?

"It's absolutely true to argue that a naming architecture is no replacement for amazing products that people choose to talk about. But if you're going to pay all those lawyers and marketing suits to work on the names, they might as well be encouraged to lead, not to follow.

"Brand names aren't brands, not by a long shot. But they are valuable clues to consumers, as well as assets you own."

Sloppy naming

Dell Gets a Facelift

"In its latest step to jump-start lagging sales, the personal computer maker is rolling out a TV, print and online advertising campaign this week aimed at promoting its new line of colorful notebook computers."

Dell Pushes Reset Button on Its Image

Nussbaum on Design Thinking

"In the US, CEOs and top managers hate the word “design.” Just believe me. No matter what they tell you, they believe that “design” only has something to do with curtains, wallpaper and maybe their suits. These guys, and they’re still mostly guys, prefer the term “innovation” because it has a masculine, military, engineering, tone to it. Think Six Sigma and you want to salute, right? I’ve tried and tried to explain that design goes way beyond aesthetics. It can have process, metrics all the good hard stuff managers love. But no, I can’t budge this bunch. So I have given up. Innovation, design, technology—I just call it all a banana. Peel that banana back and you find great design. Yummy design. . The kind of design that can change business culture and all of our civil society as well."

CEOs Must Be Designers, Not Just Hire Them. Think Steve Jobs And iPhone.

Less IS More

"Sustainability is part of every packaging engagement today,'' said Jerry Kathman, president of LPK Inc., the Cincinnati brand-identity and package-design firm. "Everybody's interested in redesigning their packaging to make it smaller, including more recycled content or using more environmentally friendly inks."

Packaging goes green

Small Packs & Big Margins

"In just three years, sales of 100-calorie packs of crackers, chips, cookies and candy have passed the $20-million-a-year mark, making them a breakout hit on par with the SnackWells low-fat fad of the 1990’s."

In Small Packages, Fewer Calories and More Profit

Driving Design from the Top

"Democracy works well for running a country and choosing a prom queen. The best product designs, however, come from someone with a singular strong vision and the fortitude to fend off everything and everyone that would compromise it."

Even After Apple, Designers Dig Jobs

Turning Green into Green

"That vision of an eco-sensitive life as a series of choices about what to buy appeals to millions of consumers and arguably defines the current environmental movement as equal parts concern for the earth and for making a stylish statement."

Buying Into the Green Movement

This Little Piggy Went to the Bathroom

W + K = Genius

"David and I had children instead of money," says Wieden. "We thought about raffling them off." But, says Kennedy, "We couldn't find any takers."

These guys create ads you remember

Y?

"They're ambitious, they're demanding and they question everything, so if there isn't a good reason for that long commute or late night, don't expect them to do it. When it comes to loyalty, the companies they work for are last on their list - behind their families, their friends, their communities, their co-workers and, of course, themselves."

"Manage" us? Puh-leeze ...

The Kids Will LIke It? Right?

London unveils logo of 2012 Games

Breaking Up is Not Hard to Do

Break Up

TREND: (Still) Made Here

“(STILL) MADE HERE encompasses new and enduring manufacturers and purveyors of the local. In a world that is seemingly ruled by globalization, mass production and ‘cheapest of the cheapest’, a growing number of consumers are seeking out the local, and thereby the authentic, the storied, the eco-friendly and the obscure.”

June Trend Briefing

Doing Some of that Strategy Stuff

"I think it all boils down to two simple things. Define what you need to do, then define what you need to do to get there. AND NEVER FORGET, your objective is NOT to 'drive footfall' or 'increase sales'. It's to understand what's STOPPING people doing what you want and finding a way to change that - ultimately you're looking for a response in someone's head, then the physical end result will take care of itself."

How to find a strategy

Project X13D

Doritos creates a random flavor. puts it in an (essentially) un-marked bag. Encourages people to name it. Simple and not bad.

X13D

These Are Awful, Right?

Is it just me? I think this whole Vitamin Water campaign is waaaay off the mark. I mean, who are they talking to? The one with 50 is the worst.

Your Moment of Zen

Organic Growing Pains

"But it's also clear P&G stopped broadly gaining market share on major competitors last quarter for the first time in years, and that a growing number of its brands are struggling."

How Can Lafley Keep P&G Expanding?

Name Brands. Lackluster Results.

Shares of marquee American brands like Kodak and Gap have languished as upstarts conquer their turf. What will it take to restore their luster?

Tough Times for Tarnished Icons

BW's Latest on Innovation

The World's Most Innovative Companies
P&G Asks: What's the Big Idea?

Wait, Why are Those Babies Driving?

TREND: Transparency Tyranny

"Old economy fog is clearing: no longer can incompetence, below-par performance, ignored global standards, anti-social & anti-eco behavior, or opaque pricing be obscured. In its place has come a transparent, fully informed marketplace, where producers have no excuse left to underperform. TRANSPARENCY TYRANNY for some, TRANSPARENCY TRIUMPH for others."

May 2007 Trend Briefing

Handling Your Business

"I mention 'handling' because it seems like the perfect word to describe one of the pointless terrors of the modern marketing world; the tendency to endlessly debate and delineate the characteristics and minutiae of the brand, while completely failing to connect with any genuine business problem."

Brand Handling

Jack White + Coke + Fun w/Animation = Insanity

The Appeal — and Risks — of Authenticity

"In an increasingly shiny, fabricated world of spun messages and concocted experiences--where nearly everything we encounter is created for consumption--elevating a brand above the fray requires an uncommon mix of creativity and discipline. "

Who Do You Love?

Gangsta

Kah Ra Shin

Entirely Random. And Amusing.

Snickers - Don't Stop

Your Moment of Zen

Hold 'Em While You Got 'Em

"ABC is considering changes in the decades-old way it interrupts programs for commercial breaks. The goal is to encourage viewers to stick around rather than reaching for the remote or racing to the refrigerator."

And Now, a Commercial Break That Doesn’t Seem Like One

That'll be $35 per Ounce, Thank You

"Coca-Cola is developing a drink in conjunction with L'Oréal, the cosmetics giant, that could sit on boutique department store shelves alongside beauty products rather than in fridges and drinks machines."

Coke plans 'beauty tea'

Ummmmmm ... SATAN!

"Procter & Gamble Co. has won a jury award of $19.25 million in a civil lawsuit filed against four former Amway distributors accused of spreading false rumors linking the company to Satanism to advance their own business."

P&G gets $19.25M in Satanism rumor suit

Behaviorial Research + Design

Jan Chipchase of the Nokia Research Center talks about how behavioral research feeds into the phone maker's design strategies

Nokia's Design Research for Everyone

TREND: Crowd Clout

April 2007 Trend Briefing

Hello.

History Lesson

A pretty cool site that details the history behind many of the world's best-known brandmarks.

LogoDesignHistory

Stengel: Market share is trust materialized

"Procter & Gamble's Jim Stengel described a major cultural shift that he believes is turning the world's largest marketer into a starter of conversations and a solver of consumers' problems rather than a one-way communicator. "

Stengel Exhorts 4A's: 'It's Not About Telling and Selling'