A Traditional Agency
by Glen Peak
In a recent blog article, What Kind of Agency Are You, an ad agency owner observed his struggle with how to “categorize” his agency, e.g. digital, creative, branding, etc. Lots of varied services and talent no doubt led him to describe such a struggle.
I was struck by the author’s observation that they never use the word “traditional” to describe the agency and wondered aloud if even “traditional” agencies use the word. Well…we don’t currently put the word “traditional” in the descriptors of our 4A’s advertising agency but this discussion prompts me to think that we should proudly include this word in our messaging. Perhaps someone would actually ask: what does the “traditional” descriptor mean?
I don’t believe that many of today’s clients understand that ad agencies were once considered to be true marketing partners (a term that has since been beat to death and misused). Better agencies were involved in high level marketing strategy, new product development, market research, package design, media planning and buying, collateral material (yes… even that stuff), promotional programs and, oh yes, advertising that worked. In short, the agency was viewed as a business-building partner and expected to bring ideas to the table that could make a difference regardless of the medium. To achieve that, agencies had to have the marketing capability and passion to understand the client’s business as well as examine trends.
If “traditional” is about being generally recognized, customary and even long-standing, I really want to incorporate this label into the characterization of our agency.
Online Brand Identity in SEO Strategy
by Amy Phillips
Good brand management is supported by a strong and strategic brand identity. For a brand to stand out in its field, a brand’s online identity is becoming increasingly important. One of the most essential support systems for strong online brand identity is good search engine optimization (SEO).
To examine a brand online, the obvious first place to start is the brand’s Web site. An optimized site, with page titles, clean URLs, good content, headers, descriptions, alt tags and navigation will help with SEO. A very comprehensive checklist can be found here. But is that enough?
For high search engine ranking, the answer is no.
Paid advertising with media such as Pay-Per-Click through services such as Google AdWords, Yahoo Search Marketing and Microsoft adCenter, is helpful but can be expensive. Organic SEO costs nothing but the time to build and maintain it. Some knowledge of the ever-changing search engine criteria for ranking algorithms helps.
But are an optimized site and paid advertising enough?
Many organic (as opposed to paid) SEO strategies today call for only 25% of effort given to “on-page” (the website) as opposed to 75% for “off-page” efforts (in-bound links and social media).
Social Media, according to Wikipedia, is composed of three things:
• Concept (art, information, or meme).
• Media (physical, electronic, or verbal).
• Social interface (intimate direct, community engagement, social viral, electronic broadcast or syndication, or other physical media such as print).
If social media is to be used to help SEO, all “concepts” must be strategic and brand-reinforcing. Anything else could actually be damaging. So, a brand’s social media presence with outlets such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube among others, needs to be carefully crafted, controlled and monitored. Never underestimate the power of perception.®
The social interface component of social media presents the most challenges. What does it entail? Meeting people and talking. Asking questions and answering them. Engaging to add value. So how does a “brand” do this successfully?
The first place to start is to create a voice. A company needs to decide whether to set up separate Twitter accounts or one company account. How do you determine the right voice? For the pros and cons of all to consider, check out “The Right Voice for Your Brand is…”
Once your company’s voice is established, make sure that it is consistent from brand image to brand experience. Make sure that expectations are aligned. Create a strategy. Have a plan. Make goals and create timelines. Involve your advertising agency. Outside consultants can give valuable advice from a “fresh” perspective. Consider an integrated advertising campaign. You can’t pay for the publicity of something that goes viral. The more publicity your brand receives, the higher its search engine ranking is, organically.
Designing Effective Eblasts
Does the look and feel of your email messaging effect the campaign results? You may have wondered whether an ordinary-looking email would get better results than a designed one, or vice versa.
We already knew that adding personalization would increase responses. But would people view a simple text email as more personable? Or would the color and design of a newsletter-type email help it stand out in crowded inboxes?
We divided our list in half, sending out a total of 1200 emails. We sent them out at the same time, with the same subject line and the same content—the only difference was the design of the email itself.
Designed email
Plain email
The results? We had more than twice as many people respond to the designed email, and 200% more forwarded it to a friend compared to the plain version.
Results
Overall, click-throughs from the eblast were responsible for a 387% increase in traffic to our site.
The Power of Frequency
When advertising legend Leo Burnett died in 1971, a book simply titled, Leo, was privately printed and distributed by his associates. Those lucky enough to have worked with the man received a coveted copy. Glen Peak was among the fortunate few.
In Leo, a compilation of famous speeches, we find timeless words of wisdom, amazingly relevant today. In about 1950, Burnett wrote about “the brand” in a speech called, “The power of frequency.” He almost sounds like a modern branding guru when he explains, “Whether it is an impulse purchase like a candy bar or a package of cigarettes or an infrequent and highly deliberated purchase like a washing machine, a refrigerator, a vacuum cleaner or a mattress, the biggest single thing that advertising can contribute is a friendly predisposition toward the brand—a whole complex of thoughts and emotions which give the purchaser peace of mind in the choice he [or she] makes. We shun the unknown. We are naturally drawn to the familiar. You might call this simply ‘friendship for the product.’ Your best friends are people whose qualities you like and admire and whom you enjoy being with—but they are usually people you see frequently. The principle of frequency in advertising has long been recognized. Several great brands have been built around rigid adherence to this principle rather than through the content or power of any single advertisement.”
The idea of a “whole complex of thoughts and emotions” about a brand sounds like modern branding building, doesn’t it? And, Burnett’s emphasis on the power of “friends” seems almost prophetic in this era of social networking.
Although the concept of brand friendship and loyalty hasn’t changed much over the past 60 years, media choices dramatically have. As marketing experts today, we ask ourselves. how much advertising is too much? How much is too little? The battle between reach and frequency is going through seismic shifts in perspective and is altering everything we do.
In light of the changes occurring almost daily, it is beneficial to review some basic concepts in media strategy and examine how those concepts are evolving. To read more about our perspectives on media planning, click here to request our White Paper 3.
Psychology of Color
by Kathryn Clark, Art Director
Color—a difference of a few shades can stimulate, depress, provoke, soothe, and even make us shiver or sweat.
In fact, according to a study at Washington State University, people who are surrounded by the color green can endure more pain, and recover more quickly from surgery using fewer drugs.1 Pink, on the other hand, has been shown to have a subduing and calming effect on violent prision inmates.2
If color is this powerful, what is it saying about your brand?
Here are a few of the ways color can influence brand perception:
• People will make riskier bets and gamble more under red lights as opposed to blue lights. This is why you see so much red neon in Las Vegas.3
• Being in a blue room can lower your heart rate and suppress your appetite. Red and yellow have the opposite effect—which is why so many fast food restaurants use these colors.4
• Yellow and red are also the best selling candy colors. Dylan Lauren, the owner of Dylan’s Candy Bar in NYC says that “Yellow is nostalgic, and red is passion. It makes people hungry.”
• Recent studies suggest that nearly all sports are enhanced in blue surroundings—including weight lifting. This may be because people tend to be more calm and focused in a blue environment.5
• Purple stimulates the area of the brain used in problem solving.6
• White pills are the most effective at soothing ulcers, even if they are merely placebos. Green tablets reduce anxiety, antidepressants are best in yellow and blue ones make the most successful tranquilizers.7
While the response to color is altered by personal and cultural experiences, many are universal and can be used for more effective brand positioning. From the office to the candy store, from your house to the grocery store, color affects our lives in amazing ways. Why not harness this power for your brand?
Psychology of Branding
The connections between marketing and psychology are particularly interesting for an agency such as ours with the brand promise, “The Power of Perception®”
The Branding Strategy Insider recently ran an article called Creating The Brand Halo Effect. The halo effect refers to how a product—through effective advertising, promotion and acceptance in the marketplace—takes off in sales, not only for that particular product, but for products associated with the brand.
The article uses Apple’s iPod as an example of the halo effect. In 2005, the company concentrated advertising dollars heavily on the iPod; however, their overall sales went up 68 percent from the year before. The big news here is that this jump wasn’t only from iPod sales, which accounted for 39 percent; but the other 61 percent of their sales, which came from computers, software and other services. By placing the spotlight on the best product or service from a given company, audiences form certain understanding or perception of an entire brand.
Putting most of your marketing “eggs” and advertising dollars in one basket may not be an easy idea to sell in the boardroom. But focusing on the best horse may increase sales in other areas.
The article also mentions how imprinting is an important concept in both marketing and psychology. In psychology, imprinting describes rapid learning that occurs on a subconscious level. In marketing, the first brand in a new category is often imprinted in audiences’ minds and percieved as more authentic than others. Examples of first brands are Kleenex, Hertz, Heinz and Starbucks.
Carefully managing perceptions to increase the value of brands has been PeakBiety’s focus for years.
Why Making the Logo Bigger Can be a Big Mistake.
by Amy Phillips, Creative Director
It’s a problem that comes up in design 101, and is waged by art directors everywhere. The dilemma of whether to engage the audience or hit them over the head with a client’s logo has endured since David Ogilvy penned his first headline.
Clients who spend money on a web banner or TV commercial naturally want to get the most out of their ad dollars. But pushing the logo into someone’s face as often as a 30-second spot or a tile-sized Web banner will allow, isn’t really the best way to do it. Viewers are way too sophisticated for this tactic. And now they have technology to back them up. One click of the mouse or the remote control, and your logo and the rest of your message are history.
Unless you quickly establish why your ad is relevant to them, they’re unlikely to register anything else. Just think of it as the, what’s-in-it-for-me? syndrome. The people you’re trying to reach are caught up in their own lives. If at home, there are phones ringing, children crying, dinners boiling over and bills that need paying. At the office, things are even worse. Deadlines loom, sales goals beckon and bosses demand answers. “Now what were you trying to sell me?”
Please…do yourself and your company a very big favor. Don’t let all your hard work and good money go to waste on an audience that isn’t paying attention. Engage them first. Then they might even be interested in your logo.
The Importance of Creative Strategies
by Glen Peak
As I was watching Justin Timberlake’s crowdsourcing effort for his 901 Tequila brand, I was amazed at his proposal.
With almost no information about the product’s goals, messaging or even target market available, how can he hope to get relevant ideas that will generate interest in the brand beyond the first five minutes of buzz?
I can’t “prove” this, but it’s my sense that a lot of advertising—all media forms, including sales collateral—is developed without a clear-cut creative strategy. This sense, born out of experience, seems particularly true in smaller companies that might not have a fully staffed or thoroughly trained marketing department. I’ve also seen loosely defined (if not completely undefined) assignments coming out of larger companies as well. My point? Operating without a well-defined strategy for creative work presents huge risks:
• The audience won’t “get” or understand the value of the product/service, and the dollars spent to produce and distribute the message and materials are significantly wasted.
• The client and agency have no foundation to assess the creative work and render judgment on whether it can work – no matter “how clever” it is in someone’s judgment.
• The strategy makes the agency’s work more focused and therefore, more likely to produce on-target work in less time (read: “save money”).
• When clients and agencies agree to a strategy up front, it minimizes chances for disappointment in the work.
So, if it’s this important, why isn’t there a strategy written to guide the development of all types of advertising? This includes: sales brochures, web content, commercials, ads, etc.
Probable answer: It’s hard work, takes time, is not glamorous and requires studying the target audience’s needs and wants. It involves getting into their heads, deciding what’s unique about your advertising style and knowing how the competition has presented themselves.
So, how often have you looked at some piece of communication and wondered, “Why should I value this product or service? How will it benefit me?” or “How is this different from what I am now using or doing?”
A good advertising agency will insist on a strategy agreement at the beginning to avoid wasting time and money. There are even tests that can be applied to judging the merit of the strategy itself, but we’ll save that for another blog post…
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