A Better Course

In case it doesn’t come across clearly enough on this blog, I’m a complete geek about branding, particularly the idea that a brand can come to “own” a single word. One of Nader Tavassoli‘s exercises in presentations is asking everyone in the room to say the single word they think of when they hear the […]

[Read more →]

There’s been a lot written and said recently about brand engagement – essentially, the idea that if someone uses something related to your brand, they will be more likely to trust (and by extension buy) your product further down the line. Even more problematically, this has frequently been with reference to brand’s Facebook applications. I’ve […]

[Read more →]

Seminar at work today by Nader Tavassoli on “mere exposure” versus “mere neglect” in advertising and brand liking. We are used to blocking things out given the constant competition for attention. Does the act of ignoring something mean that we are biased against what is ignored – in other words, is the statement any exposure […]

[Read more →]

I honestly don’t know how I would have reacted if I’d been part of Orangina’s marketing team and the agency had presented this concept: It looks like it came from a brief that asked for a change (probably for the ‘sexier’) to the previous staples of Orangina’s advertising (happy oranges, attractive people in rural France). […]

[Read more →]

Ann Handley on Marketing Profs Daily Fix writes about confirmation emails as a means of building a brand. Her example (quoted there in full and here in part) is a confirmation email from CDBaby: We all had a wonderful celebration afterwards and the whole party marched down the street to the post office where the […]

[Read more →]

Lovely IKEA adverts (via swissmiss) I like the way IKEA are (or seem to be) responding to the perception of their furniture as entirely generic by placing the home as a site of creativity; as well as the above, the UK “Not For Sale” campaign puts their products in a similar space. It’s an well-timed […]

[Read more →]

A Photo Editor shows the new adverts for Getty Images today. The comments on these ads are so far negative, but I think they’re wonderful. Getty seem to be referring directly to the fact that they’re seen a sinsiter brand and that this is a function of their being a huge corporation. There’s no question […]

[Read more →]

Stanford GSB’s library blog had a piece on the Nokia Flagship store in Shanghai today. The store allows its users to interact with the products and services before buying them. So far, so Apple Store, but there’s a good quotation; “In an age of experience-driven consumption, retailers must do more than simple advertising and product […]

[Read more →]

Following yesterday’s post I’ve been thinking a lot about narrative; both the stories we tell ourselves about ourselves, and the stories we tell our (potential) customers about our products. Some marketing or advertising seeks to fit their stories into existing narratives – innocent do well at marketing to those who already identify as “a healthy […]

[Read more →]

I recently went to see a talk by Radha Chadha on the rise of luxury brands in Asia, about which she has recently written a book. She had moved from India to Hong Kong a decade ago to work for an ad agency and, fascinated by the attitude to luxury brands that she noticed both […]

[Read more →]