Here is the third part of my interview with marketing expert and best-selling author Al Ries. Although I was originally going to have the fourth part, I realized that it would be better to give you my ideas in one final document.
So get a nice cup of coffee or tea, lift up your chair and enjoy the rest of the interview!
Marsha Friedman: We learned so much, Al, and everything was so good. I do not want to take too much time, but I have two questions that I want to make sure that I ask. First, what do you think about marketing today, compared to the seventies and eighties, when we didn’t have such things as the Internet, social networks, social media marketing, blogs, etc.? How has this changed marketing, and do you think it is better?
Al Rice: Well, the Internet is a new medium, and we are not getting very new media. Before the Internet, the previous “new” medium was television. Thus, over the course of the story, you can see that the “new” tools took a long time to develop. At first there was a publishing company created by Gutenberg several centuries ago that saved a printed book and a magazine (including newspapers and magazines). Then, several hundred years later, we received radio and, finally, television, and now we have the Internet.
Every environment changes society. You might ask, “What is the key differentiation of the Internet?” This is the first global environment. You see, radio, television, newspapers, magazines, books ... they are all mostly national. We have books published in Germany, Spain and many different countries. But each of these publications is published by different people in different forms and is unique for different countries. The book is not a global medium, such as the Internet. Every day of the week with the Internet, we correspond with people in China and in countries around the world.
According to Marshall McLuhan, “Wednesday is a message.” So what is the message on the Internet? What are the social consequences of this environment? Social consequences is averaging the world. Wherever you go into the world today, you see the same brands. This is incredible. My wife and I went to The great Wall of China and my wife said: "Let me stop at the Gatrade." Of course, they had Gatorade. This is China, right? Another example: this morning I received an email from our partner in Vienna. He asked me: “What are Excelsior Jewelry sold by Stephen in Los Angeles?” I said, “I never hear about that.” He said: "Oh, they have shops around the corner ..." I think to myself: "Wait!" I am closer than he is, and yet he is more familiar with him because of the Internet.
I am doing a monthly article for two publications in China. They send me a few questions, and the last question: "We are interested in the Disney brand, etc., etc." So, again, the social consequences of the Internet, the homogenization of the globe, is that we are becoming a monolithic society. More and more, all around the world are one and the same. Eighty percent of coke profits are outside the United States.
Interestingly, there is a really meaningful idea here when it comes to marketing. To explain this, let me give you an analogy. If you lived in a small town, where there were only a hundred people, how many shops would you find? Perhaps one. And what will store the store? Probably all. I mean food, clothes, boots, shoes ... everything that people need in general, hence the general store. Boom!
You are moving to a big city, where millions of people and what you find? You will find specialty shops. Not only clothing stores, but also women's clothing stores, children's clothing stores, men's clothing stores, dry cleaners and supermarkets. The principle is that the larger the market, the larger the city, the more specialized brands become. The consequences or consequences of the Internet, the message of the Internet, as we become an increasingly monolithic world, brands must become narrower, more focused, to stand behind something locally. And it will be a problem.
Everyone wants to be what I call a monolithic brand, a brand that is trying to get a full line of products and services for everyone. He just is not going to work. What for? Because, as more and more companies compete in the same market, each of these qualifying companies has a narrower focus.
In America, for example, we hit Microsoft, and initially focused on software for personal computers. If you live in Guatemala, where there are only three million people, can you create a company just to make computer software and grow like Microsoft? I do not think so. Invariably in such a big country like America, we have companies that you could not start in a smaller country. What for? Because the smaller the market, the bolder you need to be and the bigger the market, the narrower you should be. As we become global, the logic is this: "I will sell my products all over the world, so I must have a broader line, because there are many different people in the world." This is the logic. This is not a practical marketing. If you are going to sell globally, we should have a narrower line.
We work with many companies in small countries, and I can say that a typical company in a small country is very different from a typical company in America. The company can be in the field of food and banking, in cars and all sorts of things. It will never work in America.
In Finland, a country with five million people, they have a company whose product line is narrow. The company is Nokia, and their products are sold worldwide. What for? Since Finland is too small, so Nokia had to think globally to create a large company in Finland. We do not sometimes think globally, because America is big enough so that you can create a rather large company if you just sold it to the Americans. But you better think globally, because if you don’t do this, someone will enter America with their global brand (for example, IKEA), and they will remove your business. Thus, globalization is an idea that was really caused by the Internet.
Marsha Friedman: What a different world today. Amazing I would have been missed by the fact that I was in PR business if I didn’t ask you about your book, Fall advertising and PR growth. I could quote you forever from the book, because this is a really important message you need to hear from the business. Could you just comment, because I really want him to come directly from you, why is PR so serious in creating a brand and sowing seeds?
Al Rice: The problems here are related to trust. In other words, the average ad has little confidence. And for this there are many reasons. One of them is too much advertising. As a result, the average person does not have to believe many of the things that he or she reads in ads. This is not a problem if you have a strong brand. In other words, Ro-lex can run ads, and people will believe it, because they know Ro-lex, they know it and they know that it is one of the most powerful brands in the world. Their friends and neighbors brag when they buy them. But when they see an ad about a brand that they have never heard of, their tension is not to believe any thing they read. In fact, there are many studies that say that most people will not even look at a brand ad that they have never heard of, assuming that "if I never hear about it, it cannot be good ".
Marsha Friedman: It makes a lot of sense.
Al Rice: So advertising is no longer suitable for new brands. What is good for new brands? PR. You see, in PR you are not talking about a brand, this New York Times or Wall street journal or CBS, NBC or ABC, which says it's awesome. Thus, third-party endorsement through PR is a way to launch a new brand. Now this goes against the thinking of leadership in America. Every time someone says, “Let's launch a new brand,” the management says, “we cannot afford to spend $ 20 or $ 30 million on an advertising campaign.” And we will say: “You are right. You shouldn't do that. You have to start with PR. ” Our philosophy is PR and second advertising. You use advertising only after the brand has become established.
I'm not saying that created brands should not do PR; of course they should. But believe me, in the PR business there is such an opportunity to launch brands. As you probably know from experience, at meetings to launch the brand, and I was in many of them and looked around - there are no people with the public. The advertising agency has a marketing manager, there is a sales manager, and I ask: “Where are the PR people?”
Thus, PR business has a long way to go. First, they need to get into the room. They need to find a way to break the door in order to get into the room before the brand is launched. This is also a problem, but the philosophy that I recommend is very effective: first PR, and the second advertisement.
And another consequence of this is people with the public who should be involved in the brand strategy. This is the biggest single, depending on what is traditionally an advertising agency that works with a client to develop a marketing strategy - the words “end machine”, and not an advertising agency. But a PR agent must, in a certain sense, take over part of his brand and work on how to verbalize and visualize the brand. I think that more people with the public should be interested in reading our books, than advertising or advertising people, because some large companies can first buy the concept of PR and advertising.
This would create an amazing PR business, but more importantly, it would make the function more important to the company. And today nothing is as powerful in a company as the successful launch of a new brand. A new brand can double your business. The opportunity to expand the company is largely the development of new brands.
A few years ago, when Apple came out, Richard Edelman, the president and CEO of the largest independent public relations firm in the world, gave speeches on this topic, and Edelman’s business went through the roof. I can not believe how big they are in the last ten years. There is a huge potential in PR business if you just do exactly what I'm talking about: set up the idea that PR people should be those who are external consultants, releasing a new brand, and not advertising agencies.
Marsha Friedman: To your question that in this Board meeting there is not a single PR community discussing the launch of the brand; My experience is that management often often underestimates the actual function of PR, and for this reason they lose sight of its importance and value to the company.
Al Rice: Yes, but this is not a one-way thing. I think that many in the PR industry do not want to be responsible for the success or failure of a brand, so they really don’t want to go out and say, “Hey, you have to let us handle it.” Sometimes they would rather say: "Send us an advertisement, and we advertise the advertisement." This is an easy way out, right?
Marsha Friedman: Yes it's true. I would like to ask you about something else that just occurred to me on the basis of everything you just said about launching a brand with PR. As you attract the public, what the brand means can change based on people's reaction. I was thinking about the Clear Channel radio station here in the Tampa Bay area, where the caller was, who said that their Christian radio station was a “life change radio”. Since then, Clear Channel has captured this, and now this is their slogan. So, if PR is used effectively, the public can tell you how best to position your product in order to talk to them?
Al Rice: Exactly. That's for sure. When you start a brand with PR, the idea that you are going to live forever is not necessarily in a PR release. Usually this is what a magazine or newspapers or consumers end up talking about a brand. Therefore, always keep your ear on the ground, and when you hear something good, you jump on it. But this is something that companies do not like because they want to control the message. And when you launch a brand with PR, in a sense, you leave control of this message in the hands of the media and the public, and corporations do not like it.
We once worked in a company that does not work now, but their product was prepared. They hired us as consultants after they were in business a couple of years later, and after we reviewed their material, we noticed that in one of the big magazines there was a headline that said: “Joy not to cook.” And we said, “Terrific, that's what we want you to do.” Do you see that your company name is signed there? It’s good that we want you to put a big sign that says “Joy not to cook,” “It was a consumer-oriented idea, and these words were“ the ultimate driving machine ”for them.
Do you think we were able to sell this idea? No. Instead, they wanted to talk about the opposite: the joy of cooking and the experience of their 12 chefs.
Marsha Friedman: And this brings you to the attention of the fact that a brilliant marketer is one who is able to think about a potential client.
Al Rice: Yes, it's all in the mind of the consumer. You have a chance when you launch a PR campaign because you cannot control the message. From many companies point of view, they hate this part. they want complete control over the message, and they want to drive the idea to the consumer. I mean, look at some of the posts. I don’t know if you’ve seen the latest Chevrolet ad: Chevy works deep.
Marsha Friedman: Well, I have no idea what that means.
Al Rice: Well, what you see is old fashion photography and typography. In a sense, they are trying to say: "Look at the legacy of the Chevrolet brand, it was forever."
Marsha Friedman: I see ...
Al Rice: Chevy runs deep. Again, in our terminology, you need to bring the message to the ground. If we sell tractors, “runs deep” is excellent. But not an SUV or cars. You don't want to paint a picture of that damn thing in the ditch.
Marsha Friedman: Great point. Al, I want to thank you for taking the time to share your nuggets of wisdom with us so that our readers can get rich and, hopefully, their business grow.
Al Rice: Thank you for calling Marsha. It was nice to talk to you and answer your questions.
~~~~~~~~~~ End of Part 3 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Deep insight from Al, once again. I hope that the information shared by these three segments has given you some nuggets of marketing wisdom and is useful for the success of your business.
