Maybe it’s all the Black Friday deals, the subsequent retail promotions intended to drive sales through the holidays, or perhaps City Sports’ up to 40% going out of business sale that I see every morning on my way to work that have me thinking about “up to” claims. What are “up to” claims? To me, […]
Category: Brand Strategy
Nike’s Deal of a Lifetime
Nike recently announced that they had inked a lifetime sponsorship deal with LeBron James that some estimate could be worth as much as $400-$500 million (how’s that for lifetime value). With shoe sales of Nike’s Jordan brand exceeding $2.6 billion in 2014 alone (per Forbes), this might actually be a wise investment, especially if James […]
Marketing Metrics to Drive Business Growth
It is estimated that more than a trillion dollars are spent each year through marketing activities – and that between 15% and 30% of those dollars are “wasted.”1 That’s right – wasted. Understandably, senior marketing leaders are under increasing scrutiny and pressure to prove the value of their marketing investments – however two of three […]
David with Goliath: How Craft Beer Can Benefit from Acquisition by Megabrewers
*Image courtesy of Bloomberg Businessweek Most craft beer brewers have long considered mainstream beer producers the enemy, with one brewery going so far as to label one of its beers with, “Corporate beer still sucks.” The general attitude across the craft beer industry is that many craft brewers would “never, never sell to AB InBev, […]
View from the Trenches: Best Practices Research
Many organizations are interested in identifying best practices to help illuminate a path for growth. Often, the task is more complex, and sometimes even more treacherous, than it appears. If you’re not careful, best practices research can turn into a misguided odyssey into literature that ends up serving no useful purpose for the organization that […]
Name-dropping: Nike, Starbucks, and now Target
I am wondering why major consumer brands lose their names, leaving their brand icons to serve as their entire visual identity? Last week, I drove past a new Target store built into a tight little urban area near Fenway Park that is being rejuvenated with posh, high-rise residences. I knew it was Target because of […]
Volkswagen’s Crisis – What Should They Do?
Just days after I had leased a new Volkswagen Passat (my second Passat lease), the news emerged that Volkswagen had intentionally programmed many of their diesel engines to comply with emissions standards only when tested. The rest of the time, these engines were found to be producing 10-40x the emissions limit. While it was initially […]
Brand Strategy for Professional Services Firms: It’s Not About You
If I could give only two pieces of brand strategy advice to professional services firms, they would be the following: Identify the customer segment(s) that you can serve better than your competition; Focus your brand strategy on a benefit you provide to those customers, not your own capabilities. 1: Identify the customer segment(s) that you […]
A Millennial’s Reaction to Under Armour’s New Campaign
In an age when marketers are trying to become their consumers’ BFFs, Under Armour’s new ad campaign, Rule Yourself, has turned me off. In trying to appeal to Millennials, its most recent campaign takes a risk, adopting a forceful, parental tone that comes across as lecturing. I, for one, am not enamored. The new campaign, […]
Time to Elevate Market Vigilance
A key job of strategic marketers is to be on constant look out for changes in their consumers and their markets. But most of us don’t have this on the top of our priority lists of things to do. Most of us analyze our markets and develop our strategic plans for driving growth under the […]
