What's Next In Marketing

Brand Bubble Book Really Is What's Next!

I'm proud to say my friend and colleague John Gerzema's book, "The Brand Bubble", is the listed as the number three on the Amazon "Best of 2008 top 10 lists for Business & Investing".

A great read and a MUST read for anyone in the advertising and marketing business during these challenging times.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html/ref=amb_link_7803252_4?ie=UTF8&plgroup=1&docId=1000295911&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=left-1&pf_rd_r=055XWGHD2H4HRPTB4T84&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=457473601&pf_rd_i=1239030011
 

Brand Bubble: The Video

I wrote a few weeks ago about a new book called "The Brand Bubble",  written by my colleague John Gerzema.

http://whatsnext.typepad.com/whats_next_in_marketing/2008/10/whats-next-the-brand-bubble.html

There is now a terrific video that John has posted that outlines the theory behind the book. Have a look and become a "Fan":

http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Brand-Bubble/24168956937#/video/video.php?v=567482159042

What's Next: The Brand Bubble

My colleague and friend John Gerzema has teamed with Ed Lebar to author a terrific new business book called "The Brand Bubble".

http://www.thebrandbubble.com

John and I are colleagues at Y&R, which owns a proprietary research tool call the Brand Asset Valuator.

http://www.yrbav.com/

BrandAsset Valuator®, a proprietary Y&R (the agency we work at...John is our Global Chief Strategy Officer) demonstrates that brands are built in a very specific progression of
four  consumer perceptions: Differentiation, Relevance, Esteem and Knowledge.  More than 350,000 consumer interviews conducted across the globe,  measuring more than 55 different consumer perceptions with regard to over 20,000  brands, have shown these four measures — the Four Pillars of BrandAsset Valuator® — to be consistently linked to a brand’s ability to deliver revenue and profit for its owner — no matter the category, no matter the country, no matter the age of the brand. These Pillars measure a brand’s strength and stature — its value as an asset capable of creating wealth.

John and Ed have written an incredibly smart book: highlighting how companies undervalue the value of their brand(s), and how investing in strengthening a brand is a wise and important objective for a company.

If you or anyone else in your company is involved in activities that effect the strength of your brand, this is a much read.

It is especially relevant now and for the foreseeable future, when the efficiency of your marketing efforts will be of critical importance. Spending your marketing dollars on the right ideas and tactics will be even more important, and ROI will be looked at with laser focus.

Here's the link to the book on Amazon. Read it.

http://www.amazon.com/Brand-Bubble-Looming-Crisis-Value/dp/047018387X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1214592005&sr=1-1

What's next: Brand Digital...The Book

Alan Adamson is the Managing Director of Landor NY (full disclosure: Landor is a sister agency to my form Y&R).

He's written a terrific new book called "Brand Digital" which outlines something that I've blogged about for years: stay on top of the rapid changes technology is bringing to the advertising and marketing industries or become irrelevant.

He's written an article for AdAge that helps to set up the premise for the book:

"You'd have to be caught in a "Mad Men" time warp not to realize that digital technology has changed marketing and brand building in a way even quick-draw Don Draper couldn't have imagined. His challenge to stay ahead of the trends in the industry was nothing compared with what industry execs must do today to understand the impact that digital technology and dynamics are having on brands and brand building."

http://adage.com/cmostrategy/article?article_id=129981

Good stuff.

What's Next In Word Of Mouth (WOM): A Great Book and An Experiment In WOM

I heard this story the other day and it seemed an appropriate introduction to the following post, which talks about a new book about Word of Mouth and the experimental nature of it's launch.

A guy goes to see his Rabbi (insert Priest, Minister, Therapist, etc.) and tells him that he had said something about another member of the Temple, that it had been shared with others, and now he was worried about his standing in the congregation.

The Rabbi asked him to go and get a bag full of feathers and bring it back to the Rabbi. The man is puzzled, but does what he's asked.

When he returns, the man takes the bag full of feathers and bangs it with both hands, forcing all of the hundreds of feather out, which immediately flew all about the room.

"Why did you do that?", the man asked.

The Rabbi replied. "Each of these feathers represent what you said about this person. And how quickly and broadly they spread themselves about is an example of what happens when you speak poorly of someone."

The moral of this story is obviously that you need to understand that gossip and rumors spread quickly, and you can't control them.

The same can be said in many cases about Word of Mouth.

My friend Dave Balter is the founder of BzzAgent (www.bzzagent), an amazing Word-of-Mouth marketing firm, and one of the founders of WOMMA, The Word Of Mouth Marketing Association (www.womma.com)

I try to get together with Dave as often as I can to talk about What's Next in WOM because he is truly right at the forefront of how this powerful activity can be a game changer for a brand. And how if it is mismanaged it can be an absolutely disaster as well.

Dave wrote a book a few years ago about WOM called "Grapevine", which was required reading material for anyone who was trying to get their head around the WOM phenomenon.

http://www.amazon.com/Grapevine-New-Word-Mouth-Marketing/dp/1591841100/

Now Dave has a second book coming out, "The Word Of Mouth Manual: II", and he's embarking on an experiment in how it will be distributed that is quite a unique experiment in WOM, and a test for how publishing may need to change in the future.

Dave explains (through The Harvard Business School publishing site) the way he is going to market with the book here:

http://conversationstarter.hbsp.com/2008/06/an_open_letter_to_the_book_pub.html

See, Dave thinks that, like the ad agency model, that the book publishing model is broken. The industry is seeing a slow erosion in sales, and the old school way of bringing a book to market is broken. He believes that by leveraging new technologies (like blogging), and the power of WOM, that the way a book is brought to market could change. For the better.

He recognizes what some of us have known for some time: that the consumer is now in control, and like in advertising, they will decide what works for them and what doesn't. And either way, they will tell their circle of friends and confidants exactly what they think.

So what is he doing? He's giving the book away for free.

He believes that if the book is any good (and it is a GREAT read), that he can build an audience for it large enough and passionate enough to help him get broader distribution for the book and convince a publisher to step out of their comfort zone in regard to how good books can go to market.

You can download the book for free at this link:

http://www.bzzagent.com/downloads/wom2.jsp?src=whats_next

Yes, free.

This blog is not the only place you can get it for free. Part of Dave's experiment is to also involve other bloggers, including some blogs I read myself. Blogs by Tom Peters, Guy Kawasaki, Seth Godin, and several others. You can take a look at the list of all the bloggers involved here:

http://www.bzzagent.com/monkey/

(Side note: I am honored that Dave included me in this group. So I need the three of you that regularly read this blog to please download the book. You know who you are).

So with all that said: what's so What's Next about all of this, and what is it doing on a blog which is primarily a rant about all that is wrong and right in the agency world?

Because, first, like the publishing world, the agency model is changing, and if you don't get on the bandwagon soon you will find yourself out of the picture.

Second, technology is changing business everywhere. The ability for Dave to distribute this book in the way he's doing it wouldn't have been possible ten, or even five years ago. The dramatic growth of WOM and the social web has enabled a powerful movement in our world: the consumers ability to control what they listen to (the music business is part of this shift as well), read, and what brands they decide they want to have a relationship with. And if that relationship is a good one, they will tell others.

Think about Zappos. Zero marketing dollars. But one of the fastest growing e-commerce sites in the world because people who experience their fantastic customer service tell EVERYONE. Their marketing plan is to provide the most flawless experience possible (including internally, in how they treat their employees), and let those satisfied customer spread the word themselves. And they are.

Word of Mouth is one of the most powerful tools in a marketers arsenal. Knowing how to garner it properly is tricky, which is why the world needs people like Dave Balter and his company to help us to both understand and execute WOM campaigns that will enhance brand value.

The publishing, music, and agency worlds all need to embrace What's Next, and Dave's new book "The Word Of Mouth Manual: II" is another great way to stay ahead of the curve.

I'll let you know how this grand experiment goes when Dave sends me the final stats. I would also love to hear from all of you about what you think of this experiment.