Apple's presentation of its brand as an attitude rather than a product advantage is merely an extension of the concept that advertising superstar David Ogilvy developed in the 1950s. Ogilvy created densely written ads that told stories about the finer points of a Hathaway shirt or a Rolls-Royce. Ogilvy is perhaps best known for a 1958 print ad that carried the headline "At 60 miles an hour the loudest noise in this new Rolls-Royce comes from the electric clock" and included trivia that buyers could use to impress their friends: "The famous Rolls-Royce radiator has never been changed, except that when Sir Henry Royce died in 1933, the monogram RR was changed from red to black."
Over the years, marketers have pushed Ogilvy's ideas even further, telling stories that reduce the product to an afterthought. Any American who watched television in the 1990s will likely remember the 13-part ad campaign for instant coffee that revolved around the potential romance of its attractive lead characters. Most of the 45-second episodes ended in cliffhangers, such as the fifth ad in 1992 in which "Michael" unexpectedly found a good-looking man in his lady friend's apartment. Not until the next episode, six months later, did viewers discover that the man was her brother. In effect, the coffee served as nothing more than the sponsor for short-short films that actually made us excited to watch commercials. (The coffee, incidentally, was Taster's Choice.)
Nike is a prime example of a company that has divorced products from image. The company's "Just Do It" slogan leaves it up to the buyer to decide what "it" might actually be, whether it's running a marathon or lying on the couch. The "swoosh" logo decorates hats, headbands, T-shirts, sweatpants, socks, shoes, backpacks and maternity wear, delivering a message of grace and athletic ability that's separated from what the wearer might actually be doing. In fact, Nike has been so successful in its image-building that its brand equity—the value of its brand purely in terms of name recognition, perceived quality, mental and emotional associations, and patents and trademarks—was estimated at more than $7 billion by Interbrand and BusinessWeek in 2001, half of what the entire company is worth. That Nike's brand equity has retained its value despite accusations of unfair labor practices demonstrates how much consumers value their identification with the Nike image.
Our love affair with brands has entered a new phase: Increasingly, consumers call the shots. Consumers' ability to reformulate brands through peer-to-peer marketing is one of the biggest changes in business over the past decade. "In the old days, the successful communication of a personality through advertising gave the brand a stable meaning," says Michael Solomon. "Now consumers are more proactive in reshaping brands."
Hip-hop culture "hijacked" the Waspy outdoors image of Timberland and decided that the clothes created a cool look for city kids on the subway. Similarly, "the Cadillac Escalade was not intended to become part of the black subculture," says Solomon, but rap singers regularly plug the car in their songs. When Subaru discovered that lesbians purchase its vehicles at four times the rate of the general population, the company began running ads featuring same-sex couples in magazines that targeted gay audiences.
Our relationship with brands is increasingly symbiotic as well. We now glom onto brands and companies for our own financial gain. The auction site eBay allows sellers to create virtual storefronts, letting them serve as branded merchants instead of mere hawkers of flea market wares. Amazon.com lets visitors rank its volunteer reviewers, replacing an anarchy of opinions with a hierarchy of trusted voices. Don Mitchell, chairman of Mitchell and Company in Wellesley, Massachusetts, and Amazon's #2 reviewer, says that he receives more than 100 e-mails daily from authors and publishers seeking book reviews.
Average Joes now routinely approach companies with offers to work hand-in-hand to spread commercial messages among peers. Illinois resident Jim Nelson went so far as to have the orange, blue and black logo of Web hosting company C I Host tattooed on the back of his shaved head; in return for sporting the 25-square-inch logo for five years, Nelson will receive $7,000.
New Jersey teens Chris Barrett and Luke McCabe became living advertisements for First USA after the bank agreed to sponsor their freshman year at college. "We saw Tiger Woods on TV wearing a Nike hat with the swoosh and wondered why we couldn't do something like that ourselves," says Barrett. The duo now recruit students as test marketers. "We're peers to every other student—and creating a brand that relates to them is priceless to every company in the world," he says. "We created our brand, then found a company that fit our brand and promoted them together. We got out of it exactly what we wanted."
Basketball dervish Mark Walker can get what he wants from Reebok too.
Additional research by Thomas Sexton.
Tags:
adcult usa,
basketball player,
blood family,
branding,
brands,
children,
college scholarship funds,
family crests,
favorite food,
generation companies,
harvard business school,
identity,
james twitchell,
mark walker,
noblemen,
pepsi generation,
personality,
place of birth,
potato chips,
religious association,
social positions,
starbucks,
susan fournier,
swooshes,
symbolic language
