This question from the Growth Daily newsletter is in line with something I’ve been thinking about more and more for brands:
How would your product be branded and marketed if it was in a completely different industry?
A Story About JFK
Here's another short story that illustrates two recent posts:
- Sales is marketing (and everything is marketing)
- It doesn't matter what you mean, it matters what they think
Again via Morgan Housel.
Again, I'm not going to indent since it's long, so everything between the lines is the quote.
JFK and Jackie Kennedy didn’t have a great relationship. In 1955, two years after their marriage, Jack told his father, Joe Kennedy, he wanted a divorce.
Joe responded: “You’re out of your mind. You’re going to be president someday. This would ruin everything. Divorce is impossible.”
Jack reiterated that he and Jackie weren’t happy.
His father shot back: “Can’t you get it into your head that it’s not important what you really are? The only important thing is what people think you are!”
The marriage endured.
Everything is sales.
This is an extreme example for a specific scenario. But it could also be argued Bud Light didn't take this advice recently (that controversy is still stupid).
The true key is to craft, maintain, and co-create your brand in such a way that what you are and what they think you are is the same thing.
A new podcast ad spend report is out and some big brands are making big moves into the space.
HP leads the Movers category, increasing their $1,226 June spend to $802,531 in July. A modest 65,000% increase. The smallest increase in the top 15 was 480%.
Do these increases indicate early performance returns? Or only one day of ads in June? Or new budgets for a new fiscal year? Or just a dartboard budget number approach?
Is a ‘retail-cession’ slowly brewing as the holidays approach?
Consumers may just be shopped out. How many of us need new stuff after the pandemic years?
“Guests are out at concerts,” [Target CEO Brian Cornell] said. “They’re going to movies. They’ve seen Barbie. They’re enjoying those experiential moments, and they’re shopping very carefully for discretionary goods.”
Making up for lost time.
A great story on positioning, storytelling, and marketing via Morgan Housel.
Ford had no interest in race cars – his vision was to build a cheap, quality car for the masses.
But knowing that he needed to win over both investors and the public, he built the best race car in the world, and in 1902 it beat the reigning champion.
“That was my first race, and it brought advertising of the only kind that people cared to read,” Ford wrote. He became known nationwide.
Everything is sales.
(and sales is marketing)
no one person has control of what the brand is
via Growth Daily
The company doesn’t even have full control over what the brand is.
Brands are acts of co-creation with the audience.
A Story About Henry Ford
A great story on positioning, storytelling, and marketing via Morgan Housel.
I'm not going to indent since it's long, so everything between the lines is the quote.
Henry Ford knew the automobile would change the world. The rest of the world wasn’t so sure. In the early 1900s, cars looked like noisy toys for rich people.
But toys are fun, so the one thing the public was crazy about was car racing.
Ford had no interest in race cars – his vision was to build a cheap, quality car for the masses.
But knowing that he needed to win over both investors and the public, he built the best race car in the world, and in 1902 it beat the reigning champion.
“That was my first race, and it brought advertising of the only kind that people cared to read,” Ford wrote. He became known nationwide.
The attention was enough to raise money from investors, and Ford Motor Company was formed eight months later.
Everything is sales.
And sales is marketing.
The salad days of streaming are over.
29% of US internet households are canceling streaming video services to save money
47% annualized subscriber churn rate for streaming platforms.
This was inevitable. Now we see which companies have the strongest content moats (I am betting on Disney).
Are we primed for the return of the bundle?