Branding, Culture, Politics, and Everything in Between

Somebody at Stealthunit posted a thing called the Garfield Randomizer. Here’s a short explanation as to what it is:

..so this guy noticed that Garfield comics make just as much sense if you throw random panels together, and sometimes are actually pretty funny. He got a cease and desist letter. So he made the code available for people who wanted to try it for themselves. Here we go!

It’s addictive and a lot of fun. For example, here’s one that I cooked up in just a few minutes:

Not that good, but it shows the potential of this thing. Garfield comics ARE surprisingly modular, and it doesn’t take long to cook up a funny and sensible strip.

So what has this got to do with crowdsourcing? For one, the Garfield Randomizer is a great and fun tool for people to play with and express themselves. It’s incredibly viral. Hell, I’ve sent the link to a number of friends already and together we made a bunch of pretty darn funny comics (some of which were raunchy, I’ll freely admit). If I were Garfield’s publisher, instead of sending a cease and desist letter I would take the Garfield Randomizer right away and put it up somewhere and have people create their own comics – and share them! Imagine, a voting and commenting system for the best strips which could eventually be gathered into a book which people could buy. And the thing is, if the publisher were in control of this randomizer, they could offer links to the original strips from which the individual tiles were taken, and from there offer people the opportunity to order the original comic book on Amazon, for example. And let’s be honest, if they take this one down it’ll pop up again somewhere anyway, so might as well join the fun and get some additional benefits from it.

I absolutely love Nike’s new banner campaign for the new Lebron V shoe which is featured, among others, on ESPN’s NBA website. Here’s a screencap (click for full size):

As you can probably tell, there’s a live video feed for two different playgrounds: one in Atlanta and one in Oakland. You get to watch normal playground ballers play in real time(ish), the shoe and Nike’s brand presence is sort of on the side. But they’re definitely there. As you roll your mouse on the banner, a text appears that states that “And right now, all you’re doing is watching them play.” The message is clear: go out and play, which is pretty much what Nike is all about. I think I watched the video feed for a good 10 minutes, that’s a lot of brand exposure for one person. The addition of specific locations and “real” people add a lot of authenticity to the campaign.

We’ve been discussing the subject of brand presence on the Web with Ville quite a lot lately. I personally feel (we both feel, I guess) that a brand needs to work as a sort of lens or kaleidoscope even for information and content on the web, filtering anything the user might be looking for through the brand’s personality. Not quite working as a feedjockey (at least not yet, the idea is very enticing to me and I guess that some individuals such as Seth Godin who filter information could be considered as “brands”), but a filter nonetheless. You can see this type of behavior in the better web campaigns, Facebook apps or widgets.

And I guess it’s nice to see that banner ads are not dead, just lacking innovation. But that goes for any medium, I guess.

UPDATE: as it turns out, it’s not a video feed, just some looping video. But they do change the videos so that it seems to create an illusion of time changing. Too bad, had me fooled. But most of my points still stand =)

1. Douglas Holt – How Brands Become Icons. A must read for all those who have gone a bit too gaa gaa for viral marketing. A really eye-opening book, it’s extremely well argued and researched. I’m writing my master’s thesis combining this book’s theory with some much older research in a pretty cool way, even if I do say so myself. I’ll write more about my thesis once I get it rolling and find a company who’s willing to collaborate with me. I’ll just say that the only real weakness this book has is that it shows you how to identify brands performing myths (the core notion of building iconic brands) after the fact, but it doesn’t really give you clear guidelines how you could identify the right myth for YOUR brand and start building one. It sort of assumes you know which myth you should be practicing with your brand. I’m trying to change that with my thesis. Wish me luck.

2. Malcolm Gladwell – The Tipping Point. Yes, I know it’s been out for ages now and it’s a cliché to list it. But it really is one of the better “biz” books ever written. Marketers have studied the book’s teachings on how to create social epidemics to death, but I think the most valuable advice is on how you should organize your workforce (the 150 rule). I’m somewhat surprised that we haven’t heard more organizations try and incorporate some of the ideas this book is suggesting. I guess it’s one of those books that everybody agrees is brilliant, but very few take back to the office and actually put to good use. I sure as hell plan to if I ever get the chance. A must read.

3. Chip & Dan Heath – Made to Stick. You know it’s a good book when you’ve read only 60 odd pages (like I have, so I guess I’m a liar considering this posts title) and you feel that it could top this list easily. It’s somewhat similar to Gladwell’s “Tipping Point” in style and even content – the authors even mention Tipping Point as a source of inspiration. When reading this I just started thinking how unnecessarily hard we make “the sell” sometimes. I guess we have this inbuilt need of convincing people the hard way; I know I like to argue (in a nice way) and try to convince people through reason and facts. With this book, you won’t have to. The situations where you could apply the book’s teachings seem endless. I’m already a fan and I’m not even done yet. Highly recommended, anyway.

4. Malcolm Gladwell – Blink. I already mentioned this in one of my previous posts on NBA officiating. The unofficial sequel to The Tipping Point, it’s almost every bit as good as its predecessor. This book is more crucial for sociologists and politicians, but I still found it very relevant to marketers and other business people as well. It further confirms my belief in intuition being way underrated in marketing and that we tend to overthink when making business decisions. I’m not a fan of market research, because even though I realize it’s invaluable in doing incremental improvements in products and services, it sometimes totally paralyzes companies (especially big ones) and their ability to innovate. Relying too much on market research makes for committee decision marketing and playing it safe. I’d hate to work in a company that’s afraid to roll the dice every once in a while. In other works, I hate companies that don’t blink. Thank you, I’ll be here all night.

5. Seth Godin – Purple Cow. Another fairly obvious choice, but this is the kind of book you NEED to read to remind you of what marketing should be about. Don’t settle for second best, push forward. Aim for the top, even if it’s in a niche market. This is one of the fastest books to read, ever, since it’s so well written and quite short. It also works for a great Marketing 101 for somebody with little business background.

I’ve also read some other books as well. Martin Lindstrom’s “Brand Sense” was a bit disappointing, even though I managed to get some ideas out of it, his idea of “smashing the brand” for example is very good and something to consider at all times. He’s a bit too unscientific for my taste, especially since he’s talking about affecting every touch point of a brand. Sometimes intuition and “common sense” can lead to mistakes. For example, Lindstrom advocates using scents in retail to trigger behavior. However, some studies have shown that constant exposure to smells (think emloyees) can be allergenic and nauseating. Also, scents should be passing in nature, not ever-present. But like I said, I managed to get some things out of it so it wasn’t a wasted read.

I’m reading Chris Anderson’s “The Long Tail” now too. It’s an absolute must read for anybody who’s in the new media business, though I guess the gist of the book is easy to learn with out actually reading it. I’m a bit further along than I am with “Made to Stick” but I’m starting to get a feel that the book is very repetitive. The idea of the Long Tail isn’t too hard to grasp so I guess Anderson needs to fill pages, it feels like I’m reading the same stuff over and over again. I loved the bits about the tools of production being democratized, everybody is a creator now. I’ll have to read it through and see if the book goes any deeper.

Any books I should be reading?

And yes, I’m too lazy to post Amazon links.