Very recently there have been two rather important books written relating to the subject either directly or indirectly. The first one is “Chief Culture Officer” by Grant McCracken, which came out just over a week ago. The second one is “Netnography” by Robert Kozinets, which is still in print. McCracken’s book argues for the necessity to create an organization that “gets” culture, or at least have somebody in the organization who does. An organization should be aware of its and its brands’ place in culture to manage its meaning (and most of all, not to mismanage it!). Kozinets’ book on the other hand is – as the name suggests – about how to do ethnographic research online. It’s intended for researchers and companies alike. Of course, Kozinets’ book also has some arguments as to why a company should do this kind of research, but as a general rule I’d say that McCracken’s book is more about the “why” and Kozinets’ is more about the “how” of uncovering a brand’s meaning.

I haven’t had the time to read either book completely (there are free previews available, check the sites), so apologies if the following arguments are featured in the books and I seem like I’m passing them as my own (I’m not). Also apologies for either author if they felt misrepresented in the the “why/how” categorization above.

In the past, only a few companies (usually big ones) actively engaged in ethnographic research. To some degree it was a matter of a unappreciation for cultural aspects of the brand, but for many companies I’d guess engaging in ethnographic research may have been just too costly or time consuming to do. You’d need to commission a research team, arrange the interviews or field work dates and then wait a rather long time for them to decode the findings and write a report, and even then you couldn’t be sure you had enough data. And sometimes you’d have to do is in multiple locations if you were a global brand. To put in simple terms: it just wasn’t worth the ROI for many companies.

This is where a method like netnography comes in. If anything, social media sites offer an almost endless stream of different and rich cultural meanings – especially for brands – that can be accessed quite quickly. If a skilled researcher spends an afternoon scouring through social media sites, he or she will have at least a preliminary feel for a brand’s meaning at the end of the day. This I think is another benefit of netnography for companies: to be able to do scale your qualitative research projects from “quick and dirty” with limited but somewhat relevant results to large scale meaning mining. I have my reservations about Twitter, but its value in getting a quick feel for your brand’s meaning is invaluable. Twitter really is zeitgeist on tap. Status updates on Twitter (or Facebook) are what McCracken calls “phatic communications” or to quote McCracken:

This is communication with little hard, informational content, but lots of emotional and social content. Phatic communications doesn’t get much said, but it has social effects so powerful, it gets lots done.

I suspect both McCracken and Kozinets would cringe if the principal arguments for buying their books were “doing qualitative research is faster and cheaper now”, but I think this is an important perspective as well. If anything it’s a good additional selling point to get your company at least consider taking qualitative research more seriously. If you need more convincing about the importance of qualitative research, I’m sure both books have more than plenty compelling arguments. My guess that in the future companies will have a netnography team or a “cultural social media team” sitting next to the social media customer service team they have in place.

Here are the book covers to help you spot them on the bookshelf.

There were a few example videos I used, and here they are, in order of presentation. They’re in the embedded presentation as well, but some folks might want the direct links.

William Shatner’s “Rocketman” performance at the 1978 Science Fiction Movie Awards
Family Guy version of the the Rocketman performance
Coke’s classic “Mean Joe Green ‘Have a Coke and smile’” cultural branding ad
Pepsis’ spoof of Coke’s ad with David Beckham
Jordan Brand XXI ad with kids all over the world doing Michael Jordan impersonations

But even the most mundane subject can be researched extensively and made really really interesting. Check out this page which is dedicated solely to tracking the McGangBang phenomenon on the internet. The amount detail, the little streams of information and sort of whispers all over the internet regarding it, it’s really fascinating. It’s like watching a live treasure hunt with an anthropological twist. A Youtube clip emerges here, the first Tweet there, a new definition on Urban Dictionary over there, Flickr photos over here…

The constant updates really illuminate how this phenomenon has shaped up. This is a really good example on how you could track a viral cultural phenomenon on the net, and how you should document it. You could use all this information and really answer “what is a McGangBang” in an anthropological sense quite extensively. A lot of good tools are there. Let’s see if they go on a more higher level and start measuring Google Trends on McGangBang, for example.

Massive thanks to Antti for the link.

The cultural dynamics of so-called new retro products is something that I’ve tried to get my head around for a while now, and now that Adidas has a new website out for Adidas Orginals, I thought I’d discuss the topic a bit. I’m a certified Adidas fiend, I think I have over eight adidas track jackets (both old and new) and seven pairs of sneakers, so this is as much self-analysis as it is brand analysis.

Adidas is one of those brands that can boast to have true cultural icons in their offering. For example, the Adidas Superstar, which was made famous by Run DMC in the 1980s, or the Copa Mundial, which was THE soccer shoe in the 1970s all the way up to the 1990s. Their three stripe design has remained iconic on track suits and shoes alike.

It’s my educated guess that their ageless design contributed heavily to their popularity at second hand shops and flea markets, which started sometime in the 1990s. I’ve personally paid over 60€ at a second hand shop in Berlin for a used, worn down track jacket that I just HAD to have (am I right, ladies?).

I have three theories as to why having an original design became a identity badge. One option is that Adidas’ business and cultural meaning changed in the 1990s so that the “old” Adidas designs became a way to protest the new direction (for example, Adidas had ditched the old classic logo in 1991). Another option is that old designs became a way to distinguish your worthiness as the brand’s fanatic: if anybody could buy new, and rather similar designs than the old ones at any store, then old ones are a way to create scarcity and exclusiveness for the brand. A third option is that a culturally relevant subculture took the old Adidas designs as their own, and this cultural meaning appealed to the rest of the population.

The truth is probably something relating to all three, but my guess is that the latter two are the strongest drivers for the trend.

It didn’t take long for Adidas to pick up on the trend of their old stuff being in high demand and gear their efforts to ride this trend. In time, Adidas had launched Adidas Originals, a separate line from the new mother brand that deals exclusively in classic designs. Adidas Originals even has their own concept stores around the world, and they have plans to add more of these in the future.

For Adidas, the goal with Adidas Originals has always been to convince people that they are the same thing as finding similar designs at second hand shops. It’s a nearly impossible proposition, but to me they’ve managed to sell people the idea that buying an Adidas Original is “good enough” quite well. They’ve also managed to create some scarcity for the designs, which was essential with second hand finds, by having a large collection of different designs but keeping the designs as limited editions.

In advertising campaigns they’ve celebrated their heritage with old Adidas icons (such as Gerd Müller and Run DMC) to create a credible link between new and old. The website they’ve just launched is about “celebrating originality” and Adidas’ 60 year heritage as a brand. They’re constantly balancing between having it as a retrospect, but also going forward with promoting the new and retro designs.

It’s an interesting exericise in meaning management from Adidas, and I think they’ve handled it quite well.

1. Everything is cultural (nothing can step outside of cultural representation)

2. Culture is the richest repository of innovation and brand development ideas

3. Inspiration exists in everything (cf. Paul Smith)

4. Branding is an art (but science can help)

5. Strategy cannot be divorced from execution (overlook design at your peril)

6. Complex problems have simple, easy to understand, wrong answers (cf. HL Mencken)

7. Diversity and inconsistency keeps life interesting for people (thus everything about this blog is subject to change)

Couldn’t have said it better myself. Too bad the blog seems inactive now, he seems very much the kindred spirit.

Steve Jobs clearly is worthy of Apple. When he comes on stage at any of Apple’s major conferences and does that little dance of his, within minutes he has the brand fanatics eating out of his hand. He could (and often will) take the brand into many different directions, because of his credibility as the brand’s number 1 spokesman. Steve Jobs can present many changes to the brand and be sure that people will at least listen to what he has to say. Other brands aren’t so lucky.

The guys at Flickr, apparently, are not worthy of their brand. They decided to add video features to the famous photo sharing site, and the heavy users and the fanatics didn’t like it and are up in arms about it. I’m a bit torn on the development myself. I understand the rationale behind both the company and the people opposing the move, but that’s not what this post is about.

When people are really fanatical about a brand, they will seek to take ownership of it. They see themselves as the only “worthy” chroniclers of the brand and its meaning. That’s why it’s sometimes so hard for prominent and popular brands to be managed: the insiders and fanatics are resistant to change (as people usually are by nature), and in this new and connected consumer economy the fanatics can group up and voice their opinions given their lack of geographic restraints. This is why it’s so important to have your brand’s management “on brand” (I hate that expression but can’t think of a better one): to avoid the brand’s control slipping away from the brand’s management.

Changes to the brand are inevitable. The consumers’ acceptance of these changes, however, is not. Some people even feel that in this new economy brand managers can’t control their brands at all anymore and they should just embrace this and let the consumers sit in the brand’s driver’s seat. Echoing this notion, in the book “Authenticity” it was argued that the more consumer-driven a brand feels, the more authentic it is perceived to be. So simply handing the keys to the brand to the customers looks like a tempting idea, but I still think it’s not the best way to approach the problem.

A company controlling its brands’ destinies is still possible, but the rules for brand management have changed, and brand managers have much less room to maneuver now. Brand managers have to convey a profound understanding as to what the brand is about (more than its mission statement and brand guidelines etc.) and show a charismatic voice and a vision that people will at least be willing to hear out. Otherwise the consumers will assume control of the brand entirely and steer the brand towards a more rigid and eventually doomed path.

Because we all know how committees work as decision makers.