I was one of the millions who wondered if Christina Aguilera made a prop bet on how long the National Anthem would last.
I was one of the millions hoping for a wardrobe malfunction during the Black Eyed Peas Half Time Show snoozer.
But I may be one of the few who think Super Bowl ads have gone way of the leather helmet.
They’re historic. But now the majority just look stupid and are no longer useful.
Viewing behaviors have changed It’s true that nearly 2/3 of the U.S. population gathers around the television for this single football game, with beverage and deep-fried-anything in hand. But that doesn’t change the way we watch the boob-tube.
For years now, many of us have been conditioned by TiVo, Apple TV and/or Netflix. So you’re telling me that for one Sunday night, those habits are just going to magically disappear like the beer in my fridge? No way.
Even if fans say, “I can’t wait for the commercials.” What they’re really saying is, “I can’t wait for the commercials so I can load up on more wings and leave that pig Bill with the celery sticks.”
The thrill is gone Not so long ago Super Bowl commercials were simply enjoyed. Viewers looked forward to the next Pepsi commercial like the next episode of “He-Man: Masters of the Universe.”
Now we stuff ourselves over-analyzing them.
We dissect them at the party. We discuss them on Facebook. We comment on them over Twitter. We no longer allow ourselves to be entertained.
Part of the problem is advertisers are chasing the thrill of cowboys herding cats, lizards talking with east coast accents and babies trading stocks. But instead of innovating, they’re regurgitating ideas. And paying more to do it.
Viewers aren’t helping. Now we expect the unexpected. It’s like we’re watching the fourth installment in a slasher movie franchise: Of course the girl who walks into a dark room without turning on a light is going to get butchered.
Move forward by looking back What should be done? The answer might have been offered a few years ago when Go Daddy first started advertising during the Super Bowl.
Sure the commercials were raunchy (and still are). But they were perfectly targeted to the audience and the call to action was spot-on. In fact, their web site crashed as a result of the traffic generated from a single ad. A great return on investment for the fledgling company.
Today, companies need to reconsider the role Super Bowl commercials play in their overall strategy.
Is their commercial a single showcase of the company? If so, then it needs to be more than amusing. It must be groundbreaking. For many advertisers, that’s an impossible expectation.
But what if a Super Bowl ad was a vehicle designed specifically to send viewers somewhere else like a web site, Facebook page or other online location? Once there, they could be treated to something truly unique, entertaining, even innovative.
Helmets are still needed in football. But they were re-engineered when the game changed. It’s time for advertisers to stop banging their heads against a wall when it comes to Super Bowl commercials.
Josh Anderson is one the many partners that make up The “Adholics”, a full service marketing & advertising collaborative based in Minneapolis Minnesota.
Do you have a problem with your current marketing?
My grandpa was an Old Spice guy, my dad is too. And if you listened to my new BlackBerry ringtone, you’d think I was a third-generation Old Spicer.
Well, I’m not – yet. But that hasn’t kept me from appreciating the recent branding effort of this 70-year-old hygiene product. It still smells musty, yet there’s something refreshing in the air for Old Spice.
It all started one fateful day in February
Say what you will about Super Bowl TV ads and the ridiculous cost for one :30 second spot (over $3.5 million at last check). But when done right, they can offer significant impact.
Remember the first year GoDaddy ran a spot during the NFL’s championship game? The number of viewers scrambling to visit the company online caused a bigger crash than Danica Patrick at Daytona. And GoDaddy is a web hosting company.
At that moment, the Old Spice Guy deep-sixed any memory of the poor 1960s-70s boat captain spokes-model.
More significantly, Old Spice has enjoyed improved sales overall. According to Advertising Age, the Proctor & Gamble Co. brand has been consistently gaining market share, enough to erase a deficit built up over the past.
And though it’s hard to measure the hard dollar sales results of Old Spice Guy, one cannot ignore his impact.
Sweet smell of success
This is especially true online, where the campaign has gone viral.
Unless you’ve unplugged yourself from the digital world, you’ve probably heard about the Old Spice Guy’s 186 highly publicized videos released in early July. These videos, developed in response to people who sent in requests through Twitter, generated more than 34 million aggregate views and a billion PR impressions in a week, according to P&G.
In the six days following the start of Old Spice Guy’s personalized videos, he reached more than 100 million followers. And as of July 18, Old Spice had become the No. 1 all-time-most-viewed sponsored channel on YouTube.
Old Spice’s Twitter account @OldSpice has blown up to include more than 80,000 followers. And its Facebook fan base has grown to 630,000, with fan interaction jumping 800% since the launch of the personalized videos.
Even OldSpice.com has seen its traffic levels spike by 300%, though I’m not sure who else besides me has downloaded the free ringtone.
So what can we learn from an Old Spice Guy?
“Social media for the moment isn’t really about traditional metrics; those are on the way, no doubt, but right now it’s more about customer engagement and awareness – the opportunity for consumers to talk directly to the Old Spice Guy, and have him talk directly to them,” says Renay San Miguel of TechNewsWorld.
I agree. Old Spice is a great example of an established brand boldly going into unchartered waters to reinvent its image.
They understand that social media is changing the world of advertising as many of us know it. No longer do companies control the discussion. More and more consumers want to be entertained. And they want to interact.
To take advantage of this burgeoning two-way communication, companies must get beyond the confines of ROI. New media has blurred the direct connection between marketing and sales. And though companies still need to sell stuff in order to remain in business, they must find ways to do so while developing relationships with their customers along the way.
Looking for a refreshing approach to your marketing? The “Adholics” can provide a number of traditional and new media solutions that meet your needs.
“My diaper is full; full of chic” is the opening line of what turns out to be a 30 second homage to potty humor.
And I loved every last second of it.
Is my maturity level showing by admitting this or can we all agree that this new Huggies denim campaign is incredible.
Where did they find that baby?
How did they get him to turn and stare like that?
Has that child always been so full of himself or did those incredibly cool denim print diapers give him that confidence?
The cool factor in this marketing campaign convinced me that I just had to buy these diapers for my little guy even though for the same money I could have had 20 more plain white Huggies.
That’s like 4 days worth of diapers I sacrificed and I couldn’t care any less, those diapers are hilarious. Give him a white shirt and he’s a little rebel without a pacifier.
I’m just glad Huggies has always been open to having a sense of humor about their products, I mean doesn’t the nature of the product beg for some comedy? This isn’t their first foray into this arena, they have had some great laughs over the years. But now this funny baby thing is really catching on making the last couple of years pretty lucrative for the Baby Actors Guild. You just can’t fake the charm, non-intimidation and cutesy factor babies offer.
Who doesn’t trust babies? If a baby tries to sell you something you listen right?
Plus, Babies have one huge added bonus right now, you can put their face all over your product without ever having to worry about your spokesperson pulling a “Tiger”.
So, while we are on the subject of babies in marketing, I thought I’d offer up a batch of some of my favorite ads featuring our favorite little munchkins.
E*Trade (any and all of these are great, here’s a compilation)
Huggies “I poo in blue” Denim Diapers
Huggies Little Movers “Scoop on Droop”
Evian bottled water (did you know Evian is Naïve spelled backwards?) Reality Bites reference
My wife and I just returned from a road trip to Mackinac Island. For those of you who haven’t seen “Somewhere in Time,” (which would be most) Mackinac is a quaint island located just off Michigan’s Upper Peninsula in Lake Huron. It’s accessed by ferry boats in the summer and snowmobiles in the winter. Travel on the 8.2 mile chunk of real estate is limited to horses, bikes or your own two feet.
Since this was our first kid-free vacation in seven months, we decided to take a scenic route to the island. Looking back, 10 hours in a car may have been a bit ambitious for the first leg of our trip (even I asked if we were there yet, and I was driving). But we did it and decided to stop in Manistique, Michigan for the night.
Entering the small tourist town, we found only two lodging choices to consider. My wife wanted to stay at a local hotel. I lobbied for the Comfort Inn that shared a parking lot with a Big Boy restaurant. She must have been worn out from the trip because I won. I never win.
So why did a Big Boy restaurant have anything to do with my decision? I think it has a lot to do with the power of marketing.
Innovative marketing is a big deal
I’m over 30 years old and had never eaten at a Big Boy restaurant before this fateful trip. In fact, the only time I remember hearing about the eatery was during the movie “Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery”.
Using a rocket ship shaped as the Big Boy mascot, villain Dr. Evil jettisoned himself into space to escape capture from Austin Powers. And no, it doesn’t make any more sense if you watch the movie. But that didn’t stop me from thinking it was just about the friggin’ funniest thing I’d ever seen.
And it obviously was a brilliant marketing ploy. Because I felt passing up the opportunity to dine at Big Boy Restaurant #3 would leave my life forever void of meaning. Regretfully, the experience was worse than stroking Dr. Evil’s hairless cat.
Brand experience is a big deal
For some reason I had it in my head that Big Boy would be a classic burger joint. Not the case. Big Boy is Denny’s messier, less successful brother.
No grand slams in this place, only strikeouts. The featured dinner buffet included nine different entrees, all the same color. Even the all-you-could-eat salad bar was short on items you’d actually want to put in your mouth.
This experience was further diminished thanks to the stink-eye service we received from Dr. Evil’s estranged sister posing as our waitress.
Granted a lot has changed since “Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery” was released in 1997. And perhaps Big Boy restaurants have fallen on hard times as of late. But you would think ingenious product placement would have launched the Big Boy brand into the stratosphere. I mean, 13 years after the movie was released Big Boy still had an opportunity to convert one weary traveler into a customer for life.
Just goes to show marketing can be effective, and it can be lasting. But great marketing amounts to nothing more than a hill of soggy onion rings when the brand experience falls short of the hype. And this is a big deal for any company that hopes to make sequels of its success.
I trust Josh’s judgment, however eating at a Bob’s Big Boy will remain on my bucket list. Again, the power of great marketing prevails. I’m sure they’ll clean things up by the time I get out that way.
As an interesting followup to Jason Sem’s post last week, The “Adholics” copywriter Josh Anderson has decided to throw some of his thoughts on Social Media into the mix.
Hope you enjoy!
Talking to kids these days – 3 ways to write for social media
By Josh Anderson
Copywriter, The Adholics
It’s a social media world out there, and companies are just living in it. If they want to reach their customers, they need to figure out ways to reach them through Facebook, Twitter, the blogosphere, not to mention a multitude of other channels. And they need to take advantage of this crucial brand building opportunity starting today.
But what if your company is ready to jump in? How do you actually begin implementing your plan? Are there rules to being social?
In the immortal words of Captain Jack Sparrow, “They’re not rules, they’re more like guidelines.” Interacting through social media doesn’t come with an instruction manual, but there are three do’s and don’ts to keep in mind.
1. More spit, less shine
Too often companies treat social networking like traditional media. Problem is consumers are much savvier these days when it comes to mass communications. They can see an ad coming a mile away. And now thanks to Doritos, they’re actually making their own and running them during the Super Bowl.
As a copywriter, it pains me to say it: If your company is going to be on social media sites, you need to leave some of those rough edges on your messages. Remember, you’re having a conversation and building relationships. When was the last time a coworker met you at the water cooler and recited five reasons why she prefers Culligan over the leading brand?
That’s not to say you shouldn’t have a good idea of what you’re going to say before you post it. But if you want to develop lasting relationships with consumers through social media, remember to KISS (keep it simple, stupid).
2. Leave ROI out of it
Let’s not kid ourselves companies consider tweeting, Facebooking or YouTubing to make money. But this isn’t the place where your call to action results in immediate reaction.
Social media is a branding venture based on consumer loyalty. You should focus on the interaction you’re having with your customers. The day you start overtly driving customers to 800-numbers is the day your company starts losing followers. Build up to it over time. Sprinkle deals in here and there. Don’t push too hard, too soon.
Besides, social media is cheap to produce. It’s not like you’re pumping thousands of dollars in to it. So take the time to genuinely interact with your customers and don’t worry about the return on investment. If you build it (the relationship), they will come (the Benjamins).
3. Be active
While we’re on the subject of money, it’s worth noting that social media is a perfect outlet for many companies who need or want to report quarterly results. But for every spread sheet of numbers you post, you should consider posting 57 messages about people.
Some consumers enjoy numbers. But most are interested in who you are as a company. They want to know what you stand for, both as an employer and within your community. So tell them. Often. And use a variety of methods.
Share quick updates about your food drive. Link to your president’s blog entries detailing why your company is an expert in the field of widgets. Post short videos documenting your latest product innovation. And make sure to contribute at least two times a week.
Sound simple enough? It is. And you’ll be impressed at how quickly the kids start listening to what you have to say. For more tips on how to utilize social media, contact The Adholics. Or just follow us on one of our 12 channels.
Package Design: (more commonly referred to as Packaging) One of my favorite tools in the grab bag of marketing/advertising strategies.
Marketing tactics are changing; budgets are shifting more heavily towards the digital realm, but has this changed the need for great packaging?
Not at all.
All right, all good articles need a case study, and who better than one of the largest consumer packaged goods companies in the world, Proctor & Gamble, or as you probably know them P&G.
P&G refers to packaging as “the first moment of truth” and invest heavily in their on-the-shelf appearance. I strongly recommend reading this article http://adage.com/article?article_id=143211 if you in any way utilize retail shelf space to sell your goods/services. These guys know their stuff, just look at this list of products http://www.pg.com/en_US/brands/all_brands.shtml.
But you don’t need to read the article to get the point, just ask yourself one simple question. Have you ever made a purchase based on how a product looked on the shelf?
I bet you anything you have at least once if not many times.
“But I’m loyal to my brands” you say.
Sure you are.
But how did you first make the choice about the brand you wanted to support?
Well, aside from the fact that I was looking for a more natural alternative in my cleaning products, and at the time they were pretty much the only “natural” brands stocked at the big box stores, it was the packaging.
It was only after I was lured in by the cool look of the packaging, and even after I displayed them front and center on my kitchen sink for all to see, that I discovered that I really loved how they worked.
I’m glad I gave them a try, but not too proud to admit that if they came in a not-so-attractive container I would have passed on them all together. Being green and chemically aware is great, but coordination is just as important in my house (as long as it’s still green).
Packaging on the shelf can also have very little to do with how it is displayed at home, matching your décor may not be all that important depending on the product and use. It also depends on whether the package design is part of the product, as in a label or container, or just the method of transport and delivery, as in a really cool box.
Either way, the same message holds true, packaging is “the first moment of truth”.
So you have a great package, and consumers are buying your product up like crazy!
You’re good right?
Not quite.
It is not unlike dating; It’s the laws of attraction 101: Just like you occasionally update your wardrobe, packaging needs to be refreshed.
Don’t get too comfortable with your current design, staying on top of trends is very important and remember, your competition is watching. They can’t wait to emulate or one-up you to try and regain lost business.
And another reason for frequent packaging updates:
Have you ever stared at a shelf for 20 minutes looking for that product you always buy at that store; you just know they have it, where is it?….oh, here it is.
How many other products did you just notice while you were looking for what you wanted?
Products disappear on shelves as consumers develop blinders when things become too familiar. This is why retail establishments leave space near the registers for a rotating grouping of merchandise. This ensures you have no chance of escape, no hope of developing those pesky blinders that keep you from noticing a new way to drop another dollar. This is also why you find yourself occasionally buying the latest Us Weekly…
So as you can see, it is a whole lot more than just a box, it is on the front line of communication with your potential customer. It does not need to be all things to all people, but it does need to be something special to a good deal of them.
Branding on Social Media Channels: Who is this important to?
By Joshua Fedie
Principal | The “Adholics”
Starting my own company, and embracing Social Media as much as possible, I have found some interesting disconnects between a company’s branding and it’s Social Media Channels.
True: Branding is not just design, Branding is also the messaging that a company projects to the world, but both seem to be lost in many cases for many companies.
Is this Social Marketing concept really still too new, are we really still trying to figure it all out?
A little; yeah.
But one thing seems to have been unanimously decided, Social Media Marketing is not going anywhere, it is everywhere and it is time you embrace it, both personally and professionally.
But if you are going to go through the trouble of creating a company page on a social network, why not pull your visual branding into the mix? Is a generic theme really all you want to leave your visitor with? Do the birds panning across your Twitter page fit your Brand messaging?
Probably not.
Most social channels have a certain level of customization allowed (some more than others).
Use that capability!
Bring in your tag-line, your corporate colors, some added pizazz that leaves your visitor 100% certain that they are visiting the page of the group they intended.
A Twitter and/or Facebook page (to name a few) is arguably just as important today as a web site is to your future success. This is where your customer finds you today. They don’t call anymore, they don’t knock on your door, they Google you, they Tweet you, they Poke you and that’s how we learn about each other and the products and services in the world.
So please, I beg of you, let’s bring some Branding back into our interactive world! It is not enough for your web site to look the part; every tool needs to be in alignment.
It’s important, It’s a no-brainer, and the technology exists making it dare I say… easy?
Not quite ready to commit to SMM?
What’s that, you prefer 1 on 1 interaction?
Great; so whom have you interacted with lately?
It is true, the “Social” element seems to almost need a revolution these days, how social is a “Poke” after all? Nonetheless, this is how people are talking right now; you can ignore it if you want, but you’ll be ignored in the conversation, and forgotten should the real “Social” element come back into the picture.
And it will; it’s already heading that way.
For example: I just signed up to be a member of an interactive group of Social Media Marketers engaged in the practice of pulling “Social” back into the picture. This is an online community that actually meets! IN-PERSON!
The group I am referencing is Social Media Breakfast MSP, You can find them on the web at http://smbmsp.ning.com. They have local chapters around the country, so if you are reading this outside of Minnesota you probably have a local chapter as well. Please check out The “Adholics” profile at: http://smbmsp.ning.com/profile/JoshuaFedie_TheAdholics while on the site.
This is just one of the many Interactive Social groups making the leap of getting back to the face-to-face discussion that is too important a part of business to be forgotten.
But remember, 9 times out of 10 they find you first online, so lets look good when they find us!
I like to think that my group has done a good job of keeping our messaging/branding aligned across the various social channels, but feel free to be the judge for yourself.
And one final note, just because you went to Cabo recently and consumed a Margarita larger than your head, does not make it a good profile picture. (Unless of course you sell Giant Margarita glasses for a living, or want your friends to stage an intervention.)
I just read a great article published on www.visualthesaurus.com written by Orin Hargraves that I thought might be a good read for anybody reading my blog.
Players and painted stage took all my love,
And not those things that they were emblems of.
—William Butler Yeats, from “The Circus Animals’ Desertion”
We live in the age of online presence: it’s hard to argue that you’re part of the warp and weft of modern society if you’re not somehow accessible — if others can’t find out something about you — on the Internet. This goes even more for companies than for people, since companies are, after all, public by their nature; at least, the ones that do business with or sell their shares to the public are. We’ve been exploring the online presence of companies recently in the Lounge. The language that companies use to present their public face has piqued our curiosity and we’ve been thinking about what purpose these self-reports from companies serve.
Most company websites have a bannerline or drop-down menu link called “About Us.” Another popular choice is, e.g., “About Acme Widgets” or “Who We Are.” Clicking on this link might take you to single page, or to a microsite containing numerous other links, where you can unpack the various components that make up the package of what a company wants you to think it is. You sometimes have to drill down a few levels from the home page to find this information, and that in itself is an interesting point that we’ll return to. We looked specifically at pages in which companies lay out their business and ethical philosophy, or their “values,” which is a popular way of characterizing these aspects of a company.
Some companies lay out their values under the banner of “corporate citizenship” — a term that somewhat blurs the line between the corporate and the individual, since a citizen is, by definition, an individual. This point of view, of a company having the qualities of a person, is practical for presenting traits that are typically attributed to an individual rather than a group. It also has solid historical credentials, since corporations as they exist today were originally conceived as a sort of artificial person having a separate legal entity. Finally, presenting the company as an entity capable of holding or expressing individual human traits is useful for companies because it makes them seem more friendly — even befriendable — than they might otherwise seem.
What purpose do these “About Us” statements serve? At first glance, they seem to attempt for companies what an individual’s personal profile on a dating site does: they are a way of saying “Here are some reasons why you might want to go out/spend the rest of your life with me” — or in the case of a public company, “buy my shares” or “do business with me.” Among these pages you may find the company’s mission statement or “vision statement,” such as this one from Chevron:
At the heart of The Chevron Way is our vision… to be the global energy company most admired for its people, partnership and performance.
Or this one, a bit more bare-bones, from Cardinal Health:
Our vision
To be the premier global healthcare company.
In both cases we have preserved the italic-flagged emphasis that the companies themselves use on their websites. These two, Chevron and Cardinal, express an aspiration to superlative status, though they both avoid expressing it in language so bald as, e.g., “biggest.” Chevron merely italicizes the definite article; Cardinal uses premier, presumably in the sense “first in rank.” These language choices exemplify one theme that is invariable on company websites: a preference for gentle, civil, defanged expression. This kind of expression is at odds with the way corporations are often portrayed in public discourse: as impersonal, rapacious, and aggressive. As evidence of this: aside from purely descriptive adjectives (multinational, giant, major), the adjectives that most typically occur before the word corporation (as assayed in the 2-billion word Oxford English Corpus) are greedy, faceless, and evil.
It’s helpful to take a step back from some of these pages and analyze their content statistically; for that, we used VocabGrabber to make portraits of a few such pages, all from Fortune 100 companies. Here’s one from Procter & Gamble:
For a company that is known chiefly for its hundreds of consumer products, this portrait seems to boil down to a worthy mission: “improve life.” Kraft Foods also seems to be right on the money in making the most frequent words on its “Who We Are” page the ones that deliver its message:
Beyond the headline words, all companies are eager to put their best foot forward by cataloging their many achievements and positive attributes: words that occur frequently on almost all company profile pages are community, responsibility, and commitment. A word that almost never occurs is corporation.
Wal-Mart’s “values” page is in a similar vein. Whether intentionally or not, it succeeds in making its expanded statement a kind of holographic enlargement of its advertising slogan: “Save Money. Live Better.” Even the most scattered attention span, clocking every tenth word or so on the page, would probably still walk away with the right take-home message:
Verizon keeps to a simple message as well — “great value” — even if you miss all the other points on the page that it labels “Corporate Responsibility.”
Taken collectively, these company profiles offer a portrait of the corporation that almost glows in the dark. It is curious then that this 1000-watt bulb is sometimes hidden under a bushel, requiring the website visitor to click through several layers of links before getting to the point. In view of the disparity between the public perception of corporations and the way they wish to be perceived, why do companies not shout this information from their rooftops — or in this context, blazon it prominently on their home page?
The most obvious answer is that people do not normally visit company websites to peruse this information: they’re there to buy something, contact a service department, apply for a job, or for some other more practical purpose. To their credit, companies probably recognize this and design their main port of entry to enable the user to get where he or she wants to go quickly. But is it possible, too, that corporations are aware of the sort of cognitive dissonance that might result if this sort of information greeted the visitor immediately upon landing on the website? Say for example, that you have exhausted all the menus on a company’s customer service telephone lines and found that none of them offer you an option to talk to a person in real time. Do you really want to be told on the website that the company’s “commitment is to put our customers first by providing excellent service and great communications experiences”?
The main purpose of the “About Us” species of pages seems to be rhetorical, in every sense of the word — and even with a nod to the classical sense, reflecting Aristotle’s definition: rhetoric is “the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion.” But is anyone ever persuaded by these corporate self-reports? It doesn’t seem likely: experience is the main basis on which people form judgments, and presumably the basis on which terms like faceless, greedy, and evil came to be associated with corporations in the first place. Presumably, this fact is not lost on corporations — and they soldier on, fighting the public relations battle on all possible fronts.
I had to give the vocabgrabber a try for my own site after reading this article, and it was pretty easy and fun to see the results.
Here is what The “Adholics” site leaves in it’s visitors mind:
The “Adholics” (You’ll have to click this link, sorry for the trouble)
Give this a try on your site, see what message you are leaving your potential customers with.
Here in Minnesota, for the last 20 years now, stands an incredible store that was really a pioneer in the now popular “Green” movement formerly known as the PPL SHOP. I always thought PPL was shorthand for people, so the name to me was very matter-of-fact, like hey, people shop. Others apparently knew that the PPL was an acronym for Project for Pride in Living? But to go even further, SHOP was also short for Surplus Home and Office Products.
So the name used to be, Project for Pride in Living, Surplus Home and Office Supply.
Hope you took a big breath before trying to say that!
Which is probably why they went by PPL SHOP, which 20 years after anybody remembered what it stood for started meaning less and less.
Now I love this store, I’ve shopped there myself. They do a great job of supplying small company’s with affordable office furniture, they have helped savvy shoppers furnish homes for years in a very earth friendly way, plus they help the community through their charity supporting on-the-job training programs that helps low-income individuals and families achieve self-sufficiency.
But I had to give them some tough love in this post, not to critique, but to point out the importance in a name.
Your name can either inform your consumer about who you are, what you do, even what you stand for, or it can say absolutely nothing.
We live in a world of instant gratification, cell phones and laptops have made our patience shorter ever year that technology gets better. If we walk up to a store, we want to know what it is immediately, without thinking.
Furnish does this; PPL SHOP did not.
I’m glad they made it 20 years; like I said, I love them, but I am shocked anyone ever walked in? I wonder what the other customers on their first visit thought the place was?
Maybe they were all like me and stumbled across it on accident?
Either way, at least we found them, and I think with the new name they will be around a lot longer, and that’s a good thing.
If you are reading this, and you live in Minnesota, check them out some time, it’s actually a really fun store with an ever rotating mix of goods. You can also see them online at www.furnishofficeandhome.org
I was one of the millions who wondered if Christina Aguilera made a prop bet on how long the National Anthem would last.
