Astonish Your Customer(s)

Art & Science (how about grit)

You often hear people describe a task that requires both art & science.

My experience is that while art & science play a part in many tasks, the deciding factor is grit - the sheer will to drive something to completion and hopefully success.

Grit doesn't sound quite as poetic and lofty as art & science yet it is the must-have ingredient, whether art and/or science are involved. 

So, when you get the market research or finance team (science) together with the marketing and sales folks (art), you might want to confirm who is supplying the grit. 

O.D.O.o.O.D.B.

Sell to an existing 'Tribe'

Which is easier?

a) Listening to and creating a product for an existing tribe

B) Creating a product and then finding a tribe for it

Apple stores get more visitors in a quarter than all the Disney properties in a 12 month period.

Listen to the Apple tribe, find out what it wants and give it to them.

O.D.O.o.O.D.B.

How Apple 'mis-behaves' & wins

• "Defining how computers are used, not how they are manufactured, will create real value – and thus market power, employment, and wealth – in the decades ahead,". "A computer company is the primary source of computing for its customers."
• The future, in other words, is a verb, not a noun.
• At the core of Apple's strategy is the insight that apps are the future – because apps are verbs turned into code.
• It has a narrow product line, so the focus is clear and management isn't overloaded."
• 'Think Different' is embedded in Apple's DNA. The company is built on the proposition that the status quo is the enemy. That big and boring and dull – whether as a description of a company's products and services or as a way of working – are simply bad. Bad for innovation, bad for people, bad for customers, bad for business.
• Jobs streamlined the organization, got rid of competing teams, returned Apple so people were fighting for the company instead of fighting against each other."
• "Whether it's product design or the overall customer experience, Apple always tries to do it differently, and do it better," he says. "Innovation allows you to get a premium from the marketplace. And no matter how good you are, you can always do it better. Apple shows the value of always striving for perfection.
• "I'm not sure Apple even thinks about the competition," Keith Yamashita says. "They're uniquely themselves without worrying about anyone else. When I worked for Steve there was little discussion about the competition. The aim was for us to be the most extreme version of ourselves. When you adopt that approach, it causes you to think about things in a different way.
• The goal, Yamashita says, is to be true to the uniqueness of the enterprise. Too many companies get caught up studying their competitors, benchmarking their rivals. The result is an incremental approach to innovation: "If they did this, we need to respond with that."
• Apple's greatest strength, Yamashita says, may be its "obsessiveness." Obsessiveness about everything.
• "Apple is obsessiveness to the power of 10," he says. "And you see it everywhere. It's in things that are immediately visible, like the retail stores. They spend more on tenant improvements than anyone: stone floors, not wood floors; glass tables, not plexiglass. But it's also in things you don't ordinarily see: Apple has the most symmetrically laid out motherboard in the industry. They're obsessive about the supply chain, obsessive about the design of the product, the packaging."
• "Apple has always been on an ongoing journey to be its best self," Yamashita says. "Its marketing mission is to help Apple customers get the most out of their Apple products, to equip and enable their customers to be their best self, too. That kind of thinking has led to online tutorials, lessons at the Apple Stores, 'gen­ius bars.' What other company would hire 12,000 experts and then not charge customers a penny to talk with them?"
• The ultimate lesson from Apple? "All the pieces have to fit together," Yamashita says.
• "For Apple to be its best self, it has to be about its customers also being their best selves. Apple is aspirational and iconic. But its message to its customers is, 'You are, too.' "

From: Christian Science Monitor "The Apple Effect: How Steve Jobs & Co. Won Over the World"

Don't force consumer to enter your solution through the problem

While Method Products relied primarily on style and substance to inspire interest in cleaning products, we also tap into an often overlooked subset of consumers: people who actually love to clean. You probably even know a few friends whom you consider to be clean freaks.

We believe in making the act of cleaning more enjoyable and, if we may say so, aspirational. But virtually every commercial treats cleaning as if it were a huge hassle, virtually screaming promises of convenience and ease. Pandering to women with images of grinning maids in aprons, it was as if taking care of your things was something to be ashamed of, something you'd rather leave to someone else.

This is typical problem-solution marketing, in which you set up a problem (mildew in the bathroom) and then present your product as the hero solution (Pow! mildew gone). The problem with this approach is that it forces the consumer to enter through the problem, so your brand will always live in low-interest land.

Even if you don't find an ounce of joy in cleaning, virtually everyone loves the end state, a clean home. So we focused on talking about the aspirational end state of cleaning, and we found that, to many people, cleaning is an important part of life. It's the ritual of connecting to their homes and families by putting life back in order. To many, cleaning is a form of caring for their children or pets by providing a safe haven for those they care about most. Seeking to draw out our audience's inner clean freaks, we filled our ad campaigns with young, great-looking naked people in gorgeous, hip homes, using (or maybe just caressing) a rainbow of beautiful Method products. Rather than the "quick and painless" promises in our competitors' ads, we communicated with clever, cheeky messages intended to promote the aspirational idea that cleaning could be cool (gasp!). Flying in the face of decades of traditional cleaning commercials, the ads resonated with people of all ages.

To many people, jogging is a chore. Imagine if Nike ran advertisements featuring unhappy joggers forcing themselves through another grueling early morning routine. Not likely. To the contrary, the brand celebrates every sport it touches, with aspirational imagery. We'd even bet there are some fierce badminton ads out there that would inspire you to Just Do It with a birdie! Nike ties this to its social mission of bringing inspiration and innovation to every athlete in the world. As Bill Bowerman, track coach and cofounder of Nike, said, "If you have a body, you are an athlete."

TY: Fast Company

How specific does your target audience need to be

The more specific, the better. 

Ford's Fiesta has been a huge success in the compact car market. 

Who did they build the car for?

College student? Budget car buyer? Under-sized people? Single people?

A 23 year-old Italian immigrant.

O.D.O.o.O.D.B.

Good enough to lick

We made the buttons on the screen look so good you’ll want to lick them.
~ Steve Jobs

That's one way of setting the bar for the product design folks. 

O.D.O.o.O.D.B.

 

At Apple - Process Skills Matter, Management Skills Don't

"Jobs has been dismissive of "management" skills, and the company has no general managers.

According to Fortune, Apple has only 70 or so VPs (for 25,000 employees).

Instead the firm develops process specialists — for graphic arts, supply chain, coding, retailing, and of course, industrial design. For example, Apple's retail chief, Ron Johnson, who developed the highly successful Apple Stores, didn't handle inventory. Store inventory and all other supply chain issues were handled by COO Tim Cook, an expert in supply chain management (and Jobs' apparent successor as CEO).

To Jobs, this approach creates an organization with best-in-class skills. General managers tend to create fiefdoms."

By: Bill Lee 

O.D.O.o.O.D.B.

 

Damn, I love my competitor

So, if your arch enemy is Apple, and hence Steve Jobs, were you secretly pleased about the news that he is at least partially stepping back from the business?

Has Jobs made the other players better, by raising the bar continually?

H.E. Butt is a fabulously successful chain of food stores, based in San Antonio. It is also a privately-owned, family-owned business. 

When Walmart was stomping every retailer in sight as they expanded, I remember a meeting with the HEB senior execs. They said that the invasion by Walmart actually helped them improve - they were a better and more efficient and more customer-focused store because of Walmart's looming presence and threat.

O.D.O.o.O.D.B.

Advertising and the Future of Apple

By Bob Hoffman at www.AdContrarian.blogspot.com

After Steve Jobs stepped down as CEO of Apple last week, speculation about the company's future began immediately.

The consensus seemed to be that Jobs built a strong culture, hired smart people, and taught a way of thinking that will serve Apple well in the future. The story line went like this-- while Jobs will be missed, he is no longer essential to the future of the company and it will go on brilliantly without him.

 

I don't buy this for a second. Genius is non-transferable.

Jobs hasn't just created better computers, he has created a world that nobody else could envision. He brought an artist's sensibility to a field previously populated by capable but tone-deaf engineers. He didn't just make beautiful looking hardware, he took what was a dead screen full of little green letters on a blue background and turned it into an astounding, enchanting world of graphics, music, and video that has become a central feature of contemporary life.

He has made work more fun, knowledge more available, and entertainment more rewarding.

Anyone who has had the pleasure of buying an Apple product knows the great aesthetic delight of turning it on for the first time and seeing the beauty that ensues. Even going to an Apple store is a completely unique and strangely arresting experience.

On Friday, Apple became the world's largest company, surpassing ExxonMobil in market value. It will not simply evaporate. The most likely scenario is that Apple will continue to shine for a few years while the initiatives that Jobs started are still in the pipeline, and then slowly the company's radiance will start to dim. They will be successful and will continue to produce excellent products for a long time -- but the startling brilliance will slowly fade.

Many successful creative enterprises turn out to be the extended shadow of one individual. My best guess is that Apple is such an enterprise.

Interestingly, one of the first indications of whether Apple is capable of continuing its explosion of creative energy without Jobs at the helm may be found in its advertising. The product pipeline will take years to screw up. But the ad pipeline can be screwed up in no time.

About a year from now, with Jobs in the background, the knuckleheads at Apple (there are knuckleheads everywhere) will have a chance to get their sweaty hands on the advertising.

Jobs is a brilliant technology visionary. But let's not forget that he is also the best ad man of his generation. He is what you might call a "classicist." Apple advertising is simple. It is almost always product-focused (the product usually sits smack dab in the middle of a white page.) The TV spots for the iPad and iPhone are usually nothing more than simple but compelling product demonstrations.

Here are some clues to look for in Apple's advertising that will indicate that dull hands are grabbing at the wheel:

1. Creeping Brandism: The Apple brand was built bottom-up. That is, the products defined the brand. Virtually every Apple ad was about a product, not  the brand (okay, there was "Think Different" but that didn't last.) Keep an eye out for the erosion of this discipline.

2. Agency change: Vapid marketing people relegated to the background all these years by Jobs' dominance may suddenly start flexing. They wouldn't dare contradict Jobs' legacy, but they could accomplish the same thing by undermining the agency.

3. The Tortured Logic of Account Planning: Look for ads about you the consumer instead of Apple products. Look for moronic online "engagement" gimmicks. Or look for social media pandering.

4. Complications: Part of the brilliance of Apple advertising has been its simplicity.  Keep an eye out for complicated ideas or ads with more than one product.

5. Media: Apple has used online media sparingly. The preponderance of its advertising has been conducted in traditional media -- TV, print, and outdoor. Watch to see if Apple suddenly starts going all trendy and new age in its media choices.

If you start seeing any of these signs coming out of Cupertino, sell your shares.

Advertising will be an early indicator of whether people without vision and taste are moving in at Apple. It will be interesting to watch.

O.D.O.o.O.D.B.