Let Your Voice Be Your Guide

Your company probably has a brand standards guide – a booklet of standards for how to use logos, colors and other graphic specifications about your brand. But how much do you think about the voice you use to talk to your customers?

Honing in on an irreverent, honest tone for its new product line is why we admire the new advertising campaigns for U by Kotex. Yes, that’s right, we like ads about tampons and pads. The brilliance about these ads is that Kotex took an outdated way of talking to its customers and (ahem) flushed it down the toilet.

With tongue firmly in cheek, Kotex used its own footage from previous advertising campaigns to poke fun at the absurd way the brand previously has talked about periods – women wearing white, twirling on the beach, dancing. Let’s be honest here. Dancing is about the last thing women feel like doing at that time of the month. Based on research of its key targets, Kotex rethought its brand voice. With U, Kotex is encouraging women to talk honestly, and, well, be less ashamed, about their periods. And women have responded positively.

OK, so you may not be selling feminine hygiene products. But it does matter how you talk to your customers. Are you speaking in a way that makes your customers want to listen?

Penn and Misspeller

It turns out that even criminals need to be branded. According to a recent CNN story, thieves with a clever nickname have a higher chance of being caught and prosecuted. It’s a long-standing strategy that’s helped law enforcement officials publicize crimes and nab culprits like Pretty Boy Floyd.

More and more, criminal nicknames such as the Barefoot Bandit are given careful consideration so the public will remember them. The methodology to catch branded bandits today is akin to a well-mapped marketing strategy.

This makes me wonder: could branding office mishaps help curb the occasional office faux pas? If I hang some “Wanted” posters around the HenkinSchultz office, would fewer people swipe my writing utensils and more people clean out the microwave?

Nah, that probably wouldn’t work. They’d probably just take away my writing privileges.

Buses Attract Attention, and Most Recently, Awards

We were pretty excited when we first began working with Avera McKennan to design bus wraps for Sioux Falls transit. Turns out, some other people were excited about it, too.

Avera McKennan won a 2010 Silver Aster Award in Outdoor Transit for its bus wraps. The Aster Awards, which are given by Marketing Health Today, celebrate healthcare marketing professionals who demonstrate excellence in advertising. HenkinSchultz also worked with Avera Health, Avera McKennan and Avera McKennan Foundation on the following campaigns that won Aster Awards:

Award: Silver for Newsletter/Internal – Series
Avera Health, All of Us Newsletter

Award: Silver for Publication/Internal
Avera Health, Avera Quality Report

Award: Silver for Publication/Internal
Avera McKennan Foundation, Human Touch Newsletter

Award: Bronze for Special Events
Avera McKennan Foundation, The Big Grape Benefit 2009

Congrats to all the Avera staff members, who are great to work with on fun, award-winning marketing campaigns.

KFC Doubles Down, prepares for a bust

What’s the difference between flash and substance?

Let’s ask Kentucky Fried Chicken.

Since 2005, Kentucky Fried Chicken (or KFC, depending on the day) has seen its market share drop. It’s not a drastic drop, but it’s enough of a drop to raise concern – especially as the fried chicken industry expands and challengers Popeye’s and Chick-fil-A rise to fill market share.

According to a AdAge report, KFC is down to 30% of the chicken market. Add to that over a 1.5 billion dollars in growth, and a LOT of people are either switching from (or outright shunning) the Colonel.

And that brings us to KFC’s recent flash: The Double Down.

The Double Down, if you haven’t heard, is a sandwich – and that term is being used VERY loosely – that uses two fried chicken breasts instead of bread. Inside is a cheesy goo mixture of bacon and grease.

It’s really nothing more than a marketing ploy – the same type of empty strategy that KFC has used constantly through the last several years. It brings to mind the grilled chicken experiment, which was more “Oprah’s talking about our grilled chicken!” than “we believe you should eat grilled chicken because it’s what you want.”

On the other hand, Chick-fil-A offers healthier options as a matter of principle – not as a marketing ploy. They are enjoying the ride as an underdog, pushing the horses to a cultish status. They use better chicken. They employ people you actually want to buy chicken from. They serve it in stores you actually want to eat chicken in.

Chick-fil-A isn’t depending on decades of market dominance and flashy hype machines to sell chicken. It’s depending on substance.

KFC? Well, they’re doubling down on their bet that you’ll eat anything. And while sales may spike for a short amount of time as people rush to try this monstrosity, they’ll soon fall back to where they were.

Flash vs. substance? One gets you attention. The other gets you loyalty.

Which do you think KFC would rather have?

The Internet of Things

ReadWriteWeb has been spending a healthy amount of time researching and discussing The Internet of Things, a concept that describes how, in the future, there will be more things on the Internet – sensors, devices, automated systems – than people.

A new video from IBM’s Smarter Planet group illustrates what The Internet of Things will mean to our future, specifically the social and cultural change that will occur as a result.

Our place as marketers in The Internet of Things is still being developed, and because of this there’s a propensity for fear. The technology is adapting far faster than we can keep up with, which leads to brash and unseemly forays into interruption marketing. We fight to be a part of the answer, and in doing so we bypass working with the system by working in spite of the system.

So what’s our responsibility?

As The Internet of Things becomes more automated, it will also seek out better ways to become more monetized. Which will lead to more opportunities for marketing. Which will lead to more ways in which a person is interrupted during their life.

It’s a slippery slope, and this is where our part will come in – our responsibility to understand, both for our clients and for the customers they serve, that not every channel needs to be interrupted.

That, by choosing the right channels, standing by permission marketing and understanding which options will help a brand (rather than hurt it in ways we may not even understand), we can continue to lead our clients to effective marketing.

All without taking advantage of society and its quickly fracturing attention.

(Via: ReadWriteWeb)

HenkinSchultz: Official Google Advertising Professionals

It’s about Analytics and Ad Ranking and CPC and Quality Score.

It’s about CTR and Keywords and Region Targeting and Content Bids.

It’s about CPM and Impressions and Ad Groups and ROI.

But really, it’s about understanding the basics - and the subtle (and sometimes complicated) nuances - of search engine marketing as it pertains to Google AdWords. And, furthermore, about presenting our clients with added opportunities for promotion and awareness outside the traditional printed and broadcast mediums.

So we finally got around to taking the test. And here we are: official Google Advertising Professionals. (And we’re pretty stoked, by the way.)

We get to show off the badge. But our clients get the real prize: an added level of knowledge and awesomeness from their chosen marketing partner.

Where Is the Line? (On Advertorials and Front Page Ads)

No one would claim that the garden variety advertorial is a journalistic endeavor. Situated alongside a publication’s content, however, it can often be mistaken as real – especially if designers have taken great pains to replicate font, layout and details.

Advertorials happen. They happen all the time. Whether you think they’re effective or misleading, you probably rarely give them a second thought.

That is, until they begin appearing on your front page.

Alice In Wonderland

Historically, newspapers and magazines have held the front page as an Advertising Free Zone. It only makes sense. No one buys a publication because of the ads on the front; they look to the cover as a de facto table of contents. That’s where the impulse to purchase is created.

But with the decline in advertising revenues, publications have begun allowing more and more leeway. Small banner ads appear near the bottom of the front page. Plastic covers promote wireless services. Post-it notes offer coupons. Ads are creeping into that valuable space, precisely because it’s valuable. Precisely because magazines and newspapers can’t sell the insides as much as they once could.

So, you can imagine, if you offer a newspaper $700,000 to print a full front-page wrap, there’s a good chance they’re going to take it.

That’s what Disney did with the Los Angeles Times. The ad – a four-page wrap that mimicked the Times’ front page – was designed to “create buzz, and to extend the film’s already brilliant marketing campaign,” said John Conroy, spokesman for the Times. It also pushed the day’s headlines to a second page.

It’s not the first time the Times has slipped advertising in under the radar. Last April, an ad for NBC’s Southland gave only minimal indication that it was, indeed, an advertisement – and that was long after the “article” would have been read.

Newspapers: a Vehicle for Journalism or Advertising?

Which begs the question: where is the line? When does journalism begin and advertising end?

According to the American Society of Magazine Editors, ads and editorial content require a clear separation, and front-page ads not allowed. But when faced with the decision between selling a lucrative front cover ad and the ASME’s minimal repercussions (a letter or reprimand and exclusion from the National Magazine Awards), there’s often no more than the approval of a publisher standing in the way.

More than anything, newspaper and magazine readers place their trust in the publications they’re consuming. When ads are placed in a way that blurs the line between editorial and advertising – when advertisers seek to gain attention through deception by designing an ad that looks like real content - that trust is taken advantage of.

In other words, the content of the ads should be considered – not the location.

The Times ad reaches the news outlets because it’s on the front page. But it’s clearly an ad. It steers clear of deception simply because it’s too big to be believable. No one read that and thought, “this is a Los Angeles Times article about the movie.”

However, an advertorial clearly wants to be seen as content. Its entire premise is dependent upon a reader seeing it as an article. Posing as something it’s not, the advertorial plays upon the trust of the reader.

In other words, outrage seems to be misguided because the definition is so hazy. The line is smudged. Possibly irreparably. And it’s up to us – as advertisers and publishers – to, once and for all, redraw the line. Clean it up. Set some standards.

The balance, really, stands between editorial honor and the need to keep the lights on. We can take sides, fighting against either the stuffiness of journalistic integrity or the demons of advertising greed. But both sides have their arguments. Because without determining where that line is – the line between honorable content and the advertising that helps pay for it – we may lose the trust of our readership.

Being a Realtor on the Web

Let’s face it. Choosing a Realtor can be scary.

A lot needs to happen in selling and buying a house, and that puts a lot of responsibility – and therefore, a lot of trust – into the Realtor/homeowner relationship. Trust that needs to be earned. Trust that can’t be forgotten.

Which means, often, homeowners are on the defensive when it comes to buying or selling. They don’t have time to set up meetings with prospective Realtors, listen to presentations and choose. And often, questions arise before the Realtor is even chosen. What will stop my house from being sold? What do I need to do to prepare? Should I even sell?

For that reason, Realtors are taking to new ways of getting their positioning statement public in more non-traditional ways. We are happy to help one local Realtor – Tony Ratchford – in this very thing.

The concept: offer a seminar on selling a home on the potential seller’s time. Instead of setting up an appointment, coordinating schedules and arriving in person, Tony and his team developed a short video that highlights the needs for selling a home – and the benefits of doing so with Tony.

It’s simple: request a password, view the video, and proceed from there – which, coincidentally can all be handled on the same site. What’s your house worth? What homes are on the market? What resources are available in the community? It’s all one click away.

Fully automating the Realtor/homeowner relationship while still reaching out for a personal touch. It’s the best of both worlds, and it’s the future of buying and selling homes.

Check out the site for yourself at www.WhyHomesDontSell.com.

On Deadlines

Deadlines are the bane of a creative’s existence.

They signify a finish, a point at which the creative process stops and the technicalities begin. Everything leads to that deadline, and as time approaches, stress builds.

It’s the nature of the business. And it’s what makes a good number of us thrive.

Sometimes, our deadlines are far away. We’re afforded a large chunk of time with which to make magic happen. But most of the time, however, we’re on tight deadlines. Publications and print dates and special events and product launches are all tied to a specific date, and to that specific date our marketing and advertising materials must coincide.

Deadlines are a bane. But they’re also a framework and a promise.

So when a super hot job lands on our doorstep, sometimes there are only a few hours available to plan, design and implement. Take, for example, the case of a recent Web project we handled for the South Dakota State University Foundation.

With site design approved on Tuesday, there was but a crazy overnight coding session holding it back from getting to them by Wednesday. And it was done. Four days later, after content was entered, the site was live.

What what?

Listen, none of us want to work on midnight oil deadlines. But sometimes, they happen. And when they do, there’s a certain feeling of accomplishment – and dedication – that drives us to turn it around in an emergency.

It’s a deadline. They’re the bane of our existence. But, they’re also what makes the industry so exiting, and, in a way, what makes it so rewarding.

What what, indeed.

That plane is really an infographic

This airplane is really an infographic. And, for that, I salute Kulula Air (a low-fare, small airline out of South Africa), despite the fact that I’ll probably never get to fly on a single one of these planes.

From the Fast Company article:

With the help of local branding agency Atmosphere, Kulula launched this new look, called Flying 101. It’s more proof of the ubiquitous cool of infographics, I guess–everyone loves a good labeled diagram. And what a way to stand out on the tarmac, amidst South African Airways plain-Jane fleet: white, serifed type, and the most predictable logo possible, the South African flag.

They may not have Jet Blue or Southwest level service and support, but they certainly have an extra level of awesome. Nice work from Atmosphere.

(via/ Fast Company)

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About HenkinSchultz

HenkinSchultz is an agency. An advertising and marketing and branding and design and production agency. All of those things, and then some.

But, underneath all that, we're really a bunch of thinkers. As in, we think about stuff, both pertinent and not, with and without boundaries, as if our lives depended on it. And this right here, Post Haste, is where we write about it.

Visit us at http://www.henkinschultz.com.

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Recent Posts

• Let Your Voice Be Your Guide
• Penn and Misspeller
• Eat Your Brussels Sprouts
• Rhymes With Rice
• Embrace Losing, Embrace a Tree
• Buses Attract Attention, and Most Recently, Awards
• From the Mouths of Babes
• Needed: One Awesomewriter.
• To Inform and Delight
• KFC Doubles Down, prepares for a bust

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