by Stephanie Fierman

There’s been a bit of a scramble among brands seeking to leverage AMC’s popular series, Mad Men.  BMW is one of the largest and most frequent sponsors, prompting an auto site to gush, “BMW’s underwriting for Mad Men is mad marvelous.”

Maybe so.  After all, the series is about an advertising agency and the supposed glamour of the post-War period, all glowy and wistful.  It’s an unusual opportunity to create a fresh and fun message… IF it makes sense for the brand.

BMW did two things right. First it aligned itself with the overall  je ne sais quoi of the show: the ambience, the characters, their lifestyles, their appearance, their tastes, the physical environment. That provides a very broad base upon which to construct an association.  BMW is already an upscale, luxury brand, so this association is more of a positive reinforcement than a flat-out creation. 

Second, this attachment is even further strengthened because BMW’s ads run during the episodes themselves.  As the show transitions almost seamlessly from content, to commercial, and back again, the company and its cars place themselves directly alongside the target of their (and your) dreams.  The viewer sees both in the same sitting; the brain experiences both in the same moment. The connection is made in real time. 

London Fog‘s new Mad Men-related ads, on the other hand, miss on both these counts.

Unlike BMW, London Fog’s owner, Iconix, chose to bet all its chips on one single character, Joan Holloway (aka Christina Hendricks).  This demands a plausible or at least believable connection between what the product and the individual represent, which is not present here. 

Today, London Fog is generally utilitarian, functional, male (androgynous?), classic (tired?) and generally unremarkable, while Hendrick’s Joan is nearly the polar opposite: voluptuous, sexy, powerful, womanly, stimulating. She’s brightly-colored cotton candy in a dress.  When you watch the show, her sexual  presence makes her nearly every man’s fantasy at one point or another.  She’s unattainable, like a rare luxury item. 

London Fog is the opposite.  By its own admission, the brand has far-flung distribution and high consumer awareness: it holds little mystery, no magic, no unattainability. Mad Men‘s Joan would not wear a London Fog, and no woman  (consciously or unconsciously) believes that she will be “more Joan”  by wearing the brand.  The effect is double-whammy, given that the clothes (which might look fine on “normal” people) appear boring, dull and awkward draped on Hendrick’s frame.  The two zeitgeists are just too far apart.

Iconix may have thought that Joan’s essence would rub off on the product.  And, prior to Hendricks, Iconix enlisted Eva Longoria and Giselle Bunchen for its ads, presumably with the same objective.  The problem is that consumers cannot make brand connections that aren’t there or – worse – pulling in opposite directions. 

Forcing an otherwise adequate brand into an environment that makes it appear inadequate is sad and unnecessary: an embarrassing kind of brand dissonance that can do the brand more harm than good. 

Lastly, the Joan ads do not have the benefit of being absorbed in the same moment as the story itself. The connection failure is particularly dramatic when experienced in the middle of a fashion magazine, surrounded by circa 2010 fashions, photos and messaging.

Managing a brand – particularly one trying to meld a perhaps very different past with the present – is a fine art. The brand steward must have an unblinking grasp on what the brand is and is not, what it might become, how fast such a change in direction might be made and how to begin.  If that direction is wrong, or the speed too fast, the desired messaging won’t find its target and you may needlessely displace the neutral-to-positive feelings most people have about the brand in favor of all the characteristics the brand does not possess.  It’s work grounded in an almost DNA-level of understanding of brands, consumer desire and human behavior.

Most brands have positive if not wonderful attributes to emphasize.  Show yours in its best light.  Avoid whatever might be hot right this second if it just doesn’t fit, and create an environment in which the product can truly shine.

Yet another result of the flailing economy:  truly new brand launches are faltering while brand extensions are succeeding. 

In 2008, less than 10% of new products were “net new brands,” even though the pace of product introduction was about on par with the last five years. Take a look at the top food and non-food brand launches of last year:

If you remove the pharma/DTC products (which are in a psychic/regulatory/financial class all their own), all the products on these lists are extensions or reformulations.

In the best of times, launching a truly new product is extremely difficult and expensive.  Manufacturing, distribution, marketing – starting from scratch is daunting.  In a recession, success is even more difficult to achieve.

Then there’s the consumer psyche to consider: what are the monetary and non-monetary risks of trying something truly new?  Who hasn’t been curious enough about a new launch – let’s say something perishable that cannot be returned – to try it out?  But when money is scarce, the news is full of stories of imprudent spending and people are making trade-offs among the smallest of purchases, the price of “wasting” money suddenly becomes very high. I will feel foolish if I buy this and don’t like it when there are existing substitutes that I know are good enough.

The other thing that’s noticeable about these lists and others is that the “closest in” extensions win: an existing brand holds a space in the consumer’s mind, a range of functionality and messaging in which that brand has credibility.  Hershey’s can launch new candies, Porsche can introduce a “wireless racing wheel” for gaming, Mr. Clean can (sort of) try out the car washing business.

But a $1,200 Disney Sleeping Beauty fountain pen or Kellogg’s hip-hop streetwear? Not so much.

Here’s a quick post about an article about Disney in the The New York Times today.

The piece is all about a Disney researcher considered to be “the kid whisperer.”  Her job is to help the company understand the needs, wants and desires of boys age 6 to 14, and then use this information to drive incremental revenue.  While 40% of the audience for Disney Channel is male, for example, girls continue to drive an outsized percentage of  (merchandise) sales.

The article follows Kelly Peña as she walks through boys’ homes, unearthing insights such as – while a 12 year old is trying to be tough and mature – he still as stuffed animals on his bed.

While in-home anthropological research is becoming de rigueur in consumer packaged goods, it’s a pretty big deal in the entertainment space, where executives or creatives often believe they “know the target” and pursue a product development process not necessarily informed by real people and their real behavior.

This is a huge simplification, but there is a fundamental difference in both B2B and B2C companies alike that build something new by starting with their customer target’s belief systems and behavior vs. those who start with the best product development process.  I was trained in customer segmentation – start with the consumer (or business target) – and build “to suit” – but not everyone is.

If pursued with rigor, I think this type of development work could be extremely helpful to the process of creating new entertainment vehicles and entertainment-inspired merchandise. 

I just want to say how relieved I am to discover that I am NOT the only one who is totally digging the song in State Farm‘s TV commercials.

I’m serious:  I’ve been pondering a blog post about this for awhile, but assumed that I was just an ad nerd, grooving to some random tune in a car insurance ad.  That State Farm had come up with this insurance jingle… and you would mock me.

I really should have more confidence in myself.  Not only is it not a jingle… it’s a remake of the The Sound of Music song, “Sixteen Going On Seventeen,” by Modern Music.  And it’s all over the web, like HERE and HERE and HERE.

Perhaps the strangest cover of a song ever – but brilliant just the same (and not a Von Trapp in sight).

See the ad (and hear the song) for yourself.

Dead people are big business.  We buy licensed products, DVDs of events gone by and iconic apparel.  Their estates continue to earn royalties and hold auctions.  Forbes even maintains a “Top Earning Dead Celebrities” list.   And earlier this year, I wrote a post here that outlined just how big “dead” is:  Elvis‘ estate generates the most money each year at $49 million, with John Lennon pulling in second at $44 million annually.

Lennon’s estate generates the lion’s share of its revenue from sales of the Beatles’ catalog.  In other words, Yoko et al make money from what Lennon did and loved most of all:  make music.

Now, a television commercial uses Lennon’s likeness and digitally-altered words to sell computers: Nick Negroponte‘s One Laptop Per Child effort, to be exact.  We see John’s face, we hear the words… and it’s just creepy.

I think this is a misstep.  While I admit that I may have more information about OLPC than the average television viewer – information that puts a sour taste in my mouth – I simply don’t see the connection between children, computers and John Lennon.  I think its a stew made of this disconnectedness, an inability to not think about how Lennon died and knowing that Yoko would approve something like this (I rest my case for “weird”) that just doesn’t get me there.John Lennon One Laptop    Nick Negroponte    Yoko Ono

Stop spending your ad dollars on advertising:  it turns out that swag is more effective.  How do we know this?

Because the swag people tell us so!

The Advertising Specialty Institute just released a survey saying that pens, pencils, water bottles and coffee mugs yield a lower cost-per-impression, high memorability scores and, therefore, a higher ROI than primetime television or national magazine ads.  Ta-da!

Oy.   Your average branded baseball cap – no matter how many of them you give away – is not a ready substitute for the story-telling ability of a TV or magazine ad.

That’s not to say that promotional items don’t have their place in many advertisers’ overall plans.  I’m simply pointing out that ASI’s assertions would be far more believable if they’d pointed to this ”key ingredient” philosophy, rather than attempting to deliver an either/or-type conclusion.

Because if you force a shoot-out between a retractable solar-powered mini-flashlight and a well-done primetime :30… you’re gonna have a real hard time not getting laughed at.

Heck, it made this ad guy spill his breakfast gin and tonic!

promotional swag      adscam.typepad.com

Most people think that comic book fans are all single men who either live in their parents’ basements and/or have entire rooms filled with action figures.  

It’s not true. Some of them are married (budumbum!). 

But seriously folks… I’m not going to share proprietary research here, but chicks are a growth business in the comics world.  I met plenty of great women during my years at DC Comics who love comics and graphic novels, and manga has only fueled female awareness in the US.   Several recent superhero movies, such as Ironman and The Dark Knight, have also featured storylines and characters that made them watchable for a widening swath of women.

So it’s only sensible that Marvel would come out with an updated line of Halloween costumes for women.  This is a really smart, fun idea that will bring new customers into the fold and get devotees to ditch their handmade Spider-Girl costumes in favor of a “real” one.  One-third of adults say they plan to buy costumes for themselves this year, with 62.5% of women saying they plan to celebrate the holiday vs. 54.7% of men.  and the witch thing is so old-school.

The costumes will not only sell, but they also give Marvel additional moderately-priced SKUs to position at mass retail.

Marvel Comics

A Wall Street Journal article this week describes how retailers are becoming increasingly focused on exclusive merchandise available through brand licensing.

Phillips-Van Heusen has Calvin Klein, Meredith has Better Homes & Gardens and Toys “R” Us is the only place you’ll find Hot Wheels MP3 players.

I don’t doubt that this is a fantastic way to refresh retail environments and create revenue – I’ve seen it myself at DC Comics and written about licensing several times.

For the moment, however – when 75% of women are saying that they are buying only the clothes their family needs – I doubt that the label on a shirt will make much difference.  And few moms are likely to drive out of their way for a parity product, just because it’s Hot Wheels-branded.

Long-term, savvy licensing will remain effective.  Short-term, revenue goals should be adjusted downward and I would think twice about pushing in-store exclusives, in particular:  if Toys “R” Us wants to sell those MP3 players, they should be available on the chain’s website (I couldn’t find them…)

Most folks don’t think about the custom publishing business, per se; they may receive a magazine from Four Seasons Hotels or WebMD or AT&T, but don’t really notice that these publications were created by Pace, TMG and Time Inc., respectively).  Media people think about it, though, and have helped make it $55 billion business in the US, with 38.7 billion publications being distributed in 2008 alone.

This is one of the many reasons that Wal-Mart is smart to partner with Hearst on the store chain’s first custom publishing endeavor, 30 Days of Home.  The retailer is using the publication to promote its new line of home furnishings and distributed it with June issues of Good Housekeeping, Country Living, House Beautiful, two Oprah mags and Redbook (all Heart pubs).

A custom pub, created in partnership with mainstream publishers is typically welcomed into and kept in the home at much higher rates than a product-focused catalog.  30 Days offers editorial, useful photography and captions and video content that help the recipient see herself in a home featuring Wal-Mart furnishings:  the mag becomes something that is about her (the buyer), not the retailer (the seller).

It’s a good idea.

Very, very interesting lawsuit making the rounds in Europe right now…

 The European Court of Justice, Europe’s highest court, is hearing a case that will decide whether Google violates trademark law by allowing companies to purchase brand names to trigger pay-per-click ads.

The case stems from an earlier lawsuit filed in France by Louis Vuitton against Google.  LVMH claimed that Google was violating the law by allowing marketers to purchase, say, “Louis Vuitton replica” or “Louis Vuitton fake.”  Louis Vuitton actually won this case in France but Google appealed.   Le Meridien Hotels filed a very similar case – again in Europe – and also won.

Google has had better luck in the US although it has been sued there, as well.  The only case that went to trial was a suit filed by Geico – and Google won.  The judge said that there was no evidence that consumers were confused by the ads that appeared as a result of PPC term that included the company’s name.  American Airlines has also filed a similar suit. 

If the final decision is that Google cannot sell terms including proper nouns/company names to any entity that does not own that word or phrase, this will have major impact on search and search marketing.  After all, 444,000 results come up on Google for the search term ”Walmart S**s” alone…

As readers may know, the Burger King – uh – King is one of my favorites. Creepy, a little, and that commercial where he wakes up in bed next to you got a lot of weird buzz… but in the King’s case all buzz is good buzz.

In a new move, Burger King has licensed the King for a new line of greeting cards. Genius. Consumer licensed goods will never before the huge generator of global revenue that it is for a DC Comics, but it’s a smart, almost risk-free move that gets a huge representation of their brand into new retail venues.