Archive for the ‘Required Reading’ Category

Going to be interesting to see how Telstra play’s out its new brand position. Telstra is a brand I’ve been hyper-critical of. Great brands don’t start with marketing – they start by architecting remarkable product and service experiences, then they overlay those experiences with great marketing. In this respect, Telstra’s marketing team have their work cut out for them.

Telstra largely peddle products they don’t make, and the bit they do make – the network and service experience – is (based on my frequent and recurring experiences) lousy. It’s a brand that has been well polished over the years but I just wonder if every dollar spent on marketing would have been better spent of a massive rearchitecting of their digital, service and network experience. 

Thrive is one of the most well used brand positions out there. Nearly every country has a major brand using the language. We even use it at times. So, not a fresh position and the work seems to tread a very well worn path. The result is pretty work that is largely uninteresting and not likely to have much carry. Liked the poetic/rap voiceover. Other than that, just wanted to scream – “please god, fix my broadband, please”.

Thoughts?

FT points to the massive dominance Facebook and Google have over digital spend – about 75% of all new digital spend in fact. And that soon digital will eclipse television in terms of spend. Paul Frampton, chief executive of Havas Media Group UK, says they are “black boxes” that have too much power.

“They don’t give agencies or the brands access to their algorithms and the data being mined are for Google and Facebook — and not for the brand.”

Yes, except we as advertisers have access to massive amounts of data from both. As a result we can do fine grain targeting and drive ever increasing efficiency even as prices increase. So, perhaps it’s a grey box. 

Not touched on is whether the increase in share of media wallet is a result of us doing more in digital, or, significant increases in prices. Both are happening. What we are doing is moving more within the digital wallet as well – less to Yahoo!, Linked-in (barely noticeable at Cannes), Bing and others.

I’ll let you read the rest but what amazes me is how absent the marketer is from these conversations. Lots of agency folk, buyers and consultants. The reality is the shift is being driven by clients.

I’ve got so much reading going on I normally fail when someone asks me to recommend something I am reading. So, will start posting here on great current reads.

Top of the list is: The Seventh Sense: Power, Fortune, and Survival in the Age of Networks, Joshua Cooper Ramo (Little, Brown and Company, 2016; nonfiction).

Good list from McKinsey here. And don’t forget to read the latest book I was lucky enough to collaborate on.

Greg Thomas isn’t just a poor spokesperson for Sanzaar, he’s a mouthpiece for an organisation that has become clearly biased to serving Sth African rugby. As if the slanting of semi-finals and final locations weren’t enough, we then have the debacle where the Crusaders can’t even get to Sth Africa with a reasonable rehabilitation window – clearly favouring the locals.

Then today, Greg feels it’s his and Sanzaar’s job to rule on the quality of a team. Where local players serve their country on the field that clearly shouldn’t impact their eligibility to play in the tournament. I can see how their ruling would be fair as applied to players joining from other teams, but where it involves national representation across the code its a cynical view to hold. To suggest that the players they’ve selected are better than Messam is, well, ridiculous.

Loved this piece on and from my friend Paul D’Arcy.

“… he aims for a high mean and a median of zero, meaning he anticipates more than half of his team’s ideas will fail”