Harley Davidson: A brand community

1. Do you believe brand communities like Harley-Davidson result in greater involvement with the brand?

I do. I think that Harley-Davidson has successfully oriented their brand with a lifestyle, a broader sense of ideals and mindset. The effect snowballs when their ad campaigns, after defining their following, begins to focus on including non-typical Harley drivers like in this advert (right). They use the #StereotypicalHarley to show that they are not only a community of hardcore bikers, but of tech-savvy individuals who are free thinkers and free spirits.

2. What elements of the Posse Ride do you believe enhance the meaning of the brand for the riders?
I think one of the most interesting things about Harley is that they target the disenfranchised and provide them with an event that not only lets them network, connect and socialize with similar people (linked by the purchase of a bike) but it also lets them celebrate their disenfranchised status. The public complains about the noise and Harley riders use Posse Ride to go out and make noise. They revel in the community and chaos that it the noise brings, it is their brand and it says look at us.

3. Should Harley-Davidson get more involved in the ride or would that dilute the ride's meaning to the participants? I think getting more involved is a game of diminishing returns. It is better to organize and delegate the running of events through local and international clubs. If you use social networking to connect riders with local groups you still get out your brand message out without need for too much hands-on interaction and organizational expenses.

4. In addition to experiences such as the Posse Ride, what other ways could Harley increase involvement in the brand? I think if Harley developed a ranking system that logged years and/or events attended and awarded them with special patches for their cut, as well as giving them special ranking in their Posse Ride local clubs would be a way to award longtime loyal riders.

Chevy Drive a Cherokee

Our ad campaign idea for the Jeep Cherokee marketed to an older audience uses funny-man Chevy Chase to provide a friendly yet hilarious spokesperson for a generation wanting simple luxury.
The concept was to show Chevy ala his Community character Pierce Hawthorne, as a elder, out of the technology loop, disoriented and lost. The overall direction would be: If this dolt can do it, and enjoy the simple luxury of the Jeep Cherokee, than SO CAN YOU! By using humor and an actor that our target generation grew up adoring this ad campaign tugs on the heart strings and the brain strings (trust me, brain strings are a thing).

The ad would have Chevy get in, touching gadgets and being pleasantly surprised at the amenities and how simple they are to use. Chevy would then proceed to drive it everywhere even places not typical 'legal'. When stopped by the cops after driving down the beach, he will exit the car and yell "Where am I?" looking disoriented. The cops will laugh and give him a free pass (going back to their cruiser to continue eating their donuts) and Chevy will look into the camera and wink. 

Got Ethics?

The 5th Annual Spuler Ethics Symposium focused on ethics in advertising.
The panel included:
Michael Llewellyn-Williams, PhD & Founder and Principal of BrandMechanics®
Ivonne Montes de Oca, President & Founder of The Pinnacle Company
Tim Hendrick, Professor at SJSU and Marketing and Advertising Consultant
John Delacruz, Assistant Professor of Advertising at San Jose State University

One of the points that I took away from Montes de Oca is that Advertisers have the capability to uphold morals, that they are the gatekeepers between a companies message and the consuming public. This places a large burden on advertisers to not only make the company appear ethical, but encourage it to ACT ethically.

Llewellyn-Williams had an interesting counterpoint: that an ad can't be unethical, it is just a tool. Can a hammer be unethical? No, but the person holding the hammer can use it unethically. He ultimately places the burden of ethics on sellers saying that you can't blame ad agencies, they are the "public defenders" of  brands.

Nostalgic Commercials

Nostalgia is a useful advertising tool. To evoke a time period or event in the viewers mind and connect that feeling, not only to your product, but to an impulse to buy is a difficult thing to do. Nostalgia in advertising can be blunt and heavy handed, or subtle and deft. Both methods are relatively effective, given that your target audience remembers that time. Most ads using nostalgia aren't aimed at teenagers, instead they are targeting mid-aged people that have some life to reflect on. Here are a few examples of nostalgia used in advertising.

So God Made of Farmer for the Ram trucks is an interesting use of subtle nostalgia. It doesn't cite a time or a place but the motif it uses appeals to the "God-fearing-truck-driving-hard-working-farmer". The only problem is that not many farmers exist anymore, so what it actually does is sell cars to men who idolize hard work, and the others that this poem might speak to. The constant reference to Dad, Father, and how he is soft but hard, that is a nostalgic reference to people in the generation after the hard-worker, the sons and daughters of those farmers while still appealing to the hard-workers themselves.

A nostalgic commercial that we looked at in class was Axe's Susan Glenn ad which similarly to the Ram Truck ad uses a lone, deep voiced, serious narrator (seeing a trend here?) to describe a girl from his past. Axe chose ladies man, action hero, and all-around-bad-ass, Kiefer Sutherland, to narrate the ad. This ad's target audience is a little broader, although is mostly male. It uses nostalgia in the way that it harkens back to a similar experience that many men go through in highschool and offers the solution to that problem: Axe along with the tagline: fear no Susan Glenn.

Internet explore took a more direct, slap you over the head route with its browser you loved to hate campaign. There message was effective, it reminded you of things that were popular in the 90's which is always good for a quick laugh. But it also left you with an interesting message: 'We know we weren't the best browser ever, but that was then, we've grown up now.'

Gender Stereotypes in Advertising - The Big Game

Every year the Superbowl of advertising is, well, the Superbowl. Many of the ads that aired in this year's Superbowl had rampant gender stereotypes but not all were 'offensive'. There were also a few ads that gender stereotyped men, a group not usually vocal about offensive ads. So where is the line between acceptable, tasteless, and offensive use of gender stereotypes in an ad?

 One of the most offensive was Axe's commercial Lifeguard. It not only portrays women as helpless but also that they are objects of rescue. It implies that to repay being saved a woman is expect to fall in love with her rescuer, typical knight in shining armor.

Verdict: tasteless, because ultimately it seems as if the ad is parodying the knight in shining armor gig with the astronaut showing up at the end. But regardless are they using gender stereotyping to deliver their message: yes.

Kate Upton washes the Mercedes CLK in slow-motion. I don't even understand this commercial. It's almost like they didn't even try. This is how I imagine the ad meeting going: "What will sell cars?" "I dunno, boobs?" "I don't know, isn't that a little classless?" "What about boobs in slow motion with super cheesy Vegas stripper music?" "Sure, seems legit."

 

Verdict: tasteless, offensive, and not funny. This commercial is like a dead horse that Mercedes decided to put lipstick on. The genre is old, offensive, not clever, and only appeals to teenage boys on Reddit.

Now here is a curveball, a commercial that gender stereotypes men as stupid, laughable (by squirrel standards at least), and overweight.

 

Verdict: funny, not offensive (to me at least) but still uses gender stereotypes to sell its product. Did you catch that the woman could eat as much chocolate as she wanted?

Semiotics

Semiotics is the study of signs classified as symbols, icons, index and how these signs make up the majority of human interaction and culture. Without semiotics we would be unable to communicate; image speaking to someone who is blind that doesn't speak the same language as you. When you take away the visual and linguistic references that we used to communicate then you are left with no communication. Advertising has to be very cognizant of these cultural semiotics because they determine how you message is received. As we move closer and closer to a global culture, advertisers have to be more careful about their message because the 'target audience' won't be the only one seeing it.
For example, this ad for Groupon might be funny to most of the American audiences but it is seen as greatly offensive to the Tibetan people.

The American public might see the human right violations in Tibet as some far-away rarely-talked-about issue but the Tibetans don't see it that way. Could you imagine if the ad was changed to some issue with more media coverage in America like: Boston, Katrina, Iraq, or Israel? Many Americans would be outraged by the nonchalance shown by the ad towards issues that hit so close to home.
Advertisers often use metaphors, play on words, and jokes that only make sense in a certain language as well. This is a form of semiotics. 

This ad for Modelo, a Mexican beer, says "Modelos y Futbol. Para que Mas!" or in English "Models and soccer. What more could you want?" The play on words is Modelos, which means in spanish: models, refering to the sexy ladies in the ad, and/or Modelos, the plural form of the brand of beer. Any audience that doesn't speak Spanish, wont get the joke. This is semiotics in advertising in a nut-shell.

Toblerone Social Campaign

For our Toblerone social ad campaign we decided to mimic a campaign similar to the on run by Lay's chips which let the fans choose the next flavors of Lay's. Through a facebook application it allowed users to customize their own Lay's bag complete with stock picture, text, and bag color. Once you create your flavor it shares it to your facebook wall and gives you the option to instagram, tweet, or email your flavor. It also connected with your friends and allowed face off type voting to create flavor competition.




With this campaign Lay's effectively created a library of user created content that engaged and challenged other users to create better and better flavors which eventually lead to a final three fan-made flavors put into production.



Our campaign takes similar a similar stream of consciousness, forcing friends to compete against one another with their own custom Toblerone flavor. "Two is better than one" "We made a new flavor, now it's your turn."
The flavors will compete in a bracket voting system leading up to the holidays. The winning fan-flavor will be sold during the holiday season and share a special edition holiday box with our holiday Crunchy Salted Almond flavor.

Interruption Ads

The advertising industry is one that techniques are constantly evolving due to the changing attitudes of the consumer. Interruptive ads are a direct response to consumers 'tuning out' classical adverts. Unfortunately this has had even more extreme affects: I hardly even watch commercials anymore. With so many other media outlets as soon as my television program cuts to commercial my eyes go straight to my cell phone. This behavior is so prevalent that sometimes when I actually watch a commercial I recognize the audio but realize I have never watched the commercial in its entirety or really analyzed the message. Rather than creating simply gregarious and shocking ads to get attention, it is better to play off emotions and nostalgia while being original/artistic, most importantly with the audio and cinematography. The Levi's 'Go Forth' campaign was an example of unique audio and cinematography that immediately captured my attention and delivered their message as well as branding their aesthetic.

The web is perhaps the place where most interuptive ads are found, and unfortunately many sites allow advertisers many liberties with just how interuptive those ads can be, mostly because they are usually the sites only source of revenue. From pop-ups to ad-gating to ads that pause when you mute them the presence of online ads is becoming more and more interuptive. Just check out milliondollarhomepage.com

The problem with interuptive ads is that they aren't interesting to the consumer. This is why I am a huge advocate for advertisers to be able to use cookies to track your interests. I would rather see ads that were catered to me than ones I have no interest in. Unfortunately (as the method stands now) there is no way for the consumer to manage these interests. I would like to see more consumer control of what type of ads they want to see. I think this benefits both parties, the advertisers want to sell their product to consumers who are most likely to buy, and consumers don't want to see ads regarding products that don't interest them.

iPod Toilet Roll Dock Ad Campaign

The basic idea surrounding our campaign was to embrace the 'gag-gift' angle of our product by using iconic rock music to create a theme centered around the use of the toilet. The feeling we wanted to convey was that this musical device would give you the inspiration to poop.
Below was a rough timeline sketch we came up with in class along with our radio spot

Less Conversation
SFX: Elvis - A Little Less Conversation slowly fades in. Music cuts quickly during toilet flush.

Announcer: (Mr. Moviephone Deep Voice)
Claim your porcelain throne,
Be the King of your Bathroom,
with the Toilet Roll iPod Docking Station.

SFX: Song cuts back in to guitar solo.

Major Pumping Required

When it comes to marketing failures nothing can possibly be worse than Hasbro's marketing addition to its popular Supersoaker line, the Oozinator. The following video can only be described as a complete and udder marketing failure that should have never left the advertising womb.

Steve Hall from AdRANTS.com perhaps said it best:
"The people who created this ad are either living in a land far removed from current day culture, are completely clueless or, conversely, have a seriously twisted sense of humor. This ad for the Hasbro Super Soaker Oozinator features a gun that when pumped a few times shoots a white globular substance all over the faces and bodies of those in the ad. Sound familiar? We thought so. While we're sure it's fun to pump something until it shoots a bunch of gooey stuff, we can't help but imagine how this thing got created, reviewed and approved without a lot of snickering."WARNING: Viewer Discretion Is Advised.

Not exactly kid friendly, right? Even if your mind isn't in the gutter there is something clearly disturbing about this ad. The Oozinator and its advertisements were quickly pulled, most likely after several thousand calls from outraged parents.

I wonder what the storyboard looked like for this ad.

The biggest failure was not that this was a terrible product idea but rather, that the marketing team couldn't anticipate their target audience's reaction to this product and ad campaign. Parents buy kid's toys for kids. So not only does the ad have to appeal and be understood by children but it also has to be viewed through the adult consumer's perspective. The sad thing is this product idea could fly simply because it is a kid's toy and kid's toys are sometimes slimy/gooey/gross. A successful ad campaign may rename the product, the Galactic Slime Blaster. Instead of shooting unarmed children in the chest in the ad they could make it a space themed ad where the slime blasters blast evil aliens and stick them to the walls with goo in a comic fashion. This product was so bad that the few Oozinators that are in existence sell for hundreds of dollars as gag gifts. Maybe this would sell better as an adult toy. That idea is on the house. Your welcome, Hasbro.

Save the Whales

Sea Shepherd is a highly visible and well branded nature conservation group that focuses on protecting sea life around the world.

Sea Shepherd Logo/Flag:


They have often been criticized for the extreme and sometimes militant tactics they use against Japanese whaling vessels. Leader of the Sea Shepherd fleet Paul Watson was a former Greenpeace member and left because he felt Greenpeace's tactics were too passive. There is even a show on Animal Planet documenting the antarctic battles between Sea Shepherd and their sworn enemies the Japanese whalers. This militant dramatic style also plays out in their advertising which aims to be shocking and move you to act on those emotions.


"Predatory fishing also threatens life outside the oceans."

This ad is photo manipulated in order to show the effects of fishing on wildlife in a violent, shocking way. This is a slightly more uplifting and inspirational ad yet it doesn't stray from Sea Shepherds militant routes:





 
"Until they can defend themselves, we will do it for them."

This next ad raises an interesting point that really gets at the heart of Sea Shepherds specific mission:
To help protect our oceans.
And in the ad below they point out the simple fact that we treat some animals, especially cute, furry, hard to eat animals better than ugly, delicious, scaly animals. Perhaps because we don't live in the water we feel as though we are removed from the oceans and therefore we don't care about its inhabitants. Sea Shepherd's advertising mission is to make you think about your relationship with the ocean, and I believe their ads have done that successfully.

"Why do we treasure one species but slaughter another?"

"Respec, boss man" - VW and Stereotypes

The recent VW Superbowl commercial is one of the most racially controversial commercials in recent memory. The highly visible commercial has been heralded by Jamaica as a boost to their tourism industry.

But is this positive or negative stereotyping. Is it racially ethical? Is it wrong to promote someone else's culture through stereotypes? If so is it wrong to promote one's own culture through stereotypes? The actor in this ad, Erik Nicolaisen, attempted to downplay the controversy:

"I am an actor, I was hired two days before this commercial was made. It was written long before. I am just an actor, I was just out there representing an accent that I can do. As for the controversy, I am not in a position to affirm or deny how it makes people feel. Race is an issue, but racism is a part of American history and you can't discount it... But personally, from my end, as a fan of reggae music and Jamaican culture and also international reggae culture, I am familiar with people of all different cultures and origins, speaking in patois or singing reggae music."

We can all agree that negative stereotyping is bad and has no place in modern society. I think the issue with positive stereotyping in advertisements is that although the actors or company might say they are trying to positively portray a culture or lifestyle BUT they are ultimately selling a product. VW and all advertisers have an ethical responsibility to make their advertising inclusive and to not promote negative societal aspects like racism. Advertisers are trendsetters and tastemakers and need to be ethically conscience to what they are promoting. One opinion is that this ad wouldn't make sense to a society that doesn't have the preconceived stereotypical context that tells us all Jamaicans talk like that, that VW has the right to free speech and therefore has no ethical responsibilities. Does VW have the right to play off racial stereotypes in their ad? Yes. Is society to blame for having the stereotypical context? Yes partially. But advertisers are to blame for the perpetuation of these stereotypes from generation to generation. This is their ethical responsibility just as it is our ethical responsibility as a society to speak out against racism and stereotype in the aspects we have control over: our workplace, our children, our friends. Advertisers have to be conscience about their impact and the areas they have control and attempt to be ethical in their decisions.

Big Bowl of Brand Flakes

Me

I think what frustrates most people about brands and being anti-brand is that there is a certain level of hypocrisy in everyone. Take clothing for example. I personally try to avoid brand name clothing, however that doesn't mean that I completely avoid brands in other aspects of my life. My personal clothing preference is to buy cheap comfortable essentials (plain t-shirts and sweatshirts usually from "cheap" stores or wholesalers). My closet also includes many shirts made by local artists and anything Sharks, Giants, or Niners.  For me individuality is an important quality. That's why I tend to avoid fashion trends and anything "swag",  "in", or "hip".

Judgement and Stereotypes

Whether you like it or not people judge you based on your appearance, on the brands you are wearing, the kind of car you drive, the way you carry yourself. That's why it is important to study, understand, manage, and embrace the stereotypes that are associated with you. Brands are reliant on stereotypes, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, stereotypes exist to help define us in good ways too. We can use stereotypes to our advantage to create a interesting and individual narrative to help advertise yourself.

DJ attire:
 
Hipster Fashion:
 
Anglophile dress code:

Lumberjack uniform:
   
And finally....me.

An Experiment

In one afternoon write down every brand name you consume or use. Whether it is the GQ magazine on your table, the Coke your drinking or the Xbox your playing. Then next to it write down the first word that comes to mind when you think of that brand.
Mine looks like this:
Coke can - Thirsty
GQ Magazine - Men's Fashion (Beyonce was a close 2nd)
Xbox - Bored
MacBook - Work
Honda - Drive
Apple earphones - Sound
etc.

Now imagine you are wearing a suit with all those brands on it, like this guy:

When I realized that there were cheaper alternatives to get my thirst/fashion/boredom/sound/working/driving fix, I truly understood the amazing power of brands. The majority of these brands I only consumed because of the lifestyle and ideals associated with their advertising campaigns.

The most egregious yet understandable of these illogical choices is my recent purchase of a new MacBook.
Reasons for purchase: Designer, Ease of use, Rebellious
Cost: $1,800
Hell there is a Samsung laptop for only 1/3 the cost with almost the exact specs. And yet Apple has done a great job of marketing so I believe Apple products are more reliable, powerful, and cool and I'm willing to pay for that belief.

Proprietary Eponyms

I found a list of a bunch of brand name's that we use generically. Enjoy:

Active Trademarks:

• Alka Seltzer
• AstroTurf
• Band Aid
• Beer Nuts
• Benzedrine
• Boogie Board
• Breathalyzer
• Brillo Pad
• BVDs
• Chapstick (Chap Stick)
• Cheerios
• Claymation
• Coke (Coca Cola)
• Cola (Coca Cola)
• Cool-Aid (Kool-Aid)
• Cuisinart
• Demerol
• Ditto Machine
• Dixie Cups
• Dumpster
• Erector Set
• Fiberglass (Fiberglas)
• Fig Newtons
• Freon
• Frisbee
• Green Stamp
• Hacky Sack
• Hi-lighter (Hi-Liter)
• Hoover
• Hula-Hoop
• Jacuzzi
• Jeep
• Jello (Jell-O)
• Jockey Shorts
• Kitty Litter
• Kleenex
• Laundromat
• Levi's
• Life Savers
• Mace
• Magic Marker
• Microchip
• Novocain
• Oreo
• Palm Pilot
• Parcheesi (replacing the generic word "Pachisi")
• Ping Pong (replacing the generic term "Table Tennis")
• Play-Doh
• Plexiglas
• Polaroid
• Pop Tart
• Popsicle
• Post-It Note
• Q-Tip
• Rollerblade
• Roller Derby
• Scotch Tape
• Scrabble
• Sellotape
• Sheetrock
• Skivvies
• Styrofoam
• Super Glue
• Teflon
• Teleprompter (TelePrompTer)
• Teletype
• Teva
• Thermos
• TV Dinner
• Tylenol
• UNIX
• Valium
• Vaseline
• Velcro
• Walkman
• Welcome Wagon
• White Out (Wite-Out)
• Wiffle Ball
• Windbreaker
• X-Acto Knife
• Xerox

Defunct Trademarks:

• Aspirin
• Brassiere
• Cellophane
• Celluloid
• Corselet (Corselette)
• Escalator
• Granola
• Gunk
• Heroin
• Jungle Gym (Junglegym)
• Kerosene
• Linoleum
• Mimeograph
• Pogo Stick (Pogo)
• Saran Wrap
• Shredded Wheat
• Tabloid
• Yo-yo
• Zipper

Dinner with Dietmar

The presentation by Dietmar Dahmen was full of valuable nuggets of advertising information. The long list includes concepts such as now-ism, first-ism, virtual urbanization, generation connected, mental cost vs. access cost, fame and how it relates to use-vertising and me-vertising, consumers vs. pro-sumers, and digital anticipation. I believe the most valuable of these nuggets had to do with how companies can fail because of their inability to adapt and change to new technologies. The example Dietmar used was the canning industry and it's inability to adapt into the ice block industry and it's inability to adapt into the refrigeration industry. Since technology is evolving at a ever increasing pace it is even harder for companies to stay relevant and interact with their target market. Companies like Google and Facebook are currently (or have been until now been) on the cutting edge. Both companies have managed to grow while providing a service that has expanded to encompass the demands of the consumer. They have both been able to monetize originally free services through unique advertising methods; however, will they be able to adjust to be relevant and incorporated into Web 5.0. Will Facebook or Google be the company that is in your interactive inanimate objects: your cars, your coffee shops, and your refrigerator?

My personal opinion is that we are moving closer and closer to having one singular online identity and that whatever companies can unify your now fractured online identity and incorporate it in an easily accessible way will dominate the Web 5.0 era and possibly even cheat death (see video below). For example, I have a Facebook account that I use to interact with friends, share cool photos, ideas, and chat. I also have Instagram and Pinterest where I share photos with friends. I have my school blog where I share school ideas and a personal blog where I share personal ones. I have 5 email accounts: a personal one, a business one, a freelance design one, a work one, and a school one! Work makes me use Skype to chat with my co-workers while I use Facebook Chat for talking to my friends. All this overlap and all this clutter makes my life seem very unorganized, hectic and yet monotonously repetitive and inefficient.

Singular online identity to the next level?

The real question lies in a T.V. analogy: If you buy a smart T.V. that has Netflix, Hulu, cable, Youtube, Facebook, Pandora, etc. do you throw away of the other media items you owned that previously allowed you to experience that media? No, you don't because Smart T.V.'s with their strange UI, weak speakers, and lack of portability don't allow you to enjoy the media in an easily accessible way. It is accessibility and ease of use that drives the consumer to interact with a product.

Excited about Advertising!

As a graphic designer my path has crossed with the advertising world many times and will no doubt continue to. What I find interesting about advertising is how it focuses on understanding people wants and needs, the sociology of group thinking including advertising's relationship to stereotyping and ethics. I am currently the creative director and chief designer at allthingsjeep.com, the biggest online jeep accessories and apparel retailer. Along with my team of designers, I create, design, and direct ad campaigns and promotional emails for holidays.

I hope that this class will not only increase my understanding of advertising techniques but also enhance my creative abilities by exposing me to ads I haven't seen before. Most importantly I hope to think more like an ad-man, to be creative in creating intangible value. Ad-man Rory Sutherland explains the perspective I wish to gain:

"Engineers, medical people, scientific people, have an obsession with solving the problems of reality, when actually … once you reach a basic level of wealth in society, most problems are actually problems of perception.”
-Rory Sutherland