Art & Commerce: Staying the Course

Tesla Motors recently introduced a 100 percent electric car. The Tesla Roadster can reach 60 mph in four seconds, travel 250 miles per charge, and drive for 1 cent per mile. It retails for roughly $98,000. The Roadster has been featured in major U.S. media outlets like the Los Angeles Times, Time, Forbes and Good Morning America. "We do zero advertising," Darryl Siry, vp of marketing, told PR Week. "The interesting thing about Tesla is that it's a poster child for building your brand on communications and PR." Back in 2001, Tesla may have pushed to blow the budget on a few ego-building Super Bowl ads. Fortunately, Tesla has paid attention to the lessons of 2001. Skeptics will say, "That's easy, they have a headline-grabbing product." True enough. If you don't have a media pleaser, advertising must remain part of the branding strategy, even when the budget is minimal. So how do you approach advertising to build a brand on a limited budget? Product life cycle refers to the stages a product goes through from conception to obsolescence. Consider the idea of a branding vehicle life cycle, in which you define and communicate the brand, from day one, in a consistent manner, in all vehicles. The consistency should stretch from basic collateral, such as business cards, to key media, such as your print ads. In advertising we think in terms of reach and frequency. Such thinking should be applied to all marketing materials. Business cards, brochures, Web sites and other materials often have lengthy life cycles and provide the "long tail" of exposure that media insertions do not. Seem obvious? How many times do we see business cards from people at the same company that are different in texture, color and even shape or size? With a limited ad budget, these branding elements are important, high-touch mechanisms over the long term. Now, what about vehicle and media life cycles? Most powerful brands have been built for and over the long term. The Coca-Cola and IBM brands grew from the quality of their products as well as consistency in their message and communications approach. These brands often ran the same ads for months, even years. Such disciplined consistency can be applied to companies with far thinner budgets. If you have limited funds and you can't advertise much, you can still advertise long. Unfortunately, many in advertising—on the client and agency sides—seem to change strategies with the seasons, or at minimum with their frequently changing marketing staff. New client marketing directors are as guilty as new agency creative directors—everyone wants to put his or her stamp on the company's image. This is particularly true of small to medium-size businesses. Ironically, these are the ones that can stand to benefit the most from long-term consistency and have the most to lose from fragmentation. I look forward to the day when I hear a newly hired marketing director say, "Let's use this ad for the next six months." That's like hearing a newly hired agency say, "This ad you've been using still has life. Let's leave it alone." In our profession, we get excited about change and new ideas. Yet keeping the same message and creative in front of an audience will often do more to galvanize the brand than brilliant new creative ideas. Those amazing Super Bowl ads from the dot-com days—remember the product names? I don't. For nearly 20 years, Maidenform ran a print campaign that secured its place as the dominant maker of "bras, girdles and swimsuits." Sound dull? You know it. We do our clients a big favor when we stick with something that works, even if it's someone else's old idea. This doesn't mean change is a bad thing, just unnecessary when a current strategy is working. Finally, and perhaps most important when working with limited budgets, collaboration among communications branches (members, teams, agencies) is critical. One of our clients used to get all his agencies (PR, IR, event, design, media and Web) in one room for a quarterly meeting. Not only did it create synergy, it kept everyone honest and motivated, as some of the agencies offered competing services. In our business, we have a reputation, deserved or not, of trying to milk clients for fees. Let's challenge ourselves to think creatively in a different way, particularly for clients with smaller budgets. Let's focus on the long term, on making the most of what's already there, on leveraging PR and new-media approaches as well as traditional advertising media, and coordinating with our partners. We will rarely have opportunities like Tesla Motors, and we may feel foolishly boring when proposing long-term solutions. Suck it up. Building strong brands—even small ones—also builds strong résumés and long-term job security.

Brand Marketing

Art & Commerce: Staying the Course

Nicolas Boillot

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Nicolas Boillot