Nov 3, 2010 | Branding, Leadership, Personal Rant, Strategy
The new focus on Rural and regional Australia (R&RA) in the current parliament has great merit in ways hard to quantify.
The nature of “Brand Australia”, how we see ourselves, has always been about the wide brown land, the sunburnt country, the Akubra hatted drover gazing into the sunset, however much that sense is a myth, given the urban nature of the population, it nevertheless defined us.
Over the last 50 years a steady erosion of the rural population has occurred, and an erosion of the support infrastructure has followed, schools, hospitals, communities with insufficient size to be sustainable, coupled with the levels of immigrants who have no connection to the myth, and this has had, and will inevitably continue to have an impact on the psyche of the country.
How you put a value on this Australian psyche I have no idea, but I hope that the independents last long enough to make an impact that lasts, and that they do not become subsumed in the Canberra Politic” as I am sure that the value they can add to the sense of who we are will be greater than anything treasury can put a figure on.
Nov 2, 2010 | Customers, Sales
A frustrating “customer service” experience recently reminded me of this lovely parody of customer service meets lean principals. If it wasn’t so true, it would be funny.
Getting customers is hard, and getting harder, so when one comes to your door it is for a reason, and the last thing you should be doing is making it hard to open.
Nov 1, 2010 | Branding, Communication, Innovation, Marketing, Social Media
The communication alternatives are mind-boggling today, but sometimes someone comes up with an innovative way to combine them. Imagine Social Responsibility Marketing linked with social networking and the broadcast media, backed by comment around the world, for what must be a pretty modest outlay compared to, say, a 30 second ad spot in the superbowl that few remember. Pretty cool!.
“Chalkbot” did it brilliantly for Nike during the recent Tour de France, just how you measure the impact is a tricky question, but the value must be huge, and it is going viral, so will multiply for Nike and cancer awareness over time. Next year will be “huger”
Nike is a consistently brilliant marketer, they may have plenty of $ to splash around, but they just go to the essence of brand-building by grabbing people by the heart, not the wallet, and not letting go.
