Is John McCain A Marketing Genius?
Ad Age wants to know, “Was it marketing genius for John McCain to pick Sarah Palin as his running mate?” According to their poll as of Day 1 (the poll ends of Friday), 67% of Ad Age readers that responded said “yes” John McCain is a marketing genius.
Well, McCain’s campaign manager, Rick Davis, told the Washington Post that the election is not about issues but about personalities…”a composite view of what people take away about the candidates.” So, to paraphrase James Carville, “it’s her {personality} stupid.”
As any Account Planner or marketing strategist worth their Venn diagram will tell you, if you can capture the essence of your marketing message within an “it’s” and a “stupid” you are on your way to genius. I frequently call upon the Carville/Clinton analogy when trying to make the it point….borrowed genius.
The most recent USA Today Gallup poll puts McCain at 54% to Obama’s 40% anong those most likely to vote. The latest CNN poll shows Obama at 44% and McCain at 43% but this is a 4 point gain for McCain. Are these numbers support for the marketing genius award? Is this the Palin effect?
Who do you think of when you think “marketing genius”? Steve Jobs? Howard Schultz? A.G. Lafley? (I am reading The Game Changer…highly recommended.) That’s who comes to my mind. And what do they have in common? The words innovation, different, change are usually applied when describing their brand of genius.
So is the choice of Sarah Palin as John McCain’s running mate a stroke of marketing genius?
Well, if no other reason than that the current unpopular President is a Republican, Obama owns change but of course that is just beginning; his race, his age and he has made it his own. OK, the Biden choice was a bit off message but maybe reassuring to some.
McCain, despite George Bush’s uncomfortable satellite reference to disagreements with McCain, “I Know”is not only a Republican but as Obama reminds us, has voted with Bush 90% of the time. ( Some disagree.) And then there is that annoying enthusiasm gap.
Enter Sarah Palin. Definitely unexpected. Definitely different. Definitely change. Definitely a “personality” move. But what is “it” exactly?
I think Peggy Noonan nailed it with, “She has the power of the normal. And that is change in American politics and especially this year with the leader of the sisterhood of the traveling pantsuits the only choice to put a woman in the White House. If you believed that there should be a woman president but just didn’t like Hilary Clinton you might have felt disloyal, or at least conflicted.
So, yes, by making normal the new change, McCain is a marketing genius.
The Nikon D80 Blogger Program and My Canon EOS 30D
Photo taken with Canon EOS 30D
Picture This, I have had a long term relationship with Nikon. It seems now that it was one-sided. An elaborate invitation for a Nikon D80 did not arrive in my mailbox last April. I was not on the Nikon D80 Blogger Outreach dance card.
A Nikon D80 is a very nice camera….and I really needed a new camera.
So as I read some of my favorite bloggers write about their loaners, well I kind of wondered, what if…But like Peter Kim, cool has not chased me for anything more than expensive than a book.
But, it did make me start thinking…Now, CK did a great job articulating all of those blogger relations/blogger outreach and just blogger issues; credibility, transparency, incentives, even community building. And lots of smart, credible, community builders wrote thoughtful comments on her post.
It was just that I was thinking about my relationship with the Nikon Brand.
My very first SLR camera purchased shortly after college graduation was a Nikormat.My recollection is that I saved for quite some time to accumulate enough cash to make that camera my own.
As the years passed, I accumulated quite a collection of Nikons; even the lenses from the Nikormat found a home on my last film camera, the Nikon ProneaS. My first digital camera was a very large CoolPix990. The remnants of my Nikon graveyard is memorialized above.
I had been using a Nikon 7600 basic point and shoot when I began my pursuit of something more. As a matter of fact, I don’t think that from the time that I bought the Nikormat, that I had purchased a camera that wasn’t a Nikon. It seems to me that the D80 Blogger Outreach program changed my beliefs about Nikon.
Now, I am fairly brand loyal….I don’t get why anyone but Heinz or Hellman’s even bothers to make catsup or mayonnaise respectively; and no Pepsi is not an acceptable substitute for Coke. (Full disclosure, Heinz has been a client) But then again, after three Volvo’s, the last one was so awful I would not make any brand based assumptions in considering a future purchase.
And for me, Nikon meant camera. I started with the brand and then decided which one. Before the D80 Blogger Program that is.
I thought the Nikon Flickr program was inspired….sending D80’s to Flickr users and letting them experience the camera by creating content to upload on Flickr, that became brand advertising. The program was a kind of community mash-up that linked Flickr, photographers and the Nikon D80, engaging to all.
The D80 Blogger program was not built on exactly the same principles…and I am talking about the principles of designing the context for users to experience a brand, create content and let the content and the users market the brand, not anyone’s personal principles.
Joseph Jaffe, a D80 participant, seems to have something else altogether going on with his podcast for iPhones and more, and certainly is generating lots of opinions as John Moore points out.
All that aside, what theD80 program and the discussion that followed did for me was to point out that despite my years of Nikon brand loyalty that there were bloggers who perhaps had never spent a single cent on a Nikon product, who maybe didn’t even take many pictures or ever blog about anything photo related who were going to get a really awesome and expensive camera for f-r-e-e.
The Sprint Ambassador program evoked similar thoughts….Lots of bloggers I knew had free Sprint phones and free calls. I was a paying customer.
I had been a Sprint customer for years but for the past several had issues ranging from product quality to service quality, to billing and customer service. I not only couldn’t get my problems solved, when asked at the end of one of the many marathon customer service sessions if there was anything else they could do to for me and I mentioned that I could use a new phone, the rep said that they just weren’t able to do that anymore for customers. Guess all the phones were going to all those Ambassadors.
So, as I went into serious search for new camera mode, instead of evaluating Nikon cameras only, I looked at other Brands. I found my way to Canon and eventually to the 30D, purchased in July. I love it. I am still in learning mode and it will be a while before I can commit to Canon brand loyalty. That takes time and positive experience.
Aside, I read yesterday that the new Canon 40D is due out next month. Did I move too soon?
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