the future of marketing: make things people want or make people want things?
TRANSCRIPT
john v willshire, smithery twitter - @willshIdeja X, Croatia, 2012
hellobokoh hai
my name is john
i can be hard to understand
I can’t speak german
i do run a one-man-studio
it is called smithery
i help businesses solve problems
it’s somethingto do with these things
but it isthan thatmessier
i started
cardsplayingit on blankwriting
ideas you
insidecan step
creation of demand
exploitation of demand
creation of demand
exploitation of demand
not achoice,
a balance
creation of demand
exploitation of demand
yet weseem to do
more of This >>
it made me think of these
easter island - 1722• population of 2000 • 64 square miles• 1,400 miles from the
nearest inhabitable place• 2,000 miles from the
nearest continent
no trees
200 giant statues30ft high80 tons
how?
the original settlers arrived in massive canoes
the island they found was covered in trees
survive thrive
finite resources
3. you can’t survive1. too much
of this...
2. this all disappears...
there are over 700 unfinished statues on easter island
they kept making them right until the trees ran out...
is our predicament really that bad?
finite resources
creation of demand
exploitation of demand
people would
70%of brandsdisappeared
not care if
havas Mediameaningful brand study
we need to
Make
Things
peoplewant
Thingspeoplewant
Make
redressthe balance
four ways tomake things people want
1234
make
The makerused to be themarketer
making is thinking
antonio Stradivari’s workshop created the finest stringed instruments of all time
he left it to his sons, who had worked beside him all their lives.
the workshop closed within twenty years.
“he could not teach either of them how to be a genius.”
Sennett on Stradivari
died withthe maker
The marketing
even the most brilliant minds cannot cheat death
Though they try...
branding was the next best thing
long section on 100 years of
brand evolution[ ]
yet we’re still incredibly focussed on ‘the maker’
“when the founder is still there, people respect the brand in a way that doesn’t happen when the reins have been handed down over and over”
Entrepreneur magazine Apr 12
“when the founder is still there, people respect the brand in a way that doesn’t happen when the reins have been handed down over and over”
Entrepreneur magazine Apr 12
“when the founder is still there, people respect the brand in a way that doesn’t happen when the reins have been handed down over and over”
Entrepreneur magazine Apr 12
And the makers don’t seem too bothered about ‘brand’
“I don't believe in brands. People buy our product, not our company. You're only as good as your last product.”
James Dyson
the maker?who replacesyet when they do depart...
Sometimes
weirdthere are
replacements
product designer at hp?
packaging designer atdiet coke?
creative director of polaroid?
creative director of intel?
but usually
safethere are
replacements
accountantsdrift to the top
stephen king, jwt, 1985
”“
ftse 100ceos with
0
0.15
0.3
0.45
0.6
1996 2008 2012
51%36%
24%
source - Robert Half / Hendricks & Struggles
financebackgrounds
Safe pairof hands
Make
Things
peoplewant
Thingspeoplewant
Make
financelike the wrong sort of
marketing
those nice people in
Has MarketingFailed, or was it never really tried?1985 paper by Stephen king, JWT
( you should really read )
four marketingroutes to failure
thrustmarketing1
marketingdepartment2 marketing
mark
etin
g silo
accountant’s3 marketing
january december
payback
formula4 marketing
success = x Yz+
four essentialaspects of
realmarketing
start withthe customer1
workingover time2
using allresources3 CEO
marketing
manufacturing
innovating4
all deeply linked to theproduct
be a real marketer1234
things
what do marketers know about making things...?
you are the ruiners of all
thingsgood
bill hicks on marketers
with this ad, sadden us, you will
there is nothing interesting about our world
let’s borrow someone else’s
you are the ruiners of all
thingsgood
bill hicks on marketers
marketing has driftedtoo far fromproductreality
the atoms of a product, or the seconds spent
with a service
the feelings we get from buying, using or experiencing the thing
the two cannot be separated
pre-industrial industrial network
pre-industrial brands sufferedthe stradivari problem
mass-production branding helped solve that problem
strip out and replicate the
essence of the maker
the art of branding was compression
companies still seek their fortune in the ideas of a long dead mind...
compression don’t work for this world
every time we blink a brand changes
which can be disconcertingif you are used to consistency
“I struggle to identify a consistent set of measures across our digital campaigns”
John WoodsCoke, GB & Ireland
it will get a lot, lot stranger
we will need automation & Robots to understand it all
this will scare and confuse us
The NEw yorker, 1946
“We use the word 'machines' in place of 'software designed by people predicated on a set of cultural assumptions'...”
kim plowright
don’t lose sleep over it...
but don’t pretend it isn’t happening
“Nostalgia isn’t a business Model”
http://memex.naughtons.org/archives/2012/04/05/15944
john naughton
“We are born of complexity, shaped by complexity, and interact with a world that is inexorably growing more complex.”
Bud Caddellgraphic from http://whtebkgrnd.tumblr.com/
don’t fight fragmentation
accelerate it
fragmentation doesn’t destroy brand value
....or lack of it
it demonstrates value
there’s a different way tothink about value...
the labour theory of value
developed by adam smith...
...and later by karl marx
modern economics:
the value of a thing is determined by what one
is willing to give up to obtain the thing
The labour theory of value the value of something is determined by the labour that went into its production
£0.99 £3.33per padper pad
“marketing is world building. With unlimited bandwidth we can now show you the world.”
@TobyBarnes, AKQA
it’s easier to buy this world...
...than this world
What if we stitched smaller ideas together to create a longer idea? What if we stitched smaller ideas together to create a longer idea? What if we stitched smaller ideas together to create a longer idea? What if we stitched smaller ideas together to create a longer idea? What if we stitched smaller ideas together to create a longer idea? Gareth Kay What if we stitched smaller ideas together to create a longer idea? What if we stitched smaller ideas together to create a longer idea? What if we stitched smaller ideas together to create a longer idea? What
world building world borrowing
“The internet is biased towards fact. People don’t care about your brand mythology, they care about where your product is made and what’s in it.”
douglas rushkoff
Labour theory of brand value:
show the constant additions to the essence and the substance
be a real marketer1234
let the deeds show
people
staring at people is rude
staring down at people is a force of habit...
“We do what we do largely because of our interaction with - and under the influence of - others.
And mostly without realising it.”
Mark Earls, Herd
stop staring at people
start looking between them
differentpeoplewantthingsdifferent
how do you look between people?
anthropologish*
*not hardcore anthropology, before anyone gets angry
four disciplines
archeology
language social
culture
archeologyfuck yeah !
archeologyoh..... that
digging around in thethings folkleave behind
unseen UK, 2006
photos by the people at royal mail
look for the things that show you what people are capable of...
language
google gets it wrong:
Provjerite štoljudi žele
a friend helps it get better?
we want a... strapline three values proposition
we need a... dictionary lexicon phrase book
200milliontweetsper day
it matters what they say about you
not what you say about you
culture
don’t look for things that unite
look for things that divide...
“We seek out these obsessives, maniacs and eccentrics because they can help us get to big, breakthrough ideas”
Brian Miller,Sense Worldwide
social...
...hang on, we know about this one...
facebook offers a partial glance of the intangible half of yoursocialfootprint
galvanism:
when we thought electricity would cure all disease
from “The Craftsman” by Richard sennett
facebook does not offer intimations of the sublime
http://jeffberryman.com/2011/05/19/counting-on-the-sublime/
always look throughtwo lenses
Material& virtual
_____.jpg by Alan Belcher
what’s fascinating is where the two now begin to meet
People like the clothes online, appears on hangers in store
C&A, Brasil
archeology
language social
culture
look between people
be a real marketer1234
let your deeds showlook between people
want
three
peter doyle,Value-Based Marketing
differentwants
incipient wants
things which people want, but have no idea about until they see it.
the things that sell themselves
latent wants
things there are no present solutions for, but are easy for people to describe
existing wants
things we already know we want, for which there are plenty of willing suppliers...
existing wants
...this is where the interesting shit is
let’s think about coffee, for example
“like yacht racing, modern markets are an environment defined solely by the position of the competitors, rather than by any absolute geography”
John Cronk
Coffee was the Vendée globe
you needed a super-yacht to be in the race, never mind score points
The internet is a very lenient race judge
it lets any small boat join in...
i am a bit geeky about coffee...
i can find a great place to buy coffee whenever I’m out and about
I can blend my own coffee to suit my own taste profile.
And name it
I can watch 509 videos about how to use an aeropress
I can read 19,200,000 internet links on coffee farm soil reports*
*i haven’t
i could even start roasting coffee at home
ikawa coffee system
friends, I am a
noviceamongst my
so what’s happening?
Talent hits a target no one else can hit
genius hits a target no one else can see
arthur Schopenhauer
the big boats find it hardto see all the little boats
all of their research tools are geared to look at the direct competitors
marketers copy each other just like everyone else
It should still be possible to do something though...?
is yourbestthisresponse?
barista style....?
barista
freehugs
style is
freehugs
no
marketsharebut we have
?
it never starts with people who want market share...
there are always people who are more geeky about your market than you...
make something they can believe in
you have to want tomake a difference
To Do a common thing
brings successuncommonly well
henry john heinz
is now a lot harder to achieve than it used to beuncommonly well
want to makes things well
want to tell your story
want to create demand
people will only want the things you make as much as you want to make them.
be a real marketer1234
let your deeds showlook between peoplewant to make things
that sounds... hard
where do i start?
think of it this way
you are an operating system
they’re not consumers
they’re users
by David Lee, howstrange.com
they will make great things that you are afraid to make
they will take your things and make other things
but they always have
Jingle Bells, Batman smells,Robin flew away. Kojak lost his lollipopAnd bought a Milky Way
trad. children’s song, 1960’s onwards
open up your operating system
celebrate the passionate outsiders who use your platform
partner with people who are better at running your platform
use your platform to share value
watching yourshitty hologramhas no value
use your platform for good things
listen to the customers who’ve been begging for an open platform
remember which side you are on
fight
users
forthe
we
