Author: Suresh Dinakaran
Present Forward or Future Back: Strategy or Vision?
The future happens slowly..and then all of a sudden. In his fabulous 1926 novel The Sun Also Rises, Ernest Hemingway famously wrote that bankruptcy happens in two ways: “gradually and then suddenly”.
Some years back Andy Grove( ex-CEO, Intel) had introduced the concept of strategic inflection points in his seminal book Only the Paranoid Survive where he explained that a strategic inflection point is ” a time in the life of a business when it’s fundamentals are about to change “.
A change in the business environment that dramatically shifts some elements of your activities, throwing certain taken-for-granted assumptions into question is an inflection point. Someone, somewhere, sees the implications, but all too often they are not heard. That someone might be you!
Whether you are a powerful CEO or someone far lower down in the pecking order, not seeing the unfolding inflection points(or blind spots ) are dangerous.
What is the case we are making here? Too many managers develop strategy while focusing on problems in the present and that is especially true in the times of a crisis(like the Covid 19 pandemic that we are presently pulverised by). Lets call it ‘ missing the wood for the trees ‘. What I am trying to argue here is that leaders instead should imagine the future and work backward so that they build their organisations and brands for the new(emerging) reality.
Even during a crisis, developing a ” future-back ” mindset can spur innovation and growth.
So, in order to build strategy, start with the future.
Let’s take a look at a few examples of brands and organisations that have used the ” future-back ” approach to stunning effect.
Back in the late 90’s and the turn of the millennium, Intel was ruling the roost. With a market share well over 70%, the brand was well and truly in the driver’s seat(apart from being inside millions of computers) with the Pentium Processor going from strength to strength. At the height of that market dominance, Andy Grove took a visionary punt and launched a brand to compete against its very own Pentium– that was the Celeron range of Processors. What he did was to see the future being dominated by cheaper, faster processors( Moore’s Law ) and he did not want Intel to lose out on the potential opportunity that lay ahead of them. That saying Andy Grove was visionary would be an understatement and how prescient the observation in his book ” When spring comes, snow melts first at the periphery, because that is where it is most exposed “, bears testimony. Intel Inside. Meets Intelligence and Insight!
Take another example of the ” future-back ” approach that Reed Hastings, Founder/CEO of Netflix adopted to reach where it is today. At the height of their DVD rental business success, they ventured into streaming(encouraging both cannibalization and migration of their existing subscriber base) anticipating that the medium to long term future of in home entertainment will hinge on that. Not just that, look at their understanding of the competitive landscape- it went well beyond the typical television broadcast networks and cable TV of the day. They distilled the big picture into getting their prospect’s time and attention. Broadened the eco system significantly. Rather made it a category by itself. So, in effect, the competition included time their viewer/s spent going to movie houses, eating out, entertaining friends and family, travel and holidays etc etc. By wearing a different lens and examining a hitherto unseen/untried approach, helped them immensely in becoming the brand they are today.
No conversation about a ” future-back ” model and a vision preceding strategy would be complete without talking about Steve Jobs and Apple. Back in the day, the way they disrupted music consumption and music distribution through iTunes and iPod is now part of folklore. They did not wait for either the market or the customer to tell them what is needed. They took moonshots( it’s in the culture), created highly desirable products that the customer never knew they wanted or would need and generated unprecedented gravitas, and the rest they say is history. Apple as a brand and Steve Jobs as a leader was always seeing around corners, anticipating trends and operated at the intersection of a new future and non articulated consumer need and desire.
Let me add here. ‘ Customer knows best ‘ is a whole load of balderdash. If organisations were to depend on customers to know what is needed, there would not have been any Post It Notes(3M), Fax Machines(Xerox) and many of today’s incredibly successful brands like Amazon, Tesla, Netflix, Airbnb, Uber, Zomato etc. The onus and responsibility of drawing the future and working backward from there is fully on you, your brand, your organisation. So, don’t run away from it. Take it head on.
While we debate the vision vis a vis strategy and the “ future-back ” model to a ” present-forward ” one, do be aware that a vision is like an ‘ impressionist painting ‘ and NOT a ‘ photograph ‘. A photograph captures what there is already, there is NO speculation, hedging, punting and imagining the non existent. A vision on the other hand is similar to an impressionist painting in the sense that it is visualising what could/should be, what will/can be or what may/may not be. It is taking a shot at the future and setting the road to travel back from there.
To be blunt, getting through this tricky process of envisioning the future begins with confusion, experimentation and a touch of chaos followed by a single minded determination to make progress against an overarching goal. And an approach that futurist Paul Saffo recommends as creating as many forecasts as possible, fail as quickly as possible and vitally ” to hold strong opinions weakly “.
Another valuable perspective on this chaotic period of thinking is offered by Nassim Nicholas Taleb in his book Antifragile: Things That Gain From Disorder. Anything that has more upside than downside from random events(or certain shocks) is anti fragile.
Rita McGrath, Columbia Business School professor and business consultant recommends a ‘ discovery driven approach ‘ to anticipating the future and you can dive deeper into her thinking and recommendations in BrandKnew on these links https://www.brandknewmag.com/thinking-innovation-driving-growth/ and https://www.brandknewmag.com/discovery-driven-digital-transformation/ .
It was the 4th of February, 2014. Satya Nadella was announced as the new CEO of Microsoft, the third chief executive in the company’s history, following Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer. Recognising that most of Microsoft’s woes at the time were a function of an approach that was ” present forward “, the first thing he did was to tell everyone in the organisation ” We are going to be moving away from a know it all organisation to a learn it all one “. Looking back on how well Microsoft is doing now compared to 2014, bears testimony to the potential for organisations in adopting a ” future-back ” model.
Brands that didn’t heed the ” future-back ” model and met their fate inspite of being market leaders once upon a time include the likes of Blockbuster, Kodak, Nokia, Toys ‘R’ Us.
There are other industries very ripe for the picking to drive home further the point of vision preceding strategy. The pharmaceutical sector for instance. Based on empirical evidence, learnings from past epidemics like SARS, Ebola, Swine Flu, emerging lifestyle patterns and the accompanying chronic diseases that it helps manifest(diabetes for one), a pharma company can seize opportunities and address customer pain points that will occur in the future. An example that is worth looking at is the pharma giant Roche. Which saw huge potential in the ” future-back ” approach. That helped revive it’s struggling diabetes unit. The company ingeniously paired the mySugr app (which it had acquired in 2017) with Roche’s Accu-Chek Guide glucose meter, thereby allowing diabetics to have a different, gamified experience to managing their condition. By logging in their blood glucose levels, completing tasks and challenges, users can “tame their diabetes monster”. It’s a totally different approach(at least for the pharma sector) which forecasts that “the way forward will mean selling a total experience, not just a product.”
Rather than look at Fall of 2020 or Spring of 2021, Universities/Colleges will be best served to go further down the road and see how do we cope, prepare and anticipate learning and training needs in the near distant future and move backward from there. With the current Covid-19 crisis having caught a lot of educational institutions severely under prepared and like a deer in the headlights with no wherewithal (and mindset) for virtual/online delivery, the time is now, to graduate, to look into the future.
So, ‘ where do you go from here ‘? Or, rather, I should be asking ‘ where are you coming back from ‘ ?
PS: For leaders and organisations wanting to undertake ‘A back to the future voyage ‘, the video on this link https://www.groupisd.com/phewturecast/ can be a starting point.
ENDS
The changing idea of marketing as a concept!
If you are one of the marketers who embraces convention, no one will point a finger at you if you were to follow the norm that has been practiced for years. Build/produce/manufacture, brand, market, sell. Justified linear thinking.With strong empirical evidence( I mean brand and business success) to boot.
With so many years of conventional wisdom( that also is the wisdom of the crowds that drive collective bias) in the ring, it would have been a really uphill task for any brand to alter(let alone disrupt) the narrative. But there is something about audacity and moonshots that make them perfect partners in rhyme.
I devote this blog post predominantly to understand marketing from a new lens- the one that brand Tesla is scripting so brilliantly. Directed by Elon Musk(Iron Man). Allow me to go back a few years.
It’s the 4th of April, 2016. The Tesla Model 3 is being launched in the US. It sports a price tag of US$ 35,000 and bookings can be made with a U$1,000 down payment. Then history unfolds. A whopping 276,000 cars were booked(read pre-sold) on the day, probably a first ever in automotive marketing . And Tesla gathered US$ 276 Million in upfront cash. And here’s where the story gets interesting. There was not even a model car ready. All the sales happened courtesy a few photographs of the Model 3. That’s it. There’s more. There was not even a single car that had gone into production. The first promised schedule for delivery of the Model 3 was late 2017, that was a good 18+ months away. Tesla had disrupted automotive marketing on it’s head and how.
Let’s try to understand more of the phenomena that is brand Tesla.
- Tesla’s $0 marketing budget is incredibly awesome marketing
- Tesla Motors has no advertising, no ad agency, no CMO, no dealer network. And that’s no problem. – AdvertisingAge
- If you drop by the Tesla forums, you’ll see a community of passionate fans discussing how to market Tesla better. There are over 55,000 people subscribed to the /r/teslamotors subreddit. The brand has clearly struck a chord with its fans.
- Tesla fans are crazy advocates. They attach deep emotional significance to the car. They’re not just paying for a mode of transportation, they’re paying for a slice of the future.
- Prior to the Model 3 launch, Tesla had introduced the P100D Ludicrous– a luxury model priced over US$ 80,000(base level) with upgraded versions well over US$ 100,000. The marketing masterstroke was in the message conveyed. ” While the PD100 Ludicrous is an expensive vehicle, we want to emphasise that every sale helps pay for the smaller and more affordable Model 3 which is under development. Without customers willing to buy the expensive Model S and X, we would be unable to fund the smaller, more affordable Model 3 “. This is brand positioning at it’s masterful best, making a luxury purchase almost into a charitable act.
- Every element of the Model S – from the recharging technology to the drag coefficient of the car – is presented as the pinnacle of research and engineering.
- By eschewing marketing completely, Elon Musk is actually communicating that Tesla is focused on ground breaking technology.
- Tesla the brand transcended from being just another automotive player in the business to encompass economics, politics, world power to have global energy NOT driven by oil. In the process, creating the marketplace, the eco system where they are the game. As also the game changer.
“ BMW has a marketing department called engineering.” – Seth Godin
These things obviously don’t bother Musk too much. If one were to give him an advertising budget, he is sure to divert that into production. And the final result: an even more incredible car. And inspite of NO Advertising, he gets the world talking about his brand, especially the people who matter.
How does Tesla manage to do all of this free of cost which other brands would spend millions to buy?
First, build something that matters to people. Then, tell a story that resonates with people. Just like iPhones/iPod and Steve Jobs, electric cars are a great story. The greatest stories are aspirational, representing the triumph of passion, conviction, persistence and diligence.
” I know a lot of very wealthy people. Most of them made their money in technology. I don’t think Bentley or Rolls-Royce is anywhere near the top of very many of these people’s idea of an impressive car. A Tesla is more like it “. – Jimmy Wales, on Quora
This sort of advertising is earned, not bought.
You earn this sort of attention by making something truly newsworthy. Or saying something newsworthy.
” The public tends to be, as they should, interested in things that are precedent and superlatives.” – Elon Musk
Musk is all over YouTube. The media is chasing him nine to the dozen. Why? Because he is always working on cool, fascinating, path breaking projects.
Musk is a CEO who understands the power of showmanship(tonnes of interviews, cameo roles in films and media appearances.
Just Google ‘ Elon Musk says ‘and you will get the most quotable of quotes that media loves to lap up and carry forward.
The Hyperloop is something that Musk is NOT planning to make but delivers great PR for him as a tech visionary.
At most times,Tesla has more orders than they can build – that in itself is great marketing.
Tesla has demonstrated that brands and organisations can move on from a Build/produce/manufacture, brand, market, sell model to that of a brand, market, sell, build one. Welcome to the next normal.
As William Gibson would say, “The future is already here – it’s just not very evenly distributed.”- which will be nothing like what we have experienced before, we’re all going to be completely re-evaluating so many aspects of our lives: education, medicine, work, social responsibility, inner calling, the list goes on. And under the aegis of the Covid 19, all of this is happening remotely right now. And the question for a lot of companies and brands is going to be: Now that this shift has happened, am I still relevant? Does what I do still make sense? Am I serving an essential function, especially in a time when everyone is being careful about their finances?
Answering in the affirmative will separate the men from the boys. Wanted. More Musketeers!
ENDS
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What are your thoughts on INTERPOL’s recruitment policy ?
Are you missing coming home?
It’s a little past 6 am on the clock and a sense of anxiety has already made it’s unwanted presence felt(liquidity crisis in the form of acid reflux anyone?). Being an early bird and having realised(of late and it’s just a random realisation before you audaciously attribute that to any wisdom or maturity on my part) that my most productive hours are from the wee hours( if others thought similarly, we could call it the ‘ we hours ‘) of the morning till about noon, and every minute that I delay in getting out of the house to earn my daily dread gives me FOMO attacks(my version only and nothing to do with status anxiety). But, then, those were the days. Sorry if it sounds pre-historic.
Some days, I admit, the last thing you want to do is go to work—but since it doesn’t look like those bills will start paying themselves anytime soon, you put on your best #adulting face and head out for your daily hustle.
Over the past few weeks, just like the teeming millions around the world, being locked in(and logged in) is the (cruel) but absolute necessity. There is no mother, there is no invention. Just stay home, period. Having finished counting the tiles in the house( 2924 at last count unless some of them have been broken courtesy my better half’s multiple in house walkathons) and other highly cerebral flings that WFH has brought upon us, I was recently enlightened to realise the number of absolutely useless channels that our TV subscription(traditional) package gave us. Numbers do give us a false sense of bravado and now I know why. At least it gives the remote something handy to do. Like going up and down, aimlessly! What if we could do that with squats, seriously? Our ham would begin to string a new tune. Ok, will exercise caution now.
Work @ work was fun(and I was perfectly @ home with it or so I think)- collaborating with my colleagues(@ISD Global) and clients on changing the world, being not just the game changer but the game, we are next level normal, we will make heaven wait, how dare… and what have you while studiously ignoring their condescending disapprovals. I don’t blame them. After all even relentless monotony can’t go beyond a limit and with the keep safe distance norms in place and borders being sealed, I have to wait for things to get back to ‘ old normal ‘ for some ideas to pass(with or without Octroi). I only hope it happens ASAP unless the new definition(in the new normal) of ASAP is As Slow As Possible.
In the interim, I realise that my cell phone is acting up because when I keep pressing the Home button and look up, I realise I am still at work. Surely, some cells have been damaged. From hereon must check the sell by date. That probably calls for a visit to Shihab Mobiles(my Best Buy consultant). Alas, the contagion(no not Corona) is spreading. As now the keyboard has got into the act as well- I keep punching the Escape key only to note that I am still at work. I have seen the Great Escape but I saw something even bigger- the writing on the wall: Why is Monday so far from Friday and Friday so close to Monday? I see it better now !!
Those were the days. You always had something to look forward to. Driving back. Just like so many of us. Of coming home. And I bet, there’s nothing half so pleasant, as coming home again.
Sorry , go to go. In search of a new quest. A video on ” How to fold a perfectly folded T Shirt ” yet again! Sorry, if I wore my heart on my sleeve. But remember, we are all looking at the world with a new lens.
CAVEAT: Number of tiles indicated above will be more than 2924. I did not reckon with the other bathroom. Sorry, it slipped.. my mind. Updated stats in next piece. We can call it ‘ Stat(u)s Update ‘.
ENDS
https://www.brandknewmag.com
Just.Being.One
Is SAD the new HAPPY in Advertising?
scarcity. Getting people’s attention is what we’re trying to do, and I
think that meaning, something that people can relate to on a very
visceral level, is what drives a lot of the decisions we make when we’re
talking about things. Hyper competition has forced brands to not only
assure customers a good product or service but make it very relatable
and more meaningful than any other good product.
and people are more reflective and mindful of their lives. There is a
constant search for deeper layers of meaning once you have all the
things you need and most of the things you don’t need but desire. The
ad industry of the last decade was mean, cynical and celebrated
bitterness. Those were the days when brands wanted to be Sexy,
Swaggering or Sweeping. That showed up in most of the work that was
put up. Don’t blame them as it seemed to work for all concerned. But,
then after a while, people got sick of it and when a voice and tone which
conveyed exactly the opposite stuck in, the positive reaction was
overwhelming.
word ‘ emotional ‘ is now become the most over used word in client
agency briefs. If you are used to agencies creating a trend which should
ideally be the case(rather than following one), its time to take stock. We
just might be at a tipping point on this one. But, till such time, it sinks in,
it’s cry, cry, cry till you succeed for brands and agencies.
Same Circus, New Monkeys!
The world is going digital at a frenzied clip. It’s gone from being the flavour of the season to being the only reason for brand marketers and CMOs. In this sordid vortex of elation and over glorification with digital being heralded as the manna from heaven, the campaign hits are paraded for the world to see. There is hardly any mention of the innumerable misses that get lost in the wilderness.
Take a look at the average CMO tenure- it’s not going anywhere beyond 18-24 months(with some exceptions of course). If it’s a hit parade through and through on all campaigns, would this be the threshold duration?
So the next time you have a fire and hire issue for a CMO, please do remember what your new CMO will say:-
It doesn’t matter what the problem is..the answer will be:
- we need to get more digital
- we need to get more younger
You have a crappy product:
- we need to get more digital
- we need to get more younger
You have no discernible strategy:
- we need to get more digital
- we need to get more younger
Your advertising is a stupid pile of shit:
- we need to get more digital
- we need to get more younger
Your stores are filthy, your people are morons:
- we need to get more digital
- we need to get more younger
If you are looking for a marketing job, repeat after me:
- we need to get more digital
- we need to get more younger
It seems to be the universal marketing strategy that will get you get employed by any dumb ass organisation. Never mind that you will last only 18 months. Or 24 at best. There is always another sucker(dumb ass organisation I mean) around the corner. That needs your ‘ keen insights ‘.
Agreed we are now in an era where the 4Ps of marketing has seen a shift to personalisation, privacy, permissions & performance- fully respect the merits of these. But it sure does not offer a license to overlook fundamentals like product quality, your advertising content, the customer experience you deliver, the human resources you have and the market insights that drive your R&D. Ideally, could the true CMO combine the traditional 4Ps with the new age 4Ps? What a potent combination that would be!
There is already talk in some organisations around the world about making the CMO position redundant. So, let’s not do our bit to accelerate the demise.
Digitelly yours!
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The New Prescription for Marketers: Subscription
ENDS
Suresh Dinakaran is Chief Storyteller at ISD Global, Dubai and Managing Editor, BrandKnew.
The future of advertising: a sneak peek!
What could/should “advertising” look like in 2020 and beyond? What should we do now for that future?
Some questions that crowd our every day artery. Restless consumers and fast changing technology are creating unheralded disruption. Advertising has always been a combination of art and science. Technology is now becoming a third variable. Advertisers “have to get all three of these things right”. They have to be three good.
There are Un Ignorable Forces of Change. Throwing Unabated Challenges to the status quo. But having said that, once recognised, respected and responded right, they offer Unprecedented Upside Potential for the Future. Let‘s examine them below:-
Exponential Advances in Science & Tech: With IOT, AI, Machine Learning etc, we now have a deeper real time understanding of things, people, situations. Bringing along with it an outsized and unprecedented responsibility for what we do with that knowledge.
Empowered & Skeptical “Consumers” : Wanting Customerization & Personalization (make it mine), seeking Choice(Give me tools to make better decisions), expecting Competitive Value (Give me more for my money), searching for Communities( Let me be a part of it), across multiple Channels (I want to call, click and visit). Individuals with lives, aspirations, challenges, family, communities. They want to be worthy of respect and you need to earn their trust.
Media Disruption & Redefinition : One way has become Two Way, Static is now Dynamic, Stationary is now Mobile, Passive is now Sensing, One-Dimension is now Immersive, Visual has turned Multi sensory. There exists Unprecedented Platform Design Capabilities for delivering Exceptional Contextualised Experiences.
Culture, Society & Our World : Straddling many a Divide across Health, Income, Digital, Education, Equality & Tolerance, Climate & Sustainability.
Inspiring, Measurable Business Models: A heady mix of The customer driven/ holistic model , The co creation model, The open innovation model , Network orchestration model , The Competitive Value Model, Transformation to full service provider model, The emerging market innovation engine model, The shift to digital and network business models
So what are the takeaways that we can extract from the above listed landscape?
– Traditional mindsets, including those about advertising and marketing, must be challenged and potentially changed. I am referring to the Mental Models: The Primary Impediment to Transformation- For eg: “It has always worked this way.” “We tried it and it didn’t work.” “We’re profitable; why change?..and so forth!
Before Roger Bannister broke the 4 Minute Mile on May 6, 1954, nobody thought that such a record could be set. We need to ask ‘ What is your 4 minute mile ‘ ?
It‘s the time to challenge our Mental Models of Advertising and Move from Marketers and Agencies, through Media, at Target Demographics toward being Cross-Silo Collaborators, from Ads toward Orchestrated Value-Creation Touch points, from Frequency toward When Needed, Wanted, Appreciated, from Reach toward Where Needed, Wanted, Appreciated, from Push and Persuade For Sales toward Multi Win Outcomes,pull & engage, from Ad Campaigns toward Initiatives in Holistic, Dynamic Ecosystem.
There is also a great upside in starting to use a new Vocabulary:
From Campaign To Initiative, From Content To Substance, From Persuading To Inspiring and Enabling, From Selling To Serving, From Seeking Loyalty To Earning Trust, From Disruption To Better/Alternate Solutions, From Features and Benefits to Brand Roles in People’s Lives, From Brand Differentiation To Brand Distinctiveness, From Employees To Brand Ambassadors, From Talent To Brand Stewards, From Consumers(myopic) To People with Lives, From Advertising Campaigns To Value Creation Initiatives, From Direct Response To Actionable Communications, From Big Data To Actionable Insights, From Success/Failure To Learning.
The time has come to challenge everything. Leave no sacred cows. Even challenge the objective of the firm from maximising long term shareholder value to aligning the objectives of the brand, the people (consumers…) and society.
– A strong call out to shift your focus from media mix to portfolios of all touchpoint orchestration. Go beyond the 4 Ps- bring in CeX, CSR, Packaging, Web & App etc all. The path to purchase is not linear any more. Operating in a sliver is not serving the purpose.
– Leverage the power of content( make RAVES– Relevant, Actionable, Valuable, Exceptional & Shareworthy) and the power of context( MADE: Multi Sensory, Audience driven, Delivery across platforms, Environment & location sensitive) that helps deliver your compelling brand purpose.
– Be always in beta– in adaptive experimentation mode to foster innovation, to learn faster & better, to attract and retain better talent, to hoodwink competition.
There’s no shortage of screens and there’s no shortage of impressions. But there’s a shortage of high value connection points between brands and consumers, which is the whole point of advertising. You have to create effective engagement with the consumer that gets them to buy.
Latin is very much Greek to me but as I come towards the end of this piece some Latin to keep an eye on. We have passed those days of ‘ Caveat Emptor ‘( meaning Buyer Beware). The new skid on the block these days is ‘ Caveat Venditor ‘ ( meaning Seller Beware ).
As the brilliant Bob Hoffman puts it ” If you want to die an imbecile in advertising, don’t pay attention to art, literature, history, science, anthropology or nature. Pay attention to the Kardashians “.
Going back to Latin mode- friends- Semper Vigilans (meaning stay vigilant)!
ENDS
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