Imulus Insights » Scott

The Democrat’s Failure to Brand

Scott — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 04:56:09 +0000

Let me start out by saying that I would call myself an independent as politics go. This isn’t about who’s right about this issue or that. As a design professional I am just struck by Democratic party’s continued inability to understand the power of branding. I cannot think of a single coherent message or brand that the Democratic party has articulated in the last decade or more. The Republicans, on the other hand, appear to have this mastered. If I asked 20 people on the street what the Republican party was about I would probably hear very similar things: “They’re about family values.” “They believe in lower taxes and smaller government.” “Strong military.”

Whether you agree with these policies or not, they are consistent and haven’t really changed in decades. Repeated over and over by Republican candidates in hundreds of campaigns around the country. Just as powerful as how they have branded themselves is how they have branded the Democrats. “Tax and spend.” “Elitists, out of touch with regular folks.” “Big government.”

While these messages may or may not be true (The Republicans say they are for smaller government and lower spending, they have increased government spending at a historic rate over the last 8 years) people remember and believe them because they are so consistent.

Recent events show the Democrat’s continued inability to use this powerful tool. With the recent failures of financial institutions brought on by the sub-prime mortgage industry, is there any better time for the Democrats to rebrand the Republican party? The most basic branding of the Republican party is “conservative.” Over the last 8 years the Republicans have presided over an economy that has been anything but conservative. The word that comes to mind is reckless. If the Democrats would seize the opportunity to brand the republicans as “Reckless” they might be able to turn the Republican’s own branding against itself. A reckless party can’t have very good values. Would you trust your tax dollars to someone who is reckless? Trust them with the military?

As I said, I’m not saying either party is right or better, it’s just interesting to watch the campaign from the perspective of marketing and branding.

iPhone Availability Clusterf#ck

Scott — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 15:44:19 +0000

I’m a long time Apple fan, but the system they created for checking iPhone availability is a complete disaster. The way they have it set up sounds really great. You go online to apple.com/retail after 9pm each night and check your closest store and the next closest group for availability the next day. The problem is the stores don’t get shipments at the end of the day. They get shipments at some point during the day and put the phones on sale. Therefore when the website told me that my store would not have iPhones tomorrow, that was not true. Then they inevitably sell out of the phones before closing and once again at 9pm when you check the site it says they will have no iPhones the next day.

The situation Apple has created for themselves is that they only way to determine if your store has stock is to either go to the store, or more likely call them constantly to find out if they have gotten a shipment. This has got to be really fun for the employees at the store!

There is a simple fix for this situation. All the stores have to do is keep the shipments that they get during the day in the back until the following day. Then at 9pm the site would be correct in saying the the store will have iPhones in stock the next day. That way you don’t have to call the store, and if you really want a phone, you can show up when the store opens and your likely to get one. This is a simple fix. I would have expected more from Apple.

Netflix Goes Bad

Scott — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 20:01:43 +0000

Netflix recently announced that they are eliminating the Profiles feature from their online movie rental service. For a company that built it’s business on customer service, this is a seriously bonehead move. For families or small businesses this was the feature that made the service work for them. Without it, it isn’t a very good solution at all. I can only assume that some bean counters at Netflix think that all those profile users are now going to have to signup for a full account and they will increase their profits. On the contrary, this is going to make the service unusable for a lot of people and they will try something else. If Blockbuster can add profiles they will destroy Netflix. If you want to voice your opinion, I suggest you email Netflix and sign the petition here: http://www.savenetflixprofiles.com/

Update: Netflix has reversed their policy on this topic and will be keeping profiles for single accounts. This is wonderful, and a great example of users making their voice heard. Way to support and respect your users Netflix!

TaDaLists for Christmas

Scott — Mon, 03 Dec 2007 17:43:33 +0000

Normally you think of TaDaList.com for to-do lists, but in searching for a solution for Christmas lists that I could share with family members I found that they work great. Last year we used Amazon’s Christmas list functionality, and while in theory it’s great, in reality the system doesn’t work very well. When you purchase items off of someone’s list, the item is supposed to be removed from the list. Most of the time, it is. But sometimes an item would not get removed, so multiple people ended up buying the same item. With the TaDaList, your not tied to buying stuff on Amazon, and the checking off of items works flawlessly. I highly recommend it for your lists this year, unless you want to get three copies of that DVD that you told everyone that you wanted.

No time for a Second Life

Scott — Wed, 14 Feb 2007 15:38:29 +0000

There has been a lot of hype lately about Linden Lab’s Second Life. There have been all kinds of crazy numbers thrown around about millions of users and people making lots of money in this virtual world. Apparently in their effort to be more transparent and open they have let the cat our of the bag on their actual number of users. It turns out that around 5 out of 6 new users bail in the first month. Of those that stick around, only 10% of those have spend more than 40 hours total in the game. According to this article in Valleywag that works out to less than 200,000 people who have even played the game more than 40 hours over the entire history of the game. Most people don’t have enough time for their first life, much less a second life!

Revised Budweiser Looks a Bit Like Hallmark

Scott — Fri, 22 Dec 2006 15:14:29 +0000

As I was hanging Christmas tree ornaments last night I noticed that one of the ornaments was in a box with the new Budweiser logo, with the associated red color. Upon closer inspection it was a Hallmark box, which made me think. How close are the two logos?

Upon side by side comparison if you just drop a oval under the Bud crown you would have a pretty close resemblance to Hallmark. Am I stretching here, does anyone else think these are pretty similar?

Ballot Design

Scott — Fri, 10 Nov 2006 06:24:47 +0000

It is unbelievable to me that after countless election problems over the years that the same mistakes continue to be made. A study by CALTECH/MIT estimated that 1.5 million votes were not recorded in the 2000 election because of equipment and ballot design problems. Another 3 million votes were lost because of registration issues caused by problems with the registration forms. Since elections are handled at the state and county level there is no consistency of election process and ballot design. This is horribly inefficient, with process and ballot design being reproduced by various election officials all over the nation (some better than others). The lack of consistency also fails voters. As a voter, every time that my local election officials decide to change the ballots, or I move to another area, I have to learn a whole new way to vote. Even a bad ballot would be better than the current situation, if only the ballot were the same everywhere and every election.

From what I understand, it might be extremely difficult to change the laws and make federal standards for election process and ballot design. But as an alternative standards could be developed and ballot designs created that could be adopted by the states on a voluntary basis. If local officials were presented with an option that was proven to be effective and reduced their costs for doing all the work themselves, I would imagine that adoption would be very high.

Visit the following links to learn more about this issue:

http://www.reformelections.org
http://www.vote.caltech.edu/
http://www.designfordemocracy.org

Why Comp Work is Unacceptable

Scott — Sat, 21 Oct 2006 21:17:46 +0000

At one time or another most Interactive Agencies are asked to provide comps prior to signing a proposal, usually during the client’s evaluation period. For those unfamiliar, comp work relates to any tangible deliverables you are willing to show the client prior to receiving a signature. In this case I’m referring specifically to design and creatives.

Advertising agencies make their money from media buys, and the creatives used to wow potential clients are part of the prospecting process. Ad agencies will place hundreds of hours into creatives with the hopes the prospective client likes their idea. This process does not translate to interactive work.

In our industry, money is made by delivering the resulting work, creative or code. To offer up creatives to a potential client without receiving payment first ultimately devalues the creative process.

Marketing off a Competitor’s Mistake

Scott — Tue, 05 Sep 2006 17:39:48 +0000

Caribou coffee brillantly jumped on the coatails of a Starbucks email marketing mistake. As covered by The Denver Post, Caribou is accepting the Starbuck’s coupons which promote a free grande iced-beverage. The problem with the coupon is that it provided a month long expiration date, far too long for an email marketing campaign. Starbuck’s marketing team should have known better and made the coupon valid for 2-3 days.

Caribou has capitalized on this mistake and is now receiving attention via Starbuck’s blunder.

Credibility Determined by Excellent Design

Scott — Sun, 16 Jul 2006 02:20:41 +0000

In the hunt for information I stumbled on a report from Consumer Reports WebWatch and Stanford University on how people determine if a website is credible or not. While the report is a bit dated (2002) I believe it is still relevant today. As the report states, what consumers say is important and what they actually deem as important are two very different things.

Not unlike Malcolm Gladwell’s Blink people are quickly evaluating credibility based on impression. Almost solely on the design / organization of the site consumers will determine if they are dealing with a reputable website.

Click here for the report website