Point of Vision : Think About It

Many views, one vision.

Point of Vision — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 14:57:53 +0000

When you sit down with a team from Point of Vision, you may think of us as a principal, a project manager and a designer. What you may not know is that you’re also sitting down with a magician, an adventure traveler and a punk rocker.

For a small company, Point of Vision has an impressive cast of players with diverse backgrounds.

Some of us have lived all over the world. Others are native Atlantans.

Some of us are single. Others are married. A few of us have kids.

Some of us love living in the city. Others have found our homes in suburbia – and beyond.

Our interests range from hockey ... to dancing ... to knitting.

We think differently, too. Some of us have technical minds, others think visually, and others express ourselves best through the written word.

We have big idea people with a knack for imaginative, inspiring concepts. We also have detail-oriented people whose creativity is geared more towards finding a clever way to bring a brilliant concept to reality.

All this diversity isn’t the result of random luck. We’ve made a point to hire people with varied backgrounds, experiences, working styles and lifestyles. We think it helps us do a better job.

When we put together a client team, we know we’re going to have someone whose perspective matches up well with the way the client perceives things. We also like to have someone on the team whose perspective is different. We believe that the interplay of various viewpoints yields the clearest, most thorough thinking and the best outcomes.

In some workplaces, individual differences are tolerated. At Point of Vision, they are truly cherished.

And in the end, we respect every viewpoint because we know that no matter how differently we may see the pathway, we are all working toward one goal: the advancement of your brand.

Does your brand need a Second Life?

Point of Vision — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 13:15:04 +0000

We like to think we’re on the ball. We’re always looking for new ways to communicate our clients’ brands that will enable them to grow and prosper.

Yet we’ve never asked a client, “Have you thought about a strategy for marketing in virtual worlds?”

Virtual worlds, where people interact via 3-D images on the Web, have exploded in popularity. The site Second Life alone boasts “millions of residents from around the globe.” Some companies, seeing this new opportunity for exposure, are stepping into alternate universes with storefronts, events and even one-to-one marketing.

So why aren’t we recommending virtual marketing to anyone?

It’s not that we don’t appreciate the cool factor. We love cool. But in our advice to clients, we’ve never been about cool. We’ve always been about smart. And we think the smart move here is to wait, watch and learn.

Today, virtual marketing has too many unknowns. What return on investment can it deliver? Do participants in virtual worlds welcome or resent companies coming into their alternate universes? How do the demographics differ among the various virtual world sites, and which “metaverse” is the best fit for a given company or organization? We just don’t have the answers.

Some niche agencies are pushing their clients into this new world, despite the unknowns, saying that now is the time to jump in and start learning ahead of others.

We disagree. We say, now is the time to watch closely and learn from what others are doing.

So we are watching. We’ve seen the American Cancer Society organize a Relay for Life on Second Life that raised more than $100,000. We know that companies are using virtual worlds as focus groups, asking people to give them feedback on new products.

As we watch, we’re thinking about how our clients could benefit from the unique aspects of virtual marketing. At the same time, we’re asking tough questions, like, “How would we know who’s really in a virtual world focus group? Would we trust the opinions of alter egos as key informants in refining a product or service?”

Until we see the right fit, we’re not going to encourage anyone to take the leap into a virtual world. The way we see it, being one of the first settlers on a new marketing frontier is an ego boost. But from a business perspective, it’s not that important to be among the first to enter a new realm.

We don’t buy the hype that trailblazers are guaranteed to be the biggest winners. Later arrivals who offer something better can be as successful – or more. Alta Vista developed the first Web index, but today Google is the undisputed champion of Web search.

Of course, there are scenarios where early experimentation might make sense. A company whose target market is online gamers would find a captive audience in a virtual world. A company whose brand is centered on being a pioneer, especially a technology pioneer, also might benefit from jumping in ahead of the mainstream. In such a case, we wouldn’t be concerned with the direct return on their investment. For that pioneering client, riding the first wave in the tide of virtual marketing would be a brand-building move, not a sales move. Any revenue they generated through their virtual presence would just be gravy.

For most companies, we think there’s more to lose in investing in a medium that’s still a mystery than there is to gain from being a pioneer. So for now, we’re keeping our clients in the real world.

What do you think? Do you spend time in a virtual world? What kind of marketing do you think could work there? And when is the right time to experiment with virtual marketing?

night_shift

Holger Kappenstein — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 21:58:29 +0000

Outside the Blue Horse building, January 28, 2008

Branding goes to the dogs

Dave Greenberg — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 14:46:28 +0000

This is a full-color ad that appears on the back cover of a 70-page technology magazine. Ok, I'm all for unexpected or even mildly shocking imagery to grab one's attention, but the image should at least communicate the desired concept, convey positive brand attributes, speak to a targeted audience or make a point that supports the copy.

Even if we allow room for disagreement over the visual and the message, is it too much to ask for some adherence to good design principles? Or is bad design part of the creative strategy as well? I can't figure out if this ad is trying to be so wrong as to prove a point (although I'm not sure what that point is), or if it's just one big hot mess from start to finish.

If I have to ask myself these questions, then my guess is the only thing this ad accomplished was to confuse others who had the misfortune of viewing it as well. Would it have cost any more, or been any less effective to create a more positive message? At the very least, the ad could have been more purposefully designed as "tongue-in-cheek" as I suspect was the goal.

Instead, not only did I lose my taste for this company, I lost my appetite too.

One hotel chain can rest easy with their mark

Marcy Pett — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 22:45:41 +0000

My husband and I were traveling in the wee hours of the morning through Dayton, Ohio on Christmas Eve when we realized we weren’t going to make it to Detroit without one of us falling asleep at the wheel. It was 4:00 in the morning so for safety reasons we took the next exit determined to get a motel room to rest.

We had three choices: A Motel 6, Knights Inn and a Red Roof Inn. The Motel 6 was on the opposite side of the road and down a ways so our options became Knights Inn or Red Roof Inn. After looking at both their marks I said to Jim, “I gravitate toward the Red Roof Inn for some reason.” He agreed and said, “Yea, it looks like Knights Inn hasn’t updated their purple and white logo since the 1960s.” I quickly added that if they hadn’t bothered to update their logo in 40 years I wondered what else they haven’t changed. We didn’t have to sleep on it… right then and there our decision was made, solely based on the revised look of a brand mark.

This trip confirms my belief in the importance of a service or hospitality industries brand mark, especially in it’s most critical application: the big, high sign you see from a distance — before you even see the building, experience their customer service or see a room.

We had no problems sleeping.

Bye, Netscape…

Holger Kappenstein — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 21:27:13 +0000

*December 1994 — † February 2008

My Last Regards to the browser that changed how people saw the Internet.

Brand marketing and the educated customer

Point of Vision — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 17:46:40 +0000

As customers have become savvier about marketing, some critics have suggested that brands don’t matter anymore. The modern customer supposedly sees brand marketing as mere hype pushing one product that’s really no different from another.

But in these days of toxic toys and poisonous peanut butter, we see that yes, brand does still matter.

Beneath the slick campaigns, a brand – a well-developed one anyway – really is a promise. That’s how brands were born in the first place, as a quick reference point for quality and reliability.

And no matter how sophisticated customers become, they still want promises they can count on. In some cases, they want those assurances more than ever. For example, the typical Generation Y consumer is deeply concerned about how products are grown and manufactured, how a company treats its employees and so on. (Read more about marketing to Generation Y in a previous post.)

The critics say it isn’t so, pointing to the increased popularity of store brands. But look deeper into this growth area and you’ll see another story. Store brands are succeeding because they’ve shed the old generic image. We no longer find big white boxes emblazoned with “CORN FLAKES” on the grocery shelf. Instead, we see the emergence of private labels such as Target’s Archer Farms. The current Archer Farms ad campaign, complete with bucolic farm scenes and poetic copy (“a masterpiece made for every palate“), is proof that even the store brands are building true brands, brands with promises that go beyond the traditional “lower price” position.

If customers do think that brand marketing is just fluff – and yes, sometimes they do think that – then as the brand stewards, we have to do a better job. We have to communicate our brands in a way that shows we are different.

How do we do that? We go back to the three key building blocks of Point of Vision's Brand Framework

Define the brand position. Who are we? What does our brand stand for?
Pinpoint the brand promise. What can a customer can count on us to do or provide? Ideally, our promise is different from our competition’s.
Back it up with brand proof. Give the customer a reason to believe you can deliver on your promise. Examples of proof are a unique business process, the talent and training of your human resources, or quality control measures. This is where you build credibility, and that’s invaluable. Even if your brand promise isn’t too different from a competitor’s, if you have the proof and they don’t, you can win the brand battle.

We find that when our clients nail down their brand position, promise and proof, they discover a new clarity in how to communicate the brand to others. And with this new perspective, they can show their customers, beyond a doubt, that the brand they choose really does matter.

What do you think? Post a response to this entry – or any previous Think About It item – by December 31, 2007, and we’ll enter you into a drawing for one of two pairs of tickets to see the Atlanta Thrashers in Blueland (that’s Philips Arena for the uninitiated).

For more reading, download our Brand Framework Brief (48k PDF)

When should a brand’s visual identity change?

Point of Vision — Fri, 07 Dec 2007 19:38:55 +0000

We’ve said it before, and we mean it: Consistency is the holy grail of brand communication.

But let’s not confuse consistency with stagnation.

If a company hangs around a while, there will come a time when it will need to update its visual identity – the brand mark (commonly called the logo), typefaces, colors, etc., that are used in representing the brand.

So how do you know when it’s time for a change?

Certainly, when a company’s brand evolves, the look of its brand should change with it. So, mergers and acquisitions, expansions, or other changes that affect what’s being offered – or to whom – all are legitimate reasons to consider updating the visual identity. In these cases, the look may need to change to reflect the new character or scope of the organization.

Even when the core company hasn’t undergone significant changes, sometimes a visual identity that looks out of sync with the market needs to be refreshed. Brand managers shouldn’t chase visual fads, but they should be mindful of long-term trends. For example, Miller Lite, Burger King and the Atlanta Falcons changed their brand marks in recent years to stay in step with a young market demographic.

Most often, a change in visual identity is both a design update and a reflection of a new corporate direction. Take Holiday Inn. The company has lost considerable market share to competitors like Hilton. So company executives are correcting their course by directing their hotels to update guest rooms and improve customer service. At the same time, the company announced a change in its brand mark, getting rid of the script “Holiday Inn” in favor of a more contemporary mark: a simple, white “H.” The update gets rid of the old, dated mark, but more importantly, it serves as a signal to consumers that the company has changed.

Another good example – always setting a good example – is Apple. Apple’s genius has been in updating its look by changing colors and typefaces, never abandoning the apple-with-a-bite-taken-out-of-it icon that holds vast brand equity. When the company was born in the 1970s, its brand mark was an apple with rainbow-colored stripes. In the 1990s, the apple icon – like the iMac itself – was dressed in vibrant colors to match the company’s creative, personal image. Today, Apple is more a personal technology company than a computer company, and a high-tech grey apple logo reflects this new direction. The updated colors show the company as fresh and hip, while the consistency of the apple icon tells customers that Apple is the same company they’ve come to know and love.

It’s wise for any company that is updating its brand appearance to ask whether there is an “apple” in its visual identity – something that people connect with so deeply that it should be preserved. Abandoning your entire visual package can alienate loyal customers. In general, it’s smart to hang onto a core shape, basic color palette or main typeface and use subtle changes to give the brand new life.

What companies do you think have done a good job in updating their brand appearances? Who’s missed the mark? Let us know what you think. Post your reply to any article on our blog by December 31, and we’ll enter you in a drawing for one of two pairs of tickets to an Atlanta Thrashers game!

"Do I look fat in this design?"

Marcy Pett — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 19:36:07 +0000

I was once told by someone “Clients are always right...even when they are wrong.” This has obviously stuck with me over the years. “How can this be?” I’ve pondered. Now this is not to say that I believe the world is black or white, right or wrong...quite the contrary. However, if we are to grow as people we are to explore the possibilities as partners with our Clients, that means we should hold onto our ideas, best practices and expertise as dear. And, it works both ways, we are/should not be so egotistical to believe that good ideas won’t come from our Clients as well...they can come from anyone, anywhere, anytime. But when a less than mediocre one is thrown upon the table, sometimes as a directive, we treat our clients as friends and true partners where we can feel comfortable in pushing back and say, “Let’s think about that another way, shall we?”

This isn't to say we push back subjectively either. We are usually pointing our Clients back to the discovery work previously done in order to keep the project objectives on track. This practice resonates with me at my very core, as a human being. Ladies, when you are shopping, do you prefer the superficial answer of a friend who tells you an outfit looks good on you when you know darn well it doesn’t, or would you prefer the friend who feels comfortable in saying “You know, something else might be more appropriate or look more flattering on you?” We strive to attain these all important, real and lasting relationships with our Clients. In the end, it is a win-win situation for everyone.

Like any meaningful relationship -- it’s not always easy, but always worth it.

Stranded

Holger Kappenstein — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 20:43:39 +0000

Lake Lanier, Georgia — Thanksgiving 2007