Allow me to repeat myself

I talked yesterday about generic bank ads. Here is an example of an ad that is both a generic bank ad and a generic “we’ve opened an office/branch/kiosk in your town” ad.

The classic example of this genre is the “we’ve opened an office/branch/kiosk in Nakuru” ad: I don’t have to describe it, you know there’ll be flamingos! Kwani everyone in Nakuru is a flamingo? If I was a Nakuruite and I saw another flamingo ad…

For flamingos in Nakuru replace fishermen in Kisumu, runners in Eldoret, pineapples in Thika, camels in Wajir and buibuis in Mombasa. The thought does occur to me that if one is going to use stereotypes one might as well have some fun with them – Italian pimps in Malindi… witchdoctors in Kitui… polygamous families in Kakamega…?

To repeat only once what I was saying yesterday: if the point of an ad is to sell, and to sell you need peoples’ attention, and to get their attention you have to say whatever you’re saying in a novel and interesting way, but you proceed to say whatever you’re saying in exactly the same way as everyone else, then guaranteed you will not get their attention, therefore you will not sell.

Make sense?

There is however, as always, a deeper issue at work here – and it is to do with understanding what your brand is trying to say – what is often known as the brands’ position.

You see the thing is that every brand, to be successful over time, has to be built upon a core, fundamental promise. A brand can have one, ten or one hundred products, but as a brand, above all said products, it has to stand for something clear, understandable, memorable and compelling. The more powerful the ‘something’ that your brand stands for, the more powerful your brand.

Thus Nike as a brand stands for, I think, self-belief. So no matter what Nike product you are buying, be it running shoes or a tennis racket or a sports thong, what you are actually buying is a feeling of confirmation of yourself – yes I can (just) do it!!!

Back in the day before Tusker slightly lost its way, what you were buying when you bought a Tusker was the feeling of manhood – and specifically manhood of the Kenyan variety, as opposed to the American variety (Bud), the South African variety (Castle), the English variety (Carling), the ‘Big Black Man’ variety (Guinness) and the ‘these young men don’t know anything’ variety (White Cap.)

When a brand knows exactly what it stands for it becomes much easier to produce ads for it, regardless of particular product, service or message, because it becomes abundantly clear to all involved (including consumers) that every piece of communication (the mythical ‘touch-points’) must serve first and fore most to re-enforce the message of what the brand stands for.

A great example of this right now is CBA. If you look at all their communication, from interest rate ads to billboards to wheel covers you will see that every message is crafted in such a way as to as to take you back to the brands’ core message (or rallying cry) – that it is ‘time for more’.

Generic ads like this NBK one are therefore not so much the result of deficient creativity as they are the product of a poorly defined brand. Can you tell from this ad exactly what NBK is all about? Can you get a feel for what sets them apart, above and beyond all the other banks in the market? Me neither…

Kenya is not becoming a less competitive place. We are moving forward very fast. Be you a bank, bakery or butchery, it is no longer enough to declare to the world “I am a bank/bakery/butchery” and expect the people to come flooding in. You have to start telling people why they should come to your bank/bakery/butchery – and it is only by answering this question that you can begin to start turning your bank/bakery/butchery into a brand… and remember, once you go brand, you don’t go back.

Generic 101

With brands, as with people, the ones that truly stand out are the ones that have a distinct and distinctive way about them – they look, talk, act, sing, dress, walk, move, laugh, cry and dance in a particular and memorable way. They have ‘a style all of their own’.

The opposite of this is that much abused agency word ‘generic’, which essentially means ‘just the same as everyone/thing else’ (think school uniform, or think corporate warriors dark suit and tie).

At this point in the conversation many businessmen and women roll their eyes – ‘these ad guys, they just want to be different’.

Well yes and no is the answer to that statement. No, we don’t want to be different, but yes, your brand needs to be different.

After all what is the point of a brand? What is it if it is not a tool by which your business can differentiate itself, it’s products and it’s services in an increasingly competitive marketplace?

If indeed this is the point of a brand, to set you apart, then why would you run a piece of communication that looks/sounds/reads/feels like every other piece of communication run by every other brand in your category?

The banks in this Nairobi are especially guilty of doing this. If you conduct an exercise, as I have, in which you stick examples of a cross-section of Kenyan bank ads on a wall, and consider them, you will soon see that the various logos that they bare are essentially interchangeable. The arrayed ads are indistinct from one another – there is nothing to distinguish them from each other, other than the logos (and colors, though most are either blues or greens).  No effort has been made to generate a visual, graphic, typographic and tonal style for the brands that is clearly and identifiably of the brands…

There is a concept in psychology known as ‘groupthink’, in which a closed group of people succeed in convincing themselves of a particular reality regardless of the actual reality of said so called reality. We (marketing fraternity) are suffering in this town from an acute case of groupthink. We have convinced ourselves that this is how a bank ad is supposed to look like, and this is how a promotional ad is supposed to look like, and this is how a sale ad is supposed to look like…

How can we possibly get things so back to front? The only thing that an ad is supposed to look like is not like any of the brand’s competitor’s ads!!!!!

And no I am not saying that the ad referenced here should star a cartoon elephant and a topless grandmother in the name of being different – one must of course still work within the framework provided by the category, the brand’s position and the target audience – but if your ad is not clearly differentiated, it is doing nothing for your brand, and if it is doing nothing for your brand, pray what exactly is it doing for you???

All the great ad campaigns in history, and by great Mr. CFO I mean had the greatest impact upon the bottom line, were great first and foremost because they were so utterly different to anything that had come before them. It is this sense of difference, freshness, newness and originality that captures people’s imagination and drives them, almost unwittingly, into your stores/branches/kiosks/arms…

And no, for the last time, different does not necessarily mean pink dreadlocks with multiple nose rings. Different could mean something as simple as using illustrations when all your competitors use photos, or sponsoring a volleyball tournament when all your competitors are throwing money at football.

The great TBWA call the above process ‘disrupting the conventions.’ BBH put it slightly more poetically – “when the world zigs, zag!!!’ It is at the heart of what every good agency does, and whilst it will rarely be what the client wants, it will almost always be what the client needs…