Lever's CMO Throws Down the Social-Media Gauntlet
Clift Chides Marketers for Not Recognizing Their Brands Are Not Their Own
BATAVIA, Ohio (AdAge.com) -- Brands aren't simply brands anymore. They are the center of a maelstrom of social and political dialogue made possible by digital media, said Unilever Chief Marketing Officer Simon Clift, who warned that marketers who do not recognize that -- and adapt their marketing -- are in grave peril.
Mr. Clift was speaking to a packed house at Ad Age's Digital Conference last week, in an address that did much to define an internet-driven sea change that's put consumers in control and at times threatened to overwhelm marketers and their agencies, who -- despite frequent protestations to the contrary -- are still rather partial to the idea that they define their brands.
| Full Coverage of the 2009 Ad Age Digital Conference |
Noting that the challenge for marketing goes beyond the recession, Mr. Clift added: "brands are now becoming conversation factors where academics, celebrities, experts and key opinion formers discuss functional, emotional and, more interestingly, social concerns," and "of course, the conversation is no longer one way or 30 seconds. ... You may want to talk about sport and just doing it, and the consumer raises the uncomfortable question of sweatshops."
It's a lesson learned partly from Greenpeace, which last year hijacked "Onslaught," Dove's follow-up to the massively viral "Evolution" video, with what turned into a widely watched and discussed parody focusing on Unilever's purchases of palm oil resulting in destruction of Indonesian rainforest. "Digital is "bringing [social and environmental concerns] to the surface in a completely new and powerful way," he said. "Technology allows people to make their voices heard across YouTube or blogs and ultimately to organize a boycott."
Ascendant PR
As a result, public relations may become the fastest-growing focal point of marketing services for Unilever in the years ahead, he said in an interview after his talk. Mr. Clift said he sees an opportunity for billion-dollar brands "that address the world's challenges."
Some brands "simply won't survive this accelerated natural selection," he said.
Of course, Mr. Clift said, consumers still mainly want bathroom cleaners and soap. And brand marketers are still primarily interested in selling stuff. So he believes the corporate Unilever brand will need to step to the forefront and shoulder the burden of communicating about the deeper issues -- a turnabout for a company that long has stood well in the background behind its brands.
One of Mr. Clift's roles when he became fulltime CMO last year was to become the steward of the Unilever corporate brand, and he's approaching it aggressively. In the U.K., the company last month began putting prominent corporate signatures on all its advertising. After his talk, he said Unilever will likely make similar moves in the U.S. Unilever's decision to name a global PR roster in addition to its agency roster signals another movement in this regard.
And while digital media may have put marketers more clearly into the social and political fray, Mr. Clift also sees no problem acknowledging that social programs run by marketers are still very much about marketing.
'Enlightened self-interest'
A Lifebuoy program aimed at cutting the number of deaths from diarrheal diseases in developing markets -- estimated at 2 million annually -- in half has reached 120 million people in five years, he said. It increasingly goes through mobile devices, which are growing faster than TV in markets such as India, where only a quarter of households in the poorest villages have TVs.
"It's a sort of enlightened self-interest," Mr. Clift said. "It's not about philanthropy. It's a marketing program with social benefits."
But extending what began as a public-relations program for Dove -- Campaign for Real Beauty -- over the broader marketing effort for the brand has had its drawbacks.
"Advertising that just kind of celebrated being overweight was just clearly wrong and wasn't effective for consumers, either," Mr. Clift said. "We want to encourage you to take care of yourself. ... But you should nevertheless make yourself feel good about making the best of yourself. ... And of course there's a fine line, but there's a line that sometimes we got wrong."
Dove has grown since the Campaign for Real Beauty began in 2004, but it's recently slowed. That has more to do with the products than the campaign, he said. Most advertising for the brand is still about functional benefits, Mr. Clift said, but Real Beauty drew more attention. "This is a brand that people absolutely love but it hasn't always been relevant in product terms." He added that the brand had made itself more relevant for younger women with its launch of the Go Fresh lineup last year.
Five new rules for marketing
The flat-earth, digitized world described by Unilever CMO Simon Clift is one in which the marketing norms have changed. Here are Ad Age's "New Rules." Feel free to argue or send us additional rules you think you should be added to the list.- Listening to consumers is more important than talking at them. As Mr. Clift said, "We may be ahead of our competitors, but we're most definitely behind consumers." The consumer is not a moron, she's the person defining your brand.
- You can't hide the corporation behind the brand anymore -- or even fully separate the two. Even this editor's creaking computer only took 0.13 seconds to show that Philip Morris is owned by Altria Group. Welcome to radical transparency, where bad corporate behavior will damage your brands, and vice versa.
- PR is a primary concern for every CMO and brand manager. If "marketing" and "PR" are not the same department, tear down the wall. Spend time deciding whether PR is underleveraged in your organization.
- Cause marketing isn't about philanthropy, it's about "enlightened self-interest," as Mr. Clift puts it. That doesn't mean it doesn't count. Don't be ashamed of your profit motive, because great branding and doing good are increasingly one and the same.
- Social media is not a strategy. You need to understand it, and you'll need to deploy it as a tactic. But remember that the social graph just makes it even more important that you have a good product. Put another way: The volume and quality of your earned media will be directly proportional to the impact and quality of your product and ideas.
Send your "new rules" to jbloom@adage.com.
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First, good ad agencies have traditionally been able to translate user research into tangible messaging. While the new technology displaces talking-at rather than talking-with brand users, traditional research acumen translates into the social media world, at least so far as a mindset. Staying nimble has never been so important but ad agencies have no lack of nimble talent. It's just giving power to that talent - voice to impact client focused messaging vehicles. Secondly, this goes back to the core value of a great ad agency; the ability to translate creative firepower along with "business smarts" into compelling message platforms. The real challenge is cultural. How to shift the everyday sense of personal focus among agency talent so they feel empowered, excited, and ambitious in playing in this space? That, itself, is a social effort, and takes time and commitment by management. Certain agencies are making it happen. I'm going to avoid being self serving and claiming it's happening where I work (though that's true) but the main thing is ad talent should be helping each other out here. It's the playground we're all going to have to play.
To counter point 2: with a slight recent change, most consumers spend virtually no time thinking about the company that makes their soap. Reach out to those that do, but too much corporate branding will diminish the individuality of your product brands, the ones people actually pay for. See GM for the example to avoid.
And for point 3: add Customer Service. If anyone can be a journalist, then PR and Customer Service no longer have a clear divide. Assume what your customers are telling you they're also writing about on their blogs. This was the original way to listen to customer needs.
Jonathan Goldfuss
President, Red Bird Marketing
@RedBirdMkt
And let's not forget that social media is not limited to social networks, wikis and blogs anymore. People publish, share and interact with all sorts of content now. So, text, images, audio and video are equally important for a successful social media strategy. http://endavomediablog.typepad.com
The clear winner of the show was Simon Clift of Unilever...without a doubt the best presentation I have seen in the last twenty years of business. His candor, truth and honest insights to brand, corporate responsibility, passions from human wellness and a products effect on global social influences was refreshing and candid. Most people bury the truth. He hit truth between the eyes. After spending my career in business and advertising ... I like most of you am use to hearing corporations dodge and hide the ills their organizations put on society. Mr. Clift I commend you...not that this is what you want to hear...I'm just glad that you are at the helm...many companies hopefully will follow your lead. Instead of ousting Greenpeace for their protest on destroying trees to gather palm oil for Dove...he invited them in for tea and now is partnering with them to do the right thing for us all.
It's quite remarkable what preparation, practice and attention to detail brings to an audience. It's good to know we matter enough. Special kudos to Marisa...I thank you...you are a truly talented despite the fact that you are a Blue Jays fan.
I took the liberty of reviewing a number of events that took place at the conference...if you'd care to read them visit my blog for more insights and take away from what I believe was a very successful two days of information and presentations.
Special thanks to Jonah Bloom for all of his great efforts!! Read more here:
http://tbird827.wordpress.com/2009/04/12/advertising-age-digital-2009-an-all-thumbs-review/
Cheers
Timothy
Our efforts to get answers to these questions have not received replies.
I am sorry to say it but I think this is another example of an ad executive being more spin than substance.
Tony Gilding Australian Orangutan Project.
> this is definitely not a wake up call to the industry, let alone the throwing down of a gauntlet to the unwashed marketers who still dodn't see the light?
Around 5-6 years ago, P&G were embarking on their journey of discover on how to do this with "low-involvement products" that did not have the kind of naturally talkability traction of say, a conspicuously consumed lifestyle product like Nike. The social seeds began to be sowed, and the hands-on practise of reaping the fruits of those seeds activated.
These very fruits of the early days of Social Marketing (then called Buzz Marketing) are being mentioned today as though they were a whole new marketing breakthrough, when in fact, this is a change manifesto for fundamental company processes and best practises.
- from product back ends, to customer front-ends, to company culture and policies, and finance. To the CEO, and the board of directors.
In the age of the digitally induced Blur - "a no man's land populated by independently-minded adorers and detractors, an anarchy of promiscuity for a thousand tribes, a million communities, a billion cliques; and a trillion opinions." - the generally conclusion is there is still a need for brands to be the surrogate kings, leaders, concierges, even conduits, of this land.
I don't think we should question why Simon Clift said what he had to say. If these are the things that thousands of CEO/CFOs have already discovered the hard way, the law of the crowd, must lead.
I do applaud Simon however, for echoing this perspective brilliantly with his unique flourish in such a high profile event like the Ad Age Digital conference.
Its going to take a lot more than just the law of the crowd, to hardwire this to the law of the land.
Use people to use the internet to socialize the brand. Creating the brand stimulus package means hiring a whole bunch of people.
Let's take a $3 million budget (equivalent to a Superbowl ad) and hire real people.
Consider the average US annual wage is $40,000 so we can hire 75 people. These people work 260 days a year or a total of 19,500 days. Assuming 7 hours a day that's 136,500 hours or 8.2 million minutes.
- How many impressions could they create over the year?
- Would the impact be better, worse, or just different?
- What are the chance "you'll get lucky" with another Dove viral hit?
- Could these people & minutes reach 100 million equivalent unique prospects (or maybe more targeted ones)?
- Could you change the economics and get 769 people (at a college?) to work for a week to make and distribute brand messages?
- Is there a defining event that could/should be created around an internet activity? ( A BXBV, brand by brand value event like Staturn used to do at their production plant).
If social media means people, then how do companies get people to drive the media? Maybe new media is recruiting.
lwsmith10011
at gmail dot com
If you ASK a consumer to her face is that people generally do not care about ads. Sure, they may talk about an engaging spot for a short period of time, but it lasts only a short while, and conversation then quickly shifts back to a very functional, product-centric conversation.
If marketers are to succeed in building brands (as distinct from, for example, haggling over megapixels in digital cameras) via social media, they need to apply a new lens towards created brand experiences that consumers will actually value and talk about on their own. This chiefly stems from a brand's ability to authentically stand for something larger than its product alone.
Historically, brands have done this through emotional brand spots, sponsorship or creation of events in a particular arena, and things of that nature. NOW, I argue that brands need to continue to own and operate in areas that both they and consumers are PASSIONATE about, to cultivate consumer conversations about what that brand MEANS.
We know that product review sites will continue to debate product attributes and performance, but the way that BRAND survives in the age of social media is through authenticity and becoming synonymous with a lifestyle or set of ideals.
Agree? Disagree? Want to talk about it?
alex@agencynet.com | twitter.com/alexgmorrison | http://www.ANidea.com
1. If PR is being asked to "clean up" the brand's image, that isn't going to work. If the people working for the company don't live the message, they will be found out, no matter how slick the PR efforts.
2. If, on the other hand, PR is being asked to convey the truth in an efficient manner, then that can work. A good PR person knows how to write, how to express an idea to the media, and how to tell a story. So if the PR specialist draws upon skills to foster greater communications and clarity at all levels, then this should be a successful use of PR.
http://twitter.com/slainson
This was interesting news 2 years ago.
Tell us PR and marketing are the same and social media is not a strategy it's a tactic.
I think all this says is how behind the times Unilever really is.
Hopefully lessons will been learnt from the financial crisis, do not try to rebuild business on the principle that Marketing & Advertising are always right!
The words "60% of all advertising, globally is wasted" were splashed yesterday across the marketing papers. This kind of unanimity in the trade press is not coincidental. And if the likes of Unilever persist in praising "Social Media" similar losses will still be shown in the years to come!
To have any hope of repairing the damage left behind by the highly dishonest and incompetent banks, big business must first convince the majority of the population that they are really capable of fixing the problems. Not only are we trapped in the worst recession in living memory. But behind all this lurks a horror even more shocking; the entire marketing/advertising-economic model of free enterprise, rugged individualism, creative advertising and marketing is broken beyond all hope of repair.
Marketing/Advertising on which the Western world built its seeming success seems to have completely broken down. How else can one describes a situation in which all of the country's main financial institutions and many of its biggest industrial companies are effectively bankrupt and on government life-support?
The crisis triggered by September's Credit Crisis appears to have discredited many of the assumptions on which our prosperity and democracy was founded. In 1989 the world, from China and Russia to South Africa, India and Brazil, concluded that there was no serious alternative to market forces as a means of organizing productive activity. In 2009 the whole world seems to have reached the opposite conclusion — that free markets and financial incentives together with marketing & advertising, lead even the richest and most sophisticated societies to disaster.
The question we must ask today is not whether Marketing & Advertising is too big or too small, but whether it works at all.
Undoubtedly the crisis could well be the cause of an idea whose time has come, for the new model of Marketing & Advertising that we must now invent. More generally, financial regulation and macroeconomic management will surely now recognize that naive theories about "efficient" advertising/ marketing and the highly dubious claim they spawned "advertising works" were a major cause of the entire financial disaster. It will still be capitalism, but Marketing/Advertising will not try to rebuild business on the principle that "marketing and advertising are always right".
Already it appears that the Advertising industry, ably supported by Marketing, is already placing their faith on so called "Social Media". The Internet is NOT a medium conducive to effective, accountable, advertising.
This hysteria about Social Media again reflects the problems faced by Old Advertising & Old Media, a total lack of understanding as to the real meaning of the word "Communication".
As to Unilever we have already offered Simon Clifts a free copy of our book "Television Killed Advertising" for there he will discover ways of saving a fortune in Marketing monies as well as to how he could advertising
Rule # 3: This means most CMOs first have to learn what PR is. Most don't. (Spend time deciding whether PR is underleveraged in your organization.)
This should be Rule #1: The volume and quality of your earned media will be directly proportional to the impact and quality of your product and ideas.
Here are some quick additions to the New Rules of Marketing:
# Identify who the conversation 'influencers' ('key opinion formers') are, where they converse online and offline, and develop a relationship with them by joining their conversation.
# Join the conversation by addressing the Listeners needs, motivating Participants and enhancing the Influencers conversation topics.
# Don't be afraid to share your experiences—positive and negative—and your insights as you grow your company and evolve your product lines.
"Conversation Marketing" is a new way of looking at the market conversation universe.
It addresses the ways a business can become a qualified participant in those conversations that drive their business and create relationships with key influencers.
Businesses that don't apply this type of approach risk having their marketing initiatives lose their voice...
I was stumped by #5 though. I think that Social Media is more a strategy than a tactic. Social Media gives a Brand the platform to listen to consumers, and going by Rule #1, how can it just be a tactic?
Tej
http://brandadda.com