Some thinkers will always be a part of eternity; Peter Drucker is one of them.
Sadly after 95 years he left this place on earth but others will procede his lifetime work.
At his last year I listened to Peter at one of his lecture and one of his messages was probably the best management advice I ever got and it will always be with me:
In India the culture is stronger than any Brand book in the world. That is the reason for why Worldwide CEO of Lowe, Tony Wright talked about the colonial corporate and that its time is over at his lecture last week in Mumbai for the AAAI seminar.
Not listen to and understand a strong and powerful culture with 1,3 billion people mean that you wont sell your product. Coca-Cola is right now learning this lesson the hard way in India.
Everyone has heard of Singapore Airlines; they’re famous for friendly service and letting the traveller experience Singapore for hours before actually arriving (their brand is flying high).
Everyone has heard of Singapore Airlines; they’re famous for friendly service and letting the traveller experience Singapore for hours before actually arriving (their brand is flying high). Less well-known is the Malaysian car Proton, even though it has sales in the billions of dollars. Although its visibility is improving, it suffers from the limitation of many other Asian brands: it has had trouble charging its brand with a rich culture. Why not let the rich culture shine through in the visible design of the car. Another problem is the product itself. The two are inextricably intertwined as they were for the Japanese auto industry in the early 60’s, an industry that produced fair cars with a laughable brand. Through a combination of branding and improved product quality, Japanese cars are now considered by many to be the best in the world. If Proton doesn’t improve their quality they are soon going to feel the negative side of consumer power in hate web sites. Surviving as a brand on a transparent market means delivering on promises – rumour and word of mouth travel much faster than any car on the planet. The blogs and the media are full of stories of quality problems, yet the company has responded mostly with advertising.
Some consumers are saying that they “love to hate Proton” – this is not the sort of passion you want for your brand. Why not just be honest and tell the customers the truth. Why not ask them for their help to improve and make them believe in the brand again by becoming ONE with Proton.
Malaysia is in many ways one of the most beautiful countries in the world and its products should live up to the role of ambassador in the same way as Singapore Airlines does for Singapore. Proton should move their boardroom out into the breathtaking Malaysian countryside to stimulate change, to open the door for input from customers and to usher in a new era devoted to reaching new goals with customers, suppliers and employees. That, if anything, would inspire ”Creative Management”.
I am a big fan of Bollywood movies and Mumbai is the place where bollywood is located and where they make most of the movies. Maybe soon we will see the Worldwide CEO of Lowe doing some local Bollywood dancing with the billions of consumers in India (then he is doing “Bollybranding” as I call it).
Update Mars 1:
Some more to read about India/Bollybranding on this blog:
Bollybranding to Sweden
ONE lecture at The Advertising Agencies Association of India (AAAI).
Culturestones – Things that last over time
Fortune Magazine on Hollywood vs. Bollywood
Create more Kodak moments
DO OR DIE
How you can start ONE newspaper today!
Update 13 April:
Bollybranding will make you dance
A branding magazine that looks as good as it feels. Take a look at their new site Contagious Magazine and check out the latest news on branding to get inspired as I do. One of my favorite authors Martin Lindstrom is writing for them.
India is an incredible land full of incredible people. I had the opportunity to see most of them in the audience of AAAI yesterday. The audience consisted of 550 Indians. They were enormous enthusiastic about the ONE topic and the coming book. They where enthusiastic because of the fact that ONE is a solution for a big step that the evolution of advertising need to answer to:
The fact that consumers are saying NO to advertising. Millions of consumers are taking the matters into their own hands by literally turning off advertising. Digital technology such as Tivo is making it possible to remove commercials from the TV while similar technology is making progress removing advertising, pop-ups and spam on the web.
It is a problem that can be solve by an evolution step that is needed both from advertisers and consumers if they ever shall become ONE. That is the reason why the lecture was getting such a successful response.
The content of the lecture attracted a lot of media attention. I also got new requests about new lectures both through faxes and mails from companies and top Universities. I learned that word of mouth is incredible fast in India.
Update Nov 14: Media writing about the lecture and book:
Indian Television: Brands should involve, not hunt consumers
Exchange4media: Morning session stresses on the ‘Consumer Power’
Update Nov 23:
The Economic Times: Advertisers, agencies should become consumer centric
Impact: The Future of Advertising
Times Of India: The consumer train is powering ahea (pressindy.pdf)
Update Nov 25:
The ‘future of advertising’ is certainly vibrant and well with Stefan Engeseth´s ONE perceptive.
Advertising Agencies Association of India (AAAI)
Update Nov 29:
Brand Equity: Maverick At The Door
In the new movie Flightplan does actor Jodie Foster lift the acting to a theatrical level. Why not make this great movie into a theatre? It would be great if it then could be played in an airplane! It would be good if Boeing was brave and sponsored it with a plane, landing at Broadway in New York. Then, we in the audience would get the real fly deal, when we are sitting inside a real airplane that is shaking and moving around with the story. In the end the actors and the audience become ONE and play the story together……would you like to be the captain!? See the Flightplan trailer here.
I love reading books and is always looking for good books to read. With Google print it is easy.
Maybe they have children’s book for the Google kid?
The France the revolution will always be a part of their culture. That’s ONE strong reason why 20 towns are on fire around Paris today.
Around the world millions of consumers are revolting against big corporations who won’t be happy having fire around there headquarter (but will soon have it if they don’t open up there doors soon).
The safety development of cars has been as primitive as experiment on animals (how needs seatbelts they told consumers?). We did not see the lies that the car industry gave human-animals. Today consumer power stops cruel experiment on animals for animal kingdom has a transparence that sees and values life with blogs and your voice.
What more good things do you see on a transparent market?
How much does their consumers spend on Coke? At least, billions of bottles. If Coke stop doing advertising as a monologue and involve their consumers they could get free advertising for more than $100 billions. But then they need to be more innovative and tap into the evolution of business consumer gives.
If Coke doesn’t move forward to the next level of their business, others will go forward: A person that has added a passionate red color to the corporate palette is Richard Branson of the Virgin Company. One of his endeavors is the creation of Virgin Drinks headed up by Virgin Cola. The shape of the bottle is modeled after Pamela Anderson who has better curves than Coke. Which contains more plastic is only a hypothetical question at best.
What else business does you think, stand still ore could move forward?
What is business evolution for you?
Italian super star Eros Ramazzotti hold a concert for 100.000 fans at Stadio Olimpico in Roma. In the old days the audience use there lighter to contribute and be a part of the concert. Today not so many smoke, so they used their mobile phones. Eros told the 100.000 fans to put on their mobile phone. Then suddenly he got double size of the audience (photos, filming, and phone calls). This gave him a live audience online by mobiles, and it will “feed the story” of the concert and the phone calls was fun to make for his Italian fans “I am here with Eros and you are not, but I will tell you later – listen now”
Why not try “Eros mobile storysinging” at the next board meeting? Start by take up your phones and call some costumers so they can listen to your board meeting live?
