Brands’ biggest AI opportunity is in making customers believe the bullshit
Mark RitsonArtificial intelligence is mostly a distraction from marketing fundamentals – unless you convince your market AI makes your brand better than the competition.
Mark Ritson
Toblerone’s brand image won’t be hurt by losing the Matterhorn
Mark RitsonRemoving the famous Swiss mountain from its packaging won’t stop the chocolate brand building a desirable brand image in today’s globalised age.
1 Comment
Don’t listen to the industry sages, they’re not your ad’s target
Mark RitsonAdvertising professionals’ view of what makes a good ad is not only biased, it’s usually wrong, as their reaction to Tourism Australia’s last campaign shows.
1 Comment
Brand diagnosis is the brand manager’s first job, so prioritise it
Mark RitsonMarketers have lost sight of proper research into what drives brand successes and challenges, distracted by the lure of woolly ‘insight’.
How Guinness became Britain’s most popular pint
Mark RitsonGuinness is the rare example of a brand with solid foundations in its product and brand assets, whose full potential is realised by brilliant marketers.
1 Comment
Brand-building ads boost short-term sales, and now you can prove it
Mark RitsonTen years since The Long and the Short of It was published, new evidence shows that while sales-driven ads deliver few long-term effects, brand advertising achieves both.
Giving your brand a good death is an underrated marketing skill
Mark RitsonAlthough we never talk about it, marketers kill as many brands as we create, and doing so in the right way at the right time is crucial to business health.
4 Comments
Tesla is about to experience the seven perils of discounting
Mark RitsonBy discounting for the first time, Tesla is not only starting an electric vehicle price war, it is communicating its weakness to existing and future customers.
‘Triple-Cooked Marketing Budgets’: The full recipe
Mark RitsonMarketing budgeting is flawed. Marketers are more confused about budgeting than ever before. Here’s your complete three-step guide to fixing it for 2023.
2 Comments
In the battle between salience and differentiation, Bothism wins
Mark RitsonMarketers debate over salience and differentiation like they are mutually exclusive, when the evidence shows both in combination will deliver the best results.
2 Comments
Marketers should pay more attention to attention
Mark RitsonThere’s ample evidence that longer dwell time on ads raises brand recall and choice, so ignore Byron Sharp’s claims that you shouldn’t pay for more attention.
Can you achieve long and short at the same time? Usually, no
Mark RitsonIt’s appealing to fulfil brand and sales objectives in one execution, but they’re so different that you’ll probably fail at both.
And the winner of campaign of the year is…
Mark RitsonGreat diagnosis, smart insight, clever use of media and inventive execution, Sheba’s ‘4am Stories’ is a masterclass in simple but highly effective marketing.
Christmas advertising is drowning in marketers’ fake tears
Mark RitsonChristmas 2021 is shaping up to be an exercise in hyper-emotional brand bullshit, with Coca-Cola even choosing to edit itself out of its own campaign. But don’t worry, the holidays are still coming.
Ritson’s 10 marketing hacks to help small businesses go big
Charlotte RogersFrom a new recipe for pic n’ mix comms, to making extreme choices, Mark Ritson shares his marketing twists that can help SMEs get big brand outcomes.
P&G and Coke’s pandemic performances prove it: You don’t cut ad spend in a crisis
Mark RitsonProcter & Gamble doubled down on marketing when Covid hit, while Coca-Cola went dark. The former’s revenues surged, the latter’s dwindled, and Ehrenberg-Bass data now proves if you stop advertising you lose sales.
Five lessons on how not to do pricing from Elon Musk’s Twitter
Mark RitsonThere is a perfect pricing case study in the way the new Twitter CEO, Elon Musk, communicated his proposed fee for a ‘blue tick’ on the platform – just do the exact opposite of what he did.
Ritson’s recession playbook: 9 steps marketers should take to survive the dark times ahead
Mark RitsonFrom retaining a long-term view and the importance of excess share of voice to making strategic changes to positioning and saying no to failure, our columnist spells out how brands can navigate recession.
1 Comment
Volkswagen is right to put profit before sales
Mark RitsonThere are two paths brands can follow – one leads to sales while the other points to profitability, and the latter is invariably the right one to choose.
1 Comment
At times of war marketing is rendered superficial and ridiculous
Mark RitsonGiven what’s happening in the world right now marketing really doesn’t matter, but there are ways brands can respond without appearing tone deaf.
1 Comment
Consumers no longer care about provenance – except in Cockermouth
Mark RitsonVolvos are made in China, Stella Artois is brewed in Wales, and globalisation means we don’t bat an eyelid – though my fellow Cumbrians will test that theory to the limit as Jennings ale moves to the Midlands.
1 Comment
Transforming logos for Pride has lost brand impact and become ‘rainbow-washing’
Mark RitsonWith more brands altering their distinctive assets more frequently, often for the same reason and at the same time, code play is becoming far less effective.
1 Comment
Brand might slyly alter human truth: How brand image changes perceptions of reality
Mark RitsonThe nature of reality, and how brands influence our perception of it, is the unusually metaphysical topic of our marketing columnist’s thoughts this week.
Ritson on the UK’s top 10 sonic brands
Marketing Week ReportersFrom Autoglass to Netflix to Just Eat, Mark Ritson explores the brands with the most effective sonic assets.
2 Comments
Suffering from impostor syndrome? The cure is simpler than you think
Mark RitsonMarketers are prone to impostor syndrome, but solid training and a more realistic view of your peers’ achievements will show your worries are unfounded.
Brands staying in Russia are making a statement of support for Putin
Mark RitsonBrands that continue to do business in Russia deserve no platform in our industry, our columnist argues.
3 Comments
Welcome to the new normal, it’s the same as the old one
Mark RitsonDespite dire predictions of Covid-driven decline for some sectors and exponential growth for others, we’re largely where we would have been if it had never happened.
Musicians like Neil Young lack the market power to force Spotify’s hand over Joe Rogan
Mark RitsonThe asymmetry between millions of available songs and the five companies dominating streaming means no artist can put Spotify in a corner.
It may be tainted, but don’t underestimate the power of brand love
Mark RitsonAlthough the concept of ‘brand love’ was overused and went out of fashion, it remains an insightful way to consider consumers’ attitudes towards brands.
If you don’t invest 5% of your budget in research, you don’t know what you’re doing
Mark RitsonThe BBC’s decision to invest heavily in research should be celebrated by us all and noted by marketers. Investing 5% of your budget in market research is not superfluous, it’s key to understanding customers, serving them better and growing your business.
3 Comments
To win the biggest legal battle in marketing, Google must show who its competition really is
Mark RitsonGoogle might have an 80% share of the search market, but as the investigation by the US Department of Justice will no doubt show there are now many more ways people find information online.
1 Comment
Seven reasons why TV’s doubters are wrong
Mark RitsonOfcom’s latest data yet again shows why TV should be at the top of most big brands’ media plans, yet some marketers insist on ignoring the facts. Here are the answers to their most common quibbles.
Only bad marketers think more messages mean more effectiveness
Mark RitsonYou might increase total message recall by adding more of them, but you’ll lose credibility, as shown by the World Cup protestor who couldn’t pick one cause.
1 Comment
Follow Shania Twain’s lead and make sure product isn’t the forgotten P of marketing
Mark RitsonOur marketing columnist experiences an epiphany on his couch that leads him to revise his opinion of Heinz pasta sauce and the state of modern marketing.
Even if Unilever placates its investors, it still has Ben & Jerry’s to deal with
Mark RitsonWith CEO Alan Jope set to leave, Unilever faces battles not only with investors aiming to deprioritise brand purpose, but with its own Ben & Jerry’s brand, which is suing it for abandoning purpose commitments.
You can’t beat TikTok by becoming its clone
Mark RitsonOur marketing columnist examines the underwhelming response of the major social media brands to the TikTok threat and explores the perils of competitor orientation.
Do you have a strategy worthy of a brief? These three questions will tell you
Mark RitsonNew research shows marketers are terrible at briefing agencies. To start putting that right, ask yourself whether your marketing strategy meets these criteria.
8 Comments
Three axioms and three questions that summarise all of brand strategy
Mark RitsonBrand strategy is not complicated, it’s just the systematic application of the basics all marketers are taught. Here’s a simple way to be sure you’re taking the right steps – in the right order.
11 Comments
It’s time for ‘share of search’ to replace ‘share of voice’
Mark RitsonShare of voice is a key metric for setting budgets and predicting growth, but digital media make it impossible to calculate accurately. Understanding your share of search queries is a simple and elegant alternative.
1 Comment
Take Tesco’s lead, prepare for a recession that will dwarf the financial crash
Mark RitsonForget ‘U’s and ‘V’s, this recession will be F-shaped, and Tesco knows from the financial crash that all most brands and retailers can do is minimise their losses.
2 Comments
For Omega and Swatch, the rewards of co-branding could be astronomical
Mark RitsonFar from cannibalising Omega’s luxury sales, the collaboration with Swatch on the £200 Moonswatch will breathe new life into both these sister brands.
An ethnography of pricing: How and why marketers should put up prices
Mark RitsonInflation means price increases are marketing’s number-one priority for 2022. But how many marketers are capable or even aware of the challenge ahead? Our columnist provides a handy cheat sheet for those who want to get it right.
1 Comment
Good purpose, bad purpose: Marketers shouldn’t oversimplify the arguments
Mark RitsonBrand purpose campaigns underperform ‘traditional’ marketing on average, but for the right brands purpose will still be the most effective strategic choice.
4 Comments
The Long and the Short of It maps exactly onto the challenges of global marketing
Mark RitsonThe boundaries between marketing teams’ responsibilities become clearer if you simply make long-term brand strategy a global job and short-term, targeted product activations a local one.
Films no longer have sequels, they have sub-brands and franchises
Mark RitsonOur humble columnist spent Christmas in his underpants watching Netflix, but that doesn’t mean he wasn’t thinking about brands. This week, the fascinating whodunnit centres on the last-minute renaming of one of the holiday season’s most successful films.
1 Comment
Accenture Song is not a great rebrand, but it could be so much worse
Mark RitsonRebrands are usually a bad move, but despite the ridicule for Accenture Interactive becoming Accenture Song, there is just as much upside.
4 Comments
Does Facebook’s corporate rebrand to ‘Meta’ prove the future is ‘beyond’ it?
Mark RitsonOur marketing columnist stayed up late in Tasmania and put his headset on for the Facebook Connect VR conference. But he came away unimpressed with the branding revelations that followed.
Adidas’s sale of Reebok makes strategic sense all round
Mark RitsonReebok hasn’t reached the heights of the 1980s and 90s since Adidas bought it in 2006, and its sale means Adidas can focus on its ‘branded house’ while new owner ABG has the skills to bring Reebok into its ‘house of brands’.
P&O is the rare reputation crisis that really does matter
Mark RitsonThe damage P&O Cruises has suffered from P&O Ferries’ mistakes cuts to the core of the business, and leaves the separately owned brand with four options.
Peloton has snatched victory from the jaws of death – again
Mark RitsonMr Big’s (spoiler alert) death after a Peloton ride in the latest Sex and the City spin-off had social media forecasting the brand’s doom, but it actually created greater mental availability for the brand – especially after Ryan Reynolds’ creative agency got involved.
1 Comment
Trust in brands is illusory, just look at Facebook’s continued growth
Mark RitsonFacebook repeatedly ranks low in consumer trust surveys, yet user growth continues, revealing the idea of trust in brands as anthropomorphic nonsense.
4 Comments
If an influencer’s what you want, find a 90-year-old with bad WiFi
Mark RitsonThere’s no influence like a customer’s, as AT&T found when nonagenarian Aaron Epstein placed an ad in the Wall Street Journal criticising its service.