GM's Appointment of Lutz Shows No Respect for Marketing†

Without a Story, Carmaker's Advertising Isn't Going to Cut It

Advertising Age, July 27, 2009 — General Motors' new advertising and marketing czar is Bob Lutz, who until April of this year headed global product development. According to CEO Fritz Henderson: "Bob's responsibilities beyond creative design will include brands, marketing, advertising and communications." (I can visualize Bob at his first meeting with one of GM's agencies: "I'm not a marketing expert, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night.")

Has respect for marketing fallen so low that the most difficult job in the profession (getting GM out of the ditch) can be given to someone with so little experience in marketing?

Message in What We Buy, but Nobody’s Listening

Evolutionary Psychology and Branding

New York Times, May 18, 2009 — Why does a diploma from Harvard cost $100,000 more than a similar piece of paper from City College? Why might a BMW cost $25,000 more than a Subaru WRX with equally fast acceleration? Why do “sophisticated” consumers demand 16-gigabyte iPhones and “fair trade” coffee from Starbucks?

If you ask market researchers or advertising executives, you might hear about the difference between “rational” and “emotional” buying decisions, or about products falling into categories like “hedonic” or “utilitarian” or “positional.” But Geoffrey Miller, an evolutionary psychologist at the University of New Mexico, says that even the slickest minds on Madison Avenue are still in the prescientific dark ages.

Instead of running focus groups and... continue reading

Hanging Out at a Mall for the Holidays

New York Times, October 30, 2008 — THOUGH many retailers are closing and cutting back, Teen Vogue is taking its franchise to the mall.

The magazine is opening a store, called the Teen Vogue Haute Spot, in the Mall at Short Hills in New Jersey. But the magazine does not intend to sell merchandise.

Instead, the store will be a place for girls to relax, try on clothes and drink smoothies — all while marketers woo them.

Tough Times Increase Pressure To Meet the Marketing Effectiveness Imperative

Prophet, September 1, 2008 — Businesses today are hunkering down. With consumers clutching their wallets more tightly, companies are scrutinizing every budget item to maintain profitability even as revenues are flat and costs rise. And with marketing commonly viewed as a discretionary spend, it is one of the likeliest victims of the ax.

How Marketing Can Lead the Charge for Business Innovation

Marketing Profs, November 6, 2007 — It's surprising how many business professionals don't really know what marketing is. Some people perceive it to be a necessary evil that consumes budgets and provides little payback; others see it as a person or department tasked with producing tactical "creative things" such as advertising, Web sites, email campaigns, and so on.

If we can take one idea away from all of these definitions, it would be that Marketing's job is to create customer value, engagement, satisfaction, and loyalty. Marketing serves as the stand-in for the customer, informing product development and other functions of what customers want and need.