Integrated Marketing

Mahindra

2011-10-25T15:55:00.001-04:00

In late 2010, Mahindra decided to embark on an "Empowerment" campaign, (Apologies Professor Jim Heskitt, Harvard GSB), capitalizing on the incredible rise of ordinary people in India to inspire more and more people to do the same.

In the spring of 2011, we designed and launched a pan India social media campaign run out of New ork.

We believe this is the first time campaign of this size scope and geography was mounted out of the USA.

Mahindra

Kirshenbaum will not win BMW

2011-08-11T12:30:00.009-04:00

On 09/08/2005 during the last BMW review won by GSD&M, I wrote a piece on how weird it was for Crispin to fire Mini and take on VW. My last line questioned Crispin's choice and suggested the marriage would not last.

http://marketingintegration.blogspot.com/2005/09/bmw-review-it-gets-weirder-still.html

So this post is to validate the VW prediction made 4 years earlier and to make a new prediction for the latest BMW search.

I have been accused in the past of publishing "I told you sos", especially for BMW Agency search comments and Kirshenbaum in particular, as they must hold the "bride's maid" record.

If you read the posts, they have always been respectful of Jonathan and Richard and have merely suggested that they need help which I have been doing for a decade. Same goes for my communication with MDC.

So I am posting a reminder of what happened after I suggested that the Crispin VW move may not work out. (Below). It lasted but 4 years and they were fired despite sales rising.

But I am also predicting that K&B cannot beat Martin/Grey for the BMW business and they will finish a now outrageously expensive 2nd if you calculate how many times they have been bridesmaids.

While I am rooting for them, it might be too ambitious for Grey to win the whole thing as they have little auto credibility, especially with the performance driven marque BMW.

Brad Fogel running the pitch out of the West Coast knows autos and should at least keep the dealer business, which he understands better than anyone in the review.

VW, Crispin Split Despite Increase in Market Share
Automaker Seeks New U.S. Agency of Record for $200 Million-Plus Account
By: Jeremy Mullman
Published: August 17, 2009

CHICAGO (AdAge.com) -- Despite a rise in market share and a comparatively soft sales decline vs. competitors, Volkswagen of America is bidding auf Wiedersehen to Crispin Porter & Bogusky after a four-year run.
VW is reviewing to find a new U.S. agency of record for its $200 million-plus account despite seeing its market share climb to 2% from 1.6% through July, according to Automotive News figures, the result of a 13.5% sales decline as the decimated auto market as a whole fell 32%.
But despite those U.S. numbers, VW has been experiencing significant change at the global level, where it has been gaining ground on the likes of Toyota and General Motors of late. In addition to winning a long-running takeover battle for Porsche, it recently added former Fiat marketing chief Luca De Meo as its new global marketing chief.
"Our goal of rapidly increasing our volume in a mature market requires the Volkswagen brand to evolve into a more relevant mainstream choice," Tim Ellis, VP-marketing at Volkswagen of America, said in a statement. "The Volkswagen brand needs to inspire our base of enthusiasts as well as reach out and captivate those in mainstream America. Therefore, we are re-evaluating all areas of our business and after careful considerations have decided to take the necessary steps to ensure we have the right agency partner in place."
Search consultancy Roth Associates will run the review.
In a statement, a Crispin spokeswoman said the agency would not attempt to defend the account despite being invited to do so. "We have been privileged to have had the opportunity to work with Volkswagen for the past four years and are extremely proud of all that we have accomplished together. As a rule, we do not participate in reviews for our current accounts, and this will not be an exception. We wish Volkswagen the absolute best."
Crispin's work for Volkswagen was often controversial and occasionally bizarre, with characters such as the lab-coat-clad Helga and taglines such as "Find your fast," and "Unpimp mein auto." One series of jarring ads meant to emphasize safety showed a serene conversation in a car jolted without warning by an unforeseen collision. Another featured a painfully awkward German hip-hop singer. The agency also enlisted Brooke Shields as a narrator supposedly perturbed about families having children just to have an excuse to buy a Routan minivan, which VW also sold to soccer fans with a viral campaign mocking soccer moms. More recently, ads have featured a vintage VW Bug hosting a late-night-style talk show.
VW spent about $205 million on U.S. measured media last year, according to TNS Media Intelligence.
~ ~ ~ Michael Bush contributed to this report.

Catherine Lorillard Art Club 114th International Exhibition

2010-12-20T22:35:00.002-05:00

National Arts Club, New York 2010.Winners. Lucille Schur, Medal of Honor.

The Catharine Lorillard Wolfe Art Club 114th Annual Award Winners

View more presentations from Catharine Wolfe.

Agency Negotiation

2010-12-19T12:46:00.001-05:00

This video is mandatory viewing for all account people at any agencies I work with.

While it was created to be humorous, it is in fact a serious statement on:
(a) how Clients do negotiate, especially when they bring procurement in and
(b) how agency people come back to the agency and try and rationalize what their Clients want to reduce in the SOW.

Enjoy.

David Ogilvy's First New York Office

2010-12-15T16:39:00.005-05:00

Strawberryfrog's new office on 60 Madison Ave. is in the original office started by David Ogilvy in 1948 when he moved from George Gallup in New Jersey to Manhattan.

I visited the new offices on the 12th floor which was the exact floor that Ogilvy Benson and Mather were founded in the USA.

It was the most southerly agency on that magnificent mile of Madison Avenue one could find America’s—and therefore the world’s—most celebrated ad agencies: Ogilvy Benson & Mather, Young & Rubicam, McCann-Erickson, Grey Advertising, Ted Bates & Company, J. Walter Thompson, Benton & Bowles.

Scott Goodson, founder and Chairman told me it was appropriate that the agency that started one of the longest running revolutions in the business was followed by Strawberryfrog that introduced a new model to the world based on cultural movements.

Goodson was way ahead of his time, before the social media technology caught up with Goodson's beliefs which puts the agency on the leading edge to tap into the new technologies based on 12 years of cultural movement experience while the big agencies, dinosaurs in Goodson's parlance play catch up.

In fact David Eastman, new CEO of JWT told me he needs to hire 150 digital people in 2011 to achieve the expertise he desires. Strawberryfrog already has the experience, the cultural movement steps battle-tested and is rapidly scaling up.

Proof of concept was the recent acquisition of Procter and Gamble's Pampers brand Worldwide Digital AOR and more recently, a major confidential multifaceted long term mobile Apps project.

So David Ogilvy's 60 Madison lives again, perhaps the next long living cultural revolution in the form of Strawberryfrog.

Canadian born Swedish and Dutch experienced Goodson, like Ogilvy, has crossed the Atlantic to conquer the highly competitive New York market.

The current portfolio of famous contemporary brands includes Blackberry, Jim Beam, Pepsi, Smart Cars,Liberty Mutual, Sabra.

I wish him luck.

Grand Central

2010-06-06T14:06:00.011-04:00

The picture below is the gang from the July 2009 workshop in New York.

Lucille Schur's drawing is the last one posted by Emily if you click on the title link. (Lucille is bottom left of the photo).

Camie Davis, one of the co-founders of Jacob Collins' famous schools, Water st Brooklyn and Grand Central Academy will sadly be leaving. Here is her farewell blog entry.

We wish her well in her future school start-up.

"To my students at GCA, you have given me so much, your efforts have fueled my own. Your dedication to the highest level of quality and craftsmanship has deepened my own appreciation for the tradition of Classical Painting. Each of your own moments of success has left me with feelings of great pride. I continue to support all of you and your continued education. I continue also to support the GCA and its incredible faculty, many of whom were students at Water Street with me. I am very sad to leave you but I hope you will all support my chasing my own dreams of a school dedicated to the genre of "Narrative" within Classical Painting.

My warmest wishes to you all and remember......

-Where is my light source
-What direction is the plane facing
-Gradation, gradation, gradation

"One can have no smaller or greater mastery than mastery of oneself"
-Leonardo Da Vinci

-May the form be with you all

Camie Davis June 2010

Thunderhill 25 Hour 2007

2007-12-26T19:59:00.001-05:00

This is a link to the start of the longest endurance race in NA, described as severe endurance racing. We finished 10th in class driving car # 09, Wheels America 2.

What has this got to do with Integrated Marketing a gentle reader may ask.

Nothing would be the truthful answer. But I have always like the metaphor of racing for integrated activities in that it is not the driver that wins but the team. The Integrated team that does each of it's jobs well and when integrated by a great manager has the best chance of winning.

Here is the report on the NASA race written by official VSCCA scribe Jim Donick, one of our co-drivers.

25 Hours of Thunderhill:
A not quite Vintage Adventure
By jpd

Editor’s note: There is a concept in our family called the “yup bag.” Part of life’s adventure is to fill it up. One fills it with experiences so if anyone ever asks if you’ve driven a Ferrari, for intance, or flown an Aeronca, or fished the Battenkill, you can respond with a quiet smile, “yup”.
Like many sporting motorists I’ve dreamed of taking part in a 24 hour endurance race. Mike Donick, Jeff Schur, and yrs trly took the opportunity this year to do that in the 25 Hours of Thunderhill out in California. Why 25 hours you might ask? Well, one could argue that 24 hours is ok for the French, maybe, or that there are enough 24 hour races that nearly anyone might try one of them. One could also simply suspect lunacy on the part of the organizers. You, gentle reader, may form your own opinion.

Thursday 29 November, ‘07:
Arrived at the track from San Francisco around 2:00pm.
It’s a test day for some cars. We should have done that.
Our truck not there
Recon laps are offered for street cars at 5:00 for an hour - Much Help. Thunderhill’s a three mile circuit with fifteen corners. Several of them are blind and off-camber. The recon laps were after dark but at least we have an idea which way the course goes..
Still no truck
Called - finally - truck broken along side of road ten or more hours away.
COLD evening

Friday 30 November, ‘07:
Truck waiting in line ahead of us when we arrived at 06:45. They had been alongside the road somewhere between here and Texas for 12 hours with a broken fuel pump. Very nice guys but looking a little tired.
Walking to the car, Jeff and I wonder if this is really about the stupidest thing we’ve ever done or maybe a grand adventure. Time will tell.
Our team is Wheels America from Dallas, Texas. There are two cars. We are in the 09 car and are sponsored by TireShoppe.com. Our teammates are in 05. I’ve bought some last minute team baseball caps for our four drivers. Bought ‘em in San Francisco on Wednesday (limited selection available) and they say “Property of Alcatraz.” Hence, we in the 09 car are now unofficially “Team Alcatraz.”
Looks like 71 or so cars here for the race.
Class E2 contains our Spec-Miata, the ITA Mazdas, the RX7s and a few others. This is the slowest class. Fastest will be the Daytona Protypes. There are a fair number in the middle as well.
Morning session is COLD and very very windy. Cold continues through the day - wind dies down.
Early practice unpleasant due to mixed traffic. Also difference between driving an Allard for 26 years and driving a “momentum” car that works rather differently.
It’s quite a ways from vintage racing, where we are happy to let the faster guys have the line, to the cut and thrust of endurance racing. There will be much to learn.
As time progressed I got a little quicker but Mike and Jeff were well ahead of me. Finished the day with a short stint at night. It will prove interesting.
Still awaiting the arrival of our fourth driver.
Got closer to the groove.
New Driver for “Team Alcatraz” - Bobby Carter - arrives, a HOT shoe and very experienced at Thunderhill.. He came in and qualified the car - cold and in the dark - 3rd in E2 with a 2’09” The 05 car, with team owner Bob Stretch at the wheel, is first in E2.
Drivers all pleasant.
Car had a few prep issues. Bad wire to the Cam Sensor cost us some time.
Jeff more uncomfortable at night than I am, I think. Him faster overall by a fair bit, though.
Bobby gave us a chalk talk in the trailer after practice. It should help.
Tomorrow, per schedule, I don’t get into the car ‘til after 3:00 PM. Bobby starts and runs a single stint. Then Mike, then Jeff then me to do the twilight shift. Then we each do a single up to nearly midnight then Bobby does a Double. Then Mike and Jeff do singles and I come in to do the dawn patrol. We shall see how this plan holds up.

Saturday 1 December, ‘07:
Saturday Morning comes early.
We’ve got to get to track but I’ll not get into the car ‘til nearly dusk. Need to be there for the start, though.

11:00 Green Flag after Opening Ceremonies with Honour Guard from the Air Force
Bobby in our car at the start.
Full Course Yellow around noon
05 Car is leading the class; we are second.

13:05 Michael in car. We leading from 05 but only for about a lap while he pits.

13:10-ish Full Course RED

15:00-ish Michael into pits after a two hour stint. Schedule going out the window as stints are longer than anticipated - good gas mileage and yellow flags. Mike did a very good drive: turning mid-teens.
We sitting 3rd in class.
Traffic seems to already be getting lighter.
Temperature getting colder.

15:00-ish Jeff in car and going well.

15:20 Full course yellow for 15 min. (looks like there will be a lot of these and not worth logging all of ‘em)

16:50 Jeff comes in for my drive.
Beautiful partial moon rising in the east.
Our lights are on.
Looks like I’ll not get a stint in daylight today.
Everybody’s headlights and driving lights already on. Damn, but they’re bright.
Traffic fast. Closing speeds difficult to judge with simply bright lights in mirror. They look a lot closer than they actually are.
Car developing a bit of a miss similar to the one in practice. Comes in around 6500 rpm but is very intermittent.
Whacked by a passing car as I’m moving over for the apex on turn 9. Thankfully not much damage. Looks like it only knocked off a piece of bondo. Not pleasant, though.
It’s painfully slow driving while watching the mirror.
Chris Puskar in the 05 car had the drive train let go (differential) and stopped on the circuit - left hand of track - coming into Turn 9. This brought out a full course yellow and the pace car. While pace car was gathering up the cars behind me, I came around and pushed Chris back to the paddock. (Should anyone ask, we were “bump drafting.”) It was really kind of wild, the pace car was coming up about three cars behind with everyone in line behind him. There is no passing under yellow so, when I pulled over to push Chris, they all stopped and waited then followed us around. It was a hell of a neat parade! May not have been fast this stint but “ACE Towing” eased things for the entire team. We’ll talk about that one for awhile. I should have gotten his AAA card.
Finish the stint (1 hour and 45 minutes) after another yellow.

18:40 Handed over to Bobby. He promptly went out and the car died on his first lap.
Spent an hour behind the wall diagnosing the problem which was the same cam angle sensor plug wire as yesterday! An hour behind the wall is costly.
Once car is fixed Bobby puts in a set of blistering laps. He’s local and quite the Miata expert. His father is a racer and is with us as crew. His grandfather was Dick Carter, who raced Shelby Mustangs on the left coast when they were new. Both father and son are pleasant, helpful, and very hospitable - a great addition to the team.

21:32 Mike in car.
First time ever racing at night. He’s as fast as in daylight and is having a ball.
No significant issues.

23:14 Jeff takes car.
We have now been running for 12 hours. Only (?) 13 to go.
Jeff does a great job with the car but is dealing with a serious miss most of the time.
Closing traffic unpleasant for him - closing at unpredictable speeds and our engine off song - but he keeps us going and in the hunt. This ignition thing is intermittent but getting worse.
Jeff, the trooper, keeps on motoring.

SUNDAY 2 December, ‘07:
01:35 Jeff comes in and I take over.
The miss is getting very serious
Car becoming more than unpleasant to drive but hazardous.
Bring it behind the wall for a diagnosis.
It is the wiring to the damned cam angle sensor again.
They do some fixing and send me back out.
After another 20 laps or so it is getting very ugly again so back behind the wall and they take another shot at fixing it. This time it works but it’s, at best, jury rigged.
Once back out I’m having a ball - a moderately slow one, I regret to say - but a ball never-the-less and not off the pace.

03:25 Top up the petrol and send out Bobby.
Michael arrives back in pit from his rest at the hotel
Bobby sets fastest lap of the race for class E2 on this stint.

04:00 Bobby in for a deflating rear tyre (left) and a loose rear axle locating bolt.

04:15 Starting to rain! That wasn’t in the forecast. Where did THAT come from?

04:48 Bobby hands over to Mike.
He comes into the paddock pushing the 05 car that has run out of gas this time as we had a long full course yellow right about then.
Mike has a great stint and runs a bit faster than the 05 car for part of it.
Rainy and wet for most of the stint.
The kid can drive.
Dry line emerging again near the end of the stint.

06:55 Mike hands over to Bobby who sets another fastest lap for the class. (This one holds to the end of the race) Mike’s stints now over

07:30 Sun is up and we are still running!

07:52 Bobby comes in and hands over to Jeff.
Bobby’s race is over.
Now Jeff and I need to bring the car home in one piece.
Jeff turns in competitive lap times and makes no mistakes.
He’s happy when he brings it in.

09:00 Amazing number of street cars in the paddock up on jack stands with pieces missing off of them. It’s been a long night.

09:24 Jeff comes in and hands over to me.
Jeff’s stints are done.
We’ve now got 2.5 hours or so to go.
Car running well.
Do my best with it for first hour and forty five minutes and am enjoying the track.
Rain for part of the time.

11:00-ish In for a “splash and dash” then back out.
If this was LeMans we’d be done!
Ratchet it down a bit more to ensure we finish.
Giving faster traffic the old “Lime Rock point by” and most respond well.
One guy in the #6 Miata helps me down the straight a couple of times with a bump draft. It was fun - not something one does often in an Allard - and enhanced the camaraderie.

11:30 Half an hour to go. Don’t do anything dumb.

11:40-ish Full course yellow for maybe ten minutes. Somebody must feel foolish.

11:58 The leader is coming up behind me.
He sits on my tail at reduced speed from turn 8 around to the front straight. I try to point him by but he’s having none of it.
Will it be noon when we come around? My calculations suggest not but as we come onto the straight I see the checker furled in the starter’s hand.
I pull a tad left and brush the brakes to make sure the leader’s nose comes by ahead of me. Not planning to go around again.
We take the checker together.

NOON: “Ever finish a 25 hour motor race?”
“Yup.”

2006-12-20T11:57:00.000-05:00

Kramer Loses Control of his Brand

2006-12-13T09:57:00.000-05:00

The link will take you to the video of a man destroying many years of building a brand image. He may never recover

Why is this relevant?

Because the emerging media can do similar things to a brand that abuses the new rules of transparency.

Wal-Mart for instance tried to fool people by setting up their own social network, The Hub. It did not take long for them to be pilloried.

MySpace and other social networks all have the same potential to damage brands that try and manipulate them in any way.

Bloggers are now taking money to support brands and the great unwashed public, now the savvy digerati know this.

So to all marketers who try to be hip, the marketplace will react. As David Ogilvy once said, "look before you leap".

Integrated Marketing-Tautology in the making

2006-11-14T15:05:00.000-05:00

One of my readers, Michael Antman, kindly sent me this article which I thought I would share with you.

It sadly makes perfect sense showing that the real progress toward Integrated marketing being widely and professionally practiced is still in it's formative years, despite Stanley Tannenbaum's book on the subject written a dozen years ago.

(Click the headline to visit McSweeney & Antman's website)

UNDERSTOOD, EXPECTED AND ASSUMED: THE FUTURE OF INTEGRATED MARKETING
COMMUNICATIONS.

"Which one of these terms doesn't belong?

Automatic elevator.
Electric lamp.
Electric toaster.
Long-playing record.
Integrated marketing communications.

The odd term out is, of course, Âintegrated marketing communications.Â
That's because all of the other terms are examples of Âpleonasms,Â in which
extraneous words are used to explain a simple concept. After all, we just
assume that all elevators these days are automatic, and don't require
white-gloved operators to punch in your floor selection.

These terms weren't always pleonastic, however. Back when each of these
innovations were first introduced, there were older and less-efficient
technologies already in place, such as gas lamps or vinyl 78s that could
hold only a handful of Al Jolson's greatest hits. And in the days before
advanced toasting technology brought mankind the miracle of the BLT, bread
was held on long forks over roaring fires, so when mankind made the epochal
leap to the Âelectric toaster,Â both words were needed at first to
distinguish the new-fangled plug-in kind from the sort that scorched your
knuckles. These days, though, the modifier's just trimmed away.

The reason that Âintegrated marketing communicationsÂ (IMC) isn't yet a
pleonasm is that it just isn't possible to assume that any given marketing
communications program is, in fact, integrated. True, virtually everyone
these days calls themselves Âintegrated,Â but it's likely that 90 percent or
more of all marketing departments and agencies out there still practice
segregated marketing, or, at best, some form of integrated marketing
communications that just isn't fully baked.

The problem is that IMC is still very much of a new concept that's barely
out of its beta phase. From the perspective of clients, that's bad news: It
means they're still paying for the equivalent of gas lamps and open fires
instead of the powerful, mutually reinforcing, synergistic marketing
communications programs they should be getting.

Though there are many definitions of IMC, and its history doesn't
necessarily follow a clear path, in general IMC was originally understood to
mean the coordination of all marketing materials, including advertising,
print collateral, packaging, in-store displays and the like, so that a
consumer encountering a POP display would immediately recognize it as coming
from the same advertiser who did that wacky ad he just saw.

Believe it or not, after all this time, there are still B-to-C advertisers
who don't even do that much.

Later on, the concept, if not the practice, of integrated marketing became
more sophisticated, recognizing that well-coordinated marketing materials,
while generally an excellent idea, were only the end result of a consistent
methodology in which the marketing team, the in-house advertising and public
relation staffs and all marketing communications agencies work together
toward a common goal.

An obvious, unexceptionable idea, but one that rarely works in reality.
There are just too many different departments, each with an abundance of
jealously guarded agendas and a paucity of knowledge about what the other
departments do, to make it work. Worse, there's very little inclination on
the part of senior management to knock heads together and make it work.

At some point, the big advertising agencies began buying up smaller public
relations, events-planning, marketing consulting, investor relations and
direct-mail firms, in order to be able to describe themselves to potential
clients as comprehensive integrated marketing communications resources, and,
more specifically, to avoid leaving any tasty crumbs on the table when a new
piece of business was passed around.

The problem with this model is that just because a direct-mail firm is owned
by an advertising agency, it doesn't mean that the direct-mail folks and the
advertising folks will be any more sympathetic to, or understanding of, each
other's goals and ways of working than would otherwise be the case. In fact,
the potential for turf fights between two agencies with common ownership may
be greater than it is for two unconnected agencies.

Worse, by pretending to be all things for all clients, this version of IMC
risks seriously misleading clients by creating marketing communications
programs based on false premises. If a client that doesn't really understand
the difference between marketing and marketing communications comes to its
advertising agency for a comprehensive marketing plan, the agency probably
won't say no, even if marketing isn't among the Âall thingsÂ that it offers.
Instead, the agency will do a half-baked marketing analysis and the client,
perhaps not knowing any better, will accept it as validation for whatever
campaign the agency itself comes up with. It's likely that any number of
multi-million dollar advertising campaigns have been founded on such thin
gruel.

The good news is that there's another, better incarnation of integrated
marketing communications Â the kind that really works Â but achieving it
requires that two enormously important missing pieces be put into place.

The first is an integrated marketing communications sensibility that
pervades every level of an organization, especially senior management, so
that heads that haven't been knocked heretofore soon will be, and those
individuals who are more focused on keeping their heads down, playing
politics or winning awards than on working with their peers to create
effective communications will soon be toast.

Indeed, the most critical challenge in creating a truly integrated marketing
communications culture is nurturing truly integrated marketing
communications practitioners. These individuals might not be experts in
every form of marcom, but they must be able to develop enough understanding
of each form so that, as the lion lies down with the lamb, the advertising
creative and the P.R. professional can work together in a coordinated
fashion to advance their company's cause.

Which is, after all, what it's all about.

And that brings up the second missing piece: Sales. It is perhaps stating
the obvious to stress that the only true purpose of marketing, advertising,
collateral and all of those other functions that are supposed to be
integrated is to help a company sell more products and services. Of course,
bringing the sales team into the mix is particularly important in the B-to-B
environment, where sales people are in direct contact with the customer.

And yet how many advertising creatives ever talk to the persons who are
actually responsible for selling their company's or client's products? How
many companies habitually invite sales professionals into marketing
meetings, or marketing executives into sales meetings? How often do
companies or agencies go to sales departments to ask them what kind of
collateral they need, and then go back to them to get their approval of
concepts or copy?

Conversely, how many front-line sales people communicate the real-world
customer intelligence they glean directly to the people who are responsible
for forming their company's marketing and new product strategies?

The answer to these questions is also the answer to why, regrettably, the
term Âmarketing communicationsÂ must still be modified by the word
Âintegrated.Â The truth is, there are too many cultural, psychological,
bureaucratic and physical barriers keeping these professionals from sharing
their invaluable insights. And until this changes, companies will continue
to experience inefficiencies, miss opportunities, and spend more than they
should on marcom programs.

It may take an outside force Â an agency that understands and has practiced
true marcom and sales integration Â to help senior management get the
marketing, marketing communications and sales teams working closely together
for the greater cause. But one way or another, those companies that manage
to get all the parts clicking nicely will over time outperform those
retrograde competitors that remain hunkered down in their separate fiefdoms.

A truly integrated marketing communications capability is, or should be, the
greatest thing since toasted sliced bread. But of course, we don't call it
Âsliced breadÂ anymore. It's just Âbread.Â

So, too, should we be striving to call our discipline merely Âmarketing
communications,Â because, if we advance the state of the art in IMC to where
it ought to be, the ÂintegratedÂ will be understood."

Michael Antman
Principal, McSweeney & Antman

Managing Multidimensional Disciplines

2006-11-03T16:45:00.001-05:00

David Maister wrote this article about managing a lawfirm, but it is equally applicable to a service industry like an advertising agency. Here is the summary of what he says.

The full article is worth a read on David's website, (click the headline for a hotlink). Like much of David's advice, it is worth following but it is only followed by precious few because it forces hard choices.

"Professional businesses today are structurally complex organizations with many senior people overburdened by time-consuming and often conflicting roles.

Professional businesses often have some combination of

* Business unit
* Geographic markets or offices
* Division or department
* Product line/service offering
* Industry group
* Key account team
* Committees (recruitment, training)
* Task force or project team (service innovation, new offerings)

Each of these organizational groupings can, and does, intersect with duplicated missions, overlapping membership, and common resource pools to draw upon.

We frequently hear comments like this from members of management:

It is not at all clear what each of these groupings should be responsible for and how their activities should be coordinated and evaluated. If you are a key player in this organization, you can spend an inordinate amount of time in meetings. There has got to be a better way to organize for effective operations!

There is a better way, but the way professional businesses organize and manage has not kept up with their increasing complexity. Eventually — we think sooner rather than later — this will significantly impede their continuing success."

Mercedes Sales Rise to a record March

2006-04-17T10:56:00.000-04:00

Unlucky for big Julie maybe, but the Ides of March were good to Mercedes.

Sales were up 18% for the month, +17% for the year. Hopefully the nay sayers who have said nothing about how wrong they were thus far, are reading these results against their dire predictions about the demise of Mercedes-Benz.

They are surely realizing now that Integrated Marketing Campaigns work over time and while they maybe less sensational than the Apple 1984 Superbowl ad, they ensure every customer touchpoint is reached appropriately.

March did not include the G Class and sales of the new M were up 63% versus year ago, which augurs well for the light truck category.

But the stellar performance of the new S Class, up 119%, is consistent with the auto pundits praise of the redesigned model.

As reported on this blog, (Mercedes In Decline, we think not, 09/28/05), the S Class is the first effort for Scott Keogh in his return as general manager marketing. One of the touchpoints was a regular series of small space newspaper ads, never very popular with creatives in general, but a key component of this S Class creative campaign that supported Television with a DNA only Mercedes S Class could run.

Behind the scenes was the launch website that gave existing owners and hand-raisers early information as well as timely direct response.

Properly Integrated Marketing is the best stealth weapon as the most recent Mercedes sales prove. Each touchpoint builds exponentially on the previous one and the accumulation is more effective than a few more noticeable impressions. It is also more cost efficient.
But to some, it is less sexy. We don't plan to change this view, especially if they are competitors.

Dieter Zetsche Speaks At DaimlerChrysler's Annual Meeting

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Dieter Zetsche, CEO of DaimlerChrysler, took the stage at the company's annual meeting yesterday. As has been his motto in recent months, Zetsche preached a message of increasing operating profit by making the company more efficient and more flexible. To do so, the company will aim to make their administrative functions leaner and strive to eliminate redundancies between the Group and divisional levels. By accomplishing these tasks, reporting and decision-making will be performed faster, which Zetsche believes will "enable our operating units to focus on their core business of developing, building and selling fascinating vehicles."

−

http://www.emercedesbenz.com/Apr06/12DieterZetscheSpeaksAtDaimlerChryslersAnnualMeeting.html

Thu, 13 Apr 2006 07:45:00 CST

Integrated Marketing leads Mercedes resurgence

2006-02-01T12:09:00.000-05:00

In a previous post, (Mercedes in decline, we think not), we predicted the following.

1. Mercedes was not in decline. Sales would exceed last year and post the 12th consecutive record sales year in the USA.

2. General Manager Marketing Communications and Mercedes veteran, Scott Keogh and Omnicom agency Merkley + Partners, are well on the way through a major initiative to restore the creative to it's former distinctiveness before the personnel changes that disrupted it. (From it's historical success).

The all time high sales of 224, 000 are a matter of public record.

The AdAge article by Jean Halliday below is the first public ackowledgement that the second prediction was also accurate.

The recently introduced S Class integrated Marketing campaign used a clever blend of "traditional; media", you know the dead one, TV, that all the new media use to promote their media, interactive and direct programs.

In a classic roadblock media buy, the agency took advantage of the President's speech to launch the new S Class to the widest audience possible.

This followed months of careful nurturing of interest generated by publicity, using the web to sustain it and ultimately turn it into action once the cars became available.

The other integrated program details for this finely tuned campaign which was brilliantly executed by the Omnicom Integrated Marketing Partnership are accurately described in Jean's article below.
(Reprinted for those without access to Adage online)

MERCEDES LAUNCHES AD BLITZ TO RECOUP LOST GROUND
Despite Record U.S. Sales, Automaker Still Trails Luxury Rivals
January 31, 2006
QwikFIND ID: AAR36I
By Jean Halliday
DETROIT (AdAge.com) -- Mercedes-Benz, the fourth-ranked luxury auto brand, is looking to stake its claim for being obsessive about technology, safety and engineering in its marketing for the new 2007 S-Class in an effort to distinguish its brand from rivals Lexus and BMW.
The S-Class ad blitz combines brand and product advertising with a "left-brand-right-brain" approach in direct mail, TV spots and print ads that blend the car’s emotional heritage with a more rational presentation of its technology.

Intellect and emotion

“The exact place Mercedes-Benz needs to be is a balance of intellect and emotion,” said Scott Keogh, general manager-marketing communications, Mercedes-Benz, noting that the brand retains high scores from consumers for engineering and safety.
Even though Mercedes-Benz reported record U.S. sales last year of 224,269 units, it still trailed Toyota Motor Sales USA’s Lexus, BMW North America's BMW and General Motor Corp.'s Cadillac.

“What makes us different from Lexus and others is we have the heritage and authenticity,” Mr. Keogh said. Mercedes-Benz USA CEO Paul Hatala, who has been overseeing marketing at the brand since Mercedes USA Vice President of Marketing Michelle Cervantez left to head marketing at Hyundai Motor America five months ago, said, “It’s time to revisit some of that ground we’ve owned and had.”.

The ad blitz for the 2007 S-Class includes three TV spots from Omnicom Group’s Merkley & Partners, New York, that break this week on national cable and spot broadcast networks. The local TV buys include the upcoming Winter Olympics on NBC and Academy Awards broadcast on ABC, with a national buy during the NCAA basketball tournament in March on CBS.

In the TV brand spot, a robotic voice details the behind-the-scene processes Mercedes-Benz goes through for every model it builds: “Weld them. Dip them. Test them. Build them. Wreck them ...” the narrator pronounces.

Small newspaper campaigns

Mercedes-Benz is starting what it calls a “fractional campaign” in newspapers about the technical aspects of S-Class and the brand. Each small ad will focus on a single feature that aims to show it off “like a piece of jewelry." In one ad, a single car seat is shown with the headline “The world’s most beautiful seat.” Another ad shows an air bag carrying the headline “An airbag for Mensa.” There will be a many as 60 print executions this year.
Mercedes said it is moving from lifestyle Web sites to third-party auto shopping sites to better reach in-market buyers. Carol Goll, general manager-brand experience marketing at the automaker, said Mercedes-Benz generates roughly 40,000 buyer leads monthly from online sources -- half from its own mbusa.com and half from independent car-buying site such as Edmunds.com and kbb.com. That’s why the sedan’s online buy starts in February on those two sites and those of auto-buff books through March. Critical Mas, Calgary, handles the online effort.
The automaker launched a micro site for S-Class in December and has since gotten 110,000 unique visitors, Ms. Goll said. Seven hundred of those visitors opted in for more information about the car; 350 asked to be contacted by a dealer.
The brand will get exposure in other ways too. The $85,400 car will be driven by Meryl Streep in this summer’s “The Devil Wears Prada” for which Mercedes-Benz will do special screenings but no other advertising.

Velvet box direct-mailer

And in the past week, Mercedes-Benz sent out a high-end direct-mailer in a velvet box to 300,000 S-Class prospects themed “A great leader always makes a lasting impression." It was preceded by a “holiday card” mailer about the redone model to 100,000 current and former owners of the car. Omnicom’s Rapp Collins, New York, handles that work.

The high-end model is a low-volume seller. Mercedes said it sold 16,036 S-Class sedans last year in the U.S. vs. 20,460 units in 2004. Sales often dip during the last year of an outgoing version.
In the first 10 months of 2005, S-Class received only $67,000 in measured media backing compared to $2.8 million in the same 2004 period, according to TNS Media Intelligence. Meanwhile in the same time frame, total Mercedes-Benz spending dropped 20% to $109 million, TNS figures show.

Mr. Keogh said spending behind the S-Class launch is “substantial,” but he declined to reveal specifics.

Integrated Marketing needs Integrated talent-Globally

2006-01-20T10:57:00.000-05:00

The process of Integrated marketing has become inextricably linked with the ability to correctly and quickly identify the right talent. Globally.

This expertise based need was highlighted early last year when Omnicom was not successful in pitches against competitive holding companies. From last summer on, they have steadily defeated the opposition gaining more real revenue than the initial losses as well as a sharply honed set of battle proven best practices.

Omnicom, the largest communications company in the world has 80,000 employees.

But prior to the demand for Global pitches in the last couple of years, a formal process for identifying talent had not been necessary. Omnicom as a holding company is a small, simple organizational structure. The informal social networks have been reasonably effective at putting experts in touch with those who are in need of their services. As McKinsey says, "Around here, people know one another" is a common refrain. "If I need help, I know whom to call."

So the question appropriately asked by McKinsey was, "do you know who your experts are?"

(The title link requires a sign in so I have been fairly liberal with their content).

They advised that companies need a new approach to finding their elusive experts. Omnicom did just that.

"Expertise can be surprisingly difficult to find, even in institutions that have spent millions to attract and retain world-class experts. Take the experience of one manager at a biotechnology company.

Early in the project, it needed someone with deep technical knowledge of a particular protein. We spent weeks looking for an expert—calling HR, asking around the office, scanning personnel records. Finally, we concluded the expert didn’t exist. Three days later, I’m in an elevator complaining about this to a colleague, when the woman next to me turns and says, ’I wrote my doctoral thesis on that protein. What do you need to know?’"

Such inefficiency and reliance on chance would normally be unthinkable for corporate resources. Project managers don’t find cash lying around in elevators. Store managers don’t idly speculate on the whereabouts of their inventory. IT managers don’t spend weeks rummaging through offices for spare computer terminals. Companies, after all, follow well-established processes to connect valuable resources (cash, inventory, equipment) with the people who need them.

But the days of knowing whom to call may be over. Mergers, growth, globalization, and employee turnover have diminished the ability of informal social networks to ferret out experts. As a result, many companies are no longer willing to let serendipity dictate how their experts interact. A growing number of companies, including BP and IBM—afraid that their productivity may fall, their time to market slow, or their competitive position erode—have adopted more systematic approaches to both finding and leveraging expertise.

A large high-technology company spent tens of millions of dollars to develop a state-of-the-art expertise portal that it rarely uses or updates

Unfortunately, there has never been a good way to get the job done. Until recently, companies had two primary ways of capturing their expertise: document repositories and expertise databases. Neither can help seekers of expertise very much. Written documents reflect only a fraction of what an expert knows, while expertise databases suffer from inadequate classification schemes and tend to be out-of-date almost from the moment of inception. (One large high-tech company spent tens of millions of dollars developing a state-of-the-art expertise portal, which it rarely uses and even more rarely updates.)

Context is king

Expertise is difficult to find largely because it can be difficult to pin down. Suppose a colleague asked you to describe your expertise. How would you respond? If the question came from a stranger in a distant corner of your company, you might give a general answer such as "market research" or "clinical-trial design." But if the question came from the next desk, you would probably be more specific, giving your area of specialization within market research or mentioning the clinical trials you managed. To a colleague in another country you might give a geographic answer, while you would tell a local about your product expertise. And so it goes.

That is because the answer to "What expertise do you have?" depends on who is asking and why. The question, by itself, is too abstract to invite a meaningful reply. People looking for expertise are doing so within the context of specific problems. Cash, inventory, and equipment are always the same, but expertise is defined by its context. That makes it an unusually difficult asset to identify.

Moreover, in most cases, finding an expert is less about identifying the world’s leading authority on a recognized topic and more about reaching the person who happens to fit the demands of a particular situation.

Sometimes, the expertise wanted can be very narrow—the call might be for someone who has launched a product in a particular geography or worked for a potential customer. This type of expertise can be the most valuable of all. But it is often the most elusive because those who have it might not think of themselves as experts.

The problem of context befuddles most of the expertise directories that are in use today. Such directories contain short, context-free summaries of a person’s areas of expertise. These summaries have their benefits—especially in small companies that have relatively few experts, so informal social networks can complement the directories. But the abstracts generally are not up to the challenge of identifying the large amount of highly specialized expertise that is available in large companies with tens of thousands of employees.

What did Omnicom do?

We mapped out the specific business process and knowledge needs with the help of the Global pitch leaders. In addition to their counsel based on learning, they gave us a wish list of what they would liked to have had prior to the pitch and when they would like to have had it.

We also tested the process with 52 of the top CEO/COOs from Omnicom companies worldwide, as well as senior Harvard faculty from the Graduate School of Business.

If you can pass muster in this arena, you are close to a viable solution.

We were able to marry the business process and knowledge needs with an existing technology within Omnicom that was able to work around most of the problems articulated in the McKinsey article.

We were able to develop a unique method that functioned far more like the "Next desk" example than an expertise directory or experience database. The additional good news is that this system can not be duplicated by the competition as the information is unique to Omnicom.

This analysis not only helped identify a solution to a problem but opened up a better way to deal with broader talent issues that occur as an organization grows and matures. The technology also provides a better response mechanism for the broader aspects of integration, especially on a Global basis.

External and Internal Integration

2006-01-05T10:43:00.000-05:00

Al Ries's piece in Adage sparked the e-mail correspondence below.

What Al is really saying is that there was no Integration between the Acura's apparent wish to build a luxury marque and the showroom/service delivery system.

Lexus on the other hand, understood the need for what Al calls internal and external integration.

This is a good example of two smart companies going at the same market differently.

Lexus really wanted to be a luxury car company.

Acura wanted to sell luxury cars.

Lexus, from day one has embodied perfect integration, very hard to achieve in the automotive industry where dealers at the point of service are independent owners.

Hal Riney helped Saturn do much the same thing by ensuring that the total ownership experience for Saturn was fully integrated.

John Wren, Omnicom's CEO said to me yesterday that you can not train people to do this level of integration. They need to be imersed in it and learn by osmosis. They believe in it and like Lexus, they become it.

Then they enjoy the momentum that one sees in a winning football team that is unstoppable because it believes it will win.

I remember working with AMC as they were sliding off a cliff, ordering lobsters from Maine to be flown in for lunch while we were talking about deals to finish off the Spirit and Concord brands. Moving deck chairs on the Titanic sprang to mind. I was asked to leave Detroit for shouting iceberg. They believed they could not lose.

GM then, and Google now, believe they can not lose. That is a very different attitude to believing they can win. Google's shares may well hit the $600 smart people are predicting. But being surrounded multi-millionaires does increase the will to improve and innovate.

Lexus did this at the outset and in typical Japanese Keizan fashion, continues to make small improvements today while copying all major innovations, especially from Mercedes-Benz. Very smart using Mercedes as a development vehicle.

To the enthusiast, the product remains copycat. The style soul-less. The drive feel antiseptic.

But for the luxury target who can live without the Mercedes badge, the product is reliable, smart, good value, and drives well for those wanting a smooth trouble free experience. The sales experience superior, women friendly and service remains as close to impeccable as you can get with complex mechanical machinery.

Every piece of communication, verbal, experiential, targeted, interactive or mass media is consistent with the above.

As McKinsey says, "The 'moment of truth' in customer service" finds that to win the loyalty of customers—and translate it to the bottom line—companies must boost the emotional intelligence of frontline workers.

Both the Internal and External positioning are consonant.

This is true marketing integration.

Those who pay lip service by connecting slogans. Those who focus on only one side of positioning are putting their brand at risk to be superseded by the Lexus of their category. Read about the search engine branding disaster in Al's article and remember a time when dot com brands were contrived in elevators.

Only those who have been immersed in integration can really prevent you from making the same mistakes as Acura.

Only those who have lived External and Internal integration can help you create the marketing equivalent of Surround Sound for your brand.

Dear Jeff:

Thanks for your long and interesting email about
the Lexus/Acura situation.

And I certainly agree with your comments.

One thing I should have mentioned in the article is
the fact that a strong "external" position also tends
to drive "internal" positioning.

Because Lexus was a true luxury car, they thought of
themselves as in the luxury car business and they handled
their customers and their showrooms in the same manner.

But over at Acura, it's hard to think of yourself as in
the luxury car business if you were selling the cheap Integra
line.

All the best.

Al

Al Ries
Ries & Ries
2195 River Cliff Drive, Roswell Georgia 30076
phone: 770.643.0880 fax: 770.643.0051
website: www.ries.com email: al@ries.com
laura's blog: www.originofbrands.com

-----Original Message-----
From: Jeff Schur [mailto:jschur@merkleyandpartners.com]
Sent: Tuesday, January 03, 2006 11:34 AM
To: al
Cc: laura
Subject: Googling of the Marketing Industry

All the best to you and Laura for 2006.

Loved your article in AdAge.

One difference you did not focus on between Acura and Lexus was that Lexus
was a more single-minded brand that stood for a luxury product but also for
the no hassle, no haggle, female friendly, low jock factor sales, service
and ownership experience that the brand, Lexus, became famous for.

Acura on the other hand spent time and money promoting two brands,
attempting to differentiate the performance driven Integra and the Luxury
Legend.

The Integra, really a sporty Accord was hardly a premium priced car, nor
could it be taken as a serious alternative to a BMW as a performance
contender.

The Legend was really a more luxurious version of the six cylinder Accord
the Japanese refused to give Tom Elliott when he was the head of marketing
for Honda at the time.

So the two headed Acura Marque was indeed half pregnant and a brand not used
anywhere else in the world at that time. If memory serves me correctly,
Acuras were only available in the USA and were badged Hondas in Japan and
elsewhere in the world.

Whereas Lexus was singleminded in it's mission to give customers a luxury
alternative for a Mercedes- Benz at a better price, deliver it with a true
luxury experience and build a luxury brand worldwide.

Again taking the cue from Mercedes, they have only recently begun to pay
attention to the performance experience, but under the Lexus brand,
including racing sponsorship. Wise? Time will tell.

So perhaps it would be more correct to say that Lexus was the first true
Japanese Luxury brand.

Regards,

Jeff

Integrated Marketing- The new price of entry

2005-11-23T09:54:00.000-05:00

The New York Times yesterday (Click headline for link) quoted new CEO McCleeland's arrival at advertising agency Cliff Freeman as "indicative of the efforts that agencies are making to bolster the ranks of senior management to address the challenges they confront as consumer behavior and media continue to change.

Mr. McCleeland's experience in what is known as integrated marketing -
that is, campaigns that include non-traditional elements as well as
conventional outlets like TV and print - is of particular value as
marketers strive to broaden their media selections beyond the usual choices".

McCleeland goes on himself to say, "Now for an agency, integrated marketing is the price of entry to compete for clients," Mr. McCleeland said. "You can't talk to them without the goods."

We could not agree more. And it's particularly gratifying to have a maverick like Cliff Freeman agreeing with the position we have held for years now, ever since Omnicom owned DAS CEO Tom Harrison began expanding his roll-up strategy. While Integration has been an enigmatic goal for many since Stanley Tannenbaum's book "Integrated Marketing Communications" was published in 1992, it was not until Harrison really initiated the momentum amongst the nearly 200 Omnicom marketing services companies in his DAS group which now contributes well over 50% of Omnicom's revenue.

Harrison,an ex-entrepreneur who founded one of the first DAS companies, Harrison Star,has now written his own book, "Instinct" (Warner business Books 2005).
While this book deals with entrepreneurial instinct and not integrated marketing specifically, Tom's inspiration to integrate marketing services is raw entrepreneurialism and the opposite of the bureaucracy some holding companies are falsely accused of.

Omnicom refers to itself as a holding company of talent. But one could argue that that is just another way of saying a holding company of entrepreneurs.

Like Tom, many of the DAS company CEOs founded and built their companies from the ground up. I have built two and now work for a Global giant holding company.

In every discussion with Tom and other senior Omnicom executives, the subject is entrepreneurial. It's what the Harvard Business School would call the Service Profit Chain based on the book written by Professor James Heskett, Baker Foundation Professor at the Graduate School of Business and Len Schlesinger, CEO of The Limited Inc.

Integrated Marketing is simply the exploitation of Jim's SPC.

Each marketing company used to deliver customer service is a link in the chain. As the cliché goes, "a chain is as strong as it's weakest link".

But the chain needs to be strategically grounded to be relevant and must be executed on a simultaneous but integrated basis.

This is where most integration becomes disintegrated as the marketing services silos retract into their own shells to execute their discipline and deliver their P&L at the expense of integration. (See 11/15 post).

Tom recognized a long time ago what others are just seeing now. Integration is not a theory or a new buzzword for a fad. It's good business.

But like any good business, it needs to be properly structured and managed. This has been the challenge in the past. Now we have developed best practices based on years of solid experience and in market results.

Marketers no longer have to pay for experimentation. Provided they hire experienced people to set up and run Integrated Marketing according to proven best practices.

A New Breed of Executive needed- Integration Experts

2005-11-15T15:18:00.000-05:00

The following article appeared in the Wall St Journal today. (They still don't get viral media so no link, here is the whole article).

"They all talk about it, but everyone is having a difficult time of doing it," says Al Stefl, senior vice president of communications for Nestlé USA.

At Omnicom we have been doing it for the last six years. The only thing we agree on is that it is not easy.

But we are apparently five to six years ahead of the pack in experience based on this article.

So to Al Stefl and any Marketers frustrated by the difficulty, if you really want true integrated marketing from your marketing services companies, we know how to get it done.

We have done it for Mercedes-Benz and other blue chip brands in the USA. We are doing it for Bank of America Globally. Exxon-Mobil is benefiting from the shortened experience curve as the best practices learned the hard way are applied in people, process and technology are being honed into leading edge Global practices.

We can apply it regionally and even retail like 7-11 and Lowe's.

There's no business like Integrated Marketing. Don't experiment with people who have not learned the hard way. Experience.

Multimedia Killed the TV Star:
Ad Firms Revise Their Approaches
By SUZANNE VRANICA
November 15, 2005; Page B9

The makers of television commercials have long called the shots at most Madison Avenue ad agencies, reflecting the central role historically played by TV in advertising. But as advertisers put more emphasis on direct marketing and other techniques, the center of gravity within agencies is shifting.

Rising in prominence are executives who can devise ad campaigns that integrate all types of media, including less-glamourous "marketing services," such as direct marketing, public relations and "in-store" advertising.

In a sign of this shift, ad agency Publicis USA this week is expected to promote the head of a marketing-services unit, Debbie Yount, to a new post with the encompassing title of "chief holistic officer." Ms. Yount's job is to get agency staffers to think less about TV-centric campaigns and to devise campaigns that use whatever media suits the client's target audience.
[Debbie Yount]
Ms. Yount will have access to all of Publicis' clients and will report to Susan Gianinno, the ad shop's chief executive. That puts her on an equal level with regional ad agency heads who also report to Ms. Gianinno. Publicis USA is a unit of Paris-based Publicis Groupe.

Two other agencies took steps in the same direction last week. WPP Group's Ogilvy & Mather decided to combine the internal profit and loss statements of its ad agency and its OgilvyOne marketing-services unit in North America, hoping to encourage the two businesses to collaborate rather than compete for client dollars. The firm also elevated executives from the two units to be co-chief executives of Ogilvy North America.

In a similar vein, Interpublic Group's Foote Cone & Belding plans to hire creative executives capable of generating ideas that can be used in all types of marketing -- not just TV. Money for the hirings will come from eliminating a layer of existing management, the firm said last week. "Agencies are waking up to the fact that it isn't about TV anymore," says Steve Blamer, chief executive of FCB.

The shift on Madison Avenue comes as new technologies, such as digital video recorders, are making it easier for viewers to avoid TV ads. Just last week NBC Universal agreed to offer ad-free versions of some of its broadcast and cable shows on an on-demand service offered by DirecTV. "Consumers are not waiting around to see our next 30-second TV commercial," says Ms. Yount.

Advertisers increasingly see TV ads as one part of a broader campaign that might also include online ads, public relations and direct marketing. To devise such campaigns, agencies have to get their different units to work together.

That's a task easier said than done. Creative executives have long treated colleagues in marketing services "as poor second cousins and not respected" their businesses, says Ms. Gianinno.

"They all talk about it, but everyone is having a difficult time of doing it," says Al Stefl, senior vice president of communications for Nestlé USA, referring to the ability of agencies to break down barriers and move beyond TV ads.

At Publicis USA, Ms. Yount won her stripes by playing a key role in winning business from Tumi, the luggage maker. Rather than showing off a conventional TV commercial, the standard centerpiece for such a pitch, Ms. Yount's team skipped TV and proposed a campaign revolving around airport advertising.

For several years, Publicis Groupe CEO Maurice Levy has argued that the firm needed to use a "holistic" approach to servicing clients, rather than focusing on TV. The firm was one of the first to merge internal profit-and-loss statements for advertising and marketing services.

Kirshenbaum and Bond a bridesmaid-again

2005-11-15T14:56:00.000-05:00

No-one likes an I told you so. But on 08/24 I wrote in "BMW Review Update" that this fine agency whttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifas unlikely to be able to win an automotive account.

I know having talked to the MDC people that they are not thrilled with the costs of finishing second, which is as we have said before, the most expensive place in an agency review.

AdAge today reported that GSD&M won the BMW business from , the final two. (Click link on title for full article).

The reasons will never be public. While I am delighted for my kissing cousins in Texas who won, I really feel for Jonathan and Richard. They deserve better. There should be more automotive business run out of New York. Maybe they will finally get the message that as brilliant as they are, they need specific automotive help to break this multiyear multi pitch losing steak on automotive accounts.

Win the next one guys, hire a specialist. Not a "Car Guy" in the derogatory sense, but someone who can go toe to toe with a Tom Purvis (BMW CEO) and be credible. Someone who can help you overcome the inherent prejudice automotive companies have against New York agencies which was well articulated in Rothenberg's "Where Suckers Moon".

It's hard guys, but there are people out there who can help you next time. And there will be a next time.

An American Pilgrimage to AMG

2005-10-25T14:49:00.000-04:00

This is a report on my "vacation" from integrated marketing.10/15-24/05.

Although the project is clearly an integrated marketing program involving three departments at MBUSA, Mercedes-Benz AMG Germany, Mercedes Motorsports Germany, SpeedChannel, DTM (German Touring Car Series), ITR, the governing body of that series, as well as the Hockenheimring racetrack and a host of German race sponsors, I am writing this blog from Germany as a personal travelogue.

Read it only if you love motorsports. Also read it if you own wish to own or simply want to find out more about AMG and what it would be like to experience driving these high performance Mercedes-Benz cars on the racetrack and autobahns in Germany.

10/16/2005.

Arrived in Frankfurt after a nightmare flight from Newark in middle seat 53E, about as far back as a 747 goes. This seat has a three legged configuration so both feet can not fir into the foot cavity which can not even accommodate a briefcase. The perfectly nice cardiologist from Cologne just happened to be a 250 + pounder, so he and I sat with our arms squeezed in our laps for the 7 hour + flight.

Sprinting from terminal C to A via a long line of security screening, I missed my flight to Stuttgart.

I ran into Bobby Akin, Integrated Marketing VP of Speedchannel and an accomplished driver himself. He is the son of the late Bob Akin, a friend and one time driving instructor of mine. Bob was one of the great American Sportscar drivers who was tragically killed at Road Atlanta in 2002. Bob was a two-time 12 Hours of Sebring winner (1979, 1986)the latter with Jo Gartner and Hans Stuck in Bob's 962. He raced in six 24 Hours of Le Mans races, finishing fourth in 1984. He won International Motor Sports Association's world endurance championship in 1986.

Bobby was at the airport on his own, so he and I shared a cab to the Nestor Hotel in Ludwigsberg, just before Stuttgart and near Affalterbach, the home of AMG, our first stop.

AMG stands for Aufrecht, (Hans Werner, aka HWA) and Melcher, the two founders of the company,and Grosaspach, the town near the current home in Affalterbach, where they had their first garage. Initially they moonlighted while working for Mercedes with Melcher eventually being fired for spending too much time building racing cars with Aufrecht. They only used Mercedes engines and cars for their racing efforts, virtually inventing the sport of sedan car racing in Germany.

You can read the history on the website, but AMG is the Performance division of Mercedes-Benz. Their heritage is racing and this dominates their culture, thinking and technology development. (select AMG on) MBUSA.com).

Our mission was to film what an American owner or potential owner would experience if they visited AMG and signed up for the AMG Experience, see AMG driver training. In 2004, the cost was $7,500 (ex-travel), which included a great helmet worth around $700.00.

As soon as we checked in, we went out on the road with the film crew to look for country locations for driving scenes. So we got relaxed tour of the pretty German countryside outside the industrial city of Stuttgart. I am always amazed how the Europeans are able to maintain the balance between cities, towns, agriculture and suburbs, a skill that allows small farms to survive. It also makes for a much prettier rural countryside right near the big sometimes not so pretty cities.

My Mercedes USA AMG colleague Rob Allan and I enjoyed the E55 AMG loaned to us by the factory. This was my first chance to let this great car run on the autobahn. I had done 155 mph in this car on the oval track at Texas Motor Speedway so I knew what it felt like at speed, but running at that speed in normal Sunday traffic was a great experience. More on the autobahn later.

This car tracks very true at very high speed and has all the power and you could ever want in a high performance sedan. It just sits planted on the autobahn at 150+ mph giving you the confidence to pass cars driving in the right hand two lanes, which you approach at impossibly fast closing speeds compared to highway driving in the US.

The seat action that hugs you in the corners is a great sensation as the car senses the minimal lean and counteracts it by the seat hugging your hips on the opposite direction of the turn.

We got off the autobahn and drove through the picturesque country roads that comprise lush green crops and undulating hills. We saw a surprising number of vineyards, especially on hilly terrain where the vertical plantings broke all my high school lessons about contour planting but added a marvelous almost sculpted visual effect to the hills. Germany makes great wine which mostly goes unnoticed.

The green hills were occasionally interspersed with the blue of cabbages and the pale brown of the freshly harvested turnip fields, with thousands of turnips piled in triangular man made turnip hills near the roadsides of the fields. The result adds a colorful but subtle pastel hue, almost watercolor palette to the landscape.

Also dotting the landscape were the older buildings, schlosses etc. as well as quaint South German houses in this typically Schwabian area.

The overall impression is one of neatness and order.

Back at the hotel we were exposed to a common theme on the trip. Smoking in restaurants and public places. While I am not in favor of legislating smoking rules, I feel one should have the choice. In most places, there is a very theoretical line between the smoking and non smoking areas. At Frankfurt airport for instance, the coffee shops have two rows of tables close together. One has ashtray one does not. But second hand smoke is everywhere, which is not fair to non-smokers.

10/17

We drove through the very rural area to Affalterbach a pretty little town. AMG is in a small industrial area behind the town. A vast Glass and steel complex surrounded by cornfields and chicken farms that smelled like horse manure to the uninitiated nostrils of us urbanites.

Our Speedvision show host from the US, 4 time Trans Am champion Tommy Kendall who has won almost as many races as Mark Donohue, quipped, "you could smell the horsepower in the air".

AMG does not build cars. They design, develop and specify AMG equipment but they build engines, one at a time by hand. You can read about the one man one engine philosophy on the website.
So we met the man who would be your host if you went, Martin Heiss, who gave us unique access to an engine testing room which is a glass encased view of the dyno test. What makes this different from any other dyno machine I have seen, is that you can watch and listen to the dyno while they show a lap of any racetrack in Germany. The dyno is linked to the actual telemetry from the track, so the video shows the tach speedo and other gauges while the engine in the dyno room is synchronized to the real-time input from the hot lap. We watched Hockenheimring, the F1 track near Speyer with ex-DTM Mercedes driver Bernd Mylander run an SL65 around Hockenheim.

This is the first time I have seen a professional racecar driver do a hotlap in a box stock street car. While this twin turbo V12 engine with 604 horsepower and 738 foot pounds of torque is no ordinary car, you can drive it out of the showroom here and terrorize any street Bimmer or Ferrari on a racetrack in the US.

The SL65 AMG was voted “The Fantasy Convertible” by the New England Motor Press Association (NEMPA), consisting of New England-based automotive journalists. They tested the limited-production, high-performance hardtop convertible during its annual Ragtop Ramble convertible driving event from Boston to Kennebunkport this summer.
“Why fantasy?” asks Gerry Miles, NEMPA President and automotive editor for New Hampshire’s Portsmouth Herald. “Because it would be a fantasy to own one, never mind be lucky enough to secure seat time behind the wheel of one.”

I wholly endorse this decription. I have driven the SL55 AMG at Texas Motor Speedway at 150+ mph and the SL65 on the autobahn at 280 kph (170 mph) on the autobahn. All I can tell you is that this car will hold it's own with any car, anywhere.

We filmed the engine room where each man builds each engine in about a day and then signs it with a personal plate. The twin turbo takes about three days and each and every one is dynoed of the V12s. If you buy one, you may call the man who built it if you wish. It is a good thing my wife did not see this engine plant as even Martha Stewart would find it spotless and organized.

We popped into the world's most unique restaurant for lunch. The PS.

It is a private restaurant for AMG and it's customers, which is located in an Olympic style Dressage and riding arena, indoors an out, which adjoins AMG.

HWA has two daughters who compete at the Olympic level. On land surrounding AMG, he built this arena for his daughters to train. And inside it is the restaurant.

We had lunch with Mario Spitzner who is responsible for marketing AMG worldwide.

Mario made one of the most interesting pronouncements I have ever heard for a marketing man. He told us they did not want to grow any more. That their cars thrived on limited production for exclusive buyers. Not only cars for people like the sheik of Oman who demand special models like one with military grade night vision as an example of the incredible customization AMG will do for millions of dollars. But the C55 AMG, while retails for around $50,000 in the US. Every Mercedes model available in the US has an AMG version, so performance is available in a wide variety of configurations from the race ready SL65 to the family sized ML63 due next spring with the new generation of performance engine. (See Mercedes-amg.com).

While the sheik does not mind being talked about, most AMG buyers demand secrecy. While we know that the customers include most if not all the celebrities who love cars, their names will never be revealed or testimonials used in marketing AMG cars.

We met Klaus Ludwig at HWA racing where the raft of racing trophies is displayed along with some of the most exotic race cars, now out of production, in the world. AMG and Mercedes relationships are more complex than most. Hans Werner Aufrecht racing is the racing team personally owned by the founder.

This unit, in close collaboration with AMG, builds all the Mercedes racecars for the DTM (Deutschen Tourenwagen Masters) series regardless of race team and sponsor. In 2005 the series is supported by Mercedes, Audi and the GM German marque, Opel. Sadly, with GMs problems, it is the last year of Opel support.

In addition to building all the Mercedes cars for the series, HWA has it's own team, as does Mercedes Motorsports, all sponsored by different co-sponsors, just to add further complexity.

We will give you a race update of the DTM series which will be decided this Sunday, 10/23/05. In 18 years of DTM, the fight for the championship has been decided in the final race only 7 times. Gary Paffett in the Daimler-Chrysler Bank Mercedes has won 5 of the DTM's ten races so far the last one at the premiere race outside European Istanbul. The British driver still needs one point to take the title away from last years champion, Mattias Ekstom (Audi) who is second overall.

Only once has the leading driver lost to the second place man in the final race.

In 1991, Mercedes-Benz driver Klaus Ludwig came to Hockenheim with an eight point lead. In the wet race, the 4 wheel drive Audis were stronger and Frank Biela claimed the championship for them. While BMW privateers race, DTM has really been an Audi Mercedes contest, with Mercedes dominating the win loss column. Sinc then 4 wheel drive racecars are banned as there is no way of equalizing machinery.

Klaus gave us the coolest interview I have ever seen with a race driver, and I have seen some of the best including Senna, Prost and Mansell. They say that if you win LeMans you are a hero, twice you are a legend. Klaus won Le Mans 5 times and dismissed the accomplishment with one of his typical been there done that shrugs and a Mona Lisa like smile. He spoke fondly of his racing experience in the US where he raced for nine years winning the Camel GTP 5 times and 24 Hours at Daytona in 1986. He was very complimentary about NASCAR, it's organization, promotion and stability with sponsors. He also said we could learn something about safety from Europe.
If you watch the show on Speedvision you will see what I mean by cool.
Klaus has really done it all and deals with it nonchalantly.

He parked his 240 D station wagon and hopped into an SL65 which he put through it's paces on the autobahn at almost 190 mph. The highlight of what he said though, was that nowhere in the world can you drive legally at 300 kph (187 mph) and in no other car would he feel as comfortable. The remarkable footage shot by SpeedChannel is really worth watching as Klaus gives you unique insight to high speed driving off the race track to give you a perspective on one of the acid tests for an AMG car, the German Autobahn.

Speaking of the autobahns, you can't always drive at unlimited speed, and not just because certain sections have speed limits as one of our crew found out to his cost via the incredible virtually instant camera fine system. Another thing that slows you down is the traffic, it is awful around Stuttgart.

Rob Allan and I took nearly three hours from Stuttgart to Hockenheim which is usually a 45 minute trip. The autobahn was jammed with trucks and other traffic. As one of our AMG hosts, Uli Fritz put it, "there are too many cars for too little roads".

We checked into a beautiful Spa, the Lindner, a five star hotel in Binshof outside Speyer. It is literally surrounded by pastures and fields. From there the track is a few minutes away, across the Rhine, unless it is race weekend when the track entrance backs up for miles as it does on a NASCAR weekend in the US.

10/18

Hockenheim, 7:30 a.m. Uncharacteristic warmth and blue sky, a perfect day to meet Tomas Yeager, a friendly unpretentious young driver who was now driving for Porsche and Ford after driving DTM for Mercedes the last two years.

He and Tommy went out and flogged the CLS 55 AMG. I watched them drift through turn 2 after a flatout run down the main straight. This stylish but sedate looking car puts it's nose down under the braking on those huge 17" discs and then turns in with a purposeful nose down attitude and goes through the turn with a minimum of lean that is almost unbelievable for a four door street vehicle. While both Tomas and Tommy were inducing oversteer for the benefit of the cameraman, this is only possible because of the amazing torque, 704 ft pounds and yes once again this is a street car that looks stylish outside the Metropolitan opera or the Academy Awards.

I also watched it go through the short chute after the hairpin where there is a kink on the way to turn 6, in front of the Mercedes grandstand. This is taken flat-out in a highly tuned racecar. I guess no-one told Tommy and Tomas that this was not a highly tuned racecar as they passed us at 150-160 mph. but it certainly behaves like one.

For Tommy's comments watch the SpeedChannel show on New Year's day. DVDs of the show will be available to AMG owners in the new year from the AMG website.

Next the boys took out the DTM AMG racecar, designed from the street version of the new DTM AMG which is unfortunately, only available in Europe. But unlike the current DTM AMG we had on the track as well,this has the new 63 engine that will ultimately replace all the 55s.

On the show you will see that unlike the rest of the cars we tested which were all silver, the DTM racecar was a bright orange. You can hear the difference as it roars though turn 1 as neutral as a go-kart. While they took it in turns to drive the DTM car, they also had the official F1 safety car, an SLK 55 AMG which has been modified to pace F1 cars under a yellow flag. So with lights flashing this car was put though it's paces on the track.

While one does not normally think that a Safety car's performance is critical, it has to lap quickly enough so that the F1 cars do not overheat behind it. In the rain, this car is fantastic. There is apparently a story that in one F1 rain race, the drivers were radioing the official driver, Bernd Mylander to slow down as they feared spinning out behind the rooster tail of the SLK 55 AMG flying through the rain.

The other impressive things about Hockenheim is that the teams all back identical big rigs up to the indoor garages that lead to their pits. There is a space for pedestrians and then the Mercedes Lounge which is set up like a luxury restaurant with full cooking facilities at the rear. On top of the garages and pits they pitch a tent the length of a football field. This is for the post race gala which in their case was also for the DTM championship ceremony.

The other neat thing is that there is an autocross in the middle of the track with a raised drifting course. There is also a 4X4 obstacle and balance course for spectators to enjoy on a race weekend. The additional go-Kart track was not operating during the race.

The track itself is new and pretty perfect. But as Klaus said, American racetracks are real tracks, meaning they have setting and elevations like the Nurbugring versus the new flat F1 tracks of Europe.

Monaco remains an anomaly as this street course can not possibly conform to modern FIA F1 standards, but I suppose not even Bernie Ecclestone can cancel Monaco with impunity.

10/19 Back to Affalterbach.

More filming in the engine room with COO Wolf Zimmermann. Like Mario, all these executives have tricked out AMGs with special equipment. Wolf also drives a 1964 300 SE with a full roll cage and rally equipment to the office.

Brand new CEO, Volcker Mornhinwehg has just joined from Mercedes referred to with mixed fondness as "the mother ship". An engineer by education, he had been head of human resources.

We had arrived at an interesting time in Germany. Angela Merkel was about to take over from Helmut Schroeder as chancellor in a very weak co-alition. The Chrysler Group's Dieter Zetsche was replacing Jurgen Schremp as CEO of Daimler-Chrysler and they had already announced they would lay off 8,500 employees. While this is no different from Dieter's reorganization plan that cut 26,000 jobs at Chrysler after he took over in 2000, it is an unprecedented cost control measure in Germany.

Jurgen actually showed up at the customer center where we had set up home base to take delivery of his new AMG, and it was more like watching a rock star as all the employees dimmed their lights so they would not be seen ogling the boss for the last time.

10/20 Back to Hockenheim.

We met Klaus early the next morning. The blue sky and crisp fall days we had relished turned into a more typical cold, damp German drizzle. And a chill that rivals a Honda shoot in Ballyhoulish Scotland, where our Canadian crew, fresh from an arctic circle dogsled shoot found that North American down gear just melts in the damp cold of Europe. We had to replace it all with wool.

Klaus and Tommy Kendall took the SL55s out on Hockenheim and thoroughly thrashed them.

Watching these two great drivers come through the sharp left-hander in front of the Mercedes grandstand was poetry in motion. They would bear down the short straight after breaking hard for the preceding the hairpin, brake hard again with smoke and the fresh smell of metal rotors on on metal discs reeking into the damp air, and then throw these $125,000 cars around the corner nose to tail. The rear would come out and the two would go through side by side at 45 degrees and then correct the power on slide in almost slow motion unison as the cars came back to parallel with the track and scampered off around the next right-hander.

Don't try this bit of automotive ballet unless you are Klaus and some one as skilled as Tommy is dancing next to you. While Klaus is Tommy's childhood hero, this is the first time they had met.

We nearly lost Tommy down the main straight as a sweeper vehicle did a U turn right in front of him when he was at full chat, maybe up to 150-160 mph. This was to cost us later on in the mysterious world of German bureaucracy.

Next was a unique ride to watch. Klaus took Tommy for a few laps in the DTM "taxi". This, to Klaus's chagrin, was last year's DTM car of Jean Alesi with an extra seat in it, which Tommy scrunched his 6'3" frame into. Robert Dalrymple, owner of the production company and I watched Klaus scream past turn 1, putting his right hand wheel on exactly the same spot of the bright blue and white rumble strip each time about three feet from us.
That's what driving the Hockenheimring for 30 years and being one of the greatest drivers will do. But Klaus' devilish streak emerged when he noticed from the far end of the main straight that Richard, our Kiwi cameraman living in Germany, had crept out further on the green run off area behind the alligator strips.

On this pass, the impish Ludwig buzzed the cameraman, riding his right front tire on the inside edge of the alligator strip. It was also his first really flying lap as it took two or three to warm up the slicks. The sound of the Mercedes screaming down the straight as Klaus took the touch shift sequential box up rapidly through the gears was more like listening to Valentino Rossi than a four wheel vehicle with a V8 engine. A passenger sedan at that. Two lightning quick downshifts and perhaps a two inch turn in on the wheel according to Tommy and he went through one in a flat-out scream like a banshee.

Anyone who has been this close to that type of action will never again think of Mercedes- Benz as a sedate luxury car.

The track strikes back and disappoints a two time F1 world champion.
In the afternoon, Mika Hakkinen showed up from his home in Monaco. Now a family man with two young children he drives a Mercedes M Class. But he flew his own jet to Baden-Baden and then too the train to Hockenheim to graciously film with us.

We were supposed to do hot laps with the Flying Finn in the CLS 55 AMG. Based on Tommy's brush with the track brusher, the track announced that we could only do flying corners. A great disappointment to Mika who told us that he wanted to drive the CLS "flat out" as he had never driven a street car on a race track before.
Mika, as Frank Reichert of Mercedes Motorsports explained, was an entirely different person from the Formula 1 days when he was painfully shy and famous for monosyllabic answers. It is also testimony to Tommy's interviewing skill and personal warmth that Mika opened up. Essentially he retired because of the murderous 18 race schedule, unlimited practice and worldwide travel schedule that gave him only 1 9 days at home.

DTM has 11 races, all in Europe and testing is very limited. So he gets to do what he loves and spend quality time with those whom he loves. His life is in balance and it shows in his surprisingly engaging personality. Plus his comfort with English is vastly improved.

As we met, Mika was in a three way fight for fourth place with former F1 driver Jean Alesi and four time DTM champion, Bernd Schneider now 41.

He and Tommy had some fun with the CLS 55 AMGs, but it was disappointing for everyone including the spectators who knew Mika was driving. You will hear some fascinating commentary from Mika talking car to car in the show.

At the end of the filming session, both Tommy and Mika burned the tires in what was for Mika an uncharacteristic series of donuts. This American custom also amused the German fans. As it was Mika and not just some crazy American, it was roundly applauded. I nearly said loudly, but was reminded of Mika's comment that the fans in the US were better and very loud, both in dress as well as decibels which he says he could hear at Indy over the scream of a 19,000 F1 MaClaren Mercedes in 2000 when his engine went up in flames.

Klaus had also complimented the US fans on loud enthusiastic support.

10/21

We were at Hockenheim for an early start, but we had given all the cars back except for an E55 AMG were were filming at Heidelberg that night, near the Neckar river, called the NASCAR river by TK.

Our job today was to film Norbert Haug, head of Mercedes Motorsports. As any TV station or camera crew will tell you, this is not an easy task. While sitting in the Mercedes Hospitality suite, we watched in awe as Gary Paffett, Jean Alesi, Bernd Schneider and Mika Hakkinen drifted in and out after being mobbed by the autographed hunters outside, to get their laptimes from the contiguous race trailer as well as sip expressos as good as any gourmet restaurant. Speaking of which, we ate a lunch there that was nothing like any racetrack food in America.

My colleague Rob Allan renewed his old acquaintance with Jean Alesi who had come to the Chicago Autoshow some years ago to with with Rob and AMG US.

Rob is really the father of AMG US. From the time I first net him in 1999 when he took over AMG, he was selling less than 300 cars a year. Now that number is a controlled 20,000, just under than 10% of total US sales, but 25% of the profit. The US at 55% of worldwide sales, the largest AMG market in the world.

Rob modestly takes little credit for this, but trust me, without him this could not have happened.

10/22 Qualifying at Hockenheim

DTM qualifying is a little different. They let the cars out in random order in a timed session which they use for what they call Super Pole. Then they let the top ten out immediately in a timed session, but in inverse order to the qualifying time.

One lap out, one flying lap and a cool off sets the race grid.

Paffett blew turn 6 and sits #3 with young Jamie Green, the 23 year old Brit ex-Formula 3 champion on his first DTM pole. Tom Kristenson is on the outside pole.

It seems unlikely that Mattias Ekstrom will hold his championship as he finished out of the top ten. Bernd Schneider, the rainmeister would have had the pole but he ran off the curb on the last turn. He starts #4 with Hakkinen 6th after Heinz Harald Frentzen, the ex-F1 Jordan driver in his last DTM race for Opel. Perhaps his last race.

After qualifying, we watched our friend Tomas interview Norbert Haug and the Mercedes Motorsports drivers. He of course had to translate for Paffett, Green and Hakkinnen who speak little or no German. They all treated the crowd very well and Mika even sat on the steps in the middle of them to sign autographs. Bernd Schneider however was in a different class. I saw him mingling with the crowd in the VIP lounge long before the interviews. He also spent time with groups including handicapped children and allowed countless photographs with his arm around people. The behavior of a true champion.

Tommy introduced me to Mario Franchini, Dario the Champ car driver's brother, whom I saw later that day but did not talk to. They had popped over for the race. Dario had driven DTM cars for Mercedes before coming to the US and was going to test them in Estoril Portugal in two weeks. Also keeping in with Mercedes Motorsports boss Norbert Haug is always a good thing if you can manage it, and Tommy feels Dario will end up in DTM one day.

The Mercedes Grandstand is a great place to watch the race as you have a purview over almost four turns and at least two passing zones.The Mercedes lounge makes some of the best expresso and serves gourmet food, very unusual for a race track. It also has a direct link to timing and scoring, is rainproof and warm.

As a matter of fact, the food was so good all week, Tommy and I had to stop for a pizza and beer on the way back from qualifying to feel normal again.

They have a pretty full race schedule tomorrow, with a variety of closed and open wheel as well as high and low budget machinery covering all German manufacturers.

10/23 Race Day at Hockenheim

The day is very cool, overcast and threatening rain as we head out to the track.

Everything was dry until the race was 5 minutes away when the rain came down. Jamie Green on pole was slow away in the wet and Bernd, the rainmeister checked out in his 200th DTM appearance, so there was no real race. The action was all behind Green and Schneider, between Paffett and the two Audis of Stippler, a young privateer in last years car, and Tom Kristenson, the wily old veteran of both DTM and Le Mans.

This was DTM racing at it's best. Paffett tried for a long time in 5th place to pass Stippler. Once he got by, he went after Kristensen, only Tom would have none of the Englishman's effort to pass. They rubbed and banged for a while until eventually Tom made an uncharacteristic mistake right in front of the Mercedes Grandstand where to the roar of the partisan crowd, the 2005 DTM champion went by Kristenson for a place on the podium behind Green and Schneider for a 1,2,3 Mercedes finish.

Hakkinen finished 14th after he tried, not very hard, to let Schneider by on team orders as he told us after the race. Schneider took out Hakkinen's rear wing, so he had no downforce for the rest of the race.

The other drama was a hard shunt by Frenzen who was taken to hospital but reports said he was fine, and ALMS champion Alan McNish whose door flew of entering the hairpin. This is Frenzen's last race in the Opel and perhaps his last race.

It was Laurent Aiello's race after a 25 year career.

In Formula 3, the boy wonder Lewis Hamilton won his second race in two days, flag to flag. Apparently this kid now 18 was signed by McLaren when he was 12 or 13.

The SEAT and Polo races reminded me of SCCA Spec Miata races in the US. Bump, bang and grind. I missed the Formula BMW races which are not very popular here. BMW withdrew from DTM some years ago after being thrashed by Audi and Mercedes and they may have lost fan support although their sales in Germany do not seem to have suffered.

The post race parties on Sunday are quite something, as mostly in the US we go home after the race and the big parties are on Saturday night which is not great for the drivers.

Anyway, we leave for home tomorrow, Tommy heads for LA while I come back to New York. Now we wait to edit and finish the show, which you can enjoy, Xmas morning, on Speedchannel, sandwiched in between the Barrett Jackson auction.

10/24 The Journey Home

Even the 45 drive from Speyer to the airport in Frankfurt was different, traveling comfortably at 180 kph (+- 112 mph) in the least powerful of all Mercedes models, the 240 D.

Tommy was leaving for LA via Atlanta so we said our goodbyes and Wedersens, until next time as Tommy signs off on his show.

Seat 25D on Lufthansa back to New York was a lot better than the way over and despite the fact that it was going to be cold and raining very hard in New York, the after effects of hurricane Wilma, it was good to be going home again. A week working in Germany is just the right time.

Hall Of Fame Integration

2005-10-05T17:31:00.000-04:00

Marketing Magazine Monday, May 9th, 2005

ICA identifies top 10 Canadian TV ads of all time

The Institute of Communications and Advertising capped off its annual management conference on Friday with the unveiling of the “top ten” Canadian ads “of all time” as voted on by the industry.

The ads were selected by more than 1,000 online voters who ranked more than 100 of the top winning commercials from the Marketing Awards and the TVB’s Bessies awards since the 1950s on an Adbeast Inc.-powered website this past winter. The contest was organized by ICA to mark the agency industry association’s 100th anniversary this year.

Only TV creative was judged and French language work wasn’t considered in the voting (a similar separate initiative to pick the top French Quebec TV ads was undertaken by the Publicité Club de Montréal (PCM) last year to celebrate its 45th anniversary).

The winners represent an impressive hall of fame of legendary Canadian ads, said ICA president Rupert Brendon. The top commercials, in chronological order, are:

• “Do You Eat the Red Ones Last?” Smarties, Nestlé Canada Inc., Ogilvy and Mather (1967);

• “Mona Lisa,” Caramilk, Cadbury Chocolate Canada Inc., Scali McCabe Sloves (1973);

• “Milk Moustache,” Ontario Milk Marketing Board, O&M (1974);

• “The Road,” A&W Food Services of Canada, The Woodall Workshop (1975);

• “Atlas Ketchup,” H.J. Heinz Co., Vickers and Benson (1980);

• “It Tastes Awful. And It Works,” W.K. Buckley Ltd., Ambrose Carr DeForest & Linton (1985);

• “Bike Story,” Canadian Tire Corp. Ltd., Doner Schur Peppler (1990);

• “Stuck,”Fruit of the Loom, Leo Burnett (1996);

• “The Rant,” Molson Canada, Bensimon Byrne D’Arcy (2001);

• “Dog Tired,” Pinesol, Palmer Jarvis DDB (2003).

More details on the 10 are featured in a special advertorial supplement marking the ICA 100th anniversary in the just-published May 9 edition of Marketing.

–Stan Sutter, in Bermuda at the ICA/AAAA management conference.

Doner Schur Peppler’s spots for Canadian Tire and Leon’s produced while Jeff Schur was CEO were declared advertising landmarks in 1998.

Doner Schur Peppler and McCann are the only two agencies to have two spots in the "Bessies" Hall of Fame.

First Inducted in 2000, they held this position through the three polls taken in that year and 2001 & 2002.

“Bike Story” produced for Client Canadian Tire in 1990 got the most votes as the single best TV commercial of all time in 2004.

But while the awards were given for the television, both campaigns were fully integrated strategic marketing approaches. The Canadian Tire spot could have been for Sears in the US, capitalising on the nostalgia of the times when catalogues were the only relief for hard work on the farm and long cold winters.
This emotional differentiation was then and remains now a very potent emotional differentiator that no retailer can match.It helps Canadian Tire remain unique versus the US competition from WalMart and others.

October 2004 - Strategy Magazine
Back page

The best all time favourite Canadian ads ever!

Folks got mighty nostalgic when asked to pick the Canadian spot that remains their preferred. Talk of childhood memories got these top ad vets, well, teary-eyed. Sigh. Here are their picks...(excuse me a second. Sniffle.)...and why.

by Natalia Williams
page 50

Canadian Tire A Bike Story

"Even describing this commercial I get choked up. I've been that kid. It's really a heartfelt commercial. They could run that commercial today and it would stomp on the crap they're doing now."

Marc Stoiber, ECD, Grey Worldwide, Vancouver

"This ad connects Canadian Tire to the fabric of Canadian

childhood dreams. As a kid growing up in Windsor, I used the catalogue

to decide on my gifts - and this spot is brilliantly produced and acted. Canadian Tire recognized its power when they brought it back for

their 75th anniversary."

David Strickland, SVP marketing, Zellers, Toronto

Who are the brains behind the indelible ads?

Bike Story:

Agency: Doner Schur Peppler

When: 1989

Click here for the full story

Marketing Magazine
September 28, 1998

The 1990's Landmark Canadian Advertisements

Canadian Tire (1990)

Advertiser: Canadian Tire Corp. Ltd., Toronto

Product: Corporate image

Title: "Bike Story"

Agency: Doner Schur Peppler, Toronto

It's hard to believe this ad was selling corporate image and not tissues, because anyone who's seen the tear-jerking TV spot sniffled and felt a lump in the old throat. (And they're lying if they say they didn't.) Who could forget the young Depression-era boy who dreams of a shiny red bicycle from the Canadian Tire catalogue but doesn't dare ask his hard-working farmer father for it? And when dad surprises the kid, saying, "Hey boy, I got a couple of new tires for you to unload" the look on the boys face is priceless.

Leon's (1990)

Advertiser: Leon's Furniture

Product: Furniture

Titles: "Witness \#1/\#2/\#3"

Agency: Doner Schur Peppler, Toronto

Ten years ago, furniture retailers planning their ad strategy had a choice: either the screaming SHOP AT CRAZY BOB's ad, or the soft-focus, Muzak-infested "Let me show you how comfortable this sofa is" narrative.

Leon's chose neither, and we're all thankful for it.

In fact, thanks to the "Ho Ho Hold the Payment" and "No Money Miracle" campaigns, consumers shopping at other retailers now expect not to pay until 1999.

But back then, it was revolutionary, and sales at Leon's skyrocketed.

Jack Bensimon, whose agency Bensimon*Byrne*DMB&B now has the Leon's account, says, "The humor was so powerful that today Leon's advertising is expected to be funny. And the idea that a big-ticket, fashionable product could be sold without beauty shots and pretty actors is still not widely accepted by most retailers."

The humor used in Leon's poked fun at the screaming retail salesmen of the day, best personified in the US by Crazy Eddie.

But it did this to achieve the strategic goal of making people like Leon's as a place to visit hang out and try out without feeling that a stalker will descend on you.

The entire campaign, from the Newspaper inserts to the showroom decor were designed to enhance this likeability factor, a key "Brod" Doner addition to the already award winning Schur Peppler & Associates agency which made it's name producing Integrated Marketing campaigns for Honda, when they merged in 1988.

Integrated Marketing With Celebrities

2005-10-05T15:46:00.000-04:00

In the final days of the Adweek conference in New York, Brad Fogel CMO of 24 Hour Fitness talked about getting the fit right for celebrity spokespeople. He and his agency, Hal Riney & Partners discussed the strategy of integrating personalities like Andre Agassi, Lance Armstrong and Magic Johnson into a marketing campaign.

Full text in Adweek, "Brands Keep in Sync With Celebrities" September 30, 2005 By Mae Anderson.

But who is Brad and where did he learn his craft?

Here is an excerpt from a letter he wrote to Marketing Magazine some years ago.

"The Canadian education of an adman "

"I was transferred to Toronto in 1988, a young advertising "buck" ready
to take on the world, not just Canada. After all, I was from the U.S. of
A., and we all knew that we knew it all. Funny thing happened though, I
met quite a few Canadians (and others not from Canada or the U.S.) who
not only knew as much, but in many cases more than me or most of my
American peers. Although I tried to fight it at first, I soon realized
that I had a lot to learn, and that the Canadian advertising industry
could be a great tutor.

More than eight years later, I am returning to the U.S. Working in the
Canadian advertising industry I have learned and grown, both as a person
and as a professional. I have been lucky to have known and worked with
some of the best in the business: Dan Peppler, Jeff Schur, Robert
Troutbeck, Geoff Arnoldi, Rick Davis, John Speakman, Bill Martin, Winnie
Alord, among others.

What all of these people have in common is something quite simple: they
have a passion and resolve which is truly inspirational".

I am privileged to have worked with Brad and am flattered he would mentioned me in his tribute.

But I am proud that Brad has taken the lessons of Integrated Marketing we learned together working with Honda turning them into some of the best work in the world.

Creative work from Doner Schur Peppler done in the early 90's was honored by the Institute of Canadian Advertising as one of "Top Ten Commercials of all time".

(See Hall of Fame posting)

Brad and I produced Integrated Marketing programs for Honda. This included full collateral, promotions (including Formula One), direct mail and retail services.

We worked at integrating celebrities like Burgess Meredith and Daniel J Travanti (Hill Street Blues) where Brad as he says, cut his teeth. He went on to work with Magic Johnson, Andre Agassi and Lance Armstrong in the US, while my New York agency produced work for WeightWatchers with Kathleen Sullivan, the sweater girl of the LA Olympics and with Cybil Shepherd and David Naughton, star of the now cult movie, "An American Werewolf in London", for Mercedes-Benz.

While anyone with money can use a celebrity, it takes a different skill set to integrate a strong personality into an appropriate brand campaign. As Brad said at the Adweek conference "It sounds obvious, but it starts with the brand. Many agencies make the mistake of starting with the celebrity."

Brad has learned well. I have been most fortunate to work with people like Brad.

BMW Bails Out of Films

2005-10-03T15:53:00.000-04:00

Jean Halliday wrote about BMW leaving Branded Entertainment in Adage, 10/02/05.

This followed an article by Lorne Manly, 10/02/05 NYT, On Television, Brands go from Props to Stars.

Max Sutherland reports that when the cult movie Sideways eulogized Pinot Noir, sales shot up 22%. (See Max's great reference, "Why product placement works".

Plan international's child sponsorship quadrupled after the release of About Schmidt in which Jack Nicholson in another dysfunctional role sponsors a young Tanzanian boy, Ndugu.

With this kind of sales potency, why would BMW be leaving the scene?

While early product placement, accidental or otherwise like M&Ms on ET is part of movie culture, "nowhere has (product placement) been more evident than with the James Bond movies, these have featured a proliferation of brands including Aston Martin, BMW, Motorola, Microsoft, Omega and Bollinger" according to Sutherland.

Because Marketing Integration is difficult and Branded Entertainment is a particularly thorny component.

Whether BMW withdrew because of money, the first reason given by Hollywood, or the complexity once International management became involved as Manly speculates, or whether Pat Fallon was right, (been there done that), we will probably never know.

But Brand Entertainment done right will continue to feature products, whether it is an entire movie like "The Italian Job" featuring Mini, or a tiny part of the story like ET's M&Ms. And the symbiotic partnerships will continue to work.

Whereas forced marriages, like "The Apprentice" and Dominos (also American Eagle Outfitters), Toyota and Home Depot in "The Contender", Disney and Nascar in "Herbie fully loaded" and the disastrous "Island" that lured a list of who's who of brands will continue to not only be expensive failures, but give the genre a bad name.

Musicians are not only looking at Brand Entertainment as a source of revenue by including them, but some have figured out that a brand commercial using their music is a medium.

"Strategic marketing opportunities are at the top of every artist's marketing plan says Randy Miller Exec VP Marketing Virgin Records. (What's in a name.)

Paul Oakenfold has partnered with Toyota to launch a new single which will only release next year. Says Oakenfold, "The ad will run over a thousand times. No disrespect to any record labels. but they cannot buy exposure like this."

The problem is to work around the long deadlines, complex cross silo negotiations which are often for an entertainment product that does not yet exist. And ultimately negotiating a fair price to ensure ROMI versus expensive buzz.

It also needs someone to guide you around the growing and much publicised ethical dilemmas posed by the rapid expansion of this marketing technique.

If ever you needed a professional to help find your way through this potential minefield, it is when talking to Hollywood. Some of the traditional advisers like CAA, William Morris and Endeavor are good and getting better, the latter even hiring top agency planner Martyn Straw to help Clients strategically align brands and entertainment. But they remain agents for people and properties.

The top holding companies have savvy and experienced specialists that can help you with a 360 degree vision that is agnostic of artists or entertainment properties. Bruce Redditt, Exec VP at Omnicom really knows his way around Hollywood. There are also nimble specialists. John Garland is one of the best.e-mail John@jeffreyschur.com. He is the brother of Charles Garland whose UK company produced American Idol.

A great surgeon at the Lahey Clinic in Boston, John Libertino saved my wife's life through complex surgery earlier this year. But this was due to the Greenwich Hospital System being smart enough to correctly diagnose the problem and advise us that "a community hospital can not do the procedure".

Our best advice is don't take branded entertainment or product placement to a narrow specialist or a general practitioner.

Branded Entertainment is not as complicated as surgery. It is also not about life or death. But it needs a specialist who has already practised the craft.

Hire an expert to help simplify it. For those of us who do this every day, it's not that hard to make it easier for you.

360 Degree Marketing Capability

2005-09-28T16:39:00.000-04:00

Top Marketing and Advertising executives agree, integration is really, really hard.

Shelly Lazarus, Chairman/CEO Ogilvy & Mather. "

"You need open-minded people willing to come to the table and be respectful of other peoples ideas."

Steve Blamer, Worldwide CEO Foote Cone & Belding.

"You need one check for all the services. Compensate everyone for working well together (that) rewards everyone on the team based on delivering results."

Ed Eskandarian, Chairman/CEO Arnold Worldwide.

"The key issue is hiring people who want to work as a team and accept that teamwork is the right approach."

Tony Wright, Worldwide CEO Lowe Worldwide.

"You can't turn everyone into a 360 degree thinker."

Becky Saeger, CMO Charles Schwab & CO.

"In the end, you can not rely on the agency."

Wise words from the some of the wisest in the industry.

This is why it took us five years to perfect the unique blend of strategy, alchemy, creativity, expertise, process and technology to facilitate it for Mercedes-Benz. And then came Steve Blamer's compensation.

The reason I am referred to as a pioneer because not only did I make many of the rookie mistakes as we all did, but we persevered for longer than the usual two year stint it takes most people to burn out. We worked through the entire process, including compensation. Also the diversity of disciplines we worked with, 15 at one time, was greater than other examples.

It took five years, but Integrated Marketing at Mercedes-Benz USA works. And works well. Now that the best practices book is written on Mercedes and other Omnicom Clients, it need never take this long again. As long as the team leader has done it before and top management, like the CEOs above, are totally committed to the team approach.

Developing integration at Mercedes-Benz took an enormous effort, from the holding company mandate and critical investment in the technology, the lead agency faith and the closely knit senior integration team built up over a number of years of working together that made the impossible dream of collaborative creative development a reality.

Great creative leadership was also key. Everyone knew that not only advertising disciplines would lead the creative process. The best concept were always developed, regardless of origin.

Becky Saeger is right, while we as an Omnicom team took the early initiative and developed the team, the systems and technology, the team chemistry we had built up was most potent when the Client astutely structured for integrated marketing.

Ironically, while the CMO issued a mandate to integrate the efforts of all silos, it was one of her reports, an inspired general manager who actually had the wisdom, took the initiative and structured for integrated marketing.

Quotes taken from The Delaney Report 09/26/05

MERCEDES IN DECLINE? We think not.

2005-09-26T13:10:00.000-04:00

As we said in the 08/15/05 posting when the media wrongly reported Mercedes in decline, we wish they would get the facts right. Now again there are inaccurate reports of Mercedes "still sputtering" and unhappy with their agency.

One report's so called M-B source who "confirms" these rumors obviously does not read or understand the sales results which are anything but sputtering.

Mercedes-Benz sales in the USA are on track to achieve yet another record year. It's 12th in a row.

After admittedly lagging in the first quarter by about 5%, the company has put on a spectacular growth spurt. Sales at the end of September were even with last year, a record year, and are on pace to finish the year ahead of last year.

This confident forecast is because sales to September only included a trickle of the R Class which is in the sweet spot between large SUVs that are falling out of favor due to gas price concerns, (Sales down 43% vs last year) and sedans that lack the utility of a SUV.

In contrast the Mercedes-Benz M Class was up 25% versus a year ago.

Very competitively priced for a large sporty luxury touring car at under $50,000, the R Class stunned the buff press and this car is poised to fuel Mercedes sales for the last quarter and exceed last year, for another record.

Mercedes quality has also returned to it's rightful #1 position. I addition to significant improvements in IQS, (Initial Quality Study) each year since 2003,a recent quantitative study in Europe showed Mercedes back to it's dominant position versus BMW and Audi.

Harris Interactive conducted this new research to understand the values that adult consumers from Great Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Spain associate with 21 major automobile brands ahead of the firm's attendance at The 61st International Motor Show (IAA) Cars in Frankfurt, Germany.

As far as advertising goes, Mercedes has been the victim of multiple Marketing Vice presidents over the last five years. Certainly the last two and a half years have considerably constrained the Merkely+ Partners team which has always produced world Class work that has helped keep the sales streak alive for eleven consecutive years.

M+P would be the first to admit that the creative may have been off track, but Mercedes and the agency, spearheaded by new General Manager Marketing Communications and Mercedes veteran Scott Keogh, are well on the way through a major initiative to restore the creative to it's former distinctiveness before the personnel changes that disrupted it.

Mercedes'only problems, and not insignificant ones, are in Germany, mostly stemming from the unprofitable Smart division which took a $960 million charge in April this year. While part of Mercedes-Benz, Smart has nothing to do with cars sold in the USA. This coupled with the management turmoil that led to the early retirement of Jurgen Schremp has led to adverse publicity in Germany. The instatement of USA experienced Dieter Zetsche will help resolve this situation in the long term. Progress has already been seen, particularly on Smart.

But the USA sales performance is stellar and on track for another record, helped by the agency team that has been a part of the previous eleven records.

This does not look like sputtering to us.

Google becoming Gobbledygook

2005-09-16T12:12:00.000-04:00

Again, Laura Ries and I are in violent agreement in her article, Google is Sushi.

Her father and partner Al told me they only learn from people who disagree with them. This posting should generate a few people to disagree with me.

I wrote some time back that Microsoft's MSN is not a brand. The recent speculation that they are aligning with AOL is smart in my view, as baggage and all, aol is a brand. And a brand that can compete with the big people, Yahoo and Google, provided they change their business model and move forward from their "training wheels of the internet" image.

But aol, through parent Time Warner and powered by MSN is potentially in the sweet spot of the future of the internet, content.

But the recent restructuring does not indicate that they have the focus right for MSN yet. "MSN does not have a coherent strategy". AdAge 09/21/05 (You may not be moving fast enough, Steve).

For good up to date commentary on the battle of the search engines, read John Battle's Blog.

TechWeb News reported on 11/04, that Yahoo Inc. has hired another entertainment executive to help in its battle against Microsoft Corp., America Online Inc. and others in the highly competitive Internet-portal market.

Yahoo announced Lloyd Braun, former chairman of the ABC Entertainment Television Group, would lead their media and entertainment division.

"The combination of Lloyd's extensive business and deal-making experience, deep and long-standing relationships in the entertainment and media industries, and his proven creative instincts make him the ideal person to realize the full potential of Yahoo's media and entertainment offerings," Dan Rosensweig COO said in a statement. "With Lloyd's expertise, Yahoo is better positioned than ever before to work with creative partners to deliver exciting new content."

Yahoo's media and entertainment division includes its movies, TV, entertainment, music, games, finance, news and weather, sports, health and kids businesses.

Braun led the ABC television group for more than two years and was responsible for all creative, programming and business areas of the division, which included Touchstone Television and ABC Entertainment. Among the programs Braun initiated were "Alias," "The Bachelor" and "Extreme Makeover."

Competition in the Internet-portal market is intensifying as companies jockey to become the primary site for consumers looking for news, entertainment, music and products on the web. Along with Microsoft's MSN and AOL, a unit of Time Warner, Yahoo is also seeing more competition from giant search engine Google Inc.

Yahoo is starting to have the discussion which is enlightened, though they are not yet ready to see where they could dominate because they are still tracking the two-ton guerrilla that begins with G.

But as Laura observes, the big G is going the way the other big G went. General Motors lost it's way too. And prior to Lutz, the insular culture would not allow GM to see that it was obvious what they were doing wrong. Now that they are in the mortgage business, it is probably too late.

Now that Google is adopting the octopus strategy as Laura puts it, it may be the beginning of the end, despite a war chest that could buy Nigeria. Unless they look outside their to date successful culture, toward the future.

Like Boston Chicken which screwed up a phenomenal singleminded chicken success with the octopus notion, "why restrict ourselves to chicken?". They spent chapter 11 inducing money trying to re-brand as Boston Market. They eliminated their point of difference and business raison d'etre and succeeded in getting their business down to manageable proportions.

Boston Chicken, now Boston Market, grew very fast, going national and moving its headquarters from it's birthplace in Boston to Chicago and Colorado as it expanded. It went public in 1993 and briefly became a Wall Street phenomenon, when its stock rocketed from the initial offering price of $10 to as high as $40.
But on Oct. 5 1998 the parent filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

It is now owned by the knowledgeable quick food operator, MacDonald's corporation.

Google needs to listen to the same people who predicted this stuff for GM and Boston Chicken.

It seems so obvious to those of us who work with brands everyday.

But people who have seen their capitalized value shoot by the establishment and stock go from an issue price of $85.00 to $295.00 in less than a year at last count can not be wrong. Or can they? We will see whether Google can find some way to balance their growth by reducing the arrogance factor and consulting with experts who do know a thing or two about branding and brand elasticity.

This places Yahoo in the best position in our opinion, if only they would seize the opportunity.

Google is an Octopus.

Microsoft and aol are going to be preoccupied with whose in charge and who is on first for a while. Especially if they have a co-ownership joint management deal, again.

Before they figure it out, which they will eventually, Yahoo can steal a march and dominate the new internet. Not another Al Gore version or one of George Bush's internets, but a true entertainment medium offering the best content in the most efficient way.

Yahoos biggest competition is going to be Cable TV and then the networks themselves. they should be very afraid. Yahoo should be very brave, and provide Mr. Braun a very wide mandate.

Cable and Network TV customers are totally frustrated with existing content delivery options.

CBS, after significant success with sitcom's like Friends & Seinfeld are flailing around copying Fox with reality TV and being scooped by HBO on home grown shows. The other networks are not much better.

Cable's movies-on-demand does not work properly. The model is broken and may be leapfrogged before it is fixed.

Alternatives offer Byzantine technology. If I told you we would offer music by mail @99 cents would you buy it? So why does Netflicks work in the US mail?

Netflicks works simply because others don't. Netflicks success is only a measure of others inefficiency and this inefficiency is an opportunity for new competitors like Yahoo who have not yet begun to capitalize on the paralysis of the entertainment delivery environment.

Look at Blockbuster, the most confused of them all. They are now copying Netflicks, the very competition ridiculed by Wayne Huizenga as he went through his arrogant streak after building a miracle from trash.

The cable companies are charging a fortune for content. Customers can not afford it. The full gamut now runs in excess of $300 per month. Don't believe it? Get a quote on all channels and all on demand services including Internet, excluding phone. This is not endearing customers.

Satellite companies have resorted to paying so called entrepreneurs to give away dishes. Is this s great business model?

Speaking of phones, if you have a cable phone, pray they don't cut you off when there is "trouble in the area" or you don't pay your bill by yesterday.

Internet users are frustrated with the whole Search Engine syndrome where the "targeting" is as blunt a media instrument we have seen, patently transparent to customers and at least as annoying as pop up advertising. Try Exactseek for a particularly vivid example of badness.

This is also starting to erode even trusted brands like Ebay and Amazon who seem to be temporarily blinded and have definitely lost their cutting edge position.

This is a brilliant background for Yahoo to light a beacon for customers and offer them unfettered entertainment content. A real alternative to cable for a start and a real competitor to the other long term survivor brand, aol, powered by Microsoft.