When P is king

Reading Dazed and Confused this weekend I came across these two examples of what I'd term "casual participation" (or customisation).

Adicolor: a customisation kit from Adidas comprising a bunch of pens and spray paints giving wearers the chance to add their own designs to the shoes.

PSPHomeBrew: an online community of geeks providing peer-to-peer advice and ideas of how to mash-up various other bits of technology with your PSP - e.g. connecting your PSP to a Commodore 64.

The interesting thing is how both youth brands have approached the P-Generation (P is for personalisation and participation). Adidas have whole-heartedly embrassed it, whilst Sony are battling it to the detriment of their brand. I'd guess that the main reason for protecting their control of the PSP platform is for economic reasons, as they want to sell more Sony authored software and add-ons, however I'm also guessing that in the longer term this stragegy may well backfire on them to the detriment of longer term profitability.

Compare Sony's approach to Apple's opensource iPod approach, as typified by iLounge and you'll get what I mean.

I think the message is clearly don't battle the P, but go with the P . . . (that sounds super weird!) . . . if you don't believe me just check out the directions of Apple's share price compared to Sony's.

Me me me!

OK - I don't want to sound like a self-indulgent prima-donna here, but today I'm going to write about me . . . yes, that's right, lil ole me! me me me me me!

Sound interesting? Mmm, well wait and see, though you'll be less than surprised to hear that this bout of self-indulgance has been inspired by a politician - the Labour ex-Minister and election supremo Alan Milburn.

In Wednesday's Guardian, Mr Milburn wrote a really interesting article about how the new challenge of progressive politics was to face up to the "me generation" and their disconnection from the mainstream political process. Milburn described the "me generation" as being "people more aspirational than ever who want to exercise control over their lives", and how this group was "less deferential to power and more used to democracy". Interestingly he also said that he thought the me generation "may feel empowered as consumers but not as citizens".

So it looks like a vote from Labour in favour of learning from the consumer world, as seemingly political parties have finally woken up to need to move towards a more participative mode of politics to suit the wants of a new wave of demanding citizens, who, like spoilt teenagers, won't do what they're told by the know-it-all grown ups.

To really understand how much ground Mr Milburn and his political side-kicks have to make up, I'd suggest they flick on their TV, go down to the local news agent or surf the net. Programmes like Big Brother, magazines like OK! and the phenomena of blogs and other consumer-generated content show just how ingrained the "me generation" is over whole swathes of the UK population.

It seems everyone is now obsessed by power and the cult of the self. Everyone has the power and technology to be a journalist. Everyone has the chance to live the fame dream, in however small or insignificant way - from posting their photo on Friendster for friends to see, to appearing on Big B. And to the annoyance to the political elite, it's becoming increasingly evident that the "me generation", like a bunch of power junkies, need to get their hands on more political power - and if they don't get it, they're going to throw their democratic toys out of the pram . . .

So following on from Raul's last post about the downfall of Boots in the Netherlands, I'd suggest the politicos learn from the painful failures of the likes of Boots and jump on the brand participation bandwagon before the consumers refuse to shop and political parties are forced to close.

Unfortunately like Boots, the Labour party isn't in a position to bale out of the UK and focus their investment in other countries. Or maybe they do, and that's why they're so interested in setting up new democracies around the world . . .

Camping it up

Out shopping in Notting Hill this weekend I came across another brand participation gem - this time it was footwear / lifestyle brand Camper who were taking brand engagement to a different level.

Interestingly Camper hadn't spent 10's of thousands designing an interactive exhibit, instead they'd spent a couple of quid on two marker pens (black and red) and decided to save themselves the bother of designing the shop interior by getting their customers to do the job for them.

The result was incredible, with a mixture of messages and amateur drawings filling the walls creating a giant red and black international blur . . . of course it was more incredible once I'd added my masterful message to it!

Interesting things re: brand participation that came out of this experience are:
1) Control: although there weren't any strict rules set by Camper to govern my participation with their brand there were a few non-explicit rules: a) only red and black marker pens were provided (these are Camper's brand colours) b) because of the environment you felt obliged to do something similar do everyone else - again keeping "on brand".

2) Barriers: participation is a choice thing, and it isn't for everyone all the time. You kind of have to feel in the mood, and there's also a real sense of "self-awareness" in participating in something like the Camper wall - i.e. is my entry going to be as funny / original / meaningful as someone elses? This self-awareness can also create additional personal barriers for people.

3) Word of mouth: because of the extraordinary experience, and because I was proud of my work I felt compelled to tell people about what I'd done and extol the virtues of Camper. From this perspective brand participation and word of mouth marketing go hand in hand.

4) Emotional engagement: because of the level in which I engaged with the brand, I do now weirdly feel alot closer to the brand - to the extent that I visited their website, but not to the extent that I bought a pair of their shoes (a taste thing!). I do, however, quite fancy staying at their hotel in Barcelona!

All super interesting . . . however, perhaps not as interesting as the message I wrote on the shop wall . . .

Storminghoek

The last post by Raul got me thinking . . .
At first I tended to agree with Raul's point about going off the point of this blog with his mentioning of www.stormhoek.com, however whilst eating lunch (meatball soup from Pret a Manger) I actually realised that Raul had hit on something really important re: Stormhoek and brand participation.

The whole Stormhoek wine blog marketing campaign is designed to generate a grassroots word of mouth buzz (both online and offline) around the brand by tapping into geek networks across the world and getting key influencers to talk about and interact (drink!) with the brand.

Conceptually what Stormhoek are doing is getting people across the world to participate in their marketing campaign, and do the marketing for them. This only works with a good marketing execution, and a good product, and it seems that Stormhoek have got both spot on. Raul's talking about Stormhoek in Amsterdam, I'm now talking about it in London . . . and so on . . . the buzz has started.

This links in with an early point (again made by Raul) about the different ways in which brands can open themselves up to participation. What Stormhoek are doing with their present blog campaign is getting people participating in their marketing process and online brand presence (i.e. the Stormhoek brand). This is an extremely bold move, and shows an extreme belief in their product.

Furthermore, thinking more about it, I might even make the bold claim that Stormhoek is actually a classic example of an open source brand - allowing consumers to shape their identity, with the public freely allowed to post their experience of interacting with the product live on their website and share photos of their experiences.

Googling around for other wine-brands shows actually how darn forward-thinking Stormhoek are, with their competition creating stale corporatey online brand communications like www.piat.co.uk. The two approaches are simply a million miles apart. Having drunk a bottle or two of Piat in my student days maybe there's a clear reason for not going the Stormhoek route.

So, all in all Raul I'd give yourself a pat on the back for accidentally stumbling across an open source brand in progress! Genius! I'd be interested to see if Stormhoek lives up to the hype, and their strategy actually pays dividends . . . over to you Mr. Lansink and your drunken Geek dinner . . .

The golden nugget

Yesterday in an email to a friend I said this:

"i love blogging!
gives you a weird sense of satisfaction"

As a general insight into the potential of brand participation, I think this is a nice concise summary. It's the "weird sense of satisfaction" that I'd say was the golden nugget of brand participation. The sensation and feeling you get from participating in something is intangible, however the things it leads to is definitely:
1) a closer relationship
2) a sense of self-worth
3) a sense of well-being (happiness even!)
4) a sense of being part of something
5) a sense of empowerment
. . .

The key thing as Raul mentioned a few posts back, is understanding how different brands can get the golden nugget working for them in different ways.
And the key question is: have you ever had that weird sensation?

When open sauce turns sour

Talking about the limits and scope of open source branding, there was a v.interesting little article in the Sunday Times yesterday about Wikipedia - the king of open source apps on the net.
The article points out a battle going on at the mo involving hackers adding spurious entries into the community-based encyclopedia and thus breaking the whole spirit of open source. Amusingly it seems that a number of mandarins (or their geeky researchers) from both Whitehall and Capitol Hill have been hacking the system and adding in damning, and some times humorous, descriptions to their opponents.

The point: this is a great illustration of the lawlessness of the net and the fact that OS culture is wide open to abuse. So what's the impact to open source brands? Does the presence of wreckers mean the death of the notion of a truly open brand?
I think this may well be a detail - however it's worth considering . . .

Bad design, good brands

A quick one:
one thing that has struck me about the new wave of "open source brands" is that they have particularly bad design . . . in fact I'd say truly sh*t design.
This may be particularly harsh, however two core examples of open source brands www.Craigslist.com and www.MySpace.com are both famously badly designed.

The point is that open source brands adhere to different rules to traditional brands. Open source brands are defined by the people who've created the brand, not a million dollar design team . . .

New thoughts (from Perry)

I've just been chatting to my friend Perry, and he mentioned Maslow Abram's Hierachy of needs, which are loosely based around 3 levels:
1) Pioneers: people's needs for self-fulfillment
2) Prospectors: esteem needs and relationship needs
3) Settlers: basic needs (e.g. feeling safe, settle down, having something to eat). These basic needs might also be referred to as deficit needs.

I've never really thought of these in such a structured way, however it's interesting to think about how these relate to brands and government, as apparently government naturally covers the "basic needs" and brands "esteem needs" - and both aspire to solve people's needs for self-fulfillment, which should perhaps be left for Theropists!

Another amusing thing Perry mentioned was something a friend was working on linked to assessing the "Gross National Happiness" of a city in America - I can't remember which!

Je suis back

Am now back in the UK - hurrah! (ish)
The skiing and weather in France has been amazing for the last few days, and of course I'm not so happy to be back in London.
Hey ho . . .
At the moment I'm trying to fix up a joint blog so that me and my friend Raul in Amsterdam can jointly idle away hours of our lives thinking about brand participation and the like . . . as we've been having email debates about this on an ongoing basis, and we're keen to open this out to the world open source style . . .

The main source of contention in our debate is what we're talking about and what we should call it i.e. the first steps of a serious debate have been set . . .

Open sauce or open source

I've been chatting to a friend of mine recently and he mooted the concept of "open source brands" - the idea launching half a brand, and then letting the consumers shape the rest.

I like this idea, and think it isn't necessarily any different from brand participation, but is does in fact sit highly up the famous 7 participation levels around the concepts of "collaboration" and "empowerment".

I also think it's not a million miles away from what already happens these days when a company launches a new product or brand, as the brand will always change when it's out in the open amongst consumers. I suppose the difference is about "mind set" and vision. Companies need to be aware that before a brand is like a new born child that once out in the big bad world can / will change immeasurably.

I think this whole sauce thing needs more thought, and I'm too cold (and hungry) to think right now!

Big brands big danger

I know this sounds like a party political ad campaign tagline - however I suppose this is what meant in a nutshell in my last post about the Arctic Monkeys and the the fall of Top of the Pops etc.

The point is that no brand, however historically powerful, is now infallible. Even brands like traditional banks are facing the potential threat of peer-to-peer lending networks like Zopa (www.Zopa.com) . . .

I suppose this is one of the main themes of this blog, and my present thinking . . .

One further thing: Tesco. I was at a dinner a couple of weeks back with a bunch of leading internet thinkers. One of them was from Tesco online. Interestingly, unlike most of us who were quoffing the wine like it was going out of fashion, he was furiously taking notes all evening.

My question: what's the threat to Tesco at present?

Arctic Charts

Ok. So I've been thinking about the Arctic Monkeys again (www.ArcticMonkeys.com).
Recently they turned down the opportunity to play on Top of the Pops + the Brits (a big award ceremony), shunning the opportunity to be exposed to millions of new potential fans around the world - spitting the face of the old school music industry. This may well be young Northern chtutzpah at its most extreme, and it may well have cost them a few album sales, however I think they might be onto something . . . and may not be the bunch of naive Monkeys they look.

Why?
Well, because the old school music industry is in turmoil at the moment, and playing catchup to the young super-geeks BIG time. This includes Mr uber-geek himself Steve Jobs, creator of le iPod. As although the big labels have seemed to have stopped the desperate downward curve of record sales by offering downloads, all areas of the industry don't seem to have everything as under-control as they'd like.

Key examples for me are: Top of the Pops + the Official Charts.
Both of these formats are now haemoraging viewers / listeners, as less and less young people are participating in music via these top-down mainstream channels, and instead plumping for the likes of MySpace (www.MySpace.com) + mobile media + reality style shows.
In the past, young people from around the UK would be glued to their radios on a Sunday evening to check out the week's number One. In a similar vein, we'd all tune into TOTP on a Thursday evening to check out the latest bands performing "live". These were two key cultural events for a young (and cool) Englishman.

Now the way people interact with music is completely different, and completely baffling for the former big players of the music industry. Young people are no longer tuning into TOTP and the Charts.
It's not just a case of media fragmentation, but a shift in the way people consume and interact with music. People's relationship with music brands has fundamentally. As new media channels mature, this new media seems to be heralding a speedy new music cultural revolution, highlighted by people comsumer music in a way that suits them (i.e. songs and "playlists"not albums) and in a much more involved way (e.g. people supporting the grass-roots vibe).
Of course this isn't a completely new phenomena - we all made our tape mixes when we were younger - however by the very nature of the ease / speed of modern media, the whole process is exagerrated a million fold.

So what are the big labels and music brands supposed to do? Play catch up + try to get to grips with how technology influences consumption. The Music industry isn't the only one in turmoil, just take a look at Kodak and the attack of Digital cameras . . .
One thing I am interested in seeing is what Chris Cowey (ex-producer of Top of the Pops) does with his newly slated music TV programme. I'm also interested in seeing what MTV do. I haven't heard what the music shift is having on them, however MTV doesn't look as invincible as it did a couple of years back. And of course the Monkeys - I wonder what they'll do next? Perhaps Chris Cowey should be asking the same thing . . .

Oldest and simplest?

From the list I made yesterday I think it's clear that brand participation covers a whole host of activities and differs massively between brand types as it differs in its effect.

One thing that I asked myself this morning was, "what's the oldest form of brand participation?"

Off the bat, all I can think of is radio phone-ins where the listeners get to pick the tracks played. This is gold dust for radio producers as it really gets people glued to their radio sets and costs the radio station nothing - it's a truly simple piece of brand participation: the premise being "it's your radio station, and we play your tunes" - quite literally.

Interestingly I read an article about the London-based radion DJ Christian O'Connell, who's just moved from XFM to Virgin Radio. He's a really interesting + an ever more successful DJ who, in this article in the Guardian newspaper, had a go at lazy old school DJs who used out-dated old radio formulae, and who as a result were losing listeners. He compared what they were doing to the successful stuff he's doing, and one of the key things to note is how, in several different ways, he makes the listener feel like it's their show - like they own it.

Examples O'Connell gave were things like a competition he ran called "Rock School", in which he got school rock bands to send in their songs and then got his listeners to vote for them. This wasn't just another simple competition - this was about inspiring kids, supporting up coming old school music talent that has largely been forgoten in the wake of Pop Idol etc.
Uber-importantly, Rock School fitted the XFM brand to aT. This was exactly the same as another competition he ran called "Song for Europe" - in which he got musicians from aroun dthe UK to write a European Football Championship anthem. Again, it was irreverent + grass-rootsy + was about getting listeners to GET INVOLVED.

So, is radio a media we should all learn from? Maybe. For me it certainly goes down as one of the oldest and simplest users of brand participation principles . . . and a further thing to learn from what O'Connell was talking about, is that radio stations are now having to try harder to keep their listeners engaged with their brand, just as other kinds of brands are having to dig deeper and innovate to capture that ever-increasingly hard-to-reach and fickle consumer.