posted by Ian Summers on April 28th, 2007
Take off on all the things related to the color red. For example: Seeing red; Red heads; Red herrings; Red coats; Red cross; Paint the town red; A communist. Red clay; Blood; Maraschino cherries; Red Lobsters; Bullfighter’s cape; Red Badge of Courage; The Redcoats are Coming; Beets; Fire; Fire engines; Stop-lights; Terra-cotta; Lipstick; Jelly; Strawberries; Scarlett O’Hara; Red Square; Mars; Sunsets; Blood on the Moon; Scarlet Letter; Red tape; Little Red Rising Hood. Cherries; Firecrackers; Blushing; Red power neckties; Red sky at night, a sailor’s delight; Red Sea; Red Tide; What else?
posted by Ian Summers on March 21st, 2007
In 1927, Austrian Edward Haas came up with a new peppermint candy.The word Pez comes from the German word for peppermint (pfefferminz). It was an adult breath mint that he decided to market as an alternative for smoking. From the word pfefferminz they took the first, middle and last letter and came up with the word Pez. Pez was carried around in pocket tins. Then in 1948 they came out with the “easy, hygenic dispenser” that we all recognize now to be a standard. In 1952 Pez was introduced in the United States. Package designers placed heads on the dispensers and marketed the newly positioned Pez to children…
About 1,500 Pez dispensers, all nestled in creative landscapes, fill the Easton Museum Of Pez Dispensers. Disney Pez sit in a 10-foot-high castle. Halloween-themed Pez are displayed in a haunted house. Psychedelic Pez are set beside a real Volkswagen Beetle that appears to be crashing through the wall. There are NFL Pez and superheroes, Star Wars and Charlie Brown, Elton John and Santa Claus. There is also a “Where in the World Is Waldo” game set up on a wall display containing more than 500 dispensers.
posted by Ian Summers on March 21st, 2007
In his book Reality in Advertising (1940) , Rosser Reeves (Chairman of the Board at Ted Bates & Company) gives the precise definition as it was understood at his company:
1. Each advertisement must make a proposition to the customer: “buy this product, and you will get this specific benefit.”
2. The proposition itself must be unique – something that competitors do not, or will not, offer.
3. The proposition must be strong enough to pull new customers to the product.
Reeves also wrote that a USP does not necessarily have to be a verbal message. It can be communicated both verbally and visually. For example, a classic Clairol advertisement showing a picture of a model and just the headline, “Does she or doesn’t she?” implied the USP, “If you use Clairol products, people won’t even notice that you dyed your hair.”
Yep! You read that date right. 1940! And this philosophy hides out in terms like positioning, branding, and the like.
Positioning: The Battle for your Mind
Positioning is a marketing method for creating the perception of a product, brand, or company identity. Beginning in 1969, two young marketing guys, Jack Trout and Al Reis, wrote, spoke and disseminated to the advertising and PR world about a new concept in communications called positioning. Their 1981 book on Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind became a bestseller. It was recently reissued to celebrate its twenty year publication date. Until then, agencies had primarily been basing their media campaigns on internally conceived benefits of the client’s product. USP!
According to Trout and Reis, “positioning is not what you do to a product. Positioning is what you do to the mind of the prospect. That is, you position (place) the product in the mind of the prospect”. Since that time in marketing, positioning is the technique in which marketers try to create an image or identity for a product, brand, or company in the perception of the target market. What matters is how potential buyers see the product. It is expressed relative to the position of competitors. Typical positioning tools include graphical perception mapping, market surveys, and certain statistical techniques.
