The News Media is Becoming Extinct

Today is a great day to take a break and write this blog. 

Today is Memorial Day Monday and what I write below, is a nice match with the "memorial" part of the holiday name.

As I was getting ready to write this, I grabbed a great Southern Fried Chicken lunch at one of the great Atlanta hole-in-the-wall mom & pop restaurants.  As I sat pickin’ apart the chicken from the bones and taking a spoon full of home-made potato salad, I thought a lot about how I would best write this.

When I mentioned to the "grandmother" that cooks up the chicken, she said, "darlin', just tell it like it is!"

We are in the midst of watching an industry get slam dunked. And I’m not talking about the Big Brands mentioned in the last blog!

Gallop just released a study that evaluates sources that people trust and source that people don’t trust. Gallop has been doing the survey since 1972 – that’s 45 years ago!

In the release this year, the “national news media” scored rock bottom at the lowest level of trust since Gallop started the survey in 1972. 

“Full trust” in the news media posted only a single digit percentage!  “Total full trust” combined with “fair amount of trust” did not even secure a third of the participants at 31%. 

More people trusted banks, insurance salespersons, organized labor, the medical system, the police and the church than trusted the media! Only used car salespersons scored lower than the news media!

Folks, the news media is committing suicide!

A month ago, Fortune Magazine published the results of another study in which nearly two-thirds of the surveyed public believe that news journalists regularly “make-up” news – 64%. 

The Wall Street Journal printed a story last week that reported more people trust the Trump White House than the media!  37% of the respondents in the survey trusted that the White House was being truthful vs. 29% of the respondents trusted that the media was being truthful.

Nielsen also just issued a report in the last two weeks that radio news is at its lowest level of trust since 2013.

Having worked at Time-Warner and having worked with the CEO of CNN back then, it is difficult to say it, but I think CNN might be the root cause of the collapse.

While the bottom has broken out of CNN’s last several years of ratings, CNN needs to take on the responsibility from day #1 Ted Turner launched it.

Upon the launch of CNN, the news left behind its calling for news reporting and shifted hats to news entertainment.  After all, CNN was a commercial-supported 24/7 television network.

Oh I know, when CNN first launched, it was a replay of news most every 30 minutes.  BUT quickly the ratings it got from 6a-7a and again from 6p-7p waned. 

CNN then converted over to the new-talk forum from its radio cousins. 

And that is when broadcast news entered a new era. 

Then came MSNBC and then CNBC and then FOX News and then radio news nets fought for its slice of a slice-and-dice news entertainment genre.

With the onset of the Internet more than 20 years ago, those that thought that they still held control of news quickly added 24/7 “real-time” news websites.

As Millennials left behind the news-nets and the newspapers for social exchange, the news media bastardized itself even more with social media news feeds… or news media social feeds. 

LOL… it all adds another level of perspective to the trans-gender debate!

So where are we at today as I write this?

CNN is free-falling right now and has gotten beat out by MSNBC in primetime news!

CNN reaches 1.170 million households during primetime.  MSNBC reaches 1.174 million households during the same day part.

CNN’s ratings are down 47% from 18 months ago.  MSNBC rating are down 42%.

FOX News is not having party-time either.  While FOX News nets more viewers than CNN and MSNBC combined together during prime time for a total of 2.9 million households, its viewership is down 2% since 4^th quarter 2016. 

Some think that the FOX News slip will be more severe in 3^rd quarter 2017 as the network struggles finding talent replacement for its highest ratings hosts who are been let go for their confrontation with women.

The Big Three nets – ABC, NBC and CBS are seeing drops of more than 10% in their corresponding ratings... and that is after a decline of more than 35% in the last three years.

This past week, the news journalists spent more time foaming at the mouth about an encounter up in Montana with a congressional candidate and a small niche media journalist than reporting about a terror attack in Egypt or Wall Street stock market gains.

From the New York Times to the Washington Post to the Chicago Tribune, the big newspapers rank up even higher percentage on perceived “fake” news than the broadcast nets. 

Here in Atlanta, The Journal-Constitution (AJC) ran a series of stories highlighted on its website about the police and sexual abuse of their staff for six months.  Never found any similar news on the radio, broadcast TV or online during the same time period. 

The only winners coming out of all of this are the local community and alternative newspapers whose readership is actual increasing. 

Community Newspapers Inc. (CNI) is one of our clients.  CNI owns about three dozen small town newspapers in Georgia, North Carolina and Florida.  We also work with a set of suburban and alternative newsweeklies in greater Atlanta, North Carolina and Tennessee.

In surveys we do for the papers, local news and local events-entertainment take top slot in terms of importance among readers.

I work hard coaching the owners and editors to stay on track with reporting what is of value and avoiding editorial slants. 

Just before I started my company, I approached the University of Georgia Henry W. Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communications (that really is their name) and tried to set up a scholarship fund for advertising majors. 

When I called the Dean’s office, I was informed that he was very busy with the Peabody Awards, new faculty and relations with the large broadcast news media.

Thank God he was busy. 

Had I set up the scholarship fund, my money would not be reinforcing a basic skill, but instead churning out graduates focused on getting the ratings and readership up again with entertainment content vs. true and honest news.  

Will the news media correct itself and get out of the entertainment field?  No time soon from my perspective. 

Do brands need to re-think how they use the news media as a channel of communication?  Absolutely. 

My firm does a significant amount of work with politicians.  The strategy we have used in the past is getting re-engineered in terms of the role news media plays.  Media endorsements are not even a goal because the endorsement action itself affects the politician-brand in a way that is not necessarily positive.

People are running away from the news media and refocusing around what is real, honest, trusted and local.  

Millennials are buying homes and learning for the first time how to use push mowers.  Boomers are abandoning the East coast and West Coast urban centers for the more real, small town and in-town community hamlets. GenXers are replacing the kids soon-to-leave with volunteerism in the local non-profit and cause groups. 

Getting featured at Betty Crocker Cook-offs, Bud Beer horse-shoe tournaments, PTA meetings, 4-H clubs and Rotary meetings are bunches better than securing a TV newscast. 

Americans believe that those events are real, personal and genuine.  In an era of social media isn’t that what the techies strive for onine?

Nearly two-thirds of Americans believe those TV newscasts are fake.

I know where I am putting my bets.

The De-massing of Retail

Trendcast 2017 lists out Trend #4 as “The De-massing Of Retail” and after a set of interesting weekend experiences (no pun intended), I thought what a great blog post topic!

I am sure that many of our readers go grocery shopping at least once or twice a week.  The next time you do, take a look at the brands that populate the grocery shelves. 

What you will quickly observe is that there are a good number of brand names on the shelves of which you likely have limited, if any, awareness. 

You will also see that brands you know well and probably even purchased in the past, are less visual because they no longer command as many “facings” as they did even a year ago.

This past weekend, I shopped a combination of Kroger, Publix, Whole Foods and Target for the ingredients that went into two dinner get-togethers.  When I arrived back to the house, I unpacked some interesting options purchased that did not bear the brand names of P&G, Kraft, Frito-Lay, Kellogg, Pillsbury and Nabisco. 

Yet, the brands I purchased were smack next to those BIG brands along with a few other brands I had not seen a lot of until recently. 

Last week, the Wall Street Journal featured an article titled, “Big Name Food Brands Lose Battle of the Grocery Aisle.”  The article notes that Nielsen is reporting a decline of 2.4% for the top 10 national packaged food brands in first quarter 2017. 

That same article goes on to cite increases in the top 10 regional packaged food brands along with fresh, locally produced meats, produce and bakery items during the same time in 2017.

Occupying shelf space and taking the lime-light away from the “mass brands” are unique, locally-rooted, specialty brands that quickly personalizes the shelf facings at the “chain” grocery stores. There might not be a "mom" nor a "pop," but the stores feel more personal!

I also went and shopped at a “Super” Kroger and a Walmart “super-store.”  In both cases, after long hikes, I could not find what I went in to purchase.  I next visited a new Publix mini-store and found the fresh vegetables I needed and then visited a local lawn & garden store and found the specific type of garden supplies that Walmart did not carry.

This time last year EXPERIENCE worked with an ad agency that was attempting to pitch a restaurant-pub account.  The restaurant-pub was a chain developed by a set of founders that included the CEO of one of the largest restaurant corporations in the U.S. 

When I first started EXPERIENCE back in the early 2000s, that CEO came to us and asked us to create a new restaurant-pub concept. 

The ad agency was one of three other firms that were challenged with finding ways to increase sales.  I always quietly laugh how clients believe that the ad agencies can work magic and how the ad agencies sell themselves in with reinforcements of the belief.

The concept that EXPERIENCE developed was to create a true neighborhood non-chain, chain. We gave the concept an overall brand name, but laid out a brand platform in which the environment and aspects of the menu varied from pub-to-pub.  We also recommended setting geographic boundaries in just how close one pub could be from another pub.

The restaurant-pub initiated the review because sales were down in markets now like Atlanta that now has about 10 locations or smaller markets like Orlando that have 4 locations. Oh well, I guess that the brand platform gave way to the craving to sell as many franchise units as possible.

In my counsel to the ad agency who hired us, I quickly channeled them over to observe what a lot of the new wave of restaurant groups are doing. 

Here in Atlanta, there is a cool guy who we worked with very early on in his venture development.  His name is Ford Fry and he started with a restaurant called JCT Kitchen. 

Early in the development of the holding company, we sat down with Ford and chatted about brand expansion scenarios. He was very passionate about the uniqueness of the restaurant experiences and yet, at the same time, passionate about his brand name – Ford Fry.

Today, in Atlanta, the hippest restaurants are owned by umbrella firms that have as many as two dozen individual restaurants, each reatuarant with their own personality and brand name.

About 80% of the time that I sit in a café with my Mac and/or clients, we are sitting in an indie coffee house.  God love Starbucks with over 13,000 locations in the U.S. alone, they chucked the “third place” brand culture and now lay claim to their coffee blends and price deals. 

Business leaders and entrepreneurs that operate in a vacuum of thinking that a single concept can be defined and mass produced are living in past-times. 

My suggestion among the doubters of this blog… go spend an evening watching Food Network and check out which restaurants and dives are featured in the programming!

The de-massing of retail is still very much in its beginning stages. 

Will we see large, universal brands begin to de-mass?  My bet is before year’s end, one of the large department store brands – perhaps Macy’s – will see opportunity to resurrect the regional brands that they acquired and re-branded under the Macy’s name. 

Maybe Atlanta will see Rich’s Department Store return!

We will see more and more and more of will be in-town and village-anchored shopping centers chuck leasing out to the national chains and instead, lease out to the regional and local retailers… as long as they are able to pay the leasing costs!

Local chamber of commerce and business development groups will begin to re-think what makes their communities attractive for residents and businesses.  They will begin to think less of becoming another Atlanta or Dallas or LA and perhaps more of an Austin, Asheville or Portland.

As I was writing this, I took a time-out and met with a very cool guy that I used to work in tandem with during my Time-Warner days.  Luca Magnanini is his name.  Luca headed up TBS and TNT Latin American when I was doing global brand work with Cartoon Network. 

Luca and I both met this morning about opportunity to employ some very cool virtual reality (VR) integration into real-time brand experiences.  We specifically talked about how those VR experiences could be customized against local communities and culture.

We both commented that many of the ad agencies and technology firms are still clinging to the past models of mass-marketing – even when they lay claim to personal relationship building executed within interactive and social media “networks.”

Luca and I are engineering some very cool VR applications that can be married with the neighborhood lifestyle audience modeling EXPERIENCE has expertise in crafting. 

If you are reading this and it begins to get your mind pondering and generating some interesting thoughts and ideas, text me or call me at 404.245.9378. 

The “De-massing of Retail” is only one – number 4 to be precise – of the Top 10 Trends rattling the marketplace.  I get a kick out of presenting the trends and hearing others chime in about what they too experience and how they are working to capitalize on the change!

The Millennial Home Front... More Than Just Dwelling Space!

This Blog Post begins with a set of some questions.  Please take out a sheet of paper and write down your answers to each one. 

1.   Which of the following belong in a high-humidity refrigerator drawer?

a.    Broccoli

b.    Apples

c.     Kiwis

d.    Kale

e.    Peppers

f.      Cantaloupes

g.    Mangoes

h.    Peaches

i.      Cucumbers

2.   If one of your stove top’s gas burners isn’t igniting, what’s the first thing you should do to try to fix it?

a.    Call an electrician

b.    Clean the lighter and burner holes

c.     Turn on the gas and light the flame with a match

d.    Switch the burner on and off three times

3.     True or false… You can crush ice and frozen foods in a food processor.

a.    True

b.    False

4.     What determines how quickly a microwave will heat food?

a.    Its wattage

b.    Its voltage

c.     Its size

d.    Whether it has a turntable tray

5.     How bad is it to pick up a baby bird?

a.    Not bad at all

b.    Sort of bad

c.     Very bad

d.    Don’t do it

I will give you the correct responses at the end of this blog.

These are questions that are featured in the current issue of HGTV Magazine. 

This issue has a set of featured “sections” dedicated to educational-inspirational topics that run the gamut from…

            ** Different varieties of glue

            ** Different varieties of paint

            ** The mechanics of stenciling a wall

            ** Guessing what color a wall or piece of furniture is

            ** How sisters rehab-re-decorated their 1950s bungalows

            ** What colors are best in a back yard

            ** How to pick out the best art from HomeGoods and Target

HGTV Magazine is designed to reach one primary target group.  The second largest generation ever in the United States who – as I write this blog – are buying their first house or settling into another small space apartment. 

Whether or not you manage a “House and Home” brand, you need to subscribe to HGTV Magazine… the “Better Homes & Gardens” of the Millennials. 

The reason why HGTV Magazine is important to subscribe to is that paging through it, looking at the pictures, reading the language of expression, reviewing the topics and digesting the directions promoted will tell you more about the Millennials than any of the zillions of conferences, academic forums, media promotions or ad agency “white papers.”

Here are three quick fundamentals from the current issue.

#1 – Millennials failed to receive any House and Home education

The percentage of Millennials who took Home Economics – male and female – is less than 30%.  More than 70% of Millennials eat 4 or more dinners at home consisting of “frozen dinners” that they microwave.

Just as Zoomers never knew the world without mobile technology, Millennials never knew that kitchens did not come automatically with built-in dishwashers, microwaves, ice-makers and garbage disposals. 

Millennial’s Baby Boomer parents found that House and Home was too much of a constraint and demand to ask their kids to help.  A recent survey fielded by the George Washington University found that over 60% of Baby Boomer parents attempted to avoid asking their kids to conduct assigned tasks at home because they did not want to bias one gender over another.

Every issue of HGTV Magazine uses the Q&A format to educate the 20- and 30-somethings about fundamental mechanics found on the home front.

As much as Millennials now seek out instructional guidance about their home, they also do the same as it relates to their health & wellness, financials, automotive maintenance and how to throw a party. 

Being “ADHD” myself, I am not the best to participate in instructional sessions nor upgrade the technology on my Apple products.  As far as Millennials are concerned, it’s now part of the pathway they walk.

#2 – Millennials are being forced to improvise

Gimme, Gimme, Gimme.

The Millennials lived their childhood, adolescents and college-careers within an “I demand it and I get it” approach to life. 

Winners vs. losers.  Grades based on performance.  Rewards for actually accomplishing something.  No. No. No.  After all, according to the Baby Boomer parents, those aspects of competition are politically incorrect. 


All abruptly ended when the Millennials got out of college and started their job-career search. 
It showcases how common day items might be able to do more things than thought and how old rules might just be able to be broken and its okay.


Ask a set of Millennial Breeders which is top priority, texting or a crying baby. 
Q#1 – Broccoli, kale, peppers and cucumbers

Only then did they quickly come to the reality that automatic reward was an artificial world that their Boomer parents and Boomer faculty created for them.

Now that the Boomer parents have kicked the Millennials out of their houses and the Millennials are having to learn first-hand what cost and affordability really mean, they are being forced to truly improvise and DIY on everything from how to renovate a kitchen and bath to how to create multi-use room space to how to make okay a chair they picked up at the Salvation Army. 

Smart marketers out there are jumping on the opportunity. 

Inviting Millennials to “co-author” a brand experience personalizes it and even removes constraints that the experience must be 100% perfect.

As much as the reality check process has been difficult for Millennials, many Millennials are past the initial check point and internalizing reality. 

Brands that promise perfection and 100% super-great product quality are committing suicide today. 

Watch a BMW and Mercedes and Lexus commercial.  Then watch a Subaru and Jeep commercial.  Then tell me which brands are raking in more Millennial dollars.

Watch the idiot Chevrolet commercial with the dumbmass actor pretending to be an un-biased focus group moderator and then go out and ask Millennials on the street if they recently purchased a Chevy.

One of the most interesting sections of HGTV Magazine is the section titled, “How bad is it.”  

BTW… question #5 above is from that section and the answer is (d).  This is one of the few where doing something is 100% completely wrong!

#3 – Millennials seek out high touch more than high tech

Yes… Many Millennials stay wired to their digital mobile music.

Yes… Many Millennials cannot put down their smart phones and stop texting.

And YES… A lot of non-partnered Millennials are addicted to their credit cards and accumulated points. 

But ask a Millennial if technology produces money that will eventually pay the bills.

If you scan the pages of HGTV Magazine you will see lots and lots of ways that Millennials can add “high touch personality” and “self-expression” to their homes. 

If you watch Food Network, DIY-TV, Discovery Channel, History Channel, TLC and/or GAC (Great American Country), you will see show after show after show after show in which there’s not a single once of high-tech. 

In fact, you will see shows in which content might even be “anti-high tech.”

I get a big kick out of developers building new homes here in “ITP” (inside-the-perimeter) Atlanta.  They run real estate ads promoting all the “smart house” technology found in the homes. 

An ad in this week’s real estate insert showcased how the house has a mobile app to lock the doors.

Problem with these new homes is that they are NOT selling fast. Not like the lo-tech, bohemian-chic mid-century bungalow that still sports a laundry shoot and farm sink.

And if the new home, high tech developers do not come with “ship-lap” siding in a couple of the rooms, hand-made tiles from local "craftsmen" and/or a patio constructed out of re-purposed stone or wood… forget it.

A national group of real estate agents is running an ad right now that I caught over the weekend.  It features a Millennial guy who just broke up with a gal he was expecting to be his wife.  In his down and despair, he visits a Humane Society facilities and sees a dog that he connects with and takes home. The dog adds another dimension of high-lick to high-touch!

Before you think that the high tech advancement of your brand is what will drive its success with Millennials… think again.

If you think that launching a new app or a new website is the way to sell more product, be very, very careful in how the interactive exchange works and the brand personality translates to that tech experience.

OKAY… here’s your answers to the upfront questions... 

Q#2 – Clean the lighter and burner holes

Q#3 – False

Q#4 – (A) Its wattage

And… Q#5 – (D) Don’t do it

Go subscribe to HGTV Magazine if you are at all expecting your brand to grow among the Millennials.

The Urban Shift... To Suburbia!

Come sing along with me… nanana-nah… nanana… nah… hey, hey, hey… good-bye!

The cities are starting to lose out on the Millennials.

Over the past 10 years, a good number of American cities have celebrated and been transformed by the young professional and techie Millennials.  

Those of us Boomers have watched as the historic roots of the ‘hoods gave way to apartment “loft” complexes, gourmet coffee houses and new organic grocery stores.

Now, a number of demographers, social scientists, economists and real estate consultants are predicting that the growth in demand for urban living is hitting a stall.

As an article in American Demographics states, “There are already some signs that the inflow of young professionals into the cities has reach its peak, and that the outflow of mid-30s couples and new families to the suburbs has resumed after declining since the Great Recession.

Last week, here in the Atlanta-land, two large in-town real estate developers scrapped the plans to build two more live-work-play urban communities.

Is enough now enough... or even more than enough?  

The Wall Street journal ran an article about 30 days ago that cited an intown apartment surplus that is unraveling in Austin, Chicago, Nashville, Atlanta and Washington DC. 

Not only are forecasts beginning to predict an apartment surplus, others are beginning to predict negative impacts on city budgets as billions of dollars’ worth of new apartments built on the premise that the flood of young people into the cities would continue…dries up.

I find it entertaining on some levels how the developers, marketers and city planners believed that Millennials not only would never slow down, they also banked on the generation never aging!

Another article published on “TheUpshot.com” notes, “Here is one thing that that we do know: people do get older. And another is that people’s tolerance for small, “tiny home” living is highest when they are young adults.”

In the 2017 calendar year, the leading edge of the Millennials turns 38 years old and the peak of the the Millennial “bell-curve” caps out at age 29.  

That means that the number of 20-somthings is actually now on a decline.

A decline!

The U.S. Census Bureau recently released a report that the number of people moving into the cities and out from the cities hit a balance point in 2013.  

Since then more people are actually moving out to the suburbs than into the cities.

The trendy and hip bars and cafes are following the trend too.  

And the driver for the moves is that the “trendy” and the “hip” is actually more “mass” intown than it once was in the early waves of urban renewal and gentrification.

As I have written before, the same brands that lined the walk-ways in the suburban malls are now the same brands that have moved into the urban live-work-play developments.

Just like “tiny houses” makes a Millennial feel in control, the smaller landscape of the suburban town squares is a whole lot more personal than the vast space of the urban warehouses… further divided up into carbon copy 500 square foot loft apartments.

Dowell Myers is an urban planner at Southern Cal (USC) and was featured in a 2016 Fortune Magazine article about the future of Millennials heading to the suburbs… in droves.

Myers makes note of “what Nielsen calls the Urban ‘Burbs which are essentially walkable, loft-style developments that hug actual suburban and small town town-centers that are trendy and affordable. 

He goes on to say that “Millennials love of cities is actually superficial-driven by the desire to be seen in the trendiest bars. If fashion appeal is really all the cities have to offer, there’s no reason a developer-concocted landscape transplanted to a former cornfield can’t satisfy the same need.”

Two weeks ago here in Atlanta, I went down to where the EXPERIENCE office was located for a good portion of our years in business.  

Inman Park was the first housing neighborhood built after the Civil War.  Its also adjacent to where Dr. Martin Luther King was born and raised and where the King Center For Nonviolent Social Change is headquartered today. 

When I was down visiting Inman Park, I was astounded at just how many Millennials now inhabit the neighborhood.  As I was walking past an outdoor café, I asked a table of Millennials if they had visited the MLK Center. 

They replied, “No, but they had heard that the pub had some very interesting local brews.”

I share this to illustrate that the Millennials are less rooted in the historic roots of the urban ‘hoods and more in the ability to feel hip and cool while working the part-time jobs to pay for the student loans and the tiny loft apartments... that they share with 2-3 other room-mates.

When I moved to Atlanta, I purchased a home in the intown Virginia-Highland neighborhood.  It was an area that had a sense of charm.  It was also a neighborhood that was undergoing urban renewal largely led by the gay community. 

I sold that home eight years ago.  In my seven years of owning it, it had nearly doubled in appraised value and the taxes owed on the place each year more than doubled. 

Today, it takes about a million dollars to purchase a similar home in the neighborhood. 

As the intown neighborhoods gentrify, the Millennails have moved in, but so too have the costs of entry to own a home.  Not only can few Millennials even afford an average priced home, very few can afford to purchase intown real estate... period.

An article in the New York Times this past December noted the following… “Hip and cool” core cities like San Francisco, New York and Boston have suffered double-digit percent losses of young professionals. New York City, for example, saw its age 25 to 34 population of 2000 drop by over 15% — a net loss of over 200,000 people — a decade later. San Francisco and Oakland, the core cities of the Bay Area, lost more than 20% of this cohort over the decade, and the city of Boston lost nearly 40%."

So what does this mean to business?

Perhaps the BGO (blinding glimpse of the obvious) is to avoid getting business revenue tied to a continued prospect of intown gentrification.

Second, if the business has not looked out in the ‘burbs, get in the car and go meet the people who are now moving in. 

If you do travel out to the ‘burbs, realize that many of those moving out to the ‘burbs are not necessarily moving out to new, spec-real estate developments.  That model has changed. 

Third, rethink through what drives the emotional experience of your brand and just how that experience is becoming translated into the next wave of suburban culture. 

Finally, I will end this blog with the simple observation that a lot of the business and strategic masses out there have not, and likely will not, understand that this is happening right before their eyes until they are drowning in the next wave of urban crisis.

I have been very good in this blog post and refrained from making tongue in cheek commentary, but I will predict that there will be a share of the techie-geeks, graphic designers and media mavens that be convinced that the out-migration will all be rooted in who sits in the White House versus the person whose name is still on their bumper sticker.

Recite with me... "Make Suburbia and Smalltown America Great Again!"

England, DIY-TV, PTAs, Indie Cafes... What Do They Have In Common?

England, The U.S., Tiny Houses, DIY TV, France, Indie Cafes, Holland, PTAs.

The global marketplace is going through radical change.

Some brands are capitalizing on it.  Many more dwell in their corporate cells oblivious to the outside world.

In high school, I participated in a special class program.  We could study whatever topics we wanted and it was up to the teachers to weave in the fundamental classes of math, history, grammar, etc.

We decided to study the physics of social change.  The teachers liked it because it would incorporate mathematics and history all together in one session of learning.

What we learned quickly is how the forces of change are driven by natural physics to seek out a sense of balance and how in the process, there are often radical shifts in opposite direction.  Shifts magnified by the consistency of drive in the opposite direction.

Telecommunications set the global stage of what we are experiencing as I write this blog. The connectivity of people initially from across town moved quickly to cross-country and eventually globally.

Today, IoT (the Internet of Things) is producing a globalization that extends beyond the unification of people to the unification of environments. 

Yesterday morning, I had coffee with a GenXer in Atlanta who currently works in real estate.  He’s a nice guy.  He’s also a political Libertarian convinced that the U.N. is on a mission of global unification. 

He voiced less concern about what form of governmental and economic modeling global unification would take and more concern about the whole concept of unification.

When he voiced his concern, I quickly noted that his discomfort was not a disconnect with the fact that we were meeting at a café that was not Starbucks.

Kicking off 2017, I am spending a lot of time working with several brands that are having to step back and total re-engineer the operational mechanics of their brand deliverables.

National brands crafted their standardization model all the way down to their graphic standards manual and hit the accelerator full speed forward in market roll-out.

I vowed this year not to write a blog about the Super Bowl ads.  

Too many folks now do it and the depth level of commentary does not venture much deeper than the surface.

The news media though has become pre-occupied in the Audi, 84 Lumber and AirBnB ads that sought to voice political perspectives. 

What’s fascinating is that the very fact that brands elected to produce and run the ads.

Those brands might not be able to affect global change, but by damn, they are going to at least take individual control and convey an unchallenged viewpoint in that $2.5 million, 30-second time block.

Hollywood does live in LA-LA-Land and while they cannot change the election, they can at least locally deny its existence and pretend that they are effective agents of change. Especially within the environment of broadcast and stage performances.  

And again, that is their world where they control the stage!

Re-focus on the controllable. 

England, The U.S., Tiny Houses, DIY TV, France, Indie Cafes, Holland, PTAs.

Seeking a sense of local control, authorship and interconnectivity is driving a radical refocus of relationship that transcends beyond other humans, but iconic elements of identity and relationship.

And that includes corporations and brands.

Telecommunications, the Internet and social media connected individuals but also issues, problems and encounters that cannot be managed nor resolved. 

Like it or not, but the dismantling of unified and packaged branding is taking place in front of us. 

Relationships are re-establishing around experiential touch-points that are predictable and manageable.

Not only are Tiny Houses easy to transport and uproot, they are financially own-able and the monolith, non-personal, automated mortgage firm is removed from the experience. 

Not only are the Indie Cafes owned locally, the space and people working in them are identifiable and conversational and local.

Whether Boomers, Xers or Millennials, they all are saying screw even the third-party contractors, I can do the work myself.  

Political parties are not getting it.  Even those that match the banner used by the candidates or issues that voters approved.  Here in the U.S., the Republicans are just as stupid-blind as the Democrats in “getting it.”

Unification, globalization, common values, universal brands… dead. 

Uniqueness, individuality, locality, personal connectivity… empowerment moving forward.

If you are reading this… realize where you need to refocus attention…

1.    What is the character of your audience groups?  Give up the perspective of thinking of a universal target group… and further give up the belief that the individual groups universally seek out the same brand experience.

2.    How can you operationally localize the brand?  Is it in the physicality of presentation? Is it in the personality of presentation?  Is it in the actual construction of the brand itself?

3.    How can the communications be personally engaging? And if you think social media is the answer, go jump off the side of the building!  Social media is NOT the answer. 

It’s not as easy as 1-2-3, but it’s also not complex and can be avoided.

If you haven’t been disrupted yet… fastened the seat belts.

Onward!

2017...The Year Of Disruptive Change

There will be little limited change taking place this new year.

Instead, tightened the seat belts and prepare for disruptive change that will challenge many established norms.

I am not making this up.   

During the ‘Tween week between Santa coming down the chimney and the Time Square ball drop, I had an opportunity to meet up with a couple interesting prospective clients.

 While each in their own unique category and market, all four of the firms shared elements in common. 

Who they are today is due to a family member in the past starting up the company and expanding it.

The firms have built customer equity over time and each is dedicated to delivering top value customer service.

Each firm has long-term employees… some with family ties… running their marketing program. 

Each firm thrives on what they define as the mission, purpose and values.  Three of the four firms have them framed and positioned prominently where individuals entering their offices can see them.

Each firm sponsors and promotes the essence of a cause.

This sense of “stability” sounds nice doesn’t it?

Now let’s raise the scope of our vision and illustration.

There are large groups of people gathering under the umbrellas of corporations, government organizations, contract vendors, non-profit cause groups and yes… even in countries unified under a common government and iconic flag.

These groups wake up most every morning and start their days with a sense of direction and mission.

Their leadership often has deep history and roots… leadership coming out of similar past models of governance and management.

Many follow a script of action and expectation.

This sense of “stability” sounds nice doesn’t it?

About 18 months ago the early signs of a U.S. presidential election started to surface.

Two parties believed that they were prepared to win.

One party had an icon that many with some tenure in the party worshiped who would continue to employ programs from the past eight years.  The other party had a set of the tried and true.  Each party had a sense of mission and purpose.

And the candidates had already started crafting campaign strategy that combined social media of the here and now with the marketing and media models long since featured in the academic text books.

The media had already started to churn out its classic coverage and perspectives of the past.

This sense of “stability” sounds nice doesn’t it?

There were a couple of cracks in the stability that as they surfaced, grabbed my attention.

(1)  Target reported a sales decline in early summer 2015

(2)  Sister networks, HGTV and DIYTV started co-programming with Great American Country TV

(3)  Brexit not only started to be used by the media, it actually took place

(4)  “News stories” entered into social media

(5)  The use of social media by Millennials starts to decline

I could care less if a reader of this blog is a Republican, a Democrat, an Independent or a Socialist.  I could care less if you like the man or not.

The election of Trump is more than just a tipping point, but what Malcolm Gladwell cites in his best-seller is well exemplified by the election results.  Only difference is that the pace of change Gladwell cites is minor compared to what is going to take place in 2017.

Back to the prospective clients.

While each of the four firms championed who they were and how they got there, they still called me and set up a time to meet in person.

Underneath their business security blankets, I sensed more tension that anticipation. 

When I spoke of change – they all quickly took their pulpits and self-declared their sense of mission and cause. 

It reminds me a tad of Linus and the blanket.

A couple of these prospective clients might become actual clients in 2017. 

But they better have checked and made sure that those seat belts work.

2017 will be a year of disruptive change.  Models of the past will not just be re-engineered and re-formatted, they will be re-invented and re-imagined.

There’s a set of some major opportunities to capitalize on, but the brands that prosper will be brands that are brave enough to re-imagine and re-invent themselves.

Personally, what I do with EXPERIENCE is fun. 

We are not in the business to point fingers that say a brand is doing wrong, but rather to shine lights on opportunity.

We do what we do and are successful at it because we do not believe that safe-ground actions like taking tiny steps, inwardly reconfirming purpose-missions-values and standing firm on past models that are not sinking, but collapsing.

We disrupt many false perceptions of security. 

But do so because just like the guy heading into the White House says, we are here to make our clients' brands great again… and to do so, way out in front of the competition that remains in their self-defined corporate worlds of comfort.

I post this blog on New Year’s Day because tomorrow is not the beginning of another journey, its day #1 of disruptive change… and fabulous opportunity!

Be brave out there and come journey with us!