November 2009 - Beg to Differ

Nov

Here at Beg to Differ, we like think of ourselves as the blog that humanizes brands – bridges the gap between corporate brands and the human experience. But we’re not alone. The world of branding is large, and ever growing. We’ve organized our first “Blog to Differ” linkfest to help you navigate the field of branding blogs. And since we got the idea from wordworker Nancy Friedman when she included us in hers last week, we start with her excellent blog.

Fritinancy

Fritinancy focuses on the words behind the brands – how the English language can help or hinder a brand in its effort to communicate and collaborate with people. Oh, and she’s very warm and funny human too. Check out her greatest hits under her picture for some terrific reads.

Black Coffee

This blog is by the Black Coffee brand consultancy out of Boston, and their blog is totally worth a look. They make high-level brand speak interesting though imagery and conversation.

Brand New

We’ve said it time and again: a logo is not a brand. But they are often the most visual, and intriguing, piece of the brand puzzle – and Bryony and Armin post daily with in-depth critiques of the design end of re-branding exercises from around the world.

Nation Branding

Looking to brand a country? Look no further. This blog claims to offer “Everything about Nation Branding and Country Brands” and by golly it comes close. Even if place branding is not your bag, it is still a great read.

The Brand Builder Blog

He calls himself the Brand Builder, but transplanted Frenchman Oliver Blanchard is mostly talking these days about the specific challenges of building brands through social media, and lately how to calculate Return on Investment (ROI) for social media efforts. Oh, and his blogroll is unbeatable.

Church of the Customer

Special award here for a name that totally rocks our world. Want to be closer to your customers? Duh. Start with the Church of the Customer.

Brand Happens

So, what are you going to do about it? The aptly named Mark True (“Brand Warrior”) at Brand Happens because they know that a brand is not a logo. You can’t put makeup on a pig… or something like that.

Brand Autopsy

I’ll describe Brand Autopsy with a simple quote from a recent post on their blog, “When you make a decision, it results in action. And the accumulation of those decisions and actions become how people describe you and think of you. It becomes your ‘story.’” Can anyone say, “United breaks guitars?”

Brains on Fire

Brains on Fire creates and strengthens identities. When they throw out a line like “93% of WOMM happens OFFLINE”, we listen. We’re listenting online of course, but that’s beside the point.

Only Dead Fish

Okay, Only Dead Fish is not strictly a branding blog, but we just loved the name. Dead fish do not differ, either. Remember folks, swim against the current! Beg to Differ!

Nov

Scaramouche! Scaramouche! Are the Muppets back to stay?

By Dennis Van Staalduinen | Analysis & review, Automotive Brands, Brand Value, Branding Advice, Contains Video, Humour, Media Brands, Message & Positioning, Positioning, Social Media

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Has Disney finally figured out how to deal with the Muppets?

Yesterday, Beg to Differ introduced you to the brilliant new Bohemian Rhapsody parody from the Muppets – but with no brand focused commentary at all. Since then, we’ve realized that the big story here isn’t the video itself (or the others we’ve included below). The big branding story is the Muppet brand itself and its current caretaker: Disney.

Keeping your Beakers and Bunsens apart

A Disneyland attraction that visitors liked, but the problem: the kids didn't recognize the characters.

When I showed the Bohemian Rhapsody video to my kids – aged 3 and almost 5 – they laughed and laughed and laughed, just as my wife and I had done. Of course, they totally missed the parody, but it was heartening to me that they seemed to love the characters and hooted along with that trademark goofy, over-the-top vaudeville campiness.

But when I asked my 3-year old what he’d liked about it, he said: “Those Wild Things were funny.”

Anaheim, we have a problem.

It’s not like we haven;t done our parental duty by exposing him to the Muppets. This is a kid who has an Animal doll, 50 Sesame Street books, and has sat and watched the Muppets on YouTube, as well as the season 1&2 DVDs with the family. But even he couldn’t identify the “Muppet” brand, and couldn’t recall any names except Kermit and Miss Piggy.

Turns out my son is the market in microcosm (I’m so proud). Kids don’t get the Muppets. And I blame Disney.

Disney’s problem with Muppets

Since acquiring the Muppet brand in 2004 Disney has been widely criticized by fans for under-utilizing the Muppets characters and failing to re-invigorate the brand for a younger generation. For an exhaustive insider background, see Jim Hill’s blog post from 2007.

But in brief, I think this verbiage from the February 2004 press release captures the problem in humourless, corporatese:

The transaction includes all Muppet assets, including the Kermit, Miss Piggy, Fozzie Bear, Gonzo and Animal characters, the Muppet film and television library, and all associated copyrights and trademarks…

Now read that again in your best Rizzo the Rat voice to hear how ugly, inhuman and unintentionally funny it becomes. These are cartoon puppet critters people!

: Roadkill? Kermit wondering what the heck he’s doing in front of an SUV.

It’s not easy being green (but it’s worth a try).

And it went downhill from there. Disney efforts have included an aborted attempt to make Kermit more “edgy” for his 5oth birthday in 2005, and a tone-deaf attempt to exploit the lead characters as commercial shills. The Ford Explorer ad shown here is a great example.

Demographic fact: Muppets are loved by nostalgic 30-40 somethings. Frog-leap of logic: Hey! Kermit can sell SUVs!

But through it all, the big problems that were festering under the surface were 1) a failure to generate any significant new Muppets content (or that the new content was bad), 2) erosion of the brand equity of secondary characters, and 3) lack of respect for the real brand qualities that made the Muppets so charming and relevant, and sustain them to this day in the hearts of 4) the brand’s real owners: who are you, me, and hopefully, our kids.

The Muppets of the mind

So that’s why it was so nice to see yesterday’s Bohemian Rhapsody video get hundreds of thousands of hits and quickly become a trending topic on Twitter. It’s also nice to learn that more videos are coming (watch for “Dust in the Wind”, “American Woman”, “Popcorn”, “Carol of the Bells” and “Stand By Me”) and that a new Muppet movie is in the works – among other interesting projects.

But most heartening of all, there’s the tone of the new content – which finally shows signs that Disney actually gets the Muppets. The new stuff is funny, and the characters seem like themselves again. And that’s why I felt like I had to share that video immediately.

To us, the real owners of the brand, the Muppets are about creating a warm space where comedy, pop-culture, kid-culture, and pure unadulterated silliness can come together. The real Muppets in our heads never take themselves too seriously (see the “assets” quote above), and they are also never mean-spirited or even “edgy” (they’re refreshingly nerdy actually – kind of like Queen music).

Oh, and take note: the Muppets in our heads would never sell an SUV, so they won’t help us buy one either.

Welcome back Muppets

But lest we be accused of getting too serious ourselves (we beg to differ!), below are a few more recent YouTube videos featuring some great second-string Muppets.

Bohemian Rhapsody – in case you missed it

Beaker does Ode to Joy:

The Swedish Chef carves a pumpkin:

Sam the Eagle gets patriotic:

Nov

The Muppets: a Rhapsody like Bohemia never saw

By Dennis Van Staalduinen | Branding Advice

Favourite blog posts of 2009: October & November

By Dennis Van Staalduinen | Agency Brands, Analysis & review, Brand Names, Brand Standards, Brand Value, Branding Advice, Branding Mistakes, Consumer Behaviour, Consumer product brands, Humour, Media Brands, Message & Positioning, Positioning, Product Portfolio, Rebranding, Retail Brands, Service Brands, Social Media, Tag Lines, Technology Brands

What if restaurants charged like creative agencies? The other side

October 9, 2009

The branding business: we haven’t have a lot of posts about this topic area… yet. But we felt we needed to respond to a viral video which lampooned clients for not “getting” the value of the work creative agencies do. After all, it takes two to tango – or quibble over a giant invoice.

More on the biz: when branding, look outside;

How to name a chicken sandwich: thoughts for branders

October 19, 2009

Brand naming: When KFC launched a new chicken sandwich with a name developed by Brandvelope, we took the opportunity to toot our own horn a bit and talk about the process of naming a brand. And the results: our biggest single day tally of visitors as branders came by for a taste of what we do.

More on names:Sorry Shakespeare: names matter; brandscape – a chicken or egg?

American Airlines meets Mr. X – a tragic tale of brand failure

November 9, 2009

“Whole brand” thinking: This short post on the failure of a giant corporation to understand effective customer engagement in the social media era marked the first time a SlideShare deck of ours reached 2000 hits – and climbing (in response to a tip from Alison Gresik).

More on this:Toronto Web site fail; Human in five steps; the perils of too much choice; one immutable law

Green eggs & spam: a Twitter poem

November 19th, 2009

Social media: Funny to talk about this one as a greatest hit – because we wrote it in the middle of the current “faves” series – and it’s really still going with more than 100 RTs to date. Basically, we wondered a) what @SamEyeEm would be like on Twitter, and b) what Dr. Seuss might think about the new “ReTweet” feature on Twitter.

More on this topic: Twiterloo; branding explained in Twitterese; “Social Media” needs a new name.

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