Re: What about the banner? (or rather Frankel)

From: David Hauslaib <dave_at_bmedia.org>
Date: Mon 17 Dec 2001 12:03:43 -0500

Jan Hviid Hemmingsen <admin_at_eState8.com> wrote:

>Jean-Marie Vogel <Jean-Marie.Vogel_at_crealogix.com> wrote:
>
> >P.S.: Rob, first time I see someone's sig longer than the
> >actual post... Would that not be an example of overbranding?
>
>Actually I think this light annoyance is part of the Frankel
>Brand :) I think of the many posts, the bobbing head, the
>long signatures, the plugs etc.
>
>Actually this could prompt a question about whether rubbing
>people the wrong way (to exaggerate in this case) can be as
>effective or maybe even more effective than rubbing them the
>right way (whatever that may be)?


Among different ways to explain methods of advertising, there
is the hard sell and the soft sell. If you can remember way
back (or read about it), Rosser Reeves became "Prince of the
Hard Sell" by finding the key element of a product or brand
and repeating it -- a lot, so much it annoyed consumers. One
product I remember him designing a campaign for was aspirin
of some sort. The medication was the same as any other
aspirin, but he was able to connect the brand name with a
pounding hammer and two other memorable actions representing
how it could solve your headache.

Research showed two main thing: consumers knew the ads and
were sick of them, but that annoyance with the ads actually
had a positive correlation with sales. Obviously the growth
in sales cannot be entirely contributed to the ads, but the
headache-inducing campaign seemed to work wonders for
the company.

(Reeves also was responsible for an Eisenhower presidential
election campaign [see
http://www.pbs.org/30secondcandidate/from_idea_to_ad/collection/31.html]
that implemented many of the same concepts.)

So as with Reeves, it seems Frankel is doing much of the same:
a little annoyance or "rubbing people the wrong way" increases
the effectiveness of his brand. Some may be a little turned
off by it, but that turn off may be what's needed to drive
brand recognition. It's not the newest trick in the book, but
proves effective quite often.


_____________________________________________

David Hauslaib

President & Founder
BMEdia.org / Black Market Enterprises
Information Capitalist / Web Guru
http://www.bmedia.org / dave@bmedia.org
Mobile 860.655.7495 / Fax 360.397.2906





Received on Mon Dec 17 2001 - 11:03:43 CST