Umair at bubblespace draws attention to the success of MakeUpAlley. Here’s a nice irony: a site about cosmetics that looks pretty scruffy but is hugely effective – because it provides a simple way for its participants to connect about something they’re passionate about.
Umair sees big lessons here for VCs and geeks and I see big lessons for marketing. What a stunning example of the declining value of pretty packaging and making yourself look good, in favour of helping your users look good.
I linked to this paper on wicked problems the other day and Chris Corrigan commented “there’s a lot in that paper eh?”. Which is true.
I’m experimenting with marketing less and listening more
Just back from another extraordinary gathering at Medinge where the community that has produced Beyond Branding meets each summer. I was planning to keep this
Passion brands bring people together based on common interests and excitements. I’m particularly interested in ones created from the bottom up, as opposed to driven by producers concerned mainly with profit.
Interesting research from Stanford suggests that exciting brands get more trusted after making mistakes and putting them right whilst more “sincere” brands start with more trust but lose it more easily. Perhaps the sensible interpretation is that second-guessing customers can be a waste of time!
Michael Hammer’s new book, The Agenda, is about the rise of customer power. But is customer-centricity really such a good model for business and society?
Thanks to Matt Tucker at Smith Associates for telling me about What Brand Are You. It strikes me that lots of companies waste money on
The AntiBrand: blackSpot sneakers, a project by Adbusters attacks Nike directly. In doing so they take on what has become one of the great icons
We live in a world of too much marketing and too much branding. People’s faith in advertising has fallen to new lows as we simply
So the Abbey National is rebranding itself this morning. As I write this entry, they are revealing their new look, their shortened name (just “Abbey”)
All hail Jay Allen for his MT-Blacklist, just updated which is doing a great job of keeping Comment Spam off this site. About 15 attempts were blocked this morning!
Chris Corrigan reports on the Dalai Lama talking about opening and closing.
I’ve been enjoying Jon Strande’s Storyblog and finally got round to sending him a story I liked (The Rabbi’s Gift). There are a few different versions online but I decided
Viv spotted this New Scientist article: The paradox of fun. It’s a review of Ian Bogost’s new book, Play Anything. Its subtitle conveys something of its depth: The Pleasure of
