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Archives for 2010

BP – Flooded in Oil Rather than ‘Beyond Petroleum’

bp_beyond_petroleumFor years, BP has used the “Beyond Petroleum” tagline to massage the perception of the BP brand as being one that stands for so much more than oil.  While the company has been accused of greenwashing by using that tagline, given that almost all of its revenue comes from oil-related activities, the tagline did succeed in differentiating the brand from the Exxon’s of the world.  Remember, marketing and branding is all about perceptions.  Right?

But what happens when events prove those perceptions were fabricated?

BP never claimed it wasn’t in the oil business with the Beyond Petroleum tagline, but the company did attempt to position its brand as the antithesis of big oil companies that care only about profits regardless of the negative effects their products and businesses have on the environment.

Until April 2010, BP managed to protect its brand positioning as the oil company that puts the environment first, despite previous problems.  But can BP retain that positioning now that the company caused one of the biggest oil spills in history off the coast of Louisiana?

Probably not.  However, there is more to this story than brand positioning.  Do consumers truly care where their gasoline, etc. comes from?  Will they drive out of their way to find a non-BP gas station?

Certainly, consumers care, but the truth of the matter is that there is little difference in consumers’ minds about oil company brand positioning.  All of those companies are grouped together, for the most part, in consumers’ minds.

Therefore, BP will undoubtedly survive, but it’s highly likely (and suggested) that BP go through a rebranding.  Beyond Petroleum won’t get the job done anymore.  The more interesting question from a branding perspective is whether or not there is a brand message and position that truly could differentiate an oil company from its competitors — something that would make consumers pay more than the excessive prices they already pay and make them want to drive out of their way to find a gas station that offers fuel from a specific company.

What do you think?  Can it be done?  Leave a comment and let’s discuss!

Image: Flickr

Farewell to Flash? (And Why That Matters)

 

Mashable screenshot

Among the Earth-shaking events of April 2010 was Apple’s announcement that iProducts will never, ever have support for Flash.

So?

It may not be important to follow the back-and-forth technical arguments about Flash, but anyone who has anything to do with corporate communications online should acquire at least a high-level overview of this development.  And since employer branding in general, and the Careers site in particular, have a strong interest in social networking and multimedia, there are very good reasons to be in the picture on this topic.

Oh?

Skip the details, and the issue is mainly mobility.  For good or otherwise—folks today want to see/find/do everything on their phones (and other mobile devices) that they can see/find/do at their desks.  In fact they want to do more, since they will be operating in physical space, in real time, rather than just looking at a static monitor.  Plus:  They want it all to be seamlessly familiar, easily accessible, battery-friendly, and plenty quick.

Leveraging the mobility agenda is increasingly important for effective recruiting.  So companies need to be aware of shifts in technology and ahead of the adoption/implementation curve.  If IT is trying to talk to you about HTML5, listen.  If they are not talking about it, worry.

For a fairly friendly introduction to the issues at play, follow these steps:

  1. Read Steve Jobs’s clearly written and well reasoned explanation of Apple’s position.
  2. Read Mashable’s follow-up post, Apple Didn’t Kill Flash, HTML5 Did.
  3. Read another point of view from Flash developer Richard Leggett
  4. Zoom out and review the big picture with Wired’s analysis of the Top 7 Disruptions of 2009.

Finally, make sure tech evolution is getting serious consideration at your company. Will those high-value passive candidates be able to view CEO greetings, employee testimonials, and other cool Careers content on their iPads??

Inside the Unemployment Experience


Losing It

I have a friend who has been unemployed for a while now.  And I confess—I have not been altogether sympathetic to her situation.  For one thing, I’ve been self-employed just about all my life, so the idea of getting unemployment benefits seems like a luxury to me, especially as my friend doesn’t have any dependents, and does have a comfortable financial cushion.

For another thing, my friend hated her job, so it seems as if this is in some ways a fortunate opportunity.  Plus . . . she was one of the last people laid off after successive down-sizing moves in a large, troubled company—so arguably, there’s not much to be ego-wounded about, and it wasn’t any sort of surprise.

And yet, my friend has been in a deep and deepening depression since the day she got her official notice.  I honestly did not understand this until I heard a recent interview with Dominique Browning on CNN’s Reliable Sources.  Browning, who had been editor-in-chief of House and Garden for twelve years, began a steep emotional descent when the magazine was suddenly shut down.  In the interview, she describes herself as a “zombie” and the experience as a “nightmare.”  The fact that Browning was a very successful professional, living far from the edge of economic hardship, made little difference in terms of the way unemployment turned her life upside down.

Browning walks us through the experience in Slow Love, a new memoir that Publishers Weekly calls “enchanting, funny, [and] deeply gracious.”  For a while, Browning can’t stop baking muffins (she gains fifteen pounds), and as she navigates sleepless nights and panicky days, she confronts her own life in a deep and difficult way.  Read a generous excerpt in the New York Times—and don’t miss the comments, which come from both ends of the sympathy spectrum.

Needless to say, Browning’s story has a happy ending:  She rediscovers herself, moves to a small town, and becomes a blogger.   (Really.)   Also needless to say, many if not most folks don’t have the luxury of reinventing themselves quite so completely.  But Browning’s story has a lot to share, no matter whether you are coping with vocation disruption yourself, or trying to understand someone else’s challenge.

Especially valuable:  We are reminded by Slow Love of the ways we use work to structure our days, define our identities, and (often) distract ourselves from personal problems.  It happens that Browning loved her job—but many people, like my friend, find they miss jobs they didn’t like a bit.  So (here’s the relevant bit) it’s worth remembering that when the unemployed go out into the world as job-seekers, they are not looking just for a replacement paycheck.  They are also looking for a place to to reconstruct a vital aspect of their life that has gone missing.

No surprise, Browning’s blog is beautiful.  She also writes a thoughtful column called Personal Nature for the Environmental Defense Fund.  Both are worth checking out.

Is Monitoring Facebook a Good Idea? China’s Approach to Social Monitoring

Who’s watching you as you Facebook,Twitter and go on LinkedIn to talk to your friends and colleagues? Every word you type may be closely monitored if you live in China. They have recently begun new developments in their approach to social networking and the online community where they will start monitoring all social web activity.

According to this article by The New York Times, China has formed a special bureau that was organized solely for the purpose of monitoring social networking sites. They’re expected to watch and look for suspicious activity, study what the trends are and generally see what people are talking about. They are also tasked with regulating and monitoring online businesses and to spot any irregularities or oddities that may exist. There are mixed feelings as to whether or not this is a good idea.

The new bureau marks the latest outgrowth to a morass of agencies tasked with regulating online business and communications in China. (Source)

How will this new condition affect individuals who are constantly online and frequent social networking sites. How will this new bureau affect the way businesses do business?

As for individuals, there will likely be a decrease in their social web activity, or maybe they will watch what they say while they’re online. It may be that the Chinese government is not necessarily looking for anything in particular. Or are they? Most monitoring authorities employ these types of networks to search for certain patterns, activities or styles of communicating. It doesn’t always have to be bad activity, but their search and monitoring is diligent nonetheless.

Foremost, businesses will begin to monitor more closely what they put on their sites and how they engage their audiences. Businesses are going to be more concerned about profitability and their perceived involvement with other business entities. Again, although there may not be any cause for alarm in this area, there may still be slight apprehension with their business dealings.

What do you think about China’s new committee on social network monitoring? Do you think it’s something to be cautious of or that it’s not anything to worry about? How would you feel if your personal or business site were monitored? What is your comfort level on having your conversations monitored or monitoring someone else’s? Please share your opinion with me. Thanks!

Continental and United Airlines Merger Brings New Brand and Logo – Sort Of

This week, Continental Airlines and United Airlines announced a planned merger creating the largest airline.  While the two airlines claim their routes barely overlap and the merger should be completed by the end of 2010, the Chairman of the U.S. House Transportation Committee, Congressman Jim Oberstar has asked the U.S. Justice Department to block the merger.  While we wait for the merger to be approved by antitrust regulators and shareholders (and let’s face it — it’s unlikely the merger won’t happen), consumers can already see some of the effects of the merger with a new brand identity and logo — sort of.

First, a snippet about the new brand from the merger press release:

The holding company for the new entity will be named United Continental Holdings, Inc. and the name of the airline will be United Airlines. The marketing brand will be a combination of the brands of both companies. Aircraft will have the Continental livery, logo and colors with the United name, and the announcement campaign slogan will be “Let’s Fly Together.”

Next, a peak at the new logo, which combines the United name with the old Continental icon:

united_continental_logo

Finally, a look at the new airplanes that look very similar to the old Continental planes with the United name replacing the Continental name.

united_continental_airplane_585px

What do you think of the interim branding solution?  Love it or hate it? Would a complete rebrand with a new name and logo unrelated to either of the previous brands have been a better choice?

Of course, it’s still quite possible that a complete rebranding will happen in the year or so following the merger completion, so the question is whether the Continental and United brands have enough value to warrant keeping either.  Would consumers lament the loss of either brand?  It’s doubtful.

Truth be told, both brands carry a lot of negative baggage (no pun intended), and a complete rebranding could be just the ticket this company needs (again, no pun intended … well, maybe a little).

What do you think?  Leave a comment and share your thoughts.

Images: UnitedContinentalMerger.com

Goldman Sachs–Here We Go Again?

The announcement came during stock market trading hours–GOLDMAN SACHS SUED BY SEC.

Some complained that the SEC should have waited until the markets closed. But the damage to Goldman Sachs shareowners and the markets was already done.

A week later more news came out on the weekend–

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Emails at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. released by a Senate subcommittee show just how much financial reform is needed, two leading senators said on Sunday.

The emails, released Saturday, show executives and other employees at Goldman Sachs knew that the firm was making money on the collapse of the housing market, largely by betting on the failure of mortgage securitizations and derivatives like the ones it bundled and sold to investors, whose failure led to the financial crisis.

“There is something terribly wrong about a country like ours where you make billions of dollars by making nothing and producing nothing but taking advantage of an economic situation, Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., said Sunday on Meet the Press.

What makes this emerging story even more interesting is that Goldman Sachs appeared on Barron’s February 15th cover story on The World’s Most Respected Companies; it was rated 30 out of 100 companies. Barron’s noted —

Barron's Most Respected

I am not faulting Barron’s (this is a good publication and I am a subscriber). Rather, this highlights the continuing problem we have with Corporate Ethics.

This story has another interesting and promising aspect: when considering a similar deal, Bear Stearns turned it down because of its Ethics conflict. As reported in the Guardian—

Bear Stearns, the Wall Street bank now part of JP Morgan Chase, turned down a similarly structured deal to the one under scrutiny between Paulson & Co and Goldman Sachs because it “didn’t pass the ethics standards”.

The bank, which collapsed during the credit crisis, “smelled trouble” when John Paulson, the hedge fund’s founder, approached it with the idea of creating an investment that the fund could bet against, according to author Gregory Zuckerman in his book on Paulson, The Greatest Trade Ever.

As noted in the MarketWatch item above, the Goldman Sachs incident is once again motivating a hair trigger demand for more regulation. When will there be a realization that you cannot regulate ethics?

This is not an academic or esoteric issue. When people are no longer restrained by objective notions of right and wrong, nothing is safe—not your investments, not your house, not your neighborhood, not you! What we’re talking about, ultimately, is the moral consensus upon which the rule of law rests—that’s the very foundation block of Western governments and societies.

When ethics fail in the commercial markets, more and more stringent regulations are certain to follow. It’s the only way to assure the integrity of financial and commercial transactions. But we lose freedom in the process.

The problem is that regulation, however well intended, can’t solve the ethical problem. The best regulation can do is to define what people can get away with by drawing a line they can’t cross. It does not answer the question, “What is the honest way to do business?” Crosswalk.com Commentary

In one of my recent posts, I mentioned that Ethics, to be effective, must be well integrated within the organization’s Culture; so much so that it guides daily decisions of all employees-

Perhaps the key reason is that most companies don’t realize that ethics must start with “the tone at the top”. Board and C-Suite members must be visible in promoting ethical behavior and putting in place an ethics program that promotes an ethics culture. This takes considerable effort and time since it must be embedded in the existing corporate culture.

Bravo to Bear Stearns for showing that Corporate Ethics can work, sometimes.