Applied Semiotics

When I started blogging, I told myself that I was not going to blog from anger. I told myself that I was going to mostly write analysis about marketing, the internet, the automotive industry. The subjects would be edifying and the tone would be a kind of readable, Harpers-esque midbrow academic. A think tank of one.

But this is the dumbest fucking thing I have read in a long, long time:

"Senators to push for $100 gas rebate checks"

One hundred dollars. To every taxpayer in the US.

On the IRS website I learned that there were 130,423,626 individual filings in the US in 2003.

130,423,626 x 100 usd = 13,042,362,600. Go ahead and slide that decimal point over a couple of orders of magnitude.

That's THIRTEEN BILLION DOLLARS.

Not to mention the overhead to distribute the thirteen billion.

This bill is being sponsored by legislative superstars like Senators Rick Santorum (R- PA) and Ted Stevens (R-AK). I am further saddened to say that the whole enchilada is being quarterbacked by Chuck Grassley (R) of Iowa. Iowa. A state that is leading the nation in the production of biofuels. A state with a real stake in researching alternative energy.

What would 13 billion dollars worth of biofuel investment look like? What would that kind of investment in research and development or biofuel infrastructure look like for our nation? What would it look like for the good people of Iowa, who are supposedly Grassley's constituency?

What would 13 billion dollars worth of state of the art refining capacity look like in America? Recent studies suggest that fuel prices in California would be $.25 to $.50 cheaper if there was new refining capacity. But NIMBYism and a total lack of ANY MARKET INCENTIVE for the petrofuel industry to increase refining capacity have paralyzed the development of new refining infrastructure in this nation for the last twenty years.

What would 13 billion dollars worth of tax incentives for high-fuel economy passenger cars look like? What if the bonus was higher for hybrids and clean-diesel super-sippers build here in AMERICA, using american technology, burning american biofuel produced in american midwest, by american farmers? WITH NOT ONE SLIM DIME GOING IN TO THE POCKETS OF CORRUPT, DESPOTIC MIDDLE EASTERN OIL INTERESTS?

And why in the wide, wide world of sports - why for the love of all that is holy are we, the american taxpayer, paying for this Republican election-season faux-populist snowjob? Why are these supposed titans of the free market so happy to give our money away? Can't we let a little good old Adam Smith Invisible Hand pressure work on those prices some?

In marketing we have a little thumbnail rule called the $100 test:

If you would make more impact giving out the project budget as $100 cash incentives, the idea is no good. But good is such a dangerous term, because "good" is usually a value judgement grounded in relativities. Who is this $100 good for? It sure isn't good for us, the american taxpayer.

We elected these people. So let's keep our Bomb & Spend domestic and foreign policy. Let's have the foxes rob the henhouse one more time to stay in power, mortgage our collective future and security for their short term gain.

Energy Security is National Security.

The Midwest should always come before the Mideast.

Technorati Tags: automotive, government, oil war, peak oil, Bomb & Spend

A report from the frontlines of lifestyle event marketing

It is a beautiful, warm day in California's Great Central Valley. Fresno to be exact. I just ate a delicious lunch, which Toyota paid for with a $15 dollar gift certificate. I am about to take a Scion tC coupe for a test drive, something that I am mildly excited about. Paid agents, young good-looking people who are enthused about the Scion product have been paying me all kinds of loving high-touch attention for several minutes.

I am filled with a sense of well being for the Toyota Motor Corporation, USA.

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It is a well known fact that the weak link in the automotive industry's purchase funnel is the dealership.
On the one hand this makes a huge amount of sense - advertising agencies and other creative enterprises hire great talent to create brand and look for the product.
The dealership hires a clown to hand out balloons and hot dogs. Their staff works on commission - every human that walks in the front door is nothing but a man-shaped silhouette, a target that needs to be knocked down to make the sale.

But this disconnect is the great paradox of the industry! Ultimately the automotive industry is about... cars.

And cars are design objects. The number one piece of terrain between an intender and their purchase is the *physicality* of the car, this artifact *designed* from sheet metal, foam, plastic, and software. If the intender has their deepest hopes and dreams affirmed during this critical first close encounter, then the hardest sales job, the emotional sales job is over. The car "feels" right. And takes the quotes off feels - because the feelings of the intender are real.

So why is the dealership the weakest link when it should be the strongest?

How do we get the wonderful physicality of cars into the decision space of automotive consumers, literally put the product back into the hands of our customers? Especially when the retail experience of a car dealership is something that seems totally out of synch with the rest of 21st century retail universe?

You bring the mountain to Mohammed. You make meeting the product a natural part of their life.

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The Scion Drive Tour: Event Scene Analysis

Short version - this thing is a home run for Scion. It was a fun, hip, low key even that participants and passerby seemed to love.

Space: The Tower Distict
I'll be honest, I never expected to find this in Fresno. Microbreweries, cafes, bookstores... boho city. Interruptive advertising sucks when it's jamming up your episode of Desperate Housewives, but somehow it's delighful serendipity when spatially dropped into your lunch break. The location, right off the main drag, pulled in a lot of foot traffic.

Time: Lunch and Dinner
Set up next to a popular (and good) cafe, the Scion team was set up to grab both the lunch and the dinner rush.

The People: Good looking & Smart
I mean, this seems pretty obvious, but someone put a lot of effort into staffing this event. Smartly dressed in Diesel jeans and fitted Scion tshirts, the crew looked the part and knew their product inside out. They came off as smart, not pushy. And they were quietly efficient - this thing ran like a swiss watch.

The Approach: Gentle, Let the product do the talking
Nobody was out doing pushy "sign my petition" marketing. If you asked a question about what was happening, they were waiting to answer. If you asked what was going on, they explained how the test drives worked and asked if you wanted to try out a Scion (very nicely and sincerely, I might add).

How it worked:
Top to bottom, the whole thing took about 25 minutes, and that was with me asking a number of pain-in-the-ass undercover corporate operative questions. I timed other people and saw folks do it in as little as 10, with most people coming in around 15 or so minutes. This is a crucial metric - if you took 45 minutes or so to eat lunch on your lunch break, you could easily do the drive on a whim and still get back to the office without your absence becoming a major production. This is opportunity-based product-focused marketing at its smartest. The whole thing was a Scion-branded experience.

All I handed over was my drivers license. I signed a single form - and that was just a release. 30 seconds tops. I asked for the tC and the booth operator radioed back to the lot. When I got there Mike was waiting for me.





The Drive:
Mike asked if I wanted to drive, or be driven. I said I wanted to drive. The traffic control staffer even took our picture. And that was it - we were off.

Mike was my product specialist, and he was no temp agency flunky. He knew the product backwards and forwards - displacements, horsepower, gearbox, options, you name it. There was no a single question I asked that Mike didn't know the answer to. Seriously, this was the man that Toyota wanted working this show. He came off as very confident and friendly. All told we drove about 10 minutes, on a mix of urban arteries and residential roads.

Scion is a great product. Fit and finish was surprisingly good, especially considering that the Yaris comes off as such a piece of commodity-grade junk. This little coupe was a pistol to drive, and the Pioneer sound system was great. And for a vehicle that folks were climbing in and out of all day, it was immaculately clean. Prep was super.

I asked Mike about how they transported the cars from city to city - car carrier or motorcade.

"Oh, we convoy - get them out on the road."
"Do you do opportunity marketing, I mean, talk to people at rest stations and restaurants?" I asked.
"Oh yeah, we always answers people's questions, and in a group the cars make a real impression."

This event squeezes out branding and product experience value at every possible turn.

Impressions:
EVERYONE was having a great time at this event. It was very low key, but people left smiling. The mix of staff, location, a free lunch, and direct product interaction is an alchemical brew. I walked away with a great impression of this product, to the extent that I would consider the tC as a purchase if it only had a little more headroom (I'm tall).

Does a lifestyle event like this generate the numbers that a national media campaign does? No. but does it have the pricetag of national media? Also no. And this has to be, dollar for dollar, a phenomenal promotional value. BIG brand and undoubtable translation to sales. The people that were hit were *hit*. They walked away *knowing* Scion. They would talk about it when the got back to campus or the office.

The whole thing had a lightweight, almost guerilla feeling to it. These guys traveled light, but my guess is they create smart-bomb results - this is putting the marketing right on the target, but then letting the target opt-in.

Folks, this is the future. Spatially interruptive marketing that comes off as a surprise picnic, not something to be TiVoed past. How do you create awareness about the event? How scalable is this kind of marketing? Big questions, but ones that need to be answered in our Post-television, time-shifted world.


Additional commentary and complete photoset at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/johnny_n/sets/72057594107162390/

Technorati Tags: automotive, branding, event, fresno, scion, advertising

Headed north on CA99 on my way to Fresno I passed this and had to pull over to take a picture. It seemed a fitting inaugural.



I couldn't get off the freeway until the next exit, then made my way back along the frontage road. Working my way back, I passed this:



While I was taking pictures of the gas station sign and the old datsun, the old man that owned the car noticed me outside.

"I saw you taking pictures of the car," he said.
"Yessir, I did take a picture of it. Is that OK?" I said.
"Who do you work for?"
"I work for Nissan. We built that car of yours, I guess."
"Well, it's a good car," he said.
"Yeah, a buddy of mine had one just like it in high school. It was a great little car. I liked the color of yours so much I thought I'd get a picture of it," I said.
"I didn't know if maybe you wanted to buy it."
"Does it run?"
"Not right now, I got to rebuild the carb, you know?" he said.
"When's the last it run?" The conversation had rapidly shifted to two rural men talking cars.
"Well, maybe about three years ago? "
"Has it been in your front yard all that time?" I asked.
"Where else am I going to keep her? Hell, I'll give you the goddamned thing, sonny." Yes, he actually called me "sonny."
I thought about it.
"Naw, I can't bring home another problem like that," I said.
"Think about it. It's a good car when it runs."

Technorati Tags: oil war, photoblog, datsun, automotive