Too bad the presidential candidates won’t see it. Although San Francisco is natural habitat for Sen. Obama. Still, there’s a slim-to-none chance that the old boy will be exposed to this streetside socio-political commentary.
So what does all this have to do with marketing and branding? Everything. Change is, indeed, all around us. Your brand will wither and die if you don’t change in step with the technology that’s accelerating all the changes. In the era of Mad Men, it was a monologue. Sponsors did the talking through a one-way channel. And there were only three (NBC, CBS and ABC). Today? Hundreds of channels, yes. But no live drama written by people such as Rod Serling, Neil Simon and Paddy Chayefsky. However – the customer talks back to you. Dishes dirt about you to other customers. Trashes your ratings online. It’s as important as ever to give customers benefits. The change today: you better be sure the benefit your selling is the one that your customers value the most and will pay the most the get. If it isn’t, it’s not the benefit that will sell the product most profitably and sustain your business. Next thing you know, you're panhandling.
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