Pre-testing ads is not divisive, it’s a no-brainer
Mark RitsonAgencies will complain pre-testing snuffs out the creative spark, but in reality it helps brands identify the best-performing ads and make them even better.
Mark Ritson
Is this applicable to B2B marketing? Please stop asking
Mark RitsonThis week our marketing columnist asks and then answers the most annoying question of them all.
Google must adapt to a world where search engines are legacy technology
Mark RitsonGoogle owner Alphabet has so far failed to demonstrate its readiness for an AI-driven future, where its mission and established products could become redundant.
There’s one true measure of marketing effectiveness: Marketing(t)
Mark RitsonTime is the variable that most defines marketing success, because consistent growth is the truest test of a brand and its team.
Copy KitKat on your quest for ‘double D marketing’
Mark RitsonTight positioning, a respected brand heritage and refusal to overcomplicate things means when it comes to uniting distinctiveness and differentiation, KitKat has it licked.
Bluey and Bunnings’ tie-up demonstrates all the benefits of co-branding
Mark RitsonThe best bits of both brands rub off on each other, while playing with brand codes makes them more salient – but only because they’ve laid decades of groundwork.
Häagen-Dazs and BBH rekindling their flame has got me excited
Mark RitsonThe ice cream brand and its famed agency achieved one of the great UK product launches 30 years ago. Will they have the same chemistry again?
Are we witnessing the end of the CMO? No, and stop asking
Mark RitsonMarketers should cease pontificating about the validity of CMOs and their time in post, and start focusing on how to do the job better.
Don’t listen to the industry sages, they’re not your ad’s target
Mark RitsonAdvertising professionals’ view of what makes a good ad is not only biased, it’s usually wrong, as their reaction to Tourism Australia’s last campaign shows.
‘Triple-Cooked Marketing Budgets’: The full recipe
Mark RitsonMarketing budgeting is flawed. Marketers are more confused about budgeting than ever before. Here’s your complete three-step guide to fixing it.
In the battle between salience and differentiation, Bothism wins
Mark RitsonMarketers debate over salience and differentiation like they are mutually exclusive, when the evidence shows both in combination will deliver the best results.
Marketers should pay more attention to attention
Mark RitsonThere’s ample evidence that longer dwell time on ads raises brand recall and choice, so ignore Byron Sharp’s claims that you shouldn’t pay for more attention.
Cadbury’s current ads have something its ‘Gorilla’ lacked – legs
Mark RitsonMost marketers seek ads that deliver instant, one-off success, but the ideal campaign is an idea that runs indefinitely while only the execution changes.
And the winner of campaign of the year is…
Mark RitsonGreat diagnosis, smart insight, clever use of media and inventive execution, Sheba’s ‘4am Stories’ is a masterclass in simple but highly effective marketing.
Christmas advertising is drowning in marketers’ fake tears
Mark RitsonChristmas 2021 is shaping up to be an exercise in hyper-emotional brand bullshit, with Coca-Cola even choosing to edit itself out of its own campaign. But don’t worry, the holidays are still coming.
Ritson’s 10 marketing hacks to help small businesses go big
Charlotte RogersFrom a new recipe for pic n’ mix comms, to making extreme choices, Mark Ritson shares his marketing twists that can help SMEs get big brand outcomes.
Even sophisticated mass marketers need targeting
Mark RitsonAfter a short sabbatical to launch this year’s Mini MBA, our trusty marketing columnist returns to talk targeting, and why this ancient topic is one of the biggest challenges most marketers now face. Not despite the industry’s new-found love for mass marketing, but because of it.
Five lessons on how not to do pricing from Elon Musk’s Twitter
Mark RitsonThere is a perfect pricing case study in the way the new Twitter CEO, Elon Musk, communicated his proposed fee for a ‘blue tick’ on the platform – just do the exact opposite of what he did.
Ritson’s recession playbook: 9 steps marketers should take to survive the dark times ahead
Mark RitsonFrom retaining a long-term view and the importance of excess share of voice to making strategic changes to positioning and saying no to failure, our columnist spells out how brands can navigate recession.
Volkswagen is right to put profit before sales
Mark RitsonThere are two paths brands can follow – one leads to sales while the other points to profitability, and the latter is invariably the right one to choose.
12 reasons why Twitter’s rebrand to X is a mistake
Mark RitsonOur marketing columnist on the biggest branding move of the year: Twitter’s sudden transformation into X.
Toblerone’s brand image won’t be hurt by losing the Matterhorn
Mark RitsonRemoving the famous Swiss mountain from its packaging won’t stop the chocolate brand building a desirable brand image in today’s globalised age.
Consumers no longer care about provenance – except in Cockermouth
Mark RitsonVolvos are made in China, Stella Artois is brewed in Wales, and globalisation means we don’t bat an eyelid – though my fellow Cumbrians will test that theory to the limit as Jennings ale moves to the Midlands.
Transforming logos for Pride has lost brand impact and become ‘rainbow-washing’
Mark RitsonWith more brands altering their distinctive assets more frequently, often for the same reason and at the same time, code play is becoming far less effective.
Tesla is about to experience the seven perils of discounting
Mark RitsonBy discounting for the first time, Tesla is not only starting an electric vehicle price war, it is communicating its weakness to existing and future customers.
Suffering from impostor syndrome? The cure is simpler than you think
Mark RitsonMarketers are prone to impostor syndrome, but solid training and a more realistic view of your peers’ achievements will show your worries are unfounded.
Brands staying in Russia are making a statement of support for Putin
Mark RitsonBrands that continue to do business in Russia deserve no platform in our industry, our columnist argues.
Welcome to the new normal, it’s the same as the old one
Mark RitsonDespite dire predictions of Covid-driven decline for some sectors and exponential growth for others, we’re largely where we would have been if it had never happened.
Badly designed surveys don’t promote sustainability, they harm it
Mark RitsonBrands love reported data that shows people care about sustainable consumption, but these spurious findings just hold back real behaviour change.
Synthetic data is suddenly making very real ripples
Mark RitsonReady for the era of synthetic data? The implications for strategy and execution could be significant if marketers are willing to look long term.
It may be tainted, but don’t underestimate the power of brand love
Mark RitsonAlthough the concept of ‘brand love’ was overused and went out of fashion, it remains an insightful way to consider consumers’ attitudes towards brands.
If you don’t invest 5% of your budget in research, you don’t know what you’re doing
Mark RitsonThe BBC’s decision to invest heavily in research should be celebrated by us all and noted by marketers. Investing 5% of your budget in market research is not superfluous, it’s key to understanding customers, serving them better and growing your business.
Only bad marketers think more messages mean more effectiveness
Mark RitsonYou might increase total message recall by adding more of them, but you’ll lose credibility, as shown by the World Cup protestor who couldn’t pick one cause.
Follow Shania Twain’s lead and make sure product isn’t the forgotten P of marketing
Mark RitsonOur marketing columnist experiences an epiphany on his couch that leads him to revise his opinion of Heinz pasta sauce and the state of modern marketing.
Even if Unilever placates its investors, it still has Ben & Jerry’s to deal with
Mark RitsonWith CEO Alan Jope set to leave, Unilever faces battles not only with investors aiming to deprioritise brand purpose, but with its own Ben & Jerry’s brand, which is suing it for abandoning purpose commitments.
You can’t beat TikTok by becoming its clone
Mark RitsonOur marketing columnist examines the underwhelming response of the major social media brands to the TikTok threat and explores the perils of competitor orientation.
Make this the year you innovate
Helen EdwardsCompeting priorities will hold you back in this time of budget pressure and economic stagnation, so focus only on creating an offer that meets customer needs.
Brands’ biggest AI opportunity is in making customers believe the bullshit
Mark RitsonArtificial intelligence is mostly a distraction from marketing fundamentals – unless you convince your market AI makes your brand better than the competition.
Do you have a strategy worthy of a brief? These three questions will tell you
Mark RitsonNew research shows marketers are terrible at briefing agencies. To start putting that right, ask yourself whether your marketing strategy meets these criteria.
Three axioms and three questions that summarise all of brand strategy
Mark RitsonBrand strategy is not complicated, it’s just the systematic application of the basics all marketers are taught. Here’s a simple way to be sure you’re taking the right steps – in the right order.
How do you win new customers? Ask your extreme loyalists
Mark RitsonThose who spend more and buy your brand more often have unparalleled insight into what makes it special – and into what appeals to new customers too.
Giving your brand a good death is an underrated marketing skill
Mark RitsonAlthough we never talk about it, marketers kill as many brands as we create, and doing so in the right way at the right time is crucial to business health.
For Omega and Swatch, the rewards of co-branding could be astronomical
Mark RitsonFar from cannibalising Omega’s luxury sales, the collaboration with Swatch on the £200 Moonswatch will breathe new life into both these sister brands.
An ethnography of pricing: How and why marketers should put up prices
Mark RitsonInflation means price increases are marketing’s number-one priority for 2022. But how many marketers are capable or even aware of the challenge ahead? Our columnist provides a handy cheat sheet for those who want to get it right.
Films no longer have sequels, they have sub-brands and franchises
Mark RitsonOur humble columnist spent Christmas in his underpants watching Netflix, but that doesn’t mean he wasn’t thinking about brands. This week, the fascinating whodunnit centres on the last-minute renaming of one of the holiday season’s most successful films.
Accenture Song is not a great rebrand, but it could be so much worse
Mark RitsonRebrands are usually a bad move, but despite the ridicule for Accenture Interactive becoming Accenture Song, there is just as much upside.
Does Facebook’s corporate rebrand to ‘Meta’ prove the future is ‘beyond’ it?
Mark RitsonOur marketing columnist stayed up late in Tasmania and put his headset on for the Facebook Connect VR conference. But he came away unimpressed with the branding revelations that followed.
Adidas’s sale of Reebok makes strategic sense all round
Mark RitsonReebok hasn’t reached the heights of the 1980s and 90s since Adidas bought it in 2006, and its sale means Adidas can focus on its ‘branded house’ while new owner ABG has the skills to bring Reebok into its ‘house of brands’.
‘Range inflation’ is a sign Tesla has lost sight of its customers
Mark RitsonOur marketing columnist reviews the recent controversy over the driving range of Teslas and revises his assessment of the company’s market orientation.
P&O is the rare reputation crisis that really does matter
Mark RitsonThe damage P&O Cruises has suffered from P&O Ferries’ mistakes cuts to the core of the business, and leaves the separately owned brand with four options.
Peloton has snatched victory from the jaws of death – again
Mark RitsonMr Big’s (spoiler alert) death after a Peloton ride in the latest Sex and the City spin-off had social media forecasting the brand’s doom, but it actually created greater mental availability for the brand – especially after Ryan Reynolds’ creative agency got involved.
Trust in brands is illusory, just look at Facebook’s continued growth
Mark RitsonFacebook repeatedly ranks low in consumer trust surveys, yet user growth continues, revealing the idea of trust in brands as anthropomorphic nonsense.