Bella Katz on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn

What I’m reading (and RSS subscribing to) this year:

• The Gates Notes: Bill Gates has this week launched his personal new website The Gates Notes which is, of course, exceptional in many ways. The navigation reminds me of mind flow - an information collective set out in an intuitive way. Includes updates of what the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation are working on and sections titled What I’m Thinking About, What I’m Learning, Infrequently Asked Questions.  This is someone who could have spent their early retirement perma-cruising the Bahamas on a 20,000 foot yacht and has instead put money and full time resources behind philanthropy on an immense scale. If I had big charitable donations to make, this is where I’d put the money.
• Freakonomics blog: This is the New York Times blog from journalist and economist (respectively) Stephen Dubner and Steven Levitt, authors of the bestselling Freakonomics and the new Superfreakonomics. The blog was designed to “keep the conversation going initiated in their books and includes guest contributors from different worlds, whose common connections is the application of data and numbers in unique social contexts.
• Branding Strategy Insider: The comprehensive blog of branding strategists Derrick Daye and Brad VanAuken, with regular contributions from the world’s top marketing specialists such as Mark Ritson, Al Ries, Martin Lindstrom. There’s such an overwhelming supply of marketing reading and”gurus” online that you could simplify things for yourself by reading the articles here once a week.
• Brand New: If you have an interest in corporate and brand identity (AKA logos) this blog gives unbiased reviews of who is doing what, and why it does or doesn’t work. Of course a totally subjective topic, but always with a sharp view and copious comments from copious other readers.
• Marketing Ritson: The website and article archive of marketing expert and ‘International Consultant to many of the World’s Greatest Brands’ Mark Ritson. He is a hilarious and totally brutal writer who isn’t afraid to call out a disaster piece of marketing regardless who it comes from. Harvard Business Review Columnist of the Year 2009.

Whose writing do you read regularly?

Bella Katz on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn

New Zealand is big on promoting itself as the destination of choice for thrill seekers and adventure junkies, but there’s an equally lucrative market they should be talking to more often and that’s young families.

The marketing of New Zealand, at least here in Australia, has long been around the sporty outdoor activity gig - a message now well and truly ingrained. If you want to go bungy jumping, jet boating, heli-skiing, mountain hiking… <insert double-barrel extreeeme activity here> - we know the country to go to.

Now here we are in holiday mode with a very young child and that type of action adventure is as far from mine and my husband’s reality as lounging around bars all day with friends in sexy European locations. It’s not because we don’t want to you understand, we just can’t.

As a New Zealander I know NZ is a great place for families with young kids, especially for neighbouring Australians who are a mere 3-4 hour flight away, but I wonder why NZ tourism hasn’t made a bigger deal about this segment of the market and made sure New Zealand is as analogous with family as it is with adventure.

Here’s my typical mental checklist for a holiday with young kids:

1. How far is it? My child/I will go insane on any flight longer than 4 hours - unless we’re going for a month plus
2. Is it safe? Nothing on the front page today on terrorism, floods, disease, crime
3. Is there good  stuff to do that kids can get in on too? Enough to keep the kids entertained and good food/wine/sights for us
4. Is it easy to get around? I can rent a car and drive everywhere easily or public transport is solid
5. Are prices ok? Accommodation, food, currency is working for me right now

Being from New Zealand, I know NZ ticks all these boxes (except perhaps public transport, but we can overlook that as driving is so easy there). From Australia you’ve arrived within a few hours, you can jump in the car and drive to some beautiful beach destinations, you can jump on a ferry and head to gorgeous island wineries, you can eat in some fabulous restaurants, you can hit the groovy boutiques for a spot of shopping, you can go fruit picking at the best farms around, it’s all there and it’s all very easy with little kiddies in tow.

So I wonder why NZ Tourism doesn’t feature families in their marketing more prominently.  They should run some campaigns in Australia (to start with) that talk specifically to parents, get us excited about having a “milder” NZ adventure, A.K.A. world class tourism that doesn’t necessarily involve leaping off a bridge or having to wear protective head gear. It’s a ripe message just waiting to be picked.

Bella Katz on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn

IKEA in Sweden have used a simple Facebook function, photo tagging, in a seriously genius way. Watch the short video below and see creativity at is finest.

Agency Forsman and Bondenfors created a FB profile for the store manager, uploaded storeroom photos and invited people to tag the photo with their name.  First to tag won the item. Thanks to Facebook’s news feed, update and forwarding function, this promotion spread like crazy.

Sam Mutimer of Lets Refresh - thanks for finding this one!

Bella Katz on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn

Melbourne’s Chadstone shopping centre has opened its luxury wing to massive crowds. So massive in fact that rather than risk a riot, management started and finished a voucher promotion at 5am on opening day.

Yesterday, a beautiful sunny day, the queues to Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Tiffany, Chanel… were more than 30 deep with security staggering people allowed through the door. By all accounts it has been a veritable success.

Today, a rainy Melbourne day, Luxury has a different story and the new marble floor is dotted with blue plastic buckets as rain, rather than sunlight, pours through that designer glass ceiling.

I wonder what Karl Lagerfeld, Patrizio di Marco et al would have to say about that…

Bella Katz on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn

There is a serviced apartment complex in the Gold Coast’s Burleigh Heads that my family and I have been going to for almost ten years. When I got married all our guests stayed there too, so at a quick calculation I’d say we’ve contributed about $30,000 to their bottom line over the years.

For those who’ve never been there, Burleigh Heads is a beautiful beach that’s close enough to Surfers Paradise to feel connected to the action, but far enough to remain untouched by the overdevelopment other Gold Coast areas have suffered.

This complex was by far the nicest in the area, an area that is basically holiday accommodation the entire length of the coast. It was also very competitively priced for a relatively slick place with the beach just across the road.

In the last few months it has changed ownership and been renamed under its new brand and new management. It has also seriously gone down the gurgler and for all our loyalty over the years, I think we’ve done our dash with this place.

In a one week stay I can reel off this little list of failings:

• Dishwasher was broken: Not a good start for a 3 bedroom apartment with 4 kids under 10. We arrived on the Thursday and management sent someone on the following Wednesday (one day before we left) to check it out. Not to fix it mind, just to review it. Apparently management cannot fix anything inside the apartment, they can only tell the owners to do it.
• Main balcony sliding door jammed: Again, for a beach holiday with the balcony as the key selling feature it ain’t a good look. Maintenance guy came on Wednesday, six days into our stay and one day before we left and said “Yep, previous guests told us about this…”
• Two cereal bowls in the cupboard: Fun times for an apartment that sleeps 8.
• TV remote has broken battery cover and flat batteries: They couldn’t check the batteries and shove some cellotape round the thing?
• Towel rail missing the bar
• Tap dripping in the bathroom
• Bins don’t come with rubbish bags
• Apartment complex UP lift button not working: If you want to go upstairs from the 6th floor you have to push the down button, get in the lift and push UP button when inside. So if someone downstairs has pushed it before you, you’ll ride all the way down before you can go back up again.

Even when you’ve been a guest of this place as many years as we have there comes a point when you start to wonder why bother. If it takes a week for management to call in their maintenance people… If the resort do nothing more than man-the-front-desk and have no control over repairs inside the apartment… If standards keep slipping every time you go… It’s time to look around for a new place. Hell, why not pay more and go somewhere with some customer service? i.e. an extravagant place where they line their bins with bin bags…

Maybe the Gold Coast was a holiday mecca in its heyday and resorts didn’t have to lift a finger to fill the rooms - but those days are gone. Too many choices and holiday time too precious to waste doing the sort of maintenance you left home to avoid.

Management of these places have to lift their game because as guests we can forgive one or two oversights that are dealt with quickly, but lazy service and an entire checklist of chores and I’m looking for a new place to spend my hard earned money.

Bella Katz on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn

There’s a marketing crossroads companies come to when they’re at that stage of going from Small Company to Less-Small Company. It’s an interesting time for a marketer who has worked with businesses large and small, as you have to be very diplomatic and appreciate this as a pivotal step for your client.

It’s usually the point when companies have a stream of big business of their own and cannot help but compare themselves with their (usually) much more sophisticated clients. It’s also when there’s a bit of downtime from a period of fast reactive growth and the company starts thinking about proactively approaching new business.

Although logo and branding are only a part of marketing and communications, I still find with the smaller businesses it is this that requires the most urgent attention and it is this that can be the hardest sell.

One of the challenges is the perception of the logo as a simple icon and the psychological price point that the small business owner has versus the large established company.

Where a big blue chip is prepared to pay tens, if not hundreds of thousands for a new logo, the small business owner can’t see how this ‘badge’ can be worth more than a few thousands dollars. A few thousand? Why so much when they can go back to their own designer and get them to knock up three for $500.

Many may think the logo is just a symbol or a mark that sits in the top left corner of the stationary and website, but a brand is not the same thing at all. When a small company comes to that crossroads, it’s a total mindset change that raises them to a different playing field.

Needless to say there are a multitude of core business and marketing strategies that are necessary for successfully growing a small company. When it comes to that professional rebranding step though, I find that’s when the entire company - from senior level through to workers on a factory floor - start to feel the buzz and a sense of increased pride in where they work.

Without fail there’s controversy and disagreement among the staff when the new logo and brand are chosen. There are mutters of disapproval as style guidelines are enforced and the person on the front desk is told no more palm tree email backgrounds or festive signature fonts. There is an absolute uproar when Snappy Snap local printer is put under review and retired because the print quality doesn’t measure up to the new standard.

It’s a challenging time and unless you’re a marketer with total belief in yourself and in your expertise you won’t win this battle and potentially even worse, in the long term you’ll be blamed for not doing what you were hired to do in the first place: elevate the company.

There is inevitably always a good ending to this if done well. As the new signage goes up outside and in the foyer, the new stationary gets handed out and personal business cards go to individuals, as the sales team receive their impressive new collateral, as the vehicles start driving around with new decals and the uniforms arrive in a fresh new style, the website launches looking slick and professional, the trade press runs the wave of concurrent media.

When everything the company produces has the same, strong, consistent brand, that’s when it all comes together and the buzz becomes palpable. The branding controversy all but disappears and the business moves on to the next step of implementing the business and marketing strategy with a confidence in its ability to make an excellent impression every time.

For this reason I will always fight the fight with small business clients and implore them to start working with a small external team of suppliers at a much higher level than what they were in the past. That includes an excellent design, print and web partner - all marketing savvy, all highly experienced and all with initiative and skill to advise you on the best possible solutions.

FYI: A great website that reviews good and bad corporate identity is Under Consideration’s BRAND NEW

Bella Katz on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn

ecostore is a New Zealand brand of sustainable household and personal care products that was founded in 1993 although I’ve only come across the products on Australian supermarket shelves quite recently. As they’re priced at the premium end of their category, I wonder how they will do and wonder whether the world needs and will buy into another eco household brand. How will this one stand out in a busy category?

New Zealand does have a knack at this enviro branding thing and this is another of those companies that has seemingly come from nowhere (or as they say on their website “from an eco village in New Zealand”) and it is generating significant buzz.

I’ve always been a bit of a sucker for products with environmental declarations and as a new(ish) mum am no doubt bang on their target market. I approach every product with the words organic and natural with suspicion, given how little we customers know of what goes on behind the scenes. For example, I got very excited about the big no parabens marketing schtick adopted by many skincare brands and was later told by colleagues in that industry that products without it can be more harmful unless very short use-by dates are strictly adhered to - and they usually aren’t. It’s a confusing category for customers and one rife with imposters.

ecostore has entered this space with an expanding, expensive range of natural products, a great look and their marketing strategy seems clever indeed.

For instance, founder Malcolm Rands, who started the company together with his wife Melanie, is apparently referred to as “ecoman” in New Zealand. He has an interesting bio and strong ties to environmental causes and councils. He is a believable ambassador for the brand.

Speaking of ambassadors, when launching the ecostore brand into the US, the company took the low budget approach of engaging with “mommy bloggers”. This strategy of sending numerous targetted emails and samples of product appears to have been incredibly successful. I am making assumptions of success because every time I came across a blog that mentioned ecostore, the write up was full of breathless praise. See here, here and here for starters - all randomly found by typing ‘ecostore’ into Google.

ecostore are priced at a premium and are open and unashamed about this. Their positioning is value for money via concentrated formulations and on their website they argue that cost per use often works out to be lower than ‘cheaper looking’ supermarket brands.

If you’re going for the top end of the market there need to be clear justifications for what customers are getting. I suspect we’ve all been broken in and naturally assume organic and environmental products carry a premium, in that way the category has been opened up for ecostore by previous players.

Looking ahead I wonder whether there is a place in the (still) relatively niche market of natural household products for a big player? ecostore is not big yet, but looks set for serious growth.

Will the market continue to embrace a brand that had such humble beginnings as it grows on an international scale? What happens when production moves, as it is shortly due, from New Zealand to include the US? Do we believe that big successful companies can continue to have the same ethical responsibility as a little backyard brand started by an enviro-happy couple?

Look at the demise of Macro Wholefoods in Australia and the very different mood around Anita Roddick’s Body Shop versus L’Oreal’s Body Shop.

ecostore has all the makings of a small business about to hit the big time, but I wonder whether its rapid growth will be its undoing? Hopefully NOT.

NOTE: I work with New Zealand companies but thought I should add that ecostore is NOT one of my clients. I’m a recent buyer of their products via Safeway/Woolworths as it seems to be on sale most of the time. Sale price is still more expensive than most competitive products, but I’m always happy to trial a new brand and pay a premium if it does the job better.

Bella Katz on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn

Pumpkin Patch children’s clothing is a big deal in New Zealand, being its second largest publicly traded retailer. The chain, which launched as a catalogue business in 1991, now has 235 stores worldwide with close to half of all revenue coming from Australia.

But Pumpkin Patch is in decline. Several weeks ago they announced they would close 20 of 35 US stores in order to curtail further losses. They largely cited the recession as reason for a 7 percent fall in half year profit to NZ$9.5m and attributed the strength of their brand to having cushioned the blow.

I have some other thoughts…

Some of the world’s best marketers talk about how recession can lead to troubled times for one particular type of retailer: the one that’s bang in the middle. This is the brand that is neither premium nor low cost. It is that huge space that occupies the middle market and when finances get tighter it’s just easier for customers to walk away. (For a great article on how premium luxury has no fear of recession, read Luxury Stands its Ground by Mark Ritson.)

Pumpkin Patch sits right in this middle space and, contrary to their belief that they are an ‘innovative retailer’, they have over the years become just another middle of the road brand.

I would argue that when they first launched they sold uniquely designed, well-made, age appropriate clothing out of natural fabrics, such as merino wools and other fibres that New Zealand is known for. They were an immediate success in New Zealand and very quickly became one in Australia. As I’ve mentioned in the past, New Zealanders are fierce supporters of all things home made and ‘Brand New Zealand’ has a premium all of its own too.

So what has happened to that delightful little label? I suspect the same thing that happens to many delightful little labels as they grow up: they start focusing mostly on their bottom line and don’t keep as close a watch on their brand.

Pumpkin Patch now seems to make average-quality, above-average priced clothing in the same designs that low cost retailers such as Target produce. They use a lot of synthetic fabrics such as acrylic and polyester, and just about - if not everything - is made in China. These are not reasons in themselves for A brand’s downfall, but they are all reasons for THIS brand’s downfall. This is not what they set out to be and this is not what attracted loyal customers to them back in 1991.

I have a 2-year old daughter and before she came along I had no idea how determined and researched a customer I was going to become. Authenticity, heritage and craftsmanship are things new parents are prepared to pay a real premium for. For everything else there is Target. I wanted to buy from Pumpkin Patch (because I would argue that expat New Zealanders are even fiercer supporters of NZ products than those living there) but I never did.

There is a Pumpkin Patch in a premium retail position on the children’s floor of Melbourne’s huge Chadstone Shopping Centre. This is the shopping centre where mums are literally lining up as doors open at 9.30am - having an outing with their prams, passing time before baby naps or just being out of the house for a change. There are many children’s stores down there such as Fiona Scanlan’s BIG, ESPRIT, Gumboots, Early Learning Centre, SEED, Cotton On Kids (I’d argue the most successful of the lot). Then there’s always Target, David Jones, Myer etc. There’s a lot of competition and clothing from Pumpkin Patch simply doesn’t stand out.

Before writing this blog I did a quick survey of a few mums about what they thought of Pumpkin Patch. Here’s what they had to say (and I’ll add to it as comments come in):

• “I reckon it’s pretty crappy - I don’t like the designs and it’s pretty overpriced for what it is.”
• “NQR (not quite right) as in age inappropriate designs. Also quite expensive but they’ve had sales most of the year.”
• “I stopped buying from Pumpkin Patch 6 months ago because they are overpriced for stuff that looks like Target, also the stuff doesn’t wash well.”
  
• “My sister gets an esale email almost every day.”
• “I find the designs a bit naff and the fabrics are all fakes like 100% acrylic cardigans.”
  

If I could end on a few words of advice for Pumpkin Patch, as I’d like to see it get through this and find a strong niche, really I would.

1. GO BACK TO YOUR HERITAGE, back to Pumpkin Patch 1991. What did you want to stand for then? Be honest with yourself, do you stand for that now?

2. If you want to continue producing largely mass market designs out of fairly average fabrics, DROP YOUR PRICES. Become a lower cost retailer. There’s a market for that: see Cotton On Kids, Target et all as examples.

3. If you want to stick with the higher priced label IMPROVE YOUR DESIGNS AND QUALITY. Start producing truly exceptional pieces out of beautiful natural fabrics. You may even be able to charge even more and get more profit from fewer customers.

4. DO SOME MARKET RESEARCH. Talk to mums, talk to your current customers, old customers, non customers. Look around at what successful and unsuccessful children’s retailers look like. Work out your position in the market.

5. DON’T TRY AND BE EVERYTHING TO EVERYONE. Don’t be afraid to lose customers if it means you can get more from better ones.

These are a few of the New Zealand children’s labels that I think are stealing Pumpkin Patch’s premium customers. Hopefully they don’t go down the same path as they become more and more successful.

• mokopuna merino
• Nature Baby: organic NZ baby wear
• Merino Kids

Bella Katz on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn

A few weeks ago I was invited to do a presentation to a group of senior executives on Marketing Best Practice. I was ridiculously excited about it because for the last six months I’ve been a a bit obsessed with this very topic (in fact I used the word ‘obsessed’ in my last post too.) I decided to do a quick review of The Good and The Bad of Australian brands right now and one of The Bad I included was the Woolworths / Safeway rebranding.

My big issue with this is just how long it’s taking to change the Safeway name to Woolworths. It has been a good four to five months that I’ve been seeing the Safeway logo with the Woolworths strapline, the Woolworths name in the Safeway typeface with the Safeway logo, the Woolworths logo with the new Woolworths branding. I’ve seen them all at the same time, in the same store, in different stores, on the staff uniforms. I’ve heard the Woolworths jingle on the Safeway tv ad. I’ve seen the Woolworths trucks, the Safeway trucks. I’ve seen my local Safeway staff celebrating Everyday Rewards with the entire store turning orange in recognition of that branding. That happened overnight - no confusion there - they had caps, balloons, signage, uniforms, flyers, loyalty cards, a website.

I’m not entirely sure from Woolworths point of view what the issue is now. It can’t be budget, as surely a company of this size has the budget to implement a new brand very quickly across all areas of the business. It can’t be the awareness issue regarding Safeway being the more prominent brand in Victoria, not any more as we’ve been seeing Woolworths all over Safeway for months. I can only put it down to two things and neither of them are very satisfactory. Either Woolworths’ brand team have been too busy with the launch of Everyday Rewards to focus on retiring the Safeway name. Or they think customers will be too confused if Safeway disappeared entirely and Woolworths took over. Customers are already confused - put us out of our misery!

Bella Katz on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn

Recently I’ve become a bit obsessed with reading articles from the great marketing minds, old and new. I can pinpoint this down to three specific events that are going on for me right now.

1. My husband is doing his MBA and I’ve had lecturer and subject envy
2. My increased use of Twitter has led me to follow some exceptional people and read excellent articles (and conversely see how much tat it out there masquerading as marketing genius)
3. Working for myself over the last four years has meant I haven’t had a marketing mentor to work with

Banksy - monkey inspiration

For the four years I’ve worked for myself none of the above seemed to matter too much. I even stopped several papers short of completing my marketing Masters because I was fed up at regurgitating the same essay in slightly different ways to essentially the same marketing papers with slightly different titles. Marketing academia and marketing departments felt like they had frozen in time, the case studies were all the same ones from the first edition of the textbooks (Ford, New Coke etc), I felt I could learn a lot more by doing it instead of studying it.

However, a polite distance from marketing departments and a mood of change in the professional world has shaken things up and made them more interesting again. If anything good has come out the recession, for example, it may be that it’s forcing failing companies that had sat back and enjoyed the lucky good times to realise they had no recipe for success. The mediocre achievements of their mediocre execs was pretty much pure fluke.

As a result, I (would like to) believe that Thinking and Learning are making a humble comeback.

There are some true experts out there - individuals and companies - who didn’t get to where they are without constantly learning, applying good judgement and generally being excellent at what they do. Out of the seemingly endless myriad of online information I’ve found a manageable handful of those I admire and I’m going to make reading their articles, watching their presentations and seeing who else they recommend, part of my routine. There’s a lot I can learn from other fields as well as marketing - economics, science, psychology, sales, business etc. My professional resolutions have been made early this year.

Is there anyone you recommend?