has some interesting articles on connecting brands and artists from various VNU media properties.
Thoughts from the I'm With The Brand panel at last month's Billboard Dance Music Summit, including this from Armani Exchange VP of brand imaging Patrick Doddy: One of the biggest challenges Doddy faces is getting the artists he works with to see the bigger picture—the opportunities beyond the physical CD. Whenever we start a relationship, the DJ/artist is always asking, 'What can you do for me?
' They rarely see the many ways we can grow together. Still, Doddy calls it a learning process for all participants.
The Music Upfront gives U.
S. labels a forum as they plan their campaigns for the coming season to stage 'upfront' showcases of key artists and repertoire to ad agency creatives and brand marketers.
Posted by Clyde on October 17, 2006 in Interesting piece by Michael Paoletta in Inside Branded Entertainment from Billboard Biz on some of the panels at the recent in Atlanta.
During the I’m With the Brand panel, Chaka Zulu, co-co-CEO of Disturbing Tha Peace stated:
“Co-branding with other companies and products has helped create more branding outlets,” Zulu said. “You have to ask yourself the question, ‘How can I connect my brand -- my artist -- to the brands that already that a have relationship to consumers.”
Zulu illustrated this with a recent partnership between one of his artists, Ludacris, and Pontiac.
For Zulu, the deal was a natural fit, because of Ludacris’ love of cars and because of timing. It was between albums, so the ad for the Pontiac Solstice would keep Ludacris in the public’s eye in a campaign with a media buy in the millions. Ludacris appeared in the TV spot, which also featured his song, “2 Miles an Hour.
”
Since the track had no accompanying video, and Pontiac needed visuals for the commercial, the auto manufacturer agreed to pay for a video. This was music to the ears of Zulu and Ludacris.
Posted by Clyde on September 18, 2006 in
Noel Hankin, vice president of multicultural initiatives at Moet Hennessy USA.
..which markets Hennessy, Dom Perignon and Belvedere, among other drinks, said his company welcomes the association.
We appreciate that business. We want it. It's critical to our business success, Hankin said.
We've never had any hesitation or reservation about embracing the hip-hop community. ..
.
Hip-hop is really a language of the younger generation and it's always great for a brand to be relevant with the younger or next generation of buyers, said Kass Dawson, who heads emerged markets at Mercedes-Benz. We consider it a compliment of the highest order.
..It really speaks to what our brand stands for - the success, status, aspirations.
Cadillac spokesman Kevin Smith gave props to celebrities, including rappers, and their fondness for the Escalade for the company's resurgence.
As soon as I try to take a break from this blog, including ignoring various newsfeeds, alerts me to an AllHipHop piece on a recent article in the Economist in which Frédéric Rouzaud, the managing director of Louis Roderer Cristal apparently describes rappers' brand boosting as .
Assuming that Cristal is produced in limited quantities with a luxury market readily available, it's possible that they view rap name checking as a detriment to their brand.
Hmmm, I'll give Paris Hilton a holler and see what she thinks since she represents a radically upscale consumer with a connection to hip hop, such at it is.
While I'm waiting on Paris to get back to me, I'm glad the article got out in a venue that a lot of hip hop artists and fans will read, even if it is full of those nasty pop-up ads in the text. Yuck!
Uh oh, Eskay's ! I guess I'm boycotting by class default but I'm looking forward to seeing where this one goes.
Lately been schooling me in surprisingly effective ways with his comments here and elsewhere and I want to thank him for that.
He's confirming my growing recognition that I shouldn't write about things that I don't care enough about to look at deeply.
Also, I shouldn't post comments when I'm upset. I just realized that both times I've opened myself up to Mr.
Kam's critiques, it's been when I was upset or overreacted to specific comments and overrstated my case in some fashion. Plus, I was buying into always being the one who's right. Always a mistake, even for someone who's right as often as am I (lol).
The thing is, I don't really care what Seth Godin or Tim O'Reilly do. I might get worked up in a passing way as I would during a barroom conversation but in terms of anything deeply meaningful, they don't matter to me. I'm not a fan, follower or part of an imagined community, and that may be part of why I was so quick to dismiss them and their very real, personal and/or professional concerns.
None of the posts related to these guys really means that much to me personally*, but I am interested in seeing how fans and followers become antagonists. For years people have said that if your customers or fans or followers turn against you they'll eventually undermine you. And I can't think of a more visible mode in which that turn appears than in blogs or on discussion boards.
That's worth looking at without trying to trash people's reputations.
So I just want to apologize to Seth Godin and Tim O'Reilly and thank Rafi Kam for being part of my educational experience.
*Clarification: I should note that I meant everything I said and I do care about the underlying issues.
I just don't feel it was that useful a maneuver to attack Seth or Tim.
Posted by Clyde on June 6, 2006 in I was just reading Josh Spear's description of the :
Pure insanity– words can almost not describe the hustle and bustle, streets packed with vendors, shoppers, animals, and what seemed like every possible thing in the world for sale at dirt cheap prices. Vendors sold fake everything, from Calvin Klein underwear for $2, suits, polo shirts, fake watches, cell phones, sneakers– jeans and t-shirts literally lined the sidewalks.
It struck me that would be much more interesting if he did one of the following:
a) wore and used only bootlegged brands bought on the street,
b) removed all the brands like the brand-phobic character in .
Cayce, the lead character in Pattern Recognition, has issues with seeing brands and it makes for some interesting moments. Best of all, she has all brand markers removed from her clothing and personal items.
I really like that idea and actually think it's a lot cooler than the global anti-brand brand of , though I'm warming to that project, as well.
But Boorman's project is already getting interesting as the account of and what they will do to break that addiction:
I start therapy next week. I'll be attempting to understand how I have come to rely on brands for my self-esteem and personal identity.
That's when the real tears begin to flow.
I wrote previously about against Jay-Z that seems to be accelerating the decline of Cam's career. I also updated it with a link to a piece by Cedric Muhammed in which he claims that .
While CM's piece was logical and well written, it was entirely unconvincing.
SOHH NYC describes Cam's latest as on a wack, poor excuse for a rapper's beat.
Ouch!
How's that for support from New York?
I haven't checked the latest Sound Scam chart info for the status of Killa Season, but I'm sure you recall that Cam's first week out was the . And I've yet to hear anything good about his piss freak DVD (supposedly he takes a leak on someone, not sure if it was a trick or if it was an R.
Kelly style freebie, but I'm sure it was all love).
Best of luck Cam. You're going to need it!
Posted by Clyde on June 1, 2006 in U.S. forces killed two Iraqi women — one of them about to give birth — when the troops shot at a car that failed to stop at an observation post in a city north of Baghdad, Iraqi officials and relatives said Wednesday.
Nabiha Nisaif Jassim, 35, was being raced to the maternity hospital in Samarra by her brother when the shooting occurred Tuesday. Jassim, the mother of two children, and her 57-year-old cousin, Saliha Mohammed Hassan, were killed by the U.S.
forces, according to police Capt. Laith Mohammed and witnesses. .
.
Jassim's brother, who was wounded by broken glass, said he did not see any warnings as he sped his sister to the hospital. Her husband was waiting for her there.
I was driving my car at full speed because I did not see any sign or warning from the Americans. It was not until they shot the two bullets that killed my sister and cousin that I stopped, he said. God take revenge on the Americans and those who brought them here.
They have no regard for our lives.
But at least the U.S.
military is addressing their image problem:
The loss of life is regrettable and coalition forces go to great lengths to prevent them, the military said.
I'm sure the people of Iraq, as well as all those paying attention to this disaster, will feel much better when they hear the military's response.
I don't have much to say about Cam'Ron but it is interesting to see how his diss campaign against Jay-Z is taking Cam down.
If you peep the comments at Nah Right , you'll notice he doesn't really seem to be getting much support. In fact, if you check earlier posts for Cam'Ron few seem to be feeling this diss campaign.
Anybody seeing people rallying behind Cam online?
I can't really stand to spend much more time looking at what people have to say about that fool but I'm curious about how it looks to other folks.
Update: Black Electorate's Cedric Muhammed thinks Jay-Z may be in danger! He may lose the streets of New York to Cam!
! Whether or not you find that idea plausible, Muhammed has a long piece at Street and Industry (where he's a partner, who knew?) in which he suggests a .
Interesting but Cam seems to be destroying himself more quickly the less Jay-Z responds.
ProHipHop's prediction? Before this thing is over, Cam will be hustling mixtapes on the streets of Harlem where, apparently, he's still quite popular.
Famed creator of the term Web 2.0, to the controversy over a service mark registration by partner CMP for the use of Web 2.0 in the title of conferences after they sent a Cease Desist letter to an Irish conference organizer.
Lots of details that I just don't want to go into at the moment but they're mostly available via O'Reilly's post linked above.
What a mess. You're turning your brand into garbage and, while this post will satisfy some, so many people who picked up the Web 2.
0 ball and ran with it will never look to you for inspiration again.
To come up with a term like that, have it become a part of the daily language and be widely acknowledged for creating it is so much more valuable than being the only one able to use it in the U.S.
in a conference title, especially a conference that is so well known.
O'Reilly's really squandering his social capital on this one.
In an odd reversal of the O'Reilly situation, :
I am burning all my own branded possessions, and I will be attempting to live my new life brand-free, but the book is really an experiment to see if it is actually possible to disconnect from branded consumerism.
That's right, he's destroying his branded possessions in a publicity stunt to build his own brand and sell his upcoming book. I think the guy's gonna have a breakdown in the process based on some of his blog posts I've read to date.
Nevertheless, I'm sure Boorman will have great tales to tell of running naked through the forest, drinking water from the babbling brook and hunting game with a pointed stick.
Best of luck, fellas!
Update: Great example at of the damage O'Reilly's doing to his brand.
When I first saw the news that and replacing it with AT T Wireless, I had difficulty believing it.
However, Jaffe was more disturbed than I:
The cover story of this week's Ad Age documents (in my opinion) inarguably the dumbest moment in branding history...
and a continuation of the worst branding moves ever made by one of the worst companies to date . . .
Cingular is one of the branding success stories of our time (right up there with the Targets of the world) and how a monolithic, staid, lethargic and bureaucratic company like AT T could ignore Cingular's swooping courting of a younger and more progressive consumer base, is beyond me.
Karl Barnhart, managing director, CoreBrand, New York, a former AT T agency, agreed that changing the Cingular name "doesn't make sense." Cingular's brand is "relevant for the younger audience; it's a fun, hip, interesting, dynamic -- everything you don't think about AT T.
"
Mr. Barnhart estimates the changeover will cost "probably one-half billion per year for three to five years." And in the end, consumers still may not understand why they moved from writing a monthly check to AT T to writing one to Cingular and then going back to AT T, he said.
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