Stand for something.  It’s a line you’ve heard before.  And it’s a line with great application in the world of advertising and branding.
I happened upon a recent example, packaged in the form of a trade journal article titled, “AFLAC CMO Says: Shut the Duck Up.”  You know the AFLAC duck – probably all too well.  It’s practically a cultural icon.  It shared a couch with Ben Affleck on The Tonight Show.  It made a guest appearance in the movie Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events.  It’s a very famous fowl.
The problem?  Few people (myself included) clearly understand what AFLAC is, according to Ad Age.  Few comprehend what is sells, or what it stands for.  That’s after AFLAC spent about $310 million in media on the duck over the past five years.  Big oops.
So the new CMO will make the duck far less visible, and focus more marketing dollars on what AFLAC does.  Sounds like a good idea.  The supplemental insurance industry is a difficult one for people to comprehend in the first place.  Being known isn’t enough.  Not even close.  You must be understood at a deeper level than, in this case, an iconic duck provides. 
It’s a lesson for all of us.  The brand/ad idea has to be useful beyond just getting attention.  There’s a lot of “art for art’s sake” advertising that snags your attention — without having much, if any, affect on the advertiser’s bottom line.   Case studies abound.
A marketer’s job goes far beyond awareness.  It is to help your brand stand for something meaningful. 

Right now it’s March and that means my mind is wandering to the important questions of life: Does Florida have the talent to repeat? Can Villanova really go to the Sweet 16? Who will this year’s George Mason be? And since I have been invited to be a part of six different brackets, I’m obviously dedicating a few minutes of today to pondering these questions.
Fortunately, I work at a really cool place. My bosses happen to be huge sports freaks so they encourage us to participate in brackets, and actually have two separate games going on in the office. There’s no cost to enter, but there is a cash prize at the end. Starting Thursday, the conference room will have a game on the flat-screen consistently … until we need the conference room for real work.
The understood March Madness law is that no work gets neglected, no client gets ignored, and no job goes undone. But as long as we’re doing what we need to be doing, why not have a little fun?
The Salt Lake Tribune ran this fact in a recent article: “According to Chicago-based firm Challenger, Gray and Christmas Inc., companies stand to lose close to $3.8 billion in worker productivity during the tournament. The firm estimated companies would lose $4.05 for every 13.5 minutes employees viewed games online rather than tending to their duties.”
This could be a compelling argument for business owners to set strict rules about the tournament, but what my bosses understand is that they have employees who care about March Madness and are going to be paying attention to the games whether or not it’s allowed. They don’t want us sneaking around, calling in sick, taking long lunch breaks to watch the game, or constantly checking the Internet for scores. Plus, the bosses care about the games as much as the employees. So they use this common interest as a chance to connect with their employees, and an opportunity to build company morale. We love March around here. And the winner of the bracket REALLY loves March, and our bosses, who provide cash as a reward at the end of the tournament.
Work is just that: work. But I’m impressed with companies that truly recognize that its employees are its most valuable asset. The most important aspect of public relations – and unfortunately, the most overlooked aspect – is INTERNAL relations. You know, relationships with your employees.
I’m not saying you have to make every day a nonstop party. Obviously you’re in business and that means working hard. But encourage your employees to play hard too. Make sure they have lives outside of the office and you are supportive of those lives.
And at least for the next three weeks, let your employees linger a little longer in the break room to watch a close game, or a top seeded team get upset. Because, let’s face it, you know you want to know the score.

I absolutely hated middle school. I was surrounded by beautiful blond girls named Staci and Tiffani and other 80s “i” names. But I was too skinny, wore huge plastic framed glasses, had braces, and didn’t really ever learn how to do make up or hair. I was ugly. And the girls at Herndon Middle School let me know it.

So I anxiously waited to finish middle school so I could get to the stage of life where people don’t write notes about people they don’t really know, don’t push the ugly girls into lockers, and don’t pick on smaller kids. I survived by thinking, if I can only endure school and get to adulthood where people use common sense, and live by the golden rule… Or karma… Or some other philosophy that all adults seemed to understand that made them nicer than teenagers. Yes, adulthood. That would be better.

But here I am, all grown up, and it still feels like middle school. I recently heard a story from a client who had gotten an anonymous e-mail (I’m not making this up, someone actually created a fake e-mail name like somethingyoushouldknow@hotmail.com). In the e-mail, there was a link to a negative web site article about a person this client works with regularly. As he told me about this, my mind wandered back to the time Staci slipped a note into my best friend’s locker telling her that she shouldn’t be friends with me. Staci didn’t sign it, but we knew it was her.

In this situation, my client already knew the fact provided by the anonymous tipster and it had the reverse effect – the client had a good idea of who the sender was and thought it looked pathetic and desperate. But it did get me thinking … where are the adults? I hear all the time that it’s a “dog eat dog” world, but I disagree. Dogs seem more honorable than a lot of business people these days. I think the honest truth is that some of us never grew up and we’ve maintained middle school attitudes.

Don’t get me wrong, I strongly support a competitive marketplace because healthy competition is good for the consumer, and it forces companies to create and offer better products and services. But I’m also an advocate of fair play. Anonymous e-mails? Seriously? Again, where are the adults? What ever happened to “good goes round,” “do unto others,” and qualities such as share, respect, honor? Is adulthood going to be one huge disappointment?

Another notable component of this story is that e-mails are easily tracked. The same way we could tell the note given to my best friend was from Staci by the way she dotted her I’s with hearts, here in 2007 it’s VERY easy to track IP addresses. Who comes out looking worse — the subject of the e-mail or the person who sent it and reverted to juvenile habits, even creating a silly e-mail address?

This story emphasizes that public relations is much broader than media relations alone. Today, anything you say can be used against you. Every memo, every e-mail, every conversation over lunch or in an elevator or behind closed office doors… it’s all public relations. You are defining your own brand by what you tell others and how you treat others. Do you want to be the company or executive who is always verbally attacking and criticizing competition, making enemies with everyone else on the playground? Or shouldn’t you be the company who is involved in the community, has healthy relationships with competition, and uses the industry as a gauge to improve your own product or service offering? The company that people respect.

I think it will be fun to see Staci at our ten-year reunion. I plan on putting on a smile and letting things from the past remain in the past. I’m an adult now. (Besides, I landed a hot husband and will enjoy showing him off … again, I’m a fan of healthy competition!)

A lot of us get so emotionally involved in our jobs that we often don’t step back and look at the big picture. We say negative things about others to help ourselves in the moment, but often end up hurting ourselves in the long run. When we’re tempted to criticize or burn the competition, we need to remember that Salt Lake is a very small market. Word gets around in a small town, and our reputation is our most valuable asset. Unless you’re in the business of making enemies, it’s best to think positively, speak positively and act like adults.

To me, this title essentially sums up everything I want to say in this blog. Yesteday I had a client approach me about possibly helping with online branding efforts, but he was incredibly hesitant because it didn’t deal with newspapers or magazines. I conducted a two minute crash course in PR 101, explaining to him that our agency was equipped to handle any number of projects outside the realm of media relations.

Today on my list of things to do, I am working on developing Web site coby, editing radio ad copy, working on a technical writing project that will be a resource guide for a new software program, and trying to get a client on Oprah. And as of yesterday, I’m working on an online branding project.

Public Relations has endured countless definitions since first being introduced. Here at The Intrepid Group, a huge amount of time is dedicated to media relations (essentially, working to get our clients mentioned in the media in a positive light). But beyond that, we can get involved anytime a company is communicating with a public, whether it’s the media, employees, stakeholders, etc.

If your current public relations strategy is limited to media relations alone, I recommend reevaluating your strategy. PR is MUCH MORE than media relations and your PR person will be thrilled to hear you say it.

As a native East Coaster, I rarely find anything to complain about that side of the country. But this past week or so I have watched in surprise as Boston, one of my favorite cities, turned into an anti-guerilla marketing, terrorist stopping machine. How in the world one city got so worked up over a marketing-stunt-turned-bomb-scare is beyond me.

Yes, the East Coast has endured more than its share of disasters. I don’t think any of us truly appreciate or understand the fear that comes from living through a random sniper prowling the streets (DC 2002—my brother’s high school football season was cancelled to keep the kids from being outside and in the line of fire) or a world-stopping terrorist attack (NYC and DC 2001—my mother-in-law was in the Pentagon when it was hit and is still recovering emotionally from that day), and the precautions you find yourself taking to protect the places and people you love. So I give credit to the Boston police force that took the threat seriously and did everything in their power to protect the city.  But at the same time, come on! Chill out! These didn’t look like bombs – they looked like electric, neon signs of cartoon characters flipping the bird. 

After the fiasco that was this campaign, and the amount Turner will be paying out of pocket to get this problem to quiet down and go away, it will be a while before we see another nation-wide guerilla marketing campaign. 

I think the whole thing is an unfortunate series of events. We all know that thanks to TiVo and similar devices, traditional advertising is blocked out, even skipped. People zoom through commercials or use the 2:30 to get up and move around. Most of us don’t even notice ads anymore. Guerilla marketing is currently my favorite to observe and watch. I love the creativity and ingenuity that goes into a single campaign. They’re clever. They push advertisers and marketers to stretch. They’re just fun.

Well, at least until someone sees them as a terrorist threat.

It’s a shame that world events have pushed us to the point that we’re paranoid. But the lesson we can take away from this is that, unfortunately, the world has pushed us to this point. People are scared. They will call the police on anything that could be a bomb threat, from backpacks to envelopes to marketing campaigns. If we aren’t allowed to take water bottles on airplanes, we should anticipate that placing electric signs around major cities may be a problem. This event will make companies and especially advertising agencies pause and think before they act, which may not be a bad thing. The best marketers will be the ones who can examine and foresee any possible backlash on their campaign. Expect the worst case scenario and plan for it. And of course, now we all know: Don’t Mess with Boston. 

Religion and capitalism have never been better friends. Sure, Disney backed away from promoting “Narnia” as a religious film, but Mel Gibson’s “Passion of the Christ” was a hit. Christian music is flooding the radio and products marketed to the faithful are everywhere. (Don’t tell me you haven’t seen the WWJD bracelets.)

This month’s marketing challenge focuses on a local company that has grown right along with this trend, but with an interesting twist.

The Situation
Shade Clothing makes high quality, modest clothing. In Utah, where the dominant religion heavily emphasizes modesty, Shade is a big hit. Much bigger than founder and CEO Chelsea Rippy had expected. The first year of the company’s life went something like this: a customer would buy a shirt, love it, then buy 10 more and tell her friends about it. Each of the friends would do the same.

This explosive growth outpaced supply. Competitors sprung up, as they do in any successful industry. Shade took a step back and evaluated the market. Its word-of-mouth marketing was organized into a network of personal shoppers that offered incentives for people to refer their friends. This is still, according to Rippy, the most effective marketing channel.

But Rippy is finding success in other channels, too. Shade launched sales in Costco and a number of boutiques and mall carts, with a retail presence now in 13 states. Its Web site (shadeclothing.com) offers direct sales and features regular promotions – only 30 percent of the Web site sales come from within Utah. Its PR firm has done a great job and Shade Clothing has even been featured in the New York Times.

The Problem
The problem is that outside of Utah, and aside from a few other pockets of predominantly Mormon areas, “modest undershirts” are not the same instant selling point they tend to be here. The products are not obviously religious, or restricted to any specific religion in any way, but the religious emphasis on modesty has clearly been a large factor in the company’s success in Utah. And while it’s not saturated, the market in Utah is slowing down. Competition is eating at market share within the state. So reaching out is essential.

Rippy mentions a new product line, “Basic Black” semi-formal dresses, as a possible solution. With her brother, she launched a site selling high-end, designer t-shirts (brotherforsister.com) as another venture that might help. These products might sell better, but the company faces a big step as it looks to change focus.

The Challenge
So what should Shade Clothing do? How can it best support its successful, national PR campaign? How can it reach people and what should it say? Should it focus on new products, or can the traditional products sell? Rippy doesn’t want to risk alienating her core customer base, but what can Shade do to reach a new group of customers?

Remember, this is a column where you do more than just read and think. We want you to read and write back! (Preferably with some thinking between the reading and writing.)

Next month, we’ll feature the best answers we received to the last installment’s challenge about the Bombay House restaurants. And after that, we’ll share the best ideas we get for Shade Clothing. And the lucky writer who submits the idea we judge to be the very best will get a $50 gift certificate to Shade Clothing and the good feeling that comes with knowing you’re an absolute genius.

You can e-mail me directly at tom@connect-utah.com or post thoughts and questions on our blog, at (www.connectblogs.com/marketing-from-the-masses).

Happy thinking!

Fantasy Football season is upon us again, and I hate it.

The point of this section of the magazine though, is not to rant about Fantasy Football. Rather, it’s to introduce you to a new connect feature — Fantasy Marketing! We’ve got a better name for it of course, but that’s essentially what it is.

The readers of this magazine (you) are a bunch of really smart people. Many of you are experts in PR, marketing, e-commerce and the emerging Web 2.0. We’ve got seasoned and energetic entrepreneurs and businessfolk with experience and interests all across the spectrum. We want to leverage your brilliance.

So, each month, this connect readers marketing challenge will feature a local business’ marketing and/or advertising woes. The reader that submits the best idea will win free stuff and have his or her idea published in a future issue of connect.

This month we’re focusing on local Indian restaurant chain, Bombay House. Read up on its history, visit its Web site, try out the restaurant and enjoy a great meal! Then let us know what you think it should do. If your idea is the best, you’ll get a $50 gift certificate to Bombay House.

There are a few criteria that we’ll be using to judge your suggestion(s):1. Is it practical? Most businesses could sell more if their products were free. But that’s not going to win you any awards.

2. How effectively does it use technology? Blogs and RSS are cool, but real people don’t care about RSS for its own sake. When technology actually advances human purposes, that’s when it gets really cool.

3. Is it innovative? The answers don’t have to involve technology — the simplest ideas are often the best. But if you can come up with something really creative, think of how impressed all your peers will be.

Armchair marketers, get your game on. Stretch your knowledge and share your ideas. This is, after all, connect. Let’s connect!

The Setting

Visitors of the Bombay House restaurant will probably be greeted by an Indian man wearing a turban.

The lights are dim, the walls covered in murals of serene palaces and dancing gods. The furniture is lush and the colors are vibrant. Instrumental music plays softly in the background, but it’s not the light jazz you’d find in almost any other restaurant. Sitars and tablas resonate and soothe. The mixed scents of mint and curry bring home the feeling that, when you enter a Bombay House, you’ve stepped far outside your typical environment.

Daniel Shanthakumar, a graduate of BYU Hawaii and native of Madras, India, founded the restaurant in 1993 to bring a taste of his homeland to Utah. The first location in Provo has grown steadily and the newer location in Salt Lake was an instant success.

Between City Weekly, Utah Valley Magazine, and Salt Lake Magazine, Bombay House has been voted Best Indian Dining in Utah on a regular basis for the last eight years.

The Challenge

Bombay House is currently marketing in the Yellow Pages, a few local newspapers, and one magazine. Word of mouth has always been Shanthakumar’s most effective source of new customers. However, in his words, “If 100 people leave happy, they will probably tell 10 people about it. But if one person leaves unhappy, that person will probably tell 100 people about it.”

A few other considerations: growth is slowing, weeknights are underutilized, and seasonality is high. The Web site (www.bombayhouse.com) provides a menu and some other basic information, but no commerce functionality like reservations or take-out ordering — two features that have been requested by customers. The original design of the site was contracted out several years ago and there is no one on staff to develop it further.

Take Action

What should Bombay House do? E-mail your suggestions to tom@connect-utah.com or leave a comment on the Marketing From the Masses blog (www.connectblogs.com/marketing-from-the-masses).

The winner of this month’s challenge will receive a $50 gift certificate to the Bombay House.

Watch the blog for updates and results. The winning idea will also be published in a future connect issue.

If you’ve got an idea for a business with a marketing challenge you’d like to see featured here, let us know about that too. Send your ideas/comments to tom@connect-utah.com.