As reported by MSNBC.com (Horror Movie Sickens Two at Sundance), two people who were sitting in on a late-night screening of the horror movie "V/H/S" at the Sundance Film Festival last week had to leave the film during the opening sequence and were treated by EMTs.  Now, normally, customers who become physically ill while consuming your product are NOT a good thing.  However, when you are a new horror film trying to pick up steam and you have a media-savvy co-writer (Simon Barrett), it may be just the thing you were looking for.

The reality is that the two people in question had just arrived in Park City after driving 8 hours and, given that they both got sick at about the same time, it is much more likely that it was due to other factors - altitude, dehydration, something they ate along the way, etc...  The first to get sick left for the lobby where he collapsed, unconscious, to the floor.  His companion followed him out and proceeded to vomit. 

When interviewed, one of the co-writers of the film, Barrett, gave some very PR and media-savvy responses. Some of his quotes in the article were:

"Without spoiling anything, (the film's first segment) ends with a particularly intense series of scenes that involve, among other things, an injury resulting in a compound fracture that is recorded from the first person perspective." (OUCH!)

"while very funny in parts, it is also quite intense and gory...can probably be a bit difficult to take."

"I doubt the couple would have fainted and vomited if they had gone to see (romantic comedy) 'Your Sister's Sister' instead."

Knowing full well that, in a world where many horror movie goers have grown up on the gore of the 'Saw' franchise, Simon Barrett's quotes and eagerness to accept responsibility for the audience illness will likely pay huge dividends when the movie is released and marketed (the movie has been acquired by Magnolia Pictures - who have also distributed films like Joaquin Phoenix's "I'm Still Here," "Freakonomics," "Food, Inc.," and "Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer"), this tack has already paid off in a major article that makes it very clear that this is one disturbing movie.

And if there is one thing that seems to guarantee box office success in the horror-film arena, it's disturbing.

3 things we can learn from V/H/S and Simon Barrett re: PR:

1 - Sometimes the best positives can come from what might be perceived as negatives.  Embrace the upside and focus on the elements of a story that play into your wheelhouse.  Making someone sick, when you are a horror movie, can easily be spun into a positive.

2 - Know your audience.  Many adults and non-horror-movie goers will likely be grossed out and disgusted by all this.  The core audience, however, in teenage males will likely take this as a dare.  If they can keep their dinner down, they are truly hard core!

3 - Be likable.  In this story, Simon Barrett could have easily been stand-offish, or over-the-top gross, or just plain uninterested.  However, his quotes were just descriptive enough to be shocking yet subtle and low-key enough to be likable.  He doesn't belittle or make fun of the audience members who got sick - in fact he displays a level of understanding in a way that also challenges the core target's ability to endure what he is throwing at them.

However, this story could have been even more compelling.  The folks behind V/H/S the movie don't seem prepared to take advantage of this unexpected press.  There is no Facebook page I can find, and very little Twitter activity on their part.  This was an opportunity to create and cultivate fans in advance of a launch as a result of this story and, at this point, they've kind of missed it.

In recent news it has been reported that Target Corp. is asking its suppliers for help in combating 'showrooming' - described as when a shopper visits the retail establishment to check out a product and then ends up buying it for less money from an online shopping site.

In a letter to its vendors, the company asked for them to create special proprietary products for it to sell that would make it at least harder for shoppers to compare pricing.  In the letter, Target CEO Gregg Steinhafel says:

"What we aren't willing to do is let online-only retailers use our brick-and-mortar stores as a showroom for their products and undercut our prices without making investments, as we do, to proudly display your brands."

The hope, apparently, is to make comparison shopping for everything from electronics to homewares as difficult as it is for mattresses (which, by the way, is among my least favorite things to have to shop for). 

Here are 5 reasons why this strategy, at best, won't work and, and worst, will backfire in a significant way:

1. It is Anti-Transparency.  This strategy bucks most of what has become the new reality of the shopping experience.  With the rise of the web and then social media, the consumer (and people in general) have come to expect transparency as a cost of entry in their world.  They respect those who are open and honest and suspect those who are not.  This strategy is the complete opposite of transparency.  It seeks to hide information and muddy the waters rather than make it more accessible and more clear.  This breeds distrust, and all the bad things that go along with it.
2. It Ignores the Consumer's Need of Choice Validation.  You can't put the rabbit back in the hat and you can't turn back the clock.  Today's consumer has become accustomed to the strength that easily accessible information provides.  It has permeated the very DNA of how they make decisions.  At the heart of this is price comparison and, even more important, product ratings.  A product that has thousands of positive ratings online is inherently more attractive to one with just a few.  By splintering the product-verse into proprietary versions and models, you upset the wisdom of the crowd.  This means that when someone is shopping for an item in Target, and that product is unique to Target, they will not be able to ease their natural fears of making the wrong decision by reading the experiences of scores of others.  Given the choice, consumers will gravitate towards the tried and true - and likely the model that has 1,500 reviews on Amazon.
3. This strategy is in defiance of the Target Brand Promise.  From Target.com's Our Mission page: "Our mission is to make Target the preferred shopping destination for our guests by delivering outstanding value, continuous innovation and an exceptional guest experience by consistently fulfilling our Expect More. Pay Less brand promise."  By not allowing price comparison, how can one believe the Pay Less bit?  It seems hypocritical to focus your mission on price and yet not allow consumers to evaluate that price vs. competition.
4. It Ignores the Elephant in the Room.  Let's face it, online retailing is not going away anytime soon.  And the biggest of the online retailers, Amazon.com, has organized itself so that it has other businesses that are designed to offset the low margins it makes on its online retailing.  To succeed as a brick and mortar business in retailing mass market items, there must be value added above price alone.  Hiding price will not make this go away - on the contrary, it will likely make things worse.  It would be wiser to focus energy on differentiating the shopping experience, re-emphasizing the style and design that is at the heart of the Target brand and finding other ways to encourage the in person shopping experience.

It is particularly odd to see a company that has prided itself on its forward-thinking and innovation to invest itself so heavily in trying to construct obstacles to consumer progress.  I suspect that some vendors will comply, but, in the long run, Target will backtrack on this now very public error in judgement.

Many people include quotes at the bottom of their emails - some inspirational, some from movies, some just whimsical - but this one had very specific meaning for us today:

"You can't always control what happens, but you can control how you react."

You see, it came from a woman who was reaching out to let us know that the email we had sent out today regarding Brand ManageCamp had non-working links.  Now, of course, we already knew this as we have received a barrage of emails telling us that fact with varying degrees of animosity.  But, the woman who sent this email stood out - not just because the quote was so appropriate today, but because she was so nice about the whole thing.

Here's the backstory - in the months leading up to the Brand ManageCamp conference, we typically send out 1 (maximum 2) emails to promote the event and make folks aware of any promotions or offers (like the upcoming free webinar next Tuesday).  We put a great deal of effort and care into making sure the emails are as informative as possible and, of course, are in good working order.

However, when we checked on the progress of the email this morning, it became clear that things were not as they should be.  It turns out that our email delivery service provider experienced a major meltdown this morning, resulting in our emails being sent out with faulty and/or non-existant links and images.  Not only didn't the emails look the way they should, but even if someone could see past that and still want to click through, they couldn't.  To make matters worse, if a recipient wanted to unsubscribe, the unsubscribe link also did not work - leading to greater frustration on their part.

The first course of action was to cancel whatever emails had not been sent.  And now, we are settling into damage control mode - attempting to determine who did receive the faulty emails and beginning to determine the best way to reach out to them and apologize without making matters worse.  I'd be lying if I said we had it figured out yet, but we will certainly do the best we can to retain the trust and confidence we have worked so hard to build.

The other aspect of this has been individually monitoring each email we have received back to look for unsubscribes.  With thousands of out of office replies coming in, and with many folks not putting an obvious 'Remove' subject line, this has been a tedious yet necessary task. 

All through this ordeal, though, I firmly believe and draw strength from the quote found in that one woman's email.  It is something we have always lived by here at ManageCamp, but nonetheless a philosophy always worthy of a reminder.  What happened prior to the email going out was just dumb, bad luck - no amount of preparation or caution could have helped avoid it.  What we do from that moment on, though, is completely up to us and will define who we are as people and as an organization.  At the end of the day, we will rest easy knowing that we have done our best.  If we can do that, regardless of all the stress, I'll rack it up as a good day.  Hope yours is too. 

When Old Spice re-launched their Old Spice Guy campaign last week, the advertising pundits were quick to their pedestals - many criticizing the decision to return to what they would now consider an 'old' campaign (no pun intended).  Several wrote that, while the original campaign was an undeniable success, it was a mistake to go back to the well and potentially ruin all the goodwill they had built up.

The problem with most of these pundits, however, is that they forget that 99% of the target market for Old Spice does not live in their tiny world of advertising.  They don't analyze things as deeply, they don't pay as much attention, they don't see the spots as many times, and they certainly don't bore as easily.

Well, the online viral numbers from Old Spice Guy's first week back are in - and they are better than ever.  With over 3.4 million views last week, the newest ads eclipsed the orginal launch (2.1 million views) and it's sequel (2.5 million views).

This craving to move away from successful advertising way too early is, in my experience, a fairly common problem in the industry.  Think about it, you've got some super creative creatives sitting in their funky offices in Manhattan and they spent the better part of a year devising, pitching, producing, re-producing, and talking about 1 specific campaign.  These are not folks who like to sit around and be stale - they want to be creating!  So, naturally, 1 or 2 years into a successful campaign, they get bored.  And when they get bored, they start creating reasons why things need to be changed.

The reality, though, is that the typical consumer sitting at home in Madison, Wisconsin is FAR from bored with the campaign.  They haven't been living with it day in and day out for 2 years - they've maybe seen the spot 20-30 times.  They haven't been following the coverage in AdAge or AdWeek or The Wall Street Journal for that matter.  And, so, they are not bored with the campaign - in fact they probably love it (if it has been successful) and can't wait for the next execution that is pretty much the same except a little different.

The lesson here - let the consumer tell you when they are getting bored.  Until then, get every last penny out of the work you have already done.  Let's face it - successful campaigns don't come around all that often. 

In the past 10 minutes, I have emailed a pdf of a contract to a client and received an email with a countersigned version back.  In the past this exchange would have taken place via the mail.  Then there was overnight/express mail.  Then there were faxes.  But now it is mostly email and file transfer.

When express mail came in to being, the US Postal Service figured out that they needed to be in the mix and launched their own offering.  With faxes, well, there was not much they could do.  But now that file transfer is becoming the norm, there is no reason why the US Postal Service couldn't participate.  With a goal of ensuring that important documents and files get from point A to point B in a secure and timely fashion, the US Postal Service has a much better branding starting point than Dropbox.com or Box.net.

And yet, with billions of dollars in losses and swarms upon swarms of Post Office closings, they seem to be destined to go the way of ice makers (you know, the people who made and delivered blocks of ices before people had freezers or ice-makers) and Blockbuster. 

This all comes down to the age-old question of how an organization should position its brand.  As a physical delivery product, the US Postal Service has a grim future.  Perhaps the real positioning should focus on safe, secure, and timely document transfer...

OK, so it has been a while since my last post - New Year's resolution is to blog MUCH more frequently...

To start things off, I thought I would share some of the more interesting things I saw during my recent trip to Las Vegas for the 2011 Consumer Electronics Show (CES).  One can barely fathom the amount of things that can be created to be accessories for the the iPhone or iPad until one has speant time at the iLounge Pavilion at CES.  You can't help but walk away thinking "How many bling-encrusted cases does the market need?" 

Luckily, there is that and so much more to see at the annual Super Bowl for consumer electronics.  While 3D TV got a lot of play at last year's event, it was still the clear lead horse for most of the electronics manufacturers.  This year it was more about perfecting the technology and bringing much more size to the equation.  I think the 92" Mitsubishi 3D was the most impressive.  Of course, with LED there was also an emphasis on small - with LG touting the world's slimmest OLED tv at 2.9mm!

In the tv world, internet/connectivity/social was also forefront - with lots of apps, social networking, Skype, etc... being highlighted.  Bringing 3D to the consumer market in terms of image capture was also someting new - lots of 3D video cameras and such.

Beyond the ever-present hype about all the tablets/e-book-readers/etc... here were some other things I thought were pretty cool:

• anything car-related.  There were some pretty amazing car setups - nothing I would ever do to my rides, but still cool to look at cool cars all tricked out with video and audio awesomeness!
• home control - the technology available to control everything from your lights to your ac/heat to your blinds and door locks has really come a long way
• Traveler's Choice solar powered laptop case
• Golla bags - style for the mobile generation from Finland
• 3M MP180 pocket projector - a projector the size of a mobile phone - great for the sales pro on the go
• In the "Hmmm...well that's interesting" category was OhMiBod.  Their taglines are "Feel the Music" and "Where tech and pleasure come together" and one of their products is called 'NaughtiBod." Beyond that, you are going to have to check them out yourself at www.ohmibod.com...
• Gibson had some awesome guitars (The Firebird X)- in addition to being able to create thousands of different sounds, they also self tune themselves with the flick of a switch and a strum of the strings.
• One of the cooler (and simpler) iPad accessories was the Hand-e-Holder - attach it to the back and slide your hand in for an easy and pain-free way to hold your device
• The Woogie - past stuffed animal, part iPod case - cool way to let your kids play with your phone without subjecting it to sticky icky fingers!
• Sphero - the robotic ball controlled by your smartphone or iPad - why? good question.
• Gripdaddy - ever wish you could mount your iPad to the back of your headrest so that the kids could watch a movie on it while you drive?  Well, wish no more!
• Mi Suny - mobile phone case and solar charger all in one
• Recon Instruments goggles - very cool for the skier or snowboarder - these goggles have a gps chip and a heads up virtual display that can feed you real-time info on altitude, speed, air time, and more while you are racing down the mountain.  Perhaps they should also be fitted with OnStar to call for help when you run into that obstacle you missed while checking out the heads-up display...
• ZEO Personal Sleep Coach
• CASIO HDR Art - allows you to turn your photos into art

If you're interesting is seeing all the cool stuff we captured on camera, check out the following Flckr slideshow.  We also conducted some quick interviews with the reps from some of the more interesting things we saw - look for those in follow-up posts...

Wow - are we lucky!  Not only does BMC2010 speaker David Meerman Scott have a new book coming out in October that he will be previewing in his speech at Brand ManageCamp ("Real Time Marketing & PR"), but he is also giving us EXCLUSIVE access to a free chapter from ANOTHER book he's written that is launching August 1st with an all-viral marketing campaign.  Anyone who knows David knows that he has been a lifelong Deadhead, so the topic of this book is a perfect combination of his work and personal life.  The title is "Marketing Lessons From The Grateful Dead: What Every Business Can Learn From The Most Iconic Band In History." As it turns out, many of the rules of social media were figured out quite a few years ago by a band with a legion of followers and a ton of bootleg tapes.  Fascinating stuff.

It's sure to be a best-seller, and its viral success will no doubt form the case study for one of David's future books - kind of a self-propelling franchise!  Anyway, the only place to get a free chapter prior to the launch is right here.

So download away - we're not asking for any of your details, just follow the link and click your way to the chapter.  Anyone who's read David's books knows that this is the best way to do these types of things!  Tell all your friends too...there's no limits on the download.

Oh yeah, while you're here you might as well check out the details on our Brand ManageCamp conference.  It's going to be a ton of fun!

One of the bigger success stories during the time that I was at Campbell Soup was the turnaround of the condensed soup business - specifically, the cornerstones of that franchise, Campbell's Tomato and Chicken Noodle soups.  Without getting into all the details, one of the main keys to that turnaround was the team's ability to refocus our products and our positioning on where we had the greatest "Right to Win."

For example, for years Campbells condensed Chicken Noodle soup had been beaten up on by the competition for being too kid-like.  We took flak for being bland, not having enough stuff, not having big enough pieces of stuff, etc...  This was all very effective while we were focused on trying to compete for adult share of stomach.  We finally realized, however, that Campbells Chicken Noodle condensed soup did not have the greatest "Right to Win" with adults.  As our competition had so aptly pointed out, though, we had a HUGE Right to Win with kids.  And so began a massive campaign towards kids that led to the turnaround of years and years of volume declines on that business.

In what seems like the exact opposite of that case study, Kraft has decided to take their Mac n Cheese business and begin an ad push to position it towards adults.  (New York Times article - Kraft Hopes to Encourage Adults to Revert to a Childhood Favorite) On the surface, looking at the data that would point towards more stay-at-home meals for consumers - even as we come out of the recession.  And I am sure that there is plenty of research that shows that adults love to clean their kids' plates when they leave the yummy mac n cheese over.

However, the real question is does the Mac n Cheese product have the ability to compete for adult share of stomach and, in it's current form, does it have a Right to Win in that space?  Adults wanting to finish their kids' leftovers is a very different thing than making it as a meal for themselves - when it may fall flat in terms of satisfying the total adult hunger (and nutritional) needs.

Even if Kraft awakes adults' hidden desire for Mac n Cheese - will they reap the benefits of this increased demand?  There are currently several other products (think Stouffers) that offer more adult-oriented mac and cheese meal solutions.

On one hand, I applaud Kraft's desire to think outside the box (no pun intended) and look for expanded demand from their current product line.  It shows that they are paying attention to their consumers and looking for hidden pockets of demand that they can easily exploit.

However, I wonder if just coming up with a new ad twist with the same exact product line is perhaps the easiest path that may provide the least returns.  What if they had leveraged the equity in the brand and the nostalgia that adults have for it and transformed that into a decidedly more adult experience?

Just a thought.  What's yours?

OK, so I'll admit it - part of the fun of putting on an event like Brand ManageCamp is that I get to put together the agenda I want to see.  That doesn't mean that we don't do a lot of research to find out who you want to see as well.  But, at the end of the day, every one of the people on our agendas are folks I am jazzed about hearing from.

No exception to this is Aaron Magness from Zappos.  I've long been a fan of Zappos (as has my wife...unfortunately for our closet space...) and am a big fan of their approach to corporate culture and customer service.

A fantastic example just emerged over the weekend.  6pm.com, a sister site to Zappos.com, experienced a programming glitch that capped all merchandise listed solely on 6pm.com at $49.95.  Given that this site has merchandise that normally costs up to $1,000 - that's a pretty nice discount!

A normal company probably would have voided any purchases that took place under the erronious pricing.  But not Zappos.  At a loss to them of $1.6MM, they quickly decided to honor all purchases at the ridiculously low prices.  Not too surprisingly, they are getting a lot of love today from all over the social (and regular) media world.

Kudos to the folks at Zappos, and our friend and speaker Aaron Magness, for sticking to their principles.  An easy thing to do when things are easy - but not so easy when millions of dollars are at stake.  My guess is that the long term effects will net this experience out at a profit...

For more info on this, you can read the Zappos blog entry on it (written by Aaron) here...