Picture this – Steve Jobs is called up by his ‘brand advisors’ they want a meeting and they pitch him a new brand for Apple which is going to help him take the world. It’s a simple two word expression that they think will help Apple out of the doldrums. You’re right it just couldn’t happen.
First off, while we think there are considerable challenges for Apple over the coming two years, the doldrums are a long way from returning to Apple and unlikely to arrive any time while Jobs is still at the helm and operating with such a sure touch.
But at Sony, a company that has had serial disappointments, many of them technical and all of which have brought down its brand value, it seems to make sense. Or does it? Anyway the news is that Sony is introducing a new global brand message as ‘make.believe.’ That’s make dot believe.
What happened to Sony One (to suggest that the 6 divisions of Sony were one company all acting together and not divided?) or to HDNA, to suggest that Sony has HD in its DNA? The answer is the first made us all laugh at Sony because it wasn’t true, and the second only referred to its Electronics arm, which will no doubt soon come up with 3DNA (you heard it here first) to tell the world it will be first with 3D TV.
And the reason that Apple would never need it, is because its products are so clear and well reasoned, so that even when they are expensive or not quite the best in class, they are always at least desirable. It’s like the senior management at Apple all have a ‘bullshit’ detector built in, and crush products internally that won’t cut it in the real world. That’s what needs fixing at Sony, not a new catchphrase. In Apple innovation is from the top down, in Sony it’s not even from the ground up, more from the outside in as many of its star performers are copies of products seen elsewhere.
Our favorite ever branding story is the one about Addressograph and Multigraph which paid a fortune to someone to come up with a new brand. Not only did the proffered A&M International name in 1978 lead to the dissolution of the company, but even on a web audit it has almost sank without trace (try to find it using Google). So one of the Faultline economy laws has become ‘new branding means a company has no idea of what what’s wrong with its products.’
The new Sony branding was launched at the IFA show last week, and the first jokes were on the internet within a few hours ‘Make believe we’re a successful company,’ being one of them. Comments such as ‘Rather than investing in slick new messaging, Sony (Ericsson) might consider making handsets that consumers actually want.’ The campaign asks ‘what if dreams could become reality?’ and features people bouncing down the street on colored space hoppers. Let’s make believe that Sony management are actually doing something about making better products and are not bouncing on space hoppers.
The new ‘make.believe’ campaign unites Sony’s communication efforts across electronics, games, movies, music, mobile phones and network services the company says. Oh yeah? How come it doesn’t even own www.make.believe.com? Some uniting.
This is like a 300 pound, 95 year old bald man buying a wig and thinking it will change his luck with women. Sorry Sony, it’s just make believe if you think this will do any good. Change your corporate culture to a minimalist, product company and drop all the R&D edge. The last CEO thought he had done that, but he hadn’t.
The other announcement at the IFA, that Sony would bring 3D TV to the home in 2010 brought a similar groan of inappropriateness from people that have yet to see HD done right and have no hankering for 3D yet. Take a leaf from Apple. Don’t launch technologies first, launch products that use someone else’s technologies and uses them well, and do that first. Also fire all your marketing guys and use the budget you save on big press launches for those products where people can actually play with what you build.