Reinvention and What it Means to Be an Entrepreneur

By Kaira Strudivant Rouda
General Motors - fresh from Monday’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy announcement - unveiled a new 60 second television spot titled Reinvention. The spot is full of Americana images - baseball, big cities, folks hugging, sports fans, a tattered American flag, some familiar product shots, and the now, also cliched, nod to going green: [...]

Chapter 12: Branding Cars

GM’s financial quagmire and bizarre labor and bureaucratic practices notwithstanding, branding (or lack thereof) was a big part of their problem.

Are Down Economy Commercials Getting You Down?

Over the last few months we’ve been bombarded with messages like “America Needs a Comeback!” “If you lose your job, we’ll make your payments for you” “In times like these”…..are these messages effective right now?

Are You In Touch with Your “Inner Consumer”?

By Kate Newlin
If we can believe even a bit of the emerging consensus about the emotional/familial/ecological benefits of the economic downturn, then we must come to believe that brands will grow as they reconnect to consumers who have developed a profoundly altered relationship to getting and spending.
There’s a rich vein to be mined here for [...]

Liberty Mutual - Doing the Right Thing?

By Holly Buchanan
Let me ask you a question - if you are a big name insurance company, do you want people coming to your website and duking it out with personal opinions about Octomom, teen pregnancy, spying on your kids and whether your school should be allowed to put on a production of the musical Rent?
I’m [...]

“Dead Brands Walking …”

By James R. Gregory, CEO CoreBrand
Many corporate brands are being damaged or destroyed by the current economic crisis, but it is through no fault of the brands themselves. Even strong brands that help support the reputations of corporations in difficult times can be overwhelmed by mismanagement or financial conditions beyond the ability of the brand [...]

AIG - The very Definition of a Brand Crisis

James R. Gregory, CEO CoreBrand
The clever and consistent AIG corporate advertising campaign in recent years, before the collapse of the firm’s credibility, could not and did not outweigh the management decisions that caused the damage. Corporate brand campaigns can be powerful tools to support visionary leaders, but the best campaigns cannot overcome bad business decisions [...]

Open a New (Wireless) Window

By Robert Passikoff
News from the GSMA Mobile World Congress, Spain, the largest wireless industry event so far this year.
Microsoft made quite a push to make its Windows mobile software as ubiquitous as its PC operating system. LG announced that they were going to significantly increase the number of handsets that will carry the new Microsoft [...]

Brands Now Responsible for Providing Value, Meaningful Differentiation

By Robert Passikoff
Brand Keys’ annual Customer Loyalty Engagement Index presents some interesting findings for the new economy, in particular that shopper-consciousness has shifted from one of personal responsibility to ferret out value, to a brand’s responsibility to provide it.
For the 441 brands surveyed in 62 categories in the 2009 Brand Keys Customer Loyalty Engagement Index [...]

Wally Olins - Old School Thinking about Brand Valuation?

by James Gregory, CEO Corebrand

I was stunned to read Wally Olins’ recent article, denying that brand measurement and valuation isn’t an important part of brand building.
I thought the days of brand value ignorance were twenty years in the past. Yet, in this article he said, “The brand valuation process ignores tempest, turbulence and volatility.” Sorry, [...]