November!

It's nearly December, you know

Hello people,

And before you know it another month has rocketed by and Christmas is almost upon you. We have let the kids play Christmas music and both me and my wife are getting ready to rehearse Christmas carols. We’ve even decorated our first tree (my mum’s).

But what have I been up to this month? It’s been a busy one with trips for work and wading through the mounds of nonsense around Christmas ads and the fallout of the Jaguar rebrand.

I know that what isn’t needed is another opinion, but I did hear something interesting on Marina Hyde and Richard Osman’s “The rest is entertainment” podcast that did give me pause for thought. Marina had been speaking to an advertising industry executive who claimed that the Christmas ads had more going for them than just power suits trying to encourage you to part with your shekels in exchange for more shit you don’t need.  Apart from anything it was always difficult to see if there was a correlation between the success of an advert and increase in sales. But therein lies the rub. Obviously, many of these aren’t ads in the sense of “go to this store and buy this thing”. They are yoking happy feelings to a brand for long-term, vibes-based return on investment. I see the ad…I think well of the company…when I think about shopping, they are one of the things my mind feed will stop on as my brain scrolls though the raft of possibilities of a place to buy cushions or carrots. This we know. The interesting thing in the podcast episode was that these are also seen as brand uplifts for employees.

This makes sense, especially if you are working for a supermarket or department store.

Your company will earn the lion’s share of its revenue from these two months. You will obviously have to work your nuts off. The ads serve as a reminder to shoppers that you exist, but also that you are a company of repute – your company is on the telly; what you do is important to the Christmas experience – and the hard work is worth it.

So I’ve started to look at these ads again. Not through any organised or detailed research lens, but just from thinking from the point of view of someone who works there; “How does this make me feel about going to work for this company”. We often talk about the halo effect of consumer or corporate brand work and employer brand – this is it in practice. Now go and watch them again and let me know what you think. Then go and watch the Jaguar ad and tell me if you think this would make you proud to work there or talk to people about working there. No judging but I would be interested to see what you think.

Now onto some links that caught my eye

Employer branding stuff

• Kevin Delaney’s ever excellent newsletter comes up trumps again. This post contains charts that go some way to explain the world of work today. The first one which shows the drop off of entry level roles is a little depressing.

• The one that shows US corporate occupancy rates is very interesting – please also read the linked (possible) rationale as put forward by the RTO expert, Nick Bloom

• This is a pretty horrible story about tracking productivity in warehouses in Australia

• This is a note about a paper which analyses the benefits of Amazon being in your locale. Interesting in itself but if you are keen to dig into the socio-economic sentiment that surrounds this, then the comment section really is a goldmine.

• You’ve seen the Currys thing right?

  

Branding stuff

• Don’t know if you have this round your way but the Ronaldo backed vitamin and mineral enriched water we’ve all been waiting for has finally arrived…and the advertising doesn’t disappoint. No, wait… it does.

• This is about complexity and I thought it was interesting

  

• Last thing about the Jaguar rebrand, I promise. Rory Sutherland talking about it here and raises the point that, without seeing the car, we can’t be sure if it’s a flop or not. I’m not sure I agree but, in relation to my other point, whether , as an employee this would make you proud or not, possibly depends on what the car looks like and whether this ad is an accurate reflection of what that car represents.

  

And with that – I think that’s it for another month. Look after yourselves and catch you on the ‘mas-side.

Toodles