For Elon Musk’s Tesla, there is such a thing as bad publicity
Mark RitsonTesla’s woes are a rare example of bad press that does harm the brand, because its CEO’s public profile is so opposed to its environmentalist image.
Mark Ritson
Amazon must resist the temptation to bleed James Bond dry
Mark RitsonThe 007 brand will suffer if Amazon emulates Star Wars with spin-off movies and series. But it can license endless products if they’re far away from screens.
Ignore anyone who tells you to forget about targeting
Mark RitsonTargeting is the start of strategy yet many marketers are being told they no longer need to bother with it.
Nike’s turnaround has begun – but it will take a long time
Mark RitsonNike has triumphantly returned to its roots, focusing on sport while overinvesting in brand, but undoing the damage from the last regime won’t be a quick job.
This year’s ad can be a three-year investment – ask Glenmorangie
Mark RitsonLonger-running ads are more effective, research shows, so rather than starting each year with a blank slate, invest more now in creative that can run and run.
Jaguar has rebranded when it needed to revitalise
Mark RitsonJaguar’s bizarre new campaign marks a complete overhaul of its positioning, when instead it should have celebrated and updated what once made it great.
The 10 reasons Marks & Spencer is the Brand of the Year
Mark RitsonTo celebrate the retailer being recognised as Marketing Week’s Brand of the Year, our branding columnist writes about its remarkable five-year transformation. This is not just a marketing column, it is a Marks & Spencer marketing column.
Starbucks needs to cut the crap from its brand positioning
Mark RitsonThe coffee chain is a serial offender at producing esoteric mission statements, so can new CEO Brian Niccol finally uncover the brand’s appeal to customers?
There’s one true measure of marketing effectiveness: Marketing(t)
Mark RitsonTime is the variable that most defines marketing success, because consistent growth is the truest test of a brand and its team.
Don’t listen to the industry sages, they’re not your ad’s target
Mark RitsonAdvertising professionals’ view of what makes a good ad is not only biased, it’s usually wrong, as their reaction to Tourism Australia’s last campaign shows.
‘Triple-Cooked Marketing Budgets’: The full recipe
Mark RitsonMarketing budgeting is flawed. Marketers are more confused about budgeting than ever before. Here’s your complete three-step guide to fixing it.
In the battle between salience and differentiation, Bothism wins
Mark RitsonMarketers debate over salience and differentiation like they are mutually exclusive, when the evidence shows both in combination will deliver the best results.
Marketers should pay more attention to attention
Mark RitsonThere’s ample evidence that longer dwell time on ads raises brand recall and choice, so ignore Byron Sharp’s claims that you shouldn’t pay for more attention.
Can you achieve long and short at the same time? Usually, no
Mark RitsonIt’s appealing to fulfil brand and sales objectives in one execution, but they’re so different that you’ll probably fail at both.
Ritson’s 10 marketing hacks to help small businesses go big
Charlotte RogersFrom a new recipe for pic n’ mix comms, to making extreme choices, Mark Ritson shares his marketing twists that can help SMEs get big brand outcomes.
The seven things marketers need to know in order to answer The Question
Mark RitsonRight-minded marketers understand the need for long-term brand building investment, but most still question how they can convince those above them. Here’s how you do it.
Cadbury’s current ads have something its ‘Gorilla’ lacked – legs
Mark RitsonMost marketers seek ads that deliver instant, one-off success, but the ideal campaign is an idea that runs indefinitely while only the execution changes.
And the winner of campaign of the year is…
Mark RitsonGreat diagnosis, smart insight, clever use of media and inventive execution, Sheba’s ‘4am Stories’ is a masterclass in simple but highly effective marketing.
Christmas advertising is drowning in marketers’ fake tears
Mark RitsonChristmas 2021 is shaping up to be an exercise in hyper-emotional brand bullshit, with Coca-Cola even choosing to edit itself out of its own campaign. But don’t worry, the holidays are still coming.
P&G and Coke’s pandemic performances prove it: You don’t cut ad spend in a crisis
Mark RitsonProcter & Gamble doubled down on marketing when Covid hit, while Coca-Cola went dark. The former’s revenues surged, the latter’s dwindled, and Ehrenberg-Bass data now proves if you stop advertising you lose sales.
Amazon is the perfect example of why big brands need to advertise
Mark RitsonAmazon now tops the global ad spend charts, despite founder Jeff Bezos’s original scepticism towards advertising – not surprising, since it’s crucial for defending market share.
TikTok is nothing new – to marketers, it’s just another ad platform
Mark RitsonAlthough its strapline, ‘Don’t Make Ads, Make TikToks’, touts it as revolutionary, TikTok will soon reveal itself to be another ‘traditional’ ad business, as its own media strategy makes clear.
The ad industry’s ‘dirty dozen’ must rescue us from this shambolic Covid comms strategy
Mark RitsonThe government’s message on controlling coronavirus while leaving lockdown is fatally unclear, and only expert intervention can avoid a disastrous failure.
All the generic coronavirus ads are a waste of time and budget
Mark RitsonThere’s probably no reason to ditch your old creative because of coronavirus, but if you do, your new ad needs to be distinctive and avoid the bland clichés brands are currently churning out.
Copy KitKat on your quest for ‘double D marketing’
Mark RitsonTight positioning, a respected brand heritage and refusal to overcomplicate things means when it comes to uniting distinctiveness and differentiation, KitKat has it licked.
Even sophisticated mass marketers need targeting
Mark RitsonAfter a short sabbatical to launch this year’s Mini MBA, our trusty marketing columnist returns to talk targeting, and why this ancient topic is one of the biggest challenges most marketers now face. Not despite the industry’s new-found love for mass marketing, but because of it.
Five lessons on how not to do pricing from Elon Musk’s Twitter
Mark RitsonThere is a perfect pricing case study in the way the new Twitter CEO, Elon Musk, communicated his proposed fee for a ‘blue tick’ on the platform – just do the exact opposite of what he did.
Ritson’s recession playbook: 9 steps marketers should take to survive the dark times ahead
Mark RitsonFrom retaining a long-term view and the importance of excess share of voice to making strategic changes to positioning and saying no to failure, our columnist spells out how brands can navigate recession.
Volkswagen is right to put profit before sales
Mark RitsonThere are two paths brands can follow – one leads to sales while the other points to profitability, and the latter is invariably the right one to choose.
At times of war marketing is rendered superficial and ridiculous
Mark RitsonGiven what’s happening in the world right now marketing really doesn’t matter, but there are ways brands can respond without appearing tone deaf.
The horror of marketers’ strategic bankruptcy is about to be laid bare
Mark RitsonAs the BetterBriefs project will reveal this week, 90% of marketers fail to brief agencies effectively, and their failures begin with a total lack of strategy.
Facebook’s Horizon Workrooms sucks ass
Mark RitsonFacebook’s new virtual meeting software falls victim to one of marketing’s worst sins, product orientation, simply because Mark Zuckerberg needs to find a use for virtual reality to justify his investment in Oculus.
Bluey and Bunnings’ tie-up demonstrates all the benefits of co-branding
Mark RitsonThe best bits of both brands rub off on each other, while playing with brand codes makes them more salient – but only because they’ve laid decades of groundwork.
12 reasons why Twitter’s rebrand to X is a mistake
Mark RitsonOur marketing columnist on the biggest branding move of the year: Twitter’s sudden transformation into X.
Toblerone’s brand image won’t be hurt by losing the Matterhorn
Mark RitsonRemoving the famous Swiss mountain from its packaging won’t stop the chocolate brand building a desirable brand image in today’s globalised age.
Consumers no longer care about provenance – except in Cockermouth
Mark RitsonVolvos are made in China, Stella Artois is brewed in Wales, and globalisation means we don’t bat an eyelid – though my fellow Cumbrians will test that theory to the limit as Jennings ale moves to the Midlands.
Transforming logos for Pride has lost brand impact and become ‘rainbow-washing’
Mark RitsonWith more brands altering their distinctive assets more frequently, often for the same reason and at the same time, code play is becoming far less effective.
Brand might slyly alter human truth: How brand image changes perceptions of reality
Mark RitsonThe nature of reality, and how brands influence our perception of it, is the unusually metaphysical topic of our marketing columnist’s thoughts this week.
Ritson on the UK’s top 10 sonic brands
Marketing Week ReportersFrom Autoglass to Netflix to Just Eat, Mark Ritson explores the brands with the most effective sonic assets.
If you’ve never heard of ‘anthimeria’, Google it before you end up like Kärcher
Mark RitsonCourtesy of French politics, Kärcher is the latest brand to find out that becoming synonymous with your category is a double-edged sword.
Are we witnessing the end of the CMO? No, and stop asking
Mark RitsonMarketers should cease pontificating about the validity of CMOs and their time in post, and start focusing on how to do the job better.
Tesla is about to experience the seven perils of discounting
Mark RitsonBy discounting for the first time, Tesla is not only starting an electric vehicle price war, it is communicating its weakness to existing and future customers.
Suffering from impostor syndrome? The cure is simpler than you think
Mark RitsonMarketers are prone to impostor syndrome, but solid training and a more realistic view of your peers’ achievements will show your worries are unfounded.
Brands staying in Russia are making a statement of support for Putin
Mark RitsonBrands that continue to do business in Russia deserve no platform in our industry, our columnist argues.
Welcome to the new normal, it’s the same as the old one
Mark RitsonDespite dire predictions of Covid-driven decline for some sectors and exponential growth for others, we’re largely where we would have been if it had never happened.
Musicians like Neil Young lack the market power to force Spotify’s hand over Joe Rogan
Mark RitsonThe asymmetry between millions of available songs and the five companies dominating streaming means no artist can put Spotify in a corner.
The founder model works, even if Jack Dorsey didn’t for Twitter
Mark RitsonDorsey’s contention that founder-led businesses are overhyped doesn’t hold water. The right founder offers huge marketing advantage – that just wasn’t him.
Ritson on why successful marketers make time to listen
Marketing Week ReportersListening is a key attribute of high-performing marketers, alongside empathy, curiosity and an ability to make even the complex look simple, says Mark Ritson.
Pre-testing ads is not divisive, it’s a no-brainer
Mark RitsonAgencies will complain pre-testing snuffs out the creative spark, but in reality it helps brands identify the best-performing ads and makes them even better.
Badly designed surveys don’t promote sustainability, they harm it
Mark RitsonBrands love reported data that shows people care about sustainable consumption, but these spurious findings just hold back real behaviour change.
Synthetic data is suddenly making very real ripples
Mark RitsonReady for the era of synthetic data? The implications for strategy and execution could be significant if marketers are willing to look long term.
It may be tainted, but don’t underestimate the power of brand love
Mark RitsonAlthough the concept of ‘brand love’ was overused and went out of fashion, it remains an insightful way to consider consumers’ attitudes towards brands.
If you don’t invest 5% of your budget in research, you don’t know what you’re doing
Mark RitsonThe BBC’s decision to invest heavily in research should be celebrated by us all and noted by marketers. Investing 5% of your budget in market research is not superfluous, it’s key to understanding customers, serving them better and growing your business.
To win the biggest legal battle in marketing, Google must show who its competition really is
Mark RitsonGoogle might have an 80% share of the search market, but as the investigation by the US Department of Justice will no doubt show there are now many more ways people find information online.
Seven reasons why TV’s doubters are wrong
Mark RitsonOfcom’s latest data yet again shows why TV should be at the top of most big brands’ media plans, yet some marketers insist on ignoring the facts. Here are the answers to their most common quibbles.
Ethnography beats focus groups hands-down, but they still serve a purpose
Mark RitsonFocus groups are a bone of contention, as a Twitter debate featuring Professor Byron Sharp this week showed, but while they are flawed, they are still a quick and cheap route to useful insights.
Häagen-Dazs and BBH rekindling their flame has got me excited
Mark RitsonThe ice cream brand and its famed agency achieved one of the great UK product launches 30 years ago. Will they have the same chemistry again?
Only bad marketers think more messages mean more effectiveness
Mark RitsonYou might increase total message recall by adding more of them, but you’ll lose credibility, as shown by the World Cup protestor who couldn’t pick one cause.
Follow Shania Twain’s lead and make sure product isn’t the forgotten P of marketing
Mark RitsonOur marketing columnist experiences an epiphany on his couch that leads him to revise his opinion of Heinz pasta sauce and the state of modern marketing.
Even if Unilever placates its investors, it still has Ben & Jerry’s to deal with
Mark RitsonWith CEO Alan Jope set to leave, Unilever faces battles not only with investors aiming to deprioritise brand purpose, but with its own Ben & Jerry’s brand, which is suing it for abandoning purpose commitments.
You can’t beat TikTok by becoming its clone
Mark RitsonOur marketing columnist examines the underwhelming response of the major social media brands to the TikTok threat and explores the perils of competitor orientation.
Tom Kerridge’s prices aren’t a rip-off if they’re what the market will pay
Mark RitsonForget worshipping at the altar of revenue. Marketers who take a leaf out of Tom Kerridge’s book and embrace pricing power will find the surest route to profitability.
Follow The National Lottery’s example: Don’t rebrand, revitalise
Mark RitsonWhen brands struggle, marketers’ first thought is a rebrand or repositioning, but by going back to its roots you can boost sales and retain brand equity cost-effectively.
John Lewis the landlord? Welcome to brand extension nirvana
Mark RitsonEven if John Lewis cocks up in its bid to rent homes to the masses, the blowback on its department store business will be limited – even non-existent – thanks to the magic of brand extension.
Make this the year you innovate
Helen EdwardsCompeting priorities will hold you back in this time of budget pressure and economic stagnation, so focus only on creating an offer that meets customer needs.
Brands’ biggest AI opportunity is in making customers believe the bullshit
Mark RitsonArtificial intelligence is mostly a distraction from marketing fundamentals – unless you convince your market AI makes your brand better than the competition.
Do you have a strategy worthy of a brief? These three questions will tell you
Mark RitsonNew research shows marketers are terrible at briefing agencies. To start putting that right, ask yourself whether your marketing strategy meets these criteria.
Three axioms and three questions that summarise all of brand strategy
Mark RitsonBrand strategy is not complicated, it’s just the systematic application of the basics all marketers are taught. Here’s a simple way to be sure you’re taking the right steps – in the right order.
It’s time for ‘share of search’ to replace ‘share of voice’
Mark RitsonShare of voice is a key metric for setting budgets and predicting growth, but digital media make it impossible to calculate accurately. Understanding your share of search queries is a simple and elegant alternative.
Take Tesco’s lead, prepare for a recession that will dwarf the financial crash
Mark RitsonForget ‘U’s and ‘V’s, this recession will be F-shaped, and Tesco knows from the financial crash that all most brands and retailers can do is minimise their losses.
WeWork’s IPO debacle highlights the failures of modern brand building
Mark RitsonMasquerading as a tech firm has done no favours for WeWork, neither have its premature brand extensions and over-inflated view of its own self-importance.
The Guardian may be profitable but its model damages journalism
Mark RitsonThe Guardian is a fine newspaper and should be proud to reverse its losses, but by giving its product away for free it is preventing the news industry profiting from quality journalism.
Liquid Death’s fame shows how badly marketers neglect product
Mark RitsonIt’s typical that marketers fawn over a brand built through promotion and packaging, when they ought to focus on their role in improving the thing they sell.
How do you win new customers? Ask your extreme loyalists
Mark RitsonThose who spend more and buy your brand more often have unparalleled insight into what makes it special – and into what appeals to new customers too.
Giving your brand a good death is an underrated marketing skill
Mark RitsonAlthough we never talk about it, marketers kill as many brands as we create, and doing so in the right way at the right time is crucial to business health.
For Omega and Swatch, the rewards of co-branding could be astronomical
Mark RitsonFar from cannibalising Omega’s luxury sales, the collaboration with Swatch on the £200 Moonswatch will breathe new life into both these sister brands.
An ethnography of pricing: How and why marketers should put up prices
Mark RitsonInflation means price increases are marketing’s number-one priority for 2022. But how many marketers are capable or even aware of the challenge ahead? Our columnist provides a handy cheat sheet for those who want to get it right.
Good purpose, bad purpose: Marketers shouldn’t oversimplify the arguments
Mark RitsonBrand purpose campaigns underperform ‘traditional’ marketing on average, but for the right brands purpose will still be the most effective strategic choice.
The Long and the Short of It maps exactly onto the challenges of global marketing
Mark RitsonThe boundaries between marketing teams’ responsibilities become clearer if you simply make long-term brand strategy a global job and short-term, targeted product activations a local one.
Be like Plusnet and ‘do a Ritson’
Mark RitsonBT marketing director David Stratton says Plusnet has ‘done a Mark Ritson’ by simplifying its brand codes to differentiate from sister brands EE and BT – a no-nonsense approach our columnist is proud to associate with his name.
Films no longer have sequels, they have sub-brands and franchises
Mark RitsonOur humble columnist spent Christmas in his underpants watching Netflix, but that doesn’t mean he wasn’t thinking about brands. This week, the fascinating whodunnit centres on the last-minute renaming of one of the holiday season’s most successful films.
Accenture Song is not a great rebrand, but it could be so much worse
Mark RitsonRebrands are usually a bad move, but despite the ridicule for Accenture Interactive becoming Accenture Song, there is just as much upside.
Does Facebook’s corporate rebrand to ‘Meta’ prove the future is ‘beyond’ it?
Mark RitsonOur marketing columnist stayed up late in Tasmania and put his headset on for the Facebook Connect VR conference. But he came away unimpressed with the branding revelations that followed.
Adidas’s sale of Reebok makes strategic sense all round
Mark RitsonReebok hasn’t reached the heights of the 1980s and 90s since Adidas bought it in 2006, and its sale means Adidas can focus on its ‘branded house’ while new owner ABG has the skills to bring Reebok into its ‘house of brands’.
There’s no downside for Boohoo in buying Debenhams’ brand
Mark RitsonCritics might scorn the fit but consumers care little about corporate ownership, and acquiring the Debenhams brand at a knockdown price helps Boohoo target more profitable customers.
For the ‘agency of the decade’, adam&eveDDB is a mess of a brand
Mark RitsonAdam&eveDDB deserves recognition for its outstanding creative work but with its creative nous it should know it’s time to drop the adam&eve name for the good of the wider DDB brand.
Kraft Heinz’s new CEO needs to deliver a much-needed dose of tough love
Mark RitsonCan veteran marketer Miguel Patricio use his expert eye to turn a dusty and confused portfolio around or has he got himself into a giant box of shit?
Moving closer to Facebook is dangerous for Instagram’s brand
Mark RitsonNo company before Facebook has had so many users while being so disliked, but the risk of moving Instagram to the same platform is one Mark Zuckerberg seems willing to take to keep control and integrate the brands’ data.
‘Range inflation’ is a sign Tesla has lost sight of its customers
Mark RitsonOur marketing columnist reviews the recent controversy over the driving range of Teslas and revises his assessment of the company’s market orientation.
P&O is the rare reputation crisis that really does matter
Mark RitsonThe damage P&O Cruises has suffered from P&O Ferries’ mistakes cuts to the core of the business, and leaves the separately owned brand with four options.
Peloton has snatched victory from the jaws of death – again
Mark RitsonMr Big’s (spoiler alert) death after a Peloton ride in the latest Sex and the City spin-off had social media forecasting the brand’s doom, but it actually created greater mental availability for the brand – especially after Ryan Reynolds’ creative agency got involved.
Trust in brands is illusory, just look at Facebook’s continued growth
Mark RitsonFacebook repeatedly ranks low in consumer trust surveys, yet user growth continues, revealing the idea of trust in brands as anthropomorphic nonsense.
If an influencer’s what you want, find a 90-year-old with bad WiFi
Mark RitsonThere’s no influence like a customer’s, as AT&T found when nonagenarian Aaron Epstein placed an ad in the Wall Street Journal criticising its service.
To end associations with the Proud Boys, Fred Perry needs to do more than stop selling them shirts
Mark RitsonRestricting US sales will only strengthen the neo-fascists’ bond with the shirts they use as a uniform. The brand needs a big ad campaign to show it stands for the opposite ideology.
Marketers must follow The Guardian and stop enabling oil brands’ hypocrisy
Mark RitsonAs The Guardian stops taking fossil fuel ads, marketers should take a similar stand and end big oil brands’ strategy of distracting the world from the harm they are doing.
Peloton’s ad is bad, but it will ultimately benefit the brand
Mark RitsonNot all publicity is good publicity, but as long as you don’t undermine your proposition or entirely alienate your market, the salience gained from a bad news story often outweighs any damage to brand image.
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