Army is Strong

Very strong, and very motivating

This is an 'anthem' message, an umbrella idea that defines the U.S. Army officer recruiting program.

This is one of the strongest-connecting programs you are going to see in marketing in today's world, and it just happens to be in one of marketing's toughest categories.

Military recruiting in a time of war.

It's been around for a while, but you should catch up.

Army Strong is a powerful, motivating, uplifting campaign that not only reflects the values of the U.S. Army, but also sends an positive message to prospective recruits and their families and connects strongly with currently serving Army men and women and their families.

The officer recruiting message (above) is remarkable for a lot of reasons. It's about leadership and command, of course. It's about officer-ship. It's about what you, as an individual, could ultimately achieve as an officer in the Army.

But that achievement motivation is extraordinarily powerful. Motivations that drive men and women contemplating an officer's career -- the opportunity for personal growth, promotion, and career and command achievement -- are squarely and successfully addressed. There is can be no mistake about what this message is about.

The people who created this work -- and the people who ordered and approved it -- know what Army is about.

And the branding component, rapidly cutting through the insignia of Army rank, is also brilliantly conceived and executed. It's perfect motivation for a motivated officer candidate.

Very few campaigns in the private sector achieve this kind of power, this focus, and this effectiveness.

Kudos to the U.S. Army and their team.

Tiger redux

Earl brings Tiger back




Before Tiger, there was Earl, Tiger's father.

Earl was the originator, motivator, tee-er-upper, and driver.

Earl was the man who pulled the driver out of the bag and Tiger was the ball that flew down the fairway.

Now Earl is back, Tiger looks at us, and listens -- as we listen -- to thoughts from Earl, delivered with a questioning sincerity.

It's Nike advertising, of course.

But if this is Earl's real voice, or even just Earl's thoughts, it's powerful enough.

If any marketer had to re-think and rebuild, it's Tiger.

If any marketer had to personally participate in the rebuilding, it's Tiger.

He had to open private memories for this renewal to happen and make a very big emotional contribution.

Nike stepped to the edge. Tiger went with them. And Nike's creative team said, just look at the camera for us, Tiger. So he looked. The camera rolled. And Earl spoke.

How else would you re-enter the candidate? Could there be a better way? Would you have a better idea?

Tiger did more than could be expected.

Nike did well.

Moving Ford

Which is exactly what Ford is doing




Automakers continue to struggle.

Meanwhile, Ford continues to create contemporary messaging that taps into how people think and feel about their cars.

Ford continues their investment in the celebrated Drive One campaign, which actually is a breath of fresh air in a very boring, very predictable category, now into its third year.

Ford sales continue to grow.

And frankly, you can't imagine that a robust trend like this is going to reverse itself, not by a long shot, not anytime soon.

The moral, obviously, is run a healthy company. Build great cars. Innovate. Use technology to make cars great, safe, and fun.

Above all, know your customers, know how they think, and connect.

Then, make money.

Ford does it all, and does it exceptionally well.

Maybe Ford is the new Toyota.

Wait a minute, I have a black box?

You do. It’s in your car.


Did you know there’s a system in your car, like an airliner’s black box, that captures critical data about your automobile, starting just a few seconds before your crash and continuing for a second or two after the airbags deploy?

You didn’t? Well, you do now. It’s called an EDR, electronic data recorder.

Depending on your car, it captures the speed you were traveling, the angle of your accelerator, your gear shift position, whether you were using your seat belt, even the angle of the driver’s seat. Some EDRs record data on brakes and the anti-lock braking system.

Toyota’s EDRs, for example, do all of that. And despite the gazillion cars it sells each year, until this week there has been only one U.S.-based laptop – one laptop in the entire country – capable of reading the data.

In other words, data from your Toyota crash is locked up in the EDR and Toyota’s laptop is the only key to getting it out.

In fact, until this week, according to the Associated Press, Toyota refused to allow access to the laptop and even the data, and only provided printouts, sometimes edited, when supoeonaed by a court.

Interestingly Ford, Chrysler and General Motors cars have EDRs, too. But they have open architecture that lets law enforcement officials – or anyone for the matter – recover the data in seconds. Nissan has something similar. But other car makers have other strategies. Honda, for example, also controls access to Honda crash data and their spokespeople say it’s only made available by court order.

The point here, tragically, is that Brand Toyota has just taken another hit.

This is absolutely is the worst case scenario for anyone managing a brand in a crisis.

If the only break in the crisis is one piece of bad news after another, that’s something no corporate television commercial can ever fix.

Toyota is still in critical condition.

Tiger's apology (2)

Not apology, mea culpa

Yesterday, we watched – actually, all of us took part – in Tiger Woods’s counseling program.

Think about that.

If it’s true, it explains the absence of apology language in Tiger’s remarks. The event wasn’t about apologizing. After all, he made a profound apology in December last year.

It wasn't a press conference, either, which explains the absence of journalists.

Part of his counseling program, we believe Tiger had to admit his errors, confront them, accept them, and acknowledge the impact his behavior had on people who are important to him and who care about him. Except for his wife Elin, those people were in the room yesterday.

So why couldn’t he call his friends and associates individually, or invite them over to his home? A friend in alcohol recovery might call you and say the same things – which has happened to us. Yesterday, Stewart Cink, the PGA professional golfer, said that has also happened to him.

Sadly, a phone call doesn’t get the job done. Tiger is a celebrity as big as the planet. His confrontation and acceptance, inevitably, must be equal to his reality, which is not just enormous, but global.

Which explains the television cameras, the importance of major news coverage, and even the words Tiger used – and probably wrote himself.

All of which puts Tiger’s talk in a different perspective. Clearly, it needed to be as honest, sincere, and authentic as he could make it. It was about his life, his future – and literally, who he is.

In fact, when he said that Elin didn’t need an apology, but will be convinced by his behavior, he meant it.

And in his amazing talk, he included all of us in that statement.

Tiger's apology

Did it really happen?


The curious thing about Tiger Woods isn’t Tiger, frankly.

It’s all of us.

As golf fans and hero worshippers, we put Tiger on such a pedestal, and he dazzled us brilliantly for so long, that it’s very hard for us to deal with the fact that he is human and does what humans do. He lives his life. He tries to make things work. He runs into headwinds and events – like we all do – that slow us down, steer us off track, and sometimes hurl us into unyielding trees.

Today, Tiger took a step to made amends for what hurt his family and disappointed the people who are important to him.

“For all I have done, I am so sorry,” was Tiger’s headline on the 14-minute speech, delivered in a tightly controlled, closely managed event in the clubhouse at TPC Sawgrass in Ponte Vedra, Florida, championship home of the PGA Tour. That statement came midway through his remarks.

What is interesting about the proceedings is that only three journalists were invited to attend, but had no opportunity to ask questions.

What is interesting about the speech is that the only apology delivered was the parents of children who looked up to Tiger. Very deliberately, his language was about being sorry.

His wife, Elin, Tiger said, did not want a verbal apology. She will wait for his behavior to improve. For her, he told us, his improved behavior will be the best apology.

Nevertheless, in emphasizing that this nationally televised event was not a press conference, Tiger’s management team left dangerous questions dangling in the air.

If it wasn’t a press conference, what was it?

If no apology was offered to his fans, his business partners, and his colleagues on the PGA Tour, was an apology actually made?

“I am sorry” means what it says – I am sorry for what happened. It hurts me deeply. Well, we are sure that is exactly how Tiger feels. And, yes, sorry is an expression of regret. But “I am sorry” is definitively not the same as “I apologize.”

An apology means I am sorry for you, too, and I regret that.

Semantics? Possibly.

There was a lot of emotion in Tiger’s talk, which took courage for him to deliver. He did make an unequivocally powerful commitment to living a different kind of life.

But this was also a carefully scripted event.

Apology language, it seems to us, was carefully scripted out.

Toyota, moving forward?

What do you do?


We just checked.

It hasn’t changed.

It’s still being used.

The Toyota motto, amazingly, is ‘moving forward’.

Brand strategists notice these things.

Everyone on the planet, it seems, has noticed, too.

As in ‘moving forward’ scarily, as your Toyota or Lexus inexplicably accelerates?

As in ‘moving forward’ relentlessly, as you pump the brakes on your Prius, in vain?

As in ‘moving forward’ uncontrollably, while the power steering on your Corolla has different ideas about where you want to go?

Perhaps Toyota made a conscious decision to protect the slogan.

Perhaps it's been overlooked.

Perhaps it should have been quietly removed.