We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are.
—Anaïs Nin
IT WAS 1999 AND WE WERE LOST IN THE DEPTHS OF THE tropical jungle. I was being the adventurous one on this otherwise romantic trip for two, insisting that we drive the back roads from Playa del Carmen to visit the Mayan ruins of Chichen Itza. Traveling down a dusty dirt road through the dense rainforest in our four-wheel-drive rental, transported back in time to the natural terrain that once ensconced all of Mexico, we nearly forgot we were in the last year of the twentieth century, but then we were quickly snapped back into civilization. In the middle of the rainforest sat an imposing, brand new factory. Etched on its façade was the classic horse-head logo and the words Jordache Enterprises Inc. I was surprised to find that the popular jeans designer of the late 1970s and early ’80s was still in business, let alone in the depths of the Yucatan Peninsula.
I rolled down the window of the truck and asked a local, “Dónde está Calle Libre?” As the young man pointed out directions, my eyes were drawn to his shirt. On it were the blue, red, and white rectangles made famous by designer Tommy Hilfiger. There was, however, one peculiar difference between his shirt and the millions of others that populated the streets of America. Instead of Hilfiger, the shirt read “Tommy Halfmaker.” I soon discovered that this man was not alone. Many others were sporting the popular knock-off merchandise, from shirts to hats to backpacks, all with Hilfiger’s coveted trademark albeit with a different last name. This urban style was being fabricated in the obscure seclusion of Mexico, and Halfmaker was just as popular as Hilfiger.
As we continued to drive down the busy streets of Valladolid, it struck me: Brands don’t live on the racks of department stores, they live within the minds of people. The connection between a brand and its associations depends on the subjective viewpoint of the observer. To the residents of this small Mexican city, Tommy was still Tommy, but Hilfiger was now Halfmaker, and nobody cared or even noticed. Halfmaker enjoyed the same set of desirable attributes as Hilfiger did back home on the streets of Manhattan. Brand names and their associations can be both arbitrary and malleable because they live in the world of perception, not reality.
Originally known for his preppy, classic, all-American designs that appealed primarily to a niche of clean-cut, white, middle-class males, Hilfiger became wildly successful through his brash alliance with the key influencers of a diametrically opposite target segment: the inner city youth of African American hip-hop culture. Because of this partnership, Hilfiger’s brand image was immensely transformed from one relegated to country clubs and yacht clubs to the influential urban streets, and later to the far-flung suburbs—and all because Tommy tapped into the growing power of the hip-hop movement.
And no one exemplified the raw and gritty talents of the city streets more than admitted ex–drug dealer turned legendary MC, the Notorious B.I.G., also known as Biggie Smalls.1 In an open attempt to tap into the mainstreaming of the urban youth market, Hilfiger gave free wardrobes to influential rappers like Biggie and even used hip-hop bad boys Method Man of the Wu-Tang Clan and Treach of Naughty by Nature as runway models. The wardrobe gifts became de facto product placements, from which artists would give Hilfiger shout-outs at concerts and mentions in the rhymes of raps. His clothing was center stage in the prevalent rap music videos of that time, profoundly impacting popular culture and Hilfiger’s sales numbers.2 When gangsta rapper Snoop Dogg wore his red, white, and blue Hilfiger rugby shirt for an appearance on Saturday Night Live in 1994, sales skyrocketed overnight.
Hilfiger was intuitive enough to recognize that beneath the veneer of suburban life, those ideals of good, clean, family fun and of the American dream realized, was a desire for defiance. In the 1990s, that defiance was best translated by the street cred that hip-hop had defined. Hilfiger built his company and his designs on his brand logo knowing that it ultimately needed to stand for something bigger. As the designer explained, “It is important that my logo communicates who I am to the consumer. It has to say, ‘I am about movement, energy, fun, color, quality, detail, American spirit, status, style, and value.’ The brand must relate to the consumers’ sensibilities. Whether they are based upon sports, music, entertainment, politics, or pop culture—it must have the cool factor.”3
The unmistakable logo became synonymous with urban cool. And because fashion trends emanate from big cities, the brand’s appeal spread from coast to coast, growing well beyond inner-city youth to varied demographics across the country and world—old and young, suburban and urban. Celebrities and public figures that included President Clinton, the Prince of Wales, Leonardo DiCaprio, and musicians and rock stars that included Michael Jackson, Bruce Springsteen, David Bowie, Elton John, and Mariah Carey wore Hilfiger designs.4
In 1995 the Council of Fashion Designers of America named Hilfiger Menswear Designer of the Year.5
From 1991 to 1995 the company would net a sixfold increase in sales of 321 million with profits reaching 41 million. Hilfiger significantly outpaced industry growth in sharp contrast to the relatively poor performances by his formidable and well-established competitors of the time, like Donna Karan, Ralph Lauren, and Calvin Klein.6 By 1999 the company was the highest-valued clothing commodity on the stock exchange, grossing more than half a billion dollars.7 And all because Tommy Hilfiger figured out before any other designer how hip-hop could not only sell albums but an entire cultural trend.
Perhaps one of the most remarkable moments in advertising is now considered one of its most infamous. In 1924 Philip Morris introduced Marlboro to the world. At the time, it was branded as a women’s cigarette, a milder, filtered version to contrast the stronger-tasting unfiltered brands that men mostly smoked. The Marlboro filter was even printed with a red band to hide lipstick stains and openly targeted feminine sensibilities with the ladylike ad slogan “Mild as May.”8
But in 1954 all that changed. Precipitated by emerging public health concerns about the dangers of tobacco, many smokers were rethinking their allegiance to harsher unfiltered brands.9 And Marlboro sought to leverage its distinction as a safer filtered cigarette to a wider audience beyond women. That was the year that ad executive Leo Burnett first conceived the Marlboro Man, achieving the greatest about-face in branding history. Burnett was looking for an image that would reposition and reinvent the brand for mass-market appeal. In a 1972 documentary Burnett explained how the idea for the “Marlboro Man” was first conceived in a brainstorming session when he asked his creative team, “What’s the most masculine symbol you can think of?” and one of his head writers spoke up and said, “a cowboy.”10 The revered and reviled cowboy became what many industry experts consider the most brilliantly successful ad campaign of all time. Launched in 1955, the original Marlboro Man campaign featured close-up images of rugged masculine archetypes using the product. These included not only cowboys but also sailors, drill sergeants, construction workers, and other men of quintessential manly professions.11
The cowboy became the most popular Marlboro Man because of his ability to generate a powerfully rich set of compelling associations in the minds of many different people. Although Marlboro was originally defined as a man’s cigarette by symbolizing ideal masculinity, the cowboy had wide appeal to both sexes. He embodied traits that were equally desirable to both men and women: independence, defiance, adventure, and romance. These universal, iconic, and downright sexy attributes borrowed the spirit of the Western frontier and life on the range, symbolizing the freedom and audaciousness of American culture as popularized worldwide through Western movies and television shows. Steeped with the alluring values of the American West, the ads offered intimations of strength, fearlessness, control, substance, and heroism.12
When the Marlboro Man was rolled out nationally in 1955, Marlboro sales jumped 3,241 percent to 5 billion, compared to its 1954 earnings when its US market share had been less than 1 percent.13 By 1957 sales increased an additional 300 percent, going to 20 billion.14 In 1963, when the Marlboro Country campaign began focusing solely on the symbolism of the American cowboy—using classic images of hats, boots, horses, and Western landscape—the Marlboro man became a global phenomenon and among the most widely recognized cultural symbols. By 1972 Marlboro was the leading tobacco brand in the world.15 According to Philip Morris, it is still the number one brand of cigarette today, for both men and women, in every state of the U.S., and crossing all age groups. With a massive 42.6 percent retail market share, it has more than the combined market shares of the next 13 brands.16
The evolutionary psychologist Geoffrey Miller believes that consumerism shares key parallels with narcissism, or excessive self-love. Miller observes that one’s ego and self-esteem are often unconsciously linked to many of the brands we purchase. He argues that the capacity for self-absorption seems present in all ordinary humans, and often the choices we make in buying a certain brand are based primarily on its ability to help us show off to our social groups. Miller believes that two components drive the consumer mindset: status and hedonism. We show off to others in order to please ourselves, touting the indicators that advertise our biological potential as mates and friends.17
Humans display brands much like proud peacocks exhibit the ornamentation of their tail feathers. Peacocks spread their intricate plumage to convey to other birds their natural beauty conferred by good genes, their ability to find seeds and insects that sustain the health and integrity of their tremendous plumage, and their ability to avoid predators by negotiating and navigating the wild with such a cumbersome tail. Generally animals don’t have any conscious awareness as to why they display these various indicators; the urge simply comes to them and they reap the evolutionary benefits of greater attractiveness to prospective mates.18
We humans also advertise our attractiveness to our fellow kind. The brands we choose to buy are the indicators of our health, wealth, and well-being and imply that we have certain traits that mark success and worth. And, like the peacock, we often have no conscious awareness of the fact that we are doing this in order to reap the evolutionary benefits of these associations in the social hierarchies in which we live. We simply have the urge to wear Prada, suggesting class, or Adidas, suggesting athleticism—and in turn promote the real benefits of our brand ornamentation: the perceptions of socioeconomic fitness and status. We show off to our tribe to make ourselves feel good by attracting attention and adulation.19
Great brands are like magnificent peacock tails. They communicate best through implication, because, fundamentally, our minds process information through inference. The challenge for marketers is to target and imply the traits that we unconsciously covet—the things that we so often can’t or won’t articulate. In the case of Hilfiger and Marlboro, it was oblique access to the concepts of rebellion and rugged independence—that elusive cool factor embodied by rappers and wranglers. These brands let people share in the intimidating badass mentality that the mainstream media made renowned and infamous. The gun-slinging outlaws and robbers and the gangstas and pimp players are all molded from the same archetype, simultaneously becoming the heroes and the villains of their respective times.
It is not just about what the brand says about the product, it is rather what it suggests about the person. The explicit message of the Marlboro Country campaign was “come to where the flavor is,” but it was the flavor of the character, not the cigarette, that motivated smokers. As Mick Jagger once sang, “He can’t be a man ’cause he doesn’t smoke the same cigarettes as me.” And women too wanted to share in the same tasty defiance that society encourages in men and condemns in women. This double standard only strengthened female resolve to claim the manly brands as their own. Likewise, it was similar insight that enabled Hilfiger to extend his brand to include a women’s line, and allowed Marlboro to sell far more cigarettes to women as a men’s product than it did when it spoke directly to feminine sensibilities.
When brand associations change in the minds of people, market shares shift because we learn and make decisions about brands largely driven by associative memory. Humans have the largest association cortex, which enables our species the cognitive advantage for complex mental functions beyond the mere detection of basic dimensions of sensory stimulation.20 When marketing stimuli are processed by the mind, they don’t trigger a linear sequence of conscious thoughts and ideas one after the other. In fact, a great deal of activity in the mind occurs at the same time; a single idea can simultaneously trigger many ideas, which in turn triggers many more thoughts. The tricky part for marketers is that only a few of these thoughts actually reach consciousness.21
The storage and retrieval of information occurs through a set of neural networks of association that become linked together in memory. This is why one thought can elicit the recall of a vast network of other interconnected thoughts, ideas, images, words, and emotions. It is not the specific word or image used in the advertising that has meaning, but rather the associations attached to it, encompassed by those thoughts in the subjectivities of people. While advertisers must remain focused on delivering a clear, consistent, coherent message, they must also recognize that this message is just the tip of the iceberg. When such a message reaches the target’s mind, it must be evocative, conjuring up a rich, comprehensive set of meaningful associations below the surface.
Since brands can be reduced to memories through these associations, building these associations, both conscious and unconscious, is truly the essence of branding. It is not just about the overt art and copy of your ads, but also the subtextual meaning they generate. If you don’t know the exact associations you seek to reinforce or change, you are missing one of the most important elements in branding.
When a brand consistently repeats a coherent, compelling message over a period of time, the net result is actually a physical change in the brain’s circuitry at a cellular level. This rewired neural network of learned associations automatically predisposes people to think and respond in certain ways toward the brand. You want people to link your brand to a benefit without any effort. The brand’s message becomes linked unconsciously. If I say, “Melts in your mouth,” your mind automatically completes the thought, “ . . . not in your hands.” Similarly, Allstate’s 48-year-old tagline, “You’re in good hands with Allstate,” enjoys 87 percent recognition, the most recognized ad slogan according to a 2004 survey.22 Not only can people explicitly recall the slogan, they also are implicitly conditioned to link the brand with the feeling of being protected, the right mindset for someone thinking about buying insurance.
Freud first suggested the phenomenon of neuroplasticity, that the brain can be shaped, molded, and changed by experience. The neuropsychologist Donald Hebb theorized the basic mechanism behind it, which came to be summarized as “cells that fire together wire together.” Repeatedly firing the same nerve cells rewires the brain’s circuitry by increasing synaptic strength—the connections between neurons that provide a neural foundation for habits of thinking and behaving. These networks of learned associations determine the very strategies of how people approach life and choose brands.
Once these brand associations are set in the memories of people, they are not easily changed. For Tommy Hilfiger, he had the benefit of being a relative newcomer to the field of the fashion industry, and for Marlboro, before the introduction of the cowboy the brand had less than 1 percent market share.23 As these brands spread throughout public consciousness so too did the implicit associations that would eventually become deeply rooted in the brains of individuals and subsequently within our collective cultures.
There is no such thing as an objective reality. When people discern product information and size up brands, they bring their own luggage and proclivities to the party. The gut reactions that help them make decisions can be reduced to their unique memories.24 When someone says “I have a gut feeling about this,” what she is really saying is, “I have seen this pattern before.” Intuition is nothing more than recognition of learned events from our past that, when prompted by situational reminders, provide us with feedback on how to think, feel, or behave. The activation potential of these triggers strengthens when we experience them more often and they remain more active within our minds.
In psychology, priming refers to the ability of our minds to react to certain stimuli with increased sensitivity as a result of prior experience. For example, if you first see the word yellow, you will be slightly faster to recognize the word banana because these two words share a close relationship in memory. When one node of the associative network of memory is activated, it warms up another nearby node, making it easier and faster to retrieve that information.25 Priming is believed to be an involuntary unconscious phenomenon because it occurs outside of conscious awareness and does not depend on the conscious retrieval of information. It relies on implicit nondeclarative memory, rather than on explicit declarative memory that we can recall consciously. Research has shown that priming can play an important role in how we make decisions.26
Since all of our past experiences differ, we each create our own unique set of personalized and malleable, implicitly learned associations. These learned associations often take precedence over rational evaluation. For example, Martin Lindstrom discovered that those scary warning labels about the risks of heart disease or emphysema actually stimulated the nucleus accumbens, the “craving spot” in the brains of smokers. Apparently the warning label had become associated with past pleasures of smoking rather than effectively warning people of future health risks. Similarly, Melanie Dempsey of Ryerson University and Andrew A. Mitchell of the University of Toronto conducted research that exposed participants to made-up brands paired with a set of pictures and words, some negative and some positive. After seeing hundreds of images paired with several fictitious brands, the subjects were unable to recall which brands were associated with which pictures and words, but they still expressed a preference for the positively conditioned brands. The authors of the study labeled it the “I like it, but I don’t know why” effect. In a follow-up experiment the participants were presented with product information that contradicted their earlier impressions, offering them reasons to reject the products they had been conditioned to like, but they still chose the brands associated with the positive imagery. Factual information to the contrary did not undo the prior conditioning, suggesting that their product selections were driven more by unconscious conditioning rather than rational analysis.27
We are always reacting unconsciously to environmental signals that stimulate feelings like craving or warning, pleasure or pain. The jingle of an ice cream truck or the siren of a police car activates responses that influence our behavior toward or away from objects. Green means go. Red means stop. Jeffrey Blish, our strategy leader at Deutsch LA, will sometimes wear a necktie when he is moderating focus groups, which he uses to dictate the level of formality in the room. When he wants to relax and lower the guard of the panelists he loosens his tie. When they get a bit unruly or off topic, he slides the knot tighter and they snap back to attention. Jeffrey doesn’t realize that he does this because his behavior is unconscious competence. This competence represents the highest level of learning, from which both mastery of skill and intuitive judgment arise. Brands can function much like the knot of the tie. They can be shifted back and forth to push people away from or toward the brand depending upon the associations elicited by the messages being sent out.
But just because we respond unconsciously to this stimuli doesn’t mean that marketers who attempt to sneak their messages below the radar of consciousness are going to be successful in communicating their brands. While it is true that the mind learns and responds on an unconscious level to sensory associations and brand messages in the environment, it learns and responds much better when that message is clearly in the focus of our attention spotlight. In order for priming to favorably dispose your brand toward the positive, the brand concept and its storage chest of associations must first become imprinted on the minds of people. The best way to accomplish this task is through conscious attention.
Leading market researcher Ipsos ASI evaluated the impact of advertising based upon a robust sample of 97,083 respondents and an extensive array of 512 ads. In the research, subjects initially believed that they were evaluating a new television program. As part of the programming, they were also exposed to a test ad, which simulated their natural exposure to advertising. The study revealed that advertising had a significant effect on brand choice even if the message was processed at low levels of attention. But the respondents who experienced higher levels of attention to the ad—those who could spontaneously recall the test ad and accurately describe it—were over two and half times more likely to demonstrate a shift in brand choice than those who paid low attention to ads and were only able to recognize them when prompted by a description. In addition, the ads processed by the high-attention group were six times more impactful than ads processed by the ultra-low-attention group, who could neither recall nor recognize having seen the ad even though they had been exposed to it. This group of unconscious responders experienced only a 1.2 percent positive brand lift.28
Furthermore, when advertisers have used subliminal messages presented below the levels of consciousness, attempting to influence consumers through hidden images, words, pictures, slogans, or sounds, their efforts appear to have been a waste of resources and energy. As psychologist Timothy Wilson concludes, “Subliminal messages have little or no effect on consumer behavior or attitudes when used in ad campaigns, whereas there is considerable evidence that everyday, run-of-the-mill advertising does.” Wilson adds, “Words hidden in movies do not cause people to line up at the concession stand. . . . Nor is there any evidence that implanting sexual images in cake icing increases sales, despite popular claims to the contrary. This is not to say that subliminal messages never have an effect—just that they have not been shown to do so in everyday advertising.”29
People often confuse unconscious effect in advertising with subliminal advertising. All traditional nonsubliminal advertising has an unconscious effect, not because there are hidden messages but because we have unconscious associations to the messages communicated. Consumers are often aware of the message in the advertising—what they are unaware of is how the message influences them. Wilson points out that a prospective smoker doesn’t say: “I think I’ll start smoking because I want to be like the Marlboro Man I saw on a billboard. Instead adolescents learn to associate smoking with independence and rebellion with little recognition that it was advertising that helped create this association. Even when we consciously see and hear something such as an advertisement, we can be unaware of the way in which it influences us.”30
In order to effectively brand a product you need a reference point, some sort of context out of which to identify the meaning and value of the product. Einstein’s theory of relativity is a good example for understanding not only the laws of physics but also the laws of cognition and marketing. When it comes to brand perceptions, there are no absolutes. Brands are never perceived independently of other relations, as the mind is always evaluating brands relative to something else. Without this contextual comparison you simply have no sense of its worth.
Perhaps the best marketing example of the power of associative learning in marketing comes from the highly acclaimed “Intel Inside” ad campaign. Prior to this effort, Intel, the maker of premium PC chips, was confronted with a difficult challenge. To mainstream computer buyers, the brand was unknown and invisible because there simply were no points of reference in their minds on which to form judgments about the product. Even though Intel was the very engine that powered the personal computer and had become the industry standard for processors, its market position remained buried and subjugated within the brands of the products it empowered. The Intel processor was rendered not only imperceptible but also indistinguishable from the competition, which contributed to the perception of a highly commoditized market for microprocessors.
Launched in 1991, the Intel Inside® Program was a cooperative marketing program aimed to stamp the brand in the minds of end users by employing Donald Hebb’s law of associative learning through repetition and persistence. By sharing advertising costs and convincing other manufacturers to place the Intel Inside trademark and logo in their marketing materials, the Intel brand experienced a remarkable leap in advertising exposure. The results of the program were immediate. In 1992, about a year after the campaign was introduced worldwide, sales rose 63 percent. From 1991 to 1995, awareness of the Intel Inside logo grew from 24 percent to an astonishing 94 percent among European PC purchasers, and by 1998 Intel controlled 90 percent of the world’s market share of PC microprocessors.31 In 2001 Intel ranked fifth on the list of the most valuable brands.32 Intel’s brand equity ballooned, going from obscurity to eventually becoming a world-class player synonymous with the computer industry. Today, the Intel Inside program is still one of the world’s largest cooperative advertising campaigns, supported by thousands of PC makers licensed to use the Intel Inside logos.33
Not only did Intel benefit from the countless repetitions of brand exposure through PC makers’ advertising, it helped them to align their products with some of the world’s best and biggest computer brands, such as industry leader IBM. Today Intel remains one of the most valued and best known brands in the world, ranking in a rarefied air with Coke, Disney, and McDonald’s. And in the computing industry, Intel enjoys outright ownership of its all-important associations of “quality,” “technology leadership,” and “reliability.”34
The manner in which you present brand information has primary influence on how the message is received. This framing effect creates a cognitive bias that can make the same information feel different depending on how the facts are spun. By shifting the focus of attention from the positive to the negative, marketers are able to slant the emotional coloring on top of the literal facts. This is why negative political advertisements predominate, honing in on obscure, often personal and emotionally charged transgressions of the opposing candidate, rather than talking about the bigger issues and the facts at large. And it is also why we get excited when we hear about a steak that is touted as being 90 percent fat free, and think twice about the same steak when it is claimed to contain 10 percent fat.
A great example of the tremendous power of cognitive reframing is the National Pork Board’s long-standing “The other white meat” campaign. This effort debuted in 1987 with the goal of increasing consumption by dispelling pork’s fatty reputation. Even though pork was perceived to have more fat than white meat chicken and turkey, pork shared an important opportunistic association with these lean protein choices. It turned white when cooked. With one simple flip of perspective, a common heuristic—that white meat is lean meat— was put to work. Pork had joined the ranks of its healthful poultry counterparts by association with a commonly shared and meaningful attribute.
Consumer research conducted prior to the launch had discovered that over 40 percent of all consumers had already subconsciously viewed pork as a white meat. Webster’s dictionary even defined pork as such. After extensive pretesting of the campaign, which showed that the approach was both believable and effective, “The other white meat” campaign was born. Within seven short months an independent research company confirmed that attitudes were shifting. In the first seven months in television markets, the campaign reached 85 percent of the projected target audience with a 72 percent increase in awareness of the white-meat message. At the end of the first year of the campaign, agriculture economist Glenn Grimes of the University of Missouri said, “The apparent increase in demand for pork put 500 million in US pork producers’ pockets during 1987 that wouldn’t be there under normal conditions.”35 The campaign would become one of the food industry’s most successful, increasing pork consumption by more than 20 percent, and last for 23 years.36
In 2000 a study conducted by Northwestern University reported that “The other white meat” ranked as the fifth most memorable promotional tagline in the history of contemporary advertising.37
The lesson for marketers is that without a meaningful associative frame of reference you simply don’t have a brand. Association determines your brand’s worth while context determines the meaning of those associations. It is not just what is inside the Tiffany gift box that determines the value; it is the box itself, the context in which the message is delivered, that helps to create the greatest value, making the ring and your brand shine all the brighter.
Mine your brand’s associative DNA. The totality of a brand is much greater than its positioning, advertisement, or package design. Recognize and tap into the entire associative architecture of the brain, the neural network of associations attached to the images, words, feelings, thoughts, and ideas that your brand evokes. In order to become fully cognizant of these associations, try breaking them out by explicit versus implicit associations. These associated qualities and features need to be discussed when you are creating the marketing approach; and the deeper dimensions can be uncovered through the use of qualitative projective techniques such as image sorts and collages to get at these hidden associations.
Another approach is to consider the neuromarketing techniques available, such as elucidating the precise points of your brand experience that trigger natural desire: the deep excitatory prompts of anticipatory pleasures. For example, NeuroFocus, a leading neuromarketing researcher, measures moment-by-moment brain wave responses to product interactions to identify what they call neurological iconic signatures (NIS), or neural high points. In one study, NeuroFocus found that when people enjoyed yogurt, the real moment of brand truth was “grasping and removing the foil covering over the top of container.” The brain loved the multitude of sensations that this action produced. Once these peak moments are identified, emphasizing them, whether in advertising or through the point of sale, tends to increase ad effectiveness and sales. As NeuroFocus founder A. K. Pradeep says, “It primes [people] to desire and seek out the product between uses.”38
Rethink forced exposures. One of the most pervasive and alarming trends in digital marketing these days is forced exposure to online advertising—those annoying pop-up windows, ads, and links that stand like roadblocks between you and your desired content. Rather than just creating awareness of the product, these intrusions train people to associate and link negative emotions like anger and frustration to the brand. After countless annoying exposures, advertisers might see an increase in brand awareness but they may also see the results of negative conditioning, i.e., the “I don’t like this brand, but I don’t know why” effect.
Choose the right names. Perhaps the most important thing a company can do is choose the right name for their brand. Names come with an intrinsic set of preexisting attributes, becoming the most repeated element of the brand.
Repetition is how the unconscious becomes programmed, so once you have established a mainstream brand name, it is unwise if not impossible to change the name as those hardwired associations have already set like concrete. When companies have attempted to establish more contemporary associations by changing their names, they have typically drawn only derision and confusion from customers. RadioShack failed in its attempt to shed its antiquated associations when it was rebranded as “the Shack,”39 and similarly Pizza Hut’s re-branding as “the Hut” also met with a backlash.40 Conversely, KFC succeeded because it borrowed upon the existing nomenclature of fast-food customers, who had long been using the shortened version of Kentucky Fried Chicken in their everyday vernacular.
Dress Barn is a clothing retailer who saddled themselves with a name that implied cows and overalls more than models and runways. So they did the next best thing to changing their consumer-facing name by changing their corporate name to Ascena to reduce some of their dowdier baggage in order to better attract investors. Philip Morris, the maker of cigarettes, also changed its corporate name to distance itself from the negative connotations of tobacco. Instead, they chose the name Altria, which sounds suspiciously like altruism, an intention the company denies.41
If you are in the position to choose the name of a brand or new product, make sure you explore the entire associative structure attached to the name. Choose a name that is an unblemished canvas, lacking any hidden baggage, or find one that is already linked to positive thoughts whose meaning coincides with the product you’re selling.
Choose the right brand extensions. It should go without saying that it’s extremely important to choose the appropriate line extensions that both reinforce the brand and help take it to new heights. Think of Nike’s foray into the Air Jordan sub-brand that fit perfectly with the brand’s mantra, “authentic athletic performance.” At the time, no one better exemplified the highest level of athletic performance than Michael Jordan. As Magic Johnson once said, “There’s Michael Jordan and then there is the rest of us.”42
Even major marketers like Colgate can fail to understand the ramifications of their base-brand associations. The launch of Colgate Kitchen Entrees was met with obvious distaste and disappointment. From the company perspective it made sense: eat our food and then brush with our toothpaste. But people don’t think that way. The thought of minty fresh toothpaste failed to whet their appetites for stir-fried chicken and vegetables.
Carefully choose endorsers. One of the easiest ways for a brand to promote its compelling attributes is through the borrowed interest of celebrity sponsorships. For example, Proactiv has become one of the leading brands of skin care treatment with a massive cultlike following thanks to a long celebrity A-list that includes Justin Bieber, Katy Perry, Britney Spears, Jessica Simpson, and P. Diddy.
But when brands align strongly with a celebrity endorsement, remember that a celebrity’s swift fall from grace can have a damaging impact. Pepsi leveraged the “Choice of a new generation” through their powerful alliance with the “King of Pop,” but when public attention began to focus on allegations of Michael Jackson’s painkiller addiction, they severed the relationship.43 Similarly, as Tiger Woods’ public perception and golf ranks fell, so did his relationships with major advertisers. Tag Heuer, AT&T, and Gatorade all canceled their endorsement deals amid revelations of his personal life and extramarital affairs. Perhaps the most ironic twist occurred in the late ’80s when the Beef Industry Council launched their “Beef . . . real food for real people” campaign featuring the likable actor James Garner, who was hired to fortify the image of beef during a time when people were becoming more health conscious. Not too long after that, Garner underwent quadruple bypass surgery.
Consider novel contexts at retail. I recently saw a picture posted on Facebook of a point-of-purchase display for condoms. Hanging on a j-hook in front of jars and jars of baby food were boxes of Trojans. Set in the context of the consequences of unprotected sex, the display worked to remind those passing down the aisle of the trials and tribulations of early parenthood. This is an intriguing example of how retailers and marketers can leverage associations. Retailers have long worked the planograms of their store shelves to match the associative context of the brain—whether it’s chips alongside salsa or baby food next to condoms. In marketing your product, you must also consider what associations you want your brand to activate when the time comes for the most important moment of branding: the moment of choice.