I was riding the bus to York earlier this week when we passed a billboard Ad for Canada’s National Newspaper: The Globe and Mail. Here is what it looked like:
There is a picture of a chicken in the middle, and three thought bubbles each indicating what it means to a different columnist.
I then overheard someone on the bus say how similar it was to a certain university’s marketing campaign. I did some digging in my magazine collection and found the following print ad for York university. Note: this was in a magazine published in December 2007.
It shows a gift bag of wine and what it can mean to….wait for it…3 different areas of study. What a fine bit of Deja vu?
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In class this week, we had a guest speaker from Taxi speak to us about the history of the Telus “Future is Friendly” campaign, which, if you are keeping count, has been around now for 10 years. Starting with Clearnet and then carrying on through the acquisition by Telus, “Future is Friendly” was revolutionary because it positioned a cell phone company in a completely different area that the major players in the Canadian market.
Its success cannot be denied. From being a late entrant in a market dominated by national players, Telus has exponentially grown marketshare, brand equity and continues to still be in the “most liked” campaigns according to Marketing Magazine [citation needed]. To the credit of both Taxi (Telus’s Lead Agency) and Telus, the company has been very disciplined in staying with a consistent message for a time period much longer that most other campaigns in the telco. industry.
Simple. Consistent. Different. Effective. To paraphrase a page from Marty Neumeirer’s book “Zag” – When everyone else is zigging, you should look to zag.
So why so often do competitors who have the resources to take their brand in any direction work so hard at imitating another brand’s success? Apparently in marketing, imitating is not flattering for anyone involved.
