CommonGround Partners

WHEN BUSINESS STRATEGY BECOMES UNINTENTIONAL COMMUNICATIONS STRATEGY

Is that possible?

Oh yeah. For a had-it-too-good-too-long oil company detached from the needs and wishes of its customers it’s very possible.

Exxon Mobil announced recently that it is getting out of the gas station business. Why? It says it cannot make enough money selling its own product!

Neither can anyone else. A friend of ours recently had to give up his gas station for this reason.

Now, folks, there’s something terribly, terribly wrong here.

The relationship between product manufacturers and retailers was sorted out a long time ago. It is an essential factor of business that the retail mark-up be enough for the retailer to make a profit. No profit equals no retailer which equals no outlet for the product. Well, at least in the case of a product that is impossible to sell on the Internet!

So the only conclusion is the providers of gasoline are making it impossible for gas station owners to make a living.

Proof? Even the manufacturers cannot make profit from that end of the chain. But they can settle for the obscene profits they are making from their core business. And leave the fighting over pennies and gas station ownership to others who are so desperate they’ll try anything.

We’re pretty sure that Exxon Mobil’s communication strategy is not, “We’re rich, so screw the rest of you.”

But getting out of gas station ownership – something that in easier times might be seen as simply good business practice – is sending exactly that message to the American public.

WINNING STRATEGY FROM A LOSING AGENCY

So, Wachovia Bank announced the finalists this week in its agency review. The 11-year incumbent, Mullen, did not make the finals.

We find this odd, since the Winston-Salem office of Mullen just finished what might be the smartest merger ads ever done for a financial institution, in support of Wachovia’s acquisition of A.G. Edwards.

Now we all know what the average merger ads look like: “X is now a part of Y.” Totally self-centered ads that give no hint as to why the merger happened or how the “new” company will do any better at servicing its customers.

But the guys at Mullen took a much smarter and fresher strategic approach. They turned what could have been a simple announcement into a customer-focused idea. They did it using the simple word, “with.” Here’s some of the copy:

With. An unassuming word that holds so much meaning…the
moment you add with, a bond is created. ‘I’m with child.’
‘She’s with me.’ ‘We’re with the band.’

The spots quickly tie the idea right back to Wachovia Securities:

Our financial advisors champion with, because we’re fully invested
in your success…we listen, we understand your life goals, we deliver
an objective plan.

And how do they bring in A.G. Edwards? Brilliantly, we think:

Search for those who value ‘with.’ We did. A.G. Edwards is
now with Wachovia Securities.

In 30 seconds, the customer (both existing and new) gets a sense of why Wachovia Securities is a good choice for investments and gets an understanding of why the merger of Wachovia and A.G. Edwards creates a new company that will be even stronger in meeting customer needs.

Now, we don’t know all the reasons why Mullen didn’t advance, but we can’t believe it’s because of any lack of strategic insight or compelling creative.

Is this the end of the Bart Simpson strategy?

"Oh what a tangled web we weave,
When first we practise to deceive!"

- Sir Walter Scott

Yes, Sir Walter said that, not Shakespeare. A common misattribution that is corrected in seconds by a trip to the Internet.

And that's the whole point of this piece.

We have noticed, as has any American paying even a little attention, that some of our politicians have been relying on a strategy that simply stopped working when the Internet placed so much information at our fingertips.

First, Hillary Clinton spoke proudly of landing under sniper fire in Bosnia. Sniper fire, we quickly learned, that happened nowhere but in her imagination.

Within minutes video footage of her calm, leisurely arrival, complete with meetings on the tarmac was hurtling around the Internet and ending up on all major news channels. But nowhere in cyberspace could anyone find footage of the occasion she'd confused with Bosnia - you know, the time when she did land under sniper fire. Had it been there she would instantly have been forgiven for confusing one event with the other.

Then recently John McCain denied having criticized the media for giving Hillary a rough time. Instantly his speech from the night that Obama claimed the nomination of the Democratic Party was re-circulated in which he clearly says - you guessed it - the media gave Hillary a rough time.

In both cases the politician in question, when challenged, responded in Bart Simpson fashion. Bart's favored "I didn't do it" became "I didn't say that" or "I didn't mean that" or, unbelievably, "I misspoke."

And here's the thing. Until the Internet made the storage and circulation of every filmed, recorded or otherwise documented event readily available, as an encyclopedia of everyday life, the "I didn't do it" defense usually worked for politicians. Which is why, down through history, they have made great use of it.

So what is really happening here and how is it relevant to marketers trying to get a message across to existing and potential customers?

It has to do with how well we adjust to and accept a world in which the Internet is only growing more powerful not less.

It's not like Obama hasn't had his stumbles. But he's shown he's smart enough not to deny them but to accept his mistakes and try to explain them.

He learned the hard way that there's no such thing anymore as a private meeting. Not in a world where cell phones take photos, shoot video and record conversations.

Obama, if elected, will be the first Internet generation President. He has used it as a powerful fund-raising tool, he has won praise for embracing social networking and the community-building power of the Internet. And he knows that his every move and every word is sitting out there on a server somewhere waiting to confirm or contradict his future words.

Regardless of political leanings, companies today must become like Obama.

The Vista operating system from Microsoft may be a seriously flawed product. But it didn't take an Apple ad campaign for this to become an accepted fact. The truth was on the Internet almost at the same time as the product was launched.

Of course, a lot of what is out there is personal opinion. But there's also a vast reservoir of dispassionate third party opinion that has to be taken into account.

That's the world marketers face.

The strategic challenge right now is to make honesty and truth exciting. And we don't see too many brands succeeding at that.

The man in seat 27A is angry.

And you know what? He has every right to be.

In the latest of a long line of strategic errors American Airlines just announced its plan to become the first carrier to charge passengers for checking baggage. No, not the $25 many airlines are now charging for checking a second bag - $15 for the first bag!

Baggage and airlines just belong in the same sentence don’t they?

Let’s analyze what American just did.

It said “Well aviation fuel is up 80% from not too long ago and we are losing money. We need to make money. So what extras can we charge for?”

Bad strategy.

The truth is, we all know fuel prices are increasing. It’s headline news every day. The American public should totally understand if airlines increased their ticket prices or imposed a fuel surcharge.

But charging for baggage just seems petty and unnecessary.

So why do it?

As we see it, there are three reasons for this ghastly error. First, it becomes a hidden cost. It has no impact on the ticket prices the airline advertises. It’s buried in the small print.

Second, it can become permanent. By not relating it in the minds of travelers directly to fuel costs, as a fuel surcharge would, it can become an “accepted” part of the cost of an airline ticket.

Third, it has zero impact on the airline’s most profitable passengers – business travelers. Long ago these folks learned to live out of carry-on baggage. And even if they do check a bag occasionally it’s a business expense. Furthermore, large companies with very frequent fliers never pay full price any way.

It’s this third point that gives the man in seat 27A every right to be angry. This fee impacts most those who can least afford it.

It’s a shame the airlines – okay, so far it’s just American – think they have the right to be so shortsighted.

Let Them Del(l)iver

We all know the old joke about opinions and assholes. But the advent of round-the-clock news, the creation of the blogosphere and the ability to instantaneously and anonymously comment on it all, has made it truer than ever.

We (CommonGround Partners) are now outside the daily fiasco that is the big agency world. (Oops – slipped an opinion in there!) But looking back at the business of creating ads it seems like it is facing a major problem with this never-ending battle of opinions and egos.

Look at Dell.

Is the concept of a dedicated agency for a single client a new one? No. Is it worth a try if the client feels it wants to do business that way? Yes. Would every one of us build it differently? Of course.

It will succeed or it will fail. And only time and talent will decide the outcome. But as usual in the ad business, opinions are already flying in all directions. People not charged with finding a name for the new agency jump on any suggestion as flawed. People who have a vested interest in its success describe the agency with more jargon and bullshit than should be allowed in a single paragraph. And there’s no in between.

But there are lots and lots of opinions. Many of them thrown around with the fervor that comes from the anonymity of the blogosphere. People who have never actually run a business in their lives are totally comfortable telling those who have how they are doing it wrong. Some people put their names to their comments, which we admire, but then still feel free to pass judgment on things they know precious little about.

It’s funny how you’ll still hear “Don’t believe what you read in the papers” while everything on the Internet is somehow accepted as truth!

But, back to Dell. A group of people has been asked – and is being paid – to create this thing. Let them build it, name it, run it and then judge them by the only things that matter - the work and the sales it generates.

For everyone who loves the name Synarchy there’s someone who hates it. For every WPP detractor there’s an art director or writer happy to have a job.

The ad industry needs to stop devouring its young. In the heyday when money was disgustingly easy to come by for agencies, this kind of ego-driven, elitist rubbish was harmless and marginally entertaining. Today it is a time-wasting anachronism.

Changing: Easier said than done.

"Hire young people. And don't tell them what to do, ask them what to do."

This is how Lee Clow closed his recent speech to the 4As.

Now, we are the first to agree that Mr. Clow is an ad legend. The respect he commands in the industry is totally merited. It’s just that this remark – and the apparently enthusiastic reception it received – seems to us to typify an incredibly large problem facing the advertising industry right now; the lack of leadership. There are many ‘leaders’ in advertising from whom we’d expect this kind of baloney but we were surprised to hear it from a proven creative visionary.

But this is not about Lee. It’s about leadership.

John D. Rockerfeller said, “Good leadership consists in showing average people how to do the work of superior people.”

In advertising, it is hoped that we still start out with better than “average people” but the point is valid. Leadership is not about asking people what to do - at least not on the job. Staying abreast of trends, thinking, fashions, technology is part and parcel of being an advertising person. Or it should be.

Those young people Lee mentioned will turn up on day one believing and hoping they are about to learn something; not having to teach their bosses stuff they should already know.

Speaker after speaker at the 4As meeting – and here we must point out we didn’t attend, we read the speeches and reports of the speeches after the event – went to great lengths to issue warnings.

They all followed basically the same format; our industry must change or die.

We must change. We must evolve. We must embrace the new media world. We must stop wishing for the past to return.

All true.

We hear stuff like this all the time. We read stuff like this all the time. But nobody follows through to say exactly how agencies should change. That would require leadership. That would require sharing your agency’s proprietary plans. That would require a common understanding of the problems the industry is facing. That would mean living up to Peter Drucker when he said, “Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.”

Colin Powell said, “The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help them or concluded that you do not care. Either case is a failure of leadership.”

Clients are like those soldiers. And if you stop having answers, only questions or vague pontifications on the need to change, they will indeed lose confidence that you can help them or will conclude that you do not care.

Part of this problem is the holding company structures within which most agencies find themselves. The ‘leaders’ of these holding companies are not concerned with advertising as a component of marketing. They are only concerned with it as a way to make money. And most of their time is consumed in managing that money to make more money.

The agencies themselves, as well as shouldering the proportion of the cost of the holding company that is allocated to them, have become separated from the old source of revenue, the media budgets. Media got spun off as a separate revenue stream a long time ago.

Agencies are left with nothing but diminishing fees for doing the creative work. And with the emphasis now clearly shifted to direct marketing, online, events and away from big-budget TV spots, that work is more labor-intensive not less. But it does not justify the salaries of the past – which is the real reason the industry has been so slow to follow its own advice and change. It’s still trying to support a cost structure and earning expectations even on the part of new hires that are rooted in the past.

We know what Mr. Clow meant when he said he didn’t believe in telling young people what to do. But surely he realizes that the unspoken suggestion he was making was really “Get rid of the old guys – we don’t get this new paradigm.”

Leadership will always arise. And right now, with agencies so clearly lacking in this area, clients are taking back the leadership role.

At CommonGround Partners we take great pride in using our strategic skills to put CMOs in a position to truly lead their agencies. To paraphrase Mr Clow, a CMO’s approach to an agency should be “Don’t ask them what to do; tell them what to do.”

The World Is Spinning

Advertising has been called many things. Marshall McLuhan said, "Advertising is the greatest art form of the twentieth century." But H.G.Wells offered a slightly different point of view when he said, "Advertising is legalized lying."

Call it what you will, the one thing we can safely say in 2008 is that conventional advertising is not quite as effective as it once was. It is no longer the sole magic ingredient of marketing success.

We all know the reasons that are frequently cited, from too many media choices to too few true innovations in product design.

But what if McLuhan and Wells were both right?

It is quite possible that the greatest art form of the twentieth century was indeed constructed around stretching the truth. Perhaps that was part of the art even as McLuhan described it.

Hold that thought for a second. And consider something that is on all our minds right now - the race for the White House.

Something is happening in politics that is very similar to what is happening in advertising. And it too has to do with the art of legalized lying. Or as the political campaigns call it, spin.

The spin-doctors try to influence how an event or a speech is interpreted. But increasingly their efforts fail. Advertising has traditionally told us what to think and increasingly it fails.

See the parallel?

If we take a cold, hard look at our world with all its confusion and conflict and diversity and potential, only one thing has truly changed - us.

And we’ve changed in one dramatic, irreversible, almost unbelievable way: we have more knowledge at our fingertips than anyone a generation ago would have thought possible. Every single day we do things that were once considered science fiction. And it all has to do with information.

This is why spin doesn’t work like it used to. We have too much knowledge of the words or the event being spun. We know we are being spun. And if we are not sure we can check to see with a couple of clicks.

Spin worked when it had the chance to become the primary interpretation of an event that few of us actually witnessed or had any real detail about. Spin became truth in the absence of information.

Advertising worked when it became the primary interpretation of a product’s value. Advertising became truth in the absence of information.

We’ve not only learned to question both forms of communication we’ve developed the tools to do it. The most obvious of these tools is the Internet. But immediate access to information has changed everything.

We are no longer waiting to be told what to think. Well, most of us at least. We witness far more first hand. News is less reported and more experienced. (A fact made wonderfully clear in the book ‘Peter Jennings. A Reporter’s Life’ which looks nostalgically back to the days when foreign correspondents would work for weeks, even months, on gathering a story).

You could even say that it was once the role of the media (in both an advertising and non-advertising sense) to interpret life for us. Now it is their job to let us experience life. We expected cameras to be in Baghdad before the first bombs fell during the US invasion. We now expect news to be instant and real.

Spin is now seen for what it is; a blatant attempt to have us interpret events the way the spinner wants us to. And even if there’s truth in the spin we still resent the source and the technique.

Unfortunately, you can substitute the word advertising for spin in those two sentences and they remain true. Go back and try it.

This is the overwhelming reason why the very nature of advertising has to change – driven by a change in the way we discover and express marketing strategies.

In 2008 the primary interpretation of a product’s value is as likely to come from a third party web site comparison as from the marketer’s web site. It’s more likely to come from vocal user groups using social media as it is from a magazine advertorial.

But the key thing is it will be a personal interpretation reached individually by each of us calling on whatever sources and tools we feel most comfortable using.

Far too much advertising is created under the assumption that advertising’s powers are the same as they used to be. But to claim today that advertising provides the primary interpretation of a product’s value…well, that’s just spin.

Ford goes into reverse

This is how Adweek reported the agreement between Ford and The American Family Association that ended the latter’s call for a boycott of Ford products that started in March 2006.

“First, Ford would have to cease all advertising on gay Web sites and throughout gay media outlets, including magazines, television and radio, in the U.S. with the exception of $100,000 to be used by Volvo. The Volvo ads would have been the same ads used in the general media and not specifically aimed at the gay community. Second, Ford would not be able to renew current promotions or create future incentives that give cash donations to gay organizations based on the purchase of a vehicle. Third, Ford would be prohibited from making corporate donations to gay organizations that engage in political or social campaigns to promote civil unions or same-sex marriage. Lastly, Ford would have to stop giving cash and vehicle donations or endorsements to gay social activities such as "gay pride" parades.”

So what’s the deal? Gays don’t drive? Or just that in the eyes of The American Family Association they aren’t American?

It’s only our opinion but we feel this sets advertising back many years. Ford should have stood up and defended its right to advertise to any segment of society. Obviously the boycott represented more sales than the gay community could replace. But this should not have been about sales it should have been about freedoms – remember those Ford? Aren’t they supposed to be the foundation of this country? Surely the days when those freedoms did not extend to the gay community are long gone? Apparently not.

The American Family Association should be ashamed of using the words American and family. The association should also remember that none of the people they seek to protect would even know of Ford’s advertising in gay media or its support of gay events if they weren’t already investigating those same media and events. Is it really 2008?

108,810,358

It’s generally agreed that we are in the middle of the most open American election process ever. It’s also true that more people have already voted than in any Presidential primaries in history.

So what has changed? It is really the historic possibilities of the first woman President or the first black President? Is it the sudden fervor with which the American public has finally decided it wants rid of George W?

Or is it something else?

We think it is all of the above plus that something else: the Internet.

If you’re wondering what the title of this piece means, it’s the estimated number of distinct web sites available to anyone with Internet access. Of course, nobody knows for sure and it changes every minute. But we do know one thing: it’s an incredible number.

It’s what this number represents that is even more meaningful. It represents knowledge, information, involvement, participation, connection, learning, opinion, entertainment and 108 million other things. But it is all these things instantaneously.

In short it represents power.

The power that has helped Barack Obama raise impressive amounts of money by paying more attention to his web presence than does his rival. The power for people – both the smart and the scary – to instantly comment on news as it breaks and so feel that their voices are truly being heard.

In many ways the term “open process” is inadequate. We are dealing with a new “closeness” – it is the proximity we feel to the process that makes that process feel more urgent and relevant.

So, if we think about it, the process has not changed; it’s our involvement with it that is different.

And this is where there is a direct parallel with marketing. Products and services may not have changed but the way Internet-empowered customers engage with them has.

This is why even marketers who embrace the Internet need to ask themselves a question, “Is it changing everything we do or has it simply been added on to what we were already doing?”

Adding the Internet to the periphery of your marketing efforts – just adding to that number of web sites – is not enough. The Internet is a transformative medium. It has to be placed at the center of the customer relationship and allowed to impact everything else.

What a marketer does on TV and in other advertising media should now be an extension of what it does on-line. Not the other way around. At the center of everything is the customer and the marketer’s relationship with that customer. The Internet is the best medium for creating closeness in that relationship and then everything else flows outward from there, building on the relationship that already exists.

This is why, to borrow another phrase from the world of politics, we believe in the separation of powers. Just as the different branches of government are there to act as checks and balances for each other, so we believe that strategy and execution should not both be in the hands of advertising agencies, digital or mainstream.

A CommonGround Strategy starts with the marketing organization itself, defines and expresses its unique relationship with its customers and then extends outward through all media with the right message at the right time. This is the only way to build ‘closeness’ – something that has already reshaped politics but has yet to reshape marketing as fully as it should.

Where is the wisdom?

Carla Hendra, co-CEO of Ogilvy North America, said the economic climate coupled with the fragmentation of media has created an "interesting and dynamic time" for the business.

"It's almost an all-bets-are-off kind of moment where you have to reinvent yourself," Ms. Hendra said. "We don't have a business anymore where we make a marketing plan for the year. We're making them every day, and that's had fundamental implications for how we staff and how we get compensated." - Ad Age

Marketing plans by the day? Did we read that right?

This quote is from an article in Ad Age reporting on the Direct Marketing industry, as marketers worried about the economy start to look for savings in that area. And yes, we read it right.

The interesting thing, from our perspective, is that the word strategy is never mentioned. The idea that smarter thinking can make tactics more effective and more efficient, potentially creating the savings that marketers need without sacrificing sales, doesn’t seem to be a topic of discussion within the industry.

Agencies are now, as Ms. Hendra says, willing to base their staffing plans and compensation on a by-the-day philosophy, if it can be called a philosophy.

Nobody questions the right of agencies to make money. But when they can only staff simply to execute and maintain maximum flexibility, who is doing the thinking? As we’ve said before, compensation based on scope of work does not pay agencies to experiment and certainly does not cover the high cost of senior agency brand planning talent on any but the largest of accounts.

In tough economic times we believe the marketers who will do best are those that have the strongest underlying strategies, driven not by specific tactics like direct marketing but built on fundamental truths that make every marketing activity more fruitful.

Companies like Commonground Partners are the answer to the question “How do I pay less for top class strategy which will make all my advertising dollars work harder?”

Does old thinking waste new tools?

TNS Media Intelligence/Cymfony polled more than 60 marketers in North America, France and the U.K. to gauge how they are faring navigating the world of social media. It asked them feedback on their agencies' abilities to help. TNS found, in its words, "Agencies don't get it."

Clients complained that their agencies -- creative, media, public relations, design and others -- typically treat social channels like blogs as traditional media. In other cases, their ideas are not backed up by practical skills in the area. What's more, one client pointed out that his agencies have little of their own experience using social networks or video sharing sites for themselves.

That’s strange. In our experience people working in agencies are avid users of social media. In fact they seem obsessed with them. Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, advertising blogs, personal blogs – they use them all. So why is this not translating into “practical skills” for their employers?

This poll reported in Adweek is not the first time that research has suggested that agencies are falling behind their clients in wanting to embrace, understand and use new media.

But why is this? Why are agencies not responding to the rapidly changing dynamic between sellers and buyers despite widespread use of these new tools by their own people? And what can marketers do about it?

Some would say, the Adweek piece included, that it has to do with money. They would suggest that agencies do not embrace anything new until they have figured out what’s in it for them. And compensation models based on scope of work have never allowed room for experimentation and development of new skills.

But it does not explain why large agencies that try to tackle these new areas, putting profit aside for a moment, do such a bad job.

We think it has to do with a chasm between the skills of their people who use social media and the agencies’ efforts to use the same media as advertising vehicles. We think it has to do with the application of old thinking to the use of new tools. We think it has to do with their inability to give up the kind of control that has always been associated with advertising.

Only a few days ago a senior player at a major direct-marketing-driven agency that shall remain nameless, suggested that because they had greater amounts of data now than ever before they could use it to more accurately predict and control customers.

And there’s the problem.

Simply put, the customer can no longer be controlled.

Agencies bought into the language of having a “dialogue” with customers a long time ago but, with the exception of the smart few – and we all know who they are, they have not bought into the reality of that language. They are still busily trying to control customers, to manipulate customers, to claim power over customers because historically it was this power that justified their profit margins.

The last new medium that large agencies embraced without making it a separate revenue stream was TV! So it’s no wonder that the closer we get to being able to have true dialogue between buyers and sellers, the less comfortable these agencies become.

This is why we believe that clients should own their creative strategies.

It’s why we believe that strategy itself must change. Strategies must allow marketers to meet their customers on common ground. It’s not about power over those customers.

And it’s why we believe that holistic thinking can no longer come from the fractured infrastructures of large agencies. Their strategies cannot help but suffer from the Dominant Discipline Thinking of whatever fragment of the agency is leading the thought process.

Enthusiastic, talented young companies are already stepping in to fill the gap in the large agencies’ capabilities in the area of social media. But, like their forerunners in the digital space, they are nowhere near ready to take strategic leadership.

They become just one more stage in the fragmentation of creative resources that is demanding a refocusing of strategic thinking…within marketing organizations themselves.

New light on old subjects

“Differentiation doesn't even make the top 10. While CMOs are worrying about customers or segmentation or ROI or search-engine optimization, their brands are sinking into a sea of commoditization.”

This is the opinion of Jack Trout, as recently expressed in Ad Age, on the subject of why the average CMO lasts less than two years on the job.

And we couldn’t agree more. Well said, Jack.

But there’s something more at work here than CMOs worrying about the wrong things. It has to do with the old and the new.

The new is always distracting. The new is always shouting “Look at me.” The new is always claiming importance. The new is, usually, all the journalists want to write about. It’s the main subject of countless discussions in agencies every single day. And all just because it’s new.

The old is just the old. It’s familiar. It’s boring. It’s tedious. But the old may still have a lot to offer.

So the challenge here is to make the best use of all that is new in marketing, from Internet-empowered customers to new methods and levels of accountability and measurement, while at the same time applying the time-proven basics of marketing.

It’s this new dynamic that demands a new kind of creative strategy.

And that’s why we started CommonGround Partners: to create strategies that help companies (and CMOs) to meet their customers on common ground. Because differentiating your product makes perfect sense. But how you communicate your difference today is not how you communicated that same difference just a few years ago.

But more than this, the changed customer may also change how you find, define and express your difference.

So Jack’s right that it’s still about differentiation. But, in 2008, what constitutes a point of difference may be different.

Update:

Today Grey launched a new web site. And since we took them to task just a few days ago for having a site under construction for two years, we thought it only fair to note the new site here.

It's good to see Grey has opened its digital door.

Closing your digital door

A recent post on a blog we read – Adscam – mentioned that Initiative has an “under construction” sign in place of a web site.

They are not the only ones. Since the Grey web site that was created by darkGrey (the unit we once ran) was taken down in early 2006, it too has had a place-holder site offering a view of “recent work.” Sadly even that is not true. The work also dates from 2006, maybe early 2007. The agency didn’t even bother to post its entertaining if strategically flawed work for E-Trade (See our last post). It’s as if the agency leaders have forgotten they have a web site.

And a visit to Grey Group’s site is no different. It too is “coming soon.” Although the old site is, oddly, still active; listing clients the group no longer has among other out of date information.

Now, these just happen to be two examples we know about. A search quickly revealed a few more.

Is this a bad strategy at a time when the role of digital communications is more critical than ever before? Of course. It goes without saying. And it’s why we posted some time ago that in buying digital agencies, WPP is actually buying replacements for its rapidly shrinking old-guard shops like Grey and O&M.

But here’s the truth.

It’s not hard or time-consuming or expensive to get a web site up and running. Although this may be contrary to what these agencies have been telling their clients for many years.

We would never say that our web site – commonground-nyc.com – is on the leading edge of what is possible but it proves our points.

It was written and built in under three weeks.

It did not cost boatloads of cash.

And it was active on the day we opened for business.

If we can do it, why can’t these major companies do it? Any agency worth its salt could construct a simple site giving a flavor of its work and thinking in the same time and, probably, for even less money. And it would be a thousand times better than an under-construction sign or out-of-date content.

The only possible conclusion is they simply don't care.

What do Cheetos and E-Trade have in common?

You don’t have to work in advertising to know that they have absolutely nothing in common. One is a snack food. It’s fun, trivial, one of life’s little meaningless pleasures. The other is, in our hopes and dreams, a way to make money, a way to realize the American dream. Or a way to lose it all if you are unsure of what you’re doing.

Like we said, nothing in common.

So why are they talking to their customers in the same way?

The Super Bowl has become as much an advertising showdown as a sports showdown. But there is one major difference. The sporting event is decided by who wins. The advertising "winner" is based on what more people like, or more specifically, find the most entertaining.

And that’s fine. As long as the impact of this advertising on the brands that pay for it is totally ignored which, of course, our industry should NEVER do.

Our recent review in Brandweek of Goodby, Silverstein and Partners’ new campaign for Cheetos congratulated the agency on creating Look at Me marketing designed perfectly for the Look at Me generation.

But when that same mentality is applied to investing, well, it’s a whole different feeling.

Yes, the puking baby was oddly entertaining, human, universal and funny. But wrong. And the clown likewise.

What was the underlying strategic approach of E-Trade? It can be reverse engineered as “So easy a baby can do it.” But if the roller-coaster ride of Wall Street has proved anything recently it’s that losing is just as easy as winning. And the premium today is on advice not the basic simplicity the Internet brought to trading a long time ago.

If the puking baby ad had run during the artificial euphoria of the tech boom it would have been perfect and totally understandable.

In 2008, the trend is clearly towards common sense. Rational, diversified, long-term investing has replaced the almost casual trading carried out by anyone with a computer that this campaign advocates. In our current economic climate this is more than wrong it’s dangerous.

The danger is not just for anyone swayed by the message, we doubt many will be, it’s dangerous for the credibility of the brand. At a time when even Charles Schwab encourages us to “Talk to Chuck” – offering real help and individual guidance – it trivializes something that simply should not be trivialized.

But our concern goes even deeper than this. We think it’s dangerous for our industry when getting a laugh – even on the Super Bowl – is considered more important than unearthing the right, long-term, credible strategy for a brand.

We all know that the E-Trade effort reunites the client and agency leaders who claim responsibility for the MasterCard ‘Priceless’ campaign. Sadly we think they’ll find that the lack of a great strategic foundation this time around will prevent the E-Trade campaign from being anything like as long-lived, positive for the brand, or as successful.

Great advertising is about connecting with your customer in the most compelling way. We like to say that today it’s about “meeting your customer on common ground.”

The customer for the E-Trade advertising has not existed for some time now. And just because it gave a lot of people a laugh during a football game does not make up for that horrendous strategic misstep.

Talk to Chuck.

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Incidentally, the best Super Bowl spot, in our opinion, wasn’t even part of the Super Bowl: