by Laura Ries
Art critics, for example, will file this picture under “Cubism.” Then under “Picasso.” And if they are real experts under a subfile “Women of d’Avignon.” Artwork has no real meaning until it can be verbalized.
Watch art enthusiasts stroll through an art museum. If they don’t recognize a painting, they will quickly look to read the name of the artist who painted it.
A good visual hammer takes advantage of this phenomenon. To judge the effectiveness of a hammer, you constantly have to ask yourself, what is this potential hammer saying?
Because they create an emotional response, two of the strongest visual shapes are the phallic symbol, associated with the male sexual organ, and the kirkos symbol, associated with the female sexual organ. Visual hammers using either of these symbols can be particularly effective. Two examples: the contour bottle, a phallic symbol, and the Tri-Star, a kirkos symbol.
The weakest shape is the square, a deadly-dull visual. Why in the world would H&R Block, the leading income-tax service, use a green square as its trademark? Presumably, management thought, Well our name is Block and a block is a square. So we’ll use a square to remind people of our name and we’ll make it green to represent the color of money.
But that isn’t the way consumers think. They don’t see a “block.” They see a dull, green, meaningless square.
Look at how many people use shapes in the vernacular. A “square” is somebody who is “not with it.”
On the other hand, a “circle” is usually used in a positive way. As one of the social-media sites says: “Google+ lets users organize people into Circles of friends.”
Neat, organized, buttoned-down people (typically left-brainers) often use squares or rectangles for symbols because they reflect their “don’t-rock-the-boat” outlook on life.
But if you want to call attention to a symbol, you should avoid dullness at all costs.
Take The Gap, for example. The clothing chain’s long-term logotype is a blue square with the letters “GAP” in white type. Not particularly eye-catching, so it was understandable why the chain wanted a new logotype.
But the revise was terrible. Instead of moving away from the dull blue square, the designer emphasized the square by using it assymetrically behind the letter “P.”
What in the world was the redesign of The Gap logo trying to symbolize? Blue jeans for squares?
After unveiling its new assymetrical logo in October 2010, The Gap received a barrage of negative feedback from customers. The Internet was literally ablaze with the backlash. So the old logo was promptly brought back.
What should The Gap have done? Since consumers “verbalize the visual,” one way to approach the problem is to “visualize the verbal.”
What was The Gap’s long-term slogan? “Fall into the Gap.” Instead of a free-floating square, why doesn’t The Gap try to visualize the “fall into” idea?
Perhaps by using a symbolic funnel or something similar that would hammer the “fall into” nail in the mind.
J.C.Penney is also following the footsteps of The Gap, moving from a square to a typographic logotype with a smaller decorative square.
I’m amazed that hordes of Penney customers didn’t complain about the new logo. In additional to the dull square, why would the company split its name in half, so it reads: “JCP/enny?”
Furthermore, Kentucky Fried Chicken was often called “KFC,” so that name change made some sense. But J.C.Penney was never called “JCP.” So why use initials?
While the new J.C.Penney logotype is undeniably more attractive than the previous one, attractiveness is not the most important criteria in designing a logotype.
That’s the problem with the Gatorade logotype. The designer made the orange lightning bolt so attractive that it doesn’t look like a lightning bolt anymore.
It looks more like a knife than a lightning bolt. But it gets worse.
The name disappears on the new Gatorade logo to be replaced by the letter “G.” That’s a mistake.
Who calls Gatorade by its initial letter? “Give me a G” won’t get you a Gatorade in any store I know.
Sometimes nicknames are used so often that manufactures are forced to include them on labels.
Coca-Cola, for example, was almost forced to use “Coke” on its beverage cans. But note: They didn’t label the product “CC,” because nobody called it CC.
How badly will the logo change hurt the Gatorade brand? In the short term, not at all. But in the long term, there are bound to be problems.
Marketing is essentially a long-term discipline. Marketing is more like a tree farm than a vegetable garden. In the long term, the Gatorade brand will suffer.
Consider the fact that worldwide 490,000 babies are born each day. That’s almost half-a-million potential Gatorade consumers who will have to learn to associate the “G” with the Gatorade name.
Why doesn’t the company make the learning process easier by keeping the Gatorade name on its logotype?
Furthermore, some 275,000 people die every day. Many of these are loyal Gatorade consumers who take their knowledge of what the “G” on the can means to the grave with them.
CHAPTER 4
COLOR
BE THE OPPOSITE.
Color can be an effective visual hammer, but the problem is, there are very few distinct colors in the spectrum. Five primary colors: blue, green, yellow, orange and red. And a handful of secondary colors.
If you happen to get in early, you can enhance the reputation of your brand by pre-empting a specific color. Tiffany, for example, has pre-empted the color blue.
Introduced in 1878, Tiffany “blue” has become a worldwide icon for the high-end jewelry store.
As a visual hammer, it communicates the elegance and authenticity of the Tiffany brand. The color is a private Pantone custom color and is even legally protected in the U.S. as a color trademark.
Tiffany stores have one thing in stock that you cannot buy. They will only give it to you. That is the blue box.
The rule of the establishment is ironclad, never to allow a box bearing the name of the firm to be taken out of the building except with an article which has been sold by them and for which they are responsible.
The Tiffany box is a very effective visual hammer. Put a blue box on a table and a white box from some other jewelry store next to it and watch the reaction of a typical woman. The blue box will generate an emotional reaction that the other box will not.
Kodak did the same with “yellow.” The yellow box communicates Kodak’s leadership in photographic film. A green box of Fujifilm just isn’t the same. Unless it’s a lot cheaper, or the store doesn’t have Kodak in stock, most consumers won’t buy “green” when they can get “yellow.”
But note: A hammer is useless without a nail. The yellow box hammers Kodak’s photographic-film leadership. But photographic film is practically dead today because photography has gone digital.
So Kodak made the classic error of trying to use its Kodak name and its yellow hammer on a line of digital products. The results have been dismal. In the decade of the 1990’s (from 1991 to 2000 when photographic film still reigned supreme), Kodak had sales of $125.2 billion and net profits after taxes of $6.9 billion, or a net profit margin of 4.5 percent.
In the following decade (from 2001 to 2010), Kodak had sales of $115.0 billion and lost $917 million. No wonder Kodak went bankrupt.
Compare Kodak with Shutterfly, a small company with a single focus (digital prints via the Internet) and a single color (orange.)
In the last ten years, Shutterfly had revenues of $1.3 billion and net profits of $56 million.
Kodak competes with Shutterfly using a website called Kodak Gallery. Another example of the folly of line extensions.
Why didn’t Kodak give its digital-print website a different name? (In a big company, “loyalty” is the ultimate virtue. The principles of marketing are not something managers pay attention to when the principles conflict with their loyalties
to their companies.)
What should Kodak have done? It should have launched a digital line with a different name.
Failing that, it would have been helpful to launch a Kodak digital line with a different color to differentiate its new digital products from its older photographic-film products. Much like Ralph Lauren did when it launched its highest-priced men’s line as “Ralph Lauren Purple Label.”
The Red Cross is one of the most famous charity organizations in the world. So back in 1929, a Baylor University executive developed a hospital plan which he called “Blue Cross.” Ten years later, another organization was formed called “Blue Shield.”
Blue Cross and Blue Shield developed separately, with Blue Cross plans providing coverage for hospital services, while Blue Shield covered physician services. The two organizations eventually merged.
Today, the merged Blue Cross Blue Shield Association is a federation of 39 separate health insurance organizations and companies in the United States.
Combined, they directly or indirectly provide health insurance to over 100 million Americans.
“Blue” is the color that strongly differentiates the brand. The confusion factor is the two names and the two symbols used together. Either one would have made a more-effective brand strategy and visual hammer.
(But in too many mergers, marketing effectiveness takes a backseat to corporate ego, trying to please both organizations.)
Sometimes you can take a simple product but paint it an unusual color and create a potent visual hammer.
In 1968, Mary Kay Ash purchased a Cadillac and had it painted pink to promote her line of cosmetics.
The car was such a good advertisement for the brand that the following year she decided to reward her top five producers with a pink Cadillac paid for by the company.
Today, Mary Kay Inc. has annual sales of some $2.5 billion. More than two-million independent consultants demonstrate Mary Kay products in the U.S. and some 35 other countries. Consultants vie for awards each year, ranging from jewelry to pink Cadillacs.
General Motors estimates that it has built 100,000 pink Cadillacs for Mary Kay to give to her top producers.
How do you tell one Caribbean island from another? They all have sand, sea, surf, palm trees and overpriced hotels. Bermuda found a way. Pink sand.
And Bermuda is not even in the Caribbean!
Is pink sand any better than tan or beige or white sand? No, but it’s different and that’s always the first thing to look for when you’re looking for a visual hammer.
Unfortunately, one thing Bermuda doesn’t do is to connect its unique pink-sand hammer to a memorable verbal nail. Instead it uses a cliché that could apply to almost any island or any brand. “Feel the love.”
In the world of professional golf, there are four major championships: (1) The U.S. Open, (2) The British Open, (3) The PGA Championship and (4) The Masters.
The first three are hosted by major golf organizations, but the Masters is hosted by a private club, the Augusta National Golf Club.
Guess which tournament draws the most attention? The Masters, of course.
One reason is the green jacket, the symbol of a Masters Champion. The tradition of the green jacket dates to 1937.
That year, members of the Augusta club wore green jackets during the golf tournament so fans in attendance could easily spot them if they needed to ask questions.
Visual symbols are not only memorable, but they tend to elevate the importance of the event or the person who wears the symbol.
When a leader of the Catholic Church is promoted to Cardinal, what picture is published around the world?
The new Cardinal in his red hat, of course.
(It is said that Cardinals of the Catholic Church wear red because it is a symbol that they are ready to shed their blood to defend their faith, a nice verbal nail.)
For years, the real-estate firm Century 21 insisted its agents wear gold jackets. You might be surprised at how many Century 21 agents object to wearing a “uniform.”
Yet the gold jacket was probably the best marketing idea the company has ever developed.
Century 21 sometimes uses the verbal nail, “The Gold Standard.” But the verbal nail might be stronger if Century 21 used it consistently and if they had qualified it by saying, “The Gold Standard in Real Estate.”
And look at the success of Christian Louboutin, a French designer who regularly tops The Luxury Institute’s index of “most prestigious women’s shoes.”
In 1992, he applied red nail polish to the sole of a shoe because he felt the shoes lacked energy.
"This was such a success,” reported Mr. Louboutin, “that it became a permanent fixture.”
The red sole was the hammer, but what was the nail? It was the stiletto (heel heights of 120mm or more) which Louboutin helped bring back into fashion in the last two decades. To build a brand you need both: The red sole and the stiletto.
A color hammer is particularly effective in the retail field. It’s hard to miss a McDonald’s restaurant, even driving down the road at 50 miles an hour. Those golden arches are a visual magnet.
To capture the traveling motorist, Waffle House uses giant yellow letters to spell out its brand name. But many Waffle House units take the idea one step further. They use giant yellow awnings to reinforce the brand’s color identity.
What might the next step be? Paint the entire building yellow. This might be a good direction for almost any brand associated with a single color.
Red Roof Inn is a motel brand that uses its red roofs as both a color identifier and a visual hammer. What’s missing for both, of course, is a verbal nail that would connect the red roof to some consumer benefit.
When it comes to color, many retailers miss the paint bucket. Retailers tend to design signage for attractiveness rather than for uniqueness.
Look at Exxon, one of the world’s largest gas-station chains. Hertz is yellow, Tiffany is blue, Kodak is yellow, but what color is Exxon?
Exxon gas stations are not nearly as visible on roads and highways as single-color gasoline stations like “yellow” Shell locations. Or “green” BP stations. (Exxon is red and blue.)
The air-cargo carrier Federal Express got off the ground with a powerful verbal nail: “When it absolutely, positively, has to be there overnight.” But what was the visual hammer?
The overnight letter, of course. When a Federal Express envelope arrived, the company wanted to make sure it received the maximum amount of attention from the recipient. So Federal Express picked two colors most likely to stand out in a dull office environment.
Purple and orange.
An excellent choice in the short term because the two colors were shocking, but not in the long term where a single color might have been better.
Then FedEx, the new name for the company, did what most companies do. After expanding into many other services, the company uses color to differentiate them.
Red for “express.” Blue for “custom critical.” Green for “ground.” Etc.
Today, FedEx is a rainbow company, associated with no particular color. That’s a typical pattern many other companies follow.
Its major competitor, United Parcel Service, took a different approach. Instead of using one of the popular colors you see everywhere, UPS selected “brown,” one of the least popular colors.
(Most companies are focused on being “better” when the real opportunity lies in being “different,” even in color.)
Today, brown is as strongly identified with UPS as blue is with Tiffany. So strong, in fact, the company runs ads with the headline, “What can Brown do for you?”
Brown is a strong visual hammer, but the current UPS nail is weak. “We love logistics.”
(I love consulting. But “I love consulting” wouldn’t make a good verbal nail for my marketing-strategy firm. It’s much too generic.)
What would make a good verbal nail for a Brown hammer? Almost every good verbal nail is competitive in nature.
It differentiates the brand from its major competitors. What differentiates UPS from FedEx? Not logistics, which both companies practice.
“Leadership” is what differentiates UPS from FedEx. UPS is the bigger, more profitable company.
“Brown delivers more packages to more places in more countries than any other carrier” might not be as lovable as “logistics,” but I think it would be more effective.
Everybody knows Starbucks is green, but what color is its competitor, Dunkin’ Donuts?
There are more than 6,700 Dunkin’ Donuts locations in America, almost all of them east of the Mississippi river. But most people don’t associate the brand with any particular color.
Dunkin’ Donuts signage is attractive but not nearly as memorable as the green mermaid at Starbucks and the yellow “M” at McDonald’s.
Ever wondered why beer bottles are usually “brown?” Actually, beer bottles were green in color until the 1930s when it was discovered that brown bottles filtered out the light that caused beer to go “skunky.”
(Sunlight breaks down acids in hops that react with sulfur to produce a chemical nearly identical to one that skunks spray. Gives new meaning to the toast “bottoms up.”)
In Europe after World War II, there was a shortage of brown glass, so many brewers of beer including Heineken exported their products in green bottles.
As the leading imported beer in America, Heineken became closely associated with the color “green.”
