Geoff Dillon - Marketing, PR, Strategy Blog

Throwback Marketing

I admit it - I'm a fan of Pepsi Throwback. It just arrived in Canada and I snapped up a case as soon as I could. In fact I've dropped my usual Coca-Cola on the weekend in favour of Pepsi's retro cola.

But marketing Pepsi throwback is an interesting challenge, isn't it? It's almost like admitting there's something about your current product that isn't as good as it used to be, hence the need to reintroduce an old formula as a "throwback".

In the 80s and I guess part of the 90s, pop was made with real sugar. To save money, major drink manufacturers slowly moved to high-fructose corn syrup. As a teen I didn't really care, but as a responsible grown up I preferred not to drink high fructose corn syrup. That, and the cola just didn't taste as good. 

But now Pepsi from the 80s is back. So what's the message here?

Does it undermine the current Pepsi branding by suggesting that the formula from 20 odd years ago is better than their flagship brand? 

Or is it a harmless line extension that will help sell some cola?

I think it's a bit of both.

Bringing a cola product to market that pushes the "made with real sugar" angle certainly suggests that there's a reason you'd want to have sugar rather than corn syrup. It would be like launching a KitKat bar made with "real chocolate" (slight exageration but chocolate substititues have increasingly shown up in chocolate bars over the years to keep costs down so you're getting a lot less chocolate than you used to.)

And once you switch a cola drinker to the retro product, you'd better be prepared to keep it on the market since you may not get them back if you pull it. They may seek out sugar-based alternatives (the premium "Jones Soda" brand would be one option).

However, Coke currently doesn't offer a sugar-based option so its possible Pepsi will sway some cola drinkers who keep hearing bad things about high fructose corn syrup. 

And, if you assume most current Pepsi drinkers skew younger because of the brand's relentless pursuit of the younger end of the market, a "throwback" product doesn't seem terribly likely to cannibilze sales (teens and 20-somethings don't think much of retro products). 

Should be interesting. In the meantime, I'll keep enjoying a small slice of younger days. 

 

 

The Tourist Trap Paradox

The only way to succeed as a merchant in a tourist destination is to have more and more people wanting to visit the destination. More foot traffic = more opportunities to make sales.

This is why most tourist destinations have tourism boards – to attract foot traffic.

Curious then, that individual merchants often treat tourists as targets to be gouged for maximum short term profit at the expense of longer term benefit.

Case in point - I visited Niagara Falls recently, and was struck by the very overpriced attractions that seemed intent on grabbing whatever money they can from the tourist crowd.

Although I pride myself on being immune to such things, I’ll admit to falling victim to a 15 minute “Spongebob 4-D movie” that cost me almost $60 for two adults and one child. My soon to be brother-in-law had the line of the night when he said "the 4^th D is for disappointment." It didn’t help that the lady selling tickets was dishonest about the quality and length of the show.

And that’s how it is in that town. Each attraction seems hell bent on emptying your wallet.

• - Most of the chain restaurants post menus without prices, knowing that once you’re seated and you see the higher-than-usual prices, it’s less likely you’ll get up and walk out.

- When you ride up the Skylon tower at a cost of about $10 a person, the first question they ask you before you get on the elevator is “how many for lunch” – the assumptive close here refers to making a reservation for you at the top of the tower for lunch, whether you wanted it or not.

The paradox: as a merchant, you spend money to be part of a tourism board to help draw people to town, and then treat them in a manner that encourages them to avoid repeat visits, and tell others about their negative experience, which of course reflects on the town.

You then spend more for your tourism board dues because tourism is down and your revenues are hurting. You charge more to recoup the higher tourism board fees. And so on.

How do you think this cycle ends? What if you and your fellow merchants realized that the person in front you could be a lifetime revenue stream if you all played your cards right?

Tourism a zero sum game. People will spend their money with you, or elsewhere, but they generally have a budget for the year. I’m not arguing for lower prices here. I’m suggesting that treating tourists as clients instead of disposable sources of short term profit would ultimately bring in higher and more sustainable revenues … (and lower tourism board fees).

Repackaging Common Sense for Fun and Profit

There’s money to be made in repackaging common sense and reselling it to the market as wisdom. 

This happens all the time, everyday. For example, a training course is often a repackaging of some common sense information about a topic, which is fed back to participants in the form of a “model” or “approach” to help the topic make sense. But within the model, there’s no single component that is anything but common sense. 

I should be clear that I am not being negative here. Packaging information up so that it can be delivered to people in a format that they will welcome, understand, and even seek out is hugely valuable.

Example - one of the most influential business books of our time could be viewed through this lens. Stephen Covey’s 7 habits series focuses on key areas for self improvement. As a reminder, the 7 habits are:

-    Be Proactive

-    Begin with the End in Mind

-    Put First Things First

-    Think Win-Win

-    Seek First to Understand, then to be understood

-    Synergize

-    Sharpening the Saw

When you look at the concepts presented above in isolation, don’t you think you could have come up with some of these over a coffee? Being proactive, and beginning with a defined goal in mind certainly seem like very common sense tips for making yourself a more effective person. Yet, millions upon millions of people bought the book, making Covey a recognized expert in his field. 

It’s the packaging that makes it work. It’s the relationship between the 7 habits, and Covey’s way of delivering them that create the package that people buy into. When it’s packaged this way, it makes sense to people and gives them a framework to work within, even if there are really no components within the framework that are lightning bolts of insight. 

This has implications for how you approach communicating. It’s not always about inventing a new message. Many times, it’s about making sense of the world around you and giving people a new way to look at what they already know.