Two counter culture youth icons. One has 100m members. The other 82m viewers. The first is transforming the online promotion of music, and just got a fat $900m revenue guarantee from Google. The other established video as the ultimate vehicle for music promotion, and even after a quarter century, continues to seduce big brand advertisers. In the showdown between MySpace and MTV, its tempting to call the round on the numbers. But there is a more interesting comparison to be made.
Continue reading "Context is King" »
The one thing harder than creating an online brand is
leveraging an existing one to do so. Conventional wisdom holds that the more
channels in which a consumer experiences your brand, the better. Maybe so for
retailers. But for media companies, the task is more complex. The web is not
just another delivery channel - it is an entirely new product platform with its
own house rules for attracting audiences and making money. And that is more of
a headache than an aspirin for companies with longstanding mastheads to defend.
Continue reading "Left Hand, Right Brand" »
Naomi Klein notwithstanding, Brands are back on the agenda. Once you abandon the mid twentieth century view of brands as just a cynical megamix of product benefits, you are open to musing about a more interesting question. What are people actually buying when they knowingly pay a premium for a brand name?
Continue reading "Know Logo" »
