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The emerging marketing choice: fame or respect

Written by: Mark Di Somma

Article Overview: Branding today is increasingly extreme, requiring companies to make extreme choices. One of those is the decision to think huge or small. For marketers, that means making a deliberate choice to pursue one of two outcomes: fame or respect. The former is epitomised by the scale-driven strategies of the major global brands; the latter is a more subtle affair, but one that is gaining traction with customers with every passing day.

The emerging marketing choice: fame or respect

Branding, like many aspects of business today, is becoming increasingly extreme. The middle market is becoming the muddle market. To succeed, you need to either think huge or small, or be making the transition to one of these positions. And for more and more marketers, that means making a deliberate choice to pursue a polemic course of action. Fame or respect.

Fame is gigantic, and makes big demands, but what it gives back is can’t-miss footprint, power brands and talked-about presence. Fame is front foot, impressive, embracing. Fame-driven companies often become that way through sheer force of personality and ambition, achieved and maintained by multi-million dollar marketing budgets. The costs, complexities and adaptations required are extraordinary, multi-dimensional and pan-global, but powerful marketing leverage ensures famous companies and their fame-fuelled brands are seen in all the right places and in all the right ways.

Famous companies are household names. They are the A-list of corporate global; master-marketers capable of driving home all the advantages of size, power and presence at the same time as they press the emotional flesh with brands that are very cool and have huge personal appeal. Timberland, Mercedes, Vodafone, Nike, Adidas, Mars, Tag Heuer, Everlast, Michelon and Bvlgari appeal to the individualist/collectivist dichotomy in all of us. And they do what power brands do best. They leverage recognition. Louis Vuitton, Rolex, Cartier, Gucci, Prada and Fendi … the names alone conjure images.

Respect is a very different mindset. It appeals to the exclusion streak. Many of these brands still leverage the power of branding to ensure they are admired and advocated for by those who welcome being “in the know”. But the marketing is much more subtle, and at the same time, the brands themselves can be more obscure, less public, generally requiring far more specialist sector knowledge and understanding to be fully appreciated. They use all this to wonderful effect.

For brands seeking respect, obscurity – the exact opposite of fame - can be a focused part of the integrity equation. There’s a consensus amongst fans (because that’s what respect looks to generate) that these companies and their brands are pure, unfiltered and quality-driven, rather than publicity or results motivated. These are companies that seek to become known as opposed to making themselves known.

Of course, this is not a strategy that can work for everyone. There are whole swathes of the economy where this approach is untenable. But for those looking to build customer bases where those they do business with believe they have emotional ownership of something special, something only a “few of us” know about, building respect rather than a huge pan-global, mainstream-marketed fame could be a strident, controllable and successful option. It’s certainly legitimate – and with every passing day, arguably it is becoming more so.

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Women Entrepreneurs - I happen to have one of those uncommon names (Chanie). The majority of new clients/prospects have assumed I'm male, or Chinese... both wrong. That said, I've found that only a very small number of people have actually treated me with less respect due to my gender... while a few others have suddenly treated me better after seeing my photo. Though I do prefer to think it's due to a more personal connection being established, rather than any racial issue. Of course these people are the minority - as a rule, I find that people treat me with a good measure of respect right from the outset. I suppose if they didn't, I wouldn't work with them. But then I am lucky enough to be in a position to make that sort of choice!
Re: 40 cents per dollar is spent in a franchised business - Hi Kevin and John: I definitely agree that it's a personal choice, but what makes it hard is that it is in essence a business decision as well. the mixture of the two and the weighing of each aspect makes it a difficult choice for me to understand. John, what kind of things go into the due diligence part? i think there must be more beyond understanding the nature of each franchise...such as the fit of the franchise with respect to location etc. owning a no-frill pizza franchise in a ritzy lifestyle-conscious neighborhood might not be as good as say a healthy juice-bar type of franchise etc. any market research help available out there?
Our Reactions - I've been thinking about the comments here and on the young entrepreneur board about respect and I have a question. Do any of you think that part of the respect problem could be the way any of us react when people assume we're men or older? I've had misunderstandings with people and their reaction made a big difference in my initial thoughts and impressions of them. Could just be me, but thought I would ask. If that is possible, what could we as women or young people to help make it easier to help people know who we really are and to begin to respect us? I still say it takes time and no one is entitled to "automatic" respect. But, can we find ways to get our business relationship started on the right foot, so to speak? Shri
Re: Analyze the market and competitors - I would even submit to you, that extracting from traditional means of advertising and marketing may work for you. Try spending some money on attending industry exhibits and workshops. Go to these events and make sure you network, network, network! Your future isn't necessarily tied up in the web marketability of your business - it's in the general perception others have of your business. Security consulting is heavily vested on respect and reputation. You need to garner that initial respect through meaningful networks and relationships.
Two hats - startup sales mentor and Message Slinger - Hello all, As a consultant, my focus is on helping companies in emerging companies jump start their revenue generation. As the CEO of Message Slinger, I try and aid in developing and offering the world's best online and e-mail marketing system, Please feel free to reach out and contact me about anything and everything, my third venture is helping anyone I can. All the best, Karl


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