YOU ASKED FOR IT

My face has been tucked in more timesthan a bedsheet at the Holiday Inn.

—Joan Rivers

September 25, 2014EVERYTHING’S COMING UP MOBILE

BRAND OBSERVATIONS OF THE DAYFrom my random collection of info sources, here are some highlights related to the brands of our times...

• Former Google execs Eric Schmidt and Jonathan Rosenberg were on Fox Business yesterday morning and said this of mobile advertising...“Ultimately, mobile (advertising) is going to be much, much better because it’s ‘location aware’ so you can target much, much better ads...over time, the mobile ad should be worth more because you have more information, you know more about that person, of where they are, what they’re wanting to purchase, or avail themselves of...” (NOTE TO SELF: Buy mobile advertising now before everyone realizes how cost effective it is and drives the mobile ad prices up!)

• Blackberry launched their new Passport, and it actually seems pretty impressive...although it was a bit painful to watch CEO John Chen struggle to hear the Bloomberg interviewer as he attempted to conduct the interview over his Passport phone.

• Speaking of phones...The news feeds have exploded the last two days with stories about the new Apple iPhone 6 Plus and its bending problems. Should be interesting to watch the PR triage over the next few days!

JIM HUEBNERj i m h @ h u e b n e r p e t e r s e n . c o m

C E L L U L A RT E L E P H O N E970-420-3382

Hmmm.

Brought to you by popular demand of a client, my mom, and some folks I met at a church potluck

From the remaining gray matter of Jim Huebner

Information that will make you smile, groan or think...

I mean, it’s not like we’re going to LIVE in the water

like the fish do.We’re just going to drink it

so...it’s all gooood.

© 2014 Hmmm by Jim Huebner

Taking relevant product innovation to heart

...and on its way to the HuebnerPetersen blog...! PAGE2

My brother works with two cardiovascular surgeons in California, so he sees his fair share of heart problems. That’s why he nudges me on occasion about the importance of taking low dose aspirin each day.

“That’s for older folks who are worried about heart attacks,” I’ve said to him.

While he agrees that older people definitely need to be taking low dose

aspirin, he has politely pointed out that guys a lot younger than me have heart attacks.

So last week, I finally took his advice and picked up some Bayer low dose aspirin. When I got home and opened the box, I was surprised to see a lid very different than those I’d seen on other over-the-counter-type medicines.

The lid was rubber.

It was a rubber lid to make it easier for “older folks” to grasp and open. I’ve watched my own mom struggle with lids that were slick and difficult to grip, so a rubber lid like this was just what

the doctor ordered. It also proved that somebody at Bayer is in touch with their market and innovating in ways that are relevant and meaningful to their customers—a lesson from which we can all benefit. Whether it’s manufacturers, drug companies, or even advertising agencies, the more relevant the product change is to the need of the customer, the more opportunity you have to set yourself apart from your competitors.

In his book Brand Relevance—Making Competitors Irrelevant, David Aaker discusses an “Innovation Continuum” which categorizes product enhancements from incremental...to substantial...to transformational. While the goal of most brands is to be so differentiated that their competition becomes irrelevant, Aakers points out that “most organizations lack a healthy mix of transformational, substantial, and incremental innovations.” He cites studies showing major innovations in development portfolios dropping from 20.2 to 11.5 over a recent 15 year time period. The definition of a “major innovation” and where it fits on the continuum is certainly subjective to

the industry, product category and other factors. However, the point here is that relevant product changes—no matter how small or how dramatic—are critical to success and growth.

If innovation is something your company is wanting to concentrate more effort toward, here are some questions to ask your team:

1) What product enhancements have we made in the last 6 months that are relevant to the changing needs of our customers? How have we communicated these enhancements?

2) What are we doing that no one else in our industry is doing and is something that our customers love? How can we better promote this?

3) Would the customer-relevant innovations we’ve made in the last 6 months be considered incremental, substantial or transformational? Do we consider this a “healthy mix”? If not, what can we do to create a better mix?

Jim Huebner is President of HuebnerPetersen Integrated Marketing.The firm was established in 1989 and specializes in making companies heroes to their distribution channels through strategic brand positioning, integrated marketing, and front lines marketing services. You can reach Jim at jimh@HuebnerPetersen.com or on LinkedIn. For “Hmmm” archives, CLICK HERE

WORDS TO

LIVE BY

Where can I go

from Your Spirit?

Or where can I flee

from Your presence?

–Psalm 139:7 (NASB)