There’s an interesting article on the front page of the Business & Investing section of today’s Wall Street Journal. I think it explains why mainstream brands are struggling . . . although that’s not the purpose of the story, which is worth reading here.
Makers of biggest household staples have little control over where Amazon’s virtual assistant Alexa sends consumers, the story tells us. More specifically, if you ask Alexa to recommend a product – say, ketchup – it’s going to give you only one or two recommendations.
So, unlike a web page, if you ask Alexa to recommend a laundry detergent, you most likely will get the brand you last bought, or a brand selected by an algorithm. That’s sharply different from what you see on Amazon.com, which shows over 3,000 possible choices, or on Walmart.com which lists 734 results.
It’s also different from what a shopper encounters in a supermarket, where there might be 20 to 50 choices.
What’s interesting to us is how it appears marketers have lost sight of their job. How have marketers tried to respond to the perceived threat of Alexa and similar voice assistants?
Procter & Gamble has a Tide app. It gives advice on how to clean over 200 stains – but doesn’t recommend a Tide product. “We don’t want to overwhelmingly push our products . . . we hope they choose us,” a P&G exec told the Journal.
Unilever has developed an Alexa app that gives free recipes and cleaning tips – but may or may not recommend Unilever brands. “We’re moving to something that’s less about interrupting you like TV advertising does,” a Unilever exec explains.
Excuse me? Marketers don’t want to push their products? Providing information about how their products meet consumer needs is interrupting? What do they thing their job is, anyway?
Of course their job is to push their brands. That’s the only reason – repeat, the only reason — they earn big bucks. They’re not working at Consumer Reports, they are working at a company whose workers and shareholders are counting on them to get people to buy that company’s products. They’re not in the information business. They are in the sales business.
The question marketers should be trying to train customers to ask Alexa isn’t which deodorant or detergent is best (or, for that matter, which beer is best), but where to buy the brand of deodorant or beer they are paid to push.
Pepsi-Cola did exactly that in a tremendously successful ad campaign starting in 1957 that boosted their sales into the next decade. “Say Pepsi please” was everywhere in America – on signs, on TV, even on portable radios. Pepsi wanted to make sure that everybody knew that “people who think young say, ‘Pepsi, please’.” They even managed to get some product attributes into a 26-second ad, all while telling their viewer that “people who think young say, ‘Pepsi, please’.”
For marketers, the answer to Alexa is to not to count on a search engine serving up your brand either alone (on Alexa) or on a web page. The answer is to advertising your brand as much as possible in every other possible media. You want people, when they think of your product category, to specifically think of you – and to ask for your brand by name.
Not only in paid media, but also in every possible way the consumer could see your brand. Anheuser-Busch built Budweiser by putting its name everywhere – even on the mud flaps of its trucks. Pepsi-Cola did the same thing with “Say Pepsi, Please.”
That’s not to say you can’t do some market segmentation. Pepsi did position its brand as one for people who think young. A-B’s Michelob Ultra is doing the same thing with its fitness-themed campaign.
Michelob Ultra Pure Gold carries the targeting a bit further. Not only is the line extension aimed at fitness buffs, but it’s specifically aimed at the organic shopper.
“We see this as an opportunity to keep leading the way in innovation in light beer and aligning great-tasting products with health and wellness trends,” said Azania Andrews, vp-Michelob Ultra.
Michelob Ultra was created in 2002 for beer drinkers who wanted fewer carbs and calories. The Pure Gold product will have a different audience, Andrews said. The target demographic is “probably someone who’s 28-plus who shops for food in more high-end places – like a Whole Foods, for example – and is focused on really understanding the kind of things that they’re putting in their body,” she said. “They maybe are people who are very disciplined about organic food and vegetables and other beverages.”
Michelob’s marketers are doing what marketers ought to do – targeting their audience and responding to the wants and needs of their customers. . . . and making sure that audience knows about their product.
Don’t expect Alexa or anyone else to recommend your brand. Instead, find a way to get consumers to ask for your brand.