In My Look, My Ego, My Brand, Ruth LaPerla looks at how stylish, self-promoting fashion bloggers are attracting lucrative product endorsement, TV and other contracts. (Andy Torres, shown here, blogs at Style Scrapbook.) Image is a big part of it. So is the content they create. Their blogs attract large online audiences who are both peers and consumers – the kind hotly sought after by fashion labels. Their personal style results in a front-row presence at prestigious fashion shows, where they are flanked by celebrities and fashion industry royalty whose own career rise often took decades.
Social media savvy, crafting their image to attract attention and the willingness to put themselves out there are key aspects to their success. They are also authentic: their readers can relate. According to Ms. LaPerla, Andy Torres’ audience grew considerably when she started using her own image in photographs that show readers how to pull together different looks. In an industry where creating imagery is a multi-million dollar business, the appeal of such indie style makers makes a strong statement.
A new book published by Harvard Business Review highlights how Whole Foods founder John Mackey’s philosophy has played a central role in the grocery chain’s distinct reputation and success.
Whole Foods’ “higher purpose” is reflected in everything from its longstanding “Declaration of Interdependence” to its recent ban on unsustainable seafood. One key way the company established its distinct reputation was by providing customers with “information and narrative, along with the food.” “It told stories about where the food came from, putting up displays by the seafood counter with photographs and descriptions of the real fishermen who had caught it all,” Nick Paumgarten wrote in a 2010 New Yorker profile of Mackey. Paumgarten also cites the company’s decentralized management structure as a “key contributor to Whole Foods’ success, and to its reputation and self-image as a progressive business,” and that the “high degree of autonomy” of regional divisions and individual stores has fostered “creativity and a sense of ownership.” Some stores, for example, have added bars serving craft beer and local wine, while the company’s Portland, Maine location sells live lobsters. Whole Foods’ strong reputation springs from the fact that its core ideals are reflected throughout its operations.
Mackey’s unique perspective, principles and personality have been the source of the Whole Foods’ guiding philosophy, but, as the CEO of dairy company Stonyfield Gary Hirshberg told Paumgarten, Mackey is “management’s greatest asset but also, at times, its greatest challenge.” In 2007 an FTC investigation revealed that he had anonymously attacked a competitor in online financial forums prior to Whole Foods’ offer to buy the company. That led to a realization, Mackey told Paumgarten: “If I wanted to continue to do Whole Foods, there couldn’t be any part of my life that was secretive or hidden or that I’d be embarrassed [about] if people found out about it.” Such radical transparency has generally served Whole Foods well, though there are exceptions, such as Mackey’s 2009 Wall Street Journal op-ed on health care reform, which triggered a social media-fueled boycott.
That response may have inspired Mackey to more closely examine the expectations that accompany his business’ reputation. According to a Wall Street Journal article from last February, Whole Foods “doesn’t want to be known as the pricey grocery store for well-heeled, organic-food sophisticates” and has implemented a “price perception” strategy to counter that reputation. The outcry didn’t, however, move Mackey to recant his opinion on health care. “So many politicians and C.E.O.s get to be sort of boring, because they end up suppressing any individuality to conform to some phony, inauthentic way of being,” he observed in Paumgarten’s profile. “I’d rather be myself.”
Pepsi has announced a trail-blazing, $50 million collaboration with superstar Beyonce. The deal combines Pepsi advertising and marketing with an estimated $25 million-dollar creative content development fund to support the singer’s own conceptual projects. That’s the interesting part. “For Pepsi, the goal is to enhance its reputation with consumers by acting as something of an artistic patron instead of simply paying for celebrity endorsements,” reports Ben Sinsario.
Affiliating with Beyonce as an artistic patron will align Pepsi with far more benefits than a standard commercial endorsement. Pepsi will attain luster from the sheen reflected by Beyonce’s creativity, blue-chip image and relationships with the biggest names in entertainment. Her husband Jay-Z is a powerhouse on all levels. It is a brilliant relationship for Pepsi.
Arts Patronage Has Always Been the Ticket to Superstar Prestige
The patronage aspect of the deal revisits corporate support of the arts campaigns during the ‘70s and ‘80s. American Express, Exxon and other major companies underwrote national tours of blockbuster art exhibitions and dance companies. Such sponsorships aligned them with wealthy, educated cultural audiences. Many corporations replaced arts sponsorships with sports underwriting.
Arts patronage has always been a conduit to status. But affiliating with contemporary culture – art, film, literature, music – confers a cool factor like no other. (The star-studded Miami Art Basel fair, which closed yesterday, attests to that. So do the dozens of private jets that flood Miami’s airports just before it opens each year.) In supporting Beyonce’s creative projects, Pepsi is enabling her with a bigger platform for her creative ideas. We trust it isn’t just another a commercial deal.
Consumers’ Desire for Authenticity Influenced the Concept
Brad Jakeman, president of PepsiCo’s global beverage group, attributed their decision to authenticity.
“Consumers are seeking a much greater authenticity in marketing from the brands they love,” he told Ben Sisario. “It’s caused a shift in the way we think about deals with artists, from a transactional deal to a mutually beneficial collaboration.”
In other words: consumers are tired of being sold to. Pepsi and Beyonce’s management and marketing teams have responded using the key principles of reputation management: authenticity and trust. We anticipate they’ll deliver the goods, too.
Sallie Krawcheck is a top candidate to become the next head of the SEC, according to Dealbook, but it’s not just her record and resilience as a Wall Street executive that’s put her in the running.
Since she began tweeting last spring, Krawcheck has gained more than 11,000 followers. On LinkedIn she’s attracted an even larger audience—75,000 and counting. “She has drawn a significant following with her conversational style and posts on investment issues,” Dealbook says, referring to an earlier article in which Krawcheck called her move “part of a larger effort to style herself as an industry analyst” and “lend her Wall Street experience to the broader debate about the industry’s evolution.” Already among LinkedIn’s top “Thought Leaders” and Business Insider’s “101 Finance People You Have To Follow On Twitter,” she’s clearly had a great deal of success with her strategy.
Social Media Savvy
A big part of that success comes from Krawcheck’s deft use of social media to take ownership of her image and message. In the past, she would have had to rely on a public relations intermediary to arrange interviews and keep her name out there, as many prominent figures do. However, she has used social media to take more direct control of her voice and reach a larger audience at the same time. In a recent RIABiz.com article Dina Hampton examines how Krawcheck “used those months of technical unemployment to cultivate a distinct and intimate online voice that may, industry watchers say, deftly position her for her next move.” Speaking to Hampton, Gregory FCA Communications’ Joe Anthony adds that Krawcheck’s strategy has “broadened her footprint to where more people are recognizing her beyond the financial services space” and “gone from being seen as a sharp mind within wealth management/banking to a thought leader and business titan.”
While she may describe herself in her Twitter profile as a “current mom” and “crazed UNC basketball fan,” a closer look at Krawcheck’s online presence shows that her approach is far from amateur. In addition to regularly sharing useful links and poignant thoughts on both Twitter and LinkedIn, she has self-published popular posts like “Lessons Learned in Leading During a Crisis” and “What I Learned When I Got Fired (the First Time)” and penned op-eds for outlets including the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post and Politico.
Those posts have given her a chance to share her own perspective and narrative regarding her previous experience, while the op-eds appear to be setting the stage for her next move. “Lately Krawcheck has been peppering the media with her thoughts and strong recommendations about how to address, if not solve, the gigantic, chronic, almost genetic, ills of the global financial industry,” The Daily Beast’s Allan Dodds Frank wrote in October. “If she can continue her nonpartisan stance,” Frank observed, “she might be the ideal person to be in charge of consumer protection, be nominated to the Securities & Exchange Commission or to a Treasury Department job.”
Setting the Stage
Her undergraduate degree at the UNC School of Journalism has likely helped Krawcheck communicate effectively, but perhaps more important is how she has applied the same strategies that made her one of Wall Street’s top female executives to her social media endeavors. “The secrets of Krawcheck’s success, however, hinge on her social skills,” Heidi N. Moore wrote in 2009, adding that “she has built a reputation as Mrs. Clean” and combined “a warm interest in others’ feelings, an obsession with preparation” and with “frank talk and open ambition.”
Speculation about where she’ll end up next will surely continue, and there’s no guarantee that she’ll be tapped as the next SEC chair. But one thing is certain: as one of the first major names in the banking world to dive headfirst into social media, Sallie Krawcheck has reaped the vast potential of an open and savvy online strategy.
Fake reviews on Yelp and similar sites are an integral part of Internet culture. (Yelp is an online guide to local businesses worldwide. Its listings are based on consumer reviews. Anyone can write them, using their real name or a false one. Over 30 million reviews have been posted since its founding in 2004.)
Yelp is an invaluable research tool for consumers. It is also an important marketing resource for businesses that rely on positive word of mouth to attract customers.
Anyone can post a fake positive review, just as anyone – including the competitor across the street – can post a bad one. But Yelp allows businesses to create their own profiles with photographs and respond to reviews publicly or privately. That helps level the playing field. It also enables businesses to acknowledge their faults and build relationships with customers who give them bad reviews, should they want to. (A customer who cares enough to take the time to write a bad review may be one who cares enough to give you a second chance. Their critiques can help you make your business a better one.)
Today technology reporter David Streitfeld writes about Yelp’s new strategy for reducing inaccurate listings. Yelp’s action is a signal that the Internet is entering a new development phase: one where the drawbacks of fake reviews are addressed by the platforms that host them.
The more one utilizes the Internet for researching businesses, organizations and people, the more it becomes clear what a game-changer it is in terms of consumer empowerment. Reading Yelp reviews, it is clear that 30% (or, in some cases, all) of the overly effusive ones might be fake and that 30% of the bad reviews (or, in some cases, all) might be due to a bad day on the part of the reviewer. (Or that the reviewer is a competitor.) The rest provide a middle ground from which readers can draw their own conclusions. It isn’t perfect, but it is a rich mosaic of opinions which provide us with the best resource for helping make well-informed decisions: each other. That’s why Yelp’s step forward is a positive one.
Jon Rimmerman writes a wry, witty, entertaining daily email extolling the pleasures of wines – recommending some, panning others. “The Pied Piper of Wine” built Garagiste — a $30 million a year wine sales business – after a series of such emails sent to his inner circle attracted fans through word of mouth. (The subscriber list now exceeds 130,000.) After reading about wines he recommends they can order bottles directly from him.
His story illustrates what can result from pairing passion, authenticity (his personality and writing style) and the Internet culture.
Once upon a time, entrepreneurs would spend a year or more planning such a business. They would line up investors. Mortgage the house. Work two jobs while building it. Not anymore. As writer Daniel Duane explained in yesterday’s NYTimes Magazine:
“Garagiste, which gets its name from a French winemaking movement, has not advertised since its creation in 1996. Rimmerman built a Web site only two years ago. Before that, you had to hear about his list through a friend, copy the e-mail address, then send in a polite request to join — analogous, in some ways, to the nightclub without a name, creating desire precisely by its disinterest in attracting you. Even today, the Garagiste Web site — through which you can now sign up for the e-mail list — has no e-commerce function nor even a blog post of Rimmerman’s daily offers. You get the memo or you don’t, and Rimmerman rarely offers the same wine twice.”
Anyone wanting to glean insight into how the online culture is helping to build the independent entrepreneur culture should read Duane’s excellent article. What differentiates Rimmerman’s business from many others is that his newsletter is genuinely written in his voice. Readers trust it – and like it. They know he will not praise wines he is paid to sell, including those with fillers and unappealing chemicals. It is all about authenticity. Authenticity is a key driver in establishing a trustworthy reputation – whether you are an entrepreneur, a politician or a CEO.
Entrepreneur Elon Musk is a leader in space exploration and founder of the pioneering electric car company Tesla. Yesterday David Brooks explained why Musk represents the best aspect of capitalism. Brooks was inspired by Bloomberg tech writer Ashlee Vance, whose comprehensive profile of Musk was published a week ago.
Both articles provide insight into the myriad elements that influence how today’s visionaries are perceived. Musk’s public image has been built from such elements as views from friends and colleagues like Silicon Valley venture capitalist Peter Thiel and WebTV co-founder Bruce Leak, skeptical voices on the Tesla Death Watch blog, his frank acknowledgement of two divorces (one in which both he and his ex-spouse blogged about the divorce negotiations), unhappy employees who have filed lawsuits and blogged about Musk’s demanding CEO style (which some say compares to Steve Jobs’), the need to schedule 10 hours a week to dating, and his goal of establishing a colony on Mars within 15 years.
Musk is part of the new era of entrepreneurs using technology to lead the way into a better future. He is self-made and has been involved in launching successful ventures that have gone public, enabling him to fund his current undertakings. Articles on his personal and work life may not be on everyone’s reading list, but they may be the best information investors and entrepreneurs who hope to follow his lead in business can find.
Coco Rocha is one of only a few contemporary fashion models that has a very strong online brand—one of the few whose name is well known outside the fashion industry because of her social media strategy. This New York Times article examines advice she gives to young models on establishing a brand using her techniques. Early in a career, a key challenge is distinguishing yourself from your peers. Building a brand can be the answer, and social media is most often the most accessible platform to use.
Most any brand will benefit an emerging career. Ms. Rocha’s advice to a young model creating a Tumblr content: “I don’t care if it’s about cats, just make it the best cat Tumblr out there.” And any audience you can muster is a clear asset you can offer clients. Her savvy is very likely to extend her modeling career…because of the added value her large audience brings to the products she is hired to showcase.
