May 23, 2005

More Sense

No sooner had I posted my Friday entry about the importance of the senses in marketing than I read this quote from Brian Collins, executive creative director, Brand Integration Group, Ogilvy & Mather, New York:


"For years, I have kept a small refrigerator in my office stocked with freezing cold Coca-Cola - but only in the original glass contour bottle. I offer it to everyone when we meet in my office. Coca-Cola delivered this was activates so many positive emotional and sensorial cues - sight, sound, touch, smell, and taste - that it's always a great way to kick off a meeting. I have seen some people get crazy happy about it. And happy people are imaginative people."

He gets it, for sure.

As planned, I did my sensory check of all the places I went on Saturday and was especially disappointed that the restaurant - (which DID have very tasty food) - didn't woo me with distinctive smells or touches.

Later in the evening, I read a review of Moto, a hot new restaurant in Chicago. Moto features aromatherapeutic flatware threaded with sprigs of fresh herbs (and listed as a course on the menu). Now that may be taking this sensory thing too far! One reviewer of Moto describes servers approaching the table with six-inch syringes to inject a single rice ball with a sweet-and-sour sauce. Get a grip, Chicago!

But there IS a point here. And that is, marketing involves ALL the senses. My Saturday restaurant didn't get that. Moto gets it...but (from the sound of it) goes a bit overboard.

Can Marketing Change the Profile of a Disease?

Ever think about how some maladies are OK to talk about and are happily accepted and dealt with...while others are pretty much kept in the closet?

I'm thinking (in the closet category) of depression. Sure, celebs talk about it and maybe some even may capitalize off of it. But most folks stay quiet about it and don't even get help, when they know darn well they need it.

Yesterday, I read a review of Peter D. Kramer's latest book ("Against Depression"), and it points out that the World Health Organization calls depression the single most disabling disease. And studies put the annual workplace cost in this country alone at $40 billion - the equivalent of 3% of the gross national product.

I wonder if marketing could change this dynamic. I wonder if marketing could bring depression out from the closet and catalyze people getting help, employers helping those in need, and a great reduction in the cost that depression inflicts on our economy in addition to the toll it takes on its sufferers and their families.

I've typed a post on the reputation of the media three times and it keeps disappearing into cyberspace. Maybe it's not meant to be. Tomorrow. I'll try again tomorrow.