“The New Marketing Manifesto: The 12 Rules for Building Successful Brands in the 21st Century”

Citation

Renart, L.G. (2000), "“The New Marketing Manifesto: The 12 Rules for Building Successful Brands in the 21st Century”", Journal of Consumer Marketing, Vol. 17 No. 6, pp. 550-560. https://doi.org/10.1108/jcm.2000.17.6.550.4

John Grant was founding partner of St Luke’s Communications, which was Campaign magazine UK “Advertising agency of the year” in 1997. He is a passionate communicator, who proposes that nowadays, successful brands apply the following 12 rules of new marketing:

1. 1.

   (1) Get up close and personal.

2. 2.

   (2) Tap basic human needs.

3. 3.

   (3) Author innovation.

4. 4.

   (4) Mythologise the new.

5. 5.

   (5) Create tangible differences in the experience.

6. 6.

   (6) Cultivate authenticity.

7. 7.

   (7) Work through consensus.

8. 8.

   (8) Open up to participation.

9. 9.

   (9) Build communities of interest.

10. 10.

    (10) Use strategic creativity.

11. 11.

    (11) Stake a claim to fame.

12. 12.

    (12) Follow a vision and be true to your values.

After a short introduction, most of the book (Part Two, pp. 21‐176) is devoted to the 12 different chapters presenting the meaning and examples about successful brands which applied each particular rule.

I found particularly interesting his list of The Fifteen Fundamental Human Drives, listed in the chapter devoted to Rule 2. These are: sex; hunger; physicality; avoiding distress; curiosity; honour; order; vengeance; social contact; family; prestige; power; citizenship; independence; and social acceptance. This is a very complete list of “hot buttons” an advertising strategist may decide to press in order to elicit the desired response from its target audience. Obviously, marketing managers may also find them useful and actionable beyond advertising and communications.

Part Three (pp. 179‐235) is devoted to showing how the 12 Rules apply in combination, that is, not just applying each rule separately, but using them in certain combinations of several rules, sometimes all of them at the same time. This is much closer to what happens in the real world. Grant does this by presenting and commenting on 12 case studies, ranging from TV series Friends, to IKEA, The Tamagochi, Football, British Telecom, or the new bank Egg.

This book is guaranteed to make any marketing professional’s mind sparkle with new ideas, some of which may be directly applicable to his/her situation. This is the kind of book you may want to read pencil in hand, so that you may register, as you go along, the different ideas which will certainly pop up in your brain. For instance, you may get ideas about how to position or reposition your products, or how to change the contents of your communications to make them more effective and more contemporary. You may get new ideas regarding how to creatively use new media, how to relaunch a “tired” brand, etc.

It is certainly a book worth reading, especially if you are puzzled by the question of how some brands succeed by doing “new things” which do not seem to appear in the typical, classical marketing textbooks on marketing strategy and the four Ps.

You will find in it the ideas of a highly perceptive advertising executive, whose special “antennae” allow him to capture and to present the latest social trends. The author shares with the readers his insights about the present generations of consumers. Not only this, John Grant gives specific suggestions on how to strategically react to these social trends, how to have “creative ideas to solve problems” (p. 185).

Having said that, it may be worthwile to list a few criticisms and some honest advice regarding what is not covered in this otherwise excellent book.

This book is “very British”. Some of the examples concern global brands we all are likely to know, such as IKEA or the Tamagochi. But contingent on your country of residence and/or your recent travel activities, you may not be all that familiar with, say, the TV series Friends, New Labour’s New Deal, Tango (a drink) or Pizza Express.

At times, the book is also very British in its expression, and I had to look up some words (not always successfully) in my dictionary. Sample (from p. 93): “They built a model whisky distillery and bar for Bells at the T in the Park music festival which was a great hit with the punters, including Noel and Liam Gallagher’s mum apparently”!Maybe in a forthcoming edition, the author would do well to give some complementary explanations, or to use more frequently than he does the expression “In case you don’t know,…” (as he does in p. 221, when he explains what is French Connection UK).

And do not expect to find many references regarding some major trends in today’s marketing such as the explosion of private branding by retailers, or how to market commodity products; the increasing concentration of retailing, due to organic growth by existing retail chains, combined with the ongoing activity in mergers and acquisitions; or the exploding activities in Internet marketing; or any aspect at all of business to business marketing. It is almost 100 per cent about manufacturer’s brands, sold to consumers.

Also, John Grant is “very intuitive,” meaning that there is no “scientific proof” in the book regarding the scientific quality of his personal insights. Readers may, at times, feel a little bit uncomfortable about this, and may ask themselves: Do I really believe that the success of this brand was due to these factors identified and described by Grant?

All this brings me to my final criticism regarding John Grant’s book: he has wonderfully captured the present generation insights in the UK. But very appropriately, the author points out that “brands have to do something interesting rather regularly” (p. 158). How long will John Grant’s 12 Rules of New Marketing last? They may be an excellent guide right now in the UK but… are they equally applicable in, say, the USA, Spain, Japan or Poland? And even if they were right now, for how long? Of course, anybody capable of spotting a new trend and of launching a new pop group to substitute for The Spice Girls could become a millionnaire. John Grant’s challenging question would probably be: “Why not you with your own brand?”