JCPenney is attempting to recover from the damaging strategies it took on during ex-CEO Ron Johnson’s tenure. Its logo is one of its main concerns, with branding surveys showing JCP logo awareness dropped as much as 28 percentage points from 2010 and 2012.
In JCPenney’s recent apology ad, it begged customers to “come back” to the retailer. It also featured a redesigned logo, one that used the company’s whole name rather than the hip ’jcp’ design taken on last year.
According to E-Poll Market Research, a trend-oriented market researcher, every redesign of the JCPenney logo since 2010 has hurt consumer awareness of the brand:
In April of 2010, JCPenney’s classic logo was recognizable by 84% of those surveyed. Following a 2011 redesign, awareness dropped to 76%.
And following the radical 2012 redesign, awareness dropped to a measly 56%.
But it didn’t even show up in the Ace Metrix Top 10. Ace Metrix measures a panel of 500 consumers who watch ads and rate them for effectiveness. That research says Doritos’ sling baby ad won the night.
It was also a big night for dogs. Volkswagen’s much anticipated follow-up to its little Darth Vader spot from last year used an obese dog getting in shape to gets its revenge on a VW it wanted to chase down the street (and then somehow ended up in the Star Wars cantina scene).
Skechers used a dog — Mr. Quiggly — in a greyhound race.
So did Doritos, in another comedic appeal revolving around the whole Dogs v. Cats war.
There weren’t any total disasters — last year both Groupon and HomeAway had to apologize for their ads — but there were some failures in the sense that clients ads bored people or went unnoticed.
Chase ran an ad that for the life of me I can’t recall even though I am paid to remember these things. And TaxACT’s ad, featuring a kid who urinates in a swmming pool, was disgusting.
Later today — much later — we’ll take a look at how B.I.’s readers judged the ads with the results of our Super Bowl ad readers’ poll. Vote early, and often!
Here are the top ten in his poll of 25 (hit his site to see more).
think outside the box (16%)
circle back (15%)
synergy (14%)
it is what it is (13%)
touch base (13%)
at the end of the day (13%)
let’s take this offline (12%)
low-hanging fruit (11%)
value-added (11%)
proactive (10%)
If you know anyone who uses these phrases feel free to show them this post. You can’t blame the words, but it’s worth keeping your language fresh and cliche-free when possible to avoid weakening the point you’re trying to make. You’ve heard my take (and Meeting Boy’s), but let’s hear your most hated work cliches.
The Fire is second behind the Galaxy Tab as the Android tablet developers are most interested in doing work for. Not a huge endorsement considering how weak the Android tablet app market is, but IDC says the level of interest is equal to what Apple had with the iPad pre-launch.
If the Amazon is going to have a long term life in the tablet market, it’s going to need developers building apps for its tablets.
Dr. Augustine Fou is Digital Consigliere to marketing executives, advising them on digital strategy and Unified Marketing(tm). Dr Fou has over 17 years of in-the-trenches, hands-on experience, which enables him to provide objective, in-depth assessments of their current marketing programs and recommendations for improving business impact and ROI using digital insights.
