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Sunday, July 3, 2011

Convention hunting 2

'The ladder' is a disruption theory tool for identifying a category's communication / advertising conventions - and is helpful in the construction of the convention planets - another convention ID tool used in disruption.

The ladder
Helps to identify and disrupt communications conventions and explore brand visions along 6 areas of focus.


How the ladder works

In a given category, there is often one focus for communication which dominates. In doing a competitive review, going through competitors' TVCs (for example) and just marking a place on the ladder for each one will start to unearth the category's conventions.


Then ask 'why'? What is the assumption that explains why everyone is focussing on this? The answer to this will help fill in the convention planets and to identify assumptions that are being made about what the consumer thinks or wants.


Ladder elements or 'registers' in detail
  • Top of mind - What is the one word that you would want consumers to keep in their mind about you to best understand the vision? This is the first and most immediate association with the brand.
  • Attribute - What specific attribute does your product need in order to give you reason to believe in it? Ingredients, promotions, packaging, services etc.
  • Benefit - What benefits do these specific product attributes bring the consumer? Emotional as well as material.
  • Territory - The objective is to construct a real or imaginary territory surrounding your brand. This is a description of the territory or world that the consumers enter thanks to our products.
  • Value - If we sell products that bring our customers these benefits, what are the values that we might stand for? A value which can be shared between the brand and the consumer.
  • Role - If we as a brand, stand for these values, what role do we play in the wider spectrum? It can be a role in consumers' lives. It can be a role in society as a whole.

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