Clicking With the Wired Consumer

NEW YORK — It’s a brave new world of consumers empowered by emerging technologies — one in which people are armed with more information than ever and subsequently are less averse to trying new products and unfamiliar brands.

As a result, it’s becoming more important than ever for marketers to have a clear vision of what their brand stands for and precisely who they’re targeting, advised Irma Zandl, president of The Zandl Group, who has come up with 10 rules to guide brands seeking to engage consumers (see box).

“There is so much more information available now, it breeds a greater sense of independence and individual style,” declared Zandl, citing people’s growing use of Internet resources such as Weblogs and comparison shopping sites. “We’re not brand slaves.”

Based on her work over the past five years, Zandl, a trend forecaster who consults with a range of clients, including Bath & Body Works, Parfums De Coeur, Disney Consumer Products, Coca-Cola and Bacardi, has developed her 10 rules of engagement as the basis of a book she’s seeking to publish next year. At the heart of each rule, she said, is an insight that illuminates “why certain brands click with the consumer — what is their special sauce?”

Consumers’ expanding access to information, Zandl said, is creating a class of free agents either enamored of the latest thing or at least willing to try it, and less brand loyal. As evidence, she cited the rising popularity of technology toys, like digital cameras and Web-enabled cell phones. “LG is a brand that virtually didn’t exist [in the U.S.] five years ago and now it’s one of the most popular brands of cell phones,” Zandl pointed out, speaking of South Korea-based LG Electronics.

As a result of consumers’ ever-more independent mind-sets, she noted, “There’s a big chance tradition and heritage are becoming less valuable. The desire for traditional brands as something familiar may be replaced by other [familiar] things, like wanting to eat macaroni and cheese,” Zandl projected. “For hipsters, retro brands like Puma might still hold some appeal, but they don’t necessarily spawn trends.”

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With consumers more than ever in the driver’s seat on the information highway between product development and consumption, the life cycle of a hot brand or product has grown shorter, and more niche brands have sprung up. Thus, for marketers to maximize their appeal to consumers, Zandl counseled, they ought to differentiate between brands and items that are of the moment — say, a hot bag or shoe from Puma — and a broader trend like hip-hop culture, which has shown staying power for more than 20 years.

In order to develop products responsive to nascent lifestyle trends, brands need to immerse themselves in people’s everyday lives, Zandl said. For instance, ethnographic research that takes brand marketers into people’s homes to observe how they use and regard various items will propel companies out of what Zandl termed their comfort zone and enable them to better sense what consumers might want next. Such an approach has been applied by Procter & Gamble over the past five years, resulting in the creation of products such as Crest Whitening Strips and Swiffer, items that expanded people’s capabilities in home dental care and house care, respectively.

Of course, by getting close to consumers, brands stand the best chance of understanding their attitudes and behaviors, knowledge Zandl considers among the most valuable to come from the adoption of a consumer-centric approach. In response to its customers’ craving for convenience, for example, J. Crew offers free shipping on items ordered online or from its catalogues if those goods were not in stock when a customer shopped for them in a J. Crew store.

Oftentimes, the strongest surges in brand popularity stem from narrowly targeted niches of people passionate about what’s on offer. These are people, Zandl said, who become brand evangelists, telling others of their favorites, and spawning taste tribes who maintain that momentum. Apparel marketers have done this in various ways, from the offer of limited-edition sneakers from megabrand Nike, to one-offs, like Karl Lagerfeld’s populist play at Hennes & Mauritz, she noted.

“Nike has done a good job of keeping its sense of cool, its cachet, by doing special things for their sneaker heads,” Zandl maintained. “They have a 140-pair, limited edition of shoes at Moss in SoHo, and shoes designed especially for Alife on the Lower East Side. Nike has a special division that caters solely to fringe interests.”

Nike is also one of several brands Zandl contends have done a particularly effective job at leveraging the cult of personality, such as Phil Knight’s — a founder’s visionary stamp that inspires people, sparks their imagination and connects on a visceral level. Brands that have most convincingly embodied their founders’ vision, in Zandl’s eyes, also include Apple (Steve Jobs).

And although it’s not commonplace, some companies elevate people with a strong singular vision to a top post, Zandl said, naming Starbucks chairman and chief global strategist Howard Schultz, Target chairman and chief executive officer Robert Ulrich, and L’Oréal Paris president and general manager Carol Hamilton as examples. “Hamilton has a commitment to product excellence, to staying in touch with trends,” Zandl said of the beauty executive, who in October announced the signing of a multiyear deal with Kyan Douglas, grooming guru on Bravo’s “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy,” to become a spokesman and consultant for L’Oréal Paris. “L’Oréal was one of the first to offer hair color for men, to capitalize on the metrosexual phenomenon,” Zandl added.

With the democratization of style at such stores as H&M, Zara, Ikea and Target; a culture becoming increasingly visual, and products trading more heavily on their design, like MP3 players, flat-panel TVs and cell phones, Zandl said, consumers’ expectations for style-imbued items have been raised. At the same time, these dynamics have helped consumers access the best style, she noted, adding: “For $1,000, anyone could have a nice apartment.”