Uncategorized | Ken Segall

AirPower: a fiasco beyond imagination

04/1/19

If there was a Beginner’s Guide To Corporate Screwups, surely it would explore the tried-and-true ways for companies to shoot themselves in the foot.

Release buggy software. Fail to protect customer data. Run a bad ad. See your CEO arrested. So many possibilities!

But AirPower is not your stereotypical screwup. It’s something far grander. Never in history has Apple announced a product, gone silent about it for 18 months, and then killed it before it ever shipped.

At least it proves that Apple can be a true innovator in the area of self-immolation.

“Freedom to fail” is actually a liberating thing, essential to the Apple culture. In an internal meeting, I once heard Steve Jobs defend Apple’s large cash reserve by saying, “It gives us the freedom to jump as high as we want. If we fail, we will always have solid ground beneath our feet.”

Unfortunately, AirPower isn’t the “liberating” kind of failure. It’s just shocking and sad.

Battle of the insurance jingles

08/10/18

Okay, Farmers. You’ve enjoyed your monopoly on silly insurance ad jingles long enough. This is war!

Liberty Mutual has now marched into the arena, armed with a jingle even more annoying than yours. Surrender now, or you will see no mercy.

What Liberty Mutual did is actually pretty rare in this business. After running an ad campaign for at least a couple of years, they decided to “enhance” it with a new jingle at the end—a veritable body blow to competitors taken from the Classic Book of Advertising, circa 1964.

I’m painfully aware of how hard it is to come up with smart strategies and creative executions. I also know how many meetings it takes to sell a creative idea to people who may not see what you see.

That said, I can’t explain how ideas that deserve a quick and merciful death survive a process that includes multiple checkpoints at both the agency and client. The best I can do is imagine how the final meeting went…Continue reading…

Ron Johnson was right about JCPenney

06/11/18

The latest painful chapter in the JCPenney saga has now been written.

CEO Marvin Ellison resigned a couple of weeks back—with the company’s stock price down to a mere $2.43. That’s a particularly brutal number, considering that in 2007 a share of JCP went for $85.

Technically, this plummet was co-authored by three CEOs serving four terms—Marvin Ellison, Ron Johnson and two stints by Myron Ullman.

By numbers alone, it’s hard to tell who was worse. The stock plunged 65% under Ullman (Act I), 54% under Johnson, 58% under Ullman (Act II) and 66% under Ellison.

So I was surprised that Ellison received the praise of many writers reporting his resignation. “He helped turn around J.C. Penney,” said The Street. In what universe that happened may never be known.

Not only do the writers let Ellison off the hook, they seem to rally under a common theme: it’s all Ron Johnson’s fault. After all, Ron was in and out in less than two years, and the stock was decimated during his reign.

However, this narrative ignores two major facts. First, JCP had already lost more than half its value before Johnson took the reins. Second, Ullman and Ellison succeeded only in driving JCP further into the ground.

The truth is, Johnson’s vision was correct and necessary. History has now proven that JCP was (and is) doomed without a radical plan for reinvention.

The company committed the classic sin of throwing out the baby with the bathwater.Continue reading…

Think different, Take 2

01/23/18

Now that my website has been redesigned into the 21st century, I thought it would be fun to start off with a little cross-century creativity.

Back in 1997, when Steve Jobs introduced the Think different campaign at an internal Apple marketing meeting, he noted that people we honored in the campaign didn’t actually use Apple technology, and then quipped, “but they would have.”

Cue Michael Rylander, designer/art director who was part of the agency Apple creative team back in those days. Steve’s words inspired him to let some of those great people reach into the future to get their hands on some iconic Apple products. Time travel courtesy of Photoshop, of course.Continue reading…

iPhone X and the critics’ Festival Of Wrong

12/25/17

Getting Apple wrong is hardly anything new. Apple naysayers and wrongness share a rich and glorious history.

Remember, Apple failed when it created a computer that works with a mouse; when it left the floppy drive out of iMac; when it forgot how to innovate after iPhone; when it built a watch nobody wanted; when [your favorite fail here].

But history be damned. Following three years of physically unchanged iPhones, iPhone X was a target many critics couldn’t resist.

The result? We were treated to a veritable Festival Of Wrong, served up by countless critics in four distinct phases.Continue reading…

Stretching the truth with iPhone X

10/17/17

Since the dawn of time, advertisers have stretched, exaggerated and mutilated the truth to get consumers’ attention.

Hey, that’s life. It’s also why advertising is a consistent bottom-dweller in every “most respected profession” survey.

But there is hope for mankind.

Some companies have a refreshingly strong sense of advertising ethics. They believe that their products are so good, an honest portrayal is the most effective advertising tool.

Apple has always been one of those companies. That’s one reason I was so attracted to it when I was a baby copywriter.

Apple advertising was always creative and fun, but it was also intelligent and accurate. That’s what made it the industry’s “gold standard” for marketing.

That’s why it makes me nervous when I see today’s Apple playing loose with words and images to sell a product.

Case in point: the “all-screen” iPhone X.Continue reading…