It is pretty rare that a sequel to any game or movie is ever as good as the original. Often times concepts are lost, or the fan-base feels that the developers have ’sold out’ to brand placement and co-marketing efforts. In this world where ‘authentic‘ content is so valued— creatives, writers, and strategists find it increasingly challenging to come up with something fresh; or more so to evolve something with what is contemporary-cool.

With that said I am absolutely as guilty as the other 926,000 GTA addicts out there…I just can’t put the game down to save my life. But second to the amazing gameplay experience, and rich media licensing that Grand Theft Auto brings to the table, is what I like to call a 2nd-Degree Brand Experience.

Let me explain…
For those of you that play the game, you all have seen the Escalades, Vespas, and Corvettes be translated into a GTA version of the product. Even Fast food chains, Fox News, and architecture landmarks are recognizable, yet not exactly what they would be in real life. This publishers tactic was once used to avoid licensing complaints, but the likeliness in these cases are so blasphemously obvious that I have started wondering about the positive effects of this 2nd-Degree Brand Experience. The real debate though is that knock offs in real life [Payless vs Adidas] cause serious brand infringements and legitimate lawsuits but should knock offs in games be rewarded through media buy dollars?

In past games we have seen actual brand names used, but this might be overkill and kill the authentic messaging that our SEM-eteers argue will rule the world. So rather than kill the authentic nature of a game, knock off the brand in a way that it’s audience will enjoy and still give them the brand experience; and make them pay dollars for it.

I have always believed that each situation deserves an educated audit prior to making a self-proclaimed sagacious decision. With that said, as politick ensues in my workplace, in my circle of friends, and while visiting family, I have remained somewhat silent and meditative; just taking it all in…maybe getting a little annoyed. Given the background that I have, and my interest in marketing, messaging, and creative collaboration I have decided to let my creative process help dissect what is happening in the political foray in hopes that I shed light on the nominees beyond their scripts.

Some of you will disagree with me as this all unfolds. That is fine, welcomed, and expected. This is intended to be a creative-process driven exercise into deeper issues, not necessarily a discussion for ‘omg can you believe what _____ said on cnn last night?’

Brand Audit

My first exploration into the campaigns [Obama, Clinton, and McCain] will happen through a continuous brand audit; a process that I lead many of my clients through when pursuing answers to the following questions:
a) How do I wish to be perceived or want to communicate?
b) How do I believe I am perceived?
and c) How do I perceive those around me?

The Beauty Contest Begins

Left to Right:
Clinton
McCain
Obama

Above you will see our motley line-up of our most participating TV celebrities and media purchasers….our Presidential candidates. As part of a basic creative dissection for visual language and written messaging we will analyze our candidate brands based upon the following:
1) Visual Language: color, typography, expressiveness and hierarchy.
2) Perceived Call to Action [CTA]: what does this candidate want us to do with this site?
3) Utilization of Media: Is the candidate utilizing contemporary Website technologies to the fullest? If not does that play well into the demographic they are choosing to pursue?

Hillary for President

The first in the line-up is Hillary Clinton’s site. What we notice about Hillary’s visual language right off the bat is that her visual language is not taking any chances; she is like most candidates, trying to show America that she is a patriot and perhaps hoping everyone forgets about Bill’s security blunders.

Hillary has branded her campaign as ‘Hillary for President’ which I think is a conscious decision to not be referred to as ‘Clinton for President.’ She is clearly trying to create her own identity separate from her husband and judging from the ‘3 Myths about the Democratic Race’ button she is also politicking within her party [an important discussion for later]. We also see a prominent Elton John and Hillary button that is looking to drive support; this is interesting because this is a serious name-drop using a cultural icon rather than a political endorsement.

To me this is a youth-focussed messaging segment that will appeal most to first time voters as opposed to people who have a strong knowledge of the current political players. For a seasoned voter the Elton John reference might seem like a weak culture-play that does not say politics enough.

Below the fold we also have the gamut of social networking sites ranging from Twitter to Facebook to Myspace to the Boomer network Eons. By the listings of social networks that Hillary has adopted we can distill that she is going for a fairly broad audience without a nod to any specific minority or religious social networking group. What she has shown though is that she is going after a limited number of social networking sites will leaving her everyday tasks wide open to the public through Twitter an awesome way of syndicating what you are doing as it happens. Just don’t ever blurt out that you are ‘Twittering Hillary’ at work.

I was however not impressed by the fact that her site has a Spanish version of one page; I can only assume she meant to have an entire site in Spanish but her campaign might not be big into QA; I hope they aren’t reviewing policy for her.

Through deduction my perceived message is: I’m hip strong individual with well-known friends with funky rhinestones but it isn’t kicking out enough money. I want you to know that I love everyone…including the vets and I am social networking enough to be out there, but nothing too crazy. Please donate.

Mccain *

McCain’s site has a completely different look and feel than Hillary’s. Immediately I can see the McCain wants to appeal to veterans by his prolific use of an iconic military star and almost Vietnam Memorial referencing reflections in the obsidian graphics; if anyone has the right to do so it is a guy that spent 5+ years in a POW camp. McCain also uses quite a bit more imagery of himself on the site, in a way that Opera is on the cover of each issue of ‘O’ magazine. Though it is easy to say that this comparison is a prod, in fact it is a well-tested method for publicizing someone in the limelight. I imagine McCain wants to look and feel presidential, he is embodying the idea that this is his show, so get used to seeing his mug.

On the social networking front I am aware that McCain’s daughter is doing video blogs on YouTube which is fun to get a voyeuristic view into Daddy’s campaign, but we aren’t really seeing the content syndication that someone wanting to have readership should have. There is a McCainspace on his page, which is a joke in itself…did he think he was going to out-brand Myspace? He also has a blog-because-you-have-to-have one sort of blog, but McCain falls short on this one. It seems he should maybe hire his daughter to get the kids on board through other social networks; if not for any reason besides ‘the other guys are doing it.’

There is no bilingual page option on his site; though we can speculate that this will not hurt him this go around, statistically it might hurt the next guy who has to decide whether they will brave the Republican nomination without latino support.

Through deduction my perceived message is: I don’t have to be hip, I was on the Daily Show tons of times punks, so listen up; I am acting like a president, I have been around forever, and I don’t want to seem gimmicky and with the times. If you are a God fearing service man, click donate.

Obama ‘08

On a quick first pass, and from a brand experience, Obama’s site really shines. First I want to take a second to mention that his logo has become somewhat of a phenom and we are seeing other social-networking enthusiasts sprout novel ideas to support their candidate such as Logobama [great idea guys, I will see if I can beat you to it next time!] The overall look and feel of this site has slight gradients which make it feel more like a culture-brand in itself, kind of Apple meets the White House…then White House becomes multi-racial. This site also has a look to me that fits well with Facebook, which interestingly enough was a Harvard [Barack’s alma mater] social networking site in its origin.

From a usability and user experience perspective Obama’s site has a lean menu and a great sense of space allowing it to feel a little less political in nature. This is an interesting topic because Obama has endured a bit of criticism for not really showing his stances enough, and I think that comes through in his identity. Does this mean he is a candidate without much to say? I don’t think so. But from a marketing and messaging stance we have an easier message to receive from Obama; he is trying to only communicate a few points that he thinks he can win on.

The other thing worth mentioning is that Obama is riding political topic through his larger graphics as opposed to fundraising or culture-focussed messaging. He also has some interesting call to actions besides the standard donate and make phone calls; ‘Meet Barack Obama’ and have ‘Dinner with Barack’. This might be the most profitable dinner ever.

Below the fold we see that Obama is extremely socially networked, far beyond any other candidate. That means that we can almost assume that he has a young technologically-progressive staff and following. We can also distill that he is reaching out to an audience that is young, and he is also reaching out [based on social networks] faith based and minority social networks; a stance that Hillary did not pursue with her social networks.

I am also impressed that Obama’s twitter account is so heavily updated, again showing quite a bit of transparency into what he is doing on his day-to-day campaign. Obama also has an RSS feed and a functional Spanish version of his page, which again I am surprised he is the only one doing both of these.

Through deduction my perceived message is: I am going to communicate to those people who will want to hear my ‘change’ mantra; the youth of our country. I hope they have large piggy banks.

So what is working?

So this is something that was just bound to happen. I have been practicing self-restraing for quite some time; having only registered for social-networking sites that I felt were practical and presented an immidiate offering that I could buy into.

Nope. Now that is over. I have gone out of control. I think I just registered for a million different sites in the course of a week, AND I have a Second Life avatar to boot. Am I late to the game? Not really, I have been playing with social networks since bbs’s and silly gaming portals like TEN and MPlayer but now I am trying to remember everything I have registered for and I am literally hemoraging from my brain.

So here is a breakdown of the winners:
Myspace vs Facebook: Facebook wins
Twitter vs leave-me-the-heck-alone: Twitter wins
YouTube: duh, this is too fun
Yelp vs Citysearch: Yelp
AIM vs MSN vs ICQ: I have all of these still and yes I use them all.
WoW vs Second Life vs Xbox Live: Xbox Live….Second Life makes me feel like I failed at my first life.
Utterz vs Facebook: They work together, kind of…I like Utterz. Who doesn’t?
Bookmarks on my computer vs del.icio.us: del.icio.us wins
Running at the gym vs Nike +: Nike + wins…

So what the heck does all of this mean? I think it means that all of these things that are supposed to make my life easier to map out and share with everyone just made my life a heck of a lot more complicated.

Today I had the pleasure of attending an AMA lunch that featured a Starbucks spokesperson, informing us as to the ways Starbucks is furthering the CSR front especially on the topic of sustainability. I can only imagine how difficult it really is to harness a large company like Starbucks and steer it in a direction that really pleases everyone.

With that said, aside from the lengthy feel-good speech, the most interesting question I heard was ‘What is Starbucks doing with regards to 14 year olds becoming addicted to caffeine and hanging out in your stores?’

Answer: [excuse my memory if this is not precisely what was said] ‘Caffeine, in the medical industry, is something that comes and goes with regards to its benefits and effects. Some might say that caffeine, in a cardiac sense, is actually good for you.’

Oh geez. I drink more coffee than most. I know it is bad for me. But what?!?!!? Starbucks, here is the challenge: come up with a real answer to this question so you look as smart as you actually are.

I have been thinking a lot about the students that I am working with; more so because I am about to meet with Norton, the Dean at the AI of Portland. I have been thinking about constructing a workshop of sorts for the local design students that would want to enter into rigorous critique far before their required graduation review. In my mind, it makes a good deal of sense to know where you stand as a designer, presenter, and conversationalist far before you are thrust in front meeting room full of bored-and-busy art directors and creative directors; as I had once experienced in my Junior year of college when making it to the final round at Sandstrom Design for their internship program.

Students, design-students in particular, tend to be such an interesting and often diverse build. But the underlying truth is that most all of the students I encounter fear what I call the design-mirror.

Success in our industry is based upon subjectivity, and it is a hard life-lesson for these young designers to put themselves out there. In fact, I would say that even some of the most senior professionals that I encounter still fail to do this. So stay tuned for the said workshops, they will be fun and difficult; exactly what keeps creativity at its finest.