Latest / Marketing Shed / McLaren’s New Logo and the Case for Daydreaming
Transcript
- Warren Fiveash: Paul, it's good to see ya. How you doing? Paul Duxbury: Yes, it's very good to see you two. I am very good. It's a Friday. We normally record this on a Tuesday. I've no idea. I can't remember why we're doing it on a Friday. But, you know, any day is a good day to see you, Warren. But I'm Warren Fiveash: Yeah. Paul Duxbury: very happy. I'm very happy to be seeing you today. Warren Fiveash: Well, it's a lovely way to finish the week, Paul. Seeing yourself, I think yeah, I can't remember why we didn't do on a Tuesday. It's probably something to do with me. Paul Duxbury: I think I was getting my hair cut. I think that was it. Warren Fiveash: it was it getting your hair c wash washing your hair, washing your hair. Or yeah. But do you know what? The fact we're we're doing it, Paul we're here if it's like you said it's Friday, it's a nice way to go into the weekend, isn't it? And Paul Duxbury: Yes it is. Yes it is. Warren Fiveash: Always good to see you. And what have you been up to this week, Paul? Have you been up to much? Have you been out and about? Have you been abroad? Have you been Switzerland or Spain or Portugal this week? Paul Duxbury: I do know I haven't, which is good, I have to say that I am going to the Isle of Wight at the weekend, Warren Fiveash: Yeah. Paul Duxbury: which is obviously major international travel. But I haven't been anywhere exotic in that regard. But I have been doing interesting things. And the thing that springs to mind in particular is the e-consultancy capability leaders. Forum. Do you remember I've spoken about being there in the past? Warren Fiveash: Yes, I do. Yeah, I do. I've been there a couple of times. Good good one, that one. Paul Duxbury: I didn't know they let you in, honestly. Yeah, shocker. Well, Warren Fiveash: Yeah, no, they let any old riff raff in these days. Yeah. Paul Duxbury: I mean, I think kudos to Mr. Paul Davis, who runs the whole show. And it was a great event. And what happened was instead of a panel discussion, which has been the default for previous sessions, instead of a panel, they took a capability challenge. which was about how do we demonstrate the impact of capability building. And they had a number of experts who sat in various breakout groups. And as breakout groups, we worked out how to respond to that challenge. So very practical. know Paul's going to issue a record of what was talked about, but I thought it was a very good way of getting the best out of an expert forum as opposed to the panel, which can be good, but there's a lot of panels nowadays. So I thought it was really nice to work on a problem together. And as part of that, I tell you what was really nice was I bumped into a couple of former colleagues. I bumped into Agnes. Agnes is an expert brand builder Warren Fiveash: Yeah. Paul Duxbury: who I worked with at Halion and Lucy George. I don't think you know Lucy, but Lucy is an expert capability builder. She's now at William Grant and looks like she's having a great time there. So really nice to connect with people at a human level too. Warren Fiveash: I love that. I love that they've taken a different approach to these things. 'Cause there are I do go to a lot of events and there are a lot of panels and they're great, right? Good to hear from Paul Duxbury: Especially when we're on them, yes. Warren Fiveash: Exa exactly, yeah, we're you know, we're used to funding them and watching them, aren't we, Paul? But Paul Duxbury: Yeah. Yeah. Warren Fiveash: I think I think it sounds like a a good one p t to tackle tackle problem solving and that that helps you come up with how you apply it to yourself, right? How you apply these things to what you're doing. So I think it's I think it's a nice way of doing it. Sounds good. Paul Duxbury: Yeah, yeah, yeah, we'll see what the write up looks like, but I'm pretty sure Paul will produce something both informative and action orientated. So, yeah, well done to him and the e-consultancy team. How about yourself, Warren? What have you been doing apart from not turning up for our Tuesday podcast? Warren Fiveash: Well, part of the reason why I didn't turn up was 'cause aside from my usual work day to day work, is 'cause I've spent a lot of time in hospitals, Paul, because of kids being ill and sick, thankfully, nothing too serious and it's kind of viral infections. Paul Duxbury: Yeah. Good. It must be somewhat serious, but I'm glad that you're feeling all right about it by the sound of it. Warren Fiveash: Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, so it's all all good, but you know, when you're waiting for doctors actually gives you gives you time to think a little bit more when you maybe haven't had time to think. So it's been good from that point of view. I actually read a newspaper the other day, which I haven't done Paul Duxbury: You've read a newspaper. Warren Fiveash: Yeah, which I haven't done for years. So Paul Duxbury: Are you talking about a physical hard copy newspaper? Warren Fiveash: a physic a physical copy of the Times. There are other newspapers available. but yeah, Paul Duxbury: Wow. Warren Fiveash: it was good. I enjoyed it. I enjoyed it. And one thing Paul Duxbury: Wow. Warren Fiveash: came to mind when I was in the hospital was that and I know the NHS hasn't got loads of money to throw at this kind of thing, but just made me wonder why they don't make the seats more comfortable in hospitals. Because I feel like that'll get a lot of issues sorted. You're in these seats for ages and you've got a child and they're trying to lay down and rest and It's just the seats aren't made for it. And it it's a marketing problem. Paul Duxbury: Look, the idea is to get you out of hospital. it doesn't, know, obviously it should be a caring and and healing Warren Fiveash: Yeah. Paul Duxbury: environment, but it's not meant to be comfortable because otherwise you might just hang Warren Fiveash: Make it. Paul Duxbury: out there. That's not what we need. Warren Fiveash: Interest that is a good psychological yeah point, I think. You're right actually. You don't want people hanging around if it's too comfortable and 'cause you do get a bit of that. So and actually my Paul Duxbury: Yeah, you do. And I think they should play the music faster like they do in, I think, fast food restaurants so that you're encouraged Warren Fiveash: Yeah. Paul Duxbury: to do your business quickly and then move on. Warren Fiveash: Interesting, interesting psychology. Maybe we should pick that up as a separate subject in weeks to come. Paul Duxbury: Yeah, I don't think I'm going to get an invite to advise any hospital trusts anytime soon on patients' satisfaction. Warren Fiveash: but I'll tell you what I am interested in, Paul. I'm interested in what your your thing of the week is to discuss in the marketing sphere. What have you been seeing? Paul Duxbury: My marketing thing of the week. Well, I thought, I thought this, this one is, is an interesting one. I'm going to talk about the McLaren, automotive companies, re-branding or their new logo. it has Warren Fiveash: I saw this. Paul Duxbury: been all over LinkedIn, the, the swamp that is LinkedIn. I'm, I'm not going to comment on whether I like or dislike the logo. There's plenty of views. about whether people prefer the old logo or the new logo. For anybody who's not seen it, the previous logo was featuring a sort of slopey which I guess implies speed or motion. It had the speed mark, which is the sort of crescent, the orange crescent. The new logo retains the speed mark, but it is a much simpler font, think would be fair to say. You can Google it very easily. And Warren Fiveash: Mm. Paul Duxbury: I believe it is inspired by the sign that appeared on. I'll just check my notes. Yeah, the founder of McLaren's parents service station in New Zealand. So his mum and dad had a service station that said McLaren. The new logo is is very reflective of that. And I've got a bit of a bit of a sort of personal link to it only in so much as I live in Woking where McLaren Warren Fiveash: Yeah. Paul Duxbury: are based and outside the factory. They have a big a sign, a glass sign which illuminates orange when they win a Formula One race and the logo on that, of course, has changed. So I noticed that very, very clearly when it changed. But I thought our viewers might be interested to understand why that logo has been changed and Warren Fiveash: Mm. Paul Duxbury: irrespective of whether one prefers the new logo or not and My my thought I'd be interested to if you agree one. My thought is that McLaren are looking to extend their portfolio So they they obviously make high-performance sports cars, do racing in Formula One. I think they have a lot of technology businesses that come off that. They've also just got into golf, making golf clubs. And I dare say they want to get into many other fields linked to engineering. And I suspect that the previous logo was felt to be a bit too intrinsically linked to automotive. And therefore, if they were going to have a logo that would work across a range of product categories, they might need to change it. And they've done it in a way which is, for reasons stated, authentic. So I thought that was quite interesting. The challenge, of course, the challenge is having got that flexibility by changing the logo. Will that enable the McLaren brand to successfully be more versatile Warren Fiveash: Mm. Paul Duxbury: without losing the meaning that's inherent within the old logo and remains within the I think the Warren Fiveash: Strong. Paul Duxbury: new identity will travel more easily into other categories. But will some meaning be lost or change as that is done? Interesting. It'd be interesting to see what you think. Have you seen the different logos? Warren Fiveash: I have. Yeah, I have. like you said, irrespective of what people think. I think this comes down to I think this comes down to strategy and brand positioning, right? Because Paul Duxbury: Yeah. Warren Fiveash: if their strategy is to diversify into other areas or other, you know, markets, and therefore different products within those markets to appeal to those audiences, then your brand positioning has to shift slightly potentially to to adopt to that and therefore I'm assuming the logos change because of those two reasons because they'd need Paul Duxbury: Yeah, I think so. Warren Fiveash: to adopt a logo that applies to the new positioning and the kind of the the market sphere that they're trying to enter. So I I think it comes back down to that and I guess as long as the marketing the market positioning aligns with the the logo and the the way they want to kind of appear to the different audiences. Within those markets, I think I think it makes sense. It makes it obviously if it's a strategic decision, then it makes sense. If it's a logo that's been created in isolation, which I doubt it would have been, without Paul Duxbury: Yeah. Warren Fiveash: any thought to the strategic decisioning, but you've kind of hit on the point really, is that they're trying to kind of go into other other market other markets and expand their portfolio. So and I guess as as long as there's a visual framework and a and a and a flexible brand system that that works across these different products but then links back to the core core brand of who McLaren is, then I think it makes sense, right? And I think my my summation of of why this potentially works to your point about not kind of diluting the original McCarran brand by going too far off where they come from. I'd imagine that going into things like golf, you know, things like speed and power kind of link back I I don't know their brand positioning, but I'd imagine that those things link back to the reason why they exist for cars. So I suppose as long as you're not going too far from that. Paul Duxbury: Yeah, I think so. And I think it's around engineering. Yeah. Automotive, that sort of stuff. I think Warren Fiveash: Makes sense. Yeah. Paul Duxbury: it fits in with that, that, that taken Warren Fiveash: Yeah. Paul Duxbury: things. And of course they've got the link back to the original service station business, which is entirely within the right sphere. So yeah. And then, you know, I agree with you. I think it's, easy when we look at a visual to judge it on appearance alone. But we know that we get used to things over time. regardless of our initial reaction. And I think out of respect for the people at McLaren, we've got to say, look, of course they're doing it for a reason. They're not just doing it to try a different font or something. They're smart people. They're thinking about things intelligently. And what we're discussing is one plausible explanation. Be interesting if there are other plausible explanations, because you wouldn't do it lightly. But notwithstanding that, I wish them every success. Why wouldn't we Warren Fiveash: What Paul Duxbury: want a British-based manufacturing business to thrive? Warren Fiveash: Can you think I'm putting ourselves on the spot here, I'm just trying to think. My trying to wrap my brains of other brands that have done similar things where they're trying to expand into different markets and they've changed their logo or appearance slightly to adhere to that. Paul Duxbury: Well, I suppose the memorable one for me is BP when they went beyond petroleum. Do you remember that quite a few years ago? Yeah, and they went from Warren Fiveash: yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Paul Duxbury: the literally the letters to Warren Fiveash: Yeah. Paul Duxbury: the sort of the is it a flower? That's the flower, sun Warren Fiveash: Yes. Paul Duxbury: type logo. And that was a big old thing. But clearly did a very good job of making their strategic intent super clear. albeit I think there's been a bit of a refinement, shall we say, of that positioning in recent years. But nevertheless, that was probably something of similar size of change, albeit Warren Fiveash: Yeah. Paul Duxbury: in a much larger business compared to McLaren. Warren Fiveash: Do you think most people notice these changes as well? I mean Paul Duxbury: Well, I I'm, you know, I'm often looking at supercars and deciding which one to buy. So obviously, you know, that's, I would notice it straight away. Fair point, very fair point. I think the Warren Fiveash: Yeah. Paul Duxbury: Cognizante will notice it, but most people Warren Fiveash: Yeah. Paul Duxbury: would probably just see it in the context of a very impressive motor car or a very impressive set of golf clubs and say how Nipah looked. Warren Fiveash: Well, this watch this space to see where they go. see if it does the job. Paul Duxbury: Yes, yes, it'll be interesting. Yeah, and tell me, that's what I've seen. Have you had chance to get your peoples Warren Fiveash: Yeah. Paul Duxbury: onto anything this past few weeks or few days? Warren Fiveash: I haven't, but do you know what? Reading newspapers and spending time in hospitals gives you time to think. And actually this Paul Duxbury: Yes! Warren Fiveash: this is my point this week is actually have have we lost the art of daydreaming? And I and you might ask me what's that got to do with marketing, but I think it's quite pertinent to marketers. I say daydreaming, I mean the the the time to to sort of let your mind wander and think. And I was reading the Times and I found I came across an article that made me think about this even more. so there's a bit of research done by a chap called Shillang Shalette from the University of California, who did some studies on, you know, allowing your mind to wander and daydreaming and the fact that we live in a world now where we are, you know, this is this is a cliche and everyone knows this, but we're just inundated with information and distraction and we've got mobiles and actually rarely do we sit there and just kind of let our mind wander and and and let it wander off into other realms Paul Duxbury: Do you? Warren Fiveash: shall we say and actually what effect is that having? So actually what the study they found was that there is benefit to letting your mind wander without any particular thought. actually what it does is strengthens memory. So when you come back to out of that daydreaming and you d you get into something, it actually strengthens the memory of things that you need to remember. and it helps with statistical learning. So they give the example of in the in the article of, you know, a music lover who's heard a song, who's unfamiliar with the song, but they can almost read what's going to come next in the song because they kind of understand the patterns of of what what songs are made up of and they've had that time to kind of let their mind wander and Consolidate the information, and so actually the job is doing that processing when it's wandering. And I think for marketers, I think that's really important. I think we need time to get away, and we mentioned this before, but this research has just kind of made me double down on the fact that we're not getting enough time to get away from our desks as marketers, let our minds wander. You know, you'll go say, for example, you're working on a project around audience profiles and you're in the data and then you go into a Teams meeting and then you're doing another project after that. And you know, our our days are very like segmented into projects and meetings these days. What we're not doing is giving our time ourselves time to let our brains process and let ourselves kind of think about these things in a way Paul Duxbury: Mmm. Warren Fiveash: to make better decisions from them. So Paul Duxbury: But two questions on this topic for you, Warren. Warren Fiveash: No. Paul Duxbury: Well, the first one is, can you just repeat what you've been saying? I've just been daydreaming. Warren Fiveash: Ha ha ha. Paul Duxbury: No, have been listening. I have been listening. I have been listening. Yeah. Yeah. I Warren Fiveash: And that probably is all of our listeners or listener are probably doing the same. Yeah. Paul Duxbury: have been listening. The second question, a more serious question, is slightly provocative. So how would you feel if... members of your brilliant team were to say, really sorry, Warren, I haven't been able to produce that piece of analysis because I've just been daydreaming and you didn't know how important it is. Warren Fiveash: Well, I th that's a really good point. I think context is important with all these things, isn't it? I think obviously you wouldn't be happy with that, but I think there is something in saying, you know, I need time to consolidate information and time to think about this bit of work rather than getting so bogged down in the kind of data and trying to analyse Paul Duxbury: Hmm. Warren Fiveash: the data at the at your desk twenty four seven. Because I it probably links to a wider point about, you know. Some of this is about gut feel as well and gut instinct and the experiences you've got and the in and the things you've learned throughout your career and being able to sit with that, some of that stuff, as well as looking at the data on your screen and allowing your mind to wander, or like having time to do that, is is a way of of of of of trusting that experience a little bit, I think, as well as alongside the data. I think we're very data focused in in all not just marketing, but every across everything these days. And I think Paul Duxbury: You see, I do absolutely agree with the value of what you describe. what I think as well is weirdly, it requires, I think, a huge amount of discipline, self-discipline, Warren Fiveash: It does. Paul Duxbury: in order to find, to make the time and the space to think freely and to dream, to use your very helpful description. But just imagine that, you know, because of course it's never going to work by saying, well, you know, four hours a week of my role is to dream. Warren Fiveash: Yeah. Yeah. Paul Duxbury: You've got to somehow deliver your role and then build space within the work you do to do that dreaming. So I think there's a lot of skill to actually be able to dream effectively because the temptation to sleep is probably overwhelming, especially if you've been in hospital, you know. looking after your kids for example. Warren Fiveash: Well, how many people it goes out of work as well, doesn't it? So daydreaming is a weird term to talk about in regard to work, isn't it? And actually I need more time to daydream. Like actually it goes to a wider point around how often do I don't know if you if b this is true of you, Paul, but how often do you go for a walk and you stick your earphones in listen to podcast or, you know, we're consuming stuff like we never consumed before effectively and I I do it. You know, I don't give myself time just to wander and Let my brain wander when I go for a walk. I'll be listening to something or, you know, I'll be looking at something on my phone. And so actually there's a wider point around probably being disciplined in your wider life to enable that. Not necessarily in your day job, but just to make sure you are thinking things through. Because Paul Duxbury: Yeah. Warren Fiveash: I've tried to do this recently and actually spend more time give myself the time to kind of really think things through and write actually. A bit more because spend more time on my own thoughts writing about the things I need to think about because it enables you to process those things and come up with a solution yourself. And especially with AI now is an easy is easy to rely on kind of those things to do things quickly, but it the human brain's required to to really to process and and think about these things and make better decisions. So it's just a little concerned. It was good just to read the article 'cause I think I think perhaps we don't play enough play s enough empathis emphasis on it. And to your point, I think maybe it is derided a little bit that conversation because, you know, maybe using some of the terminology makes it feel a wishy washy, but there is something in it, I think, that we need to be aware of and conscious of and be more disciplined about. Paul Duxbury: Yeah, yeah. Love that point. Thank you for giving us chance to dream or permission to dream. Warren Fiveash: So so don't listen to this podcast, go and daydream. that's my message. Paul Duxbury: Yes? Yes, or do both? Yes. Warren Fiveash: and so Paul, what are you up to this week? What's going on in your world? Paul Duxbury: There's a week ahead, isn't there? Yes, I'm doing some very exciting stuff. So I'm doing some delivery in Warren Fiveash: Yeah. Paul Duxbury: terms of building some skills on various topics, particularly around storytelling. It is remarkable how much traction there is at the moment for, let's call them power skills. I quite like that phrase, power skills like storytelling with data. Warren Fiveash: Yes. Paul Duxbury: separate to that. I'm also in development mode. I'm developing a talk I've got to give to a bunch of students in the Czech Republic in about a month's time, talking to them about how they can become lifelong learners and build their marketing capabilities through their own initiative and efforts. That's going to be fascinating. I'm prepping for a very big growth workshop. I think I've mentioned it previously on this pod. But I'm trying to get my head around how to help a group of very, very smart individuals think expansively about growth opportunities in a new category space and come out with some practical recommendations. And then linked to the storytelling piece, I'm also thinking about what the learning journey might look like to help, let's say, functionally specialist marketers to become marketing leaders. What are the skills they need to sit at the top table and how do they acquire those skills? So yeah, there's a lot of thinking to be done. I'd like to think the line between thinking and dreaming is quite a narrow one. And I will try and use the latter to power the former. That's my plan over the next week or so. Warren Fiveash: Yeah. Sounds a quite a quite quite week, Paul. We haven't got much going on there, have you? A few things. Paul Duxbury: Exactly, exactly. because I need to allow time to watch celebrity traitors, obviously. Warren Fiveash: Yes. Yes, no spoilers, please. Yeah. Paul Duxbury: No spoilers, no spoilers. How about you Warren? Are you going to spend time in the local health care centre or doctor surgery? Hopefully not, no. Warren Fiveash: No hopefully not. Hopefully not. Hopefully hopefully not. Hopefully it's a quite a week in that regard. I'm actually gonna I'm actually gonna look at how a marketing requires maybe a slight nuance for the charity sector. So something Paul Duxbury: changes. Warren Fiveash: that's been in my head for a while, and something I want to get down on paper and maybe discuss on next week's pod next week. And it's beneficial for the organisation I work with at the moment because I think it's important to reference how you apply marketing in the sphere we're in. I don't think anyone's really done that at this point. So there's there's something in how charities are slightly differently set up to the commercial world. Quite complex organisations in regard to their audiences and their propositions and who they have to speak to and the and the products they offer. to yeah, to to to to apply things slightly different from the marketing fundamentals. So I think the fundam fundamentals stay the same, but there's some slight nuance within that and I want to talk about that a bit more next week. Paul Duxbury: like to hear about that because funnily enough I was advising not technically not a charity a community interest company is that the right phrase I was advising Warren Fiveash: Yeah. Paul Duxbury: them a week ago and yeah I'd love just to sense check my advice against your even more expert advice so look forward to that. Warren Fiveash: Yeah. Great stuff. No, yeah, well I'll be on that. I'll anything I could do to help you pull is you know, I'll always do it. So I'm glad it'll be of benefit to you and I'll I'll share my thinking before we do the pod. So you yeah. Paul Duxbury: You're a gent and have a cracking week and wishing all the best to you and your family to be fully fighting fit. Warren Fiveash: Thanks, Paul. Yeah, no, thanks, Paul. We're on we've got the vitamin supplements and the things to make sure we don't get ill. So fingers crossed. Fingers crossed for this week. Great stuff. Paul Duxbury: Superb. Right, well take care, speak very soon. Warren Fiveash: Take care, Paul. Have a good one. Paul Duxbury: Bye.