I once had a marketing professor who used to push the idea that as a marketer, your job is to be a tool. One whose purpose in life was to investigate, understand and find ways to connect with your company’s target customers. However, over the years it has become clear to me that far too many of our peers in the world of brand, marketing and business have misinterpreted the idea and taken it as an order to be foolish. Because rather than focus on developing strategies and tactics, brand platforms and campaigns, products and services that speak to their consumers, time and time again we see brands that have chosen the easy route of marketing to themselves.
TIME AND TIME AGAIN WE SEE BRANDS THAT HAVE CHOSEN THE EASY ROUTE of MARKETing TO THEMSELVES.
If you haven't used it before, Dropbox is a service that allows users – whether consumers or companies – to store files of all sorts on the web. You can access these files from anywhere, using a browser or a downloadable app, you can sync files across your PC and smartphone, share files and folders with colleagues, and enjoy access to your stuff wherever you are. It’s a lot like Apple’s iCloud, Google’s Drive, and Box’s…um…Box. See the problem? Online file storage is a commodity, and as the cost of storage continues to fall, the ability for companies like Google and Apple to offer up fully-integrated alternatives to Dropbox has put the company in a tough spot. It means that the Dropbox brand needs to help the company stand out and seem like more than its commoditized competition.
DROPBOX IS “AN OPEN PLATFORM, AND A PLACE FOR CREATION.” SERIOUSLY, THAT’S WHAT IT SAYS.
With an IPO on the horizon later in the year, and competitors taking big bites out of Dropbox's core business, it’s clear that the organization needs to build up some momentum. So, what’s the solution? Apparently, a key piece is to make the case that Dropbox isn’t (just) a storage company. You see, Dropbox is “an open platform, and a place for creation.” Seriously, that’s what it says. Dropbox’s design page also talks about how the underlying idea for the brand is “Extraordinary things happen when diverse minds come together.” The team talks about how people want to do creative work that matters, not busy work. You know what I hear?
Dropbox is a platform for creative people (like us) to be creative (like we want to be) instead of dealing with details of modern work (because that's not fun).
Call me naïve, but that strikes me less as a broad value proposition and more a reflection of the attitudes of the people who developed the brand. Which brings me back to the call for marketers to be tools for their companies. As it stands, the shift to a younger, hipster-cum-millennial audience is something that we see over and again.
