Personality can be a vital component of effective marketing both in terms of communications messages themselves and the brands behind them. B2B marketing, however, is all too often criticised for being devoid of personality sometimes rightly, sometimes wrongly. Personality-free marketing is bland, soulless and utterly divorced from the individuals who created it and (more importantly) those that it is designed to appeal to. In other words, it doesn’t work. So when a marketing initiative comes along that is based on real personality, it tends to stand out: it has integrity, achieves cut-through, and for want of a better word has an ‘X’ factor which makes people take notice.
One such initiative was the ‘Small steps…’ campaign, developed for Canon Business Solutions by Tidalwave (see B2B Marketing’s Channel Marketing supplement, distributed with February 07 issue). Its aim was to communicate the business benefits of Canon’s printing products to SMEs and channel partners, using the analogy of physical health and fitness to promote ideas of healthy business and financial vitality, and will provide a springboard for a whole series of initiatives utilising the same theme.
Although the agency undoubtedly played a key role in developing the final proposition, it is apparent that the campaign’s genealogy is a consequence of the unlikely pairing of Canon’s cutting edge printing technology with the intense fitness regime of its UK marketing director David Smith. In this way, the campaign has unusually evolved directly from the major personality traits of the brand, and its lead marketer.
Both the approach and message may be unconventional, but that has not prevented them from being effective. Some of my colleagues were nervous [before the campaign], says Smith, but the customers loved it. They leapt to where we wanted them to go, before we could even tell them the story. We’ve found a theme that makes the dull things interesting, and relates to customers personally.
In a market that is as highly commoditised and competitive as office and professional printing products, such success is gold dust and unsurprisingly the theme of fitness looks set to provide the focus of Canon’s marketing activity for months to come. This, in turn, is illustrative of the importance of Smith to Canon’s marketing strategy, and the impact he has had since taking up the post 18 months ago, with a brief to fundamentally change its whole approach to marketing.
Canon’s ‘personality’ as an innovator is not widely appreciated in B2B circles and is partly obscured by the profile of its consumer camera division (despite the fact that its B2B turnover is larger in the UK). In terms of its technological aptitude, Canon Business Solutions is something of an unsung hero: the fact that it manufactures the print drivers for the products produced by a number of rival brands, or that it has consistently been amongst the most prolific developers of patents for new technology over the last 10 years, is little known to the wider market. As Smith says, Canon has great technology and are doing great things, but nobody knows about it.
By contrast, it’s apparent that Smith is extremely fit and healthy from the moment he walks into the room. He is tall and lean, and is open, friendly and relaxed he looks a good five years younger than his stated age of 42. Appropriately for a marketer from the technology arena, he is almost Californian in his manner, with a Steve Jobz-esque laid-back, informal style, reinforced by an steely-eyed determination and confidence.
Smith’s commitment to fitness, which proved inspirational for the ‘Small steps’ campaign, borders on the obsessional, including 5 am runs before work, and three hour gym sessions at weekends. To say Smith is driven is something of an understatement, but along with that he is also extremely focused, qualities which were undoubtedly critical in his selection to lead the marketing revolution at Canon Business Solutions in the UK.
Although his commitment and attitude to fitness are held close to his heart, Smith says it only emerged as a campaign theme after a detailed examination of Canon’s strengths and its position in the market. However it is far from unlikely that his lifestyle provided the inspiration.
We started looking at what Canon stood for, but no-one could really say. So we looked at our customers’ pain points in business and what we could do to fix those. One of the issues that emerged from this process was the companies’ desire for predictability particularly with regard to customers. Board directors don’t like surprises, says Smith. We realised that we had a very good story in this area. The volume of colour printing has exploded, but so has the cost because most people don’t know how expensive it is. Canon’s products, however, can offer completely fixed costs. This is because they use separate colour cartridges, whilst other manufacturers’ products have a single toner that must be replaced when one colour runs out.
The focus then moved to the target audience. They are mostly male, aged 25-55, ABC1, leading a sedentary lifestyle. They are health conscious and are probably gym members but don’t go very often, and probably eat and drink too much. They’d like to be fitter.
The combination of these two insights created the spark for the ‘Small steps…’ campaign: helping companies to get fitter by cutting unnecessary print costs. We’ve created a human interest programme to tell a story, enthuses Smith. This is something that is unusual in B2B generally and in technology and printing in particular and looks set to function as a key asset for Canon going forward. We’ve got a theme that makes the dull interesting as it relates to customers personally.
David Smith is Canon’s first marketing director. Prior to my arrival, the head of marketing was a more junior role, and the marketing function was generally about supporting sales, he explains. I was headhunted by Canon with a brief to change the way that they did things. It was important that I was a professional marketer, and that I had an outsider’s perspective.
He explains that Canon realised it needed to become more customer focused as a consequence of dramatic changes taking place in its markets with the emergence of new competitors and changing customer buying patterns. A prime example of this is that many of Canon’s products are now maintenance-free, which is a fundamental shift. This breaks our traditional service-centric model, he comments. Therefore Canon had to change.
Smith continues, At the same time, Canon itself is introducing new technologies in new markets. To break in, we need a strong engagement plan. The challenge is to build the market and unseat the competition.These threats and opportunities represent a compelling catalyst for change.
The brief that Smith was prised away from HP in order to deliver was, he says, to make Canon customer-centric, rather than sales-led. This, as he acknowledges, is a dramatic change, particularly for individuals who have been with the organisation for a long time and as a result he has ruffled some feathers. But whilst Smith says he knew that commitment was there from the board to make this happen, some of the other fundamentals for a radical reinvention were not in place. My perception of Canon before I started was quite different to the reality. I realise now that the opportunity is probably bigger than I thought, but so is the challenge.
He refers in particular to the marketing infrastructure. When I arrived, I thought we’d be further along than we were and that marketing would be about adding the icing on the cake. But in many cases we still had to build the table. Some fundamental work still needed to be done. This has been frustrating, I have had to peel back my expectations.
He sites the integration of the communications function within the main body of the marketing department and the establishment of a dedicated channel marketing team for the first time as examples of some of the fundamentals steps he’s taken in the first 18 months, in order to get marketing functioning correctly. We bucked the way the company runs in Europe to create a channel team, but it is really working, he says. Redesigning the website to reflect the way companies buy, instead of how Canon is structured, is next on his list. But the good news is that we’ve done most of the hard work now and it’s starting to get really exciting, he adds.
With Smith at the helm, a feature of Canon’s marketing going forward is likely to be that it will continue to break with convention. ‘Small steps…’ for example, was a paradigm shift in how the Canon markets itself. This campaign was a real departure for Canon. Historically it has been a product company that sells technology. I was worried that the dealers and sales department might not accept it. But the results, he says, speak for themselves, and the campaign has widely been accepted and embraced as a success.
Smith also defied convention in his first examination of Canon’s market position, soon after he arrived. Traditionally, the company had focused on competitors with directly competing products to evaluate performance and gauge marketshare. Smith sought to promote a broader view, taking inspiration from Jack Welsh, CEO of GE. When he arrived at GE, he was told that they had huge marketshare, and they didn’t know where they could achieve growth. So he redefined the markets in which they operated so that they only had a small percentage. He changed the way they thought it was a eureka moment.
Canon Business Solutions has taken a similar approach. Specifically this means that instead of just thinking in terms of the market for laserjet printers, Canon now recognises the inkjet colour printer brands as competitors also.
Similarly, Smith is not afraid to draw on examples from consumer marketing to influence and inspire. I have real favourites in advertising and we use the Orange ads for training salespeople. I love the one where the woman walks across the tundra to kiss her husband goodnight. The ad is about text messages, but it tugs at the emotions and makes the dull interesting. And there’s not a product in sight. We can learn an awful lot from B2C advertising.
Fitter marketing David Smith has pioneered a courageous way of thinking for Canon that has broadened its horizons and opening up new opportunities. The fitness theme will be key to taking this forward and a series of follow-up programmes have been devised, enabling Canon to build on its success. For example, ‘Diets’ creates a link between people’s unhealthy eating habits and their use of expensive printing products. The message is about finding the right balance.
With a radical approach to marketing in this conservative sector just beginning to roll out, it would seem that there exciting times ahead for Canon, not to say busy times. And no one will be busier than David Smith. As well as his punishing fitness schedule, he has to find time for a wife and three young children, not to say the rambling house on the South Coast which forever needs work.
And if that were not enough, he’s also a musician and currently writing and recording a solo album. I sing, play guitar, and also keyboards. I cut what I’ve done to CD and then listen to it in the car on the way to work. Its quite time consuming, but it doesn’t impact too much on family life. He says he enjoys the creative outlet it provides.
Just as personality is key to effective marketing, after only 18 months, Smith looks set to be key to Canon’s future success. Although the merits of close alignment of marketing strategy with the personal interests of an individual is probably a moot point, in this instance it is proving highly effective. But despite this, it seems unlikely we will see any Canon marketing based around singer-songwriters in the near future.
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