Here’s a new investment strategy: sell shares of any company that trots out new advertisements that reek of self-importance. Morgan Stanley and Apple – which both have new campaigns running now – would top the list.
It pains me to say it, since they’ve both been great companies and great brands over the years, but their current advertisements stink. Both are inward-looking and largely ignore the things customers care about most. They both have the perverse effect of raising questions about whether management really knows what it is doing.
Apple, in a break with tradition, is running text-heavy ads that feature people in various states of happiness, presumably caused by using Apple products. Its tagline reminds us that the products are designed in California (but not manufactured there or anywhere else in the US, of course).
I understand the rationale behind emphasizing Apple’s product designs and its culture of ‘spending a lot of time on a few great things.’ Its competitors don’t focus on those things as much, and it is a message that draws attention away from Apple’s current weakness – it’s inability to innovate new products as fast as investors (and, yes, many consumers) would like.
But Apple’s traditional advertising was strong because it was simple. It presented the product and a few of its amazing features, and that was pretty much it. No one needed to be told it created a great experience; they picked it up and knew immediately. Any time you need to tell people how they should feel about your products, you tread on dangerous ground. These ads feel inauthentic, as if they were selling products from some other firm (like Microsoft – gasp!).
Morgan Stanley’s advertisement, launched to mark its purchase of the remaining part of Smith Barney, is even more of a head-scratcher. It surely cost a few million dollars, yet no one really cares about that deal, aside perhaps from the firm’s employees. Even customers are likely to be indifferent: will the deal really improve the service they get?
Of course, Morgan Stanley CEO Jim Gorman and the board of directors probably care a lot, and the ads are a nice way for them to take a bow for their deal-making. But they still have to show the “new’ Morgan Stanley can perform, and only time will tell.