Three Lessons Nonprofits Can Take From Droid's Weird Branding

The new Verizon Droid phone is a pretty damn good device. Why then is their branding so terrible?

For people who follow this sort of thing, it's pretty widely acknowledged that Droid is the first phone to actually be a realistic competitor to the iPhone. This has a lot to do with the fact that it is a) on the Verizon network, which is widely perceived as a better carrier than the iPhone's AT&T and b) the fact that it's using Google's Android platform, which makes it another appealing choice for application developers.

Yet if they've successfully built the first device that can competes, they've not done nearly as well on their branding. Check out the video below.

There is a lot that is really weird about this to me. For example

1) Who decided that "hyper-masculine" was the way to go? This could be an add for a new Terminator movie, and basically tells me that they don't give a crap about the female market. Whereas iPhone has successfully turned basically the most powerful piece of technology you can stick in your pocket ever created into something that's an everyday accessory for anyone, Droid's branding would make you think they were just going for the video gamer market. As one Youtube comment put it: "Really? Really you guys? There's a place in between the overly pink land of princessdom and RAWR REAL MAN EAT ROCKS. Strangely enough women exist there too."

2) Trying to convince me that something that sucks about your phone is actually cool probably isn't going to work. Maybe the weirdest thing for me here is that they take a shortcoming of the phone - which is it's relatively clunky, boxy, IBM industrial aesthetics and try to convince us that actually that's just part of its coolness. Rather than focusing the story on a fundamental experience they want us to have with this device, they start off with a bad point. This reminds me of Windows 7 dumb acquiescence to Apple's framing of the industry. Their new advertising basically says "remember all that stuff that you said sucked about Windows? Actually you were right but we've TOTALLY fixed it now and it's really awesome."

In a world of ever-increasing choice, brand is all companies and organizations have to differentiate their offerings. Whether you're a nonprofit looking to build new donor bases or a product company trying to carve away from the market leader, the emotional associations people have with your enterprise are central to your success.

Right now Droid is riding a wave of being a viable iPhone alternative on a carrier that people like a lot better. In the long run though, its greatest strength is the integration with Google's Android system, which developers may flock to. But if, as a device, it wants to succeed, it's going to have to get it's branding in order.

So what are the take aways for nonprofits thinking about their brand?

1. Really know who you are. Windows and Droid are trying to be anti-Apples. That makes their message confused, and by definition, tied to someone elses. The key to good branding is authenticity.

2. Slick messaging < Well constructed messaging. The new Droid ads are slick and visually interesting, but they're not well constructed. Nonprofits tempted to pay for expensive campaigns may do better to spend their time on perfecting the message and extending it across their media presence.

3. Think about the long-term emotional experience of your brand. Droid may get a bunch of Apple hating dudes right now, but where do they go from there? What happens when they try to switch their message in a year to be more inclusive? They could easily seem like a flaky company. Nonprofits are particularly vulnerable to a loss of brand trust. Because social change efforts necessarily call upon our emotions and morals and ask trust to steward our resources to important problems, when people feel like their trust has been violated, their response can be especially strong. Nonprofits need to think in terms of long-term brand equity.