In yesterday’s post, I talked about how advertising has to become more inspirational. Calling it coincidence or luck, I encountered above inspiring example last night.

Visiting Amsterdam for a few days, I’ve seen a lot of print/display ads and billboards announcing the new H&M flagship store in Amsterdam. Nothing made me stop and consider visiting the store. But above video installation just made everybody stop in their tracks and look. Muse created such an amazing video experience, it wasn’t clear for a while if we’re looking at art or advertising as art. In the end, it doesn’t matter. H&M and Muse put a smile on my face and made Amsterdam even more magic. If you think advertising can’t be inspirational, just watch the video.

Unless you lived on the moon, you realize the global economy is struggling because most corporations are not constructed to produce any real value. They are designed to maximize shareholder value while stakeholders are getting squeezed to improve the bottom line and introduce as many efficiencies as possible. Add to that corporate welfare, Fed and Treasury policies, regulations (or lack thereof) and you end up with a toxic mess of an ongoing banking crisis, mind-numbing landscapes of mini malls, toxicity in assets, the environment and the overall capitalistic world we are living in. And, while people are crowding the bargain bins, corporations continue to develop cheaper ways to satisfy the need for the bargain. Interestingly, when you produce a mediocre product/service (create thin value, as Umair Haque calls it), the price is all what matters. When you create real value/thick value, price becomes a tertiary consideration. Call it awesomeness, call it being amazing, call it being a linchpin.

With a few, rare exceptions, advertising has focused on creating thin value. Rather than inspiring people with marketing for products that add value, most of marketing/advertising is focused on brainwashing people into buying stuff that makes no difference. Just another item I can use and throw away/forget about effortlessly without considering the implications for the rest of the world. (Labor Conditions, Environment, Export/Import Structures)

Now, let’s look at the advertising/marketing industry. It’s not a dying industry but an industry in deep trouble. We are not considered partners, we’re just another vendor that sells questionable value. Media Buying has become a commodity, media planning to follow soon. The people we market to are busy tuning us out because they don’t feel marketing creates any real value. While we continue to communicate to people as they were still consumers, they are busy producing, communicating and building networks. We have commoditized our industry to death, starting to hop on a dangerous death spiral. Just like the whole economic system.

Advertising is just one pillar of the economic system we’re living in. Advertising can’t change the world or make it a better place. But, as part of a new economic system, advertising can be an inspiration, an artistic expression of the paradigm change. As an industry, we need to focus on the drastic changes the economic system is going through. We can safely say, the end of creating slim/thin value for profit is fast approaching. No matter how good your strategies/tactics/ideas are, unless you create real value for society with your products and services, you will fail in the long run.

My headline “Why advertising professionals need to be economic professionals” didn’t imply you need to watch Bloomberg all day, read each article in the WSJ or get a degree in economics. Most of what you read or see there is just an expression of times almost passed. All of us need to understand that our whole economic system is transforming and changing into something much more substantial, sustainable and human. Advertising is just another expression of this change. Please work, create, add value accordingly.

Brands often consider creating communities on their site or social platforms. It sounds so appealing: You create a community and now you have an easily accessible group of people that you can engage and converse with.

The problem is: You can’t create communities

Think about your local community. It wasn’t created by plopping down a Starbucks, Target or a local snack shack and then hoping for people to show up. Communities are places where like-minded people can come together. That’s why you have art communities, food communities, religious communities – you name it. And that’s the reason why certain stores and brands don’t work in your community because they don’t understand the mindset of your local world.

In the digital space, brands often consider communities as a place to be worshipped by people. Instead, online communities are places where like-minded people hang out and, if you’re really lucky and doing a great job managing the community, where people can interact with brands and tell them how to do a better job delivering their product/service. At the minimum, brands need to help communities do what they want to do. Brands need to give people something concrete to gather around for. You have to kill your corporate hubris and believe that participants in your community can actually improve your product/service. Foster discourse and an open exchange of ideas.

Tap into the need of people to be heard: People have transformed from passive consumers to active collaborators and co-creators of the products and services they produce. These principles help you tap into the power of communities by developing a foundation of trust, motivating people to become more active participants and providing access to peer group knowledge and skills. It requires a lot of work and community management to tap into the power of communities. You don’t create communities, you merely help them get things done. On their terms. Based on their needs. Not yours.

face it: Nobody is more hated than Wall Street and the banks associated with the financial crisis and TARP. These emotions are based in reality: People feel they are paying for the mistakes of the banks, the banks have escaped punishment, get preferential treatment from the Federal government, and continue to reap benefits/pay bonuses.

Pre-Lehman, all banks tried to build emotional trust by showing smiling employees, happy customers and surround their communications with happy music, inviting colors, babies and dogs. The warm-and-fuzzy path. This might have somehow worked pre-Lehman when we considered banks as partners and service providers.

From partners to enemies

When banks transformed from partners to enemies, people started to look closer at bonuses, at their own bills and the fees they are forced to pay. Each new scandal (can you say Foreclosuregate?) reinforces the negative perception and opinion of banks. And, what do banks do? They continue to travel down the warm-and-fuzzy-path. Instead, they need to walk a mile in the shoes of their customers and understand the daily struggle of private customers and small businesses. They need to stop pretending the financial crisis was nothing more than a little bump on the road to economic recovery. For many people, it was and is the Mt. Everest of financial difficulties.

Stop smiling. Start helping.

It’s time for banks to stop smiling and understand the severity of the situation for many people and businesses. There’s nothing warm and fuzzy about the path many people and businesses have to travel right now. Banks need to develop programs and services that help build trust. Stop squeezing your customers with hidden fees and unnecessary penalties. Consider your cusomters as kings and not servants of your marble-filled empire.

In summary, stop talking about how great you are. Rather, let the people talk about the good experiences they had with your brand. Good experiences in the banking system are so rare right now, any shared success story by people could have an enormous impact. Stop advertising a false reality. Start producing a valuable experience for experience.

The biggest opportunity: Credit Unions

Is it the decentralized nature of Credit Unions or the non-flashy nature of Credit Unions that made them not take advantage of the financial crisis and the negative perception of banks? Sure, we have brilliant initiatives but we don’t really experience a unified effort from Credit Unions. They are perfectly positioned for the current mindset of people: local, community-focused and human. Their biggest disadvantage remains that people believe Credit Unions are for specific professions only and have a limited network. Credit Unions need to fight these misperceptions aggressively and continue to tap into their biggest strength: the community of like-minded people.

Financial institutions have to find ways to disrupt the current way of doing business. Clearly, people are not happy with the status quo and starve for disruptive products and services. They have to focus less on delivering profits and focus more on delivering a delightful experience and service. Marketing is much more effective when you have a remarkable product or service. Too many financial institutions continue to focus on their above the line campaigns or the bottom line and not enough on what really counts: the needs of their customers.