Three stories of imposing red brick, McIntyre Elementary School was a small town classic. Towering windows, chalkboards that seemed a mile-long, green walls and black tile floors, it remains the picture that pops in when I hear the word school. Is your school still in you? Are you still in school?
Marketing is the continuing education of observation; labs are campaigns. When the student in you is ready, the lesson always arrives. Today it comes courtesy of Bavarian Motor Works–better known as BMW.
After pioneering the era of “branded entertainment,” BMW has popped the clutch and left it behind. Advantages are always fleeting and seldom is there a better example than this: BMW practically creates a category. Others rush in to copy. Demand explodes. Prices escalate. Value diminishes. BMW exits.
AdAge reports, “The primary reason for BMW’s new backseat approach: Branded entertainment is just getting too expensive. According to executives close to the client and experts in Hollywood, BMW doesn’t have the marketing dollars to ink entertainment deals at a time when integration fees and marketing requests from film or TV partners are escalating.”
Like poker and used cars, knowing when to get out is almost more important than getting in.
Here’s the lesson: Don’t love marketing campaigns that can’t love you back. BMW saw the party was over and moved on. You should too. When advantages diminish, depart. Better yet, when it seems they are about to–be the first one out the door.
Like BMW, you can create just as much buzz ending something as in beginning it–provided you do both boldly and smartly.
There’s another lesson in this story. Go read it now and then click to continue…
