Our
new pug Pay As You Go campaign for Three has got me
thinking about pets on the net and how they’re used.  People are proud of their pets, sure, but the
growing diversity in how they are being presented online is surprising. 

It
seems to be more than just a ‘cute’ thing, although the cult of ‘cuteness’ in
itself is not something to be scoffed at. The Japanese have their very own term
for ‘cute’. All things cuddly and sweet are called ‘kuwaii’. Kuwaii is a
massive part of culture there and has been for decades. Hello Kitty for example
is typical of kuwaii. It’s all things with chubby cheeks and over-sized doughy
eyes. 

There
seems to be an immediate positive enjoyment in seeing a cute image. But studies
have also found it to be more than this. Research suggests that ‘because cute
things produce positive feelings, their influence may extend to other aspects
of behaviour’.  This study suggests that not only
do we feel good when we see a cute animal; we are also more attentive
afterwards. Participants given a simple motor task (the children’s game
Operation) consistently performed better after having seen images of animals.
What’s more those who saw baby animals outperformed those who were shown less
adorable adult animals.

This
might be going a bit far, but as different sharing platforms develop and
diversify over the web, pets and kuwaii are becoming something mainstream on a
global level. 

Evidence
can be found in the sheer volume of YouTube hits for pet-related content: Fenton 9.3 million views of a
dog chasing deer, 3.7 for a cat playing with a toaster. Maybe pets have become
the great leveler that football used to be before it got excessively expensive
and political. People can relate to animals. Despite the pampered pooches of
the likes of Paris Hilton they also remain slightly classless.

They
are certainly useful in this way to brands. Take Chanel. Chanel is a brand
that’s pretty inaccessible to a lot of people. It’s at the summit of high end.
Even those passionate about fashion can sometimes only aspire to its style
rather than being able to afford the real deal. Karl Lagerfeld is likewise a slightly aloof
figure. What did he do? He put his cat in charge of the Chanel Twitter channel.
Genius. Suddenly the brand has a bit of the humour it maybe lacked before. This
gentle charm has made it accessible.

Mark
Zuckerberg’s done it with his dog Beast. Though this feels less about the
Facebook brand and more about softening his own public profile.  According to The Telegraph one in ten pets
has a social media profile. I wonder if it’s not a nice way to talk online
about something without it being so overtly personal as one’s own social media
profile. You can have fun with it, because you’re pretending to be cat or dog.

Kuwaii and pets on the net seem to be good
barrier breakers. They have a mass appeal that can make both brands and
personalities more accessible.

[Thoughts
from Planning newbie Alexa]

This
week I’ve been looking at how brands exist outside advertising.  We absorb so much of advertising
subconsciously, and it’s so irrevocably tied to culture, that this is actually
quite a tricky mission. The core question is what would someone think of our
clients if they hadn’t seen any ads? What might they pick up from culture at
large? This could be references in books or magazines, how people talk about
them in their tweets, how people manipulate them in memes etc.  What is the brand’s impact on society? Do
people joke about them? Do they respect or chastise them?

One
concept I was invited to explore was the ‘Schema’. This is a psychological idea
I’d actually read about years ago and completely forgotten. Yet it’s a huge
part of how we sculpt our opinions and form memories. 

[An
abstracted diagram of schemata in our consciousness]

Here’s
a cut down definition from Wikipedia:

"In
psychology and cognitive science, a schema (plural schemata or schemas), describes a mental structure of preconceived ideas, a framework
representing some aspect of the world, or a system of organizing and perceiving
new information. Schemats influence attention and the absorption of new
knowledge: people are more likely to notice things that fit into their schema,
while re-interpreting contradictions to the schema as exceptions or distorting them
to fit.”

The
“Schematas influence attention and the absorption of new knowledge” bit is
really crucial to brands. You can say something new about a brand, but often
people will have a preconceived idea about the product or company, and so they
will only take the message on board if it sits comfortably within their frame
of reference. If it fits it sticks. Schemata give our brains a framework in
which to relate things. Stereotypes are a kind of schema. 

[the
brain naturally makes networks and associations – these can be hard to break]

Schemata
also have a frightening ability to manipulate ideas. I remember when I first
learnt about them I was shown the opening scene from a film with a motorbike
accident. I think it may have been Lawrence of Arabia. Anyway, after we watched
this five-minute clip we were asked several questions. The key one was: “Did
you see broken glass?” The majority of us answered affirmative: Yes. However,
winding back the film there was no glass at all. Our brains had filled in the
gaps with ideas based on expectation. Bike crash- carnage- glass.  We’d taken new information (film of the crash)
and manipulated it to meet our preconceived expectations (broken glass). 

[Lawrence’s
bike]

So
schema can be both a help and hindrance to advertisers. Positive schema are
useful, and negative a hurdle. However it’s not even that simplistic. Your
brand might be surrounded by positive schema, but these might not sit perfectly
in line with the direction in which you want to take the brand. Learning to
unlock the psychology and culture behind what people think of your brand is an
invaluable lesson. It helps you nurture your brand, and ultimately to change it
for the better.   

[Thoughts
from Planning newbie Alexa]