The Kardashians: B2B Marketing Lessons From the Branding Empire with Head of Marketing & Communications at Foursquare, Michele Morelli
The Kardashians are masters of marketing. It’s the way they live. From their TV show to their individual brands like 818 Tequila, Good American and Skims, the Kardashians and Jenners are marketing themselves.
So with the help of our special guest, Head of Marketing & Communications at Foursquare, Michele Morelli, we are taking marketing lessons from The Kardashians.
We’ll talk about using the power of proximity, controlling your own narrative, and much more.
About our guest, Michele Morelli
Michele Morelli is Head of Marketing & Communications at Foursquare, where she oversees Foursquare’s efforts and strategy across product marketing, corporate communications, public relations, partner marketing, and design. Michele brings with her over 20 years of experience across numerous industries – including technology, finance, and media, at companies like Gartner, Yahoo and AOL. Prior to joining the company in 2021, Michele served as EVP of Marketing at Toluna Corporate.
What B2B Companies Can Learn FromThe Kardashians:
- Use the power of proximity. Reference and connect cultural touchpoints to your brand. It’s like how the Kardashians are close to the OJ Simpson trial, Paris Hilton, the Olympics, Kanye West…all cultural touchpoints that increase their awareness and brand recall in the public’s mind. Ian says, “It matters to be close to Hilton because everybody knows what a Hilton is. It matters to be close to the OJ Simpson case because everybody knew what that was. It matters to be close to the Olympics because everybody knew what that was. A lot of times in marketing, you're trying to figure out how you can leverage the power and the story of other things to do that sort of jiu jitsu, to take that energy and put that wind in your sail too and propel you forward.” Similarly, you can align your brand with other like-minded brands and cross-promote content. Michele says that “There's this cross-promotional audience blending that has happened simply because of who [the Kardashians] have aligned themselves with.”
- Control your own narrative. The Kardashians were able to control their story by creating their own reality show. Michele says, “Controlling the narrative is always incredibly important, but two, the consistency from which they hit the narrative is so important. Like, they know what they stand for, they know what the business is they want to promote, they know how to weave a narrative around it. In marketing where you want to control the message that goes out, if there's going to be a story that's written, how do you make sure that it's framed in the best possible light for your brand?”
Quotes
*”John Wanamaker was famous for the quote, ‘Half of my advertising spend is wasted, the only problem is I don't know which half.’ It is no longer true. I think we have a much better direction of how we are spending our money and where we're actually seeing movement. The question is what aperture you look at it with. Is it a week? Is it six weeks? Is it six months? So really making sure you have that right window to measure your media I think is also going to be very important.” - Michele Morelli
*”What's really important from a brand perspective that I think Kim embodies is that if you are a legacy brand or a heritage brand, it is very difficult to move away from how people perceive you and what the core is. There's always a, ‘Yeah, but…’ when we talk about Kim. And I think for marketers, we see that if once you are thought of in one way, getting people to come along for the journey, that you're something different, especially if you're still doing that same thing is very, very difficult.” - Michele Morelli
Time Stamps
[0:55] Meet Michele Morelli, Head of Marketing & Communications at Foursquare
[1:55] The Kardashians' Marketing Powerhouse
[3:20] Foursquare's Marketing Strategy
[5:2 The Origin of The Kardashians Show
[8:13] The Evolution and Impact of The Kardashians
[15:32] Marketing Takeaways from The Kardashians
[18:38] The Power of Proximity in Marketing
[36:10] The Kardashian Flywheel Effect
[36:21] Kris Jenner: The Mastermind
[37:56] The Ubiquity of the Kardashian Brand
[45:54] The Evolution of Foursquare
[51:18] Content Strategy and ROI
[1:00:01] Embracing Technology in Marketing
Links
Connect with Michele on LinkedIn
About Remarkable!
Remarkable! is created by the team at Caspian Studios, the premier B2B Podcast-as-a-Service company. Caspian creates both nonfiction and fiction series for B2B companies. If you want a fiction series check out our new offering - The Business Thriller - Hollywood style storytelling for B2B. Learn more at CaspianStudios.com.
In today’s episode, you heard from Ian Faison (CEO of Caspian Studios) and Meredith Gooderham (Senior Producer). Remarkable was produced this week by Meredith Gooderham, mixed by Scott Goodrich, and our theme song is “Solomon” by FALAK.
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