CoreBrand featured on BtoB
14 June 2011
“Big Blue” birthday: IBM celebrates a century of innovation and transformation
Original article at: BtoB Online
IBM Corp., which celebrates its centennial this month, has achieved remarkable success over the years by developing innovative technology products and services and by continuing to transform its brand to adapt to a changing world.
The company was founded on June 16, 1911, as Computing Tabulating and Recording (CTR) Co., making such products as punch-card tabulators, commercial scales and clocks.
Three years later, the founders recruited Thomas J. Watson Sr. from National Cash Register Co. to be president-CEO. He led the company for 42 years, changing its name to International Business Machines in 1924 to reflect its global expansion.
Since then, IBM has been instrumental in developing technologies that have helped advance business and society, such as working with the U.S. government in 1936 to automate the Social Security system and providing technology systems to power NASA's Apollo 11 space mission in 1969 that put a man on the moon.
“For most of our history, we have been a company that has been dedicated to making our clients successful through science, data and engineering — from the earliest days of punch-card machines to helping to automate a lot of functions of enterprises today,” said John Kennedy, VP-corporate marketing at IBM.
“BIG BLUE”
IBM has long been known as “Big Blue,” a nickname whose exact origins are unknown. One theory is that it was inspired by the color of IBM's first mainframe computers, introduced in the 1960s. Another is that it sprang from IBM's former dress code of white shirts and dark suits, when many of its sales reps wore blue suits. A third theory is that it came simply from the color of IBM's first blue logo, introduced in 1947.
Whatever its origins, the nickname stuck and has long been associated with the company's image as a global technology giant with professional sales reps and strong corporate values.
“IBM really helped depict and define the image of the modern corporation — IBM blue-suiters and the image of a direct sales force for a company that is multinational and global,” Kennedy said. “When people thought of a modern corporation, IBM was an iconic company they thought of.”
Hayes Roth, CMO at branding firm Landor Associates, said, “As a kid in the '50s and '60s, I remember the IBM persona was one of this brain trust of incredible professionals at the forefront of everything technology-oriented. Always the white shirts and the blue suits — they had a real brand personality.”
Thomas J. Watson Jr. took over as CEO from his father in 1956 and led the company for the next 15 years, during which he focused on strong research and development. It was during his tenure that IBM introduced the first mainframe computer — the System/360 in 1964 — as well as innovations such as the first floppy disk in 1971, which made data storage affordable.
“THINK”
One of the most enduring slogans associated with IBM is “Think,” a motto first coined by Thomas J. Watson Sr. that appeared on signs at IBM offices to motivate employees, in advertising and as the name of the company publication.
“When I think about the history of IBM, one corporate concept that really jumps out at me is the word ‘Think.’ When they had that, they were really at the peak of their brand power,” said Jim Gregory, CEO of branding agency CoreBrand. “It was such a beautiful and simple concept, and it represented everything they did in a single word. I think that was one of the great branding ideas.”
IBM carried the “Think” idea forward into some of its products, including the ThinkPad, which debuted in 1992, following the introduction of the company's first personal computer in 1981. “The ThinkPad put IBM at the forefront of brand recognition for the general public,” Roth said. (IBM sold its personal computing business to Chinese computer company Lenovo in 2004.)
“[The ThinkPad] was by any measure the most recognizable brand for us — and arguably the only brand that touched individuals — tens of millions of people. For all these reasons, the idea that we would divest the PC business was, for many — pardon the pun — unthinkable,” said Sam Palmisano, who took over as CEO of IBM in 2002, during a speech this year at Johns Hopkins University. “Yet we knew that the emerging computing model would only accelerate the commoditization of the PC industry. And that's not where we wanted to be.”
With the divestiture of its PC business, IBM could focus solely on b2b, continuing to roll out technologies and services that would have an impact on businesses, government and society.
CONSULTING, E-BUSINESS AND ANALYTICS
Over the past 10 years, IBM has expanded significantly in three key areas — consulting services, on-demand business platforms and analytics.
In 2002, IBM acquired consultancy PricewaterhouseCoopers for $3.5 billion; the deal added 30,000 consultants to its consulting services division. The same year, IBM rolled out a new business platform, eBusiness On-Demand, to show how it anticipates customer needs and provides hardware, software and services for an on-demand computing world.
To launch eBusiness On-Demand, IBM turned to its agency of record, Ogilvy & Mather, New York. Lou Aversano, worldwide managing director at Ogilvy, who has managed the agency's IBM business since 1994, said, “Given IBM's unique point of view on the Internet, this was an opportunity for IBM to really take a leadership role with e-business and make it relevant.”
The eBusiness On-Demand campaign began with an eight-page manifesto in The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal that laid out IBM's ideas on how the world had changed, what the future held and how the company could help its customers achieve success. The campaign also included TV, online and outdoor advertising.
Another big push for IBM recently has been its entry into data and analytics services. It has acquired a number of companies in these areas over the past several years, including Cognos, Coremetrics, Netezza, SPSS and Unica Corp.
SMARTER PLANET
IBM's latest transformation has been the introduction of Smarter Planet, a business platform unveiled in November 2008 that shows how the company is providing solutions to help solve some of the world's most pressing problems in areas such as energy, transportation and healthcare.
Ogilvy created an integrated campaign to introduce the Smarter Planet initiative, and it has continued to roll out new executions — including TV, print and online ads, interactive billboards and social media.
“I think Smarter Planet is IBM at its best,” Aversano said. “IBM is a brand that has a point of view of what's going on in the world, and how it helps to shape that. IBM continues to push the boundaries of what technology can do to help advance business, societies and governments.”
IBM's Kennedy said: “We view Smarter Planet as a contemporary expression of what IBM has been doing for 100 years. EBusiness was an expression at that time of how IBM was driving progress and helping clients be more successful. Smarter Planet is today's version of how IBM is helping its clients be more successful and helping make the world better.”
Some of the newer components of Smarter Planet include Smarter Commerce, an e-commerce solution that reaches customers across multiple channels such as mobile devices and social media networks; and Smarter Cities, a program to help provide more efficient municipal infrastructures for areas like public safety and traffic systems.
“The agenda is a vision of the future,” Kennedy said. “It's an optimistic message, an agenda that has helped in a lot of ways make the IBM brand more approachable. IBM has been seen as a big company and, because it's big, we're very careful to make sure we portray ourselves as an organization made up of people who are sincere about making the world work better.”