Because no one cares.

Sell love. Sell style. Sell confidence. Sell friendship. Sell something that people cares about. And, the simple truth is no one cares about your product.

You could have the most awesome widget in the world. Your customers would love you and your widget, until a better and cheaper widget come along. And inevitably, it will come.

This is the essence of branding. It evokes something inside your customers that goes far beyond your product offering.

However, you need to know exactly what your brand stands for. Everything that you do must go with this branding. Once you deviate, you risk jeopardizing your brand.

Take a look at these two ads:

Would you say that these two ads are well differentiated from each other? From just this ad, would you choose to shop at one retailer versus the other? Could you tell what the branding is for these two ads?

I would say that they both similarly stand for “affordable style”. However, I could not really tell if I’d prefer one or another.

Now, if I tell you that one ad is from Target, and one ad is from Ikea, would you now have a preference?

Some of you may be indifferent, but I think at least a few of you would have a preference.

And that preference was formed over a history of interactions with the brand. This history includes past shopping experience, product experience. Lastly, this history included your past experience with their branding: “affordable style”.

In fact, I would assert that some of you would have a preference on which style you prefer from the two different retailers. You may or may not be able to tell from this ad, but the product offering are different. For the most part, Ikea carries products that are uniquely available at Ikea. In fact, Ikea’s style is so iconic that one could walk into a living room and recognize the Ikea style.

I would even assert that while both brands stand for “affordable style”, Ikea leans a little more toward the style side of that equation. This is a good thing for Ikea, because affordability means price, and price could always be undercut.

Which is why it was so shocking of a move that Ikea would have posted the above ad. Ikea, this month, gave up its iconic font for 50 years, and instead adopted a commonly used font, a font so common that you have it. It’s Verdana, available on any Microsoft products.

Now, I personally love Verdana. It’s designed for ease of readability on the web. In fact, this blog, at this time, is designed with Verdana. However, is this the best print font for a company that relies so heavily on style and design? I doubt it.

In fact, this change caused so much controversies, that it caught the attention of Time, NPR, and Fast Company.

Ikea picked the new font due to cost reasons… And I think we can all empathize, especially in this economic environment.

However, something is sacred. The icons of your brand are sacred, and should never be sacrificed.

In Ikea’s case, their font was one of their icons, and it had just been offered up in the name of cost-saving.

Would it have a negative effect on Ikea? In the short-term, probably not. In fact, the cost-saving would probably yield a positive return for Ikea.

In the long-term? I ask again, are the two ads above differentiated enough from each other that you could form a preference for one or the other?

Ikea forgot that, at the end of the day, they were not simply selling furniture, they were selling a style. That style just got a little bit less stylish…

Related articles

• Ikea customers furious over change of font (dailyfinance.com)
• Ikea’s first font change in 50 years ignites backlash (ctv.ca)