Will brand Zuma survive the wrath of the youth?

2011-09-05 07:21

Looking at TV news coverage last week of those angry youngsters outside ANC headquarters, burning T-shirts imprinted with Jacob Zuma's face, made me wonder just how representative they are of the majority of South Africa's voters who are all under the age of 30.

I'm pretty sure they were certainly representative of all those black, unemployed youths who make up almost 20 per cent of the total vote and who are Julius Malema's greatest trump card.   

And with youngsters, however poor, being so brand savvy, it made me wonder just how Brand Zuma was doing these days.  

Few politicians ever bother to consider the role of marketing in their success or failure and there is no question that the dramatic drop in popularity of President Zuma among those protesting supporters of Julius Malema last week, has been caused by him and his closest allies ignoring the fundamentals of marketing.

The most fundamental mistake that Zuma and his cabinet make is to completely ignore the very foundation of marketing communication. And that is they persistently keep telling South Africans what they, the government want to say, and never ever what the citizens of this country what they want to hear.

Especially the unemployed youth and poor, services-deprived communities.   

The second big mistake made by cabinet misters, with the exception of seasoned marketers such as Trevor Manuel and a few others, is to assume that human beings are naturally endowed with the ability to communicate. Not realising and often demonstrating that human beings are the most inefficient of Mother Nature's communicators. Many of the ministers chose to talk down to their audiences, be they small rural communities or the entire nation through the mass media.

Another mammoth mistake is to ignore the fact that when it comes to any form of human interaction, relationships are the key to successful discourse. Whether this involves husbands and wives, friends, work colleagues, companies and their customers or politicians and their constituents.

As any junior salesman will attest, if one does not have a personal relationship with a customer, selling something to that customer is extremely difficult if not impossible.

I wonder if President Zuma remembers that insightful comment by Independent Newspapers' Peter Sullivan - if President Mbeki has chosen to meet with editors regularly instead of just once every now and then, the drubbing he received at Polokwane might well have been avoided.

The importance of relationship building is critical to business and even more important in politics. Because trying to communicate with strangers, let alone doing business with them or asking them for support, is difficult and often extremely dangerous.

When it comes to getting across a point of view, people you know listen to you far more intently and sympathetically than a complete stranger.

From a marketing point of view, President Zuma has probably lost the confidence of the majority of South Africans by not making any effort to get to know them; not knowing what to say to them and being seen to be indecisive and non-committal. Not to mention lacking leadership.  

He and pretty much all of his ministers are making the most dangerous of all marketing mistakes by branding themselves as masters and not the servants they were voted in to be.

Marketing is an obsession with customer service. Which, on the part of companies and brands means taking chips off shoulders and displaying a modicum humility and subservience.

President Zuma and the bulk of his cabinet have never understood that simple definition but opted instead for marketing themselves with an obsession for control and superiority.  

If government were a company its corporate slogan would probably be something like; "We might make mistakes, but we are ever wrong."

NOTE: This is an almost identical article to one I wrote in 2008 and have simply substituted the word "Mbeki" for "Zuma."  

Thabo Mbeki also won landslide elections for the ANC. He was also aloof and accused of being indecisive. And in spite of what the ANCYL claims now, they were at the forefront of calling for his dismissal at Polokwane.

Makes you wonder about the sustainability Brand Zuma doesn't it? Did he so much give his brand image much of thought as he sat with the King and Queen of Norway exchanging pleasantries while his headquarters were under siege in Johannesburg?      


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