The Invisible Giant

A Business Lost in Translation

Recently, Canadian retail giant Sears introduced their new logo as part of their strategic plan to re-invent themselves. Over the last decade, sales have been on a steady decline causing the company to cut costs and close some of its stores. This new plan includes changing the format of its stores and improving their online customer experience.

Here's their new logo...

"Sears is in a free fall without a parachute. In its first quarter results in June, the company continued its decade-long downward trajectory, and at a frightening pace. It reported a 7.4% decline in same-store sales and a 14.5% year-over-year decline in revenues to $595.9 million. A new logo, when I can’t remember its old logo, isn’t a parachute." - Sears Founder, Tony Chapman.

It feels as though Sears just woke up and realized it wasn't at the top of people's minds anymore. I don't remember the last time I've heard or seen a Sears ad... and if I have, I don't remember it.

All that aside, let's take a look at this from another perspective. When you Google "Sears", this is what you get:

The first few items they highlight are: mattresses, furniture and appliances. But if you don't think of Sears when you need these things, you won't Google "Sears". However, you might search for those keywords instead.

When I searched "mattress store", Sears appeared 5th after The Brick, Dormez-vous, Sleep Country and Leon's. The same thing happened when I searched for "appliance store", appearing 4th after Leon's, Best Buy and Home Depot. Even worse, searching for "furniture store" put them on page 2. My point? Unless you directly search for Sears, odds are you won't find them early enough in your search results to click on their link. Somewhere along the way, people forgot about Sears because the company stopped planting the seed in their customer's minds and now consumers don't think of them first. When I'm shopping for a mattress, furniture or appliances, I think of a few different stores, but I don't think about Sears.

So what is Sears about? Do you remember their tagline? At one time it was "This is Sears". But what exactly is "This" referring to? It's obscure and unfocused. There is nothing that differentiates them from the rest and there lies the problem. Take a look at this Sears ad and see for yourself.

So my message to you is...

Your first priority as a business owner should be to remain at the top of people's minds so that when people need that  "thing" that you do so well, they will think of you instead of leaving it up to Google to tell them where they should go. 

What are you doing to continuously water that seed you've planted in people's minds?

Morty Silber, CEO

Mad Strategies Inc.
a Wizard of Ads Partner