The dangers of judging quickly

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When Steve Jobs returned to Apple in 1997 the company was in bad shape. Its market share had been eroded by Microsoft, and the business was reportedly losing $1.04 billion per year. The co-founder led a bold reimaging, and launched the iconic advertising campaign Think Different. The ad itself consisted of archive footage of trail-blazing individuals - from Muhammed Ali, to Mahatma Gandhi. The voiceover proclaimed that “the ones crazy enough to believe they can change the world, are the ones that do.” The commercial didn’t feature a single Apple product, but it did offer a compelling vision of the company’s new worldview.

While Jaguar’s electric re-invention ad has divided audiences – and whipped the marketing community into a frenzy – Apple’s example shows that the approach is not without precedence. Soon the carmaker will reveal the model at the centre of its new direction. While vision and philosophy are fundamentally important, there’s nothing so crucial as the product. Will it captivate audiences? Offer something fresh? And catapult the cat into a lucrative era supported by the adoration of a new market? The code to unlocking this lies in the company’s heritage – and the way in which that heritage is articulated. Brands often assume that younger people don’t care about history, but this is a mistake.

The fact that the Jaguar film has caused so much debate is one way of qualifying its success. Neither has the re-launch been restricted to the echo chamber of those who work in branding. After doubling down on core products, a sharp re-brand and some cost saving exercises, Jobs produced a miraculous revival of Apple. A year after his return, the business was making $309 million per year. Jaguar executives will be hoping for an equivalent leap.