Introduction
The name of Leo Burnett is imprinted in the history of American culture as a unique expression of the approach to advertising aesthetics as a particular type of art. The originality of the Burnett brand lies in the innovative introduction of memorable characters into advertising culture. At the moment, the Burnett agency is a force that independent agencies have to reckon with, an example of which is the story of the Australian independent agencies, which Burnett Inc. practically declared war on (Coyne, 2021). The images created under the auspices of Burnett are among the most expressive examples of advertising culture as an art in the 20th century. Burnett argued that every product contains an inherent practical component, something that motivates people to buy it and compels a manufacturer to release it — this characteristic of a product makes it stand out from the crowd (Sampson, 2021). It is this component of the product that every product advertisement should emphasize.
Leo Barnett opened his creative workshop in Chicago at the most challenging time – during the Great Depression, and many predicted the failure of this enterprise. However, Barnett set himself the goal of creating high-level advertising, and, despite any difficulties, he achieved the desired results. Like Rosser Reeves, Barnett focused on the product; his concept was based on the “intrinsic drama” of the product – a quality that can be emphasized and that can interest the consumer (Strickland, 2021). In 1955, Leo Barnett undertook another successful rebrand for Marlboro cigarettes. Initially positioned as a ladies’ cigarette, the brand even had a red filter explicitly designed to hide lipstick marks (Bright, 2021). Therefore, Barnett faced a rather difficult task of attracting a male audience to the brand: Leo understood that a new packaging design and a successful slogan were not enough for repositioning (Grilo et al., 2021). Then the image of the brutal cowboy Marlboro Man was created, in which the masculinity and strength of a real man were most clearly manifested (Bergon, 2019). The fascination with Westerns in the 1950s also contributed to the advertising campaign’s success.
Accordingly, the historical context of the company was set by the creative side of Barnett’s personality, which relied on current trends and understanding of the audience in the creative activity of creating advertising images. Thus, the primary marketing tactics and strategies that the company has relied on since the beginning of its history were created. Barnett was hardworking and wanted his employees to share his dedication to their cause. Burnett’s all-consuming pursuit of perfection was contagious. The competition brought out the best in Leo Burnett and the best in the people who worked with him. Burnett’s creative approach was in stark contrast to many of his contemporaries, who built their advertising agencies on research and marketing (Meng & Huang, 2022). Burnett based his reputation on the assertion that “market share” can only be captured with the help of the “lobes of the brain” – the ability to stimulate customers’ basic needs and beliefs. When Burnett began his career in advertising, claims about the benefits of various products were accompanied by intricate narratives—full stories about buyers of a given product who were rewarded for their choice with social success, popularity, and romantic adventures. Instead, Burnett pushed imagery to the fore. This revolutionary approach reflects the historical context of the company.
He was convinced that visual eloquence was more compelling than empty promises and lengthy narratives. The photographs and drawings appealed to the buyers’ “basic emotions and primitive instincts.” In 1956, he argued that the most effective advertising is one that makes an emotional impression on the consumer (Bozorgi et al., 2022). He devoted much of his career to coaching his employees to identify these symbols, these visual archetypes, that could “leave a lasting impression of the advertised brand in the minds of consumers.” Thus, the company, led by Barnett, was keenly aware of the audience of buyers and their social structure and moods. The social aspect brought the phenomenon of advertising and marketing campaigns closer to people, developing concepts such as the target audience, market segmentation, and much more due to many social factors.
The economic success of the marketing business was thus, for the first time, based more on creativity than scientific knowledge. Leo Barnett’s methods, which have survived to this day in agency branches worldwide, were often disadvantageous in terms of economic processes (Jain, 2021). For example, from time to time, Burnett invited an outside person to evaluate an advertising campaign, which increased the duration of work on projects. The agency staff did not like this method. In Burnett’s defense, after the consultant’s visit, everyone tried to do a little better (Purchase & Volery, 2020). The head of the company often gave creative, innovative tasks to his employees, where he asked in a structured or stream-of-consciousness mode to describe a product or topic that he personally asked. Such approaches confirmed the importance of innovation policy in the economic success of any company, which was scientifically proven only years later. However, the economic context was not limited to innovation.
Initially, Barnett worked for several years without earning a dollar. The market was not ready for changes that were ahead of history: neither the chocolate makers nor even Wrigley Gum was interested in marketing campaigns (Ratten, 2022). The expense items did not include advertising as a mandatory aspect of doing business, so even Barnett’s bright ideas, which later became a cult for the nation, were rejected. At the same time, the financial side of the company itself initially consisted of the capital of 50 thousand dollars, which began to pay off only ten years later (Hawkins & Neilson, 2022). However, now integrated marketing communications around the world, creating creative concepts and interactive solutions, up to print and guerrilla marketing, are the basis of the operations of company branches (Zavattaro et al., 2021). It was meta-innovations, the preservation of a unique organizational approach that allowed the organization to achieve the creativization of advertising professions, their integration into the culture, and the approval of marketing as an essential process within any business.
The outstanding talents that the Burnett brand showed in its industrial path from 1935 were highly appreciated, as Theodore McManus influenced them, an iconic figure in the world of early advertising culture. The Burnett brand is a patronizing figure exposing other companies in need of support seeking significant market presence. The historical context for this entrepreneurial brand is that of the Burnett agency’s lasting influence on the American establishment’s marketing tactics and structural organization. The social aspect of the activity of this business is expressed in the specifics of the aesthetics of advertising a particular product (Ali & Anwar, 2021). Based on representative brands and persona concepts, the enterprise under the auspices of Leo Burnett created a galaxy of expressive advertising characters whose expressiveness was able to promote the market behind them.
Entrepreneurship
Advertising in business is a lever for promoting goods and services. The primary function of advertising is to convince potential customers to buy. It serves as a source of information as a factor of psychological influence on potential consumers (Beard & Petrotta, 2020). This media business paid more attention to the social factors of advertising, revealing the creative aspect of this activity to a greater extent. As a rule, advertising texts of those times were full of promises and extended narratives, which were accompanied by nothing more than the product’s appearance. The social reaction to this phenomenon was as nondescript as the advertising itself. By replacing long texts with visual images, and short, simple but biting phrases, Burnett Inc. ushered in a new era of advertising agency entrepreneurship.
The entrepreneurial spirit was born initially in the company at its very dawn: Leo Barnett started a risky venture by borrowing a significant amount of money. Marketing is always riskier than other aspects of business and operations because the effect of advertising can only really be measured after it has been launched, which incurs costs. Moreover, marketing requires constant innovation, which is confirmed by such essential features as market positioning, the need for rebranding and refurbishment, brand accompaniment, mission, and vision (Camilleri, 2018; Kotler et al., 2019). Accordingly, the nature of entrepreneurship was built on the integration of advertising with marketing, innovation, and values close to the consumer. Long before the concept of integrated marketing, Leo Burnett believed that in his speech, advertising does not play a solo part but is an integral part of a group of activities that can be generalized by the general concept of marketing, and it should play its role in harmony with them (Quesenberry, 2020 ). At the same time, entrepreneurship in this area has finally received a color closer to human behavior.
The style of advertising, authored by Leo Burnett, was based on love and respect for people. He understood the consumer very well and addressed people in a welcoming and friendly manner, using firm, simple, and instinctive imagery and relatively simple phrases. From an aggressive selling style, coercion, and enticing style, advertising has become a more subtle art, even becoming somewhat of a cult phenomenon (Campbell et al., 2022). Such an approach involved taking into account the audience secondary to the agency. When the company took orders, the employees had a better understanding of the target segment than the customer, which provided an incredible experience in terms of knowledge and understanding of consumer habits and behavior. Working with diverse companies, Burnett Inc. built up and constantly supplemented and changed the profile of the citizens of the country, thoroughly representing their interests, purchasing power, and preferences. In fact, the innovation policy was supported by the organization’s very fabric, and not just by the personality of Leo Barnett, which created the unique value of entrepreneurship. Maintaining this approach at such a high level has allowed not only the development of organizations worldwide but also to maintain a leading position for many years.
The economic feature of the company’s activities became the meaning of this business and was expressed by following the current trend. The Burnett brand has been following youth culture since the 1960s. In particular, within the framework of the activities of this company, there was a marketing song dedicated to Heinz ketchup (Sohel, 2019). Its specialty is the company’s commitment to creating exceptional characters as a business value that embodies brand culture. Determining the importance of this entrepreneurship, it should be noted the organization’s in-depth approach, including the attention to detail and style necessary to expose brands during marketing campaigns. Advertising activity in the analysis is expressed as patronizing concerning other businesses, as a guiding conceptual arch. The nature of this business lies directly in the awareness of the need to brand the product being sold. The Leo Burnett Brand deeply embraced creating a relatable and attractive identity to sell products, thus revolutionizing the business industry and the American culture. The uniqueness of Burnett’s concept is inherent in American culture in general, in which branding is one of the unique features (Anwar & Shah, 2018). Branding goods and creating unique cultural artifacts from them equipped with mascots, that is, the characters responsible for the product, made a natural sensation. Within the advertising-oriented culture prevalent in America in the second half of the 20th century, the measurements developed by Burnett turned out to be appropriate. Economically, branding is such a relevant feature to the economic picture of Western culture that Leo Burnett seems to be one of its pioneers.
Leo Burnett’s global advertising agency network, headquartered in Chicago, includes approximately 270 companies in 78 countries, including 88 full-service advertising agencies, including mail order, database, sales, and product promotions on the market. To date, Burnett’s advertising agency is the largest in the US and seventh in the world (Leo Burnett Worldwide, 2022a). It consists of Leo Burnett Company Inc. and Leo Burnett Worldwide Inc., an international holding company. The company is also the largest private advertising agency in the US. Leo Burnett successfully serves 7 of the top 25 brands – Coca-Cola, Kellogg, Marlboro, McDonald’s, Nintendo, Tampax, and Walt Disney (Leo Burnett Worldwide, 2022b). Thus, some of the most famous brands and most prominent companies adhere to the foundations of innovation policy and integrated marketing laid down by the founder of the organization at the very beginning of his journey.
Networks
However, the number of competitors still cannot but exert a certain pressure on the business of this organization in external and global commercial networks. Despite the unique concept of creating expressive characters, Leo Burnett can’t help but experience a break from international competition. According to a selection of the most influential advertising agencies, Burnett has comprehensive coverage but cannot enter a full-fledged global market. Speaking in network theory, there is a fierce struggle in the global market for free nodes of beneficial relationships with corporate clients, leaving practically no ribs for connection. Companies from Latin America are significant enough to enter the top five, which is an obstacle to the company’s growth to a more impressive global significance.
The geographic factor is an essential indicator of external networks and valuable relationships. The obstacles to the horizontal development of the company lie not only in the plane of high competition but also in a whole layer of cultural differences and features of the market offerings. Leo Barnett could offer working ideas for America in large quantities, but the color and beliefs of other regions of the globe require a completely different approach, which in turn must be implemented by professionals in this field. At this stage, the struggle for nodes turns into a struggle for highly qualified personnel who can help avoid incidents and conflicts on a cultural or religious basis, as well as provide positively resonant advertising for the products of this region. Accordingly, for the most part, practical relations with external networks rest on the issue of expanding the company and finding appropriate high-level specialists for this activity.
The social network is scalable as a particular pattern of a company’s relationship to operations in the context of society. Leo Burnett is committed to the brands he seeks to promote; therefore, the company’s principle of operation is based on networking (Iqbal, 2019). The company is a meta-agent helping to promote other brands. Due to this, the individual brand character of this advertising agency is formed. The company’s philosophy is to take special care of the companies it promotes to ensure an exceptionally respectable position as a trendsetter in the social network. These functional relationships contribute to the gradual expansion of the social network in which the company operates. Moreover, the organizational structure of the fresh approach to social responsibility makes the agency’s interaction with the internal network unique at the edge level, using resources as graphs (Anwar et al., 2018). Keeping up with rapidly changing cultural trends requires the same agile, and adaptable thinking at the management level passed down to employees.
Commercial networks are often linked to the supply chain. However, this media business is focused on services that can be produced remotely in many cases. Therefore, aspects of the relationship of nodes are built on financial and direct interaction with customers. Given the creative nature of Barnett Inc.’s operations, relationships also have a unique structure. Advertising largely depends on the product or service itself, which strives to be unique in the market: this type of activity is entirely far from routine repetition. Therefore, it is practically impossible to predict the result each time unless the company has experience in the customer’s field. However, even in this case, it is necessary to develop an entirely new approach so that the positioning of the customer in the market does not coincide with the previous client of the company. Thus, an ecological, commercial network is being built, where the edges of relationships try not to intersect and not create conflict nodes. The agency is fully interested in the fact that even direct competitors, turning to them for help, will maintain profit growth and remain loyal for many years to come.
Finally, if we consider in detail the company’s internal organization with the theory of networks, then its structure will also differ from the classical business. The company rules described above, which Leo Barnett introduced, can also be supplemented by regular gatherings of employees and presentations of products, advertising projects, and services. Each cell of the network is constant interaction with others, and the management in this situation is not removed from the employees but, on the contrary, actively participates in their operational tasks. The network graph edges are forked in all directions, forming this permanent connection. Thus, the company tries not to miss any idea that could potentially become an effective and successful advertising campaign for the customer’s product. Given the role of management, which often divides the work of lower-level employees, it is possible to imagine the internal structure as a fully connected equal ball. Such an organization promotes cohesion and inclusion, which in turn affects employee satisfaction and productivity (Meng & Berger, 2019). In addition, these motivational factors are a prerequisite for maintaining the company’s innovation policy.
Pressure Points
One of the weaknesses of this business stands out is its absence in critical markets that could contribute to being the global leader in advertising agencies. The response to this factor can be a gradual and thoughtful study of emerging market segments, which can be directed to expand. First, Leo Burnett Inc. has many tools for conducting its integrated marketing activities, which constitute its professional function. In other words, creating a marketing campaign for potential customers can be of maximum benefit with limited resources. Secondly, since the beginning of its history, this agency has dealt with many risks, including bankruptcy. However, the experience and potential of the founder’s talent, which was transferred to the employees, showed that as a result, ever higher peaks are reached, despite the many risks. Therefore, entering emerging markets is almost inevitable and can give an essential impetus to the company’s further development.
However, under constant supervision, agencies in this industry need to respond to global crisis conditions. As part of any supply chain disruptions or recessions, even large companies cut marketing spending in the first place (Hewett & Lemon, 2019). The economy is in decline, which is reflected in the purchasing power of consumers, who are becoming more indifferent to advertising, reducing customer companies’ profits. Long-term loyalty contracts concluded with large companies become a proactive measure in this situation. This kind of media business is susceptible to global market changes, while broad knowledge can give signals to other companies and plan to maintain profitability. Although the company inevitably loses assets in the event of an economic downturn, it can focus on the most profitable cases during the crisis, working with government orders or offering favorable conditions for new market players.
It is worth noting that the legitimate behavior of a business of this kind lies in both following the laws of the country of operation and reputation based on value orientations and a trend agenda. Respect within the framework of social responsibility, and environmental appeals have become practically indispensable conditions for sustainable business development in modern times. Many studies have already proved the impact of advertising on society, and given these trends, it has become an essential mission in regulating and minimizing the negative impact. It requires constant internal and external research by the company on various issues, beliefs, and current news in order to avoid hot topics and unfortunate comparisons. Any product of the activity of this company becomes the face of the customer’s brand and the hallmark of Leo Burnett Inc., which imposes double responsibility on any operational activity.
Ethical Concerns
Despite the agency’s outstanding contributions to advertising culture and contemporary brand aesthetics, some of Burnett’s campaigns are overblown and potentially scandalous. In particular, public attention was drawn to the case when the Wikipedia site was manipulated to promote its products. Burnett’s agency used dishonest hacking tactics to break into the top search engines and hacked the resources of the encyclopedia by inserting their images there (McCarthy, 2019). The ethical aspects of the activities of this company are thus quite dubious given the reciprocal claims of Wikipedia representatives who claimed that they never collaborated with the people behind this hack attack. Intrusion into potentially positioning itself as an objective and impartial source of information seems ethically unacceptable. This incident indicates that this company should be more legally careful regarding Internet activities. Legal rights on the Web are a mandatory principle of the company’s functioning and an important, if not the primary, way for it to disseminate information about itself (Hassan et al., 2018). It is established that even at the moment, Burnett’s agency has an expressive power and competitive tenacity. To date, Leo Burnett is the most successful agency in the world and has received a special award to determine this (The One Club for Creativity, 2022). Competing agencies are representatives from New York, London, and also Spanish cities, which thus represent the main competitive forces opposing Leo Burnett.
Thus describing the main perspectives of Leo Burnett’s enterprise, its obvious advantage is its far-reaching history. The company focuses on coming from afar but at the same time revolutionary trends in the advertising business, which allow one to talk about the enduring relevance of this company. The creation of characters identified with a particular manufacturer’s brand ensured the demand for this company. Its main advantages are precisely the layered stable position in the market and the hype that accompanies the company’s new orders. Undoubtedly, the competitive aspect expressed in the activities of Latin-American, British, and native companies is quite vital, which, however, should give Leo Burnett Inc. motivation for more excellent market coverage.
Therefore, the primary issues include ethical issues, the impact of which is covered by the legal aspects of the legislation. In other words, even if such effective moves as with Wikipedia were successful in advertising, the company can receive a hefty fine and a reputational blow that will scare off potential honest customers. The field of operation of Leo Burnett Inc. should always be limited to accessible ways that do not exceed the power of law. Potential problems are also more related to reputation but do not threaten a severe danger to any authorities. First, the company does not have an open policy of corporate social and environmental responsibility. Current trends require that an international organization post these values on the company’s main website. The absence of such activities increases the chances of high-profile scandals, and the principled positions of companies on these issues can lead to the loss of a customer base. Secondly, the advertising agency has repeatedly postulated a focus on people and their interests, but actions with Wikipedia undermine the attitude of those involved and affected in the scandal. In the future, with the repetition of such actions, the gap between the audience’s understanding and the company’s values may further increase.
The company’s current ethical issues may arise due to global crises. The aggravated conflict in Eastern Europe requires an appropriate response from management, which may affect specific customers and the company’s audience. The remaining challenges from the pandemic include the average pace of recovery in the purchasing power of the organization’s customers, stricter frameworks in the creation of advertising campaigns, and globalization in marketing processes. Therefore, Leo Burnett Inc. must find a balance between profit maximization and actions that could harm the company’s reputation by leveling potential and current ethical problems.
Conclusion
This paper considers the advertising agency Leo Barnett’s business’s historical, social, and economic context. With the help of entrepreneurship and network theory aspects, the main operational processes inside and outside the company were described, and pain points were identified. Ethical issues have been classified into current, potential, and primary through the context of the organization’s history. The result was a complete picture of the media business operating at the community level.
A strong position that has already established a company in the market must have sufficient remaining strength to continue to exist globally. It requires taking into account many ethical and professional issues while maintaining the most innovative approach, effective practices, and focus on the human values embedded in the company by Leo Barnett. Networking is the basis of the company’s activities, which could not exist without relying on other projects requiring an aesthetic presentation. Considering through the prism of the theory of networks, the external and internal interactions of the company, the main opportunities, strengths, and tasks currently facing the organization were clarified. Although the marketing tactics of this company need to be adjusted since the imposition of irrelevant data presented as a source of information is unethical, positioning aimed at human values is the basis of social responsibility in the context of sustainable development. Thus, the analysis demonstrates the main competitive parameters of this advertising agency, outlining the prospects for danger and the features of its activities.
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