"There's no business without show
business," says Michael J. Wolf
'82, author of
The Entertainment Economy: How Media
Forces are Transforming and Shaping our Lives (Times Books, $25). As founder and leader of the
media and entertainment practice at the management and consulting
firm Booz-Allen & Hamilton, Wolf -- hailed as Consultant to the
Czars by Electronic
Media -- has advised media
clients such as Viacom, Turner and News Corporation on how to
maximize their economic impact, and non-media clients such as Ford
Motor Co. on how to add what he calls the "e-factor," entertainment
content, into selling strategies. Note how Budweiser's commercials
featuring talking frogs, lizards and ferrets go for laughs without
saying anything about beer.
The Entertainment Economy
investigates this growing reliance of
industry on entertainment and predicts further blurring of the
boundaries between the economy and entertainment. As needs for
essentials diminish, people's desires for luxury goods increase,
prompting new marketing campaigns to lure the consumer into
purchasing. Already, as Wolf notes, the success of Burger King's
tie-ins with Disney's Pocahontas and The Lion
King spurred McDonald's to forge
a 10-year, multi-billion dollar exclusive contract with Disney, a
deal that helped McDonald's to a 7 percent increase in sales in its
first year. It is no longer enough to have a good product, Wolf
maintains, the savvy business strategy is to entertain the consumer
into buying the product.
"Entertainment has always had an
impact on our culture. In the case of our society, the
entertainment phenomena like Titanic and Star
Wars loom large in people's
interactions with each other; they shape what we talk about," says
Wolf.
"I saw those changes as profoundly
shaping the way in which we interact with each other, the way we
interact with our children. And I thought they were of prime
importance to people in business and to also those who were not
necessarily in business, people who are thinking about how
entertainment shapes their world."
Wolf notes that the foundations of
American society have changed as well, from a community-centered,
tightly knit experience to one that is isolated and impersonal. The
suburbanization of cities and the creation of malls and movie
theater complexes work together to diminish the importance of
once-thriving urban centers.
The Mall of America in Bloomington,
Minn., with its indoor amusement park and aquariums as well as
retail shops, demonstrates the profitable outcome of combining
entertainment, consumerism, and social interaction. It attracts
some 40 million shoppers a year -- more visitors than Disneyland,
Disney World, and the Grand Canyon combined. Consumerism is no
longer just about buying a product, says Wolf, but rather becomes
an interactive social experience addressing the craving for human
interaction.
Wolf emphasizes that the most
profitable business strategy still relies on the most elusive
element in success: the creative imagination. There is no
fool-proof method to pinpointing the popularity of a color or
trend; the ultimate success of a marketing campaign rests on the
creativity and ingenuity of the team members.
Wolf says his education at Columbia
has influenced his mindset and philosophy.
"Columbia gives you this tremendous
ability to broaden your horizons," says Wolf. "Certainly my case is
unique in that I'm in a business that's populated with people who
have their MBAs and I don't have one. But I feel that Columbia was
a tremendous preparation for me and I see the same for my
classmates and others who graduated before me. We at Booz-Allen are
always interviewing people who are just out (of college) to work
here, and we find the people best equipped are the greatest
thinkers, not necessarily the greatest business people."
