Branding

If we practiced what we preached, we’d stop calling it brand.

The center of what branding is has been completely lost with all the ideas and thoughts and opinions about what we all think a brand is. We keep putting new layers around it, on top of the latest thought,  hardly ever listening to what came before it. We’ve created a giant rubber brand ball.

continue

I keep reading Daniel Pink’s book A Whole New Mind. It helps me keep many things in mind, including the concept of “whole.” As in complete. Balanced.

I spent some time yesterday with an artist. Gwen Laine has some amazing work and has recently gifted an installment to the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center. (If you’re in the Springs or passing through, take a minute to swing by and check it out. Or click here to see the work online.)

Gwen’s art is often installed without any kind of trial run. The installation is the final expression of the vision. Gwen’s latest work wasn’t even installed by her. She provided the FAC detailed instructions and then let it go.

I asked Gwen what it was like to create something that she doesn’t see complete until it’s installed. Does it typically match her vision or not? Her answer was enlightening. She doesn’t have a clear picture of the final outcome. She told me you have to be comfortable with letting the materials and the process inform the outcome. You can’t be constrained by a static end vision.

continue

Think about what it would be like if you started from scratch. If there was no such thing as advertising agencies. No preconceived notions.

You have a big entrepreneurial idea. You figure you could  start a business that solves problems for companies by executing efforts that reach new customers and motivates them to buy something. You’d integrate other efforts with those efforts that would retain existing customers, too. And probably a few reputation-building efforts thrown in to make sure stuff like the company’s social license to operate is in good order, and that various stakeholders feel good about their investment in the company.

If you were to start from scratch, you’d probably do a bunch of research to figure out what companies’ pain points are, what they’d expect, and what they’d be willing to pay for it.

My guess is you’d find companies with pretty basic needs. Get us lots of customers, make our existing ones so happy that they buy again while telling others to come to us, and give our other stakeholders a good feeling about their investment in us.

I’m guessing you’d also find plenty of companies willing to pay handsomely for that, so long as you can prove what it is you’re doing actually works. My guess is that your research would conclusively demonstrate that any investment a company makes must demonstrate a return, and the investment made in your activities would be no different. Management and stakeholders wouldn’t have it any other way.

continue

My father wasn’t much of an arts and entertainment kind of guy and he had but a few jokes at his disposal. One of them was a Bill Cosby take on doing drugs. Goes something like this:

“People say that drugs enhance your personality. Yes, but… what if you’re an asshole?”

So to be discovered on Google I should be consistent. Be a one-note blogger. Write myopic web copy.

Yes, but… what if I’m multitudinous? What if the value I add to clients and the world is an ability to connect and align seemingly disparate data points into a cohesive and effective strategy that uncovers efficiencies and new ideas? What if I see branding as much about leadership as marketing? What if I find as much professional inspiration from Walt Whitman as Seth Godin?

I don’t want to be known for what Google says I’m known for. I don’t like how it evaluates people and their value. A good yellow pages. Not a good relationship builder.

We are large. We contain multitudes. Sign me up for references and conversations.

That’s my context, anyway. Not the right approach for all brands and clients. (Do I contradict myself? Very well then, I contradict myself.)

Ed Stein, EdSteinInk.com, reprinted with permission

If the current dialog about health care reform can teach us anything, it highlights the importance of figuring out our values.

We all know the importance of inside-out strategic planning (and brand development, for those who consider them separate). The enterprise values, vision, and mission (brand) should be a collective exercise. Involve as many people as possible. Hold retreats, perform exercises, play games, put the words of participants on giant sticky notes. Transform the more insightful quotes into pictures on the graphical strategy map. Include verbatims in the final deliverable. Stage-gate the process by communicating back to the larger enterprise during development.

And we’ve all seen the process devolve and the gears grind. Collaboration turns into open season across units: operations launch scuds at market verticals, marketing challenges revenue models. Anyone can write copy — wordsmith-ing hijacks strategy.

Then at some point getting the damn thing done trumps involvement. Can we just move on already? I’ve got work to do.

How to avoid this in strategy and brand development? It’s probably in the values.

continue