Ego.

    The B word.

    brand planning tips

    Brand Planner Tip #15.

    0

    I changed my Twitter profile description today to include “operating at the intersection of never been and nowhere.” Until today it said “I operate at the intersection of nothing.”  The latter reference was a snark at all the people on Twitter who operate at the intersection of two things.  For the strategically minded that may be 10-20% of profiles. 

    That’s the more caustic Steve. Today I dialed it back so there’s less cynicism and more focus on an actual idea. The idea relates to operating from tabula rasa. A blank slate. I attempt to come at a branding problem with an unbiased, untainted view of the category or business. Clean.

    In most every initial meeting with a client I lead with “I’m a simple man.”  I look at things simply and hopefully without complication. I like to communicate with simple people through simple symbols, emotions and ideas. Done well, done with panache and believability, this approach resonates. (Even in complicated businesses like Blockchain.)

    In order to get to simple, you must clear your mind. Cultural anthropologists get this. They watch, listen and go deep on understanding.  With preconceived notions you don’t get to deep. You can often find yourself tangled in complexity.

    So I proudly operate at the intersection of never been and nowhere. Try it.

    Peace.  

     

    Brand Strategy Boil-Down.

    0

    My wife suggested reusing an Amazon bag for shipping something to my mom. The wifus is a smart lady. There was a lot of noise on the outside of the bag including printed bar codes, markings, and UPS truck soot.  Her idea was to put a new label over the old Amazon label and let it fly. Save a tree, use a proven vessel, a good idea.

    I suggested turning the bag inside out, which I did. The inside was pristine gray.

    This story is a bit metaphoric (sophomoric?) for my approach to brand planning. When doing discovery, you want to look at all sides. Inverse. Obverse. I’m sure there’s another verse.  The point being, and this is certainly true for creative problem solving, more perspectives are energizing.  Sometimes typos can be informative. Especially so for me.  Sort of like the 3M person who spilled mixatives and created the Post-It note. (Is mixative even a word?)

    Brand planners know their own process. Amass information then do the boil-down. Everyone should boil from a bigger pot. Let the fun begin.

    Peace.

     

    The Recipe for Behavior Change.

    0

    I’ve had some time to think about my post from yesterday asking whether brand planners should focus on behavior change or attitude change and I have decided upon attitude change. Behavior change unbacked by a set of values is simply a transaction. A default to ease-of-use. A reflex. These can and do drive a lot of commerce, don’t get me wrong. Habit is something to be sought in marketing.  But brand planning is about ingrained habits. Emotional habits. Cognitive habits. And those come from thoughtful cognition.

    I’ve written hundreds and hundreds of brand strategies. My framework uses one claim and three proof planks. Claim without proof is not branding, it’s advertising. I’d venture to say 95% of my proof planks are attitude based. One A Day Vitamins, named after a behavior still needs to support the behavior with a why. Got Milk still has to support the behavior with a why.

    Trust me, changing behavior is a critical goal in marketing. But changing attitudes is the brand planner’s job. It’s the recipe for behavior change.

    Peace.

     

    Brand Planning Interview Starters.

    0

    Yesterday I wrote about the need to understand the language or dialect of the customer.  

    Marketers thoroughly understand the language of the product and speak it exhaustively in their building but it’s only when they get into the field that they’re able to know if it syncs with the language of the customer.

    Companies that want to learn the language or dialect of the customer hire a brand planner.

    When attempting to learn language in a new category I start by breaking out one of my trusty questionnaires. But those question sets don’t always help me learn the category, which is prerequisite of learning the language. Hence some customization has to take place,

     

    A tip.

    On a recent technical engagement, I popped out this little discussion starter, “Write the headline that captures the most important news in the ____ business today.” The headline (and it must be a headline, not a run on) set up the next question or six. Another clarifying question I used was “In what segments of the _____ business would you say (company name) operates?” And I riff on that.

    Learning starts every brand planning party.

    Peace.

     

     

    Brand Planning Tips

    0

    merle haggard

    So I was listening to Merle Haggard yesterday and the old coot was doing a duet with Jewel and, by God, he changed his vocal treatment – his voice — on the song. It was Merle but he was trying to impress her, trying to woo her. Men! There was a gentleness to his voice that you won’t hear in most of his tunes. The tone send a message. So I’m thinking if he can change his tone and impart different meaning, sub rasa meaning, so can the rest of us. Why not use it as a brand planning tool?  So I’m playing around with an interview technique that will prompt interviewees to answer questions in various voice types. You know the voice you use when someone is confiding tragic personal news to you? Or the voice used to encourage a child who needs support? Have you a sexy voice? The key is to get the interviewee to use a topic-appropriate voice in an interview to impart greater meaning.  To do so you have to put them in a zone; coach them like an acting coach. Get them to a place where they are feeling an emotion then get them to answer your question, truthfully, but that particular voice.

    Try it, I certainly will. Peace.

     

    Teaching and Learning.

    0

    Those who follow the What’s The idea? blog know how I view education. Having worked at a K12 Ed Tech company I realized there is a big difference between “teaching” and “learning.” One is the means, the other the end. After scores and scores of teacher interviews, I understood there can be poor teaching, but no poor learning. Learning is always positive.

    So, I took that learning to heart and incorporated it into my business model. Consumers are more apt to favor a brand they learn from than a brand that sells them. Great marketing helps consumers learn about brand value in other words. Learning they can articulate themselves and, perhaps, even conclude.

    So just as learning is a touchstone for consumers in terms of product preference, it should be so for marketers. A new question I’ve decided to use in brand discovery with marketing stakeholders is “Tell me something you still need to learn about your business or consumers?” Implied with the question is that this learning will help business.

    There’s another learning question in my brand discovery battery but it’s slightly different. Not to give away too many secrets — but we are in the middle of a pandemic. The question is “Walk me through your education at the company. What was your top “aha” learning moment?”

    Okay enough learning for the day.

    Peace.

     

    Jeweler or Speweler.

    0

    A friend of mine is a jeweler.  Part of his job is working the bench — where the action is.  Jewelers work, in some ways, is like that of the brand planner.  It’s detail work. Focus on small things. Magnification. 

    When a jeweler opens a watch for repair s/he needs to diagnose the problem and deal with it. Isolate the parts that don’t work and fix them. All the other parts of the watch, though important, are outside of the focus of the repair.  A lay person looking at all the moving parts might be overwhelmed.

    When I open the metaphoric watch in a brand planning assignment, I must familiarize myself with the parts. The first time I looked into the brand of a infosec boutique in NYC, I was faklempt. But then I started asking questions, learned a little bit of language and like a visitor in a foreign land was treated with kindness to match my kindness.  You see, I was more interested in them than in me and my craft. This approach allowed me to understand enough to focus on the problem without asking “What’s The Problem.”  The jeweler in me could then see around the watch parts to the mechanism in need of repair.

    So, my advice?  More jeweler, less brandbabble spew-eler.

    Peace.

     

     

    Zoom and Brand Research.

    0

    Brand strategists are always on the lookout for trends and cultural developments. One such trend, resulting from the pandemic, is the growth of Zoom meetings. In my last post I discussed how less meetings and more independent work are not the most productive ways to work in today’s world – though there are certainly positives.  But recently I was on a Zoom call and noticed a neat strong positive to working remotely, albeit it was a bit embarrassing.

    Last week I was on a Zoom webinar sponsored my alma mater Rollins College on the topic of diversity, inclusion and equity; a topic on which I need mas training. For a change most of the postage stamp heads were black. (Is it me or do other white people look at rooms filled with white heads and feel uncomfortable? White much? is a meme I like to use.) Anyway, the webinar guest, activist Sophie Williams from London, was explaining that decades ago the gov’t tried to recruit blacks to live in the U.K. by running ads in the West Indies, highlighting all the wonderments of UK life. Sophie went on to say it was effective advertising though it never mentioned that life for blacks in the UK was going to be “shit.” I giggled at her expletive. No one else did. Zoom allowed me to see that. Big ass faux pas. Insensitive me. Had, in real life, I been in a row of students looking at the back of heads I would never have known my mistake.

    While working at Zude, a social media startup, years ago and attempting to recruit musical acts, I uncovered an important planning insight: “never are musical artists more in touch with their art than when looking into the eyes of the audience.”  Zoom lets you do that. Used properly it can be a great research tool.  

    Peace.  

     

    Brand Planning Tips

    0

    Hank O’Brien, was a Group Director of mine at McCann-Erickson NY in the 90s.  He had great chops for a Mad Man and a good intellect.  One thing he once said to me while doing some brand and marketing planning was “Who is going to lose the sale, you are making?”   It was an interesting way to pose the question about the competition.  And it didn’t always target a direct competitor. If you were advertising a new product or service, something that had no direct competitor, you might be talking sales from another category. Or two.

    The fact is and was, the money has to come from somewhere and it’s good to know that somewhere. It lends behavioral context.

    Uber, for instance, takes money away from cab companies.  That’s a clean take-away. Netflix, takes money from movie theaters and cable companies and network television. It can also take money from bars and restaurants. Not so clean.

    Good planners follow the money.  That too, is good advice.

    When you are making your touchy-feely brand value decisions, it’s always important to align them in some way with commercial advantage. We are not mercenaries, but our clients are.

    Peace.