Monthly Archives: December 2025

Brand Strategy Presentations.

0

Today’s post is on presenting the brand strategy. Presenting the strategy is something that shouldn’t be taken lightly. It’s the crescendo of all the work — the make-or-break moment.

If, during the presentation, you take too long, people get antsy. If you don’t set the right context, things can go off-track.  Luckily, my brand strategy framework results in a fairly simple presentation. I call my framework a “claim and proof” array.  One claim three proof planks.

The claim is the macro part of the brand strategy, a stand-in tagline that pays off the proof planks. But make no mistake, the proof planks build the brand. They are the money-makers. While the claim gets a good deal of the branding credit, it is the proof that does the convincing. The proofs organized into planks or buckets are the tangibles.  

Claim without proof is advertising. Claim with proof is branding.   

I left out a great deal of sausage making and to be honest, decision makers don’t need it. They need the boil-down of the thinking. In their language. In the consumers’ language. In the accountant’s language.  If you’ve done your homework, answers to the decision makers’ questions come easily. Then they are in control of the “buy” moment, while the sell moment is minimized.

Peace.

 

Truth in Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.

0

The dissolution of truth and proof is hurting brand science.  Let me ‘splain. There was a time in American advertising when nationally broadcast TV commercials had to pass before lawyers in Network Television “Standards and Practices” departments.  If you couldn’t prove a claim, you couldn’t make it. It was a truth thing. Lesser media bodies were not so stringent, e.g., you could say stuff on local radio and print ads that weren’t particularly true and get away with it.

Fast forward to today and our current political environment where prevarication is the art of the day. Our president, for instance, often states that the inflation he inherited was the highest in the history of the United States. (Spoiler alert: I remember in the early 1980s running bank ads with CD rates at 18.5%.)  Saly, the truth today is whatever people say it is.  And that not only erodes national character, it makes marketing unbelievably hard.  

What’s The Idea? is a brand consultancy built upon creating brand positions and brand value on proof. Proof of what, you might ask?  Well, that’s where the strategy comes in — that’s what clients pay for. But recognize this, it is proof that makes a claim believable. Evidence convinces.

In the future, we will return to truth once again. Truth in politics and truth in advertising. But for today, those brands that delve into truth and proof will prosper even more. Because in an era of foggy, unsupported claims, the real truth sings like a Robert Plant lyric.

Peace.