Random

    Brand Strategy

    Teaching Less and Learn More.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    I was talking to a client last week and something quite smart came out of my mouth. Unplanned. I like binary things — like “there are two kinds of women in the world, those who eat a sandwich with one hand and those who eat with two.” Don’t ask. Anyway, I was remarking to a this talented client who had lots of irons and revenue streams in the fire that in her line of work you were either “teaching” or “learning.”  I surmised she spent about 85% of her time teaching (in the hope of picking up consulting and speaking gigs) and 15% learning or getting smarter in her craft. I for one can empathize. Give it away in the hopes of getting paid-work down the line.

    I suggested she should flip the model or at least even it up at 50/50.

    People who constantly teach and don’t learn become pedants. And they’re not a lot of fun to be around. Teachers need to refresh so they can be fresh. And that requires listening. And positing. And debating.

    The best part of being a brand planner is the learning. We open the faucet and fill up the stock pot. Only when the pot is full do we turn on the heat and start the boil down.

    If you find yourself teaching to much in your line of work, do something about it. You need to up the ante on learning.

    Peace.

     

    How To Sell a Brand Strategy.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0

    How can an consultant come into a company, study data, ask 200 questions, drive around with salespeople, and begin to think s/he can tell a CEO or C (fill in the letters) about the heart and soul of that company?  Or tell the CEO what will make the company grow at an out-pace rate. What customers want — and the best way to sell them.   It’s ridiculous to think a consultant can do that. But that’s what brand planning consultants do.

    So how does a brand planner present findings in such an uphill setting?

    First, the planner shares data the C-level can’t disagree with. Data doesn’t lie.  Plus, the data often comes from the same executives to whom the planner is presenting. Second, present observations. Who can argue with an observation?  It’s not a recommendation, it’s a carefully selected, important piece of field work. And, if spun with elan and poetry it can become powerful and memorable. “Peter Pan Syndrome,” for instance, is something I shared while working on Microsoft. Not really forgettable.

    Third, organize the big picture stuff in a way that allows for leaning moments driving Cs toward a POV or conclusion. A conclusion they will get to before it is presented.

    Forth, remove the complexity and contradictions. Oh, and there will be contradictions. (Deciding what not to present is often the hardest part of brand planning.)

    Fifth, give them a brand strategy that is brand-familiar, competitive, and with eyes up — toward the horizon. Also, one that makes the Cs feel a little uncomfortable. More often than not, in a great brand strategy there will be a word with which they disagree. The beauty of the word is that is can be changed – by the creative team. The brand strategy is a strategy, not the creative. And even if the “word” is pregnant with creative meaning like, say, the word “reboot,” it is really just stimulus for the creative team. (That’s why Campaigns come and go but a powerful brand strategy is indelible.)  In step five, the C gets to exhibit strength, power and insight (and have the last word) and yet idea détente is still achieved.  We have lift off. Peace!

    Brand Craft.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0

    carbonsPlease don’t kill me for this poor metaphor, but China is pumping 1 million more tons of carbon into the atmosphere than previously reported. And Greenland is melting. It’s worth a big fat ulcer. And we’d better do something about it.

    The state of the advertising and marketing business is not much better. We are pumping billions of dollars into the advertising atmosphere, filled with not much more than “we’re here ads” and other cultural blather. “We’re here” advertising works when awareness is all that is needed to stim a sale but its poor tradecraft. Blather is not only poor tradecraft, it creates a pool of murky water through which consumers cannot see the good work. It uses and re-uses words like “quality” and “innovation” and “best” to the point where advertising is melting. This is exacerbated by online messaging.

    Great brand strategy creates a map of acceptable “good ats” and “care abouts.” It organizes them in such a way that the collective story stands out. A brand strategy is easy to follow. You are either on strategy (one claim, three proof planks) or you are not. When the brand craft is good, the advertising tradecraft is good. Even if part blather. Let’s start practicing brand craft to improve our tradecraft.

    Peace.

     

    Whither go the brand strategist?

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0

    There are a number of brand strategy consultants out there I hold in high regard. They totally get insights and market conditions, are quick studies in business categories, have keen understanding of meaningful metrics, and possess indefatigable bullshit barometers. Sadly, I’m seeing a trend among this crew where they are reinventing and repositioning themselves away from pure brand work into other aligned areas. Customer experience. Team optimization. Digital transformation. Culture plotting.

    Why is this?

    Well, that’s what the market sparks to. Most marketers and business owners don’t think they need a brand strategy. They want measurable results on sales. Higher top line and lower bottom lines.  What they don’t understand is that those things are directly tied – or can be tied – to a smart brand strategy. When you define brand strategy as “an organizing principle for product, experience and messaging” you begin to understand how brand strategy can impact bottom lines. And top lines.

    Tomorrow I’ll share some business metrics side-by-side with brand metrics. I encourage you to tell me which are more actionable.

    Peace.

     

    Symbolic Value and Real Value.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0

     

    I was listening to the Sweathead podcast interviewing Ana Andjelic, chief branding officer at Esprit, and she mentioned a branding notion of “assigning symbolic value.” It immediately gave me pause.  My brand-o-babble alert went off. Buttttt, the more I thought about it the more I appreciated the idea.

    I am a brand strategist. I make words. And those words are about positioning products and services in the minds of consumers. Symbols, not so much. Symbols I leave to creative parties.  My business has always been anchored by strategies tied to “real” values. Endemic values. Coke is refreshment. Real and endemic. Swallow a big gulp of cold Coca-Cola and you are refreshed.  

    Butttt…Ana isn’t wrong when dabbling in symbolic value. Symbolic value can be part of an organizing principle. But it’s best worked on a mature brand.

    A strategy I wrote for Zude, a drag and drop web authoring tool, positioned it as “the fastest, easiest way to build a web page.”  The creative/tag line was “Feel Free.” Freedom was ancillary yet endemic inside the category. Freedom was symbolic. For those not experiencing the brand within the category or never having heard of Zude, “Feel Free” was meaningless.

    Branding is first about real value, then about symbolic value.  It’s a serial thing. A less expensive thing. A commercial thing. Nobody knew who Zude was, so “Feel Free” was a bridge too far. Had we $20 million in the budget the bridge would have been closer.

    Build a bridge (to consumers) first with materials then with dreams and symbols.

    Peace.

     

     

    Advertising Success Lies in Proof.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    People who know me have heard this one before “Advertising is 90% claim and 10% proof.”  That miscalculation is the foundation of What’s The Idea? That, plus the propensity for most advertising agencies and marketers to utilize the lazy tactic of benefit shoveling (see post earlier this week).

    When you shovel benefits or advertise by bullet point you lose focus. You water down your idea. One of my mentors, Dick Kerr, once told me Joe Louis never knocked anyone out with his first punch.  It was always the second punch. (He was talking about media buying, but it pertains to strategy as well.)  Don’t claim something then move onto the next benefit. Say it then prove. Then prove it again. This is how you communicate an advertising message. Advertisers who make a living proving their claims are advertisers getting their money’s worth.

    In a study published last month called the Better Briefs Project, it was reported that 33% of marketing budgets are wasted due to poor briefs. And 7% of agencies felt they were poorly briefed.  When you don’t have a sound, differentiated positioning idea what do you do?  You get the work approved by breaking out the shovel.

    Peace.

     

     

     

     

    Engineered Preference.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0

    Campaigns come and go but a powerful brand strategy is indelible, is a line I wrote for a Gentiva Health Services pitch many moons ago. Gentiva is now owned by Kindred Health for those still counting. A powerful brand idea, is a difference-maker in marketing because it anoints a product or service with a value that only it can claim. Burger King owns “Flame Broiled.”  Coca-Cola owns “Refreshment.”  Google owns the “World’s information in one click.”

    Establishing and owning a brand idea is the job of the brand manager. Constantly and without pause, hammering home a key care-about or good-at, seeds the brand idea — building and reinforcing consumer preference. Preference is not the only job of the marketer but it’s an imperative job. I may prefer an Impossible Burger, but if it’s not in my store, no sale.

    The job of the brand strategist is to engineer preference. I choose to do it with a model based upon claim and proof. My approach is repeatable. Other’s do brand strategy differently.  Shades of right, I guess. Either way, preference is our goal. Preference makes the revenue.

    Peace.

     

    Brand Strategy Building Blocks.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0

    In an article about the promotion of Parag Agrawal following Jack Dorsey’s step down as Twitter CEO, the NYT referred to Parag as “…having stood out for his strong skills in math and theory. If you are good at the theory, you can have the ability to be analytical, to reason, to make decisions.”

    Math and theory or science and theory are also critical competences of a brand planner.  The science part is unquestioned, but often underdeveloped. That is, we are all supposed to create strategies that predict success. Be it in sales or preference. That’s science. Finding replicable “if/then” equations.  But theory — theory is where brand planning gets a little dicey. The abilities to be “analytical” and to “reason” are critical but the ensuing “decisions” or last mile are the planner’s secret sauce.  And that last mile often lacks science. Planners, you see, talk about science and art. While the science may be right the art can derail it.

    Rather than provide science and art in brand strategy, I suggest we provide a science and theory strategy…and leave the art to the creative peeps.

    At Whats The Idea? brand strategy comprises one claim and three proof planks. Claim without proof, goes the logic, is entertainment. Yet a strategy built around one claim and three proof planks is theory — not art.  And when that theory is tied to science, you have building blocks. You have things to measure.

    I love when I hit a creative triple or home run. It’s not my job. Science and theory are my job.

    Peace.

     

     

     

    Meaning.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0

    About a year ago I developed a brand strategy lite document for a local math tutor I was mentoring through the Venture Asheville Elevate program. Here are the first two slides from that presentation:

    (Slide 1)

    Caveats:

    • The brand claim is not a tagline.
    • (Brand name) is well-named but not well understood. It’s our job to add meaning.
    • Lastly, the work has only just begun. You need to build the brand through deeds, proof(s) and culture…and new service offerings.

    (Slide 2)

    Precis:

    • A brand strategy, carried out effectively, is easily played back in research by customers thanks to its clarity, succinctness and endemic values.
    • Marketing’s job is to deliver the strategy through product and tactics.
    • All tactics and communications should make deposits in the brand bank (not withdrawals).              

    I must have been having a good day because these couple of slides, with the exception of the well-named bullet, apply to all my clients — large and small. 

    (Just to level-set, my definition of brand strategy is “an organizing principle for product, experience and messaging.” And my brand strategy framework is “1 claim and 3 proof planks.”)

    People on Quora often ask what’s the difference between a brand and a product. Someone smart once said “a brand is an empty vessel into which we pour meaning.” Adding meaning is what a brand strategist does. Organizing and prioritizing meaning. How do you do that?  Not through words which is the most common mistake of marketers. You add meaning through deeds, proof and culture (which enables more deeds and proof.)

    The end result of brand work is consumer understanding.  Not awareness. Understanding that is programed in by the brand manager. When consumers play back the specific brand values you promote (via research), you and your agents are doing your job.

    Frankly, it’s quite easy.  Once you have a plan. A brand plan.

    Peace.

     

    The Magic Logic Partnership.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0

    The dichotomy of creative and strategy has been around in marketing and advertising for ever. There was a times in the 1800s when “We’re Here advertising” worked. Demand so out-stepped supply that all you had to do is tell people where to buy your product and the transaction began.  I experienced this back in the 90s when all AT&T Network Services had to do to sell Cat 5 computer wire was to publish an address in the Thailand edition of Computer World magazine.  Today competition is too great. Marketing has to be competitive and advertising great.

    The strategy/creative dichotomy was explained quite nicely last week, during a viewing and discussion of the film about Sir John Hegarty with outgoing CSO of BBH Sarah Watson. “I provide the logic, you provide the magic.” Succinct is always best.

    When one applies magic against logic it’s a recipe for success. Magic by itself, not so much.

    Brand planners are in the logic business. The more the magic can excite the magic makers the better.

    Magic. Logic. It’s a nice living.

    Peace.

     

     

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