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    The Yoda Route.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0

    In brand planning there’s discovery and there’s discovery. (Discovery defined as the legwork and research that precedes crafting the brand strategy.) At What’s The Idea?, I use personal interviews with C-level executive, customers, subject matter experts and influencers as well as primary and secondary research, trade shows, user’s groups and any other meetings where buyers and sellers convene.

    I’ve built the economics of my engagements so that I can deliver a brand strategy in a month’s time for a fair and equitable fee. Problem is, not all of my clients are able to pay the full freight. And sometime I’ve been known to take on pro bono work. That’s when things have to get creative.

    If I must shortcut my traditional process I go the Yoda Route. That is, I rely on one really smart person for all my input; usually the founder or owner. They provide all the grist for the insight mill. It can be dangerous to use only one source — one Yoda — but it can work. The brand planner’s brain is never really off so after Yoda does her/his information dump you use that to build insights which can be massaged through other shortcut piggyback research and some much needed internal combustion. Yesterday I wrote “The only truly bad research is research that misleads,” and going the Yoda Route can mislead. Be careful. Be very, very careful.

    Peace.

     

    Google Announces a Poorly Chosen Brand Name.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0

    Google Meet, a multipoint videoconferencing service available to paid Google Suite customers, announced today it will become a free service as early as next week. Zoom, which is killing it as a business and consumer videoconferencing tool, has had some security problems of late and Google Meet is hoping to capitalize.

    Google Hangouts still exists though Meet will support up to 100 participants (for free) and offer lots of bells and whistles unavailable to Hangout users.

    Hangout was a nice brand name. Paired with master brand Google, it offered a great Is-Does. Meet offers a great Is-Does but doesn’t verb well. Zoom has become a de facto videoconferencing verb – “Want to do a Zoom later today?” Verbing is a key in branding.

    Google had an opportunity to verb-alize this brand name, but chose a redundant and too generic option. If one asks you to participate in a Google Meet that will make sense but we know people like to shortcut and drop master brands and that will make the name confusing.

    I love a good Is-Does, especially for younger less established companies. Google is neither and could have pushed the name a little further. And, of course, there’s something to be said for a little originality. Google missed a big opportunity here.

    Peace.

     

    Patriotism.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0

    The saying “What’s the worst that could happen?” is often said by people up against modest problems. You never hear families dealing with cancer say this. You never hear the question posed to someone on the brink of financial ruin. Or generals on the battlefield. It’s said by everyday people with first world problems.

    Well, welcome to the coronavirus world. This once-in-a-hundred-year pandemic has eviscerated daily life and commerce in ways rational people never expected. It has created heroes out of ne’er-do wells. It has exposed leaders as pleaders. It has turned preening entrepreneurs to sand.

    We are so much more than money. We are Americans. Born of grit. And comity. Our heritage is as pioneers, not bougie idlers and finger pointers. We are scientists and helpers. At our best we are selfless and empathetic.

    In the business world and in life, those who come out of this crisis alive, or in many cases dead, as “givers” rather than “takers,” will set the table for the future. Money is not the litmus of success, humanity is. And sometimes humanity means making difficult decisions. But for the good of the tribe.

    As one of my heroes Eddie Vedder likes to say “I am a patriot.” Patriots will win out when this is over. Not those political nabobs or sign swinging, USA chanting folks. I’m talking about Americans who actually helped their way out of a crisis. With no agenda other than lifting up a brother and a sister.

    That’s patriotism.

    Peace.

     

     

    Design. Brand Strategy. And Metrics.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    I guess you can call a brand strategist a designer. Albeit one whose job does not include art outputs. Say the word designer and art director comes to mind. Logo creators. Environment designers. Certainly not someone who writes briefs, turned into documents, intended to drive marketing strategy. But give a designer an assignment without a brief and they’re left to their own devices as to what to create. Staring at a white piece of paper or screen doesn’t scare a designer. It’s freeing. But without a strategic goal, who decides if the work is good? Who decides if the work if business-building. The most common metric for design success is “likeability.” A distance second might be “communication value.” The holy grail, on the other hand, is brand claim and proof planks – the result of brand strategy.

    Brand strategy in more cases than not offers marketers a qualitative metric; the client approves the logic, understands how it will help build business, but then gets lost in the weeds of approving deliverables/contents. Done right brand strategy should have quantitative metrics. It’s rare. And it’s a shame.

    Return On Brand Strategy, as illusive a concept as it is, drives business at What’s The Idea? For a chat about brand strategy metrics, hit me at Steve@WhatsTheIdea. And be prepared to put on your seatbelt.

    Peace.

     

    Brand Architecture Is For Babies.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0

    The other day I wrote about marko-babble, the effluvial language in branding and marketing that makes our craft less finite and more interpretive. Head on, I’m going to share a few marko-babble terms you won’t hear from an engagement with What’s The Idea?

    You will not hear about brand hierarchy. If it’s critical to brand success or customer success, it’s included in the framework (one claim, three proof planks.)

    You will not hear about brand architecture. At What’s The Idea? there is only an organizing principle. One that allow for consumer and market change. Architecture suggests structure whereas an organizing principle allows for fluidity of components. Don’t get me wrong, the organizing principle is binary (you are either off or on strategy) but it’s not immovably static.

    You will not hear about brand voice. We are a polyglot world with polyglot consumers.

    We will not talk of brand platform. See organizing principle.

    And there will be no talk of brand narratives. Or brand story. Stories get old. Jokes get old. Yes, some stories have morals and been shared over the generations. What sticks is up to the buyer, not the seller.

    There will be no discussion of brand passion, only dispassionate product and consumer insights. Passion is in the eye of the beholder.

    What you will hear.

    You will be encouraged to do research, both qual and quant. There will be constant and unbridled learning. It will become a virus — waking you up at night. You will always be on in search of new demonstrations of the brand claim, fitted to the proof planks.

    Also, you will be asked to think with an interdisciplinary worldview. Where all parts work within the organizing principle. (In the ad business, I recall sometimes how hard it was to develop a radio spot to work seamlessly with a TV spot.) Campaigns rarely translate. An organizing principle translates.

    Some guidelines for brand success, brought to you sans marko-babble.

    Peace.

     

     

     

    Earth Fare.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0

    Earth Fare is emerging from Chapter 11 hell with a new ownership org and what hopes to be a bright future. Earth Fare began in Asheville, NC and it will rise from the ashes in Asheville. When it opened, it was branded “Dinner for the Earth.” The current name is head and shoulders better than the original, which to me suggests the earth will eat up the population and return us all to soil. Technically, that isn’t wrong, it’s just not a great brand building strategy.

    (The earth has been a hungry place lately, thanks to Coronavirus, and we’ve all been fighting like crazy to remain on it — not in it.)

    Asheville has a reputation as a crunchy town. We love sustainability, recycling, charity and brother/sister love. In branding? Ahhhh….sometimes we could use a little help. And branding starts with naming. One of my brand strategy discovery questions is “How did the brand get it’s name? And why?”

    I wish Earth Fare all the best. The founding fathers’ hearts were in the right place. But maybe they were a couple of doobies too far down the road the night they picked the original name. Hee hee. Much love.

    Peace.

     

    Brand Discovery Shortcut.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0

    One of my favorite brand discovery tools is the web. Como se duh? You can go anywhere. Approach anyone. Find almost anyone. And if you have the gift of gab, a conscience and perhaps bit of wit, you can engage anyone.

    Back when blogging was a thing, before Instagram, I coined a term called “Posters” to refer to people who posted original content to the web. (The obverse of Posters is Pasters, those to who paste other people’s content.) Based upon the commitment and communications ability of certain Posters they are easily findable. They also had committed followers. The first real Posters were writers, mostly for the tech press. They were pioneers that crossed the line from paper to digital. Then the unwashed writing masses joined in. Anyone with fingers could post online and hope to become a subject matter expert. Not many did.

    Melting Mama was an early influencer online for research into bariatric surgery patients. Kandee Johnson became a goddess to young women on the topics of personal care and fashion. Bob Lefsetz, analyzes and loves music like few others. Emo Girl posted podcasts about teen culture. The godfather of Posters, Robert Scoble, opens new worlds in tech – living the tech, while creating daily if not hourly content. And danah boyd (lower cases) understood (and understands) online social culture like no other.

    You can do quantitative research for tens of thousands of dollars and it’s a worthwhile pursuit.  But for me, finding the right Posters is the quickest way to the soul of your branding challenge.

    Peace.

     

    Technology During the Coronavirus.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0

    Americans are resilient. Technology is amazing. Complexity is the bane of both. Nowhere are these statements more accurate than for small businesses seeking help or employees in search of unemployment assistance during the coronavirus business meltdown. Americans, as a people, do not like to ask for help. I guess it’s a declaration of independence thing. But when they do ask they are undeterred. Note the NY women who called Unemployment 300 times a day for days and didn’t get through. Or the line of cars stretching miles to pick up donated food. Or the stick-to-itiveness of mom and pop businesses trying to get Paycheck Protection Program money to keep businesses afloat — burning down servers.

    The holdup is technology.

    If SBA loans were available from banks “in situ,” people would be lined up for miles, sleeping in soccer chairs. The holdup is servers, bad user interfaces, horrible application logic, and poorly connected databases. It’s nice that everybody has “an app for that,” but what about having scalable IT systems that are easy to use, easy to interconnect, and have back-up.

    The SBA (Small Business Administration) brand is quickly losing luster. Steve Mnuchin’s hollow promises of success are killing it. Of course, the SBA will blame it on the banks and the banks will blame it on the SBA. 

    The fact is, we were not prepared. Not to handle the healthcare crisis, not to handle the technological aftermath and fall out. What a shit show.

    The Department of Defense games this stuff out but they didn’t completely foresee how technology was going to be a choke point.

    When all is over, the American brand will be stronger. Of that I’m sure. The SBA, will need a name change. And technology will be a culprit in its undoing.

    Peace.

     

    Coronavirus Conundrum.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0

    I love to delve into conundrums in the businesses with which I work. For complex business problems it’s a nice way to add an interim step before planning. The process has me identifying no more than 10 contradictions is business, consumer care-abouts, brand good-ats and/or financial drivers. These I then presented to business and stakeholders for a discussion. The results help me with the boil-down.

    One major conundrum in my city of Asheville and across the U.S. for that matter is what to do with employees in the hospitality business who receive paychecks from the Paycheck Protection Program once money starts to flow.

    Let’s say you own a restaurant and had to shut it down. You let 8 people go. The Paycheck Protection Program requires you pay them a salary in order for you to accept the SBA money. But the store (restaurant talk) isn’t open for business. What do you do? I’d suggest getting them out of their houses (safely, and 6 feet apart) and putting them to work. Find a way to cross train them. Have them paint the bathrooms. Clean the storage rooms. Clean behind the stove. From a creative point of view, have everyone (again, safely distanced) rethink the menu. The supply chain. Sourcing of ingredients. Seating arrangements. Have them think about the business in new business-improving ways.

    This is a time to think. To improve. To do. And now you actually have a bit of “think and do” time.

    Peace.

     

    Future of Work, circa. 2011. Final Thoughts.

    By
    Steve Poppe
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    0

    Thanks for joining me on this travelogue of posts devoted to the future of work, as outlined in 2011 while on assignment at JWT forMicrosoft. Some final observations about what stuck and what did not:

    I’m not sure working remotely is the future of work. The growth of the Logged and Tagged Economy and the coronavirus works against this observation, however. But to me it seems collaborative and interactive people are best served in the same room — where manners dictate colleagues attention. When alone we are way too likely to participate in Twitch Point behaviors. (Search this blog or the web for thoughts on Twitch Point Planning.) Left to our own devices we become more ADD.

    I’m also thinking Peter Pan Syndrome is overstated. Experience, maturity and life lessons, for many jobs, are more important than facility with code, operating systems or the algorithm.

    As for how Microsoft can best comport itself in the future of work  I’d suggest following consumer behaviors with heightened focus. (With an eye toward ergonomics.) Embed with consumers. Becomes consumers. Windows revolutionized the software user interface (thanks to Apple). More universality in your products and services will help guide you. After all in 200,000 years, we will all be speaking one language and have one skin color. Hopefully.

    Peace

     

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