Category Archives: Best Practices

The Rules of Brand Strategy, Part Six

Posted on September 18, 2012 | 1 comment

People love stories. It’s not something we learn or develop as sophisticated consumers; human beings are hardwired to respond to stories that inspire us, challenge us, entertain us, empower us and comfort us. Stories that engage us matter to us.

Human beings don’t respond nearly as well to facts or statements. We think we do—we want to believe we are logical beings capable of making rational, practical choices—but we aren’t motivated by a fact until we consider it within the bigger context of a story.

We need to know how we feel about the facts before we decide if a fact is important.

A story is not a single message, nor is it just a series of facts. The story defines the relationship people have with the facts. A story provides the context for the facts, and the story we believe is how we know how we feel about the facts. Those feelings anchor the relationship, and the relationship matters.

People won’t connect with one message, but they will understand one story.

Since the early days of brand strategy, common wisdom emphasizes “one message”—one single message that occupies the mind of the consumer. This basic philosophy—correct, but too simplistic—undermines the complexity of the relationship people will have with the brand. If you focus only on one message, you risk bombarding your stakeholders without engaging them. It’s not about you—it’s about how they feel when you’re part of their experience.

Your brand is deeper than one single message. Your brand is one story—one complex, evolving idea shared through simple narratives which capture, celebrate and reward the human condition. Your brand is the story that puts facts into context.

Facts can be copied; stories are unique. Facts can only be absolute; stories are fluid. Facts change; stories evolve. We learn facts; we love stories.

A great brand strategy is built around one shared story. It invites people to share in the greater vision by experiencing the story, often in a variety of different ways, and continues to reward everyone with new adventures, new ideas, and new opportunities.

Your brand is one story—one awesome story—with many engaging chapters.

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The Rules of Brand Strategy, Part Three

Posted on July 5, 2012 | 3 comments

The Rule of the Fluid Formula.  

I am a firm believer in the concept that ‘Everything Matters’. Every single touch point factors into the brand experience equation. How much each elements factors in is a matter of debate and strategic preference, but make no mistake about it—everything matters.

If you’re looking for a proven formula, though, you’re out of luck. Great brands embrace the fluid nature of the experience. Here’s an example:

As I walk into a local cafe, music plays in the background. The coffee is good and the seat is comfortable, so I sit down to work. The soundtrack is a cool retro 70s funk—loud enough to recognize the song, but not so loud that I can’t think. If the total brand experience is equal to 100, the music is probably a 5. Maybe less.

So, the music in the cafe is equal to 5% of the total brand experience score. Not really significant. I’ll be back, but not for the music.

As I walk into the same cafe the next day, there is no music playing. The coffee is still good and the chairs are still comfortable, so I sit down to work. There’s a weird silence. Lulled by the sound of refrigerators humming, the soundtrack is punctuated by sounds of coffee machines buzzing, mugs hitting tables, and chairs sliding across the floors. I can even hear the person three tables away tapping on their keyboard. The lack of music is distracting. If the total brand experience is equal to 100, the lack of music probably distracts 50 or more points away.

Now, the music in the cafe is equal to 50% of the total experience. Pretty significant. I won’t be back, simply because the music was a mistake.

Is the music worth 5% or 50% of the total brand experience? Actually. It’s both.

Often, it’s impossible to define what makes a great experience great; it’s the collection of every little detail working together in a constant, fluid experience. However, when one detail fails—one detail that contradicts the expectation—it becomes pretty clear why the experience is negative.

There is no strategic formula that defines how much each touch point is worth to the brand. The key is complete understanding of the experience you are promising, being aware of every possible detail, and giving your team the necessary tools, training and permissions to act. You have no idea which detail will have an impact.

Poor brand strategy relies on a few key touch points to wow their stakeholders—assigning fixed values to an arbitrary formula—while believing the failure of less important touch points doesn’t damage the brand. Poor brands ignore the details. Great brands know that everything matters, and leave nothing to chance.

Great brands embrace the Fluid Formula.

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The Rules of Brand Strategy, Part Two

Posted on June 8, 2012 | 5 comments

Be amazing at the one thing you promise. Every time. No exceptions.

You have a lot of options for your brand story. You get to explore different ways to deliver your service, how your culture fuels the brand experience, how leadership pushes new boundaries and how you continue to engage and excite your stakeholders. It’s your brand; it’s your story to tell.

Every story, though, is based on a familiar plot. Just like an action story needs an adventure or a love story needs a romance, a brand story must live up to the core promise. If your brand can’t manage that one thing, nothing else matters.

Too often brands get caught up in the elements that make the brand unique but drop the ball on the one simple thing that anchors the relationship. Poor leadership gets in the way— it’s either laziness (just too uncommitted to care), complacency (believing people will judge the brand on intent and flair rather than action and results), or ignorance (having no clue about expectations).

Brand Strategy always starts with clarity about your capacity to do the one thing you promise. Without a solid grasp of this reality—and a commitment to deliver an uncompromising experience—success is simply out of reach.

Photo Note: I snapped the accompanying photo in 2004 during a vacation in Oregon. In 2011, while traveling the same route, I couldn’t find the business. Not surprisingly, Golden Touch Signs is no longer in business. A keen eye will notice the company name in red letters over the door; another fine example of this company’s stellar work.

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The Rules of Brand Strategy, Part One.

Posted on May 22, 2012 | 1 comment

There are rules to great brand strategy. One of them is that you don’t have to follow all the rules.

If brand strategy were simply about following a checklist, every competent organization would have a well executed brand. And if following the checklist were all that mattered, each precisely executed brand would have a predictable number of loyal brand followers. Mission statement? Check. Logo and snappy tagline? Check. Differentiated product message; staff consisting entirely of amazing brand ambassadors and talented innovators; committed vendors and partnerships? Check, check, check.

Of course, we know it doesn’t work so easily.

Brand Strategy is both a science and an art form. Human behaviour has patterns; cultures have expectations; our senses trigger subconscious reactions—there are many predictable outcomes that we can draw from as we build our brand. The science of relationships and interactions is deep, and we are wise to use what we know is true.

But only to a point.

Brand strategy is also about telling stories and creating experiences that connect human beings. It’s about building relationships through moments of inspiration.

A great brand strategy will shatter the status-quo. A great brand strategy will twist expectations, shifting experiences into a comfortable relationship—a relationship that welcomes stakeholders with a common purpose and a shared attitude.

How we break a rule reveals our culture, and an awareness of the problem we’re crushing. It could be rooted in “where have you been all my life” or “why hasn’t anyone thought of this before” or “wow, this is what it should be” or (the monopoly killer) “well, finally someone is thinking about us”. Whatever the motivation, the result will be a deeper connection; an experience that has no substitutions.

There are certainly some things that stakeholders expect from your brand. No question—when developing your brand strategy we use a checklist of initiatives and tactics to assess your competency against the opportunity. After all, nobody likes a brand that recklessly ignores common sense or form that ignores function.

We’re not auditing your brand for compliance. The most important thing we will be looking to reveal is the thing that breaks the rules; the one thing that breaks from convention and says to your stakeholders, “yeah, we know this matters.” Because it’s the thing that makes all the difference.

UPDATE: (August 9, 2013): A Twitter friend, Harvey Briggs (OBX_Harvey), offered a nice twist on this rule, and I’ll paraphrase: “You only get to break the rules if you know which rule you are breaking.” Great point about being purposeful, not accidental. He has other great thoughts on brand and strategy.

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