Brand Evangelist

Formula for Personal Growth

2008-03-03T15:48:00.002-05:00

My personal formula for success:

Success = (Knowledge + Talent) x Sticky Attitude

Chip and Dan Heath have given us a great recipe for a sticky attitude. In their book Made to Stick, they give us a check-off list of six qualities our ideas and presentations should have to make them memorable to our audience. They are:
1. Simple (keep it simple stupid!)
2. Unexpected (Surprise)
3. Concrete (quickly discernable)
4. Credible (not a stretch)
5. Emotional (relevant to the heart)
6. Stories (told with a great story)

Made to Stick explains the “sticky attitude”
part of the above formula…the stories we
tell the world. However, I’d like to pull back
the curtain a bit to look at two principles
that I believe are required before projecting
a brand that sticks. “Knowledge” and
“talent” together are the underpinnings of
great brand building. Knowledge and talent
in the right combination will determine
our ability to create sticky ideas.

Knowledge
I used to find it difficult to organize the
vast amounts of information I learned
in professional development. Profound
concepts for personal growth seemed
to fly out of my head as fast as they flew
in! How do we access this vast wealth
of information when we need it?! I’ve
developed the above formula that works.
We import knowledge into our heads four
different ways: a) by hearing,
(like at RAC!) b) by reading books,
c) through our experiences and d) through
observation. Stephen Covey teaches us
that being human requires us to teach
knowledge to others before we can fully
learn it ourselves. This means that in order
to fully grasp information and make it stick
in our minds, we must export it…we must
teach at the same time that we learn. It’s
called mentoring. Stephen Covey calls it the
“Eighth Habit of Highly Effective People.”
I then discovered the secret to organizing
knowledge for easy access; kind of like a
library management system in your head.
I do this with a concept map. When I learn
something, I link that knowledge to a concept
or even a feeling. Then, when I’m introduced
to a similar concept in the future, the
knowledge appears in my mind automatically.
This works for me, and is particularly useful
for recalling information needed in impromptu
meetings or speaking engagements. It works
for me much like Martin Lindstrom showed
us last year, that our sense of smell recalls
vivid memories that were originally linked to
a particular smell. (By the way, I was the guy
in the audience last year who remembered
the design of the Play-Doh logo simply from
the smell of Play-Doh!) Maybe I’ve stumbled
on a similar intellectual sense that has the
cataloging power to organize knowledge?!

Talent
It’s one thing to have knowledge, but to use
it in the right situation with the right attitude
under fire requires talent. While knowledge
is static and mostly learned from the outside,
talent is active and is honed through practice
and constant application. We think of talent
as public speaking, interpersonal skills,
memorization or quick-thinking. While these
are talents, I suggest that they are really only
symptoms of a personal commitment to the
principles of humanity within our soul. Similar
to the way the Equal Rights Amendment
is a symptom of the principles of humanity
recorded in the Declaration of Independence.
Our soul’s commitment is known only to us
through a deeper, more intrusive index of
our hearts. What others see as talent in our
public lives, is sprung and governed from the
principles of the truth that we stand for in our
secret lives. Therefore, talents are a natural
result of inward excellence. Lastly, while
knowledge mingled with talent work hand
in hand in our personal interactions, both
should be indistinguishable from the other
when we project them in our public lives.
This (Knowledge + Talent) factor is at the
basis of all great brands. It gives power to
create stories that stick…which is where
Chip and Dan Heath’s book begins. There
is a naturally created energy that resonates
with our humanity when we are smitten
with a brand that we love. Maybe it’s
because as humans, we want to be like
great brands: simple, surprising, concrete,
credible, emotionally engaging with the
ability to tell a compelling story. We can do
all of these, but to sustain a sticky attitude,
we need our foundation to be strong.

Your Sticky Attitude
I once heard of someone characterized
as having a thirst for knowledge and an
infectious zeal…a sticky attitude. I can’t think
of two better qualities for either people as
individuals or brands as entities. What do we
know? How do we project that knowledge?
Are we living in the realm of constraints or
possibilities? Are we true to the integrity of
our soul or someone else’s idea of it? What
story are we telling and how enthusiastic
are we in its telling? Are people following
us or our brand with a religious fervor? Are
we giving them something to believe in? A
sticky attitude, a zeal for what we know and
what we do will infect others with our ideas.

Success = (Knowledge + Talent) x Sticky Attitude
Building a brand or a reputation is achievable
with this formula. To be successful do this:
import knowledge, mingle it with your talent
and multiply those two together by projecting
a sticky, memorable attitude. You cannot
effectively apply knowledge without the right
talent. And you must be just as concerned
about developing your talents as you are
about gathering knowledge…without either,
the other is empty. From there, your attitude
must be memorable and it must be sticky.

Stories of Love

2007-04-30T13:47:00.000-05:00

Love engages us and makes us whole. As individuals, groups or corporations, we connect with the outside world when we give and receive expressions of love. Through these expressions of love we are nurtured, we find meaning and purpose...we find the essence of life itself! Our expressions are our stories; the stories we tell ourselves, the stories we tell others, the stories we tell the world. In the corporate arena, we call this advertising.

The book “Crucial Conversations” reveals that there are four steps involved in expressing ourselves. First, we learn the facts. Second, we tell ourselves a story about those facts. Third, we develop feelings based on the story that we told ourselves, and lastly, our expressions are based on our feelings about our story and not on the facts by themselves. Herein lays profound personal implications in that we can change the way we feel, by changing the story we tell ourselves!

We have the power to create our own story. The much larger global implication is we can change the way others feel by the story that we tell them, thereby influencing them to act. What story are you telling?

Stories of love are an art form. Stories of love have transformative power. They intrude into the secret life of both the teller and the hearer and reflect and touch the human soul. Stories of love change lives.

The implications are enormous and sobering. Do we take enough time and energy to tell the right story? In our self-centered world that rewards the warrior with the spoils of victory do we minimize the power of story on the human heart? Often, we are too busy ascending steps to worship at the temple of “things that can be measured and justified.” But the prudent among us take the time to create a story; explaining facts in the language of the human heart...the language of love.

My friend Randy Curtis, from Wal-Mart fame, taught me the central theme of advertising before he passed away. Randy taught me that “everything we are drawn to is a matter of the heart.” He also taught me that “Relational Marketing is not rocket science but it is science, the science of human needs and relationships.”

A wise man, who lived 2,000 years ago, convinced over a billion customers to buy what he was selling simply by telling amazing stories of love. Randy Curtis was a customer of this wise man. Through him, Randy resolved questions of the human heart and found his own wisdom through the wise man’s stories. We would also do well to learn that if we were to just once, hold up a mirror to our customers and reveal to them their own wisdom, we would tap into the most powerful language in the world and change their lives.

We should be telling stories of love.

Kevin Roberts taught us this universal principle in his book “Lovemarks” by showing that Love is central to our customer’s brand-loyalty and their perception of value in our products. If we want sustained growth in our frenzied and hyper-material future, we must be able to, as George Steiner writes, “break into the small house of our [customer’s] cautionary being” so that “it is no longer habitable in quite the same way as it was before.” We must show our customers how our products and services can change their lives through story.

This is the challenge. How shall we answer it? We must answer it by the way we create our advertising messages. We must answer it every day in the way we market ourselves, our products, our groups and our corporations. We must create ingressive stories that penetrate to that powerful place in the human soul that makes it sing, and dance, and whistle, and live…truly. Furthermore, we must do it every day as if it were a familiar refrain. The battleground is the heart of our prospects, which governs their feelings, which in turn dictate their actions. We are not only Warriors but we are Shamans too, and our primary and most effective weapon for victory is our skillfully crafted and executed expressions of love through story.

We must create stories of love. Let’s get about doing it. Nothing happens until it happens and if we don’t do it, who will? Let us honor those brave souls who went before us, who showed us the path to advertising greatness. Let us also be driven by a thirst for the knowledge of the key drivers of humanity and be sharp enough to apply those principles with great skill and wisdom. We will find that our most effective expressions will be when we tell our story. And who knows, we may even teach the world how to love along our way!

Einstein's Credo

2007-04-20T22:03:00.000-05:00

A Sense of the Mysterious
One of Albert Einstein’s special gifts was his ability to think in images. As a theoretical physicist, he could resolve an equation with his mind’s eye. Whether he was running alongside a shooting light beam or watching a pebble leave the window of a speeding train, he visualized the world around him with his imagination…which he felt was more important than his vast knowledge.

One of Einstein’s greatest truths relevant to marketers was not his theory about relativity or light quanta, but an inauspicious comment he made about his deep sense of the mysterious in response to the question; “Do you believe in God.” I copy the last paragraph of his response (his Credo) below.

Einstein’s Credo (conclusion only)

The most beautiful and deepest experience a man can have is the sense of the mysterious. It is the underlying principle of religion as well as of all serious endeavor in art and science. He who never had this experience seems to me, if not dead, then at least blind. To sense that behind anything that can be experienced there is a something that our minds cannot grasp, whose beauty and sublimely reaches us only indirectly: this is religiousness. In this sense I am religious. To me it suffices to wonder at these secrets and to attempt humbly to grasp with my mind a mere image of the lofty structure of all there is.

From the greatest mind of the 20th Century, I've learned that if we can, just once, give our customers a sense of their belonging to a greater world and attach with it a greater purpose that adds richness to their lives, we will have created something in them as powerful as religious feelings.

Excellent marketers tell the stories and capture the images that resolve complex problems, improving the lives of their prospects and customers. As marketers, sometimes we are fortunate enough to have a life-changing product to market. More than likely though, we must find the “mysterious truth” about average products and present them artfully, engaging the emotion while demonstrating their utility.

I was sitting in a Starbucks today in Hudson Ohio sipping my tall drip coffee with cream. I couldn’t help but watch a steady stream of loyal patrons strolling in one by one to be engaged emotionally! Sure, there is a certain utility to a shot of caffeine in the middle of the morning but after the purchase, I observed the real reason for their pilgrimage---small pockets of people engaged in meaningful conversation and fellowship. The coffee was secondary, just a compliment to the rich depth of meaning that Starbucks was adding to their lives through community and mutual interests.

Like that great physicist, I’m going to convert my Starbuck’s experience into a mental image, add a shot of Einstein’s inspiration, and reverse engineer a few brand messages with great visuals and relevant prose. Who knows, I might just be able to help a customer be more like one of the fastest moving brands in the universe!

Book Review

2007-04-19T16:42:00.000-05:00

The National Retail Federation asked me to write a book review about one of my favorite books. I chose...Marketing to Women: How to Understand, Reach and Increase Your Share of the World's Largest Market Segment by Marti Barletta

It is one of the best marketing insights books I’ve read. I give it a ten out of ten for both wisdom and relevance. I’ve gifted away at least ten copies to my customers and friends. This book explains why it is so important for retailers to speak to their customers with one voice through all twelve guest communication channels.

Marti Barletta provides a comprehensive and easy-to-read framework for understanding the way women approach retail shopping. Ms. Barletta first provides context by comparing men’s goal in shopping, “a good solution”, with women’s goal, “the perfect answer”. Then she peels off a detail-rich look at how women go through the five steps of the shopping experience which she lists as; a) Activation, b) Nomination, c) Investigation/Decision, d) Retention, e) Recommendation. While men go straight through all of these steps like an arrow, women require much more detail, tending to revisit any of the previous steps before completing them all.

The hallmark of her book is the Gender Culture Star for women. Imagine a four pointed star with each point representing four main “inherent perspectives and priorities” that women bring with them when they shop:
Social Values – Different beliefs and attitudes about how people should relate to each other. How they view the world and their part in it.
Focus Strategies – Consistent differences in how women perceive and process information.
Lifetime Factors – Implications of the ways in which women’s roles differ from men’s.
Communication Keys – Different patterns and rituals of expression.

Marti Barletta then draws a circle and places the twelve “Guest Communication Channels” around its circumference like the numbers on a clock. She places the Gender Culture Star within the clock, then rotates the star to illustrate the different ways a woman views the channels…through each of her four inherent perspectives and priorities.

Marti Barletta references many of her experiences and examples to support her concise conclusions. It’s the kind of book that you read and say to yourself, “of course”!

Put this book on the top of your reading list if you are charged with creating strategies for driving store traffic and customer retention with the most influential decision maker in the home!