Brand Champions

Developing a Sustainable Brand is Not About Going Green

I advocate that a sustainable brand is not about a logo, tagline and advertising campaign. A sustainable brand is also not about going green. While a logo is an important visual representation of your brand, and a tagline and advertising campaign may be ways to communicate what your brand stands for, your purpose, guiding principles and helping your brand champions understand what your organization stands for are the most important aspects of brand development.

My experience tells me that the majority of people and the organizations that they work for or buy from still think that the words brand and branding are buzz words that replace other words like marketing and advertising. The same appears to be the case with the words sustainable, sustainability and going green. To me going green is a strategy that may or may not be a logical choice to support your brand and your brand champions. The overarching strategy should be the umbrella that reflects your brand which your green priorities fall underneath.

A sustainable brand is based on mission, core values and stakeholder engagement. A sustainable brand is not about going green. When you understand your brand DNA, you better understand your carbon footprint.

Rex Whisman

BrandED Consultants Group

Political Ads Destroy Brand Alignment Process and Create Brand Orphans

There was once a time long, long ago when people like you and I had the opportunity to elect political candidates whose party and individual principles and purpose in life aligned with ours. In those days I could decide if a Democrat, Republican or Independent party candidate connected with my personal brand. In that system, I have voted for those in each of these categories.

Those were also times when it was a given that whoever one voted for, at the end of the day there would be the expectation that compromise and bi-partisonship would result. Today, we are increasingly left without that opportunity. Even though the list of candidates grows, our choices are diminished. Our only option is to vote from a list of candidates who all seem to sound alike. Their strategy is to attack their opponent, insult our intelligence and never consider working with other parties.

In the days of yore we had to go to a polling place on election day and fill out our ballot. Today we can vote early. Despite having the opportunity to have voted already, I have not done so yet. Why? I have no one who seems to align with my brand. I feel like more like a brand orphan than a brand champion for the choices that I have between now and Tuesday. By the way, would the economy be a political issue if the money spent on political television ads were spent for more productive uses?

Rex Whisman

BrandED Consultants Group

Brand Champion of the Day-Monopoly

This year marks the 75th anniversary of a time-tested brand, Monopoly. In that period of time Hasbro had sold some 275 million board games with an estimated 1 billion of us who have played the game. How many brands can boast those numbers? Not many. Whether we are talking about the original board game, web and mobile versions or the new Facebook game, Monopoly has stayed true to its purpose.

Isn't that what branding is all about? We should honor our history and traditions and place them in a modern context. Too often organizations get stuck in the past and are afraid to be forward-thinking, or they get too ambitious and all of a sudden appear to be super aspirational. Monopoly has been successful in seeking a balance.

One billion users? Those are some serious brand champions. I count myself as one of those people. I have not played for a long time, but I remember the fun and inspiration of owning properties all the way around the board and my determination to win the game. For being the envy and model of many-a-brand, Monopoly, you are the Brand Champion of the Day!

Rex Whisman

BrandED Consultants Group

Stakeholder Engagement is the Key to a Successful Brand Strategy

I have spent the past four days in Philadelphia on the campus of La Salle University meeting with representatives from there and La Salle College High School, and engaging stakeholders from those institutions in a national P-20 school brand initiative that they are a part of. A colleague of mine and I have spent this week meeting with senior leadership, faculty, staff, parents, student, alumni and representatives from other stakeholder groups to report our brand work to date and garner opinions and recommendations for developing a brand strategy to connect over 40 schools throughout the country.

This week has reinforced what I have trumpeted for many years. A sustainable brand is based on mission, core values and stakeholder engagement. While logos, taglines and advertising campaigns are important and may very well be significant aspects of this project, providing opportunitites for stakeholders to help shape the brand strategy ensures that an adopted strategy will be sustainable. This approach also allows those who organizations rely on to live the brand and deliver on the brand promise are more likely to do so when they are actively involved in the process.

Our employees and our customers are our brand champions. When the play key roles in determining the brand strategy, they will go out of their way to recruit and retain more brand champions. When they are left out of the process, brand champions can easily become brand inhibitors.

Rex Whisman

BrandED Consultants Group

 

Which is More Important to Your Brand, a Verbal or Visual Identity?

Of course both are important. Which is more important probably depends upon who you are asking and what the people do who you are asking. A graphic designer, marketer or web developer will probably tell you that he or she thinks a visual identitiy is more important than a visual identity. Come to think of it, most people regardless of their position, probably would say a visual identity is more important than a visual identity. After all, most people still think a brand is a logo, supported by a tagline and advertising campaign.

I am not naive enough to say that a visual identity is not important, however I believe that a verbal identity is more important. I argue that the conversations people have about your organization help build your brand and contribute more to the development of your reputation than a logo. Your name, the associations that people make with your name and how they communicate the essence of your name is critical to your success. How your name is represented by a logo is very important, but not as important as how people talk about your organization. A great example is Southwest Airlines. Word of mouth is more important than their less than stellar logo.

Ideally we should strive to align our internal culture with our external reputation. That is what branding is all about. Equally important is aligning our verbal and visual identity. Brand Champions prefer to talk.

Rex Whisman

BrandED Consultants Group

Higher Education Branding, Taking it Personally

I wanted to give a shout out to any of you who will be attending the American Marketing Association's 2010 Symposium for the Marketing of Higher Education. If you are going to be in San Diego and are contemplating a pre-conference workshop, you might want to consider joining me and Harry Hayward, director of electronic media for the University of Washington.

Our session, Building the Brand Called YOU will take place on Sunday, November 7 and provide attendees with insights about how to develop a sustainable personal brand, and how to effectively align your personal brand strategy with that of your department and your current or future institution of higher learning. Remember your brand is your name, what your name stands for and the associations that people make when they hear or see your name. Your brand is not your family crest of your personal license plate.

I look forward to connecting with fellow brand champions from around the globe.

Rex Whisman

BrandED Consultants Group

Brand Champions of the Day-Texas Rangers

Who doesn't like an underdog? Of course the New York Yankees do not, but most of us do. We tend to want to connect with someone or some organization that appears not to have as much of a chance for success as a larger more established brand. This was certainly the case with the predicted victory of the New York Yankees over the Texas Rangers in the American League Championship Series. Guess what? The Rangers have a stronger brand.

The Rangers? Yes, the Rangers. This brand is the right combination of pitching, hitting, fielding, fan suppoort and many other necessary attributes of baseball brand. Most times we know this as a team, and I think the Rangers best represent that right now in the American League and that is why they won the championship. I often tire of people who use sport as a metaphor for other business concepts. I often tire of writing about them.

Today I will make due because the Texas Rangers are the Brand Champions of the Day.

Rex Whisman

BrandED Consultants Group

Like Traditional Media, Social Media Needs to Communicate the Essence of Your Brand

Most communications and marketing professionals have been trained to focus on external audiences and communicate messages through traditional media like advertising and try to create some buzz, with the hopes that clients will line up for products and services. Now that social media is becoming more mainstream, communications and marketing professionals, as they tend to do, are gumming onto social media and thinking that there will be some wave of business.

The downturn in the economy is now forcing more and more organizations to start focusing internally and do more with less. People are doing the same. Increasingly organizations and the people that work there or customers who inquire want to know what the organization stands for. At the same time we are all embracing social media as a communications and marketing resource. Not just because it is often more cost effective than traditional media like advertising, but for many reasons.

I see that approximately 80 percent of governors in the States are making use of YouTube as a way to deliver their message. Many governors realize that YouTube is now the second ranked search engine and are creating more of a presence for people who want to see and hear what governors stand for. Some governors think that they can make use of YouTube to rant and try and be cool. No matter what media you use, it needs to be done in order to communicate the essence of your organization in an accurate, authentic, concise and consistent manner.

Social media can be a great way to recruit and retain brand champions. But only if it supports your brand not dilute it with Mad Men antics. I have been a huge advocate of social media for four years now. What I have found is the key to building a sustainable brand is authenticity.

Rex Whisman

BrandED Consultants Group

How is Your Brand Perceived Internally and Externally?

The ideal answer is that the perceptions internally and externally are in alignment. Indeed branding is the process of aligning your internal culture with your external reputation. Our role as brand strategists should be to help ensure that there is balance between our internal and exteral brand champions. In most organizations there is an alignment problem.

We either have everyone internally aware of and understand our mission, core values and strategic plan, and we lack an external presence or understanding. More often people outside the organization have a better understanding of who we are (or think they do) and what we stand for than do our employees. Why? Because most organizations and the marketers within that organization limit their focus to prospective customers. Why? Because that is how most marketers are trained to think and act. When this happens we let the market determine who we are.

Organzations need to do a better job of helping their internal stakeholders understand the mission and core values. This allows employees to be more loyal and do a more effective job of recruiting and retaining external champions. How your brand is perceived internally and externally is critical. Seek a balance. As a sidebar, the USA Today ran an interesting poll result from a survey conducted by BrandAsset Consulting. Who are the most arrogant USA sport brands? In order, Tiger Woods, New York Yankees, Miami Heat WWE Wrestling and Dallas Cowboys. I would say all of those are on-brand.

Rex Whisman

BrandED Consultants Group

Brand Champion of the Day-Joe Buck, Fox Sports

One of the most interesting people in sport is Joe Buck. Or is it that Joe Buck makes sport more interesting than other announcers. Even a very long, extra-inning baseball game feels fun when listening to Buck. His brand attributes include knowledge, professionalism, humor and normality. Unlike other announcers of sport, Buck does not yell at the audience or make the game about him.

Whether one is watching a Major League Baseball game when Buck teams up Tim Carver whom Buck has calmed with his presence, or with Troy Aikman for a National Football League game, Buck allows the viewer the chance to gain interest in the contest. I used to play a lot of sport and spent way too many hours in my past viewing sport. Because of this addiction, the past few years I have come close to losing complete interest.

Joe Buck has provided me with an opportunity to re-enter the world of sport. For his exemplary work, Joe Buck is the Brand Champion of the Day. Oh by the way, his dad was one of the best too. "I don't believe what I just saw." I am a huge champion of the Buck brand.

Rex Whisman

BrandED Consultants Group