Brand interactions with your customers are rare: make them count

Every waking hour of the day, every where they turn, your potential customers are assaulted with media that wants to grab their attention–that’s the environment in which your messages compete. In that rare moment when they gift you with their attention make it worth their while–make it count by giving them something that justifies the time they’re spending with your brand: inform, educate, entertain, inspire … by making that moment meaningful you can actually earn their interest in your offering, and eventually, earn their business.

Be bold and prosper.

In every field of human endeavour, he that is first must perpetually live in the white light of publicity. Whether the leadership be vested in a man or in a manufactured product, emulation and envy are ever at work. In art, in literature, in music, in industry, the reward and the punishment are always the same. The reward is widespread recognition; the punishment, fierce denial and detraction. When a man’s work becomes a standard for the whole world, it also becomes a target for the shafts of the envious few. If his work be mediocre, he will be left severely alone — if he achieves a masterpiece, it will set a million tongues a-wagging. Jealousy does not protrude its forked tongue at the artist who produces a commonplace painting. Whatsoever you write, or paint, or play, or sing, or build, no one will strive to surpass or to slander you unless your work be stamped with the seal of genius. Long, long after a great work or a good work has been done, those who are disappointed or envious, continue to cry out that it cannot be done. Spiteful little voices in the domain of art were raised against our own Whistler as a mountback, long after the big would had acclaimed him its greatest artistic genius. Multitudes flocked to Bayreuth to worship at the musical shrine of Wagner, while the little group of those whom he had dethroned and displaced argued angrily that he was no musician at all. The little world continued to protest that Fulton could never build a steamboat, while the big world flocked to the river banks to see his boat steam by. The leader is assailed because he is a leader, and the effort to equal him is merely added proof of that leadership. Failing to equal or to excel, the follower seeks to depreciate and to destroy — but only confirms once more the superiority of that which he strives to supplant. There is nothing new in this. It is as old as the world and as old as human passions — envy, fear, greed, ambition, and the desire to surpass. And it all avails nothing. If the leader truly leads, he remains — the leader. Master-poet, master-painter, master-workman, each in his turn is assailed, and each holds his laurels through the ages. That which is good or great makes itself known, no matter how loud the clamor of denial. That which deserves to live — lives.

If your brand’s story is getting this reaction, that’s a problem

The biggest sin in branding is <yawn> being boring.

Why? Because boring is expensive, very expensive. Boring branding wastes money because it simply isn’t effective.

Your brand communications must not only inform, they must also engage your audience in a way that makes them feel something. When people interact with branded communications that elicit emotion, they create more durable memories. There’s a substantial body of neuroscientific research that establishes this principle:

“Commercials [and other branded communications] that produce strong emotional responses during viewing will be more likely to be recalled, and recalled in more detail than commercials that produce little or no emotional response during viewing.”

 “Emotional messages will be better liked and produce more positive effects on judgments of influence than neutral messages.”

(Batra 1985; Friestad and Thorson 1985)

Here’s how to apply it to your company’s next branding project: once your messaging mandatories have been established, ask “how do we want people to feel about our brand after they see this?” then let that feeling be a driver during creative development.

Keep. It. Simple: happy, wistful, anxious, excited, comforted, lustful … emotions are basic and primal, and the more complex they become, the less effective you will be.

People think with their hearts first. Use emotional branding to grow awareness and  revenue.

Be bold and prosper.

“The younger you are the more inclined you will be to be video literate. Video will be part of almost every brand strategy. Reverse mentoring is very important in the workplace as well. For those of you in marketing, this will be your life. This is where branding strategies will happen. Video will be used to provoke and engage. Vivid images and video displays that can be displayed anywhere will change marketing. Video displays will be anywhere, including on clothing. Amateur videos will mix and be blended with professional video.”

Here are some great examples of entertaining and engaging brand films that hit it out of the park.

Here’s another:

But that’s not all:

Inspired yet?

Be bold and prosper.

Why is a high quality brand film important?

Because your film is not only competing against your competitors’ communications, it’s competing against everything else in our culture that’s vying for your audience’s attention.

Make yours memorable and engaging. Make it great.

The answer to company’s branding quest lives within your company

“We’re really excited to get started, here’s our brochure and a link to our website–when do you think the brand film will be finished?”

Wait, wait, hold your horses.  Brand films serve various purposes: they can tell your company’s story, introduce a new product or service, announce a merger … but all of them have one thing in common–their content: the selection of the images, words, and sounds needs to very focused on creating a distinct impression and communcate a precise and often enduring message for your brand. To gain the maximum value from your film you need to think deeply through this content.

We call the process of uncovering your key messaging, “Discovery”, and it remains one of the most critical phases in the development of great branding assets, particularly films.

A typical Discovery Session involves answering the following questions:

1. Who are we?/Where are we going?  Quite often brands express themselves as reflections of where they were. Where are you now? Relative to your competitors, are you expressing a unique voice, offering, and  viewpoint in the marketplace? If not, brand films can be an excellent cornerstone asset that defines your brand in the here and now.

2. Who are we talking to? Define with as much precision as possible who your audience is: their roles, their needs and wants, their sense of your brand, and critically: “Why should they care about what we’re communicating to them in our brand film?”

3. What do we want them to remember? Rather than focusing on all the things you want to tell your audience, begin by asking what three things you’d like them to remember once the film is over. What are the three things you’d like the viewer to tell someone else about your company and its offering? Remember, keep it simple–that’s the way human memory works, and more money has been wasted on films trying to tell everything than those that focus on only the most important things.

There are many other questions to ask, but these are at the top of the list–they’re a great place to begin digging for the content that will drive your film’s script and production concept.
We often have to sift through lots or extraneous information to find the gold nuggets that exist within your company, but once they’ve been revealed, you’ll find your film will embody a messaging focus that is compelling and memorable–one that drives sales and revenue.

Be bold and prosper.

If you were hungry (needed to purchase a B2B product or service)

… had $2 (or $2,000,000)

and, I presented these two brands two you:

On the left, Brand A, a most delicious, and nutritious orange (or SAAS solution.…)

On the right, Brand B, an equally qualified product …

Which one would you reach for first?

What if the price for Brand B was %10 higher? Would you still grab it and inspect it first?

If you said yes, welcome to the human race. We’re genetically programmed to reach for things that are more visually appealing as they indicate healthiness, quality, and a whole host of other attributes.

Your B2B brand is no different. Looking good isn’t just a successful branding strategy for the B2C world–people are people wherever they go.

Nothing is more memorable than truth beautifully told. Invest in quality design of your brand and all your brand communications materials, and witness the reaction your audience has to them. Great looking corporate design is one of the most effective brand differentiators you can possess. And relative to its ROI, one of the most cost effective too.

Be bold and prosper.

Whether you’re creating a B2B print ad, webpage, or Powerpoint sales presentation, your goal should be to clearly, effectively, and memorably communicate your message to your audience. Simply “covering the topic” is not sufficient.

Imagine yourself as a teacher rather than  a salesman or marketer, and ask yourself, “If I gave a quiz to this person (or group) at the end of my presentation, how well would he remember my key points?”. Looking at it this way, you’ll want to maximize the memorability of your story, and the single most effective way to do this is to add relevant imagery.

Here’s the science: from among all of our five primary senses, roughly 80% of the information we process is acquired visually–the more visual our communications, the more information our audience will absorb, and as demonstrated in the image above, words accompanied by an image are more memorable than words alone.

Be bold and prosper.

Dear QV,

You guys are always beating the emotional B2B branding drum, and frankly I think you’re full of it.

Look, we’re in the industrial heavy equipment manufacturing business–there’s nothing emotional about that–not to us–not to our customers. What do you want us to do, put pictures of puppies on our website? Yeah, that’ll make our customers go “awwww”,  then pick up the phone to order one of our industrial incinerators. We’re men selling steel, smoke, fire and destruction to men, not Barbie dolls to little girls.

I think we’ll just keep on selling our products like we always have, while you branding boys are hugging it out in the corner.

Signed,

Tank Watson, CEO
Dragonfire Industries

 

And there you go. When we say “emotional” we mean “to move people with a feeling.” But, when Mr. Watson heard “emotional”, he interpreted its meaning within a much narrower definition–like the happiness a daughter feels when she sees a puppy, or other primary emotions like sadness or anger. In the right context those emotions could be leveraged by a B2B brand, but thankfully we have many more to choose from. Here’s a list of emotions from Wikipedia. –that’s a very broad vocabulary to work with, and allows you to do some very refined and well-tuned emotionally based branding.

Here’s my response:

Hello Tank,

Thanks for your letter.

I’m afraid you’ve misinterpreted our definition of “emotional”. Indeed, we wouldn’t recommend using a puppy in your ads–mainly because there’s nothing cute about Dragonfire Incinerators, and as you noted, your customers want to destroy things, not cuddle with them

I’d probably recommend you go with “arousal”, as in “the arousal men feel when they destroy things”–that’s the  emotional core of your brand. Here’s a great example from another B2B brand in a comparable industry. I think they crushed their brand messaging with their series of brand films–moving their audience with an emotional feeling (“hell yeah!”) while demonstrating the power and effectiveness of their product. I believe something similar could be very effective for you.

Best wishes for your brand,

Rick Julian, CEO
QUO VADIS

Whew! That turned me on. How about you?

While this was a mythical interaction, I hope it illustrated the broader opportunities for emotional engagement that are possible. For every company, in any industry, there exists a core emotion that is strategically relevant to your marketing goals. Find out what turns your customers on, then layer your brand messages (functions, features, competitive advantages) upon it–it’s a Trojan Horse style strategy that provides high levels of memorable engagement while forging a strong bond with your B2B audience.

Be bold and prosper.