brand relationship model (Photo credit: zilver pics)

Here is a quick 30 second video clip called How To Make Your Corporate Culture Part of Everything You Do.  This is one of Fast Companies 30 Second MBA series.

Worth watching – only 30 seconds obviously!  Whilst Joel Weinegarten talks of team activities (which are  important), the critical point he states is make sure when you hiring people, you filter out the ones who do not appear to be aligned with the core values of the brand/business.   If the staff  you hire are aligned, then you have the right platform for building the right culture.

And as we know if the right culture is strong and positive within your business, then how the business is perceived externally will only be positive too.  The result (amongst many other internal benefits as well) is your business’s brand reputation will positively become stronger increasing your businesses brand equity.

In my view that the core purpose and values of your business are another way of expressing what the your brand’s purpose and beliefs are. Your brand’s purpose and beliefs are not only important for the culture of the business, they are the reason why customer buy from you in the first place and why they stay loyal.  The quote below taken from the blog called actually lets talk about brand equity articulates this point well.

Some people say that a “real,” durable, brand equity springs only from a distinct set of brands’ purpose and beliefs: “Equity is more a factor of a brand’s ability to express a clear and honest sense of why they exist and what they believe about the world than simply the quality of what they do or make. What do you stand for? The clearer that belief, the more attractive the brand is to those with similar beliefs. If others believe what you believe, they will put up with all kinds of better offers to do business with you”

The sentiments echoed in the above quote are not dissimilar to Simon Sinek and Marty Neumeier’s view as expressed in a previous blog of mine. 

Related articles

• The GAP Logo Poll: Is Ignoring Brand Equity A New Marketing Trend? (rohitbhargava.com)
• Brand Equity and Ockham’s Razor (robwolfemba.wordpress.com)
• Announcing: Integrity Culture™ Innovative Organizational Development Process — New Program (prweb.com)

The link takes you to the Fast Company article in which the video is embedded.  It is worth watching and worth wondering how do I apply this thinking to my business?

Major General Stanley A. McChrystal listens to a reporter's question during a Pentagon press conference on April 16, 2003. McChrystal and Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs Victoria Clarke briefed reporters about the situation in Iraq. McChrystal is the vice director for Operations, J-3, the Joint Staff. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

From left to right, the structures of A-, B- and Z-DNA. The structure a DNA molecule depends on its environment. In aqueous enviromnents, including the majority of DNA in a cell, B-DNA is the most common structure. The A-DNA structure is dominates in dehydrated samples and is similar to the double-stranded RNA and DNA/RNA hybrids. Z-DNA is a rarer structure found in DNA bound to certain proteins. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In the work I do, I always seek out what is the DNA of the business.  The reason is because here in lies the authenticity of the brand.  Here in lies the behaviours of the business; the behaviours the business can’t help themselves doing – it is just the way they are wired.  However much they try to behave differently – overtime they can’t maintain it.   Or people just see through them and usually very quickly!

Like people, businesses can’t be something they are not.  Simon Sinek has written a blog The Definition of Authentic Brand.   The blog clearly sums up the dangers of a business pretending to be something it is not.

I do like what this man has to say and I know this is the second blog in succession I have been inspired by him.  It’s a bit irritating however, because I would like to be the one to say what he has to say so succinctly!

So over to you Simon…

Image via Wikipedia

Golden Circle.  This Golden Circle diagram comprising of three layers which articulate the three fundamental principles that Simon Sinek believes all businesses exist from.   The three layers are: -

1. The outer layer identifies WHAT the business does
2. The middle layer identifies HOW the business does it
3. with core of this circle being WHY does your business exist?

• The Golden Circle – How Great Leaders Inspire Action (yahwehssong.com)
• “Start with why” – by Simon Sinek (thestartupangel.com)

Image by Intersection Consulting via Flickr

How a business behaves to its customers over time forms the perception on how the customers feel about the business.  This is very much the same way how people judge other people.  The behaviour they display consistently determines whether one person likes another person and importantly whether they can be trusted or not.  With the onset of the internet and social media, the behaviours of businesses have come under intense scrutiny i.e. can we trust the business or not, do we like this business or not etc.  The way a business behaves now is the brand.

This is relatively a recent phenomenon changing the whole relationship and view businesses have to have of branding and in particular their own brand.  No longer can branding be the sole responsibility of the marketing department – everyone in the business has a role to play. This is not a new way of thinking; it just wasn’t as pertinent then as it is now. One has to only go to www.change.org to see how the internet is facilitating and influencing the behaviours of large organisations. Or listen to a recent interview on the radio with Nick Allardice; Deputy Global Campaigns Director for Change.org discussing the online platform that publishes petitions and mobilises community changes for greater appreciation of the power of change.org.

This is good news – the way a business does its business becomes a strong and sustainable point of difference, The brand is the reflection of the cultural DNA of the business. It is very hard for a competitor to match or emanate another business’s competitive culture.

The bad news is everyone in the business has to recognise this and be equally responsible. This is from the top down permeating and exuding through every pore of the business.

This is too important to be left as the sole responsibility of the marketing department or marketing consultant.  It has to be controlled by the senior management of the business.

Controlling the way the business’s brand is manifested throughout business is done as a ‘top down’ and ‘bottom-up’  pincer movement of brand mentoring at senior management level and brand training at the coal face of all the brand touch points with the customer.

If a business cares how it is perceived, cares about its reputation, then it must care about the brand of its business, not just its branded products and services.

The trouble is, I am getting confused again.  Just when I thought I would settle for an Android Samsung Galaxy – the Nokia N9 comes on the market.  I do like how the Nokia N9 organizes the apps, the most recent and favorite pages.  I do like that you can find things faster (I think?).  And I do like the aesthetics and the way it has been designed.

So far so good.  I am thinking, maybe I should get this instead?  I go to the bottom of the page and Ash Sangamneheri  makes the comment: -

“Does make you wonder, if they did such a good job why did they have to abandon it for WP7?”

To which Danile Ostrower replies: -

“Good point. And why would I buy it knowing the OS is already end-of-lifed?”

With a final comment from Chris Clement: -

“MeeGo itself is not EOL though (it is doing very well, actually). I’m with you guys on questioning their initial intent, but here’s hoping they change their mind. Even knowing it could end up on the back-burner, I still can’t help but want! “

What are they talking about!  My guess is the technology is already redundant?  But that can’t be, it has just been launched!

This leaves me with the thought who do I trust then – Nokia, Fast Company (who wrote the review) or the people who left their comments.  My heart wants to buy the N9, my head is saying don’t.  Will my trust in the Nokia and Fast Company brands i.e. my heart win over the logic of the comments made?

May be the iPhone will win. After all I had a dream the other day, where I had just bought an iPhone and how pleased I was – how sad is that!

Or maybe I should stick to a Blackberry and get an all screen smart phone.  It is after all geared up for business better.  But then so is the Windows Phone 7.

Into the mix is the apps.  Clearly iPhone holds the advantage now – but in 12 months?

‘What-a-to-do’!  So much choice.  And the real irritant is, I know whatever I choose will be out of date within months!  The head part of my body is saying, buy a second hand smart phone.  I know it is already out of date, so it won’t matter.  And I will be able to buy at a significantly cheaper price.  But there again my heart wants the latest and greatest – oh ‘What-a-to-do’.

The conclusion I have come to is I respect and trust all the brands mentioned above, but at the end of the day, hopefully I will probably listen to people who are in the know, despite my emotions screaming to get a ………!

However whilst Apple have not introduced NFC into the stores over last weekend as was indicated in my last blog, they have refined their in-store technology to get iPadified!

I particularly liked the Simpsons’ Maple Store cartoon at the bottom of the Fast Company article.

NFC is being hailed as the future of shopping with some conjecturing this could hail the death of credit cards.  This is unlikely to happen in my opinion as I am sure companies like MasterCard, Visa and American Express aren’t going to go down without a fight!  They will a)adapt if nothing else, or b)bring out their own version.

What I do find interesting is will NFC be a gimmick only (check out Think & Go to find out more on how it can be applied)?  I do find people can get very excited about technology believing it is the fix-all to their challenges, the magic pill that will change everything.  And in some cases it might, in some retail scenarios it may be totally relevant for the consumer.  The smart retailer will work this out before committing significant capitol.  The smart retailer will work out how useful NFC is to their customer.  Will it make the consumer’s shopping decisions easier?  Will it help consumers  make the right choices?  Will it make the selection process faster and more convenient for the consumer?  And from the retailer’s perspective; will it encourage the consumer to spend more, will it help to generate repeat business, will it make consumers become loyal customers?  Answering these questions will help the retailer understand whether or not NFC is relevant for their business, that it adds value to their customer’s shopping experience.

It is very easy to get caught up in the hype of new technology.  It is exciting especially when Apple gets on the band wagon.

So will the rumor prove to be true this weekend?  Lets find out!

Image via Wikipedia

There was an article recently in Fast Company called: -

How 3M Gave Everyone Days Off and Created an Innovation Dynamo

It’s about the story of 3M.  This isn’t news per se, but the article does illustrate clearly the power of having a culture of innovation and a culture of creative competition.  3M learnt very early on to ‘innovate or die’.

Now they have the financial resources to maintain actively a working environment that allows new ideas to percolate to the surface.  Both Apple and Google do the same.  This is why they are such power houses in business.

The article says the R&D budget for 3M is not cheap.  At this point most executives and business owners go, nice thing to do - can’t afford it.

However can a business afford not to innovate?  Can a business survive forever without ever improving any of their products or services?  I don’t think so!

Yet surprisingly there are many business who think they can until they wake up to the fact they are losing market share, losing relevance, their product or service increasingly becoming more and more commoditised etc. etc!

There is a story about two Kentucky farmers sitting on a porch chatting away drinking bourbon .  One of the farmers has a dog who is sitting next to him howling.  The other farmer asks “Why is your dog howling?” to which the farmers says “He is sitting on a nail.”  ”Why doesn’t he get off the nail then?” “Because it isn’t hurting enough yet!” the farmer replied.

And this is true of most businesses, and true really of all humans, we don’t make changes until it hurts too much.  We tolerate our circumstances for far longer than we should.  We justify to ourselves and to anyone who listens why we are prepared to tolerate the circumstances we find ourselves in.

Smart businesses, smart people start to make changes before it hurts too much.  And what is smart about that is they have the resources, the energy and the money to effect change, to innovate.  Waiting till it hurts too much usually means there is a lack of resource, energy and money to  truly effective change at the speed required to survive, grow and prosper.

Logically this makes sense, emotionally – acting on this is a lot harder.  Logic has to be the driver here – it is an imperative.  Make small changes, create an environment where everybody can contribute ideas from the bottom up.  This doesn’t cost money to instigate.  Take the best ideas and determine which ones the business can afford to develop further.  Stage gate the process to keep finances in check reducing financial risk.  Just develop one idea a year at a minimum will keep most SME’s alive and relevant.

Don’t you just love the design!  It’s sculpture with purpose.  I want one!