Branding Book... have a second life

The Branding Comedy

2012-01-02T14:39:00.000+02:00

The Country’s Blandest Yogurt?

2011-11-03T09:24:00.003+02:00

I never thought the day would come but, these days, I would much rather have a tart frozen yogurt sprinkled with blackberries and coconut shavings than a creamy chocolate ice cream sprinkled with chocolate chips. Years ago, it was fat over fat-free. Perhaps the boom of the “froyo” craze, fueled by Pinkberry, of the mid-2000s had something to do with it, which has positioned this treat as a cool, groovy, healthy swirl to consume. Not even remotely associated with the upheaval of the froyo is TCBY (The Country’s Best Yogurt), the forefather of consumer frozen yogurt that opened its first store in 1981 and now has over 900 franchise locations, approximately 400 of those outside the United States. I remember the TCBY in a mall in Mexico, it was full of hippie foods and it couldn’t shake the old school health attitude if its granola depended on it. In the last ten years in the US, I don’t recall, once, seeing a TCBY outpost. Surely, I have, but it has receded into the background against its contemporary, colorful rivals. In June, TCBY announced plans to change all this, introducing a new store design and identity created by Salt Lake City, UT-based Struck/Axiom.

“We feel like the tone of the experience, energy, and choice self-serve offers the consumer is not only a dramatic departure from our current experience, but a departure from the category as a whole,” says Timothy Casey, CEO of TCBY. “Today’s announcement is the culmination of tremendous strategy, research and creative execution by our internal team and agency, StruckAxiom, to bring this trifecta — concept, design, and brand identity — to a realization. More important, it’s symbolic of the new TCBY, a pioneer ready to infuse and lead the movement around a growing frozen yogurt category. Today is one of many steps in that direction.”
— Press Release

The following images are of directions presented, not chosen. Provided for your process enjoyment.

End of process images.

TCBY requested a simple, yet empowering logo that would remain a recognizable, iconic depiction of the company’s trademark acronym. Along with Foster Research & Consulting, StruckAxiom conducted focus groups on TCBY’s behalf to gauge consumer sentiment on the refreshed logo. Consumers felt the new logo and identity were clean and simple, and spoke to freshness, health and relevancy. TCBY will incorporate variations of the updated logo on in-store and outdoor signage, packaging, employee uniforms and marketing collateral.

The old logo had a clumsy playfulness that didn’t come across too endearingly, not committing fully to being more daring and fun. The new logo, in contrast, commits to something: trendiness. The magenta color, the thin geometric letterform, the lowercase… it’s not a particularly good or bad logo, but it doesn’t offer anything new. I can appreciate the “y” in the shape of the cup and the well-balanced length of the ascenders and descenders but that’s where the yogurt stops serving. The name spelled out next to tcby is too tight and mashed together, the complete opposite message of light and airiness that one might prefer to associate with frozen yogurt.

With a distinct color palette and welcoming social lounge, the new store design boasts a clean, progressive personality with smart functionality for both consumers and employees. Mindful of the concept’s vision, TCBY has created a self-serve customer experience that is both accessible and attractive. Upon entering the store, customers are greeted by 10 to 16 soft-serve flavors boasting 98 percent fat free and sugar free frozen yogurt and sorbet options. After choosing their favorite flavors, guests approach an extensive toppings bar brimming with fresh fruit, granola, and a variety of dry and hot toppings to finalize their creation. Pricing is done by weight at $.39 per ounce.

The new store design does feel more engaging and welcoming. I’m also a fan of anything that allows me to interact less with bored teenagers waiting for costumers to pick a flavor. The self-serve stations, which are now the de facto model in most froyo chains, is indeed a boon. TCBY is getting a big visual boost with this concept, but all those franchises still need to adopt the new look and feel, and that may take a long time. TCBY is already a step behind the competition, it may be too many steps more before it catches up.

Photos from the soft opening of a new concept store in Salt Lake City.

JWT works on ‘Brand USA’ - the country’s first global consumer brand

2011-11-01T08:36:00.001+02:00

JWT has created what claims to be the United States’ first-ever global consumer brand, the Brand USA project, for US government organisation The Corporation for Travel Promotion.

The identity is set to be unveiled in London on 7 November.

Working with WPP sister consultancy The Brand Union and PR agency Hill & Knowlton, JWT’s New York office has named the brand, developed an identity and a brand manifesto.

The CTP did not start searching for its consultancies until July and the consortium of agencies were not appointed until late August.

WPP says its consultancies beat ‘two undisclosed global agencies in a pitch’.

The CTP, which is understood to have a $200 million (£125 million) budget, was set up in 2010 as a partnership between the travel industry and federal government to market the USA to international visitors and in turn create jobs in the industry and economic growth.

Launching at the World Travel Market in London on 7 November a discussion of the ‘rigorous strategic positioning and brand identity process’ is promised by CTP.

http://www.designweek.co.uk/

Simon Anholt on Brand Egypt

2011-10-27T11:48:00.001+02:00

At Business Today there’s a very interesting interview with Simon Anholt about Brand Egypt:

How does a nation benefit from branding itself?
Branding a country is very different from branding a product, because it’s not simply a matter of conceptualizing an image, then creating a marketing strategy and ad campaign. In my opinion, that would be propaganda and a huge waste of money. That’s not what I do. I don’t work on tourism campaigns, either. Instead, I advise governments on how to change the complete reputation of their country abroad. I work on innovation strategies with governments, which involve making real policy changes, then getting that message across to the rest of the world.

Does that mean the changes have to take place first before the branding campaign begins?
No, the two can take place simultaneously. A country in the process of reforming itself is a fact that you can use to build a brand — provided that the reforms are real and not just propaganda on the part of the government. A work in progress can be a brand.

Do developing economies need branding more than their fully industrialized counterparts?
Yes, definitely. If you look at the results of the quarterly country surveys that I conduct as part of my nation brands index [see www.nationbrandindex.com], developed countries have the strongest brands. They rank as the top 20 countries in the survey. It’s the developing nations that need stronger images. If the image doesn’t change, nothing will move forward; it has to go hand in hand with any development strategy.

Is now the right time for to brand itself?Absolutely. Actually, Egypt already has a brand — it has had one for about 5,000 years. The problem is that is hasn’t been able to successfully manage it. I would say that it is about 500 years too late in getting around to managing it.

Are you working in an official capacity with the government of Egypt on a branding campaign?
No, I am not currently working with the Egyptian government — but would very much like to.

Should Egypt brand itself as a complete destination for business, investment and tourism with a unified image campaign, or can each aspect be tackled separately?
Branding must be approached as a comprehensive effort. You can’t tackle tourism alone, for example, and ignore the rest. It wouldn’t be effective.
This is actually the problem that Egypt, and many other developing countries, are suffering from today. They put out a lot of conflicting messages. On the one hand, you have the messages coming from the Tourist Board — those are always the shiniest and the loudest, promoting Egypt as a wonderful tourist destination with amazing hotels, beaches and ancient monuments. It’s not false advertising, but then you have the other images that come from the media: the negative political climate, the occasional terrorist attack, the failing economy.
These are all conflicting images that people have of Egypt, so the overall image is very fragmented. People outside don’t understand a thing about the country. They see a very weak economy — I’m talking about the average person on the street, not necessarily the investors — and political turmoil, but an interesting holiday destination despite the hardships.

How do you deal with these conflicting messages?The way to deal with the terrorist threat is not to ignore it, but rather get the message out about how the government is working on fixing the problem. I think most tourists acknowledge the fact that it is not the fault of the government that these incidents happen, but they are interested in knowing what is being done about it. Denying that it exists is not very effective.

Have the Pyramids become a liability rather than an asset? There is talk here that we rely too heavily on them as a ‘brand’ for Egypt.
You can’t deny the fact that Egypt is famous for the Pyramids. That’s not a bad thing. I mean, less than one fourth of the countries in the world today are famous. Egypt is one of those famous countries.
Clearly, you cannot rely on the pyramids or your ancient history alone with your branding strategy, but they don’t have to be erased. Doing so would be a mistake, because they are too heavily entrenched in people’s minds.
The trick is to try to make links between the past and the future. That is the challenge. The Pyramids will not bring in foreign investments or improve trade deficits, but they are better than being invisible.
You have a better situation than a country like Bangladesh, which isn’t famous for anything. It’s much easier to change the course of a conversation about Egypt from Pyramids to industrial growth and GDP than it is to start a new conversation about Bangladesh.

Many business leaders here believe that this focus on the old —like the Pyramids —is part and parcel of why we make little effort to innovate and create like Dubai has.
You can’t compare Egypt to Dubai on any front. In fact, it’s difficult to compare Dubai to any other country in the world, because [it is] run more like a corporation than a country. It’s very easy to market and brand a corporation. There is no challenge there whatsoever.

Does your Anholt Nation Brands Index include Egypt?
Yes, it does. Egypt ranks 28 out of 35 countries, 35 being the weakest brand, which is not so good, I’m afraid.

What’s your methodology?We survey 28,000 ordinary consumers all over the world and ask questions in six specific categories: governance, culture, people, products, tourism and business climate.
Egypt does incredibly well on culture. It actually ranks number one in this area. Cultural heritage is your strong point, and that’s something you should be capitalizing on. Egypt ranks reasonably well on tourism, but could improve.
The areas in which you rank the poorest are governance and products. When, for example, the consumer is asked the question “If you buy a product, take it home find a ‘Made in Egypt’ label on it, would you feel that you have overpaid, underpaid or paid a fair price?” The answer was always overpaid. So “Made in Egypt” currently adds no value to a product. Egyptian products ranked 34th out of 35, with Japan being the top country.
Egypt’s business climate also ranked poorly: 33rd out of 35.
But keep in mind that it was a general audience that was being surveyed, not investors, who may be more familiar with the repercussions of the recent reforms and legislation.
We also asked questions like, “If your company were to relocate you to Egypt, would you be happy about the move?” The answer was usually “No.” That puts into play other factors like the perceived quality of life.
Egypt also ranked 33 out of 35 as a destination for education or a place to study.

How can we go about improving our overall image?Well, the way I would go about it is to create a single public-private partnership made up of government — the ministries of trade, investment, foreign affairs and tourism — top business people and civil society. They would be responsible for putting together a brand strategy and overall direction for the country.
The participation of civil society here is very important. You need to have the participation of religious leaders, educational leaders and intellectuals in order to come up with some clearly defined goals. It isn’t an easy process. National image is very slow-moving — it can take 20-30 years to build, so even if there are positive improvements in Egypt on the economic and business front, they won’t trickle down to street level either at home or abroad for quite some time.
But the positive stories have to be well managed, highlighted and made public. Egypt has done a very poor job of that thus far. It’s the negative images that get out. This is not unique to Egypt: Most countries suffer from the same problem because of the nature of the media. Bad news sells better than good news.

Your survey also tries to quantify what national brands are worth.
Yes, right now Egypt’s brand is worth $67 billion, which is only 20% of its GDP. A very strong brand like Germany, for example, is worth double its GDP. Clearly, we can see that Egypt is under-performing in terms of image.

How you calculate how much a brand is worth?
It’s complicated, but basically, 50% of the calculation comes from consumer research and the other half comes from economic data — things like foreign investment, tourism revenues etc. What boosts the brand worth of countries such as Japan and Germany, for example, are the strong brands that they are known for, including Mercedes, BMW and Toyota.
Famous exports can be powerful ambassadors. Egypt doesn’t have any famous exports. Egyptian cotton is perhaps Egypt’s most famous product, but it is not really a brand.

All of this ties into the global power of brands you postulate in Brand New Justice?
The book is about branding and economic development. Brand value is an incredibly powerful economic force. It is responsible for a quarter of all the wealth on the planet.
It isn’t a coincidence that countries that are very good at branding are also the wealthiest. Branding is the most powerful tool that humanity has created for distributing wealth, and it is branding that can close the gap between rich and poor nations. If we teach developing nations how to brand, it can dramatically change their plights. There are well-established policy routes that can help the nations of the developing world change their image.

So how can Egyptian industry change its poor image abroad?
In the 1950s, Japan was a poor country; today, they are an industrial superpower. The Japanese government basically adopted a strategy they called ‘backing winners,’ which meant that they gave their full support to companies that were promising. Things took off from there.
For Egypt, I think the route to changing the poor perception of Egyptian products will not be through the manufacturing of consumer electronics. It is very important to understand consumer psychology. Even if Egypt starts producing good-quality consumer electronics, it is cultural heritage that is Egypt’s strong point in the minds of consumers worldwide. It would be very difficult to get them to buy electronics manufactured in Egypt — at least for the time being.
So start with something that is easy for the world to accept. I think fashion and textiles might be a good start, since the association with cotton and art are already there. Egypt already makes much of the clothes that are sold in the developed world, so coming up with indigenous textile and clothing brands is the next stage.

What do you hope to achieve with your participation in Egypt’s Economist Conference?
I will be participating in a session with Minster of Tourism Zohair Garana on branding. I hope to feed some ideas into the minds of the government. This is a globalized world, but I think developing countries sometimes work on strategies that completely ignore the marketplace.

How did you decide to get into ‘place’ branding?
This is what I love and believe in, so I created this business based on that. I have been in the field of place branding for 10 years or so, serving as an advisor to governments. Before that, I had extensive experience in the field of corporate marketing, but I got bored with companies.

http://nation-branding.info/2006/05/02/brand-egypt-anholt/

A Rebranding Concept That Could Make Ladies Love Car Accessories

2011-02-21T10:50:00.000+02:00

Vinh Pho's AutoZone packaging makes car accessories appealing to the fairer sex (and more accessible to everyone).

If motor-oil canisters are any indication, women don't buy oil. Ever. The packaging has so many muscular angles and mannish colors and all-cap type treatments, you half expect it to go marching into a meeting of No Ma'am. Which should make sense to precisely no one. Women drive. Some even (gasp!) know how to change their oil. Shouldn't motor oil -- and all auto accessories for that matter -- appeal to the fairer sex?

Enter Vinh Pho, a student designer living in France, who has snipped away all that dudishness to produce a refreshingly simple (and, yes, gender-neutral) packaging concept for car gear sold by the spare-parts giant AutoZone. The products include hand tools, microfiber pads, a drying cloth, and, of course, motor oil, and each is done up in a sleek graphic scheme of orange, gray, and white, with minimal text and lots of lower-case letters; think Method instead of Nascar.

As for the shape of the packaging, it suggests a light feminine touch: The oil comes in a capsule that resembles a Glade PlugIn, microfiber pads in something that could easily pass for a compact.

Sure, some men might scoff at an oil canister that doesn't look like Axe body spray on steroids. But set aside all this gender talk, for a moment, and think about this: Pho's design is leaps and bounds easier to read than most car-accessory brands. Look at his oil capsule, which makes the most important information, the oil grade, the biggest feature. That's great news for ladies and guys alike -- nothing's less manly than pouring the wrong oil in your car.

[Images courtesy of Vinh Pho]

Harmony Amid Chaos: Another Brand of Brotherhood in Egypt

2011-02-13T11:35:00.001+02:00

As the world gazes upon and analyzes the uncertainty in Egypt, much focus has been given to the radical "Muslim Brotherhood" group. Well, there's another Egyptian brotherhood that's caught my eyes recently.

Last week I was touched by a picture posted here on Revelife in which a group of Egyptian Christians surrounded their Muslim countrymen so that they could safely worship/pray amid the chaos in the area. And I was just as moved several days later by other images showing Egyptian Muslims returning the favor, joining with and protecting their Christian countrymen in worship. So indescribably beautiful.

I once read about a similar situation somewhere else in the Middle East. I want to say it was in Iraq, but I'm not entirely positive. In the midst of Christianity vs. Islam, Christians and Muslims cohabited a city together with no suicide-bombers, no gunshots in the street, no egg'd porches or TP'd lawns -- no conflict whatsoever. Further, the Muslims and Christians in this town would immediately stand up and defend the other whenever outsiders came in to try and disrupt the peaceful community they'd built.

Why don't we hear about these kinds of stories more? It's always bombs here, battles there, and it's all just so disheartening.

I can't stand conflict. Drives me nuts. Especially conflict between Christians, or caused by so-called "Christians" against non-Christians, who don't at all extend the love that Jesus taught and exuded. I hate divorce, despise constant arguments that go nowhere. Why can't we all just get along on this earth? Why can't we all follow this beautiful example of Egyptian brotherhood, arms across shoulders, crosses and Korans within inches of each other with no fists flying?

Lord haste the day when we know nothing but peace for all eternity.

[ Diamond Beads ] on the Behance Network

2011-02-13T10:48:00.000+02:00

[ Diamond Beads ] on the Behance Network

The Rise of Egyptian Aspirations, The Fall of the American Brand

2011-02-09T10:53:00.001+02:00

It’s been exhilarating to watch Tunisians, Egyptians and Yemenis take to their streets and demand an end to the dictatorial regimes controlling their lives for decades. But it’s exhilaration mixed with dread, doubt, disappointment and embarrassment.

The dread: That the guns trained on the protesters of Tahrir Square in Cairo will eventually open fire, just as they did in China’s Tiananmen Square in 1989, ending that country’s brief grab for democracy after three weeks of demonstrations. The Egyptian military tells protesters it won’t open fire as long as the protests are peaceful. That’s a cue for the government’s agents provocateurs to light the fuse when the time comes.

The doubt: That the follow-through in any of these Arab nations will be as democratically sustained as the revolutionary passions fueling the movements. Too few credible opposition leaders are ready to assume leadership. That’s what happens after decades of dictatorship: there are no trained leaders to step in. And too many forces are arraigned against the movements, including, sadly and pitifully, the United States.

The disappointment: To see the rest of the Middle East, where freedom and democracy are no less alien, sit out the movement. Where are the protesters of Algeria, Libya, Morocco, Jordan, Syria, Saudi Arabia and Iran, each a nation with unelected, illegitimate leaders? Where, for that matter, are the protesters of Iraq and Afghanistan, where the American illusion of democracy is not nearly as convincing as the authoritarian regimes in place now? Qatar’s al-Jazeera has been providing gripping, round-the-clock live coverage of the revolutions. Egypt just censored al-Jazeera’s broadcasts anywhere in Egypt and revoked the accreditations of the satellite station’s journalists in Egypt. But it’s not as if Hamad al-Thani, the leader of Qatar, who founded and funds al-Jazeera—enlightened and more liberal than most Arab leaders as he may be—is any more legitimate than his cohorts elsewhere in the region. He breaks fewer skulls, Qatari prison conditions are not significantly different than Florida’s, but he’s still an unelected leader ruling by those old and wacky presumptions of hereditary or divine right (the Moroccan king actually thinks he’s a descendant of Mohammed, though by DNA he has more in common with Pee-Wee Herman).

The embarrassment: To hear the leader of the Arab League—a league of 22 nations, 20 of them entirely undemocratic and therefore illegitimate—call for multi-party elections in Egypt, as he did Sunday, after sitting out that sort of declaration for as long as the league has been around. That’s to be expected from the current crop of Arab leaders. Far more embarrassing is to hear Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton sound no different than the leader of the Arab League: vague declarations about the need for elections, but no commitment for democracy now, no conviction, no inspiration for the protesters, certainly no endorsement of their demonstrations, and continued tacit support for Mubarak. It’s American-made tear gas, after all, that’s been raining down on protesters, part of the $1.5 billion in military aid the United States sends Egypt every year. No let-up of that rain in the forecast.

“This is an ongoing conversation that American officials have had for 30 years,” Clinton told an interviewer on Sunday. And what has that achieved?

It’s Not Just the Last 30 Years

There’s also a false demarcation between the Mubarak years and the years that preceded them. Democratically speaking, Mubarak was neither an improvement nor a step back from the regime of Anwar el-Sadat that preceded it, no matter how much and how justifiably the West admired Sadat for making peace with Israel. Sadat, too, was a dictator in his 11 years as Egypt’s president, as brutal and unforgiving as Mubarak. It was in Sadat’s prisons that Ayman al Zawahiri, al-Qaeda’s Number 2 man today, was tortured, and in his prisons that Zawahiri’s vision of a Muslim caliphate turned from a peaceful one to a violent one. Sadat was no improvement from the preceding regime of Gamal Abdel Nasser, no matter how much the Arab world admired Nasser for briefly appearing to give Arabs some dignity in the face of Western or Soviet designs. Mubarak, in sum, extended by 30 years a non-democratic, dictatorial habit of rule that has defined modern Egypt and the greater Middle East.

Which is what makes these demonstrations so remarkable, and so tenuous.

Not Quite the Middle East’s 1989

The comparison with Eastern Europe chucking off 45 years of Soviet oppression in 1989 is tempting. But it’s inaccurate. It raises false hopes resting on false parallels, particularly since this time around the United States is on the wrong side of history, the down side of influence, the backside of respect: you don’t see on Tahrir Square, as you did in Tiananmen Square 22 years ago, anyone brandishing replicas of the Statue of Liberty. You won’t even see Barack Obama’s face on placards and mugs, as you did in Cairo two years ago, when he delivered another one of what, in retrospect, was an empty-hope speech about the West’s relations with the Muslim world.

In 1989, the nations of Eastern Europe were liberating themselves from oppression with unqualified American support. They were returning to the democracies they’d been before World War II. They were getting rid of the Soviet Empire’s hold, an empire that itself would vanish two years later. But the Middle East today, from Morocco and Mauritania in West Africa all the way to the border of Pakistan in South Asia, is what the Soviet empire was in the 1980s—a black hole of repression and regression—with significant differences.

Four Differences

First, Eastern Europe’s oppressed nations were still well educated, so they were well positioned for a re-start in 1989. And they’d all had democratic traditions before 1939. Education in the Greater Middle East is so poor and so discriminating that it ranks somewhere in the neighborhood of crimes against humanity. And aside from Lebanon, the Palestinian territories, Turkey, Israel and, briefly, Iraq, the Middle East has never known democracy. It has no place to re-start from. It would all be brand new.

Second, Eastern Europe’s oppression was largely imported and fueled from Moscow. In Egypt, in Algeria, in Saudi Arabia and all the other undemocratic abysses of the Middle East, the oppression is home grown, one independent from the other, though each reinforcing the other as if by tradition and solidarity, the way Europe’s old monarchies reinforced each other before 1789. Leaders like Mubarak and the now rather putrid monarchies of Morocco, Saudi Arabia and Jordan, play on the cult of personality, the father-of-the-people fantasy that appears to have a few frames left in the reel.

But the majority of the Middle East’s autocracies and dictatorships—including Egypt, Tunisia, Morocco, Algeria, Saudi Arabia, Jordan—are all American client states, all aided and armed by the United States. Their police states’ thugs are trained by the United States. Their truncheons and ammo are manufactured by the United States (jobs! Jobs!). Their dictators are legitimized, wined, dined and largely enabled, in the eyes of each country’s masses, by the United States. In oil-producing nations, those dictators are largely financed by American gas-guzzling: the difference between the Saudi Arabian and North Korean police states is one of degrees, not of substance. In some degrees—women’s rights and the religious policing of “vice”—Saudi Arabia is more oppressive, making it little different than the Taliban. Yet Saudi Arabia is one of America’s closest allies—without, of course, a peep from the American public’s conscience (a conscience whose civil and human rights synapses have been brain dead roughly for as long as Mubarak has been in power anyway).

Third, when Eastern Europe was breaking its Soviet chains, the Soviet Union was exhausted economically. The United States isn’t there yet, though at the current pace it’s on its way. American dollars still finance Arab and Middle Eastern oppression. American troops are still on Arab soil in more than half a dozen Middle Eastern nations. And American strategy still hinges on that axis of authoritarianism that keeps the people quiet: it’s easier for American presidents to deal with less than two dozen robed and titled thugs than to deal with the noisy democracies of 350 million Arabs.

Fourth, American calculations over Eastern Europe weren’t distorted by American vassalage to Israel and American distortions of the Islamic threat. They very much are in the Middle East today. The Obama administration’s reluctance to endorse democracy in Egypt as in the rest of the Middle East results from fears that, as in Gaza, democratic elections would lead to Hamas-like leadership by such parties as the Muslim Brotherhood. It’s a narrow-minded, frankly stupid and often bigoted view that reduces and defines all Arabs according to American prejudices and ignorance—as opposed to American ideals and traditions.

An Avalanche of Fearful Misconceptions

There’s not enough space to set straight a half century of American stereotype about Arabs and Islam, so let’s just take the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, the closest thing Egypt has to an organized opposition: It is not a clone of al-Qaeda. It explicitly rejected al-Qaeda in the 1990s because of al-Qaeda’s embrace of violence, just as it rejected violence as a legitimate, let alone an Islamic, tactic. It is a conservative organization, but in the sense that America’s religious right organizations are conservative. It has no less democratic aspirations, and respects social work on behalf of the poor as an institutional responsibility far more than the American religious right does. That’s largely where the Muslim Brotherhood gets its respect in Egypt—from masses in a country where the majority of its 82 million people live in abject poverty, to the indifference of the government.

Egypt has a peace treaty with Israel. But Sunni Egypt in 2011 is not Shiite Iran in 1978: the revolution unfolding in Egypt is not ideologically driven. It is politically driven. Iran wanted to spread the Shiite creed in 1978. Egyptians just want to have their own democracy. They have zero interest in spreading anything, being too busy trying to survive, and needing, at most, to spread a little wealth around at home. They need the peace treaty with Israel the way they need to keep the Suez Canal safe and sound: both have been among their few economic boons. So has the break from going to war every seven years. They’re not about to mess that up.

“A Republic, If You Can Keep It.”

Benjamin Franklin was asked on the street about what had just been achieved. The question elicited one of his more famous quips: “A republic, if you can keep it.” Egyptians could create for themselves the same hopeful circumstances, in roughly the same, unfortunate isolation as the United States were in 1787, though the Egyptian model would unquestionably have an Egyptian, not a western, imprint.

It would be wrong to say that America is losing legitimacy in Arab eyes for refusing to embrace the democratic movement, that legitimacy having been squandered many times over in the past few decades, the past 10 years especially. To Arabs, American prevarication, the rank hedging of bets, is no longer surprising. It’s the usual hypocrisy, the usual cynicism of the last several decades.

Besides its shaky legs, that’s the most disheartening thing about the Egyptian revolution, and its echoes elsewhere in the Middle East: The imprint of American ideals, of inspiration, of aspirations, is gone. The United States is no more revered politically in the Middle East today than the Soviet Union was in Eastern Europe in the 1980s. In some regards it’s despised (think American indifference to human rights violations, think blind American support for Israel). It is still revered for its materialism, for its KFC’s and sitcoms and shoot-em-up movies, even for its universities for the lucky rich few who can make it there. But materialism is no substitute for the more powerful emblems once indistinguishable from the American brand abroad: liberty, democracy, support for the oppressed.

That brand is no longer sold in Egypt or the Greater Middle East, except in the souvenir shops of old sentimentalists.

Egypt named again as world's Best Country Brand for History

2011-01-26T09:43:00.000+02:00

Egypt has once again been named as the world's Best Country Brand for History in the fourth edition of the Country Brand Index (CBI), edging out other historically rich country destinations like France, Italy, Greece and China.

Mario Natarelli, Co-CEO, FutureBrand

The top ranking also shows Egypt's continuing success in being able to market the country's rich historical heritage and positioning itself as one of the prime tourist destinations in the world.

The 2008 Country Brand Index also puts Egypt in the top three list of world's Best Country Brand for Arts and Culture and is also cited for being in the top five list of world's Best Country Brand for Authenticity.

Now in its fourth year, CBI continues to provide a comprehensive branding study that includes rankings, trends and travel motivations of tourists around the world. Over 2,600 international travelers take part in the annual study conducted by FutureBrand, a leading global brand consultancy, in conjunction with Weber Shandwick's Global Travel & Lifestyle Practice.

CBI examines how countries are branded and ranked according to key criteria and aims to provide an extensive overview of the challenges and opportunities within the worlds of travel, tourism and country branding.

Mario Natarelli, Co-CEO, FutureBrand, said:

"Egypt has once again proved that it is the number one tourist destination in terms of historical appeal. It has successfully positioned itself in this spot by leveraging its rich history, ancient sites and mystical structures such as its pyramids, which have contributed in making Egypt one of the most popular destinations for travellers from around the world."

This year's study also cites Egypt and the United Arab Emirates as the only countries from the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region that have made it to the distinctive list.

Egypt hires brand agency to buff up private tech firms

2011-01-26T09:36:00.000+02:00

Egypt’s government is funding a $15m branding push to coach local technology companies on how to rival foreign IT firms, a top official said in an interview in Cairo.

Yasser El-Kady, the CEO of ITIDA, the Information Technology Industry Development Agency which serves as the government’s point-of-contact for foreign tech companies looking to enter the Egyptian market, told Arabian Business that branding firm Bisqit is already working with 100 companies in his country.

The move forms part of the government’s continued long-armed support of its fledgling information technology sector. Outsourcing revenue is currently estimated at $1.1bn. El-Kady said he wanted to hit $3bn by 2015.

Part of how it will do that is by attracting more foreign investment. Another, crucial step is making its own locally-grown companies players on the global level.

“We’ve hired consultants to come focus on Egyptian companies – to brand them on a world standard level,” he said. “We’re looking at company structure, how they can build a business plan and focus on HR development.

“We want to take [their standard] outside of Egypt and put them on a level with Europe.”

The cost of the branding push is so far estimated at $15m.

He said the government was also hoping to start a ‘Go to Africa’ programme, similar to its previous scheme, ‘Go to GCC’, calling on technology companies in the Gulf to work with Egypt as an outsourcer.

“We want to help out IT companies grow and develop into bigger markets,” he said. “The Egyptian market has limitations, so I have to take them outside – to the GCC and [now] to Africa.”

He said the Egyptian government would throw its full support behind expansion of its technology sector

“They’ll have strategic political support – we are enabling the companies, trying to have them work together,” he said. “Are they going to go together or as a solo? If you go in together, you have a higher chance of success, and less risk.”

The Egyptian government began its quest to become an outsourcing hub just 12 years ago, in 1999.

Taha Khalifa, the general manager for Intel Egypt, said that he arrived in Cairo in 2001, with one assistant – as the company’s only employee. With government support, he said Intel had swelled to nearly 70 employees, all Egyptian.

He credited the government with the quick expansion.

“There’s a lot of collaboration in the IT community, and the credit for that goes to the MCIT [Ministry of Communications and Information technology] because they put us together and said, ‘work together first on outsourcing’ – and we succeeded at that – ‘and now comes the innovation.’ The feeling is that we’re all working.”

http://www.gowealthy.com/gowealthy/wcms/en/home/news/interviews/Egypt-hires-brand-agency-to-buff-up-private-firms.html

Brand Champion of the Day-United Nations

2010-10-20T10:41:00.000+02:00

Yesterday I watched U.S. President, Barack Obama address the general assembly of the United Nations. He spoke about peace, security, social progress and human rights, the hall marks of the UN, or as we say in the world of branding, those are the reasons to believe in the brand. The 192 member states are brand champions, or should be brand champions for supporting these guiding principles.
Observing the member nation representatives as they watched President Obama, I realized that while the UN aspires to be a branded house, the UN is a house of brands. Much like Proctor and Gamble and its many brands. The UN is not a Starbucks or a Southwest Airlines. It also dawned on me that as globalization has become a reality, so too are the differences in cultures around the world. Maybe we are just now facing the extremes of those differences and realize that we have not developed the systems necessary to play together. To be a group of one brand champions.
As we hit the refresh button and live and work in the new normal, perhaps the UN can be the guiding light that it was intended to be. Like all complex organizations, the UN brand has periodically been bruised. But like sustainable brands it has not forgot its mission, core values and given stakeholders the opportunity to engage in dialogue about its brand. Today, the United Nations is the Brand Champion of the Day. Brand Champions remember your name is your brand. You are the UNITED Nations.
Rex Whisman
BrandED Consultants Group

Does Your Personal Brand Align With Your Organization's Brand?

2010-10-20T10:40:00.000+02:00

More and more people are asking themselves this question. For a number of reasons this is becoming increasingly important. The economy, the expectation that everyone and every organization stand for something and the new normal are just some of the reasons why people are coming to this realization. In the past few decades people and the organizations that they worked for threw caution to the wind and believed that they would always land on their feet.

Those days are in the past and might stay there. People and organizations are going through an introspective process of determining what is important to them and understanding that core values and mission are more than words on a piece of paper. A purpose and core values are increasingly guiding personal and organizational brand. Consequently the alignment of personal and organizational brand is expected.

Rex Whisman

BrandED Consultants Group

Branding Best Practices Learned From the GAP Logo Debacle

2010-10-17T09:46:00.000+02:00

I took some heat for my last post on how the new GAP logo was better. In that post, I explained how the old square shape makes it smaller than competitors, and how the old serif font is out of tune with their otherwise ubiquitous use of Helvetica.

Soon after my post, the GAP responded to the 'gapocalypse'. First, saying they would use the outcry ('engagement' in their speak) to try again by crowdsourcing their logo. And then, when the design community reacted with even greater outrage, deciding that they would just keep with the old logo ad infinitum. End of story.

So what can we learn?

Lessons For Brand Holders Like the GAP

2009 to 2014 will see more change in the marcom industry than all of the change we've experienced since the Mad Men era. You cannot take anything for granted in this sci-fi day and age. Check all your mental models before you plan to ship.

In this case, the GAP assumed the crowd didn't care. Don't make the same mistake. This ain't up there with the 1985 New Coke disaster but it has the same taste.

The GAP assumed they could solve their problem with a crowdsourcing contest in time for the holidays. For gold-plated brands, great crowdsourcing is a campaign unto itself, nothing less. Case in point: I went into my corner store this summer and saw a bag of Dorritos that had no name, and a contest to come up with a name. That kind of thoughtfulness will garner respect from the creative community, rather than the anger the GAP got from designers who see crowdsourcing as a threat to their values.

Lessons for Logo Designers

Since the weekend, I've seen hundreds of GAP logo designs that have sprung up in various online contests and forums. What concerns me is how many of the ones clearly done by brilliant artists miss the mark on the importance of shape, the value of simplicity, and the importance of continuity.

Logos should be landscape rectangular to fit the human field of view. Square or round logos will always be smaller, and therefore less viewed than rectangular competitors.

Logos should be the simplest thing that works. For example, if a name says 'GAP' you don't need to actually draw a gap. If a name says 'Tide' you don't need to show the sea.

When the brand is a big part of people's lives, continuity is king. Change your brand so the audience sees evolution, not revolution.

With these lessons in mind, Todd Major and I threw together in a few minutes the wordmark above. It mirrors a safer, saner, best pratice-ier direction that would have stuck.

By Axle Davids

Textile Exposé

2010-10-14T09:09:00.000+02:00

Established in 1973, Hemtex is the leading store of home textile products in the Nordic region with 189 stores in Sweden (where it has the most at 143), Finland, Denmark, Norway and Estonia. Hemtex produces, designs, and/or commissions most of its products, while others are carefully selected from existing inventory. Its range spans everything from towels, to pillows, to curtains in playfully minimalist patterns and simple color palettes. Hemtex recently introduced a new identity designed by Stockholm Design Lab.

The new identity reflects, literally, the fabric of the brand, with the thin lines visually representing strands of textiles weaving to form the name. The visual trick is deceivingly simple, creating a rich texture out of what otherwise would be a bland sans serif wordmark. It's also a great way to fake a three-color mark using only two colors as when the lines hit the solid color they create one more. The rest of the identity matches the products in quiet playfulness and sophistication.

How awesome is the photo above? The products make up the striped X.

Thanks to Sofia Olsson for the tip.

PricewaterhouseCoopersWasALongName

2010-10-14T09:08:00.000+02:00

The clearest picture I have of what PricewaterhouseCoopers does is of two dudes in tuxedos holding a briefcase with the envelopes that announce the winners at the Oscars. But, clearly, with 163,000 employees in 151 countries they do more than that. They are one of the "Big Four" professional services firms — the three others are Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, Ernst & Young, and KPMG — and boast gross revenues of 26.2 billion USD (fiscal year 2009). Officially, they "provide industry-focused assurance, tax and advisory services to enhance value for their clients." Yesterday was the official announcement that PricewaterhouseCoopers would be changing its name to PwC, keeping the mouthful of a name as the full name of the global organization for legal purposes. PwC also introduced a new identity created by the London office of Wolff Olins.

'We think our new brand expression visually distinguishes PwC in the same way that the quality and expertise of our people differentiates the experience of working with PwC,' said Dennis Nally, chairman, PwC International. 'Underlying the visual elements is what the PwC brand really stands for -- how we are viewed by our clients, our people and our stakeholders. Beyond our capabilities and experience, we want PwC to be known for building great relationships with clients that help them create the value they're looking for.'
– Press Release

Brand identity film introducing all the elements. (Roll over to see controller).

I have always found the old logo hard to believe; that a multibillion-dollar firm would use such a quirky, unfocused wordmark as its logo. It was endearing in the way that you look at a possum and think 'Aw, what an ugly poor little booger you are. Now scram!' The new icon is hard to digest at first, as it's not exactly clear what it is. At first I thought it was a digitized flower that a C-level executive would wear on his suit pocket to soften his look or appear as he cares about some cause. It's not a flower. But then there is the underscore, a cue that something came before it or that something else is about to happen. The reality is that the icon is just a series of boxes that stretch and genuflect to, I think, represent the various facets of what PwC has to offer. Still, I'm unclear what it is, but if this were 1971 I would also be unclear what the Nike swoosh was. For a firm of this size, of this influence, and the kind of clients and work it does for them, anything that's beyond the scope of a wordmark is an extremely bold move. This icon is as bold and innovative as it gets in this very exclusive category.

Logo animation.

The typography is not a sans serif. Imagine that. It's possible to design a contemporary-looking logo without resorting to rounded sans. I have always been a fan of hard-angled serifs and this one really struts those chiseled looks. The only thing that originally jumped out at me is that the 'w' is italic, giving it a slightly jarring contrast against the two roman letters, but I'm willing to accept that it made more visual sense to do it this way than all of them straight, as the roman 'w' might have been too monotonous.

Brochures and other collateral.

The great thing about this work is that the logo is merely the beginning. It provides the framework for the rest of the identity, which is absolutely stunning. It has amazing flexibility while establishing resolute consistency. Again, you have to remember what kind of firm this is for, it's not some small start-up that can run with something like this. This is fresh and agile. This is the most encouraging sign in all of 2010 that interesting, daring work can be done along with corporate clients.

Details of the sign.

Thanks to Renee Bortoli for first tip.

4 Tips on Writing Great Stories For Your Brand

2010-10-13T09:46:00.000+02:00

When telling a story, how do you make it a worthwhile read? How do you captivate your audience? Reflect on your daily activities to look for life experiences to help reach and engage with your audience. How do your use your life experiences to shape your story?

One thing to keep in mind when writing your story is the focus. As storytellers, we can easily go off on tangents and get distracted. Stay on track by sticking to the focus of your story. If you’re having trouble finding your focus, then stop and think….

and think…

It’s easy to forget a fundamental key in storytelling…thinking.

Think

After some reflection and thought, the focus may come to you once the story’s been told. The focus is what the story is about…why it was told.

Ask yourself four questions when preparing your story:

1. Why does my story matter? Why are you telling your story? You think it matters, but who else does? This goes hand and hand with understanding your audience and telling them a story they’d connect with… emotionally.

2.What’s the point? What’s the purpose of the story. To teach something? To share an experience that changed you? This is your focus. You should be able to define what that is with only a few words.

3.Why am I telling the story? Original content comes from people who are simply willing to tell their story – not attention seekers. So what’s your motivation behind the story?

4.What does this story say about me? Does it reflect you in a good light? Does it tell your audience who you are? Does the story flow? Is there a clear understanding? You want to make your story understandable and relatable. You want to be liked, but you want to leave them with something to chew on.

By answering the four basic questions… your audience may be able to make a real connection with your story and ultimately you (your brand).

Why is it important to focus? Because we want to know what the story was about.

We want to know why that story was shared.

We want to take something away from it… connect with it.

Personal Brands: Have It Your Way

2010-10-13T09:44:00.000+02:00

I could tell you this story 6.8 billion different ways, which is just about how many of us there are on this planet. It’s the story behind why I didn’t write last week and why I didn’t have a barbeque's on Labor Day. The same saga could have (and likely did) happen to others.

I’m going to tell you what happened to me in “my way.” Just like you must now be searching and refining “your way” to talk about what happens to you.

Communication is everything

Communication is everything in personal branding. And, you’re probably going to talk about the same things that other people do – other people who want the same job, the same project, the same promotion or the same gig. When you have to compete with 6.8 billion people, believe me, there’s a lot of overlap of material.

When your personal brand is your authentic self, you are going to tell your stories in a coherent, remarkable, and recognizable voice. You are not going to sound like anyone else.

The best way to find your voice is by writing and speaking often enough, about things that are and are not your area of expertise. For a while you may “try on” others’ voices until slowly you hear your own. I tried on Calvin Trillin, Bill Maher, Jon Stewart, Robin Williams, Ricky Gervais, William Arruda, Chris Brogan, Peter Shankman and dozens of others until I finally heard my own voice.

Consider how you would tell my story if it happened to you. Here goes.

Over five long days, including the Labor Day “holiday,” my doctors stuck me in the hospital because I’d developed this massive gut infection. They’d actually watched it brewing for weeks until – inconveniently, it started to blow up on the Saturday when they’d all been planning their final summer barbeques.

It’s a weird week to be in hospital. Pretty much all the regulars are on vacay so the hospital is filled with moonlighters. It’s like a MASH unit with green recruits filling in for Hawkeye and company. Most of them looked like members of a grunge band, working for cash to fix their broken down VW bus.

My arms were purple and blue because the lab didn’t have staff to send up. Coming off the bench, the fill-ins were averaging 3 sticks for every one that actually drew the blood needed to see just how badly things were going, several times a day.

So, rather than just dig in and get out the offending organ (and spoil the weekend), the floating docs tossed me around for “tests.” Several were piloted by technicians who’d never even seen the MRIs or ultrasounds until they had me in or under them.

I was in one MRI for about an hour, with the tech yelling, “Fill ‘er up” (take in a big breath to fill my belly), followed by “Let ‘er go,” (push the air out). There was a lot of banging. Turns out no one there knew how to read whatever film was actually produced.

So, five minutes after exiting that tube, I was wheeled to an older one that stood in a doublewide trailer parked in the lot next door. This tech was completely silent with her ear buds in, and her iPod tunes helping her stay awake.

What I gleaned (not learned, since no one told me what was going on or going wrong) was that the growing infection clouded the field – meaning by now surgeons were reluctant to operate because they’d have really poor visibility.

Intravenous lines ran and ran out. Drips were hung and went dry. Finally, despite the delay game by the jv squad, it was time because there was no more time.

The procedure took about 45 minutes. Typically, it’s a Jiffy Lube type operation: in and out of a surgery center in just a few hours. It took me five days, a zillion times the expense and a substantial amount of pain that I might wish on my worst enemy, depending on the crime committed.

Per Diem staff (day laborers who normally don’t work the hospital) watched me for a few days and sent me home on two medications that I’m allergic to – both stamped in bold on my medical records at that hospital, and on an easy to see red band that yells ALLERGY on my left wrist.

After being let out, I was back in the emergency room two days later with my immune system shut down, allowing small white palm trees to grow in my mouth. At first the ER doc said, “Too bad, it’s the only drugs you can take for this infection, so you cannot stop taking them.” I frowned, squashing one of the plants onto the roof on my mouth. He stepped out “to make a phone call.” and returned to tell me to “Just stop taking them.” I got a banana flavored liquid to swill in my mouth and a bottle of Benadryl, apparently worth $120 since that’s what the ER visit cost.

As I left, he shook my hand and said, “Sorry for the confusion. I’m actually an allergist. But, I’m just moonlighting here.”

Okay, over a half million people had their gall bladders removed in the US this year. So, the next story could be yours. Personal brand: how would you tell the story your way?

Find your voice

Listen to a friend. Watch a TV show. Read a blog post. Every time you can, ask yourself: How would I tell this story?

The Wicked Social Media Backhand

2010-10-11T09:58:00.000+02:00

We’re asking companies to listen and use social media but when they do, we question their motives. Or whether they really care. Or whether they’re just responding because someone yelled loud enough or has enough followers. Or whether they’re just going through the motions because someone said they should.

What exactly do we want from them?

I, for one, am happy to see businesses that are starting to change the way they do things to meet new customer expectations. That doesn’t mean every business can overhaul their customer service in the blink of an eye, or resolve every issue perfectly, or prevent every mistake from happening. And sure, some companies are probably getting involved reluctantly or with some initially misguided intent.

But if we’re going to stomp our feet and demand that they pay attention to us and this social media thing, don’t we have the responsibility to offer a little bit of acknowledgement – dare I say commendation – when they do? When they try? When they start somewhere?

When I told people I wanted to lose weight and try a new start at fitness, I got lots of cries of support that included “starting is the hardest part!” and “little changes can equal big results” and all that stuff. Everyone encouraged the change and the importance of the effort. No one would ever dream of disparaging me from not being able to run a marathon in the weeks that I start to jog around my block.

But we do that with businesses. All the time.

We’re asking them to change, but we’re exceedingly unwilling to reward small victories or acknowledge effort. It’s all or nothing. The fact that someone responded to a Tweet just means they’re scared, not that they might actually be trying to deliver better customer service. If someone comments on a blog post, it must be because they’re trying to cover their butt, not because they really are trying to improve their responsiveness and connection with their community.

Heaven forbid a business take a baby step.

I know there are trust issues in business, folks. That’s part of why we’re all here doing this stuff. But if we’re going to be the agents of change, we have to be willing to nurture it, not crush it in it’s awkward and sometimes stuttering beginnings.

Go on being a cynic if you like, or always assuming the worst, or refusing to be satisfied with anything other than perfection. I’m going to be over here giving people a chance to do exactly what we’re asking of them, and doing my best to reward the small changes along the way.

Are You The Complete Package?

2010-10-11T09:55:00.000+02:00

Today post is by our friend and cohort Tom Webster. Tom blogs at Brand Savant and is a contributor to Social Media Explorer, and at his big kid job he’s the VP of Strategy of Edison research. Connect with Tom on Twitter at @webby2001.

If you’ve ever worked for somebody else, chances are you’ve gotten a performance review. This is not a day you should dread. If you work for a quality manager, this day should not be full of surprises – you know what you need to work on, and your review should be just that – a review of your progress.

If you work for a less competent manager, however, then your review will also provide you with valuable information – about your manager. In any case, it’s all information, and information is neither good nor bad. What you do with that information, however, is another story.

Being Incomplete

Years ago, near the start of my consulting career, I received the following helpful advice in a performance review: “Tom, if you could develop some sales skills, you’d be the complete package.” For a number of years, I operated under that assumption. I mean, who wouldn’t want to be a complete package? I had established an early reputation in my field as a sharp thinker, but even sharp thinkers need clients to put food on their family’s table. So I started to work on that aspect of my career. I’m not a natural salesman, so I enrolled in some training courses, read a few books, and – most importantly – tried to find a role model in my organization who could show me the ropes.

I started teaming up with another consultant in my firm who was a gifted salesman – I’ll call him “Jack.” While we were on the same level in the organization, he was clearly bringing in more work to the company. We were about the same age, and had gotten along well socially up to that point, so I was genuinely looking forward to working with him more often in the field. For about a year, Jack and I were a road team for a fair amount of the company’s international work, and we spent lots of time together in conference rooms, airports, and hotels.

I quickly discovered that we were basically oil and water;. While Jack took pains to couch his advice and make the client feel good, I was oblivious enough to call the baby ugly, even when the baby was in the room . Sometimes, when I felt as if he just didn’t “see” what I saw in the data, we would have open debates about interpretations and recommendations – in front of clients.

I saw these debates as healthy, and in service of finding the best solution; he saw them as presenting a message to clients that we weren’t on the same page. We were both a bit stubborn, and soon our perceptions of each other began to result in a more strained relationship. I began to dismiss Jack’s client communications as “happy talk.” Jack saw me as an egotistical loose cannon. We were, of course, both right.

You’re Not My Type

Several years later, Jack and I had both moved on to bigger and better things, and I didn’t spend much time reviewing this particular chapter in my career until I had the good fortune to take a management science class while working towards my MBA. In the course of this particular class, I took a number of assessments and psychological instruments that described my working style, inventoried my skills, and even analyzed my personality. The latter test, the famous Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), was particularly troubling to me at first, because I saw the results as prescriptive and limiting, rather than as “information.”

If you’ve never taken the MBTI, let me strongly urge you to do so – if you approach it with the right mindset, it will change the way you think about your work, and might even change your life. In my case (and I’ve taken the test twice with identical results), my personality type is what the instrument calls INTP, which basically means that I’m better with problems than with people In fact, I’m pretty much the very textbook definition of an INTP.

As I hinted earlier, at first I rejected the results of this test, because I incorrectly interpreted it as telling me what I can do and what I can’t do, and I don’t like being told I can’t do anything. What I learned, however, was that the test was exactly right – it didn’t tell me that I couldn’t be extroverted or empathic, merely that I would have to work at those things and employ coping mechanisms for those times when I need to be “out of type.”

For example, the “I” in INTP stands for introverted, which doesn’t mean that I am a shy wallflower (I’m not), but rather that people tire me out, and I have to be alone when I need to recharge those batteries. Extroverts, on the other hand, recharge with people. The test doesn’t say that I can’t be extroverted when I need to be, merely that I’d be more comfortable by myself. Maybe you’re the same way?

What Fits, What Complements

When I really came to grips with what I learned as a result of this process and accepted it, I began to rethink what it means to be “a complete package.” To return to my original example (developing sales skills), there is nothing in the MBTI that says an INTP can’t be a competent, or even very good seller. It’s simply a matter of either finding a sales style you are comfortable with (HINT: 99% of the “sales” books on the shelf at your local bookstore aren’t written for you) OR trying to play “out of character” when you need to, and allowing yourself time to recharge when necessary. In my case, I chose the former option, and have worked out a number of strategies over the years to find a sales style that works for me (by the way – and make no mistake about this – whether or not you are in sales, you are in sales. Believe it.)

Turns out, there is also a third option. While INTP’s like myself are not natural sellers, their polar opposites - the ESFJs – are. If you’ve ever met a pure ESFJ, you’ll know the type instantly – gregarious, easy conversationalists, natural connectors, and don’t particularly enjoy the abstractions and theories that an INTP swims in. I’m not even remotely like an ESFJ. I’m pretty sure I know one, however – my former colleague, Jack.

What I saw early in my career as “oil and water” – my opposite – I now see with the benefit of another decade of experience as my complement. Had egos not gotten in the way, I would have realized that “the complete package” I was striving for was really the combination of Jack and me. Jack was an exemplary salesman, and together we were actually a formidable team. Today I can “do” sales, but I’ll never be as good as Jack. I’m now OK with that – I have other gifts. That doesn’t mean I don’t still work on things like sales to be the best I can be, but I no longer see those things as “flaws”; weaknesses that prevent me from being the complete package.

You Don’t Need Fixing. You Might Need Jack.

So here’s the ultimate lesson about all of this. You’ve heard management gurus by the truckload tell you that you have to “break out of your comfort zone,” but sometimes it’s hard to see beyond the cliche, and extract the brass tack thinking behind it to make it work for you (yes, Amber and Tamsen, I DID just do that ) Often, when we form groups, teams and task forces in our jobs, we naturally gravitate towards like-minded people.

True, when I see people at conventions, conferences and in social occasions, there are some people I’d rather have a beer with than others. In business, however, the people you might steer clear of in social situations might, in fact, have completely different thinking styles, communication styles and ways of breaking down tasks and problems that are, if not foreign to you, at least uncomfortable – and that’s exactly why they are invaluable. Working with those people is exactly what I mean by breaking out of your comfort zone.

In the words of John Donne, no man [or woman] is an island. Had I truly been ready to break out of my comfort zone those years ago, I would have recognized that the Toms of the world and the Jacks of the world might individually be good at some things, not so good at others – but put the Toms together with the Jacks, and there is some serious ass-kicking potential. The Toms and Jacks of the world need each other. Together, they are the complete package.

What about you? When you examine your working style, your projects, and even your career, what holds you back? Do you encounter the same stumbling blocks and sticking points over and over? Have you succumbed to negative self-talk, defeatism or other unhealthy thought patterns as a result? Maybe you don’t need “fixing.” Maybe you just don’t know Jack…yet

The World, Underlined

2010-10-10T08:39:00.000+02:00

Founded in 1987, Conservation International (CI) is an organization with 900-plus employees across more than thirty global offices. Its mission is to build 'upon a strong foundation of science, partnership and field demonstration, [to empower] societies to responsibly and sustainably care for nature, our global biodiversity, for the well-being of humanity.' CI has partnered with companies like Starbucks, Patagonia and Walmart and works with government bodies to achieve its mission. Earlier this month, as CI announced plans to expand its scope and scale of work, it introduced a new identity designed by Chermayeff & Geismar.

CI's new iconic logo is a modern, unmistakable graphic that represents the breadth and scale of our efforts, both on land and at sea, and the kind of international collaboration needed to help societies move toward a more sustainable economic model. It represents what we hope to achieve: a healthy blue planet supported by a green development path. The successes that have defined CI for years have resolved themselves into this great, blue circle of life; our markets, policy work and public engagement endeavors are charting a new, green path that incorporates these efforts.
— Conservation International New Logo for a New Mission

Logo animation by Thornberg & Forester. If you have problems with the video above click here.

Principal partner Sagi Haviv's solution — a blue circle underlined in green — symbolizes our blue planet, emphasized, supported, and sustained. The mark can also be seen as a unique human form. As a result, the new mark works both as a powerful brand signal for Conservation International, and a critical new mission message:

'The new symbol for Conservation International is an instance in logo design where the power is truly embedded in the simplicity,' says Haviv. 'Yet it is expressive enough to help the organization redefine itself, and therefore has the potential to become a true international icon. It was a perfect fit.'
— Chermayeff & Geismar Press Release

The previous logo reflected the nature (pun not intended) of the original scope of activities by CI — "working with communities to protect species and prevent habitat destruction in tropical countries facing the greatest threats to biodiversity." — so the tropical forest, wildlife and hut were a good representation. But as a means to carry an organization forward with more ambitious plans and gain a stronger and serious presence with businesses, governments and other organizations, it just made it look too small, as if it were a grassroots organization. The new logo is the complete opposite and, to some, this may be quite a turn off by being overtly corporate, minimalist and vague. I believe it works and that it communicates quite clearly that this organization, even if you have no idea what they do, are concerned with the planet. It's only a circled stroke and a stick under it, but it manages to look serious enough to demand attention. The typography is simple and it's quite nice to see the two words match in length without sacrificing too much or too little tracking in one or the other. For the sake of pointing it out, it's Gotham.

Overall, this identity fits very well an organization of this size and scope and it's a proper evolution that represents its growth and influence.

ESPN College Football Buffs Up

2010-10-10T08:36:00.000+02:00

For some people the end of Summer is a bummer. It's back to work and back to school. For a whole bunch of other people — in this case Americans to be specific — it's the beginning of their obsession. College Football. Bars are full. Conversations are about nothing else. Men scream at TVs wearing faux uniforms whose colors does not befit their skin tones or physiques. But it's here. And bringing these seemingly life-or-death matches to the screen is ESPN through its ESPN College Football (ESPN CF) programming, which has the rights to air games from the major divisions. To add a little oomph to this season's package ESPN CF turned to brand agency Troika to overhaul the on-air package.

The package centers around the concept 'Mania,' a frenetic visual interpretation of the excitement and anticipation surrounding the College Football season. Viewers are taken on a visual journey through an Escher-esque world of descriptive typography and iconic visuals inspired by the game. The rebrand, which included logo design, opens, transitions and title sequences, was designed to evolve with the College Football season, culminating with elements created specifically for each of ESPN's five BCS games.
— Troika Vimeo page

Comparing the old logo against the new logo is like seeing Bruce Banner transform into The Hulk. All the same components are there except that the new one is bigger, bolder, and more aggressive. Not smaller, lighter and wimpier. For a football logo on the sportiest and explosiest of channels, the new one is definitely more appropriate and, more importantly, it has much better screen presence. My favorite detail is the dirty ball, nice attention to detail. Since this logo lives on-air, the animation is even more important than the logo itself, and Troika has done a fantastic job in bringing to typographic life the sights and sounds of college football.

Stills from the animation package. Video below.

I wouldn't go as far as calling the animation Escher-esque as it has none of the artist's quizzical labyrinthine qualities. But I would call it kick-ass-esque. As that what it is. It pumps you full of energy before anyone has screamed hike for the first time. It brings together the solid typography with the more real imagery quite nicely giving it a nostalgic aura reminiscent of the Lou Dorfsman's Gastrotypographicalassemblage wall at the CBS cafeteria. I couldn't care less about college football, but this could get me to care. Actually, no it won't. It just gets me to care about the people that make such nice animated things.

New Work: Fashion Fringe 2010

2010-10-07T09:36:00.000+02:00

Fashion Fringe is an annual competition for young British designers timed to coincide with London Fashion Week. The concept of Fashion Fringe was created in 2003 by Colin McDowell MBE in partnership with IMG Fashion. Since 2006 John Rushworth and his team at Pentagram have been working with Fashion Fringe—initially creating the identity and in subsequent years creating all of the graphics for the competition.

On 4 June John Galliano announced the three finalists for 2010, Alice Palmer, Corrie Nielsen and Jade Kang. Since then they have been working on their collections, which were showcased on 18 September in Covent Garden. At the end of the show John Galliano selected Corrie Nielsen as the winner.

For 2010 the Covent Garden venue was transformed into a multi-coloured fairground themed space complimenting the invitation and the catalogue.

Project Team: John Rushworth, partner; Kirsty Whittaker, designer

Italicized Mail

2010-10-07T09:30:00.000+02:00

This will be a fairly short introduction and light in informative design background because the little information there is about this is in Korean — but, as always, the universal language of identity design will get us through this together. Korea Post is the mail carrier of Korea in charge of all postal services and the financial services offered by the post offices. A new identity, exhaustively covered in this brand manual, is now being implemented.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that the icon represents a Magpie, the national bird of Korea. The old icon had a very defined 1970s aesthetic, with those thick and thin lines representing depth — the equivalent of today's drop shadow — but the single bird by itself is a very strong and memorable visual, so it's nice to see the new identity building on that. The new italicized version is bother better and worse I feel. In one view it feels striking and dynamic, but in the other it feels like it lost of the gravitas the older one had. Perhaps it's also the colored tail feathers that make it feel less serious and, perhaps too, that was the intention, to make it less commanding.

The rest of the identity is fairly formulaic and repetitive, which is not bad but after going through the 162 pages of the standards manual I was hoping for a little surprise here or there. Everything hinges on the 'Harmony Line' background pattern of concentric circles, which is a decent device and provides a good contrast against the angularity of the icon, but the same sentiment applies. Too much of the same. The choice of Myriad for the corporate typeface is frugal (it's probably installed in all government computers) but ultimately bland, and its italics have never been the most fetching. In the end, though, this seems like a perfectly suited system for proper deployment at a large scale.

The Language of Brand Licensing

2010-10-05T16:05:00.000+02:00

Regular readers of Branding Strategy Insider know we welcome and answer marketing questions of all types. Today, Bill, a Marketer in Los Angeles writes…

“I have a question regarding brand licensing. Let's say I want to license the brand Dora the Explorer and use the brand image on my product. What are typical licensing terms? i.e. who pays whom, how much and on what schedule?'

Thanks for your question Bill. There are a variety of brand licensing 'deal terms' that are unique to every contract. Having said that you can expect to see these common licensing terms:

Brand - you already answered what brand you wish to license. In case Dora was not available, what other brand might you wish to license? The manufacturer (or licensee) pays the brand owner (or licensor) a royalty to use the brand on their product.

Channels - from a retail perspective, where do you intend to sell your product? Do you intend to sell a Dora branded product in the mass merchandise channel or department stores? Or, will you go to specialty shops? The brand owner typically will grant you channels that you have demonstrated sustained retail success.

Exclusivity - will you be exclusive in your product category, or will the brand owner license the category to a competitor? Many licensor's agreements are non-exclusive, but the licensor practices exclusivity. This keeps the licensee (manufacturer) motivated, but gives eliminates competition which could hurt their sales. If you wish for exclusivity outright, it can cost you 3 times the minimums - if the brand owner is willing to agree to it.

Minimum Guaranteed Royalty - Based on your minimum sales figure, what are you prepared to guarantee in royalty payments? The 'minimums' as they are referred to in the industry are on an annual basis and usually by region. Royalties are paid typically on a quarterly basis. If your sales generate less royalties for the brand owner than you are required to pay in quarterly minimums, you will be required to make up the difference, which can be difficult for many businesses. Therefore, be sure you can meet them.

Royalty Rate - this can vary depending on the strength of the brand, but usually ranges from 5% to 15%. While royalty rate is typically written as a percentage of Net Sales (another important term to understand), it can be based on anything measurable, e.g. cents per unit sold.

Minimum Sales Targets - what sales commitment can you make to the brand owner? This is typically by region and can also be required by channel? You will be asked to project a sales forecast; you will then be requested to agree to minimum sales targets to show your commitment. The minimum sales targets are typically 25% - 40% of your overall projected sales.

Sell Off Period - the length of time the brand owner allows the licensee to sell off inventory after the agreement expires.

Term - how long will your agreement be for in years? This can vary, but licensors (brand owners) usually look for about 3 years as a minimum as any shorter period is not long enough to be effective.

Renewal Period - usually matches the length of the initial term.

Territory - geographically, where do you wish to license the brand, in this case, the Dora brand? Are you requesting the United States, Canada or another territory?

Bill, we wish you the best in your brand licensing endeavors.

Pete Canalichio, Brand Licensing Expert, The Blake Project

Fables of the Deconstruction

2010-10-05T16:00:00.000+02:00

Let me tell you a little something about brass tacks.

Though the origin of the phrase, “Let’s get down to brass tacks” is unclear, there are a couple of theories:

It refers to the tacks used both structurally and decoratively in upholstery

It refers to the tacks or nails in the soles of boots or shoes

It refers to tacks used to accurately measure fabric for cutting

Regardless of which origin is the real one, brass tacks are something you use to build or measure. They’re the things that hold something together, or hold something in place, so you can get a better sense of what you have to work with.

Yet there’s an all-too-common temptation when taking something (or someone) “down to brass tacks”: to think that by laying bare the foundation we’ve done our jobs and can now go home.

That’s unfortunately a very easy thing to do, and is what I think we’re doing when we #FAIL something, or resort to snark, or sit back and judge the actions and beliefs of others. We’re saying, “This is the problem. Deal with it.” Or even worse, “This is your problem. Deal with it.”

But sometimes, when you want to bring about change, how you bring it is as important as what it is. The method by which you’re trying to do something can have a huge amount to do with whether that change happens at all (regardless of how important or how potentially company-, life-, or world-changing that change might be—or how passionate you might be about the potential results).

That’s why it can be helpful, as we go about making things happen, to decide for ourselves what our standards, our values, are for doing so—even more helpful if we turn those values into something we use as both reminder and test for what we do and say. (Here’s mine:)

Be useful. Be passionate. Be thoughtful. Be kind.

The two in the middle are for me, really, and are guides for my inner life. The outer two are guides for how I want to interact with everyone else—and serve as an important balance to one another.

We can be kind, but not useful (unless, of course, being kind is the most useful thing to do in a given situation). But, more importantly, we can be useful without being very kind, especially if we cloak it in a desire to “be helpful.”

Yet if I’ve learned one thing about being helpful, it’s this: “helpfulness” is determined best by the person who needs it. And that’s not you. You can offer help. You can offer change. But the choice of whether or not people take you up on that offer? That’s theirs.

If you truly want to be helpful, then your job—your responsibility—is to figure out how to offer help in a way that’s most likely to be accepted. Pointing a problem out repeatedly, or publicly, or with (at least perceived) vitriol, accomplishes the exact opposite.

Kindness may not be something you value—that’s fine. That’s your right. Kindness is something I value, and I’d say Amber does, too. But not for any hug-it-out, kumbaya reasons: it’s because kindness, more often than not, makes it easier to get things done. It provides a soft landing for hard change.

So the next time you want to tell someone they’re doing it wrong, to take them down and stick ‘em with the ol’ brass tacks, remember what those brass tacks are for.

Give them a moral to the story. Give them something to build on. Show them where to go, and how.

In other words, be useful. And kind.