The true identity of your brand

I recently had the privilege of presenting an activity at a local networking event for the Keystone at the Crossing Rainmakers meeting. The activity revolved around the concept of identity and how taking time to learn more about someone at a networking event could positively impact your business. And while my presentation at Rainmakers was specific to that event, here's a slightly edited version of my presentation for this context:

The top grossing movie of 2008 is all about identity. The Dark Knight. If you haven't seen it yet, it's the latest installment in the Batman series. One of my favorite scenes finds Batman's true identity, Bruce Wayne, off to dinner at a swanky restaurant. He's been rejected by his longtime girlfriend, Rachel, who is one of the few people in the world who knows his secret identity is Batman. Of course, it just so happens that Rachel is out at that same swanky restaurant with her new boyfriend—the City's District Attorney, Harvey Dent.

As Bruce Wayne walks into the room with his Russian Ballet girlfriend on his arm, he pretends at first not to see them, but then he's "surprised" and feigns a smile to greet the new couple. Rachel is annoyed at first but responds as cordially as possible. "Bruce... this is Harvey Dent." Harvey doesn't seem to feel the tension and smiles back at Bruce, "Rachel has told me everything about you." To which Bruce replies, "I certainly hope not."

Identity can be a complex thing. Like yours, there are many elements to my identity. I'm a business owner. I'm a father. A husband. A brother. A son. An artist. A writer. And some things I don't care to share in public. Some people know me very well... others don't know me at all.

What about your identity? What makes you who you are? Are you more than a sales person? More than a business owner? Who is it that most people think you are? And who are you REALLY?

I don’t know for sure, but I’m willing to bet you’re somewhat like me… you want your public identity to be more than your life roles. More than "just a salesperson." More than "that tall guy who wears jeans." There are some things that you want to be known for, and there are other things that you would just as soon keep to yourself.

Now what if I flipped that and asked, "What is the true identity of your company?" Your brand identity is one of the most valuable assets that your business owns. Is your "true identity" crystal clear to your customers? Most importantly, has the public perception of your brand kept pace with how your company has grown? Do we see your brand like you do? Our company specializes in positioning high-end services and premium products. We help companies clearly define who they are, what they do, and why consumers should care.

Our goal is clarity in how the public perceives your brand. When your brand "walks" into a swanky restaurant and encounters your next potential customer, what is it they will say about you?

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What brand of razor did Ockham use?

Ockham's Razor is an age-old principal that suggests the most simple solution is usually the best. If you take a complex solution and peel away all of the unnecessary layers, you'll eventually get down to the essence of the idea. That one, pure, simple solution.

This works great when we're developing a trademark for a brand. It applies to business problems, and as I recently found, it also applies to personal hygiene.

Interestingly enough, while I was in Jacksonville, FL a few weeks ago, I needed a shave.

Much to my frustration, I'd left my razor at home. Now I'm not sure about you, but I'm still using my trusty Gillette Sensor Excel. Anymore it seems a little puny. It's quiet, simple, square pivoting head looks pretty basic. It's the kind that you pay a six or seven bucks for, and then spend the rest of your life paying for blades. (Which is a brilliant marketing maneuver by the way, but not my point.) It's not that I hadn't tried out the other "fancy" razors. I just kept breaking them. I've tried Schick and Gillette. (And don't event talk to me about electric razors. I want to shave my face, not irritate it.) The more blades and bendy features the razor boasts, the faster I could break them. I'm not sure I've got the world's toughest beard, but apparently I needed a simple solution to my facial hair problem.

In this modern world we get to choose between three, four, and five-blade razors that slice, dice, and even battery powered models with vibrating blades. And there I stood in that Jacksonville bathroom, without even my lowly two-bladed razor. Bummer. So I responded the way I normally would in these situations... "HONEY!!! ...Did you pack my razor?" Of course, I had to make her feel like she was a part of my issue. "Just use my disposable razor," she said, "It's in the bag."

With a major blow to my masculine soul, there sat a brand new, disposable Venus razor, staring back at me from our bathroom luggage bag. At first glance it was curvy, and a two-toned white on girly blue. "Ugh. Whatever, I have to shave." And shave I did. I've got to admit, even though it looked a lot like the more feature-heavy men's razors, it's very simple. The flat head houses three blades. It's sturdy. And best yet, it shaves very, very well. I know it sounds a little odd, but I kinda liked shaving with this kinda girly razor.

So I'm not sure if William of Ockham would agree, but for me, the best solution actually has three blades, and is marketed only to women. I haven't broken it yet. And yes, I'm still shaving with a "women's" razor.

What product or service do you sell to a specific target market, that could possibly benefit from looking to other markets? Do you sell anything to just one gender or industry? How could it change your sales model if you rebranded this product, and broadened your focus? What solutions do you provide that could be further simplified?

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Holiday Cow

HolidayCow.com

Some of you are probably thinking, "Uh... a cow?" Others might be thinking "Finally something different this holiday!" And some of my more discerning students may be thinking, how does Holiday Cow relate to the Miles Design brand?

The short of it is, we wanted to wish everyone Happy Holidays in a way nobody else would. And we think, even if you do have an innate fear of cows, you will probably find this humorous on some level. At least we do.

Sometimes doing something a little out of the norm is the best way to get noticed. And other times, it's not...

Something that veers towards inappropriate, crude or subversive, is bound to get noticed as well, but not necessarily in a good way. Chances are, the most creative way to get noticed is also appropriate for your brand. Doing something outside of the norm just might help a potential customer imagine your company in a fresh, new way. "Hey, did you see that thing with the cow? You gotta see this."

For us, Holiday Cow is about sending a fun Holiday message to our friends, clients, and vendor partners. It carries on our slightly irreverent sense of humor, our brand look and feel, and just so happens to "moo" occasionally. Hopefully you will enjoy Morty as much as we did creating him for you. (Who knows... maybe next year it will be a Llama, named Ike.)

What have you done with your brand that's outside of the norm (in a good or bad way)? What can your brand do differently in 2008? How can we help?

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Make the Logo Greener?

If you've ever worked in the marketing world, you're very familiar with the phrase "make the logo bigger." Now there's a push for companies to be perceived as environmentally responsible, and practicing sustainable business er, practices. In effect, companies want their brands to be perceived as the most "green."

NBC has taken this one step further. They made their logo and website green for the week. Okay, I'm sure NBC means well, but is making their logo green for a few days really benefiting the environment? NBC launched "Green is Universal" last weekend during Sunday Night Football. As part of this awareness campaign, NBC dimmed the studio lights to demonstrate how they were helping conserve energy. Here's where it gets funnier...

In addition, NBC flew anchors from the Today Show to all ends of the Earth to report on the conditions from all around the world. I'm no expert, but isn't jet fuel a major contributor to the release of general nastiness into the environment? It seems to me that they could have done more good by launching local campaigns in local markets, instead of burning jet fuel to report on the damages already done.

As icing on the cake, David Schwimmer and Al Gore are guest staring on 30 Rock Thursday night, in totally comedic "environmental wacko" roles. Interesting that they would choose this week to poke fun at their own initiative. Go figure.

Silly or not, they got me talking about their very own "brand of green." But if you ask me, it's just another green logo.

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MD News updates

Much has happened in the past four months. A new office, new baby, etc... So in the interest of catching everyone up quickly, here's a recap in bullet point format:

07.01.07 - MD moves into new offices at the Precedent, complete with a fourth floor view of "Lake Precedent." (To date, no geese have chased Josh into the new office. Stand by for further updates.)

07.01.07 - Long time MD collaborators, Wired Ground, agree to share office space with MD.

08.15.07 - Meg Taylor Miles
Born 1:37 am
7 pounds, 10 ounces
19.75 inches long
Eyes - grayish... maybe blue, but too close to call.
Hair - short brown
Hands and toes - long and thin

09.01.07 - Two MD entries have been selected to appear in Graphic Design USA's design annual, due to hit newsstands in January. The selected pieces were the redesigned brand identity for Surroundings, and MD's own holiday card from 2006.

10.01.07 - After much delay, MD finally settled on printing new business cards on plastic. Cool stuff.

10.22 - Brand identity design specialist Brian K. Gray joins the team at MD.

10.27.07 - MD designer Amanda celebrates her nuptials with husband Joe, in quaint New Harmony IN.

11.01.07 - MD remembers blog, updates past four months.

11.04.07 - Did anybody catch all of that?

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Why blog?

It's funny. It's been over a year since we added our first (albeit brief) entry to the Miles Design blog. Although my original vision for our blog was to have a venue to talk about branding and share all of the interesting things around me, here we sat nearly 15 months later, with just one entry.

Ironically, as I have been procrastinating over writing new entries, I've had several clients asking me about blogs. Among our clients, there are those who are considering starting blogs, those who are a little slow to add content to existing blogs, and of course the clients who seem to be getting the hang of it. Just the other day at lunch, blogging came up again. This time it was a potential client who asked us a very straightforward question, "Why would our business even want a blog?"

Our group all chimed in to share their perspectives... A blog is an opportunity for an organization to show it's personal side. If a brand is the total perception of a company, what a great way to build "personality." It's a great chance to express opinions, discuss trends, dig deeper into the details of a project, or have the ability to go deeper than the company's 'capabilities' or 'client list.' It's an opportunity to showcase their best team members as thought leaders, or even express the CEO's sense of humor. It's a place to link to interesting sites or stories. And some business leaders find blogs less intimidating to add to, versus updating the "about us" page on their website.

Thankfully, I'm taking our table's advice. As a part of our impending re-launch of MilesDesign.com, we're re-committing to maintaining our blog, not just updating our samples and client list.

So why would Miles Design want a blog? First of all, our previous website was launched in February of 2006. Our single "news" page listed our all of our "newsworthy" items over the past few months. While that seemed adequate at the time, it forced our "news" to be reduced down to headlines, such as:

08.06 - MD launches smart new ad campaign for The Heart Center of Indiana.
07.06 - MD begins work with Sensory Technologies.
07.06 - MD (and team) win Telly Awards for The Heart Center TV commercials.

You get the idea...

So for us, a blog is a great opportunity to expand our "news" into full stories. It's a chance for us to share more about what is happening in our office, as well as outside. And let's face it... I like to talk about us, almost as much as I like the BBQ chips from Jimmy John's.

Secondly, our blog allows Miles Design to be a better example for our clients. If branding experts can't demonstrate the marketing benefits of a blog, why would their clients show interest?

Finally, let's not downplay the fun factor. It's a chance for us to share the cool things we experience all around us. Our shop maintains strong ties to culture, and it's something our principals encourage. As design thinkers, we're constantly looking at the trends going on around us: in business, music, fashion, all types of design, and (of course) branding... all topics we'll likely be exploring. And when you have a such a simple, fun, brand-building forum as a blog, who wouldn't want to share?

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