The document discusses how to build an iconic brand through cultural branding. It argues that most brands focus too narrowly on functional benefits and abstract emotional benefits rather than championing an ideology that resonates with consumers. Iconic brands engage with key cultural issues in society and position themselves as advocates for an ideology. The document provides examples of how brands like Ben & Jerry's, Mountain Dew, and Nike became iconic by leveraging cultural tensions and popular myths through their branding strategies. It presents cultural branding as a way to move beyond "mindshare branding" approaches and build strong emotional connections with consumers.
Cultural Strategy Battle School - iStrategyLabsEric Shutt
Cultural Brand Strategy is the link between creative and strategy that can elevate brands, campaigns, and creative work to achieve a culturally iconic status. These creative executions side-step conventional marketing value propositions and categorical benefits — in favor of positioning Brands to address, disrupt, and resolve specific cultural tensions in a social context. Often ‘snuck in’ by agency creatives and missing from explicit client creative direction — learn the basics of how to identify, create and execute on creative strategy in a new way.
Theory and sources by Douglas Holt & Douglas Cameron; 'Cultural Strategy' & 'How Brands Become Icons'.
23 of the world's most effective Positioning TerritoriesAshton Bishop
A brand's role is to own a position in their customers' minds. The way to find the 'position' that's right for you is to consider the dominant positioning territories. Step Change Marketing has compiled 23 of the world's best and most effective. Which one's right for you and your brand?
What challenger brands are, how they work and how to become one. Illustrated ...Drthomasbrand Limited
An overview of what challenger brands are and what makes them work. Illustrated through extensive examples. How do you become one, what are the steps and strategies that works.
Cultural Strategy Battle School - iStrategyLabsEric Shutt
Cultural Brand Strategy is the link between creative and strategy that can elevate brands, campaigns, and creative work to achieve a culturally iconic status. These creative executions side-step conventional marketing value propositions and categorical benefits — in favor of positioning Brands to address, disrupt, and resolve specific cultural tensions in a social context. Often ‘snuck in’ by agency creatives and missing from explicit client creative direction — learn the basics of how to identify, create and execute on creative strategy in a new way.
Theory and sources by Douglas Holt & Douglas Cameron; 'Cultural Strategy' & 'How Brands Become Icons'.
23 of the world's most effective Positioning TerritoriesAshton Bishop
A brand's role is to own a position in their customers' minds. The way to find the 'position' that's right for you is to consider the dominant positioning territories. Step Change Marketing has compiled 23 of the world's best and most effective. Which one's right for you and your brand?
What challenger brands are, how they work and how to become one. Illustrated ...Drthomasbrand Limited
An overview of what challenger brands are and what makes them work. Illustrated through extensive examples. How do you become one, what are the steps and strategies that works.
How do brands really grow? How do brands grow in a radically disrupted internet economy? We explore brand growth in today’s digital world, with perspectives from Nicholas Lovell, Lionel Benbassat of Eurostar, and the Arena strategy team.
A New Brand Strategy For A 2.0 World.
This document focuses on cultural tension strategy and grassroots marketing as tools of implementation in a new media world shaped by consumer activism.
It shows a systematic way to embed culture in the strategic process and demonstrates its financial value.
In the two decades that Y&R’s BrandAsset® Valuator (BAV®) - the world’s largest database of brand perceptions - has studied the brandscape, brands have become 200% less distinct from one another. Marketers must work harder than ever in order to make their brands stand out. But how? By studying thousands of brands - from the most iconic to the most commoditized - we found that breakaway brands have an inherent tension that makes them irresistible. We call this BRAND TENSITY®
Best Practices in Brand Portfolio StrategyFullSurge
A tutorial workshop on the best practices in brand portfolio strategy prepared for and facilitated on behalf of The Institute for the Study of Business Markets (ISBM).
Brand Archetypes: The Science Behind Brand PersonalityStephen Houraghan
We all have an emotional connection with a brand where the alternative simply won't do. Your connection with that brand is likely on a human level. Whether they speak your language, champion a cause you believe in or represent who you are, the connection is more than just transactional. The world's most loved brands all connect with us using a similar framework. This framework is based on decades of scientific research and has its roots in Greek Mythology. This Framework is Archetypes. www.iconicfox.com.au/brand-archetypes
John Gibson, Vice President/Global Planning Director at The Martin Agency, gave this presentation at "Ambidexterity 2," the VCU Brandcenter's Executive Education program for account planning on June 24th at the VCU Brandcenter in Richmond, VA.
The planning, creative and broader marketing community uses insights or an insight to get to ideas that will solve their marketing or business problems. This is a brief exploration into the definition of the insight.
Idealism and commercialism are not polar opposites. In fact, as counterintuitive as it may seem, sustainable profits are supported by sustainable idealism. Brand owners should not have to choose between idealism and profit, and profits based on a degree of idealism are more likely to be strong and sustainable over time. Businesses have come to recognize this and want their objectives, and those of their brands, to be attractive and easily defensible. While the economic crisis has tested some companies’ resolve, the fundamental factors that encourage them to espouse inspiring missions and defensible practices are unlikely to wane. Ogilvy has developed The big ideaL process to convey the ethos of the brand or company to people from different cultures and to employees and consumers alike.
An idea collected from different sources in internet and hush-puppies website for creation of a creative brief which helps in product promotion and advertisement....
Top 10 Planning Departments in Advertising ShortlistJulian Cole
For more strategy resources sign up to Planning Dirty at https://www.planningdirty.com/newsletter
A common problem for planners moving markets is understanding the best agencies to work for. With a great list of international planners in the Planning Dirty newsletter group I thought I would ask the planners who they thought was the best agency to work for.
I compiled the first 10 agencies for the shortlist by analyzing the planning (IPA, Effies, Jay Chiats) and creative awards (Gunn Report) from the last three year looking at the agencies that consistently perform well.
I am making a shortlist of 20, so would love to get recommendations on agencies that you think should make the list.
Next week on the newsletter through an anonymous vote, I’ll put out the poll and report back the results. Sign up to the Planning Dirty newsletter to vote and get the best planning tools and resources fortnightly. bit.ly/PlanningDirty
How do brands really grow? How do brands grow in a radically disrupted internet economy? We explore brand growth in today’s digital world, with perspectives from Nicholas Lovell, Lionel Benbassat of Eurostar, and the Arena strategy team.
A New Brand Strategy For A 2.0 World.
This document focuses on cultural tension strategy and grassroots marketing as tools of implementation in a new media world shaped by consumer activism.
It shows a systematic way to embed culture in the strategic process and demonstrates its financial value.
In the two decades that Y&R’s BrandAsset® Valuator (BAV®) - the world’s largest database of brand perceptions - has studied the brandscape, brands have become 200% less distinct from one another. Marketers must work harder than ever in order to make their brands stand out. But how? By studying thousands of brands - from the most iconic to the most commoditized - we found that breakaway brands have an inherent tension that makes them irresistible. We call this BRAND TENSITY®
Best Practices in Brand Portfolio StrategyFullSurge
A tutorial workshop on the best practices in brand portfolio strategy prepared for and facilitated on behalf of The Institute for the Study of Business Markets (ISBM).
Brand Archetypes: The Science Behind Brand PersonalityStephen Houraghan
We all have an emotional connection with a brand where the alternative simply won't do. Your connection with that brand is likely on a human level. Whether they speak your language, champion a cause you believe in or represent who you are, the connection is more than just transactional. The world's most loved brands all connect with us using a similar framework. This framework is based on decades of scientific research and has its roots in Greek Mythology. This Framework is Archetypes. www.iconicfox.com.au/brand-archetypes
John Gibson, Vice President/Global Planning Director at The Martin Agency, gave this presentation at "Ambidexterity 2," the VCU Brandcenter's Executive Education program for account planning on June 24th at the VCU Brandcenter in Richmond, VA.
The planning, creative and broader marketing community uses insights or an insight to get to ideas that will solve their marketing or business problems. This is a brief exploration into the definition of the insight.
Idealism and commercialism are not polar opposites. In fact, as counterintuitive as it may seem, sustainable profits are supported by sustainable idealism. Brand owners should not have to choose between idealism and profit, and profits based on a degree of idealism are more likely to be strong and sustainable over time. Businesses have come to recognize this and want their objectives, and those of their brands, to be attractive and easily defensible. While the economic crisis has tested some companies’ resolve, the fundamental factors that encourage them to espouse inspiring missions and defensible practices are unlikely to wane. Ogilvy has developed The big ideaL process to convey the ethos of the brand or company to people from different cultures and to employees and consumers alike.
An idea collected from different sources in internet and hush-puppies website for creation of a creative brief which helps in product promotion and advertisement....
Top 10 Planning Departments in Advertising ShortlistJulian Cole
For more strategy resources sign up to Planning Dirty at https://www.planningdirty.com/newsletter
A common problem for planners moving markets is understanding the best agencies to work for. With a great list of international planners in the Planning Dirty newsletter group I thought I would ask the planners who they thought was the best agency to work for.
I compiled the first 10 agencies for the shortlist by analyzing the planning (IPA, Effies, Jay Chiats) and creative awards (Gunn Report) from the last three year looking at the agencies that consistently perform well.
I am making a shortlist of 20, so would love to get recommendations on agencies that you think should make the list.
Next week on the newsletter through an anonymous vote, I’ll put out the poll and report back the results. Sign up to the Planning Dirty newsletter to vote and get the best planning tools and resources fortnightly. bit.ly/PlanningDirty
Some context for the controversy surrounding Pepsi's endorsement deal with Beyonce, and notes on the shifting cultural frame. Also, some initial thoughts on how brands have to proceed in the future to avoid these blind side hits.
Attention, Art & Social Capital in BrandingYvette Dubel
Invites viewers to consider the role of Attention and social capital in branding. Slides are from storyboard for related project(s) still in development.
Tim Leberecht@NEXT09: The Seven Rules of the Chief Meaning Officerfrog
"The job of leadership today is not just to make money. It's to make meaning," writes management consultant John Hagel.
This talk argues that the fundamental crisis of capitalism presents a historic opportunity for brands to transform themselves into arbiters of meaning. Becoming Chief Meaning Officers, CMOs and other marketing leaders must move beyond simply connecting products and customers with the goal to facilitate transactions – they must now create "meaning" through actions and interactions. A "meaning surplus" will become imperative: Only brands that give more than they take will be able to create sustained brand loyalty.
It's all about Content Marketing, it's about the Content and the Human Mix, it's about the rules of the Social Media World.
Presentation by Stefanos Karagos, Founder of XPLAIN at Social Media World 2012 Conference
Marketing Strategy: Evolution Of A SpeciesGuy Gouldavis
What people want from brands and how they engage with them is very different today than even 5 years ago. The result: planners have to approach brand building and consumer engagement very differently. But it's as important to consider what hasn't changed in what we do.
Simple Creative Products case study - Album Superbrands 2014Superbrands Polska
Case study marki Simple Creative Products - Album Superbrands 2014
Marka Simple Creative Products otrzymała tytuły:
Superbrands 2013/2014
Created in Poland Superbrands 2013/2014
2. What is an iconic brand?
A powerful cultural symbol.
Brand champions an ideology that resonates, that people
care about, and so they use the brand in their everyday lives,
an important component of their identities.
Because iconic brands play such an important role for
consumers, they have very strong and durable brand loyalty,
and are amongst most loved and respected brands.
3. Some brands become iconic simply because
they provide much “Better Mousetraps”
4. But many iconic brands are not better mousetraps.
Rather they are cultural innovators.
7. Ads: pouring ¼ moisturizing cream into bar
Mind share: gentle, luxurious
8. Users
benefits
PRODUCT
quality emotions
personality
A brand is a set of emotion-laden, distinctive, relevant
associations in customer’s minds
9. Mindshare branding
1950s Roots: Unique Selling Proposition
Trout and Ries: Capturing mental real estate
Became conventional one-size-fits-all model for MNCs
P&G, Unilever, Coke, Henkel, Nestle, etc
Major ad agencies followed suit
Academics formalize and diffuse via MBA
Dominated marketing since 1980s
10. 1990s: added emotional benefits
BRAND DNA or ESSENCE
FUNCTIONAL EMOTIONAL
BENEFITS BENEFITS
11. Complicated
Unwieldy
Version
problem-solution Megaperls (german)
Orientation Longterm Color Technology
Gel
Cleanliness Protection
Experience Recommendation
Innovation (from generation to
generation)
Skin Care
well being Superior Cleanliness trust / Omnipresence
(internal care) security
Characteristic
and Care
Tradition
Perfume (smell social recognition /History
of cleanliness) (external care) Partly
Environmental Mainstream authoritarian
friendly orientation Family external
values representation
TheCulturalStrategyGroup
12. Okay for daily stewardship.
But mindshare strategies
cannot build iconic brands.
three problems.
14. Baby Boomers Enter the 1980s
“Sixties
Generation” middle-class came of age
advocating progressive ideals about society and the
environment
TheCulturalStrategyGroup
15. Political Shift Fuels Cultural Tension
The “Reagan Revolution”: antithesis of Sixties ideology dominated
Capitalism over environmental and humanitarian values; greed is good
ideology; aggressive militaristic posturing
Left-of-center baby boomers become deeply alienated
Created powerful desire for countervailing challenger to advocate for liberal
societal-environmental ideals, taking on Reaganism
TheCulturalStrategyGroup
16. Enter Ben & Jerry’s
Advanced humanitarian business
ideology
Source material:
-back-to-the-land hippie subculture
- Yippie political prankster media stunts
17. What’s The Doughboy Afraid of?
When Pillsbury tries to use market
power to shut Ben & Jerry’s out of
marketplace
Cohen responds with a provocative
prank that captured the liberal baby-
boomer imagination
18. Ben & Jerry’s Vs. Reagan’s Cold War
Guerilla campaign
and new product
launch receives
national coverage on
all major networks
20. Rainforest Crunch vs. Slash-and-Burn
Farming in the Amazon
Leverages media wave covering
rainforest activist Chico Mendes
assassination in 1989
Launch reported on all major television
networks and news dailies
28. Typical Abstract Adjective Strategy
MOUNTAIN DEW Positioning (circa 1993)
You can have the most thrilling, exciting, daring
experience but it will never compete with
the exhilarating experience of a Mountain Dew.
29. Leads to Strategic Black Box
Functional +
Emotional
Benefits Brand
Archetypes Expressions
Brand
Personality
Strategy is too vague to make effective decisions between good and bad
brand expressions; it is not doing what strategy is supposed to do.
30. Cultural Strategy provides specific
direction on brand expressions
Functional +
Emotional
Benefits Cultural Brand
Archetypes Strategy Expressions
Brand
Personality
31. Cultural Branding Laboratory
ACADEMIC RESEARCH (30+) CONSULTING (60+)
Budweiser Coca-Cola
Volkswagen Converse
Snapple Microsoft Windows
Mountain Dew
Corona
MINI
Mountain Dew
Mastercard
Harley-Davidson Jack Daniel’s
ESPN Sprite
Levi’s Vitaminwater
Nike Friskies
Marlboro Fancy Feast
Jack Daniel’s Amazon Kindle
Hyundai
Patagonia
Ben & Jerry’s
Starbucks
Planet Green
Tango Georgia Coffee
Cazadores
32.
33.
34. Modern Quest for Meaning and Identity
Religions Ideology
Tribes
Nations Culture =Idealized Stories
Communities
Subcultures
Myths
Life Story Ideal Self
Rely on myths
- Interpret the world
- moral anchors
Identity Project - community and status
35. Who authors modern myths?
Films
Television
Politics
Sport
Music
Movements
Brands
36. People (and other cultural “actors” such as brands) that perform the myth that
society most “needs” at a particular historical moment become icons.
37.
38. Iconic communications drove both
functional + emotional benefits
Resonance, Identification
Best tasting Makes me happy
Most refreshing Makes me optimistic
Most invigorating Makes me feel good
39. If we reverse engineer..
how would we describe
the strategy that led to
these ads?
41. Media
obsessed
with
rioting
Politics
becomes
police
crackdowns
42. Media filled with disturbing
images of Vietnam war
Sparks huge protests,
also dominates media
43. Media
imagined
black men
from the ‘hood
as the nation’s
nightmare
44. Brand responds with myths that bring to life
the ideology that consumers demand
Coke’s Utopian Humanitarian Ideology
Drinking a Coke is a moment of communion with the world—a pause that
not only refreshes, but that also allows us to feel our common humanity
with peoples very different than us. Drinking a Coke produces a profound
sort of happiness that comes from integrating our life with disparate others,
rather than experience life as isolated individuals.
Coke embodies this utopian humanitarian ideology because, time and
again, the brand (and company) has inspired its customers to imagine a
world in which the most troubling inhumanities and social inequalities can
be overcome if only each of us acts every day to make it so. When the
world has problems, we have come to rely on Coke to inspire us and to
take action.
45.
46. Red Ocean Branding
BRANDS DUKE IT OUT WITHIN CATEGORY’S
CULTURAL ORTHODOXY
Benefits trench warfare
Emotion words slugfests
Chasing generic trends
Clichéd ideology
54. Historical Change
Cultural Orthodoxy
Ideological
Opportunity
Social
Disruption
Source Material
Subculture. Media Myth. Brand Assets.
TheCulturalStrategyGroup
55.
56. Historical Change
Cultural Strategy
ideology
myth
cultural codes
TheCulturalStrategyGroup
63. Better Mousetraps competition fades
Leveraged emerging discipline of biomechanics
Brooks developed kinetic wedge
Asics introduced dual density midsoles
Early technical advances provided quantum leaps in
performance, but soon became incremental
Nike Air barely noticed in late Seventies
68. Nike champions competitive runners’
ideology as antidote
Ideology
Transcend barriers with
Combative Solo Willpower
Cultural Codes
Runners “backstage”
training by themselves
in terrible weather with
great cheer + determination
69. Now what?
After casuals flop, basketball
Cultural
Strategy
Group
72. Code innovation #1
dramatize ideology outside professional athlete subculture
Code innovation #2
useCultural
extreme disadvantage contexts to set up myth of transcendence
Strategy
Group
73. Mythologize ideology in the ‘hood
Subculture: harshest place in USA, impossible to succeed
Myth: if you embrace the right ideology, you can achieve
The American Dream even in the very worst circumstances
79. Historical Change
Cultural
Orthodoxy
Cultural
Tension
creates
Ideological
Opportunity
Cultural Strategy
Ideology-myth-cultural codes
Social Disruption
Source Material
Subcultures-Media Myths-Brand Assets
82. Social Disruption: Demographic Explosion
Creates Craft Segment
Early 90s—first generation to grow up with college-
educated parents comes of age
For upper-middle class “bourgeois-bohemians” (Bobos),
huge pent-up demand for new products and services that
conveyed cultural sophistication
Food/drinks were bulls-eye
84. Red Ocean Branding
BRANDS DUKE IT OUT WITHIN CATEGORY’S
CULTURAL ORTHODOXY
Benefits trench warfare
Emotion words slugfests
Chasing generic trends
85. Social Disruption II:
Cultural Sophistication Migrates to Work
New professional work ideology:
Creative inventive work, making “insanely great” stuff
86. But few did. Routine work in stressful organizations was the norm. And
they make big bucks so they can’t walk away..
They can only dream of another life.
Cultural Tension = The ache of the Bobo..
87. Historical Change
Cultural Orthodoxy
Cultural
Tension
=
Ideological
Opportunity
Social
Disruption
Source Material
Subculture. Media Myth. Brand Assets.
88. Popular articles on avocational connoisseurship
e.g., starting a boutique organic farm
TheCulturalStrategyGroup
89. Gathered Subculture Source Materials
to Curate Brand Story
COMMUNITY OF AMATEURS
Stubbornly independent renegades who
opted out of careers to passionately pursue
avocations, allowing them absolute freedom
to turn work into creative inventive
expression
Don McClung
29” single-speed mountain bike pioneer
92. Historical Change
Cultural Orthodoxy
Cultural
Tension
=
Ideological
Opportunity
Social
Disruption
Source Material
Subculture. Media Myth. Brand Assets.
93. Cultural Strategy (summary)
New Belgium is a community of pastoral amateurs with many
avocations, including brewing beer. We celebrate quixotic playful
exploration. Pastoral amateurs investigate their chosen domain with
intensity. But this isn’t a masculine conquest. Our approach is
communal, not competitive. We prefer childlike innocence to jaded
professionalism. This is a playground, not a frontier.
We champion wildly non-instrumental investments of time. We
embrace brash iconoclasm. Pastoral amateurs will take whatever time
it takes to learn what needs learning, pursue the paths of inquiry that
are open, experimenting to get things right, attending to the details.
101. Cultural Strategy
Embrace 3rd wave’s celebration of woman’s body and
sexuality
Challenge patriarchal scientific approach to women and
their bodies
Take on category taboos
102.
103.
104. Results
UK 55% sales increase
Germany 45%
USA 80%
Radio only 35%
106. MuchMusic USA
“Me too” imitation of MTV
No reputation
Extremely low awareness
amongst youth target
Poor production values
Very limited marketing budget
107. Cultural Seeding
Efficient and compelling brand communication by
provocatively engaging mass media discourse with brand
ideology
• Pick the right discourse
• Pick the right tension within the discourse
Ideological flashpoint
• Use “cultural seeding” to provocatively assert brand
ideology in the discourse
108. Cultural Jujitsu
Special case of cultural seeding
Leverage the power of the category leader to sharply and
efficiently assert point-of-view
109. Incumbent’s Cultural Achilles Heel
Mid 1990s: Abandoned youth
rebellion against bourgeois
adulthood
Instead, celebrated the
teenybopper dream of the rich
and beautiful lifestyle
• Undressed, Sorority Life, Room
Raiders
• Brittney, Paris, Jessica Simpson
Great ideological opportunity
110. Populist Prankser
New anti-bourgeois myth: celebrate rude sloth
Use cultural jamming to mock MTV’s bourgeois tastes
Extend to other points of engagement in discourse
Low fidelity to show up MTV’s slick production
124. Shifts in category ideology
create massive cultural opportunities
Society changes over time, often seismically, transforming
the key ideologies that structure your category..
These ideological transformations challenge category
conventions, devaluing incumbents and creating
opportunities for new and restaged brands.
This is a far more important innovation driver than generic
trends
125. Winners become new iconic brands
Successfully responding to historical changes that matter
to category consumers is what transforms a brand into a
cultural icon.
Iconic brands champion a category-relevant ideology that
resonates powerfully in people’s everyday lives.
Which acts as a powerful halo shaping product quality and
benefit perceptions.
126. Brands take advantage with resonant
expressions, not declarations
Iconic brands don’t tell people what they stand for.
Rather, they create myths—they act in compelling ways to
dramatize their ideology.
They tell stories with implicit ideological meaning (myths)
that make an emotional connection with the audience.
128. And brand management
Your brand’s meaning and value is to be found in people’s everyday
lives, in the media, in word-of-mouth, not in positioning statements or
white board exercises or brand metrics reports.
Your brand’s opportunities move with history. Game-changing
opportunities emerge from structural changes in society and culture
bearing down on your category. These opportunities can be
researched, but require new kinds of cultural analysis. They are not to
be found in trend reports!
To do cultural branding requires that managers embrace new ways of
doing research, strategy, and creative development.
129. Cultural branding is a systematic craft.
With practice & perseverance,
you can do it too!