Half Of Marketing Is Knowing When To Say No
Photo by Kristopher Roller on Unsplash
A wise man once told me, “Half of marketing is knowing when to say no.” Without a confident ability to say no, a marketer is left with random acts of marketing. A promotional idea over here that has zero connection to a social media idea over there. A TV spot that doesn’t continue the conversation on the website. An “About” page on the website that says stuff, but really says nothing.
But the question is, how does a modern marketer know when to say no and when to say yes? When you have a clear, powerful, well articulated brand idea, that’s how.
It’s not about what you would do in the marketplace, it’s about what your brand would do.
You know you have a solid brand idea when you can almost ask it what it wants to do in the marketplace. Is this partnership with another brand a good idea? Well, what would the brand say if it could talk? Would it roll its eyes in disbelief or would it say, “Damn right!” This is the greatest skill of the modern marketer. The ability to “channel the brand” with every decision.
And it’s not just you, it’s your whole team. And it’s not just your whole team, it’s your whole company. Every decision the company makes is best made through the prism of the brand idea. Every hire, every new store location, every tent card, every benefits package for employees. Is this what the brand would do or not?
The result is true, pure brand integration. Where your audience can really sense who the brand is based on all of its behavior, including but not limited to the advertising. The question is, if you don’t have a brand idea (or a clear, powerful, well articulated one), how can you get one?
Four brilliant writers walk into a bar…
Well, maybe not an actual bar, but a virtual one. Just last week we conducted a project with a company who makes high quality products for a passionate niche audience. The thing was, the brand didn’t have an idea behind it. It was a little tired, dated, and the site seemed like it suffered from the “random acts of marketing” bug. So this company found Ideasicle X and signed up for our proXy Service, where we ran an entire idea project for them as follows:
Assignment: brand ideas in the form of tag lines
Rounds of ideas: 1
Timing: one week
Team recruiting strategy: all senior creative directors/writers
Fee: $10,000
The client had done some really great initial thinking on the brand in the form of a deck. After an immersion conversation with him, I poured through that deck and found lots of inspiration for the creative brief. Meanwhile, I recruited four creative rock stars I’d worked with in the past.
And let me stop here for a quick side-bar. Any one of these creative rock stars could have been briefed alone and worked alone and come up with a great presentation. But having these four rock stars not only come up with their own ideas, but see each other’s ideas, build on them, and riff new ideas, is where the real magic is within the Ideasicle X virtual process and was a real sight to see in this particular case.
By the end of the week we had about 70 original ideas posted. 70! And that’s not counting all the riffs and builds. It was tough but I went through them all and chose my favorites and went back and forth with the team to get it down to 13 brand ideas that we loved and were proud of. Next up was the presentation to the client.
Brand idea presentations are the best corporate therapy.
My favorite presentations are brand idea presentations because they become useful therapy for the client. They react viscerally to the ideas, debate them, and in these discussions find their collective soul as a brand. It’s not unlike that old adage about the sculptor who was asked by a child how he chisels a horse out of a giant block of marble. To which the sculptor says, “I simply remove all the parts that are not the horse.”
Having 13 brand ideas to review and react to is similar to removing all the parts that are not the brand. Rejecting ideas is critical to the process because it makes the client feel more energy towards the ideas left in contention. And then it’s like trying on clothes.
Would we look good “wearing” this brand idea? Would our audience respect us? Would they relate? The discussions are always productive and, in this case, only took an hour. They did a tally of everyone’s favorites and 9 of the 13 ideas were brought up by someone on the client side. Not a bad hit rate. Right now they are mulling the ideas separately and reconvening to make a decision.
And when they do make a decision on which brand idea they choose to move forward with, all the decisions after that will become much easier to make.
It will be easier to say no and avoid the dreaded random acts of marketing. Do you have a brand idea? If you’re not sure, fill out a proXy Service form and we’ll talk.
Will Burns is the Found & CEO of Ideasicle X. Follow him on Twitter @WillOBurns.