From time to time, someone will ask me whether they really need to worry about branding their company. It’s usually asked by the leader of a B2B enterprise that markets to a select few customers and where the sales relationships are one-to-one, very personal. If I’m basically selling to my golfing buddies, goes the reasoning, […]

In his incredibly valuable book, Grow, ex-Procter & Gamble Global CMO, Jim Stengel, identified the 50 fastest-growing companies worldwide – now, known as the Stengel 50 – and sleuthed out the one characteristic they all held in common, the one thing that explained their phenomenal growth. After a decade-long study, he found these businesses crossed […]

After last Tuesday’s election, 28 states plus Washington DC have legalized marijuana for medicinal use. Of those 28, seven states, plus DC, have also legalized recreational use. And of those seven, one is California with it’s huge population and habit of setting trends for the nation. Marijuana is now big business and it looks like […]

Most businesses, whether startups or mature, have no real inkling what their brand promise is or what it should be. As I’ve written here before, most businesses are marketing in the dark. They try different tactics, they mail out a new brochure, they launch a new website, they switch from Instagram to Snapchat, they build […]

“How long should a brand strategy last?” It’s a question that comes up often in my branding workshops. My answer is always the same. A good brand strategy should last a company somewhere between 15 and 20 years … except if the brand in question is a fashion brand. Fashion, by its very definition, is […]