You may recognise the following exchange when discussing positioning or messaging for your organisation. “How about we say we help our customers…” “Yeah but help feels a bit plain, how about…” You can insert the replacement words here – a grab bag of escalating verbs designed to show that while the others might...
One of my favourite topics addressed in my articles, and one I talk about regularly with clients, is how actions align with values. Values aren’t values unless you do them every day, and one of the best organisations around for actioning their values is Patagonia. I know I use them as an example a...
I know, I know. Lots of people will tell you that you do. Big companies everywhere keep ditching the old for no good reason and putting in the new (yes, I’m looking at you Yahoo!), so why would I be saying the opposite? After all, a bright, shiny new logo...
I was talking to a reporter about the so-called Coca-Cola “weight washing” announcements last week and it got me thinking about a broader issue. We all have ideas on what promises organisations should be making, but that isn’t our job. Coca-Cola doesn’t promise to keep you thin. They do promise to “refresh the world and...
This is not the article I was going to write. I had a whole different one started about setting expectations. But then while reading about the recent promise fail by Domino’s, I saw this: “Phil McDonald, the Brisbane managing director of advertising agency George Patterson Y&R, said the fallout was another example of...
I’m going to keep this short and sweet. I’ve recently had a number of conversations with people where my brand advice to them ended with the following statement: Everyone is not your customer. It should be obvious and some companies do get it. Too many don’t. There are plenty of ways you can...
Subway is famous for their “foot-long sub”. It is one of the promises the brand stands on. They have talked about their “foot-long subs” for years. They’ve run ads about it. They have even trademarked the term, so we could be forgiven for expecting that the subs that carry that...
It probably seemed like a good idea at the time. A clever hashtag. A tweet. And then faster than you can say RT it all comes unstuck. I am of course talking about Kayser Lingerie and the somewhat infamous #kaysermaleinsider tweets. But it was one in particular that really sent things off...
Last week at the QR National annual meeting, shareholders voted to support the change of the corporation’s name to … wait for it. Aurizon. There’s a good article about the craziness of this move at LeadingCompany, where editor Kath Walters explores what they might have been thinking – aided and abetted by yours...
I was at the Smart Company Smart 50 Awards last week, chatting to those who had made the list and enjoying hearing their stories about how they keep their promises. Just before the official announcements got underway, I was asked the following question to think about while gongs were handed out: “How do you...