It’s been 10 years since I wrote this post, and almost 50 since Al enlightened me and yet the battle of the hetero sexes for equality rages; and at exponential rates for queer and transgender beings.
I’m reposting it because Al’s message rings as true to me today as did in 1978; and it’s an idea worth repeating. And, to honor the women in my life, now and in the past, whose profound insight and partnership, personally and professionally, have made me the man (he, him) I am.
It shouldn’t be just one day or even a single month in 12 we believe them.
Peace. Z-
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Every so often there’s an article enumerating “The 10 Most Important Things I’ve learned in Business.” Inevitably it starts with #1: “I learned Excel.”
Well, I’m as big a sucker for these lists as the next guy, and always scan them for tidbits o’ wisdom. And sure, learning Excel is probably one of them.
Oddly though, I’ve never seen the one lesson I’ve always considered most important in my business life.
It came the day my first real boss and mentor, Al Baier, a pioneer in recruitment advertising and founder of what’s now Buyer Advertising, popped his head into my first ever private office, and with a gleam in his eye and his trademark sly smile, he said to me (I was 25):
“Tom, women are the greatest under-utilized resource we have in this country. We have to start believing them more.”
-Al Baier
This simple statement had a profound effect on me: at that moment women became more than the object of my 20-something male longings; they became lifelong partners.
I’ve always been grateful to Al as I went on to a career in the agency business, which thanks to the great ad maven Mary Wells was one of the first to shatter the glass ceiling for women. And his insight served me well as I worked with some brilliant women, both creatives and clients, throughout my agency and brand coaching years.
To say nothing of the brilliant woman I married. It’s clear she’s much more resourceful and tougher than me. No contest there.
But sometimes I wonder why so many men seemed to have missed the memo. And when women such as my friend Lisa Pertrilli, an extraordinary business woman says to me “I hope you’re right,” when after a significant victory by a woman I suggest to her “your time is coming soon,” I really wonder what’s taking so long.
I don’t think it’s something we can dictate in business and expect long-lasting effect. Regulations are fleeting, political, and subject to resentment and neglect. And my ERA Now! bumper sticker has long faded, a snowball’s chance in hell of being reprinted in today’s political climate.
No, I think this insight must be seeded in our children, boys and girls, by those of us lucky enough to be dads. And for every reason it should start today.
Do so, and my sense is it will all add up to great advances in our businesses, and our lives. Your daughters (and sons) will thank you. And at the end of the day the numbers in your Excel spreadsheet will, in comparison, pale in value.
Thanks Al.
Peace, Z (aka Tom)
Today’s random thought: for all intents and purposes, as the only one in this business, I am Zenecist™ (brand), and not “The Zenecist.” So just for fun I’m trying out signing my posts with a Z rather than a T. Sure kind of goofy, but as as kid Zoro was a chief hero – I ran ragged in the neighborhood with my black cape and mask. In the 80s my then Wellesley ad agency, The Lanen Company, created a logo for the heavy/metal rock Zildjian “Z” cymbals line; and as a drummer I always played Zildjians–that’s my old high-hat in this musical instrument sculpture. Ha! What do you think: Z or T?
I’ve just completed my first significant assignment solely as a strategy and brand coach, versus the full-service ad agency guy I’ve been throughout my career. When I took the assignment, I expected it to be routine: the charge was to help re-establish a mid-technology B2B brand, and the beginnings of a marketing program — right in my wheelhouse. But, while one of my primary goals was to encourage the client’s staff to take over content and social media creation, I expected resistance, and thought I’d still have to be part of the tactical team.
Then I met the young stakeholders of this Austrian mid-technology business. And when they understood their new charge, they stepped-up and took full ownership of the brand. I was delighted.
You see, much like my college-age twins, they did so with a knowing light in their eyes – the “faces with a view” songwriter David Byrne once described – giving me great hope for both their professional careers, and for the people whose lives they will touch.
The emotion was more than I’d envisioned as I’ve formulated my strategy to evolve into a coach over the past few months. But they didn’t need me to tell them how to characterize their brand any more than my sons need me to tell them how to live their lives.
They just wanted a few hints about its structure; and license to go at it their way. Excellent.
All Lines In The Water
I was most struck by their instinctive understanding their brand was about truth, and not some epic myth we advertising folk used to invent. Though I think it helped their new CEO, a brilliant Austrian technologist and who’d also taken the CMO reigns, had very focused and transparent business goals he’d begun to share across the organization.
Faced with aggressive owner expectations for sales and revenue growth, he was convinced his strategic concept of “active fishing” could make the cash register ring more consistently. His approach suggested every contact every employee made – at work, and even their personal lives – was a possible customer, and they should be encouraged to benefit from all the business and brand offered.
My dad and I, circa 1981, back from a wonderful morning’s fishing outing on Lake Winnipesaukee in New Hampshire, when all lines in the water, we both caught beautiful land-locked salmon.
My heart soared as I listened: it was not unlike a concept my dad, a sales engineer and manufacturer’s rep, had postulated and talked about during happy fishing outings in New Hampshire many years back. It was part of our legacy. And, with my decades of experience since, I recognized it wasn’t just a sales strategy, but an umbrella brand marketing strategy.
What he was asking was every single person on his staff become an active brand ambassador.
We can do that!
Osmosis Isn’t a Brand Development Strategy
Just one problem: the brand story was in disarray. Every person to whom I spoke had a different feeling and sense about the company, and its focus. This is quite common with going businesses; it’s easy for owners to think because they know the current and/or evolved business story everyone in the business should. It’s often not accurately reflected on websites either.
This typically happens when a brand’s strategic communications platform and position — a core foundational block — hasn’t been formally or recently articulated. As such it can’t be scaled throughout the organization, much less executed against in its inbound and outbound marketing.
After long discussion, including an introduction into current best practices including marketing automation, and content and social media marketing, I agreed with the CEO/CMO’s assessment: its marketing and sales teams needed branded “quality bait.” And only brand stakeholders could determine what that meant.
Much to his credit, the last thing he wanted was for me to ‘create’ it. He’d already given that a go with other agencies, and had neither the budget or patience for it. Nor did I.
During a week of meetings in Austria, I helped lead the company’s best and brightest construct the elements of their core brand – not just the “what,” but the “why” – using oversized post-it notes with considered contributions teams had created in a moderated workshop format.
As they did, and it all started to take shape, I enjoyed one of the biggest thrills of my multi-decade career. You see, I was experiencing the (re)birth of a pure brand, one representing the exact sensibilities of its owners. Brilliant!
Part of my interest was how the brand lexicon was evolving from what I viewed as a rather obtuse brand design system to language-based understanding; and addressed technical and non-technical audiences without loss of technical context.
Importantly too, the team also recognized and addressed how each linguistic bite translated into core understanding – mutually agreed upon translations – as it affected its markets and cultures, European, American and Asian.
In short, when the workshops concluded all participants were armed with the first vestiges of a defined and agile brand story to take back to their teammates. Everyone could talk to the same brand regardless of where they lived; a baited hook they could cast at will.
“(Beyond marketing materials) you build (brand) equity every day with every little decision you make along the way, which sounds simple and easy. But if you are growing, how do you continuously protect and preserve and strengthen the brand when more and more people get involved? That’s where brand becomes culture.”
These young leaders redefined their brand to address current day technology and marketing dynamics as they see it. It became their brand as it is, and can be. Not just some brand as it could be.
And that’s how it should be. Because today marketing is not about creating a myth and selling it; but about finding a truth and sharing it. And about creating a brand customers want to find, and make part of their own personal and professional brands.
A Living, Agile Entity
It would be simplistic to suggest the client team fully formulated its brand within a scant few meetings or they’ll even take it any further now the meetings are over.
Or, that their definitions will remain intact, which can be a good thing, given my sense today’s brands should be agile and allowed – even required – to evolve with changing attitudes and technologies.
But, while visual design systems will remain a constant to brand identity (and a love of mine), today it’s more about how a brand engages people on every possible level, inside and outside of the business.
It’s about building upon the core emotional dynamics of a brand, of being real, as tactics to add value and understanding; and to help the business qualify for brand value premiums because their goods are perceived worthy.
Importantly, it’s about having a brand baseline upon which everyone on the company team can build an ongoing sense of their own brands and purpose in their lives; something to which they can belong while building self-esteem, and their paths to success.
It’s all so exciting – even if I’m not creating it all as my agency-guy ego might once have demanded.
But then again, my brand has had yet another defining moment too.
Tom Lanen is the principal of Thomas Marketing Services Corporation, an erstwhile full-service advertising and digital marketing agency he founded in ‘89, now a strategy and brand coaching consultancy. He truly enjoyed the people, and the lusciously rich coffee and desserts for which Austria is known; though is less convinced of its many permutations of wiener schnitzel.
His marketing in-service program, Fishing Where The Fish Are Today™, is designed for business owners and brand stakeholders in small businesses who seek a better brand and marketing process as a strategy to hit their numbers. Tom can be reached at +1 508- 951-0130 or at [email protected]
