Well, here goes. First blog post. No pressure.
My name is James, and I am the Creative Director at Tractor Beam – the guy who makes the visual candy. I often tell people that my brain works a little different than most so-called “adults”. You see, crayons rock. Fruit Loops are the best way to start the day. Girls are still kind of icky. LEGO is way better than video games.
As I am writing this article, I’m laying in bed with my laptop. And looking over to my bedside table, I have my collection of books which I keep near for inspirational reading. So what books do I keep handy? Well – permanently (or until my toddling children decide to risk their lives by attempting to stake their claim on them), I have the entire collection of Calvin and Hobbes. Yep.
And – well, I can go on, but that kind of paints the picture.
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The Simple Reality
Now, if you’ll indulge me, I’d like you to let your mind drift for a minute – and I’d like you to picture a simple, small town residential street. It has everything you might expect. Imperfect, well-weathered pavement lined with boulevard styled trees overgrowing the side walks. Every other house has a little driveway, with a mailbox and a trash can or two pushed against the picket fences or lush green hedges that run the length of the yards. An upside-down cardboard box is placed just to the side of one such driveway, unevenly covered with a thin and dust spotted white cloth sheet.
A little blond hair boy sits tucked into his toddler sized lawn chair behind the box, his bright blue eyes peeking over the top and his neck occasionally strained to see if any of the passing cars are slowing. On the front side of the box, taped with an excessive amount of scotch tape, is a standard letter sized paper marked with crooked and faded red felt pen lettering. “Lemonade. 25 cents”, it modestly announces.
Young as he is, this little boy is trying to accomplish what every business owner is attempting to achieve. His little blue eyes shimmer and glow with hope and anticipation, as though they are saying, very simply…”Choose me”.
It is, to me, a most innocent of beginnings – but also, a most simple and honest depiction of the reality of the business owner. While the heart of the entrepreneur is outwardly attempting to demonstrate a confidence and optimism, the sobering truth is deeply felt. Without someone to dial your number, or to darken the door to your business and ultimately to “choose you”…the shimmer and glow in your eyes, or in the eyes of this little boy, will become as a discarded cardboard box on the side of the road.
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Do You Depend on the Brand?
I have made my living working in and with marketing firms for the past 12 years, as well as running my own freelancing business for the past four years. I’m paid to make people look good. For many of those 12 years, I was encouraged and taught to believe that all I needed to do was make beautiful designs for inquiring clients and companies, and that would make those companies suddenly flourish. Throw in a catchy heading, a catch phrase and a clever tagline and “VOILA!”, the customers will instantly start calling (right?).
I observed on many occasions how excited the client was when they were presented their new logo design, business card, website and whatever else may have been provided them. And to be clear, I do staunchly believe that a company requires a strong visual (logo) brand; it is a vital cornerstone. But I have since come to believe – to a degree, we were selling false hope with the new logo and “branding” if we suggest to the client that their logo equals their “brand”.
Shaking hands with these clients and sending them on their way to business success based on a “logo brand” is like telling the little boy selling lemonade that all he needed was a better cardboard box. Branding goes far beyond the “visual” (logo, website, etc). If a client is not educated to this fact, they will falsely depend on their brand when, in reality, their brand is depending on them.
Marketing as a whole really is one of several key aspects of a business operation. You need to ensure your business model contains all the mechanics for success, including the vital processes and systems which, although conceptually mundane, keep the integrity of a business in place. There is little point focusing and building a marketing machine when the company that is being "touted" is hardly capable of living up to what is being promoted. We all can likely name some big corporate businesses which mechanically built a marketing machine to promote what essentially was a sour lemon in the waiting.
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Injecting the Dynamics
The concept of "Marketing & Branding" can be depicted in many ways through creative analogy, so for this blog, I'll describe a business as being somewhat like a hot air balloon. Obviously you need the physical balloon (the business model, structure, practices and systems, products, etc), and yes, it is designed to inflate. But is it “flight worthy”? Does it have the capacity and integrity to hold air? You have to make sure the "mechanics" of the balloon will sufficiently sustain what you, the entrepreneur, must ultimately bring; the "dynamics". It is you that injects the vision for the purpose of the balloon. The balloon already has it's purpose; if it is well made, it will do exactly what it is made to do. But now, what about you?
You bring the creativity and passion, the attitude and the energy, the sweat and tears, the direction and the objective and everything that will make your business attractive to both customers and employees. Your "brand" is really everything encompassed in the attitude and style of the company. Absolutely, it does need to become "visual", yes. That is only a part of it, because what does your visual brand, or logo, stand for anyways? A brand speaks of representation, and you need to decide what it is your company is all about. That is the dynamic which you create. It's the "dynamic" which puts the "mechanics" into action.
How do you do that? Well, if you have confidence that your "balloon" will fly, this is where the whole purpose of marketing comes into play. That's what I'm going to try and bring in my following blog posts. Developing the “dynamics” to put your “mechanics” into purposed, driven and infectious action. It’ll weave between the practical, rubber meets the road stuff that I love, and the inspirational.
So, where are you now? Still on the ground? Drifting aimlessly? Losing altitude? Blowing holes? Shining like a glowing, colorful beacon? Soaring higher and stronger? How you fly is closely determined by how your approach your marketing. The goal is to build what can be called "Brand Equity", where your brand doing exactly what it should: working.
I know what it is to be the little boy sitting on the curb with his cardboard box. Now let’s help that little boy turn his lemonade stand into something big.
TO BE CONTINUED...(Next Tuesday)...
by JAMES ROZAK, Creative Director @ Tractor Beam Marketing
