Robert Burns as Marketing Strategist Tuesday, September 5th, 2017

Robert Burns, a Scottish poet and lyricist of the 18th century, remains considered by many the national poet of Scotland. Today his work and literary influence are celebrated globally. This verse from the Burns poem, To A Louse, describes the value of qualitative research in drawing a bead on what is important, and what is not: O would some Power the gift to give us
To see ourselves as others see us! As Burns suggests, as…
During a life that began humbly as a wagon driver, hotel porter, bricklayer, farm laborer, hobo, dishwasher, coal heaver, soldier, West Point washout and later college dropout, as a poet and writer Carl Sandburg became an often-honored advocate for laborers, soldiers, the civil rights movement and social justice. Upon Sandburg's death in 1967, President Lyndon B. Johnson observed: "...more than the voice of America, more than the poet of its strength and genius. He was…
W. H. Auden, an Anglo-American poet, born in England, later an American citizen, is regarded as one of the greatest writers of the 20th century. Auden was a writer through and through, as throughout his life writing was always uppermost. As a writer and poet, Auden deeply understood the power of words. Quoting Austrian writer and journalist Karl Kraus, "language is the mother of thought, not the handmaiden of thought," Auden added: "Words will tell…
Legendary singer-songwriter and musician Woody Guthrie is today remembered as an American icon. Guthrie wrote over 1,000 songs, including one that became his most famous, "This Land Is Your Land." Beyond his more obvious talents, Guthrie left to marketers and brand strategists a gem of timeless advice: "Any fool can make something complicated. It takes a genius to make it simple." He was right of course. Yet Guthrie lays out a difficult objective, as business leaders and often…
Richard Branson, founder and Chairman of the Virgin Group offers this maxim for business success: "Complexity is your enemy. Any fool can make something complicated. It is hard to make something simple." Branson reprises a quote originated by legendary singer-songwriter Woody Guthrie, who first framed it in this way: "Any fool can make something complicated. It takes a genius to make it simple." Growth in the reputation equity of any product or enterprise requires an abandon-the-superfluous focus. A difficult objective, as business leaders…
Gabriel García Márquez, the Colombian novelist whose "One Hundred Years of Solitude" established him as a giant of 20th-century literature, died last week at his home in Mexico City. He was 87. Speaking to the Paris Review in 1981 García Márquez explained how early on he searched for the "right tone" in his writing, and in so doing shares insight for brand marketers of the importance in finding the correct tone to prompt audience engagement: "I had an idea of what…
Rudyard Kipling, author of literary works such as The Jungle Books, Captains Courageous, and If, and winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature 1907, understood how the effective deployment of words could move people to support a cause, an individual and even a product, long before terms such as brands, marketing, brand strategy and advertising emerged in contemporary culture. Here is Kipling in 1923, on the power of words: "I am, by calling, a dealer in words; and words are, of course, the most powerful drug used…
Nate Silver, who grew his reputation equity and became a pop culture icon as elections forecaster, creating two respected brands, on March 17 launched his new ESPN-backed FiveThirtyEight.com. Since then, has Silver broken the brand promise of data analysis rigor on which his personal reputation equity has been built, as well as that of FiveThirtyEight, through a case study example of brand overreach? Indeed he has. For those unfamiliar with Silver, after focusing on baseball statistical analysis early…
François-Marie Arouet was a French Enlightenment writer known for his wit and defense of civil liberties, including freedom of religion and the right to a fair trial. Arouet, more commonly known by his pen name Voltaire, he the author of Candide, ou l'Optimisme, also offered us the following, which today applies to the discipline of branding: The best way to be boring is to leave nothing out. Too often organizations rush to tell their public everything about themselves. Think…
Coco Chanel, reflecting upon the early days in building her business, of what would eventually become the House of Chanel: People laughed at the way I dressed, but that was the secret of my success: I didn't look like anyone. Not looking, sounding, thinking like the competition is the key behind any successful product. Gabrielle Bonheur "Coco" Chanel intuitively knew this, long before the development of property rising to the level of differentiated brand became a topic of discussion.…
Leonardo da Vinci, the Italian archetype of the Renaissance Man, is described as infinitely curious and equally inventive. One of the greatest painters and artists of all time, he of the Mona Lisa and the Vitruvian Man, also offers us the following, today of application to any enterprise and product brand: Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication The topic of simplicity appears often throughout these pages. Differentiating a brand through simplicity is key to engaging any audience one seeks to influence. Leonardo…
In the 1930s, Harvard linguist George Kingsley Zipf found that the most-used English word - the - occurs about one-tenth of the time in a typical text; the next most common word - of - occurs about half as often as the first; the third most common word - and - occurs about one-third as often as the first. What emerged was Zipf's Law, one of probability distribution, asserting that the frequencies of certain events are inversely proportional to their rank. The New…
The power of emotion behind decision-making comes from what might seem a surprising source. Alexis de Tocqueville, a young aristocratic French lawyer, traveled to the United States in 1831 to study its penal system. His visit resulted in the classic De la démocratie en Amérique, also known as Democracy in America, a 19th century masterpiece of United States cultural and political analysis. de Touqueville offers this insight of the power of imprinting upon the human mind, and how these…
Anais Nin was a Cuban-French author who became famous for her published journals. Years before branding emerged as a business and marketing discipline, Ms. Nin offered this insight: We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are. In creating an engaging and hard to forget product, the process of branding must reveal things as they actually exist in the real world, rather than how a product owner sees them. For many organizations and their CEOs, this…

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