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The importance of simple differentiation

The simplest branding trick. Living in the northern suburbs we see these pink cement trucks lots. My girls love them, shouting out whenever they see them. They always bring a smile to my face and clearly demonstrate the real power of differentiation. It’s let down…

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A Lesson in Retail from Hanoi’s Shoe Street

Is this the toughest retail environment on the planet? On a trip to Vietnam this month I spent a couple of days sweltering through the streets of Hanoi Old Town. The mercury hit 37 degrees and the humidity was thick enough to cut with a…

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The 3 golden brand rules to standing out in a crowded market

The strategic brand thinking at the heart of every successful brand. Over the weekend I was having a conversation for the thousandth time with the owner of a relatively new, fast growth business who I realized was hearing it for the first time. The conversation…

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Stabilo Boss campaign creates powerful brand storytelling

Bright idea highlights incredible women and rewrites history After a disgraceful week of politics, we’ve lost another Prime Minister but perhaps the real loss in the fallout is Julie Bishop. So it’s quite fitting that I came across this campaign from Stabilo Boss. Created by…

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The first steps to creating a new brand. Part One.

We’re constantly working with start-ups and entrepreneurs looking to get their brand up and running on limited funding. Wondering what they can do to guarantee value from the process and for ways to use the budget as efficiently as possible. So over my next two…

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Google’s Material design promotes uniformity

Looking at the new launch videos for Google’s new Material design, I can’t help but feel they are locking the platform into uniformity. For all the talk of tailoring the look and feel of your apps brand, the tools provided seem at first glance to…

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What P.T. Barnum taught me about branding

Of Show Business & Branding A good mate of mine sent me an email this morning with a link to the trailer of The Greatest Showman, the first feature film of her great friend Michael Gracey. She was proud as punch and so she should…

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Political Incorrectness and Brand Differentiation

Can Political Incorrectness ever be a valid brand communication strategy? OK, so this may be skirting the boundaries of sensitivity and taste, but sometimes the most interesting strategies are found where others fear to tread. When it comes to political correctness, most clients want to…

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Coles muddies the milk with undifferentiated brand

Farmers Fund milk brand clouds the issues As predicted Coles have started muddying the waters around fair Milk prices by introducing an undifferentiated milk brand called Farmers Fund to the market. The brand which ‘gives back’ 40c of each 2 litre carton to a Fund…

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Branding, invisible gorillas and the art of standing out

How much are consumers really noticing your brand? In 2004 Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons shared the Ig Nobel Prize in Psychology, awarded for ‘achievements that first make people laugh, and then make them think’, for the experiment they completed at Harvard that inspired The…

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How American Baseball taught us the Golden Rule of Brand Differentiation.

Differentiation works in Major League Baseball too. Re-reading Marty Neumeier’s book ‘Zag’ this week, I was fascinated by the story of America’s shortest ever professional baseball, Willie Keeler. Wee Willie, as he was known back in the good ol’ politically incorrect days of the 1890s…

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