Driving brand management (in the real world)

I originally wrote this post for my work blog at ADwërks, but also wanted to share it here on my personal blog. Enjoy!

Imagine a perfect Saturday afternoon. You’re driving down the street when you look in your rearview mirror and discover that, seemingly out of nowhere, a large pickup truck is riding your tail and isn’t letting up.

Your blood boils. You’re already going the speed limit. In fact, you might even be going a few miles per hour over the speed limit. You think, “Why is this idiot so desperate to get past me?” Then you get over to let them pass and, as they speed by, you notice an “Anderson Construction” or “Jackson Bros. Plumbing” logo along the side of the truck. And you think to yourself, “Well I’m never using THOSE jerks in the future.”

Unfortunately, that’s what happened to me last weekend. Odds are you’ve experienced the same at least once or twice in your life.

As a business owner or manager, can you really afford to have drivers leaving such a negative impression of your business on potential customers? Of course not. But, for some reason, it happens more than it ever should as far as I’m concerned.

In an era where business owners are increasingly concerned about the next “viral campaign” or “engaging” on their Facebook page, maybe they should remember to train their employees on reputation management in other important markets like, you know, real life.

I know everybody can have a bad day and people are people, but if you’re going to slap your logo on the side of a truck and let employees drive it around town, remind them that they are no longer Johnny Anonymous. They represent your business now, and, unless your business doesn’t care for new customers, they should probably drive like it.

Think of it this way: A little bit of brand management from the start will do a lot to keep your employees from driving me crazy – and driving me away from your business.

-Mike B.

How about you: have you dealt with similarly frustrating experiences? As a business owner, have you trained your employees to represent your brand with class and professionalism? Let us know your thoughts on either question in the comments below.

Photo c/o nick@. Thanks Nick!

Tupac: The Thug That Danced Ballet

When most people think of rapper Tupac Shakur, the first thing they think about is his music. His hard-hitting lyrics opened people’s eyes and ears to the perils and predicaments that inner city youth face on a daily basis in the U.S. by appealing to both the mainstream music world as well as the streets he represented through his music.

The second thing people think about when they hear the name Tupac (or 2pac) is his life as a “thug.” From the “Thug Life” tattoo across his stomach to a prison sentence to the drive-by shooting that took his life, Shakur firmly planted himself in history as someone who would be forever respected as a gangster and revered as a visionary in the rap industry.

What most people have never heard is that Shakur spent three years of his youth enrolled in the Baltimore School for the Arts, “where he studied acting, poetry, jazz, and ballet. He performed in Shakespeare plays, and in the role of the Mouse King in The Nutcracker.” That’s according to Wikipedia, but I also wrote a 22 page paper on Tupac in college and found that info in about a dozen other resources.

Which brings me to my point. On one hand, you have an idolized, revered and respected rapper who universalized the Thug Life mantra by which he lived. On the other hand, you have a gifted student of the arts who ultimately aspired to act in major films (as he had begun to do before his murder) rather than rap and who had not only studied jazz and poetry, but had even danced ballet in The Nutcracker. Upon first glance, it would seem there’s a major disconnect between the two.

While plenty of concepts could be discussed in this overview – don’t judge a book by its cover, the importance of image and branding, etc. – the one I’m going to focus on is this: behind every great and noteworthy personality lies another layer (or 3) that we may never have realized existed. It is within those deeper layers that the greatest people of a generation find their separation from "normal" society. It is more than a book and the pages inside the cover. The intangible details are the fibers that make up the paper itself.

With Tupac, the cover of his book was “Thug Life” and what that lifestyle entailed (danger, street respect, fearlessness). The pages themselves were his upbringing in the arts and his ability to convert a performer’s passion into an image that he went out and lived every day. The sinewy fibers of Tupac’s deeper layers were the fascination, respect and adoration for fine arts (which few people ever grow to love so wholeheartedly) as well as his ability to turn that fascination into a constant quest to prove and improve himself on a personal, internal level that the public never saw.

The question I have for you is this: What is the substance that makes up your pages? What do your sinewy fibers consist of? What is the focus of your heart that the outside world rarely, if ever, gets a glimpse of? If you don’t know, do some soul searching and find out. And then let me know in the comments if you’re willing to share.