The Agile Brand with Greg Kihlström®: Expert Mode Marketing Technology, AI, & CX

Continuing our discussion of what sets agile brands apart from others. Today, we're talking about telling genuine stories. Any brand story must be authentic and stay true to your company values. It must also resonate with your customers’ values and... Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We all hear about engagement, but what does it really mean? To many digital marketers, it’s a metric to be reported. Consumers rarely view engagement in the same way, or think of it all. In an era where advertising and marketing are so pervasive, customers aren’t seeking engagement with brands. In fact, most people who do not work in the marketing world rarely, if ever, think about something like...

While some things need to stay the same in a brand, a truly Agile one needs to evolve over time. There are two ways to look at how an audience changes over the life of a brand. First, you can look at audience shifts in terms of how an audience’s preferences and behaviors change over time. This could be measured in everything from how they interact with your brand (e.g., a shift in mobile device us...

Once when I was speaking on the topic of agile marketing at a conference, someone asked a question that should be addressed here: Doesn’t it go against the fundamentals of branding to be so agile, and adapt to change so easily? What about the core things that make up a brand? For this reason, we need to think of the Agile Brand as being nuanced. Earlier in the show, we described “timelessness” as...

This special episode is generously brought to you by TEKSystems. Every organization has a not-so-secret weapon: data. It’s incredibly valuable information generated from every aspect of the enterprise, including research and development, sales and marketing, supply chain and customer service. Every activity in every facet of the business provides data. And it goes well beyond the organization’s fo...

Having discussed what agile is and means, let’s talk more specifically about the current state of branding, and what I’ve defined as the Agile Brand. Agility is built on principles of sprints and optimization discussed in the previous chapter, and on the fundamentals of branding. There are five key things agile brands do which sets them apart: 1. Have an open dialogue with customers. 2. Tell stori...

Building on the last episode that discussed agile methodology, this episode explores agile marketing in greater depth. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Although this topic could take up an entire podcast on its own, this episode briefly discusses what agile methodology is, and how it applies to marketing and branding. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The fourth and current stage of the evolution of brands. As more and more brands have adopted the experience approach, it has become clearer that a one-off moment in time is not enough to cement brand loyalty. This takes us to the current stage in the evolution of brands: brand as relationship. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The third stage in the evolution of brands. With increased competition, and consumer preference for more tailored products and services, brands were forced to differentiate themselves beyond occupying an idea. They needed to insert themselves into key life moments and become part of our experience. Apple’s brand experience extends all the way from the initial sale (either in one of its branded sto...

The second stage in the evolution of brands. With increasing competition from mass production, mass advertising, and mass media in general, the need for brands to be more than an object came along. At this point, it wasn’t enough to simply have a logo that was recognizable and a product that was available in stores. Brands now needed to compete for mindshare. As consumers and marketers have grown...

The first stage in the evolution of brands. Our use of logos to represent companies, organizations, or individuals is based on a long history that originates with the very beginning of written communication. The moment we used a drawing, an image, a symbol to represent something else, we’ve been essentially branding things. From cave paintings to hieroglyphics, to the first logo representing a com...

I discuss how I first fell in love with the concept of branding, at a rather young age, and through my appreciation for cars. Auto branding taught me hierarchy, positioning, and many more things. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In order for a brand to be strong, it must remain relevant or find a way to be culturally relevant in the moment. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This special episode is generously brought to you by TEKSystems. After decades of struggling to fully understand consumers, they now hold the key to complete enlightenment: customer data. Armed with smartphones, tablets and laptops, many consumers relinquish their personal data so that brands can provide them with unique, personalized experiences. Many brands have already figured out the digital c...

“Our audience is everyone.” If I had a nickel for every time I’ve heard that sentence after asking a marketer or executive, I’d be a very rich man. Instead, in order for a brand to be successful, it must focus its efforts on defining its ideal audiences, even if it ultimately wants to appeal to a broad set of potential customers. I use Apple as an example of this. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/pr...

For a brand to be strong and have lasting success, it must have substance. We can describe substance in two ways: 1) an ideology which is clearly articulated in the way an organization conducts business and communicates with its audiences, and 2) a genuine experience for the brand’s audiences that builds a memorable and meaningful relationship. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more infor...

When branding is done well, it differentiates your organization in a way that targets the right audiences and drives the right customers to your brand. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A good brand allows potential customers, employees, and other audiences to understand what they should expect before they make a purchase. When done well, this combination of messaging and visuals helps create a better customer experience by setting the right expectations from the start. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Successful brands can create their own intrinsic value to an organization. In this episode, we discuss how the value created by a brand creates many internal and external opportunities beyond marketing benefits. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

While it may seem obvious, setting your brand apart from the competition is often easier said than done. Successful brands think beyond purely aesthetic or surface differentiation and find ways to meaningfully occupy an idea in their consumer's minds. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Gone are the days of "set it and forget it" with your brand. Instead, you need to embrace a continually evolving landscape where your customers, employees and competitors are continually in motion. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Successful brands understand that customers have unlimited choices, and a two-way relationship keeps you top of mind with consumers. This is not far-fetched or unrealistic when brands approach it by solving real challenges that their clients have, and positioning themselves in a way to solve those challenges better than their competitors. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information...

As Jeff Bezos famously said, "your brand is what people say about you when you're not in the room." While much effort is spent on logos, brand guidelines, and messaging structures, if your brand doesn't resonate with your audiences, they will write their own version for you. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

How do you create a vocabulary that people inside and outside your organization will want to adopt and use to talk about you? If you create it well, it will be something that employees are able to easily use, and something that is meaningful to your customers. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.