Book Review - The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding: How to Build a Product or Service into a World-Class Brand

The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding: How to Build a Product or Service into a World-Class Brand
by Al Ries and Laura Ries

I recently stumbled upon this book written almost ten years ago and after finishing it, I was amazed at how well these "22 laws" still hold true for modern day business. The common sense approach that this book takes to branding speaks more to the overall strategy and mission of a company as to the just the marketing side of things. Where as many people might identify branding as just some element of business that marketing controls, no bigger per say than manufacturing is to operations, The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding shows us that the strength of your brand will ultimately be the single most important element in the success of your business. Whether you are starting a new business or looking to improve upon an existing one, these 22 laws are a guide and resource to successfully (or unsuccessfully) building a company.

The 22 laws are as follows (this list would make for a great print out and should be hanging on your wall):
1. The Law of Expansion - The power of a brand is inversely proportional to its scope.
2. The Law of Contraction - A brand becomes stronger when you narrow its focus.
3. The Law of Publicity - The birth of a brand is achieved with publicity, not advertising.
4. The Law of Advertising - Once born, a brand needs advertising to stay healthy.
5. The Law of the Word - A brand should strive to own a word in the mind of the customer.
6. The Law of Credentials - The crucial ingredient in the success of any brand is its claim to authenticity.
7. The Law of Quality - Quality is important, but brands are not built by quality alone.
8. The Law of the Category - A leading brand should promote the category, not the brand.
9. The Law of the Name - In the long run a brand is nothing more than a name.
10. The Law of Extensions - The easiest way to destroy a brand is to put its name on everything.
11. The Law of Fellowship - In order to build the category, a brand should welcome other brands.
12. The Law of the Generic - One of the fastest routes to failure is giving a brand a generic name.
13. The Law of the Company - Brands are brands. Companies are companies. There is a difference.
14. The Law of Subbrands - What branding builds, subbranding can destroy.
15. The Law of Siblings - There is a time and a place to launch a second brand.
16. The Law of Shape - A brand's logotype should be designed to fit the eyes.  Both eyes.
17. The Law of Color - A brand should use a color that is the opposite of its major competitor's.
18. The Law of Borders - There are no barriers to global branding. A brand should know no borders.
19. The Law of Consistency - A brand is not built overnight. Success is measured in decades, no years.
20. The Law of Change - Brands can be changed, but only infrequently and only very carefully.
21. The Law of Mortality - No brand will live forever. Euthanasia is often the best solutions.
22. The Law of Singularity - The most important aspect of a brand is its single-mindedness.

These 22 laws are the stuff that great companies are made of. Want to know how strong your own company's brand is? Get this book and go through each chapter one by one and point out how well your brand follows each law. It might even open your eyes to strategy faults in your own organization but it will also give you a clear understanding of the bigger picture of public perception.

A brand is everything. It is who you are. And knowing who you are, what you stand for and how you can make that extremely clear and known to the rest of the world is critical to building a powerful brand.

Company Highlight - Chick-fil-A: Keeping it Simple with Chicken and Great Service

Photo from Flickr by _rockinfree

If you are a frequenter of fast food establishments, you've probably noticed an increased presence and growing popularity for the franchise Chick-fil-A.  Chick-fil-A, a chicken focused chain, has not only become a popular chicken restaurant, they have become the best drive through in America. QSR Magazine's annual Drive-Thru Performance Study has consistently, year after year, recognized Chick-fil-A as the best of all drive-thru's as they continue to exemplify outstanding customer service and a great product.

While Chick-fil-A does its fair share of charity work to get involved in local communities, they also do a great job of sticking to what made them great in the first place. The simple idea, to focus on making your product better, is a recipe for success that any business can follow.  Their goal is to make great tasting food, primarily chicken and to consistently demonstrate and improve upon their exemplary customer service. In fact, each and every year the company spends millions on improving their service instead of dumping it all on expensive ad campaigns. This commitment to incremental improvements shows in the form of amazing service that gets talked about and word of mouth advertising (free) will always give you the highest return on investment.

Chick-fil-A sticks to what they do by limiting their products to what they are good at. You don't see them frequently and drastically expanding their menu and adding new products that have nothing to do with who they are. Their menu is simple and the underlying focus has always been and continues to be chicken. They even go so far to prove this point that their entire advertising campaign is based on three simple words that perfectly define them - eat more chicken. By choosing these words they fight the intelligent fight and stay away from a chicken chain war with KFC. While this slogan might in fact send potential customers to a major rival in KFC, the amount of customers to be gained from beef focused chains far exceeds any increase in sales that could be gained from customers that are already big fans of chicken. Coke and Pepsi could learn something from this strategy as the number of cola drinks that are consumed each year continues to dwindle yet these two giants have been attacking each other for years instead of competing against coffee, energy drinks, beer or any other non-cola beverage. Chick-fil-A, on the other hand, wins if people simply choose chicken over beef.

Related Links:
http://www.bigisthenewsmall.com/2010/09/20/what-chick-fil-a-can-teach-us-about-success/

Book Review - Rapt: Attention and the Focused Life

Rapt: Attention and the Focused Life
Written By: Winifred Gallagher

Rapt is an exploration of how attention plays such a crucial role in the quality of your life. The idea that what you choose to pay attention to shapes your life is the theme of the book as it explores the impact attention has on productivity, decisions, creativity, relationships, happiness and health. Rapt supports its claims with numerous insights, studies and data from both neuroscience and behavioral psychology. Simplistically the book is best summarized with the following quote found in the introduction:

"My experience is what I agree to attend to." - William James

The idea that attention holds so much power over your life should be encouraging because it means it is possible to shape your existence, outcome and daily mood. The human mind can only absorb and attend to so much and knowing how to control this is considered the secret to happiness for many.

The title of the book, Rapt, is appropriate as the term literally means to be completely absorbed, engrossed, fascinated and focused at any given moment. Rapt attention can make time seemingly fly by, create inner happiness and help you concentrate better in all aspects of your life. If you are achieving a rapt state of attention it most likely means that you're seeking out activities and a life that is full of your undivided attention instead of the reactive, unfocused and drifting way that many of us spend our time.

Rapt offers many antidotes to take control of your attention such as meditating and choosing the right activities. Through the power of meditating one should give complete focus to a single task for prolonged periods of time such as breathing. This practiced state of rapt attention increases your capacity for living the focused life. The wisdom to consistently choose enjoyable but challenging activities enables you to work your brain just enough to experience complete "flow" which the books considers the optimal human experience. Flow is better achieved when you choose activities that stretch your mental muscles such as when you are devoting time to a challenging hobby like learning guitar, playing sports, cooking a new recipe or devoting your time to a specific project at work. It is less likely to occur though when you space out while watching TV or when are trying to accomplish twenty things at once while multi-tasking. A consistent commitment to challenging and focused work and leisure produces a better daily experience and in-turn develops you into a more interesting person.

Rapt is a book for life and work. It preaches such timeless concepts as demonstrating self-control, focusing on positive thinking and making sure you give the people in your life the full, undivided attention they deserve. According to Rapt, this is the secret to a healthy and happy life and while we can't be happy all the time, the decisions we make on where to devote our attention and mental energy, goes a long way to shaping our overall life experience. As the book explains in discussing the connection that positive and productive rapt attention has with your overall health and well being, even the longevity of your life depends on the ability to control your attention.