S07.EP10 - The Science of Brand Associations with Ulli Appelbaum

22:47Podcast Host:And one thing that strikes me is that in 80 % of the cases, they all have a slightly different opinion of what the brand is or what the brand should be. That's where it starts, right? So your customer service guy, when he does his work every day, has a different opinion than your CMO that develops an advertising campaign. Bad, bad starting point. So alignment. The second thing is understanding of your consumers. Does everyone in the organization have the same understanding of what matters to people? And then you'll also be surprised how often there is no alignment. Because what you get is a lot of guesses, right?

23:23Podcast Host:like, yeah, the 26 reasons why I think people should buy my book. That's another way to say, I have no idea why people are buying my book, but I hope that one of these 26 is the core driver. But that's what it is, and that's what you have in organization. The third one is very simply being clear on our strategic approach. And what I mean with that is if you want a brand to grow, it needs to acquire new customers. I have one client in my whole portfolio where the exception is that his growth is coming from existing customers and growing his share of business with existing customers. But in 99 % of the cases, we need to be aligned.

24:04Podcast Host:Now, again, this sounds obvious, but it's not the case. So if the three of us are aligned on what are the associations we want to grow, we have the same shared understanding of what drives our consumers, and we are all focused on customer acquisition as a core strategy. then you are I would argue at 60 % of the equation there already because all these frictions internal frictions are gone and then it's building your brand right so you have the associations that is understanding the role of communication the role of communication is and I talk a bit about that in the book is building these memory structures is creating these associations advertising folks will often tell you it's about creating attention because if someone doesn't pay attention to you, your communication is useless.

24:52Podcast Host:I think like, well, paying attention is like cost of entry of every form of professional marketing. If you're not able to catch consumers' attention, maybe you should look at another job. You know, it's like the purpose of my car is to drive. It's like, well, I assume that all the cars that are being sold around the world know how to drive, have this feature built in, right? So, but building memory structures, I think is an important element. The second one is that understanding what we talked about earlier is consistency. Repetition across all touch points is really a core element of successful brand building.

25:27Podcast Host:And the third element is simply, and that's what design comes into as well, is distinctive brand assets, right? Let's say if I take your quotes, Matt, and put them in a different context and go online and use your quotes as my own, I don't associate them with you as the brand. And put differently, the stronger you associate your own content and messaging and association with your own brand and your own brand assets, the easier it will be for people to remember what Matt said and easier to see when they see content that is relevant from Matt. Oh, that is Matt content. So building distinctive brand assets is another important element.

26:06Podcast Host:And again, we can go like that for another 60 minutes. But again, nothing I'm telling you, I'm sure, is surprising you. I'm sure you would agree that it's about internal alignment, you'd agree that it's understanding your customers, you know, all this kind of, yes, you need to be recognizable, and all these kind of things. And it's surprising how often these principles are not being applied. I'm working with a client right now that where we're going through the exercise, basically developing the scorecards on effective brand building for them. And one thing that struck me is in the last three years, they changed strategy five times.

26:42Podcast Host:and it's absolutely mind-blowing. And then you wonder why the brand is confused and why consumers are confused. So you encounter that in the marketing world everywhere, basically.

26:56Ulli Appelbaum:If you're serious about mastering branding and building a thriving creative business, the Brand Builders Alliance is for you. Inside, you'll get live masterclasses, mentorship from our eight resident coaches, a stacked resource vault and a global network of brand builders who actually get it. If you're done winging it alone and are ready to scale with structure, support and serious momentum, head over to joinbba.com and get on the wait list. That's joinbba.com. We're very short term, aren't we, unfortunately, in a lot of businesses that we think about. We're sort of quarterly sales cycles, yearly planning.

27:35Ulli Appelbaum:And sometimes these things take more than that to kind of embed themselves and we don't give them enough chances or that a new person comes in and wants to build you know through their ego their own approach which you know might be wrong or right but from a consumer's perspective you're right the worst thing is to confuse everybody and to kind of change it because you're almost doing damage to the equity of the brand rather than building on the past.

28:00Podcast Host:I think Fantar has this data point that shows that 70 percent of your future consumption of your future demand is driven by the clarity of your positioning. So meaning, if consumers are clear about what you have to offer, 70 % of your future demand will be driven by that. And why? And that's another big important part of brand associations. And you guys are familiar with that concept too. It's like, you don't just communicate to people who are in the market today, you communicate to the whole market so that in two months, if you guys, you know, think about oh i should maybe buy a book on brand marketing or brand strategy you think about my book because two months earlier you've listened to the podcast you've heard about the book and you're creating this future demand by being clear on what you have to offer well that's that's the

28:49Ulli Appelbaum:two speeds of marketing isn't it you know the longer the longer game 95 are not in the market to buy 5r but we all tend to focus on the five why correct you know as you say the science the stats is focus on both right but yes so don't exclude one group for for the other where a lot of brands i often go in like yourself yuli and a lot of brands are just in performance-based marketing they're not thinking about longer-term thinking so it's a tricky one it's a tricky one i've got a lot of work to do it seems to me so i had a question for you on this associations business because it seems to me there's like there's two things going on here there's the brand and alignment internally around what associations the leadership team i guess would connect or define in order for them to see growth that they that they believe but then also the brand might be already out in the market right out there i don't know what your thoughts are but like sometimes when i do discovery work i also talk to customers as well as internal audiences external and sometimes there's a huge gap in in why customers are buying what value they see and then what the the internal business sees so there's a complexity there and then there's an added complexity because you're not just dealing with something at this moment in time their leadership team are often thinking about you know if they're a good leadership team they're thinking ahead they're thinking five five odd years in the future so then there's this expression like hit the puck where the player's going to be right then there's this challenge there so it's that is why it's also tricky right like even if you've got a team fully understanding it they might define something which then consumers are not attaching to it now and don't see relevant and also it might be that they will find it relevant in the future i just wondered if you had any thoughts on those dynamics like do you listen to audiences uh out there and mold around them or how do you sort of see approach that in in your work uh absolutely well first of all yes you need to listen to the consumers right because the challenge is that the way these perceptions and associations are being

31:01Podcast Host:formed the influence of marketing is minimal and again it comes back to your memories right what what creates a memory it's your personal experience with a brand or with an offering that that is going to have the strongest impact on what you associate with the brand the second strongest impact is going to be what people say about it, what people you know, trust, say about it. You're looking for a new lawnmower. Your neighbor is mowing his lawn, you know, every Saturday morning from 6 to 9 a.m. The guy's obsessed about his little lawnmower. You're going to go and talk to him and ask him for a recommendation because you know this guy knows about the subject and what he's going to recommend.

31:38Podcast Host:So this is going to inform your perception of a brand. Then you have like media, right? The press, what you see in social media, what influencers talk about and all this kind of thing. And at the bottom of the totem, you have marketing, right? This brand itself saying, hey guys, I'd like you guys to associate this with my specific offering. So because of that, understanding what consumers associate with your brand is crucial, both in understanding why they really buy you, and that comes back to the core drivers, what the equity you've built over the years. So one thing that I see a lot of brands don't do is they have like 30, 40 years of equity in the market and they don't ask, what is it that made us successful?

32:21Podcast Host:What is the equity we've built over the last 30 years we can continue to tap into to succeed? New marketing director, as you said earlier, wants to do everything different, ignores everything that has been done before and tries to do something different. Very, very poor approach. But then you also want to know what consumers think because you want to know what are potential barriers to purchase. And I've seen it in many of my, not many, but several of my projects where you talk to consumers and you'd ask them, what do you think about this brand? And all you hear is positive statements. And there's nothing negative about it, but they still don't buy it for whatever reason.

32:58Podcast Host:And then you probe a bit more and then you get, okay, well, maybe the price point is just too high for me. That's an obvious barrier. but it's maybe a brand I don't identify with. You know, and that's, for example, a problem Harley Davidson has. You know, a lot of young riders, motorcycle riders, don't identify with the old white guy, which I will realize that I would be the old white guy seen to ride a Harley Davidson. A lot of young people don't identify with me. So that's a barrier for me to buy. So understanding the barriers have. So understanding where consumers are and what they think allows you then to determine, mean, okay, are there old associations I need to refresh?

33:36Podcast Host:Are there associations or equity that needs to be brought to life in a more interesting way to make it more relevant again? Or are there negative associations I need to actively target and go against to change people's opinions? So that is why understanding consumers is so essential. And then you need to ask yourself, well, which one do I want to build on top of the ones consumers have already? Now, Now, and you guys know that as well as I do, is what you say doesn't matter is what you do that matters. It's everything that matters. So you can tell me, you know, Volvo, which I may associate, let's say, with safety, can tell me they're all about design now.

34:15Podcast Host:If their cars continue to look like Lego cubes, I'm not going to buy the design angle. You know, I'm not going to think, oh yeah, great, the Lego cube design is really actual and modern, you know, I think. No, the product needs to embrace and help create these associations. So it takes time to build over time, but the proof needs to be in the pudding, right? It needs to be in your product. It needs to be in your consistency over time. It needs to be in whatever the brand does more so than what the brand claims it wants to do. And so there's a lot of information here, but you cannot fight negative emotions, negative barriers.

34:53Podcast Host:You need to work with them. You can try to overcome them, but you cannot ignore and fight them. and you cannot, you know, you will not become a beauty queen in Brazil, Matt. Sorry, you're great looking and everything, but the stretch to you becoming a beauty queen in Brazil is a bit too high.

35:09Ulli Appelbaum:I was really banking on that for the next week of my career.

35:12Podcast Host:Sorry for that. But just like a Volvo probably will never become the gold standard in car design, you know, which other brands might be because the stretch, they don't deliver against it. And the stretch in consumers' mind is a little bit too big. so to say but great question you cannot build a brand without understanding where consumers

35:32Ulli Appelbaum:are at mentally and associate with you so uli i had a follow-up question to that where yeah in when the brand is a little bit more abstract so for example like insurance and there's like mascots like the gecko for geico where there's there's like no meaning behind it apart from like the name and the character but is there a relationship between like distinctive assets like that meaning and memory?

35:58Podcast Host:Absolutely. Thanks for asking this very leading question, Jacob, because yes, there is a clear correlation. Now, the interesting thing is, and that's the big debate between distinctiveness and differentiation, right? Is if I recognize you and develop emotion towards your offering, you're already winning the branding game. And that's exactly what GEICO does in the insurance business, very intangible things. And that's the power of mascots and distinctive brand assets, right? And that's what I said earlier. It's like when you create these brand assets and you get exposed to them, you know, you're driving on the highway and you see the M, the Archers, McDonald's Archers, and you're on a road trip.

36:37Podcast Host:Oh, Sonia, I'm hungry. And you're like, oh, maybe I should stop at McDonald's at the next exit. Seeing these brand assets triggers the memories you have. But if you have an intangible product creating these assets, and a mascot is perfect, right? Because a mascot is sort of like how do you call it? It's a difficult word. Anthropomorphization. So basically, you know, projecting human traits to an object is a great way to create sympathy for that brand that is very abstract. So yes, it's an extremely powerful tool and especially Aspels, and you guys know that too, for me it's one of the most underutilized brand assets, potential brand assets for a brand.

37:25Podcast Host:And what you've seen is, I think there is research that shows that over the last 30 years, the use of mascots has decreased in marketing. And yet the effectiveness of mascots is at an all time. It's one of the most powerful devices in branding you can use. Just like your flamingos, Jacob. It's like, you know, you see the flamingos, you think about Jacob and your community right away. When you think about, you know, talk to me about a global community of brand people. like well let me think i don't know you know to think a bit about it takes more time show me the flamingo i'm like duh of course so yes very powerful devices so you've mentioned uh jacob's

38:06Ulli Appelbaum:brilliance but like perhaps just for folks you know in terms of like global brands obviously we've got people tune in from all over the world have you got any sort of examples because people love examples like of of brands that have built powerful mental associations well and perhaps why you're just thinking of a couple like I always think the classic example is like coca-cola right like a lot of people have that when they're a child right so they get they get it as a treat you know on a hot summer's day mom comes out or mom allows you to buy it as a treat because it's not normally something you'd have when you're very very young so you come of age you you know maybe you're eight years old and you're given your first coca-cola and you associate with a hot summer's fun you're probably out somewhere it's a treat and then as you grow those you know you build on those mental associations and you know christmas time comes around you see the adverts with the santa claus and all of this stuff so obviously that is a juggernaut of a brand and has been around for ages but it's a powerful idea it's a drink at the end of the day and and but it builds such mental emotional pictures because perhaps some of those things that i'm just suggesting that that's probably attached to the brand i'm just wondering if you've got any other ideas perhaps through that your research you think oh this is a great example of a brand that does

39:26Podcast Host:there are a lot of and it depends by geography as well right or even the global scale but before i go there just to point out your your coke example the amazing part about coke is the consistency of its branding, right? And so I grew up in Africa and you can be in a small village in Africa and go in one of the small stores on the side of the road, you will see a freaking Coke logo and a Coke sign. You know, I can go into a 7-Eleven here in the US, I will see a Coke sign somewhere. We get exposed to this brand and I'm sure you do the same. You're like in the Outback in Australia, you know, where there's really nothing.

40:05Podcast Host:but yeah probably the outback but during your your vacation or your weekend you you do a road trip right through the outback you will find a coke logo somewhere um so absolutely other brands for me is um that are very successful doing so mcdonald's is another one that's another a no brainer right but then you have things like kitkat in the confectionery business kitkat global recognition in japan as much as you know in germany or wherever else taking a break taking a Kit Kat. It's a strong position. I think the FIFA football organization is part of that as well. I think Netflix has turned Formula One into a global phenomenon as well.

40:46Podcast Host:You know, Facebook, Timo, TikTok. I mean, yes, we use them as platforms, but again, that's probably the brilliance of these things, right? So those are extremely strong brand. Why? Because we interact, we have personal experience with them, not because we see advertising from them. So there are a lot of brands out there that really provide that. Then you have things like Rolex, luxury brands, Yves Saint Laurent, whatever luxury couture and categories you want to focus on. You know, Verve Clicquot, you see the color scheme and you recognize the brand around the world. So there are actually a lot of brands that do it properly.

41:26Podcast Host:But again, they are consistent and they consistently repeat the associations they have and they consistently use their brand assets up to wazoo right i think it's mark rithson who says you know it's like uh use your brand he calls them brand codes use them in every touch point every touch point and then when you get sick of them continue to use them even more because and it's true um that's really really what you need to do so yeah that tremendous amount of brands out

41:52Ulli Appelbaum:there you have to be you know really hot on that and i i think this goes back to the original conversation we were saying at a leadership level like this needs to be understood because i i was working with a brand a global brand was it last year i think it was and you know we we've got a positioning i was you know grateful enough to be able honored honored really to work with a very talented brand director and they got it and they were very keen to to connect my work with say their design teams and so i was working with the head of design and then i was talking to them about the challenges, right?

42:27Ulli Appelbaum:Like of executing anything, right? Across this organization, a global organization. And they said, Matt, the challenge is, right? Is that like, we've got teams in Africa, we've got teams in APAC, we've got teams in India. And what we find is that what I was talking about before, like these local teams, they want to add their own stamp to everything. Like this is just a nightmare. So they showed me these examples, right? So they'd created a mood board. They were so upset about this you know and and and they were showing like some some stuff that had gone on in china that was like so different so off-brand so wild these this team in china had created its own brand identity that was overpowering the corporate identity and we were just like what is going on so the governance side of of that is absolutely crucial and i think that's we perhaps don't realize is the power of consistency, the power of control needs to be there.

43:25Ulli Appelbaum:And controls are a horrible word in some companies culturally. But ultimately, if you want to build a powerful brand, you have to control the way it goes to market. And you have to get these principles into the people on the ground in those local markets so that they understand it. And when you talk about brands like Coca-Cola, McDonald's, these are brands that take that seriously they invest in getting those design teams on boarded and they meet regularly there's cadence behind all the execution it's a machine that goes on behind it and that's the bit i often think the design of the designers right is sometimes missing in some of these organizations so i think this is a great point we should aim for the output but tricky to do right uli tricky

44:09Podcast Host:I totally agree with you. The interesting thing is, right, you want to leave the, I don't know what it is, the desire to imprint our own, you know, work, personality, whatever, ego, to your point, on something. Early in my career, I was working in Budapest at Leo Burnett. And one of the big clients of Leo Burnett was Marlboro. Now, Marlboro, at the time, we were still advertising in Eastern Europe. And it was one of the biggest clients of the agency. Now, if you're familiar with Marlboro, it's all red. It's the conventions, the design convention of the brands are absolutely rigid. And the way it happened at the time is you didn't mess around with the brand.

44:47Podcast Host:But what you get is you get from headquarter in the US, once a year, a massive database of brand assets, including videos, films, print ads, posters, whatever. And you can select them and choose them for your own market and then apply them. But you didn't mess with them. And I remember we had a yearly meeting where the following day, we had a meeting where we wanted to discuss with the marketing director of, it was a Philip Morris Central Europe. What are the activities for the next six to 12 months? We're going to focus on Marlboro specifically. And so we had a bunch of assets that our designer, our art director at the time was trying to put together and visualize for the Central European market.

45:28Podcast Host:And so the creative director and I were out for dinner, have a few too many drinks, and come back to the agency at 11 o 'clock at night to look at the work before it was presented to the client the next morning at 8 o 'clock. And the art director, real sweet girl, talented woman, had turned every Marlboro ad into green. So when you know Marlboro, it's all about the red, and it's part of a Ferrari, a highly recognizable equity of the brand. And so he asked, why did you change that in green? It's like, I was getting a bit bored. You know, I thought maybe we need to mix things up a little bit. So I thought green might be a great change.

46:09Podcast Host:Now, needless to say, the poor girl spent the night at the office changing everything back to red. But yes, so it's, but the reality is you can, you know, you see that with brands like KitKat, where the strategic platform is global, where the design assets are global, but where the storytelling is local and culturally influenced by the local region or the regional aspects. And that's a great way to do it as well. As I said, KitKat and a lot of the mass brands do that. So there are ways to play with that. But yes, the control is... The truth is we have problems ourselves. I don't know how, Jacob, how do you feel about that?

46:48Podcast Host:But I love to see, coming back to your flamingo, How often do you think about changing the flamingo or making the flamingo do something different than what it's supposed to be doing? I don't know how often you have the drive to want to change things. I know I have that with my visual identity and my core identity on my branding, so to say. The drive to change things because we spend day in, day out with it is strong, right? And yet you probably see my content or my branding once every six months if I'm really lucky and not every day like I do. So yes, it's the rigor behind that is really, really hard to maintain.

47:35Ulli Appelbaum:I've kept the same pink color since 2007 when I started. So that's been there from the beginning. The flamingo is much newer. It's probably only a few years old. So it's still quite fresh. But my office is covered in flamingo stuff. I've given flamingo gifts. My kids draw flamingos and give them to me. There's so much flamingo stuff and it has been really associated with the brand and people just recognize it. And I've ruined flamingos for a lot of people. I apologize for that. But yeah, it's true. No, it's great.

48:04Podcast Host:Have you thought about changing the shade of pink since 2007? I kind of go through a little gamut.

48:11Ulli Appelbaum:So sometimes it's like more purple, more pink, depending on the context. But it's always around magenta, give or take. So yeah, but definitely not like I haven't gone to a totally different color.

48:24Podcast Host:But it's interesting because I think your Flamingo shows something else that is important about brand assets, if I can just come back to that real quick. And I'm sure you have a meaning behind the Flamingo. I don't know what that meaning is. And I have no idea what the connection to brand design and brand strategy is. But the reality is, it doesn't matter. You know what I mean? is we're able to create the Flamingo Association with your work. And so that every time I see it, I think about you and your work. I don't have like a big cerebral brain that has a designer outfit that tells me, oh, Jacob is a great designer and great strategist that does design work.

49:02Podcast Host:So the visual doesn't embody the benefit you provide or the expertise you provide. It's just a point of distinctiveness. So that's the interesting part about brand assets as well, right?

49:15Ulli Appelbaum:That's why I was asking about the gecko because there's no real connection. But if I think of insurance, that comes to mind. So that's the difference. The meaning behind it is, yeah, the pink obviously related to the mascot. And then I just shared that. And whenever I was sharing creations, I'd use the flamingo as just like a point of reference as an animal. and people just associated that with me over time and then I leaned into it more and it really became more ingrained in people's memories and I kind of explored some language around it like stand the flock out and flock ordinary and had some fun with it and really built an identity around that flamingo so now it's really about that idea of standing out which is what we do as branders everyone says it but this is a new spin on standing the flock out yeah so now you know

50:06Podcast Host:No, and you just described how you created that association, talking about it in your meetings and people hearing you talk about it consistently or consecutively. All of a sudden, they make the association themselves and then you build on it. So that's what brand associations are.

50:24Ulli Appelbaum:So can we get a little bit practical here for our listeners? We talked about some great examples. So rather large companies. So maybe for smaller brands that want to build these brand associations that are up against these big brands that already have strong associations, where do they start? How can they compete? How can get these memory structures going?

50:43Podcast Host:Well, first, that's a great question, right? Because the marketing science suggests that big brands with big budget that have been established for a long time have it easier than smaller brands. As a smaller brand, you need to be very clear on how you want to grow. So where do you want to take the business from? So if I launch, let's say now an energy drink, it's kind of easy, right? I know I need to go after the energy drink brands in the category. So I need to provide something that is different from them. You know, it cannot just be energy drink number 12 for consumers to buy me. I need to provide something that really makes consumers think, oh, they do something different, different type of energy, different type of flavor, different type of, you know, way to absorb or eat the flavor.

51:27Podcast Host:Maybe it's not, you know, cans, liquid in a can. Maybe it's an energy popsicle as a delivery system. So you need to find a way to really stand out and be different from what the category has to offer. And you need to be better, basically, at at least one certain level. And then I think the part that most people, especially in the design world, don't, it's hard to implement, is you need to be louder and more extreme than you think you can or you should be. And what I mean with that is, so typical example, and I don't want to put all the designs in one category, but I look at it in the United States, right?

52:06Podcast Host:I look at the chocolate category and I wrote about that in the book as well. It's like all the chocolate brands out there have the same design convention, you know? And the reason is when you think about what are sort of like the cues of the category, it's like, well, it's brown, it's black chocolate, it's white chocolate, it's this kind of thing. So when you look at a wall of chocolate brands at a Whole Foods or a grocery store, you see all these different shades of brown and black, basically. And what you need to do as a brand to really stand out is to break with those category conventions and do something completely different.

52:41Podcast Host:And the example I would, I mentioned in the book is one is Milka, which I'm sure you guys are familiar with, which is, you know, the lilac cow, the purple cow. What does cow, I understand what a cow has to do with chocolate. What does purple have to do with chocolate? I have no idea. But it stands out. It really helps me stand out in a sea of brown and dark chocolate brands. And the second one is Tony Chocoloni, right? When you think about Tony Chocoloni, it's like all these bright colors, which again have not much to do with the conventions of the chocolate category, but they allow you to stand out at point of sale, basically.

53:18Podcast Host:When I go at the point of sale, I see brown, maybe a bit of white, dark chocolate. And then I see purple cow. Oh, interesting. And then I see colorful splash being Tony Chocolony. But to have the courage to break these conventions and to go out of these conventions takes a lot of courage. It's like you thinking like, okay, I'm going to associate my business. And I mean, it's your business, it's your sustenance, it's your lifeline. I'm going to associate that with the flamingo. Why? Why would I do something that silly? You know, maybe I should show like a university logo in the background to show how, you know, smart and what an authority is.

53:58Podcast Host:No, you took the courage and it helps you. But a lot of brands I've learned or I've noticed don't have the courage to break out of their conventions to the point where they need to. They get scared. They think consumers are going to be shocked or turned off. But no, the reality is you need to push the envelope so that you can break through and that people notice you in a sea of other brands that have already established memories in the mind and the brains of consumers.

54:29Ulli Appelbaum:Awesome. Well, look, Uli, it's getting to a bit of a closing in terms of time on our podcast. There's loads I know we could have gone through. Sorry, I'm talking a lot.

54:39Podcast Host:I know.

54:40Ulli Appelbaum:No, no, no. It's been so helpful. I guess that the main thing is to refer folks back to your book. We've got a quick fire round in just a minute. But before we get into that, just so that folks know, where can we get hold of this book? And how can people kind of follow you?

54:57Podcast Host:So you can everywhere around the world where you can get books digitally on print on demand, you'll find me. So initially, I was only on Amazon, but now you find me on all the major platforms in Asia, in South Africa, and so on and so on. That's the beauty is, right? No one has written a book on science association yet. So write the search, the science of brand associations, with mine, with markets, and I'll pop up somehow, somewhere around the world. So that's the benefit of being the first one here.

55:25Ulli Appelbaum:All right. So are you ready for your quick fire closing round?

55:29Podcast Host:No, but I don't have a choice, do I?

55:31Ulli Appelbaum:No, definitely not. Definitely not. You're now thinking, what the heck have I got myself into? But hey, here we go. So question number one. I hear my wife calling me.

55:40Podcast Host:I hear my wife calling me. Yeah, dinner time.

55:44Ulli Appelbaum:So question number one, what is the most underrated brand association in the market that you can think of?

55:54Podcast Host:Like an example or a type of brand associations?

55:57Ulli Appelbaum:Give me a type, give me a type. And an example if you have one, but just a type of...

56:00Podcast Host:The core motivation on why you buy, why you read books, why you buy lemonade, why you use detergent. It sounds ridiculous, but trust me, it's the most underrated one, the core driver of the behavior in a specific category. That's the one, guaranteed.

56:17Ulli Appelbaum:I like it. Right, Jacob, your turn. Yes, one brand that owns a clear memory structure that we haven't mentioned yet.

56:26Podcast Host:That we haven't mentioned yet. Victorinox, are you familiar with that? The Swiss Army knife? Oh, yeah. Yep. And the little, what is it? It's a shield that they have on the Swiss Army knife, which is Victorinox. That is a brand asset that most people I know would recognize. I'm sure you see it, you would recognize.

56:48Ulli Appelbaum:Yeah, for sure. Certainly in Europe. Yeah, yeah. Amazing. All right, cool. Biggest myth marketeers believe about branding and associations?

57:02Podcast Host:Biggest myth about brand associations? it's hard because a lot of people use the word without really knowing what it is and how to use it. So I don't think we made it to a point of having a myth around it. About branding is that you need to reinvent the wheel every single time. And every week you have a new trend you need to follow. It's no, the older I get, maybe I'm getting lazy. But it's like focus on the basics, but do those rights. And that's where you want to focus on.

57:32Ulli Appelbaum:Awesome. one word to describe a great brand strategy

57:40Podcast Host:behavior changing sorry that's two words but that's ultimately what you do we put a dash in it it'll be fine thank you i have a german so for me it's like one word you know a german construct we put two words together and make one of them so behavior changing that would be it because the rest is just intellectual uh bs if it doesn't change

58:02Ulli Appelbaum:behaviors it's not a good strategy all right last one one piece of advice for marketeers

58:09Podcast Host:trying to grow brands today it sounds ridiculous right but use any ai platform that you use It doesn't matter, chat GPT or cloud, whatever. And make a query about highlighting and pulling out all the evidence-based marketing principles that the LLM can identify based on the data, mentioning the sources, yada, yada, yada. You'd be surprised that all this knowledge is already available out there and that you need to buy my book because I went through the effort to summarize everything. but the knowledge is out there. There is no excuse. If you search principally based or data-driven principles of brand building, you'd get a whole report from Cloud GPT, nicely packaged and formatted.

59:04Podcast Host:And that would be my advice.

59:07Ulli Appelbaum:Awesome. Awesome. Well, listen, Uli, thank you so much for carving out some time. It's been a great bounce of some ideas, Brown, I'm talking about brand strategy and brand associations. As I say, folks, jump on it. Follow Uli. Uli, how do people actually follow you personally, though? Because you mentioned the book. Is there like a website or a LinkedIn or something that you post on? Substack?

59:30Podcast Host:I'm really bad at posting on social media. That's one of my to-dos for the next few years. But that's why I admire you guys so much. LinkedIn is the best way to find me. So Uli Applebaum on LinkedIn, follow me there. and that's the rare times I post that's where I would post it I'm trying to build an Instagram page and followers but I stopped posting six months ago and beyond my parents and my brother no one really follows me there so if you want to check it out and help me grow that you can go at

59:58Ulli Appelbaum:first the trousers on Instagram a massive spike now a massive that's exactly right

1:00:03Podcast Host:tripling my fan base from three to nine. And the simplest part is really LinkedIn. Or if you want to go to my website, firstthetrousers.com, what you'll find there is you'll find a whole bunch of scorecards that you can download for free that allow you to analyze is my positioning strong, are the activities I developed to build my brand strong, et cetera, et cetera. So simple, easy, free tools. I've learned you gotta give free free stuff uh to attract people what i haven't learned is how to attract people with free stuff but the free stuff is available so that's that's an easy easy amazing

1:00:42Ulli Appelbaum:we all we all love free stuff so appreciate that thank you for all your hard work and particularly for putting this book out there as you say there was a gap in the market it's certainly needed so we appreciate you here on just branding and thank you coming for coming on again um all the best

1:00:56Podcast Host:thank you thank you thanks for having me i'll talk to you again in three years for my for my next book

1:01:01Ulli Appelbaum:all right we'll hold you to that one thank you and thank you at home for tuning in on what you might not be at home you might be on your commute you might be at work you might be gardening I have no idea but thank you for tuning in we've really appreciated having uh you know being in your earbuds so take care folks and have a great rest of your days thank you