Topics

Transformation


On Design, Branding, and Where the “Brand Magic” Happens: Interview with Emotive Brand Creative Director

On Design, Branding, and Where the “Brand Magic” Happens: Interview with Emotive Brand Creative Director

Interview with Jane Brown, Creative Director Jane joins Emotive Brand with over 20 years of experience developing corporate and brand identities ranging from global corporations to startups – bringing both agency and client-side, as well as print and digital media expertise to the table. Jane has built a reputation around delivering high-level thinking and design systems that enable new brands to compete in crowded marketplaces and venerable brands to deepen their relevance. In this interview, Jane shares her point of view on branding challenges, client-agency relationships, collaboration,...
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The Real Cost of Brand Transformation

The Real Cost of Brand Transformation

Oftentimes, branding is seen as just another expense. Another project that needs budgeting. Another to-do to check of the list. Additionally, a brand’s visual identity and its implementation are often seen the same way – but they shouldn’t be. Branding is only costly to a company if the company doesn’t fully tap into the brand’s value. Likewise, if you leave your brand’s visual identity to flounder in a presentation deck, it remains an untapped value. Understanding the value of your brand and what its visual identity means is key to shifting the conversation from a business cost to its...
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What Brands Need to Do Right to Nail Their Digital Strategy

What Brands Need to Do Right to Nail Their Digital Strategy

Emotive Brand Experts #5: Michael Beavers Continuing our Emotive Brand Experts series, we’re interviewing past and present Emotive Brand clients to discover what they do better than anybody else – and how that expertise can be used to embolden your brand today. Michael Beavers is a Silicon Valley-based digital strategist who works with leading technology enterprises, consumer brands, and startups. A veteran from both sides of the client and agency relationship, he’s worked with Google, Yahoo!, Intel, and many others. *** How do you define digital strategy? Digital strategy describes the...
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Business Transformation: How to Drive Successful Change

Business Transformation: How to Drive Successful Change

The Need for Change Management There are many reasons why an organization might come face to face with the need for a business transformation. Increasing competition, new seemingly unattainable prospects, large growth goals, or not meeting the expected return on investment are among many of the most common we see. These reasons and warning signs are by no means mutually exclusive. A business transformation generally involves large shifts that dictate change at every level of the business and brand – small and large scale. And managing a change of this scale is no easy task for businesses or...
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Liberate Your Leader

Liberate Your Leader

In the movies, we always cheer for the regular Jane or Joe who looks Big Bad Leader in the eye and tells it like it is, rather than how Big Bad Leader likes it. Then, of course, Jane or Joe is exiled to the ends of the earth as punishment . This is known as “killing the messenger.” History says that angry rulers sometimes killed messengers who brought bad news because they could not separate the news from the person who brought it. Obviously these rulers were bonkers, but the concept of “killing the messenger” never went away. The phrase lives on today in organizations with hierarchical...
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How to Make a Business and Brand Transformation Successful

How to Make a Business and Brand Transformation Successful

Emotive Brand hinges itself on the power of business transformation through brand strategy, and brand strategist, Jo Schull adds a honed strategic mind to our team. By working directly with clients to help understand the true essence of their business, she uncovers the necessary internal and external strategies needed to transform the potential of their brand into a reality. In this interview, Jo offers her thoughts and expertise on how to make a brand and business transformation successful. People are always talking about business transformation – what does that mean? Business...
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Fast Forward Your Startup: Agile Strategy for High-Growth Companies

Fast Forward Your Startup: Agile Strategy for High-Growth Companies

A new approach for supporting high-growth companies We work and compete in a fast-moving world, driven by an accelerating pace of technological and social change. The markets we compete in shift quickly, competition intensifies, and expectations rise. Flux is the new normal. This increases the pressure on high-growth companies and brands to evolve and implement strategies in shorter and shorter time frames. As a brand strategy firm, we discovered that many of our high-growth companies, especially those operating in crowded, in-flux categories, needed a much more agile approach to addressing...
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Preparing for Transformation

Preparing for Transformation

One of the big themes for business is constant change — transformation. With globalization making markets more volatile and cross-border financial flows making bondholders and investors more powerful, companies have to keep evolving to keep up. So they change their business model or their brand strategy. If they keep doing the old things, they do them in new ways. Or they do entirely new things in ways that haven’t been invented yet. For our parents, IBM was a computer company. For us, it’s a consulting company. Time Warner was a media company; now it’s a content company after selling...
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The Role of Patience and Fortitude in Branding

The Role of Patience and Fortitude in Branding

The business world is tough out there It’s only natural, especially given today’s pressure cooker environment, to want instantly actionable ideas and immediate results. This is especially true the closer you are to the marketing machine within your business. At the same time, more and more businesses are realizing that they need to transform themselves in order to remain competitive, if not stay viable, in the 21st century. They are recognizing that their traditional strategies and tactics simply no longer work as expected. Also, the commoditization and price/value pressures they...
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Good Leadership Character Leads to Good Brand Character

Good Leadership Character Leads to Good Brand Character

Tough time call for strong leaders As recognition sets in that the COVID-19 crisis will not be short-lived, companies must respond appropriately by communicating in ways that are empathetic and relevant, contextually aware, human and sensitive. Leaders, brand stewards, and their teams must be extremely focused, keep up with the new normal of uncertainty, and have the ability to rapidly re-evaluate what their company stands for, how it communicates, and why this matters now more than ever. Leadership Character An excellent post at IMD.org speaks to two attributes that the writers, Professors...
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