Bank on Knowledge
Build a brand bank now, or risk deflation of uninvested brand knowledge.
Build a brand bank now, or risk deflation of uninvested brand knowledge.
You’d be forgiven for assuming leading entertainment companies would be masters of building entertainment brands. You’d also be forgiven for assuming top toy, clothing, or car manufacturers are the branding experts in their own fields.
You’d be forgiven, but you’d be mistaken.
Over the years, I’ve come to the striking realization expert knowledge is, among experts, woefully limited. Time and again, I’m stunned to find so-called “experts” possess knowledge that’s within the scope of the average person’s repertoire.
This wasn’t always the case. Great brands, established by strong leaders with exceptional vision, became giants in their fields. They fought to win their supremacy. They’ve been creative, been wily, used original methods to harness consumer attention, and, often, even reinvented their own brand categories.
Slowly, something alarming began to occur. The exceptional brand knowledge that fueled such amazing brand journeys disappeared. Not overnight, but gradually, like gas leaking slowly from a huge balloon. No one really noticed the incremental deflation, but it became embarrassingly apparent to people outside the organizations the emperor is wearing no clothes. To insiders, he was still parading in all his finery.
Opposition between inside and outside perspectives is logical. As time passed, key brand-builders left their organizations and took their knowledge with them. Every departing generation took a little more of the knowledge that was still there when they arrived. Without anyone noticing, even fundamental brand-building knowledge, essential to brand survival, trickled out the door after retirements and resignations. Replacements faithfully served their organizations, ignorant of knowledge they never had. And so continues an unstoppable spiral of ever-diminishing brand knowledge.
What’s not logical is the failure to address the problem.
You should establish a brand bank. A bank that contains internal brand knowledge. You must deposit the knowledge, save the knowledge, invest the knowledge, and grow the knowledge. This is an essential function for any company. So are the tools to make it happen:
The above plan may not work for everyone. But that’s not the objective. What’s most important is a plan, a strategy for knowledge retention, maintenance, and growth. Start the debate, preferably among senior managers within your organization. How will you invest your own brand knowledge to ensure its security and longevity?
If you want your tarnished brand to recover its old potency, establish a brand bank now. Nothing can stop the steady deflation of uninvested knowledge.