This past week, marketers from diverse consumer and B2B brands gathered in San Diego to embark on a hero’s journey to create new value for their brands at the premier of The Un-Conference: 360° of Brand Strategy for a Changing World. And what a journey it was!
For two days, these intrepid marketers blazed a new trail in brand management for the 21st century. Working together in teams of 10, and energized by an unusually informal and competitive learning environment, The Un-Conference participants brought an amazing level of enthusiasm, creativity and skill to a variety of learning exercises designed to challenge the conventional wisdom about brand strategy and brand management.
All the barriers to interactive participation were torn down – no podiums, no stages with talking heads, no formalities – just the creative energy of presenters and participants working together on the most important concepts in brand management in our post media, post marketing world.
To set the informal tone of The Un-Conference, participants gathered the evening before for a welcome cocktail reception on the rooftop of the Andaz Hotel that offered amazing 360 degree views of downtown San Diego and a wonderful opportunity to get to know one another and learn which team they were on before the conference. The uniform for all was jeans.
To get things started, Derrick Daye, Managing Partner of The Blake Project and Master of Ceremonies for the event, introduced participants to an interactive card game created especially for marketers known as “Brandingo: The Brand Management Safari”. The game of Brandingo was a critical and entertaining component that made the competitive learning sessions throughout The Un-Conference much more fun and engaging.
Based on a safari theme, participant teams could collect, trade and even gift their Brandingo cards to bolster their overall team scores during the competitive exercises created by The Blake Project Senior Partners. As in the marketplace, the competition among the teams was fierce!
The Un-Conference: Day One
Kicking off The Un-Conference, participants enjoyed a compelling story of innovation and transformation from John Sculley, former CEO of Pepsi and Apple. With grace, wisdom and humility, John shared his fascination for innovation and transformation through his early years at Pepsi, where he lead the product development and marketing initiatives that transformed Pepsi into the leading soft drink brand in America.
In discussing the idea of “creating new value” in the hyper competitive soft drink category, John shared the fascinating story of how Pepsi brought to market the two-liter plastic bottle coupled with innovative distribution strategies which changed consumer’s consumption behaviors.
While arch rival Coca-Cola focused on selling more bottles, Sculley and his team realized early on Pepsi wasn’t in the business of selling bottles, rather they focused on helping consumers at home keep a ready supply of liquid refreshment conveniently in their refrigerator. This simple insight led to the advent of the two-liter bottle and changed forever how soft drinks where marketed and sold in the grocery store channel.
Of course, participants listened intensely as John shared the critical lesson about value creation learned from Steve Jobs during his tenure as CEO at Apple at the dawn of the personal computer era – “zoom out, connect the dots, zoom in and innovate”. John shared with intimate detail the genius of Steve Jobs to see what others around him could not see, then with laser focus and hyper restrictive boundaries, Jobs and his design teams would innovate the beautiful products that would forever change the world.
Looking into the future, John shared his point of view on how prescriptive data will be a critical component to transform the delivery of health care services in America. According to Sculley, health care is an industry on the eve of radical innovation in much the same manner as the PC changed the culture at the dawn of its evolution.
In keeping with the theme of The Un-Conference, John worked directly with each participant team during the afternoon competitive learning exercises facilitated by Brad VanAuken, Senior Partner of The Blake Project.
The Power Of Surprise
Prior to arriving in San Diego, participants knew they would be enjoying a semi-private dinner at the San Diego Padres game on the evening of Day One. What they did not know was that someone on the winning team would be throwing out the first pitch of the game in front of 35,000 people at Petco Park. This information certainly charged an already competitive atmosphere.
The big moment of the afternoon session on Day One came during the “Branding Commodities” exercise, where Brad VanAuken challenged the teams to develop a brand platform for the most ubiquitous commodity on the planet – water.
The teams were challenged to innovate a product development concept, target consumer segment, and brand positioning platform for their branded water product. The creative energy in the room was palpable as each team huddled together to skillfully build the foundations of their brand. At the conclusion of the exercise, each team presented their brand concept to the entire group and the panel of judges comprised of the Senior Partners of the Blake Project.
The winning team, (the “Hyenas”), presented a powerful, poignant and emotionally moving brand concept based in social and environmental stewardship of the world’s water supply, and providing access to fresh water for populations in parts of the world who have no access to drinking water.
The big surprise came when each member of the winning team drew a card out of a hat to determine who would throw the opening pitch. The winner was Craig Morris, Brand Manager from GlaxoSmithKlien. After the days events, conference participants headed to the ballpark together to watch the San Diego Padres play the Washington Nationals. Craig headed to the pitchers mound and a legend was born.
The Un-Conference: Day Two
Continuing the journey, the morning session began with a presentation and a lively group discussion on Brand Storytelling Strategy in the Digital Age, presented by Thomson Dawson, Senior Brand Strategist of The Blake Project. Thomson presented several important ideas on the profound shift from iconic myth making of the broadcast era– where brands were the hero in a consumer driven culture – to the digital social era driven by a return to the ancient oral tradition of storytelling where the audience is now the central hero of the brand story.
The highlight of the presentation involved a lively group discussion on the role storytelling plays in building the critically important business assets of relationships and reputation. Thomson shared several case studies of current story based brands whose stories have enhanced their relationships and reputation with customers, and examples where brand stories can be perceived as disingenuous and contrived bringing the brand’s credibility into question.
Thomson suggested the key to successful brand storytelling in the digital age lies in connecting to the shared values between brand and audience. Story based brands live their values through their behavior in the marketplace.
Building on the work completed in the prior day, Thomson challenged the teams in a learning exercise to create and present a brand storytelling map for their respective branded waters.
John Selvaggio, former CEO of Song Airlines, a subsidiary of Delta Airlines kicked off the afternoon session. John shared the amazing story of creating new value in the highly competitive and regulated airline industry.
John shared insight on how he and his team at Song Airlines reinvented the flying experience for customers through innovative service amenities such as touch screen video monitors placed in seat backs, credit card enabled purchasing of in-flight organic foods, and other amenities not found on any other domestic airline. John’s presentation demonstrated how marketers, against all odds, could create new value and redefine a category rather than compete for the value created by others.
The afternoon session concluded with a lively presentation and discussion on Brand Extension and Brand Licensing Strategies presented by Pete Canalichio, Senior Partner of the Blake Project and a leading expert on the specialized discipline of brand licensing. Pete shared his insight on the best practice strategies marketers employ to extend the value of their brands into new categories to earn greater revenues and build the equities of their brands in new markets.
Through a variety of product categories, Pete revealed many successful and not so successful examples of how brands extend their value into new market spaces. After his presentation, Pete challenged the participants in an engaging group discussion to name their own examples of success and failure in brand extensions.
The Un-Conference Finale: The Brandingo Winning Team Announced
At the conclusion of the team presentations, Derrick Daye announced to the participants the surprise Grand Prize of the Brandingo game – a $5,000 contribution in the name of the winning team members to The Water Project, a global human services organization helping to provide accessible drinking water to people in under developed countries all over the globe.
It was a gratifying and emotional experience for all the winning team members and participants of The Un-Conference to know their creativity and skill in all the learning exercises would play a role in changing the world for the better. Thank you to all who participated! A special thank you to QualQuant Signals and the American Marketing Association for your role as co-sponsors with The Blake Project and Branding Strategy Insider.
The Un-Conference: 360° of Brand Strategy for a Changing World is designed for those marketers who see comfort zones as a dangerous place and are looking for a unique, intimate experience focused on brand strategy.
The next installment of The Un-Conference will be announced shortly. To be included on the list of future participants contact us.
