Creative Strategy
“It’s so easy to jump straight into a creative or logistical project without really understanding the foundations. Mo’s facilitation in brainstorms is second to none. She has a way of pulling everything (and everyone!) apart to get to the bottom of things. She has helped us bring clarity to briefs and a real sense of understanding for all facets of a project – the creative, the logistical, the audience and the client. If you need fresh eyes and clear speech – Call Mo!”
Caro Ryan, Principal, Juicy Projects
You know you need to be innovative. And you know that marketing and branding are essential to your business. But you can’t justify creating a full time position at the level you need – the skills are too specialised. Even small-to-medium sized agencies often do not have a dedicated planning department – which can be an obstacle to growth.
Perhaps you’re an agency who wants to take things to the next level, but only needs a planning director on an ad hoc basis. You may have a difficult brief to crack or a pitch to win. You may need to upgrade your strategic capabilities and intellectual property, or want to turn your client relationships into partnerships. Maybe you just need a fresh set of eyes with big agency expertise. Or a killer insight.
Perhaps you’re a business who needs help with a brand – launch or relaunch, rename or refresh – and want someone you can trust to take you through the process. Someone who can understand the issue from the inside out – starting with your business – instead of applying a cookie-cutter formula.
Mo has deep corporate experience from both sides of the table; agency and client. She knows branding, marketing and business strategy.
And she always works with the business in mind.
[slidingnote title=”Mo’s Take on Branding.”]
Mo’s Take on Branding
What is a brand? It’s not a rational proposition or an idealised list of values and attributions. It’s not a product or a service or a funky design.
It’s not tangible.
It’s not static.
It’s not separate from the business.
It’s the most powerful marketing tool you have.
And it’s not, in the end, yours to control.
So what is it? A brand is the emotional response people have to experiencing you, your product or your service, and the reputation they then create for you. A brand happens after the sale, not before. As every art dealer knows, it’s the response people have to seeing a painting that determines whether it’s art or just pigment on canvas – whether it has value or not.
So how do you create a powerful brand? In the ‘old days’, ad agencies talked of the brand as a person, and to some extent this is true. Where they went off the rails was thinking they could create a person by listing the attributes they thought consumers would like instead of finding the essence of who that person would be, and expressing that. So they populated our televisions with frankensteins and germ-obsessed Stepford Wives rather than real entities that people wanted to be or hang out with. And it was no better on the corporate front, where vision statements created by committees to reflect the soul of an organisation were etched in brass and placed in reception then never glanced at again.
Branding is about who you are – really – and why you’re here. It’s about is-ness and congruence and authenticity. And most of all, it’s about relationship.
Which means marketing is entirely about relationship too. And seduction.
So. Who are you? Why are you here? Who thinks you’re hot? And what do they say about you when you’re not around?
The aim of art is to represent not the outward appearance of things, but their inward significance.
Aristotle
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