The Nobel Peace Prize is tricky. I must say I do not envy those who have to decide on the recipient for such an award. Is it really even an award, or more of an incitement to do better? This year it is the inspirational Malala Yousafzai.
Cities have become important actors on the global scene. Metropolitan governments are among the best ‘glocal’ players, sharpening their global influence strategy and improving the management of their brand. International city branding has its undeniable challenges, however.
How strong is the average college brand? How well are America's liberal arts colleges able to meaningfully differentiate themselves from each other?
What chance does the museum world have with millennials? Are millennials and museums really oil and water? Let's hear the story from the horse's mouth.
With Museum Camp (now in its second year), Nina Simon is trying to find a way to infect our thinking long enough for it to dent our obstinate surrounds. We should be trying to help.
I flew out to California for Museum Camp last week on the power of a hunch—If Nina Simon was doing it, then I would learn a lot. That was a pretty good hunch.
Can a group of diverse and interesting New Yorkers sit around a table for dinner and have a SINGLE sustained conversation for at least two hours—no moderator, no side conversations—just a single, contributive, collective, shall I say it ... civilized, conversation on a given topic?
Mascots—those lovable anthropomorphized characters who push cereal, chocolate milk, and tires—are more than just cute tools for marketing to children.
Yoga is about controlling your mind. Marketing is about trying to control other's minds. End of story, right?
Not exactly.
"Products are made in the factory, but brands are created in the mind." —Walter Landor
Among all the things I experienced and vividly remember from the 2014 American Alliance of Museum Annual Meeting and Expo in Seattle, I would like to discuss one particular session. It was a session fascinating to me for reasons unintended by its designers.
"All strategies aimed at exploiting an innovation must achieve leadership within a given environment. Otherwise, they will simply create an opportunity for the competition."
In general, the difference between the good and the great can sometimes be a matter of how effectively you sweat the little things, the things that actually matter to people at the human level interface. We call this the tactical user-level interface. Sometimes this is the difference between a positive experience and a negative one. This difference matters for any brand.
Within the museum world there seems to be some reluctance to engage with contemporary culture in a deep way. But if you take a look at the museums that are thriving, you will find a willingness to do just that. The museums that are flourishing now exhibit a conscious responsiveness to and engagement with contemporary issues and concerns.
Brand strategy gives McDonald's a 27 billion dollar advantage over Burger King. It's important that you understand how this happened, and how it applies to your organization.
