The other day I was discussing marketing with prospect and the subject of a brand’s character came up. Typically, businesses assume that their brand character directly mirrors what they see as the attributes of their business, or at least those characteristics they wish their customers and the world at large to associate with their business. You know the usual bona fides: hard work, integrity, ingenuity, honesty, loyalty, helpfulness, friendliness, courtesy, kindness, obedience, cheerfulness, thrift, courage, cleanliness and reverence.

Wait a minute, that’s the Boy Scout law.

But you get the point. A good as all of these attributes sound – and they must because pretty much every company claims them – when used in the context of a brand’s character, they miss the point. Well, you may ask, what IS the point of a brand’s character if it isn’t to promote a company’s probity and wonderfulness?

To begin with, if the brand character is the same as every other brand’s character then the brand has no point. A “me-too” brand only marks you as ordinary. And, if you’ve read any of these musings, you know the most important task of any brand is to make the brand’s sponsor extraordinary – not just different from competitors but from every other brand.

To be effective, a brand’s character not only needs to be unique, that uniqueness must be consistent for it to have value. This is not unlike a character in a well-written book or movie. One of the most frustrating things for me – and why I don’t read a lot of fiction – is the propensity of all too many authors to create an interesting character, and then have the character behave in totally uncharacteristic and/or arbitrary ways because it serves the author’s purposes. Not only is this lazy writing, it totally destroys my connection with the character.

Integrity of character is key to brands as well, whether that be an implied set of characteristics or the embodied character of a brand mascot. As a guide to this point, you need only recall one the most successful – and memorable – cartoon characters, Donald Duck. Why is he so much more interesting than Mickey Mouse? Because, though Donald can be kind and thoughtful, he is basically a raging spirit forever confronting the forces of nature and failing. As such he represents a facet of human nature – something we can all identify with. Now contrast Donald’s character with Mickey Mouse who – over time – abandoned his original mischievous and adventurous spirit for a milquetoast demeanor, with the consequence that his name is now a synonym for mediocrity.

Creating and maintaining a brand image requires the same commitment to the integrity of the brand’s character. Take Charlie the tuna – a likeable character even if he is a bit rough around the gills. Yet he’s the mascot for Starkist, a brand that wants to known as a very high-quality product. As everybody knows, the gag is that Starkist is much too classy for the likes of Charlie who lives in constant frustration at failing to be chosen. If Charlie were to realize his dream, not only would he disappear – you don’t return from a trip to the cannery – but he would cease to be memorable…just another Nicoise salad or tuna melt.

Many brands have paid costly tuition learning the lesson that you don’t mess with your brand’s personality. I’m sure we all remember these notorious flops: New Coke, the 914 “volks” Porsche, Harley Davidson trying to sell perfume, McDonald’s “Mickey D” facelift, Levis marketing shoes…

So, class, what are the lessons in all of this?

One: If you want to create a brand that resonates with customers and builds affinity for your company then give it (or he, or she) admirable traits of course, but make sure the character (personality, or “persona’) of your brand reflects a genuine, human character, and that generally means some distinctive or even quirky traits as well.

Two: Maintain the integrity of the brand character by making sure that everything you use the brand for makes sense with that brand’s character. Or, if the brand must act out of character, be sure the brand behaves as you would in a similar situation.

Three: Put that brand to work. Use it every way you can, in advertising, promotion, signage, employee motivation… Find a role for your brand in any marketing tool that you use to communicate your company’s value.

There’s a great story about a famous ad guy who was trying to explain to his mother what he did for a living. She wanted something to say to the ladies, with whom she played Ma Jong, who were bragging about their sons who were doctors and such.

Try as he might, he couldn’t convey to her what an “ad guy” did. In frustration, he cast about for an example and spied a match book. “See the ad on the cover of this match book” he says holding the match book up to his mom. “Some one had to come up with the idea for the ad on the cover of this match book. Write the slogan. Design the image. Take the photo. Send the layout to the printer.” At the end of this explanation, the ad guy’s mom smiled broadly with comprehension. “See? That’s what I do.” Said the ad guy relieved to have finally justified his existence to his mom. At least he was until he overheard his mother telling her card-playing buddies that her son makes match books.

I often find that explaining marketing generates much the same quizzical expression that I suspect the ad guy saw on his mom’s face. And when I give specific examples, people often seize on the example to define my service… “Oh, I get it, you do websites!”

In point of fact I do websites, but factual as that may be,  that’s not the point. Websites, ads, direct mail, radio spots, etc., are just tools of the trade. Likewise, telemarketing, market research and marketing strategy. To focus on one single aspect of the business is like picking up hammer in a craftsman’s workshop and assuming that defines the artisans’ efforts. “Oh, I see. You’re a hammer!”

Just in case you’re wondering why I’m belaboring a point that may be blatantly obvious to you, it’s because – in my 35-some years of experience – the purpose of marketing and even why marketing people exist has been blatantly not-obvious to all too many business men and women who desperately need marketing help.

Unless they’re perpetually hanging ten on a tsunami of sales and profits, most business folks eventually come to the realization that they need some of this “voodoo” called marketing. However, their lack of familiarity with the subject often leads them astray. Herewith is a short primer on the two-kinds of marketing: the “pro’s” and “con’s.”

Marketing as a product. Often called marketing packages you see these all over the place. Free Checking packages at banks. Popular Radio formats such as “All Hits All the Time.” “Ace the Friendly Hardware Place” is a marketing package. They are off-the-shelf packages of slogans, graphics, ad-templates, etc. The are almost identical in each market where they appear.

This “marketing as product” solution is very appealing to business folk because of its promise of a predictable ROI. The people who sell these packages generally do so based on the program’s “performance” in another – generally distant – market. And, after all, if it pulled in 34% growth in sales in Racine, it’s should do that in Santa Rosa.

Customers for “marketing as a product” probably also favored “can’t miss” pickup lines such as, “is it hot in here or is it just you?”

The problem any pre-packaged solution is that one size never fits all, and generally is good for none. Even assuming the salesperson is telling the truth (I know, I’m so gullible) about how the marketing package performed elsewhere, the current circumstances are bound to be different: the economy’s changed, locals have different preferences, the list goes on.

Marketing as a process. Right off the bat I’ll tell you that many business people feel about entering into a marketing process the way vampires feel about garlic. I understand. The process includes mysterious stuff like market research, focus groups, and surveys. The results are unpredictable and the process often requires that they face some unpleasant truths about their product or business. Since most companies are legends within their own walls, it’s a cold bath of water when market research reveals that the majority of their coveted target customer either has never heard of them or worse, has heard of them and doesn’t’ consider them the “market leader.”

Then there’s the whole “creativity thing.” Once the marketplace has been assessed and a strategy developed – no mean feat in and of itself – someone has to come up with a unique and persuasive way to implement that strategy. Just Xeroxing the marketing strategy and calling it ad copy doesn’t really work though people keep trying.

For those wise enough to forsake the false grail of pre-packaged marketing, with the integrity to expose their preconceptions to valid market research, and the courage to try out a creative idea that they didn’t think of themselves, the rewards can be amazing: a marketing campaign that separates your product, company or service from it’s competition, a message that captures the attention of customers old and new, and the chance to look your more timid competitors in the face and tell them…

“Hey, no guts, no glory.”

Believe it or not, I’ve actually heard business men and women say with a certain amount of pride that their company engages in “stealth marketing.” I’ve never gotten an exact definition of the term from them, but they seem to mean that they somehow achieve their customer acquisition through sorcery. Or, perhaps, there is a secret commodity trading floor that deals in consumers known only to small body of businesses which renders traditional marketing moot…

I would hate to believe that these individuals are too cheap or lazy to expend the time or money necessary to promote their enterprises. Perhaps the truth is that they are flummoxed by the array of options, the lack of metrics short of sales increases, and the specter of spending money for something they see as imprecise and unpredictable. If that’s the case, I don’t blame them for seeking solace in the concept of “stealth marketing.”

It’s a shame really, because marketing is actually very simple. The absolute, fundamental goal of marketing is to distinguish a company in the minds of those it wishes to reach.

Merriam-Webster defines “distinguish” as meaning: 1) to perceive a difference in or mentally separate 2) a: to mark as separate or different, b: to separate into kinds, classes, or categories <distinguish words by their part of speech, c: to give prominence or distinction to, d: to characterize 3) a: to discern, b: to single out or take special notice of. 

That says it so well, that I have no compunction in following up by saying that marketing that fails to distinguish its sponsor is a waste of time and money.

Many of these “stealth marketers” tell me that overt marketing is unnecessary because they get all of their business through referrals. Given the bland, careless uniformity of local radio, TV, print and direct mail advertising, I don’t doubt this at all.

Who’s to blame?

High on the list of responsibility for marketing materials that fail to rise above mediocrity or penetrate the customer’s consciousness is “technology” – specifically, desk-top publishing (DTP) with its promise of “professional results” at the touch of any ones’ fingers.

It’s as if making high-performance cars available to poorly or untrained individuals would result in every one of them becoming a world-class race driver over night. Wait a minute! We actually do that and more than 50,000 people die each year in traffic-related accidents. At least DTP doesn’t kill or maim…

A second factor in the creation of mediocre marketing is the media itself. Newspapers have always provided “ad services,” but before DTP the services were mostly bland type setting and the odd piece of clip artwork. The term for these efforts was “pub set” ads.

With DTP the newspaper’s production staff was able ad a little more flare and a cornucopia of fonts to their service. However, since the papers generally offer these ads as “free” the staff is discouraged from spending sufficient time to craft any particular ad, which results in a pervasive homogeneity on pages checker-boarded with pub-set ads.

The consequence to advertisers who produce their own materials or who rely on the publication are pages full of notices for businesses which not only fail to distinguish themselves from their competitors…but fail to stand out from the other ads on the page.

Not to be out done, radio and TV outlets as well as direct mail houses also offer “free” creative services to their customers with similar indistinguishable results.

Lest you dismiss all of these words as the ranting of an underappreciated professional marketer, let me reiterate that the absolutely essential role of marketing is to distinguish a business. If you don’t want to hire someone who’s make a career at doing this for clients, then do it yourself.

If you are unable to produce marketing materials that separate your company from its competitors and/or make it stand out from the gray noise that permeates the media, you can slip into the mode of “stealth marketing”…or you can hire the help you need to build sales, profits and business value.

Whatever you choose to do, if your marketing effort doesn’t separate you from the pack, save your money.