MARKETING SPEAKS TO BRAND STORYTELLING, BUT THEREIN LIES THE SINGULAR FOCUS, THE REALM OF ATTENTION—AND FURTHER, THE INTENTION OF THE REACH.
That comes down to the specificity of relevance and utility, the sound of the brand and its resonance to consumers, and finally, the takeaway in how a person relates—the three indices of connection and community—each an alliterative reference—the three R’s, that intertwine and interpolate as inter-functional components.
Relevance is the basic utility of product; resonance is the vibe and voice of brand—its sound to the heart-fullness of the enterprise, its founding mission and team of participants and the community of experiencers.
Core is unforgettability, brands have to matter to be memorable—brands can be loved and admired, esteemed and revered as a consumer relationship.
Given the flooding of exposures, those brands [and otherwise] that are strong, will require extraordinary staying power. Stamina, commitment, resilience and fluency. But more importantly, to the nature of memory, the idea of impact will need to focus on the foundations of two groupings of presumptions. These series relate not only to the notion of brand in the context of building and strategic pronouncements, but as well in the communities that they serve —internally, the builders; externally, the users that embrace the brand premise.
A core marketing presumption:
I have a story to tell.
There is someone to listen.
That is a foundational reflectivity—there’s a story, and it can be reflected back. The brand has a story, the consumer has a story, they intertwine—hence the anthropology of brand ecosystems.
It is a drop in the proverbial well of experience and contact;
and it moves out—like a rippling.
Off and on, I’ve talked to clients
and brand enthusiasts on the Singularity.
While I grasp the strategic future visioning of Vernor Vinge, the so-called inventor of the concept of Singularity, who notes that “we are on the edge of change comparable to the rise of human life on Earth. The precise cause of this change is the imminent creation by technology of entities with greater than human intelligence. There are several means by which science may achieve this breakthrough (and this is another reason for having confidence that the event will occur)…From the human point of view this change will be a throwing away of all the previous rules, perhaps in the blink of an eye, an exponential runaway beyond any hope of control. Developments that before were thought might only happen in “a million years” (if ever) will likely happen in the next century.”
There’s more to the positioning that you will explore with Kurzweil, historical overviews and expansions on the idea of Moore’s laws of acceleration.
What we think of singularity—as enterprise strategists and designers—is more to the original intentionality of the value. To brand, it’s a singular value or proposition of meaningful and relative exchange that allows a brand to survive. Friend Marty Neumeier calls this the “onliness”—the state of singular, distinguishing relevance, and relativity, from maker to brand, to story, to community.
And back again.
To our thinking—supporting the positioning of the singularity of brand positioning and offerings—that idea of a single purpose character might be tough to manage. Big brands have many layers. So there might be an onliness strategy that starts at the top, then filters into varying areas — divisions.
The one reach—singularity of vision, the meaning of the work—intentionality, and the focus on the indices of marketing—attentionality.
R+R+R | RELEVANCE+RESONANCE+RELATIONSHIP
The idea of this string goes to two layers of character—one, the opening reflection of the single purpose: singularity. What, to the root of the singular—key drivers and purposefulness?
Two, the tension of intention:
what’s the point of your brand, your story, the offering, getting to it? What is the intention that your brand offers, and who cares? Know these, the enterprise thrives—struggle, and it will be a challenge of direction. “Where are we going and what’s the point of it?” What, to the root of intention—from ? Think of intention as a stretching towards something. But that idea of intention reaches to the ancient Latin tracery, intendere “turn one’s attention, strain,” literally, “to stretch out, extend,” from in-“toward” + tendere “to stretch.” There’s more, to follow — literally. Brand linkage happens because that’s where the heart of the matter rests: follow?
But then to the next tiering of attentionality—what is the focus of the brand, and what is the degree of connection for a relationship? The notation of attention is a phrasing that is fraught with layered meaning — the concept of the attention of a user.
We’ve referenced Stone, her studies of technological attentionality — devices, how to “pay attention” to them. And there’s a reference, earlier, to the spirit of Marc Jacobs—his personal ideas on attention (attracting attention, to him). Brand says—“pay attention to me.”
Audience says— “pay attention to me.” Thinking of attention—the sync to intention speaks to the principle of being: the tenet. The metaphor of the tenet is a beautiful thing—this principle that lies at the center is the ancient word for weaving. Tenet—the thread, the sinew, the lasting tightening that is “loom” reaches to the causal quality of stretching and holding.
Wrapping, the nature of this triad has one other completion to the geometry of strategy and connection—the array of the brand nexus, the organic and crystalline meaning of its dimensionality—
at least as to how we see it.
Everything is hard and clear—business fast and operationally engineered. But everything is soft and human and linked to emotional characteristics of how humans relate. We need to hold both of them true to heart. And in that poetry, whether mathematical or no, it is about the spirit of these closing, organic models—the other half of the ringing, circling triad.
Find relevance, listen for resonance, sow relationships. The metaphor, if you can hold that visualization in mind, is another rippling in the threading of that spiral, rolling outwards, circling inwardly.
A brand is everything
if there is relating—the relevance.
A brand is everything
if there cohesion in a soulful resound—resonance.
A brand is everything
if there the relating, the carrying forward—of relationship.
Think poetry, when you think brand; think deeper than the operational imperative; think soul, when you think of the fire of the brand.
tim | GIRVINOSEAN + WATERFRONT
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