Last month we talked about Heart Loss. That’s when a company loses that very essence that has made it great. Some call it culture. Others consider it the brand. But in fact culture and brand are very hard to separate. One thing for sure is that when a company loses its heart, it loses a priceless asset.

So how do you avoid Heart Loss within your company? Here are a few thoughts to keep in mind that come from personal experience. I’ve been there dozens of times.

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Great brand or cautionary tale? What has happened to Sony, a brand that built its reputation on innovative firsts that literally changed the world? For our younger readers who won’t remember, Sony gave us the…

- First portable tape recorder
- First pocket transistor radio
- Sony Trinitron TV
- Sony Walkman
- BetaMax video camcorder
- The Compact Disc player�

Even though these innovations seem downright primitive now, they weren’t. They were as revolutionary as, say, the iPhone and the iPad. Maybe more revolutionary. Sony was also one of the brands that transformed the image of Japan from a country that manufactured low-cost trinkets, to a high-tech powerhouse that became synonymous with innovation and quality. Sony was a phenomenon that knew its consumers. They would deliver to us products we ourselves didn’t even know we wanted so badly. Sony was cool, and if you had a Sony TV or Walkman, you were cool too.

So what happened? Sony isn’t cool anymore. Somehow the world’s coolest brand, greatest innovator and even greater marketer lost its edge. Worst of all, what happened to this legendary company can happen to your company too. It may be happening as we speak. Are you prepared? Can you stop it? Read the rest of this entry »

A while back I asked the folks on Twitter to submit their biggest marketing problems. One tweeter wrote, “How do you convince the C-suite that word of mouth works, i.e. spending $ on customer gifts & special attention.” Well, getting support from the top is a problem most marketers can relate to, particularly if you work in old guard companies that haven’t seized new methods and ideas.  What do you do?  Read the rest of this entry »

Who says you can’t deliver a product or service from the heart no matter who you are, where you work or who you work for? Building a brand with heart starts one person, one day at a time. Meet this TSA (Transportation Safety Administration) worker. I met him passing through security on my way to give a speech on branding in London, England last month. There I was, standing in a long line, the lone American in a sea of foreign exchange students from Korea, parents and children from the countries of Europe, Asia and Africa and business people from South America, Australia and everywhere else in the world. My ears were filled with a collage of languages, few of them English. Read the rest of this entry »

People may not say it out loud, but sometimes I know they are thinking it.  What’s heart got to do with business?  Especially when I’m talking with marketing directors or corporate VPs who have been trained to believe that great brands, and therefore great businesses, are built by the numbers.  Well, there is no doubt that numbers in business are important.  I’m a business owner; we track the numbers to be sure.  But as a business owner, and a former employee of several companies, I know that the way to create a really great company—one that consistently delivers great numbers—is by making sure you are a company with heart.  Don’t believe me?  Read the rest of this entry »