Marketing and Reputation

Pregnant mothers are being pooled to place ads on their round, shiny stomachs as part of “tummy branding.” Some argue that this is how news is created. To some, this is “desperate branding” in action. Welcome to “guaranteed-to-fail branding,” a process that ensures a top spot on the list of branding failures. These projects are sometimes called “reality branding.” There is no limit to these weird processes.

Roy Disney said, “You need branding when your product has nothing to offer.” Roy’s uncle, Walt, invented Mickey Mouse and created the Disney empire. At the time, the word “branding” was reserved only for cowboys branding herds of cattle by the fiery iron.

The word “branding” is dangerously overused. Many people use branding as a cure for all kinds of problems in all kinds of businesses. To lay claim to a deeper understanding of this elementary word, branding agencies all over the world have developed some cute variations of it, from “emotional branding” to “primal,” “sensory,” “musical,” “internal,” “external,” “holistic,” “vertical,” “abstract,” “nervous” and all the way to “invisible” branding. However, to see these distinctions, you will need special 3D spectacles.

The list of branding types is almost like the three MIT wizards who took an academic conference for a ride by submitting a paper in all fake jargon: “Rooter: A Methodology for the Typical Unification of Access Points and Redundancy.” Their paper was accepted.

Haphazard Branding

There are hundreds of such branding terms pointing to the same thing. Let’s analyze and see how this historical process of branding ownership marks on animals got transformed into a word circus, bending the state of mind among corporations, institutions and many governments.

Branding is often presented as a culturally, emotional or lifestyle crazy, sugarcoated packaging process. Sometimes it is like rap music, with spinning colors or psychedelic pastel overtones accompanied with hip-hop idea drivers. Other times it comes with esoteric concepts to camouflage the products or services just long enough to get the customers’ attention. Most of the time, it comes as juicy ideas under some new blanket term of branding that is designed to create a safe and secure feeling for the corporation while waiting for the thunder from the charge of anxious customers.

For some reason, if the highly anticipated traffic doesn’t show up, then the term is changed immediately to the likes of “primal branding,” with a twist or a new style dance added to the circus. The same single promotional process is re-named repeatedly.

The idea is that when share prices fall, call the branding team and let it apply its “fiscal branding” to mail fancy brochures to shareholders. When products fail, let the “visual branding” make logos makeover, and when elevators don’t work, give it to the “yo-yo branding” unit, as they are real experts in north and south mobility. Floor please.

Today, branding is a mixed bag of basic, traditional advertising tools, simply waxed and packaged to appear as intellectual advice with an expensive price tag. It is targeted to fit any hungry frame of mind, and is designed to make corporations feel ever so comfortable with terms like “verbal,” “digital,” “audio,” “smelly,” “silent” or “loud” branding, as all these terms are designed to offer great safety and invisible lifelines to sinking ships. But does it work?

Just Promotional Tools

At times it does, as corporations do need solid and real branding. However, it most often fails, frequently due to lack of substance, quality, intelligence and experience. What is now being offered in the name of branding includes perfumed stationery at the banks, as sensory tickles, jingles and chimes for the funeral parlor — just raw promotional tricks.

These approaches fail because they are just basic promotional tools and skills and because they are trendy quick fixes. Branding has been defined so many times by so many experts that it is almost useless to redefine it. Like beauty, it is in the eye of the beholder.

The presentation of fancy fireworks at a huge marina as a big branding exercise might be merely ordinary to some other company. Hundreds of hired people walking on a busy street with their foreheads painted with the names of products might be kinky, tacky or too smart, all depending on the culture and mental level of the client.

Pregnant mothers are being pooled to place ads on their round, shiny stomachs as part of “tummy branding.” Some argue that this is how news is created. To some, this is “desperate branding” in action, to others it is getting the word out at any cost.

Welcome to “guaranteed-to-fail branding,” a process that ensures a top spot on the list of branding failures. These projects are sometimes called “reality branding.” There is no limit to these weird processes.

Most of the time, the creative powers overtake the process, and fancy jargon becomes the Band-Aid while the Laws of Global Corporate Image, Rules of Corporate Nomenclature and Name Identities, Cyber Domain Management, Principals of Marketing and Global Branding are all completely ignored as being too rigid, too serious and too formal.

Solid Training, Thorough Skills

Let’s face it, these branding rules are very hard to learn and very difficult to apply because they require solid training and thorough skills. Simple, raw promotional skills backed by big budget fireworks are only “accidental branding” at play, where everyone becomes happy as long as there is some noise. In the recent past, this is how “high volume” or “intense” branding got the center stage. Today, in this budgetless environment, it is only a dream for most agencies to get such mega breaks.

U.S. businesses are still very much overdosed with over-branding. Massive turnover in the advertising and branding industry, compounded by the Internet , e-commerce and outsourcing has created a large glut of branding consultants with too many faceless, nameless consulting services and Web sites.

The market is simply glutted. Western branding agencies are losing their grip by not producing world-class standards and are becoming a laughing stock by adopting, in a panic, monkey-see-monkey-do campaigns.

In reality, you definitely need proper branding today; the type is not the issue. However, first you must have something very good to offer. You also need highly specific and proven branding with highly tactical positioning skills, under proper corporate and brand name identity and image laws, rather than raw graphic and promotional tools.

‘Useless Branding?’

Empty concepts and poorly designed and beaten up products and services can’t be resurrected with some abstract branding terms along with some flashy campaigns. Big money spending will not buy big image anymore. It worked in the past, but times have changed. Today, the latest cyber-branding techniques are in big play. Corporations are opening up to a debate on this subject among senior management and ignoring the old, traditional branding methodologies.

As e-commerce matures by the minute, the masses of customers have successfully ignored the expensive blitzes and pretended to have some type of an early Alzheimer’s condition to justify their memory loss. Nothing sticks in mind any longer.

The blasted, useless messages are instantly forgotten. The 15-minute fame suggested by Andy Warhol is now only a 15-second blip on the global e-commerce landscape. What was previously shoved on 24-7 ad campaigns and lasted at least a year is now completely forgotten the very next day.

Should we now re-define branding all over again? Should this word be re-invented? How about “useless branding?” No, not yet.

 – Naseem Javed

– 7-27-05

If you’re the head of your company, you have to be able to define not just what your company does, but why it does it.

Having difficulty? That’s normal. You can blame it on the way your brain works. The part of the brain that contains decision-making and behavior doesn’t control language, so when you’re asked questions about why you do what you do, it’s natural to get tongue-tied.

That’s where great leadership comes in. Leaders are required to put in to words what a group does; they’re required to cross over between the decision-making and behavior sphere and the language sphere. Leaders are great because they’re good at putting feelings into words that we can act upon.

So it’s up to you, as company leader, to define your “why.” Here are four reasons you should, if you want to survive as a company.

1. Your company’s “why” generates loyalty.

Apple can sell phones not simply because they have the smarts to make phones; every single one of their competitors can make phones too. What gives Apple permission to sell products beyond computers is the fact that it doesn’t define themselves as a computer company; rather, it is a company that stands for something. It represents an ideal: Down with “the man”; attack the status quo; champion the individual.

As long as Apple’s products are consistent with its cause, the company has the freedom to do things other companies cannot. Those who identify with Apple’s cause, in turn, will say they “love” Apple–even if they think it’s because of the products.

2. Organizational success (or failure) often dates from inception.

Most great companies were founded by a person or small group of people who personally suffered a problem, went through an difficult experience, or had someone close to them face a tricky challenge–and then came up with a solution or alternative. That original solution to that original problem is what they formed their company around; it’s why they do what they do.

Organizations that just look to capture some market opportunity, or are born out of some market research, often fail (or else need endless pools of money to keep going). No one has passion for a problem revealed in market research. People have passion to solve their own problems or to help those they care about.

Fortunately, it’s easy to build trust in a business relationship. Here are the rules, based on a conversation with a true expert in trust-building Jerry Acuff, author of The Relationship Edge: The Key to Strategic Influence and Selling Success.

1. Be yourself.

Everybody on the planet has had unpleasant experiences with salespeople, and many have walked away from a sales situation feeling manipulated. So, rather than acting or sounding like a salesperson, simply act the way you would when meeting with a colleague.

2. Value the relationship.

If you want people around you to value having a relationship with you, you must truly believe that relationship building is important. You must also believe that you honestly have something of value to offer to the relationship.

3. Be curious about people.

People are drawn to those who show true interest in them. Curiosity about people is thus a crucial element of relationship building. Having an abiding fascination in others give you the opportunity to learn new things and make new connections.

4. Be consistent.

A customer’s ability to trust you is dependent upon showing the customer that your behavior is consistent and persistent over time. When a customer can predict your behavior, that customer is more likely to trust you.

5. Seek the truth.

Trust emerges when you approach selling as a way of helping the customer–so make it your quest to discover the real areas where the you can work together. Never be afraid to point out that your product or company may not be the right fit.

It’s no longer enough to have a sleek website, social-media presence, and consistent brand aesthetic online. The new rules of branding your business on the Web have a lot less to do with presentation, and a lot more to do with interaction. In order to bring you up to speed, Inc.com has compiled nine of the most innovative and ingenious tips from articles, guides, and interviews in Inc. and Inc.com over the past year. These are the new rules of branding online.

1. Don’t just start the conversation.
Be an integral and evolving part of it. “Social media has one very important perspective to share with brand management—the conversation. Like branding, social media is all about the conversation and building effective relationships. They are perfectly suited to one another,” says Ed Roach, founder of The Brand Experts, a brand management consultancy in West Leamington, Ontario, the author of The Reluctant Salesperson, a free e-book available at http://www.thebrandingexperts.ca. The rules for brand messaging through new media versus traditional channels haven’t changed, but “the game sure got better and more interesting,” says Roach. It’s not enough to have a Facebook page or a Twitter account, you must participate in the conversation by making regular posts and replying to direct messages from your customers. Ron Smith, president and founder of S&A’s Cherokee, a public relations and marketing firm in Cary, North Carolina, agrees, adding that you’ll want to stay on top of what people are saying about you and your brand online. “Monitoring social media is a must for all companies. Social media has shortened the time frame for company responses to complaints or accusations. These days, companies need to acknowledge any issues and control the messaging in a matter of minutes instead of hours or days,” says Smith. Read more.

2. Either keep your personal brand out of it…
So you have 10,000 Twitter followers. Does it matter to your customers? Tim Ferriss, the entrepreneur behind the sports nutritional supplements companyBrainQUICKEN and author of The 4-Hour Workweek, told Inc.com contributor John Warrillow: “Unless you’re in one of a handful of businesses like public speaking, I think managing and growing a personal brand can be a huge distraction for company founders. I see all of these entrepreneurs trying to collect Twitter followers, and it reminds me of a matador waving a red flag in front of a bull. In this case, the founders are the bull. The bullfighter moves the flag away, and the bull comes up with nothing but air. Steve Jobs has a personal brand, but it isApple’s product design that makes it such a valuable company. He isn’t jumping onFoursquare to develop his ‘personal brand.'” Read more.

3. …or dive in and make all the headlines you can.
Appearing in the media as a source of expertise can go a long way toward building your brand, Inc.’s April Joyner reports. To gain press, identify media outlets that are most applicable to your particular areas of expertise and send them targeted pitches.

Why do weaker creative brains have a tendency to steal in broad daylight, and why is big money spent in promoting look-alike names, despite knowing full well that these names are stolen from other famous brands? Is it really human nature or just sheer stupidity? Unfortunately, some lack the basic skills for recognizing The Three Golden Rules of Naming.

Millions of entrepreneurs and thousands of account executives from major ad agencies all over the world are losing their sleep these days, most sleepwalking in search of new names with some extra “OO”s to ride along with the success of Google’s name.

During the day, they daydream about coming as close to this name as possible. Copy, modify or steal, who cares, as long it as sounds like Google. OOGLE, BOOGLE, FROOGLE, NOODLE, POODLE, CABOODLE, who cares? Just leave the Google brand name alone.

Look-Alike Names

Why do weaker creative brains have a tendency to steal in broad daylight, and why is big money spent in promoting look-alike names, despite knowing full well that these names are stolen from other famous brands? Is it really human nature or just sheer stupidity?

Unfortunately, they seriously lack the basic skills necessary to recognize The Three Golden Rules of Naming:

• Rule One: Do not hide under someone else’s umbrella, you will still get wet. Don’t be a copycat. It is very bad to copy or borrow from an established identity. A look-alike, sound-alike name, resembling the personality of a powerful, established, legendary name would be fruitless in the long run. Stay clear of legendary names.

In the current battle with Froogle, Google has the full right to challenge as the spelling of frugal was changed to appear like Google’s. Just like in the past, Apple, as in computers, faced copycats called, Pineapple, Banana and Cherry, but all perished in the copycat game. There were also Boohoos, UHOOs after Yahoo. Creative agencies love to steal. That is why there are ALTIVA, ALTIPA, AMTIVA, by the hundreds or ENGENT, PANGENT, and CANGENT. Ever wonder why most cars, beer, banking, medicine commercials are just the same? The corporations pay millions and do endless research that is all wasted in the end, as the resulting names or ads are always just the same. Surely, they are not all out of new ideas — or are they?

• Rule Two: Creativity is a spark of genius. Over-creativity can cause fire and damage. Don’t get too creative. Do not twist, bend, stretch, exaggerate, corrupt or modify alpha-structures to their extremes in naming. It might result in difficult, confusing, unpronounceable and only silly names. Avoid overly creative solutions. Studies have shown again and again that most ad commercials or strange branding themes and names, which surely win top awards from their peers, are simply shut out by customers. Next time, just check the top 10 most-awarded campaigns and their related sales performances. Here, raw creativity is rewarded whether it rings clients’ cash registers or not.

• Rule Three: Work locally, think globally and name universally. Do not short-change. No matter how small or local the project, think of the future and think of this small planet. A name is only good when it is free and clear to travel around the globe, without encountering translation problems or trademark conflicts. Name for the universe. Ninety-five percent of the corporate and major product names will fail a test of global protection and suitability. It is so easy to have a global name identity.

Clarity Needed

Global branding and rules of corporate branding in just about every sector are faced with the massive proliferation and commoditization of leading brands. This factor alone demands clarity in the name identity and a precise definition in the marketplace. Copying and stealing famous names is the first step to a big failure.

Globalization is at a serious crossroad. Nationalistic posturing is demanding localization of brands at a much faster rate. At the end of the day, global corporate nomenclature is the most sought after issue of any serious branding exercise. This process is not to be confused with name branding exercises that are primarily looking at global directories and stealing famous name ideas by changing a letter or two, all in the name of big branding.

Creative agencies should pack up all gear, leave the success of Google’s name alone, and wake up and smell the coffee.

By Naseem Javed
10-07-05

Deciding whether to grow or to remain hunkered down is a key issue for America’s business leaders today. Companies can do more to take their future into their own hands and move forward faster in the economy by addressing their brand. Here are five critical steps that a company can take to drive growth through branding.

1. Know where you are relative to the competition.
Continuously monitoring your competition will help identify where you are today and set the direction for the future. It will help to determine whether your positioning is still unique or if it needs to evolve to better separate yourself from the pack. It will also gauge the momentum of your corporate brand on multiple attributes. Familiarity and favorability measures versus your industry and the competition can provide key strategies for future growth.

2. Develop a long-term five-year brand strategy.
Your brand strategy should support your business strategy. Base the branding budget on what it will take to achieve specific revenue and asset growth goals. Branding is an investment, so establishing long-term goals today is critical for future success.

3. Communicate to the world.
Show that you are serious about your growth plans. Demonstrate how you are retooling your brand to reflect a current look at who you are. You might refresh your logo or your brand identity. Whatever you do, communicate your new brand position to both internal and external audiences.

How much planning has your organization dedicated in enhancing (or, God forbid, establishing) a creative corporate culture?

First, let’s get a grip on the “creative” in creative corporate culture. Creativity isn’t just for design firms, art studios and elementary craft projects. Creativity and creative thought is necessary for all agencies and communication professionals who seek innovative strategies for their clients. Consider your organization’s best and brightest idea—was there not a light bulb of creativity that popped on (even flickered) that lead you down the path of project righteousness?

It’s also important to recognize that culture comes from the people—it is the people. Think about the individuals within your organization—what are their personalities like? Who are they outside of work? What tickles their fancy? All of these things lend to the culture of your organization, and ultimately your agency’s product. Once we begin tapping into these quirks, culture begins to form.

As daunting as the idea of a creative corporate culture may seem, fear not my fellow PR and marcom professionals. If you are one of the bold and daring to take on the challenge of building said culture in the New Year, here are a few tips for your right brain to digest:

1. Get a desk tchotchke, already. Culture is built by sharing parts of our personality with those around us—what better place for that than your workspace? If your personality could be personified by something small that fits on your desk, what would it be? Find that thing, embrace it and share it!

2. Build a community space. Forget the archaic days of water cooler chats. People like to hang in hip spaces—gather ‘round a Wii, create a community bulletin board or have a reading nook filled with industry related publications. As the saying goes, “if you build it, culture will come.”

3. Play games and buy toys. Incorporate games (and yes, even toys) into traditional office activities. Play a round of Apples to Apples before a staff meeting, or leave baskets of building blocks around the office. Using different parts of the brain is important to creativity and improving the overall quality of our ideas.

4. Find a platform and give back. A surefire way to build corporate culture is engaging team members in charitable activities—it feels good to give back, and when you do it as a group it creates unique bonds and fun memories. Find a kooky charitable activity in your town and make a day of it!

5. Eat, drink and be creative. The easiest way to enhance an organization’s culture is eating together. Consider a monthly potluck where staff can bring their favorite fares for teammates to enjoy. Encourage exotic recipes and fanciful presentations—these always create a buzz around the office.

It’s no longer enough to have a sleek website, social-media presence, and consistent brand aesthetic online. The new rules of branding your business on the Web have a lot less to do with presentation, and a lot more to do with interaction. In order to bring you up to speed, Inc.com has compiled nine of the most innovative and ingenious tips from articles, guides, and interviews in Inc. and Inc.com over the past year. These are the new rules of branding online.

1. Don’t just start the conversation.
Be an integral and evolving part of it. “Social media has one very important perspective to share with brand management—the conversation. Like branding, social media is all about the conversation and building effective relationships. They are perfectly suited to one another,” says Ed Roach, founder of The Brand Experts, a brand management consultancy in West Leamington, Ontario, the author of The Reluctant Salesperson, a free e-book available at http://www.thebrandingexperts.ca. The rules for brand messaging through new media versus traditional channels haven’t changed, but “the game sure got better and more interesting,” says Roach. It’s not enough to have a Facebook page or a Twitter account, you must participate in the conversation by making regular posts and replying to direct messages from your customers. Ron Smith, president and founder of S&A’s Cherokee, a public relations and marketing firm in Cary, North Carolina, agrees, adding that you’ll want to stay on top of what people are saying about you and your brand online. “Monitoring social media is a must for all companies. Social media has shortened the time frame for company responses to complaints or accusations. These days, companies need to acknowledge any issues and control the messaging in a matter of minutes instead of hours or days,” says Smith. Read more.

2. Either keep your personal brand out of it…
So you have 10,000 Twitter followers. Does it matter to your customers? Tim Ferriss, the entrepreneur behind the sports nutritional supplements companyBrainQUICKEN and author of The 4-Hour Workweek, told Inc.com contributor John Warrillow: “Unless you’re in one of a handful of businesses like public speaking, I think managing and growing a personal brand can be a huge distraction for company founders. I see all of these entrepreneurs trying to collect Twitter followers, and it reminds me of a matador waving a red flag in front of a bull. In this case, the founders are the bull. The bullfighter moves the flag away, and the bull comes up with nothing but air. Steve Jobs has a personal brand, but it isApple’s product design that makes it such a valuable company. He isn’t jumping onFoursquare to develop his ‘personal brand.'” Read more.

3. …or dive in and make all the headlines you can.
Appearing in the media as a source of expertise can go a long way toward building your brand, Inc.’s April Joyner reports. To gain press, identify media outlets that are most applicable to your particular areas of expertise and send them targeted pitches.

WHEN STEVE JOBS INTRODUCED THE IPHONE IN 2007, he said: “I skate to where the puck is going to be…not to where it’s been.” He often borrowed that saying from Walter Gretsky, who said it constantly to a boy named Wayne.

Poignant words that I resolutely believe drive breakthrough brands. It’s not enough merely to improve on your competition. You must innovate. To do that you must imagine where the puck will be, not where it is.

That said, if you were to ask me where the puck is going in social media, from a business perspective, I would say without hesitation: reputation management.

Mark my words. This will be a major growth industry over the next decade. Think about it: Companies invest thousands, millions, even tens of millions of dollars–and untold hours–building precious brand equity and erecting a beautiful brand image. And, it can be unraveled online in hours. Very few people, or companies, know the art of reputation management.

If you were considering a career to pursue, marinate over this one. If you can help companies listen to the online conversations about their brand, draw actionable insights from that, develop strategy and make measurable progress, you can write your own ticket. This is a brand new field. There are no “benchmark salaries” for this kind of job. It’s all “value based fees.” You could waltz right in and say: “Look, you spend $11 million a year on advertising to build your brand. You should pay me 10% of that to protect it.” If you are an expert in reputation management, you will be able to charge a fortune — and get it.

Deciding whether to grow or to remain hunkered down is a key issue for America’s business leaders today. Companies can do more to take their future into their own hands and move forward faster in the economy by addressing their brand. Here are five critical steps that a company can take to drive growth through branding.

Sometimes it’s darkest just before the light.  Here are 11 great articles to assess the times we’re in, and plan for better days.  

Five C’s for Communicating in this Crunch

We’ve developed a gut-check list of “Five C’s” to help guide communications on dire economic subjects, from news releases to corporate Web sites to internal communications.

10 Tips for a Challenging Economic Environment

9. Communicate authentically. Strong leaders acknowledge the challenges they struggle with and, by doing so, build trust among followers. Rather than being a sign of weakness, it’s a sign of strength.

Marketing and PR tactics, budgets likely to change during recession

What companies don’t realize is their marketing budget will go a lot further and create much more buzz in a down market. As your competition pulls back, you should become much more aggressive. When you do, you will achieve top-of-mind status and grab market share as the economy stabilizes and will be able to remain on top during the next upswing in the economy.

Are You a Media Savvy Leader? How Agency Heads Can Boost Results in a Tight Economy

I think the inability of the PR business to really comprehend what Web 2.0 is about is shocking. So, real leaders get in there and they take a look at the trends in media and online and get active there. For example, if you’re going to offer a CEO blog, you have to be prepared to spend an hour a day doing it—not every other day. Also important is understanding and respecting the online world’s mindset of sharing—it’s all about developing conversations with constituents.

Your website can thrive in a recession

It is 14 times cheaper to allow a customer to complete a task on a website than to have the customer complete the same task over the phone. The Web is 35 times cheaper for completing such a task than a face-to-face interaction. Isn’t that a compelling business case for a website during a recession?

Leading through uncertainty

The range of possible futures confronting business is great. Companies that nurture flexibility, awareness, and resiliency are more likely to survive the crisis, and even to prosper.

Time to Reboot: What to Expect in Politics, Policy and PR in 2009

For those in consumer PR, this will be a tough year as product-side clients retrench. But if you are engaged in advocacy PR, public affairs or crisis communications, 2009 may be a robust year for your business, especially if you can hitch things to the “change” agenda in Washington and on Wall Street.

Social Media Begins Forcing the Totally Transparent Layoff

The combination of social media technology such as Twitter—where people post updates about themselves online at Twitter.com—and a cultural shift toward greater personal disclosure means more and more employees will document details of their dismissal, said Jennifer Benz, a communications consultant based in San Francisco.

Give Data a Human Touch to Weather the Economic Storm

The key, say many experts, is to use customer data and analytics for its original purpose: forging stronger customer relationships.

Market Smarter in 2009: Make the Right Choices

Remember two words: frequency, consistency. Even with finite resources, it’s vital to maintain a level of frequency and consistency. It is crucial to stay in front of your customers and prospects. You should never disappear for stretches at a time. If that means you need to focus marketing efforts on a few of your strongest market sectors, do it.

5 Lessons on Marketing for the Recession

Lesson: Keep hiring channels open and be pickier than ever. For anyone who hasn’t read Hard Times or any of the Studs Terkel interview compilations, they are an incredible insight into people’s attitudes and behaviors throughout history. I highly recommend 

Walmart is viewed by many people as the Darth Vader of retailing, and I certainly have my complaints about the company. You should recognize, though, that by its sheer size, Walmart can have a substantial impact on sustainability issues.

I have friends in the personal care products industry and the pool maintenance products industry, and both have told me how strongly Walmart is demanding that their products meet sustainability standards. In both cases, Walmart is their companies’ single biggest customer. If they don’t want to lose the relationship, they will make it happen.

With that in mind, I thought you’d be interested in this video. It features the head of a company called WorldWise, which has been a Walmart vendor since 1996. WorldWise takes Walmart waste, such as plastic bags, bottles and hangers, and turns it into pet products. Watch the video below to learn more.

So if you don’t care for Walmart, will its efforts to address sustainability start to change your mind? Leave a comment to let us know.

Peter Faur, RightPoint
Communications Inc.

Watch the Video

I had just been reading another book on sustainability when my copy of The Responsibility Revolution arrived in the mail.  Wrapped in 100 percent post-consumer fiber, I picked up the book, read the preface and introduction and gleefully put down my prior read to immerse myself in Hollender and Breen’s next adventure.

A nice complement to The Necessary Revolution, by Peter Senge (Senge writes the forward in this book as well) Hollender and Breen have a refreshing way of making responsibility real and tangible for companies considering the shift to this new for-purpose (and profit) way of life.

The book’s opening chapter champions five directives businesses can adopt to transform conventional enterprises into “responsible and authentic” businesses. To support this blueprint, Hollender and Breen provide provocative case studies that support their theories and prescription for success. While Hollender admits: “There is, of course, no one right way to transform a conventional company into a revolutionary company” — the authors note four key principles must be manifest — mission, transparency, authenticity and innovation.  Following is a high-level overview of the five directives outlined by Hollender in the book.

Blueprint For a Responsible Company

To build a truly authentic and responsible company, Seventh Generation’s Co-Found Jeffrey Hollender says a company’s mission should matter.  “Responsible companies believe that what you stand for – your purpose and values – is far more important than the products you make or the services you sell.” He adds: “When organizations stand for something big – something that truly matters to people – they sharply differentiate themselves from their competition.”

To build trust in the company and its mission, Hollender states that organizations need to become transparent in their dealings with all stakeholders, from employees and customers to communities beyond. “By publicly baring its less than admirable impacts on society and the environment,” Hollender writes, “the transparent company preempts its critics – and takes the first step towards collaboratively fixing its problems.”

To unleash solutions, Hollender proposes that responsible companies transform workplaces into burgeoning communities of purpose and innovation. “Talented people, animated by a community’s sense of purpose,” the authors explain, “provide the brainpower for generating breakthrough ideas and the firepower for getting them into the world.” In other words — when companies let associates set their strategic direction, they act less like employees and more like entrepreneurs primed to innovate.

To optimize the value of “community” innovation, Hollender advocates bringing consumers into the organization. The more heads a responsible company can collaborate with, he notes, the greater the impact on the company and marketplace.  “Good companies genuinely listen to customers and outside stakeholders. They interact. And a few dare to put consumers at the very heart of their innovation process,” Hollender observes.

Whether an organization seeks to create meaningful innovation, build community or bring consumers into the fold– Hollender is emphatic that all actions must come from an authentic place that demonstrate a “real” commitment to solution-making. “Do-good marketing doesn’t cut it anymore,” Hollender writes in his book.

And lastly, for the responsible enterprise seeking longevity, the authors state: “No enterprise can truly attempt to embed the sustainable ethos into everything it does without constructing a collective view of what it should be.”  To demonstrate the value of this insightful point, Hollender opens chapter two with his first case study — a deep dive into OrganicValley’s 2004 Dry Thursday event.

If you’re not familiar with this story (originally covered in Inc. Magazine), a massive shift to all things organic back in December 2004 meant Organic Valley did not have enough product to fill orders. The company had a critical choice to make – continue to serve the big box retailers who were driving organic mainstream, or hold true to the green grocers that helped build the market in the first place. Since this case study is central to the heart of the book and Hollender’s blueprint for a responsible company, I won’t delve into specifics here other than to say that Hollender is spot on when he says: Mission matters. To learn more about this case study and others profiled in the book, check out The Responsibility Revolution.

Source: The Responsibility Revolution, Jeffrey Hollender and Bill Breen, March 2010, Jossey-Bass™ Publishing. All quotes attributed to authors.

Lori Schwind

The corporate social responsibility industry is starting to draw criticism for not being … responsible. Questions are being asked about how companies elevated to “best citizen” status get there in the first place, as a blog entry in today’s Christian Science Monitor points out.

Writer Christine Arena notes that “to an increasing number of observers, the transparency (of how corporate responsibility leaders are crowned) seems elusive – as does a clear indication of what the CSR industry stands for.” She notes that numerous companies with significant blemishes and faults nevertheless win recognition as corporate citizenship leaders, including Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, ExxonMobil, Chevron and Monsanto. She also notes that many organizations offering CSR rankings rely on financial support from the companies being ranked.
This is no reason, of course, to jettison efforts to hold companies accountable for their performance and to reward and punish companies accordingly. It signals, however, that the CSR industry needs to come of age and needs to be honest with itself about its shortcomings and opportunities for improvement.

In the realm of CSR, there is no counterpart to the accounting profession’s generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP). There’s no equivalent to the International Standards Organization, whose ISO 9000 (quality) and ISO 14000 (environment) requirements are universally recognized as gold standards.

Efforts are being made in the area of CSR, and the guidelines of the Global Reporting Initiative might yet attain such status. Now, however, companies often feel free to pick and choose which guidelines they’ll select and which they’ll ignore in reporting on their CSR performance.

It’s a growing issue, and until it is better addressed, it will hamper efforts to ensure that companies are held accountable for corporate social responsibility performance.

What do you think?

Peter Faur, RightPoint Communications Inc.

March 16, 2010 — Jeffrey Hollender, co-founder of Seventh Generation (and a keynote speaker at the recent  New Models of Social Responsibility Communitelligence Summit) unveiled a new book today designed to offer strategies to help the next generation of businesses win with sustainability in the marketplace.

The release, posted to CSRwire, states: “Industry heavyweights like IBM, Nike and British merchandising giant Marks & Spencer to emerging dynamos like Linden Lab and Etsy — are winning customers and profits by:

• Taking on a cause. Revolutionary responsible companies believe that what you stand for is far more important than what you sell. When Organic Valley organized itself around a mission that mattered — saving the family farm — it sparked employee’s imaginations and became a magnet for powerful partners. The result: it’s now the nation’s second largest brand of organic dairy products.

• Daring to wear the see-through. To be a truly responsible company, you can’t be opaque. So the Danish pharmaceutical Novo Nordisk, the world’s largest maker of insulin, invites animal welfare activists to tour its labs and improve its protocals for animal experimentation. The drug maker understands that by acting transparently, it stands a better chance of turning critics into collaborators.

• Scaling innovation. Green marketing campaigns don’t cut it anymore; insurgent good companies focus on innovation rather than reputation. Nike harnesses the creativity of its designers through the Considered Index, which rates the ingredients for each product it uses and suggests more sustainable alternatives.”

The release goes on to say that many more actionable strategies from the book will help businesses large and small win the race to the future. I don’t know about you, but I can’t wait to get my hands on a copy. The book, “The Responsibility Revolution: How the Next Generation of Businesses Will Win” is published by Jossey Bass. Cost is $27.95.

Look for a recap on the book from me the immediate future.

Lori Schwind

As I mentioned in my last blog entry, Paul Hawken, already 25 years ago, was working with themes that have sustained his career for, well, a quarter of a century. I’m particularly impressed that he saw the drive toward building quality into products, to reduce energy, and to succeed by providing exceptional customer service.

This spring, Hawken gave the commencement address at the University of Portland. These excerpts show what he’s talking about today. I can’t think of a better challenge to be laid down for those who care about corporate citizenship:

Class of 2009: you are going to have to figure out what it means to be a human being on earth at a time when every living system is declining, and the rate of decline is accelerating. Kind of a mind-boggling situation… but not one peer-reviewed paper published in the last thirty years can refute that statement. Basically, civilization needs a new operating system, you
are the programmers, and we need it within a few decades….

There is invisible writing on the back of the diploma you will receive, and in case you didn’t bring lemon juice to decode it, I can tell you what it says: You are Brilliant, and the Earth is Hiring. The earth couldn’t afford to send recruiters or limos to your school. It sent you rain, sunsets, ripe cherries, night blooming jasmine, and that unbelievably cute person you are dating. Take the hint. And here’s the deal: Forget that this task of planet-saving is not possible in the time required. Don’t
be put off by people who know what is not possible. Do what needs to be done, and check to see if it was impossible only after you are done….

When asked if I am pessimistic or optimistic about the future, my answer is always the same: If you look at the science about what is happening on earth and aren’t pessimistic, you don’t understand the data. But if you meet the people who are working to restore this earth and the lives of the poor, and you aren’t optimistic, you haven’t got a pulse. What I see everywhere in the world are ordinary people willing to confront despair, power, and incalculable odds in order to restore some semblance of grace, justice, and beauty to this world. The poet Adrienne Rich wrote, “So much has been destroyed I have cast my lot with those who, age after age, perversely, with no extraordinary power, reconstitute the world.” There could be no better description. Humanity is coalescing. It is reconstituting the world, and the action is taking place in schoolrooms, farms, jungles, villages, campuses, companies, refuge camps, deserts, fisheries, and slums….

The first living cell came into being nearly 40 million centuries ago, and its direct descendants are in all of our bloodstreams. Literally you are breathing molecules this very second that were inhaled by Moses, Mother Teresa, and Bono. We are vastly interconnected. Our fates are inseparable. We are here because the dream of every cell is to become two cells. And dreams come true. In each of you are one quadrillion cells, 90 percent of which are not human cells. Your body is a community, and without those other microorganisms you would perish in hours. Each human cell has 400 billion molecules conducting millions of processes between trillions of atoms. The total cellular activity in one human body is staggering: one septillion actions at any one moment, a one with twenty-four zeros after it. In a millisecond, our body has undergone ten times more processes than there are stars in the universe, which is exactly what Charles Darwin foretold when he said science would discover that each living creature was a “little universe, formed of a host of self-propagating organisms, inconceivably minute and as numerous as the stars of heaven.” …

Ralph Waldo Emerson once asked what we would do if the stars only came out once every thousand years. No one would sleep that night, of course. The world would create new religions overnight. We would be ecstatic, delirious, made rapturous by the glory of God. Instead, the stars come out every night and we watch television….

This extraordinary time when we are globally aware of each other and the multiple dangers that threaten civilization has never happened, not in a thousand years, not in ten thousand years. Each of us is as complex and beautiful as all the stars in the universe. We have done great things and we have gone way off course in terms of honoring creation. You are graduating to the most amazing, stupefying challenge ever bequeathed to any generation. The generations before you failed. They didn’t stay up all night. They got distracted and lost sight of the fact that life is a miracle every moment of your existence. Nature beckons you to be on her side. You couldn’t ask for a better boss. The most unrealistic person in the world is the cynic, not the dreamer. Hope only makes sense when it doesn’t make sense to be hopeful. This is your century. Take it and run as if your life depends on it.

Peter Faur, RightPoint Communications Inc.

Twenty-five years ago, I edited Enterprise, an employee publication for Southwestern Bell Corp., which at that time was newly independent from the mother ship of AT&T. Ironically, years after the government split the Bell system apart, Southwestern Bell became so strong that it bought almost all the old pieces of AT&T, including AT&T, and renamed itself AT&T. That’s a story for another day, however.

At the time, Southwestern Bell, as a newly independent company, turned to a number of management experts and thought leaders for advice and counsel. One of them was a young Paul Hawken, who had just written a book called The Next Economy and had founded Smith & Hawken five years earlier. Just recently, Smith & Hawken announced it was going out of business, but it had a good run. Over the years, Hawken himself has continued to be respected as a thinker and innovator in sustainabilty and environmental responsibility.

Today I want to share some of the thoughts Hawken brought 25 years ago to Southwestern Bell. In my next post, I’ll share some of his more recent thinking. It’s interesting to see how a thought leader like Hawken can find a theme early in his professional life and then grow personally and professionally with it over the years. Here is Paul Hawken, circa 1984:

For the past 100 years, we, as a society, have been developing our motor skills. For the next 100 years, we will be putting the nerve system in place as we turn from a mass economy to an informative economy.

From 1880 to 1973-74, we experienced what I term the mass economy, in which we developed our manufacturing capabilities. During each decade of that period, we escalated our use of fossil fuel to produce goods for the masses. And we were successful.

But since 1973, the cost of energy in real terms has gone up, and wages in real terms have gone down. Therefore, we have had to make a choice – to use less energy or continue to consume. We are changing rapidly, entering what I call the informative economy.

This new economy is characterized by an emphasis on design, utility, knowledge. It is more human in that it stresses service, morale and understanding.

And it is a consumer-led change. For many years, Americans assumed their wages always would continue to go up. Their purchase patterns reflected this.

Now Americans are emulating Europeans, who have seen their economies wiped out every few decades by war. Europeans are cautious consumers. Americans are becoming much more cautious and are demanding quality. We may have less, but it will mean more to us.

This change in consumer attitudes has a big impact on an industry (like telecommunications) that is being deregulated. Your industry will have to satisfy the selectivity of the market.

One way you are doing this is the introduction of technology such as fiber optics. Such technology uses fewer resources but possesses more intelligence. This is key in the informative economy. The phone system will become a nervous system that thinks.

There are certain problems involved in this transition from the mass to the informative economy. There will be high capital costs, the liquidation and breakup of large corporations, a contraction of government and the elimination of the middle man.

But overall, the shift to the informative economy presents a tremendous opportunity for entrepreneurs who can see the change and take advantage of it.

I read Hawken’s words today and am very impressed with how much he got right. What are your thoughts?

Peter Faur, RightPoint Communications Inc.

The Competitive Enterprise Institute has put together a series of videos called “Policy Translated,” whose purpose, I gather, is to cut through the fog and simplify major policy issues for Americans. You can see the one on corporate social responsibility here. Go ahead and watch. I’ll wait.

If you decided to skip ahead, though, I’ll summarize. Companies contribute everything they need to contribute to society by being in business. They create jobs, pay taxes, make shareholders wealthier (at least ideally) and keep the economy humming with their purchases of goods and services. Demands for companies to do anything more will be the death of capitalism. Or, in a word, refried Milton Friedman.

This whole line of thinking depends upon setting up straw men that have nothing to do with modern thinking about CSR. No reasonable human is dreaming of the day when corporations will take every cent they make – and then some – and hand it over to social agencies. Of course that would destroy capitalism; who would deny that? But that’s not what CSR is about.

This either/or approach to the discussion of corporate responsibility is tiring after a while. For decades, companies voluntarily have set aside resources to do their part to make their communities better. There’s nothing new about this. And there’s nothing to force companies to do so. Companies may feel pressure from demands for corporate responsibility, but the decision of how to respond to that pressure is theirs and theirs alone to make.

Whenever I see these simplistic critiques, I feel like borrowing the line Ronald Reagan used to disarm Jimmy Carter: “There you go again.” (The issue Carter was attacking Reagan on, incidentally and fittingly for this day and age, was health care reform. But that’s another story.)

If the Institute wants to make a real contribution, it can do better than the “take a swipe” videos it has produced. What do you think?

Peter Faur, RightPoint Communications Inc.

In all the coverage of General Motors’ problems in recent days, we haven’t seen much about the company’s record of social responsibility. With all the issues of debt, the health-care burden carried by the company, and its difficulties in a crowded supplier market, social responsibility concerns often fade into the background.

Interestingly, though, at least one voice has risen up in praise and appreciation of GM. The Washington Informer, and presumably other African American newspapers, carried an article today by William Reed of Black Press International. Reed calls attention to the long history of GM in working with, employing and supporting African Americans and indeed black people in many parts of the world, including South Africa.

Reed points out that in 1971, GM appointed the first African American to the board of a Fortune 500 company. That appointee, the Rev. Leon Sullivan, became internationally famous for developing the Sullivan Principles, which challenged U.S. companies with operations in South Africa to treat their black employees equitably and fairly. At the time, GM was the largest U.S. employer in South Africa. GM followed the principles in South Africa, and eventually 125 U.S. companies within operations in the African nation followed suit.

Of the companies that adopted the principles, at least 100 withdrew from South Africa as it became apparent that the government would not readily change its apartheid policies of segregation and discrimination. Certainly the economic blow of having so many companies leave contributed to the eventual overturn of these policies. GM and Rev. Sullivan were squarely in a leadership role on the issue.

In his article, Reed also lauds GM for other initiatives:

“It was GM that provided buses to transport people to the Poor Peoples’ March on Washington. Since the early 1970s, well ahead of other companies, General Motors has gone the extra mile to make sure the American dream was achievable for all Americans. Under the guidance of Sullivan, in 1972 GM became the first auto company to launch minority dealer and minority supplier initiatives. It spent $2.5 billion with people of color and women-owned suppliers in the U.S., and had full-time management focused on supplier diversity.”

Reed calls upon African Americans to rally behind this company as it emerges from bankruptcy and seeks a new competitive footing. If this happens, GM could realize a substantial reward for all the good work it has done over the years. For those who doubt the importance of building strong relationships through responsible action, perhaps this will be a lesson.

Peter Faur, RightPoint Communications Inc.

Recently the news media was all a twitter about billionaire movers and shakers getting together to discuss the increasing need for philanthropy in the U.S. and abroad. Bill and Melinda Gates, Oprah Winfrey and Warren Buffet were alleged to be attending the secretive meetings. Personally, I was heartened to learn that humanity was top of mind for global leaders because if there ever was a time to lead and address need, certainly, that time is now.

We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.

If your organization has been sitting on the side lines waiting for a better time, a better place, it’s time to move off the fence. Starting a community based program (aka corporate philanthropy program) would be a good place to start. If enough companies birthed mini-versions of Buffet and Winfrey-like programs, the world would be a vastly different place. Why not start now?

To get started, I’ve outlined five simple D’s to create an A-level program that would do any company proud. To begin:

Define your company’s purpose for the program. Start by asking and surveying employees: what do we want to accomplish? What should the purpose be for the program? What value can the organization uniquely bring to the world/state/region/city that would make a difference? What needs should be addressed? Where we can be of value? What matters most to us? Then whittle the ideas down to the top 5 or 10 for consideration and exploration.

Discover your passion. Once you’ve defined what matters most to your employees, discover all you can about each need or topic. Ask employees to discover: who currently addresses this need? Can we collaborate with them? Ask them to discover what programs are addressing these needs and why they are successful? Have them talk to groups about their experiences. Inquire about their strengths. Their successes. What worked? Why it worked and how it worked? What did they learn from this experience? What did they value most? What value to do they continue to bring to this need? Stay away from weaknesses. Focus solely on strengths-based results. Only by understanding what works and why it works can we mirror and replicate success…Choose to focus on creating success with your program.

Dream your passions into life. Now that you have a handle on what you wish to create, dream about it. Imagine the answer to this question: It’s five years out and the New York Times is interviewing your company for a story about your corporate philanthropy program. What successes would you play up? What successes were most important to you? How did you make a difference? Where did you address the greatest need? How did you do that? What was most effective? Play with these questions in your mind…Consider: What if we …..? Imagine if we….? How could we? Dream big. Let your imagination lead the way. When we dream, we shift our minds from limitation-based thinking to the unknown where we can freely explore new avenues of possibility. Play with your dreams and see what forms. Then follow your company’s heart to the place that resonates best with your organization’s voice and mission.

Design a successful process. Once you have your dream established, it’s time to design a system to implement and execute to it. Take your dream and make it real by putting a foundation to it and processes in place. Make it real and tangible. Let your employees determine the processes and foundations. Invite collaboration and knowledge sharing. When employees are invited to participate in ventures that matter to them, productivity, morale and success increases exponentially.

Deliver a program that makes a difference in the world.  Implement your vision with the utmost compassion and of course, passion. Once your organization has a handle on its strengths, host your own mover and shaker meetings with other like-minded organizations to share best practices so that the circle can begin again.

Lori Schwind