Learning From 'Cool' Brands

Lucky enough to stay in one of those trendy boutique type hotels over the recent bank holiday weekend, the type you like ‘cos it doesn’t remind you of your grandmother’s house, there is a noticable absence of dado rails and porcelain ornaments like which your mother’s obsessed with and they understand the simple pleasure in wooden flooring.

In the room was a glossy book on cool brands.  It was there because the chain was included.  It was a pretty useless read, just like its elder sibling on ‘superbrands’.  Then, right at the back, warblings of a self-styled consultant of ‘hip’ featured an eight-point plan to coolness.  And thankfully this wasn’t too bad.  In fact I spent the entire journey home thinking how I could leverage such points next time I pitched.  Here’s a summary:

Keep It Real – tangible demonstrations of proof of delivery, genuine nature of deliverers
Tell Stories – share around success throughout customer community
Make Things Simpler – simple to compare, buy, find, evaluate
Change Lives – create transformational products fulfilling complex needs
Feel The Difference – don’t just communicate, collude with customers to create offerings
Care For Communities – genuinely do this
Inhabit ‘Experience Ecomony’ – how does your product make an interactive, living impact
Dare To Dream – mesmerise, astonish, inspire, fascinate, immerse, transform