Beyond the brand icon model
To anyone involved in brand-building, it’s pretty clear—if not shockingly obvious—that we’re in the midst of a tectonic shift in the nature of brands. One sign of this upheaval is that slowly but surely, the glory days of the brand icon model are drawing to a close. Everywhere you look, famed icon brands are increasingly isolated, or in danger of toppling from their pedestals. Yet, while this is certainly bad news for those brands affected, it’s by no means the end of brands, or of great brands.
Icon brands point backward, not forward
What’s evident is that the icon brand model wasn’t made for the new market landscapes now emerging. For decades, the “brand-as-icon” was the ideal, the brand raised aloft to be revered, commanding rapt attention and radiating context from atop its pedestal. In today’s flattish, interactive world, however, icon brands point backward, not forward. A brand that sets itself high above customers separates itself from customer input, energy and direction. It can easily set itself up for a fall.
Pedestals lock you in place
Note, too, that pedestals lock you in place. Thus, it’s no surprise that icon brands are now often being outpaced by customers. Customers have dozens of brand choices, and can create their own brand value via collaboration, co-creation and social networks. At the same time, once-dominant icons are being out-innovated by upstart players who thrive on customer connections. These new firms can deliver new forms of brand value in weeks, not decades.
Some icons will shatter, but most will survive
In the present seismic turmoil some notable brand icons will hit ground and shatter. But many more will realize that there’s little advantage to being perched on a pedestal in the first place. (Indeed: being on the pedestal is part of the problem.) Brands can redirect themselves in mid-air and land safely on brand platforms, a far better foundation.
From brand icon model to brand iteration model
What we’re witnessing is a monumental change in brand models and brand paradigms. Brands are migrating from the lofty icon model to a customer-grounded brand iteration model. The latter is characterized by the ability to rapidly prototype, test, and iterate new brand initiatives to deliver new forms of customer value. The brand appears as a value stream, rather than an object. Brand program iterations enable brand pacing. They also can produce multiplier effects because they’re structured as architectures of participation. They can tap into customer intelligence and energy to create new brand initiatives from below.
Brands focused on iterating customer value won’t need to preen themselves as icons. They’ll be too busy creating customers.
A dynamic platform strategy plus robust brand iteration is quite in evidence here.
More vital and less iconic
The current challenge for icon brands is to get off their pedestals and get down to business. The brand icons that manage to survive will be those that reinvent themselves to be more vital and less iconic. In fashion, Coach has shown a way forward from its iconic plain leather purses. The ultra-plaid-iconic Burberry, once hit hard by the anti-icon “chav” embarrassment, faced a more daunting task, but has transformed itself into a powerfully nimble brand, especially through social media.
From timeless icons to timely iteration
On another front, Apple exemplifies the shift from timeless icons to timely iteration. Apple is vigorously reinventing itself (and its customers) out of the traditional computer business, music business, phone business and publishing business. Ever notice how Apple seems to make things happen while its iconic competitors sit dumbly on their hands?
There’s a reason why most “icons” are symbols of the past. Maybe Apple is on to something.
Iconic brands and iconic brand experiences
Today we create brands as experiences, not as fixed objects. We don’t simply program a brand experience as “iconic” and then walk away. We monitor every aspect of it and change it often, curating it rather than sticking it on a shelf. It’s a hands-on experience from the customer side and from ours, iterative in every respect. The “iconic” brand experience is never allowed to become an icon.
Create iconic customers instead of iconic brands
As a brand builder, if you still wish to create the iconic brand (pedestal and all), be aware that iconic brand mechanisms (especially those of the top-down, command and control variety) often impede brand innovation at the customer level. The iconic approach comes with a rigid icon attitude that resists change, plus a full-body cast that minimizes customer touch.
Personally, I think we’d all be better off if we tried to create iconic customers instead of iconic brands. That approach puts brands on the right footing. We position customers to win, and win with them—pedestals be damned.
Top photo: Andreas Tille, Wikimedia Commons
July 29th, 2006 at 8:25 am
turning the customer into the icon is understood in my sector (Scotch Whisky). Johnnie Walker’s ‘keep walking’ brand positioning is saying this brand is the brand for the executive business guy on the move (upwards). Thats not backward looking ‘hills and heather’ iconography. Old brand distillers are keeping their established brands locked down so to not alienate what has worked (Single Malt Glenfiddich – No. 1 in the world) while launching a new brand (http://www.monkeyshoulder.com/) to talk to the younger consumer.
But still the industry is stuck in the past as much as any sector could be. They have such a global dominance they can remain profitable even while vodka’s, wine and bourbon snap at their heels
July 30th, 2006 at 7:14 pm
Even in a market as well defined as Scotch Whisky, I would think there’s still some new territory for creating an “iconic customer” that’s more than a brand symbol (Johnnie Walker) or a status symbol (generic executive), even though those have proven very powerful. I’d be thinking of whisky as an “enabler of superior personal context,” where the brand is more a proactive tool than a symbol. This might be something along the lines of:
“iPod” is to “music lover” as “brand X whisky” is to “_______.” The idea being that the brand actually enables a higher level of expression/fulfillment/being, which is what makes the customer “iconic.” With whisky you can’t really do this via the product proper (though the illusion is bracing), so the brand programs would need to do the work “off bottle.”
Along same lines, I don’t know if any distiller is doing much with brand platforms, where the platforms offer a directed customer experience that other distillers–and competing vodka’s, rum’s, etc.–can’t match. That would be one way of using the iconic customer as a competitive weapon.
I would think that at some point, the biggest threat to Scotch Whisky will not be another spirit, but someone who reinvents the drinking customer, however that plays out.
July 31st, 2006 at 12:32 am
Brian I think we are basing both our brand and the very physical fabric of that brands distillery or ‘shrine’ (which we are building from scratch) as such a tool that allows the customer to become the iconic customer. By building the brand around a club of 1250 commited founders, who are consumers who commit to the cost of making, or paying for, 50 years of ‘their own’ whisky we have started on this path.
Experience (both in the mind and physically by visiting or even becoming a whisky maker at a whisky school) and individual expression exist already, in spades, in our club which has reached 300 members in over 30 countries. Even more interesting for such a ‘leap of faith’ starter in our industry is the loyalty that comes from opening up the whisky brand experience in such a way; It is both significant and surprising.
March 28th, 2008 at 1:42 pm
Hi, can you clarify what the “brand iteration model” is? are these models referrred to in any academic sources
March 29th, 2008 at 12:58 pm
romy — A brand iteration model breaks the brand into multiple value streams, all on a much smaller scale than an overriding brand icon, which is typically a symbolic monolith. These streams are created as value prototypes that can be co-created with customers, and iterated as necessary to create more value. Think of it as lots of brand value initiatives that are close to the customer, rather than a top-down brand idea broadcast via advertising.
Look at the Toyota Scion website for a glimpse at how this model works. The brand iteration model is more about building a brand culture from the ground up.
I’ve seen no reference to brand iteration models in academic research. Most research I’ve seen is still geared to very old-fashioned brand models.