The Virtual CMO

Building a Brand Story That Resonates with Your Ideal Customer with Michael Solomon

March 04, 2021 Eric Dickmann, Michael Solomon Season 4 Episode 4
The Virtual CMO
Building a Brand Story That Resonates with Your Ideal Customer with Michael Solomon
Show Notes Transcript

In part 4 of our Masterclass Series on Building a Strategic Marketing Plan, host Eric Dickmann talks with Professor of Marketing and Author, Michael Solomon, about Building a Brand Story That Resonates with Your Ideal Customer.

Michael “wrote the book” on understanding consumers.  Literally. Hundreds of thousands of business students have learned about Marketing from his books including "Consumer Behavior: Buying, Having and Being" -- the most widely used book on the subject in the world. 

Michael’s mantra:  We don’t buy products because of what they do.  We buy them because of what they mean. He advises global clients on marketing strategies to make them more consumer-centric, and he is currently directing Nielsen’s revamp of its global Brand Health Model.  Michael is a Contributor at Forbes.com, where he writes about issues related to consumer behavior, marketing, and retailing.  His articles have been cited over 30,000 times, and he is frequently quoted in publications such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, Time, USA Today, and Adweek.  His newest book, The New Chameleons:  Connecting with Consumers Who Defy Categorization, will be published globally by Kogan Page in February 2021.

As a Professor of Marketing (in the Haub School of Business at Saint Joseph’s University in Philadelphia), a sought-after keynote speaker, and an industry consultant, Michael combines cutting-edge academic theory with actionable real-world strategies. 

His latest book, "The New Chameleons - Connecting with Consumers Who Defy Categorization" is available now on Amazon

For additional resources on this episode and from our other episodes in this Masterclass Series, visit https://fiveechelon.com/masterclass

For more information about Eric Dickmann and The Five Echelon Group, visit https://fiveechelon.com/

For more information about Michael Solomon, visit https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelsolomon/

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Eric Dickmann:

Michael welcome to the virtual CMO podcast. I'm so glad you could join us today.

Michael Solomon:

Thanks so much for having me. I appreciate it.

Eric Dickmann:

Now, this is great because, um, as our listeners know, uh, this season, we are doing a masterclass series all around this idea of building out a strategic marketing plan for your business. And in previous episodes, you know, we've covered out the purpose behind building that plan, the target market, your ideal customer profile, product market fit and competitive differentiation, all of those building blocks to help you understand how you want to market your product and service. And I'm really excited today that we can talk with you about this idea of building a brand story that resonates with your target customer. So for our audience, who might not be familiar with you. If you could just take a few minutes and give us a little bit of your background. Um, I, that would be great.

Michael Solomon:

Sure. Well, you know, I never ask a professor to tell you what he does because Uh, but yeah, I'm a, uh, I'm a professor of marketing at Saint Joseph's university in Philadelphia. I'm a consumer psychologist. And I've been studying consumer behavior for a lot of years. And I worked had the opportunity to work with a lot of companies. With a lot of brands to make them more consumer centric. So basically what, what I focus on is looking at what we call the deep meanings of brands and, you know, the idea, Mike. I guess my mantra is. We don't buy things because of their functionality because of what they do. We buy them because of what they mean. And that's where your brand story comes in is it's so important. Uh, you know, time after time is I've worked in different verticals. I've seen that. That many, you know, and, and managers hate to hear this, but consumers think that most of the competing brands are pretty much the same. Every, every manager owner hates to hear that. Uh, but there's always one or two that kind of stand out from the rest. You know, your apples, your Nike's, the usual suspects. And so what I focus on is, is really looking at the brands that successfully tell a story and a story that people want to hear. A story that people want to participate in telling. And that is, you know, as you're. Focusing in this masterclass on strategic planning and competitive differentiation. That is usually the single biggest differentiator. So that's what I do in the process. I I'm a textbook author. I, uh, my book on consumer behavior is very widely used in business schools and, um, And, uh, yeah, I love to, I love to do keynotes and, and talk about why brands are so important to us in the roles they play in our lives.

Eric Dickmann:

You know, I love the mantra that you just talked about, and I really want to dive into that a little bit more, but you mentioned something else that was something we talked about a little on the, on the previous show, which is this idea that there aren't that many revolutionary products out there. Most products are just incremental improvements or changes to what's out there. Do you see this a lot when you're talking with companies, you know, you mentioned the fact that a lot of a. Founders CEOs tend to think that their product or service is so unique and different, but it's not really true. Is it?

Michael Solomon:

It's it's usually not true. Uh, I mean, there are, there are glaring exceptions and those are the real success stories that podcast hosts love to talk about, you know? Um, uh, and, and actually sometimes, you know, the revolution is not in, in the functionality of the product, because like you say, it's usually an incremental improvement. But sometimes the revolution is actually sparked by the users of the product. And they're the ones who, who, uh, not only come up with new uses for a product, they come up with new meanings for a product. Uh, you know, we can talk about examples of that if, if, if you'd like, but. One of the most important developments today is that your, your brand is not something that you create and own. It's actually co-created and co owned by your customers. And a lot of. Business people have trouble accepting that idea. But in today's, you know, wild West internet world where anybody can post whatever they want. You have to be very, you have to really keep your ear to the ground and see what your customers are doing. That's revolutionary with your brand.

Eric Dickmann:

That's interesting that you talked about. Cause in the pre-call we were talking a little bit about something that Walmart did over the holiday season, uh, with Tik TOK, where they actually did a virtual fashion show with influencers and influencers or something relatively new in marketing. I think, you know, we used to call them brand advocates, but it's, it's changed its terminology a little bit. And what that means. But is that the kind of thing that you're talking about with a consumer's really owning the brand a little bit more?

Michael Solomon:

Yeah, well, that's, I mean, that's certainly part of it and everybody's talking about influencers. In fact, some people are saying that their day is already over a certain either pandemic has. Has taken the bloom off the Rose of some of those influencers. Um, to some extent it's all wine and new bottles, you know, like. Brand ambassadors, influencers, uh, opinion leaders over the years, you know, But, but the, the basic idea is that every day people are very. Are today much more proactive in terms of how they relate to brands. And what that means is that they often take a brand and they change the meaning of it. So that it actually, in some cases it expands to a new market. If I can give you a quick example that comes to mind.

Eric Dickmann:

Please do.

Michael Solomon:

You take a, you take a brand like Timberland, right? So everybody knows Timberland. It's a great outdoor brand. Uh, you know, it's all about the wilderness and being at one with nature, et cetera, et cetera. And when you see the ads for Timberland traditionally, it's, you know, it's cocky young, Caucasians, very happy and healthy out in the woods somewhere, you know, or climbing a glacier or something. Um, and then a few years ago, uh, what happened was you had some, I guess we'll call them influencers, um, in the, in the African-American community. That actually took that brand. And if you will hijack that, and this happens a lot, you know what I call brand hijacking where. Uh, where some of these people who were concentrated in urban areas, you know, really never were, were, had the. Opportunity to go out to national parks and stuff. Uh, started to wear the, the, the, the. The clothing and especially the shoes. And it became actually part of hip hop subculture. And so you started to see a lot of, uh, you know, music videos and things like this. Not necessarily sponsored by Timberland, you know? But what that means is so they're essentially these people are, I think my theory is they were making an ironic statement by saying I'm the last person you'd ever see out hiking in the, in the wilderness. Because, you know, my domain is, is the urban jungle, so to speak. Um, but so I'm going to make this ironic statement and in the process. This opened up an entire new market for this brand. And it wasn't something to the best of my knowledge that they instigated at all. But they are smart enough to kind of take the pulse of who was wearing and what they were doing with it. And that creates new opportunities. So there are many examples of that certainly in the fashion area, but, but he, you know, even in B2B settings, And I know you do most of your work there. If you look at the so-called boring place, you know, industries like chemicals and things like that. I'm showing my bias because I usually work in B to C. Um, if you look at something like the chemical industry, You know, according to research, I've seen about 70%. Of the new product ideas and that industry. Came from the customers of those. Chemical companies.

Eric Dickmann:

Interesting.

Michael Solomon:

And there's similar findings. You don't want a variety of engineering, uh, you know, uh, aviation and so on. Um, it's the customers. Who are living with that product and are now putting their own stamp on it. So it's not that they've entirely taken it over. But they are co-owners in the sense that after you release it or sometimes before you release it, in the case of say Lego's or somebody like that, they do a great job of that. Um, these are companies that are not afraid to give their customers a peek under the kimono and, and, and, and not wait to, to release a brand or product before. It's absolutely perfect. And that is that's one of the biggest changes we see now there are, you know, the biggest exception there is Apple because they're famously secretive about, you know, about leaks. Um, but they're the exception that proves the rule. And, and so really this revolution and thinking, I believe started with software because this notion of a beta testing, you know, and getting your users to find the bugs in the program before you launch it before you launched that code. I mean, that's been an enormous game changer for companies like Microsoft. And so your listeners. You can adopt that perspective. I think by, by not look by not keeping your customers at a distance. But rather by acknowledging and welcoming them, uh, to be part of your development team and part of your sales force. And in general, what we find is that, that whenever you get, whenever people have the opportunity to be literally involved in creating what they buy. Their level of engagement with that brand goes through the roof. I actually, we called the Ikea effect. Uh, sometimes because everybody has to build all the bookshelves and things like that. Yolk that I, whenever I've done that, I always have like five pieces left over. I don't know what they are, you know? But the, but the, but what I was like, you know, I'd say is like, if I build a bookshelf, you know, every time I look at that bookshelf, I'm not just seeing a bookshelf, I'm seeing my own sweat and labor. That went into that. And so my level of engagement with that. Is much, much bigger than it would be with just a boring bookshelf and. No matter what product or service you're you're into. I think you could probably identify some parallels that can be very powerful.

Eric Dickmann:

You know, you said a couple interesting things. I want to drill down on one of them. Uh, and I find this a lot when I'm dealing with founders of companies, CEOs is that they get very sort of single-minded in their vision of what their product or service is or does. And in fact, there may be data sitting right in front of the net, says customers are using this product in a slightly different way. If you would explore that. You might have a whole new source of revenue or a whole new direction for this product. And oftentimes they're saying, well, yeah, but I don't want to put all my eggs in that basket, but I think your point is so well taken is that sometimes customers can literally be your best resource in product development or market research to say, Hey, we, we can take this product in another direction that maybe we never even thought of.

Michael Solomon:

Absolutely. And, you know, uh, sometimes it takes a while for this to sink in. I maybe if I could share a quick story with you that

Eric Dickmann:

please do.

Michael Solomon:

favorites, it's a little dated now, but. Some of your viewers may remember the movie office space. It was kind of a cult hit. Um,

Eric Dickmann:

Very much. So, yeah.

Michael Solomon:

yeah. You know, some crazy. And there was one guy in particular, the guy, I forget his name, but he, you know, the one that they put in the basement, you know, they were always trying to. Get rid of them. Uh, he was a really weird guy and, and he had this red stapler. That he used, it was a pretty big. You know, it was pretty big in the, in the plot of the movie. And he was very jealous of the, you know, very guarded about this red stapler. And, and there was no such thing as a red stapler is actually a Swingline stapler. Common grace stapler and some prop guy when they were filming the movie, had the idea to spray, paint it red. Okay. Well, swing line starts, you know, when the movie starts to become a cult hit swing line starts getting emails. And, you know, from customers saying, where can I buy that red staple, that the guy stapler, that the guy had.

Eric Dickmann:

guy had in the movie.

Michael Solomon:

Well, they didn't make one, well, two years. Afterwards two years afterwards, swing line came out with a red stapler. So, uh, you know, it was a mixed bag. It took them a long time to figure it out, but they eventually figured out, you know what people are asking us for something we don't make. But we know that there's demand there because they're asking us. And so they, they finally, you know, it's like turning a battleship, but with a big company, But kudos to them for finally figuring it out. And that red stapler flew off the shelves because people identified with it so strongly. So when, when your customers start making suggestions to you, I'm not saying you should follow every one. Some of them are going to be off the wall. But. Listen to them carefully. And when you talk about data, that's right under your nose. Your employees are often the best source of marketing research that you have, and it's free. You know, unless you incentivize them, which I think you should too, too, because they're in the trenches every day, you know, they're interacting with customers, they're hearing their objections, et cetera. And yet when it comes time to let's say, develop next year's line. How many companies actually go to their Salesforce or to their top salespeople and say, Hey, what are you seeing? And it's right there, you know?

Eric Dickmann:

Yes. Yeah, there's good intelligence. That's right in the company. And may not even be used. I want to talk about something that you mentioned in your book and let me make sure I've got the quote, right? But you talk about how marketers sell vertically, but consumers by horizontally. Can you explain a little bit about what you mean by that? I thought that was so interesting.

Michael Solomon:

Yeah, I'll, I'll try to explain quickly. So, so basically, no matter what business you're in, you're in a vertical, right. We refer to it as a vertical. And when you benchmark your performance, when you come up with new product ideas, You're always looking at your most immediate competition. And there's nothing wrong with that. But it's a very, very myopic view. Because consumers don't care about your competitors. They don't care about your market share. Consumers are buying horizontally. And what I mean by that is they are looking across verticals. So, if you can imagine, you know, I, I don't have a Blackboard or anything here, but if you can imagine a bunch of verticals, you know, and let's, let's say it's a living room. Okay. We have lamps, we have tables, we have carpet, you know, whatever we have all that. The knickknacks, the things that go into a living room. So if you're a lamp manufacturer, You're benchmarking directly against other lamps, but for me as a consumer, I'm looking for a lamp. That is complimentary to what I've bought in other verticals. Like, does it go with that couch? Does it go with that table? Et cetera. So that's what I mean by horizontal buying, which is that what we are, what we're doing is we're, we're constantly assembling a, if what I call a constellation of products. That go together because in our minds that go together. So when you think about a constellation up in the sky, right? The ancient Greeks looked up in the sky and they see these random stars up there. But our brains don't see them as random the way we're wired psychologically. Is that our brains are looking for patterns and connections. And so what was a random collection of stars becomes the big dipper. Right? And then there's a story about the big dipper that. That people that people tell. Well in the same way, when we see some brands together, we assume that there will be other brands that go with that. Because the media, you know, there's a lot of influences on this, but, but let's, you know, one of my favorite examples, hopefully some of your listeners are old enough to remember the yuppie. Right. I don't

Eric Dickmann:

The APY. Yeah, that's right.

Michael Solomon:

But how do we define the yuppie if there ever was such a thing? Uh, we define the yuppie largely in terms of what he or she owned. And it wasn't just in one category. It was, uh, it was a Rolex. It was, you know, playing squash. It was, uh, Berberi and Brooks brothers and, and Brie and white wine and on and on. So you'll notice, you know, if I give people that descriptor, if I say here's a person who actually uses these, you know, we've done a kind of an inventory check of what they're using. A lot of people would say, Oh, that's a yuppie. And. And that makes perfect sense to consumers because no matter what, you know, what your social identity is, There's a lot of things that go along with that. So music is a great example. If you look and I actually, years ago, I did some work with back when MTV used to really show music videos. Um, I did some work with them and we, we, we actually showed music videos to people, to kids both here and in Scandinavia. Uh, with the sound music videos they had never seen before.

Eric Dickmann:

Okay.

Michael Solomon:

the sound off. And we asked them to tell us what John era of music. Was playing in that video.

Eric Dickmann:

Oh, interesting.

Michael Solomon:

And as you can imagine, they were just about a hundred percent accurate without even hearing. The music just by seeing who the people were, you know, what products they were holding up, you know, a bottle of liquor or something like that. They were able to say, Oh, that's rock that's country. That's hip hop. What have you. Because they are looking horizontally. And so strategically that's I can't tell you how important that is. Um, it can be as simple as going to a clothing store like Nordstrom. And buying a, let's say you go to a Nordstrom year, obviously a snappy dresser. I appreciate that. got. Nordstrom and you buy a shirt. Well, if you're a really good sales person, what should you do? You should, you should March you over. Or the sales person should March you over to the jacket, to the blazer section or the suits. Or the Thai section. And we call that upselling right. What it means is, you know, how often do you walk into a clothing store and you see a mannequin with wearing an entire outfit?

Eric Dickmann:

Right.

Michael Solomon:

That someone has put together. Not very often, you know, I don't I'm talk, I'm not just talking about a shirt and a tie. I'm talking about accessories. I'm talking about shoes. Maybe a briefcase. That's a very powerful way to merchandise. Right because it's going horizontal across, you know, The time maker may not be the same as the shirtmaker, but they certainly have a lot of synergy. Together. So when you see even joined promotions, like some, like I remember Louis Vuitton, you know, they had a, uh, a leather version of, I want to say it was a Mercedes, like maybe I think it was Alexis actually. Where, so you buy the Lexus and you get these leather seats and that, that are made by Louis Vuitton. Now, you know, that's not rocket science, but it's two very different verticals. You know, leather goods and automotive. I mean, come on. What do they have to do with one another? Well, it turns out a tremendous amount because the same person who buys a Lexus is likely to, you know, to buy that, that quality of leather. And, and, and on and on and on. So, you know, I would encourage your viewers to, to really come up out of their vertical sometimes and ask themselves, what are, you know, when people buy my product, what else are they buying with it? And you can, you know, at the least you can find some very interesting cross licensing cross-merchandising opportunities because you're not just looking at functionality. Like, you know, if I'm a lamp manufacturer, like I was saying before, yeah. I can go to GE and say, Hey, we should partner. Cause you make light bulbs that go in my lamp. Well, that's, that's great. But I should also go to that couch company and say, Hey, you know, we, we can coordinate an entire and it's like, like you go to Ikea, which I mentioning again, you know, I'm not working for Ikea, but. So, you know, they'll have, and they will do this. They'll have an entire say a kid's bedroom. Right. It's got everything set up or, you know, there's a company. I don't know if they're still around called rooms to go where, you know, uh, you, you basically order a whole room. I think, I think a lot of guys who got divorced and were thrown out of their houses would buy. You know, rooms to go because they, they, they could get a whole room delivered. Um, that kind of horizontal marketing is very rare, but I can't stress enough how powerful it is because it's a reminder of the more basic principle that I'm, that I'm really pounding on here, which is. Walk a mile in your customer's shoes. Don't sit in your office and assume that you understand what your customer does. And furthermore, you know, another corollary to that, and I've seen this in my own work many times. Many managers cater or think about the customer they want to have, rather than the customer, they actually have.

Eric Dickmann:

Oh, yeah.

Michael Solomon:

You know, so, and so in fashion, you know, or, or other products like that, Everybody wants to go after the affluent, you know, 30 year old urban woman, let's say. But in fact, your customer may be a 50 year old woman who lives in the Heartland somewhere. But everybody's got this, this notion, which is why, for example, uh, older people are largely ignored in television advertising. Even though they, they spend much more money than younger people do.

Eric Dickmann:

People want to go to what? Sexy, right?

Michael Solomon:

Yeah. Yeah. And as I've gotten older, somehow that problem seems more, more of a big deal to me. I don't know why.

Eric Dickmann:

Well, you know, what's interesting just to add onto your example, you know, you're talking about rooms to go. I actually have an email from them the other day.

Michael Solomon:

Oh,

Eric Dickmann:

they wanted to create a virtual background for me to be able to use on zoom calls, but obviously it would be all of their furnishings and whatnot that would be in this. So you could create a virtual room using their furnishings and they would do this to you for free. Yeah.

Michael Solomon:

That's that is great. Kudos to

Eric Dickmann:

Yeah. it's creative and taking advantage of the circumstances that exist right now. And you know, everything that you're saying really to me, You know, comes together around this idea of creating a story for your brand, right. You don't just have a product or a service. You have a product or service that fits into a business or a person's life in some way. And part of the story that you're trying to create is how can your product or service fit into, uh, the workings of a business or the workings of somebody's life in a way that adds value and changes it. So. You know, who do you think are some examples out there that you think have really created a fantastic brand story? You know, we're in this age right now where everything is so visual, right? We've all got cameras. Uh, in our pockets, we've got YouTube and Instagram and all these channels. And I see brands taking advantage of this in ways, uh, that are largely different than before. You know, there were newspapers and magazines and radios and things like that. But today you can create such an immersive experience for your brand to really tell that story. Uh, are there some that come to mind you that think do an excellent job?

Michael Solomon:

That's a great question. You know, there's, I mean, there's a lot of ways to answer it one way. I, well, first of all, you know, there was, there was a famous marketing researcher named William Shakespeare. And what would. Shakespeare said all the world's a stage.

Eric Dickmann:

Yes.

Michael Solomon:

And that perspective, we call that the dramaturgical perspective on marketing. Um, I've written about that a lot. And, and what it means is that we are actually like, uh, you know, like attending a play. When we think about. A lot of these situations where we have actors that are expected to say certain things. Um, you know, we have props, we have settings. And all of that is so crucial. Um, so to answer your question. You know, one, one thing to do is to look at some celebrities. And how they've reinvented themselves. Uh, my favorite, my favorite personally is Ralph Lauren. And what I love about Ralph Lauren. Uh, is, I mean, he's does great work, et cetera. But when you think about his brand story and everybody can probably visualize it, you know, you think of. You know, maybe you think of this, this beautiful blonde. You know, kind of waspy couple walking on the beach, in the Hamptons. In white linen with their sheep dogs running around, you know, so it's that

Eric Dickmann:

It's so true. That's exactly the image I get. Yeah.

Michael Solomon:

You know, and, and, but when you look at him, so, you know, he literally invented reinvented himself. So his real name is. I don't think it's a secret is Ralph

Eric Dickmann:

Yes. Yes.

Michael Solomon:

the son of a, of a Jewish house painter from Brooklyn. And not many of his customers know that. You know, so

Eric Dickmann:

roll off the tongue quite the same.

Michael Solomon:

And so he, at some point, you know, has invented himself in the same way. We might say Kim Kardashians has invented herself. You know, that's a whole different brand story, I guess. Um, but this happens a lot with celebrities just by changing their, their name, you know, uh, Martha Stewart. Has got a certain image. Uh, you know, maybe it involves going to jail, but for a lot of people, it's a different image. Um, but you know, she's the daughter of Polish immigrants, you know, she's, she reinvented herself. And you can go on and on and on. Um, you know, even just taking a stage name. Uh, yeah. As many, obviously many singers and actors and other people do. Is part of a way to, uh, to, to reinvent yourself. And the point is that once you create that story, if people buy into that, Then that story is again, co-created by the consumers of that. And so you think of a fandom, for example, if you know that term, it would, you know, people who are just incredibly passionate about some, let's say a TV show, like lost or something like that.

Eric Dickmann:

Yep.

Michael Solomon:

So you think about star Trek, right? So you've got, um, obviously a huge to this day, even though it hasn't been on for a long time. You know, this huge community of people, like, you know, the ones who dress up and go to these conventions and stuff. But you've also got several really well done star Trek movies that were done by fans of star Trek. So they were written. By people who are just, you know, crazy about star Trek. Yeah. Some of them actually, uh, star some of the people who appeared in minor roles in the original star Trek. And so you continue to have this community and you could say the same for star Wars and, and many other franchises like that. You know, Disney understands this very well and on and on.

Eric Dickmann:

Wait. And I think, you know, some of the examples you gave are so good because if you take a brand like a Ralph Lauren or something like that, You can visualize it. And then that extends to the displays in the stores or the packaging or the advertising or the website. That story comes through and sure. When you're selling a brand like that, maybe that's a little easier to create a story around versus a chemical company or S or something. Along those lines. But, you know, there are ways to, you know, say that we're an environmentally conscious company, for example, where we're doing things in a way that is safe for the environment or, uh, what is the, a, the, a sock company. I think that says, you know, for every pair of socks that you buy, we donate a pair of socks, you know, to a, to a homeless shelters or something like that. There are ways to create a story around your brand, really, no matter what it is, you're selling, but so many brands really don't take. The opportunity to do that there. So product centric that you really don't have any idea what they stand for or how those products fit into your culture or your likes or dislikes.

Michael Solomon:

Yeah, you, you, you nailed it. And you know, if I can suggest to your listeners a quick exercise, I've done this many times. Um, sit down, you know, if you're the owner or the president, whatever. Sit down with, I don't know, three or four of your top people. And, and ideally a few of your top customers. And give each one a very simple assignment. Which is, um, imagine that one day your brand comes to life as a person. And you wake up one morning and your brand is sitting on the edge of your bed. And wants to say hello to you. All right, write me a paragraph or two. And describe that person as specifically as you can. You know, gender age, what music do they like to listen to? What are they wearing? What do they like to eat? Whatever, whatever comes to mind. And then. Look at everybody. So everybody has to do that on their own. And then look at everybody's descriptions. So on the one hand. If everybody aligns really well. That tells you something about the solidity of your brand story. Now, if your customers write a description, that's very different than your manager's wrote. That's a re that's a red flag, right? Because it means that that the message you think you're communicating the story you think you're telling is not the story that people are hearing. And so regardless of the outcome, and I'm not saying, you know, this is not a scientifically valid approach. You know, based on what a few people say, but it can really be eyeopening. And what I like to, you know, and I've done this sometimes when I, even, when I've given keynotes and so, or, or seminars. And some managers look at me like I'm from Mars. And what I say to them is if you can't form an image at all, if you can't relate to this assignment, You have a very serious problem because it means that your brand doesn't have an identity, even in your mind. Compared to the competition. You're somewhere in limbo. And imagine if you can't come up with the story, why would you expect your customers to come up with a story? So for what it's worth.

Eric Dickmann:

No, I think that's a great exercise and a very valuable one. I'm going to make sure we highlight that in the show notes, because I think, you know, being able to visualize that so important and it's actually a pretty good segue to the next question I wanted to delve into a little bit, which is how important is an emotional connection when you create this brand story versus, you know, facts and, and statistics and features and whatnot. In, especially in this stage, in it. Day and age, how important is it really to establish that emotional connection?

Michael Solomon:

Uh, well, how can I answer that? The short answer is unbelievably important. Slightly long answer, longer answer is, you know, it took, it took the marketing discipline and I'm including academics. Researchers who do work in this area. It took a really long time, several decades. For many of them to figure out that people don't want facts. For the, you know, and, and I'm not saying facts aren't relevant, but if you look at the way, our brains are organized. Uh, basically, you know, we evolved from reptiles, right. And, and you can kind of, it's like a tree when you, you know, you can look at the rings in the tree to see how we, how it's grown. Um, are the, the. The initial reaction that we have to any stimulus is an emotional reaction. Uh, it's something that's formed in the limbic system of the brain. And so what we really need to do is to create that emotional response, which, which typically then triggers a desire to justify that response. So you want to make people feel. Are good about your brand. You want to arouse the proper emotions, which is a motivator for them to then tune in and say, why did I feel so great about. And that's where they often exp you know, it's like trying to, you know, to someone who's, let's say really into sports cars. You know, you say to them, Oh, well, you know, they say, Oh, well I just, you know, this Corvette, you know, 68 Corvette or whatever, just speaks to me. You know, I love it. And blah, blah, blah. And then when you get, and then when you get into asking them why they start giving you answers like about the, you know, the displacement ratio, I don't even know, you know, the different, the torque and the engine and stuff like that. Come on. That's not why they want that Corvette.

Eric Dickmann:

Right, right.

Michael Solomon:

They may or may not admit it to themselves. But it's purely an emotional reaction. And so it's not just, you know, it's big ticket items as well. That often have this reaction, you know, like, like buying a house, you know, And so to the extent that you can engage memories, emotions. So for example, you know, uh, they used to say, I don't know if they do anymore in the real estate business. Uh, you know, one way to sell a house is to have huge door knobs, uh, uh, handles on the front door. And the reason is that when people open it. Their hands feel smaller. And it reminds them of when they were little and they grew up in, in their own house. That reminds them of opening the door.

Eric Dickmann:

Or interesting.

Michael Solomon:

And you also want, of course, want to have the smell of fresh baked bread or something in the oven. Right? So it's, so even for this very expensive purchase and not just a bobble or a shirt or something like that, I can't, you know, I can't over overplay the, the, the importance of that emotional response. Again, I'm not saying you can, you can abandon facts because. Especially, but, you know, I was going to say, especially with B2B products, but even there, you have these kind of irrational attachments and I'm sure you could speak to this better than I can, but it may be that, you know, you've got five different competitors that are selling you. I don't know, office supplies. But you have a relationship with a rep of company a and you'll buy whatever she tells you to buy. Right. And it has very little to do with whether her pencils are better than the other guys, pencils.

Eric Dickmann:

Well, and I think the whole car industry is based on emotional connection. Right. You know, what's the difference between a, a Kia and a Mercedes, right? They both have four wheels that get you where you want to go. Uh, they may even have similar technology and sure. You can argue that maybe there's better engineering or better features or whatnot, but it's that emotional connection that drives the huge difference in price and the reason that some people are willing to pay it versus some who aren't, because it's, it's all about that emotional connection. And rarely in the advertisements, do they go feature by feature and walk through what's on the window sticker, right? They may highlight a thing or two, but it's still about building that emotional connection.

Michael Solomon:

Absolutely. And again, you know, it, it shows you that in so many verticals, I'm sure. For example, a car efficient auto is probably not going to like what I'm going to say. But it's not that, you know, some cars definitely performed better than others, but there's a minimum level where nowadays, even the cheapest cars are pretty good. And sense, and I'm not talking about whether they're going to inspire envy as you drive down the road. But they're not going to break down very much. You know, and we could say that about computers and phones and many technical products. As well as household products. I mean, you know, these five dish detergents, they're all, none of them are gonna burn your hands off or

Eric Dickmann:

Right.

Michael Solomon:

Bad. But somebody's going to pay a premium, let's say for method, the method brand, because when they look at the, at the really interesting and beautiful package of that method, I don't know if you're familiar with. You know, with the, the, the, the containers that they use. In. It actually has an aesthetic response for a very mundane. Product. And that helps to explain their success. For example.

Eric Dickmann:

Yeah, this is such a fascinating topic because it really makes a difference. You know, we haven't talked too much about a company like Apple, because they're, they're an overused example, but they're overused because they do so many things well, right. You know, Steve jobs was famous for never wanting to get into the specifics of how fast his chips were and things like that. Cause he was selling other things. He was trying to make that emotional connection. It's you know, this is just a topic I think we could spend hours on, but I also, as we're sort of getting near the end here, I wanted to give you an opportunity to talk a little bit about your new book that's coming out, because it's exciting to be able to have a book launch. And we're very close when this episode comes out. I think the book will just be coming live. So tell me a little bit about the book it's called the new chameleons. Correct.

Michael Solomon:

Yes. Uh, the new chameleons, uh, uh, how to connect with consumers who defy categorization. And, and essentially what I talking about there is the reason I use the term chameleons is that that's what modern consumers are in that we change just like chameleons change their colors, you know, constantly we are changing our identities very, very quickly. And each of us has multiple identities. Uh, so what, what that means is it opens a lot of opportunities for companies, but it also presents a lot of challenges because. We, we, uh, we're all grounded in this idea of traditional market segmentation and, you know, Maya culpa. I teach my, my own MBA students. This. Uh, which, which is, you know, the logic is that, that we can't be all things to all people. So we divide our market into these fairly large homogeneous segments. And we find products that will meet the needs of those people fairly well. Um, so, you know, uh, Uh, Henry Ford is famous for saying, you know, my customers can have any color car they want, as long as it's black.

Eric Dickmann:

Right. I remember

Michael Solomon:

And then general motors came along. And they actually invented the concept of market segmentation. Cause they said, you know what? You know, actually just in terms of income, some people, you know, can afford a car. That's maybe got some bells and whistles and others. Camped. And so they came up with this notion of divisions, right? Uh, you know, so you've got Cadillac and you've got Chevrolet and you've got others in between. Um, but today, Each of us is more like a market of one. And we don't want to be placed in market segments. You know, whenever I say to someone, you know, if I say, Oh, you're, you know, you're just a typical member of a market segment. You know, my student makes them crazy, you know, Oh, you're a 22 year old female who goes to school in an urban area, blah, blah, blah. So you're the same as every other 22 year old, blah, blah, blah. Well, they go out of their minds because in, because they're very unique. And the odds are that, that they are because they're sampling lots of different identities. So if I can use a food metaphor, it's kind of like in the old days, you know, you would open a. A restaurant like an Italian vertical or a Chinese vertical, or what have you. But today we're more like, uh, people who are eating at one of those huge international food buffets. I don't know if those will come back after COVID, but. You got the idea where we want to put, take our plate and we wanna, you know, we want to put an egg roll on it and then a taco and, and on and on. That's the way we're grazers today. And so these traditional approaches to segmentation. Uh, are not necessarily as valuable, especially when we have the technology that can literally create a market of one. And so as I'm sure, you know, very well, let's say it's something like Facebook. Uh, you and I can be quite similar. Uh, to one another. But based on, you know, our past behavior and so on, you might click on, let's say a political ad in Facebook, and I might click on the same one, but we're getting slightly different messages.

Eric Dickmann:

Sure.

Michael Solomon:

Based on because you've been interested in the past in social justice issues and I've been interested in the past and something else. And so the candidate is going to talk to you about one thing and talked to me about another. Well, you and I are each a market of one. And so the ability to personalize and customize our offerings, whether it's tech products or fashion products or, or services, that is what people are looking for today. So in, in the book, I talk a lot. About some basic categories that everybody uses. And we don't think about it that are no longer valid. And so some examples are producers versus consumers. Like we were talking about before. Today. That isn't true. Consumers are producers. The whole gig economy is evidence of that. Uh, online versus offline today, everybody's online and offline all day long. And all my students are, while they're listening to me, they're online, you know? Uh, or even something as basic as male versus female. Right. So we, we, our brains like to put people in categories, he's male versus female. Today, especially among younger people, the concept of gender. Is fundamentally being disrupted.

Eric Dickmann:

Yes.

Michael Solomon:

And many people are, you know, I mean, there's a lot of political controversies about this, but the point is that this creates new opportunities. If let's say you're a company that's traditionally made, let's say female products, whatever that means. Well today, you might have males that are more receptive to that. So. In the UK, for example, a high percentage of men wear cosmetics. And there are stores that sell like mascara.

Eric Dickmann:

Yeah, man. Kara.

Michael Solomon:

Uh, you know, uh, there are, there are men who wear man bags, maybe their friends tease them about it, but they carry a man that, well, if you're a hand handbag manufacturer, You, you suddenly discovered a new market. If you're willing to abandon your, your very traditional. Uh, but very strong assumption that you're either this or that, which is what segmentation, uh, encourages us to think about. So I talk about a number of those in the book. And I show a lot of examples of companies that have created new markets for themselves. By actually letting chameleons out of their cages because they're all escaping anyway. And that's how you create new opportunities.

Eric Dickmann:

Apps. You know, we started out talking a little bit about influencers are and what not. And I think there's, there's a lot of that within that community because it's fitting in by being different. And so everybody wants to fit into a certain extent, but at the same point, they want to do it on their own terms. And it sounds like exactly what you're talking about. I will definitely have links to the book in the show notes so that people can find it, uh, when it's available to order a Michael, this has been a great conversation. I think brand stories are so important. And the example that you shared with us today, I think are very meaningful. So thank you so much for spending time with us today. It's been great for our listeners.

Michael Solomon:

I really appreciate it. And I enjoyed it. I appreciate it.

Eric Dickmann:

Thank you again.

Michael Solomon:

Yeah.