Episode 144: Transcript

Attention = Currency: Legendary Brand Building

Speaker 0 00:00:04 Make It Right. The manufacturing podcast
Speaker 1 00:00:10 As a leader of a manufacturing company, how do you see your role? Is it to drive the financial success of the business by keeping an eye on the bottom line, attracting more business, inspiring your workforce, or being the Oracle with all the answers. Are you focused on the internal part of your business or are you looking outward at how others see you and your brand this week on the Make It Right podcast, we look at how companies can build irresistible brands that attract customers by showcasing what makes them special and worthy of that customer loyalty. And it all starts with the leader and creating big little legends. Our guest is a former broadcaster, turned international speaker and author who has worked with such brands as Apple, cat, and Lexus. I’m Janet Eastman, Kevin Snoop, and I are pleased to have Gair Maxwell as our guest. Welcome to the show Gair.
Speaker 2 00:01:05 Great to be here, Janet, all the way from London, Ontario to, uh, Ottawa, to Thailand, where Kevin is in Bangkok, where I heard rumour has it that one night in Bangkok makes a hard man. Humble. Is that still true? Oh, well I’m not a hard man, so I wouldn’t know about that, but I’ll work on being humble. Well, I’m, I’m delighted to be here, Janet, Kevin, and I’m fascinated to know where you’re going to take this conversation to be honest.
Speaker 1 00:01:35 Well, I’m curious about, um, creating legends and we’re talking manufacturing here right here. So how do you create a legendary manufacturing company?
Speaker 2 00:01:50 Well, that’s, that’s a great kickoff question. Uh, go, go, go right for the throat, right, Janet.
Speaker 1 00:01:57 Well, you know, well, we might as well,
Speaker 2 00:01:59 It starts, I think it starts with first of all, from a leadership perspective, I love what you said, Janet, about leadership because in my view and considerable experience on this topic, leaders, I think failed to understand that what is brand and its significance in terms of their, whether it’s a manufacturing enterprise or a service enterprise, it really doesn’t matter because what happens is oftentimes you’ll see it’s the most misunderstood and unleveraged asset on the balance sheet. Let’s just talk, is it cost versus investment here? And how does this all play out and manifest itself? And why I zeroed in on the study of legends, like I’m fascinated by the enduring appeal of legends, where did they come from in the first place and, and, and all, is there something from that intangible, invisible force that could influence buyer behavior in your favor? If you’re a leader of a manufacturing company, when you strip it all down, what are you looking to do? How do you influence buyer behavior in your favor? And does that make sense, Janet?
Speaker 1 00:03:17 Well, I’m thinking that just leads me to why do brands team up with sports heroes and actors and whatever, because they’re trying to connect the brand with the legend because they don’t have their own legend.
Speaker 2 00:03:32 Exactly. So it’s guilt by association. Okay. That’s, that’s how that works. If you want to make someone famous, who’s not famous. Stick them next to Alice Cooper and that’ll do it right there. Okay. But here here’s a universal way that we can enter into this. So I’ve got a, a great manufacturing case study to share with you, Janet. Cause when you, when you invited me on, I thought here I, and I could give you many examples from the world of manufacturing, but I think it helps if people recognize there’s a universal aspect to that, which is legendary. You can go back to King Arthur, you can go to Robin hood, you can go to JFK MLK, you can go. You just mentioned Janet sports heroes, Michael Jordan, LeBron, they go Wayne Gretzky and, and sad to see that Walter, his father just passed away, but Walter became a legend in his own.
Speaker 2 00:04:30 Right? So one of the examples I use when I speak to CEO groups and executive groups all over North America and the different parts of the world is it doesn’t matter whether it’s a product, a service, an industry, a person, a place here’s a place. And I know Kevin from the United Kingdom, uh, would be very familiar with this place. Um, it looks like St. Andrew’s the old course in Scotland and how many golf courses are there on planet earth. Janet, I’m going to throw out the number 26,000 plus. That’s basically around the number. Okay, great. Well, how many golf courses on planet earth are truly considered legendary? And you in St. Andrews is always in the top three, along with Augusta national and pebble beach. And so I’ve been very lucky on, um, uh, a few years ago on a speaking tour in the United Kingdom, they put me up at a bed and breakfast.
Speaker 2 00:05:33 Now, I don’t know if viewers can see this on the screen, but we’re going to give it a shot. The bed and breakfast is about a four minute walk from to the first tee over at St. Andrew’s. And so not only did I get to play the old course, but I study human behavior. Let’s not lose sight of what this is about. How do we positively influence human behavior, buying behavior in our favor study behavior? That’s this is what I, I do. And so consequently, this photograph illustrates it perfectly. This is me, Kevin, on all the way from Bangkok Thailand. Can you see, I’m taking the picture of the guy taking the picture. I study lineups for a living folks, and here’s why I’m fascinated. But if you look at the photo subjects on the bridge, on the Iconix Wilkin bridge, are they golfers or non-golfers?
Speaker 2 00:06:37 And I would argue, this is what happens. I know Kevin you’re from Liverpool. You don’t have to be a fan of the Beatles, but if you’re in Liverpool, you’re going to the cavern club for the photo, op the selfie, et cetera, et cetera. This is a manifestation of human behavior working in your favor. And people will say, executives will say, especially if you’re a linear, obsessed executive, you’re going to say, what’s the connection. How, how does this all translate to the bottom line? It’s simple attention equals currency attention equals currency. Is that bridge getting some attention from non-golfers? The answer is yes. How does that convert at the merchandising shop down the road? Of course, it’s, it’s a multi, multi multimillion dollar business, but it speaks to a larger question that I think manufacturers all over the world have to consider. Now, based on that St Andrew’s story, how are we going to inspire people to pull over and stop? Does that make sense, Janet? Like, wait a second.
Speaker 3 00:07:50 How do we actually get people to pull over and stop
Speaker 2 00:07:53 And give us some of their attention? So that’s what it looks like visually, but now how does it happen for instance, in the online world where we can’t necessarily get out and see people in person, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And by the way, the skeptics, the cynics and the crowd who’s ever watching are going to say, well, geez, that’s easy. If you’re St Andrew’s, you got a 700 year old treasure, uh, it’s the Mecca Bethlehem and the Vatican of the golfing world at sacred and Holy ground. It’s easy if you’ve got the brand already built and that reputation already built. And I contend, no, that’s the visual demonstration. Now it comes back to a leadership question. How are you going to do it? Because it has been done. And I could give you countless examples, but here’s one that I know you’re going to enjoy. Let’s and I share this all the time with men
Speaker 4 00:08:58 Just before you dive into that. And I’m guessing you’re going to say no, by having a 1990s website with some nice pictures of machines on it. Is that right?
Speaker 2 00:09:08 You couldn’t be more correct. Uh, Kevin and yes. Uh, you, you were, I think I I’m a Canadian, so I, I tend to be a little more polite, Kevin. So I say my line on that is 2006 is calling. They want the website back. Okay. And you’re gonna see there’s a difference between a glorified online brochure and a 21st century digital story hub. There’s a, there’s a massive shift that has taken place, but let me just show you in that spirit of just getting people to pull over and stop getting people to give us their attention. Here’s a case study. I share all the time. Let’s just suppose. And Kevin I’d be fascinated. Janet, how many people watching today consider themselves they’ve got an unsexy product or service? There’s nothing,
Speaker 4 00:10:04 Probably most of them, right? Like,
Speaker 2 00:10:06 Like it’s like the ugly duckling business, right? Well, no one would care. No one would be interested. Okay. And you’re, you’re operating from a remote location and you’re trying to sell to distant markets. So you’re imagine you’re in the middle of nowhere, but you want to sell to the world, let’s make this better. You’ve got a 10 cent marketing budget. You don’t have money like Apple and Amazon and Starbucks, and Coca-Cola to throw at marketing, but the antidote and it’s the two words underneath. And this is so true of how brands are being built now on relenting action with the tools at your disposal. And the story I share to illustrate this point is these two guys, uh, Harvey Stewart and Darren Mitchell, they’re from Coleman Prince Edward Island. It is Canada’s smallest province. Janet is in Ottawa, has barely heard of Charlotte town, let alone Summerside Coleman is a Hamlet of like 86 people, but that’s where they manufacture live bottom trailers.
Speaker 2 00:11:23 That’s what they do. Yeah. They’re doing live bottom trailers. And a number of years ago, 2010 to be exact because they were in the middle of nowhere in Canada, smallest province, they’re trying to figure out, well, how can we extend our reach? How can we get people to pay attention to us and get noticed? They launched a YouTube channel in 2010, they launched a YouTube channel. Well, that YouTube channel has been steadily gaining ground. Now, when they started interesting to note from a numbers perspective, it’s a $2 million company with about 16, 17 employees. So if you want the case study, there it is. They, they could probably have the whole company meet, uh, around three picnic tables. Well, as of just, uh, at the start of the pandemic, it’s 106 employees and they were doing North of 45 million by the end of, uh, 2019. So what they, what they created, and I think some of the visuals will show it.
Speaker 2 00:12:26 What they created was, uh, uh, a video representation and reflection of their culture, which is work hard, play hard. Do you know that YouTube is the second biggest search engine on the planet owned by Google I’ve studied folks well over 7,500 websites. And I can categorically tell you for a fact, not downloaded from the Google, but this is my own research and my own data. Well, over 90% of B2B companies do not even have a YouTube channel. And if they do, it’s more often than not. It’s the video posted four years ago, when they thought maybe we should do something while traveling,
Speaker 1 00:13:16 How did they actually get enough content on their channel? And what kind of stuff were they showing them?
Speaker 2 00:13:23 Perfect. Well, here, check this out. Janet, how to videos look at this. You just grab your phone, scan a barcode and a how to video it’ll comes up on YouTube, but even more than how to, I’m hoping you can hear this all the way to Bangkok.
Speaker 5 00:13:40
Speaker 1 00:13:48 That’s East coast Canadian culture.
Speaker 5 00:13:51
Speaker 1 00:13:56 Where does this take us? Where does this take us down the road from back when they set that channel up to where they are now?
Speaker 2 00:14:05 Perfect. Here’s and here’s the implications, Janet. So they, like I say, they’ve grown into a $45 million business, 106 employees, but the implications from trout river industries and the fact that they have a digital footprint, that people are paying attention to the implications. Are this for anyone, for any leader, who’s serious about turning their brand into an asset. There is no more B2B or B to C. You can’t stop. You can’t think about that anymore. Any longer. It’s only P to P person to person because people are still connecting with people only. Now they’re doing it over the phone. It’s it’s it’s so astonishingly simple. Once you get, once you bust out of 20th century thinking, so Janet, how about you? And I do a role-play. Okay. You ready for this? Let’s suppose in this role-play Kevin is the easiest way to explain it to anyone. Let’s just suppose so here’s, here’s just a snapshot of the trout river YouTube channel, which is very active and they’re posting consistent original content.
Speaker 1 00:15:19 No, just so that we know that, is it like every day?
Speaker 2 00:15:22 Well, and your broadcasting background, it varies from company to company based on your available resources. I’ve got a client in Calgary. They post video every single day. I’ve got another guy, another manufacturer I’m going to, I’d love to share the story with you. He’s posting an original show every Friday. Okay. So personally, and I’m a practitioner at this. I do this myself. I post every second Wednesday. Right? I’ve got somebody else that does every month. Okay. But it’s Janet. It’s like, it’s the old story from broadcasting. What time is the six o’clock news? Yeah. Yeah. It’s six. O’clock right. So you’ve got to decide what is going to be your publishing calendar with respect to your available resources. Does that make sense? Yep. Perfect. So trout river industries, the reason I wanted to show you this and do a quick role play, let’s just suppose Kevin, that Janet is a truck driver.
Speaker 2 00:16:25 Okay. Okay. Where Janet, where to truck drivers hang out? Well, it probably stops. Exactly. So Janet let’s suppose that you and I are trucking buddies. You’re running, you’re running freight up and down the four Oh one. So am I right? We probably meet somewhere around the Ontario, Quebec border. Every once in a while only. This is the day Janet, that you have one of those new trout river trailer rigs on the back of your cab. What am I going to do? We meet at the truck stop. I see she’s got the new rig. What am I going to do? Kevin, I’m going to ask for all kinds of questions about adjusting the chain, checking the tension. How do you agree? The trailer marketing snobs. We’ll look at that and go. And I know the numbers are too small to go. Well, there’s only 536 views. Are you kidding me? 536 views booze actually watching Janet trucker. Yep. Okay. So I come up to Janet, my friend, Jan, did you have your device handy by the way?
Speaker 1 00:17:36 In fact, I do.
Speaker 2 00:17:37 Of course she does. How about this? So what we’re doing right now, Kevin is the customer journey for any manufacturing or any company on planet earth. I go up to Janet and I say, Janet, how does all this stuff work with your new rig? And she pulls out her device and she says, look, I’ll show you. And then she says the five magic words of marketing, finish the sentence, Janet, I’ll send you the video. I’ll send you the link, the link. I’ll send you the link. Who has said that. Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:18:12 So funny is that when you look for anything now, and you have a question about anything, you go to the Google and usually a YouTube video will come up and tell you how to do it. So what this is telling me, and I’m going to ask if this is the secret sauce to irresistible branding for a manufacturer, is it, get it out there to the people who are using this stuff and they’ll do the marketing for you. Is that the key?
Speaker 2 00:18:47 I, you know, there was a psychic in Canada years ago, Kevin known as Kreskin Janet just pulled the Kreskin card out of the deck. He used to do one of these Kevin. Exactly. You ready for the look of this? Here’s the next slide? And we did not rehearse this. We didn’t. Here’s the strategic question. How do we get the customer to do the marketing? This is one of the biggest strategic questions that business leaders need to be asking. What just happened in the role play with me and Janet, the trucker. Well, it’s clear that Janet had content on her phone who put the content there. Trout river industries did. This is what any manufacturer supply the end user is Janet Kevin, a big time decision maker in an ivory tower office. No, she and I are the troops on the ground. We’re in the Fox hole, but guess what?
Speaker 2 00:19:46 Once she sends me that video and it’s on my device, where am I going to send it? That’s right. And if you want to know the numbers, if that’s why it’s not a linear path, that’s how trout river industries kept getting the phone calls and stills getting the phone calls from heaven. The emails from heaven, uh, the call from Lincoln, Nebraska. I’ve been watching some of your videos, uh, and we’d like to talk. So the brand acted as a giant magnet on steroids generated the inbound phone call or email from heaven. Does that make sense? And that phone call Janet from Lincoln, Nebraska, and there’s been many of these stories. That’s a $2 million order. So
Speaker 1 00:20:35 I want to bring in Kevin. I don’t know whether this reference will make any sense to you at all, but Gary, I’m sure you’re going to get it cause you’re from North America. But remember the ad that used to appear on television and it was the Breck girl and the Bret girl, and she told two friends and she told two friends and so on and so on. And what happened? The visual Kevin was there’s a girl in the center of the screen and she tells two friends. Then there’s three girls. And then they tell two friends. And then the screen just fills up with all these women with beautiful hair. And that’s from, I don’t know, the early seventies, but they got it back then that the customer tells other people and they tell other people. And I guess this brings it all the way around to we’re here again with YouTube and we can all do it ourselves.
Speaker 2 00:21:26 We all, Janet. I just think you completely closed the loop historically. And philosophically word of mouth is still the most powerful form of advertising, right? People trust their friends and their recommendations from their friends. But if you’re a manufacturer and you don’t have a deliberate publishing strategy anchored to a brand strategy in terms of telling your story, like you’re, you’re so vulnerable because of some other competitor figures this out before you do, then you’re going to be playing catch up forever. Does that, does that make sense? Well, in my view, Janet, that’s, that’s, that’s that salient point, right? How does the customer do the marketing?
Speaker 1 00:22:15 And the customer will do the marketing because if they don’t like your product, where do they take their message? They take it to YouTube and social media and they tell you, I don’t like this product. So if you’re not out there telling people why your product is good, there’s somebody out there telling you why it’s not.
Speaker 2 00:22:36 Yeah, excuse me. It’s not to get all emotional over this and choked up over it. But no, it’s it’s, and it’s a story from journalism too, in the sense that you always want to be ahead of the story, you want to define the story. And so, um, I can show you here something real, real quick that I think will really bring it full circle in terms of sorry, tickle in the throat here. But content, one of the things we teach is to qualify as content that has value. It must be either educational, entertaining, informative, or inspiring. It’s not about the ads necessarily, right? It’s people typically don’t like ads, right? However, with trout river industries from Coleman PEI, I think people will find this fascinating, this video here maybe only got 242 views, but you know, who was watching someone from the boring company in Los Angeles, California who owns the boring company? Well, that would be Elon Musk, right? How does Ilan Musk and his company become a client buying stuff from trout river industries in Coleman PEI with a population of 86 people because this levels, the playing field. And in my experience, folks, manufacturers, especially B to B have, have, have incredible opportunity. Now, unprecedented opportunity to leapfrog ahead of everyone else. Once they recognize it’s all about unrelenting action and diving into these wonderful tools that are right there at our fingertips. And the thing is you just have to start, right? Yeah. Kevin.
Speaker 4 00:24:37 Yeah. I’ve been, uh, been working with a few companies recently that a B2B companies that are moving to B to C and there’s a huge jump from appetizing to other corporations. And there is still advertising to consumers or customers or direct yeah. Direct consumers. Um, but in the way that you’re putting it is going to pizza P uh, it, it means that it’s basically the same either way, right? You’ve got, you’ve got a product or you’ve got a company you’ve got a, a location. You’ve got something that you’re proud of. Something that you really want people to know about. And then he shifts the matter about doesn’t matter whether that person is in another business or a person is a direct consumer. You want to be able to get that message out to them.
Speaker 2 00:25:21 No question. And, and Kevin, you’ve just opened up an interesting discourse in terms of the greatest brands in the world. This is what I do. I study the greatest brands in the world. I’ve been there, Nike Ferrari Apple, you know, years ago, I spoke at an Apple specialist marketing conference and with big little legends, what we wanted to do with the book and the program is, is, well, if you’re not an Apple or a Disney or a Starbucks, which many people can’t relate to, how do you become the big little legend who were the small to medium-sized companies that have this incredible magnetic appeal with their brand and literally there’s dozens of them. So when you strip it all down, Kevin, further to your question, the greatest brands in the world are not built on their products and services. They’re built on values, and those values are captured in a story.
Speaker 2 00:26:19 And the story has no ending. Now, let me give you a classic example of, of like best-in-class Nike. Okay. Let’s just use Nike as an example. What’s their three word story that has no ending, just do it. Okay. Now the characters change through the Nike, the evolution of the Nike story. And so since 1988, this is what Nike has been doing. The characters change. In other words, it was Michael Jordan and it was Bo Jackson. And then it goes through, you know, tiger woods, Colin Kaepernick, big leap for social justice into that world Serina, right? I mean, I saw Nike during the election, encouraging people to vote. What happens if Nike decides to get into the manufacturing business in terms of they’re going to manufacture live bottom trailers? Well, the Nike brand transfer over, could they put swooshes on those things? In other words, the values, what are the Nike values? Just do it encapsulates initiative, cutting edge, courage, determination, humans, P to P person to person resonate with values. Do you think it’s any coincidence that Nike’s brand valuation is routinely double their top four competitors combined? Because every, sorry, I apologize. My, my point is while everyone else is talking about their shoes and their products, Nike has had a tradition of telling stories where they don’t talk about the pricing or the products. When’s the last time anyone from Nike gave you a cold call, right? Because we go to them.
Speaker 4 00:28:19 Yeah, right? Yeah. I heard the thing. It’s not a product demonstration. I think a lot of manufacturers fall into this. And if that’s the old idea that you were talking about before with the manual, just taken the old sales manual, being taken or brochure, and then thrown onto, onto the website. Right. And this is a completely different idea. This is around building that story. And it’s a story about the people and the values and the initiatives behind the, behind the brand. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:28:47 You’ve got it. And I just thought, you know, I should, I should explain, well, how does the Nike philosophy, uh, dovetail into anyone in manufacturing? So it starts with this idea right here. Folks, you’re a media company first, and you’re a manufacturer. Second. That’s where it starts. You are now a media company that happens to produce live bottom trailers or happens to do X, Y, Z red bull would be best in the world. At this they’re a media company that happens to sell an energy drink. Nike, likewise media company that happens to sell shoes, t-shirts golf equipment, whatever they want to do. All right. And so, but let’s bring it into the world of big little legends. Let’s bring it into every world that people can relate to. If I said to you, Kevin, and here you are on the other side of the world from me, let’s just suppose, you know, someone who needs a highly niche product, how many manufacturers, folks have highly niche products.
Speaker 2 00:30:00 A lot of them. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So Kevin, now we’ll role play it with you. Let’s just suppose, you know, someone or you have a need for thermally modified wood. Let’s just suppose, which is not commonplace. Is, are you familiar at all with thermally modified wood? Well, I know it, but I don’t know any manufacturers that do it. Right? So they bake it at like four, you know, 4,000 degrees or whatever it is. But in the course of the role-play and us illustrating the customer journey globally, then Kevin you’re in Thailand. You say to me, Hey, we have a supplier that we’re not happy with. We need a new source for thermally modified wood. And I say two words, Kevin, I say, thermal wood, Canada. And that’s all I tell you, but he’s already, Kevin’s already equipped enough to go to the Google. What’s he?
Speaker 2 00:30:58 What’s he going to do punch in Thermo would Canada, the good ghost goes to their home, goes to their website. What do you see right on the homepage, Kevin, right there. You have the video, big box, big box with an arrow. You see what just happened, Jen? Kevin’s already curious. What will a curious human do? Who’s already in the market when they get to the digital front porch or first impressions, you never get a second chance to make a first impression. You know? And so, and so he’s gonna push the button only. What’s he going to see, he’s not going to see the corporate video. You want to make them run for the Hills. First, call it a corporate video. Then show them the video of your stilted employees and their hundred thousand square foot state-of-the-art facilities with their factory trained technicians know, instead what Bob Lennon at Thermo wood Canada’s doing, he’s created a movie trailer, a movie trailer that tells a story that reflects his beliefs and his values.
Speaker 2 00:32:07 And if Nike was about initiative and courage and cutting edge, well, Bob Lennon’s story is more about being underestimated when you’re from the middle of nowhere. And so here’s the guy Kevin you’re looking to shop, and you can see the guy looking the camera right in the eye, and you can see the passion he has for his community for starting his own fire, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So he’s sharing some of his philosophy on this video. It’s about three minutes or so. Okay. Movie trailer kind of format, right? And he’s talking about how they’re they are from, uh, Northern new Brunswick Canada, but yet they’re selling their products all over the world. So it’s a very much a David and Goliath type story. That’s what it is. And all you gotta do. Janet is ask yourself, well, does that increase the odds that a guy like Kevin or anyone else is actually gonna phone him or email him after watching that?
Speaker 1 00:33:21 Well, I think Gary, if we, if we take it to what we all grew up with and probably Kevin, you had something similar, but here in Canada, North America, we had something called the yellow pages. When you were looking for a business, you went to the yellow pages. Well, now the yellow pages is Google and it’s global and you just stick a word in and all this information comes up. So I’m getting the message really clear here, care, because if you’re not on Google and searchable, nobody’s going to find you, or they’re going to find your competitor, right. And they’re not going to go to you, but they may not go to your competitor if they don’t like your competitor’s story, because you’ve told a better, more compelling story that relates to me as a human being,
Speaker 2 00:34:11 You know, and, and this is, I’m so glad you brought it up, Janet, how do I explain this politely? I remember I’m the polite Canadian, Kevin like the yellow pages, dude, ain’t coming back. This is done. This is over. And yeah,
Speaker 1 00:34:26 Your fingers are doing the walking in a totally different way on these, right?
Speaker 2 00:34:33 Yeah. And so, and so what I like to say as well, Janet, to piggyback on your point is that the movie trailer, uh, is kind of like the 21st century digital business card. Do you remember in business? We all used to go to these networking functions at chambers of commerce or, or economic development clubs, and we’d meet and we’d hand out business cards and we clink wine glasses and have some cheese hors d’oeuvres, et cetera, et cetera. Well, what if that all disappears? What if it’s all happening now on LinkedIn? What, what if and, and, and how are you going to put your best foot forward? If you don’t have something that speaks in using modern technology, not buggy, whip, marketing technology, but modern 21st century tools. Because again, it goes back to the power of these first impressions and they can all happen at lightning speed because I, from a manufacturer’s perspective, what manufacturers want to be thinking about is when they go to the website, just how are we going to get them there? Number one. But if they do get there, do we actually increase the odds that they’re going to actually call us, reach out and inquire further? Does that make sense?
Speaker 1 00:35:59 Yeah, Garrett, we’re, we’re very close to time here. So I wanted to just jump right ahead and get some key points, key takeaways from you about how a manufacturer can get started with this. Because I think the point’s pretty clear if you’re not out there on Google telling people what you do and showing them and being what I think the word is authentic. If you’re not being authentic with your customer, whoever that may be, or the people that are on Google, um, you’re not going to get the business. So, uh, I’m a manufacturing company. I don’t have a YouTube channel. I don’t have any of this. What do I do to get started quickly?
Speaker 2 00:36:39 Uh, and this is the answer that people aren’t going to like. Um, because quick implementation is probably the fast track to quick derailment as well. We recommend do not approach this without a strategy strategy before tactics always strategy before tactics, the world has become a mean and unforgiving place right now. So what I just showed you, the thermal would Canada movie trailer, uh, is reflection of a strategy that understands well, first of all, what’s the purpose of the homepage. The whole purpose of a homepage is create connection, inspire trust. In the first month of that release of that video, Janet 18,000 views, 104 shares. But that’s just the start of a bigger strategy because Bob Lennon is a media company. First, he’s a thermally modified wood guy. Second. So what does he do every Friday? This is one of the ones I was telling you about every Friday.
Speaker 2 00:37:43 He does, what’s called the Northern heat report. So thermal would Canada’s brand strategy is around two words, Northern hate, get it. Yeah. And they tell stories. And Bob tells stories about people who are bringing the heat, people who are actually making a difference in their community because he’s a real community guy, because he recognizes that’s. The mandate of the media company is to grow the audience, but Nike’s got their story down to three words. Just do it just for fun. Janet, I’m going to put you in Kevin on the spot. What’s the first words you think of when you hear the word Reebok.
Speaker 1 00:38:31 Okay.
Speaker 2 00:38:32 That’s my point. You see, I can’t an audience anywhere in the world, right? No one knows and no one knows, but here’s my point. Reebok has spent tens of millions of dollars on marketing execution without a strategy you need. Here’s the big takeaway for today, Janet, Kevin, you only have two to six words to own the market with what are your two to six words that tell a story that has no ending that is infused with drama, some sense of drama, not your product or service that you can build a storytelling strategy around and become your own media company. That to me is the optimum way to do this. We’ve had many success stories with clients who once they figured out it was about having an anchor, a two to six word anchor for their story, their brand story, that they could just tell story after story, after story and build what we call reputational equity in the marketplace. This is a long-term plan and it’s for long range thinkers. And if the CEO is not thinking longterm, this goes, this is why I say, this is not, this has nothing to do with marketing, everything to do with leadership. Kevin, if the CEO is not thinking longterm well, who else is in the company?
Speaker 4 00:40:01 Yeah, exactly. And that fits in really clear with our, you know, the aligned strategy where the first part is aim from the heart, right? That’s the whole strategic part. And if you’re not, if you’re not committed to a direction, if you don’t know exactly where you’re going and you’ve got that, you you’re, you feel inspired by it so you can inspire others. Then, then the whole company is lost. When you do have that, you have to, you have to talk a very little because it’s already there.
Speaker 2 00:40:28 Yeah. And then, and then B, because for that reason, it, um, it, it, it’s gotta be something more than just marketing your standard product service, feature, advantage benefits. Everyone’s already done that. And, and if you, you know, if you look around at any competitor, by the way, just so you know, I’m the easiest guy Janet found me online. So I’m the easiest guy for people to reach out to. But I, I do this myself. I think this is important that people know I’m not theorizing on this. Okay. We’ve been involved, we’ve had some clients get millions and I’m talking millions and millions and millions of dollars of free publicity from like a $50 video. Okay. But unless you’re playing in the space, unless you’re willing to jump in and actually commit yourself and your organization to developing a strategy around this, you’re always going to play, follow the leader.
Speaker 4 00:41:27 Does that make sense now, now with, with trade fairs being wiped out by COVID, et cetera, Intercontinental
Speaker 2 00:41:34 Travel, being wiped out, and this is the right time to be investing on the online strategy, online strategy as well. And, um, so it, it, I think everything now is converging. People are getting more comfortable with it, but you’ve also got the time and resources to be able to do it. So, so the key really is to, to get started. Right. Well, and it’s recognizing the, I think the key is to get started on building the plan so that when we do go to launch, we’re launching not throwing spaghetti against the wall. Like, like so many sales tactics are right. We’ve actually B because, uh, we, we see video quite frankly, and video storytelling getting more and more sophisticated with each passing month. Yeah. So this is a month by month game now. Right. But Janet, when are we doing the movie premiere for make it right?
Speaker 1 00:42:28 I got to start on my strategy. I’ll be, I’ll be right on this. After this. Gair, it has been an absolute pleasure having you as a guest, thank you for sharing some really terrific stories with us. And, um, I hope we’ll get a chance to chat with you again.
Speaker 2 00:42:45 I, I look forward to it. Uh, you guys are a lot of fun and, uh, I love the way that, uh, you on this podcast are building what we’re so fond of, which is reputational equity, bringing, you know, solid ideas to a topsy turvy world. So thank you for the opportunity to share this,
Speaker 1 00:43:04 Our pleasure, Gary Maxwell, Maxwell’s an international speaker and author. You can find him at gairmaxwell.com and Kevin Snook of course, is a manufacturing leadership advisor. And he is the author of the bestselling book, Make It Right – Five steps to align your manufacturing business from the frontline to the bottom line. I’m Janet Eastman. You can find, Make It Right on Twitter and LinkedIn, and you can find all our shows on iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, and YouTube until next week. Thanks for listening.
Speaker 0 00:43:38 Make It Right. The manufacturing podcast.