Everything Speaks

Here is a video we recently completed with The Collective for a client. Today's entry will be an object lesson. (The video is the object, not me. I would be more of an objectionable lesson, but that's another blog..)

This client is a new "up-and-comer" and like most entrepreneurial companies, they are at the "tipping point" as Malcolm Gladwell would call it, in their history.


The goal was to communicate their product message to the public, but in a compelling way. (Not to say that this is not every company's goal!) But the key to good marketing is not just to relate the product story, but to relate the company story as well. And if you are doing it correctly, communicates the company's culture as well. (Remember our conversation on image versus identity?)


This company has a great story. Vigilance is one of their core values. Isn't that great? We need to create a "story" and not just a commercial. And we needed to use mediums that were viral and "quietly" working behind the scenes. After all, that is how their company works.


Whether or not you like the video, you can see how it relates not just a need for their product, but also taps into the raw emotion one feels when this happens to them. This company's expertise is being able to empathize and understand this emotion of being violated. And you can feel that in the video. While you do not see the company (intentionally) you do feel the emotion.


Now, will this be an award-wining campaign? Who knows. Hope so. But that is not the point. The point is that this company took a risk. Instead of following traditional models for their marketing, they stepped outside the box. BUT NOT outside their box? Make sense?


Too many companies are afraid to let their culture show. they feel that corporate culture is for internal use only. Nothing could be further from the truth. Today's human wants an emotional contact to the company or organization they are buying from or supporting.


Today's lesson? You will win more business by living out your culture in public than you ever will by placing your name on a NASCAR.


Last thing I will say on this topic - most companies that feel that corporate culture is for internal communication and not external are afraid or ashamed of what their current culture is! Is this you?