Immersion. Distillation. Creation. Implementation.

The power of branding.

Across the street from my office at King and Spadina in downtown Toronto is a prime site for a painted billboard. Recently I noticed a couple of painters on a swing scaffold creating a new ad for the Apple iPod Nano ...

Wait a minute - they hadn't gotten around to painting the logo or any other brand identification yet, other than the iPods themselves. Yet could this ad have been for anyone else?

No. Apple has done in this decade what Nike was able to successfully do in the 90's. Their brand is so distinctive, so differentiated, that this ad could only be from Apple. And it's not only because we recognize the products.

This is why Apple is so strong right now. A powerful brand, consistently applied. I'm not certain in this new reality of user generated content that any brand will ever again be able to pull this off, because a brand manager sitting in a corporate office doesn't control the brand imagery anymore. It's now a collaboration with the brand's users, and detractors.

I wonder though, will anyone ever be able to use a silhouette in an ad again without us immediately thinking Apple?

The mea culpa post.

I haven't been posting regularly to my blog because:

1) I've been traveling extensively and therefore keeping a very irregular schedule.

2) I've been extremely busy between work and teaching at OCAD.

3) I've become completely absorbed in podcasting since taking over a project for a non-profit.

4) I've run out of topics to speak about.

5) The dog ate my keyboard.

There isn't really any excuse, although some mixture of 1, 2 and 3 above would be a start. It certainly isn't 4 or 5. Posting is like exercise. It's easy to fall out of the habit if you're not diligent.

I'm back on it. Promise.