A Contrarian’s View on Branding - How to See, Think, & Do Different with Ulli Appelbaum
Read time: 3.5 min
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What does it mean to be a contrarian? How does taking a contrarian view help with brand strategy and branding? How can all of us be more of a contrarian?
In this conversation with Ulli Appelbaum, Founder and Chief Strategist at First the Trousers then the Shoes – a brand research and strategy boutique, author and creator of the brand positioning workbook and a set of best-selling positioning method cards, we break down how Ulli became a contrarian and get his take on using that superpower to build winning brands.
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In this episode, we explore a variety of topics:
Ulli’s journey of becoming a contrarian
How to protect the core business while disrupting it
Shepherding the brand from the POV of the customers
Three ways to thrive as a contrarian
Curiosity of a contrarian - hold strong opinions loosely
Learn from failures and don’t hesitate to change your mind
Discussions and stories about Hallmark, Bud Light and Wrigley
KEY LESSONS
How to protect the core business while disrupting it
To Ulli, being a contrarian doesn’t mean just disagreeing for the sake of disagreeing. He defines it as follows:
“Contrarian is not the pain in ass that contradicts, everyone all the time. That's not the idea of being a contrarian. It's a skill. It's the ability to adopt an opposing point of view of maybe what the majority might think.
So if everyone is focused on brand purpose, you're able to step back and say, well, maybe it's not about brand purpose. Maybe there is something deeper going on. I think that is at least for me, the essence of being a contrarian”
So for organizations to adopt a contrarian POV, it needs to look beyond its core business and experiment challenging category conventions. But how do you do that and not risk the core part of the business? Ulli offers a suggestion.
“A company spends 99% of its energy to maintain success, to maintain the way things have worked. You would be crazy if you say, you know what, in the next 12 months, we are gonna risk all of that.
Instead, the bulk of our effort is going to be focused on maintaining our success, but let's carve out resources and a team, or several teams to explore, to look for new ways of doing things to challenge the category conventions, to look at a new way to engage consumers”
This way, you get to continue with the core business while green housing a separate group to look at the world differently to continue growing in new ways. If not, your business will be waiting to be disrupted by others or fail to become relevant in the shifting consumer landscape.
“If you identify a skunk team or a group that you take out of the organization and the regular way of working of that organization, then you can be innovative, then you can be contrarian and challenge all the ways the business has been built without threatening the core business. It's easy when the market is in decline, but more difficult when the business is doing well”
Shepherding the brand from the POV of the customers
One of the topics we discussed was the Bud Light debacle and Ulli’s point of view was that it can be risky to bring personal beliefs to a brand.
“I'm pro inclusion, that doesn't mean that everything I do in my work needs to be pro inclusion. That's a potentially damaging comment I'm making here that can easily be used against me, but it's the reality.
I think in her interview, she (Alissa Heinerscheid, Bud Light Marketing VP) said my job is to bring my beliefs to the brand. No, that is not your job. Your job is to revive the brand, to make it relevant to a broader audience while not leaving behind your core audience.”
It's more about the strategy and then the nuance of how you execute on the strategy.
“It doesn’t matter what political view you have. Is your strategy a bad or poor strategy?”
And in the case of Bud Light, strategically it seemed right, but tactically failed. Ulli recalled a conversation with someone at Budweiser.
“I've talked to a guy who was an insider at Budweiser. Bud Light has been supporting the LGBT community for many years. They just never overlapped the media, and they always were very targeted in their effort. And Bud Light is a very inclusive brand. If you are the market leader, by definition, you are an inclusive brand because you appeal to a broad, um, spectrum of the population. So it wasn't that ‘they took a pro LGBT stand, they have done that 10 years ago successfully, it's how they've done it”
Four ways to thrive as a contrarian
1/ Leave your ego at home
“It is so much about identity politics nowadays, but you know what? Your identity doesn't threaten mine. And what you say about your identity or your opinion doesn't threaten who I am and how I feel about me. So leave your ego at home and try to really understand what the other person is trying to say.”
2/ Assume good intention
“So let's say we have different opinions and that's perfectly fine. I'm sure there is a strong rationale or good reason for why you have this opinion. There are very controversial areas, example the Arabic world versus the western world. Try to understand why the Arabic world thinks the way they do about the U.S. And trust me when you do that, there are 25 good reasons why a lot of them hate the United States. They have their reasons like you have yours.”
3/ Think critically
“Often people confuse critical thinking and criticism. I'm an immigrant. I moved to the U.S. 20 years ago. I absolutely love the U.S. My wife is American. My kids are maybe way more American than I wish they were. I love it here. But looking at some of the policies or the cultural things going on. I love the country, but I don't agree with this. The typical reaction is, well, if you don't like it, why don't you go back home? You know that is the dumbest answer I've ever heard to any form of comment because that shows me you don't understand the difference between being critical, having an assessment and criticizing.”
4/ Practice real empathy
“Empathy doesn't mean accepting and being nice to people who have similar views to me, and then dissing people who have the opposing views to me. Empathy is really the ability to put yourself in the shoes of, you know, that single African-American mom that raises two kids… a liberal that goes and talk to a hardcare Trump fan to understand why they are the way they are.”
Conclusion
Thinking like a contrarian is actually not contrarian at all. In order to build a brand that is relevant and distinct, you have to be seeking alternative points of view, irrational truths and non-standard insights. In order to do that, leaders cannot be seeking validation, afraid of conflict or act solely through their ego. Are you ready to be one?
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