Latest / What is Business Development? / Episode 78: BD Book...Top 3 Tactics from Ulli Applebaum's new book, "The Science of Brand Associations: Win Minds, Win Markets"

Transcript

Episode 78: BD Book...Top 3 Tactics from Ulli Applebaum's new book, "The Science of Brand Associations: Win Minds, Win Markets" · What is Business Development?

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Business Development podcast, brought to you by
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: the Global Business Development Association, delivering the strategies and tactics
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: to boost your career and corporate growth.
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: Hello BD pros, and welcome to the Global Business Development
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: Association podcast called What is Business Development? Hey, let me
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: ask you something. You know, marketing is tough, and there
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: are some overlooked concepts in marketing that are extremely powerful
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: and they're science backed about what is in the minds
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: of your prospect in customers. Wouldn't you like to know
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: what some of those tactics are. Well, today we're going
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: to talk about them. And you may be thinking, hey,
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: this is marketing. I thought this was business development. Well, look,
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: marketing is a key teammate for all business developers. We're
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: all on the business development go to market team. So
• 1:12
  Speaker 2: understanding marketing not only makes you a better teammate, it
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: also helps your own business development functions because oftentimes business
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: developers are applying scientifically proven marketing best practices to be
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: able to succeed. Now, if you want to learn some
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: of those scientifically proven methods, you can get your copy
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: of the Business Development Body of Knowledge at the Global
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: Business Development Association website or on Amazon and that has
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: all of the content you need as a business developer
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: to learn and take the exam for the Business Development
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: Professional certification. Now, let's get back to the show and
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: let's introduce our guest today. Our guest is Uli Applebaum.
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: And Uli is an internationally recognized and award winning marketing
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: and brand strategy consultant and trainer with over twenty five
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: years of experience creating business building brand strategies around the world.
• 2:17
  Speaker 3: Now.
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  Speaker 2: Prior to launching brand strategy and training boutique, which is
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: first The Trousers, then The Shoes Incorporated in twenty fourteen,
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  Speaker 2: he held senior strategy roles at some of the world's
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: top advertising agencies, including Head of Strategy at BBDO Germany
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: and Leo Burnett Chicago, and Global Strategy Director at Fallin
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  Speaker 2: Worldwide and Sapient Nitro. He's contributed to seven Fies and
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: he has award excellence in a number of other award areas,
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  Speaker 2: creating strategies for a number of Fortune five one hundred companies.
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: And he's also the author of multiple books. And today
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  Speaker 2: we're going to talk about his latest work, The Science
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  Speaker 2: of Brand Associations, Win Minds, Win Markets, and this book
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  Speaker 2: helps you address that question of what if everything you
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  Speaker 2: thought you knew about brand building was missing the most
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  Speaker 2: essential ingredient. Well, I can't wait to hear what those
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  Speaker 2: essential ingredients are today. And the Science of Brand Associations
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  Speaker 2: is a science, evidence based guide to the one concept
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  Speaker 2: that silently drives every successful brand, and that's the network
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: of meanings, experiences and feelings living in your customer's memory
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  Speaker 2: and mind. Well, Oolly, thank you for joining us in
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  Speaker 2: our minds today as business developers, and I can't wait
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: to hear about everything you have packed into your fantastic book,
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: The Science of Brand Associations. Early, welcome to the show.
• 4:08
  Speaker 3: Thank you so much for having me, Tony, very excited
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  Speaker 3: to be on your show.
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: Now, Early, I always like to tell people how did
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: you get into the profession you're in today? You have
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: an exceptional career in marketing and wonderful success, But how
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: did you get into that profession?
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  Speaker 3: To be honest, I stumbled into it more than anything else.
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  Speaker 3: I did a bachelor degree in Belgium. I'm German, but
• 4:31
  Speaker 3: I spent my teenage years in Belgium, did my bachelor
• 4:34
  Speaker 3: degree in business administration there and then joined a master
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  Speaker 3: program MBA program, which at the time was very unique,
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  Speaker 3: a European style program where you spent a year in Paris,
• 4:45
  Speaker 3: a year in Oxford, and the year in Berlin and
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: study in those three languages and use the educational style
• 4:52
  Speaker 3: of those three countries. Today every university has an international program.
• 4:56
  Speaker 3: At the time it was very unique, and there I
• 4:59
  Speaker 3: started basically writing my master thesis about just in time
• 5:03
  Speaker 3: production management and uh. Midway through the through the through
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  Speaker 3: this thesis, I think it was at the end of
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  Speaker 3: my second year, I realized I'm way more interested in people.
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: And you know, I would typically read the interview section
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  Speaker 3: in magazines everything that I would be interested in biographies.
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  Speaker 3: I was interested in the way people think and and
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  Speaker 3: you know what behaved, what what what changes their behavior?
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  Speaker 3: You know how what makes them feel certain things? And
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  Speaker 3: I realized that the best place to discover this was
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  Speaker 3: in marketing and slash advertising and more specifically in account planning. So,
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  Speaker 3: as I said, mid mid year, mid mid within those
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  Speaker 3: three years of studying at this MBA program, I told
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  Speaker 3: my my tutor that I'd like to change my thesis
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  Speaker 3: content and is that I'm completely crazy because I had
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  Speaker 3: one year to catch up three years of work, but
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  Speaker 3: I did it, and I was passionate ever since and
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  Speaker 3: ever since. You know, with science, with your own experience,
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  Speaker 3: you learn more and more about people, about what drives
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  Speaker 3: them and all these kind of things. And that has
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  Speaker 3: been guiding me ever since, whether it was in Europe,
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  Speaker 3: working around the world, or in the United States for
• 6:13
  Speaker 3: the last many years. And to be honest, it doesn't
• 6:16
  Speaker 3: matter to me if we're talking about you know, women
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  Speaker 3: washing the hair and the psychology that's behind that, or
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  Speaker 3: if we speak about you know, hydraulic lubricants. And at
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  Speaker 3: the end of the day, it's all about people, their
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  Speaker 3: behavior and what makes them think and what makes them
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  Speaker 3: choose specific options over others. And it's an endless well
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  Speaker 3: of knowledge and insight that you know, probably do this
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  Speaker 3: the next thirty years as well, and keep as excited
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  Speaker 3: as I am today. Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: Well, human drive and understanding what drives humans is critical
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  Speaker 2: for success, not just in marketing but also business development.
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  Speaker 2: So OOLI I'm curious what drove you to write this book?
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  Speaker 3: Well, the interesting thing, Tony is if you google brand
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  Speaker 3: associations in on Amazon, right, if you don't Google you
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  Speaker 3: search it on Amazon, not one single book pops up,
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  Speaker 3: not one single book out of the millions Amazon is
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  Speaker 3: offering focuses on brand associations, and yet brand associations a
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  Speaker 3: couple of people called in and I like it, so
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  Speaker 3: I use the term. It's sort of like the operating
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  Speaker 3: system of successful brand because brand associations are nothing more
• 7:30
  Speaker 3: than the memories you have about a specific offering. And
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  Speaker 3: these memories can be facts, information, this can be experiences.
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  Speaker 3: You know, I went to McDonald's, I interacted with this vendor.
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  Speaker 3: That's a memory that's going to build into my brain.
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  Speaker 3: Or feelings I really like the interaction with you know
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  Speaker 3: that group of people, or I hated the food in
• 7:51
  Speaker 3: that restaurant. Those are old feelings that are associated to
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  Speaker 3: your brand. So brands are basically memory networks, or I
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  Speaker 3: call them association networks. And without that, you don't have
• 8:04
  Speaker 3: a brand because if it's not a trace in your
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  Speaker 3: brain something you remember about it offering, the brand doesn't exist.
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  Speaker 3: It's null. There is nothing there. So this is the
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  Speaker 3: single most sort of like vehicle of meaning of a
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  Speaker 3: brand in your brain that no one has taken the
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  Speaker 3: time to analyze. So I'm going to be honest. When
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  Speaker 3: I first saw that there's no book on Amazon. I thought,
• 8:28
  Speaker 3: maybe I'm wasting my time here, But then I've started
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  Speaker 3: to realize as well that a lot of the thought
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  Speaker 3: leaders I'm following in marketing, a lot of the marketing academics,
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  Speaker 3: the big ones, all use the concept and notion of
• 8:44
  Speaker 3: brand association, but always to explain something else. And the
• 8:47
  Speaker 3: concept has been in play for the last thirty years,
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  Speaker 3: but no one ever decided to curate the existing scientific
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  Speaker 3: and evidence based knowledge around brand associations in one book.
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  Speaker 3: So I made it my mission to be that one person.
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  Speaker 3: So and I said, this book is not my opinion
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  Speaker 3: or my experience. It's really just based on what does
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  Speaker 3: science tell us about memory and memory formation, and what
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  Speaker 3: is the marketing evidence out there. The principles that are
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  Speaker 3: data driven, are data supported that tell us what works
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  Speaker 3: and what doesn't work. So it's really a curation. Of course,
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  Speaker 3: I have my ego, so I've sprinkled a bit of
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  Speaker 3: my own experience and stories, but it's really an evidence
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  Speaker 3: based curation of the existing knowledge around brand memories and
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  Speaker 3: brand associations.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, I love what you said about stories. First
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  Speaker 2: of all, your personal story, but how you indicate that
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  Speaker 2: all consumers all prospects, all customers. They create a story
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  Speaker 2: in their own mind, that brand association story that follows
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  Speaker 2: the typical three part story arc that we talk about
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  Speaker 2: in the business development body of knowledge created by Aristotle.
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  Speaker 2: And then there are scientists like kind of in that
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  Speaker 2: evolved that in modern eras where the prospect is their
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  Speaker 2: own hero of the story. They're the prime character and
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  Speaker 2: they have a low point where they start, they have
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: the high point, and then they have the solution that follows,
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  Speaker 2: and so that's the story that they remember, those low points,
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  Speaker 2: the lowest low point, the highest high point, and then
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  Speaker 2: the winning story at the end. So I can't wait
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  Speaker 2: to jump into this, ULI, because obviously you are an
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  Speaker 2: expert in this topic, and I'm always fascinated by the
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  Speaker 2: science of storytelling, but more importantly the minds and the
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: neuroscience of humans. So let's dive right into this and
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  Speaker 2: let's talk about your first top takeaway or tactic from
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  Speaker 2: your book.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, So, I think one thing to bear in mind
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  Speaker 3: is that brand to succeed, and I think that's the
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  Speaker 3: case in business development. You need to create an expectation
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  Speaker 3: towards the offering, or need to create predisposition. And what
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  Speaker 3: I mean with that is, in an ideal world, a
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  Speaker 3: brand needs to build awareness and association in a mind
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  Speaker 3: of a potential customer before he's shopping in the market.
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  Speaker 3: So the point being is like, if you build awareness
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  Speaker 3: for offering in the B two B world, in the
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  Speaker 3: B two BC world doesn't really matter. You don't only
• 11:31
  Speaker 3: target people that are currently in the buying cycle. You
• 11:35
  Speaker 3: target most potential customers in your field basically. And the
• 11:41
  Speaker 3: reason is if I knock at your door Tony and say, hey,
• 11:46
  Speaker 3: you don't know me, we've never talked before. You need
• 11:48
  Speaker 3: know what I offer. I'd like to introduce you to
• 11:50
  Speaker 3: my services, It's going to be a huge difference than
• 11:53
  Speaker 3: if you've seen me on LinkedIn, you follow my post,
• 11:56
  Speaker 3: you've seen my thought pieces, you know that and the strategies,
• 12:00
  Speaker 3: you know that I work with this type of clients.
• 12:02
  Speaker 3: You know that, you know there are positive reviews. And
• 12:05
  Speaker 3: then I knock at your door and say, hey, Tony,
• 12:08
  Speaker 3: I'd like to introduce myself. Then you'd be like, hey,
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  Speaker 3: I know you've been followed, I've heard of you, I've
• 12:12
  Speaker 3: seen you. Yes, I'd be happy to talk to you.
• 12:16
  Speaker 3: Or if you're buying consulting service, you'd be like, I
• 12:19
  Speaker 3: was just thinking about getting a consultant and you're hearing
• 12:22
  Speaker 3: at my knocking at my door at the perfect time.
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  Speaker 3: So this predisposition. There's actually data that shows that this
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  Speaker 3: predisposition represents seventy percent of future sales. It's just mind blowing.
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  Speaker 3: So without building this awareness amongst a group of potential
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  Speaker 3: customers that are not necessarily immediate customers. Without doing that,
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  Speaker 3: you you hold yourself away from seventy percent of your
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  Speaker 3: future sales, which uses mind words. So step number one
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  Speaker 3: is build predisposition. That's what a brand is predisposition to person.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I love that. I love that with the brand
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  Speaker 2: association where they are predisposed the brand predisposition. I like that,
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: and I think, what's interesting. Can you say that that
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  Speaker 2: figure again, sevent.
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  Speaker 3: Of future growth of a brand is driven by this predisposition,
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  Speaker 3: so wow.
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  Speaker 2: And that that predisposition is before first contact, that is.
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  Speaker 3: Before I decide I'm going to buy a new car,
• 13:31
  Speaker 3: you know, for example, or I'm going to buy baked beans,
• 13:35
  Speaker 3: or I need a cyber security consultant for my company. Yeah,
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  Speaker 3: if I am aware of the cyber security company or
• 13:43
  Speaker 3: a car brand, because it stands out with this communication.
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  Speaker 3: I'm going to be more predisposed to go with those
• 13:49
  Speaker 3: brands than with I wonder what new brands of cars
• 13:53
  Speaker 3: out there, And you need to re say O, Brandy
• 13:55
  Speaker 3: tries to find shortcuts, and that's that's one of the
• 14:00
  Speaker 3: processes we tap into, right, Yeah, seventy percent. It's a
• 14:04
  Speaker 3: study done by Kantar, the global research company, so it's
• 14:08
  Speaker 3: more than valid and legit and it's just mindlowing. But
• 14:11
  Speaker 3: most people don't think in those terms. So you're investing
• 14:14
  Speaker 3: not only in current customer immediate customer acquisition, you're investing
• 14:20
  Speaker 3: into future customer acquisitions with your brand building efforts.
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and I'll also like what you said because oftent
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: times people say, well, that's the job of marketing is
• 14:31
  Speaker 2: to create awareness within the marketplace, within the community. During
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: the awareness phase of the customer journey, when the customer
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: indicates interest, some sort of intent to buy a product
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: and explore solutions, that's when they enter the activation phase,
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: which is the domain of business developers prospect developers specifically.
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: But I tell people, look, the business developers themselves are
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: also part of that awareness phase. Right then, And what
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: you indicated I think was a really interesting tactic as
• 15:04
  Speaker 2: a matter of fact, I just posted about the reposted
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: about this on LinkedIn today, or commented about somebody's post
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: about this on LinkedIn today, and the point was that
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: the individual was making and it was a fantastic point.
• 15:16
  Speaker 2: They put a whole process together that says, you know,
• 15:18
  Speaker 2: you need to have employees of your company be active
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: on LinkedIn, and I specifically said, yes, business developers have
• 15:26
  Speaker 2: to be actively involved in LinkedIn, providing value almost on
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: a daily basis, because you are creating and contributing to
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: your prospect predisposition, your community's predisposition, where they first of
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: all recognize the brand, but then they also recognize you
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: as the individual. And so when you have first contact
• 15:50
  Speaker 2: with them, they say, oh, yeah, I know Tony, and
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: I know Tony's company. Oh yeah, I know Uli, and
• 15:55
  Speaker 2: I know ULI's company, and I'm very familiar with that,
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: and that's my safe zone. And these other possible I
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: either I don't know who they are or I'm not
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: as familiar with them. And humans, as you say, we
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: love for the shortcuts. We love the shortcuts because they're safe,
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: and we are predisposed and a cognitive bias to move
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: with shortcuts. What's safe what's familiar, That's what humans want.
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: We drive, We drive to safety, and the easiest way
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: to safety is a preferred path. So this is this
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: is so fascinating. Okay, Ellie, build that predisposition. I love that.
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: That's that's take away number one, what's takeaway number two?
• 16:35
  Speaker 3: So take away number two? And again it's so basic, right,
• 16:38
  Speaker 3: But I've noticed that with my own client or potential
• 16:41
  Speaker 3: clients that come to see me, is you need to
• 16:44
  Speaker 3: be crystal clear on what you want to be in
• 16:49
  Speaker 3: the category, what you're standing for or coming back to
• 16:52
  Speaker 3: my book, is you need to be crystal clear under
• 16:55
  Speaker 3: three or four associations you want to create in the
• 16:59
  Speaker 3: mind of your prospect, to your immediate customers and your prospects.
• 17:03
  Speaker 3: And you'd be surprised by how few companies have this
• 17:08
  Speaker 3: clarity of what they want to be. And you'd be
• 17:12
  Speaker 3: surprised by how few companies are aligned internally on what
• 17:17
  Speaker 3: the three or four association should be. And my logic is,
• 17:21
  Speaker 3: how can you expect consumers to have a clear image
• 17:25
  Speaker 3: of what you are if you don't have a clear
• 17:28
  Speaker 3: image of what you are, or if you don't have
• 17:30
  Speaker 3: an internal alignment on what you guys want to be.
• 17:34
  Speaker 3: So this clarity and a simple way to do it
• 17:36
  Speaker 3: is again, you know, there are so many frameworks, so
• 17:38
  Speaker 3: many strategy frameworks. Is client to look at me strange
• 17:42
  Speaker 3: when I first come up with my association analogy and
• 17:45
  Speaker 3: put like a little mind map on a slide, because
• 17:50
  Speaker 3: it looks so simple and so almost childish. But if
• 17:53
  Speaker 3: you're not able to write down where the three, four
• 17:56
  Speaker 3: or five associations on a piece of paper or on
• 17:59
  Speaker 3: a mind of what you want to be, you lack
• 18:04
  Speaker 3: this clarity. And if you put those down, it changes
• 18:09
  Speaker 3: the way you look at your brand building because you
• 18:11
  Speaker 3: can look at is what I'm doing? Is am I
• 18:13
  Speaker 3: linked in posts aligned with this three or four association?
• 18:16
  Speaker 3: Am I building them or supporting them? Or am I
• 18:19
  Speaker 3: going completely off track if I repost an article, or
• 18:23
  Speaker 3: if I do a piece of advertising, or if I
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: cooperate with a partner, Am I reinforcing and building those
• 18:30
  Speaker 3: associations or not? And we're not talking about twenty six
• 18:33
  Speaker 3: twenty seven. We're talking about three or four important relevant
• 18:37
  Speaker 3: associations that you need to build. And this clarity often
• 18:43
  Speaker 3: determines there's another set about the clarity which I think
• 18:47
  Speaker 3: I forgot to what the percentage was, but it was
• 18:50
  Speaker 3: also in the sixty seventy percent of like, if you
• 18:53
  Speaker 3: are going to be more successful if your customer sixty
• 18:56
  Speaker 3: to seventy percent more successful, if your potential customers have
• 19:01
  Speaker 3: a clear sense of what you have to offer. And
• 19:04
  Speaker 3: it sounds so basic and so so fundamental, but you'd
• 19:08
  Speaker 3: be surprised by how many companies, how few companies are
• 19:13
  Speaker 3: able to really crystallize this, call it desired positioning statement
• 19:17
  Speaker 3: or desired what they want to be in the future.
• 19:19
  Speaker 3: It's just insane. So a great predisposition with crystal clear
• 19:24
  Speaker 3: clarity is for me, step number two.
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: All right, okay, so step number two is that crystal
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: clear clarity about how you want to be perceived in
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: the community. And that's as you indicated. It's a struggle
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: for a lot of companies because they have a lot
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: of competing interests. They want to grow, they want to
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: try someone to try to be everything to everybody, and
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: that effectively does not work. It creates, it dilutes the
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: brand predisposition because the prospect has no idea what you
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: really stand for, and so it makes challenging for them. Now, Ollie,
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: this is a challenge for so many business developers listening
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: because let's face it, you're in the activation phase marketing.
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: Senior leadership they should be focusing on this, but oftentimes,
• 20:15
  Speaker 2: as you indicated, they don't or they struggle with it.
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: So business developers are kind of left up to their
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: own devices. Let's dig into this. Let's say, Okay, so
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: I'm a business developer. I'm posting on LinkedIn or maybe
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: I'm posting on another social channel. If I don't have
• 20:31
  Speaker 2: clarity from leadership, how should I position myself as a
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: business developer? And I'll just share with you my story.
• 20:40
  Speaker 3: You know, my.
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: Perspective is position yourself as an industry expert in whatever
• 20:46
  Speaker 2: vertical that you are passionate about, and that may not
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: be your role today, but it may be your role
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: tomorrow or what you find as your vision ten years
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: from now, you know, as where you want to be.
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: And in my reck, my personal position is, look, talk
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: about what you're passionate about, what you know about, and
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: what you personally what your personal brand.
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: Should be?
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: That that brand, what do your personal brand predisposition should
• 21:17
  Speaker 2: be so that anytime you reach out to somebody, they go,
• 21:20
  Speaker 2: oh yeah, Tony, Tony is the expert in this vertical.
• 21:23
  Speaker 2: ULI's the expert in marketing and brand association. He talks
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: about it all the time, every time consistently. Brand association,
• 21:32
  Speaker 2: brand association, brand association ding, it's Uli. I must call Uli, right,
• 21:36
  Speaker 2: So I guess you agree with that?
• 21:39
  Speaker 3: Then right, I agree with that.
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: I think your brand isn't okay, Yeah, you need.
• 21:43
  Speaker 3: To add value on an ongoing basis. What I would do, though,
• 21:46
  Speaker 3: is I would circle back to the predisposition part because
• 21:49
  Speaker 3: I've done a lot of work in IT and software development,
• 21:54
  Speaker 3: a lot of my clients in that field, and I've
• 21:57
  Speaker 3: done a lot of stakeholder interviews with corporate buyers. I've
• 22:00
  Speaker 3: talked to one hundreds of biers over the last few years
• 22:03
  Speaker 3: to see what is it, you know, decision making right
• 22:06
  Speaker 3: years and all that stuff. And one thing I've learned
• 22:08
  Speaker 3: which we don't often talk about, is that a lot
• 22:11
  Speaker 3: of potential bias before they knock at your door, if
• 22:14
  Speaker 3: you're in the B two B world, they have already
• 22:17
  Speaker 3: this predisposition. That means they will have checked you out before.
• 22:23
  Speaker 3: They will ask your peers what they think about you
• 22:26
  Speaker 3: and what the experience is working with you. They may
• 22:29
  Speaker 3: check in with organizations like Gardner and look at the
• 22:32
  Speaker 3: magic quadrant. So the point is these companies will have
• 22:36
  Speaker 3: already a clear sense, oh I'd really like to work
• 22:38
  Speaker 3: with Tony, great reputation. Maybe it's not good at the
• 22:42
  Speaker 3: follow through. I'm making stuff up here, right, but of
• 22:45
  Speaker 3: all it does a great job. When I reach out
• 22:48
  Speaker 3: to you, I have this in my mind, so I
• 22:50
  Speaker 3: don't need and a lot of companies make this mistake,
• 22:54
  Speaker 3: and bd people I think make this mistake will start
• 22:56
  Speaker 3: to say, Tony, thanks for reaching out. Let me give
• 22:59
  Speaker 3: you my boring one hour credential generic credential presentation. You know,
• 23:05
  Speaker 3: I'm going to bore you to death. You know we
• 23:06
  Speaker 3: started in seventy three and these are the capabilities we have. No.
• 23:12
  Speaker 3: I think what you should start to do is start
• 23:13
  Speaker 3: to say, talk to me about your problem, why are
• 23:15
  Speaker 3: you trying to solve and how can we help you
• 23:17
  Speaker 3: solve those problems? So you put it on and then
• 23:20
  Speaker 3: you'll hear what they've heard about you already. You'll hear
• 23:24
  Speaker 3: about the situation, and then you'll be able with your
• 23:26
  Speaker 3: category expertise to come up with a recommendation and you
• 23:30
  Speaker 3: basically they open the doors for you. I think that's
• 23:34
  Speaker 3: one of the most powerful way to approach it. And
• 23:39
  Speaker 3: in the BID two SEA world, it may not be
• 23:42
  Speaker 3: a you know, hinds Ketchup may not have an opportunity
• 23:44
  Speaker 3: to have a single conversation whether with Tony to convince
• 23:48
  Speaker 3: him to sell you a bottle. But as a strategist,
• 23:52
  Speaker 3: you can understand what is relevant to Tony when he's
• 23:55
  Speaker 3: buying a bottle of ketchup, and this relevant driver needs
• 24:00
  Speaker 3: to be in one of the associations you create. In
• 24:03
  Speaker 3: the B two B world or in the BB world,
• 24:05
  Speaker 3: I can ask you, Tony, what are you looking for?
• 24:08
  Speaker 3: What is the problem you're trying to solve you. I'm
• 24:10
  Speaker 3: basically asking you to tell me what matters the most
• 24:13
  Speaker 3: to you. And then once I know that I can
• 24:16
  Speaker 3: design my script around here tell me. Let me tell
• 24:19
  Speaker 3: you why my solution is the best suited to solve
• 24:23
  Speaker 3: the problem that you currently have. Way more effective to
• 24:27
  Speaker 3: play with this predisposition, and then let the potential customer
• 24:31
  Speaker 3: talk to you about the issues they have to address,
• 24:34
  Speaker 3: and say, let me boil you to death with my
• 24:36
  Speaker 3: one hour credential presentation before we even take it any
• 24:39
  Speaker 3: step further, Because my script says I need to walk
• 24:42
  Speaker 3: you through my twelve selling points that probably don't interest you,
• 24:46
  Speaker 3: but you know, so that's how I would approach this
• 24:53
  Speaker 3: process if a client approaches me.
• 24:55
  Speaker 2: Yeah, sure, well, and you know, and those discussions also,
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: those objections, those questions, those answers, those turn into great
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: LinkedIn content. Those are great things for you to talk
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: about because if you're having one prospect that has that problem,
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: I bet you have a lot of prospects that are
• 25:13
  Speaker 2: having that problem and it will resonate with them. Yeah. Yeah,
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: And it's a great feedback to marketing as well as
• 25:18
  Speaker 2: the business developer with boots on the ground going, hey, folks,
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: I know you say our message is this, but I'll
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: tell you our prospects are telling us it's something else
• 25:27
  Speaker 2: and we need to we need to change, we need
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: to we need to evolve. Okay, that's great. Let's bring
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: it home with top tactic number three. What do you have?
• 25:37
  Speaker 3: So again, it's a boring and it's a very simple one. Tonally,
• 25:42
  Speaker 3: it's be consistent consistently. So why doce you define your
• 25:47
  Speaker 3: two or three or four brand association? You need to
• 25:51
  Speaker 3: communicate them at every touch point you have with potential customers,
• 25:56
  Speaker 3: every single one from your packaging to your shelf presence,
• 25:59
  Speaker 3: to everything on an ongoing basis, because while you spend
• 26:04
  Speaker 3: a lot of time thinking about your business, most people
• 26:07
  Speaker 3: don't think about your business as much as you do.
• 26:09
  Speaker 3: So after like three or four weeks of posting, let's say,
• 26:13
  Speaker 3: on LinkedIn, you may start to think, oh, I'm getting
• 26:15
  Speaker 3: bought by my own subject. I want to switch things
• 26:17
  Speaker 3: up a little bit. Well, you may have reached three
• 26:20
  Speaker 3: thousand people with your posts and you didn't reach another
• 26:24
  Speaker 3: fifteen thousand that haven't been exposed to your messages. And
• 26:28
  Speaker 3: it's the same with marketing. Every time a marketing director
• 26:31
  Speaker 3: joins a new company, the first thing he wants to
• 26:32
  Speaker 3: do is change the advertising, change the brand. You know,
• 26:36
  Speaker 3: without asking what are the associations I'm creating? And I
• 26:40
  Speaker 3: want to reinforce So be consistent in everything you do,
• 26:44
  Speaker 3: or even if you're bought to death, that is not
• 26:48
  Speaker 3: even a signal for you to stop being consistent. And again,
• 26:52
  Speaker 3: it's very simple, but it's the simplest thing that are
• 26:56
  Speaker 3: the most difficult to implement. Click clarity that is implemented
• 27:02
  Speaker 3: very consistently, and there's a lot of science that shows
• 27:05
  Speaker 3: us that this is what helps brand succeed. Like is
• 27:09
  Speaker 3: research for example, that came up recently about the effect
• 27:13
  Speaker 3: of advertising and in advertising one of the big sort
• 27:16
  Speaker 3: of like the team has always been all the ware out,
• 27:20
  Speaker 3: you know, advertising wears out so quickly. Well, now we
• 27:24
  Speaker 3: have data that shows us now that actually advertising becomes
• 27:28
  Speaker 3: more effective the longer you air it. So a piece
• 27:32
  Speaker 3: of advertising that works well will work even better in
• 27:36
  Speaker 3: the second year and even better in the third year.
• 27:39
  Speaker 3: But marketing directors and advertising agencies are like, Okay, this
• 27:42
  Speaker 3: has been on air for six months, We're going to
• 27:44
  Speaker 3: change it. No, that's the worst thing you can and
• 27:47
  Speaker 3: the most expensive thing you can do. Is like, if
• 27:49
  Speaker 3: you have a piece of communication that works, grow it,
• 27:53
  Speaker 3: focus on the people that are not in your current category,
• 27:56
  Speaker 3: but continue to hammer this message in. You'll never get
• 28:01
  Speaker 3: the consumer is never going to get tired of it.
• 28:03
  Speaker 3: Which is so as a consistency in implementation and continuity
• 28:08
  Speaker 3: in implementation is the total very basic, very simple. But
• 28:12
  Speaker 3: that's what people don't often realize. But that's how the
• 28:17
  Speaker 3: brain works, right is you tell me a piece of information,
• 28:20
  Speaker 3: I may or may not remember it. You tell me
• 28:22
  Speaker 3: the same piece of information a time, I'm going to
• 28:25
  Speaker 3: memorize it. That's how we learn, you know, we learn
• 28:27
  Speaker 3: through repetition. A musician learns by playing the same piece
• 28:31
  Speaker 3: of music twenty thirty forty times. That's just how our
• 28:35
  Speaker 3: brain is wired. And if you're clear about what you're
• 28:39
  Speaker 3: trying to consumers to remember, you are clearing what to communicate.
• 28:45
  Speaker 3: You know, if you take a musician and you give
• 28:48
  Speaker 3: him forty different pieces of music to play, you'll have
• 28:52
  Speaker 3: to play this forty different piece of music forty times
• 28:55
  Speaker 3: before he can master one of them properly. You know,
• 28:58
  Speaker 3: if you change every day in a p this one now,
• 29:00
  Speaker 3: play be it over, now, play back, now play this,
• 29:03
  Speaker 3: the duty is going to be confused. He's not going
• 29:05
  Speaker 3: to be able to play one piece or play back
• 29:08
  Speaker 3: one piece.
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: Well yeah, well, I think this is so powerful, not
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: just for large corporations, but also again the individual business developer.
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: I'm on LinkedIn every day consistently. I built it in
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: my routine starting a year ago, and it's consistently the
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: same message. It's all about business development. And I think
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: that's very powerful. So let me just ask you one
• 29:37
  Speaker 2: final thought, how can folks follow you, connect with you?
• 29:43
  Speaker 3: So I try to follow my own philosophy. So the
• 29:46
  Speaker 3: simplest way is google my name Uli Applebom, and I
• 29:49
  Speaker 3: should be popping up everywhere. The other place is really
• 29:52
  Speaker 3: linked in. That's my also my main platform out there
• 29:56
  Speaker 3: under ly apple bomb, you'll find me and you'll find
• 29:58
  Speaker 3: the type of continent published. So those are the two
• 30:02
  Speaker 3: main sources really where you can find my or on Amazon.
• 30:05
  Speaker 3: You could even type my name into Amazon and my
• 30:08
  Speaker 3: folks will pop up as well.
• 30:09
  Speaker 2: So okay, yeah, so listen, folks, if you want to
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: understand these top three techaways in more detail, you know,
• 30:18
  Speaker 2: takeaway number one is you know understanding what that brand
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: association should be. You know that that brand uh prominence,
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: that what you're trying to build in the minds of
• 30:33
  Speaker 2: your prospects. Understand that as your primary objective, you know,
• 30:39
  Speaker 2: precondition them to the brand. The second thing is that
• 30:43
  Speaker 2: crystal clarity on what are the top three or four
• 30:48
  Speaker 2: things you want the prospect to know When they see
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: that logo, automatically their brain is pre wired to go, oh,
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: they do these three things, they do them really well.
• 30:58
  Speaker 2: And the third key piece is consistency over and over
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: and over again, and that allows you to over time
• 31:11
  Speaker 2: capture the seventy percent of growth that so many companies
• 31:16
  Speaker 2: miss out on because they fail to execute these three
• 31:19
  Speaker 2: fundamental tasks on a daily basis. OUI, you've been fantastic
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: and fascinating. Folks, you can connect with OOI as he indicated,
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: follow him on LinkedIn learn more about his corporation called
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: first the Trousers, then the shoes. Well we've got Thank
• 31:39
  Speaker 2: you for sharing today, Oly, how to put on the
• 31:42
  Speaker 2: trousers of brand association and folks. Grab his book on Amazon.
• 31:48
  Speaker 2: It's five star rated, and it's in kindle, it's in hardcover,
• 31:53
  Speaker 2: and it's in paperback. And again the name of the
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: book is The Science of Brand Associations, Win Minds, Win Markets,
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: and Uli. You've been a winner for the business development
• 32:08
  Speaker 2: profession for so long, so many years. Thank you for
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: sharing your wisdom with us today. Can't wait to have
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: you back on the show when you publish your next book.
• 32:17
  Speaker 3: Thanks for having me. I had a great time.
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: Thanks Tony, Thank you, Oly, Thank you for listening to
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: the Business Development Podcast. Join our free community of corporate
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: partners and business development professionals advancing the art, science, and
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: ethics of the business development profession at Gbdassociation dot org.