Do you see yourself as a Patagonia or Prada person?

A brand is really only an idea. Strictly speaking, a brand doesn't even exist.  That said, a brand is much more than just a logo or TV ads.  If your airplanes fall out of the air all the time, that's what defines you, not your social media or those other things.

Brand Thinking and Other Noble Pursuits is a book featuring conversations with marketing and communications leaders, and what it mostly boils down to is that brands exist in each person's mind whoninteracts with them.

The word brand originates from long, long ago. Ancient Egyptians branded their livestock with fire. But the phrase is much older than that even. The kind of mass-market branding we think of today really originated with the UK's trademark registration act in 1874 and now, a little more than a century later, there are more than 100 brands of bottle water alone.

Debbie Millman

While people like Naomi Klein in her legendary No Logo book may consider this a good or bad thing, Brand Thinking's interviewer/author Debbie Millman is most interested in asking why we behave this way, why we split into tribes who choose one water over another, and why we proclaim our various allegiances.

Conversations in the book include:

• Design research and the inadequacies of branding consultancies
• Procter & Gamble's move to purpose-driven brands
• Why wit is crucial in branding
• Smart Design's emphasis on creating cooking tools that work for all people, from experts to novices
• The balance between enlightenment and commodity
• How top brands embody archetypes

Whether we see ourselves as a Patagonia person or a Prada one is entwined in all sorts of cultural, economic, spiritual, and even mysterious processes. Stay tuned as I dig through this book and dig into some of the most interesting ideas.

How Does Social Media Fit in to Traditional Public Relations?

I spoke on a really impressive panel on how social media is reshaping the world of public-relations this morning at the Mid-America Marketing Summit at USA Today's headquarters. 

Public Relations in a Social World (left to right)- Kevin Dando, Director, Digital Marketing & Communications, PBS
- Paul Mackie, Director of Communications, Mobility Lab
- Mike Smith, CEO, MSBD
- Elizabeth Shea, President and CEO, SpeakerBox
- Moderator: Jeff Davis, Partner, Sawmill Marketing Public Relations

It was an honor to be asked to speak on a panel with the likes of PBS's digital marketing director and other pros.

My main points were:

• That PR work is more transparent than ever, especially with social media
• Be great at social media, don't simply hand it over to an intern because it's simply too crucial to your full suite of strategic communications
• One of the most important traits of a consistently great PR person is the ability to be friendly, helpful, and a person who gets great stories out of himself and clients
• The ability to build an army of collaborators to help you spread your messages (on both social media and in person)
• Make your issues relevant, no matter how hard your organization may push back on that
• Practice and hone your storytelling and writing by having your own blog (on whatever topic you like)

Conference sponsor Speakerbox also covers our panel nicely here.

United Airlines Offers a Great Example of How NOT to Do PR

When Canadian musician Dave Carroll looked out the window of his United jet to see the workers flinging his guitar across the tarmac, he knew there was going to be some damage. Sure enough there was. But after months of being given the runaround, he realized his only weapon would be to write a song about it.

"United Breaks Guitars" was the result and, even better, the video went viral on You Tube. But even that wasn't enough to get the lumbering behemoth of United's PR department moving into action.

The excellent book, Real-Time Marketing and PR, details Dave's situation, commending him for his PR knack. He eventually got real-world results when United changed its customer-service policies, but not before the company's stock fell 10 percent in the week after the song was released.

Further, Carroll owned a Taylor Guitar, and the owner of that company gave Carroll two new guitars. The company was adept at jumping in when the iron was hot to get a little positive PR of its own.

The song hit number 1 in the iTunes store. Carroll went on to become a hot item on the public-speaking circuit about customer service. (On one of his trips, United lost his luggage.)

The whole point of the book, by David Meerman Scott, is that, in today's world, companies need to be ready at any moment to seize positive PR opportunities. Crisis communications can truly be the difference between a relevant operation, like Dave Carroll himself and Taylor Guitars, and one that seems to be fading, like United.