Martin Lindstrom Quotes

What do Harley-Davidson, LEGO, and Apple have in common? They're all based on communities.

Considering LEGO's considerable brand equity, you might expect that the company must have a marketing budget in the billions. Not so. In fact, LEGO's marketing budget is so modest that if I recorded it here, you'd probably think it was a typo. LEGO doesn't do its own talking; it lets LEGO maniacs talk for it.

Imagine Pepsi without Coke. Impossible, right?

When we brand things, our brains perceive them as more special and valuable than they actually are.

Products are produced in the factory; brands are produced in our minds.

If marketers could uncover what is going on in our brains that makes us choose one brand over another-what information passes through our brain's filter and what information doesn't-well, that would be key to truly building brands of the future.

Branding is not about what something says or what it means, but how it makes us feel.

Where big data is all about seeking correlations - and thus to make incremental changes - small data is all about causations - seeking to understand the reasons why.

We're no longer bored - in fact we're petrified of being alone with ourselves getting bored. Yet boredom is the foundation for creativity - an asset slowly disappearing from our world.

Brands' use of social media is not a matter of yes or no. It is simply a matter of how and when. The next generation of consumers will expect their brands to always be available, providing interactive experiences and bringing value to our lives by taking advantage of social media tools in their marketing communications

Brand handling synergy means developing and communicating your company's values and identity consistently.

A global brand building strategy is, in reality, a local plan for every market.

Imagine a smashed stained-glass window, a page torn from a Bible, or a snippet of choral singing. You would still recognize their religious roots, wouldn't you? In 1915, Coca-Cola designed a bottle so unique that if it were smashed into thousands of pieces, from a single shard of glass you'd still be able recognize the brand. We call such a device a Smashable. It can be anything from a color to a sound, from a pattern to a smell to an icon.

Storytelling has driven faith and religious practice, keeping them alive for millennia. Just as every hymn, icon, and stained-glass window in a church links to a story, brands have the potential to build holistic identities.

Brands must make use of the inclination of consumers to be persuaded by friends.

Small Data is not about testing concepts - it is more to create the foundation for innovative brand thinking.

Thus ideas like subliminal advertising today rarely works and or even exists.

Roughly 21,000 new brands are introduced worldwide per year, yet history tells us that more than 90% of them are gone from the shelf a year later.

Placing a wedge of lime in the neck of a Corona bottle helps sell those beers. And where did that ritual come from? One story has it that two bartenders in California were curious how fast a ritual could spread. Astonishingly fast, they discovered.

Powerful brands in the future will instead carefully choose who'd they'd love to be friends with - and who they'd be comfortable upsetting.

Remember, that the logo is really the dot on top of the i.

A competitor is a valuable foil that unites a company from within and pushes the brand's boundaries.

A brand is an emotional construct. It helps you to project an image to the world which you'd like to own.

Word-of-mouth is powerful, trusted, and cheap.

Because we're always more woundable when caught at exactly the time where we're in the mood for that particular product or service - and as Big Data increasingly are able to pick up on clues revealing desire - automated systems are increasingly able to hit at exactly those moments, across those channels we move - with an offer matching exactly what we're desiring.

Today's evangelism is just as likely to take place via chat rooms and viral videos as it is in a personal conversation or a sermon.

Big data is great when you want to verify and quantify small data - as big data is all about seeking a correlation - small data about seeking the causation.

Rituals build brands.

Here in particular the idea of contextual communication - i.e. communicating the right message, at the right time to the right audience - seems to generate an increasing effect on the consumer in a manipulative way.

Online marketing rarely is able to appeal to more than two senses - yet offline often (if utilized the right way) represents the option of multi sensory appeals.

We're all obsessed with our smartphones and thus really don't see anything around us.

If we define value as emotions - and emotional engagement...i.e. love!

The enemy shapes the brand.

Visit your local supermarket or retail chain. You'll experience a lot of visual stimulus, but it's unlikely that your other senses will encounter any compelling messages.

The consumer has become increasingly sophisticated in the way they obtain and digest information - of the simple reason that they've become comfortable about building and maintaining their own personal brands. This has thickened their "filter" and as a result made them become more critical towards advertising and communication.

[Logo] is an encapsulation of an emotion.

Small Data defines this space, identifies the imbalances we all have and thus the gap these imbalances represents for your new innovation.

In a world where authenticity increasingly is in focus, consumers are seeking more than brands who focuses on revenue - consumers want to support brands with a purpose - one that justifies an emotional engagement.

Fear can come across in absence of sharp corners, locked windows in hotel rooms, locks, passwords, security...fairytales (the type of storylines)...in fact everywhere.

The fact that we all leave behind seemingly insignificant clues behind ourselves - emotional DNA or what I call Small Data - which are able to describe with an insane accuracy who we really are, our personalities and desires. But even more how we all represents out of balances - perhaps I feel too overweight, feel alone or feel I haven't achieved what I'd hoped for when hitting 40. These imbalances are surprisingly visible when visiting consumers' homes - and surprisingly invisible when relaying on Big Data.

The world's holy texts are built on ancient oral traditions.

Once you know the reason why - you've defined your white space of canvas on which you can paint and create a new concept idea. No matter how creative you are - and thus how much creative space you need - there's always some fundamental values and drivers your brand should seek to address - in order to become successful.

Sex doesn't sell anything other than itself

I did however realize that only 4% of the world's population turns creative when in contact with water and thus we dialed this dimension down and changed direction.

Opinion free brands simply will struggle to survive in the future - of that simple reason that we increasingly want to associate ourselves with opinionated and authentic brands.

The reality is that a brand can no longer afford to be "friends with everyone."

I think it is fair to say that the end goal might be a demand yet your focus when building brands should rarely focus on this objective.

Once such emotional engagement has been created - demand will always follow - yet one could say the "side product of your effort is demand" the primary purpose is to create love.

New techniques - often spinning out of technology and lack of privacy has resulted in new manipulative communication formats.

If you were to close your eyes and walk into a place of worship, the sounds and smells would alert you to where you were: ringing bells, incense, the rumble of a massive organ. Most brands are lacking these sensory stimuli.