The only thing scarier than a new idea, is an old one.
It’s a saying we have become quite fond of within my branding agency, Willow & Blake.
You see, we’re in the business of ideas. If it’s not new, we don’t want it.
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New ideas terrify most people, so they play it safe. They water down bold ideas until they look and sound the same as everything else out there, subsequently leading them to the exact result they were trying to avoid: commercial failure.
Old ideas keep businesses stagnant. And what happens when every brand campaign looks and sounds the same? Consumer loyalty wanes and the profit line eventually flatlines. Creativity is under siege, but the stakes have never been higher – now is the time to commit to doing something bold, something different and something, dare I say, risky.
C-suites have become risk-averse, defaulting to what has proven to be their method for growth. But what’s proven has been done. It worked, most likely, because it was new and innovative for the brand at that time. Best practice brand strategy and execution will always remain somewhat the same, but the idea — the heartbeat you bring a strategy to life with — well, that’s where you truly find out what you’re made of.
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Are you the type of leader who runs from new ideas or embraces them?
Are you the type of marketer who is ready to take the big risk to get the big rewards?
Business obsession with immediate ROI has created a loop where only incremental ideas get funded, yet everyone from the world of brand building knows it’s a long-term play. To build a great brand that sees the P&L trend up and to the right quarter after quarter means committing to an idea and funding it, quarter after quarter.
By killing brave ideas early, businesses ensure diminishing returns because the “tried and tested” eventually wears thin.
ROI is a creativity killer. It doesn’t mean we throw caution to the wind. Every marketer is aware of the commercial objectives of the business they work in, as they are usually measured on those objectives. But every good marketer also knows you can’t grow a brand, foster positive customer sentiment and increase consideration by doing the same things everyone else is doing.
You need to stand out in the sea of sameness.
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C-suites can set their team and business up for success by not pre-emptively killing bold ideas in favour of what’s already proven. And those same C-suite leaders who champion original thinking will also unlock disproportionate returns: cultural relevance, customer loyalty and viral growth.
My own brand, Frank Body, bucked every conceivable trend in its category. A bold brand that ventured where no bodycare brand had gone before, it embodied the cultural relevance and fresh take the consumers were craving. And it continued to evolve over the 12 years since its inception to ensure it stayed relevant because even our own new ideas eventually become old ones.
There’s a reason that almost 40 million units of Frank Body product were sold around the world – a testament to an incredible product, and a testament to a brand that piqued enough interest and garnered enough trust for people to hand over their hard-earned dollars, because it was different to everything else out there.
The challenge now is that we live in a world of AI drivel. When so many people and brands are using AI to regurgitate slightly remixed versions of what already exists, how do you have the guts to truly stand out?
In my opinion, in the AI era, the value of human creativity is increasing, not decreasing, but only if we’re brave enough to use it. It’s our lived experience and human insight that make our ideas valuable and unique – that is what those of us charged with growing brands need to ensure we keep front and centre.
It’s also imperative we create psychological safety for our teams to pitch bold concepts. We have to deliver feedback with clarity and kindness. As Brent Smart, chief marketing officer at Telstra, put it when I spoke with him, “hard on the work, kind to the people”.
At the end of the day, we live in a world with so much stuff. Stuff we don’t need yet will continue to be made.
And in a world full of stuff, much of it the same as the next, boldness may very well be the last true competitive advantage.
