How to achieve success in Marketing

A playbook to help you reach your full potential in a Marketing career.

Graham Robertson Accomplished Brand Coach whose purpose is to help

brand leaders unleash their full potential

Why Brand love matters?

When I was head of Marketing, one of my Brand Managers brought in a print ad for my approval. It was just awful. I kept looking at this pathetic ad, wondering where to even start to give this guy feedback. It was obvious he saw this ad as a mere task on

his to-do list. So I asked one of the best questions I have ever asked, “Do you love it?”

He said, “No, not really”. So I gently passed the ad back across the table and said, “Bring me back something you love”.

While I hope it was a great lesson for him, it was an even greater lesson for me. I have always been driven by my own personal passion in my work. I wanted that passion

from everyone. From that day on, I kept asking my team “Do you love it?” I even had one person say, “Does that matter?” I said, “Of course it does. If you do not

love the work, how do you expect your consumer to ever love your brand?”

If you can create a deep emotional bond with your most cherished consumers, you will create a stored energy of power that you can use against every possible stakeholder in the market. You will even have power over the very consumers who love your brand,

the retailers you sell through and the influencers who recommend you. You can leverage that added power to drive higher growth rates and higher profit for your brand.

You have to love your work,

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Table of Contents

Build your career behind your core strength 4 ...................

When your strength is running the business 6 .................................................................................................When your biggest strength is Marketing Execution 7 ....................................................................................When you are naturally a strategic thinker 8 ...................................................................................................When your biggest strength is leading people 9 ...............................................................................................

Marketing skills, behaviors and experiences. 10 .................

First, you must nail the obvious 11 ....................................................................................................................The crucial Marketing skills you need 13 ..........................................................................................................The ideal leader behaviors for a Marketer 16 ...................................................................................................The necessary experiences every marketer must go through 18 ......................................................................

Climbing the Marketing career ladder 22 ...........................

Assistant Brand Manager (ABM) 24 .................................................................................................................Brand Manager 28 .............................................................................................................................................Marketing Director 32 ......................................................................................................................................VP Marketing/CMO 35 .....................................................................................................................................Success factor summary for each level of Marketing 40 ..................................................................................

Your 7-second personal brand pitch! 41 .............................

Tell me about yourself: Deliver your 7-second pitch 41 ...................................................................................Expand your 7 second pitch up to a 30-minute pitch 43 .................................................................................So here’s how the interview should go: 44 .......................................................................................................

Six habits of great brand leaders 47 ...................................

Habit #1: GREAT Brand Leaders push to make focused choices. 47 ...............................................................Habit #2: GREAT Brand Leaders represent the consumer to the Brand. 51 ...................................................Habit #3: GREAT Brand Leaders are fundamentally sound, even when using their instincts. 53 .................Habit #4: GREAT Brand Leaders find their greatness in the greatness of others. 55 .....................................Habit #5: GREAT Brand Leaders create other GREAT Brand Leaders on their team. 57 ..............................Habit #6: GREAT Brand Leaders have a desire to Leave a Legacy. 58 ...........................................................

Beloved Brands: Who are we? 59 .......................................

We help brands find growth 59 .........................................................................................................................We make Brand Leaders smarter 60 ................................................................................................................Bio for Graham Robertson 63...........................................................................................................................

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1 Build your career behind your core

strength Just like a brand, we each bring a core strength as a marketing leader. It may be

based on your natural skills, your leader behaviors or the experiences you have had in your

past. It can also be impacted by where your passion lies. You should map out your future

marketing career based on your core strength, whether that is running the business,

marketing execution, strategic thinking or people leadership.

One of the toughest question I ask is to pick your #1 strength as a Marketer from

these four potential choices:

1. You like running the business and managing products

2. You have a passion for marketing execution

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3. Strategic thinker, writes strong Brand Plans

4. Leader of leaders, gets the best out of others

I know it must be a tough question, because everyone refuses to pick just one. Even

if you are well-rounded, explore what might rise or fall based on skills, feedback, success,

passion, or interest. While you have been trained and have learned to be a generalist, it

might be time to re-focus on a specific strength.

Let’s take it a step further. Here's a game you can play to force your thinking. Look

below at the diagram. You have 4 chips. You have to put one on the highest strength, two on

the medium and force one to be at the lowest.

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If you still say, "I'm pretty good at all 4" then push yourself, I might not believe you. No

one is equally great at all four. I want you to know what you are best at. As you make your

next move, each choice may lead you to 4 different career choices. 

If you like running the business, your career choices could be Product Management,

Private Equity or New Industries. If you are into the Marketing Execution, you should explore

switching to an Agency role, maybe a brainstorming ideation leader or become a Subject

Matter Expert. And, if you are a Strategic Thinker, you could move into becoming a

Consultant, Professor or go into a Global role. Finally, if you feel your strength is on the

people leadership side, you can keep moving up to GM, explore the Entrepreneur world or

become a Personal Coach.

When your strength is running the business

You are naturally a business leader, who enjoys the thrill of hitting the numbers–

financial or share goals. In Myers Briggs, you might be an ENTJ/INTJ (introvert/extrovert,

intuition, thinking, judgment) the “field general” who brings the intuitive logic and quick

judgment to make decisions quickly to

capitalize on business opportunity.

You like product innovation side

more than advertising. You are

fundamentally sound in the core elements

of running a business—forecasting,

analytics, finance, distribution—working

each functional areas to the benefit of the

products. You may have gaps in creativity

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or people leadership, but you are comfortable giving freedom to your agencies or team to

handle the creative execution.

My recommendation is to stay within Product Management as long as you can. If

you find roadblocks in your current industry, consider new verticals before you venture into

new career choices. You should consider running businesses on behalf of Private Equity

firms or venture into Entrepreneurship, where you can leverage your core strength of

running a business.

When your biggest strength is Marketing Execution

When you are the type of Brand Leader who is highly creative and connects more to

ideas and insights than strict facts and tight business decisions. You believe facts can guide

you but never decide for you. And, you are high on perception, allowing ambiguous ideas to

breathe before closing down on them. Moreover, you respect the creative process and

creative people. You are intuitive in deciding what is a good or bad idea. You may have gaps

in the areas of organizational

leadership or strategy

development that hurts you

from becoming a senior

leader. And, you likely see

answers before questions

and frustrated by delays.

Staying in the

Marketing area, you may end

up limited in moving beyond

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an executional role. You may be frustrated in roles that would limit your creativity. Moving

into a Director level role could set you up for failure. Look to grab a subject matter expert

type role in an internal advertising, media, innovation role or merchandising.

Going forward beyond Marketing, consider switching to the Agency side or Consult

on a subject-matter expertise (Innovation, Marketing Communication or Public Relations) to

build on your strengths.

When you are naturally a strategic thinker

You enjoy the planning more than the execution. You might fall into the INTP, where

you’re still using logic and intuition, stronger at the thinking that helps frame the key issues

and strategies than making the business decisions. The introvert side would also suggest

that your energy comes from what’s going on in your brain, than externally. An honest

assessment would suggest that managing and directing the work of others is likely not be a

strength.

If you stay within the marketing industry, you would be very strong in a Global Brand

role, General Management or even a Strategic Planning role. You need to either partner with

someone who is strong at Marketing Execution or build a strong team of business leaders

beneath you.

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Going outside, you would enjoy Consulting and thought leadership which could turn

into either an academic or professional development type roles. Continue building your

thought leadership to carve out a specific perspective or reputation where you can monetize.

When your biggest strength is leading people

You find a natural strength in leading others. You are skilled in getting the most from

someone’s potential. You are good at conflict resolution, providing feedback, inspiring/

motivation and career management of others. You are a natural extrovert and get your

energy from seeing others on your team succeed. As you move up, you should surround

yourself with people who counter your gaps–whether that is on strategy or Marketing

Execution.

If you find yourself better

at Management than

Marketing, and you should

pursue a General Management

role where you become a

leader of leaders. You would

benefit from a cross functional

shift into sales or operations to

gain various perspectives of

the business enable you to take on a general management role in the future.

After you hit your peak within the corporate world, consider careers such as Executive

Coaching where the focus remains on guiding people.

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2 Marketing skills,

behaviors and experiences.

As you manage your own Marketing Career, you assess your skills, behaviors and

experiences, to figure where your gaps that you should address.

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A marketer must build their capability around key skill areas strategy, analytics,

positioning, planning and execution. The best marketers must exhibit leadership behaviors

that take ownership and inspire others. And, they run their business like an owner. They can

exhibit broad leadership across the entire organization. Finally, many of the more

complicated areas of marketing takes experience. Over the years, I found myself saying,

“You almost screw up the first five times, you…” And, I started to realize, that message fit

with advertising, managing others, brand planning, launching new brands, and leading

beyond your own team. 

First, you must nail the obvious

Let me start with the expected behaviors for success at any level of Marketing. Trust

me: if you do not hit these, you will eventually annoy someone enough to get rid of you.

They would certainly annoy me enough. These are non-negotiable and if you miss

continuously, they could become potentially career-limiting moves.

You must hit deadlines

Never look out of control or sloppy. Marketers have

enough to do, so if you begin to miss deadlines, things will just

stockpile on each other. Do not try to constantly negotiate

extensions. There are no real extensions. There are just missed opportunities.

You must know your business

Avoid getting caught off-guard with questions that you cannot answer, such as P&L

(sales, growth, margins, spend) market share (latest 52, 12, 4 weeks for your brand all major

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competitors) and your sales forecasts. Make sure you are asking the questions and carrying

forward the knowledge.

Be open with communication

There should be no surprises, especially with your boss. Keep everyone aware of

what’s going on. When you communicate upwards, always have the situation, implications,

options and then quickly followed by an action plan of what to do with it.

Listen first and then decide

It is crucial that you seek to understand to the experts surrounding

you, before you make a decision. Early in your career, use your subject

matter experts to teach you. As you hit director or VP, use them as an

advisor or sounding board to issues/ideas. They do want you to lead

them, so it is important that you listen and then give direction or push them towards the end

path.

Take control of your destiny

We run the brands, they do not run us. Be slightly ahead of the game, not chasing

your work to completion. Proactively look for opportunity in the market, and work quickly to

take advantage. When you don’t know something, speak in an “asking way”, but when you

know, speak in a “telling way”.

Able to use regular feedback for growth

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Always seek out and accept feedback, good or bad, as a lesson for you. Do not think

of it as a personal attack or setback. Identify gaps you can close, never think of them as

weaknesses that hold you back. You should be constantly striving to get better.

The crucial Marketing skills you need

At Beloved Brands, we use a 360 degree view, where you need to be able to analyze,

think, define, plan and then execute. And then repeat.

1. Analyze brand performance

Great brand leaders must be willing and able to dig deep into data, draws

comparisons and builds an analytical story to help draw out the business conclusions. They

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We make brands stronger.We make brand leaders smarter.

Definethe

Brand

Think Strategically

BigIdea

The branding approach that gets you to think, define, plan, inspire and analyze.

Vision Analysis

Key Issues

StrategiesExecution

• Advertising• In-Store• Innovation

• Consumers• Category• Channels• Competitors• Brand

Values, Goals

• Experience

Brand Plan

Create Brand Plans

Inspirecreative

execution

Analyze performance

Smart

Creati

ve

Ideas

have to able to lead a best-in-class 360-degree deep-dive business review for the brand.

This means they understand all sources of brand data—whether that’s coming from sales,

consumption, market share, brand funnel data, market research or brand financials. Finally,

the great brand leader must be able to write analytical performance reports that outlines the

strategic implications

2. Think Strategically

A brand leader must be able to think strategically,

by asking the right interruptive questions before

reaching for solutions. They must be able to employ

360-degree strategic thinking that looks at 5 types of

strategic thinking: your brand’s core strength, consumer

strategy, competitors, situation and consumer

engagement. Strategic alignment is a crucial skill. They

have to be able to lead a well-thought strategic

discussion across the organization. Finally, the great

brand leader must be able to make smart strategic decisions that are based on vision, focus,

opportunity, early win and leverage.

3. Be able to define the brand

A brand leader must be able to define their brand. You must be able to define the

ideal consumer target, framed with need states, insights and enemies. They must take a

consumer centric approach to turn brand features into functional and emotional benefits. And

then, they must be able to bring it all together to find a winning brand positioning space that

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is own-able and motivates consumers. Finally, the great brand leader should be able to

develop a big idea for brand that can lead every consumer touchpoint. There are five

consumer touchpoints including the brand promise, brand communication, innovation,

purchase moment and the consumer experience.

4. Create Brand Plans that everyone can follow

The brand leader must be able to understand and lead all elements of a smart brand

plan; vision, purpose, goals, issues, strategies, tactics. They must be able to turn strategic

thinking into smart strategic objective statements for the brand plan. They must be strong in

presenting brand plans to senior management and across organization. And finally, the great

brand leader must be able to develop smart execution plans that delivers against the brand

strategies

5. Inspire creative execution

The brand leader must be able to write a strategic, focused and thorough creative

brief to inspire great work from experts. They must be able to lead all marketing projects on

brand communication, innovation, selling or experience. And they must be able to inspire

greatness from teams of experts at agencies or throughout organization. Finally, the great

brand leader must make smart marketing execution decisions that tightens bond with

consumers.

Taking this a step further, you can use the assessment tool to identify gaps in your team.

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The ideal leader behaviors for a Marketer

1. Be Accountable for results

The great brand leader holds everyone accountable to the goals of their tasks. They

are able to make things happen, they get things done, and they do not let details or the

timeline slip. Moreover, they stay on strategy, by eliminating executional ideas that are not

focused against the vision and strategy. They are able to works the system behind the

brand, anywhere from sales to finance to operations to HR.

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2. People leadership

They manage their core brand team with elements of focus, communication, solutions

and results. They know how to let others shine. They are keenly interested in their people’s

development and career development. They take the time to coach, teach, guide the team

for higher performance. They provide honest assessments to their people and upwards.

From what I have seen, the best go far above and beyond the people requirements of the

organization.

3. Broad influence

The best brand leaders are active listeners, who seek opinions and then make

decisions. They own the strategy, yet know where to offer flexibility to let the subject matter

experts to pursue new ideas on the execution. The best carry influence throughout

organization. As a leader, they think of others beyond themselves, empathy to pressures/

challenges others are facing. This broad influence is like leadership capital, stored up during

the good moments, and then leveraged during a time of crisis.

4. Authentic style

The best brand leaders are self aware of their impact on others within and beyond

their team. They are exceptional under pressure. The four pressure points a marketer

normally faces includes the pursuit of results, the ambiguity over the expectations of any

new program, the constant state of change when operating in a live market and the constant

strain to hit every deadline. One of the most important leadership qualities is to show up

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consistent and almost predictable. The best are also willing to admit mistakes, challenges

themselves to improve and finds ways to adjust to new ways.

5. Runs business like an owner

Brand Leaders are running businesses. The best ones act like a ‘Brand CEO’ who is

accountable to the long-range health and profits of the business. It should never be about

just doing cool stuff. They have to make smart decisions that adds to the health of brand, not

their career or personal wealth. It is crucial to makes the right choices, that are good for the

company, consumers, customers, market and society. As the brand and culture are

becoming one, it is crucial that the brand leader is seen to live and breathe the culture, as an

example to all those who work behind the scenes of the brand.

The necessary experiences every marketer must go through

Many of the hardest experiences a Marketer must go through almost takes 3-5

opportunities for the Brand Leader to really nail.  I remember how challenging it was for me

the first time I launched a new advertising campaign.  Can I confess now that it was a

complete disaster? I had no clue what the major steps were and no one on my side who

could teach me. I was lucky that my client service person helped me through every step.

Over the years, I would get better and better, learning something new each time. I then

struggled the first time I managed a person for the first time. Then I struggled to launch a

new brand. It is starting to sound like I was a disaster at everything. Well, I might be over-

exaggerating, but I can tell you that I got better each time. And you will as well. Here are the

experiences you need learn at each stage of the way include:

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Write Brand Plans

Writing a brand plan takes experience. At the early stages of your career, I

recommend you should learn some of the same skills through writing brand

recommendations, writing a brand review or writing a section of the brand plan. As you move

up to Brand Manager, you have to take full ownership over the plan. One of the hardest

elements to work on is the flow. I always say that a well-written Brand Plan should feel like

an orchestral arrangement, with each element of the plan with separate song sheets, but

everyone’s contribution adds up to one plan.

Leading a Brand Turnaround

When the results are not meetings the expectations of the business, the pressure

goes up exponentially and the scrutiny intensifies. If there is a hint of concern, senior leaders

will roll up their sleeves and get involved.

Launching new advertising

Launching a big new campaign from scratch involves a lot of crucial steps to manage,

while dealing with the ambiguity of what makes a great creative and smart media choices.

On top of that, it is essential to keep the agency motivated, while keeping your boss aligned.

Managing a team

Managing can be such a challenge that when I worked at J&J, when we promoted

someone to Brand Manager, we usually tried to avoid giving them a direct report. Most

people mess up their first direct report. A similar pattern happens: excited to have someone

do the little stuff they hate doing, then the person struggles so the manager does it

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themselves and gets mad at the person who can’t do it, then begins to think their direct

report is incompetent. On the other hand, the direct report thinks their boss refuses to train

them, gives them little feedback and is a control freak. 

Firing a Marketer

This sounds like a strange experience to put on the list, but it is one of the most

difficult decisions you will have to make. I wish you never would have to fire one, but the

reality is that you will. To make sure you are making the right decision, you really need to

understand the role and be able to measure that person against the criteria for what they

can and cannot do.

Launching a new brand

While managing a brand is difficult enough, creating a brand from scratch involves

every element of marketing from the concept to the product to naming to production, selling,

shipping, advertising, displaying, promoting, and analyzing the performance. You better be

great at Marketing before taking on a launch from scratch.

Leading across organization

As you move into more senior leadership roles, a great way to extend your breadth

across the organization is to take on more cross-functional roles, whether special projects or

moving into a cross functional role. This allows you to begin seeing every corner of the

organization through the eyes of other team players in sales, HR, operations and finance. 

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Here is a tool to track your experiences from an entry-level up to a senior role. I tell

Marketers that you should try to have a good balance as you move up, so you can avoid

having any experience gaps when you hit a senior level. 

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3 Climbing the

Marketing career ladder

When I look back on my 20 years in the consumer packaged goods industry, I

remember fondly every promotion I received. We will look at four levels of Marketing which

are Assistant Brand Manager, Brand Manager, Marketing Director and VP/CMO. While we

present in a linear way, I think learning is rather random. We gain confidence through our

success but we learn from our failures. You must boldly look to make an impact and take

chances. Put all your passion into your work.

At every level you have to adjust to the new role. Brand Managers fail when they

keep acting like ABMs who are looking for a to-do list. Directors fail when they keep acting

like Brand Managers by micro-managing and making every decision. And, VPs fail when

they don’t know what to do. We all say we want to advance, but don’t think of it as just a title:

think of it as a challenge to step back.

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In every job I’ve ever

been in, no matter what

level, or what company, I

rode the IDIOT CURVE. The

idiot curve lasts about 90

days, coincidental to what

most companies call

probation period. The basic

rule of the Idiot Curve is: You

get dumber before you get

smarter. During the idiot

curve, the first thing to go is

your instincts. Your brain is only so big, that all the new facts you learn, that when pressed,

you reach for one of these new facts instead of using your instincts. The second thing to go

is your ability to make decisions. 

New jobs are always stressful–trying to impress your boss, trying to maintain

composure with ambiguity, and trying to deliver when you aren’t sure how to do that

yet. Most of us think that stress impacts execution first. But really it impacts decision-

making–you might find yourself frozen like a dear in the headlights or you might make

choices you think you are supposed to make instead of  taking the time to think things

through. The third thing to go is your natural strengths. Everyone has natural strengths and

natural weaknesses. But in these early days, you spend too much time, covering up the

weaknesses, that you don’t allow your strengths to fully show.    

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We make brands stronger. We make brand leaders smarter.

The Idiot Curve

Day 1 Day 90

You tend to get (and feel) dumber,

before you get smarter again.

Know that the IDIOT CURVE is a normal part of every job. Be patient. Take your time. Ask

questions. Reach for your instincts

Assistant Brand Manager (ABM)

For the most eager first-time marketers that want to change the world, the role is a

reality check where you learn before you can run. Too many new grads want to focus on

strategy right away, but this is a “doing” role. You will be executing programs, analyzing

results and learning how to be a project manager. Through the execution, try to send signals

that you are capable of thinking and leading in the future. In my 20 years of marketing, I

must have interviewed 1,000s of potential Assistant Brand Managers. I was lucky to have

hired some of the best, who have gone on to have very strong marketing careers.

What separates the average from the great ones that gets promoted? The best seem

to figure out the right

thing to do and then

go make it happen.

Some figure out the

right thing to do, but

struggle to work the

system to make it

happen. Other

ABMs can work the

system, but they

forget to think

through what is the right thing to do. The role will feel frustrating to you, many times

inhibiting your creativity and even your own ideas, but fight through it. It provides a

foundation you will use throughout your career.

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Five success factors for Assistant Brand Managers

1. Analytical Story Telling

A great Assistant Brand Manager is able to tell stories, where others just see

data. There is tons of data all over—share results, tracking, test scores, etc. One of the most

critical skills that an Assistant Brand Manager can work on is developing stories with the

data. It is one thing to have the data point, but another to have thought it through and know

what it means, and what action you will take on this data. Look for patterns or data breaks,

ask questions, start putting together stories and challenge the stories. Use stories backed up

by data to sell your recommendations. Never give a data point without a story or action. You

risk letting someone else (your boss) take your data and run with it or tell a story different

from yours.

2. Be Pro-Active

A great Assistant Brand Manager takes action and moves before being asked.

Most of the projects for Assistant Brand Managers are already set by your manager. When

you are new, it is comfortable to wait for your projects. But don’t get in the habit of waiting

for someone to create your project list. A great Assistant Brand Manager starts to push ideas

into the system and create their own project list. Some of the best ideas come with a fresh

set of eyes and we need a continual influx of new ideas. We also start to see the Assistant

Brand Manager making good decisions, on their own, and communicating to their boss. Not

asking permission but telling what they want to do and look for the head nod. Know what’s in

your scope and align with your manager.

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3. Make It Happen

A great Assistant Brand Manager can get what they want. Instead of just

functionally managing the steps of the project, great Assistant Brand Managers “make it

happen”: faster, bigger and better. Faster means you understand what are the important

milestones that need to be hit. Manage the bottle necks: the task that have the longest

completion time, that impact the entire project. Sometimes you need to push with an

inflexible but motivating fist to get it done. Bigger means you want to do more than is

required. You find that magic to make it even have a bigger impact. Creative solutions or

motivating others to do more. Better means you have to take the same people and get them

to give their best ideas or their best effort or their best work. Guaranteed you will meet many

points of resistance. Every project will. Solving these and still getting the most you can, is

what separates great Assistant Brand Managers from the rest.

4. Contribute Strategically

A great Assistant Brand Manager puts their strategic thoughts forward. You

need to be a strategic thinker—asking the right questions to ensure you are focused on the

right area, where you can gain a positional power that leads to higher growth and profit for

your brand. Ensure you are staying strategic and not just falling in love with some execution

not aligned to your brand’s strategy. It’s so easy to be lost in your own “cool” projects. At the

Assistant Brand Manager level, showing that you can keep things aligned to the strategic is

just as important as being strategic. Speak up and represent your strategic thinking.

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Standing up for your thoughts shows that you are in the game, that you are thinking, and

that you believe in your strategic thoughts. Silent Assistant Brand Managers never last.

5. Accountable

A great Assistant Brand Manager is accountable in the ownership of their work.

Accountability is the stepping stone to ownership. And the ownership of the brand is a sign

you can be a Brand Manager. We need to see that before giving you your own brand. Great

Assistant Brand Managers motivate but don’t delegate. If you have to step in, then jump in.

You cannot let things slip or miss. You have to stay on top of the timelines and lead those on

your project teams. You have to be action oriented, and solution focused. You can never

allow your team to get stuck. Be the hub of communication to all team members, and to key

stakeholders, including upwards to your manager.

The ten reasons Assistant Brand Managers fail.

1. Can't do the analytical story telling.  2. Struggle to deal with the ambiguity of marketing. 3. Slow at moving projects through.  4. Selfishly think about themselves.  5. Don't work well through others.  6. Miss answers by not being flexible.  7. Fall for tactical programs that are off strategy.  8. Hold back from making contributions to the team strategy.  9. Settle for "OK" rather than pushing for "great".  10. Poor communicators, with manager, senior management or partners.  

If you can be better at these five factors than your peers, you will get promoted.

Conversely, if you are missing any one of these, you might not get there. I hope your boss

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gives you a quarterly review because Assistant Brand Managers can grow so fast that you

need those regular check-ins. If you just get an annual review, you won't go as fast. Ask for

feedback, cherish it, and use the next 90 days to build on a strength or eliminate a gap.

Brand Manager

Most new brand managers mistakenly think this role is about managing because they

finally get a chance to manage a direct report. However, the bigger part of this role is the

transition you need to make as you move from do-er to owner. Yes, you’ll get your first

change to manage a direct report, but many times that effort can be a distraction from your

chance to continue to learn and grow. Many brand managers are disheartened to find out

they are a disaster with their first direct report, but I always remind them that they’ll finally get

better by the fifth direct report. 

Five success factors for Brand Managers

1. Ownership

A great Brand Manager takes ownership of the brand. Many Brand Managers

struggle with the transition from being the helper to being the owner. As you move into the

job, you have to get away the idea of having someone hand you a project list. Not only

should you have to make the project list, you should come up with the strategies from which

the projects fall out of. A great Brand Manager talks in ideas in a telling sense, rather then an

asking sense. It is great to be asking questions as feelers, but realize that most people are

going to be looking to you for decisions. They will be recommending you will be deciding.

When managing upwards be careful of asking questions—try to stick to solutions. If you fail

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to do so, you just gave up your ownership. Your director wants you to tell them what to do,

and debate from there.

2. Strategic direction

A great Brand Manager provides a vision & strategies to match up to. Bring a

vision to the brand. Push yourself to a well-articulated 5-10 year brand vision great. But a

vision can be as simple as a rallying cry for the team. But you have to let everyone know

where you want to go. The strategy that matches up to the vision becomes the road map for

how to get there. As the brand owner, you become the steward of the vision and strategy.

Everything that is off strategy has to be rejected. Communication of strategy is a key skill.

Learn to think in terms of strategic pillars, with 3 different areas to help achieve your overall

strategy. Having pillars constantly grounds you strategically, and is an easy way for

communicating with the various functions. Each function may only have 1 strategic pillar but

seeing how it all fits in is motivating.

3. Working the system

A great Brand Manager gets what they want and need. The organization is filled

with groups, layers, external

agencies, with everyone carrying a

different set of goals and

motivations. You can see how the

organization works and

appreciating what are the

motivations of various key

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stakeholders. You then use that knowledge to begin to work the system.You are starting to

see key subject matter experts giving you their best. You understand their personal

motivations and find a way to tap into those motivations as a way to ask people for their

best. It might be an odd step, but from my experience a really motivating step. Very few

people ask for “your best”.

4. Dealing with Pressure

A great Brand Manager can handle pressure: ambiguity, results, relationship

time. Ambiguity is one of the hardest pressures. As a leader, patience and composure help

you sort through the issues. The consequences of not remaining composed are a scared

team and choosing quick decisions with bad results. Another big pressure is when the

results don’t come in, it can be frustrating. Reach for your logic as you re-group. Force

yourself to course correct, rather then continuing to repeat and repeat and repeat. Challenge

team to “this is when we are needed” You will see pressure in relationships. Be pro-active in

making the first move to build a relationship. Try to figure out what motivates and what

annoys the person. Understand and reach for common ground, which most times is not that

far away. At every level there is time pressure. It is similar to the ambiguity. Be organized,

disciplined and work the system so it doesn’t get in your way. Be calm, so you continue to

make the right decisions. Learn to use time pressure to your advantage.

5. Managing others

A great Brand Manager spends the effort to make their Assistant Brand

Manager as good as can be. Most Brand Managers struggle with their first five direct

reports. The key is to keep self evaluating and looking for ways to improve with each report.

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They struggle to shift from “do-er” to coach. They think they can do it faster, so they may as

well do it. They just become the “super ABM”. Many Brand Managers fail to share the spot

light, so it becomes hard to showcase the Assistant Brand Manager. But the work of your

Assistant Brand Manager reflects on how good of a manager you are. Assistant Brand

Managers need feedback to get better—both the good and bad. I see to many Brand

Managers not giving enough feedback. And so many afraid of “going negative” so the ABM

is left in the dark or left thinking they are doing a good job. Great Brand Managers take the

time to teach up front, give the ABM some room to try it out and then give hands-on

feedback in real time. Use weekly meetings to give both positive feedback and address

gaps. Brand Mangers should do QUARTERLY sit down performance reviews with their

ABMs, who have the capacity to learn faster than annual reviews allows for.

The ten reasons Brand Managers fail:

1. Struggle to make decisions

2. Not analytical enough

3. Can't get along

4. Not good with ambiguity

5. Too slow and stiff

6. Bad people Manager

7. Poor communicators, with manager, senior management or partners

8. Never follow their Instincts

9. Can't think strategically or write strategically

10.They don't run the brand, they let the brand run them. 

At the Brand Manager stage, I hope you love the magic of marketing. Let it breathe

and let it come to life. It is easy to lose your passion and try to do what your boss wants or

do things to make short term numbers so you can get promoted. Those don not really work

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long term. My advice is do not just do the job, do it with all your passion. If you don’t love the

work you do, then what consumer would ever love your brand.

Marketing Director

This role becomes less marketing and more leading. Your role is to set the consistent

standard for your team and then hold everyone to that standard. To be great, you need to

motivate the greatness from your team and let your best players to do their absolute

best. Sometimes you’ll need to teach, guide and challenge. Sometimes, you’ll have to put

your foot down to stay fundamentally sound and other times you’ll have to follow creative

ideas you might not be so sure will win. Let your best people shine, grow and push you. It is

their time to be a star, not yours.

Five success factors for Marketing Directors

1. Set a consistently high standard

Hold your team to a consistently high standard of work. Rather than being the

leader by example, I would rather see you establish a high standard and hold everyone and

yourself to that standard. Shift your style to a more process orientation so you can

organize the team to stay focused, hit deadlines, keep things moving and produce consistent

output. They deliver a consistent quality of brand plans, execution and interactions with

everyone. It is about how to balance the freedom you give with the standard you

demand. Delegate so you motivate your stars, but never abdicate ownership of how your

overall team shows up.

2. Be the consistent voice on the team

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A great Marketing Director becomes the consistent voice of reason to any

potential influencers, acting on behalf of the brand team. The director becomes the

usual point person that the VP, sales team, agency, each turn to offering their thoughts on

the brands. Yet the Director has to allow their BM to own the brand. As the team’s voice of

reason, a great marketing director must continue to ground all potential influencers in the

brand plan with the strategy choices, consistently communicate the brand's direction and

back up any tactical choices being made by the team.

3. Consistent people leader

Let your people shine. Newly appointed directors have to stop acting like a “Senior-

Senior Brand Manager" and let your team breathe and grow. We know you can write a brand

plan, roll out a promotion super fast and make decisions on creative. But can you inspire

your team to do the same? It becomes the director's role to manage and cultivate the talent.

Most Brand Managers have high ambitions--constantly wanting praise, but equally seeking

out advice for how to get better. Be passionate about people's careers--anything less they

will see it as merely a duty you are fulfilling. A great Marketing Director should be meeting

quarterly with each team member one on one to take them through a quarterly performance

review. Waiting for year-end is just not enough. 

4. Consistently shows up to the sales team

Marketing Directors become the marketing person for the sales team to

approach. Great sales people challenge marketers to make sure their account wins. I have

seen many sales teams destroy the Marketing Director because they do not listen, and they

stubbornly put forward their plan without sales input. Be the director that consistently

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reaches out and listens. They will be in shock, and stand behind your business. If sales

people feel they've been heard, they are more apt to follow the directors vision and

direction. A great Marketing Director should informally meet with all key senior sales leaders

on a quarterly basis, to get to know them and listen to their problems. This informal forum

allows problems to bubble up and be heard, before they become a problem.

5. Consistently makes the numbers

A great marketing director makes the numbers. They have a knack for finding

growth where others can’t. And yet when they don’t, they are the first to own the miss and

put forward a recovery plan before being asked. Great Directors have an entrepreneurial

spirit of ownership, create goals that: “scare you a little but excite you a lot”. They reach out

for help across the organization, making those goals public and keep the results perfectly

transparent. And everyone will follow you.

Consistency matters

Hopefully, you noticed the word “consistent” show up in all 5 factors for

success. Stay Consistent. That is a trait I would encourage every director to take: show up

with consistency in standards for your team, strategy, people management, dealings with

sales and owning the numbers. With a bigger group of people that you influence, with a

broader array of interactions across the organization and with a bigger business line on the

P&L, anything less than consistent will rattle your core team and rattle the system built

around you.

No one likes an inconsistent or unpredictable leader. They will mock your mood

swings in the cafeteria. You will become famous but for the wrong reasons. The sales team

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will not be able to rely on your word–and to them, that’s everything. Senior Leaders will

struggle with you–and will not want to put you on the big important business because it just

feels risky. Your agency will be uncertain as to what mood you will be in, when you show up

to meetings. With your maturity and experience, now is the time to start to craft a consistent

version of what you want to be.

VP Marketing/CMO

At the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) level, success comes from your leadership,

vision and getting the most from your people. If you are good at your role, you might not

even need to do any marketing, other than challenge and guide your people to do their best

work. Your greatness comes from the greatness of your people. Once you figure out the

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magical leadership equation that better people create better work, you’ll be able to deliver

better results. Invest in training your people as a way to motivate your team and keep them

engaged. At the end of each of your meetings, you should use teaching and mentoring

moments to share your wisdom.

Quintessentially, rule #1 is you have to make the numbers. As the VP, your main

role is to create demand for your brands. You are paid to gain share and drive sales growth

to help drive profit for the company? The results come from making the right strategic

choices, executing at a level beyond the competitors and motivating your team to do great

work. But how you do it, and the balances you place in key areas are choices you need to

make.  Making the numbers gives you more freedom on how you wish to run things. Without

the numbers, the rest might not matter.

The five success factors for VP Marketing and CMO roles:

1. People come first

Focus on the People and the Results will come: The formula is simple: the

smart the people, the better the work and in turn the stronger the results will be. You

should have a regular review of the talent with your directors. I would encourage you to

ensure there’s a systemic way to get feedback to everyone on the team, preferably on a

quarterly basis. Invest in training and development. Marketing Training is not just on the job,

but also in the classroom to challenge the thinking of your people and give them added skills

to be better in their jobs. Marketing fundamentals matter. The classic fundamentals are

falling, whether it is strategic thinking, writing a brand plan, writing a creative brief or judging

great advertising. People are NOT getting the same development they did in prior

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generations. Investing in training, not only makes them better, but it is also motivating for

them to know that you are investing in them. 

2. Run the process and the system

While your people run the brands and the execution, you should run the P&L

and essentially run all the marketing processes. You have to run the P&L and make

investment choices. Bring an ROI and ROE (Return on Investment and Effort) mind set to

those decisions. These choices will be one of the essentials to making the numbers and

gaining more freedom in how you do the job. In terms of process, it’s always been my belief

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that great processes in place—brand planning, advertising, creative briefs—is not restrictive

but rather provides the right freedom to your people. Get your people to drive all their

creative energy into great work that gets in the marketplace, not trying to figure out what

slide looks really cool in the brand plan presentation.  

3. Be the visionary

You are the mayor of Marketing: Bring a vision to the role. Look at what needs

fixing on your team, and create your own vision statements that relevant to your situation.

Bring a human side to the role. Get up, walk around and engage with everyone on your

team. It will make someone's day. Your role is to motivate and encourage them to do great

work. Influence behind the scenes to help clear roadblocks. Know when you need to back

them up, whether it’s an internal struggle, selling the work into your boss or with a conflict

with an agency. Do they love it? When they put their great work up for approval, and it’s

fundamentally sound, approve it. Don’t do the constant spin of pushing for better, because

then you look indecisive.

4. Put the spotlight on your people

Let your people own it and let them shine: It has to be about them, not you. Do

not be the super-duper Brand Manger. It is not easy to balance giving them to freedom to

lead you and yet knowing when to step in and make a decision. By making all the decisions,

you bring yourself down a level or two and you take over their job. Instead of telling, you

need to start asking. Ask good questions to challenge or push your team into a certain

direction without them knowing you’re pushing them is more enlightening than coming up

with statements of direction. Challenge your team and recognize the great work. It might be

!38

my own thing, but I never said: “thank you” because I never thought they were doing it for

me. Instead I said: “you should be proud” because I knew they were doing it for

themselves.  

5. Be a consistent, authentic, approachable leader

People have to know how to act around you. You have to set up an avenue where

they are comfortable enough to approach you, and be able to communicate the good and

bad. A scary leader discourages people from sharing bad results, leaving you in the

dark. Open dialogue keeps you more knowledgeable. If you push your ideas too far, you

could be pushing ideas from a generation too late. Get them to challenge you. Inconsistent

behavior by a leader does not “keep them on their toes”. It inhibits creativity and creates

tension. Be consistent in how you think, how you act in meetings and how you

approve. Leadership assumes “follower-ship”. Creating a good atmosphere on the team will

make people want to go the extra mile for you. Knowledge makes you a great leader, and it

starts with listening. Once you show up ready to listen, you will be surprised how honest they

will be and how much they will tell you.

The VP role can be very lonely.

I remember when I first took the job as VP, I found it surprisingly a bit lonely. Everyone

in marketing tries to be “on” whenever you are around.  And you don’t always experience the

“real” side of the people on your team. Just be ready for it. The distance from your new

peers (the head of sales, HR, operations or finance) is far greater than you’re used to. It

might feel daunting at first. Your peers expect you to run marketing and let them run their

own functional area. And the specific problems you face, they might not appreciate or even

understand the subtleties of the role. Your boss also gives you a lot of rope (good and bad)

!39

and there’s usually less coaching than you might be used to. It is important for you to have a

good mentor or even an executive coach to give you someone to talk with that understands

what you’re going through.

Success factor summary for each level of Marketing

What I have noticed is that Marketing careers are an iterative learning process that

build on the skills and behaviors we pick up at each level. Looking below, you can see how

each of the five success factors build on one another. If you learn to be accountable, then

you need to translate that into ownership. If you can ‘make it happen’ then it allows you to

‘work the system’ and eventually ‘run the process’.

!40

4 Your 7-second

personal brand pitch!

A typical marketing job interview starts with you waiting in the lobby longer than you

wanted. Then the big introduction, the handshake, that awkward small-talk on the way to the

tiny little room where all you can think to talk about is the weather or you finding a great

parking spot. Then you sit down, and out comes that dreaded question, “So, tell me about

yourself”. Oh god well all hate that question. “Ummmm, let me see, I like basketball, walks in

the park and I think I’m rather funny, or at least my wife does”. Wow, bad start. Then you get

about 8-10 questions that ask “tell me a time when…”. And finally, they end the interview

with, “Anything else to add?” Then there is that awkward walk back to the reception desk,

where you talk about your plans for the weekend. Then you drive home, and realize that you

forgot to mention your 3 biggest career accomplishments.

Tell me about yourself: Deliver your 7-second pitch

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“As a brand leader, I find growth where others couldn’t, and I create a motivated

brand team that delivers great work to drive results”. Think of this like your 7 second

personal brand pitch, where you give a summation of your personal brand’s big idea. Here is

a simple tool I have created to help you answer:

• What is the shortest way that you define yourself?

• What is the primary benefit you will provide your next employer?

• What is the secondary benefit you will provide?

• Then wrap it up with an expected result.

!

Look at your resume and then start off by brainstorming as many options for each of

the 4 areas as you can. This is a great way to assess yourself based on what you have done

!42

over the last few years. Make sure your definitions are more forward looking with an

aspiration for what you want to be, not what you have been.

Once you get that done, you can then begin to piece it all together and see what your

own 7-second pitch might start to look like. Keep tightening that pitch until it flows. In my

20 years of CPG marketing, I became the turnaround guy, so “I could find growth where

others couldn’t” became my little hook. What is yours?

!

Expand your 7 second pitch up to a 30-minute pitch

Then, when you feel comfortable with your 7 second pitch, take each of those 4

statement areas and try to come up with 2-3 examples and stories from your past that can

prove and demonstrate. These examples help define your 30-minute pitch:

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!

Now you have 10 stories you can use to bring into your interview to answer any of the

“so tell me a time when…” questions. If these are your best 10, then you should refer to these

to help demonstrate your big idea. This is also a great page that you can be looking at when

you are sitting in the reception area, just prior to your interview.

So here’s how the interview should go:

• “So tell me about yourself”: Deliver your 7-second pitch.

• The 8-10 interview questions: Deliver any of the 10 examples from your 30-minute pitch.

• “Anything to add?”: Repeat your 7 second pitch as your closing line.

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This way, you are now controlling up front how you want to define yourself. All 8-10

examples will help add to that definition. And as you get to the end, you wan to use a 7-

second close to re-affirm your big idea.

Later on, as the various interviewers re-group to discuss each person, you hope your

big idea sticks in their head. “I really like Bob, because he could turn this brand around. He

has done it before. He gets results”.

Lead everything with your 7-second persona brand pitch

You can use this 7-second pitch that top of your resume, your descriptor for your

LinkedIn profile, your handshake introduction at networking meetings, or within the body of

any emails that you send looking for jobs. The more you use it, the more you begin to make

this your reputation.

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One last tip. If you are in Marketing and can’t think of a safe “what’s your weakness?”

I can tell you mine. “I’m not very good at negotiations.” The reason it is safe, is that most

marketing jobs don’t really require any negotiations. If you’re reading this and you’re not a

Marketer…then I guess your safe answer might be: “I’m not really good at marketing”.

Good luck to you. I hope you get what you are looking for in your Marketing career.

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5 Six habits of great brand

leaders Habit #1: GREAT Brand Leaders push to make focused choices.

Everyone says they are good decision makers, but very few are. If you present an

either-or situation to many brand leaders, they struggle with the decision, so they try to find

a way to say, “Let’s do a little of both”. But in reality, what separates out a great brand leader

from the pack, is that great brand leaders know that decision-making starts with the choices

where you have to pick one, not both. At the core of business, brands only exist to drive more

profit than if we just sold the product without a name on it. Marketing has to be all about

ROI (Return on Investment). For the best Brand Leaders, ROI should come naturally, as it

simply means you get more back, than what you put into it. Marketers always have limited

resources (financial, time, people, partnerships) to apply against an unlimited number of

possible choices (target market, brand positioning, strategic choices or tactical activities).

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The only way the equation works is when you limit the number of possible choices to match

the limited resources. You can’t do everything so you have to do the most important things.

Don’t tell yourself that you are good at making decisions if you come to a decision

point and you always choose BOTH. Strategic thinkers never DIVIDE and conquer. They

make choices to FOCUS and conquer

FOCUS, FOCUS, FOCUS!!!

To be GREAT, you need to focus on a tight consumer target to make sure you can get

them to do what your brand needs and get them to love you more. A new way to think is to

find those consumers that are already highly motivated to buy what you have to sell and get

them to love you,

rather than targeting

everyone and get

them to like you. The

reality is that leading

brands within each

category are more

loved than the pack of

brands struggling to

figure themselves out.

I would argue that it is better to be loved by a few than tolerated by everyone. I once talked to

a bank whose target was 18-65, current customers, new customers and employees. That’s not

a target. How can you have an adequate ROI if you are spreading your limited resources

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against EVERYONE? As a brand, we always try to matter. Well, if you matter to anyone, then

you have to matter to those who care the most.

To be GREAT you need to focus on creating a tightly defined reputation that sets your brand up to own an area.

A brand has four choices: better, different, cheaper or not around for very long. Giving

the consumer too many messages about your brand will confuse them as to what makes your

brand unique. Trying to be everything to everyone is the recipe for being nothing to anyone.

Today, consumers receive 5,000 brand messages a day. Wow. As a consumer, how many of

those 5,000 do you

engage with and

digest each day?

Maybe a few? Then

why as a Marketer,

are you trying to

shout 3 or 4

messages? It is

really odd for you to

think that the way

to enter an overwhelmed crowded brain is to give more messages and not less. Slow down

and keep it simple. Great Brand Leaders find a way focus on one message. When I ask a

room full of Marketers, tell me one word that defines the Volvo brand: half the room yells

out, “SAFETY”. Volvo has been singularly focused on the safety positioning since the 1950s

not just externally but internally the safety positioning guides every decision. That is focus. If

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I asked your team for one word that describes your brand, would I get the same word from

everyone on the team? Why not?

I see too many brand plans have both penetration (getting new users to use) and

frequency (getting current users to use more) in their plan. Do you want to get more people

to eat your brand or those that already do to eat more? A Penetration Strategy gets

someone with very little experience with your brand to likely consider dropping their current

brand to try you once and see if they

like it. A Usage Frequency

Strategy gets someone who knows

and uses your brand in the way

they choose, to change their

current behavior in relationship to

your brand, either changing their

current life routine or substituting

your brand into a higher share of

the occasions. These are very

different strategies. And it is a choice you must make. I see so many Brand Plans and Creative

Briefs with both penetration and usage frequency strategies. Go look at your plan and see if

you are really making choices. Because if you’re not, then you are not making decisions,

you’re just making a very long to-do list that will exhaust your resources.

When you focus, four things happen for your brand:

1. Better return on investment (ROI)

2. Better return on effort (ROE)

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3. Stronger reputation

4. More competitive 

5. More investment behind the brand

Next time you are faced with a decision, make the choice. Don’t pick both, just in case you

are wrong. All you are doing is dividing your limited resources by spreading them across

both choices—which turns limited resources into sparse resources. Without the right

support, you won’t see the expected movement on your brand and instead of putting more

resources behind the right ideas you then put even less. I always say that a strategic person

would never get the “steak and eggs” but rather would choose twice the steak. When faced

with choices, a GREAT brand leader picks one, never both.

Habit #2: GREAT Brand Leaders represent the consumer to the Brand.

Everything starts and ends with the consumer in mind. I always ask Brand Leaders:

“Do you represent your brand to your consumer or do you represent your consumer to the

brand?” It is an important question as to your mindset of how you do your job. Start thinking

like your consumer and be their representative to your brand. There is only one source of

revenue on your financial statements. It is not the products you sell, but it is the consumer

who buys your brand.

When you think like your consumer, you will notice the work gets better, you will see

clearer paths to growth and you will start to create a brand that the consumer loves rather

than just likes. Marketing is about creating a tight connection with your consumer. The more

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love you generate for your brand, the more powerful position it occupies in the marketplace

and the more profit it can generate from that source of power.

You have to get in the consumer’s shoes, observe, listen and understand their

favorite parts of the day. You have to know their fears, motivations, frustrations and desires.

Learn their secrets, that only they know, even if they can’t explain. Learn to use their voice.

Build that little secret into your message, using their language, so they’ll know you are

talking to them. We call this little secret the consumer insight. When portrayed with the

brand’s message, whether on packaging, an advertisement or at the purchase moment, the

consumer insight is the first thing that consumers connect with. When consumers see the

insight portrayed, we make them think: “That’s exactly how I feel. I thought I was the only

one who felt like that.” This is what engages consumers and triggers their motivation and

desire to purchase. The consumers think we must be talking to them, even if it looks like we

are talking to millions.

Consumer Insights are secrets that we discover and use to our brand’s advantage.

It is not easy to explain a secret to a person who doesn’t even know how to explain

their own secret. Try it with a friend and you will fail miserably. Imagine how hard it is to

find that secret and portray it back to an entire group of consumers. Safe to say, consumer

insights are hard to find. The dictionary definition of the word Insight is “seeing below the

surface”. To get deeper, when you come across a data point, you have to keep looking,

listening asking yourself “so what does that mean for the consumer” until you have an “AHA

moment”. You can start with the observations, trends, market facts and research data, but

only when you start asking the right questions do you get closer to where you can summarize

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the insight. Look and listen for the consumer’s beliefs, attitudes and behaviors that help

explain how they think, feel or act in relationship to your brand or category. Because the

facts are merely on the surface, you have to dig, or you will miss out on the depth of the

explanation of the

underlying feelings

within the

consumers that

caused the data.

Think beyond the

specific category

insights and think

about life insights or

even societal trends

that could impact changing behavior.

Good insights get in the SHOES of your consumer and use their VOICE.

We force every insight to be written starting with the word “I” to get the Marketer into the

shoes of the consumer and force them to put the insight in quotes to use their voice.

Habit #3: GREAT Brand Leaders are fundamentally sound, even when using their instincts.

I am a huge believer that marketing fundamentals matter. In fact, we train Brand

Leaders on all the fundamentals of marketing including strategic thinking to writing brand

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plans and creative briefs. But that’s a starting point to which you grow from. If you don’t use

fundamentals in how you do your job, you will and should be fired.

Great Brand Leaders know when to be a strategic thinker and when to be an action

thinker. Strategic thinkers see “what if” questions before seeing solutions, mapping out a

range of decision trees that intersect and connect by imagining how events will play out.

They take time to reflect and plan before acting, helping you move in a focused efficient

fashion. They think slowly, logically, always needing options, but if go too slow, you will miss

the opportunity window. Action thinkers see answers before even knowing the right

questions, using instincts and impulse. Any delays will frustrate them, believing that doing

something is better than nothing

at all. This “make it happen”

mode gets things done, but if you

go too fast, your great actions

will be solving the wrong

problem. Always find the right balance by thinking slowly with strategy and

thinking quickly with your instincts.

A good Brand Leader does a good job of bringing fundamentals into how they do their

job. They know how to back up the fundamentals by gathering the right facts to support their

arguments. But GREAT Brand Leaders are able to take it to the next level and bring those

same fundamentals and match them against their instincts. They have a gut feel for decisions

they can reach into and bring out at the boardroom table based on the core fundamentals,

the experience they bring from past successes and failures as well as this instinctual

judgement.

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It’s not that great marketers have better instincts. It is that great marketers are able to

believe in their instincts and bring instincts into their decision making. They use their head,

their gut and their heart to decide the pathway on finding greatness in Marketing.

Habit #4: GREAT Brand Leaders find their greatness in the greatness of others.

I think what made me really good at my job is that I did nothing. Absolutely

nothing. Over my 20 years of Brand Management, whenever I walked into a meeting, I used

to whisper to myself: “You are the least knowledgeable person in the room. Use that to your

advantage.” The power was in the ability to ask clarification questions. When I was in with

the scientists, following my C+ in 10th grade Chemistry, I was about as smart as my

consumer that I represent. I needed to make sure all the science was easy to explain. With

my ad agencies, I finally figured out that I never had to solve problems. I just gave them my

problems to solve. It became like therapy. Plus, with six years of business school without one

art class, what do I know about art. I was smart enough to know that I needed to make the

most out of the experts I was paying.

While we don't make the product, we don’t sell the product or create the Ads, we do

touch everything that goes into the marketplace and we make every decision. All of our work

is done through other people. Our greatness as a Brand Leader has to come from the experts

we engage, so they will be inspired to reach for their own greatness and apply it on our

brand. Brand Management has been built on a hub-and-spoke system, with a team of experts

surrounding the generalist Brand Leader. When I see Brand Managers of today doing stuff, I

feel sorry for them. They are lost. Brand Leaders are not designed to be experts in marketing

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communications, experts in product innovation and experts in selling the product. You are

trained to be a generalist, knowing enough to make decisions, but not enough to actually do

the work.

Fifteen years ago, Ad Agencies broke apart the creative and the media departments

into separate agencies, forcing the Brand Leader to step in and be the referee on key

decisions. Right after that, the explosion of new digital media options that mainstream

agencies were not ready to handle forced the Brand Leader to take another step in. With the

increasing speed of social media, Brand Leaders have taken one more step in. Three steps in

and Brand Leaders can’t find a way to step back again. Some Brand Leaders love stepping in

too far so they can control the outcome of the creative process. However, if you are now

doing all the work, then who is critiquing the work to make sure it fits the strategy? Pretty

hard to think and do at the same time.

Brand Leaders need to take a step back and let the creativity of execution to unfold. I

always say that is okay to know exactly what you want, but you should never know until the

moment you see it. As the client, I like to think of marketing execution like the perfect gift

that you never thought to buy yourself. How we engage our experts can either inspire

greatness or crush the spirit of creativity. From my experience, experts would prefer to be

pushed than held back. The last thing experts want is to be asked for their expertise and then

told exactly what to do. There is a fine line between rolling up the sleeves to work alongside

the experts and pushing the experts out of the way.

It is time to step back and assume your true role as the Brand Leader. Trust me, it is a

unique skill to be able to inspire, challenge, question, direct and decide, without any

expertise at all. After all, I am an expert in doing nothing.

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Habit #5: GREAT Brand Leaders create other GREAT Brand Leaders on their team.

Great Brand Leaders focus on their people first, believing that is the best way to drive

results. The formula is simple: the smarter the people, the better the work they will produce

and in turn the stronger the results will be. Invest in training and development. Marketing

Training is not just on the job, but also in the classroom to find ways to challenge their

thinking and give them added skills to be better in their jobs.  

Great Brand Leaders know that marketing fundamentals still matter. There is a lot of

evidence in the market that the classic fundamentals are falling, whether it is strategic

thinking, writing a brand plan, writing a creative brief or judging great advertising. As things

move faster, Marketers seem more willing to let go of the fundamentals.

However, as the speed increases that should be even more of a reason o reach for your

fundamentals. People are NOT getting the same learning and development they did in prior

generations of Marketing. Investing in training, not only makes your people smarter, but it is

motivating for them to know that you are investing in them. 

Great Brand Leaders find ways put the spotlight on their people. It is time to let them

own it and let them Shine. Make it about them, not you. Great Brand Leaders find ways to

challenge your team and yet recognize when the work.

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Habit #6: GREAT Brand Leaders have a desire to Leave a Legacy.

I am always asked so what does it take to be great at marketing, and I’ll always

jokingly say, “Well, they aren’t all good qualities”. The best marketers I have seen have an

ego that fuels them. The best Marketers are like thorough-bred race horse. Use your ego in

the right way, so that it shows up as confidence and a belief in yourself. I can tell you that out

of the ten great projects I worked on throughout my career, each met major resistance at

some point. It was my confidence that helped me over-come roadblocks whether they cam

from peers or bosses.

I always challenge Brand Leaders to think of the next person who will be in their

chair, and what you want to leave them. When you create a Brand Vision, you should think

10 years from now, advertising campaigns should last at least 5 years and the strategic

choices you make should gain share and drive the brand to a new level. Yet, the reality is you

will be in the job for 2-4 years. When you write a Brand Plan, you should think of the many

audiences like senior leaders, ad agencies and those that work on your brand, but you also

should think about the next Brand Leader. What will you do, to leave the brand in a better

position than when you took it on? What will be your legacy on your brand?

Great Brand Leaders always push for greatness and never settle for OK

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Beloved Brands: Who are we?

At Beloved Brands, our purpose is to help brands find a new pathway to growth. We

believe that the more love your brand can generate with your most cherished consumers,

the more power, growth and profitability you will realize in the future.

The best solutions are likely inside you already, but struggle to come out. Our unique

engagement tools are the backbone of our strategy workshops. These tools will force you to

think differently so you can freely generate many new ideas. At Beloved Brands, we bring

our challenging voice to help you make decisions and refine every potential idea.

We help brands find growth

We start by defining a brand positioning statement, outlining the desired target,

consumer benefits and support points the brand will stand behind. And then, we build a big

idea that is simple and unique enough to stand out in the clutter of the market, motivating

enough to get consumers to engage, buy and build a loyal following with your brand. Finally,

the big idea must influence employees to personally deliver an outstanding consumer

experience, to help move consumers along the journey to loving your brand.

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We will help you write a strategic brand plan for the future, to get everyone in your

organization to follow. It starts with an inspiring vision that pushes your team to imagine a

brighter future. We use our strategic thinking tools to help you make strategic choices on

where to allocate your brand’s limited resources. We work with your team to build out project

plans, creative briefs and provide advice on marketing execution.

We make Brand Leaders smarter

We believe that investing in your marketing people will pay off. With smarter people

behind your brands will drive higher revenue growth and profits. With our brand

management training program, you will see smarter strategic thinking, more focused brand

plans, brand positioning, better creative briefs that steer your agencies, improved decision-

making on marketing execution, smarter analytical skills to assess your brand’s performance

and a better management of the profitability of the brand.

Workshop 1: How to think strategically. Turning focus into bigger gains for your business.

Strategic Thinking is an essential foundation for Marketers, to inspire them to ask big questions that challenge and focus their decisions.• You will learn how to think strategically, by asking the right questions before reaching for

solutions, mapping out a range of decision trees that intersect and connect by imagining how events will play out.

• To start, we take you through the 8 elements of good strategy: vision, opportunity, focus, speed, early win, leverage and gateway. We introduce a forced choice to help Marketers make focused decisions.

• We emphasize the value of asking good questions, using five interruptive questions to help frame your brand’s strategy. This helps to look at the brand’s core strength,

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consumer involvement, competitive position, the brand’s connectivity with the consumers and the internal situation the brand faces.

• As a result, you will learn how to build strategic statements to set up a smart strategic brand plan.

Workshop 2: Brand Positioning Statements. How to define your brand to the consumer

A winning brand positioning statement sets up the brand’s external communication and internally with employees who deliver that promise.• Our program shows how to write a classic Brand Positioning statement with four key

elements: target market, competitive set, main benefit and reason to believe (RTBs)• We introduce our Consumer Benefit ladder tool, that starts with the consumer target, with

insights and enemies. We layer in the brand features. Then, get in the consumers shoes and ask “what do I get” to find the functional benefits and ask “how does this make me feel” to find the emotional benefits.

• You will have access to unique tool that provide the top 50 potential functional and top 40 emotional benefits. This help Marketers stretch their minds yet narrow in on those that are most motivating and own-able for the brand.

• Then, we show how to build an Organizing Big Idea that leads every aspect of your brand, including promise, story, innovation, purchase moment and experience.

Workshop 3: How to write a Brand Plan.

A good Brand Plan helps make decisions to deploy the resources and provides a road map for everyone who works on the brand• We demonstrate how to write each component of the Brand Plan, looking at vision,

purpose, values, goals, key Issues, strategies and tactics. And, we provide definitions and examples to inspire Marketers on how to write each component.

• You will have a full example of a Brand Plan, with a framework to use. Marketers can try out concepts on their own brand with hands on coaching and feedback to challenge them.

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• We show how to build Marketing Execution plans as part of the overall brand plan, looking at a Brand Communications Plan, Innovation Plan, In-store plan and Experiential plan. This gives the strategic direction to everyone in the organization.

• We offer unique 1-page formats for an Annual Plan and Long-Range Strategic RoadMap.

Workshop 4: How to write Creative Briefs

The Creative Brief frames the strategy and positioning so your Agency can creatively express the brand promise through communication.• Marketing Execution must impact the brand’s consumers in a way that puts your brand in

a stronger business position. The Creative Brief is the bridge between the strategy and the execution.

• Through our Brand Positioning workshop, you will have all the homework on the brand needed to set up the transformation into a succinct 1-page Creative Brief that will focus, inspire and challenge a creative team to make great work.

• The hands-on Creative Brief workshop explores best in class methods for writing the brief’s objective, target market, consumer insights, main message stimulus and the desired consumer response.

• You walk away from the session with a ready-to-execute Creative Brief.

Workshop 5: Get better Marketing Execution

You will learn how to judge and decide on execution options that break through to consumers and motivates them to take action.• We provide Marketers with tools and techniques for judging communication concepts from

your agencies, as well as processes for making decisions and providing effective feedback. We talk about the crucial role of the brand leader in getting amazing marketing execution for your brand.

• To start, we teach how to make marketing decisions with the ABC’S, so you can choose great ads and reject bad ads looking at tools such as Attention (A), Branding (B), Communication (C) and Stickiness (S)

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• You learn how to provide advertising direction that inspires and challenges the agency to deliver great execution. You will learn about how to be a better client so you can motivate and inspire your agency. 

Workshop 6: Analytics  

You will learn how to build a deep-dive business review on the brand, looking at the market, consumers, competitors, channels and brand.• To start, you will learn the smart analytical principles that will challenge your thinking and

help you gain more support by telling analytical stories through data.• We teach you the steps to complete a deep-dive Business Review that will help assess

the health and wealth of the business, looking at the category, consumer, competitors, channels and brand. We show key formulas you need to know for financial analysis.

• Marketers will learn how to turn your analysis into a presentation for management, showing the ideal presentation slide format. We provide a full example of a business review, with a framework for every type of analysis, to use on your own brand.

• You will learn how to turn your analytical thinking into making projections by extrapolating data into the future.

Bio for Graham Robertson One of the leading voice of today’s brand leaders.

Graham spent 20 years in Brand Management leading some of the world’s most

beloved brands at Johnson and Johnson, General Mills and Coke, rising up to VP Marketing.

In his career, he has won numerous Advertising, Innovation and Leadership awards.

Graham played a major role in helping J&J win Marketing Magazine’s prestigious “Marketer

of the Year” award. Graham brings a reputation for challenging brand leaders to think

differently and to be more strategically focused.

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Graham founded Beloved Brands in 2010, to help brands find growth and make brand

leaders smarter. He leads workshops to help define your Brand Positioning, build your

brand’s Big Idea, and write strategic Brand Plans that motivate and focus everyone that

works on the brand.

Our Beloved Brands training programs will help your team, produce exceptionally

smart work work that drives stronger brand growth and profits. We cover everything a brand

leader needs to know including strategic thinking, planning, positioning, execution and

analytics.

If you need our help, email me at graham@beloved-brands.com or call me at 416 885 3911

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