Branding:Lessons From #Brand Akothee.

Back in my marketing class, I had this towering intellectual with a masterful capacity of simplifying concepts. While pursuing my diploma in Marketing Management, this towering figure; both in stature and intellect was my professor in a basic course called ‘Principles and Practices of Marketing’ and here’s how he simply defined branding.

He repeatedly told us, “Simply put, a brand is a promise to the customer. “It tells them what they should expect in terms of products and services and also helps them differentiate you from competition,” he would add. Quite simple, don’t you think?

Personally, I consider a brand as the sum total of all tangible and non-tangible assets that one uses to both woo customers and distinguish oneself from competition. Not much of a difference if you think about it critically. So I will marry the two and use them in drawing up my points of view.

If you have a TV, radio, a Smartphone or even just a basic feature phone, chances are that you have heard of a lady called Akothee. If you are one who loves to understand things a little bit more than what is usually thrown around, then you’d probably also know that that’s not her real name. Her birth name is Esther Akoth-typical Luo girl as she defines herself in one of the interviews.

However, from the typical Luo girl, Esther Akoth is now known to many as Akothee and she is so many things to different people-FACT. Ask Ezekiel Mutua about Akothee and lets save that conversation for another day.

Personal Brands:

My readership, have you ever googled your name? When you do, you might obviously find other people who share your name but somewhere at least through Facebook, linked in or through any other social media site that you are registered on; you are likely to pop up.

Now, say you had just come from a cocktail where you happened to drop your card to an influential businessman who wants to throw some business your way and decides to “check-up” a little bit more on who you are through the internet and wallah!, all there is raunchy photo 1, against drunken photo 2 all competing with leaked nude 3.

That right there would be your personal brand. Without sounding too simplistic, a personal brand is how you promote yourself. It is what you put out to the world in terms of your unique skills, experience, and personality that you want the world to see.

So, with that elaborate background, let me get to the matter at hand. What lessons, if any, can we learn about branding through #Brand Akothee?

And for the avoidance of doubt, my role here is not to play judge, jury or advocate to #Brand Akothee, just to engage in an academic exercise as we build on the body of knowledge.

i. The Birth of #Brand Akothee

From the little research I gathered online, Akothee is a scion of a Rhumba Band. She used to be a dancer for Limpopo International. There is an interview Akothee did with Larry Madowo, not certain of the actual dates but on YouTube it was published on 9th August 2015. In this interview, she notes that she came into the limelight in 2014 and I will work with that as part of her birth story. Here are crucial excerpts of the interview I will use to build my case. After she answers forthrightly about not needing a man and being Miss Independent, the dialogue (not in systematic order) developed as below:

Larry: So how did you make all this wealth that you seem to possess and display quite openly?

Akothee: I don’t display openly, that’s the life I’m living.

…after a few minutes

Larry: So why are you splurging all this money on music if it doesn’t pay you?

Akothee: I’m fulfilling the dream of Akothee and my fans and I believe it will pay.

Larry: What is that dream for Akothee?

Akothee: “…I am an impossible woman, I try the impossibilities…I do the impossibilities, what people are afraid of doing.”

For those who’ve had chance to read the gem of a book that is Simon Sinek’s “Start With Why,”  233 pages, 14 chapters and after loads of ‘pause and think’ moments later; all this guru tries to emphasize on is Brand Purpose. Of late; I have come to fall truly, deeply and madly in love with this book and for good reason.

Folks, like I pointed in my previous article; Safaricom was founded on the ethos of “transforming lives”, Apple on “think different” and Kempiski on “luxurious hospitality.” Now you take a minute and think about it. In your estimation, do you think these brands are actually living up to their standard? Most probably you answered yes to that question. If you did, now draw a correlation to the results of those companies and I’m not just talking financial results here.

Think brand equity, think brand love, think brand familiarity, brand positioning etc. Do you think they score highly in all these metrics? That’s because they are brands built on Purpose. 

Back to Akothee, from the get go, Akothee talks about “I do the impossibilities, what people are afraid of doing.” That is a clear WHY. She set out to defy the ordinary, not to be just another creature of the norm. She was intent on pretty much to doing that which a majority will consider impossible. She was on a mission to challenge what people define as “good”, “acceptable”, “girl-like” even.

And hold up, even before I am done with this lesson 1. She knowingly or unknowingly says a very profound thing when asked about keeping to her Music dream despite it not making money. She says, “I’m fulfilling the dream of Akothee and my fans and I believe it will pay.” 

My readership, lesson No. 1: # Always build your brand on purpose, believe in it, put in work and results will align.

ii. Know Your Audience, Know Your Brand

Daring, bold, courage, self-belief, assertive, go-getter, unconventional, naughty, “kreki”, “flip-mode” “chizi” and maybe just maybe, weird and not too well behaved all the time. Those are all verbs, adjectives and in our urban dialect sheng’ -words that at one point or another many have found themselves associating with Akothee.

There have been celebrities throughout history who managed to epitomize their larger-than-life, personas and their wealth to be in sync with their “crazy” lifestyles and did this for the different eras they lived in; some, even beyond their eras.

If anything, this is an elusive and rare quality that can't be manufactured. These are characters that transcend their respective fields and become part of a larger narrative and in some part, just a mere reflection of what society is. Locally, Akothee holds this title. If you were to cross borders, look at the likes of Floyd Mayweather.

Many of us know Akothee for her larger than life personality and she makes proper use of it. Akothee has over the years built her brand on doing what she feels and not feeling the need to justify to anyone what she does. Something, I think a majority of us would wish to have; that sense of free spiritedness, seemingly being in full control and generally just being Unbound.

Akothee, just like any other brand has built an audience by sticking to this persona and continually continues to feed into it. Love her of hate her, she does have a fan base, locally and across borders. Next time be a little bit keener, when the name Akothee is being mentioned, is it about her music? Seven out of ten times it’s usually about the side shows and action that Akothee pulls off-stage. But even after that, look at her nest time she has a performance, she will still pull a crowd.

Magic? I don’t think so. Akothee knows that her brand is ALL about the attributes mentioned above and speaks to that audience that shares the “be yourself, be unbound” mantra.  

Lesson number 2: #Know Your Audience, Know Your Brand.

iii. Your Brand is only a commodity; Package Yourself

In case you haven’t been told this about yourself; you, just like myself and everyone else, all love to look at good and beautiful things. Hold up, I’m not passing any judgment on Akothee’s beauty here; for she does herself justice on that pretty well (link below refers).

Far from the aesthetics, I am talking about functional packaging and design to help sell your brand. Personal branding is a dynamic process that happens in many ways and many places.

In fact, every time you post something online, how you go to work, how you behave in a party, how you talk to others, your attitude and your general mannerisms all form the self-package.

For comparative purposes, take for instance yogurt packaging.

Some years back, it was one cumbersome endeavor for one to savor their refreshing packet of yogurt. The packaging came without a cap and it was simply a messy affair. Other products that underwent evolutionary growth in terms of functional packaging include: brands such as blue band, Omo (from the box to durable plastic), a lot of the milk brands, cocoa, Drinking Chocolate etc. The brands today have enhanced both the functionality and design of their brands through packaging.

For #Brand Akothee, I will simply go with my view that her self-packaging is both functional and designed with plenty of color and all fit well with her Brand. Allow me to refer you to the World Wide Web because I believe it’s all self explanatory.

Lesson #3: Good Packaging=desirable brand experience which equals loyal consumer base.

 Iv: For Brand Building; Publicity is King, Queen & Guardian Knight

We are all bad in someone’s story. That’s a hard pill to swallow, right? For a lot of folks and just judging by public sentiment, Akothee might be bad in a lot of people’s stories; fair assumption? I don’t know but it’s just an assumption all the same.

Because celebrities are constantly in the public eye, they occasionally fall victim to negative press. Of course, this negative press isn’t always a death sentence. In fact, many celebrities have taken bad media coverage and turned it positive. Same thing has happened for product and service brands as well.

Akothee’s publicity stories are replete with negative press. If it’s not the costumes she’s dawning, then it might be the moves she pulls on & offstage or probably just some ‘unconventional’ responses she gives when asked some questions. Take for instance that one time a fan asked her “How do you get these rich men you have?” To which she responded: “Just the same way you meet the poor ones. There is no formula!” Heh, kweli huyu hapendi ujinga! And that response alone got her some fair share of bad publicity.

From ‘simple’ comments as those to elaborate moves she pulls that even get’s our top dog moral police; Chief Corrector Mr. Ezekiel Mutua to come out guns blazing, this lady is no stranger to bad publicity. One would not be so wrong to deduce that to her, truly all publicity is good publicity.

But with all the bad that can be attached to this Kenyan brand, a week or so ago, she stood up and stood out for humanity. Akothee came with a basketful to feed the hungry in Turkana -and she didn’t do it alone, she used her usual energy and verve to rally Kenyans behind her beautiful cause. Just as it is rare to miss a corruption headline in Kenya today, this story too didn’t get Akothee any form of flack. If anything, Kenyans were impressed with the self declared “President of Single Mothers.”

Despite the fact that she was just as “naked” as she usually is, all people connected to was her sense of compassion, sacrifice and sincerity in reaching out to the hungry and that right there, brings me to my last lesson. In brand building (and as borrowed from prison break), the below holds true…

Lesson #4 There’s nothing as good as a bad man with a good story or as good as a good man with a bad story.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYSJAZNgqKY