Stamping feat

I'm sure you know the story about where 'branding' comes from - literally branding the backside of livestock so people would know who they belonged to. This metaphor translates neatly into the concept of modern brand logos of course, but actually the ways that brands can stamp their mark are far broader.

Logo-stamping remains critical and its function has barely changed for a thousand years. But brands’ palette of stampable marks has become richer too: Burberry’s tartan, HSBC’s red frame, Oatly’s chunky typography etc. (Notice how I’m not using the D word). But that’s not the end of it. There are even more ways that brands can stamp their marks, only it gets a lot harder to do...

Apple stamps its mark on retail experiences with discerning minimalism and tech-literate nomadic staff. Monzo stamps its mark on banking with disarmingly informal and thoughtful information. Virgin Atlantic stamps its mark on airline advertising with feel-good flair and progressive representation. And so on.

This kind of stamping is not quite* a form of identification, but it is a reinforcement of it. Brand building is about first standing for something and then reinforcing that position through everything you do. Your more identifiable marks (logo etc) confirm its you and these supporting behaviours and attributes either feed or confuse people’s perception of you. (still not using the D words!)

Now, while it’s extremely easy to stamp a recognisable mark in the form of a logo or colourway, it’s almost impossible to stamp a discernible mark in the form of an experience. *I think I would just about recognise an Apple retail experience if you removed logos, products and typography, but maybe not - copycats are never far behind. And this is the world’s most famous brand, well-known for its philosophy and style. But the way they stamp their mark on retail experiences absolutely backs up everything they claim to stand for. Which is the point. The logo tells people what to expect, the experience then has to deliver.

How easy do you find it to stamp your company’s mark on things? How clear is your team on how to do that? Do they know which tools or techniques to use? What to avoid?

The thing with stamps (stampers?) is that the crisper their edges and the richer the ink, the clearer their mark. That’s why logos and fonts and graphic shapes work so well. It’s harder to stamp your mark on, for example, photography. Could you tell a Nike and Under Armour photo apart without the logos? My client, allplants does a brilliant job with its highly saturated and expressive food photography, but achieving that level of stand-out is rare.

And by the time you get to experiences—how you write, how you create retail events, your customer service—the edges of your 'stamps' get increasingly blurry. You might think you have a nice array of behaviours and principles that the world recognises instantly, but do they make a clear impression or leave behind a smudged blur that says nothing and could have come from anyone?

Because it’s so hard to do this well, it’s important to take your brand attributes/values very seriously, not treat them as an afterthought or a way to capture everything in one place. You need to get them spot on before you start dipping them in ink and applying them to everything with lavish abandon.

So, what does your 'box of stamps' look like inside your organisation?

Do you have a dozen brand values that can be interpreted in 30 different ways, or three crisp-edged attributes with clear Dos and Don’ts? Does your team understand the value in reinforcing your brand positioning or did you just send a deck around and tell people to get on with it? Do they feel involved and empowered to make those decisions on behalf of the brand, or do your guidelines feel like a straitjacket that stifles their creativity? Do you have inspiring references for each one or do you leave people to it? Few companies do this brilliantly. Because it’s hard.

There are two ways to get this wrong. And they sit on the two extremes:

1. Arrogantly assume that everything your brand does is very YOU without actually interrogating it. This is the kool-aid approach.

2. Accept that it’s so hard to consistently stamp your mark on every experience that you don’t bother to try, and simply stamp your logo on them instead.

The third approach is to understand the value of reinforcing what you stand for and to be thoughtful and clear in your intentions to do so. To work out what the pillars of your brand really are and translate those into simple, repeatable guidelines. And to involve team members so they are invested and empowered in the process.

Anyone can stamp a logo. It takes a special kind of company to stamp their mark on everything they do, so we remember not just who they are, but who they are.