Considered branding books – Primal Branding and ZAG

If you are a business marketer or have ever studied branding, I would like to recommend some very decent branding books. Let’s compare the two and discuss some of the main themes and where each of the authors came from. The two books that we will discuss are:

1. “ZAG: The # 1 High Performance Brands Strategy“By Marty Neumeier; New Riders Press, Berkeley CA; 2007.
2. “Core Brand: Create Fans for Your Brand, Your Company, and Your Future” By Patrick Halon, Free Press, a division of Simon and Schuster, New York NY; 2006.

Primal Branding was a quick read, like ZAG, although Primal Branding was very repetitive. Patrick Hanlon, the author, did what Marty Neumeier promised not to do; That’s Patric’s book he took a little topic that could have been a 15-20 page essay and spread it out into a 245 page book.

In fact, I think Partick Hanlon did what many corporate PR writers do; highlighting your clients, prospects, and friends’ clients as a way to prop up and help secure your own legacy alongside your clientele. It’s a public relations strategy that many in that industry have used as they borrow their own clients as case studies, helping them publish and the author as their CBO or outsourced brand manager.

Still, Primal Branding was a valuable book and a good topic and it was definitely worth the $ 25.00 with the 10% discount on the Barnes and Noble loyalty card. Smile. One of Patrick Hanlon’s clients since 2003.

In fact, I liked that both authors took on the loyalty programs. I see Patrick was very focused on the Fortune 500, and this may explain why he failed, except on a couple of occasions to note that you can make a quality brand of anything with enough money. It’s as if you could run your dog for president of the United States and practically get him elected even without papers for $ 750 million. That’s not as impressive as building without the advertising or marketing budget.

Over the years many of the companies that you would have noticed used in Primal Branding as examples were obviously not Patrick’s clients or within his knowledge base so they weren’t on the list, but should have been. instead of all the repetition. The main topic was interesting, but “Primitive” It has been used successfully in book titles before, so perhaps that is why they used it.

You know, anyone can make an analogy and try to force everything to fit all the points, but Primal Branding misbranding a bit, I noticed this immediately in the introduction with their mention of Starbucks, without Howard’s knowledge. Schultz’s book; “For your heart in this” or how Starbucks Media and Howard moved to Los Angeles and Hollywood to help with their pop trend branding efforts from the start.

Anyway. I think Patrick is someone I wouldn’t hire for branding and Marty, author of Zag, I would like. But, I also got the idea that Patrick was old school (also judging from his bio) and Marty is both or at least has a good knowledge base from the 70s, 80s and earlier due to his personal studies background and great interest, but it has made its mark in the 90s and today. If that makes sense to you.

As for Patrick, his most important summary was at the bottom of page 236 and at the beginning of page 237. I think that’s what one should get out of that book, it’s a decent format. I would love to compete against Patrick in the marketplace, with whatever company he has as a client. When it comes to Marty, I’d like to work on his team against anyone else on the market.

Patrick’s book discussed the obvious, like Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, but shall we? Was your book written for a newbie? For someone in the industry? A newbie may have a small business, they are not running a large one, and their advice is not intended for small businesses, although it is intended to be, perhaps to increase book sales by expanding secondary target readers.

For someone in the industry, stating the obvious causes the reader to have low expectations, which I think is a good thing, since that’s all it really delivers. All of your examples are larger companies with the exception of a couple, so the book is not suited to the small business market, which is a good chunk of those who buy the book.

On page 209, Mr. Hanlon talks about several books that he recommends, I have read many of them, most of them I did not like. Your recommendation for “Built to last“Collins is right, of course Marty’s book list includes that book as well, and Marty’s list is so much better and I’ve read several of those too, I agree that all good books. The list from Marty at the end of ZAGI especially liked the short summary next to each title of why. I’ve included a couple that I haven’t read on my 2009 reading list.

As I read the end of Patrick’s book, I felt like he borrowed some old work that he had done and forced it onto the pages, I felt that his summaries of previous events weren’t exactly correct and that he was limited and in the same box that he claims to count. . us to go out. His comments in the final chapters of the story were based on perspective, not real and frankly somewhat wrong, and he attributed the results of events to actions that probably had little to do with them.

Patrick’s bibliography was completely weekly, it almost seemed an afterthought and it made me question what I had just read, although I know for sure that a lot of his advice is relevant, because I understand the brand for the most part, having lived it using my own money in the business world. So I see his wisdom on the one hand and assume on the other that his success in life was due more to who he knew than what he was able to accomplish with his brand genius.

In many respects, Patrick, in my opinion, has come to believe in his own created myths and the myths created by others in his field, or so he claims in his book. Like I said, I’d love to see this guy on the battlefield in the market. Even though the book was decorated around a fun theme I’d say he put a square peg into a round hole so I wonder if he even enjoyed writing this book or if he actually wrote it or just spoke into a tape recorder and had someone else write it.

Why? Simply put, if you’ve ever done this you will find yourself repeating yourself frequently, especially if you rarely dictate to transcribers. Ask any transcriber, it’s a big deal, and if this is the case, the embarrassment of putting your name on something, barely touched it, that’s not fair to the reader.

If he wrote it himself with all that repetition, I wonder if that’s all he knows or if he’s just getting old and not remembering. If someone is at the top of their field, they should be able to do better. Now, with that said, I understand that you have connections in New York, a lot of them, and that you have great clients because of that, so it was easy to get a book deal. I wish he had put his best efforts into it. It’s obvious that Patrick is overpaid and doesn’t work as hard as he should given the severity of his advice and the size of his clients. [in my opinion].

This does not detract from the business success of the gentleman, but it reveals the character. Now even with all that said, yes, it was worth reading and easily worth the $ 25.00, but it’s what I read between the lines in this book.

So I’m really glad a fellow branding expert recommended him to read, I learned a few things and understood his premise, but he could have those two paragraphs on pages 236-237 in a 250 word article. I bet Marty, author of ZAG would agree with me, I should ask him. When i finished reading Primal brandI wrote those two paragraphs word for word in my trusted journal to use in an upcoming major branding project.

Now, regarding the ZAG book, it is all that it promises on the cover, even more so, and you will be pleasantly surprised after reading it. The format is brilliant and easy to read, you don’t waste time with repetitions or nonsense. It’s short, sweet, and to the point. It is worth the $ 25.00 and is something that every entrepreneur, business person, marketing department, head of government agency or non-profit public relations person should own. He sits proudly in my corporate library, he is a gatekeeper.