Why Great Brands Win (Even When Ads Stop Working) | Bill Harper

Summary

Podcast Summary

Podcast: Liftoff with Keith: Conversations with Super Founders and Growth Experts
Episode: Why Great Brands Win (Even When Ads Stop Working) | Bill Harper
Date: June 30, 2026
Host: Keith Newman
Guest: Bill Harper, Top Branding Expert and Founder, Brand Boss HQ

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Episode Overview

This episode delves into the everlasting power of brand—specifically, why great brands continue thriving even when traditional performance marketing and advertising channels plateau or lose effectiveness. Keith Newman hosts Bill Harper, a renowned branding strategist, for a candid conversation about brand differentiation, storytelling, market positioning, and actionable lessons for founders. The discussion is filled with real-world examples, memorable quotes, and practical strategies for leveraging brand as a catalyst for sustainable growth, regardless of industry or the latest marketing technology changes.

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Key Themes & Insights

The Real Value of Brand (00:36 – 05:14)

• Brand Beyond Identity:
  Harper emphasizes that too many companies equate brand with logos, colors, and domain names, ignoring the strategic foundation that actually makes brands memorable and successful.
• Brand as Differentiation:
  Great brands succeed by building simplicity, relevance, and meaning—by owning an idea or “enemy”—instead of getting lost in a sea of similar offerings.
  • Quote [02:54 - Bill Harper]:
    “No one buys anything for the thing… Nobody wants to buy software. They want to get their boss off their back, and the software makes it possible.”

The Power of "Owning the Problem" (05:14 – 14:58)

• Effective Positioning in Crowded Markets:
  Harper uses insurance advertising as a model: while Geico owns “time & money,” Progressive positions itself on obsessive customer service, Farmers leverages “experience,” and Allstate leans on “edutainment” through its “Mayhem” character.
  • Quote [07:04 - Bill Harper]:
    “Each one of them picked an island… If you say time and money, you’re Geico. Customer service is Progressive. Experience is Farmers. Edutainment is Allstate. Each addresses a specific psychographic profile.”
• Lesson:
  Find the precise pain you want to solve, plant your flag around it, and avoid diluting your message or mimicking competitors.

Making Brand Tangible for Founders (12:44 – 17:05)

• Practical Example:
  The Raleigh plumber with the “If we’re not on time, you don’t pay a dime” message succeeds by solving the #1 customer frustration—unreliable appointment windows—rather than touting generic service quality.
  • Quote [14:58 - Bill Harper]:
    “…By making that distinction, by saying we’re the brand that solves this one particular problem, you can count on us for this, they put themselves apart from everybody else in the category.”

Translating the Lesson to Tech Startups (15:37 – 19:10)

• Harper’s Guidance:
  For SaaS and AI startups, features and benefits are surface level—what matters is the emotional need or headache you remove. Cut through feature noise; message around the real-life outcome your tech enables.
  • Quote [16:48 - Keith Newman]:
    “So you’re saying interview your customers, slash prospects, understand their need, and formulate an insight that allows you to differentiate and still deliver on the value proposition…?”
  • Quote [17:05 - Bill Harper]:
    “Once you understand the need behind the product decision, that’s the thing that you’re actually solving.”

Simplicity & Focus: The Hallmark of Brand Success (19:10 – 22:54)

• From Complexity to Clarity:
  Harper details the process of distilling a brand story into one unforgettable promise or idea. He shares the example of Delsey Luggage’s “travel light” campaign, which skyrocketed sales by addressing an overlooked emotional trigger—unexpected baggage fees.
  • Quote [21:30 - Bill Harper]:
    “It’s not that nobody wants to buy lightweight luggage… They want to solve the reason they would need it. The second we showed them that, their sales just popped off the charts.”

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Branding Across Generations (22:54 – 25:29)

• Fundamentals Don’t Change, Expression Does:
  Harper pushes back on the notion that Gen Z is fundamentally different. Human needs—aspiration, identity, feeling unique—are timeless; only the preferred vehicles for expressing them shift across generations.
  • Quote [23:12 - Bill Harper]:
    “Everybody is trying to do ownership and build their own identity… I want to be seen, I want to be heard… the emphasis is on a different syllable.”
• Trends vs. Underlying Drivers:
  Using the “Labubu” phenomenon, Harper illustrates how group identity and status remain paramount, but the cues—and what makes a brand hot or dead—change rapidly.

Research & Social Listening (25:29 – 27:39)

• Continuous Consumer Research:
  Harper and his team use a mix of traditional and digital “social listening” to detect shifts in trends and buying psychology, but the real clues are always in how and why people make purchase decisions.

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AI’s Double-Edged Sword for Brands (27:39 – 31:34)

• Production is Demystified, Strategy is Not:
  AI means anyone can execute on assets that used to be expensive—leveling the playing field for design and marketing execution.
  • Quote [27:55 - Bill Harper]:
    “You’ve just got a crayon box that went from 64 to 64 million overnight… The downside is that those groups are confusing pretty and fast with strategic and impactful.”
• Paradox of Prompts:
  When everyone uses the same AI tools and prompt recipes, outputs risk sameness. Brand advantage now returns to owning a distinct idea and emotional territory—not how quickly you can generate a slick asset.
  • Quote [30:50 - Bill Harper]:
    “You’re making the point without even realizing it… there isn’t a chance in the world people are going to buy it because it doesn’t mean anything … and it’s not differentiated in a way that’s relevant to anybody.”

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Founder Advice & Classic Branding Wisdom (31:34 – 37:41)

• Extreme Simplicity Wins:
  Harper urges founders to cut to one clear promise—no more, no less.
  • Classic Brand Example [34:15 - Bill Harper]:
    “If you’re going to start anywhere, what is your one thing that you can promise and how simply can you say and repeat that so that people can’t forget it?”
• Consistency Breeds Results:
  Powerful brands repeat their core ideas endlessly until customers repeat them back (e.g., “Just Do It,” “Curiously Strong Mints,” “What happens here, stays here”).
• Avoid Chasing Shiny Objects:
  Losing focus, even in pursuit of new markets or revenue (Vegas’ failed attempt to chase families) can tank both new and existing business lines.

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The Enduring Power of Brand—Even in the Age of AI (35:12 – 37:41)

• Brand Preference is Human Nature:
  As consumer journeys become more automated, the brands people “like most” will always win—purchase drivers remain emotional, even in B2B or AI-mediated environments.
  • Quote [35:43 - Bill Harper]:
    “It’s people making choices and people choose emotionally and then justify their choices logically. … You can’t get around the fact that it’s people making decisions.”

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Contact / Learn More

• Find Bill Harper online:
  • TikTok: @BrandBossHQ (2,500+ free marketing videos)
  • Website: brandbosshq.com

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Memorable Quotes & Timestamps

• "No one buys anything for the thing. Nobody wants to buy software. They want to get their boss off their back." — Bill Harper [03:31]
• "Perception equals demand." — Keith Newman [12:17]
• "If we're not on time, you don't pay a dime." — Bill Harper cites Raleigh plumber [12:44]
• “Once you understand the need behind the product decision, that’s the thing you’re actually solving.” — Bill Harper [17:05]
• “Extreme simplicity wins… businesses are like, ‘God, it can’t be that simple.’ Actually, it’s the only way.” — Bill Harper [31:54]
• “Consistency breeds reputation and reputation breeds choice and choice makes the cash register ring.” — Bill Harper [34:19]
• "Brand will always matter because it's people making choices, and people choose emotionally." — Bill Harper [35:43]

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For Listeners Who Missed the Episode

If you want a masterclass in building a resilient, sustainable business—regardless of technological fads or advertising cycles—this episode delivers the blueprint. Whether you’re a startup founder, growth marketer, or executive wrestling with differentiation, Harper’s wisdom offers both strategic frameworks and tactical, actionable ideas, all delivered with clear-eyed candor and punchy real-world examples. The central message: Great brands don’t just survive marketing changes—they win, because they understand and own a singular, timeless, and emotionally resonant idea.

Transcript

[A]

Foreign.

[B]

The sponsor of Liftoff with Keith is the one and Only Compass Strategic Advisors.com an experienced partner to help you navigate everything from cap tables to stock option and compensation plans, and all types of backroom and marketing services. There is no better friend to the startup CEO than Compass. Check them out at Compass Strategic Advisors. Well, this is very exciting to have Bill Harper with me. Bill, listen, welcome to Liftoff with Keith.

[A]

Thank you. Thank you so much for having me.

[B]

Yeah, and this is a great conversation. You know, we talk a lot about working with founders, startups, entrepreneurs, the next generation, the new wave. And one of the conversations that kind of gets left behind is brand building. And I know that. And you know, the whole focus on building brand has been. One of your folks is you were recently named a top 20 branding expert. So I kind of.

[A]

When people say that stuff.

[B]

Yeah, I don't know. And what, who are the other 19?

[A]

Well, I know a couple of them, actually. So it was kind of nice, right? Like you get this thing and you look on them like, oh, I know Ashwin.

[B]

Oh, I know that guy.

[A]

I know that guy.

[B]

Yeah, I know. Misery loves company, right?

[A]

For sure.

[B]

But you've helped a lot of brands drive growth through perception, through passion, through positioning, demand creation. Let's start with your story. How did, how did this company, brand boss hq, get formed and what was your path to get to here?

[A]

What I wanted more than anything. I've owned five advertising agencies. All of them have been growth centric. Right. All of them have been about scale. I'm not there to do just like, you know, keep treading water marketing. And what I've found is that brand has gotten so lost in the wake of performance marketing, let me track it, let me see where it goes, et cetera, that nobody's actually building simplicity. Nobody's building relevance anymore. What they're saying is, look, I've got a great product or service and I can go out and I can buy my audience. And that's great for the beginning, but the thing about that approach is that it tapers off and eventually you have to pivot from the early adopter growth to mass. And in order to do that, you have to have something that is relevant and meaningful and differentiating between you and your competition. Otherwise you, you're just saying, you know, we're the tallest Q tip in the box, but really we're better, we're taller. And it's like, it's not measurable and it's not interesting and it's not unique. That's what these big Brands know, and that's what brands like Liquid Death and Dollar Shave Club leveraged to be able to scale the way that they do. If you want to know how Liquid Death achieved a $1.4 billion valuation in seven and a half years, something that, you know, most Harvard grads would cut off their left arm to have, it wasn't because of the product. Their product was not innovative. It's flavored water in a can. There were thousands of competitors. What they did was they changed the story. They flipped the script on the value that they provided, and in doing that, they created a demand within the category that didn't exist. Water was. Water was water until Liquid Death came along and changed the game plan. And when they did, they made themselves unique, and that's what lifted them up, and that's what made them the success that they are today.

[B]

So how do you take that approach and find a way to differentiate yourself? You're saying you. You come up with, what's that. What's that different angle that's going to kind of find some signal through all the noise?

[A]

Yeah. So it comes down to one of two things. You are either making a goal possible, or you are solving a problem. But you must have an enemy. If you don't have an enemy, then you can't get there. And people ask me all the time. They're like, which is it? Is it an enemy or is it a goal? They're the same coin. Right?

[B]

Right.

[A]

It's the exact same thing. If I want to look like Arnold Schwarzenegger, then the goal is to look better, and the. The enemy is my couch. Right. But those two things have to exist simultaneously in order for that to happen. Most businesses are so focused on inside my product, my service, my track record, my pricing, my better, whatever, that they. They miss the fact that that's not how people buy from them. And they go, well, yeah, it is, man. They're going to know that the ink in my pen is better. And nobody gives a shit about the ink in your pen. So the whole idea is to be able to come in and say, okay, well, if they don't care about the ink, then what do they care about? And that's the first step in knowledge, when we can accept the fact that no one buys anything for the thing. Nobody wants to buy software. They want to get their boss off their back, and the software makes it possible to get their boss off their back. They. Nobody wants to buy a hammer and nails. They want to hang a picture on the wall. The sooner that we recognize the Fact that we are nothing more than a bridge from where they are now to where they're trying to go to either make a goal possible or to make an enemy go away the faster we become relevant. And for businesses that want to truly scale, that's critical because that's what every household name brand you know or have ever known or will ever know leverages to achieve that kind of growth.

[B]

Yeah, I've always thought it was either save money or make money. Same kind of thing as goal or enemy too, right?

[A]

I think it is. It depends on how you use it. So here, here's a great example of that. There is no more commoditized marketplace on the planet than insurance. You can't touch it, you can't taste it, you can't measure it, you can't smell it, you can't bend it. It doesn't desalinate water, it doesn't solve world hunger, okay? It's just insurance. And what's worse, you got to have it. So people hate it. So it's a product you don't use and don't touch that you have to pay for. So people dislike it. Geico, when they wanted to come in and change from being focused on government employee insurance, which is what GEICO stands for, and they pivoted from being a mom and pop brand to becoming a category player, they, they needed to move to mass from niche. What they did was they created a character in the Gecko that talked about two things that they knew were critically important to people, their time and their money. Give us 15 minutes or less and we'll save you 15 or more. Right? This construct, well now progressive looks over and they go, damn, we don't want them to keep stealing market share from us. We've got to do something. But if we say time and money, we're going to look just like them and that's going to copycat us. We can't afford to do that because we're just going to be marketing their message, which is going to remind people of geico. So instead we're going to do something else. So they take a look at their category and they say, well, okay, what do people feel? This is where market research is so important. What do people feel about insurance? Well, they hate it. Okay, well, if they hate it, what do they expect for it? Well, if I've got to pay for this thing that I don't like anyway, you damn well better serve me. And that's what Flow and her band of characters is all about. We're so obsessed with Insurance, we are so obsessed with your well being that we are literally here 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year, should you need anything. And we're obsessed about it and know everything about it. And if you look around the category, each one of them picked an island. So time and money is geico. You know, customer service is progressive experience. As farmers, you know, we know a few things because we've seen a few things. That's an experience story. And then Allstate came in and, and they did edutainment. Their whole thing was, we know how it feels to have life throw a curveball at you. So we create this character called Mayhem so you can laugh along with, as we say, God, doesn't it suck when X happens to you? And you then have to use your insurance. Each one of those addresses a specific psychographic profile. And so the people who say, well, time and money is the most important thing, or entertaining me is the most important thing, or making me feel like I'm the king of the world is the most important thing, they gravitate to those brands based on what that story is, the brand promises. That's where that works.

[B]

Really clever positioning breakdown there too. It really forces everyone to think and look. As a result, insurance maybe have the most creative commercials in the industry. In the, in the, of all categories.

[A]

Well, and for those of us old enough to remember, and unfortunately I am, before then, right before, it was State Farm and Allstate who owned everything, and they did these horrible commercials. Sad. These, like, gut wrenching, you know, when a tree falls on your house, you're in good hands with all I think is the most horrendously soap operatic dreck that ever was in marketing. And they all copied each other. And so people were like, well, whichever one. Getting back to your point about price, whichever one's cheapest, I guess I'll go with that. Or whichever one's easiest, I really don't want to change. And that's, that's how the insurance category changed. Geico literally changed the entire game for everybody. And everybody, with the exception of State Farm has followed suit. State Farm is the last holdout. They're, they're kind of dripping along with that idiot kid that they've got in their commercials that tries to say something cute. But every other one of them has successfully migrated to try to pitch State Farm Bill. Yeah, yeah, they're going to send me a check. But if you look at them like they pale in comparison. The other stories are interesting and, and magnetic and all the rest of it and state farms are boring.

[B]

That leads to a question I have, because I deal mostly with tech companies, right? And there's this whole wave of AI coming that's going to disrupt everything because it can, you know, change the whole, you know, tenor of a conversation to a brand perception. But what are companies getting right today or wrong today about their branding and their positioning?

[A]

Most businesses honestly pay no attention to brand at all. And that is the biggest opportunity for most.

[B]

Come up with a URL, maybe a cool logo. They want the right color.

[A]

So that website and that's it, they all think that brand is brand identity. Now, the word brand used to mean, what does a company stand for, what strategy is it using and how will it differentiate itself in the category? And now people are like, dude, we got a bitch and logo. And they think that that's like, that's the end of it. Like, those are my colors, that's my logo. What are you talking about? And in large part that's because the focus has become so unbelievably, overwhelmingly performance marketing generated and that I refer to this as the opioid epidemic of our industry is this complete dependency. And it is nothing short of dependency on performance marketing's behavior. And then they can't understand why when performance marketing stops working, which it does for every category, every industry and every company, when you have basically gone and pulled all of the corn out of the ground and no one has bothered to plant any new corn with, with awareness marketing, then there's nothing else. There's nothing else to harvest and you're out of it. And so then you are in a position of commodity against your competitive set. But that's also the greatest opportunity if they, for the brands that recognize that people don't buy the best product or service, they buy the best, the products or services they like best. If you can just get that nugget in your head and understand that it's people making decisions and people are emotional and therefore they choose emotionally, they're not logical, they're not going down and saying, well, you know, I spent the last three weeks evaluating the balance sheets and the side by side comparisons and I hired an independent third party to evaluate these two SAS programs against each other and found that this one is 6 microseconds faster in its decision making than that one is and that it has a 3.2% difference in terms of its potential for adopting new technology. That will be to my benefit. Like, if the BS light isn't going off for you yet, nobody Evaluates that way, nobody. They evaluate based on whether they like the person who is the sales rep. They evaluate whether they like the brand and what it stands for. That's what they're buying. And for businesses that recognize that it is a massive opportunity to grow very quickly in any market.

[B]

Yeah, I'm going to paraphrase you. Perception equals demand.

[A]

You got it.

[B]

And we're seeing a little bit of example of that because we know that AI can help us with a product decision, but we want to feel good about the relationship, about what we're buying. Right. So what do you advise people to get started? Hey, I just got my, you know, check in the mail. My product starting to get some traction. What do I need to be thinking about?

[A]

Yeah, the big thing is to solve one particular issue. And I'm going to use something that is so stupid simple so that everybody can make sure that they wrap their around it, because it can become very complex. So let's keep it really simple. So there's a plumber in the Raleigh area who does a lot of marketing, and their marketing message is, if we're not on time, you don't pay a dime. Now, a lot of people are going to mistake that and oversimplify it and say, oh, well, that's just a catchy tagline. No, it's not. It's actually very smart strategy, because what they understand is that for people who need a plumber, one of the biggest problems, one of the biggest pains of hiring a plumber is the way that they handle time. Because they'll call you and say, I'll be there on Tuesday. And I've got kids to drop off and pick up and I've got groceries to go buy. And I have a business that I'm now working from home that I still have to manage all of my schedule around. And if you just say, hey, I'm going to be there sometime on Tuesday, I can't do anything about that. I can't plan around that. And that really frustrates people. So what this group did was they said, look, a plumber is a plumber is a plumber. We're not going to try and fight on whether or not we tighten the bolt or, you know, put the. Put the screws together. Right? Like, that's. Nobody can measure that. Nobody cares about it. But what they do care about is the impact it has on their day and that we can control. And so they use this one phrase because plumbing was going to happen regardless. But now if I know plumbing has to happen now, I Have to make a choice on which plumber I want to use. This is where brand is so very important. And by making that distinction, by saying we're the brand that solves this one particular problem, you can count on us for this. They put themselves apart from everybody else in the category. And the question that I get back a lot is, well, other brands have talked about it. Yeah. But other brands didn't own it. And, and just like Geico, sure. All State and Farmers and State Farm all talked about price at some point and they all talked about time at some point. But none of them came out and put a stake in the ground and said we own this one problem. And the second you do that, you win. And it's everywhere. Volvo is safety.

[B]

I bet they so that, that the example of the plumber, they're doing quite well. Yeah.

[A]

They have a line out the door.

[B]

So if I unpack that build into our conversation, is it because they identified the enemy as the loose schedule? The issue of people not really having that understanding among their competitive set?

[A]

Yeah. And because the rest of the competitors in the area, they go, well we'll just be there when we're there, we'll call you when we're on our way. Well, I can't.

[B]

It's our six hour window on that.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, right, exactly. And the fact that you know that is exactly the problem. Right. Everybody's like, well I will be there in a six hour window, a four window, whatever, we'll be there in the afternoon.

[B]

So if I'm starting, if I'm starting an AI or a tech company, what do I do? How do I unpack this or apply this, I should say to, to what I do.

[A]

Yeah. So two, so you know, it's hard to give you a specific example without looking at a particular business, but let's say that it was a software company, right? And I start talking to the people who are going to buy, number one, they'll talk about the features and benefits of what you've given because they need those functionalities. That's surface level. You got to look past that. Why are they buying? What problem are you making go away for them and listen, because after you've sold to a handful of people, you're going to recognize that you know what they're actually buying because they've got a legacy problem and this solves that. Or they're actually buying because they can't get their team to operate faster and this allows them to bypass that problem. That's the thing. Thing. They're actually trying to solve. They're just using your tech to be able to solve that problem. It isn't about the tech. It's not about the software. It's not about the solution. It's about what the solution allows them to do. And once you recognize what that problem is, then you've got it all figured out.

[B]

So you're saying interview your customers, slash prospects, understand their need, and formulate an insight that allows you to differentiate and still deliver on the value proposition you have developed.

[A]

Yeah. So let's say that I'm using AI to get legacy programs to talk, right? I've got an inventory system over here. I've got a manufacturing group, and I've got a sales group, and I've got a finance group. And they're all using old legacy programs. One of them's from, you know, the 1990s, and another one is from last year. And they won't match up because they were all developed at different times or whatever. But I figured out a tool that will let them do that. I don't talk about the functionality of the tool. What I talk about is, don't you hate it when it. When finance takes three weeks to get to an answer because their software is older and it doesn't inform manufacturing? And so you wind up either building the wrong thing or not realizing that you have money to do stuff, or you don't cancel an order fast enough because you didn't realize what happens, we make those problems go away. Now, you're not talking about the software at this point. What you're talking about is the problem that necessitated the need for software in the first place. Once you understand the need behind the product decision, that's. That's the thing that you're actually solving. Just like CarMax, CarMax didn't care what car you bought. They knew that people didn't like buying cars because salespeople made them uncomfortable. So they solved the uncomfortable salesperson problem. You can talk to any one of us. If you see anybody that's in a blue shirt and a pair of khakis, we'll talk to you. And the price that's on the car is the price you pay. No haggling, no issues. If you don't like me, go talk to Sarah. If you don't like Sara, go talk to Tommy. Doesn't matter. We don't care. And it can be a Nissan, a Toyota, a Honda, we could care less. But we want you to be comfortable. That's solving the problem behind the decision. And if you solve the problem behind the decision you win.

[B]

That's so cool. I think part of it is messaging too. Companies have these convoluted stories about what they've developed and why people need it. And it's seven sentences, right? And they can't get to that Zen moment of three words. How do you break that down? How do you help them with that?

[A]

Once you understand what the thing is, then it becomes very easy, right? If the only thing I have to sell is, is safety, then it makes it very easy for Volvo to be creative long term. If I only have to sell athletic progress, then for Nike, just do it becomes easily applicable to anybody, right? Because this notion of, hey, we're going to make you, if you just do it, will make you better today than you were yesterday and better again tomorrow than you are today. And it becomes super, super easy. So the whole idea is to get it down to that one thing. Because once you understand what that one thing is, you know, going back to my legacy, you know, communication problem, the one thing is probably lost opportunity because of the time it takes for the teams to talk and make decisions. So the real problem that you're solving is we save you time, which earns you money, right? And that gets back to the time money thing. So if it was me that was doing it or the frustration where I'd be like, are you sick of having meetings yet where you're talking about implementing a million dollar solution that's going to take six months that you don't have the time or money? God, yes. Right. The minute you see that emotional, like, oh, like that's the thing you're looking for because that's what they're actually buying. Your, your software, your pen, your service, your whatever is completely irrelevant. It's just you make it possible to make that bigger thing that caused the need for a purchase in the first place to happen everywhere.

[B]

Let me throw you, let me throw a softball at you. Give me an example of one of the ones that you've worked on yourself and sort of had to go through the big rocks to the little Roc before you got into the sand. Yeah.

[A]

So, okay, Del, say luggage. When we worked with them, we grew them 837%. We handled North America in the first six years. Okay. It was tremendous. And we did it with the smallest part of their brand. They had hundreds of SKUs in the United States and one line of five bags called helium. That was a lightweight product. When we did research, we recognize that people, all of the changes that came after 9, 11 people forgave standing in the long lines, having to take their shoes and belts off. All the rest of that. They forgave all of that in the interest of security. But you know what really chapped their butt? What really chapped them was I get to the thing, and somebody at the thing says, your bag is overweight, and you have to pay now, because that money is tipping into my vacation or my whatever. And I didn't see it coming. And that's why they hated it so much, was that they couldn't predict it. So we did an entire thing called travel light. And the whole idea was about leveraging this lightweight bag to say, hey, we make travel effortless again. And we did these funny things. The first one was a woman walking through wet cement, and she leaves tracks in the cement, and the bag doesn't. The bag goes over it, and it's so light, you don't even see the, like, roller wheels through it. That one ad, and that was all we ran in the first year, generated an 86% lift in North American sales. Year one, that totally and completely changed the business for them. And we just kept growing year after year after year after that. And it was because we were able to get down to one thing. And you know what? They almost didn't let me do it. I had to fight him to do it because he was like, nobody can make lightweight work. Europe's tried it, Asia's tried it. Samsonites tried it in the US Nobody cares about lightweight luggage. And I said, it's not that. It's that nobody wants to buy lightweight luggage. They want to solve the reason that they would need lightweight luggage. And the second we showed them that, the second we put that out there, their sales just popped off the charts. That's how you solve it.

[B]

Bill, you've talked a lot about Gen Z and some of your writing. Like, you think things are really changing in terms of buying behaviors among the different generations or demographics. Maybe it's shifting from luxury to status to access to identity to. What are your thoughts on that?

[A]

I don't actually believe the generations change. I think that they talk about it differently. I think that the same everybody is trying to do ownership and build their own personal identity. Those things will never change because they're the fundamentals of human nature. I want to be seen, I want to be heard. I want to be valued and recognized. So those things are all the same. But where it's different is how they express it. So for our generation, we thought about it as aspiration, right? Along comes Chanel. Enjoy the fantasy. Or Ralph Lauren Polo. And it was, you know, live the Hamptons lifestyle. They're not the same kind of thing that way. For them, it's about, let me make it my own. Let me. Let me have the ability to create my own version of this. So I want. I want some sort of customization that allows me to do it. So it's. It's not that the fundamentals are different. It's at the. As my father would have said, the emphasis is on the different syllable. So they've got, like. They have a different way of expressing it, but it's the same thing. So if you look at Le Booboo, for example, you know, these little things, right?

[B]

Yep.

[A]

That was all about a cry for, I'm in the. I'm in the know, I'm. I'm in this club that gets this thing. And the second it went mainstream, all of those people dropped. They all dropped out of it. Labubu dropped like a bad habit overnight. And you like, where's Labubu now? Find it on. Find it online. Like, nobody's paying any attention to it. And it was white hot seven months ago. And the whole idea is, look, when I. When it made me unique and interesting, then it was cool. And the second it became cool to everybody, I don't want it anymore because it's. It lost its value, which was, I'm part of something. I. I feel special. I feel like I'm in a club. And that. That's very important to this generation in a way that it wasn't important the same way to ours. If you wore Polo back, a Polo back in the day, or if you drove a Mercedes or a few, whatever. That was our way of expressing. We're in a club. We just did it differently. They do it with different types of products in different types of ways, but it's the same fundamental emotional drivers.

[B]

Well, what I like and compliments you on is that you're really staying attuned to what, you know, these different buying segments are doing and what they're responding to and what they're not responding to. Are using a lot of social media yourself to gauge consumer buying patterns. How are you staying abreast?

[A]

What is your.

[B]

What is your strategy or tactic as it relates to just staying on top of buying behavior with different. Different audiences?

[A]

Well, we do a lot of consumer research as a part of what we do, so of course, we do social listening and the rest of it, but that's just a part of our industry. You know, like, painters pay attention to paint. Right. So we're paying attention to this because we have to all the time. But honestly, you can see it in the buyer behavior, you can see it in their responses to things. And you can see it from a distance, even in how people buy and what they gravitate to. Like, why is everybody chasing, I don't know, I'm trying to think of the name of a celebrity that would make sense. A Kardashians favorite, you know, slushy drink at the local health bar, whatever. Like, they're doing it because they want to feel special, they want to feel unique, they want to feel in the know. So when you watch these kinds of mass migration movements, it's easy from a little bit of an objective perspective to look down and say, this is what's important to this audience at this time. Now, keep in mind that these younger generations are having families now, and they're becoming responsible now, and they're getting further and further away from COVID now. So you're seeing some of that change a little bit, and it's just beginning. But they're going to get into the same groove that we were just in their own way of wanting to aspire, et cetera. And, you know, there's the same thing that we had about, oh, my God, I'll never buy a house and I'll never get as far as my parents did and like, all of that stuff. So they're all going through the same trials and tribulations. They're just doing it at a slightly different time frame, window. So I think all of us go through a very similar kind of trajectory. It's just how we choose to express what we're trying to achieve, which can vary from generation to generation.

[B]

Sure. Along those lines, I mean, this AI transformation that's going on now affects every industry and business. How have you utilized it? How have you taken AI and benefit from it? And maybe where do you see it hurting?

[A]

The biggest benefit to AI is the fact that it's leveled the playing field for production. Nike used to have an absolute overwhelming advantage over everybody because it could afford to produce better. And the simple truth is, now they can't. So the positive side of it is that you've just got a crayon box that went from 64 to 64 million overnight. You have every crayon in the box and it's leveled the playing field for everybody, more or less. I mean, you know, certainly they can afford to do some things that others can't, but by and large, you can get just about anything you want. Now, the downside is that those groups are confusing pretty and fast with strategic and impactful. So they go on and they say, dude, look at what I did with AI. I created Morgan Freeman hanging upside down, eating McDonald's french fries, and I did it in 11 seconds. And I nod my head politely and I say, that's fantastic. And it's going to do nothing for your brand at all because there's no structure or strategy to why you chose that. You just said, I had an idea. I put it into AI, and AI spat it out at a nice enough quality level that I felt I could be proud about it. But when you really think about that, only about 16 to 18% of businesses have any touch with AI at this point. I know that that's a startlingly low number, especially in the. In the audience range that you're with. But the vast majority of American businesses, they don't even. They don't even know the platforms yet. Yeah. So these businesses that come out and find this stuff, everybody is going to be able to use it. And this is the thing, if you really want a good education on it, take. Take 30 minutes, just 30 minutes and gross. Go scroll in particular Instagram and search for image prompts, brand identity prompts, anything like that, brand prompts. You'll find a million prompts that answer the question of how to make an identity, how to design packaging, how to create fonts and color sets, how to do style guides. You'll find all of that and more. Website design, everything in the blink of an eye, using a prompt. Now, I want you to imagine that every other company in your category has the exact same prompt. What do you think is going to happen when they all leverage the same prompts? They're going to get the same outputs. And that's what people haven't thought about yet, because they're not used to playing with these toys in the first place. So they're going to go, I was literally watching one this morning. It was cracking me up. I found four different Instagram providers that had all used essentially the same prompt. They were different people, and they had all gotten something that was so close that if you had put them on a shelf, they all chose to do like a sports drink, like a soda, that kind of thing. If you had put all four of them in a row at Target, you would never have been able to tell them apart. And they're all super hyped up, like, dude, check out my prompt and what I was able to do with it. And I'm like, you're making the point without even realizing it, you're going to go and be super excited about this thing you made and put it out in the universe and not realize that there isn't a chance in the world people are going to buy it because it doesn't mean anything and it doesn't stand for anything and it's not differentiated in a way that's relevant to anybody. So the fundamentals, the AI, the biggest thing that AI has done is it's put all the emphasis back on the thing that mattered in the beginning, which is what is your story and strategy and how are you unique and different and why did you make the choice to be that thing? And that's what businesses are going to unfortunately learn the hard way.

[B]

Yeah. Along those lines, any other thoughts you have about founder advice? I usually have that as one of my sort of closing questions, but you've already given a couple of good, you know, pieces. But just, just another thought on whether it's, you know, things that should be invested in more. They should stop doing what comes to mind.

[A]

Number one, and this is the most important thing. And it's a combination. It's a two, it's a two punch. Number one. You can't make it simple enough. And people can only remember one thing. You can't make it simple enough. When you really look at the businesses that have become hyper successful, Altoids is only about curiously strong mints, period, end of story. Volvo only sells safety, period, end of story. And businesses are like, God, it can't be that simple. Or man, those guys are missing out on so much opportunity. To which I give you this amazing story, which I just love, because it's a brand everybody knows. So Las Vegas hired a woman from Disney a number of years ago. And the woman from Disney's Inner was that she went to them and she said, you guys own the night. Las Vegas is all about night and it's about nightlife and indulgence and all of the rest of that. But nobody is doing anything during the day. You guys are so dumb. Why don't you use those venues for families? You could double your revenue. Right? And the people at Vegas were like, you know, that makes a lot of sense on paper. Let's do that. But the problem is this. When you and your four buddies are going to your last friend's bachelor party at 4:40 years old and you're on a three day bender because you haven't been out of the house in six years and you stumble back home at six in the morning to your elevator burping Gin or whatever. And the elevator doors open and there's mom, dad, Susie and Ben on their way to get Britney's autograph before the matinee show. You're embarrassed and you don't want to be there.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And so what happened was the revenue tanked from the people who used to go to Vegas for wanting to be in Vegas, and the revenue tanked from the Disney Day part because nobody believed that taking their kids to Vegas was a good idea. So you've got this like, it hurt twice. And the, the like solve for this was they walked the woman from Disney back to the Nevada state line and said, thanks very much, go away now. And they came out with the line that everybody knows now, which is what happens here stays here. And that was the big mea culpa of the brand that said, we forgot ourselves for a minute. We went chasing dollars we weren't supposed to chase. Sorry, sorry, sorry. Please come back. You can sin safely again here now.

[B]

And we can start earlier too. We have these things called pool parties and concerts.

[A]

You want to get drunk at 8am we got you right? Like it's not a problem. So they, but they forgot who they were as a brand and that's what hurt them. So if you're going to start anywhere, what is your one thing that you can promise and how simply can you say and repeat that so that people can't forget it? Your goal is to say it so consistently that people say it back to you. If I ask anybody in the world, what is Nike's tagline, they know it and the reason is because they have been relentlessly consistent. Just do it. Just do it. Just do it. Just do it. To the point where the people at Wieden and Kennedy have to rotate off so that they like can stay creative because they have to think that same thought every day. But that's the point, that consistency breeds reputation and reputation is what breeds choice and choice is what makes the cash register ring. So that's, that's the big lesson.

[B]

So, Bill, I just want to wrap up with one question, maybe a hypothesis here, because you were, as you extended the story and brought it to today from where we started with some examples from, you know, decades ago. Branding is not going to really go anywhere, is it? I mean, it's not going to disappear in the age of AI because it's not necessary anymore. We just kind of put together the counter proof that it's going to stay and it's going to become as important, if not more so.

[A]

It will always be. And the reason is because it's people making choices and people choose emotionally and then justify their choices logically. I see the Harley, I want the Harley. I tell myself how my life would be better if I had the Harley. That's storytelling and that's how we make decisions. And you can't ignore that because that's a fundamental part of human behavior. So even when websites go away and you go online and you say, I'm going to a wedding this weekend and I need an outfit that goes with my wife's, you know, dress, and here's what the dress looks like, and the agent runs out and says, well, Banana Republic has this jacket and so. And so has these jeans and so, and so Nordstrom, whatever has these shoes and which, which comb do you want me to order for you? And you don't even go to websites anymore, which we're probably a year or so away from. Even when that sort of thing happens, you're still going to say, I don't, I don't like buying stuff from Banana Republic because the last couple times I bought them, their shirts don't fit me well. Or I don't like what Target has become now and I would rather support a different company. You can't take preference out of the equation. And brand is all about building. As you so eloquently said earlier, perception. And perception is success. So you can't get around the fact that it's people making decisions. And those people, even in B2B land, I know nobody believes it, but it's true. Make them emotionally about the thing that they want. This is why FedEx was so unbelievably successful, because they as a B2B play, which is what they were originally recognized. One problem that UPS and DHL and US Postal Service wouldn't deal with, which was guaranteeing overnight delivery. They said, we know that you don't like missing out on the opportunity of not getting your package there when it absolutely, positively has to be there. And we're going to make sure that that happens. And that one promise, that single, simple, repeated, forever brand promise blew them up into the billion dollar company they are today.

[B]

That's fantastic. Bill. I could go on for another 20 minutes. I have at least that many questions, but I got to let you get back to work. Plus, I mean, this is a lot of great knowledge that you're passing. How can people get in touch with you? What's the best place for the brand boss? Where's he hanging out these days?

[A]

So if you want to find me on TikTok and take advantage of. We've got more than 2,500 free videos that dissect just about everything in marketing. You can find me on TikTok at BrandBoss HQ or visit us [e-mail] for the website. And there's plenty of ways that we work with groups, so if there's a question that you have or something that you'd like done for you, by all means, let us know and we'd be happy to talk with you about it.

[B]

Oh, Bill Harper, thanks so much for taking some time with me today. It was great catching up with you, and I look forward to having this conversation again down the road, just for a few more examples, because all of them just brought back such fun memories too.

[A]

It's so great. Keith, thank you so very much for having me on. I appreciate it.

[B]

Oh, I bet. Thank you.