Your name matters!

I read an eye-opening book a few years ago when I was on holiday in Egypt. It’s part of a series of two: Brand failures and Brand Royalty. Brand failures tells the truth about the 100 biggest branding mistakes of all time. What can we learn from other people’s mistakes?

As the economic outlook is dismal, even with the media reporting retail sales are better than this time last year, as we rush to buy Christmas gifts which will mostly end up on ebay by February, I am thinking how can companies make sure they survive in difficult times.

When things are hard, when we are under pressure, when we sense loss, we revert to type. Old habits, basic strategies and remove over complication. A fighter will look for the punch that saved him last time he was in the corner, companies look to cut costs, adapt to become more flexible and consolidate.

I think when times are tough it is even more essential to FOCUS on strengths to survive. It’s not the time to work on the weak aspects, during the time you spend working on improving your poor right jab you will have been knocked out.

How do we a) know what we’re good at, and b) use it to survive? That can be tricky as what you were good at 5 years ago or even last year may not be right for today and tomorrow. But what stays the same are the basic rules of the game.

What I want to help people to understand is that by removing complications, by focusing and keeping it at the most basic level you will have a fighting chance.

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