If you’re passionate about great bands and great brands, please click here to subscribe to Brand Like A Rock Star by email. You can also download the free e-book “Three Chords in Thirty Years: How AC/DC Built The Model For Brand Consistency” here: http://www.mediafire.com/?xydnoitdanm.

Soul
Every great brand has it.  It isn’t visible to the naked eye, and you can’t account for it in any spreadsheet or P&L statement.

And for that reason, if your brand is left in the wrong hands it is sure to be lost.  Haven’t we all seen that happen?  A great brand is taken over by a new CEO or purchased by a new company that just doesn’t “get it”.  For no apparent reason, the brand starts to slide and eventually fades away.

That’s what happens when a brand loses its soul.

As Dodge prepares to roll out their new line up of 2011 vehicles, “soul” is what they are striving for.  Ralph Gilles is the CEO of the Dodge brand.  He told the Wall Street Journal “I’m a big believer in cars having souls, and these do” as he showed off the latest Dodge products.

I’m not convinced Dodge is the best example of a brand that is full of soul.  On one level, they are the “power” brand with their famous Charger, tough Hemi engines, rig-styled Ram trucks, and Durango SUVs.  On the other, they are brand famous for perfecting the minivan, a vehicle that is impossible to position as powerful.  To that end, they will soon be revealing their “man van“, a minivan injected with testosterone.  Full points for striving for soul, though.  It’s a good mission.

Great music is all about soul, too.

In the recent documentary about the making of “Darkness On The Edge of Town”, Bruce Springsteen talks about the lengths they went through to create a drum sound with soul.  They spent, literally, days upon days in the studio trying to find the perfect sound for Max Weinberg’s snare drum.  Other musicians waited for the phone call to come in and lay down their tracks, but the call never came.  Bruce was busy finding soul in his drum sound. He eventually found it, and proceeded to record an album chock full of soul on every level.

Does your entire team understand and respect the soul of your brand?

Great brands recognize it, salute it each day when they come in to work, and steadfastly refuse to let it be compromised.

After all, human beings have soul.  We connect with other living, breathing creatures.  We don’t connect on the same level with inanimate objects lacking a soul.  If your brand is perceived as having soul, imagine the depth of emotional connection you can create with your customers.

That connection will take your brand to “The Promised Land”.

If you are passionate about music and business, get Brand Like A Rock Star updates by email.

If you’re passionate about great bands and great brands, please click here to subscribe to Brand Like A Rock Star by email. You can also join the discussion on Facebook.

Consider two great bands.

Both rose to fame in the 1970′s and their songs dominated rock radio stations of the era.  Both replaced their lead singers (as well as other less prominent members) over the years.  Both continue to tour from city to city with only one original founding member.  Both are legendary.

Foreigner had over a dozen hit songs during their prime years.  They rocked out with songs like “Urgent” and “Dirty White Boy” and “Cold As Ice”.   They had massive ballads like “Waiting For A Girl Like You” and “I Want To Know What Love Is”.  There are few bands that had as many hits as Foreigner did between 1977 and 1987, and nearly all of their hits are must-play songs on classic rock and oldies radio stations across North America.

Lynyrd Skynyrd brought their brand of southern rock to the world a few years earlier, from about 1973 to 1977.  In ’77 a plane crash took the lives of three of the band members, including lead singer Ronnie Van Zandt, as well as their assistant road manager and two pilots.  They didn’t have nearly as many hits as Foreigner did.  Today only “Free Bird” and “Sweet Home Alabama” are among the most played songs on those same classic rock radio stations.  Some of their other songs are heard now-and-then, but certainly not very often.

Foreigner is a lake.  Lynyrd Skynyrd is a well.

Foreigner has a wide catalog of memorable music, although passion for any one song isn’t all that great.

Lynyrd Skynyrd has a small catalog of memorable music, but passion for their two main hits is extremely high.

What is the better scenario for a brand today?

The lake is wide, but not that deep.  Chrysler is a lake.  They make all kinds of cars from all price ranges and passion for the Chrysler brand isn’t particularly deep.  Sure people love Dodge trucks and Jeep Wranglers, but few people crave a Chrysler.

The well is small, but extremely deep.  Porsche is a well.  They only make a few cars, all expensive and high-performance, and passion for the brand runs very deep.  People save money all their lives to own a Porsche.

I don’t know if there’s a right or wrong answer.  Both “lake” brands and “well” brands can be successful.

Which would you rather be?

I look forward to your thoughts.

If you are passionate about music and business, get Brand Like A Rock Star updates by email.