I get the question a lot.

Which is the most well-branded band in rock ‘n’ roll history?

And as often as I get the question, I don’t always have an easy answer. So many bands have branded themselves successfully! But there are three bands that, in my opinion, have created the most powerful brands in rock history.

These are three bands whose brands transcend their music.

KISS

No band has mastered the art of merchandising like KISS. No band has turned their music into an financial empire like KISS. Few bands have created such a powerful following as KISS did with the KISS Army. Their drive to monetize their music has turned many people off over the years, but it has made the band millions.

JIMMY BUFFETT

The beauty of Buffett is that he turned one little catchy song into a profit machine. “Margaritaville” has become synonymous with the beach bum lifestyle, and fans flock to his restaurants, casinos, and hotels to experience it. They pick up his Landshark Lager beer and wear his clothing line to celebrate the idea of life on the beach. His annual tours have become destination vacations for his Parrothead followers.

GRATEFUL DEAD

Without the benefit of mainstream exposure, the Grateful Dead created their cult by giving away their music, actively engaging their Deadhead fan following, and touring relentlessly. The Grateful Dead made a ridiculously disproportionate amount of money considering the minimal radio airplay and exposure they received, and their brand continues to live on nearly two decades after Jerry Garcia passed away.

What do you think?

Which rock band has created the most powerful business brand?

Download the Kindle version or order the paperback of Brand Like a Rock Star with just one click here, and start building a stronger and more profitable business using the core marketing strategies of rock legends like AC/DC, U2, The Beatles, Bob Dylan, and many others… including the three well-branded artists mentioned in this piece.

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I heard an ad on the radio this week for a car rental company that claimed “we invented picking you up“.

That’s fine.

But there is a car rental place that owns the image “we’ll pick you up“.

Enterprise.

It doesn’t matter who was first. All that matters is who owns the image in the mind of the consumer.

Apple didn’t make the first tablet computer.

Jeep didn’t make the first SUV.

Marconi didn’t send the first radio transmission.

Seldom does the pioneer in any field get the credit they deserve. Such is life.

If a band came out today singing folky harmonies with a banjo, mandolin, and accordion, they would be a Mumford & Sons copycat. Even if they were doing it before Mumford even had sons.

Same with make-up. KISS clone, even if they were rockin’ before KISS came along. Acoustic guitar and nasal voice? Dylan wannabe, no matter when they first sang a protest song.

Being first doesn’t mean shit.

Neither does best.

All that matters is what the customer thinks.

If the customer thinks you own the image, you own the image.

Perception is reality.

Click here to order Brand Like a Rock Star with one click, and learn to turn your business into a rock star brand.

So you think the pace of your industry changes fast?

Try being a rock star.

You write a great song. It’s four minutes long.

Now do it again, but different.

Now do it ten more times so that you have an album.

Now, as soon as your album is a hit, start working on a follow up.

While you do all of that, watch as tastes evolve and styles change. Watch as social media accelerates these changes. Watch as technology makes it possible for people to avoid paying for your album and that same technology makes it possible for far less talented artists than you to go viral.

When change hits your industry, you have two choices as I see it.

The obvious one is to adapt with the times. This is what nearly every expert says you need to do. Embrace the new technology! Change what you do to match the evolving tastes! Evolve or die!  Sometimes it works, and sometimes it is like KISS going disco with “I Was Made For Lovin’ You”. When it works, it is Apple evolving from a computer company into a technology company… or Old Spice changing from your grandfather’s cologne into your kid’s body wash. When it works, it is glorious and profitable.

The less-obvious choice is to intentionally avoid changing. Often not changing fails, and you appear out of touch with the times and irrelevant.  But consider The Rolling Stones. The Stones are celebrating 50 years together, yet they’ve only recorded four new albums in the past 25 years. That means that they made nearly every memorable piece of music in their first 25 years! Then, they decided not to change, and they became a very wealthy nostalgia act. When it works, it too is glorious and profitable.

Neither choice is right or wrong.

The only right thing to do is recognize the changes around you and formulate a conscious plan to deal with them.

It isn’t so much “Change, or die”… it is, more accurately, “Be aware of change, or die”.

Love them or hate them, you cannot ignore them. KISS grabbed the world by the throat, got our attention, and never let go.

For three decades, the KISS marketing machine has turned the band into cultural icons… and it shows no signs of slowing down.

On Monday, December 3 at 2pm ET, join me and Michael Brandvold for a free webinar that takes you inside the marketing genius of KISS.

Who the hell is Michael Brandvold?

Michael was personally tapped to help build the KISS on-line presence. He worked on the inside, witnessing first hand how Gene Simmons and KISS grow and profit from their brand. Since then, he launched Michael Brandvold Marketing and authored the fantastic ebook The KISS School of Marketing. You’ll get a free copy of that ebook after the webinar.

The webinar is free, but does require advance registration here.

This webinar is not just for KISS fans. This webinar is for those who want to elevate their business beyond the ordinary, no matter what you think of the music of KISS.

What are you doing to elevate your business into a brand that rocks? Click here and order Brand Like A Rock Star now and start creating a rock star brand, putting the core marketing strategies of rock ‘n’ roll legends to work for your business and your personal brand.

Think your industry changes fast?

Picture yourself as Kip Winger (above), leader of band Winger. It is early 1991. You’ve just come off a 13-month tour in which you played sold-out stadiums around the world with bands like KISS, The Scorpions, and ZZ Top. You’ve watched your hit songs get played to death on MTV. And you’ve been nominated as “Best Heavy Metal Group” at the American Music Awards. Pretty cool.

And then, without warning, along comes Nevermind. And the bottom falls out.

The debut album from Nirvana in September of 1991 was the breakthrough album of the grunge era, and seemingly overnight Winger’s forte – big hair, leather, slick guitar solos, polished production, and rousing choruses about sex and girls – went dramatically out of style.

Winger didn’t do anything to deserve it.

Neither did Poison, Extreme, Warrant, or Skid Row. It just happened.

With the rapid rise of grunge music and its emotionally draining angst, distorted guitars, and low key visuals, all of the so-called hair bands became immediately passe.

Rock ‘n’ roll is a world of perpetual change.

Songs end and new ones begin. Tours go city to city, different shows each night. Albums rise and fall down the chart. Nothing is constant.

You either adapt or die, in business as in rock ‘n’ roll.

The hair bands, for the most part, died. Some tried to alter their sound, but even Guns N Roses and Van Halen fell apart within a few years.

Here are four lessons you can learn from the hair bands and their early 90s demise:

1. Sometimes there is just nothing you can do. If you are great at hair band rock, and hair band rock goes out of style, you can’t easily become a grunge act. The perceptions of you are realities. Changing minds is nearly impossible.

2. Even when you aren’t in style, your fans didn’t just disappear. There are still people out there who want to hear your songs! So entertain them. Forget about past success and focus on making your customers happy. Even when the tide turned against gas-guzzling SUVs, there were still customers who wanted to buy a Navigator instead of a Prius.

3. Wait it out. If you can afford to wait out the fads, you might just come back into style. This summer KISS and Motley Crue are on tour together. Many of the big hair bands of the 1980s are still playing for fans and making a great living doing it. Even though the hair band isn’t today’s big thing, it is not nearly as uncool as it was in 1991.

4. Popularity and talent are not related. When his band faded from popularity, Kip Winger studied classical music. He worked on solo projects. And he wrote a 30 minute symphonic piece that because the musical centerpiece for the San Francisco Ballet’s hit production of “Ghosts”. Without the trappings of immense fame, Kip Winger found immense freedom.

Rock on!

It’s pretty simple.

Too simple, really.

The easiest way to eliminate competition is to have none.

Remove yourself from their game. Make new rules. Change the playing field.

When you do something no one else does, you become the instant leader in your category. Everyone else is playing catch up.

So if a new start-up promoted healthy and sustainable Mexican food made with integrity, we would call them Chipotle-like.

When a new tablet computer comes out, we compare it to the iPad.

When a rock band wears make-up, they are KISS copycats.

Stop trying to be more like your competitors, and celebrate what makes you completely unique! That’s the theme of a guest post I wrote for Agency Revolution, a company helping to change the way insurance agencies operate. I’ll be speaking at the Insurance Marketing 10X Bootcamp in Chicago October 25-27.

To read the full guest post, click here.

To order your copy of Brand Like A Rock Star on Kindle or in paperback, click here.

I have a confession to make…

I’m not the world’s biggest KISS fan. That title might go to my good friend and noted KISS marketing veteran Michael Brandvold. Click on his name and you can grab a free copy of his ebook The KISS School of Marketing. 

But I am a fan of KISS. I enjoy their music, but I particularly love the band because they have been so good at branding themselves and marketing their act.

Gene Simmons is as much a marketer as he is a musician.

Here are five things Gene Simmons totally gets about marketing that most businesses never fully grasp:

1. It is okay to offend people, even large numbers of people. In fact, it is wise to do so.

2. Offending large numbers of people nearly always clarifies your brand and endears you even more to the segment of the population that loves you.

3. Getting noticed is more important than anything else. If you never get noticed, you’ll never be a rock star. Get people to pay attention and then focus on being great at what you do.

4. Always put your name on everything you do. The KISS logo is on every imaginable piece of merchandise, from condoms to coffee shops. And the show Gene Simmons Family Jewels is never promoted or mentioned without his name attached to it.

5. Failure rocks. It is an integral part of success. Not everything you do will strike gold, so do a lot of things. When something sticks, it will stick big time.

Since it is Father’s Day this weekend, Gene also has a few thoughts on that topic:

“Be thankful. The next tie you get, the million-and-oneth-tie… that one? Just smile. The intention is good. We don’t need things anyway. And your straight, so stop pretending you know anything about fabric.”

If you are in LA for Father’s Day, you can buy a ticket to the Father’s Day bash at Gene’s new restaurant, Rock & Brews in El Segundo.

By the way, Gene Simmons was kind enough to endorse Brand Like A Rock Star. I’m thankful for that. You can download the Kindle version or have the paperback home delivered here.

And if you are hesitant to spend $5.99 on the book, download Chapter One for free first and get yourself hooked. It is available as a pdf by clicking here and it could not be more FREE. Chapter One deals with AC/DC and their legendary consistency. You’ll want to use that same consistent approach to building your rock star business.

Launching a new business from the ground up is a daunting task, one that eats many people alive before a business ever takes off. It is no wonder that most small businesses never get off the ground, let alone shed the “small” and become huge successes.

The start-up process has a lot in common with the struggles that a musician goes through as they begin the quest to achieve “rock star” status, and there are some great lessons that start-up businesses can take away from the careers of legendary rock stars. Here are three cool examples of the rock star/start up connection:

1. Get Noticed First.

The Sex Pistols were the creation of producer Malcolm McLaren, and McLaren need to get his new band talked about. So to launch their song “God Save The Queen”, McLaren had the band play live on a barge sailing down the River Thames in London, right past the House of Parlaiment. The stunt got tremendous press coverage in England! Millions of people were thrilled with the band’s anti-royal stance, and millions more were put off by their antics. Things got so crazy that the company contracted to press the band’s vinyl album had to turn down the contract because their own employees refused to be involved in the Sex Pistols album. The PR paid off in a major way, and “God Save The Queen” became a huge hit. The Sex Pistols, despite only having one album to their credit, made it all the way to the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame.

In the start-up world, one of the first challenges is getting noticed. There are countless other businesses trying to get people’s attention, and most of them have more money and resources than you do. Take a lesson from the Sex Pistols and capture people’s attention in a way that they can’t ignore.

2. What Makes You Special?

Wicked Lester was a struggling rock band in New York in the early 70s. Like thousands of other bands, they thought they had what it takes to be the next big thing. They had good musicians and songwriters, and a great lead singer. Yet nothing was happening for the band.  Before breaking up, Wicked Lester gave it one more shot. They changed their name, changed their look, and took to the stage in full comic book make-up as KISS. In less than two years, the band was embarking on their first world tour. They had their struggles as KISS for sure, but the path from obscurity to stardom was paved by the band’s unique difference. They wore make-up. They took on comic book personas. They blew stuff up on stage. KISS was a band that gave the world something it had never seen before.

When starting a new business, one of the first goals needs to be to establish a unique position relative to your competition. What makes you so special? Why should anyone remember you, let alone chose you over their existing options? Don’t be afraid or apologetic for what makes you different. Instead, celebrate and flaunt what makes you special. Rock it.

3. Find Your Passion!

You can’t fake it. At least not for long. When you are passionate about what you are singing about, the game changes. Bob Marley is a great example. He made reggae music because it was a part of his culture and his religion. Because Marley was so deeply connected to his music, he never wavered. He didn’t sing a disco song because disco was popular. He didn’t sing a duet with the top female pop singer of the day. Bob Marley did nothing to be rich and famous, aside from being true to the music he loved.

Are you that passionate about your start-up idea? Or will you be distracted by the lure of quick profits and easy money by compromising your core values? If you aren’t passionate enough to stay true to your values when it is inconvenient and costs you money, then you probably aren’t passionate enough to win.

The book Brand Like A Rock Star has 20 chapters filled with tips on how to build a stronger brand and better business by using the core marketing strategies of rock and roll legends. You can download the Kindle version instantly for $5.99 or have the paperback delivered straight to your door.

Few professions rely on having a strong and unique personal brand quite like real estate sales.

And for some reason, few professions play a giant game of Follow The Leader quite like real estate sales.

They all advertise in the same places. All of their ads look exactly the same. The wording of their ads and listings is nearly identical. Even their for sale signs and open house signs are cookie-cutter.

One of the rock star branding secrets is finding and celebrating your unique identity. I’ve wasted plenty of ink and hot air promoting the notion that, while quality is important, being unique is more important than try to be better than your competitors are.

KISS was a struggling bar band going nowhere fast until they put on make-up and started blowing stuff up on stage. Within two years they were one of the biggest acts on the planet, and unlike any act the planet had ever seen before.

Elton John wore wild costumes and played the piano like a madman. Even with Elton’s immense talent, it would have been far more difficult to get noticed without the crazy glasses and getups that made him so unique.

The Grateful Dead turned average songs into magical 20 minute jam sessions, and they invited fans to record their live shows… mistakes and all. The Dead made an art form out of doing things differently.

Rock stars have proven over and over again that being unique is absolutely critical to success. So why 99% of all real estate agents do the exact same things?

Let’s get hypothetical and say you are a real estate agent tasked with selling yet another average 3 bedroom/2 bathroom home on a street of similar nondescript middle-class 3bd/2bth homes.  Your first job is to find something special about this particular home. Let’s say that this home has a perfectly manicured lawn. Perfectly. Otherwise, it is exactly like every other home on the street.

A lawn this perfectly green isn’t really a lawn at all. It is the stadium where brothers throw game-winning touchdowns to each other. It is the ballpark where a son throws a strike into a father’s waiting glove. It is a festival of fall leaves to jump in and an assembly line of freshly made snow angels in the winter. It is where families create the memories that families are made of. Your home overlooking this playground has three bedrooms and two bathrooms, plenty of space for the kids and their friends, and of course a garage to store the many footballs, baseballs, and rakes you’ll be needing.

I can guarantee you that nearly every real estate ad will talk about the things that make this house just like the other homes on the street… the bedrooms and bathrooms and kitchen and living room. The blah blah blah.

Very few would have the guts to talk about what makes this house unique.

In every business, you win when you stop playing Follow The Leader. Instead, start creating ads that could only be for your business, in your town, on this day. Make your voice unique and let it stand out from the crowd.

PS - You should probably buy a copy of Brand Like A Rock Star so you can learn how to build a better brand and stronger business.

PPS – Check out this cool and totally unsolicited review of Brand Like A Rock Star by Mike Michalowicz, author of The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur and a new book called The Pumpkin Project. Mike is not afraid to be different, and in a world of business start up voices, his is unique and loud (and proud).

A few months ago, Eric Dodds of the awesome Brains on Fire Blog wrote a piece that was inspired by my book Brand Like A Rock Star.

Being a Brains on Fire fan, I was eager to read the blog post. But as I read it, to my disappointment it became evident that Eric wasn’t writing about my book. He was writing about the title. And he made a good point. Why would anyone strive to be a rock star today?

Hell, if any single industry could be accused of clinging to an old-world business model while the new world evolved before their very eyes, it is the music industry.

Rock stars are notorious for their self-destructive habits, self-delusional perceptions, and self-absorbed behavior.

And the non-creatives in the rock star biz – the suits – are just greedy bastards hell bent on turning art into money.

It begs the question that Eric asked… why would anyone want to be a rock star?

The answer is simple.

Because when you rock, the world pays attention.

And nothing is more important to marketers today that getting attention. Nothing.

Without attention, you have no awareness.

Without attention, you have no engagement.

Without attention, you have no click-throughs. No sales. No ROI.

Attention is the water in a just-add-water recipe. All of the other ingredients in your campaign are nothing if you don’t add attention. When KISS walked out on stage in 1974 wearing bizarre comic book make-up and started to blow stuff up on stage, the world paid attention. While plenty of people hated KISS, plenty more loved them.  assionately.

When Lady Gaga appeared at the MTV Video Music Awards in 2010 wearing a dress made from raw meat, the world paid attention. Gaga has her detractors, but her clan of “little monsters” is far more powerful.

Getting our attention doesn’t always have to be flashy and controversial, like KISS and Lady Gaga.

Powerful brands like Chipotle and Whole Foods got our attention by committing themselves to causes we can rally around, like sustainable farming, organic foods, and clean power sources.

Old Spice got our attention by making us laugh and by giving us content we wanted to share with our friends on social networks.

Whether through humor, causes, or controversy, all of these brands recognize that without attention, they cease to exist.

A rock star lives on center stage with a powerful spotlight shining down, thousands of fans eager to sing along and experience the raw emotional power of hearing the songs they love sung live and in person.

When you rock, the world pays attention.

And that’s why, no matter what you do in life and business, you want to be a rock star.