what I’d give to have a Periodic Table of my life!”
A few years before he passed away, I was fortunate enough to visit a David Bowie exhibition at the V&A in London.
It was startling to see just how much control Bowie had been able to exercise over his image during his 50 year tenure as a music icon. Unlike other pop stars of his genre, not only had he succeeded in sustaining full rights over his musical output; the same level of influence also applied to his hair styling, costumes, accessories and make up! This is quiet a remarkable feat given the dynamics of the world’s changing landscape as well as the rapid rise of media during this corresponding time period .
This ultimately created Brand Bowie and elevated him to pole position as one of the primary revenue generators in the music world. Bizarre to think then, that the spiky haired androgynous rebel, who shocked the world on his first appearance on Top of the Pops in the mid 70’s, would have such an entrepreneurial and corporate streak in him. More Richard Branson than Richard Seymour…not that Bowie had any Marxist/Leninist leanings!
This got me thinking about how a person becomes The Brand? Clearly the bedrock of celebrity is talent, personality and charisma. The main features and key advantages of “person branding” being:
- The voice and tone that is represented by the individual
- How personalised the marketing communication are
- The visual rights attributable to the brand (usually the most obvious and transparent!)
The similarities with businesses though are all too evident, in that all brands must convey the following attributes to succeed:
- A strong emotional bond with their customers or fans (meat and drink to a pop star!)
- Passion and commitment in delivering their promise (as above)
- Proven pedigree to fulfil those needs (why talent is permanent and X-Factor is transient)
- Creating trust to guarantee delivery (individuals are better at tribe creation than businesses)
- Deep insight into your customers needs (a little market research is always worthy and here is something pop starts can learn from the business world, if nothing else to prevent projects like Tin Machine getting airborne!)
When leaving the Bowie exhibition the usual array of merchandise in the shape of badges, books, pens, postcards, T-shirts adorned the shop, but one thing really caught my eye. There was actually a Periodic Table of Bowie’s life. This chart highlighted all his life influences from music to movies, fashion to philosophy via the prism of the various guises and alter egos that distinguished his career. In my mind this reinforced a great deal of the observations on the power of the brand as a person highlighted above and created a pinnacle of self actualisation.
As a trained chemist this struck a real chord, after all I firmly believe that the Periodic Table is the ultimate work of genius! I wonder what Brand Mendeleev would nave thought of it?[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]
