Packaging Really Matters. Here's Why.
How a lousy PowerPoint can truly sink your brand
OK, this may seem like a non sequitur, but bear with me. There is a payoff that involves your bottom line at the end.
For those of you who know me, you know I'm Turkish. (With a name like Emrah, I know, not shocking ...) But what is surprising is, being Turkish was actually the root of a big epiphany for me on brand marketing that I know you'll find interesting.
Just a couple days ago, I (being a good Turk) attended a cultural event at UCLA. It was on one of the world's top-ever leaders, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk - a pretty big thing, with about 200 attendees. It was obviously an event that took a lot of work to put together - film clips, speeches, live musicians, dancers. People whose families had worked intimately with Ataturk, telling personal stories. Oprah-quality, powerful, meaningful content.
But. (Unfortunately there is a but.) Despite the powerful stuff, the whole thing just didn't work.
The reason? Little stuff. Poor film quality. Confusing Turkish-to-English translations on the films. Silly equipment problems. Little, I know -- but to me and the 200 otherwise engaged people sitting in the audience, all this added up to crippling distractions that made me not "buy in."
So it got me to thinking about "packaging" and polish. Little stuff that's easy to overlook on deadlines - but stuff that can have a big effect on a brand's business results.
Let me translate: We've all seen studies linking 50 to 75 percent of purchase decisions to physical packaging. But when is the last time you thought -- what about "packaging" your brand beyond that? To buyers? To media outlets? To consumers?
Picture this real-world example. You're a big brand pitching a Walmart buyer, or a smaller brand pitching Folica.com. The vendor evaluates your brand and decides on shelf space allocation and promotion. And over the course of a few weeks, they also meet with all your competitors, so they are truly stacking you up, apples to apples.
Sure, you may have the better product. But if your PowerPoint deck is rough because your designer was backed up, or your pitch is less finessed because you had a busy week, you leave behind a less-than-polished image. That means they leave feeling like you're the underdog.
It's a shame to work so hard on the enormous, truly tough work involved in product development, only to come up short because the small details are overlooked.
In fact, it reminds me of what my dad used to tell me. He'd say, "Son, when you're in a room where everyone's just as smart, just as educated, dressed just as sharp as you -- sometimes it's the polish on your shoes that makes the difference."
Good advice, still to this day.
- Emrah Kovacoglu, Founder and CEO, Total Beauty Media, Inc.
