How Brands Innovate The Principles of Cultural Strategy

by Holt, Douglas

• ISBN13: 9780197602973
• ISBN10: 0197602975
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2023-08-29
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

An unconventional argument for how companies can grow or revitalize businesses through cultural innovation

Outside of tech, companies rarely succeed at growing new businesses or revitalizing stagnant ones, even in the categories in which they are most successful. And the model of innovation that tech firms use is an expensive dead end for everyone else. So how can companies build breakthrough innovations without the advantage of breakthrough technology?

In How Brands Innovate, Douglas Holt provides an entirely different way to understand how innovation works from the conventional ideas that dominate in business. He argues that market transformations are pushed forward by culture and society rather than new technology or new products. Holt--one of the world's leading thinkers and consultants on cultural approaches to branding, business strategy, and innovation--draws on his decades-long experience to show how companies can build innovative new businesses without the advantage of new technology or revitalize businesses that have lost their leading position.

Rather than beat competitors within their category, companies like Nike and Starbucks reinvented their categories. Rather than deliver better value, these brands transformed value. And rather than develop a better product, they reimagined their products. For the first time, Holt provides a concise explanation of cultural innovation--the model that details how brands like Nike and Starbucks came to be--and shows exactly how to do cultural innovation, providing a step-by-step model for analysis and then a framework for designing innovations. He draws on his own consulting work to walk readers through successful re-branding, innovations, and strategies with major global corporations like Patagonia, Huawei, and REI.

Author Biography

Douglas Holt was Professor of Marketing at both the Harvard Business School and the University of Oxford. He is now President of the Cultural Strategy Group, a consulting firm he founded that provides brand strategy and innovation solutions using the cultural strategy framework. Holt also holds
honorary professorships at Royal Holloway, University of London, and the University of Bristol. He has developed successful strategies for a wide range of brands and companies, including Coca-Cola, Microsoft, Ben & Jerry's, Sprite, Jack Daniel's, MINI, MasterCard, Fat Tire beer, Qdoba, Mike's Hard
Lemonade, Pinterest, Huawei, Tinder, Lyft, and Zipcar, along with a number of non-profit organizations.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: The Three Strategy Myopias: Why Business Needs Cultural Innovation


CULTURAL INNOVATION THEORY

PART I: BEYOND BRAND MYOPIA

Chapter 2: The Branding Treadmill

Chapter 3: How Society Innovates

Chapter 4: How Vanguards Conquer Markets

Chapter 5: How Challengers Attack Incumbents

Part II: BEYOND TECH MYOPIA

Chapter 6: The Better Mousetrap Trap

Chapter 7: How Tech Drives Cultural Innovation

Chapter 8: Constructing the Meaning of Tech

Chapter 9: Transforming Tech Into Myth

Part III: BEYOND PURPOSE MYOPIA

Chapter 10: The Purpose Industrial Complex

Chapter 11: The Activist Brand, Part 1: Myth

Chapter 12: The Activist Brand, Part 2: Provoke

Chapter 13: Summary


CULTURAL STRATEGY: APPLYING THE THEORY


Part I: APPLICATIONS

Chapter 14: Converse

Chapter 15: The Lifetime Network

Chapter 16: SONOS

Chapter 17: Huawei

Chapter 18: Patagonia

Chapter 19: REI

Part II: PLAYBOOK

Chapter 20: Solve The Innovation Puzzle: 7-Step Analysis

Chapter 21: Design The Innovation: The S.P.A.M. Framework

Chapter 22: Organize The Innovation: The Cultural Studio