For years I’ve argued that brand continuity is important, and for years franchisees have told me it isn’t. Here are two recent examples that illustrate why brand continuity matters.

Example #1 :: Sobeys

I lived in Winnipeg for two years and shopped at Sobeys because; 1. I could walk there, 2. It was a clean bright store,  3. My father-in-law recommended it, and 4. It also had a pharmacy. I came to look forward to my frequent but small shopping trips. Better yet they had a number of products that I came to love. While I’m not a foodie, Sobeys did it’s best to make me one. So now I’m back in Toronto – missing my local Sobeys and some of those special treats. I drove to the nearest one, only to find it small, dingy, unfriendly and worst of all – the treats that I loved to buy in Winnipeg were nowhere to be found in the Toronto store. Result: I will not go back to Sobey’s - Toronto and I’ll share my brand disappointment with others.

Example #2 :: Days Inn

Charlie (my dog) and I used to drive to Winnipeg and back a few times a year and made it a road-vacation. My wife and I set a leisurely pace and overnighted 3-4 times enroute. Over the years and miles we found that some hotels and motels had no-dog policies, others charged Charlie as much as a 3rd human occupant, and others put us up in their smoking rooms. Then there was Days Inn. So far, no matter what route we have taken from Toronto to Winnipeg and back, Days Inn was always happy to put up Michelle, Charlie and me for a $20.00 premium in a fresh, clean non-smoking room. Given the rooms are large, comfortable and equipped with wireless internet and a desk, they’ll continue to get our business and referrals.

As Holiday Inn used to say and should continue to in their ads: “The best surprise is no surprise”.

Toby and Banksy are here!

I’m often asked to create a wireframe for a site before I design it because the Account Group thinks it a really clever in-process sales tool - that also might reduces risk - or the number of non-billable hours that I run up.

It made me wonder: do others have the same problem with wireframes that I do? I Goggled “web wireframes” to find out; I wondered how others approach this banal task. I found a multitude of wireframe design approaches that look and smell an awful lot like post-design-rationalization . . . or bull-shit for short.

The image of all those wireframes reminded me of a chat I had with one of my mentors, Hugh Dow, about 30 years ago when I had seen one of my colleagues craft an enormous deck to sell a $2,000,000 media plan. I felt like I’d missed a few steps because I was selling much larger media plans with very short decks. Hugh assured me that I was on the right track: “if you can sell it with just one page, do it, but if you’ve got a client that needs to see all your work, append that too.”

I’ve never forgotten that valuable lesson:

• Do all the detailed work to ensure that you know what you’re doing - and why. Keep that work close at hand so that you can explain yourself if and when you need to with-out any hesitation. 
• Only say and show what’s needed to make the sale.
• Sell the benefits and excitement of sharing a great story: don’t bore them with your stupid process.

So, back to wireframes.

Stupid idea, except for VERY complex sites.

Likewise, it is good idea to provide mock-ups of key pages for a big catalog, but not for a little roll-fold brochure or a banner ad.

I’ve seen suffocation warnings on virtually every plastic bag in the U.S. including small dog-poo bags. They always get me wondering about the general demise of common sense.

Now this.

I just don’t even want to imagine the chain of events that led to IKEA stores concluding that notices like these are required on the toilets in their showroom display washrooms (which have no doors on them).

Yikes!