#strategic-positioning

#strategic-positioning

Denton's first rule: "Make it different, but relevant." The more unusual your swag is, the more likely people will remember it, want it, and share it online.

Running a photography business can be incredible fun, offering unique experiences and opportunities to meet diverse people. However, it requires significant dedication and effort, often demanding extra hours beyond a typical workweek.

People recognize polish, but they respond to purpose. What the industry is starting to learn is that value is in the principles those tools represent. Technology is initially and temporarily impressive, whereas values are unforgettable.

"Instead of starting with a product that we didn't feel like existed in the marketplace, we started with a mission that we felt like didn't exist, particularly in the beauty space," Cohen said. "We love that young people are turning to brands for not just products, but for the issues that they care about-and also that's what holds us accountable."

In a recent interview with the Wall Street Journal, Jamie Dimon explained why JPMorgan Chase is spending billions more on AI. He was making a long-term bet. The same kind of leaders make when they build headquarters, factories or infrastructure that won't "pay off" this quarter but will define competitiveness for decades. It's exactly how marketers should think about and position differentiation in the eyes of the C-Suite.

For much of the modern corporate era, brand has been treated as surface area. A story told outward. A set of signals designed to persuade, attract, and differentiate. When companies spoke about brand, they were usually talking about perception: how they looked in the market, how they sounded, how they were received. That framing made sense in a world where markets moved a little more slowly, organizations were stable, and leadership could afford to separate strategy from culture, product from meaning, execution from belief.