¿1? – Tristan Nicolas : “Happiness is a our way of doing business.” Here is a new post category we wanted to create.
We will regularly ask 4 simple questions to strategists, experts and entrepreneurs with a focus on brand utility. The first of them is Tristan Nicolas, one of the three men behind Ben & Fakto, a fun, great and responsible website to find your next clothes. I had the chance to meet him and talk about his adventure several weeks ago… 1/ Tell us more about yourself, what are you doing for a living ? I am 24, I am a runner and I love the Internet. For a living (and beyond that) I am one the three co-founders of an online e-shop called Ben & Fakto. And we began working on this idea of e-shop, we soon realized that all brands had their own way to deal with the issue, so we wanted to do something on our own. The two other co-founders are Kevin Straszburger and Harold Pognonec. 2/ How did you get into brand utility ? I think that for a large part of our generation, it seems natural. 4/ Any book or blog to recommend on the topic ?
¿3? – Brad & John – Kley – “We wanted a niche for our agency, something we were passionate about” Brad Klemmer and John R. Kelley Junior created they own agency, Kley, a few months ago. They specialize in “Digital Brand Utility”…or how to make brands more useful through technology. We wanted to give them a shout through the following interview; and wish them luck for the future ! Could you please introduce yourselves ? How did you meet ? Brad Klemmer and John Kelley. What’s Kley (please explain why you chose such a name too) ? It just worked on so many levels.
How did you come up to the idea of creating a brand utility agency ? Both of us have produced highly successful marketing campagins and the like, from branding to advertising. Most importantly, DBU is part digital creativity, social, technology, and marketing, all meeting together at this special vortex of convergence. What are some great examples of brand utility you have seen in the past ? There are some good examples, yes.
Are there any books you would recommend on the topic ? Yes, the one we’re currently writing. ¿4? – Faris Yakob – “If you aren’t useful, get off my phone !” Faris Yakob, who we do not have to present again on this blog as he already adds a lot to the “brand utility” thinking, accepted to answer a few questions from us…a few months ago.
Don’t ask why we did not publish it earlier, there’s no reason. Tell us more about yourself, what are you doing for a living ? Hello! I’m Faris. I’m the chief innovation officer for MDC/kbs+ and a founding partner of Spies&Assasins, our creative technology shop. On some projects I’m a strategy director, on some a [mostly non-traditional] creative director [and on some, like some of our ActiveE work for BWM, I'm both! How did you get into brand utility ? I wrote a thing with my friend Ben in 2006 about an idea called ‘Advertools‘ in which we said: ..Strive to make the communication channel An advertool is a communication channel, created by a brand, which offers in itself a functional utility to consumers.
Then, shortly after, an article in AdAge ran a piece calling the idea brand utility. Nike+.