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The Hero and the Outlaw

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The Hero and the Outlaw

Building Extraordinary Brands Through the Power of Archetypes

McGraw-Hill,

15 min read
10 take-aways
Text available

What's inside?

If you thought marketers were manipulative before (or if you’re a marketer who isn’t being manipulative enough), wait until you meet the innocent, the sage and the rebel — archetypes companies employ to make their products part of your life.

Editorial Rating

7

Qualities

  • Innovative

Recommendation

When you think of Apple Computer, does the image of "The Rebel" come to mind? Does Barnes & Noble conjure up "The Sage?" If authors Margaret Mark and Carol S. Pearson are right, these archetypes should spring to your mind as part of the identification of these brands. The authors assert that people think in a certain subliminal way about companies based on the characteristics of archetypal personalities. Your company, they say, should define the archetype that fits its culture (is your firm an "Explorer" or an "Innocent?") and consistently brand its products accordingly. While they quote people seldom seen in business books - Carl Jung, Joseph Campbell - they insist that their ideas are practical and profitable. If you are an executive who wonders what to do to make your brand stand out, getAbstract recommends this book to you.

Summary

Archetypes Matter

Experts once considered archetypal meaning in marketing to be quaint and interesting. Today defining your brand’s archetypal symbolism is a prerequisite. The idea of managing meaning is new. In the past, companies faced less competition because demand exceeded supply. If you were the only soda pop company, you didn’t have to worry too much about designing deeper meaning into your product.

Times now, however, are radically different. Companies must deal with increasing competition and, thanks to globalization, the competition is quickly turning worldwide. Even if you succeed in creating a comparative advantage for yourself, a competitor can quickly copy it. Recently, companies have bought out other companies not for what they sold, but for the brands they had established. The brands, with their deeper iconic meetings, were valuable because of the intangible meanings they offered. In this environment, companies that confuse their brand identity, such as Levi’s or Nike, find that distorting their archetypal images resulted in decreasing sales and profits.

If you market your brand today without paying attention to meaning and archetypes, then you...

About the Authors

Margaret Mark is the president of Margaret Mark Strategic Insight, a marketing consulting firm specializing in brand management. She is former Executive Vice President of Young and Rubicam and her recent clients include Cablevision/Madison Square Garden, Sesame Workshop, SAP American, Polo Ralph Lauren and the March of Dimes. Carol S. Pearson , Ph.D., is the president of CASA (Center for Archetypal Studies and Applications), a management consultant and the best-selling author of The Hero Within, Awakening the Heroes Within, Magic At Work and the "Pearsons-Mark Archetype Indicator" (PMAI).

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