May 2, 2024 • 18 mins
Are you armed with a compelling brand story that captivates your audience?
Get ready to unleash your brand's superpower with G. Kofi Annan, the maestro of brand strategy who's shaped narratives for giants like Puma and Mercedes-Benz.
In an era where every second counts, your brand's story shouldn't just be heard—it should echo.
That's what we explore with Kofi, dissecting the layers of strategy behind storytelling that doesn't just sell but sustains.
Tune in for an episode that's less about listening and more about transforming the way you think about—and grow—your brand.
You can find G. Kofi Annan here:
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/gkofiannan
Website: www.linktr.ee/gkofiannan
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
What's up guys?
This is Kaylee Johnson herewith Digital Journey.
If you're a person that'swanting to learn social media,
maybe that's just for youpersonally, maybe it's for your
business.
This is the right place for you.
Today, we have with us G KofiAnnan.
He is a brand strategist,technologist advisor and an
(00:20):
investor with 20 plus years of acareer spanning over 200 brand
building efforts.
Kofi has an impressive trackrecord that includes working
with global companies like Puma,pfizer and Mercedes-Benz and
innovative startups likeNurochron and Swatchon.
He distills insights, skillsand tools into actionable
(00:41):
strategies to help executives,founders and entrepreneurs stand
out and grow their brands inthe smarter way, and that is a
whole lot of fun things.
You've been able to do in thepast and you do a whole lot now,
so tell us.
How'd you get to where you aretoday?
What was your journey like?
Speaker 2 (00:57):
Thanks for having me on, kaylee, it's a pleasure to
be here and thanks for thatwonderful introduction.
I've always had a curious mindso you know, always want to talk
to wonderful people likeyourself and just different
people.
So I guess from a personalityperspective that's kind of how
I've gotten here.
But professionally I would saythat I started off early on in
my career trying to really tryto explore how people and
(01:22):
companies and entities,organizations, communicate
really.
And at the end of the daythat's ultimately how I do.
How do you bridge, how do youcommunicate what you have to
offer or what you're trying tocommunicate to another person,
another entity, anothercommunity?
So I started off in design andthen I realized, you know that I
was good enough at design, butyou know, as we all, you know as
(01:46):
we, as we all, in ourprofessional careers, at some
point you have to realize whereyou're best at, and I always
call it my superpower, likewhat's your superpower?
Right, you can do a lot ofthings, but what's your
superpower?
But in that regard I realizedthat design itself wasn't really
my thing.
It's really more about thinkingthrough the problem of how
(02:07):
people communicate and puttingthat platform and putting a plan
together and helping people dothat.
And of course, design is part ofthat, you know, as it happens.
But really it's kind of likehow do you really make people
clarify what they are doing toother people?
And you know, obviously I'veworked with some large brands,
but where I've netted out is Irealized that smaller companies,
growing companies, who have thebest ideas and really able to
(02:29):
change the markets, don't a lotof times don't have the
expertise, time, money, budgetsto really shape the market and
impact the right people.
And that's where I am now kindof trying to take the learnings
from a lot of the big companiesand what I've done there and
helping smaller, growingcompanies really apply that in
(02:50):
an efficient manner.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
That's amazing.
It is interesting the more youwork with small companies, the
more you're like these peoplehave better ideas than some of
the big companies, but they justdon't know how.
They need help implementing itor need help putting it all into
words.
And it's encouraging to seethat America is not just going
to be corporate America.
There are other smallbusinesses growing and it's a
(03:12):
very needed thing for people tobe able to have that structure,
to learn how do I communicateand realizing it's okay that I'm
not at the level as a bigcompany on my communication
skills, because it's a growingprocess.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
And technology is a large part of that too, right?
You know, in the past I wouldsay 15, 20 years ago when I was
really kind of working,technology wasn't as accessible,
right?
So you did need a lot of moneyand a lot of resources to do
these things.
But now we have so manytechnologies that facilitate
(03:46):
that and for a lower cost ofmoney and resource wise, you're
able to do a lot of stuff.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
but you definitely have to have that strategy, and
without that strategy, you canspend so much money if you don't
have a strategy, because you'rejust, you're throwing spaghetti
at the wall, I'm going to trythis, I'm going to try that, and
there's no rhyme or reasonbehind it.
You don't know where youraudience is.
And that's really true when itcomes to social media, because
people are like, okay, I have tohop on ad campaigns and okay, I
(04:12):
need to be making this kind ofcontent on this platform, and
it's like your audience mightnot even be on that platform.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
Right, exactly, and then you're wasting your time,
you're wasting your money towhere you could be putting it
into other other aspects andit'd be much more simple.
Yeah, I call that the hypecycle and that's happening with
ai right now.
When social media started someyears ago like really started to
kind of get um to bubble up Imean obviously it's going strong
now, but a couple years agoit's crypto.
Everybody wanted to do a cryptothing and everybody wanted to
(04:39):
do.
Now it's ai.
Not all of those platforms orall of those tools are valid.
Obviously social media is, but,to your point, it's how you're
using and not necessarily whatyou're using, and everyone, to
your point, tends to just jumpon and without any kind of
strategy.
It's to your point, is yourcustomer or your audience, even
on TikTok?
I know TikTok is the hot thingnow, but is that where you need
(05:03):
to be?
Who knows?
Speaker 1 (05:04):
Exactly, and that's one of the things we talk about
at Digital Journey.
Let's figure out where yourtarget audience is, because I'll
have people come into mymastermind course and be like I
need to be on these fiveplatforms and I'm like I'm not
even on five platforms and Icreate content for a living.
I can almost guarantee you youraudience is not going to be on
five platforms if you're a smallbusiness owner yeah, yeah
(05:25):
wasting your time with that.
So let's sit down, let's figureout a strategy so that you can
save time and you know thecouple platforms that you want
to be on.
You do well in, yeah, versusjust being intermediate at a
bunch.
Speaker 2 (05:37):
Be amazing at one or two yeah, and then with smaller
businesses also, right, likeit's even more important,
because, again, you don't havethe time, you don't have the
money, you don't have theresources.
I worked on a big campaign witha healthcare provider a couple
of years ago and the budget wasover a million dollars.
It was for a launchable projectand this is like peanuts to
(05:59):
them.
It was a big launch that washappening, it's.
The conversation was the samewhere, oh, we need to be on this
, this, this and this.
We went back and forth, weadvised them against it, but
again they were like no, we havethe money, just put us there.
And, needless to say, it wasn'tas effective because their
customer wasn't there.
So they had a million dollars.
They blew through more thanhalf of it before they realized
(06:20):
that they didn't need to be onTikTok or Snapchat because it
was a B2B context.
And even if you're a customeror your audience is on Snapchat
or TikTok they're notnecessarily looking to do
business there either, right?
So there's also that context.
Some of the bigger companieswith big budgets also make that
(06:40):
mistake and it's very much ahuman thing.
But it has a bigger impact on abusiness perspective for
smaller businesses.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
And I love what you're saying about it being a
human thing, because people areso eager to hop onto AI now that
it might be.
They're trying to do most oftheir content or written things
through chat GPT.
You can tell they use the same10 buzzwords over and over.
People can look at your postand be like and that's chat GPT.
So I know one thing you talkabout is brand storytelling in
(07:08):
the digital age.
What are some of those aspectsthat you dive into when it comes
to brand storytelling?
Speaker 2 (07:16):
I mean, and to that point, crafting once you realize
where you need to be and youcan make sure your audience is
there.
It's also about how do youengage and at the end of the day
, it is.
Communication is aboutstorytelling, and the simple
structure that I always use as aframework to start figuring out
how they're going tocommunicate and tell their story
and add value in any of thesechannels is first, start off
(07:38):
with the hero.
Who are you talking about?
And the hero is not you.
Your hero is the person thatyou're serving.
The hero is this person in theaudience that you're serving.
Then you understand the contextor the conflict.
What are they trying toovercome?
How are you helping themovercome?
What is kind of the thingthat's either holding them back
from doing anything?
(07:59):
It could be something as simpleas it's holding me back from
being able to celebrate my son'sfifth birthday.
Speaker 1 (08:04):
Today we have with us G Kofi Annan.
He is a brand strategist,technologist advisor and an
investor with 20 plus years of acareer spanning over 200 brand
building efforts.
Kofi has an impressive trackrecord that includes working
with global companies like Puma,pfizer and Mercedes Benz, and
(08:25):
innovative startups likeNurochron and Swatchon.
Speaker 2 (08:29):
So you have the hero, and then you have the conflict,
and now you have the mentor,and that's you need to come in
now.
How do you now help that hero,your audience, get past that
conflict?
What is the unique situation,news, unique perspectives that
you're bringing to the table tohelp those people understand, to
help those people move throughthat conflict?
(08:49):
And there are different ways tokind of contextualize that.
And then finally, at the end ofthe day, we want that promised
land.
That that's's.
You know, now that, now that theyou, you and the hero have uh,
have, uh, collaborated to getthrough that conflict, what is
that promised land?
What is that great place thatyou're going to bring them to?
And again, it could besomething as simple as now I've
(09:11):
um, I am celebrating my son'sfifth birthday because I've been
deployed or received.
It could be something as simpleas that.
And obviously it could besomething as complicated, as now
I am able to deploy my productinto the market.
So it's a simple kind offour-step process to
storytelling.
This is what Pixar and Disneyand, all through the years, any
kind of culture generally.
The storytelling falls intothese four areas the hero, the
(09:33):
conflict, the mentor and thepromised land.
So that's a simple frameworkthat anybody could use to at
least start making sure thattheir communications and their
stories are more human andregardless of the tool that
you're using.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
Yes, I majored in communications in college and we
went through that whole storymodel quite a lot of going
through it and sometimes youhave the hero and you get to the
conflict and they might notrealize what the true conflict
is.
They have, okay, I think it'sthat I'm struggling with getting
more clients when really it'sno one knows about them at all.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
Something simple like that.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
At that point the mentor can step in and be like,
yes, this is the challenge, yousee, but it's really this
challenge Exactly and kind ofretrain them, which is why
having a coach or a mentor ofsome kind is so valid A thousand
percent, and a lot of peoplewhen they think I don't want to
pay money for that, it's likebut do you realize how much
money you're going to be losingif you don't?
Thank you so much for listeningto the podcast.
(10:32):
We're going to put a quickpause on it and I have a
question for you.
Are you struggling with socialmedia?
Are you overwhelmed by whatplatforms to be on, what to post
?
We talked a little bit abouthow, knowing where you should be
, I can help you.
Digital Journey is an exclusivegroup mastermind that teaches
(10:53):
you how to grow your socialmedia, to find where your target
audience is on, so that you canspend less time on social media
and increase your profits andgain new respect from clients
and grow your product in general.
You deserve that.
So if you're interested, I'dlove for you to set up a call
with me.
You can reach out atwwwdigitaljourneynet and you'll
(11:19):
be able to find me there.
If this is something you'reserious about.
I want to hear from you If youhave a question.
Maybe you're still trying tofigure out.
Where in the world should I befor social media?
Speaker 2 (11:28):
let me know and we're going to get back to the
episode yes, and, and to yourpoint, I've seen a lot of um
smaller businesses, especiallyagain, and I focus on them
because the impact is that muchgreater.
Right, you know puma, you knowpfizer, mercedes, they'll get it
.
It's going to be a hurdle butthey'll get it.
(11:48):
We need to to really empower umsmaller and growing businesses.
But yes, to your point, you aresaving money up front and it's
short-sighted.
Right, I'm not paying this muchupfront, but really, in the
longterm one, you're delayingyour, your success.
And then the other part aboutthat is that you are spending
incrementally more and moremoney to reach your audience and
(12:10):
to have that impact on them,whether it be from ads that
you're spending, and Facebookand Google make it sound so
attractive like, oh, you need todo is $10 a day or whatever.
So many small business jumpright into the ads without
having their story or theircommunication strategy together
and then that's money you'rethrowing out the door.
(12:30):
The other side that I alwaystalk to small businesses about
investing and taking the time instrategy, and these days that
can mean an extra week or eventwo weeks with the tools that we
have.
The other impact there I alwaystell small businesses that by
spending that time you actuallyadd value to your brand and you
reduce in the startup world isthe customer acquisition costs
(12:59):
costs.
So the amount of time, moneyand effort that you're using to
reach your customer, eitherthrough ads or anything else, is
reduced because now you're moresuccinct, you're now focused
and both you can reach the rightpeople in the right channels
with the right message, but thenalso it is so succinct and so
thought through that they nowcan take that message and take
it to other areas where youcan't go monetarily.
So you're actually increasingyour reach and your impact by
(13:23):
spending whatever amount ofmoney that you think is upfront,
that you think it's not reallyhaving that impact.
It has a bigger ROI than any ofthe ads that you're able to run
quickly on Google and Facebook.
Speaker 1 (13:36):
So yeah, and that's so key, especially with small
businesses, because I think alot of times they're like time
is money, and, yes, 100%,especially even as a small
business.
You have less people, you haveless resources, but if you're
wasting time going out on aledge trying to figure out
advertising on your own ortrying so many different things,
(13:57):
you're not only spending moneyon it, but that's time you could
be pouring into your businessin a different way, or time you
could be cultivating arelationship with your customers
, and instead you're doing it,trying to do it on your own,
because, oh, I don't want to payX amount of money to have
someone help me, when, if youthink about it, like you're
really not paying anythingbecause you're going to be
(14:17):
getting more customers that aregoing to make up for that.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
I think that can sometimes be intimidating to
look at something and be likehow am I doing this?
Going back to that brandstorytelling process of you have
to overcome.
You have to recognize thechallenge and overcome it in
order to get to the finaldestination.
Speaker 2 (14:34):
Yes, and a coach or, in this case, a mentor, a
strategist like myself, willhelp you do that.
We are able to recognize thepatterns and we know the quick
ways to get that impact.
And another analogy I always useis if you're at the bottom
floor, you're entering abuilding and you want to go
upstairs, and that's wheresuccess is.
You can either take the stairsyou could put in all the efforts
(14:54):
or you can partner up withsomeone who already knows the
floor and has an elevator thatcan have the conversation with
you right before you enter theelevator to say, okay, this is
where you need to be, not thefloor that you think to X, y and
Z, and then they usher you intothat elevator and boom, you're
where you need to be muchquicker and with a lot less
(15:14):
effort and you're able to climbin that sky rise.
So you go into different levels, whereas if you go into the
stairs, you're trying to figureit all out yourself, and that
might work for some people.
But most successful businessesI've seen small, big, regardless
of the budget they dounderstand that value and how
time is money and that youshould be using the time more
(15:35):
efficiently.
Speaker 1 (15:36):
And a lot of people, especially small businesses,
just can give up because theydon't have that accountability.
And that's one thing aboutgroup coaching programs and
masterminds and coaches.
That gives you a person that isgoing to be like, okay, how did
this go?
And you don't want to come upand be the only person in the
group that hasn't done theirhomework Like, well, I'm paying
(15:56):
for this, but I don't know.
There are other people herethat want to see me succeed.
I'm not alone in this and youknow I need that encouragement
and that push Because we all do.
You know we're human, connectedpeople Like we're not meant to
do everything alone.
Speaker 2 (16:11):
Exactly.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
And when you are doing a small business, you know
you might not have a lot ofemployees and it might seem it's
just you.
So having that connection withsomeone that can hold you
accountable and teach you ismore valuable than I think most
people realize.
Speaker 2 (16:25):
Yeah, totally agree.
Speaker 1 (16:26):
Well, thank you so much for coming on.
This was super, super amazing.
I know my audience.
They love talking about thiskind of stuff and love listening
to it.
I loved all the analogies youshared, especially the elevator
one.
I think that's a cool idea,because if you're climbing 15
stories you're eventually goingto be super tired and at that
point it's like how much is thiseven worth it?
Speaker 2 (16:46):
Right.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
The elevator you're going and it's going well.
Speaker 2 (16:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:51):
So where can our listeners find you if they want
to reach out to you?
Speaker 2 (16:55):
Yes, kelly, yes, listeners find you if they want
to reach out to you.
Yes, kelly, yes, I love havingthis conversation.
Thanks for having me on again.
So my company is called theBrand Sensei, so the Brand
S-E-N-S-E-I, so you could findus at thebrandsenseico or
thebrandsenseicom.
But, more importantly, I have acouple of resources One, which
is assessments that can help anysmall business quickly assess
(17:16):
how they can leverage, how theyshould be leveraging, ai for
their brand marketing.
And then you know obviouslysome and I have some other
resources and you can find thatat thebrandsenseico forward
slash digital journey.
So that's going to be for forlisteners of this podcast.
So that's a brand S-E-N-S-E-Idot C-O, forward slash digital
(17:37):
journey, and you could find thetwo minute assessment.
It's free and it's to helpsmall business.
But then also some otherresources to help people take
the elevator where they need tobe faster with better brand
storytelling.
Speaker 1 (17:49):
Thank you so much for that.
That's amazing.
We'll have all of that linkeddown below for you listeners.
So if you're driving, doinglaundry, mowing your lawn, don't
worry about it, you can come onand click and do that.
So, kofi, thank you so much forcoming on.
It was a pleasure having you.
Speaker 2 (18:01):
Thank you, Kaylee.
It's a pleasure being here.
What's up guys?
This is Kaylee Johnson herewith Digital Journey.
If you're a person that'swanting to learn social media,
maybe that's just for youpersonally, maybe it's for your
business.
This is the right place for you.
Today, we have with us G KofiAnnan.
He is a brand strategist,technologist advisor and an
(00:20):
investor with 20 plus years of acareer spanning over 200 brand
building efforts.
Kofi has an impressive trackrecord that includes working
with global companies like Puma,pfizer and Mercedes-Benz and
innovative startups likeNurochron and Swatchon.
He distills insights, skillsand tools into actionable
(00:41):
strategies to help executives,founders and entrepreneurs stand
out and grow their brands inthe smarter way, and that is a
whole lot of fun things.
You've been able to do in thepast and you do a whole lot now,
so tell us.
How'd you get to where you aretoday?
What was your journey like?
Speaker 2 (00:57):
Thanks for having me on, kaylee, it's a pleasure to
be here and thanks for thatwonderful introduction.
I've always had a curious mindso you know, always want to talk
to wonderful people likeyourself and just different
people.
So I guess from a personalityperspective that's kind of how
I've gotten here.
But professionally I would saythat I started off early on in
my career trying to really tryto explore how people and
(01:22):
companies and entities,organizations, communicate
really.
And at the end of the daythat's ultimately how I do.
How do you bridge, how do youcommunicate what you have to
offer or what you're trying tocommunicate to another person,
another entity, anothercommunity?
So I started off in design andthen I realized, you know that I
was good enough at design, butyou know, as we all, you know as
(01:46):
we, as we all, in ourprofessional careers, at some
point you have to realize whereyou're best at, and I always
call it my superpower, likewhat's your superpower?
Right, you can do a lot ofthings, but what's your
superpower?
But in that regard I realizedthat design itself wasn't really
my thing.
It's really more about thinkingthrough the problem of how
(02:07):
people communicate and puttingthat platform and putting a plan
together and helping people dothat.
And of course, design is part ofthat, you know, as it happens.
But really it's kind of likehow do you really make people
clarify what they are doing toother people?
And you know, obviously I'veworked with some large brands,
but where I've netted out is Irealized that smaller companies,
growing companies, who have thebest ideas and really able to
(02:29):
change the markets, don't a lotof times don't have the
expertise, time, money, budgetsto really shape the market and
impact the right people.
And that's where I am now kindof trying to take the learnings
from a lot of the big companiesand what I've done there and
helping smaller, growingcompanies really apply that in
(02:50):
an efficient manner.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
That's amazing.
It is interesting the more youwork with small companies, the
more you're like these peoplehave better ideas than some of
the big companies, but they justdon't know how.
They need help implementing itor need help putting it all into
words.
And it's encouraging to seethat America is not just going
to be corporate America.
There are other smallbusinesses growing and it's a
(03:12):
very needed thing for people tobe able to have that structure,
to learn how do I communicateand realizing it's okay that I'm
not at the level as a bigcompany on my communication
skills, because it's a growingprocess.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
And technology is a large part of that too, right?
You know, in the past I wouldsay 15, 20 years ago when I was
really kind of working,technology wasn't as accessible,
right?
So you did need a lot of moneyand a lot of resources to do
these things.
But now we have so manytechnologies that facilitate
(03:46):
that and for a lower cost ofmoney and resource wise, you're
able to do a lot of stuff.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
but you definitely have to have that strategy, and
without that strategy, you canspend so much money if you don't
have a strategy, because you'rejust, you're throwing spaghetti
at the wall, I'm going to trythis, I'm going to try that, and
there's no rhyme or reasonbehind it.
You don't know where youraudience is.
And that's really true when itcomes to social media, because
people are like, okay, I have tohop on ad campaigns and okay, I
(04:12):
need to be making this kind ofcontent on this platform, and
it's like your audience mightnot even be on that platform.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
Right, exactly, and then you're wasting your time,
you're wasting your money towhere you could be putting it
into other other aspects andit'd be much more simple.
Yeah, I call that the hypecycle and that's happening with
ai right now.
When social media started someyears ago like really started to
kind of get um to bubble up Imean obviously it's going strong
now, but a couple years agoit's crypto.
Everybody wanted to do a cryptothing and everybody wanted to
(04:39):
do.
Now it's ai.
Not all of those platforms orall of those tools are valid.
Obviously social media is, but,to your point, it's how you're
using and not necessarily whatyou're using, and everyone, to
your point, tends to just jumpon and without any kind of
strategy.
It's to your point, is yourcustomer or your audience, even
on TikTok?
I know TikTok is the hot thingnow, but is that where you need
(05:03):
to be?
Who knows?
Speaker 1 (05:04):
Exactly, and that's one of the things we talk about
at Digital Journey.
Let's figure out where yourtarget audience is, because I'll
have people come into mymastermind course and be like I
need to be on these fiveplatforms and I'm like I'm not
even on five platforms and Icreate content for a living.
I can almost guarantee you youraudience is not going to be on
five platforms if you're a smallbusiness owner yeah, yeah
(05:25):
wasting your time with that.
So let's sit down, let's figureout a strategy so that you can
save time and you know thecouple platforms that you want
to be on.
You do well in, yeah, versusjust being intermediate at a
bunch.
Speaker 2 (05:37):
Be amazing at one or two yeah, and then with smaller
businesses also, right, likeit's even more important,
because, again, you don't havethe time, you don't have the
money, you don't have theresources.
I worked on a big campaign witha healthcare provider a couple
of years ago and the budget wasover a million dollars.
It was for a launchable projectand this is like peanuts to
(05:59):
them.
It was a big launch that washappening, it's.
The conversation was the samewhere, oh, we need to be on this
, this, this and this.
We went back and forth, weadvised them against it, but
again they were like no, we havethe money, just put us there.
And, needless to say, it wasn'tas effective because their
customer wasn't there.
So they had a million dollars.
They blew through more thanhalf of it before they realized
(06:20):
that they didn't need to be onTikTok or Snapchat because it
was a B2B context.
And even if you're a customeror your audience is on Snapchat
or TikTok they're notnecessarily looking to do
business there either, right?
So there's also that context.
Some of the bigger companieswith big budgets also make that
(06:40):
mistake and it's very much ahuman thing.
But it has a bigger impact on abusiness perspective for
smaller businesses.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
And I love what you're saying about it being a
human thing, because people areso eager to hop onto AI now that
it might be.
They're trying to do most oftheir content or written things
through chat GPT.
You can tell they use the same10 buzzwords over and over.
People can look at your postand be like and that's chat GPT.
So I know one thing you talkabout is brand storytelling in
(07:08):
the digital age.
What are some of those aspectsthat you dive into when it comes
to brand storytelling?
Speaker 2 (07:16):
I mean, and to that point, crafting once you realize
where you need to be and youcan make sure your audience is
there.
It's also about how do youengage and at the end of the day
, it is.
Communication is aboutstorytelling, and the simple
structure that I always use as aframework to start figuring out
how they're going tocommunicate and tell their story
and add value in any of thesechannels is first, start off
(07:38):
with the hero.
Who are you talking about?
And the hero is not you.
Your hero is the person thatyou're serving.
The hero is this person in theaudience that you're serving.
Then you understand the contextor the conflict.
What are they trying toovercome?
How are you helping themovercome?
What is kind of the thingthat's either holding them back
from doing anything?
(07:59):
It could be something as simpleas it's holding me back from
being able to celebrate my son'sfifth birthday.
Speaker 1 (08:04):
Today we have with us G Kofi Annan.
He is a brand strategist,technologist advisor and an
investor with 20 plus years of acareer spanning over 200 brand
building efforts.
Kofi has an impressive trackrecord that includes working
with global companies like Puma,pfizer and Mercedes Benz, and
(08:25):
innovative startups likeNurochron and Swatchon.
Speaker 2 (08:29):
So you have the hero, and then you have the conflict,
and now you have the mentor,and that's you need to come in
now.
How do you now help that hero,your audience, get past that
conflict?
What is the unique situation,news, unique perspectives that
you're bringing to the table tohelp those people understand, to
help those people move throughthat conflict?
(08:49):
And there are different ways tokind of contextualize that.
And then finally, at the end ofthe day, we want that promised
land.
That that's's.
You know, now that, now that theyou, you and the hero have uh,
have, uh, collaborated to getthrough that conflict, what is
that promised land?
What is that great place thatyou're going to bring them to?
And again, it could besomething as simple as now I've
(09:11):
um, I am celebrating my son'sfifth birthday because I've been
deployed or received.
It could be something as simpleas that.
And obviously it could besomething as complicated, as now
I am able to deploy my productinto the market.
So it's a simple kind offour-step process to
storytelling.
This is what Pixar and Disneyand, all through the years, any
kind of culture generally.
The storytelling falls intothese four areas the hero, the
(09:33):
conflict, the mentor and thepromised land.
So that's a simple frameworkthat anybody could use to at
least start making sure thattheir communications and their
stories are more human andregardless of the tool that
you're using.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
Yes, I majored in communications in college and we
went through that whole storymodel quite a lot of going
through it and sometimes youhave the hero and you get to the
conflict and they might notrealize what the true conflict
is.
They have, okay, I think it'sthat I'm struggling with getting
more clients when really it'sno one knows about them at all.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
Something simple like that.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
At that point the mentor can step in and be like,
yes, this is the challenge, yousee, but it's really this
challenge Exactly and kind ofretrain them, which is why
having a coach or a mentor ofsome kind is so valid A thousand
percent, and a lot of peoplewhen they think I don't want to
pay money for that, it's likebut do you realize how much
money you're going to be losingif you don't?
Thank you so much for listeningto the podcast.
(10:32):
We're going to put a quickpause on it and I have a
question for you.
Are you struggling with socialmedia?
Are you overwhelmed by whatplatforms to be on, what to post
?
We talked a little bit abouthow, knowing where you should be
, I can help you.
Digital Journey is an exclusivegroup mastermind that teaches
(10:53):
you how to grow your socialmedia, to find where your target
audience is on, so that you canspend less time on social media
and increase your profits andgain new respect from clients
and grow your product in general.
You deserve that.
So if you're interested, I'dlove for you to set up a call
with me.
You can reach out atwwwdigitaljourneynet and you'll
(11:19):
be able to find me there.
If this is something you'reserious about.
I want to hear from you If youhave a question.
Maybe you're still trying tofigure out.
Where in the world should I befor social media?
Speaker 2 (11:28):
let me know and we're going to get back to the
episode yes, and, and to yourpoint, I've seen a lot of um
smaller businesses, especiallyagain, and I focus on them
because the impact is that muchgreater.
Right, you know puma, you knowpfizer, mercedes, they'll get it
.
It's going to be a hurdle butthey'll get it.
(11:48):
We need to to really empower umsmaller and growing businesses.
But yes, to your point, you aresaving money up front and it's
short-sighted.
Right, I'm not paying this muchupfront, but really, in the
longterm one, you're delayingyour, your success.
And then the other part aboutthat is that you are spending
incrementally more and moremoney to reach your audience and
(12:10):
to have that impact on them,whether it be from ads that
you're spending, and Facebookand Google make it sound so
attractive like, oh, you need todo is $10 a day or whatever.
So many small business jumpright into the ads without
having their story or theircommunication strategy together
and then that's money you'rethrowing out the door.
(12:30):
The other side that I alwaystalk to small businesses about
investing and taking the time instrategy, and these days that
can mean an extra week or eventwo weeks with the tools that we
have.
The other impact there I alwaystell small businesses that by
spending that time you actuallyadd value to your brand and you
reduce in the startup world isthe customer acquisition costs
(12:59):
costs.
So the amount of time, moneyand effort that you're using to
reach your customer, eitherthrough ads or anything else, is
reduced because now you're moresuccinct, you're now focused
and both you can reach the rightpeople in the right channels
with the right message, but thenalso it is so succinct and so
thought through that they nowcan take that message and take
it to other areas where youcan't go monetarily.
So you're actually increasingyour reach and your impact by
(13:23):
spending whatever amount ofmoney that you think is upfront,
that you think it's not reallyhaving that impact.
It has a bigger ROI than any ofthe ads that you're able to run
quickly on Google and Facebook.
Speaker 1 (13:36):
So yeah, and that's so key, especially with small
businesses, because I think alot of times they're like time
is money, and, yes, 100%,especially even as a small
business.
You have less people, you haveless resources, but if you're
wasting time going out on aledge trying to figure out
advertising on your own ortrying so many different things,
(13:57):
you're not only spending moneyon it, but that's time you could
be pouring into your businessin a different way, or time you
could be cultivating arelationship with your customers
, and instead you're doing it,trying to do it on your own,
because, oh, I don't want to payX amount of money to have
someone help me, when, if youthink about it, like you're
really not paying anythingbecause you're going to be
(14:17):
getting more customers that aregoing to make up for that.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
I think that can sometimes be intimidating to
look at something and be likehow am I doing this?
Going back to that brandstorytelling process of you have
to overcome.
You have to recognize thechallenge and overcome it in
order to get to the finaldestination.
Speaker 2 (14:34):
Yes, and a coach or, in this case, a mentor, a
strategist like myself, willhelp you do that.
We are able to recognize thepatterns and we know the quick
ways to get that impact.
And another analogy I always useis if you're at the bottom
floor, you're entering abuilding and you want to go
upstairs, and that's wheresuccess is.
You can either take the stairsyou could put in all the efforts
(14:54):
or you can partner up withsomeone who already knows the
floor and has an elevator thatcan have the conversation with
you right before you enter theelevator to say, okay, this is
where you need to be, not thefloor that you think to X, y and
Z, and then they usher you intothat elevator and boom, you're
where you need to be muchquicker and with a lot less
(15:14):
effort and you're able to climbin that sky rise.
So you go into different levels, whereas if you go into the
stairs, you're trying to figureit all out yourself, and that
might work for some people.
But most successful businessesI've seen small, big, regardless
of the budget they dounderstand that value and how
time is money and that youshould be using the time more
(15:35):
efficiently.
Speaker 1 (15:36):
And a lot of people, especially small businesses,
just can give up because theydon't have that accountability.
And that's one thing aboutgroup coaching programs and
masterminds and coaches.
That gives you a person that isgoing to be like, okay, how did
this go?
And you don't want to come upand be the only person in the
group that hasn't done theirhomework Like, well, I'm paying
(15:56):
for this, but I don't know.
There are other people herethat want to see me succeed.
I'm not alone in this and youknow I need that encouragement
and that push Because we all do.
You know we're human, connectedpeople Like we're not meant to
do everything alone.
Speaker 2 (16:11):
Exactly.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
And when you are doing a small business, you know
you might not have a lot ofemployees and it might seem it's
just you.
So having that connection withsomeone that can hold you
accountable and teach you ismore valuable than I think most
people realize.
Speaker 2 (16:25):
Yeah, totally agree.
Speaker 1 (16:26):
Well, thank you so much for coming on.
This was super, super amazing.
I know my audience.
They love talking about thiskind of stuff and love listening
to it.
I loved all the analogies youshared, especially the elevator
one.
I think that's a cool idea,because if you're climbing 15
stories you're eventually goingto be super tired and at that
point it's like how much is thiseven worth it?
Speaker 2 (16:46):
Right.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
The elevator you're going and it's going well.
Speaker 2 (16:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:51):
So where can our listeners find you if they want
to reach out to you?
Speaker 2 (16:55):
Yes, kelly, yes, listeners find you if they want
to reach out to you.
Yes, kelly, yes, I love havingthis conversation.
Thanks for having me on again.
So my company is called theBrand Sensei, so the Brand
S-E-N-S-E-I, so you could findus at thebrandsenseico or
thebrandsenseicom.
But, more importantly, I have acouple of resources One, which
is assessments that can help anysmall business quickly assess
(17:16):
how they can leverage, how theyshould be leveraging, ai for
their brand marketing.
And then you know obviouslysome and I have some other
resources and you can find thatat thebrandsenseico forward
slash digital journey.
So that's going to be for forlisteners of this podcast.
So that's a brand S-E-N-S-E-Idot C-O, forward slash digital
(17:37):
journey, and you could find thetwo minute assessment.
It's free and it's to helpsmall business.
But then also some otherresources to help people take
the elevator where they need tobe faster with better brand
storytelling.
Speaker 1 (17:49):
Thank you so much for that.
That's amazing.
We'll have all of that linkeddown below for you listeners.
So if you're driving, doinglaundry, mowing your lawn, don't
worry about it, you can come onand click and do that.
So, kofi, thank you so much forcoming on.
It was a pleasure having you.
Speaker 2 (18:01):
Thank you, Kaylee.
It's a pleasure being here.
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