May 18, 2025 • 15 mins
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to this episode of the NerdBrand Podcast
.
It's a little belated, but wegot some Brandon news, got some
other things going on.
Last episode we listened toabout Starry and why Starry
rebranded, so let's talk aboutHBO up next.
Welcome to this episode of theNerdBrand Podcast.
(00:40):
Thank you for listening to myramblings, and we're going to
talk a little bit about why HBOMax may have gone back to HBO
Max instead of just staying asMax.
A couple of opinions One, maybethe entertainment has kind of
not been great lately, but thatprobably is not the issue.
I would say, just as anoutsider's perspective, a former
(01:04):
subscriber to the service, thatmaybe the brand equity wasn't
as much in the name Max as therewas in the name HBO.
I remember when I was younger,hbo had this really awesome
opener.
If you had back in the days ofwhen you just had cable there's
(01:25):
no such thing as internetstreaming you would know that
you're watching an HBO moviebecause of the way that it would
open up.
It would go around the O and itwould look like it's a you know
, I don't know spiral thing, butanyways, that was called the
early days of After Effects, anengine that was used to edit and
provide special effects for,like, for example, the movie
Deadpool, and so it was sort ofon the forefront of that and
(01:49):
that opener.
Ever since then you knew thename HBO and it sort of seared
it into your memory, becauseevery time you watched a movie
from the studios that had that,that's what you saw on their
channel.
So fast forward, several yearslater and here we are and
they're doing HBO Max, thestreaming service for HBO,
(02:09):
though I don't think it was thefirst one or first attempt, but
definitely was the biggest onethey went at a go at.
So HBO, everyone knew Home BoxOffice, by the way, is what that
stands for, and you know it'slike, you know, having a theater
in your house.
I remember everybody got the 5.1, I think is what they call it
(02:30):
surround sound, and that'sbasically where you have a
receiver, two speakers on eachside, a center one and two, you
know, on each side of yourviewership behind you, so you
can have surround sound.
Now we just have that out ofnormal speakers.
I mean, technology has just foraudio.
Audio has extremely, um, youknow, accelerated, but anyhow,
hbo itself goes to HBO max andthen everybody's like we, and
(02:54):
you know it's sort of it's great.
And then they renamed to max andthen they stopped calling
themselves HBO and you know thereasonings for that.
I'm like I said, this is justmy opinion, but I just think
that the brand equity is notwell.
It just wasn't there with Maxor it doesn't resonate with
people, so they went back tothat.
(03:17):
And for those of you that don'tknow, this is Warner Brothers.
I mean, it's technically nowit's Warner Brothers Discovery,
so they are the ones thatinitiated the renaming back.
So it's sort of this part oftheir HBO brand's reputation
trying to create premium content.
(03:37):
And I think that the switch upsthat are happening with some
brands out there and returningto what is familiar is strategic
due to the fact that it kind ofbrings it back to.
I recognize that, I trust thatand that's where we're getting
to.
We're coming into an age wherebranded content is unique,
content that you know comes fromthat specific place business,
(04:03):
brand, person and isn't somereplication of that that is
cheaper.
It's not the mainstays brandthat you go find in Walmart,
it's actually XYZ name brand,right, and I'll be honest, I'm
one of these people that if Ihave an off brand of cereal or
(04:27):
Coke or whatever, I can't do it,it's hard for me to like no, I
need the name brand.
It tastes better and all that.
So I think a lot of people knowthat, even if that may be
psychological or real or not Idon't know, I'm not a
psychologist but when it comesto branding, a lot of it deals
with how much do I trust thisbrand.
That just incentivizes to buyagain and to keep buying and to
(04:52):
stay loyal to that brand.
It makes marketing easier whenthat's the case, because you
don't have to convince peoplewhy they should buy it.
You just sort of have to nowremind them about it and you
have to continuously show thatyou are that trusted brand that
you could always rely upon.
(05:15):
It's something that is, I think,going to come up more and more
just because of how things arechanging.
Just pulled it up here on myscreen now HBO Go.
That's what it was.
It was that that was thepredecessor.
Okay, so, yeah, so anyways.
Hbo was bought out by Discovery, so was Warner Brothers, and
now we're back to HBO Max People.
(05:39):
Just again.
It's very simple.
If you Google it, people justassociate the HBO brand with
quality content and you know, Iremember some of the movies that
would come out on HBO.
Now, through the years thebrand has gone through a lot of
evolutions.
Yes, you know, warner BrothersDiscovery is obviously trying to
(06:01):
tap into that so that it canwin the streaming wars, even
though I think a lot of that isprobably past.
I think Netflix has already woncome out on top, it's just one
of those things.
But this rebrand just didn'tcome out of left field.
I mean it was on stage.
I mean, during Warner BrothersDiscovery's upfront presentation
(06:21):
to its advertisers, the chiefexecutive officer, casey Boyd,
announced that the company'sstreaming platform Max would
revert back to its previous name, hbo Max.
So Warner Brothers Discoveryexecutives emphasized that it
was a move to emphasize itsstrongest offerings, which is a
very clever way of saying likeour content's better than your
content Nanner, nanner offerings, which is a very clever way of
(06:42):
saying like our content's betterthan your content, nanner
nanner.
So what do we expect now thatit's been renamed Like?
What does that mean?
Like the content's now going tobe premium and better?
I don't think we'll know rightnow.
I don't think we can know.
I mean it's if you're an HBOMax fan, good for you.
If not, okay.
Well, you know that's cool too,but that is one example of
(07:05):
going back because the equitywas there and that is why they
wanted to return to that.
So I just thought that wasinteresting after we just talked
about Starry and what justhappened there.
It's not sexy, but, you know,not as much as Starry was pun
intended, but that's pretty muchit.
So rebranding is going to happenbecause you got an outdated
(07:26):
identity.
What is your identity?
Well, it's anything visualabout your brand.
That includes digitalproperties and online presence
as well.
Shift and target audience isgoing to happen in your
evolution.
Your business strategy willrequire a rebrand.
This is not marketing.
By the way, I had somebodyyesterday ask me about marketing
and branding and hearing thetwo.
It's not a this or that, it's aboth hand.
It's just sometimes one comesbefore the other and there's a
(07:48):
reason for that and that dependson the strategy Standing out.
If you're struggling to standout, a rebrand can help.
You have internal confusion orconsistency issues, you have a
negative perception and you needa lot of crisis management.
Maybe you just need to do arebrand and a rename in order to
distance yourself from thatlike sorry, so you have outgrown
(08:11):
your name or identity.
You know that's something thatcan happen.
A lot of people don't reallyunderstand like that's possible
to outgrow something and youhave to become something new.
Well, what is that?
So I would embrace minimalismin whatever you do.
We'll ask our creative directorwhen he joins the show again
later this month.
(08:32):
But embracing minimalism, it'sjust simple design, trends,
forms.
It's very clean lines, a verylimited color palette.
Those seem to be very popular.
I would point to the RTD drinkmark, the rated drink market.
You know you look at Celsius.
You look at, like a lot ofthese others, that it's a really
(08:56):
good case study in where theystarted out with a very, very
busy can design and they've over, they, iterated over time and
that iteration actually showedthat it increased sales when
they finally simplified things,because when you put that drink
next to others on a shelf, youyou want to stand out visually,
but they also want to stand outmessage wise too.
So go look up Celsius.
(09:17):
It's a great case study on howcreative can influence revenue,
and so if you don't have the topof the line creative, then you
know.
Also, I would also hint that yougo and look at the movie
industry right now.
There was a great.
Well, it wasn't a great trailer, but it's a trailer that shows
(09:39):
that when you compare it to the1980 movie of Predator and you
look at the new Predator moviecoming out, the CGI effects are
bad, so bad, and it doesn'tinstill audience confidence to
go to the theater and watch thisthing.
The CGI, I know.
Maybe they released the trailerearly, I don't know, but it
(10:00):
just looks really, really awful.
So, anyhow, focus onauthenticity, prioritize
reliability and emotion, and usebold and condensed fonts, in
moderation though, and you know,those are things that will, I
(10:27):
think, include, that will helpyou raise your, your brand, not
just awareness, but its equity,which again goes back to the HBO
Max thing, where HBO has allthe brand equity and Max was
still struggling with that,because everybody knows Disney+
and everybody knows.
If I was to say Hulu, if I wasto say you know, whatever, you
would recognize it, but Macs,you know.
So leverage creative.
(10:47):
And then you know there's tonsof places for you to go out and
look at these examples and howthey could actually be of use
and help.
So I am going to go back a bitand describe what is branding
and this is just me, but you canGoogle these things.
(11:08):
But if you're unsure about themeaning of branding.
It can be vague, because it'snot necessarily something.
That is a clear answer, in myopinion, because it depends on
what exactly are you working on.
Because it depends on whatexactly are you working on.
I've used the example a lotwhere people want to have their
(11:29):
brand be memorable and it's likeokay, let's go back where Apple
wasn't the first name youthought of and the first name
you thought of was Steve Jobs.
Everybody knew Steve Jobs.
Everybody knew Steve Jobs, theCEO of Apple.
His name sort of came out firstbefore Apple.
Does anybody know who Tim Cookis?
That's not a bad thing if youdon't, and I'm sure he's fine
(11:50):
with it.
I guarantee it.
But he's the CEO of Apple nowand has been since Steve passed
away.
So, but you know Apple, but doyou remember Macintosh?
They were called that.
People would say Macintosh,apple Macintosh, they had a
different name.
Way would say Macintosh, apple,macintosh, they had a different
name way back.
Things just evolve, is all I'msaying.
So you want to have a brand thatcan evolve, but broadly,
(12:15):
anything can be offered to amarket to satisfy a want or a
need, or physical goods,services, experiences, events,
person places, properties.
No, I'm not saying nouns,organizations, information,
ideas like that.
That's pretty much a broaddefinition.
When you put visual items outlike a logo, or you put out a
website or you put out an ad,those are expressions of your
(12:41):
brand that you're trying tocommunicate into those markets,
of what that is and the value ofit.
But let's say, let's look at avery plain and I have a pun
intended here water, freelyavailable resource, essentially
for every human being to liveand survive, right, I think.
What is it?
48 hours and you can't reallygo without water or something
like that.
But it became a product the daythat we decided to commercialize
(13:05):
it.
We started putting mineral, wesay mineral water, we put it in
plastic bottles and we put alabel on it and we started
saying like this is mineralwater and it's from here, and
then this one's from here, andthen all of a sudden, water
became commoditized and it's abrand.
You know, nestle's over here,and then you got these other
high-end ones over here and thenyou got sparkling water.
(13:25):
It's just one of these thingswhere they took something simple
like that and created a brandout of nothing.
It's amazing.
A brand is a name, it's a term,it's design.
It's a symbol, it's any featurethat identifies that good or
(13:47):
service that's distinct fromother sellers.
That's a definition from theAmerican Marketing Association.
Shine a light on as how you cantake something and create
brands and now there's likeseveral different, you know,
bottled water companies and theyall have their own distinct
(14:08):
logos.
They have their own distinctmessages and how the water is
and what it comes from At theend of the day.
Um, I would be very interestedto see if anybody's going to get
a bunch of these and put themtogether and then do some
testing and see if it's actually, if there's any differentiator
as far as ingredients betweeneach of the brands that are out
there that exist.
I think that would beinteresting.
If you know of an example likethat, please submit it to us and
(14:30):
let us know.
But in the meantime, I hopethis episode was interesting to
you and useful.
It's kind of a blast ofdifferent information at once.
It's been a crazy week and so Ihope this.
You know not sound like an AIrobot, but I hope this podcast
finds you well and you'll tunein next week for another episode
(14:50):
of the NerdBrand podcast.
And remember, keep yourNerdBrand strong.
Welcome to this episode of the NerdBrand Podcast
.
It's a little belated, but wegot some Brandon news, got some
other things going on.
Last episode we listened toabout Starry and why Starry
rebranded, so let's talk aboutHBO up next.
Welcome to this episode of theNerdBrand Podcast.
(00:40):
Thank you for listening to myramblings, and we're going to
talk a little bit about why HBOMax may have gone back to HBO
Max instead of just staying asMax.
A couple of opinions One, maybethe entertainment has kind of
not been great lately, but thatprobably is not the issue.
I would say, just as anoutsider's perspective, a former
(01:04):
subscriber to the service, thatmaybe the brand equity wasn't
as much in the name Max as therewas in the name HBO.
I remember when I was younger,hbo had this really awesome
opener.
If you had back in the days ofwhen you just had cable there's
(01:25):
no such thing as internetstreaming you would know that
you're watching an HBO moviebecause of the way that it would
open up.
It would go around the O and itwould look like it's a you know
, I don't know spiral thing, butanyways, that was called the
early days of After Effects, anengine that was used to edit and
provide special effects for,like, for example, the movie
Deadpool, and so it was sort ofon the forefront of that and
(01:49):
that opener.
Ever since then you knew thename HBO and it sort of seared
it into your memory, becauseevery time you watched a movie
from the studios that had that,that's what you saw on their
channel.
So fast forward, several yearslater and here we are and
they're doing HBO Max, thestreaming service for HBO,
(02:09):
though I don't think it was thefirst one or first attempt, but
definitely was the biggest onethey went at a go at.
So HBO, everyone knew Home BoxOffice, by the way, is what that
stands for, and you know it'slike, you know, having a theater
in your house.
I remember everybody got the 5.1, I think is what they call it
(02:30):
surround sound, and that'sbasically where you have a
receiver, two speakers on eachside, a center one and two, you
know, on each side of yourviewership behind you, so you
can have surround sound.
Now we just have that out ofnormal speakers.
I mean, technology has just foraudio.
Audio has extremely, um, youknow, accelerated, but anyhow,
hbo itself goes to HBO max andthen everybody's like we, and
(02:54):
you know it's sort of it's great.
And then they renamed to max andthen they stopped calling
themselves HBO and you know thereasonings for that.
I'm like I said, this is justmy opinion, but I just think
that the brand equity is notwell.
It just wasn't there with Maxor it doesn't resonate with
people, so they went back tothat.
(03:17):
And for those of you that don'tknow, this is Warner Brothers.
I mean, it's technically nowit's Warner Brothers Discovery,
so they are the ones thatinitiated the renaming back.
So it's sort of this part oftheir HBO brand's reputation
trying to create premium content.
(03:37):
And I think that the switch upsthat are happening with some
brands out there and returningto what is familiar is strategic
due to the fact that it kind ofbrings it back to.
I recognize that, I trust thatand that's where we're getting
to.
We're coming into an age wherebranded content is unique,
content that you know comes fromthat specific place business,
(04:03):
brand, person and isn't somereplication of that that is
cheaper.
It's not the mainstays brandthat you go find in Walmart,
it's actually XYZ name brand,right, and I'll be honest, I'm
one of these people that if Ihave an off brand of cereal or
(04:27):
Coke or whatever, I can't do it,it's hard for me to like no, I
need the name brand.
It tastes better and all that.
So I think a lot of people knowthat, even if that may be
psychological or real or not Idon't know, I'm not a
psychologist but when it comesto branding, a lot of it deals
with how much do I trust thisbrand.
That just incentivizes to buyagain and to keep buying and to
(04:52):
stay loyal to that brand.
It makes marketing easier whenthat's the case, because you
don't have to convince peoplewhy they should buy it.
You just sort of have to nowremind them about it and you
have to continuously show thatyou are that trusted brand that
you could always rely upon.
(05:15):
It's something that is, I think,going to come up more and more
just because of how things arechanging.
Just pulled it up here on myscreen now HBO Go.
That's what it was.
It was that that was thepredecessor.
Okay, so, yeah, so anyways.
Hbo was bought out by Discovery, so was Warner Brothers, and
now we're back to HBO Max People.
(05:39):
Just again.
It's very simple.
If you Google it, people justassociate the HBO brand with
quality content and you know, Iremember some of the movies that
would come out on HBO.
Now, through the years thebrand has gone through a lot of
evolutions.
Yes, you know, warner BrothersDiscovery is obviously trying to
(06:01):
tap into that so that it canwin the streaming wars, even
though I think a lot of that isprobably past.
I think Netflix has already woncome out on top, it's just one
of those things.
But this rebrand just didn'tcome out of left field.
I mean it was on stage.
I mean, during Warner BrothersDiscovery's upfront presentation
(06:21):
to its advertisers, the chiefexecutive officer, casey Boyd,
announced that the company'sstreaming platform Max would
revert back to its previous name, hbo Max.
So Warner Brothers Discoveryexecutives emphasized that it
was a move to emphasize itsstrongest offerings, which is a
very clever way of saying likeour content's better than your
content Nanner, nanner offerings, which is a very clever way of
(06:42):
saying like our content's betterthan your content, nanner
nanner.
So what do we expect now thatit's been renamed Like?
What does that mean?
Like the content's now going tobe premium and better?
I don't think we'll know rightnow.
I don't think we can know.
I mean it's if you're an HBOMax fan, good for you.
If not, okay.
Well, you know that's cool too,but that is one example of
(07:05):
going back because the equitywas there and that is why they
wanted to return to that.
So I just thought that wasinteresting after we just talked
about Starry and what justhappened there.
It's not sexy, but, you know,not as much as Starry was pun
intended, but that's pretty muchit.
So rebranding is going to happenbecause you got an outdated
(07:26):
identity.
What is your identity?
Well, it's anything visualabout your brand.
That includes digitalproperties and online presence
as well.
Shift and target audience isgoing to happen in your
evolution.
Your business strategy willrequire a rebrand.
This is not marketing.
By the way, I had somebodyyesterday ask me about marketing
and branding and hearing thetwo.
It's not a this or that, it's aboth hand.
It's just sometimes one comesbefore the other and there's a
(07:48):
reason for that and that dependson the strategy Standing out.
If you're struggling to standout, a rebrand can help.
You have internal confusion orconsistency issues, you have a
negative perception and you needa lot of crisis management.
Maybe you just need to do arebrand and a rename in order to
distance yourself from thatlike sorry, so you have outgrown
(08:11):
your name or identity.
You know that's something thatcan happen.
A lot of people don't reallyunderstand like that's possible
to outgrow something and youhave to become something new.
Well, what is that?
So I would embrace minimalismin whatever you do.
We'll ask our creative directorwhen he joins the show again
later this month.
(08:32):
But embracing minimalism, it'sjust simple design, trends,
forms.
It's very clean lines, a verylimited color palette.
Those seem to be very popular.
I would point to the RTD drinkmark, the rated drink market.
You know you look at Celsius.
You look at, like a lot ofthese others, that it's a really
(08:56):
good case study in where theystarted out with a very, very
busy can design and they've over, they, iterated over time and
that iteration actually showedthat it increased sales when
they finally simplified things,because when you put that drink
next to others on a shelf, youyou want to stand out visually,
but they also want to stand outmessage wise too.
So go look up Celsius.
(09:17):
It's a great case study on howcreative can influence revenue,
and so if you don't have the topof the line creative, then you
know.
Also, I would also hint that yougo and look at the movie
industry right now.
There was a great.
Well, it wasn't a great trailer, but it's a trailer that shows
(09:39):
that when you compare it to the1980 movie of Predator and you
look at the new Predator moviecoming out, the CGI effects are
bad, so bad, and it doesn'tinstill audience confidence to
go to the theater and watch thisthing.
The CGI, I know.
Maybe they released the trailerearly, I don't know, but it
(10:00):
just looks really, really awful.
So, anyhow, focus onauthenticity, prioritize
reliability and emotion, and usebold and condensed fonts, in
moderation though, and you know,those are things that will, I
(10:27):
think, include, that will helpyou raise your, your brand, not
just awareness, but its equity,which again goes back to the HBO
Max thing, where HBO has allthe brand equity and Max was
still struggling with that,because everybody knows Disney+
and everybody knows.
If I was to say Hulu, if I wasto say you know, whatever, you
would recognize it, but Macs,you know.
So leverage creative.
(10:47):
And then you know there's tonsof places for you to go out and
look at these examples and howthey could actually be of use
and help.
So I am going to go back a bitand describe what is branding
and this is just me, but you canGoogle these things.
(11:08):
But if you're unsure about themeaning of branding.
It can be vague, because it'snot necessarily something.
That is a clear answer, in myopinion, because it depends on
what exactly are you working on.
Because it depends on whatexactly are you working on.
I've used the example a lotwhere people want to have their
(11:29):
brand be memorable and it's likeokay, let's go back where Apple
wasn't the first name youthought of and the first name
you thought of was Steve Jobs.
Everybody knew Steve Jobs.
Everybody knew Steve Jobs, theCEO of Apple.
His name sort of came out firstbefore Apple.
Does anybody know who Tim Cookis?
That's not a bad thing if youdon't, and I'm sure he's fine
(11:50):
with it.
I guarantee it.
But he's the CEO of Apple nowand has been since Steve passed
away.
So, but you know Apple, but doyou remember Macintosh?
They were called that.
People would say Macintosh,apple Macintosh, they had a
different name.
Way would say Macintosh, apple,macintosh, they had a different
name way back.
Things just evolve, is all I'msaying.
So you want to have a brand thatcan evolve, but broadly,
(12:15):
anything can be offered to amarket to satisfy a want or a
need, or physical goods,services, experiences, events,
person places, properties.
No, I'm not saying nouns,organizations, information,
ideas like that.
That's pretty much a broaddefinition.
When you put visual items outlike a logo, or you put out a
website or you put out an ad,those are expressions of your
(12:41):
brand that you're trying tocommunicate into those markets,
of what that is and the value ofit.
But let's say, let's look at avery plain and I have a pun
intended here water, freelyavailable resource, essentially
for every human being to liveand survive, right, I think.
What is it?
48 hours and you can't reallygo without water or something
like that.
But it became a product the daythat we decided to commercialize
(13:05):
it.
We started putting mineral, wesay mineral water, we put it in
plastic bottles and we put alabel on it and we started
saying like this is mineralwater and it's from here, and
then this one's from here, andthen all of a sudden, water
became commoditized and it's abrand.
You know, nestle's over here,and then you got these other
high-end ones over here and thenyou got sparkling water.
(13:25):
It's just one of these thingswhere they took something simple
like that and created a brandout of nothing.
It's amazing.
A brand is a name, it's a term,it's design.
It's a symbol, it's any featurethat identifies that good or
(13:47):
service that's distinct fromother sellers.
That's a definition from theAmerican Marketing Association.
Shine a light on as how you cantake something and create
brands and now there's likeseveral different, you know,
bottled water companies and theyall have their own distinct
(14:08):
logos.
They have their own distinctmessages and how the water is
and what it comes from At theend of the day.
Um, I would be very interestedto see if anybody's going to get
a bunch of these and put themtogether and then do some
testing and see if it's actually, if there's any differentiator
as far as ingredients betweeneach of the brands that are out
there that exist.
I think that would beinteresting.
If you know of an example likethat, please submit it to us and
(14:30):
let us know.
But in the meantime, I hopethis episode was interesting to
you and useful.
It's kind of a blast ofdifferent information at once.
It's been a crazy week and so Ihope this.
You know not sound like an AIrobot, but I hope this podcast
finds you well and you'll tunein next week for another episode
(14:50):
of the NerdBrand podcast.
And remember, keep yourNerdBrand strong.
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I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
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