Ideals Outlive Strategies

"If you want a long-lived brand, avoid strategy altogether — instead have an Ideal (like Nike, Apple) or an executional device (Andrex, The Economist). Anything with a strategy is doomed never to outlive your client. Discuss."

"When even magnificent strategies manifested in such lines as “The Fourth Emergency Service”, “You’re amazing, we want you to stay that way”, “Have a break, have a KitKat”, “Membership has its privileges”, seem to be killed off with barely a thought, what hope is there for yours?"

"In other words, is strategy now so hopelessly mutable that hanging your brand on a strategy is like tying your dog to a parked car (something that works for as long as the car remains stationary, but with terrible consequences once it moves off)? Even in an organisation with an unwavering business purpose, an advertising strategy will rarely stay constant: after all, in marketing, the definition of “strategy” is “that thing which an incoming marketing director seeks to change or reinvent — usually biannually.”"