Copying - Giving Brand to the Consumer

I remember the first time one of my great marketing ideas was 'stolen' and reproduced to another's credit.  Anger and frustration poured out of my very soul.  I had never imagined this could be the case among honorable men.  How naive I was.


I also remember the instruction of my then mentor, David S. Simmonds.  It didn't make me feel any better at the time to understand that 'Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery'.  However, one thing David gave me that day has been taped into the front of my diary ever since.  It's part of a poem by Rudyard Kipling:

They copied all they could follow, 

but they couldn't copy my mind, 

so I left them sweating and stealing

a year and a half behind. 

I was thinking of these four lines earlier this year as I puzzled over how things have changed in my lifetime.  Whereas in the past we invested much resources protecting our brand innovations and brand ideas with copyrights and patents, we now live in a time when the 'Creative Commons' demands a new openness, transparency and widespread global sharing of brand ideas.

We can now see the day when the strongest brands will be developed by giving them over to the creative imagination of proactive consumers, mavens who add value to the brand that brand owners can't.  

On 17 April, in Toronto we will brief the industry on the new brand affiliation programs we are developing for PetLynx Corporation, will allow breeders to add the pharmaceutical, nutrition and financial services brands directly to the progeny they will market in Canadian Communities.  In addition to the differentiation they will realize as breeders from authorized use of the brand symbols, I expect they will increasingly contribute value to these brands.  Imagine Bayer or Iams or Petsecure or the OSPCA being able to show in real time the puppies or kittens that are produced in compliance with their branded program goals.  Imagine the difference this could make for an online marketplace like Kijiji, when these quality marks allow prospective pet families to adopt a new pet online without fear that they are supporting irresponsible breeders and kitten or puppy mills.

It follows that the strength of a brand will be determined by the irrefutable proof of brand use by the consumers who purchase branded 'products' not by the level of visual impressions, 'likes' or ad space a brand holder can acquire.  This is indeed a new day!