Part Wizard, Part Nerd, and one Heck of a Great Brand
Part Wizard, Part Nerd, and one Heck of a Great Brand
To date, over 250 million copies of the Harry Potter novels have been sold worldwide. This places the Harry Potter story third on the all-time best-sellers list, right behind The Bible (2.5 billion copies sold) and The Thoughts of Chairman Mao (800 million sold). The Potter books are available in more than 60 different languages. With the live-action movies, DVDs, and merchandising added in, the Potter brand is worth an estimated $4 billion in total. Not too bad for author J.K. Rowlings, who prior to the success of Potter, was a single parent living on state benefits in an unheated Edinburgh apartment.
In a recent article titled, “Harry Potter – Brand Wizard,” Stephen Brown, marketing professor of the University of Ulster, writes that the “Potter effect" goes far beyond the numbers. The entire children’s book sector has been invigorated, applications to boarding schools are way up, owls are becoming popular household pets, and locations used in the films are drawing record numbers of tourists from every generation.
So how did Harry Potter successfully transcend the boundaries of both culture and age?
What lessons can we learn from the world-famous “wiz-nerd”?
1) Story-telling is a powerful way to deliver a message.
In all cultures and for all ages, story-telling has been, and always will be, a powerful means of conveying a message. Even a marketing message. And the greater our attention to detail, the more likely we are to make a memorable impression. So don’t just tell prospects what you’re capable of. Give them a true to life account of what you’ve done for someone just like them. And make it rich with market-relevant details. They’ll not only stick around to hear the end of the story. They’ll actually remember it.
2) Mystery draws us in even further.
Harry Potter’s got the “secret sauce,” the “Intel inside.” He’s got that unexplainable point of difference we all crave - just because we don’t have it. That’s the magic of Harry Potter and that’s exactly how we should manage our brands: giving our audience just enough to want more.
3) Fun is a most welcome diversion.
Since the first Harry Potter book was published in 1998, our society has faced its share of adversity: from the horrors of war to the extremes of weather. Which is all the more reason to find a way to “say it with a smile,” to give our customers a reason to laugh as well as to buy. And as marketers, we’ll all have a little bit more fun in the process. After all, even Harry doesn’t take himself all that seriously.
Part Wizard Part Nerd and one Heck of a Great Brand - To learn more about this author, visit Ed Delia's Website.
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Let’s take a close look at Harry Potter. If you’ve never heard of Harry Potter, then you should crawl back into that cave you’ve been residing in for the last ten years.
To date, over 250 million copies of the Harry Potter novels have been sold worldwide. This places the Harry Potter story third on the all-time best-sellers list, right behind The Bible (2.5 billion copies sold) and The Thoughts of Chairman Mao (800 million sold). The Potter books are available in more than 60 different languages. With the live-action movies, DVDs, and merchandising added in, the Potter brand is worth an estimated $4 billion in total. Not too bad for author J.K. Rowlings, who prior to the success of Potter, was a single parent living on state benefits in an unheated Edinburgh apartment.
In a recent article titled, “Harry Potter – Brand Wizard,” Stephen Brown, marketing professor of the University of Ulster, writes that the “Potter effect" goes far beyond the numbers. The entire children’s book sector has been invigorated, applications to boarding schools are way up, owls are becoming popular household pets, and locations used in the films are drawing record numbers of tourists from every generation.
So how did Harry Potter successfully transcend the boundaries of both culture and age?
What lessons can we learn from the world-famous “wiz-nerd”?
1) Story-telling is a powerful way to deliver a message.
In all cultures and for all ages, story-telling has been, and always will be, a powerful means of conveying a message. Even a marketing message. And the greater our attention to detail, the more likely we are to make a memorable impression. So don’t just tell prospects what you’re capable of. Give them a true to life account of what you’ve done for someone just like them. And make it rich with market-relevant details. They’ll not only stick around to hear the end of the story. They’ll actually remember it.
2) Mystery draws us in even further.
Harry Potter’s got the “secret sauce,” the “Intel inside.” He’s got that unexplainable point of difference we all crave - just because we don’t have it. That’s the magic of Harry Potter and that’s exactly how we should manage our brands: giving our audience just enough to want more.
3) Fun is a most welcome diversion.
Since the first Harry Potter book was published in 1998, our society has faced its share of adversity: from the horrors of war to the extremes of weather. Which is all the more reason to find a way to “say it with a smile,” to give our customers a reason to laugh as well as to buy. And as marketers, we’ll all have a little bit more fun in the process. After all, even Harry doesn’t take himself all that seriously.
Part Wizard Part Nerd and one Heck of a Great Brand - To learn more about this author, visit Ed Delia's Website.
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Dave KurlanDave Kurlan is the founder and CEO of Objective Management Group, Inc., the industry leader in sales assessments and sales force evaluations, and the CEO of David Kurlan & Associates, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in sales force development. Dave has been a top rated speaker at Inc. Magazine's Conference on Growing the Company, the Sales & Marketing Management Conference and the Gazelles Sales & Marketing Summit. He has been featured on radio and TV, including World Business Review with General Norman Schwarzkopf, in Inc. Magazine, Selling Power Magazine, Sales & Marketing Management Magazine and Incentive Magazine. He is the author of Mindless Selling and Baseline Selling – How to Become a Sales Superstar by Using What You Already Know about the Game of Baseball. He created and wrote STAR, a proprietary recruiting process for hiring great salespeople, and he writes Understanding the Sales Force, a popular business Blog and is a contributing author to The Death of 20th Century Selling and 101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life, Volume 2. - Visit Dave Kurlan's Website |
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Kim CastleWith nearly two decades in the advertising and design business, with clients like Domino's Pizza, General Motors, Direct TV, Pedigree, Wolfgang Puck, Higher Octave Music, Hollywood Celebrity Products, Disney, and Paramount, as well as thousands of entrepreneurs around the world define, structure, communicate, and position their business for greater profits, BrandU(R) co-creators Kim Castle and W. Vito Montone discovered that entrepreneurs could experience the same power that big brands command for a fraction of the cost with the world's only process-based results-drive Integral approach to business creation. BrandU(R) is helping entrepreneurs grow with the power of extreme clarity from idea...to brand...to market(TM) and helping one million entrepreneurs become successful and whole so that they can make a difference in the world. Are you one of them? If you want to experience clarity all the way to the bank(TM), get started now at http://www.brandu.com. - Visit Kim Castle's Website |
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David AchesonDavid Acheson is the founder of DCJA Consultancy. DCJA Consultancy is a management consultancy business specialising in B2B sales consultancy. They offer bespoke and packaged sales consultancy including Sales Optimisation Review, Interim Sales Management, Sales & Marketing Review, 1:1 Sales & Management Staff Analysis, Management Training, Solution Sales Training, Creation of New Pay Plan, KPI's, run Customer Feedback Campaigns, assist with Recruitment, Coaching, Appraisals and set up Strategic Marketing Campaigns. David spent his early career in accountancy and then moved into sales in 1982, working in Office Equipment, IT, Advertising, Training, Outsourcing and Consultancy. He has held many Senior Positions in SMBs and Global Organisations including Head of Sales Operations & Head of Business Development. His knowledge, skills and great experience of the Sales Industry has led to David making keynote speeches and running educational sessions to key businesses through organisations including The Chamber of Commerce and Business Link. - Visit David Acheson's Website |
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Linda RichardsonLinda Richardson is the Founder and Executive Chairwoman of Richardson, a global sales training and performance improvement company. As a recognized leader in the industry, she has won the coveted Stevie Award for Lifetime Achievement in Sales Excellence and she was identified by Training Industry, Inc. as one of the “Top 20 Most Influential Training Professionals.” Ms. Richardson is credited with the movement to Consultative Selling and is the author of ten books on selling and sales management, including Sales Coaching — Making the Great Leap from Sales Manager to Sales Coach, and Stop Telling, Start Selling. She teaches sales and management at the Wharton Graduate School of the University of Pennsylvania and the Wharton Executive Development Center. Linda is a frequent speaker at industry and client conferences, has been published extensively in industry and training journals, and has been featured in numerous publications, including The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Nation’s Business, Selling Power, Success, and The Conference Board Magazine. Learn more about Richardson's sales training and performance improvement solutions at http://www.richardson.com web - Visit Linda Richardson's Website |
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