Have you seen the branding periodic table?

So….I get an e-mail from Tanya, an intern at the Kolbrener agency in Pittsburgh.  She loves my blog and wanted to share something her employers created – the branding periodic table.

Note:  It’s cool, I am not knocking that at all.  Very inventive and visually appealing.  See….

Picture_13

      

But here’s my observation.  Tanya likes many marketing blogs.  (An update — I had a conversation with Brandon Fritz of Kolbrener and he assured me Tanya only e-mailed a handful of bloggers she really does like. She likes me!  She really likes me!) And like Pavlov’s dog — we all jumped up when she rang the bell. And then we each told ten friends, who told ten friends…

Have we contributed to the pollution of sameness in the blogosphere?  Do we as blog authors have a responsibility to try to differentiate our copy if we’re going to jump on someone’s bandwagon and all write about the same thing?  (Which some did)

Or is it a "no harm, no foul" deal.  Who cares if a bunch of blogs all point at the same thing in relatively the same way? 

What do you think?

Here are some of this week’s links to the interactive table:

Peep the Technique
Doug Karr
Orbit Now
Ryan Moede
Techy News Blog
Passionate Manager
Clever Think
Bloggermacha
Debbie Millman
The Branding Blog
Uwe’s blog
James & Joe
BrandUnited
Brand Autopsy

11 comments on “Have you seen the branding periodic table?

  1. Drew … how often does a story get picked up in traditional media and spread across dailies around globe? Often. I see no difference between offline and online media here. There are over 100 million blogs out there and 14 blogs have given Kolbrener’s branding dealio some digital ink. In the big picture, that’s small … but cool.

    Gotta give Kolbrener credit for making something so cool that bloggers wanna blog about it.

    How about all the digital ink THE AGE OF CONVERSATION received? I fault no blogger for posting about it. (And LOTS of bloggers did post something about the book.) Instead, I give all the people associated with the book credit for publishing something people wanna talk about it. So … kudos to you Drew.

  2. John,

    I happen to agree with you. There have been many YouTube videos or other interesting tidbits that bloggers have grabbed onto. Remember the flurry of posts about JetBlue?

    I thought this was a good example to use….to raise the issue and talk about it some.

    I think, actually, it is an unfair criticism for the very reasons you mention. No one grouses when 75 newspapers pick up the same AP story.

    Thanks for adding to the conversation!

    Drew

  3. Douglas Karr says:

    It really is a great question, Drew. As I peruse my feeds, alerts, and emails daily, I grow very weary of the same story over and over and over and over. Especially when the iPhone came out… oy!

    That was why I change my strategy quite a while ago with the “Daily Links” post. It allows someone to scan over some of the articles I liked rather than reading an entire post about it. There are 8 links with 8 snippets in the post you are referring to – one of them is back to you :).

    I wish more people used this method!

  4. Chris Wilson says:

    Scott Monty from Crayon posted recently asking what’s better, quality or quanity. (http://www.scottmonty.com)

    I’d have to say with the large number of blogs that I read (a lot of them marketing and design), it is frustrating when I see regurgitated content. In fact I feel like I’m wasting my time.

    In general, I think it would be better to see less posts with more original content.

  5. patmcgraw says:

    I agree with Chris…I have about 40 feeds coming into my Netvibes page for Marketing alone…and it’s annoying as hell to see 20 of the blogs reporting the same thing. Thank god for the headline view and summary pop-up when I roll my mouse over it…

  6. Doug,

    I suppose we have to credit some of this to “we’re still inventing it.” I have no issue with people add more to the story, if you will.

    But to just do a pick up is more questionable. Thanks for the spotlight, by the way.

    Drew

  7. Chris,

    I think part of the problem is that each blog author has to do a very good job of defining who their audience is. (I did that a while back in a post.)

    But in some cases, we are just talking to each other. Therefore, it’s probably not necessary to be the 8th blogger to say the same thing. But, if your blog is geared to an audience different from the “insiders” then the question is a different one.

    I wrestle with this a lot. Many of my readers are carry overs from our electronic newsletter and don’t read too many other blogs. They subscribe via e-mail. So…in some cases, if I don’t tell them, will they know?

    BTW — Scott is one of the best out there. You’re smart to read him!

    Drew

  8. Pat,

    Agreed — the preview window is a beautiful thing!

    Drew

  9. Chris Wilson says:

    Yes, definitely need to know your audience. It may not be a repeat for some.

  10. bg says:

    And on the flip side though, the technique of having 50,000 blogs picking up one article helped Seth, Rubel and Jaffe become as huge as they are.

  11. BG,

    No argument there. Every blogger likes to have their posts linked to and talked about. Seth has created a model where that’s how people have to comment on his stuff.

    I have no issue with that at all. What I wonder about is — rather than just point to it, shouldn’t we add or comment on it?

    Let’s not just repeat the same conversation. Let’s enhance it. That’s my point.

    Drew

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