LIVE ONLINE COURSE
with Global Marketing Lead
Spotify
1 NOV 2022 - 13 DEC 2022
Duration:
6 weeks
TUESDAYS & THURSDAYS
12 PM EST / 5 PM UK
Are brands born fully formed? Or are they methodically created and refined?
Gerry Randolph helps growth companies answer that question every day with cohesive, values-driven brand strategies. Now, he's sharing his playbook with you.
Craft your own distinct brand strategy from scratch and apply the principles at work behind brands like Spotify, ASOS, and Oakley in this live branding boot camp.
Do you see yourself below?
Then this course is for you.
-
ENTREPRENEURS
Learn how to brand your product so it reaches the right audience and sells well. Start building your brand book and explore paths for campaign development.
-
ESTABLISHED BUSINESS OWNERS
Refine your brand strategy over a course-long project. You'll learn how to communicate across functions and accurately track brand performance as you grow.
-
CONTENT CREATORS
Find your differentiator. Learn how to create the perception you want with intentional messaging, visuals, and campaigns.
-
ASPIRING BRAND MANAGERS
Get hands-on training in techniques used by the world's most relevant brands. You'll build hard skills to define, plan, and measure impactful brand campaigns.
BRAND INCUBATOR
Put best practices into action as you workshop your own brand identity and campaign. You'll see how branding concepts work in the real world through examples, case studies, and a course-long project that brings it all home to your corporate or personal brand.
LIVE LEARNING
Instead of pre-recorded videos, you'll engage with Spotify's Global Marketing Lead in live lessons and workshops. Chat with Gerry and your peers in office hours, and get direct input from an industry leader on all your assignments.
Distill your brand personality. Create a brand book and messaging guidelines to define the brand approach that will advance your business goals.
Bring clarity to your communication strategy. Gerry will teach you how to design, plan, and execute strategy across multiple touchpoints and stages.
Identify the roadblocks and plan for success. You'll learn how high-performance and turnaround companies use branding as a differentiator to drive business results.
Randolph LinkedIn Profile
- Brings music lovers from 170+ countries a consistent brand experience as Spotify's Global Marketing Lead
- Has over a decade of experience leading the branding and marketing teams behind global brands and high-performance startups
- Overhauled ASOSā brand experience for the US, revamping the company's editorial, CRM, marketing, partnerships, social, and influencer strategy
- Built and executed robust user acquisition campaigns for the #1 fantasy sports website Yahoo! Fantasy Sports
- Avid world traveler, logging trips to 55 countries and counting
COURSE INTRODUCTION
"Brand" is one of the most thrown-around words in business. This class lays out what a "brand" and "branding" really is, considering both mainstream and emerging brands as case studies to flesh out the concept of brand.
- What defines a brand?
- The story of branding
- Types of brands: Corporate, personal, product, and service
- How does a strong brand help your business win?
- Case studies: Coke, Nike, Glossier, and Oatly
Assignment #01 Choose a brand or company that you will focus on throughout the course. (It can be your own brand or any established company). How would you describe this brand? Write a short description of how you understand the brand, using the concepts covered in class.
In this class, you will learn how to build a brandās identity from the ground up. Gerry will walk through the ingredients that go into a brand and how to bring business and creative considerations together to form one identity.
- Mission and vision
- Brand architecture and portfolio
- Core identity vs. extended identity
- Housing USP and products under one brand identity
- How you see your brand and how your audience sees you
- What to pay attention to in your competition
Assignment #02: Describe the essence of your chosen companyās brand. What is the brandās essence, core identity and extended identity?
Many business roles will be speaking for your brand via content, advertising, and customer touchpoints. Gerry will show you how to ensure your audience has a consistent experience of the brand by correctly presenting a unified brand vision within your company.
- Getting your audience right
- Positioning, cultural references, and brand personification
- How to make a mood board
- Making your brand human
- Tone of voice and messaging guidelines
- Translating brand personality for different touchpoints
Assignment #03: Define your chosen brandās target audience (limit to one profile), positioning statement, and tone of voice.
Today's class is devoted to that all-important calling card of every successful brand: the logo. You will dissect the logos of 5 well-known brands and workshop how to shape brand perception using color, font, and naming.
- 5 basic types of logos: Wordmark, lettermark, brandmark, combination, and emblem
- How to choose font, colors, and name
- Case study: Uber's brand book
Assignment #04: Build your brandās moodboard for an upcoming photoshoot. Find at least 3 key images to serve as inspiration for the shoot. What is the shoot for? Why did you choose these 3 key images for your brand and for this shoot?
Every brand faces challenges as it grows. In this class, you will look at several real-world brands to learn about the potential roadblocks that can stunt a brandās growth (and how to avoid them).
- Positioning
- Competition
- Location and targeting
- Timing
- Brand investment
Assignment #05: Identify 2-3 barriers that may impede your brandās success. Explain why these barriers may come up for your brand and how you will prepare to overcome them.
Building trust with your customer is crucial for the longevity of your brand. Today, you will explore how brands can build trust with their customers across three key moments: pre-purchase, purchase, and post-purchase.
- The importance of a good first impression
- 3 cornerstones of pre-purchase brand engagement
- Purchase and competition
- Post-purchase engagement and customer care
Assignment #06: Think about the 3 moments of engagement (pre-purchase, purchase and post-purchase) with your brandās customer. How will your brand engage your consumer in each of these moments? What is going to be crucial for you to build trust?
There are 3 main communicating channels brands use to reach their intended audiences. Gerry will walk you through the opportunities of each of these and how to incorporate them into your brand strategy.
- Digital advertising: native, programmatic, editorial
- Traditional media: TV, out-of-home, in-store purchase
- Social media: organic, paid, influencer marketing
Assignment #07: Think about your brandās communications plan and, specifically, itās social media channels. What social media channels would you leverage and why? Next, identify 2-3 influencers that you would contact to work for your brand.
This class digs into the differences between brand marketing and performance marketing. You will look at how your brand's objectives, strategies, and tactics can change depending on the channels.
- Brand marketing
- Performance marketing
- Messaging and visual guidelines in brand vs. performance
- Choosing the right channels
- Aligning objectives, strategies, and actions
- Adapting storytelling across channels
- Getting the most out of the Halo effect
Assignment #08: In thinking about your marketing budget, what percentage of your marketing budget would go to brand marketing and what percentage would go to performance marketing? Explain your reasoning?
In this class, you'll get up close and personal with the business metrics used to measure brand success. You'll learn how marketing campaigns are evaluated, how to set your brand objectives and KPIs, and why these will differ across channels.
- Setting KPIs at the start of campaigns
- Awareness, consideration, and engagement
- How do these differ from channel metrics?
- What do campaign results look like?
- Case study: ASOS brand dashboard
Assignment #09: In thinking about your brand, what would you do to raise awareness, drive consideration, and increase engagement? Give a specific tactic for each of the three objectives.
This class takes you into a real Spotify campaign to understand the roles and responsibilities of the marketing team when launching a message or product.
- Workshop: Spotify Duo Valentineās Day campaign
- What goes in your campaign brief?
- Roles and responsibilities: Product, creative, PR, media, and social
Assignment #10: Pick one of our common objectives (awareness, consideration, engagement), and write a brief to the rest of your marketing team.
Branding and marketing is a constantly evolving game. After a wrap-up of what you've learned so far, Gerry will point to some of the latest trends that are affecting brands and marketers.
- 3 trends that are here to stay
- Wrap-up: Putting everything together
Assignment #11: Drawing on the assignments you've done throughout the course, build a brand presentation you might present to a client or decision-maker in your company. Be sure to include both the creative and business aspects of your brand and to prepare a self-introduction, based on your personal brand.
In this class, you will look at how you can use the principles learned in this course to build your own personal brand as you move out and up in your career.
- What it takes to be a marketing all-star
- Tips on building your resume
- How to prepare for a marketing interview
- How to stand out in your new company, team, and role when you land your first marketing job
- Get out, be famous
What our students say
"Gerry is very thorough and gives a lot of context and examples when explaining concepts. He dedicates time for q&a after each lesson, which has been very helpful."
"Gerry is a great teacher, not just for clearly explaining the knowledge. and he can answer everyone's questions very well. I am so glad to be in this course."
"Overall i'm impressed with the level of detail and explanation around particular topics and subjects. There's a real depth to each module which for learning allows the information to stay in your brain."
"Fantastic case studies throughout each class. They are great way to explain tricky concepts and as I'm quite a visual learner, this has been particularly helpful for me."
"The best thing is that the subject we talk about with Gerry is enriched with real examples. It makes it easier to understand."
"It is very interesting to listen to the lecturer. Interesting information and presentation."
"The info is really well structured, very concise and directs me towards even more and in depth studies. I thought that I was familiar with the notions, that I did not make confusions but I realized that I needed this clarity to better understand my brand and how to work with it."
"Gerry is super knowledgeable, yet very down-to-earth and approachable. The assignments are challenging (which is good) yet bite size which doesn't impact my other work commitments too much, and allows me to focus fully on them. The frequency and length of each lesson is perfect!"
"The depth of knowledge from Gerry during Q&A's and the ad-libbing of added value during the presentation. It gives lots of extra confidence as a student of the course, that its good value for money and is adding genuine development which would be hard to find elsewhere."
"I like the way Gerry presents the materials and the tips he shares with us during the class. I've gained a lot of practical knowledge. Also, I feel that the structure is very logical and each task is really well-organized."