The Jenga of Coolness
Keeping Your Brand’s Coolness Factor Stable is Critical to its Success.
You know the game.
Jenga is a game of skill by Parker Brothers in which players build a tower using 54 wooden blocks, then take turns carefully removing blocks one at a time. Each block removed is then placed on top of the tower, progressively making it taller yet less stable as it grows until —CRASH! — it all comes tumbling down…
Every Jenga tower has a lifespan, it could last 20 or more turns or merely two or three. The game could last for an hour or just 30 seconds. Every game is different, just as every brand is different. Every brand has a life span, too. Some brands, like GE or Ford last for generations, others burn out in months.
Coolness plays a huge factor in every brand’s lifespan, or success. Face it, if your brand’s not cool, it’s not making any money and it’s not going to survive very long.
“Cool” can be defined in many ways. In this case, think of “cool” as “that thing” that makes people buy your brand over the other one; or simply, the X-Factor.
Building a brand is much like build a Jenga tower. One “block” at a time, you build your brand’s tower, and then one day, hopefully, you have a nice, solid structure — like Apple or Coca-Cola or GE or Facebook or Microsoft or Twitter or McDonald’s or Subway. Those brands are all cool in their own ways.
That “solid” structure is the goal of every brand.
Thus, Cool=Solid.
Thus, that solid structure is your brand’s Jenga of Coolness.
(Jenga of Coolness sounds much cooler than Jenga of X-Factor.)
Every brand has its own Jenga of Coolness.
The more loyal followers your brand has, the cooler it is, and the stronger (more solid) your Jenga of Coolness.
Your followers are your blocks.
Once you have built your Jenga of Coolness with a solid foundation of followers (your loyal customer base), maintaining it is another challenge. Keeping your brand cool — i.e., relevant or in-demand — means staying in-tune with the needs and wants of your brand’s followers. You need to know what’s hot and what’s not. You need to be able to step back and see your tower in the skyline…
You need to remember that with one wrong move your Jenga of Coolness could come crashing down at any time.
For some brands it’s a matter of having to constantly evolve. For others, it’s a matter of staying the same. No matter what your brand, you’re going to have followers on both sides — half will want you to evolve, the other half may want you to stay the same. It’s up to you to keep a balance between the two; to keep that tower standing, to keep your brand cool.
Drastic changes, like changing your design or changing your formula — that is, changes that may upset a significant portion of your followers — are the equivalent of removing a block and placing it on top.
You always lose some followers at the bottom to gain more at the top.
Each change builds your tower higher, but takes away from its foundation. The load of each block added to the top then is increasingly heavier in proportion to the shrinking foundation. This is good, in theory, as it means, proportionately, that many more followers are added to the top with each change.
If you’re careful enough, you can remove blocks from the bottom and add them to the top (make changes) without significantly altering the stability of the tower. Yes, the foundation shrinks by one block, but enough stability remains to keep the tower growing.
Growth is a must.
Unlike the game Jenga, however, you don’t just have 54 blocks to play with. You have all the blocks you need — -to infinity and beyond — if you play your cards, er, blocks, right.
See, unlike Jenga, your brand’s foundation ultimately repairs itself with time, as new followers arrive and as loyal followers become acclimated to, or begin to accept, the changes you made. The time varies, but so long as you continue to be cool, your foundation becomes solid again.
You’ve no doubt seen brands come and go for good, never to be seen or heard from again, and you’ve seen them come and go, and then come back again. The difference is in how well they built and maintained their Jenga of Coolness; they may have lost significant foundation at some point, but as they continued to grow their tower (persisted), it rejuvenated over time.
Too many changes too fast, or even worse, if you’re removing blocks faster than you can replace them at the top, and you cut yourself too thin; your tower gets shaky and falls. Epic fail. When that happens, you have to start again from whatever bit of foundation is left, or from scratch.
Not enough changes, or none at all, and your tower simply stays the same. No blocks are lost at the bottom — you don’t lose any followers — and none are added to the top — you don’t gain any, either. When that happens, well, nothing happens. It doesn’t go anywhere. You don’t go anywhere.
So, you have to find the balance between the two: that is, growing your tower and keeping it as stable as possible, at the same time. Knowing your followers, what they want, and what they expect from your brand is the first step. The next step is don’t be afraid to take risks. Don’t be afraid to remove some blocks at the bottom in order to add some more at the top — or don’t be afraid to lose a few of those followers if it means gaining more new ones.
Remember, the goal of Jenga is not to win, but rather not to lose.
Growing and maintaining your brand’s Jenga of Coolness is a challenge, but play it right and your tower will continue to grow as its foundation becomes stronger to support it. You don’t have to outright win the brand game, you just have to not lose it.
That is how brands grow and last and stay cool for generations.
That is the Tao of the Jenga of Coolness.
Phil Autelitano is CEO of Mediarazzi — we develop TV channels and content for Roku. www.mediarazzi.com
Follow me, oh follow me: @PhilAutelitano
