Stop Listening to the Customer

chapter 1 stop the ­consumer ­obsession

Businesses are currently obsessed with customers, consumer journey mapping and human-centred design. I believe your focus should be elsewhere: on understanding, defining and disseminating your brand throughout your organisation and to consumers. Prioritising the consumer over the brand erodes brand value and sets it on the path of homogenisation. Your brand will become just like the others. As you read this book, be open to the message to stop listening to the consumer and, instead, start to hear your brand.

Why do all cars look the same?

I recently bought a new car. During the protracted search, I became more and more confused as the brands, features, appearance and styles merged into one other. We wanted a family car with a bit of personality. This pretty low bar soon became a high bar. When I was a kid, I remember feeling proud as punch when my parents bought a Datsun 120Y. This was a car with power and grunt. And it was a radical shift from our previous car, a Fiat, which was seen as very exotic and European, particularly in Australia at the time. As a kid, I was into cars. Compared with today, the car back then had so much more character and functional differences.

But in the years that followed, something happened. Through globalisation and a flattening of consumer tastes, most cars are pretty much the same. Even car engines for different branded vehicles are made in the same factory. For example, the Volkswagen Golf GTI has the ...