Kevin Perlmutter, Chief Strategist, Founder, Limbic Brand Evolution
Kevin is a brand strategist and leadership advisor. He helps brands evolve by creating more desire for what they’re all about with a distinct focus on emotion. By understanding what makes people tick, he effectively guides business evolution and growth plans, and development of loyalty-driving brand strategy, communications and experiences.
https://www.limbicbrandevolution.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevinperlmutter/
Kevin@LimbicBrandEvolution.com
AUTOMATED EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
[00:00:01] You're listening to Scaling Up Services where we speak with entrepreneurs authors business experts and thought leaders to give you the knowledge and insights you need to scale your service based business faster and easier. And now here is your host Business Coach Bruce Eckfeldt.
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[00:00:57] Welcome, everyone. This is Scaling up Services. I'm Bruce Eckfelt. I'm your host and our guest today is Kevin Perlmutter. He is Chief Strategist and founder at Limbic Brand Evolution. We're gonna talk a little bit about branding. We're gonna talk about what goes into branding. Kevin's got a pretty interesting take on how you really develop a brand and how you make connection, how that process works and how you develop that successfully for a business can be added to the conversation. I think this is a particularly important topic for service based businesses, just because we're often dealing with sort of intangibles, we don't have physical products to kind of focus on. So the brand, your brand, your brand reputation, you know, how people think of you, how people connect with you is gonna be really, really important to the success of your business. So I'm excited for that with that. Kevin, welcome to the program. Thank you for having me.
[00:01:44] So why don't we start with a little bit of your background. Just how did you get into branding? How did you develop this limbic approach to branding? Tell us the story. Tell us the background.
[00:01:55] Yeah, I'd love to tell you the story. So I have been working as a brand consultant for for many years. I started in advertising where I was for about 16 years.
[00:02:05] And then after that, I moved to a company called Interbrand, which is one of the larger global brand consultancies where I was a brand strategist, leading client relationships, leading strategy, evolution, identity, evolution. I launched a customer experience practice there at the beginning days of customer experience practices. And it was a fantastic experience to understand how to help businesses and brands evolve. And then I moved on to a music studio that focuses on sonic branding. And at this studio, my job was actually to help the business grow and evolve and scale as I was the internal business architect, helping with offering expansion, innovation and different ways that the work that they did as musicians and composers could become more valuable in the marketplace.
[00:02:53] Just explain sonic branding. What do we mean by that? What does the actual work product that you're focused on?
[00:02:58] Well, it's creating sounds for brand identity. So like a brand has a visual identity. This is a sound identity. And the company that I worked for did this both for entertainment companies. So programming on television, that's very familiar to people like news programming and sports programming and shows. And it also does it for brands. So brands like AT&T are clients of this company.
[00:03:21] Interesting. Yeah, I do. I'm just kind of mentally thinking about all the little little music or little tones and things that I think about, you know, whether it's the intel inside. I think they have a little snippet that plays and stuff.
[00:03:32] It's interesting as I never thought about that as something you would brand. But yeah, obviously, I mean, it has an emotional connection and has a connection to something and hearing it.
[00:03:41] It definitely does. And that's that's what's become so fascinating. And it's a key component of the work that I'm doing now. So after leaving the music studio, I decided it was time with the reason why I left the music studio was because it was time for me to launch my own practice, my own consulting business. And I formed limbic brand evolution and limbic focuses on helping businesses evolve and grow with a distinct focus on emotion. So my whole practice area takes all the wonderful things that I was able to do and learn and experience at the places that I've worked. So I take from Interbrand Deep Brand Strategy Consulting and the customer experience consulting and helping brands evolve their business strategy and their identity so that they could stand out in the world and be unique and differentiated. And it takes what I did at the music studio where I was responsible for two things primarily. One was helping the business grow and expand and scale and serve the needs of its customers in better ways. But I was also responsible for research. I created a research capability there with a wonderful outside partner that was rooted in neuroscience based behavioral science based research techniques to understand the impact of emotion on people and their behavior.
[00:04:55] And that's that's the limbic. The limbic reference is the limbic brain. Masum, you didn't want to call it the lizard brain brand. You got it. You're so wonderful.
[00:05:05] So not everybody is aware that limbic is comes from the limbic part of our brain, which controls emotion, motivation, behavior and memory. So I've called myself the limbic brand evolution because my distinct focus area is around those things. Emotion. Motivation, behavior and memory. And I'm all about helping brands evolve with that focus.
[00:05:26] So you launch your own agency. I mean, I've just come from a business point of view. I'm always fascinated when people decide to kind of go off on their own. What was that experience like? What worked for you? What didn't? What were some of the surprises you ran into?
[00:05:38] It's been incredible in every way possible. And so I've been working for nearly 25 years, over 25 years, somewhere in that range. And this is the first time I'm actually an entrepreneur. And it's been a very it's been a very interesting ride. I'm responsible for everything that's you know, a lot of your listeners are entrepreneurs or started small and have grown and scaled. And I'm in that same boat. So it's it's a new thing for me.
[00:06:01] But what I love about it is that I'm able to take the best of who I am and the best of what I do and the things that I most enjoy doing, the things that I'm most motivated by. And I'm able to help clients who need those services.
[00:06:16] No, no, no, that's great. And so tell us a little bit about some of the work you've been doing and how now that you're kind of focusing on your own service offerings, how do you actually approach clients? What are you helping them with? Who tends to be your company? The company is a touch of companies you work with.
[00:06:30] Well, I'm helping clients create stronger connections with the people they want to reach. So I'm very focused on what people are emotionally motivated by. I'm very focused on helping those connections grow and expand through shared motivations and things that would be valuable to people in terms of traduce or I'm going to cut that and start. That's good. So give us can you give me a lead in verse 2?
[00:06:56] So tell me a little bit about the types of companies you typically work with, what your services look like. How are you helping them? It was a little insight on what you're doing today.
[00:07:04] Yes. So I'm working with companies to help them create more desire for what they're all about with this focus on emotion, helping them find the customers and appeal to the customers that will be most motivated by what they're all about. So I'm working with service based businesses. I'm working with other types of brands and really looking at what they are doing in the world. What what are the things in the world that they are there to accomplish? What are they most motivated by?
[00:07:32] Why did they start this business? Great brands, great businesses actually start because they have a vision for what their role is in the world. They think they can make a difference. They think that it's an opportunity to improve something for people.
[00:07:47] And oftentimes the companies that I'm working with, you know, they start out that way, but they get a little lost. They get a little off track. And they start focusing on all of the benefits that they think are going to be most important to people that are not actually emotionally motivating.
[00:08:02] Yeah, well, I would say that that the a lot of times people lose their weight because they start chasing short term money. They see an opportunity to make a buck. And I go, oh, you know, I need a buck. Let's go do that. But oftentimes they start getting off brand or they're getting off their core. And and that's a lot of a lot of times when I come in a company is is it's about stripping out all the things they've started doing that are not really based on their core purpose and their core capabilities.
[00:08:26] Yeah, that's exactly what I'm finding as well. So when I'm working with a brand, the first thing that I want to understand is how to help them focus. How do you get back to who you are? What makes you whole as a company, what you're there to do at your core? What are you most emotionally motivated by? As a business owner, as a brand leader to do for people in the world? And the second thing I want to do is help them connect with the people that they want to reach. So to do that, in order to truly connect with someone, you really need to understand what motivates them and what they care about. So I will focus then on how to their desired customers want to feel. What are the things that they need in their lives that are missing? What are the things that is most important to them? And I'm looking for that intersection. I'm looking for that. That intersection of emotional motivation. And in my business, I call that limbic sparks and limbic sparks happen when your audience is most is the limbic sparks happen when your audience is emotionally motivated by what you're all about? That's the single focus of my whole business is helping to create those limbic sparks for business leaders and brand owners.
[00:09:34] Well, it's interesting and I'm fascinated about by how you actually do this because it's you do so so much of business is kind of logical and rational or at least, you know, appears lost or logical and rational. Like we sit down and we develop a strategy and we want to understand the customer. So we go talk to them and say, like what? Well, what are you looking for? What are your needs? And oftentimes I find that there can be a big difference between what someone tells you they want and what and how their behavior really is. People often don't know, they can't verbalize or they're not conscious of really what is driving their motivation. And if you try to do it through kind of rational conversation, you will often both miss important parts and often go down the wrong path in terms of really understanding how you're going to connect with folks.
[00:10:16] So I'm curious how you get to goodbye. How are you going to get through that kind of bias? I think that thinking bias that that I think skews a lot of the insights that you're you're absolutely right.
[00:10:27] And my approach is very inquisitive and it's rooted in behavioral science approaches and techniques. So when I'm looking to understand what motivates people, I can't go in and ask them over and rational oriented questions. I really need to get around the issues. I need to go deeper than the surface answers that they might give. I might want to use techniques like metaphore Elicitation to understand how people feel about certain things without killing them into the idea that I'm asking them about something specific. So an example of that might be an example. That might be when you're working when you're working with a client for.
[00:11:05] So just give me an example of a technique that you've used to actually sit down with a client or their end customer to really get at the insights of what they're what's motivating them to make a connection.
[00:11:16] I think that's most important is finding out what's motivating them. So I want to understand what is it that they're most excited about when they're part of this experience or what is it that they're most frustrated about is what unmet needs are. They're in the experience that are causing some disruption in their lives. And how could this brand actually improve the way they approach these people to solve and serve those needs?
[00:11:41] How do you find I'm curious.
[00:11:43] When the work that I've done or the research that I've done on kind of motivating around sales and decision making and kind of connecting, you know, in the kind of selling or the persuasion process and the difference between kind of positive motivators and kind of fear based motivators.
[00:12:01] And, you know, oftentimes, you know, people will respond much more to kind of fear or avoiding loss than kind of positive, positive implications.
[00:12:12] What's your take on that based on the work you've done in terms of what what are the motivating emotions that you can kind of keep on as a brand when you're looking to connect with customers?
[00:12:21] I think it's a really interesting thing is there are some categories that really do play into fear now, and it's not a place that I typically want to go. The most important question that I'm trying to solve is how do you want people to feel? And you want people to feel positive. You want people to feel like their needs are being served. You want people to feel like they're a valued customer. You have their back, you're taking care of them. And that's a really important thing. You can't be talking too much about yourself and you can't be talking too much about the problems that are going to occur if you're not there. You should really be talking about how you're going to solve things for people. And one of the things that I like about the work and the way I approach it is that I'm stripping out a lot of the cumbersome strategy frameworks and ideals that some of the consultancies that I've worked with in the past bring into the process. A lot of times. It's a very cumbersome process. There are a lot of people involved. There are lots of layers and there's also just tons and reams of work that need to happen to get the job done. And what I've really focused on is an experience for my clients that's also emotionally motivating. It's a very simple experience. It can be done efficiently where I'm helping them focus, connect and expand. I'm helping them quickly in a very fun environment, understand what it is that they're all about and they're most motivated by we're unearthing insights, whether through existing conversations, existing data or primary research on what their audience is most motivated by. And we're finding those connections to create those limbic sparks. We're identifying what's most emotionally motivating to each the shared emotional motivation. And then we can quickly come to what is the unique and desirable brand position that they could own.
[00:14:09] How can they most appeal to the people that they want to reach and then expand into the areas that they want to expand into to better serve those customers? So trying to make things simple and trying to make it less cumbersome, try to make it easy, and it's all about what people care most about. So it's it's a lot of fun to have those conversations.
[00:14:28] Good, too. Let's talk about an example.
[00:14:30] You talk about a client that you've worked with, their kind of situation or where they were struggling and then how you kind of approached it.
[00:14:36] So we can kind of see how this really plays out in a real kind of application with the brand, certainly.
[00:14:41] So I recently did work with the AT&T Performing Arts Center, which is a large nonprofit in Dallas. And this organization, this organization is incredible. They have lots of lots of people that they serve in the community and they put on performances on multiple venues, multiple amazing buildings and stages that they are part of. And they have dance, they have theater, they have they have Broadway shows that they bring in.
[00:15:12] They serve local artists. And the challenge that they were facing was that they were a bit misunderstood in the community or. Well, weren't necessarily aware of all that they had to offer. And unfortunately, a lot of people in the community weren't feeling that it was a place for them like they were. They just didn't know how to approach the organization or what they can do there and maybe even didn't know as much about the organization as as as everyone hoped that they should. So when they approached me, the opportunity that we looked at was to understand what was most emotionally motivating to this organization. What were they there to do? What was their purpose in the world? And to evaluate whether or not they were truly expressing it in that way and to also understand what's most motivating to the community and why the community would want to be a part of this. And what information they were missing to have positive associations and use this organization in the way that everyone was hoping for.
[00:16:09] What were some of them motivated? And I'm curious. What were the things the they realized or they identified as being. But the thing is, they wanted to. They wanted their their customers or their users to feel like when you when you really got into understanding the brand and what they were about, were there kind of key, key things you identified with them in terms of references?
[00:16:28] Certainly this organization I learned through the discovery process that I went through with them is that they are super passionate about the performing arts.
[00:16:37] This is a group of people who truly enjoy what they do. They bring these wonderful performances to their stages. They support the community in ways that are incredible in terms of helping low income community parts of the community experience the arts and ignite their passion and find new opportunities for enjoyment and even potential career. They are helping artists in the community get access to these great stages, and they're helping all of Dallas who really enjoy the best of the life performing arts that the city can offer. And they're doing so in a way that is is really appealing to the people who show up there. But unfortunately, the way they were expressing themselves up to the point that we we created some work together was they were talking a lot about what they were doing and they were talking a lot about their venues, which are are quite incredible. Their tagline was staging the amazing. And it was a very well-thought out approach. But unfortunately, it wasn't connecting with people. And what we did was we helped them transition from about us to for you. And we transitioned the tagline to yours to discover and their tone of voice and the way they are approaching the market right now with their language is about welcoming and inviting people in. It's about letting them know all there is to discover. It's about how they are igniting passion in people and inspiring students and even cultivating advocates. So as a nonprofit, they're they're funded by the city. My sales and by the donations and sponsorships of advocates for the arts. So helping helping even the advocates realize that by contributing by being a part of this, they are actually helping fuel the mission of the organization to cultivate a love and passion for the performing arts for everyone in Dallas to enjoy. So it recently launched and it's still rolling out. There's a lot of work that they need to do to continue to get the message out. But it was a big shift in mindset and an invoice and approach really focused on the shared emotional motivation between them and the people that they want to reach.
[00:18:55] Yeah, I mean, I think that idea of making it more about your customer and less about you was probably good advice.
[00:19:02] I think people often get to kind of get in their head about who they know, who they're trying to be, rather than figuring out how they can connect with folks and talk to me more about these sparks, because I like this idea that, you know, doing this research, getting this understanding, like really figuring out what are these moments and these opportunities and emotions that you want to evoke as part of that connection. Tell me about the sparks. How do you really identify that? And then what do you do with that once you find a spark or an opportunity for a spark? How do you create a real strategy in terms of making that happen?
[00:19:29] For the way I'm thinking about limbic sparks is based on an understanding of the A why that has been proven by many others before me about the role that emotion plays in decision making.
[00:19:41] So when brands connect with someone at an emotional level, they're 52 percent more valuable than just brands that people find to be highly satisfying. So some brands actually think that highly satisfied is the top of the scale, but it's really about emotionally connected. And Harvard Business Review published that stat. There's other research that goes in the other direction that says that brands that have frustrating or impersonal experiences, you know, lose about forty six percent of their customer base. People will abandon the brand. And one of the most important stats that I feel. And my business is that emotion is the largest driver of loyalty in the customer experience.
[00:20:26] All other things considered, when people are emotionally need to feel well in a customer experience, they are going to be more loyal to that brand. Based on that than any other factor. So when I am looking to create limbic sparks, I'm leaning into all of that research and all of that data that's out there that says if you make people feel good and you connect with them emotionally, then it's going to help you scale your business. It's going to help you grow your relationships. It's going to lead to more desire, greater engagement, more loyalty and ultimate growth. So that's that's why I'm focused on creating limbic sparks and why I'm trying to weed out so many of the other factors that get in the way of a very clear and simple strategy that help business leaders and brand leaders evolve. I really want business and brand leaders to not think that strategy has to be this very long process or this detailed process that gets into things that they just don't have time for. It's really about spending some time to focus on what do you care most about and how are you going to get the word out in a way that connects with people emotionally?
[00:21:33] Well, I like that idea. I always talk about that strategy is really that process of deciding what you really want to focus on.
[00:21:40] And then operationally, you know, how do you how do you how do you connect with with on those things and not on everything else? Right. So it's about making a very limited set of choices. And I like this idea that from Olympic, you know, kind of strategy that you're looking at. What are the really emotions that I want to evoke and what kind of customers? And then how do I really focus on that? And because I think a lot of people, you know, they're still kind of especially these early stage companies. You know, if you're under 50 million in revenues, you're still kind of chasing, you know, money. You're still trying to you're coming with all these products and services and you're trying to take them to market. And it just gets very confusing. And, you know, customers get confused because they don't understand exactly what you stand for. Your your employees get confused because you're not sure exactly what you're delivering. And I think that, you know, there is a great strategy for really sort of focusing that and and getting a company, getting a leadership team, getting your employees around a very clear, concise set of this is what we want to achieve. This is the impact we want to have on these people. And if you can do that, you know, it's much easier to scale a business. I mean, it's it's very hard to scale it if you haven't focused.
[00:22:42] Thank you. Thanks for saying that. The work the work that I do actually leads to all of those types of solutions. So when we focus on how we're gonna create limbic sparks and we come up with that core strategy platform, it could go in two different directions. Sometimes the brand has all the business pieces in place and it really is just about making sure everybody's focused on the right thing. We understand how to communicate. Maybe it will affect their tone of voice, maybe will affect their brand identity, maybe will affect their communications or the experiences. But on the flip side, sometimes I'm working with a brand that needs to build some resources in-house. After that, we do so that they can actually deliver on the brand opportunity that exists for them. There might be an opportunity to position yourself in a certain way so that you are best expressing yourself so that you are connecting with people at that emotional level. But you don't have the the tools or the training or the resources. And what I help those brands do is put together a plan for growth. So how are they going to what what are the business pieces that they need to put in place to make sure that their marketing is going to be most robust? And in that direction, do they have the right expertise in-house to deliver on that promise? Are the customer experiences set up in the right way or do they need some some thoughts on what a plan is? So that over a few months they can evolve to become the business that they want to be and be a desired brand?
[00:24:10] How did how did you get started? So, you know, someone listening to this is, you know, running a service business there.
[00:24:17] You know, they've they've got a successful company at them and they're making money. They're good. They're they're getting revenue, but they're trying to figure out how to grow. They realize that, you know, strategy is is key to that. And they're trying to understand how to make some of these strategic decisions.
[00:24:30] And this whole idea of, you know, the emotional connection, the limbic sparks, where would you start or how would you advise them in terms of, you know, starting that process, of starting this, thinking around, you know, what what emotional connection you want to have, who you want to have it with. How do you start strategize around that and then putting you in a plan?
[00:24:47] Yeah, I I always like to say that it starts with a conversation because I really don't have this cookie cutter approach that I'm trying to push on to everyone. My my core values as a as a person and as a business are very, very simple and clear. It's about helping them make stronger connections with the people they want to reach. So in that first conversation, I get to understand a little bit more about where they feel they might be struggling and what their business goals and needs are. And then if we take it further, we can start to investigate more deeply. What it is that they're all about, what it is that the customers they're looking to reach, need and want to feel. And then we can start prioritizing how we go about solving that need for them. So sometimes it starts with some deep dive into customer understanding. Sometimes it starts with conversations with their employees and with their with some of their key stakeholders to really understand how it is that this brand can become more appealing in the eyes of the people that they want to reach. There are many ways that it can go, but it always starts with that first conversation.
[00:25:53] And you do find I'm just kind of curious in terms of the clients you you work with or the people you speak to about this kind of process and the strategy.
[00:26:01] Do you find that some leaders are more kind of in tune, just naturally in tune with some of these issues or some of this way of thinking and some are not? I don't want to. I mean, I kind of think of things like emotional intelligence kind of ideas, but I don't know if, you know, if you see that there is kind of mindsets or ways of thinking that allow some of these brands or allow some of these leaders to kind of tap in this more quickly.
[00:26:23] And what needs to kind of get developed in the leader themselves to really engage in this kind of thinking is the most successful relationships that I have with clients are the ones where the leaders are aware that there's something that needs to be fixed and they're willing to take a few steps in that direction. They're not too hung up on some of the things that they've done in the past or they recognize that there's an opportunity. And what I'm able to do from an outside perspective, from a behavioral science perspective, just from the years of experience I have working with some very large brands and nonprofits, I really can open their eyes to some things that they might not have thought about. And then, you know, I always say that the brand is not mine. The brand is there. So they need to be willing and and interested in taking the steps that I'm recommending.
[00:27:10] And if they're not, maybe we need to keep going a little bit and find the steps that they're most comfortable with, because it really is about the brand being true to itself and growing and scaling in the way that is most appropriate for a leader of that business. And if they want to be successful, there are many ways to be successful and we'll help them find them. We'll help them because I don't want to change a company's core. I don't want to change a leaders instincts. But I do want to shed some light on things that they should consider so that they can feel comfortable evolving in a way that could lead to some real growth.
[00:27:43] Now, Kevin, this has been great. If people want to find out more about you, about the system, about limbic branding. What's the best way to get that information via the Web site?
[00:27:52] It's LimbicBrandEvolution.com. That's L I M B I C Brand Evolution dot com. And there's a lot of detail on the way I approach the work that I do. There's a blog with a bunch of articles that I've written and some other resources if they want to get in touch with me directly. I’m at Kevin@LimbicBrandEvolution.com and I'm also on LinkedIn.
[00:28:14] I'll make sure that the the links, the email address and everything is in the show notes. People can click through and get that information again. Kevin, thank you for taking the time today. Great conversation. I think there's a really interesting topic, one that I don't think many leaders, many CEOs, founders think about a whole lot until they really kind of get to this point to figure out how they're going to grow in scale. So this has been really helpful. I appreciate the time. Thank you for having me.
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