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More and more brands are finding their way to the interface between brand and entertainment and adopting Hollywood's tools and techniques that lead to blockbuster story brands. And rightly so in an attention economy that rewards brands that are both meaningful and interesting.

A brand brain trust can help you gain an advantage at these important crossings.

The concept is ideal for considering how a spectrum of ideas related to products, advertising, brand content and social media can be screened, shaped and aligned in an integrated and multifaceted brand history. The focus is on multi-visioning the brand context in order to uncover innovative and effective perspectives on the brand history. Here, any visionary leader (from design, marketing, research and development or other functions) can experiment with what they have learned by applying new knowledge and new points of view to support stories about products, playing fields, athletes, campaigns or other factors that support this could improve storytelling.

This approach can be used to bring a cross-functional group together to break down the anatomy of campaigns that have failed or been successful.

In addition to Nike's Brand Guardian group (of which I was a member), Ed Catmull, CEO of Pixar, in his book & # 39; Creativity, Inc. & # 39; described the best example of using a branded brain trust that I came across in practice. Here Ed revealed the role that the idea of ​​brain trust played in Pixar and brought it to astonishing success. This story is relevant for all brands and it is worth telling it again here.

How a Brain Trust unlocked Pixar's full potential

The aim of the Pixar Brain Trust was to find out how a developing film can develop resonant relationships between the story, the plot and the characters from the perspective of how it is played for the audience. It is worth noting that each of Pixar Blockbuster's first 11 films was a 1,000% success rate. No Hollywood studio had ever achieved this success.

To get there and stay there, Pixar had to look beyond the obvious, uncover and discuss hidden dimensions of the plot, characters, and story to make stories from broken to good to good. And each of her films went through a story doctoring process to refine it to the highest possible quality. Pixar learned that the process of brain trust was to rely on the combined intelligence and instinct (thoughts + feelings) of a cross-functional team to fully understand how key scenes were played and to explore together how the whole story was played. This required a delicate process of intellectual and emotional honesty regarding personal feelings between the members of the Brain Trust team and between the feeling that everyone in that team felt in their "guts and hearts", in which the story, scene or the character was actually played. The goal of unlocking their subtle emotional bodies in this way was to create a process of providing notes to improve the story.

“Every single Pixar film was the worst film ever made at one time or another. But we know it. We trust our process. "- John Lasseter

At Pixar, the problem with fixing an entertainment project that was promising but not quite clicking was using "Notes". Ed emphasizes, "A good note says what's wrong, what's missing, what's not clear, doesn't make sense. A good note is offered at a specific time, not too late to fix a problem. A good note poses no requirements. It doesn't even have to include a change proposal, but if it does, this fix is ​​only offered to illustrate a possible solution, not to dictate the only answer. Above all, a good grade is specific. " I doubled up with boredom "is not a good grade."

Openness is very important, and it was important for Pixar to have an open discussion about how people feel and what they think without a person dominating and controlling a brain trust session. Basic rules for the engagement of the brain set the preconditions for all voices and viewpoints to play a role and to be taken into account. No idea of ​​killing on the spot, instead, notes were offered to give suggestions or suggestions on how weak ideas can be developed into stronger ones.

It was the role of the film directors to sort and interpret all of these notes, which to respond to and how to respond to the suggestions.

The Brain Trust at Pixar has accomplished several things at once:

• It provided an interactive field for intimate communication with the production team
• It made it okay for people to weigh up their thoughts, feelings, instincts, and intuition
• It provided basic rules for helpful or good "notes".
• The basic rules for polishing rough ideas were laid down, from good to great.
• It remained focused on an external goal – the entertainment experience of the highest quality
• This process reduced the project risk, increased the project quality and used the dynamics of brilliant groups.
• It strengthened the success rate to a perfect result, strengthened the internal culture and at the same time strengthened the brand image.

Pixar learned that brand brain trust was instrumental in shaping the voice, identity, personality, character, key messages and images of the brand in order to achieve long-term goals for brand positioning.

How future story brands will thrive

We are in the twilight of a data-based society. When information and intelligence become the domain of computers, society will place more emphasis on one human ability that cannot be automated: emotion. Imagination, myth, design, music, rituals – the language of emotions – influence how we work with others and what we buy. Brands will thrive based on the products and myths they create.

If your organization needs help building a brain trust or telling effective stories, contact The Blake Project.

These and other insights into the truth, purpose and in-depth campaigns of the brand are discussed in more detail in my new book Soulful Branding – Discover the hidden energy in your company and your brand.

Brand Strategy Insider is a service from The Blake Project: A strategic brand consultancy that specializes in brand research, brand strategy, brand growth and brand building

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