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Iconic Advantage®: Don't Chase the New, Innovate the Old
Modern business gurus all cry for the need to innovate, to disrupt, and to act like a startup. It's hard to argue with that kind of thinking. It's sexy and exciting. But it's wrong. Too many businesses become enamored by shiny new objects and end up overlooking the value locked away in their existing products. Maybe your business is one of them. Iconic Advantage is a different approach that allows companies to leverage what they already have to create lasting differentiation and deeper relationships with their customers. It generates disproportionate levels of profit and protects against market fluctuations. Many of the world's most successful brands have been using it for years. Now, you, too, can benefit from reaching iconic status, whether you're a Fortune 500, a local pizza parlor, or an aspiring unicorn startup.
- GenresBusiness
Audio CD
Published February 6, 2018
17 people are currently reading
146 people want to read
About the author
Soon Yu
5 books2 followersSoon Yu is an international speaker and best selling author on innovation and design who has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Entrepreneur Magazine and New York Times.
His upcoming book, Iconic Advantage®, challenges businesses, from Fortune 500 to venture-backed startups, to refocus their innovation priorities on building greater iconicity, and offers deeper insights on establishing timeless distinction and relevance. He regularly consults business leaders on developing meaningful Iconic Signature Elements, Signature Moments and Signature Communication.
He most recently served as the Global VP of Innovation and Officer at VF Corporation, parent organization to over 30 global apparel companies, including The North Face, Vans, Timberland, Nautica and Wrangler. While at VF, Soon created a $2 billion innovation pipeline, established 3 global innovation centers, and initiated industry-leading design best practices.
Prior to this he worked at The Clorox Company and Chiquita Brands, where he won company-wide awards for best advertising, best promotion and best new product, and gained industry recognition from the Webby Award, Favorite Website Award and Dope Award. He has also been a consultant at Bain and Company, and a founder and CEO for numerous venture-backed startups (including Gazoontite, Promeo Technologies and TWRL) and was recognized as a Northern California finalist for the prestigious Ernst & Young “Entrepreneur of the Year” award.
He is a highly sought after speaker on innovation, design and entrepreneurship, and teaches at Parsons School of Design and often guest lectures at Stanford University (where he received his MBA and is active with the GSB Asian Alumni Association).
His upcoming book, Iconic Advantage®, challenges businesses, from Fortune 500 to venture-backed startups, to refocus their innovation priorities on building greater iconicity, and offers deeper insights on establishing timeless distinction and relevance. He regularly consults business leaders on developing meaningful Iconic Signature Elements, Signature Moments and Signature Communication.
He most recently served as the Global VP of Innovation and Officer at VF Corporation, parent organization to over 30 global apparel companies, including The North Face, Vans, Timberland, Nautica and Wrangler. While at VF, Soon created a $2 billion innovation pipeline, established 3 global innovation centers, and initiated industry-leading design best practices.
Prior to this he worked at The Clorox Company and Chiquita Brands, where he won company-wide awards for best advertising, best promotion and best new product, and gained industry recognition from the Webby Award, Favorite Website Award and Dope Award. He has also been a consultant at Bain and Company, and a founder and CEO for numerous venture-backed startups (including Gazoontite, Promeo Technologies and TWRL) and was recognized as a Northern California finalist for the prestigious Ernst & Young “Entrepreneur of the Year” award.
He is a highly sought after speaker on innovation, design and entrepreneurship, and teaches at Parsons School of Design and often guest lectures at Stanford University (where he received his MBA and is active with the GSB Asian Alumni Association).
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
February 27, 2018
Iconic Advantage manages to be both an accessible introduction to branding and also a useful exercise in refreshing your thinking about how you can make your brand distinctive and loved. Soon Yu and his writing partner, Dave Birss, say upfront that what they share "isn’t anything particularly new,” but they provide great value by walking you through an easy-to-understand framework for how to make your product or service “iconic.” They’ve packed a ton of interesting insights and case studies into a relatively slim book (175 pages), which is welcome news for all of us who find that business books can sometimes be packed with some unnecessary padding.
Their central thesis is that companies often spend so much time chasing the next shiny new thing that they forget to protect their core strengths. At the same time, this doesn’t mean clinging to the status quo. “When we say ‘innovate the old,’ people sometimes interpret it as ‘don’t do anything new.’ But that’s not the message we want to give at all. It’s all about focusing your innovation effort in the right place."
Yu and Birss outline four levels of branding, with the fourth level being Iconic Branding, which they describe as “the ultimate form of branding, and very few brands operate at this level. This is when the brand goes beyond a superficial connection to its audience and taps into the aspirations and beliefs of who its audience wants to be. These brands transfer into icons that the audience uses to define itself.”
This kind of emotional connection is a big part of Iconic Branding: “Icons also give people a sense of belonging to the community. They feel a kinship with other people who buy the same brand. … The feeling of belonging is an important human need and iconic brands fulfill that in spades. They make loyal customers feel connected to a wider community of discerning individuals.”
A common approach by companies is to solve a problem for customers, but Yu and Birss encourage people to go further. “It’s not just about removing the pain for the consumer. Yes, that’s a great place to start. But if you want to maximize your chance of Iconic Advantage, you really need to go beyond problem-solving: you need to look at adding pleasure. It’s important that you make people feel something. If you give users a little frisson of joy when they purchase or use your product, they’re going to want to do it again. And again. And they’re going to tell other people about it. That’s where you have the real power over your generic competitors.”
The only downside to the book for me was the penultimate chapter, “Activating Iconic Advantage.” It felt too rushed and I would have liked more detail here. This chapter felt almost shorthand for some important guidance. In contrast, the previous chapter, “Capturing Your Iconic Brand Language,” dives deep on developing a document that the whole company will use to inform their decisions.
My much-underlined copy of Iconic Advantage has easily won a place on my shelf of favorite business books, and I’m looking forward to putting into practice some of the concepts as well as the ideas inspired by this book.
[Full disclosure: I was lucky enough to work with Soon many moons ago on a start-up. It was a crazy time where we both learned a lot. We lost touch, but when I read a story about him in Chip and Dan Heath’s latest book, The Power of Moments, I reached out and discovered that he had written Iconic Advantage, which has just come out. Love the serendipity of reconnecting through books!]
Their central thesis is that companies often spend so much time chasing the next shiny new thing that they forget to protect their core strengths. At the same time, this doesn’t mean clinging to the status quo. “When we say ‘innovate the old,’ people sometimes interpret it as ‘don’t do anything new.’ But that’s not the message we want to give at all. It’s all about focusing your innovation effort in the right place."
Yu and Birss outline four levels of branding, with the fourth level being Iconic Branding, which they describe as “the ultimate form of branding, and very few brands operate at this level. This is when the brand goes beyond a superficial connection to its audience and taps into the aspirations and beliefs of who its audience wants to be. These brands transfer into icons that the audience uses to define itself.”
This kind of emotional connection is a big part of Iconic Branding: “Icons also give people a sense of belonging to the community. They feel a kinship with other people who buy the same brand. … The feeling of belonging is an important human need and iconic brands fulfill that in spades. They make loyal customers feel connected to a wider community of discerning individuals.”
A common approach by companies is to solve a problem for customers, but Yu and Birss encourage people to go further. “It’s not just about removing the pain for the consumer. Yes, that’s a great place to start. But if you want to maximize your chance of Iconic Advantage, you really need to go beyond problem-solving: you need to look at adding pleasure. It’s important that you make people feel something. If you give users a little frisson of joy when they purchase or use your product, they’re going to want to do it again. And again. And they’re going to tell other people about it. That’s where you have the real power over your generic competitors.”
The only downside to the book for me was the penultimate chapter, “Activating Iconic Advantage.” It felt too rushed and I would have liked more detail here. This chapter felt almost shorthand for some important guidance. In contrast, the previous chapter, “Capturing Your Iconic Brand Language,” dives deep on developing a document that the whole company will use to inform their decisions.
My much-underlined copy of Iconic Advantage has easily won a place on my shelf of favorite business books, and I’m looking forward to putting into practice some of the concepts as well as the ideas inspired by this book.
[Full disclosure: I was lucky enough to work with Soon many moons ago on a start-up. It was a crazy time where we both learned a lot. We lost touch, but when I read a story about him in Chip and Dan Heath’s latest book, The Power of Moments, I reached out and discovered that he had written Iconic Advantage, which has just come out. Love the serendipity of reconnecting through books!]
August 16, 2019
Simple, often to the point of repetitiveness. When you think of iconic brands, you often think of products that everyone knows. I appreciated that this book spends a lot of ink considering iconic service as well. The book provides guidance and examples of how many companies have positioned their products or their services as iconic, including discussion of some tactics that are not universally cheered (such as being a proponent of celebrity endorsements). Interesting, especially for those aspiring marketers whose products and services could be managed into this level of market recognition.
September 2, 2020
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Iconic Advantage nails it! Yu has done a brilliant job making you aware of how important branding is and how easily it can be done. Also gives great examples of how some of the biggest brands in the world get it right and wrong. A must-read for creatives, marketers, and business-folk alike.
Alicia - The Book Grocer
Iconic Advantage nails it! Yu has done a brilliant job making you aware of how important branding is and how easily it can be done. Also gives great examples of how some of the biggest brands in the world get it right and wrong. A must-read for creatives, marketers, and business-folk alike.
Alicia - The Book Grocer
August 2, 2018
Very simple and quick read on understanding why brands need to create an iconic framework around being relevant and distinctive. If you’re an experienced planner/Strategist, a lot of this is not a surprise, nor are the supporting points/texts, but it’s a great 101 for newer strategists or folks who are trying to understand how to give their business more of an edge in a lasting way. Case studies could have been a bit more interesting and varied.
December 13, 2021
This is a good book for helping you see the power in your brand. If you want to build a company that endures you need to nail down your iconic advantage. Nice to see a professor of design team up with an advertising creative director and talk about that middle space between the product and the company. Your brand is the sum of a person's experience and beliefs about your company, product or service.
March 22, 2018
A good introduction to the purpose of branding for those who don’t know and a good reminder for those who do know about branding that it’s about much more than marketing. It’s about creative distinctive, iconic brands that withstand the world of trends.
May 5, 2018
3 simple principles , elaborated well to showcase how it works .
October 11, 2018
Would have been better with more specific examples
April 2, 2019
A great reference tool for marketers!
April 18, 2019
A fresh perspective on marketing -- I highly recommend!
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews