Build brand awareness and loyalty without distracting your audience.
By definition, branding is a marketing tool used to promote an organization. It allows businesses to illustrate the values they stand for, and helps to differentiate them from the competition. A compelling brand creates meaningful connections with the intended audience, gains customer loyalty, and increases sales. Historically, branding made good business sense.
Today, brands rely on many new technologies to reach potential customers. Unfortunately, some leverage invasive techniques that lead to dangerous levels of engagement and decreases our ability to focus. Constant interruptions, combined with other aspects of Surveillance Capitalism, are stealing one of life’s most valuable assets — time. In this way, businesses utilize branding as a way to detract from their audience’s quality of life. It’s important to understand how we got here in order for brands to create solutions that attract customers in the future, rather than distract them.
Stepping into the General Store is like taking a step back in time. Glass jars full of Tootsie Rolls and Swedish Fish greet you at the front door. The cracked walls are lined with photos showing the Deli as the town’s original grocery store. There’s a framed copy of the local newspaper, and the headline reads, “Men Walk on the Moon.”
My interest in the news used to be like most — casual. Since 2020, though, I’ve spent an abnormal amount of time obsessing over it. A lot happened that year, if you recall. One article per topic used to suffice. Now, the News app on my iPhone follows any article I click with a delightful notification about another. The algorithm picks up my interests quickly. However, it seems as if the perspectives and opinions of each article I read get more polarizing, controversial, and perhaps even darker.1 Another News notification? Click.
With the 2024 election on the horizon, I decided to give up the News app. But, with the satisfying vibration of each breaking story, I knew I couldn’t do this alone. I researched multiple screen time-saving apps, and decided on Opal — it promised 5 years of my life back, free from distractions. I created an account and decided which apps were the most detrimental to my focus. That was Monday night.
Breaking: The Urge is Real
Tuesday morning, I immediately reached for my phone. The apps I habitually open were blocked but, instead of checking other apps, I rolled out of bed and started my day. Throughout the week, I continued to click my phone’s notifications, only to be denied access to them by Opal. After each blocked attempt, I simply moved on to the things that needed to be accomplished. On Wednesday, I headed to the office 15 minutes earlier than usual. On Thursday, I arrived 25 minutes early! Opal awarded me with a new gemstone and let me know that I had saved enough time to watch 17 episodes of Friends. How nice, I thought.
This Just In: Data Doesn’t Lie
The Opal app was instrumental in preventing the urge to read the News, but does not provide free data. Luckily, Apple’s Screen Time app provides loads of interesting factoids. I learned that from Monday evening through Saturday, I picked up my phone 383 times! (91 pickups for Text Messages alone.) The number of notifications received during that time is also revealing — almost 150 from each of my email accounts. The biggest culprit? 263 text message notifications over 5 days. That’s much higher than I would have expected, and easily the largest source of my daily distractions.
News to Me
I didn’t look at the News app once, but I was able to ignore 173 notifications from it. I received almost as many notifications from News as I did from both my personal and professional email accounts combined. No wonder I’ve become so obsessed with the news. But the best news? Even though the number of notifications received went up each day, my daily screen time went down through Thursday. Just being more mindful about our time, I’ve concluded, seems to enable us to focus on more important things.2
It's Sunday, and I’m back at the General Store with my family. My wife and I are splitting the veggie wrap, my son Owen is enjoying his everything bagel — toasted with cream cheese — and Samantha, my daughter, is sipping her orange juice. I can focus on these little details, because I'm not staring at my screen. I also happen to notice the stack of newspapers by the coffee, and pick up a copy. I catch up on a week’s worth of news after 20 minutes, and haven't looked at the News app once. That’s one small step for man, I think to myself, one giant step for mankind.
In 2005, I worked in the basement of the Byrd Library at Syracuse University. My job was to help students load the microfilm machines. Microfilm was already outdated, but I enjoyed the physical nature of thumbing through the card catalog, jotting down the call number, and locating the tiny white box among aisles of stocked shelves. I’d align the sprocket holes of the film, flip the light switch on, and spin the reel to the first article.
“All set,” I would say, “just turn the knob to the right if you want to fast-forward.” I took pride in mastering this antiquated database, and gladly accepted $5.15 an hour for my services.
If the technology wasn’t enough of a symbolic divide, a long row of black filing cabinets separated the microfilm machines from the Apple computers at the other end of the Media Center. It was always busier on that side, and I was curious about what people accomplished with the new technology. I remember thinking, could I learn Photoshop CS? I gave myself 6 months to figure it out — At the time, it was a goal that seemed just out of reach.
Fast-forward 20 years and a similar, though metaphorical, divide exists in my family today. Every weekend, we go to my in-laws’ house for a traditional Sunday dinner. There are two grandparents, six parents, and seven cousins between the ages of six and fifteen. On one side of the divide are those of us that sit around the dinner table chatting. My wife’s mother, whom we affectionately refer to as “Mimi,” and I discuss books that we’ve recently read. Stolen Focus, by Johann Hari, is a recent example. Mimi, whose Italian father served in WWII, was interested in the psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. Looking around the room, I quietly mentioned his discovery that staring at screens provides the lowest amount of “Flow.”1Our discussions are always deep and insightful. I usually learn something new.
It’s ironic, of course, that as one group engages in conversation, the other stares intently at their mobile devices. Sometimes inches away on the same couch, the adults in this group endlessly scroll through Facebook and Instagram, or swipe through the latest viral TikTok videos. The kids will play video games, text, or Facetime their friends. I can’t help but wonder, which group is missing out? Should I learn to communicate with emojis?
At Syracuse, I was initially reluctant to learn about the tools on the digital side of the basement. Eventually I did, though, and that educational leap began my journey to becoming a graphic designer. Should I cross a similar bridge today? After noticing the division within my own family — and equipped with a rudimentary understanding of the technology that causes distraction — I recently conducted an experiment. I revealed to one of the family members that I had been diagnosed with Lyme disease. I may have had it for years, I exclaimed. Looking up from her phone blankly, but not directly at me, my subject simply replied, “That sucks.” Her eyes darted across the room, then straight back to her screen. (Perhaps she didn’t read any fiction novels in her youth, I concluded.) Having received what I deemed the incorrect amount of empathy, I pulled the iPhone out of my back pocket and began scrolling. I needed to check how many hearts my most recent Instagram post received.
My name is John, and I’m a procrastinator. I openly admit to this apparent character flaw because, as a graphic designer, I’ve worked alongside an Olympic-sized roster of procrastinators. We’ll come up with any excuse to delay a project. Ask any designer how much time it takes to complete a specific assignment, and you’ll get the same response: “How much time do you have?” Putting things off is kind of our MO.
I accepted that procrastination was a part of my occupational DNA a long time ago. And, after 20 years of practice, I’ve become damn good at it. You can, too. For all the aspiring creative procrastinators, here’s a few confessions you might find insightful to becoming a pro like me.
I Dally Every Day
Whenever I don’t feel like working, I run. I like to consider running my dally habit — it’s how I delay getting started on challenging creative problems. Do you need to run to procrastinate successfully? Hardly. But, for a dally habit to be productive it needs to be achievable, and it needs to be carried out every single day. Commitment turns a dally habit into a keystone habit — a small, easy-to-achieve victory that contributes to more significant changes in one’s life.1 Yoga is a fine keystone habit, but fishing works just as well. Put things off with intention, and you’re well on your way to making procrastination worthwhile.
I Lose Focus, On Purpose
It can be painfully difficult to separate work from life. I try to, though. For instance, I don’t have any thoughtful or creative agenda when I run. I just run. My mind bounces from subject to subject. Inevitably, I will start to think about a recent project. If I’m lucky, my mind-wandering connects unexpected dots, and a new idea emerges. As Hari puts it in Stolen Focus, “Many breakthroughs don’t happen during periods of focus, they happen during mind-wandering.”2 Creatives, rejoice. This is why keystone habits don’t include activities like watching TV, doom-scrolling through Facebook, or reading a book. Ironically, those activities take too much attention.3 Turns out, letting my mind wander increases the chance that I develop a breakthrough creative concept. That’s reason enough for me to keep losing my focus.
My Ideas Suck, at First
Whenever I kick off a new project, my anxiety level immediately skyrockets. Is there enough time to develop an original solution? The first few ideas are almost always crap, so I make a point to write them down (or sketch them out) instantly. By getting the first-level thoughts on paper, I free my brain to explore unexpected solutions. As Michael Beirut, Partner at design firm Pentagram, suggests, "Somewhere along the way an idea for the design pops into my head out of the blue."4 Getting started right away may seem like the antithesis of procrastination, but eliminating bad ideas allows me to procrastinate when I can’t focus.
Being creative isn’t easy. With a seemingly infinite number of possible solutions, getting started is the hardest part. If you’re going to procrastinate, you might as well do it in a way that’s productive to your problem-solving process. Develop an obtainable habit that allows you to get away from work when you get distracted. Allow your mind to lose focus and wander, by giving your brain the mental space it needs to sort things out and make abstract connections. And damn it, get those shitty ideas out of your head immediately. That’s how I do it, anyway. After all, pros need to get paid, and you’ll never finish any project you haven’t started.
Have you considered the importance of your brand's tone of voice? Are you fun and playful, or confident and matter-of-fact? It's equally important to consider both what you say, and how you say it. Use language that resonates with your intended audience. If targeting German Shorthaired Pointers, for example, a casual "let's go to the creamery" may cause confusion, possibly suspicion, or even worse — no response at all. However, a quick, "Time for ice cream kids!" is sure to result in tail-wagging, and a sharp, "Anybody want a pup cup!" will undoubtedly trigger immediate salivation. (The latter resulting brand dissonance with the kids, of course.) Remember, the goal is not to please everybody. Try to create an authentic connection with your brand advocates — those dogs that love you for who you are, what you stand for, and how much ice cream you serve.
We're big fans of Mother's Day around here – just ask the kids. One day, we hope they understand and appreciate that our tattoo appropriated Milton Glaser's original I ❤️ NY design. Though, similar to the updated campaign from the Partnership for New York City, "I" has been replaced with "WE." We thought it would be more inclusive but, let's be honest, the kids couldn't care less — They just like plastering the tattoos all over. Hope all the moms out there had a day filled with flowers, smiles, and hearts.
