Stop hammering a bent nail:

Evolving Your Brand Through Experienced-Based Marketing and Design

Purchase the book on Amazon: Stop Hammering a Bent Nail

This guidebook was composed to help assist the multifamily and mixed-use industry with marketing and design practices that have proven successful. Using advanced concepts and research in the field of neuroscience, the hospitality industry has always been at the leading edge of exploring the ideas about what guests say they want and what they really want? Understanding the value and return on creating customer experiences, they have mastered this process and the multifamily housing industry can adapt this method to better increase their Return on Creativity (ROC).

This book provides insight into the processes that can be implemented into the multifamily housing marketing and design programs. Recently, the multifamily housing industry has seen crossover in the services and designs historically practiced within the hospitality industry. Combining industry practices with the field of neuroscience has allowed marketing and design agencies to expand their understanding about human behaviors and habits in the current market.

An old story exists about a husband watching his wife prepare a ham for a family dinner. She pulls out the pan and cuts the ends of the ham off before placing it in the pan. The husband is intrigued and asked his wife, “Why did you cut the ends of the ham off?” “I don’t know; it’s something my mom always did,” she replied. “Did you ever ask her why?” he asks. “No, we’ve just always done it that way.” The man later calls his mother-in-law to ask her why she would cut the ends of the ham off before baking. She replied, “So it would fit in the pan.” To this point, most of what has been done in the multifamily marketing industry has been a result of old school traditional thinking and marketing.We all suffer from the Conditioning Effect; otherwise known as, “We’ve always done it this way.”

Over the years, companies have continued to evolve and advanced as they focus on their Return on Investment (ROI). While few companies like Nike and Google have invested in ROI, they have also invested on ROC. Today, the development industry is suffering from the Conditioning Effect when it comes to ROC related to marketing and design. When you are selling a creative concept, not everything has to be a WOW wall idea. Creativity is not always synonymous with effectiveness since an emotional side of a design may be more critical to a product’s success than its practical elements. It is better to understand how your message will be perceived. How will your end-user interact with your message?

Telling a story is the best way to resonate emotionally with your end-user and to engage them in your product/message/design. This book is intended to bridge the traditional practices of marketing and design within the multifamily housing and mixed-use industry, to create a greater understanding of ways to connect with your audience in a modern world.