Branding Lessons From Steve Jobs

"It’s a complicated and noisy world," mused a younger Steve Jobs, "and we’re not going to get a chance to get people to remember much about us. "

That chance to make a memory, he says, is the essence of brand marketing.

For Jobs, who looks so Jobsian—and so 1997—in his sandals, shorts, and turtleneck, that chance to make a memory presents the fundamental question of branding. The oft-mythologized executive laments that Apple's brand had fallen off, and the way to get back was not by talking about speeds or megahertz or why Apple is better than Windows.

How would Steve Jobs improve Customer Experience

Steve Jobs was a true customer experience and user experience thought leader, wildly and repeatedly successful at transforming the customer experience for millions of customers worldwide, through Apple’s computers, mobile devices, the experience at the Apple Store, and in many other ways.

And his approach was based on a very simple message that he drilled into his team over and over and over: You've got to start with the customer experience and work back toward the technology--not the other way around.

In other words, the technology sold by Apple, or used by Apple in support of the customer experience, doesn’t have to be invented at Apple. And the technology Apple has lying around at its disposal doesn't have to end up being used.