June 26, 2014
Here at Cult, after looking at some of the most adored brands out there, we have discerned some of the common traits among these brands. These traits enable brands to better connect with customers and ensure maximum potency when trying to deliver your unique brand personality and offering. They are as follows:
Be Remarkable.
Deliver the extraordinary.
Cult brands don’t buy impressions, they make them. We help brands become truly remarkable, diverting mass media budgets toward more engaging activities that drive affinity and word-of-mouth advocacy.
Have Purpose.
Be driven by a powerful ethos.
Cult brands get customers to not just buy, but to buy into their noble cause. We help brands find and convey their “why”, so they can stop bribing customers with points and discounts, and start winning their hearts.
Be Inspirational.
Inspire from the inside out.
Cult brands invest in indoctrinating employees with their beliefs and values. We work with CMOs to improve their brand culture, and to harness human resources as their most powerful branding tool.
Be Relatable.
Brands are not real people.
Cult brands behave like people, and represent aspirational human characteristics. We assess all brand/customer touchpoints and look for ways to insert more personality and humanity.
Be Involved.
Shut up and listen for a change.
Mediocre brands scream via mass media; Cult brands shut up and listen. We help clients learn how to collect and value customer input and systematizes processes of co-creation.
Be Pervasive.
Cult brands are everywhere.
Cult brands extend their reach into non-traditional channels (i.e. Lego movie, Marvel Comics mobile app). We help brands come to life in complementary ways beyond their core offering.
With these concepts in mind any brand can garner a cult following.
Ryan began his professional life in digital marketing. His first company, Suitcase Interactive, was a consistent best-digital-agency award winner. And his tenacity and forward thinking also led him, personally, to being awarded a coveted place on the auspicious 40 under 40 list. (Notice that we're not telling you how many years ago that was, we're kinda attached to our kneecaps ; ) Those seminal years also led Ryan to the enlightenment that the whole concept of advertising and digital agencies was dead. From there it was a short putt to the birth of Cult, one of North America's first true engagement agencies. As Cult's President, his legacy as a pioneering thinker has blossomed from pushing pixels, to pushing forward what marketing actually means. Ryan then founded The Gathering in 2012, an annual international event to honor cult-like brands that put the generation of movements before the creation of ad campaigns. The Gathering is now widely acknowledged to be one of North America's premier annual marketing conferences. And it's an idea that has introduced Cult to brands like Keurig, Converse, Airbnb, UFC, Las Vegas Tourism and Red Bull, among many others… hey, there's only so many names you can drop in one bio. Never one to whine about the status quo, but rather put his energy into finding a better way, Ryan’s latest innovation is the founding of a whole new operating model for marketers, both on the client side and in the industry that serves them. Called Communo, this tech-enabled work model is an incomparable brain trust of talent for brands, a human resources platform for marketing professionals, and an unprecedented business development engine for both. In his "spare time" Ryan continues his strong commitment to giving back, both at home in Calgary, and around the world. He spearheads Cult's ongoing monthly commitment to Ronald McDonald House and continues to lead Project Smile, the international relief organization he founded over a decade ago. He even managed to find some spare, spare time to co-author three editions of Fix: Break The Addictions That Are Killing Brands, Cult's thought leadership book that's changing the way CEOs and CMOs see the marketing function. 
