Cornelius the rooster. You might not know the name, but you’ll know the OG of the breakfast table by sight.
You’ll also probably have seen Kellogg’s mascot brought to life for the first time in its ad, ‘See You in the Morning’.
This is a masterclass in using your most distinctive brand assets to make your brand memorable, recognisable and become the go-to choice when it’s time to buy. You might also know this as building salience or mental availability.
Kellogg’s does this by using its famous mascot to make it the breakfast choice for a generation who probably don’t even put milk on their cereal.
You don’t need a 100+ year history to do this. There are always lessons from the big brands that can be applied to their smaller counterparts. This short guide outlines how your brand can be both distinctive and different. We explore the design principles behind some of the world’s biggest brands and give practical tips to cure your brand boredom, whatever your company’s size.
Most organisations have put time and effort into the fundamentals — the visual and verbal tools that help them stand out from the pack.
These tools usually include your name, logo, choice of typeface, use of colour, packaging design, etc. But, how distinct are they?
Distinctive brands aren’t just for B2C
Brands that are considered ‘serious’ (like professional and financial services) also benefit from distinctive brand assets. Insurance brand Geico struggled with recognition until its Gecko mascot stepped in.
There’s no get-out clause for B2B
Successful B2B brands have long leaned into this consumer-like buying behaviour.
We’re all human beings, and the lines between B2B and B2C have now become blurred beyond all recognition. In an increasingly noisy marketplace, your brand needs to work hard to stand out among similar suppliers and service providers.
B2B brands are drowning in a sea of sameness
LinkedIn’s B2B Institute analysed 300+ assets from 59 brands across six B2B categories. It tested for recognition and attribution.
The researchers found that on the whole, ‘B2B brands are all drowning in a sea of sameness. Every brand is blue, every brand is saying the same things in the same way’.
So… the question for every brand owner battling in the same space as everything else is ‘are we pushing our brand to be distinctive enough?’
The answer is yes for only a fraction of firms.
‘Business-centric brand marketers are focusing more on building value rather than just driving sales.’
Stephen Lepitak, AdWeek
Key insight: Most brands are forgettable
According to a Forrester forecast, trillions are ploughed into marketing — $47tr this year. This may make your eyes water.
Measuring the impact
IPSOS tested five types of brand assets (logos, slogans, mascots, colour and product) with over 26,000 respondents to understand recognition and attribution. It tested perceptions of a diverse mix of brands and their assets. IPSOS found that 85% were being wasted.
Where’s the waste?
Only 15% of assets tested were found to be Gold standard, or truly distinctive. Just 19% of logos were truly distinctive, slogans came in at 6%, mascots came in at 16%, colour was just 4%, and product did better at 31%.
Example: Mastercard
Mastercard broke the mould when it dropped its name from its logo six years ago.
You’ll know the visual symbol — overlapping red and yellow circles. Its other distinct brand assets include the word ‘Priceless’, and a melody (also launched six years ago) which became its sonic brand. Mastercard also released an album, ‘Priceless’, in which up-and-coming artists put their twist on the music.
The melody, which is memorable and recognisable, helps increase trust and spark brand loyalty. The brand’s chief marketing and communications officer Rajamannar explains: ‘Hearing our transaction sound at the end of a payment experience has been shown to increase consumer trust by four times’.
It’s more than a corporate jingle that never changes. The sound can be adapted to context. For example, employees and their brand network can use their AI-powered sonic studio to create sonic DNA tracks for their own purposes, like a trade show.
The sonic boom
Brands are increasingly exploring sonic cues as a way to cut through.
As Rajamannar explains: ‘People are bombarded with over 3,000 brand messages a day, yet they remember only one or two. Our multi-sensory approach allows us to cut through this clutter and capture people’s attention’. In general, brands investing in sonic branding achieve 76% higher brand power and 138% higher perceptions of advertising strength, according to Kantar.
What we can learn
Sure, it’ll take nerve to be creatively different. And as we discussed earlier, you don’t need the marketing heft of a big brand to do this. You’ll need a well-crafted brand strategy, vision, a forensic understanding of your purpose, position and customers, and be bold enough to take the creative leap. Inaction costs.
Key insight: Brand boredom is real
People are increasingly bored by brands. GenZ is most likely to yawn. The good thing is that creative marketing wakes them up.
Here’s what SAP Emarsys found:
• Boredom means 46% of UK GenZ shoppers in the UK have ditched a brand they were once loyal to. The figure dips to 29% for the general population.
• 30% of GenZ say they have tried a new brand because of its creative marketing. The figure stands at 23% of the general population.
Navigating brand boredom
Customers like predictability and familiarity… up to a point.
Boring or cookie-cutter creative will just make them gloss over, click away, scroll on or skip. This raises the question: Why do so many websites and apps look the same? The logos on some websites (professional services especially) could be swapped and customers might not even notice.
As briefly discussed earlier, categories get wrapped up in a specific colour. Most financial services firms, for example, think inside the colour wheel and go for blue or red. Researchers Lauren Labrecque and George Milne found that blue is used in over 75% of credit card brand logos.
In the deluge of online ads, these types of visual cues can give people an unconscious message, but if you follow colour convention, are you truly standing out? Colour psychology isn’t watertight. You could just be building salience for your category, not your brand. And here’s the thing. You need more than colour to earn recognition and stick in people’s minds.
‘Standing out has never been more important.’
Marketing Week
Example: Coca-Cola
Few brands have assets as instantly recognisable — and fiercely protected — as Coca-Cola.
The contoured bottle. The red ribbon. The looping script. All of them steeped in memory, loaded with meaning and undeniably distinctive.
Let’s start with the bottle. First introduced in 1915, the ‘hobble-skirt’ silhouette was designed to be recognisable in the dark or smashed on the floor. More than a container, it’s a brand signal. Even when rendered in silhouette, it’s unmistakably Coke. Then there’s the red. Not just any red — Coca-Cola red. It’s been part of the brand’s visual identity since the late 1800s, used to make the barrels stand out from the competition. Today, it’s the backdrop for every billboard, fridge and vending machine. In a crowded category, Coca-Cola owns that colour.
Material matters too. Coke still shows up in glass bottles and aluminium cans — deliberately tactile, refreshingly cold. These formats evoke nostalgia and authenticity, giving the brand cultural weight. A glass bottle on a summer
day isn’t just a drink — it’s a brand experience. It’s all been thought about.
Finally, the logotype. Flowing, Spencerian script that hasn’t changed much in over a century. It’s a signature in the truest sense. Hand-drawn, human, and full of heritage. Unlike the stripped-back sans-serifs favoured by others, Coca-Cola’s logotype refuses to chase trends.
What we can learn
Distinctive assets don’t just make a brand recognisable — they make it unforgettable. And once you’ve got them, guard them like treasure.
‘Design a bottle so distinct that it could be recognised by touch in the dark, or when lying broken on the ground.’
Coca-Cola bottle design brief, 1915
Key insight: Dull brands burn budget
‘Most ads leave audiences feeling nothing’.
This was one of the headline findings from the research team at System1, who teamed up with Adam and Peter Field to better understand the impact of UK and US ads, specifically those that triggered a neutral emotional response.
Their findings add more weight to the IPSOS research. Testing more than 100,000 ads, they found that ‘most ads leave audiences feeling nothing’. For the average UK TV ad, 52% of responses were emotionally neutral. Neutral ads can increase mental availability and drive some sales, but they’re not as efficient as ads that make a positive emotional impact, making a brand more memorable and helping it build positive associations. As the report authors point out, ‘the problem of Dull isn’t damage. It’s waste’.
Key findings
• 48% of B2C ad responses are neutral
• 78% of B2B ad responses are neutral
The cost of campaigns that don’t stand out
Average cost (£million per annum) by category to match campaigns that inspired people to share or talk about them.
• Retail — £17m
• Durables — £16m
• Financial services — £10.8m
• Non-financial services — £7.1m
• CPG non-food/drink — £4.7m
• CPG food/drink — £2.9m
Example: LEGO®
There was a time when Lego nearly lost the plot. In the early 2000s, the brand overreached with theme parks, video games, clothing lines — a dizzying array of product lines.
The result? Confusion, bloated costs and a steady decline in relevance. The company that once fuelled childhood imagination started to feel… boring.
The turnaround didn’t come from something new. It came from going back to what made Lego matter in the first place — their distinctive yellow brick. The simple, plastic, click-together system that had powered generations of play.
Lego made the brick the hero again. But this time, they combined it with cultural franchises that kids (and parents) already loved. Star Wars. Harry Potter. Marvel. The strategy was to use their most distinctive asset, but layer it with storytelling and characters that spark obsession. Suddenly, building a spaceship or castle wasn’t just open-ended play — it was stepping into a familiar universe.
The partnerships weren’t skin-deep, either. Lego’s strength has always been its ability to turn complexity into creativity. A Millennium Falcon or Hogwarts Castle made of bricks isn’t just a replica — it’s an way to rebuild, remix and reimagine.
What we can learn
When in doubt, go back to your most distinctive asset. Not what’s trendy, new or will satisfy your accountant. For Lego, it wasn’t about reinventing the wheel — it was about realising the wheel was already perfect.
They just needed to fit it to a different vehicle, then hit the accelerator.
‘Jørgen Vig Knudstorp turned Lego around by going back to basics.’
James Moore, The Independent
Key insight: Distinction requires ‘difference’
It’s hard to build distinctive assets without first creating true brand differentiation.
You’ll have probably worked out what you want to be known for. We call this your point of difference. Most successful businesses are already heavily invested in creating a differentiated brand experience.
In our experience, there are only two bulletproof ways to develop your point of difference, and both have their pitfalls.
1. Doing something unique
If you’re a product brand, unless you own a patent, chances are your uniqueness has a short shelf life. If you’re a services brand (like a law firm) — then every competitor may superficially claim to offer similar services, at a similar level for a similar price.
2. Doing something better
Most brands have invested in the hot pursuit of creating a differentiated, frictionless customer experience. For years, speed, convenience, consistency, friendliness and human touch have been the CX mantra. But are the elements that are now automated or digitised making brands forgettable and adding to the boredom?
How many third-party apps do you use to book a trip, for example? We’re all often once-removed from the original brand we travel and stay with. You need to work hard to build salience at every encounter.
Do two things to move forward
- Nail your point of difference, and
- Create distinct brand assets
Example: The Feather Company
A distinctive visual language built around their unique point of difference.
The Feather Company, a specialist manufacturer of luxury feather and down bedding, hadn’t touched its brand for more than a decade. We recommended repositioning, injecting consistency into its materials and using its distinct feather illustrations to enhance recognition.
As you might expect, their business is all about feathers. The clue’s in the name. They know them better than anyone else. Our approach was to simplify their messaging and celebrate their expertise, which helped us to introduce a premium visual language to work alongside a refined product portfolio, increasing brand loyalty and driving up sales by +300%. Using insights from the manufacturing team, we designed a new identity system that focused on the products.
By stripping everything back, we communicated the messages at the heart of the brand; the products are hand-made using generations of experience, the materials are rigorously selected from responsible, cruelty-free supply chains, and it is a family-owned business. These principles became the backbone of our approach.
The visual identity took the form of two distinct brand marks: ‘The Feather Company’ wordmark and the ‘TF’ symbol. These assets work interchangeably across various applications, helping the brand feel considered in every setting. Restrained use of colour helped champion the products, pushing the attention back onto the materials and craftsmanship. Using the new brand proposition, we mapped all essential customer journeys (consumer and B2B).
From there, we could identify and design each touchpoint — from initial website discovery to product portfolio, photography, packaging and other printed materials such as receipts, labels and swing tags.
‘We’ve noticed an increase in sales, especially with our higher-priced products.’
Gareth Monro, Managing Director, The Feather Company
How to overcome your own brand boredom
Three questions to ask yourself
1. What makes us undeniably ‘us’?
Use your customer, competitor and market insights to do some soul searching. What makes you different? As mentioned earlier, this differentiation guides your distinctiveness.
• Define your brand’s purpose and position. What do you stand for? What’s the value in your offer?
• Revisit your brand story. What narrative do you want to share?
• Rethink your brand identity. Does your identity (your visual and verbal tools) carry the shift? Do they reflect your values and personality?
• Revisit your messaging. Is there consistency in your messaging?
2. What’s holding us back?
Identify and purge any old assets that mean your look and feel is indistinct and inconsistent. Don’t dilute your brand. The sweet spot is three or four assets. This makes it easier for customers to build associations. Focus on the ones that will make your brand easily recognisable and memorable. (Some marketing teams put too much focus on the meaning of their assets rather than their distinctiveness, which can lead to assets that are neither.)
Which elements are already building salience? If you’re a brand with heritage, take care. You won’t want to throw this away. Fight the urge for novelty and newness. Embedding your assets takes time. Once you’ve earned salience, you’ll want to flex and stretch your most distinctive assets. This could be years down the line. It takes time to build recognition and become memorable.
3. How do we become ruthlessly consistent?
Don’t read this as boring. This just means you’re presenting your brand in a way that’s indisputably ‘you’ – at every touchpoint and on every surface. If the answer is not yet, we’re in design 101 territory. Distinctiveness, consistency and quality creative are essential to ensure your brand elements reinforce brand recognition and build a strong, memorable identity.
