The New Familiar with Josie Ellerbee

How do leading brands like Oreo, KFC, and Sephora manage to surprise and delight customers while remaining instantly recognizable? In this episode of CoverBrand, host Ethan Decker welcomes brand strategist Josie Ellerbee to explore the art and science of balancing stability with innovation. Josie shares insights from her 15+ year career, discussing the importance of a strong brand foundation amid the rise of AI, rampant templating, and a marketplace craving for both reliability and novelty.

Listeners will discover actionable tactics—whether you run a consumer goods powerhouse, a B2B firm, or a service-based organization—to avoid the pitfalls of becoming too predictable or chaotically inconsistent. Tune in for practical strategies, fresh examples, and expert wisdom on how to make your brand stand out for the right reasons.

Main Topics Covered:

• Why brands struggle between being too consistent (boring) or too novel (chaotic)
• Real-life branding wins: Oreo's celebrity collabs, KFC’s creative Colonel swaps, Cards Against Humanity’s brilliant stunts
• When and how to refresh a brand without losing its identity
• The impact of AI on branding—both for systematizing and pushing creativity
• How even B2B and service brands can inject novelty without diluting their message
• Creating flexible but focused brand strategies to guide innovation
• The importance of brand strategy in navigating change and maintaining relevance

Links to Additional Resources:

• Work with Josie.
• The Bear (FX TV show featuring Eddie Vedder’s cover): The Bear on Hulu

Feeling stuck between too much sameness and risky chaos in your branding? Want to leverage novelty without losing your brand’s core identity? This episode is your playbook. For personalized guidance, reach out to Josie Ellerbee or visit appliedbrandscience.com for more on building resilient, engaging brands in the AI era.

Subscribe to Cover Brand for more insights into the world of branding and marketing. Share this episode with a friend who could benefit from these strategies, and head over to appliedbrandscience.com to dive deeper into the principles of brand science. Your success starts here!

Castmagic and Descript used to create drafts and then edited with human eyes, ears, and hands. Produced by BiCurean.com

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