How Brands Are Built
Episodes
Alex Foss says good research starts with good questions
09 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode of How Brands Are Built, I talk with Alexander Foss about research—why it matters, what makes it valuable, and a few pitfalls to avo...
Robin Goffman is all in on Designing Brand Identity
14 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
On today's episode of How Brands Are Built, host Rob Meyerson of Heirloom speaks with Robin Goffman—brand thinker, design strategist, and founder of...
The Q&A episode
10 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
A few weeks back, on LinkedIn and Instagram, I asked whether anyone had questions about branding, naming, or other topics I might be able to speak to....
Jacob Cass ran a wildly successful summit
23 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In today's episode of How Brands Are Built, host Rob Meyerson speaks with Jacob Cass, designer, brand strategist, and founder of Just Creative, about ...
Alex Center links package design to fashion
02 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Today's guest is Alex Center, a designer and podcaster and founder of the award-winning design and branding studio, CENTER. From 2006 to 2017, Center ...
Designing Brand Identity book launch at Noise 13
20 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This episode of How Brands Are Built is a live recording of an April 25, 2024 book launch for Designing Brand Identity, sixth edition, held at Noise 1...
The Brand Names Report: A walkthrough and summary
30 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Back in February of this year, I released the first Brand Names Report, an analysis of polling data on brand names from Brand New, the leading brand ...
Fabian Geyrhalter builds and launches successful brands
13 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Rob Meyerson and Fabian Geyrhalter discuss brand strategy's balance of innovation and foundational rules, touching on brand creation challenges and su...
Rob Goodman uses content to drive business outcomes
06 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Today's guest is Rob Goodman. Rob specializes in content strategy and creative content production, with experience at companies like Google, Wix, and ...
Season four wrap-up: How brands (and branding professionals) can do good
07 Jun 2021
Contributed by Lukas
It's the summer of 2021—one year since the murder of George Floyd. And if you're wondering what that has to do with the season-four wrap-up of a po...
Diego Segura goes through the doors that open
01 Mar 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Diego Segura is a design apprentice at Collins, an independent strategy and brand experience design company with offices in New York City and San Fra...
Alina Wheeler has a doppelgänger named Blake Deutsch
21 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Today's guest is Alina Wheeler, best known as the author of Designing Brand Identity: An Essential Guide for the Whole Branding Team, now in its fifth...
Nirm Shanbhag sees brand architecture from the consumer's perspective
07 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Nirm Shanbhag is the Chief Strategy Officer of Sid Lee USA, an international creative company. He's also my old boss. Back in 2012, he was running t...
Emily Heyward builds brands that inspire obsession
23 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Emily Heyward is co-founder and and Chief Brand Officer at Red Antler, the leading brand company for startups and new ventures. Red Antler is the bra...
Armin Vit has a little grid in his mind
09 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Today's guest is Armin Vit, co-founder of UnderConsideration, a graphic design firm, and editor and writer for Brand New, the leading site for reviews...
Sunny Bonnell reframes your vices as virtues
26 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
On the podcast today: Sunny Bonnell, co-founder of Motto, one of the leading branding agencies in the country, with clients like Google, Hershey's, a...
Dava Guthmiller makes the invisible visible
12 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, I'm talking to Dava Guthmiller, founder and Chief Creative Officer at Noise 13, a brand strategy and design agency based in San Fran...
Dr. Jason Chambers explains the origins of racist brands
28 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Season four has arrived, and my first guest is Dr. Jason Chambers of the University of Illinois. The theme for this season will be a bit looser than p...
Special episode: Rob on IG Live with Ilya of Studeo
27 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
On June 11, 2020, Rob (creator and host of How Brands Are Built) joined Ilya Lobanov of Studeo on Instagram Live for a chat about brand strategy and n...
Special episode: Rob on the JUST Branding Podcast
13 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Rob joins Jacob Cass of JUST Creative and Matt Davies on their new podcast, JUST Branding. We explored best practices for naming, positioning stateme...
Mini episode: David Aaker on game-changing subcategories
27 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Today's episode features a rare repeat guest: none other than David Aaker, Professor Emeritus at the Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley, Vice-Chair ...
Mini episode: Brands reacting to COVID-19
15 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Generally, I try to make the How Brands Are Built podcast evergreen. I want listeners to be able to go back any old episode and find that the conversa...
Mini episode: Brad Flowers and The Naming Book
09 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
For the second mini episode of the podcast, I'm talking to Brad Flowers, founding partner of Bullhorn, a marketing company in Lexington, Kentucky. Br...
Mini episode: Career advice
09 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
This is the first of several "mini episodes" of How Brands Are Built. Hopefully, you saw this mentioned on social media or in the newsletter: betwee...
Season three wrap-up: How to build a brand experience
15 Jan 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Season three of the podcast featured my most wide-ranging conversations yet. I talked to guests about topics such as naming, social influence, and fus...
Denise Lee Yohn fuses brand, business, and culture
09 Dec 2019
Contributed by Lukas
My final guest for season three of the podcast is Denise Lee Yohn, author of the bestseller, What Great Brands Do: The Seven Brand-Building Principle...
Myra El-Bayoumi doesn't mind blowing up the process
02 Dec 2019
Contributed by Lukas
My guest on today's episode is Myra El-Bayoumi, Strategy Director at Character, a branding and design studio with offices in New York and San Franci...
Alan Brew sees corporate narrative as the evolution of positioning
18 Nov 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Alan Brew has been in branding since 1985. In this, episode he takes us back to that year to explain how he got into the industry and what he's seen c...
Ana Andjelic helps brands design for social influence
11 Nov 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Ana Andjelic is a strategy executive with wide-ranging experience on the agency and client sides. Recent roles include Chief Brand Officer at fashion ...
Dennis Hahn makes brand culture by Swarming
04 Nov 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Dennis Hahn is Chief Strategy Officer at Liquid Agency, a brand experience, strategy, marketing, and design agency with offices in San Jose, Portland...
Caren Williams plays creative brain games with clients
28 Oct 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Caren Williams and I met in 2012 at Interbrand San Francisco, where she was a Director of Strategy. Caren's since become an independent brand consulta...
Fabian Geyrhalter builds a brand platform in one very long day
21 Oct 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Fabian Geyrhalter is the principal and founder of FINIEN, a Los Angeles-based branding agency. Fabian's also a prolific writer; you can find articles...
Ken Pasternak plots impact versus effort
14 Oct 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Today's guest is Ken Pasternak, President of Two by Four, a full service advertising agency based in Chicago. On the episode, however, you'll hear me...
Jeremy Miller helps you unlock your team's creative genius
07 Oct 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Today's guest is Jeremy Miller, author of the bestselling book, Sticky Branding, and founder of a strategic branding and business development consul...
Season two wrap-up: Five themes for brand positioning
22 Jan 2019
Contributed by Lukas
This past season, I had a great time reconnecting with old peers like Miriam Stone, Tim Riches, and Erminio Putignano, as well as getting to talk t...
David Aaker got religion on the power of stories
10 Dec 2018
Contributed by Lukas
He's been called "The Father of Modern Branding." If you've ever read anything about branding or brand strategy, my guest today requires no introduc...
Tim Riches builds bridges held up by brand pillars
03 Dec 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Today's guest is Tim Riches, Group Strategy Director at Principals in Melbourne. I met Tim in Singapore, at FutureBrand. When I joined FutureBrand'...
Miriam Stone uses the sticky note method
26 Nov 2018
Contributed by Lukas
This week's guest is Miriam Stone, an independent strategist who works with agencies around the Bay Area, including lifestyle branding agency Noise 1...
Allen Adamson thinks Jerry Seinfeld would be a great brand manager
19 Nov 2018
Contributed by Lukas
This week's guest is Allen Adamson, Co-founder and Managing Partner of Metaforce, a boutique, hybrid marketing services firm focused on growth strat...
Erminio Putignano connects big ideas and tiny details
13 Nov 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Erminio Putignano is founding partner and managing director of PUSH, a brand strategy and design firm based in Melbourne, Australia. He's also an ad...
Adam Morgan asks clients what they hate most about their category
05 Nov 2018
Contributed by Lukas
When Adam Morgan wrote Eating the Big Fish: How Challenger Brands Can Compete Against Brand Leaders in 1999, he introduced a new term to the marketi...
Gareth Kay believes brands should show, not just tell
29 Oct 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Gareth Kay believes brands should show, not just tell Gareth Kay is cofounder of Chapter, a San Francisco-based creative studio. Before Chapter, he wa...
Laura Ries has six brand positioning principles
22 Oct 2018
Contributed by Lukas
The concept of brand positioning was introduced to the marketing and advertising world in the 70s and 80s by Al Ries and Jack Trout in a series of Ad...
Marty Neumeier wrote a business thriller
15 Oct 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Within the branding community, Marty Neumeier needs no introduction. But just for good measure, here's a quick rundown: - Director of Transformation...
Wrapping up season one: Tips for the naming process
02 Jul 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Today's episode marks the end of season one, but certainly not the end of this podcast. Plans for season two are already underway, and I'm very excite...
Eli Altman started freelance naming at age sixteen
25 Jun 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Eli Altman runs A Hundred Monkeys, a naming and branding agency in Berkeley, California. A Hundred Monkeys was founded by Eli's dad, Danny Altman, i...
Scott Milano does sprints in the morning
18 Jun 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Scott Milano is Founder and Managing Director of Tanj, a boutique brand language firm specializing in names, taglines, stories, messaging and voice st...
Laurel Sutton could talk about linguistics all day
11 Jun 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Laurel Sutton is a co-founder of Catchword, a Bay Area naming firm behind names like Asana, Vudu, and many of the activity trackers from Fitbit, like ...
Jonathan Bell starts with coffee and a sheet of paper
04 Jun 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Jonathan Bell is Managing Director of Want Branding, a brand consultancy with offices in Miami, Denver, and New York, and clients like Bose, Royal...
Amanda Peterson considers CamelCase a crime
29 May 2018
Contributed by Lukas
On this episode, I spoke with Amanda Peterson, formerly the Head of Naming and Leader of Brand Management at Google. While there, she helped establish...
Steven Price says "go," "maybe," and "maybe not"
21 May 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Steven Price runs Tessera Trademark Screening, which specializes in preliminary trademark screening, a critical step in any naming process. Steve is t...
Clive Chafer has a wonderful thesaurus
14 May 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Listen now: Clive Chafer has been a namer for almost as long as naming has been a profession. In 1987, he started at the firm now known as Lexicon, wh...
Shannon DeJong is a hummingbird and a drill
14 May 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Listen now: Shannon DeJong is the CEO of House of Who, an art house and agency based in Oakland, California, whose clients include Google, among other...
Anthony Shore's naming partner is a neural network
14 May 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Listen now: Anthony Shore is one of the most experienced namers out there. He has over 25 years of experience in naming and has introduced more than 2...
This is_ How Brands Are Built
06 Mar 2018
Contributed by Lukas
How Brands Are Built is a blog and podcast where branding professionals get into the details of what they do—and more importantly, how they do it. ...