Mobile, big data, content and disruption, the usual suspects, were all marched across the stage at the 2013 Ad Age Digital Conference. One theme, close to all our hearts, truly dominated: the humans that give every brand their reason for being.

Whether the motives behind it are altruistic, dollar-driven or both, the result does seem to be better experiences for people. From insights to new levels of convenience to heart-wrenching, real-life adverstories, at this year’s Ad Age Digital Conference, humanity was the bee in every business’ bonnet.

Some were using it to greater effect or on a more meaningful level than others. Google, for example, walked the walk, eschewing any talk of "digital marketing," opting instead to talk about storytelling. They didn’t just talk about it, but presented it in a way that embodied the ideas they were touting, wowing a late-afternoon crowd with a spine-tingling, genuinely engaging and human-pleasing experience.

Before we get too gooey, congratulating our Adland peers on being human after all, let’s not forget what this is all in aid of: sales, naturally. In these digitally enabled times it does appear, though, that the efforts of businesses to appeal to our human needs and desires is actually resulting in a better time for people.

Digital video and original content is a great example. People like watching TV, movies and videos. If we’re to believe the speakers at Ad Age, people just like watching in general. People also like and need to watch on their own schedule, and they don’t want to pay too much or for things they don’t watch.

Starting from these basic human insights and then applying technology to the problem has brought new companies and business models into being: companies like Netflix, Hulu, Redbox and, more recently, Aereo. Aereo, using tiny digital TV antennas, allows consumers to view live broadcast television in HD on any internet-connected screen. Rejecting the traditional bundled options existing cable companies offer, CEO Chet Kanojia said the idea was to create a digital "cable" option from the consumer perspective, "to connect the dots for consumers so they can access the TV they want."

It’s an idea that has caused more than a little controversy among the TV establishment, but has ultimately resulted in more options and better access for the TV-viewing public. Hulu takes a similarly disruptive view, using their digital capabilities to free them from the usual constraints of scheduling and ratings, and allowing them to focus on finding and creating quality content tailored to their wide range of viewers. Again, it’s a new approach to raking in the bucks for business, that absolutely pays off for the viewer.

As ideas go, putting people at the center of any brand endeavor, digital or not, may seem more common sense than mind-blowing. But with brands and businesses properly putting their weight behind the effort, it appears we humans can only win.

Claire Falloon is a Senior Consultant in Verbal Identity for Interbrand.

Thanks a billion: Making names pay

Words are free. Well, they start out free, anyway. When developing a new name for a product, service, or business, it's easy to window-shop, imagining how your brand might look wearing this word or that. Then the search gets serious, and you spend time and creative effort to find ones that represent your business accurately. An investment in linguistic and validation research follows, and the ever-important trademark registration. At what point, exactly, does a word transform from a handful of letters into a valuable asset that's synonymous with the brand it represents?

It takes time and investment to turn a word into a widely recognized brand, but it can pay off handsomely. Forbes noted that names can come to comprise a major portion of a business's total valuation: "'Google,' 'Walmart' and 'Microsoft'—all trademarked names—represent a significant chunk of their owners' overall worth." This means, potentially, billions of dollars.

And the equity in a name goes beyond dollar signs. It has the power to inspire, to differentiate, to help your audiences understand that you're the right choice. It's a simple sound, a few syllables, yet it can have the power to move markets.

So how did the journey from "apple" to Apple™ happen? A word becomes a billion-dollar asset when iconic products are combined with concerted brand-building efforts. This special mixture yields value—a value that's captured in the name. As that value grows, so does the need to protect the name from misuse and outright piracy. Enter trademark legal.

Brands and trademarks are often considered synonymous. They're related, but far from the same. You can register a trademark and not have a valuable brand, but it's impossible to build a valuable brand without owning its trademark.

Trademarks are the quickest, most cost-effective way to ensure your name is exclusively yours. As every brand owner knows, differentiation is key. As the value of your brand and name grows, it's the power of the trademark that keeps would-be infringers at bay. For this reason, "the strength of its trademark defines the power of your brand."

Owning a trademark doesn't guarantee your name or the brand behind it will become a billion-dollar asset. But it does provide the legal foundation on which you can build a free word into a prized aspect of your brand's identity.

This week's guest authors are Jerome McDonnell, Global Trademark Director, and Ilan Beesen, Senior Consultant, Verbal Identity.

Pictured: Martin Cooper (from ArrayComm) & Facebook Home

Yesterday the world celebrated the 40th anniversary of Motorola's demonstration of its portable telephone, the DYNA TAC system. Martin Cooper, then Vice President of Motorola, Inc., is said to have called a rival at AT&T's Bell Labs from the streets of New York City. According to an April 3, 1973 press release from Motorola, the new portable phone was expected to be available for public use as soon as 1976. The cell phone took a bit longer to take off with the public, but four decades later smartphones have become part of our daily lives and today president and CEO, AT&T Mobility, Ralph de la Vega was on hand at Facebook's big unveiling of Facebook Home.

As David Vales, Senior Systems Engineer for Interbrand, noted in his recent blog post, Smart Phone Sector Heats Up With Big Launches, with BlackBerry's Z10 now available in the US and Samsung's release of the S4, which Vales describes as "very impressive," the smartphone race is intensifying. Today's Facebook unveiling was the introduction of Home, software designed to "turn your Android phone into a great, living, social phone," according to Tom Alison and Adam Mosseri in Facebook's newsroom. The first phone to come with Home pre-installed will be the HTC First, available exclusively from AT&T on April 12. Home will be downloadable on other Android devices, but won't have all of the features of HTC First.

"Apps aren't at the center, but people are at the center and we bought into that" said de la Vega at the event. The new Home-ready HTC First phone will run on AT&T's 4G LTE network and will cost $99.99. Tech writer Chris Taylor who heads Mashable's editorial team commented, "Great coup for HTC and AT&T -- probably the largest captive audience they've had for a phone announcement." Mark Zuckerberg noted, "By putting people first, and then apps, it's one of many small, but meaningful changes in our relationship with technology over time."

Facebook Home brings its News Feed experience to users' mobile home screen. The new Home experience includes Cover Feed, Notifications, App Launcher, Instagram and Chat Heads. The latter, a mobile messenger that allows users to reply directly to friends instantly or move a floating head image of a friend when not ready to respond, inspired strong reactions in the comments section of Mashable's live streaming of the event. Chris Taylor reacted,"'Chatheads.' -- really?" and "'Chathead.' it really is going to take a while to get used to that word." 

Caitlin Barrett, Associate Director of Verbal Identity for Interbrand and the creative lead for Naming, responds to the name Chat Heads, "It's hard to say whether Chat Heads will change behaviors and expectations the way the 'Like' button did, but the name is just as absurdly simple—and perfectly aligns with the new chat experience." 

Barrett adds, "Is it awkward? A bit, as it doesn't seem necessary to specify the parts of your friends with which you're chatting. And it doesn't fall naturally into everyday conversation: Will we talk about it like a platform? 'We talked on Chat Heads earlier today…' Or an activity? 'Let's Chat Heads later tonight.' This might very well be the point. If Facebook wants this to simply be the way we chat on Facebook, perhaps it doesn't want to take the hit by trying to brand what could easily become a generic term for this new style of chat. So is it a bad name? Certainly not. We all giggled at the iPad when it was first launched too, but as long as the functionality proves to be differentiated and useful, the name will cease to be part of the story."

What does Facebook Home for Android mean for Apple? Several commenters in Mashable's chat and on Twitter expressed new shifting interest from Apple phones to Android. 

As discussed on CNBC recently, concerns about Apple are growing. Colin Gillis of BGC Financial, CNBC's Jon Fortt and Interbrand's Jez Frampton discussed the slowdown in orders at China's Foxconn and if this is a sign of problems for Apple. Frampton observed, "In terms of the brand, there's no doubt about the fact that Apple still is one of the pacesetters in the market, Samsung are giving them a good run for their money, but this lack of innovation is a concern. To be honest we've been taught as consumers to expect the next new thing every other week almost, and now they're slow on the iPhone 5S. And what's next? Where's Apple TV?"

Gillis added, "The market is still valuing [Apple] well north of $400 billion, but the market is changing. What we're seeing is lower cost competitors are getting traction. ...For Apple to maintain their margins and to maintain the volume units, they need to keep innovating and that's an issue for the company right now."

What does it mean for Google? Commentor Lance Ulanoff asked Chris Taylor during the live chat today, "Has anyone asked specifically about Google+? Chris Taylor responded, "Nope, but this really does seem like another nail in Google+'s coffin." JoeyMartin91 commented, "If I'm Google, I'm nervous. Facebook just took my niche market and rewrapped it." Robert Stephens, founder of The Geek Squad and former CTO of Best Buy, tweeted:

QOTD "@parislemon: Facebook not forking Android -- more like spooning it."

— Robert Stephens (@rstephens) April 4, 2013

The reveal today raises a number of questions about privacy concerns, battery life and, of course, consumer interest. Understanding consumers will have many questions, Facebook has planned for trials of Home before users commit to downloading it or purchasing the HTC First pre-loaded with Home, a smart move. We'll also be following this initial post with more on Home and what it means for the marketplace in blogs to come.

Amy Edel-Vaughn is Interbrand's Community Manager.

As the 5-day SXSW® (@SXSW) Interactive Festival comes to a close today, it celebrates 18 years of providing a unique and unmatched culture of inspired creativity and international community. The combined entities of SXSW Interactive, Film and Music will be the highest revenue-generating event for the city of Austin this year with projections easily surpassing $200 million. 

While a predominantly start-up culture initially differentiated SXSW Interactive, the festival is now inclusive of both the bootstrapping entrepreneur and the corporate giant. As a festival veteran and attendee this year, I will try to distill the main themes that emerged from the 2013 talks and symposiums.

#TheGreaterGood

While SXSW Interactive continues to be a wellspring of inspiration for emerging and potentially disruptive technology, a growing number of panels focused on the societal outcomes beyond digital tools and platforms. Elon Musk (@elonmusk), an SXSW Interactive keynote speaker and CEO of Tesla Motors and SpaceX, delivered a well-received session. He stressed the application of technology to solve the problems of sustainable energy and "non-terrestrial" exploration. 

Former Vice President Al Gore (@algore) spoke at length about our "stalker economy" — how forms of surveillance are being monetized, such as check-in apps, RFID tags, embedded cookies and geo-location, and that we will inevitably reach an impasse. Apps such as Snapchat (@Snapchat) allow the privacy-conscious to enjoy being social without accruing a potentially incriminating digital record. 

The tech-savvy Cory Booker (@CoryBooker) lists among his many mayoral credentials an impressive Twitter following of 1.3 million people. He emphasized using social media channels to expand degrees of political and civic influence and, more importantly, as a potent vehicle for delivering hope and inspiration.

TED celebrity Cindy Gallop (@cindygallop) returned to SXSW Interactive to discuss enhancements to her Make Love Not Porn properties — digital platforms that work to course correct sexual misconceptions stemming from hardcore pornography viewing. At the core of her multi-faceted and controversial initiatives, however, is a concern for more humane types of intimacy, reproductive health and safety. Always a provocative persona, Gallop, whose panel coincided with Al Gore's, tweeted: "At 3.30pm today, don't do @algore, do me. As it were :)"

#TheInternetOfThings

Tim Berners-Lee (@timberners_lee), inventor of the World Wide Web, spoke about the past, present and future state of the internet on Sunday morning. The Internet of Things — a term Kevin Ashton coined to describe the connected network of intelligent machines — was long foreseen by Berners-Lee, who was adamant that the Web be preserved "as a space where any compatible device works." Berners-Lee expressed excitement over the versatility of HTML5 and the surge in coding literacy. He also cautioned about potential threats to this expansive connectivity, namely ISP interference, state surveillance and a lack of robust digital rights management (DRM) protocol.

The frog SXSW Interactive opening party, titled "The Other Singularity" — a playful Kurzweillian twist, provided a compelling take on The Internet of Things, exploring how smart connectivity will extend to mundane gadgets and impact our lives in the future. Reminiscent of conceptual designers Dunne & Raby, the frog technologists exposed SXSWers to a crowd-sourced DJ jukebox platform, a robotic Zen gardener, smart Porta Potties and a user-device controlled "light as ink" installation.

#WearableTech

Echoing the growing presence of hardware at the festival, SXSW featured exciting developments in wearable tech that introduced new form factors and HCI models altogether. Leap Motion (@LeapMotion) — a motion controller peripheral for PCs and Macs — debuted at SXSW with much fanfare. Designed for detecting precise hand gestures with little-to-no latency, the product boasts an accuracy 200 times that of its Kinect predecessor, and might someday be integrated into standard computer hardware. In the demos, drawing with your finger in the air appeared effortless, and the fidelity of the motion capture was remarkable. Leap Motion CEO and co-founder Michael Buckwald sees his product as a solution for faster modeling with 3D software in addition to the obvious gaming applications and will be available to consumers in May.

Google and its oft discussed Google Glass (@projectglass) technology stole the show on Monday as Timothy Jordan, Senior Developer Advocate and presenter, provided SXSW developers a first look at the Google Glass Mirror API and app integrations for Gmail, The New York Times, Evernote and Path. The glasses feature a small screen visible over your right eye with a microcomputer in the right arm of the eyewear. As Jordan flipped through news articles on his glasses in front of an awestruck audience, the excitement was palpable and served as a key element of Google's product socialization — a reminder that your digital products are only as good as the developers who are excited to continually redefine the envelope of possibilities.

#DIYHardware

There was a noticeable and shifting emphasis this year of hardware and devices over software and social apps and platforms. MakerBot CEO and keynote presenter Bre Pettis (@bre) introduced the "Digitizer" — a 3D desktop laser scanner that eliminates the need for computer-aided design (CAD). MakerBot (@MakerBot), along with MaKey MaKey from the MIT Media Lab (@medialab), Arduino microcontrollers (@Arduino) and the Raspberry Pi (@Raspberry_Pi), are ushering in a new era of affordable DIY power tools. 

This democratization of technology coincides with the proliferation of open source and entry level hardware projects and is part of a larger Maker Movement that supports STEM education and seeks to revive American manufacturing, and subsequently the economy, through a growing and technologically skilled labor force. Next year I'm anticipating another spike in hardware start-ups that will descend upon Austin.

#SocialXSW

SXSW is an inherently social festival. Simple advice for a strong appearance in Austin: be memorable and be talked about. Internet star and meme sensation Grumpy Cat (@RealGrumpyCat) became an instant Austin celebrity as people waited hours to take pictures with the frowning feline. The Game of Thrones (@GameOfThrones) guerilla campaign was a smash hit as SXSWers took pictures of themselves on the Iron Throne in the Convention Center. Who would have thought that tech nerds would be drawn to Sci-Fi-/Fantasy?

#NextBigThing

While there was no discernible unveiling on par with the historic Twitter or FourSquare debuts, two apps and a platform did make an impression at SXSW, with social media chatter, investment and downloads to prove it. Takes is a camera app that transforms still photos into dynamic video, with filter and music options. MessageMe (@msgme) is a group messaging app that allows users to send rich content in addition to SMS, such as songs, videos and doodles. 

Realty Mogul (@Realty_Mogul), a real-estate crowdfunding platform won the HATCH pitch competition held at the 2012 SXSW Startup Village. The Los Angeles-based start-up provides a vehicle for "accredited investors to pool money online and buy shares of real property like office buildings, apartment buildings and retail centers."

This was the largest SXSW Interactive to date with an estimated 27,000 to 28,000 registered attendees. An optimal SXSW Interactive experience is a blend of inspiring and structured speaker sessions with the impromptu and organic discussions — convivial exchange that happens away from the official venues. I can't wait for next year’s festival.

Forest Young is Associate Creative Director at Interbrand New York.

Self-driving cars have seen a lot of progress in the past year, but the latest represents a surprising intersection of robotics and consumer tech. Oxford University students recently demonstrated how an Apple iPad can be used as the control center for a self-driving Nissan. It can engage “autopilot” on familiar routes, avoid obstacles and pedestrians, and return control to the driver with a touch of the breaks.

Cool-factor aside, this is one of many recent examples of how consumer software and technology are finding their ways into product classes traditionally dominated by industrial heavyweights. Some near century-old giants of automotive, aerospace and manufacturing are finding new competitors in previously unrelated categories.

• The Federal Aviation Administration recently granted permission to American Airlines to use the iPad as pilots’ resource for regulations and aircraft manuals. In addition to eliminating 35 lbs. of paper from the pilots’ flight bags, it allows the airline to avoid costly aircraft retrofits with dedicated electronic flight bag consoles.
• MirrorLink, a technology that duplicates the display and touch controls of smartphones into automotive head-units, is gaining support from device and entertainment companies. This could compromise automakers' ability to market their own branded infotainment and telematics systems and maintain consistency of the driving experience.
• The increasing accessibility of 3D printing technology is threatening to disrupt the value chains of all kinds of industries. There are implications for intellectual property, labor, the size and location of plant and equipment, shipping and – perhaps most importantly – product design. 3D printers are already being used to make on-demand spare parts, prosthetics and product prototypes.

The modern computing landscape, characterized by pocket-sized devices stuffed with sensors and backed by vast cloud computing power, has changed consumers’ expectations for usability, connectivity and access to the state-of-the-art. For brands whose product lifecycles are measured in decades, it will be ever more important to develop platforms that allow their products to keep pace with the innovation happening around them.

The components of Brand Strength can be helpful tools for looking at this challenge. Some manufactures will attempt to stake out their differentiation with proprietary branded solutions, at the risk of losing relevance because of rapid obsolescence. Others will try to maintain relevance by creating transparent conduits for consumers’ existing tech ecosystems, at the risk of commoditizing their own products and compromising consistency. Successful brands in the durable goods and industrial categories will see these components not as tradeoffs, but as mutual necessities in maintaining and growing brand value.

Alex Foss is an Associate Consultant, Brand Strategy at Interbrand San Francisco.