1 week, 57 brands, 245 entries.

Last sunday, I decided I was going to track my significant interactions with brands (or branded objects / services) using Daytum.

At the time, I figured I would do this for a month.  I was blissfully unaware of how much of a time commitment that was.

So, after one week, here we are.  57 brands, 245 individual entries, and an awesome pie chart.

The top spots go to Club Monaco (37), Google (28), Apple (23), Body Shop (16), H+M (14), Starbucks (12), Roots (11), Zara (9), Tumblr (8), Twitter (8).

None of this is particularly shocking, but some specific things popped up to me looking at the information.  Roots, for instance, is just recurring use of two items, my wallet and a scarf.  But the fact that the wallet is in my pocket every day, means at least one daily interaction with Roots.  

(If someone asked me what the top ten brands I interact with were, Roots would probably not make the list.)

Similarly, Body Shop is semi-coincidence.  I bought several products on boxing day (body wash, skin cream, face wash) but don't really consider myself a Body Shop loyalist.  That said, I was interacting with up to three products from Body Shop every morning, making it outrank things like my car (Acura), my glasses (D+G) or public transportation (TTC).

Things I use every day ranked easily.  Companies that offer more than one product or service I use skyrocketed - I didn't think clothing would be such a huge factor, but it makes sense - dressing appropriately for winter requires about ten items of clothing, and I don't shop at too many different places.

The really interesting part was the changes in my behaviour brought on by knowing I would be tracking this information.  I'm conscious of the brands I associate with, but this was very different, literally altering my decisions based on thoughts like 'I've already been to Starbucks twice today, I should really try something else' and 'I don't really want to enter another brand into the tracking data, I'll wear the H+M socks instead'.  

I also began thinking about the amount of 'real estate' in my life I've decided to give to Apple, Google and Club Monaco.  Normally that was fairly invisible to me, as the justification for purchase or use is based (I hope) on functionality or enjoyment on my part.  What was more interesting to me was the amount of real estate I was giving to brands I'm more or less ambivalent about (again, Body Shop is a great example).

(I wasn't tracking instances, which is an important thing to note.  If I had been, this would have been impossible, and would be based mostly on how often I check my iPhone.)

Some of the things I use most visibly ranked substantially lower than things I don't really think about.  The brands I consider statements, or somewhat representative, did well, but not as well as a competitor with a broader product line.  This makes me wonder about the value of branding a product as a statement rather than a functional commodity.  Creating a badge that people want to be associated with is an excellent way to sell one thing.  But I was spending most days covered in stuff that wasn't overtly identifiable by brand - if the average person sees me in my day to day clothes, they won't immediately think of a brand, considering how often I get asked where some clothes are from.  Meanwhile, the bag that says 'Fred Perry' on it in massive lettering was only used once this week.

I don't know if that's a statement on me, or on the process I used, but I'm guessing it's both.

In terms of usable information, experiment fail.  But in terms of getting me to think differently about my brand interactions, it was a massive success.  

In short, the most successful brands, in terms of integrating themselves into my life, aren't the ones that I think about constantly.  I'm surrounded by brands I don't think about at all, and they are probably making a bigger subconscious impact than I think.

Oh, and I'm stopping this particular experiment.  I'm still a huge fan of Daytum, and will leave this information up there for the foreseeable future, but this was an exhausting experience.

addendum: daytum brand tracking.

A few things to add:

I'm counting individual objects / services, not instances. So, three coffees from Starbucks is 3, whereas google search gets 1 entry per day, regardless of how much googling I do. Similarly, my iPhone, Twitter, Tumblr usage is really just checking in on the same service again and again.

This puts a focus on brands that offer multiple discrete products or points of service. Physical products get an advantage, which I think reflects the greater impression a physical product can make.

As well, a magazine gets a mention, but not the brands featured within. TV is being left out, as I track that independently on daytum.

I'm also not counting independent / one-off stores.  Interestingly, I decided not to count Futureshop, as the experience had little to do with the store.  I came in, got a gift, and paid.  Futureshop as an entity had little to do with the process other than being the box it took place in.

This is already more work than I had anticipated.

how i will drive myself mad.

I was recently invited into the beta for Daytum, a personal data tracking site that you can read the interesting history of here.  (It's the progeny of the Feltron Annual Reports, and if you're a design geek like myself, knowing that the same guy is one of the Daytum co-creators just made you click the link and read the slideshow.)

I was trying to figure out which things about myself I should be recording, and the very last thing that came to mind was tracking what brands I use, and how often.  Clearly, this owes a massive (and total) debt to the Brand Timeline idea created by Dear Jane Sample.

The concept (and rules) are as follows.  Every branded object / service that I interact with on a meaningful level gets noted.  Each object / service only gets noted once per day, otherwise apple would get a mark every time I checked my phone, which is enlightening, but not in the way I'm aiming for.  If I mentally associate a brand with a larger parent brand, that's where the mark goes, such as giving google the nod when using blogger.  If something fades into the background, it doesn't get noted.  I know my furniture is from Ikea, but once I bought it, it's seems more like it's part of my room than it does an Ikea product.

I'm totally aware these rules are somewhat arbitrary, but I need to set certain minimum requirements to keep the workload from this plausible.

I'm hoping that 1) this doesn't drive me completely insane, and 2) I can be consistent enough to develop some interesting information regarding which brands I use constantly versus irregularly, and how much of my mental 'brandscape' they make up.

That said, I do still need to work a day job and lead some kind of life, so I can guarantee it won't be 100% accurate.

You can see my Daytum page here.  It is likely utterly boring to everyone except myself.