Forty years ago this week, John Lennon & Yoko Ono made camp in suite 1742 of Montreal’s Queen Elizabeth Hotel. What began as a quiet protest against the Vietnam war became known as their ‘Bed In for Peace.’

The suite, which today is marked with a commemorative plaque, was visited by many other New York celebrities that week, including Timothy Leary, Petula Clark and others. More than 200 Beatles fans loitered in the lobby for days, once Lennon & Ono’s whereabouts was known.

Explaining their ‘bed in’ to the press, Lennon simply repeated, “All we are saying, is give peace a chance.” And on June 1, 1969, they recorded the soon-to-be-famous song:

Ev’rybody’s talkin’ ’bout
Bagism, Shagism, Dragism, Madism, Ragism, Tagism
This-ism, that-ism, ism ism ism
All we are saying is give peace a chance
All we are saying is give peace a chance

(C’mon)
Ev’rybody’s talkin’ ’bout
Minister, Sinister, Banisters and Canisters,
Bishops, Fishops, Rabbis, and Pop Eyes, Bye bye, Bye byes
All we are saying is give peace a chance
All we are saying is give peace a chance

(Let me tell you now)
Ev’rybody’s talkin’ ’bout
Revolution, Evolution, Masturbation, Flagellation, Regulation,
Integrations, mediations, United Nations, congratulations
All we are saying is give peace a chance
All we are saying is give peace a chance

Ev’rybody’s talkin’ ’bout
John and Yoko, Timmy Leary, Rosemary,
Tommy Smothers, Bobby Dylan, Tommy Cooper,
Derek Taylor, Norman Mailer, Alan Ginsberg, Hare Krishna
Hare Hare Krishna
All we are saying is give peace a chance
All we are saying is give peace a chance
(Repeat ’til the tape runs out)

The names mentioned in the last verse is the list of friends who sang with John & Yoko to record the song.

So reads the headline in a recent article in The Economist about Nigeria’s government’s attempte to ‘rebrand’ their nation. Their subhead, ‘The government of a great nation tries a short cut to salvation,’ seems to sum up the author’s perspective: “Got a problem…? Don’t fix it! Rebrand it!”

Unfortunately for Nigeria, this would seem to be the misguided strategy.

It’s hard from this distance to criticize the intentions of Dora Akunyili, the new minister of information, and the person responsible for the new ‘Nigeria: Good People, Great Nation’ campaign. But it is revealing, I think, that the previous attempt at a rebrand (‘Nigeria, Heart of Africa’) failed.

In both cases, the foremost criticism in-country has been that “Nigerians say their government should tackle the country’s fundamental problems—power shortages, crime and corruption—before worrying about its image.” Of course, nothing is so connected to ‘image’ as the authentic facts of any brand. In Nigeria’s case, the facts include rankings of Lagos as the worst place in the world for expatriates to live. Surely if the aim of the information minister is to build Nigeria’s esteem overseas, the $1M spent from government coffers for the new campaign could have been put to better use reducing crime, repairing roads, and improving sanitation.

A simple Google search reveals an endless list of references to Nigeria’s rebranding efforts. But the lesson i this short Economist piece is a simple one: Branding only works when builds an image based on credible insights. Successful strategies leverage strengths on which the brand can build. In Nigeria’s case, the people may well be good, but a legacy of corruption endures sufficiently that the claim isn’t credible overseas. And while Nigeria is achieving more than many of its African neighbours, and certainly aspires to become a ‘Great Nation,’ it has a long way to go.

An effective strategy would consider factor international perceptions and awareness into the development of a strategic roadmap for the brand. ‘Good people, Great nation’ is an aspirational position; clearly Nigeria can’t jump to that with an advertising campaign. But it could be a ten-year (or 20-year) goal. Ms. Akunuili’s job as a leader is to define the steps from here to there, and to work with her government colleagues to take those steps.

It may be that infrastructure is the first place to spend; certainly communicating success stories about infrastructure development and enhancement would be a more credible approach than leap-frogging to ‘Great nation.’

Of all possible branding projects, surely rebranding a country is the most challenging. But the fundamentals remain the same: Authenticity must come first.

Today is the 58th annual Human Rights Day. I had intended to write a piece on the origins of this annual day of awareness, remembrance, and action, but I found that The Chronicle has already written a fine, succinct piece. So instead, I’ll ask you to consider this:

Through the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the United Nations articulated an ideal, best version of humanity. They set a standard to which the world could aspire, just three short years after the horrors and atrocities of World War II and the holocaust.

Yet today, some 60 years later, the world continues to stand witness to unfounded arrests of those who speak out against abuse and unfairness. We see genocide in nations crippled by drought and famine. We live with the horror of ‘honour killings‘ and executions of political prisoners after closed-door, unfair trials.

And most of us simply don’t know what to do. How can one person have an impact?

Today, on International Human Rights Day, you can. The past year has been celebrated around the world as the 60th anniversary of the Declaration of Human Rights. Now that you’re aware of that, will you take one simple action? Will you join people from around the world who have signed the Declaration?

It’s a simple act. It’s a few moments of your time. But yours will join the millions of voices calling for justice, freedom and peace.

Octopus Strategies is excited to congratulate our client, Small Energy Group, on winning their New Ventures BC Award as one of BC’s most innovative and ground-breaking technology companies.

Small Energy Group’s Energy Management Software communicates with a large number of building automation and metering systems to collect, archive, analyze and communicate energy information. The system helps building owners and operators to quickly identify and resolve inefficient energy use, helps occupants learn how their buildings perform and ultimately helps to save money and reduce emissions.

With BC’s liberal government enacting their carbon-reducing gasoline tax on Canada Day, and the federal Liberals announcing their Green Plan last week, environmental stewardship would certainly seem to be on Canada’s collective mind at the moment.

So Friday’s article in the Calgary Herald about curbing pollution in northern Alberta is interesting for a few reasons. First, as what’s alleged to be the largest toxic project in the world, the oil sands must certainly capture mass media attention soon. Second, it makes for a sad, but interesting study in corporate reputation management, or brand management, in our parlance. As new regulations governing toxic effluent are enacted, Greg Stringham, vice-president of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers had this to say:

“Fort McMurray plants will only be able to take the new rules in stride because they anticipated the change and made early starts on working toward complying with toughened waste management standards and policing.”

Readers are left wondering whether these plants and the oil companies that own them are simply ignoring the environmental problems they’re making in favour of inestimably massive profits. It’s hard to imagine Canadians’ taking long to react to what would appear to be a blatant disregard for the natural environment that’s so central to Canadians’ collective self-image.

Are the oil companies digging massive holes for themselves in more ways than one? Does their campaign to engage Canadians in the oil sands debate hold water?

Tibet has seen a lot of news this week. From protest coverage to the actions of Chinese authorities to halt them, and now to calls in Canada for boycotts of the Beijing Olympics, the news serves mainly to confuse: So much information and so many perspectives are ‘covered’ in the sound-bite way of the western media, that the average citizen has a hard time discerning what’s true, what’s important, and what should drive their own opinion.

So what can we say from the perspective of a Brand Strategy firm? First, clarity is important. The challenge for news outlets and personnel is to take a complex interaction of cultures, history and perspectives, and present them clearly to audiences who care to know the truth. Sometimes, it’s impossible to do this in a sound-bite. (In fact, that’s almost always true, but we’re not writing to knock the media!) Give this important topic the attention and consideration it deserves.

Second, with regard to the idea of a boycott, be sure that the action can deliver the intended results. Is it really fair to ask our athletes, all of whom are amateurs that have worked a lifetime to earn the opportunity to compete, to forgo their dreams? Or would we be better off identifying Chinese companies whose products we can all boycott, instead? Which alternative is more likely to deliver a message to Chinese authorities that we, the consumers of the goods their companies produce, care about their approach to humanitarian issues, such as those rearing their ugly head in Tibet these past weeks?