Earlier in the week, we announced the first of the speakers for the year’s NEXT Service Design. Here’s a little more insight into the thinking of Dean Crutchfield, a leader in brand strategy and innovation, with over two decades’ experience under his belt.

Dean blogs periodically on Forbes, most recently on the rise of the eclectic CMO:

As the agency-of-record concept dies, CMOs need to broaden their expertise well beyond traditional marketing and promotions by developing the coveted technology and social-media skills that enhance customer understanding and customer experience. Expertise that was not lacking when Stephen Gillette, former head of digital and CIO at Starbucks became executive VP and president at Best Buy Digital prior to becoming CMO (he is now president of Symantec). Compounding the digital challenge is that while two-thirds of CMOs are planning to enhance their social-media strategy this year, only 18% believe they have the skills and know-how to fully exploit the digital customer engagement.

Back in April, he used the state of the beer market for a discussion on trust in brands:

Today, most organizations commonly refer to the meaning of share in terms of market share, profit share, revenue share and share of wallet, among other things. What they often foolishly overlook, however, is that they are also competing with other brands and organizations for share of trust.

Dean is also active on Google+, where’s he’s always good value, from taking issue with Orwell’s advice on writing, or meditating on the challenges marketers face when identifying the traits people covet:

And even when we uncover the deeper meaning with projective qualitative tools like storytelling, imagery, and metaphors, etc., we still can’t reliably measure these elusive associations in evaluative quantitative tests, because respondents remain unaware of them or simply choose not to admit to them.

Brand narratives were a theme that he highlighted when he talked to the Financial Times for a piece about Procter & Gamble in April:

Dean Crutchfield, a branding consultant, says P&G’s marketing is too traditional and rarely achieves the “empathy” of a recent ad from Unilever’s Dove soap, in which an artist drew sketches of women based on their self-descriptions. He applauded an amusing P&G Superbowl ad for Tide detergent this year, which P&G says got half of its viewers on television and half on social media. But Mr Crutchfield says digital successes are the exception. “P&G brands don’t really have a story. It’s old school.”

Dean’s also on Twitter and Facebook.