There’s an old saying in customer service that a customer who has a good experience with your business might tell a single friend while a customer who has a bad experience will tell ten. Unfortunately, those numbers might be drastically out of date in the age of social media. In an era where any individual has the chance to communicate with millions of people around the world, even a single incidence of poor customer service can have significant impacts for businesses of any kind. (more…)
Posts Tagged ‘Brand Management’
When Your Brand is the Victim of an Epic Fail
Tuesday, March 5th, 2019
by Justin Grensing, Esq., MBA
Companies spend big money on celebrity endorsements. Nike alone spends billions of dollars on celebrity endorsements each year. Sometimes, the endorsements simply serve to bring publicity to a brand. Or they may entice consumers who want to emulate celebrities they respect. “A Taiwanese study shows that consumers show greater recall of products that have been endorsed by celebrities—regardless of whether they are actual fans or not,” says Guided Selling. (more…)
Using Push Marketing Techniques to Grow Your Business
Thursday, October 25th, 2018
Most of us in the marketing business are familiar with the concept of – if not necessarily the term – pull marketing. Pull marketing refers to using your business development strategies to attract customers actively seeking out a product or service to your particular offering. For example, a pizza company might work on increasing its page ranking through search engine optimization (SEO) so that it shows up prominently when a hungry potential customer searches for “pizza near me” in their search engine.
But there’s another type of marketing that takes a more aggressive approach. “On the other side of the coin is a push campaign,” writes Rocco Baldassarre – Founder & CEO of Zebra Advertisement 1DollarAd.com – In an article for Entrepreneur. “A push campaign presents products and services to an audience without serving an initial demand.”
Baldassarre writes about push marketing in the context of online marketing and offers four tips for maximizing the outcome of your efforts. (more…)
Understanding, Managing and Communicating Consistently Across Customer Touchpoints
Wednesday, September 5th, 2018
In an article for Harvard Business Review, Adam Richardson discusses the concept of customer touchpoints, which he broadly defines as “any interaction point between the customer and your brand.” If we think about this definition, it truly is quite broad, not least because it invokes the concept of the brand, which is itself extremely broad.
Does an online ad reflect on your brand? What about a discussion with a billing agent over a discrepancy on an invoice? While the answer to the first question is probably obvious, the second might seem like a stretch at first. But in truth, both are examples of touchpoints. And touchpoints have a direct impact on consumer brand perceptions. (more…)
The Potential Perils of Tying Your Brand to a Real Person
Friday, August 10th, 2018
There are numerous examples of company names tied directly to an individual. That person is often the founder but could also be a key personality. Even our current president achieved a great amount of fame by attaching his name to everything from hotels and golf courses to steaks and an online university. Naming a company after an individual can add some personality to the brand and make potential customers feel a more personal connection to that brand. We know who the frontperson is; we know what they look like; and we know a bit about their personality and character.
But that isn’t always a good thing. (more…)
Companies Need to Make Sure Everyone, from the CEO on Down, Recognizes the Impact of Their Words
Wednesday, August 8th, 2018
In a highly publicized conference call, first reported by Forbes, Papa John’s founder John Schnatter used the “N-word” during a discussion between Papa John’s executives and marketing agency Laundry Service. What followed was weeks of turmoil where Schnatter first stepped down as chairman of the Papa John’s board of directors, then said his decision to step down was a mistake, and then filed a lawsuit against the company he founded for what he describes as the “heavy-handed” way he was treated. The company’s stock has (more…)
5 Branding Missteps You Should Avoid
Thursday, March 15th, 2018
Branding is an area we explore regularly with clients – conducting brand audits, developing brand positioning, etc. Some of the most common errors we see are: (more…)
13 Branding Skills From the Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC)
Thursday, January 4th, 2018
An Entrepreneur.com slideshow discusses the 13 skills that will help improve branding efforts. This is a subject area we are particularly focused on, so we wanted to take a look. The list was compiled by members of the Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC). The 13 skills they recommend are: (more…)
Building Your Brand Story, One Piece at a Time
Thursday, December 28th, 2017
Brands are made up of multiple components – your product or service; your logos, advertising campaigns, public relations and sponsorships; the behaviors of your employees and your customers’ interactions with them; the personalities of the top executives and/or owners, etc. As we’ve said many times before, it’s ultimately the market that truly defines your brand, and they do so by absorbing all of the elements we just mentioned into an overall image in their mind of who your company is and what it stands for. (more…)
Brand Building for a New Business
Monday, November 27th, 2017It can take years to develop a firmly established brand. And for good reason. A brand is more than a logo or an advertisement or even an entire ad campaign. A brand is how the market sees your business based on the totality of the information available to them: your marketing efforts, media coverage of your organization – including social media, stories from friends and family – and their own personal experiences.
For new startups, the brand is essentially non-existent. The market may be familiar with the entrepreneurs behind the company, which can add some element of a brand, but for the startup itself, the brand is a blank slate. That’s both a curse and a blessing. The curse is that nobody knows anything about your company: your story, your values, your mission, etc. The flip side to this – the blessing – is that you have the opportunity to attempt to build a brand as you see fit. (more…)
Subcribe to This Blog
Brand Evaluation
CONTENT CREATION
PR/MEDIA RELATIONS
SOCIAL MEDIA
STRATEGIC PLANNING
