Archive for December 3rd, 2009

This is part of the the book BLOGTASTIC! Growing and Making a Difference Through Blogging. You can read the table of contents and follow the book on this page:

See the table of contents for the book here: BLOGTASTIC project

Previous article: What’s on your “About Me” page?

BLOGTASTIC: Brand Building vs Brand Extensions

Some people think that they can create a brand simply through their blog. While that can happen, it is more of an exception than a rule.

There’s a huge difference between building a brand and extending a brand.
In the world of marketing, a brand extension takes an existing brand and places it into a new context.

Let’s look at brand extensions for a moment.

Crest is known for its mint-flavored toothpaste, but they also have launched cinnamon and citrus flavored toothpaste. The new flavors are extensions of a well-known brand. However, if Crest launches a mouthwash, that would be a brand extension into a new but very related category. The brand is connected through the concept of “oral hygiene.”

Note: There is a limit. If Crest decides to offer carpet cleaning services (for whatever reason) then using the Crest brand will be a stretch. Consumers won’t mentally link the two brands. Clean teeth and clean carpets don’t go together.

When you launch a blog, your blog is typically a brand extension. It becomes an electronic platform for your existing personal brand. A blog is a vehicle through which you are sharing a piece of yourself with the world. If you have a strong brand in the offline world, then it will be much easier to establish your brand in the online world. Who you are, when you enter the blogging world, matters a lot.

There is no shortcut to building a powerful personal brand. You will have to work online and offline for a long time

A blog is a great way to extend your brand online. With the right content, you can augment your personal brand. Your blog offers virtually unparalleled reach with minimal cost.

I can think of two influential people who started blogging late—Guy Kawasaki who is a venture capitalist and entrepreneur and Tim Sanders who wrote books like Love is the Killer App (one of my favorite books) and The Likeability Factor. Both Guy and Tim  started blogging in 2007. Of course, they both saw a huge following almost immediately. While they write great content, the fact is that their fans were waiting for them to blog. Their strong personal brands created instant traffic for their blogs.

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Blogging Tip: Focus on building your personal brand–online and offline

Whether you like it or not and whether you want it or not, you already have a personal brand. This identity presents “who you are” to the world. By living in this world and interacting with people around you, you are making a “promise” to the world and that promise is your personal brand. You can’t escape having one.

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So, the key question that you should ask yourself, “how effective is your personal brand today and what can you do to make it more powerful?”

Rajesh Setty is an entrepreneur, author and speaker based in Silicon Valley. He maintains another blog called Life Beyond Code and tweets as @UpbeatNow

Tagged as: brand building, brand extensions, crest, guy kawasaki, personal branding, tim sanders

On October 29^th, the US Department of Commerce stated that the US economy grew in the third quarter for the first time in over a year, signaling the end of the worst recession in over 70 years.    Even though we are “out” of the recession, do you still feel like your customers are not buying and hesitant to move forward on projects?  Do you feel more and more pressure to bring in new opportunities for your company?  Unfortunately, regardless of the economic condition of the marketplace, as salespeople, we are required to perform as our company’s success is directly tied to our individual success.

In a previous post (What I Wish I Knew More About In Sales #2: Know What To Quit), I discussed how it’s important to learn when to quit opportunities so that you can focus more time on those that have a higher probability of closing.  Following this process in today’s difficult marketplace is more important than ever as it’s more difficult today to find qualified and real opportunities, but just as important to focus more on those opportunities that are realistic. 

In today’s post, I will discuss some basic steps that you can use to develop an ideal customer profile which are the business characteristics that your organization looks for in your customers to sell your products and services and to drive them to do so now. 

In developing the ideal customer profile, go through your list of accounts and try to answer the following questions for each one:

1. What does your product/service do?
2. What do your customers do in lieu of your product or service? 
3. If they are using a competitor’s product or service, what marginal value does your product/service offer that the competitor’s does not?
4. With your product/service, how would it improve your customers’ productivity, efficiency, security, etc…?
5. What characteristics would cause your customer to have/care about your product/service?
6. Without your product/service, who in the organization is likely to benefit if they were to have it (individual contributor through CEO)?

Going through your list of customers and being able to answer these questions results in:

1. A list of information to gather to determine where we have opportunities
2. Targeted contacts who will be interested in solving the problem

The next step is to gather information about your customers.  Decision makers are not necessarily the right contacts for gathering information.  In addition to looking at any sales history you might have and any research you can gather via the internet about your customer(s), you can also gather information from secretaries, receptionists, their sales people and their customers.

Once you have answered the questions above and gathered information about your customer(s), you are now ready to sell the appointment with a targeted executive and to truly start developing your opportunities.

This article was contributed by Robert Driscoll, co-founder of Active Garage. You can follow Robert on Twitter at rsdriscoll.

Tagged as: active garage, business, Business Management, business planning, Business Strategy, developing opportunities, execution, http://activegarage.com, Leadership, management, possibilities, Robert Driscoll, sales, Sales and Marketing, Strategy, www.activegarage.com