Posts Tagged ‘authentic’

A well designed brand is like a well designed car – lovely to look at, lots of power, and can really take you places.  The power of a brand is based on how well it can convince people to buy your stuff.  There are countless definitions of what a brand is, and regardless of your definition, if the brand doesn’t help you sell more stuff, then, it isn’t doing its job.

All brands are built with three essential elements:  Personality, Message and Identity.

Brand Personality: Defining the underlying personality of a brand is sometimes difficult, but is always necessary if the rest of the brand elements are to come together.  The personality reflects what the organization wants its brand to be known for. Think about specific personality traits you want prospects, clients, employees, and partners to use to describe your brand. You should have 4-6 traits (5 is ideal), each being a single term, usually an adjective.

Authentic, Creative, Innovative, Approachable

Trustworthy, Trendy, Cool, Desirable, Reliable

Relevant, Honest, Flexible, Unique, Relevant

How you define the personality determines the tone and voice of your brand, and therefore all your communications.  A brand that is “hip, cool, trendy” sounds decidedly different from one that is “honest, trustworthy, reliable”.

Brand Message: What do you customers need from you?  Why should they choose your brand of product or service over another one?  What can your brand deliver that no one else can?  The answers to these questions form the foundation of your messages.    I have found it useful to create three core messages based on these customer needs.  Each of these messages needs to be supported by “proof points” which are specific, measurable and relevant to the audience.  For example, think of Brand X as a car.

Brand X is BETTER:  safety record, flexible seating arrangements, trade-in options

Brand X is CHEAPER:  gas mileage, insurance premiums, maintenance costs

Brand X is FASTER:  redesigned engine, chassis, performance measurements

Which of these messages best reflects the brand is based on the brand personality and the needs of our customers.  It is not based on what we think sounds good, what is easy for us to prove, or what our boss thinks.   At least it shouldn’t be anyway…

Brand Identity: Ask ten graphic designers their opinion of a company logo and you’ll get ten different answers.  Brand design is the aesthetic that communicates the underlying message and personality of the brand.  There are five core elements to any brand identity:

Logo

Tagline

Typography

Photography

Color

How these elements work together are explained in “Brand Guidelines”.  These help anyone working with the brand know what to do and not to do with the brand.  Combined with templates (Presentations, documents or web pages for example) and standardized collateral (business cards, signage and such) your brand begins to take form.  From here on, it is all about execution.

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Tagged as: 42 Rules, active garage, authentic, brand guidelines, color, competitive, flexible, honest, Identity, laura lowell, Logo, mechanics of branding, message, personality, photography, relevant, reliable, tagline, trustworthy, typography, unique

There seems to be a perception that online communication is radically different from offline communication.  I strongly disagree.  As Jennifer Jacobson said in her new book, “Communication is communication, both online and offline.”  The tactics are certainly different, but the objective, tone and purpose is the same.  It amazes me when I hear of people pretending to be someone else online – especially professionally.  Yes, there are the stories where it worked to the persona’s advantage, but most of the time, this is not the case.

One of my favorite online/offline stories is about Britney Mason (aka Dave Peck).  Dave was (and still is) a middle-aged father of five, by his own description.  He was new to social media and created a fictional person, Britney Mason, who developed a really big following based on her knowledge of social media and her big boobs (again, Dave’s description).  No one had met her, they had just interacted online. One thing led to another and finally Dave was forced to fess up on national TV with a profile on CNBC.  For Dave, and Britney, things turned out OK. But this is definitely the exception and not the rule.

For most of us, we need to carefully consider our behavior and how it affects our brand, both online and offline.

Online: Online conversations have been compared to a cocktail party.  In “real life” you wouldn’t walk into a cocktail party, or a networking event, or other gathering and start shouting “look at me!”  The same holds true for online communication.  Here are some of the rules of online etiquette you should try and follow:

• Be authentic: don’t pretend to be someone you’re not.
• Be honest: lies, even little ones, will come back to haunt you.
• Be polite: DON’T YELL AT PEOPLE IN ALL CAPS!
• Be relevant: in a conversation, don’t change the subject to suite your needs.
• Be friendly: make friends as they are the foundation of your network.

Offline: Offline conversations are more natural for most of us since we’ve been having these all our lives.  Not surprisingly, the rules of polite behavior are pretty much the same whether you’re online or in person.  In person, you can tell almost immediately if someone is being authentic, if they are trying to pull a fast one on you, or only care about what you can do for them. These are the folks who say “thanks” but you know they don’t mean it.

In a recent study I conducted I asked professionals to rank a list of activities based on how important they are in communicating your personal brand.  10 being the most important and 1 being the least important.  The results are interesting:

• Personal presence and speaking ability are the most important elements when communicating your personal brand
• Twitter, FaceBook and LinkedIn – while important – are less relevant than articles, books or your website.

What does that tell us?  Your brand lives both online and offline.  We are no longer one or the other; we are now a combination of our personal presence on our social profiles, our speaking ability and our books and blogs.

When it comes to building your brand, remember, we are who we are.  Who we are doesn’t change based on whether we’re online or offline.  Unless you’re Dave Peck, of course…

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Tagged as: 42 Rules, active garage, authentic, both online and offline, Branding, britney mason, Communication is communication, david peck, honest, Identity, Jennifer Jacobson, laura lowell, offline, online

Today’s article on Branding is about Branding with Passion. Before I delve into that, though, here are the links to the branding Series, so far:

1. Branding – What’s the point?
2. Branding – What’s your brand promise?
3. Branding – Branding is a balancing act
4. Branding – Consistency, Consistency, Consistency
5. Branding – Don’t get caught in the hype
6. Branding – Get the mix right
7. Branding – Your brand is being created with or without you

It’s a lot easier to do things you like, than things you don’t like.  You might be thinking…”duh”.  But how many of you spend your time doing what you are passionate about?  How many companies focus on the things they can do, as opposed to the things they should do?

I’m talking about what in most MBA programs would be called “core competencies”.  These are the fundamental things your customers value, and that your company does better than any of your competitors.  Let’s use HP as an example.  HP is a company with many lines of business, many products and even more things they could be doing.  One of the things that has made HP successful it its ability to “stick to it’s knitting”, as my Grandma used to say.  When they have veered off course, they have acknowledged it and pulled back – sometimes not as fast as they would have liked in hindsight, but they eventually realized it and corrected their course so that they play to their strength of innovation.  Their core competencies are the things that HP people are passionate about – innovation is what they are about.  R&D is a vital part of every successful division.  HP Labs holds more patents than any other working technology lab.  The net result is that HP continues to lead in the businesses where it innovates.  Why?  Because it is doing what it loves to do.

When it comes to smaller scale businesses, the idea is even more important.  Brandon Mendelson started his company in response to, well, having nothing else to do (his words not mine.)  The company, Earth’s Temporary Solution, is the production company behind Brandon’s campaign “A Million High Fives” (#AMHF on Twitter).  Brandon is a guy who does good things, because he wants to.  He is sarcastic and a bit wacky, but he is nothing if not following his passion.

“Our goal is to empower others to help those in need. In the not-for-profit world there’s a lot of mistrust and people looking to make a quick buck on willing, happy people, so as a for-profit, we want people to trust us and know we are providing them with the right tools to do the greatest good”, says Brandon.

By following his passion, and sticking to his core competencies, Brandon has amassed a huge following on Twitter, FaceBook and other networks.  Currently, Brandon is one of the most followed non-brand, non-celebrity, non-media outlets on Twitter. He is following his passion, and consequently, people are following him.

Now you ask, how can you identify your passion, your core competencies?  Ask yourself these questions about your business and your brand:

• Why do my customers choose our brand over another?
• What do we do that our competitors don’t?
• What is the one thing that we would protect over anything else?

Your answers will lead you towards clarifying your competencies.  Take them, build on them and make them to focus of your branding (and business) efforts.  When your brand is built on passion, it is authentic.  There is an honesty that comes from doing what you like to do.  You can’t make that up and you certainly can’t fake it.

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Tagged as: 42 Rules, A million High Fives, active garage, authentic, Branding, Brandon Mendelson, core competencies, Hewlett Packard, HP, laura lowell, passion, Research and Development

We’re all bombarded with thousands of messages each day – personally and professionally. Maybe it’s because of new media like Twitter, LinkedIn or FaceBook. Maybe it’s the internet in general.  Whatever the cause, the effect is the same. The volume of marketing messages is overwhelming to most Americans. In fact, 60 percent have signed up for the do-not-call registry; 33 percent have installed Web pop-up blockers, and nine percent have signed on to a do-not-e-mail list (and 40 percent may want to). So the question is: “How do you break through in this environment?”  One answer: Branding.

Everyone has a different definition of branding – everything from your logo, your message, to your visions and personality.  Each of these is correct in a way.  My definition (just so we’re clear) is that a brand is a promise; a promise of authenticity and value and sets our expectations about the product or service we associate with the brand.

That’s all well and good, but here’s the real question:  What’s the point of having a catchy slogan if it doesn’t strengthen or support your business? Why invest in PR if it doesn’t translate into increased awareness and recognition? Why go to trade shows if they don’t produce high-quality leads? Branding, or a promise to your customers, is a way to differentiate yourself in a crowded market so your company can sell more stuff.  Short and simple.

Independently, without a coherent brand strategy, these tactics do little to attract customers and drive revenue. However, as part of an integrated brand and marketing strategy, these and other tactics are the foundation that will deliver results for your business. Sounds simple, right? Well, often the simplest things are the hardest to do.

Here are three things you can do today to make sure your brand is doing it’s job – helping your company sell more stuff.

1. Look at your website: Is your brand consistently applied on your website?  Do you use the same logo, or do you have multiple logos scattered about the place?  What about your messaging, are you delivering similar yet different messages and confusing your customers?
2. Ask 10 people what they think: You want to know what they think your brand stands for.  Hopefully you get similar responses, and hopefully they are right on target.  If not, well, you have more work to do.
3. Step out of the box: Life doesn’t happen in a vacuum.  Step outside your company and look at what’s going on around you.  Is your brand relevant in today’s market?  Are you linking with current events and trends?

Marketing should get people’s attention, and convince them to consider your company’s products or services over the competition. An integrated brand including strategy, messages, visual identity, and other marketing tactics extends the impact of your marketing investments. You can more efficiently and effectively improve awareness, produce leads and ultimately drive revenue. After all, isn’t that the point?

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Tagged as: 42 Rules, active garage, authentic, brand strategy, Branding, brands, commitment, expectations, facebook, laura lowell, linkedin, product, promise, service, Strategy, tactics, Twitter