Brand
™
Issue 3 | Volume 2
May 2013
Quarterly
Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
Need More Hours In The Day? Get Back Your Time By Systemising Your Brand And Marketing
Our First Global Survey It’s Time To Be Heard Managing Change The Why, The What, The How The Rise Of The Personal Brand What Your Company Needs To Know
Brand Quarterly™
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In This Issue 8 10 14
Learn Your Brand Etiquette
As Simple As “ABC” Improving Your B2B Sales Process
Is Your Brand A Social Standard Bearer? Demonstrating Leadership Through Innovation, Creativity, And Community Building
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Target Markets
18
Currencies Of Change
20
It’s Time... To Be Heard
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The Rise Of The Personal Brand
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Didn’t Your Mother Ever Teach You… ?
Insight From The Marketoonist
Do You Want To Cash In?
Our First Global Reader Survey
What Your Business Needs To Know!
Need More Hours In The Day? Get Back Your Time By Systemising Your Brand And Marketing
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Sharing The Wealth
30
The Lollipop Entrepreneur:
32
Managing Change
Building Your Brand Through Employee Ownership
Behavioural Styles and Motivation
The Why, The What, The How Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
38
Design 101
40
SMEs:
42 44
Typography Terms
Getting To Know The Monster
The Buck Stops Here Who Is Responsible For Developing A Franchisee’s Business?
Bridging The Gap Getting The Old And New To Work Together
From The Editor From Strength To Strength TY from the team @VeseyCreative for tuning in to another issue of #BrandQuarterly & a warm welcome to all of our 1st time readers #gratitude Yep, you guessed it. Someone’s been spending a lot of time on Twitter recently. In fact we’ve finally taken the leap into the Twitter-verse. So pop by and say Hi. Our handle is (surprise, surprise) @BrandQuarterly. You can also follow us at @VeseyCreative. I’d like to say a quick ‘Welcome’ and a big ‘Thanks’ to our first time contributors. And of course we can’t forget our regulars. Without all of your great content, we wouldn’t have such a wonderful issue. This issue also sees the launch of our first ever, global reader survey. I hope you are able to get involved, as the more feedback we get, the better we can make Brand Quarterly. If you’re into Marketing (as many of our readers are) then you should check out our newest publication Global CMO The Magazine. It’s free, it’s digital and it’s monthly. Check it out at www.theglobalcmo.com and follow on Twitter at @TheGlobalCMO
Fiona Vesey Vesey Creative
Once again: TY for joining us for this issue of #BrandQuarterly. Remember: “If you love it - share it” Enjoy Fiona Issue 3 | Volume 2 | May 2013 Brand Quarterly magazine www.brandquarterly.com Publisher/Design: Vesey Creative Ltd studio@veseycreative.com
As the publishers of Brand Quarterly, we take every care in the production of each issue. We are however, not liable for any editorial error, omission, mistake or typographical error. The views expressed by all contributors are not necessarily those of the publisher.
Brand Quarterly™
Copyright: This magazine and the content published within are subject to copyright held by the publisher, with individual articles remaining copyright to the named contributor. Express written permission of the publisher and contributor must be acquired for reproduction.
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Featured Contributors Kent Huffman Kent is a results-oriented marketing executive, change agent, customer experience advocate, and published author. Serving as Chief Marketing Officer at BearCom Wireless since 2006, he is responsible for expanding the company’s presence in its target markets, as well as driving all marketing strategies and tactics, including thought leadership, integrated marketing, and demand generation. In 2012, Kent authored the book 8 Mandates for Social Media Marketing Success, and in 2008, he co-authored the book Maximizing Your Marketing Efforts. Kent also is Co-Publisher of Social Media Marketing Magazine, a new digital publication written by the leading CMOs, marketing book authors, and marketing professors around the world who are active on social media. www.kenthuffman.com
Julia Payne Julia Payne is the co-founder of Incisive Edge [solutions] Limited and an expert is sales strategy and aligning marketing to drive sales. She has advised FTSE 100 companies, mid tier companies looking to enter the FTSE, owner managed companies, Royal families, associations and governments on several continents. Julia is well known for providing strategic sales and marketing advice that is down to earth and relevant, taking into account real-world complexities of business. She is also a prolific writer, being extensively published in the field of sales and strategy and a highly sought-after speaker on process-led implementation, business growth through sales and marketing and how to drive revenue. www.incisive-edge.com
David Mattin David Mattin is Lead Strategist at the global trend forecasting firm trendwatching.com where he is responsible for trend thinking across the company’s free and Premium content. trendwatching.com is an independent and opinionated trend firm that scans the globe for the most promising consumer trends, insights and related hands-on business ideas. Established in 2002, the company relies on a worldwide network of analysts and spotters from over 120 countries, with offices in London, Singapore and Sao Paulo. trendwatching.com publishes its insights in its free Trend Briefings (available in 9 languages for over 200,000 subscribers worldwide) and its paid Premium Service, which counts over 1,200 of the world’s leading brands as clients. www.trendwatching.com
Ken Vesey Ken Vesey styles himself as a ‘QA Specialist, People Management Specialist, Facilitator, Implementer, and Technical Writer of policy and procedures’. His passion is towards the small business owner, whether in business or in education. Over the past 27 years, Ken has compiled a wealth of management knowledge whilst holding the positions of NZQA Panelist & Moderator, Learning Manager at the Employers and Manufacturers Association, and Regional Director of Training for the Order of St John Auckland. www.approachableconsultancy.com
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Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
Andrew Vesey Andrew is Director of the New Zealand and United Kingdom based Graphic Design and Branding Agency, Vesey Creative - the official Brand Guardians for Global Marketing Network (GMN). Working in partnership with a wide variety of clients around the globe, Andrew’s business experience includes over a dozen years leading design and branding studios and agencies. He is also a member of GMN’s Global Advisory Council Andrew is a strong believer in continually upskilling, learning and staying relevant in business. This ‘education brings growth’ mentality lead him to create Global CMO The Magazine, a digital magazine for Professional Marketers, and the magazine you are now reading. www.veseycreative.com
Heather Townsend Heather Townsend helps professionals become the Go-To-Expert. She is the author of the award-winning and best-selling, ‘FT Guide To Business Networking’, and the co-author of ‘How to make partner and still have a life’. Over the past decade she has worked with over 300 partners, coached and trained over 1000 professionals from the most ambitious UK and global professional services firms. She blogs regularly at: Joined Up Networking - www.joinedupnetworking.com Partnership Potential - www.partnershippotential.co.uk ‘How to make partner’ - www.howtomakepartner.com
Jeffrey Peel Jeffrey Peel is Managing Director of Quadriga Consulting Ltd – a company that helps other companies build knowledge and presence in a socially connected world. Jeff is a former Director of two leading global market research firms. His clients include leading technology businesses as well as early stage venture capital funded companies. He’s @jeffreypeel on Twitter. www.quadco.co.uk
Euan Fraser Euan is a Chartered Accountant who drifted into franchising 18 years ago. He holds the British Franchise Association’s QFP qualification and regularly judges the Franchisor of the Year awards. He believes that successful franchising is achieved by replicating what you do well, delivering your product or service consistently and passionately supporting franchisees. His clients include Nokia, Nike, Ralph Lauren, Danone, Cortefiel and American Eagle www.amoconsulting.com
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Featured Contributors Fiona Vesey Fiona is Co-Founder and the Creative Spark at Vesey Creative, a New Zealand United Kingdom based Branding and Graphic Design agency. She is also the Editor of Brand Quarterly and Editor-in-Chief of Global CMO The Magazine. She thrives in partnering with people and companies wanting more than just aesthetically pleasing design. Her initial training lead Fiona to opening her own photographic studio, and becoming a well respected multi-award winning professional photographer. As an active member in the photographic industry, Fiona sat on the Auckland board for the New Zealand Institute of Professional Photography for 3 years. www.veseycreative.com
Jacqui Mitchell Jacqui is passionate about changing the way capitalism operates. She project manages the transition process for business owners who wish to move their companies into employee ownership, whilst recognising that working with people to effect cultural change is just as important as the technical process. She also works for Great Game UK to build a strong culture of ownership within organisations where the employees don’t necessarily hold shares. www.greatgameuk.com
Tom Fishburne Tom is the Founder and CEO of Marketoon Studios, a content marketing studio that helps businesses such as Unilever, O2, Kronos, Baynote, Rocketfuel, and the Wall Street Journal reach their audiences with cartoons. He is also a frequent keynote speaker on innovation, marketing, and creativity. Tom draws from 16 years in the marketing and innovation trenches. Over five years with Method Products (“the 16th most innovative company in the world” ~ Fast Company), Tom launched new products, led marketing, and started the European business from scratch. He has led brands at Nestle and General Mills, and helped launch the first English-language magazine in Prague. www.marketoonstudios.com
Dr. Ivan Misner Dr. Ivan Misner is the Founder and Chairman of BNI, the Senior Partner for the Referral Institute, an international referral training company, as well as a New York Times best-selling author. Called the “Father of Modern Networking,” by CNN, Dr. Misner is one of the world’s leading experts in business networking and referral marketing. As well as Brand Quarterly, Dr Misner also contributes monthly articles to Entrepreneur.com as the online magazine’s networking expert, and he is a featured blogger on BusinessNetworking.com. Check out: “Networking Like A Pro: Turning Contacts Into Connections”
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Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
From The Web Branding is everything. A young girl once came up to me and told me I could be famous because I looked just like Richard Branson! Sir Richard Branson
What to Do When Customers Trash Your Brand Online Social media has opened up a whole new world of opportunities to engage with our customers like never before. We openly ask for their feedback and opinions on our brands, products and marketing programs. Click the image to read via Entrepreneur.com
The Power Of ThirdParty Influencers Why you should build a relationship with third-party influencers to gain traction within the consumer marketplace. Click the image to read via Inc.com
3 Ways To (Usefully) Lose Control Of Your Brand The days are past (if they ever existed) when a person, company or brand could tightly control their reputation. Tim Leberecht offers three big ideas about accepting that loss of control, even designing for it. Click the image to view via TED.
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Didn’t Your Mother Ever Teach You… ? Learn Your Brand Etiquette Growing up, you always had someone there to tell you how to act and how ‘not’ to (normally whether you liked it or not). Now you’re all grown up and are responsible for running a business, who’s there to offer you that same sort of advice for your Brand? Fear not friends. Here are a few pieces of advice for you, to help get your head around the basic do’s and don’ts of Brand etiquette.
Right. Stop slouching, elbows off the table, and let’s begin.
Your Tone Of Voice. Having the right tone of voice makes a huge difference to how successfully you connect with your customers. I’m pretty sure we all know, that you can say the exact same sentence in different tones and it will be interpreted completely differently. So why do many businesses not follow this with their Brand messaging? Are you a high energy, free-wheeling Brand? Or a ultra-professional and reserved Brand? Both of these scenarios are perfectly fine for the correct markets, but only if executed properly. Yes, it’s obvious that you can sound too unprofessional, but don’t forget - you can also sound too professional as well. You need to clearly understand what it is you stand for (your Brand Values) and the type of language and tone of voice that appeals most to your market. Then it’s a simple matter of delivering From your tweets, to your web site and advertising, through to the way you greet and farewell people on the phone or in the office.
Who’s The Focus? Another important factor in defining the appropriate etiquette for your Brand is working out who your messaging is focused around. With most of you, I can safely say that the customer is the focus and you want them to feel important. If this is the case, don’t just stand there and go on about yourself all day long. Your customer is the important one, so talk about them. You can talk about yourself too, but relate it back to them whenever possible. The are certain cases however, in which the focus is on the Brand, not the customer. These are what we would call ‘Ego Brands’. Ego Brands focus on themselves to let the customer know that it is thanks to the Brand that they have their level of status. This will normally only be an option for high expense, luxury goods, although it is becoming more 8
mainstream with midrange Brands relying on slightly modified ‘Peer Pressure Branding’.
Promotional Prowess. This is something that trips up a lot of people. Unless you get your promotional etiquette right, you can very easily start sending out mixed messages as to who you are. Are you a high-end quality Brand? Then why would you be throwing out discounts left and right? I understand you want people to buy, but don’t do it at the expense of your Brand Values. The odd discount or sale is fine for the high-end Brand - as long as you have a good reason for it. A number of cosmetic companies do this very well. Unless it’s an end of line or similar, they never discount their products. What they do is offer loyalty rewards or ‘a free gift with purchase’ (which is normally samples of their other products so you will end up buying them too). Have a look then next time you are in a store during a major holiday sale. You’ll quite easily pick out the Brands who stick to their guns and values. In saying that, if your Brand is built to offer discounts and have regular giveaways, then that’s great too. The important thing is that you know what
Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
your Brand stands for and what sort of promotions reflect that.
Following Up And Keeping Them Warm. How often should you keep in touch? And what is the best way to do that? Two good questions to ask yourself. You want to keep your customers warm so they think of you when it’s time to buy, but you need to work that fine line between too often and not often enough. While your Brand image will come into the equation a little, the biggest determining factor really is your product or service buying cycle. If you’re looking to get regular weekly or monthly purchases then very regular contact is probably the order of the day. Where as a buying cycle of two years will probably lend itself to a quarterly contact cycle.
Be Authentic And The Rest Will Follow. The easiest way to make sure you are on track with your Brand etiquette is to (as I have mentioned a number of times) take the time to understand your values properly and just be authentic to them. Getting a real understanding of your Brand and what it stands for is a worthy investment of your
time and can bring great rewards. Once you understand, you can then easily ask your self “Does this feel authentic?” If the answer is yes, then you’re on the right track. If it’s no, then maybe you need to take another route.
And One Last Piece Of Advice... Once you have your etiquette worked out and start implementing it, please make sure you remember to document it all. As your business grows, you will have more people who will need to know the correct etiquette and it will make things much easier for you if it’s all documented. After all, your main goal in correcting your etiquette is to help encourage more growth, so you might as well do everything you can to prepare for it.
Fiona Vesey Vesey Creative
Until next time kids. Remember your ‘Please’s and ‘Thank You’s - and for crying out loud, stop poking your tongue out like that.
Brand Quarterly™
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As Simple As “ABC”
‘ABC - Always Be Closing’ - Glengarry Glen Ross (1992)
Improving Your B2B Sales Process Alec Baldwin in Glengarry Glen Ross has a lot to answer for. For those of you that haven’t seen the film, it follows two days in the lives of four real estate salesmen who become desperate after their Head Office sends a trainer to “motivate” them. Alec Baldwin, the trainer, announces that all except the top two salesmen will be fired – “first prize a Cadillac, second prize a set of steak knives, third prize, you’re fired”. Head Office certainly knows how to inspire productivity in their sales team…. All the team have to do is follow the process.
Julia Payne Incisive Edge
Amazingly, some sales leaders still view Alec Baldwin as a role model. We have been presented with the Youtube video on more than one occasion – “I want to be like this” they said. After we finished hysterically laughing, we realised that they were in fact, serious.
B2B selling is undergoing a revolution. Face to face meetings are being replaced with technology and online channels which in turn, provide an informed choice. Virtual environments in the form of social media now help to influence the sales and decisionmaking process. Customers expect more and demand evidence of expertise, acumen, value and a return on investment. In short, customers have fundamentally changed the way they buy and your sales process and your role in that process needs to reflect those changes.
From Custodian To Steward The first step in changing your sales process is the most fundamental. Your sales process must be designed from your customer’s view point, not from yours. Complex value propositions demand customised solutions – a detailed understanding of how the sale is going to impact your client. This requires the customer’s decision-making or buying process to be at the very centre of your sales process. There are many ways to skin the sales process cat. Typically, sales consultancies rely on a highly bespoke solution for their client companies and invariably a large budget. However, in these days of constraint, is it possible to create a process that is both flexible and adaptable in nature, which can form the basis of successful B2B sales? We believe it is and have outlined the four principle phases below.
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Phase 1: A Quick Guide To The B2B Buying Process. Phase 1 is seen through the customer’s eyes and the questions they will need to address in order to purchase services. 1. What is the market and competitive environment we are in? 2. What is our business strategy? What plans and initiatives do we have? 3. What do we need to meet our strategies and plans?
Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
4. What are our options? 5. Which option should we select? 6. What problems do we need to overcome with the option we have chosen? 7. How do we implement? 8. How do we evaluate success? Time spent with customers is critical in sales, but improving the sales process is now less about present and persuade and more about plan and orchestrate. Pre and post sales planning is essential. It requires a higher level of preparation with the support of data and cross-functional teams. It’s
not about the amount of face time, but how you actually use that time when in front of the customer. High performing sales teams take the time to understand their customer’s purchase processes and to co-ordinate their own sales processes accordingly, extending the process to the internal resources necessary to deliver. Today’s sales chain is far less about the steps in the sales process your company must complete, but rather the steps your buyer will take. Creating the ideal sales process requires buyer and seller processes to harmonise, with those of the buyer taking precedence.
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But how do you harmonise the two? 6.
Phase 2: Building on the customer’s buying process, establish the ‘convergence’ points in the purchase process. These convergence points are where the seller can influence the buyer, adding new insights to help them compete more effectively and out-perform the competition. Clients no longer want to educate the sales person – rather they want to learn from them. 1. How can we influence the decision-making process? (convergence point) 2. What is the market and competitive environment we are in? 3. Why now? (convergence point) 4. What is our business strategy? What plans and initiatives do we have? 5. What’s the source of the buyer’s problem? (convergence point) 6. What do we need to meet our strategies and plans? 7. What are our options? 8. How can we influence the buyer? (convergence point) 9. Which option should we select? 10. What’s in it for the buyer? (convergence point) 11. What problems do we need to overcome with the option we have chosen? 12. How do we implement? 13. How will we deliver return on investment? (convergence point) 14. How do we evaluate success?
Phase 3: Having established these anchor points, now is the time to align the actions within your internal sales process with the buyer’s journey: 1. Can we influence the decision-making process? Process: Research buyer, company & company position 2. What is the market & competitive environment the buyer is in? Process: Understand the buyer’s environment, their problems/issues/challenges, budgets & time frames 3. Why now? Process: Determine the compelling event 4. What is the buyer’s business strategy? What plans & initiatives do they have? Process: Develop strategic plans linked to business initiatives 5. What’s the source of the buyer’s problem? What do they need to meet their strategies & plans? Process: Understand the buyer’s specific 12
7.
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needs, their decision making process & the access you will have to the decision maker What are the buyer’s options? Process: Quantify the customer opportunity & establish your point of difference How can we influence the buyer? Process: Determine the selection criteria & highlight your value proposition Which option should the buyer select? What’s in it for the buyer? Process: Establish credibility & authority. Display solution & industry expertise. Create partnership criteria What problems do we need to overcome with the option we have chosen? Process: Address the concerns of the buyer, mitigate risks & highlight results How do we implement? Process: Develop succinct implementation strategy How will we deliver return on investment? How do we evaluate success? Process: Establish success metrics with buyer
Phase 4: The final step in your high performing sales process is to marry the stages in your process with the sales team interactions with your buyer. This is where the experience of the sales person can play a pivotal role. If these stages are outlined or understood sufficiently early in the process, the sales person can influence, educate and engage the buyer and differentiate themselves from the crowd. However, it is crucial to involve marketing in developing sales collateral to reinforce the messages, both internally to assist the process and externally, to engage the prospect. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.
Introductory meeting Needs analysis meeting Discovery review & results meeting Production/Solution demonstration meeting High level solution discussion Solution outline meeting Proposal delivery meeting Success metrics & ROI meeting
At each stage in the process, create criteria which when met, ensure you progress onto the next level of buyer interaction or if unmet, allow your team to progress to the next opportunity without wasting valuable sales time and resource on a no decision/ no win. As Alec Baldwin says “ABC – A Always; B Be; C Closing. Always Be Closing”. This sales process ensures you will be.
Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
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Brand
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Quarterl
Is Your Brand A Social Standard Bearer? Demonstrating Leadership Through Innovation, Creativity, And Community Building Leaders are most often valued and respected for their knowledge, experience, passion, and vision. The most effective leaders also demonstrate a strong sense of responsibility, have a relatively high tolerance for risk, and lead by example. They tend to think strategically, plan for the short and long term, have the innate ability to inspire others, and serve as standard bearers for their organizations and industries. Innovation is another primary hallmark of a strong leader. They not only create new concepts and trends and serve as change agents, they also figure out new ways to generate value for their organizations and 14
Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
Impact By - And On - The Brand Dr. David Aaker is a world-renowned brand strategist and author and has often been called “the father of branding.” When I was writing my latest book about marketing last year, I asked David for his thoughts on the importance of innovation, creativity, and community in demonstrating leadership in the social space. He said, “To impact using social media going forward, it is necessary to first be focused on what the audience is interested in and wants to talk about, and second, to be creative in providing content.” David added that the best way to trigger community involvement is by “providing new information like BettyCrocker.com, entertaining like RedBull.com, having compelling promotions like P&G, or connecting to common interests like PampersVillage.com. All this will only happen to brands that lead, that get out in front.”
The Corporate View A similar sentiment about leadership on social media seems to be prevalent within B2C and B2B organizations alike. From small mom-and-pop businesses to mid-market companies to large Fortune 500 corporations, a consistent refrain centres around the same three topics: innovation, creativity, and community. For example, Mark Addicks, the CMO at General Mills, put it to me very simply: “Innovation is the fuel that powers leadership in the social Kent Huffman media revolution.” BearCom Wireless
Connect is the largest community of HP business technology customers around the world. Connect’s CMO, Nina Buik, said that you “must allow your network to freely share its views while ensuring your content is creative and relevant. To be a social media leader, you must do just that—lead.”
constituents and generously and consistently share that value with others around them. And they excel at creating vibrant, growing communities that connect people with their brands—and each other. The most successful social media leaders are no different, whether they are individuals or brands.
Brian Kardon, the CMO at Lattice Engines, told me that true leaders “demonstrate their leadership every day by engaging in social media. They are quick to comment on a blog post, tweet, or update on Facebook. They are willing to try a new sharing app, upload their presentation to SlideShare, and be part of the never-ending conversation. Their organizations are watching them. They need to lead by example.”
Brand Quarterly™
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Academia’s Take
The Common Threads Of Leadership
So what is being taught by professors at the leading universities about the impact of innovation, creativity, and community on social media leadership? Johanna Skilling, a noted branding and strategy professor at NYU, is a great example. She told me that “before there was ‘social media,’ there was a public conversation—led by writers and artists, protestors and politicians, scientists and social workers, advertisers and advocates. People who created change through the power of ideas. People whose words and actions motivated millions.”
Did you notice the common threads in the comments from all these marketing and branding professionals? Innovation. Creativity. Imagination. Ideas. Conversations. Community. Today’s social media standard bearers undoubtedly share all those qualities.
Johanna went on to say, “The public conversation is still alive and well—and being fuelled by social media. But just as the public conversation has always been influenced by leaders with ideas, imagination, and dedication, social media success depends on those very same factors. Because people who can lead in social media can also lead the public conversation—and that is where real change can happen.”
Interns: We Want You!
But why is it so important to be a standard bearer? Whether online or offline, brands that lead and set the standard in their industries are often admired and imitated. Brands that lead are generally viewed as more progressive, innovative, and authoritative. Brands that lead tend to be more profitable in good times and more stable in tough times. Brands that lead usually attract more investors, smarter employees, and stronger partners. Brands that lead tend to have more loyal customers. And brands that lead typically have more success and longevity in the marketplace. That sounds like exactly the place I want my brand to be. What about yours?
Brand
Global
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THE MAGAZINE
Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
We have a number of opportunities available within Brand Quarterly, Vesey Creative and Global CMO. If you are looking for a placement to complete your current course of study, are looking to gain experience, or would like to add another feather in your resume cap, NOW is a great time. Gain experience with Brand Quarterly magazine, Vesey Creative, a successful multi-national Brand and Design Agency and the Official Brand Guardians of Global Marketing Network as well as Global CMO The Magazine the Official Magazine Global Marketing Network. •• Learn “By Doing” in your chosen career
•• Operate as a remote intern - from anywhere around the globe
•• Fit your hours around your study or other projects (as long as deadlines are meet of course) •• Minimum 20hrs per week for 13 weeks
•• Gain GMN Membership Benefits while you’re an intern
•• Receive a full letter of recommendation based on your work
Requirements include: •• Familiarity and an interest in your chosen internship field
•• Computer competency (basic plus specialist skills dependant on your internship) •• Good access to internet services. Majority of work will be online and contact will be via email and Skype
•• A good grasp of the English language (other languages are great too - we just need to be able to communicate clearly with you) Please note: These internships are unpaid ‘Work Experience’ placements and do not constitute an offer of employment or guarantee any future offer.
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Internships Available:
Marketing (overall) Publishing Branding and Design Website Design (HTML, PHP) Onine and Social Media Research
To apply:
Email your resume along with a letter of application to andrew@veseycreative.com using the subject line Internship Application. Your letter of application should state the internship you are applying for and (in approx 150 words) why you have chosen this field. To ensure you get credit, please include your course’s internship requirements if you are studying.
Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
Target Markets It cracks me up that there are two main disciplines that require one-way mirrors: market research and police interrogation (although I imagine that market research is the only one that stocks bowls of M&Ms on the dark side of the glass). Identifying a target market for a brand is one of the trickiest but most essential aspects of marketing. Yet it can feel like a police dragnet. Too often, marketers define target markets as everyone who could conceivably buy a particularly product: “women, aged 18-49”. Sometimes marketers are guided by a strategic need for a brand to appeal to a particular demographic group: “we need a product for Boomers” or “we need to appeal to Millennials”, as if these groups were uniform and there was a one-size-fits-all way to attract them. Too many target market statements lack a unique and compelling insight.
Tom Fishburne Marketoon Studios
Target markets are not a catch-all. The best target markets are deliberately exclusive. Investing the time to crack a target market statement can unlock everything for a brand.
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Currencies Of Change Do You Want To Cash In? Many consumers feel that they should make positive changes to their lives, towards choices that enhance health and wellbeing, or are more sustainable and socially responsible. But lack of time and resources mean that making those changes – and sticking to them – can be hard. Now, consumers are looking to brands for help. That’s why they’re embracing brands that offer CURRENCIES OF CHANGE: meaningful rewards, material and otherwise, for positive lifestyle change and good behaviour. David Mattin
At first sight, embracing the CURRENCIES OF CHANGE trend might seem a risky play. After all, it means asking consumers to undertake something new and challenging, and making this the basis of an interaction with your brand.
trendwatching.com
But the vast majority of adults understand full well that making positive lifestyle change is never going to be effortless. And consumers – who increasingly demand mature, collaborative relationships with the brands they engage with – would prefer that this basic human truth is acknowledged by brands that claim to care about them and their environment. Consumers don’t want brands to offer an easy way out when it comes to making positive change in their lives: they know that none exists. Instead, they want help to help themselves. Give them this help, by incentivizing healthy, sustainable or ethical behaviour, and you’ll nudge them towards an action that makes them feel good about themselves. And that action may even create evidence that they can share later on social networks and elsewhere. That means a status boost for them, and the chance for your brand to gain traction on social media, too. But the mutual benefits of CURRENCIES OF CHANGE go beyond that: this trend offers new ground on which to build a more long-term relationship with consumers. By asking consumers to do something positive that takes real effort, you’ll also earn their respect, and encourage them to feel that both of you are involved in a collaborative effort towards real, longlasting change. Sure, you could offer an effort-free way for consumers to ‘make a difference’ – by donating part of your standard price to charity, for example – but consumers realize that these onetime gestures don’t compare to positive change that they make, and stick to, themselves. Help them make that change, and you become partners in a 18
joint effort: and that could mean the start of a more meaningful, long-lasting relationship. Want to launch your own CURRENCIES OF CHANGE initiative? Take inspiration from brands around the world already applying this trend. Take a standard CURRENCIES OF CHANGE programme: credit (in the form of vouchers or loyalty card points) for positive behaviour. In February 2013, clothes retailer H&M launched an initiative that rewards shoppers for bringing old or worn apparel into a store for recycling. H&M accepts items from any brand and in any condition, and customers who bring in apparel to be recycled are rewarded with an H&M voucher. Take the trend a step further by thinking beyond only monetary rewards: status-based social rewards will also be important to many consumers. So how can you help consumers to share news of their positive
Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
lifestyle change (and share the involvement of your brand at the same time)? See how Nike Mexico are incentivising exercise with their #makeitcount Facebook campaign, launched May 2012. The campaign allows Facebook fans to bid for new trainers on Facebook, using as currency kilometres they have run and recorded with the Nike+ app via smartphone or the Nike+ Fuelband. Registered runners can bid on featured products using the miles they’ve racked up, and the runner with the most miles wins the product. CURRENCIES OF CHANGE can promote positive social responsibility and community action, too. In December 2012, Coca-Cola unveiled the Cajero de la felicidad (‘Cashier of Happiness’) in Madrid. Cash machines across the city offered passersby EUR 100 if they promised to share and make someone else happy. The machines displayed various options for actions that individuals could undertake, such as
buying breakfast for everyone in their office, giving a neighbour a surprise gift or treating a few cab drivers to lunch. Feeling bold? How about rewarding consumers by offering a seamless way to do even more good? Brazilian energy supplier Light did just that with its Light Recicla programme: participants exchanged recyclable materials (metals, plastics, paper, glass, vegetable oil), and could choose between money off their energy bill or a donation to charities registered with the programme. Ready to launch your own CURRENCIES OF CHANGE initiative? Just remember, sincerity is everything. Consumers will instantly see through a programme that is all about grabbing their attention or drawing them to your brand, and nothing to do with positive lifestyle change. So ask for meaningful action, and give a meaningful reward in return. Good luck!
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The Rise Of The Personal Brand What Your Business Needs To Know! The start of the personal branding movement is often attributed to the article written in 1997 by Tom Peters for the Fast Company Magazine entitled “The Brand Called You”. However, personal branding is not a new concept and has been around for many years before Tom Peters’ famous article. In this article Heather Townsend, author of “The FT Guide To Business Networking’ and co-author of ‘How to make partner and still have a life’ explores the rise and importance of the personal branding 22
movement, and how you can help your employees identify and utilise their personal brand to help strengthen your business brand. Before we go any further, let’s define what we mean by ‘Personal Branding’. Probably the best definition is Dan Schwabel’s, author of Me 2.0, “Personal Branding: How we market ourselves to others”
Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
The reason why personal branding has come to the forefront of society and business is the impact Web 2.0, or more generally social media has had on the world. Before Web 2.0, as opposed to today, your opportunities to get the word out about your business was limited. In fact, apart from word-ofmouth campaigns, you were reliant on the media to help you get your message out. Your ability to get your business message into the media, i.e. in front of your target audience, was typically limited to the size of your advertising and PR budget.
Although it doesn’t feel like it sometimes in this tough economic climate, but the recruitment process needs to be a two-way process. Just as you need to decide whether the potential hire is a good fit for your organisation, your potential hire needs to do the same due diligence. As your company brand is made up of the sum total of your employee’s personal brand, it makes sense to check during the recruitment process, that your potential new hire’s personal brand is closely aligned to the business brand.
As a consequence, it was the individuals with influence and budget who controlled, i.e. the marketing and external communications department, largely, the company brand, and how it was perceived by the outside world. Now, a company’s brand has always been the sum total of the employee’s personal brand. Because social media has truly given each individual a voice into the world, your employees personal brand and how they use it, has risen in prominence to companies. Whether you like it or not, all of your employees are constantly communicating to a global audience via Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Google+, YouTube, blogging etc. As Paris Brown, the short-lived youth police commissioner for Kent, found out recently, how you communicate externally to the outside world via social media can have massive consequences on both your employees’ future career prospects but also the reputation of your company.
Very often the reason why employees become disengaged with the company, or their career stalls is because there is a mismatch between the individual and company values, an important part of an individual’s personal brand. This disengagement can often lead to the employee delivering sub-standard client/customer Heather Townsend service, or even voicing their The Excedia Group frustration about the company on social media. The net effect of this disengagement is a reputation risk to your company’s brand. Helping an individual identify their own values and how this sets the tone for how they interact in the work-place is one of the core components of self-leadership vital for good client/customer service. How are you helping employees through timely development options, understand who they are, how they ‘tick’, and how their talents can be best utilised in the workplace?
The question is, what do you need to do as a company to help your employees use their personal brand to strengthen your business brand?
Actually the answers are not that difficult. They are, not surprisingly, similar messages that big mediasavvy companies, such as Procter & Gamble, have been drilling into their employees for decades. The first thing you need to do is educate your employees to the role they play in your company’s success and the impact they can have with the way they treat customers and clients, and communicate to the outside world. As you will know, a company’s brand is not fixed in stone; and as many brand managers will tell you, it’s defined by the last touchpoint that a customer or client has with the brand. Employees need to know that their actions and how they communicate and behave, online and offline, will be seen as representative of your company’s brand as a whole. How are you helping them to behave and communicate in accordance with your company’s brand and values? Are you setting expectations at interview, induction and within ALL your company’s people policies and processes, not just your social media policy?
The professions, who largely sell their time for money, have known about the importance of a personal brand for a long time. After all, clients now rarely buy into the brand of the firm, but the personal brand of the advisor they want to work with. Many professional services firms have been helping their fee earners with their personal brand for years. However, the professions face a huge challenge marshalling all of their fee earner’s social media presence, particularly an individual’s Linkedin profile, so that it communicates the values and desired brand of the firm.
In summary, although the concept of personal branding isn’t new, the access to a global audience that social media has brought us, has changed the way our business externally communicates with the outside world. Companies, if they are to protect their brand reputation, need to wise up to the impact of their employees personal brand on the company as a whole.
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Need More Hours In The Day? Get Back Your Time By Systemising Your Brand And Marketing Whoever you are, I know that you’re looking for ways to give yourself more hours in the day. It could be freeing up more of your time to spend it with the family. Perhaps you’re looking at claiming back some ‘man hours’ from the overall business to invest in increased growth. Or maybe you’re a bit of a workaholic (guilty as charged), who’s trying to find more time to get even more work done every day.
Andrew Vesey Vesey Creative
In all three of these scenarios, systemising your Brand and Marketing implementation can afford you many extra hours, all year round. The results will vary depending on your current methods of operation, your company structure and you own personal level of time expenditure on this area of the business. Any business however, can make a noticeable change in time requirements, while also getting the added bonus of a more consistent and effective Brand.
So how do we go about this?
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Is Our Brand Strong And Well Implemented?
can be strides ahead when the time comes.
I can’t go any further with a clear conscience without first getting you to ask this question.
Get Buy-In From Those Involved.
If your Brand is in a bad place to begin with, following through with the systemisation of it will only send it in the wrong direction even more effectively than before.
You’ve now written down all the different things that need to be done, all the rules that need to be followed and what the end result will be. It’s time to see what others think.
So take the time to review your Brand and Marketing. From core values, through to how it is all implemented. Find any weak spots and sure them up, or if you need to, start from scratch and build your Brand back up.
They may not have anything to really add or improvements you could make, but the small time investment will get most of them buying into any new initiatives this process generates. Purely for the fact that you asked their opinion on things - people like to be consulted.
Write It Down.
If you are solely responsible for the Brand and Marketing right now, then discuss what you have written with your trusted advisors and anyone you have decided to delegate to. They can give you a very different point of view and maybe point out important things that weren’t recorded (normally because it seems to obvious to record).
It’s time to get it out of your head and onto (probably digital) paper. I struggle with this myself sometimes. I come up with the best systems and processes for our company, but then never get around to actually documenting them. I know exactly what needs to be done, so I just assume that everyone else does too. This is why I’m glad I have someone like Fiona to ask me about every step of the process and avoid technical jargon wherever possible. Sorry, you’ll have to find your own Fiona, I’m not sharing. Document each piece of your Brand and Marketing, as well as how it is implemented. Include as many details as you can, from your logos and colours, through to standardised Brand messaging and the way that the phones are answered. Pretend you are writing it for someone you’ve never meet, who doesn’t know anything about your company. This will pay dividends later as you grow. With each new staff member, franchisee or Brand Carrier you bring on, you won’t have to worry about missing things out or miscommunication. It will all be there in black and white.
Learn To Delegate. It takes a village to successfully run a business, and the larger that business gets, the bigger the village becomes. As village chieftain you aren’t going to have time to do the Brand and Marketing work yourself or monitor it 24/7. Now is the time to look at what you have recorded as your ‘current system’ and work out how you can utilise others to get it done. This may be outsourcing some or all of it, or you may be in a position to insource the entire lot. It really is a case of seeing what resources you have and what will be the most beneficial for your business. You may not quite have the resources yet to fully delegate the responsibilities in their most effective way, but if you plan for that eventuation now, you 26
When you already have a number of others involved with your Brand and Marketing systems, it’s a good thing to ask each of them to write down what their part of the process actually is (in as much detail as possible of course). Using this method you can find a number of extra gems, including where you are duplicating work and where there are ‘too many cooks in the kitchen’ leading to poor Brand consistency.
Document It. Using all of this data you have collected, you will now be able to create a comprehensive Brand Manual. More than just a basic Visual Identity Manual (what a majority of businesses call a Brand Manual), this document should include everything from your values and visual identity, right through to staff responsibilities and which Brand Carriers are to be used to effect your Brand implementation. I recommend producing this document in distinct sections as you will need to supply some of the information to outside sources and may not want to share absolutely everything with them. In most cases, three sections will work fine: 1. Core Brand. Including values, tone of voice, standardised messaging etc 2. Visual Identity. Logos, colours, fonts, basic design rules 3. Brand Systems. The who, what, where, when and the how of implementing your Brand This entire Brand Manual should be able to find a comfortable home inside your operations manual or along side your business plan.
Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
Be Flexible - To A Point. While you want to be as detailed as possible, you will also benefit from programming a little flexibility into your Brand delivery. Including logo and font variations, through to guidelines on altering certain designs or Brand Messaging can cut down ‘approval hours’ (sometimes quite dramatically) while maintaining a high level of consistency.
and authority to make judgement calls on everyday issues. To ensure they have the authority they need, it is a good idea to give them a title and let everyone know what it means. If ‘Brand Guardian’ sounds too much like they’ll be spying on the other staff, maybe go with something positive like ‘Brand Champion’.
The Next Level. Make It a ‘No-Brainer’. Having all the above information well documented in the Brand Manual is great, but let’s take it one step further. Why just list what logos need to be used and what fonts are required, when you can easily package them up into one or more Branding Packs. These simple packs can include any pre-formatted piece of your Brand and Marketing, along with any necessary guidelines for it’s use. Internal staff and even external suppliers or the media can then very easily be given the required Branding Pack and provide you with high quality, consistent Brand delivery in a fraction of the time (and time is money).
Who’s Your Guardian? You need to appoint someone in the business (or an external team) to be the guardian of your Brand. This guardian is your one point of contact internally and externally for all Brand and Marketing enquires. They should understand your Brand requirements (that you have now systemised and documented) back to front and have the ability
How can you improve your systems even more and grab back more hours? Well, technology is your friend here. There are a number of technologies and systems out there that can help you to better systemise your Brand and Marketing. Some are simple DAM (Digital Asset Management) systems, which can help your to centrally store and control all of your Brand materials and distribute them where they need to be with a couple of mouse clicks. Other systems include the ability to order standardised and templated Marketing Materials from one or multiple suppliers, giving you consistency of design and again taking out the middle man (or middle men, in the case or larger companies), saving time in bunches. Through the above process you will be armed with enough information to judge each piece of technology against what you need it to do.
Remember. Time is money - and we all want more of both. So invest a little time now to get your Brand and Marketing systemised properly. It will pay ongoing dividends for years to come.
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Sharing The Wealth Building Your Brand Through Employee Ownership Highly engaged and motivated employees can give you a competitive edge in terms of business performance and are also crucial in terms of building a strong brand. Employees are often on the front line particularly within the service industry so they really need to embody what your brand is all about. You want them to care as much about the company and be as enthusiastic about the brand as the owners would be. This can be achieved through giving everyone the opportunity to be shareholders in the business but financial participation alone is not enough. For employees to really think, act and feel like owners then there must be transparency in terms of the sharing of information within the company. Open Book Management is a phrase used to describe the methodology used by SRC Holdings, a US company which has been Jacqui Mitchell employee owned for around 30 years. Open Book Management Great Game UK isn’t just about sharing financial results with employees. They actually need to understand the numbers and not just the historical figures. More crucially they must also understand the future projections, know what the critical numbers are and how their actions can impact on the bottom line. Employees also need to have autonomy in their roles. Give them the responsibility to make decisions to strengthen your brand and the freedom to make mistakes without the fear of reprimand. A strong ownership culture within a company would also mean that employees are consulted on major decisions. There are currently several tax efficient share schemes in the UK which can be used to make your employees shareholders. In particular, a 28
Share Incentive Plan would allow employees to be awarded shares which are completely free of tax and/or to purchase them from gross salary subject to annual limits set by HMRC. Employees may not even hold shares on an individual basis. Many employeeowned companies such as John Lewis use a Trust structure to hold the shares on behalf of employees. Regardless of whether shareholding is through a Trust or on an individual basis, the stake that employees as a whole have must be meaningful to ensure that the full benefits are realised. The fact that you are employee owned can also be a key part of your branding and what differentiates you in the market place. Many employee-owned companies will proudly include this as part of their logo and/or mention it on the homepage of their website. Customers and suppliers alike are pleased that everyone from the company that they deal with has stake in the business and it can also help attract and retain talented individuals to join the company. All is not lost if you’re not employee owned and don’t intend to go down this path as some of the benefits of “ownership thinking” may still be obtained even if employees don’t actually have a stake in the business. The sharing of information and consultation on decision making can still ensure that employees are enthusiastic ambassadors for the brand and the sharing of rewards can be through a bonus scheme and indeed may not even be financial as long as employees feel that they are being fairly rewarded for the contribution that they are making. To find out more about employee ownership, please visit www.employeeownership.co.uk or Google ‘Employee Ownership’ for your region. Support is available in Scotland for companies wishing to explore the possibility of employee ownership through Co-operative Development Scotland ( http://bit.ly/YedYRd ).
Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
YOUR
BRAND OUR
TEAM
Coming Soon To A Brand Near You
VESEY CREATIVE LIMITED presents in association with BRAND QUARTERLY a VESEY CREATIVE production ‘THE BIG REVEAL’ starring YOUR BRAND and OUR TEAM offering BRAND ESTABLISHMENT, BRAND REVIEW, BRAND MANAGEMENT, BRAND IMPLEMENTATION and BRAND DEVELOPMENT based on YOUR COMPANY VISION supported by a VISUAL IDENTITY MANUAL plus Graphic DESIGN, PRINT MANAGEMENT, WEB DEVELOPMENT and MARKETINg consultancy in conjunction with Strategy, tRADE SHOW DEVELOPMENT, SOCIAL MEDIA, PHOTOGRAPHY and COPY WRITING produced by FIONA VESEY directed by ANDREW VESEY
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The Lollipop Entrepreneur: Behavioural Styles and Motivation Referral marketing leads to few – if any – overnight success stories. In fact, the most crucial part is building relationships, which takes a lot of time and effort.
For the most part, your behavioural style is determined by what motivates you. Motivation is defined as the biological, emotional, cognitive or social forces that activate and direct our behaviour.
However, when you’ve taken the time to build the right referral relationships with the right people, and you are able to understand each of their behavioural styles, these longterm relationships will be a huge part of your referral marketing business.
Put simply, it’s the reason why you act the way you act.
Dr. Ivan Misner BNI The Referral Institute
Of course, it’s really important to understand your own behaviour style before you can go any further. After much research and working with experts in the industry, we’ve identified four key behavioural styles that people can fall into.
Nurturer If you are slower-paced and people-oriented, your style is most likely NURTURER. Nurturers tend to be caring, thoughtful people who enjoy helping others and strongly dislike confrontation as they do not like to hurt people’s feelings.
Promoter If you are fast-paced and people-oriented, your style is most likely PROMOTER Promoters tend to be gregarious, fun people who enjoy excitement and the spotlight and are very concerned with people liking them.
Examiner If you are slower-paced and task-oriented, your style is most likely EXAMINER
Why did you get out of bed this morning? What made you wear those shoes today? What has you going 75 mph in a 55 mph zone? What makes you attracted to that particular business person? What makes you choose to go to that networking event? Why did you want to talk to that person and stay away from the other one? Motivation can be very tricky to understand. Humans are incredibly complex on one hand but on the other hand so easy to figure out when you understand behavioural styles. When you think of what motivates you, it can be a multitude of things. Some motivation is a temporary situation. Say you don’t enjoy numbers or accounting, yet at the end of the month you want to receive your paycheck. You may be temporarily motivated to do the accounting necessary to generate the paycheck. However, if you thought about a career in accounting, it would make you sick to your stomach. Many people make an incredible living in this profession, so obviously you wouldn’t die if you had to do that forever. But you are definitely not motivated to work with numbers on a regular basis. The motivation that we would like to discuss now is the “how you are wired” variety. It’s a motivation that may have been with you forever. If you’re a parent, have you ever noticed that your children are “wired” differently? Did you notice what motivated them before they could even speak? Did they want independence or to hold their own things? At times did they seem to not need you?
Examiners tend to be very methodical, processoriented people who enjoy completing tasks and dislike anything with too much hype that is not based on facts.
Or maybe your child had a knack for taking stuff apart and putting it back together, had to have 12 toys to play with to be happy or maybe they simply wanted time with you. Can you see how this is related to the four behavioural styles?
Go-Getter
The independent baby could be the Go-Getter. The baby who is taking everything apart and putting it back together could be the Examiner. The baby who has to have 12 toys to play with or they get bored could be the Promoter. The baby who just wants time with you to feel safe could be the Nurturer.
If you are fast-paced and task-oriented, your style is most likely GO-GETTER Go-Getters tend to be very driven, challengeoriented people who enjoy winning at everything and strongly dislike being wrong about anything.
As you might imagine, it’s not so simplistic that 30
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every person in 100% one style or the other. It’s in our nature to be a blend of all four styles, but most people do tend to display one style more prominently than the others. And the same is true for me…
Ivan The Go-Getter When I was 11 years old, I missed the bus to school one day. The school was only two miles way, and I had time, so I started walking. Along the way I passed a gas station that had a small store attached to it. My eye caught some beautiful lollipops – big, red strawberry-flavoured suckers. They only cost a nickel (I’m probably aging myself with that information!) so I bought 4-5 of them and headed on to school. A friend saw what I had and asked if he could buy one. I said sure – for a dime. He bought it right away! That day I sold all the lollipops but the one I kept for myself…and I saw a great business opportunity. The next day I walked to school again, this time buying a dozen lollipops. I sold them all before school let out for the day. I did this the next day,
and the next…for almost a month, very happy at my markup and the money that I was starting to see growing from my lollipop enterprise. Then one day, I got called into the Vice Principal’s office. He asked me if I were selling candy at school. I said yes, indeed! – and started to share with him the exciting story of how I was doubling my money. Before I could get very far, he interrupted me to say that I was not allowed to sell candy at school, and that if I continued I would be expelled! I was shocked. In fact, I immediately thought of the many fundraisers I had already seen at school by that time, which sold – you guessed it – candy. I asked the vice principal why it was okay for candy to be sold at school for fundraisers but I couldn’t do the same thing. His only answer was a cryptic, “It’s different.” That was my first experience in business and even though a “government regulation” shut it down after only a month, it was obvious from that early time in my life that I was a Go-Getter.
How do you behave?
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Managing Change The Why, The What, The How ‘Change management is the approach for supporting individuals through the changes required in how they do their jobs’.
Memo: To all staff: As you will be aware, ABC Concordia Ltd recently undertook a review of the business to identify performance opportunities and to consider the resources, processes and systems required to promote growth. It is important to ABC Concordia Ltd that business performance and profitability are prioritised throughout our operation. The review has made clear that significant changes will be required if ABC Concordia Ltd is to meet its needs through growth development to achieve long term business viability. Identified changes may require the introduction of new business practices, reporting relationships, priority areas and in some instances, roles. ABC Concordia Ltd has formed the view that a strong back to basics approach to customer service must be our future focus to enhance sales and business performance. As such we will increase the direct support provided to our valuable staff. At the same time, management will focus on developing a comprehensive understanding of business performance, and the changing needs of the business.
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Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
‘Why’ Is There A Need For Change? The above memo sets out to staff why the organisation needs to change. There are many triggers which present an opportunity or an issue for an organisation to consider they need to address improvements in organisation performance. Triggers could be customer demands, competitive response, internal performance (or lack of), regulation or legislation, market shifts, new structures, policies, targets, acquisitions, disposals, re-locations just to list a few. These are transformed into ‘projects’ or ‘initiatives. The organisation can now say ‘why’ there is a need for change. These are facts which can be relayed to others further down the track.
‘What’ Changes Need To Be Made? Now that we have a why, the next logical step is to consider ‘what’ changes to processes, systems, tools, job roles or organisation structures are required. These are the targets of the solution(s) that will be developed to address the opportunity or issue.
‘How’ Will These Changes Affect People? Logically, any changes made to processes, systems, tools, job roles or organisation structures ultimately impacts ‘how’ some people in the organisation do their jobs. This may be just one person. Then again it could be 12 or a whole department. Whatever happens, the results of the project or initiative is going to require some individuals to change how they do their present job. If these people do not adapt to the ‘new way of doing things’, the project or initiative will fail.
Prosci goes on to say their benchmarking data clearly shows the connection between managing the people side of change and achieving the required outcomes of the project or initiative. Prosci’s correlation analysis of data from the 2009 and 2007 benchmarking studies shows that projects with excellent change management are six times more likely to meet objectives than those with poor change management. And, projects with good change management in place are five times more likely Ken Vesey to meet objectives than those Approachable with poor change management. Consultancy The analysis goes one step further, though, showing that effective change management also increases the likelihood of staying on schedule and on budget. The 2002 McKinsey Quarterly article “Helping employees embrace change” draws a similar conclusion based on data from forty projects. The bottom line is, the better the people side of change is managed the more successful a project will be.
What Does Change Management Involve?
It is only on the ‘how’ step that change management takes effect. Prosci, a company formed in 1994, is an independent research company in the field of change management. Prosci’s definition of change management is: “Change management is the [application of] the set of tools, processes, skills and principles for managing the people side of change to achieve the required outcomes of a change project or initiative”.
A key component for managing the people side of change is understanding how one individual makes a change successfully. Remember that change occurs ‘one person at a time’. If you like, the person is the unit of change. You are actually managing this ‘person unit’. The success of the final project or initiative relies on the individual adopting the change and making their own personal transition from the old way to the new way.
Change management involves thoughtful planning and sensitive implementation through communication. It is essential to actively consult with, and involve those people directly affected by the changes. If you force change on people the natural reaction is to resist. Change must be realistic, achievable and measurable. Do not try and ‘sell’ change to people as a way of accelerating ‘agreement’ and implementation. ‘Selling’ change to people is not a sustainable strategy for success, unless your aim is to be bitten
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on the bum at some time in the future when you least expect it. When people listen to a manager high-up ‘selling’ them a change, decent diligent folk will generally smile and appear to accede, but quietly to themselves, they’re thinking, “No bloody chance mate, if you think I’m standing for that load of old bollocks you’ve another think coming…” (And that’s just the amenable types - the other more recalcitrant types will be well on the way to making their own particular transition from gamekeepers to poachers.
Who Has The Responsibility For Managing Change? The organisation, through management, has the responsibility to facilitate and enable the change, not the employee. Did the employee suggest they change? No way!!!! Change means work! I may have to start thinking! I may have to learn something new! The employee does not have a responsibility to manage change - the employee’s responsibility is to do their best, which is different for every person and depends on a wide variety of factors (health, maturity, stability, experience, personality, motivation, etc). Management needs to understand the situation from an objective standpoint and then to help people understand the reasons, aims, and ways of responding positively according to the employees’ own situations and capabilities. Increasingly the manager’s role is to interpret, communicate and enable - not to instruct and impose, which nobody really responds to well. Change must involve the people, not be imposed upon people. It is of no use to think people currently have the ‘wrong’ mind set. If people are not approaching their tasks or the organisation effectively, then the organisation has the wrong mind set, not the people.
How Difficult Can Change Management Be? If you are contemplating introducing change, then be aware that people generally react badly to change in the first instance. You will observe people in a change process become anxious and in shock. This is followed by expressing a degree of happiness or relief about the situation, glad that something was happening at last. Then fear sets in. If there is a healthy amount of two way communication at the happiness stage, then the degree of fear may be reduced, but it is always present.
that many people have, but there is not a typical response to loss as there is no typical loss. Our grief is as individual as our lives. The five stages, denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance are a part of the framework that makes up our learning to live with the one we lost. They are tools to help us frame and identify what we may be feeling. But they are not stops on some linear timeline in grief. Not everyone goes through all of them or in a prescribed order. Some people move more quickly through the stages than others, depending on their temperament, life experiences, degree of control and so on. People may regress to an earlier stage depending on their situation. An effective change agent is able to plot where people are on the transition curve, and respond appropriately People will resist change, afraid of what lies ahead and how it might affect them in a negative way. If you are a change agent, accept that this resistance to change is a perfectly normal reaction and do not be deterred by it. For example, there is no point focusing on the benefits of change, if people are still in the stage of fear or threat. You have to listen to them and attempt to understand where they are at that moment. The discussion should ideally move to an action stage when they are ready for it. As long as you are ahead of them on the curve, you can guide them forward at the right time. What are the risks change management brings? The four largest risks to the change management are: 1. 2. 3. 4.
Impatient owners or senior decision makers Control issues from above Resistance from employees Not effectively communicating with employees (resulting in resistance) and clients (who may take their business to a competitor).
Trying to change too quickly prevents proper consultation with experts and involvement with key people (like employees – which will further aggravate point three). Both will lead you to waste time, money and increase frustration and decrease satisfaction as short cuts cost you dearly in the future (either by incurring additional development, losing market share, and / or loss of valuable staff). Will a more sensible time-frame really be disastrous?
Elisabeth Kubler-Ross in early research identified five stages of grief. She found there are responses to loss
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Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
What Are The Benefits That Change Management Brings? While change can be risky, the benefits far outweigh the potential pitfalls. Remember that change management has benefits for both the organisation and the staff and individual. Benefits of change management to the organisation: 1. Change is a planned and managed process. The benefits of the change are known before implementation and serve as motivators and assessment of progress. 2. Change can be implemented without negatively effecting the day to day running of business. 3. Organisational effectiveness and efficiency is maintained or even improved by acknowledging the concerns of staff. 4. Employee performance increases when staff feel supported and understand the change process. 5. Increased customer service and effective service to clients from confident and knowledgeable employees. 6. Managed costs of change: change management helps to contain costs
associated with the change. 7. Creates an opportunity for the development of “best practices”, leadership development, and team development. 8. Increased return on investment (ROI) Benefits of change management for individuals and staff: 1. Effective change management supports a smooth transition from the old to the new while maintaining morale, productivity, and even company image. 2. An efficient change management process creates the correct perception of the change for staff and public 3. A carefully planned approach to change reduces stress and anxiety and encourages people to stay loyal to the organization 4. Change management reduces disruptive aspects and emphasises positive opportunities in the change process. 5. Improves morale, productivity and quality of work. The change management methodology gives organisations a roadmap to help them achieve success. I will begin to address this roadmap in the next quarterly article.
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Brand Quarterly™
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When you’re creating and maintaining a brand, you’re working with designers. Whether they are in-house or an external team, designers and branding are never far away from each other.
Design 101 Typography Terms
Design 101 is a series aimed at bridging the gap between you and the design world. Helping you to better communicate your vision with your designer and get an understanding of ‘how they tick’.
When working with magazines, brochures, annual reports and catalogues, you will come across a whole new language that relates to the use of text and types of fonts. To help you get to grips with this new language, here’s a selection of the more common terms you will come across:
Baseline
Character
An invisible horizontal line on which the feet of all characters on a line of type are set, used for proper alignment of type.
Any letter, figure, punctuation, symbol or space.
Flush Left/Right
Paragraphs set without indents.
A paragraph or lines of text are aligned on the left/ right side. Synonymous with the term Left/Right Justified.
Body Text
Folio
The main portion of a book or other document, excluding front matter and back matter.
A page number, commonly placed outside the running head at the top of the page. A folio that appears at the bottom of a page is called a drop folio.
Block Text Or Block Type
Block Quote A long quotation--four or more lines--within body text, that is set apart in order to clearly distinguish the author’s words from the words the author is quoting.
Gutter In typography, the term refers to the space between columns of type, usually determined by the number and width of columns and the overall width of the area to be filled.
Justified
Serif
Type that aligns on both the left and right side. Alternate term for justified text, justified type, and justified composition.
An all-inclusive term for characters that have a line crossing the free end of a stroke. The term serif refers to both that finishing line and to characters and typefaces that have them.
Kerning
Tracking
The reduction of letterspacing between certain character combinations in order to reduce the space between them, performed for aesthetic reasons.
The adjusting of the letterspacing throughout an entire piece of typeset copy.
Weight
Leading (pronounced “led-ding”) An alternate and more popularly used term for line spacing.
The lightness or darkness in print of a particular typeface, based upon its design and thickness of line.
White Space
Monospaced Descriptive of characters of a typeface all having the same width. The lowercase “i” and “m”--which would have different widths in proportional width typefaces--are identical in monospaced typefaces.
Orphan The last line of a paragraph when it is less than onethird the width of the line -especially when it is the carry-over of a hyphenated word, carried to the top of a new page or column.
The space on either side of typographic characters, which can be reduced with tracking.
Keri Sandford Vesey Creative
Widow The last line of a paragraph when it is less than onethird the width of the line, especially when it is the carry-over of a hyphenated word.
Sans Serif Characters (or typefaces) without serifs, which are lines crossing the free end of the stroke. “Sans serif” means “without serif”.
Brand Quarterly™
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SMEs: Getting To Know The Monster It used to be easy – or at least easyish – to know about markets. A focus group here. A survey there. Markets were boring dull things that lumbered about occasionally. But, more often they slept like drugged Orks. But markets are not like they once were. They’re a tad more active. They change and disappear. They reinvent themselves and replicate or splinter. It’s all because of the blistering speed of global communications and a gargantuan increase in information sharing. Markets can now be created overnight. Brands can come and go and be destroyed in the blink of an eye. But there’s a wonderful democracy about all of this. Big businesses find it no easier to deal with the deluge of data and opinions and
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social media than smaller companies. In fact small companies might just have competitive advantage. Because the social dialogue has a pulse – it’s a living breathing thing. And we can get to know living and breathing things if we just spend a bit of time investing in the relationship. The wonderful thing is that social media presents us with a head-spinning array of opportunities to know things about our new dynamic, hyperspeed markets – in real time. Think about any topic. Let’s say you’re a vendor of apple seeds. Try typing “apple seeds” into Twitter search. Before your eyes you’ll see what people are saying about apple seeds in real time – or just seconds ago. Let’s say you provide medical equipment to people with dodgy knees. In seconds
Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
you can create a community around dodgy knee issues. In just a few days you’ll have built an international community of dodgy knee people – all of whom you can get to know by first name. You can ask them about knee stuff and get them to try your products. Or you might want to tap into an existing dodgy knee community on Facebook. Or you may want to feature photos of knees on your Tumblr account or Wordpress blog. In short, regardless of what products you peddle you can piggy-back on communities or create your own. You can act as a voyeur and easily listen in to conversations. Forget about “quantitative” research or “qualitative insight” – you can ride the rollercoaster of global customer conversations.
But, here’s the problem. You may end up knowing the beast or simply wrestling with it (fully greased). Because, just because information is vastly more accessible doesn’t mean it’s any more understandable. You may, in fact, end up with lots of information and no business. And by observing your markets you may end up influencing it. In fact you may make it angry. The trick is to know what to listen for and adopt a humble attitude to knowledge. Pervasive, global and highly available knowledge is a great thing. If you choose to ignore social conversations about the markets and issues upon which you depend – well you’re missing a great opportunity. Moreover, you can jump in and participate in the debate. People often spread myth and nonsense via social media. You can seed the conversation and become a thought leader. But that requires investment of time. And you’ll need to think carefully about what you want to say and what you’ll be willing to hear. Some of the most successful SMEs do just that. If they have something interesting to say they participate in the conversation. They realise that there are two sides to the conversation bargain – giving and taking. They also know in advance what persona they want to adopt and what language they need to use.
Jeffrey Peel Quadriga Consulting
Social consumers appreciate that. They don’t want some type of tell-sell. They want to reach their own conclusions – and they’ll respect organisations that treat them as thinking, rational adults rather than supine idiots. The marketing ego-rant of old simply doesn’t cut it anymore. Business is now much more interesting and challenging than it used to be. SMEs now have the chance to get to know their customers and people who influence their markets. The companies that realise what a privilege that is will be the ones that most deserve their success.
Brand Quarterly™
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The Buck Stops Here Who Is Responsible For Developing A Franchisee’s Business? If you listen to most franchisors there’s a simple answer – the franchisee. It’s obvious that’s what they’re here to do. It’s the franchisee’s business so it’s up to them to drive it, grow it and make their fortune. But I wonder if this is just too easy an answer so let’s explore it. Franchisees start at the entry level of the network with one van, one store, one business unit and learn their trade on the ground. We all know that this is a tricky time; the business plan is written, funds raised and the first steps are taken into the unknown. The franchisee knows though, that you’ve done this before and that you’re there to help and guide. “Don’t do this, try that instead” because we’ve 42
been here and we know what we’re doing – that’s the message that you need to be giving and it’s a message that gives confidence to your network. All very sensible and most franchisors are good at giving this support but what happens after the first couple of years? The franchisee is growing well, business is booming and they want to expand. Many franchisors will say great, off you go, but do they give any practical support? Usually no, the franchisee is on their own having to employ and manage new staff, re-allocate duties, operate from two locations, oh, and usually see profits drop for a while too.
Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
the expansion. Staff will be important in helping to protect the integrity and success of the existing franchise operation, which should not be allowed to suffer through distractions and difficulties that emerge as a result of expansion.
Critical Path So now we get to the nub of my argument. Franchisors are very good at encouraging growth or forcing growth by setting targets but they’re dreadful at showing the franchisee how to do it. Loads of case studies and data are available across the franchise network and these need to be leveraged for the benefit of growing franchisees. Here’s my suggestion: take control of the franchisee’s growth. Build a critical path to growth and train your network on how to plan for the future. A franchisor should be able to analyse the trigger points for growth by analysing the growth of their mature franchisees and prepare a variety of business models to signpost the way for up-coming franchisees.
Euan Fraser AMO Consulting
Franchisees need to be helped to think through the consequences of growth. They need to be aware of “the next level” in the system: • What are the turnover triggers that mean I need to expand? • What are the organisational changes I’ll need to make? • What should I expect and watch for at the next level? • What job roles do I need filled? • How much extra cash will I need in the short term? • What will be the additional costs, revenues and profits?
Tackling Risks Expanding a business creates risks, and it is important to manage these carefully by telling the franchisee what could go wrong, how likely this outcome is, and putting in place systems to deal with problematic events as they arise. It is impossible to prevent risk entirely as many eventualities can’t be controlled. However, by attempting to predict what could go wrong, you will give the franchisee confidence that you know what you’re doing and they will be better prepared and able to deal with problems if they arise.
The value of the critical path is directly proportional to the effort you invest in developing it. Begin by evaluating your current operations – analyse your franchisees into categories that you think might reflect the levels in your organisation. Compare the resources they employ, compare their cost base, look at the equipment they use, look at their training needs, look at their marketing, look at their figures. Then develop your models and work through them with your network. Encourage your franchisees to move from one level to the next as fast as they can – or are able and let them do it with the confidence of having a tried and tested path to follow.
It is important to keep staff motivated and behind
Brand Quarterly™
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Bridging The Gap Getting The Old And New To Work Together Hands up those of you who are content to be trapped in no-mans land, in the constant battle between the Marketing mediums of the past and the leading edge technologies and innovations of today (and next week). Good. Seeing as everyone’s hands are still on their keyboards, mice or holding tablets (or a tasty cup of coffee), we can begin today’s discussion. 44
The Old Vs The New. We see it as a problem for the modern marketer, due to the slew of new technologies and innovations being thrown at us. True, it’s probably more difficult now than it ever has been, but let’s remember, ‘Traditional Media’ was once ‘The future of Marketing’ too. The printing press, commercial radio, television, that crazy thing called the internet that a lot of people
Building Your Business From The Brand Up™
trickle in, but the reply was standard: “I’m sorry, we don’t accept electronic images as they are not of acceptable quality to produce your marketing. Please send transparencies or at the very least, a developed print produced by a film camera.” Nowadays, a little over 10 years later, I can’t imagine many studios being pleased to be handed a bunch of transparencies. A lot of them probably wouldn’t have a clue what to do with them. We now see companies using mobile phone cameras and tools like Pinterest and Instgram to create viral campaigns which, when executed correctly in the right market, can easily outdo the reach and effectiveness of a traditional print advert. Andrew Vesey So with all this constant change Vesey Creative in the industry and everyone looking to find that extra edge, how can you give yourself and your Brand the best chance of success? Well let’s have a look at how most of the successful Brands have done it before us (and are still doing it). Understand your market and have a solid grip on ‘Who you are’ Deliver a product or service that fulfils a need Market it through a combination of the most effective traditional and leading edge mediums Keyword there - Combination. didn’t think would take off. Even mobile and digital mediums which are still in relative infancy, are looking over their shoulder to see what’s going to replace them. Thinking back to when I first started in the industry (a meagre 15 years ago), no client even tried sending the design team a digital photo (I’m not sure if anyone in New Zealand owned digital cameras at that point). A couple of years later, they started to
Collaboration Beats Competition. Forget about the TV vs Radio, Print vs Web, Web vs App debates. While it is important to understand the strengths and weaknesses of each medium, it should be to make the decision on how they can work together rather than which of the two deserves your entire budget. In very few markets, will a one medium campaign
Brand Quarterly™
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outperform a mixed medium one. Collaboration beats competition every time.
understands the strengths and weaknesses of QR Codes, the ‘hype’ is actually well worth it.
We of course all have budgetary concerns, which is why most companies can’t deliver a fully immersive, integrated media campaign anymore - and it just gets more difficult with every new Marketing medium that comes along. Herein lies the importance of understanding each medium to a reasonable level and being able to chose the right ‘tool for the job’ and team it up with the most effective supporting cast.
Being able to get a Quick Response (yes, that’s what QR stands for), on the fly from a potential customer is powerful. Instantly connecting them from a magazine advert, flyer or bus stop poster, directly to your latest online campaign, loyalty generating app or ‘TV’ commercial that’s ready to go viral.
Depending on your product/service and your target market, you’ll find the right combination for you will vary, compared even to some Brands you may consider competition. Be it a print campaign, supported by a web site and social media, or a Mobile App supported by old-school ‘Street Teams’ (and if you want to easily manage your Street Team, then yes - There’s an App for that…), the key to successfully implementing any campaign is understanding the different mediums and blending together the best combination for you.
Building Bridges. Not Burning Them. Getting the most out of our Marketing implementation doesn’t mean abandoning what’s worked in the past in favour of the new and shiny. It relies on us being able to find ways to connect the old and the new, giving us the ability to reach much more of the fabled Marketing Bell Curve. A campaign that can reach the Early Adopters, Mid Market and even touch the Laggards is a wonderful thing to see (and ones that do it EFFECTIVELY are quite rare). So often, the latest technologies and innovations don’t actually provide us with a truly new medium to work within. What they do is add to the effectiveness or reach of a medium, or help us to bridge the gap between two mediums more effectively.
Case In Point: QR Codes. These little square barcodes (which my friends at QR Code Scotland like to call ‘Paper Hyperlinks’) work wonders for connecting printed mediums with the web and apps. By themselves, they’re useful if you’re using them for highly detailed inventory tracking or for sharing your contact details from a business card to a mobile phone. But as a Marketing tool they don’t really do that much on the surface. So why the big fanfare and sometimes obsessive need for them? Well, some of that has to do with new tech hype and not understanding how to utilise the QR Code as a tool. But for any Marketer who actually 46
Other examples include the very new Augmented Reality. Hold your phone in front of a movie poster at a bus stop and the trailer (or a special AR only promo) loads, to give a much stronger message than a static poster ever could. Of course, as with QR Codes, there are limitations. A reliance on mobile internet is the big one for both, but let’s be realistic - you’re trying to connect paper and the web so it makes sense that you need an internet connection. This is a prime example of needing to know your tools’ weaknesses and work within them.
Combining Strengths Of Old And New. Think of all of these different Marketing mediums as pedigree breeds. While they can look stunning, and let’s face it, give you a big ego bump because they’re ‘a pure breed’, you have to remember that every single one of those pedigree breeds has some (sometimes major) weakness. How to combat those weaknesses? Well, of course you need to know what they are so you can keep an eye out and avoid them if possible. But, the most effective route is to get yourself a ‘cross-breed’. One that has been chosen carefully to counteract the weaknesses on both sides. You can end up with all of the good and (hopefully) none of the bad. OK. all of this is making me want a puppy. So I’d better move on before I buy one. I can’t tell you which is the right combination for you, as every company, Brand and product is very different and so are the markets they operate in. It really is up to you as a Marketer to keep on top of the latest Marketing mediums while not forgetting about the tried and true. No one expects you to know all the intricate details of every possible option out there, but you do need to know what the options are. Find yourself experts (internally or externally) who can advise you on the finer points of the different mediums and answer the two really important questions: “What are it’s strengths and weaknesses?” and “What will compliment it most effectively?”. Once you have these questions answered, you’re well on your way to implementing a successful Marketing campaign.
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