Branding Archives - Page 28 of 42 - McLellan Marketing Group

Marketing Tips from a Marketing Agency: Make a good first impression

June 2, 2007

It would only stand to reason that a marketing & branding agency would be pretty good at branding and marketing itself.

So I thought it might be fun to explore some branding & marketing concepts using our own agency, McLellan Marketing Group, as the guinea pig.

Make a Good First Impression

Retail brands like Apple and Barnes & Noble get this. Just by walking into their space — you are enveloped into an experience. They begin their brand story at the front door. But B2B companies and service providers have been much slower at recognizing the power of maximizing that first impression.

At MMG, we don’t even let them get into the front door before we begin our brand story. I’ve enhanced this night time shot, so you can get a sense of what our building looks like — day or night. The upper panel shows our tagline (where strategy and passion collide) and logo in a can’t be missed size. Then, the display window below is filled with our work. Often times, people show up late to meetings at our place, because they’ve stood and perused our display and lost track of time.

And clients love to see their work in the display case.

Using your exterior or lobby to create a brand impression can really set your company apart. It’s not uncommon for prospects to scout a few companies before they choose a new partner.

John Roberson the president of LobbyMakeover.com, a division of Advent based in Nashville offers these 7 elements to consider for your lobby makeover.

A high-impact logo—Reflect your brand with a tastefully fabricated logo that is appropriate to the space.
A clear key message—Differentiate your company with a positioning statement that lets folks know what you do and how you do it differently.
An effective color palette—Use colors that are evocative of the brand and show contrast, but are not a literal application of your brochure.
An engaging group of images—Choose images that reflect your company and the way you do business.
Success stories and awards—Artistically include customer testimonials and accomplishments.
Mission/value statement—Share where you are going and what you value because it is meaningful to customers, employees and vendors.
A user-friendly information and media center—Offer presentations, information, brochures and business cards to guests in a purposeful and attractive manner.

Be honest — what does your exterior/lobby say to your visitors? What do you suppose that first impression costs or earns you?

Analogies = sales

May 30, 2007

If you’ve read this blog for awhile, you know I believe in the power of storytelling, especially analogies.

If you want to talk about the importance of your employees understanding/believing in your company’s brand, why of course you’d talk about little red wagons.

If you need to convince someone of the importance of repetition and consistency, wouldn’t you naturally talk about toothbrushing?

The importance of planning? Why getting to Cleveland silly. How marketing should feel? Hello…campfire. You get the idea.

Analogies work because:

They break down the complex and make it simple
They turn the unfamiliar into something relevant
They are very memorable
They’re viral — you can tell the story and watch it spread
They take the abstract and make it tangible

But don’t just take my word for it. Check out this article at RainToday.com. What Jill’s selling is no fish story!

Think of the most complex aspect of what you sell. If you could make it tangible, relevant and easy to understand — do you think you’d sell more? What analogy could you use to vividly describe it?

Best Practice: Branding

May 30, 2007

This appeared in the Des Moines Register’s Best Practices series on Tuesday, May 29th, 2007.

DREW MCLELLAN, TOP DOG, MCLELLAN MARKETING GROUP, DES MOINES

A brand is not your logo or your tagline.

Those are important tools you use to express your brand. But not the brand itself.

A brand is a unified, singular understanding of what an organization is about and how it is unique from the key audiences’ points of view. In English – it’s why a potential client or employee would choose you over your competitor. What makes you stand out from the rest? What’s it like to do business with you?

It is you standing up, hand on heart and making a promise. And then keeping that promise.

A brand is like a three-legged stool. The three legs are:

1. The company’s vision of the brand
2. The consumers’ vision of the brand
3. Where your brand sits in the marketplace

How you view your brand:

This is your take. What do you believe the brand values are? What promise are you making to the consumer? How does that promise also weave through your dealings with employees and vendors? What are you willing or not willing to compromise on?

How your consumers view your brand:

This is their experience. Do you promise one thing and then do another? Do your employees consistently deliver the same brand promise? Do your marketing communications pieces (ads, website, direct mail etc.) paint a different picture than an actual buying experience?

How you fit into the marketplace:

This is the 30,000-foot view. When you look over the competitive landscape, where does your brand sit? If you are a local coffee shop, how do you compare to Starbucks? If you’re a phone/internet provider how are your materials and sales people different from the last three I talked to? What does your brand promise say that makes you different from your competitors? Or are you like most companies and it doesn’t?

As a business owner, you need to make sure that you understand all three legs of the branding stool. You also need to make sure they square up together.

Why does branding matter?

Every business exists in a complicated, crowded marketplace. No matter what you do, someone else does it too. So, how do you stand out in the marketplace? How do you differentiate yourself? Every business has a simple choice. You can create/identify a brand to differentiate yourself or you can just be the cheapest option.

Which would you choose?

Or you can view it as it appeared in the paper: Download 052907DesMoinesRegister.pdf

Flickr photo courtesy of mleak.

Do you inspire joy?

May 28, 2007

We spent the weekend in New York City. While we were there, we saw the new play, Curtains. It’s a whodunit musical and well worth the ticket price. The performances, singing, dancing and choreography were really something to behold.

As I stood watching people spill out of the theatre, a young girl about five years old literally came dancing up the aisle. Her face was one of pure joy. At that moment, she *was* on that stage, dancing to the roaring crowd. You could see it all in her eyes.

My first thought was, "I wish the cast could see her. They’d be reminded why they chose this profession. Because they inspire joy."

My second thought was for you. (And me.) Do we inspire joy in our work? Does our product or service make our customers want to dance?

It’s really easy to dismiss that question with a "We don’t sing or dance, we build websites. Or we sell checking accounts …or we insure their families." But that’s a cop-out.

Every one of us has the capacity to create a joyful experience. Haven’t you ever hung up the phone with a big smile on your face because someone exceeded your expectations? Haven’t you ever finished a meeting with a business partner and felt so good about the work you’re doing together that you wanted to do a little jig? How about that little song of relief that wants to burst out when you realize that someone really and truly "gets" you and your work?

If not…you need to find new business partners. And if we’re not inspiring our clients, so do they.

What could you do that would inspire joy in your clients this week?

And now, for your viewing pleasure…some shots (off their official website) of Curtains. The lead in the play is David Hyde Pierce (Frasier’s brother Niles).

Seeing the other side

May 26, 2007

Think about it for a minute. There’s the work you. The family you. The buddies at the pub you. The girls at poker night you. The I’m so tired I could cry you. The blogger you. The marketer you. The consumer you. The son you. The trying not to laugh during church you.

So many faces. All of them you. Each honest, real and unique. But each one slightly different because of the circumstances, surroundings, or people involved.

That’s a very important thing to remember as marketing professionals. No one is just a 35 year old Caucasian man, with a wife and 2.3 children. Many faces. Many passions. Your marketing needs to push beyond assuming you know what the aggregate whole wants. You need to let your audience help you define why they need you. Because each 35 year old Caucasian man may want something slightly different.

See their many faces.

That’s what intrigued me about David Airey’s Face Behind the Blog post. Basically, he is reminding all of us that we’re more than the face we hold out as we author our blogs. He’s suggesting it would be interesting and insightful to share a photo of ourselves that puts us in a different light. That shows another face.

So far, several others have jumped on board.

Gayla at Mom Gadget
Char at Essential Keystrokes
Paul at Reflections
Rob at 2Dolphins
Zep at The In-Sect
Ingo at Stixster
Stevie at Lost In Cyberspace
The Paper Bull at (oddly enough) The Paper Bull
Lisa Sabin-Wilson at Just A Girl In The World
Dawud Miracle at dmiracle.com
Wendy Piersall at eMoms at Home
Dennis Bjørn Petersen at Petersen Inc.
Randa Clay at Randa Clay Design

I first read about it at Dawud Miracle’s blog and decided to join in.

So….step aside Blogger/Brander/Marketer Drew and make room for…

Table for One Drew?

I love this picture of my daughter and me. We’re at (wait for it….) Disney World and we’re waiting for a show to begin in front of Cinderella’s castle. This is us at our most comfortable, compatible best. And apparently my head is indeed flat enough to rest a popcorn bucket on!

So what do you say? Will you show us one of your other sides?

Update: Here’s who has jumped in since my initial. Is your name there?

Drew McLellan at The Marketing Minute
Becky McCray at Small Biz Survival
Phil Gerbyshak at Make it Great!
Steve Woodruff at StickyFigure
Dave Olson at Live the GREAT life that you desire
Greg at Become a Remote Control SEO
Ariane Benefit at Neat Living Blog

Is your tagline part of your brand?

May 24, 2007

That’s the question I posed over at Marketing Prof’s Daily Fix and we are in the midst of a pretty lively discussion. Come over and either add your two cents or just learn from the diversity of opinions.

How to use a survey effectively

May 23, 2007

I responded to a survey called "Media Relations in Practice" generated by PR News and recently received a "preview" of the results.

Let me share a couple of the graphs (screen shots from their website) and then make a couple points and get your feedback.

Some interesting results. Apparently they will be covering the findings in more detail in an upcoming issue of PR News. One of the charts I did not include was tied to the question "how do you track your PR efforts?" The overwhelming majority answered either Google or Yahoo.

But what interested me even more than the results was the way the survey results handled. As a respondent, I was sent a note of thanks and a web link. Oh yeah…and an "additional bonus for responding" a $50 off coupon for one of their products. Good for 90 days.

Here’s what I might have done differently.

I would have sent a web link but also offered each individual chart as a jpg (or some other format) for easier sharing. After all, their own respondents told them how important blogs and other social media are.
I would have solicited comments/examples to make the results come to life and used them in the upcoming article.
I would have attached a free white paper on a related topic, based on the results received, rather than the coupon.

How about you? Any a ha moments from the results? How would you have handled distributing the results or thanking the participants?

Silence kills a relationship

May 22, 2007

You know what drives me nuts? When I am ignored, like I’m barely visible. The silence is deafening.

We have a vendor/partner who does very good work. But they have a cultural habit that is resulting in my agency deciding to look for new vendors. They go silent.

When we run into a snag, we call or e-mail. They say they’ll check into it. I have no doubt that they’re doing something and trying to figure out the solution. But we don’t hear a word. We are left waiting. Our client is asking for updates and we have nothing to offer. We e-mail and e-mail or call and call, and finally we will get an update. I’m pretty sure (and yes, I have asked) that their culture says — focus on fixing the problem and then report the solution.

I want more than that. I want over communication. It’s not that I don’t want them to expend most of their energy on solving the snafu, but also I need them to recognize that I’m in the dark and how uncomfortable that is.

I want a daily update that gives me something to offer our client. I want to know what is working and what still has them stumped. I want anything but silence.

I think one of the most damaging things we can do is ignore a client. Because in essence, that’s what silence is.

When your clients are in crisis (or their own perceived crisis) how do you handle it? What do they want? How do you know it’s what they want? Are you guilty of keeping them in the dark?

Helping college grads get a job – FREE e-book

May 18, 2007

About 6 weeks ago, I asked my readers to take pity on all the college students who were about to start their first real job hunt. I suggested that the greatest graduation gift we could collectively offer was tough lessons learned, insights and practical tips. "Let’s give them a fighting chance," I said.

Boy, did they bring it on!

50 pages of sage advice. All for grads. All for free. Get it while the getting’s good! You have two download options. With and without photos. (In neither case is this going to win any design awards. Let’s remember that I am a writer.)

3+ mg e-book with photos Download collegegradsadvice.pdf

Tiny little 300K text only e-book Download collegegradsnophoto.pdf

Please take a minute to say thanks to the many professionals who took the time to offer a word of encouragement, a war story or an idea. Without them, this would have been a very short book!

As always, I’m honored by their generosity.

I apologize in advance if there are any errors. Also, if someone posted their answer on their own blog — I tried to catch them all, but if I missed you, I’m very sorry. And without further ado — the wisdom collective:

Aaron Potts
Andy Brudtkuhl
Andy Nulman
Andy Wibbels
Ann Handley
Ann Michael
Anne Simons
Becky Carroll
Bob Glaza
C.B. Whittemore
Carolyn Manning
Chris Cree
Christine Brown
CK
Darren Barefoot
David Reich
Delaney Kirk
Derek Tutschulte
Designer Mike
Doug Karr
Doug Mitchell
Drew McLellan
Joan Schramm
Kevin Hillstrom
Lewis Green
Liz Strauss
Mario Sundar
Mark Goren
Mark True
Mary Schmidt
Nick Rice
Patrick Schaber
Paul McEnany
Phil Gerbyshak
Roberta Rosenberg
Roger von Oech
Rosa Say
Seth Godin
Sharon Sarmiento
Stephanie Weaver
Steve Miller
Steve Sisler
Terry Starbucker
Toby Bloomberg
Tony D. Clark
Valeria Maltoni

White papers worth reading

May 16, 2007

In yesterday’s post, we discovered that readers place a very high value on white papers. So here are a few that I think you’ll value and learn something from.

The first two come from Barry Linetsky at The Strategic Planning Group. (just scroll down and they are right under his photo.)

Walt Disney: Nine principles of his success
Quiznos’ Low Road

This last one is a series I wrote back in November that, if you haven’t already downloaded and enjoyed, I hope you will.

Marketing Lessons From Walt Disney

Enjoy!

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