May 12, 2007
An excellent question!
When John Godfrey Saxe crafted his famous parable, he probably didn’t know he was telling a story about branding. But he was.
Find out how 6 blind men and one very patient elephant are all about branding in my first post over at Small Business Branding.
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May 10, 2007
Did you read the title in one of those reverberating loudspeaker voices? If not, you need to go back and re-read it that way. I’ll wait.
That is the soundtrack of my youth. I grew up dreaming of hearing the announcer’s voice booming my name I strode confidently to the mound.
My hero – Sandy Koufax, the preeminent pitcher of the 1960’s. He had a fastball that could singe your eyelashes before you knew it was even out of his hand. He had the stuff, on and off the field. He was an ambassador for the game and a class act.
I wanted to be just like him.
I would drift off to sleep many a night, shaking off pitch signals in my head as I imagined myself reaching my dream.
When I discovered blogging, I experienced a similar reaction to a different team – the bloggers at Marketing Profs Daily Fix. They were articulate, smart, insightful and engaging. I admired how confidant they were in their areas of expertise and how they could weave stories and facts together to illuminate their points of view.
I wanted to be just like them.
So I can’t tell you how humbled and elated I am to invite you over to the Daily Fix to read my inaugural post. Now if the Fix’s Ann Handley would just get on the loudspeaker…
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May 10, 2007
Over at the Daily Fix, Spike Jones (a great baseball name if I ever heard one) raises the question "why would you ever call out your competitors in your ads?"
He goes on to make some valid points.
But…
All of Spike’s arguments are based on the assumption that the only audience for advertising and marketing tactics are prospects. They’re not.
Who’s the most important customer? Right, the one you already have. They can either be out there, spreading your brand’s good word or they can not care enough to choose you again if the other guy is cheaper.
But when it comes to building brand loyalty and love, sometimes a little bashing goes a long way. Comparison ads do just that. They hold up two choices and they make a clear distinction between the two. And in doing that, sometimes they create or reinforce the building of ownership and pride in a brand.
Case in point — the Mac versus PC ads. Do I think that those ads sway some PC owners to come over to the other side? Sure. But what I think they really do is get us Mac people to thrust our fist in the air and shout a little. They reinforce our buying decision. They give us talking points so we can go out and spread the brand’s good word. They make us feel smart and special.
Which means that when its time to buy another….
Smart.
And now, for your viewing pleasure. Imagine me giving a little cheer.
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May 8, 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.
Express your brand simply and visually
At MMG, we help clients discover their brand so they can create love affairs with their clients.
That’s our brand in a sentence.
We understand that a powerful brand begets love affairs. For our clients. For the agency. For MMG team members. We call it a love affair in the round.
or….we can express our brand this way: This is what we do and how we do it.
Which one is more memorable for you? How could you do the same thing for your brand?
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May 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.
Brand your interviews
We brand ourselves so consumers can decide if we’d be a good match. We make a promise so that someone who isn’t interested in our promise just moves on. We should be using our brand to do that same kind of sorting/weeding for employees too.
Your interview questions should do more than tell you about the candidate. They should tell the candidate about you.
Here are some MMG favorites:
I’m not suggesting these are the questions for you. These questions speak to the MMG brand. Each of these give a little clue about the company and the people who work there.
So knowing your culture like you do — what might your branded interview questions be about?
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May 1, 2007
Today is a great day for Iowa Businesses! IowaBiz.com officially launches and boy is it packed with content!
IowaBiz.com is designed with only one goal — helping small businesses grow stronger and more profitable. We’ve lined up 12 incredibly smart and generous Central Iowa bloggers who are going to create new content every single day of the month.
Meet the Team
Accounting/Finance: Joe Kristan
Human Resources/Leadership: Shirley Poertner
Intellectual Property Law: Brett Trout
ESOP/Company Culture: Victor Aspengren
Life/Work Balance: Mitch Matthews
Insurance: Brian Honnold
Networking: Adam Steen
Social/Viral Media: Mike Sansone
Business Law: Rush Nigut
Call Center/Customer Service: Tom Vander Well
Project Management: Tim Johnson
Marketing/Branding: Drew McLellan
All of the authors are open to topic suggestions, so stop by, enjoy the high quality insights and ask a question or two.
Special thanks to Professional Solutions Insurance Services for being our corporate sponsor!
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April 30, 2007
From time to time, I’m going to share a mixed bag of ideas, marketing tips, brilliant writing and sometimes — something that just made me laugh out loud. Here’s today’s offering:
This one had me nodding my head: Steve Woodruff has harnessed the power or PageFlakes to create a remarkable quilt of marketing, branding and business blogs. Talk about an incredible library of ideas!
This one had me connecting with my own purpose: Steve Farber who you know as one of business’ most profound and real authors is asking a very important question on his blog. He’s asking about giving back. I saw his post a couple days ago and haven’t gotten over there to reply, but I sure am going to. You too?
Enjoy!
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April 28, 2007
Consistency is one of the immutable laws of marketing and branding. Inconsistency will erode awareness, loyalty, and trust.
When most people mention consistency, they mean visual consistency and there’s no doubt that is critical.
But today, I want to focus on a different kind of consistency. Voice.
Often times, how you say something is more important than what you say.
You should have a clear idea of what your company’s voice is. And regardless of how many different writers are involved, your materials should always be in the same voice. How do you "sound" in your communications pieces? Are you formal? Conversational? Do you use short, choppy sentences or long, descriptive paragraphs? Do you strictly adhere to grammar and style rules or do you take some liberties? What about slang or industry jargon? What does each of those choices say about you?
Don’t assume the right answer is based on industry stereotypes. Imagine the tone and style differences between a corporate law firm and a law firm that specializes in family law.
Your voice goes beyond the written words. What is the attitude of your radio spot? How about your signage? Is your voice consistent in how you answer your phone? The signature line on your e-mail? What about your press releases and sales promotions materials? Your on hold message?
Think of all the ways you communicate to your customers, potential customers, employees, and vendors.
How consistent and strong is your voice?
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April 27, 2007
Eight months ago next week, I launched this blog. I didn’t really have any sense of what I would or wouldn’t want in terms of widgets, tools, archives, categories etc. So as the months have gone on…we’ve just sort of tacked on this or that.
A few weeks ago we decided enough was enough…and have completely re-designed the blog with the user interface always front and center.
I’m hoping these changes make the blog even easier to access, more fun to read and will lure you back time and time again.
We’ve still got a couple surprises and tweaks coming up…but for the most part, this is it. I’d love your feedback. But be gentle. After all, I am a delicate flower.
As with all things on my blog — my continued gratitude and appreciation to Mike Sansone. He is all things blog for me.
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April 26, 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 the invisible visible
Let’s face it — there are many elements of business that are pretty ordinary. Not only are they ordinary but 99% of businesses do them the same way.
Think of all the communication elements that you pretty much ignore because everyone’s looks and behaves the same. Posted hours of operation, fax cover sheets, privacy disclaimers, e-mail signatures. And on and on the list goes. We’re so used to them being ordinary that, as consumers, we don’t even notice them.
Which makes them invisible.
A smart marketer will use the element of surprise and make the invisible visible. An agency friend of ours in Denver (AOR) sends out a quarterly newsletter. At the bottom of the newsletter, just like everyone else, they have a privacy disclaimer. But theirs reads something like:
We’ll never sell or give your e-mail address to anyone. Because that wouldn’t be nice.
They turned the invisible visible and gave us a hint of what working with them might be like.
At MMG, one of the invisible things we make visible is our titles. Could I be CEO or President? Sure. But yawn.
But by being the Top Dog, suddenly we’re visible. When was the last time someone looked at your business card and make a comment? It happens to all of us at MMG every day. Along with the Top Dog, some of the present and past MMG titles have been:
The Warden (are you going to risk not giving her your time sheets?)
Girl Wonder
Sgt. of Strategy
Brandologist
Chaos Curator
Conductor
Go To Guy
Dr. Designo
Do our titles say much more about the agency, our work style and our attitude than CEO, CFO, Art Director, etc. would say?
What’s invisible in your world that you could make visible?
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