Are we aware of the psychological tricks and traps some marketers use to lure us into purchasing specific brands? Just because most of us at the Daily Fix are involved in marketing doesn’t mean that we can’t be affected by our colleagues’ ruses.

No matter how smart we think we are, I guarantee we’ve all fallen prey to a marketing enticement trick or two. I know I have.

While working out recently, I watched an interesting segment on the Today Show about a branding experiment conducted by author and branding/consumer behavior expert, Martin Lindstrom. In it, a California couple agreed to promote specific brands to their friends and social circle in everyday conversations and at parties that they hosted. At the end of the three-month period, the results were staggering:

• 9 out of 10 brands were bought.
• One brand had a 1,000% sales increase.
• An estimated 13,000 people were affected by the couple.

Now, maybe our pal, Daily Fix blogger, author, and word-of-mouth marketing guru, Andy Sernovitz wouldn’t be surprised by this, but others may.

Admittedly, I haven’t yet read Lindstrom’s book, Brandwashed: Tricks Companies Use to Manipulate Our Minds and Persuade Us to Buy, but based on the experiment and book reviews, I am certainly intrigued.

I could never have imagined that some companies begin marketing to babies in the womb. Or that shoppers in U.S. department stores who are exposed to Muzak with a slow tempo shop 18% longer and purchase 17% more than do those who shop in silence. Or that peddling panic and paranoia was so ubiquitous.

What’s even more interesting is Lindstrom’s take on it all.

“Whenever I meet up with executives around the world, I remind them that today the most powerful force in marketing is not a corporation. It’s not a CEO. It’s not a big-budget marketing department. Today and in the future, the people who hold the real power are hyperconnected, mouse-clicking consumers and their wide circles of virtual and real-life friends and acquaintances. In other words, the people who hold the real power are us.

“As a result, brands of the future simply must be transparent and live up to their promises. Trust me (and you marketers out there take note), any brand that doesn’t will be instantly and painfully exposed and reviled.”

Your turn: Were you aware of these types of brandwashing  tricks and tools? Have you ever been duped by them? Do you think marketers should continue to employ these tactics, or do you think they are unethical? WEIGH IN!

Even though so much of marketing is done online now, the traditional 2.5”x3” business cards are still as significant as they have ever been. This tiny billboard that represents your business will stay in the hands of your potential customers for months and even possibly years. The better your business cards, the better impression you will leave.

Here are some fabulous tips for making your business cards stand out:

1. Give them flair.
As long as your business cards look professional and are easy to read, you can play with the design as much as you want. Use colors that draw attention and non-traditional fonts that suit your style. Graphics and photographs add character to any card, and this is an important design move that can give your clients a better idea of who you are.

2. Leave room to breathe.
You will probably be tempted to fill every corner of your business cards. This is not only unnecessary, it can often cause your cards to look cluttered. By using plenty of white space in your design, you will help to draw eyes to your information. With white space, viewers will be able to take in your information in just a quick glance, which is all the time some clients will give your card.

3. Add web addresses.
You would never forget to include your name and phone number on your business cards. Now that online networking is such a huge part of marketing, you should also never forget your web addresses. Include your website address first, and then add one or several social networking sites that you are a part of. Do not forget your email address as well.

4. Use contrast to create interest.
Contrast can be developed with colors, text sizes, and types of fonts. Using contrast can give your card a more structured appearance, so bold your title and shrink your other content. This contrast draws attention to the content that should be read first. Make sure your text color stands out well from your background color. If you do use more than one type of font to set apart information, limit yourself to only two different types so as not to clutter your design.

5. Carry a card holder.
The condition of your business cards gives almost as much of a professional appearance as the design of your business cards. Keep them clean and crisp without folds and smudges by carrying them in a card holder. Just imagine what an impact you can create when you open an impressive card holder and hand your prospect or client an inspiring business card. This thoughtful presentation of your card can really alert clients to what you have to say.

Nearly every businessperson needs business cards for effective networking, so use the tips above to design and print yours right away. Next time someone asks for your contact information, you will have an impressive card that you will be proud to distribute.

Tara Hornor writes about marketing, advertising, branding, graphic design, and desktop publishing. She works for PrintPlace.com, an online printing company.

Dear Johnson & Johnson,

For many years, I’ve depended on you to be there for my family and me. Your products are our staples: Your Band-Aids have helped mend scrapes; your Children’s Tylenol has brought fevers down; your baby shampoo has never caused a tear.

I’ve been impressed with how you have consistently adhered to your company’s now-famous credo, crafted in 1943, that begins: “We believe that our first duty is to the doctors, nurses and patients, to mothers and fathers and all others who use our products and services. In meeting their needs, everything we do must be of high quality.” Your corporate actions and brands have always held the high ground.

But, J&J, I’ve been disappointed with the way you’ve handled the recalls of your products, as well as by some business dealings, in the past year. Little by little, your products disappeared from shelves—to be exact, there have been 22 product recalls, involving well over 300 million bottles of medicines, since September 2009—without so much as a peep out of you. (Most notably, OB Tampons went missing, only to return in April, more than six months later … without nary a statement as to why they’d been pulled in the first place.) I waited for explanations … silence.

Meanwhile, I saw you in the news and at congressional hearings (like the one a few weeks ago in which you were fined $70 million for paying bribes to European doctors to use your devices.) Yikes. Needless to say, this behavior doesn’t reflect the J&J I know and love.

This silence has taken its toll. Lost revenue stemming from recalls and the lengthy closure of a plant in suburban Philadelphia reduced J&J’s 2010 sales by $900 million. In the fourth quarter, J&J posted a 12% profit decline and a 5.5% drop in sales.

Fortunately, it’s not too late for you to make things right. J&J has always been in the business of building and sustaining trust, and if you take your own medicine, this may just be a tiny blemish on your rock-solid reputation. To regain your footing , you just have to look at your own credo for guidance. I quote:

We must be good citizens.
Johnson & Johnson has always been good about apologizing in a timely manner for mistakes. (When Tylenol turned up tainted in 1982, you jumped into action, even when the tragedy wasn’t your fault. Now THAT was good citizenship.) Now, unfortunately, you’ve already let more than enough time pass between the recalls and a public statement. It’s time to say “sorry” to regain the trust of your consumers.

Working conditions [must be] clean, orderly and safe.
Your Fort Washington, Pennsylvania plant has been closed for almost a year. Now, there is talk that you will shut down your plant in Las Piedras, Puerto Rico. Once you fix the problems at your plants (or better yet, build state-of-the-art new ones), go one step further and show us what’s really going on behind the scenes by adopting a policy of complete openness. Install 24/7 webcams in your plants. Post updates via YouTube. Keep us informed through Twitter to demonstrate your commitment to making things better.

Research must be carried on, innovative programs developed and mistakes paid for.
In recent months, Advil has tried to bank on Tylenol’s misfortune by launching a campaign, “Say Yes to Advil,” which is essentially encouraging people to, “Say No to Tylenol.” Show your customers and competitors you haven’t thrown in the towel. By continuing to create innovative new products (as well as bringing back your existing ones), you will show the public that you cannot be impeded by this blip on the radar, and that you are, and always will be, living up to your promises.

We are responsible to our employees. We must respect their dignity and recognize their merit.
If you want your staff to live up to your company credo, then you have to respect their dignity and recognize their merit—even if that merit is warranted because they’ve called out imperfections within your own company. Stand by the people who are helping rebuild your company, stood by you in hard times, and even the ones who blew the whistle on you because they are ultimately helping you to live up to the high standards that you have set for yourself.

It’s never easy for a mother to discipline her child, and it pains me to have to adopt this tone with you, Johnson & Johnson. But tough love is sometimes required in tough times. By getting back to the words on which your company is built, I think you can find your way back.

Full disclosure: In this article, the role of “Mom” was played by CBX’s managing partner, Gregg Lipman (an actual dad, who has spent enough time with his own mother and wife to dish out maternal wisdom—and who holds J&J in high enough regard to care).

Gregg S. Lipman is managing partner at CBX, a strategic branding company with expertise in corporate, consumer, and retail experiences.

If you check out Melody’s Blog, you’ll find a high-quality site, full of great conversation and insight into the Starbucks brand.  She appears to have a large and loyal following that is highly participative. I sat down to talk with Melody about her passionate blogging for the Starbucks brand.  As a follow up to this article, I also plan to post a companion article with some Tips for Managing Unofficial bloggers on my site after our discussion.

Here is the transcript of my chat with Melody:

Melody, tell me a bit about yourself.

Well, I’m an ordinary person who lives in Seattle!  Since 2006, I’ve been working downtown as a lawyer for a non-profit.  I hang out with friends, enjoy my city, and work a lot.  I usually blog on the weekends and late at night.

How did you become a Starbucks brand evangelist?

I have always enjoyed a good cup of coffee, and I’m a regular Starbucks patron. I got into a pretty strong and enjoyable habit of going almost twice a day, Monday through Friday, while working downtown.  It’s a nice break from a courtroom and also a quick way to recharge and re-energize the work day.

Eventually, Starbucks acknowledged my brand habit.  In 2008, I was invited to Starbucks Headquarters for a tour. Later that year, I was invited to a “Gold Card” event at headquarters, for the Thanksgiving Blend coffee.  Stepping foot into Starbucks headquarters really set me on fire. The Thanksgiving Blend event was attended by a large number of passionate Starbucks customers. It was amazing to meet so many like-minded, long-term, hard-core fans.  It’s very energizing in a good way to realize you are part of a much bigger movement, but it’s also very humbling, too.  I’d never call myself “Starbucks’s biggest fan” because I’ve learned that thousands of us feel the same about Starbucks.  All I can say at this point is that I might be slightly more visible than some other fans due to my blog.

Why and how did you start blogging about Starbucks?

In the summer of 2009, I had a strong desire to blog. I knew I had a lot to say and needed an outlet for myself, even if nobody listened.  As a lawyer bound by client confidentiality, however, I can’t blog about my work.

As a die-hard Starbucks fan, however, I had already engaged on several unofficial Starbucks blogs and had even been asked to join as a guest blogger on one of them. My problem with that centered on some of the negativity and monotony on many of these blogs.

After thinking about it, I realized that I had enough to say about Starbucks on my own, having been a customer for a long time and a Seattle resident. I had a ton of passion about Starbucks, and I decided that I’d rather invest my energy in a new site, so I started StarbucksMelody in September 2009.

What did you want to accomplish that the other blogs, at the time, did not?

In part, I did genuinely intend to create some competition for the other sites by creating an alternative community for people to join.  I wanted the site to be clean and visually attractive, diverse in terms of content, and positive and upbeat by nature.  To keep things positive, my policy is to be fair-minded while encouraging open dialog and active participation.  I discourage overly negative content.  Healthy and constructive criticism is fine—slander and name calling are not.  I have worked hard to get other fans and brand evangelists involved and continue to do so today.

I took a glance at a few of the more popular Starbucks blogs out there. You’re among the most popular, it seems. Tell me about your site usage and readership.

It may sound strange, but I pay less attention to how I rank against others than I do to the content I post.  However, based on my stats, I have global readership, which is no surprise because Starbucks operates in 56 countries.  Right now, it is not at all uncommon for me to get about 15,000 unique visitors per month from about 110 to 116 countries.

Recently, I recently received a tweet from a favorite Twitter friend. His name is Sebastian Birr.  Apparently, he was in a Munich Starbucks talking to a barista about my blog.  It turns out she was already a reader!  That was fun!

The blog’s readership slowly grows over time, slipping backwards some months, spiking on others—but pointing to a steady gain.  My readers are also pretty engaged.  Most of my blog posts get about 20 comments. There’s a very active “core group” of folks that come back on a very regular basis. In general, traffic and engagement are very content-driven.  For example, when Starbucks released the new “Trenta” sized cup, traffic went up exponentially.

How has Starbucks responded to the presence of your blog?

The response was mixed at first, but it seems to be increasingly positive. We have exchanged emails where I felt some negative energy initially.  However, I don’t really want to go into that because emails are personal and rather one-dimensional.  Hopefully, I misunderstood them.  On the upside, there have also been times where Starbucks has reached out to me in a really positive way, making it clear that they enjoy the visibility and are flattered by it.  Adam Brotman, vice president of Digital Ventures, contacted me to talk about the Starbucks Digital Network, and I was also invited to a Friends and Family event for the opening of the Olive Way Starbucks.  So, I am optimistic about the future.

Have you met Howard Schultz, chairman and CEO of Starbucks?

I met him a few times in 2008 and have been to a number of Starbucks events that have given me exposure at the executive level.  I ran into him in late October 2009, when my blog was only about eight weeks old, at 15th Avenue Coffee and Tea, which is a coffeehouse operated by Starbucks but without the Starbucks name.  He recognized me and politely said hello.  I told him I’d started a blog, and he looked at me with an expression that seemed to be irritation—an “I’ve got to get to work and you must be kidding me”  look.   He replied, “What’s it called?”  I said, “StarbucksMelody.com.”  I asked him if I could interview him for the blog.  He again gave me a facial expression as if I had two heads, but replied, “Maybe.” And then said he had to go.

Unfortunately, running into someone like Howard is worse than having a Twitter conversation.  Your brain has essay-length thoughts to express, and you have less than 140 unpremeditated characters worth of time before he moves on or out.  I remember thinking afterward that telling him about the blog was a really dumb thing for me to do on all levels. I thought “What if I fail?  I just alerted Howard to the fact my blog existed!”  So, I’m really thankful the blog didn’t tank!

Do you frequently get mistaken as an official Starbucks voice?

Well, first, it is very clear my blog is an unofficial blog written by a fan.  However, it does routinely happen that people email me using the “contact me” form or even sometimes contact me through Twitter, asking me questions because they think I work for Starbucks.

I have gotten emails asking, “When will I get my tickets to the annual shareholder meeting?” Just today, I received an email asking which stores sell the Vancouver BC Suspension Bridge mug.  I have gotten questions about the Starbucks Card, and I’ve been asked about how to open a franchise. I’m happy to forward them to the right official channel for their questions. The problem is, this type of stuff is bound to happen.  People often don’t read, and you just can’t control the Internet.

On the whole, this is probably one of the big downsides of the blog. It can create confusion as readers might think it’s an official site, and there is definitely the possibility that once in a while I have wrong information on the blog.  A barista will tell me something, and later, I find out it is not true.  This came up, for example, when I was writing a blog post about the “largest Starbucks in North America.”  I mistakenly thought it was in Seattle, but later realized that it is Texas.  Everything is bigger in Texas.

I noticed you also tweet under the handle “SbuxMel.” So, with potential brand confusion and misinformation, why shouldn’t Starbucks (or any other brand dealing with unofficial bloggers) just try to shut you down?

That’s a great question.  I’ve taken the time to look around on the Internet, and there are a lot of Starbucks blogs out there.  Partners are blogging, there are other fan blogs, and there many Starbucks-related websites.  Starbucks realizes they can’t control the web—or at least, I think they do.  There is no logical reason to go after a small blogger with a positive Starbucks blog.  I’m good for the brand, or at least, I think I am.

Tell me more about that.  How are you good for the brand?

Well, I hope not to overstate any of this, but here are my thoughts.  First, my blog is a fair platform for open discussion about the brand by fans and critics.  Many like-minded Starbucks lovers congregate on my site, and hearing our chatter is a great way for Starbucks to get a pulse on what we think and feel.  We also encourage open, constructive, and respectful criticism, which is also a good way for Starbucks to learn.  In this way, we’re like a 24/7 focus group and another place Starbucks can gain insight, feedback, and ideas.  Furthermore, we’re promoters:  We encourage people to try new products, register their Starbucks Cards, and opt in to promotions all the time—and they do it.  Generally, the blog leaves people with a positive feeling about the brand—and that’s never a bad thing!

If you had one thing to tell brands about unofficial bloggers, what would you say?

Well, in a nutshell, it’s this:  Know your advocates, and be responsive and transparent.

Thanks, Melody!

As a person who writes, consults, speaks, and teaches about about customer experience for a living, I walked away from my interactions with Melody full of thoughts.  First, I remember thinking how hard it would be to hire someone as bright, passionate, articulate as Melody is.  Just ask any recruiter.  Second, I know from experience that kind of zeal from a brand evangelist can make a company feel uncomfortable—especially at the executive level.  However, what these executives need to embrace is the idea that what folks like Melody are doing is a gift for Starbucks.  It only takes one look  at Melody’s blog to see how much of herself she has invested in it, how much she cares about her audience, the content, and the brand.

The truth is, when a customer cares enough to share thoughts, criticisms, and feelings—in any channel—it’s a gift.  This is true whether the feedback is positive or negative.  What brands like Starbucks have to decide, therefore, and in light of investments in their own blogs, crowdsourcing sites and partner channels, is how they will receive these gifts.  As they decide, they must consider that we live in a day and age where corporate confidence is at an all-time low—where people statistically trust people much more than brands.  In that light, it’s important to consider how powerful unofficial spokespeople can be.  When a brand demonstrates sensitivity, humility, gratitude, and care—just providing great service provided on the local level—it can have a sizable, positive impact on the way people feel about brands.  In the digital era, people with a trusted following can be strong and highly vocal advocates for brands or huge detractors.  In the day and age we live in, it’s up to the brand to recognize the voices in the digital divide, and decide how they will respond to them to extract every ounce of value there is.

If you represent a brand, I’d love to hear your thoughts about unofficial bloggers, fans, promoters, and detractors. Or if you want to weigh in and say hi to Melody, leave a comment.

Why Everyone Matters

Dave Carroll may not have had an AdAge Power150 marketing blog, a stratospheric Technorati rating, or a huge Twitter following. Like the other David, Carroll slew his Goliath with humble means:

• A good story, artfully told
• A clear plight that resonated with others
• Proficiency with You Tube and other social channels
• Creativity and personality
• Incredible tenacity
• Helpful pals
• A little dumb luck

We bat around terms like “influence” but when push comes to shove, it’s all terribly subjective and unstable. I’m not saying we can’t call people “influencers.” However, it occurs to me that, oftentimes, the people who assail us most effectively largely emerge from left field. Play along with me for a second.

Imagine that you are call center supervisor. Who is more important?

• Plain Jane with a seemingly straightforward service issue
• Influential Tom who is ticked off
• Corporate Fred who is on call number five and is getting the runaround

But here’s what you don’t know:

• Plain Jane’s issue impacts thousands of other customers and is costing you thousands per second.
• Influential Tom exposes companies for a living, and he’s armed to tattle on you to 1 million consumers.
• Ordinary Fred just happens to know your boss.

Everyone Has the Potential for Influence

This doesn’t mean that everyone will prove to be influential—it just means they have the potential to matter greatly to your business. Now, if we truly believe this, everyone must matter to us. If we truly believe this to be the case, we have no choice but to respond by making sure we treat people accordingly. We must listen and applying critical thinking instead of running people through hoops and  homogeneous “chutes” for processing, like cattle. This goes far beyond lip service, because it is our actions that speak the loudest. Do we listen? Do we demonstrate empathy and care? Do we take action on their behalf? How do we handle people, their issues and carefully respond?

Bad Things Happen When We Assume People Don’t Matter

When was the last time a brand or company communicated (explicitly or implicitly) that you don’t matter? How did it impact your feelings toward the brand? When act on bad assumptions, rotten things can happen—to our prospects, customers, partners—and to our businesses themselves. Borrowing from our example above, lets say we blew it in our handling of Jane, Tom or Fred.

• Plain Jane gives up because no one she encounters “gets it” when she tries to explain what transpired. Her issue isn’t escalated and costs your company $850,000 before it is properly discovered.
• Influential Tom tweets his experience in real time in a highly entertaining manner, making you and your company look ridiculous in the process.  His resulting blog post creates a mountain out of a mole hill, which results in bad press and a PR fire drill.
• Corporate Fred calls your boss to complain, pinning the responsibility on you. In reality, his issue is really a larger company policy matter that is beyond your power to resolve, but nothing is done about it, and the issue is bound to repeat itself.

Now, I’m being intentionally one-sided here. It’s true that cases like these might be a minority—but it’s food for thought and illustrates a good point: If it is what we don’t know that can hurt us most, why aren’t we actively listening and responding like people matter?  In the end, even a Plain Jane matters simply as a good customer. However, she will matter even more if she’s unhappy and decides to combine her voice with 20,000 others.

Treat people as if they do not matter, and they may decide to prove you wrong. Consumers have more resources at their disposal today, and they’re intent on using them to be heard. In this light, companies have more to lose than they might think.

So, Do You Roll Out The Carpet For Everyone?

In a manner of speaking, yes. But don’t get me wrong. It’s entirely worthwhile effort to create  tiered service levels for customers who fall into various relational tiers or “premium” experiences for high-value customers. However, these elevated levels of service should be offered over and above the already great service you offer. The problem is, many companies emphasize key segments (frequent buyer, frequent flier, target demographic or insert segment here) to the detriment of everyone else. As a result, they fail to create a baseline customer experiences and service levels that unilaterally treat people like they matter—and this becomes a critical flaw. It’s also a flaw when these segments become the primary focus of things like Voice of the Customer programs.

When we decide to ignore the “lesser masses” (limiting the avenues customers have for self expression, suggestion, or obtaining service, response and resolution, or plugging our ears to their plights), we create disservice and frustration. This damages customer experience and produces corporate dysplasia, deafness and blindness that destroy relationships. This is more common than one might think!

Customer Experience Is the Litmus Test for Corporate Values

It’s essential to make sure we deliver solid, consistently pleasing baseline experiences. This is where the real, dirty, operationally intense work is.  Everything else we offer is icing on that cake. In this era of “social commerce,” this means companies must be oriented to:

• Actively and expansively listen
• Apply critical thinking and common sense
• Respond with care
• Assess. learn and improve

We must do this  not by just using our “owned infrastructure”  but within the cloud and social web as well. While this is more challenging now than ever, it’s also more exciting and promising because of the dynamic applications, tools, and solutions at our disposal.

When push comes to shove, when we fail to deliver the customer experience fundamentals well, there’s a likelihood that many, many people will know. As I said to a senior airline executive in my last post, Pandora’s Box is already open! If we play games with people and refuse to listen and respond, they will make themselves heard somewhere else. Treat people like they don’t matter and, like Dave Carroll or Jeff Jarvis or Motrin Moms, they may just prove you wrong.

Yet, that’s exactly what happened leading up to the 2008 financial crisis where banks bundled shaky and suspect mortgage loans known as collateralized debt obligations (CDOs) and resold them to pension funds and other investors worldwide. And while some financial services companies have since settled with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission for their role in misleading investors, most have not admitted fault.

Which leads to a larger question—when is it acceptable to knowingly sell a substandard product?

Charles Morris, author of “The Two Trillion Dollar Meltdown” aptly describes the period leading up to the financial crisis of 2008 as “sheer idiocy”. To start with, he says, debt to equity—or leverage—by many financial firms was as high as 100:1. In addition, high risk mortgages were more than the flavor of the month, as CDOs in 2006 were created from “more than 40% of all mortgage originations.” And of course, we haven’t even mentioned derivatives such as credit default swaps (CDS) that tied global banks together in an intricate web of interdependency.

What is the end-result of the 2008 financial crisis? The International Money Fund (IMF) estimates losses from the financial crisis at $4.1 trillion, jobless rates still hover at 12.5% or more in some states, and 401K account’s are still recovering from losses of 30-50% and sometimes more! Indeed, if anything has been learned from this global meltdown it’s that —caveat emptor still reigns—otherwise known as “let the buyer beware”.

Let’s get back to CDOs for a minute. A collateralized debt obligation is simply a bundle of 100-200 mortgages that are sliced and diced into “tranches” and then priced and sold to investors based on a risk management formula. Investment banks engaged in buying mortgages from “mortgage mills” and then packaged and resold these CDOs to investors. Not a bad concept, unless you know beforehand that the package consists of fraudulent and dubious loans that will likely never be paid.

In fact, Carl Levin, chairman of the US Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on the Financial Crisis scolded a row of investment bankers on the process of producing CDOs and other financial products saying, “You people think it’s a piece of crap, and go out and sell it!”

But here’s the rub—as the writer of the Financial Times Lex Column describes it; “…selling crap is no crime per se.” In fact, the writer goes on to say, “If the SEC is so against the practice, it should also prevent people from the buying of crap too.”

In fact, there are many businesses that profit greatly from the buying of distressed assets including foreclosed homes, flailing companies, and even tarnished brands. Obviously, these sales should continue. However, the writer of Lex must also remember that some US states do prohibit the “knowing” sale and re-sale of defective products; for a good example see lemon laws for pre-owned cars.

A Financial Times reader responds—tongue in cheek—to the Lex column by saying if it is indeed a legitimate business practice to sell substandard products that the Lex column author, should “bear this principle in mind (the next time he/she) visits a doctor, dentist, pharmacist, lawyer or accountant.”

With the advent of the internet, the Smartphone explosion and now social media, global companies cannot afford to take the risk of knowingly selling sub-standard products. This advice of course, only applies if companies care about brand perception, reputation and integrity.

For many companies—reputation is one of the last bastions of competitive advantage. Millions if not billions of dollars in brand equity and goodwill are at stake. And consumers have long memories. There are no real shortcuts when it comes to quality.

Questions:

• In an age of “asymmetric information”—where the seller often knows more than a buyer—why are brands so important?
• When is it OK to sell a substandard product?

Co-branding can be a boon to brands—or a bust. It really depends on the strength of both and compatibility. Many have tried and failed. But this deal between Cream of Wheat and Cinnabon might work.

In a recent Media Post article, Cream of Wheat marketing VP, Jordan Greenberg says, “When we spoke to consumers, the Cinnabon flavor profile ranks very, very high.” I hope they did more research than this, but it’s a start!

Interestingly, Cream of Wheat already has a hot “Cinnamon Swirl” cereal, and Cinnabon has a branded cold cereal in supermarkets. So what’s the differentiator in a marriage between these two brands?

For one thing, the new Cream of Wheat flavor will incorporate the same cinnamon blend and frosting that Cinnabon uses in its famous rolls. For another, hot cereal—unlike cold—releases far more aroma. As Greenberg succinctly states, “. . .the hot cereal provides more of the overall Cinnabon experience. It gives off the smell of a Cinnabon.”

Though traditional advertising will support the product roll-out, sampling in key markets is going to be a very important element of the marketing strategy. Social media will also be used to promote the product and send out free sample coupons.

Greenberg says, “The sampling is the most important part of it because it’s a product that once you smell it and once you taste it, you’re going to fall in love with the product.”

Questions:
• Do you think this co-branded product will be a winner?
• Are the brands compatible? (Cream of Wheat = healthy and Cinnabon = cinnamon rolls with frosting) Will translating this flavor profile into hot cereal make sense?
• How about the strategy and tactics being used to promote it?

I’d love to hear from you.

So, you want examples, eh? Well, I can’t link to specific pages because that would be just plain mean—besides being highly risky for litigation. But, I’ll tell you about a few I’ve seen lately on Twitter.

Example #1
A social media company that provides social media marketing services to businesses has 175 followers on Twitter, follows around 650, and is on 5 lists. The author has written a total of 10 posts. Huh?

As if that isn’t enough, here’s the copy that appears on the company’s Twitter page: “Social Media Services Ofeered”

Now, would you contact this company for social media marketing assistance?

Example #2
How about the man whose Twitter page says he’s been a general contractor for years? In his bio, he mentions all the nice outdoor activities he’s done in his life. First impression from the photo and the intro? Nice smiling guy in his 60s who probably wants to connect with new people who enjoy the same things. NOT!

Click on the link to his Website, and what smacks you in the face? A sensational headline and high-pressure multilevel marketing pitch with video and an “act now” message. What a disconnect.

Example #3
A professional in my target market began following me recently. I clicked on his profile to check it out. A large message greeted me that says:

This person has protected their tweets.
You need to send a request before you can start following this person.

Is there any wonder that he has only 63 followers? Doesn’t this strategy defeat the entire purpose of social media networking?

OK, your turn. Got any social media marketing dummy stories to share?

Porsche drivers flash their lights at each other while MINI drivers tend to wave. Volkswagen just wants us to punch each other in the arm.

Stella Artois is doing its best to get us to “behead” our beers while Corona is satisfied to have us plunk a slice of lime in the necks of our bottles.

Rituals matter to us as a species and play an increasingly important role for us as stewards of our brands.

Rituals define our groups and create a sense of community and exclusivity. Those of us who perform this ritual are different from all the others here and this uniqueness is the heart of the group identity. High-performing teams have rituals. They may be subtle, but they very often have cultural nuances and group behaviors that set them apart on purpose. This forges a sense of exclusivity within our peer groups—all important elements in the psychology of group influence.

Rituals spread ideas through source similarity. We see people like us doing something that intrigues us and we copy their behaviors. In a world where we define an ignoramus as someone who doesn’t know what we learned five minutes ago, rituals are powerful compliance techniques. Monkey see, monkey do.

On a personal level, rituals serve as centering touchstones, reminding us of the importance of those behaviors they bring to the fore. We don’t just tap our tennis shoes with our rackets to shake the imaginary dirt from them; we do it to remind ourselves to move our feet on the court. The haka doesn’t just give us a little frolic before a match; it reminds us of our warrior spirit (not to mention the side note that it scares the hell out of our opponents).

In a group setting, rituals create a means to affect culture change by forging symbolic rewards systems. When we create rituals within our teams, we are creating systems within which we are rewarding people for the right behaviors. We do things in a certain way that may appear stylized, but s masks their underlying meaning. Sweeping the proverbial temple steps, in other words, often masks the attention to detail, the meditation––and the upper body strength conditioning—eeded to master the martial arts.

So, have a conversation with me for a moment on this idea.

• Think of a behavior that you need to instill within your team, organization–or just yourself. Make a short list.
• Think of a ritual that you could create–an act that you perform or a process you go through–that would make this behavioral change more visible, easier to remember or more palatable to your group.
• What do you come up with? How can we surface the idea of creating rituals on purpose to affect change and what can this do for us?

I’ve got some other thoughts on brand rituals and a few personal case studies at my blog, StephenDenny.com, so please drop by and share your experiences!

According to Giving USA Foundation chair Edith H. Falk, “In addition to support from individuals and foundations, some nonprofits received exceptional support from the corporate sector, which included billions of dollars’ worth of in-kind donations, particularly from information technology firms and pharmaceutical manufacturers.”

This is great news, of course. But, do you have to be a big corporation to do good? From cause marketing, to grants, to buying tables at fund-raising events, businesses of all types are flying their corporate social responsibility flags by investing in their communities. And why?

According to the 2009 Global Edelman goodpurpose™ Study, “Despite the downturn, across the globe people’s sense of commitment to helping others—and to brands and companies that share that commitment—remains strong.”

And get this:

“Around the world, consumers voice a strong desire for marketers to connect their brands to social action. Forty-two percent say that if two products are of the same quality and price, commitment to a social purpose trumps factors like design, innovation and brand loyalty when choosing one brand over the other. Half (52%) of consumers globally are more likely to recommend a brand that supports a good cause over one that does not, and 54% would help a brand promote a product if there was a good cause behind it.”

Your company doesn’t have to be big to create this win-win situation.

So, what is YOUR brand doing? What’s working and what’s not?

Stepping off on a hike last fall in New Hampshire, I was overwhelmed by the sense that I was back home in New England. No matter that I’d spent seven years in Tennessee, and a quarter-century in New Jersey. I’m a Connecticut boy, and the New England woods are home. Driving in and around Mystic CT last week, the trees and stone walls and topography and houses all felt like … home.

How powerful can it be, then, for a brand to become a “home” brand. So much a part of your life, that you are not comfortable without it.

From day one, the iPhone became a home brand for me. I can’t imagine not using it daily. Google is a home brand, indispensable, every day. A particularly helpful blogger can be a home brand for you. As can a certain make of car. Or a brewer, such as Samuel Adams.

One of the signs that something is a home brand is that price becomes almost irrelevant. I barely even look at my AT&T mobility bill for the iPhone. I don’t even think about writing a check to Amica Insurance. Price is secondary because it’s … home. Part of the family. And, just as we talk about our family members naturally and eagerly, so we word-of-mouth our home brands without any effort.

We all have our home brands, and if we’re marketers, we all strive to BE one of those home brands. Undoubtedly, you have a home brand or two that come to mind — share them in the comments!

(Image credit)

The first call came from an organization I truly admire and respect. It was a pre-recorded message asking me to donate goods and clothing. I could have just hung up, but I took exception with being solicited on a major religious holiday and wanted to bring it to the management’s attention. So, I called the toll-free number stated in the recording.
I explained that I wanted to advise the organization of the insensitivity of the inbound call on my holy day, to which she apologized first and then responded by saying, “I did not call you,” totally absolving responsibility on behalf of her employer. She asked if I wanted to be taken off the call list, and after I asked if that was permanent, she said it would be. This action, of course, would have eliminated me from future solicitations, a move that would be detrimental to the organization.
When I asked why she did not offer to bring this issue to senior management, she replied that I did not give her that option and that is not her job. When I asked who is responsible for outbound automated calls, she said she had no idea. She was defensive, ill-prepared for such an issue, curt and border-line rude.
It’s not that I didn’t want to give; it’s that I thought they could show more sensitivity by refraining from outbound calls on the holiest days of my religious calendar. I doubt they make calls on Christmas Day, so why can’t they just check the major holy days of the top 2-3 minority religions in the country and show the same respect? Am I in La-La Land to expect this? Isn’t this about diversity and inclusiveness?
The second call came from an advocacy organization asking me to participate in a 15-minute survey on my current health care plan. I first asked if my being in marketing disqualified me, to which the caller said it didn’t.
I asked for clarification on the first quantitative question asking me to rate my overall satisfaction level from 1 to 10. My satisfaction compared to what? Other providers in the market, pricing, service, coverage? I’m not a market research expert, but my response would glean useless information unless I understood what I was rating.
After the second question, which was also generic and similar in style to the first, I again indicated my confusion as to what I was being asked to rate. The rep cursorily thanked me and hung up on me – after about three minutes into the 15-minute interview! So, here I am, agreeing to participate in a survey on a Sunday afternoon and she hangs up on me!
Both these situations are examples of poor brand experiences. As a result, I can tell others what happened and identify the two organizations (bad word-of-mouth) or I can cancel my membership, support, or participation in these organizations (attrition). Instead, I’m blogging about it to help shed light on this so maybe, just maybe, someone on the inside will read it and make some changes.
Why don’t organizations and companies do a better job training their telephone personnel? This touchpoint has a huge bearing on the brand. Any comments, suggestions, other stories? Let’s share. It’ll be cathartic.

Since its modern inception, the internet has been a resource for people looking for information. That hasn’t changed, but what has happened recently is the social web now gives various entities the opportunity to become thought leaders in a specific category. While some attain this status by consistently offering valuable information, many (especially in competitive categories) becomes leaders by guiding those who are searching.

To illustrate this point, rather than referencing some of the overused (albeit relevant) examples of Dell, Zappos, or Wine Library, I’m going to go local. If there’s one thing we have a lot of in Chicago, it’s pizza places. If someone told me the number of places in the vicinity was near 10,000 I would believe it.
The point is, you’ve got a popular product that is available from a lot of different places. Pizza places make it very easy for you to find them when you’re looking, but do they try to help or interest you when you’re not? A fellow by the name of Ramon De Leon or DPZRamon as most know him runs several Dominoes chains in Chicago. He also leverages social networks to connect with Chicagoans. He reaches out to consumers about local events, technology, and yes Pizza. There is no question, that among online influencers in Chicago, Ramon is the most well known pizza guy. I won’t go into deep detail about him, you can get that here.
Right now, Ramon is fairly unique in Chicago, there aren’t many pizza chains in Chicago that also have such a well known personality. But what about the next pizza shop that jumps into the online conversation after Ramon? And the one after that? Will they be able to establish themselves as the same kind of resource to the local audience, and on the flip side, will they be able to reap the benefits of engaging in these social channels?
The answer is yes, but what they have to realize is that they’re going to have to work much harder than Ramon. There’s already a “pizza guy” offering great conversation in Chicago so in order to have any chance of winning attention (and subsequently the opportunity to promote themselves) the next pizzeria is going to have to work longer and harder to earn the trust and ears of their potential customers. If they mimic Ramon but only use the channels to promote themselves, they will not see success.
If you’re not the first thought leader in your category it’s ok but–

1. Start adding value among your potential community immediately. The longer you wait, the more of a head start your competition will have.
2. Remember that adding value doesn’t mean only talking about things relevant to your product. People don’t always care about a product, but they do care about people (or a personable brand). Give them a reason to like you, and they’ll go to you when they need a commodity you offer.
3. “Take” from the community very sparingly until the time is right. Remember there was someone before you who offers the same as what you’re offering however they may have already earned the right to ask for some help. Or they offer help/advice for free without “pitching” anyone.
4. Leverage your brand equity from elsewhere. Some brands have a strong community before entering a social space. Transfer as much of that equity to the new space. There’s no reason to waste an investment.
5. Don’t compare yourself to your peers when it’s not appropriate. If your competitor has been at it for two years, don’t expect to use their results as your own. Measure your progress against checkpoints in time you’ve set.
6. Approach your potential community from a different angle. Just because you have a lot of competitors in social networks, it doesn’t mean your brand can’t become the expert in certain niche.

Bob’s quote really struck a chord with me because it’s a simple reality that many organizations are either overlooking or ignoring today. People are starting to view the Google search bar as their URL entry box. Instead of typing “www.zappos.com” people are simply typing the world “Zappos” into a search form. An excellent piece on ReadWriteWeb provides further insight into this rising habit.
What this means for companies is that their homepages should no longer be considered the most highly trafficked resource for people looking for their product. Consumers are becoming savvier, and an unfortunate consequence (for brands) is that people are more likely to trust third party resources vs. the brand themselves.
Because consumers are no longer spending as much time on the tightly controlled environment that brands build themselves, companies, more than ever, need to be fully aware of the search results that are sharing space with them and hopefully taking steps to make those neighbors ones that raise the value of their real estate.

Is Google the Big Winner Here?
Does the above situation translate into a need for all of a brand’s paid listings to pop up when users search for them? To Google’s dismay…not necessarily. A brands biggest concern should not be that their competitors sites are popping up in paid listings next to theirs, their biggest concern should be the negative pages that show up in the results organically. Those are the listings that are much less in Google’s control and more in the hands of consumers/brands.
Shopping for groceries is a great example of the above. You go down the canned food isle. You see that there are diced tomatoes being sold by Dole and Del Monte. They are both about the same price, size, and are located on the same shelf. If you don’t have a preference, you’ll end up just randomly picking one. Next time, you’ll pick the other. Now let’s say the situation is slightly different. You walk through the same isle and on the way to the tomatoes you see a small sign on a now empty shelf that says “Del Monte canned peas have been recalled due to a case of E-Coli.” The peas probably have nothing to do with the tomatoes you want to buy, but odds are when you get to the tomato shelf, your decision on which tomatoes to buy is no longer a 50/50 split.
But my tomatoes don’t have E-Coli!
There are great brands with great products. So much time, money, and resources are put into creating those products and then getting those products into the hands of consumers. That effort should not diminish when the product changes hands.
Just because there are people who are writing about your product on Yelp and GetSatisfaction, doesn’t mean you have to sit back and watch your search results get contaminated. No one is barred from producing content on the web. A brand has just as much right to talk about their great qualities and respond to those who disagree.
It may not be possible for a small team to compete with the entire voice of the internet, but it can definitely help. People want to engage with the brands they use. If an irritated customer posts a review on a site it may get a handful of comments, but if a representative of a brand posts something, it will be dramatically more populated. Those subsequent comments may not all be positive, but they all lead to an initial thread in which a brand got to voice its honest thoughts and show that it took an interest. A thread which in many situations will show up higher on a search results page than a very negative post that has just a few responses.
Reacting to others isn’t the lone remedy either. Creating great content around your product in pivotal to your organic search success. A big part of Google’s secret formula for organic search is traffic. If you build it (something great), they will come. The better something is, the more traffic it gets, the closer it will rest to your ideal search results.
So a microsite isn’t enough?
The key takeaway here is that when planning out budgets for consumer facing entities, the microsite simply cannot take the full budget anymore. The microsite certainly serves a purpose (as does investing in SEO to bring it higher up), but the majority of brand/consumer interactions are taking place in the domain of the consumer’s choosing. Subsequently the brand has no other choice but to focus a larger chunk of its efforts to optimize the content being created by their consumers and their critics.

This was no ordinary dealership. It was the shrine of Harley-Davidson.

I was surrounded by people who were speaking a certain dialect: Harlean. Technical terms about engines and models and paint colors were tossed about with a mix of both profanity and reverence. Uniforms (mostly black Harley t-shirts), symbols (lots of tatoos), and a certain swagger of the elite were all in vogue. You see, these people were not mere motorcyclists. They were Harley owners.
Over lunch, I discussed my reaction with my friend. He laughed, realizing that the Harley rider community was, indeed, cult-like. I had heard in the past that this was the case in Harley-land, but this was my first visit to one of the temples. As I saw the two-wheeled icons on display, and watched the evident brand attachment in the eyes and voices of the owners, it reinforced something that had been brewing for years in my mind. Brand advocacy isn’t always the highest goal to shoot for. You really want to create a cult.
You want people to feel like they’ve found “it.” That they are now part of a special association, an elite, the kind that freely exchanges the secret wave when they pass each other on the highway. You want folks who pull up to a bar or club anywhere in the world, and fellow cult members immediately start a conversation about the icon and their experience of it. You want people who will pay more for the brand t-shirt, who will proudly wear the brand tattoo, who will boast about the apparent advantages of the brand – and you want outsiders to jealously wish they could be part of the club.
You want full alignment with your tagline. These owners really do Ride to Live, and Live to Ride.
I was informed that there are even special edition red Harleys for firefighters, and special blue ones for police personnel. My friend explained to me some of the sub-groups – denominations, as it were – within the Harley cult, but the common denominator was: fierce attachment.
My guess is that Harley has managed to tap into certain aspects of the American psyche – the yearning to chuck it all behind, hit the road, make noise, and show the rest of the world that you fully intend to be free. Other cults latch onto different mindsets. Those who are part of the tree-hugging and latte cult aren’t likely to be Harley buyers, but that’s just fine – they can hop into their Priuses to visit the recycling center and gather to compare Obama and Hillary. Harley riders will roar down the highway to parking lots and rallies anywhere and gather to compare chrome and engines.
I’m not a motorcycle rider (yet?). I feel like quite an outsider in the Harley temple. But I know great marketing and branding when I see it and feel it, and these guys have nailed it big time. Do you have a plan for creating, not just a marketing campaign, but an out-and-out cult?
(Image credit: Harley sign)

Case in point – a CPA I know. He’s very good at marketing his business: sending regular e-newsletters, hosting social events, advising clients of tax changes, deadlines, etc. Yet, I’m in the market for a new accountant. Why? He doesn’t get back to me in a timely fashion and sometimes needs a second contact before following up. His e-mail responses are ambiguous. I feel like an imposition. I even referred a friend who experienced the same thing. What good is the informative newsletter and the after work food if the service sucks?
Case #2. I went to www.meetup.com to find a local tennis league I could join. I found something promising and e-mailed a question. The reply came in the same day, but here’s what it says:
We group players of similiar skill levels by their zip codes in order to limit drives as much as possible. Our goal is to make the league as convenient and fun as possible. Thanks.
Best regards,
Administrator
XXXXX Tennis League
Sponsored by [major sports company]
The first thing I noticed is that the administrator didn’t use his/her name in the e-mail signature. Does that sound fun and welcoming to you? Seems very distant and unfriendly to me. Secondly, where’s the “thank you” for contacting them? How about a call to action or a link to the registration page or a simple, “I hope you join us. Don’t hesitate to contact me if you have other questions.”
Almost every week, I encounter missed opportunities on the part of businesses, people and organizations. They succeed in spite of themselves. Maybe I’m just tuned into this stuff as a marketer, but it just seems like common sense is often lost.
What do you think? Is it me?

That may be a bit more of a stretch for some of you, but it’s crucial from a personal branding perspective. Just ask Shel Israel who did not have www.shelisrael.com purchased and someone else put up a site devoted to poking fun at him.
Other heavyweights like Robert Scoble (www.robertscoble.com) don’t own their domain names either. Re-acquiring a domain name from a cybersquatter has some legal precedent, but it can rack of legal fees or large one-time purchase amounts.
However, let me ask you this. Do you own your personal/corporate Twitter username? How about your YouTube username? How about your Flickr username? If you don’t, it’s probably a good idea that you do (they’re mostly free anyway). I lost out personally on my YouTube name because I used my nickname instead. You may not acquire them all, but you can sure try. These usernames do come up with search result pages adding to the importance of owning your identity.
The risk to your reputation that you run when somebody does register your username is potentially huge. There is no legislation (which I am aware of) that addresses these micro level identity-squatters. It could get to a point where people/companies have to pay for their usernames ala the late 1990’s domain name deals.
Once you have acquired the usernames you will need to decide how, if at all, you use the account. While I don’t like the fact that accounts may sit empty in the short-term, it is advisable that you secure your ID as soon as possible.
What are you waiting for? Go claim your identity!

* * * * *
You must admit — marketers have a curious way with language. For decades it was the industry’s goal to “target” an audience, as if to say the only way to make money was to treat consumers as objects to be destroyed. More recently, although we are using more 2.0-friendly language for interactive marketing, just as often we still use “target” and “engagement,” both of which project the consumer as an adversary.
Though it seems strange and disjointed, the language isn’t actually the problem. Even when we use the “right” terms — or at least terms the hypersensitive have less to be offended by — too often to be ignored, the problem is that our goal is still the same as it’s always been.
Consumer Electronics: An Analogy
Imagine walking into an electronics store in search of some speakers for your home entertainment system. You don’t know exactly which ones you want, but you’re pretty sure you’ve got an idea about how to narrow your choices. You just have a few questions you want to ask about the ones the store has available.
You track down a salesperson and explain what you’re looking for and what type of system you have. Easy enough.
A normal person would expect to be given helpful information, but the head of marketing, hip to the whole “Information Superhighway” thing that’s all the rage with the kids these days, meticulously trained the sales team on how to approach prospects. Thus, instead of giving you the answer, the salesperson hits you with a thirty-second explanation about how great his company is. Worse yet, there is no skip button (Not that
one would help).
Sound like any splash pages you’ve seen?
Beyond Appearances
This is what clueless people think passes for “marketing 2.0.” For all our ruminations and advocacy on the blogosphere, the goals of marketing today are the same as they’ve always been: Interruption and
Transaction. They are just dressed in a different garb.
Today’s marketers call what they do “engagement,” “interaction,” “relationship-building” or worse yet, “encouraging the customer to experience the brand.” However, substitute “brand” with “Tabasco enema,” and you can picture the usefulness of such tactics and how uncomfortable your audience is with them.
The sad news is that your company’s brand isn’t nearly as important to your audience as it is to you. Unless you’re the only provider available online, which is unlikely, it’s very easy for your audience to find someone else. No amount of “brand engagement” you pull out of your magic hat is going to make people think more about you than they do of themselves.
So don’t fool yourself about this “brand experience” thing. It’s important, and it can be done, but it isn’t going to happen because you dressed your marketing up with prettier language or pictures.

In my estimation:
Brands increase sales effectiveness: If a potential buyer says, “I know your company– you have a reputation for doing a great job and treating clients well,” you’ll be in much better shape than if they say, “Now who are you again and why are you here?” Also, we all know that large buying decisions have multiple people influencing the purchase from the buyer side. When your prospect asks around and hears, “Yes, I’ve been following their research for years. They’re a leader in the space,” or “I’ve worked with them before–they’re as solid as they come,” it’ll be much better for you than if they hear a chorus of “Nope–never heard of them,” or worse.
Brands help generate leads: If a prospect knows and respects your company and reputation, they’ll be more likely to accept when they get an invitation to an event, an invitation to download a new white paper, or a telephone call to see if they’d like to have lunch and discuss business. If they’ve never heard of you, the messages can often go unnoticed and untouched. (Until the messages build up enough over time and they’ve seen them for a while, but then you’re starting to establish a brand–) Research supports this argument.
Brands create premium fees and pricing: It may be basic, but buyers are looking for services firms to do what they’ll say they’re going to do. If your brand and reputation a) creates a promise for what the buyer can expect from you, and b) supports the belief that you deliver on your promises, you’ll garner higher fees.
Brands help you beat competition: If a buyer knows he’s going to get top quality, high output, reduced risk, leaders and thinkers, or whatever your brand is they often value that over the lowest price. Without distinct criteria for them to evaluate what you will do versus someone else, or knowledge that what you say is, indeed, what they’ll experience from you, price often becomes a central factor.
Brands facilitate repeat business: When buyers know what to expect from interactions with you, that you keep your promises and that you deliver at and above their expectations, they’re less likely to switch or stop buying. Boil it down, and a brand is simply the degree to which a buyer prefers to purchase from you versus other options available to them.
Brands draw strong labor pools: In good economies and bad, services firms need to hire the best people they can possibly find. Brands are often a force in attracting the best job candidates and getting them to accept positions at your company versus the others.
Brands increase the value of a company: As discussed throughout, brands help create premium fees, new business leads, strong sales, strong labor pools, and other benefits. These are long-term financial advantages. These advantages translate into higher market value and company valuation, especially because of how long it takes to establish a brand from scratch. This point may only be interesting to the owners of a business, but, then again, they often hold the purse strings and keys to success for brand and marketing initiatives.

Because I needed a shower valve, about a $200 part, and my plumber just happened to have one on his truck, and all it would cost me is a little over $1100. So I politely declined, ran all over town to find one, and remain without a shower in our bedroom until the plumber can return. So what’s wrong with this picture?
1. Plumbers in my area are in such short supply, they can’t keep up with the demand.
2. Therefore, most don’t bother to call you back, leaving you hanging.
3. Then when you do find one, they often are booked out several weeks in advance. So you wait.
4. And when they do make it to your problem, their parts are over-priced and you can either pay the ransom or you can do what we did–reschedule until you can buy the part at a reasonable price.
If only these situations occurred with plumbers, we could live with it. But we find the same lack of service and fair pricing exists in every industry and practiced by many companies, leading us to ask: Who is the customer here? Who does this business serve? Me or the bottom line?
I understand supply and demand. But that is only part of the reason for a lack of response, service and pricing that greets customers faced with repair or replacement needs. Some of those in a position of scarcity are taking advantage and charging excessive mark-ups and combining it with horrible service. I believe that attitude reflects on business universally, even if we are not engaged in the practice.
Am I wrong? Do consumers paint with a broad brush and when faced with bad service and high prices attribute that attitude to all business? Do they think of us as greedy before ever doing business with us or do they judge us as individual businesses not as a class of businesses?
Are brands affected by group think or can individual brands within an industry rise above others by resisting the temptation to reduce customer service to cut costs and increase their margins to raise profits?
Should a business always compete on that basis, or should some step us, increase customer service to meet demand and lower their margins? Doing so means that at the end of the day our top and bottom lines will show at the very least a short-term decline?
But what would the long-term hold for such a company? Can we guarantee that customers will flock to us in the numbers necessary to make-up for increased customer service and lower prices without any decline in quality?

It is an attractive and safe way (reduces tripping) to tidy and stow loose line.

1. they care,

2. how neat and professional, and
3. what great attention to detail.

One of the reasons I admire Walt Disney is the way he pushed his teams to take extra steps to care and make their work neat and professional. His animation, theme park legacy, and brand was built on this attention to detail or “flemishing the lines.”

Today, I take a different view on the subject. One that should not be controversial but it might be provocative, based on the lessons shared.
Everyone within the blogging community that I most frequently participate in is a business person, most often involved in services such as marketing, advertising, PR, consulting, design, and web-based technologies. We are not non-profits. We work hard to earn a living. For me, that means that a piece of growing my business includes a blog. Like my web site, the blog was launched to build brand and to grow business. But those two goals do not form the foundation of the content.
I do little self-promotion and whatever branding I do primarily involves my business name and my picture, which appears in the left column. The blog is what it is. A place to offer and share free professional experiences and advice, and a place for others to join in the conversation and offer their opinions. The blog is designed as a sharing avenue for readers to grow personally and professionally. The content is not about me. It is about you. Pandering to readers also is avoided, even if it causes me to hurt my brand or my potential to get work.
Content, however, as any good marketer and writer knows, achieve my goals of monetizing the blog. Last week, I attained my third paying client who discovered my through my blogging since May. In my mind, creating an educational and a conversational blog based on quality and focused content is the “right” way for me to monetize my blog (and my web site, as well as the other blogs, books and articles that I contribute to or author). No advertising, no sponsorships, little to no self-promotion. Just straight-forward talk and story-telling.
Ninety percent of my marketing effort is tied up in my web site (where free content and advice are also offered), my blog and my writings. I think this is what Mack is getting us to think about when he asks how to share income with our readers that we make through our blogs. My answer is that we achieve value for our readers and our clients by giving away tens of thousands of dollars of consulting and business advice and experiences, and then when one of them hires us, we work our butts off to exceed their expecations.
In an effort to share here what I believe works (but you are the final judge of that), here are tactics are that I use to provide value and to market my services and build my brand:
1. Keep to the subject, which in my case is the world of business, most often centered on marketing but not always. Only on Fridays and weekends do I veer away from business talk to sharing the music I love.
2. Create weekly series that publish the same day each week so readers know when and where to find them. My current series are called “How Do You Feel About [name of company]” and “Fridays and Weekends Rock with [name of musician or band].”
3. On occasion, be provocative. Don’t avoid controversy. Do avoid being argumentative. Never be rude and always respect readers’ intelligence. Cam does this better than most.
4. Accept all comments except those that cross the line of respect, dignity and decency.
5. Post four to five days weekly.
6. Listen to readers and write about the topics they seem most interested in.
7. Respond to every reader comment with an e-mail and at the very least, say thank you, even if you don’t respond in a blog comment.
8. Read other blogs and comment and, when appropriate, get to know them better with a personal visit or an offline conversation. CK is great at this.
9. Credit others, especially when following up on their posts or when using their ideas to create a different point of view. Use links, in other words, to help bloggers grow their readership. Toby and Valeria are generous in this way.
10. Reread every post and delete first-person pronouns as much as possible. Write about and for readers, whenever possible. (Believe it or not, this post has about half the number of first-person pronouns than the original. There still are too many, I think, but my brain hurts.)
These tactics are not thorough, of that I am certain. For example, David Armano does a great job with visual elements, and that is a marvelous way to draw in readers and to help them better understand his thoughts. What other strategies and tactics can help us continue to share but also monetize that sharing in a professional business manner?

They have also “owned” a signature event for the past five years. It has its own name and logo identity, with equally high recognition. It is one of the premiere events for their industry. Neither the name or logo of the event sound or look like Cooper’s Pharmacopia. But most attendees would be very clear that they sponsor the event.
They just got a new marketing director. Your new client. He would like you to take the event logo (it’s round) and merge it into the company’s logo by replacing one of the o’s in Cooper’s Pharmacopia with the event logo. That would become the new event logo.
Question: From a strategic point of view (not if the round logo looks good as an o) what is your response?
Should you take an established “sub brand” and blend it with the corporate brand? Or, should the parent company and the sub branded event each retain their own identity?
Which strategy strengthens both the company and the event’s brand?

I was pondering this while watching that beautiful Sony Bravia TV commercial featuring the hypnotic music of Jose Gonzalez. But this wasn’t on commercial television, but featured on a show about art. The segment wrapped with a quote from Guy Debord — “The spectator does not feel at home anywhere, because the spectacle is everywhere.” Suddenly the bells began to ring in my mind.
In a world where so much of our daily experience is mediated by technology, “engagement” no longer seems to be an end goal, but rather a milestone. “Engagement” does not reach far enough nor adequately convey the restless desire we have to connect — with brands, with organisations and with each other. Just look at the words we use to describe a website (home page) or an online network (social community) and you will see evidence of this underlying yearning.

Perhaps because the “spectator” cannot rest, a transformation is underway. No longer content in this passive role, consumers are stepping out of their comfort zones into the worlds of social media, co-creation and multi-channel conversation … and technology is being harnessed as a first and necessary step.
It seems to me that brands who continue to invest in the spectacle will be able to “engage” at least some of the people some of the time. But those brands wanting to delve deeper will need to find ways to transform our experiences — one heartbeat at a time.
Photo credit: Beagley

For Father’s Day, I requested a trip to one of my favorite restaurants called PF Changs. It’s kind of like a chain-type Asian food restaurant. I would describe it as high-quality, not-fast-food type Chinese food.
My past experiences with PF Changs (about 4 other times over the last 5 years) have all been great, therefore I equated the brand with high-quality. I reserved trips to this restaurant for special occasions.
However, this past trip I noticed a few things. First off, I noticed that they stopped using nice white table cloths, which to me give a restaurant a touch of elegance as opposed to wood “wiped down with a wet cloth” tables. The second thing I noticed was that the portions were smaller by about 25%, I figure.
I’m going to guess in pure speculation here that the changes were made to reduce costs. Less money needing to be spent on cleaning table cloths and a reduction of portions to trim a few percentage points off the bottom line of materials. Those are guesses. I have zero facts to back them up.
To me, they quality of the experience was severely damaged. The PF Changs brand in my head is no longer a “special occasion” type of experience. The reduction in quality now makes me think of it as a place that’s “ok, I guess”. But I’m not going out of my way to go there anymore.
I’ve seen this happen many times before, and not just in restaurants. And everytime it happens to me I do the same thing. I stop evangelizing and purchasing from the brand in question.
You cannot reduce quality and expect to keep your brand intact. You’re better off simply raising prices. Take a lead from companies like Jaguar. They don’t “cut back” on their quality. In fact, they continue to make improvements in quality.
Do you have any examples of brands that have suffered from a quality reduction?

Lots and lots of nuts.
In Jericho’s season-ended episode, a character’s exclamation of “Nuts!” drove fans to adopt it as a rallying cry after CBS announced that the series had been cancelled. So fans sent nuts by the truckload to CBS’ New York offices. Twenty-five tons worth of nuts.

In total, CBS received over 30,000 emails from fans, and over 50,000 pounds of nuts. Fans also donated over $15,000 to tornado victims in Kansas, where Jericho is set.
CBS got the message and agreed to bring the series back next year for a limited run, with the possibility of more episodes if viewership rises.
“A loyal and passionate community has clearly formed around the show,” Nina Tassler, president of CBS Entertainment, said. “But that community needs to grow. It needs to grow on the CBS Television Network, as well as on the many digital platforms where we make the show available. We will count on you to rally around the show, to recruit new viewers with the same grass-roots energy, intensity and volume you have displayed in recent weeks.”
Note what CBS just did. They not only acknowledged that Jericho’s fans wanted to bring the series back, but decided to utilize their power, by giving them “ownership” of the show. CBS reached out to the show’s evangelists, and told them that the show’s future belongs to them.
This is BRILLIANT! CBS just tapped into the natural tendency that fans of Jericho already had in promoting the show, and gave them a reason to focus that energy. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if Jericho wasn’t one of the hits of the upcoming season.
And all those nuts that CBS received? According to Nedra at Spare Change, the network is working with City Harvest, a hunger-relief program, and State Island Project Homefront, which makes care packages for troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Kudos to Jericho’s fans for taking ownership of their series, and kudos to CBS for encouraging them to do so.