Category: Branding

Entrepreneur Daily: Sports fans of all ages have plenty of team memorabilia to help them root on their favorite players. But what about the increasing number of grown-up gamers? How can they show off their gaming pride? Before G8 Brand, there weren’t too many options. But now, this lifestyle brand hopes to change the public’s perception of gamers and their sense of style. “I always wondered why nobody had ever done an apparel brand for gamers,” said Tony Crisp, owner of G8 Brand. “What Quiksilver has given to surfers and what Volcom has given to skaters is what I want G8 Brand to give to gamers … a brand to call their own.”
The first collection of t-shirts consists of high-fashion prints inspired by gaming designs and classic video game imagery. As for the future, the brand plans to launch a special artist series of tees, in addition to a signature series with some of the world’s top pro gamers.
New Brand Targets Gamers [Entrepreneur Daily]

Small Business Branding: Consumers are exposed to over 3,000 marketing messages a day. TV spots, radio ads, billboards, logos on t-shirts, packaging labels, coupons in the mail, pop up ads on the internet, kids selling cookies at the door – they are everywhere.
And yet you think the consumers you want to talk to are going to filter through over 3,000 messages a day – just to find yours. And because this task alone is not daunting enough, most businesses decide to make it harder by hiding their messages. If you are not consistent in ALL your marketing materials, you are wasting thousands of dollars and losing potential customers every day.
Here are some questions you should ask yourself to check your brand’s consistency.
– Are you using just one logo? Is it always in the same color?
– Are you consistent with paper stock – color, texture and weight?
– Is the tone of all your communications pieces the same – is it in one voice?
– Does that one voice match the personality and soul of your company?
– Do your sales, recruiting, internal documents, and other communications match your marketing materials?
– Do your ads reflect the same look, feel and voice?
– When you do your radio/TV ads – do you use the same talent for the voice of your company? Is he/she also on your answering system?
Do a Quick Brand Check [Small Business Branding]

This is an article submitted by Ken Wisnefski. Submit your article! Find out more.

Introduction
Do you think there is a corner in the world where you can find a computer user who does not know of Microsoft? Is there anyone in the world who looks for information on the Web and has never heard of Google? These names are indelibly ingrained in our brains. Did you ever think of why?
Both companies are world renown. They have molded a brand name that is synonymous with success. Most experts will tell you that you need experience, excellent service/product, ingenuity, and commitment to become a success. These are all ingredients in becoming successful, but more help comes from customers than most think.
You need to provide optimal services or products to become popular with the public. Most celebrated companies will be happy to sell services and products and hope their acclaim continues. Some of the best companies do not realize their satisfied customers can become their most powerful marketing tool.
The customer knows best
It is important to foster a rapport with your customers, regardless of the size of your business. Experts in customer management will tell you that ideally, you want to make the customer-to-business relationship as personal as possible. The dynamic should be comparable to that of a mom and pop shop located in a remote, small town with their second to third generation customers.
How can you inspire this relationship? Listen to your customers. Comprise a customer testimonial page on your Web site. Customer testimonials can be incorporated into newsletters and fliers, but it will be seen by most on your Web site.
Promote testimonials
For most, the customer testimonial page (if there is one) is usually discreetly showcased, accessible through an obscure link somewhere on the bottom of the home page. This is a mistake.
Positive customer feedback needs to be exhibited as strongly as other content on the site. Browsers will come across testimonials and relate to the authors. Those who testified were once like them – looking for a provider of goods/services.
Good testimonials should be completely overt and conspicuous for all to see. Everyone knows that each business will have positive things to say about themselves through their content, but the customers can give unbiased, objective information. This is what a potential customer wants to see – no inside advertising, just the facts.
Building the Brand
Once a business has accumulated and read a large number of testimonials, they can begin to see patterns in responses. What exactly about the products/services is so appealing to the customers? What products/services get the most positive feedback? What (if anything) needs to be improved? What separates the company from the competition? Finding the answer to these questions will begin to shape the image of your brand.
Most companies believe that they choose their brand. They believe the public at large will accept what they are told. There is too much competition for people to be persuaded into accepting something before they have proof of its veracity.
Testimonials can aid in building the brand of your business. A “brand” is about perception and your testimonials are just that – the perception of your customers. Word-of-mouth is the greatest marketing tool imaginable, but costs a business nothing in advertising costs. The investment comes from having an excellent product/service to provide.
The dynamic of the interaction between a business and its customers is the “brand.” If a business has customers that have positive associations towards the business, this equals the “image” of the business. The image is shared by the existing customers and is to be potentially shared by new customers.
Getting Practical
Thus far, it may seem that we have been speaking theoretically, and not about how to come up with a physical brand (logo, slogan).
Working with a graphic designer can ameliorate the process of composing a logo. The logo should originate from the feeling that comes from the customer feedback.
Collect the testimonials and survey them for likenesses. What adjectives are used to describe your business? What analogies or references are made in relation to your business? Is your business prided on speed? Is it prided on efficiency? Is it prided on customer service? Create a symbol based on a conglomeration of the feedback. This will be your logo.
The same process can be used for a slogan. A slogan usually will have something to do with the mission statement or the ideology of the business (Ex: eBay – “The World’s Online Marketplace”), but it can be a combination of this and the relationship with the customers (Wegmans – “Everyday You Get Our Best”). It is best to combine the company’s mission with what it can provide for its public. The choice is yours, but the latter seems to make more of a connection with the customer.
Ken Wisnefski is the president of VendorSeek.com, a site that specializes in connecting business consumers with qualified vendors from an Approved Vendor Network that provide competitive price quotes for their specific service category.

Mind Petals: Business brochures and commercials that ridicule their competition, insult customer intelligence. I don’t want to buy a car from a guy who tells me why everyone else in his field is unworthy of my patronage. I do want to support companies who state examples of why their “unique” strategies work better. We’re not stupid consumers. We don’t expect companies to endorse their competition. So, as entrepreneurs, we need to advertise as consumers.
If there’s something you don’t like about what your competition does – set yourself apart by showing how your system exceeds their quality. Nothing portrays this better than testimonials from satisfied clientele. Your customers are more apt to believe in your product if they see results from their peers.
Post testimonials on your site and brochures. Beat your competition without spitting a negative word their way. New businesses successfully beat the veterans all the time. Just remember that how you choose to run your company now – sets the tone for your permanent professional image.
Dis-count the Competition? [Mind Petals]

Entrepreneur: It’s a brand new work world. And I do mean “brand.”
It used to be that only large businesses worried about branding. To thrive, they had to distinguish their company from the competition. This meant carving out a niche based on competitive advantages and specific corporate attributes. They crafted and maintained a strategic brand–a unique, useful promise to current and prospective customers–to gain brand equity and loyalty. This was business, after all.
But things have changed. The 21st century is the age of free agents and custom ringtones. Nike doesn’t just sponsor Tiger Woods; Tiger Woods sponsors Tiger Woods (check out the personal logo on his cap). Today, branding occurs at the individual level. This is especially noticeable in service industries, but increasingly in others as well. Everything about you, from the type of cell phone you carry and the vocabulary you use, to the brand of coffee you drink, says something about who you are and what you can do for the rest of us.
In business today, your most important job is to promote yourself. You probably won’t work the same job from graduation until retirement. More likely, your future depends on leveraging your strengths along a winding career path ripe with possibilities. To take advantage of these opportunities, you need to stand out in a crowd. You must become your own brand.
Know – and Brand – Thyself [Entrepreneur]