BrandOrganizer

Ted Souder, the Head of Sales, Midwest Travel for Google, shared 10 best practices shaping the future of marketing. Chris Brown, from Branding & Marketing, shares his insights with us.

Tags: branding // Add Comment »

Read this articles of Chris Anderson and Bob Gilbreath. Also, about You Tube (another flop), Jon Fine on Businessweek.

Tags: branding // Add Comment »

This is my profile: just follow me and I’ll follow you back (for now, at least).

Tags: branding // Add Comment »

River West acquires brands when the products themselves are dead, not merely ailing. Aside from Brim, the brands it acquired in the last few years include Underalls, Salon Selectives, Nuprin and the game maker Coleco, among others. “In most cases we’re dealing with a brand that only exists as intellectual property,” says Paul Earle, River West’s founder. “There’s no retail presence, no product, no distribution, no trucks, no plants. Nothing. All that exists is memory. We’re taking consumers’ memories and starting entire businesses.”

Rob Walker, in the New York Times.

Tags: branding // 1 Comment »

Let’s keep an eye on this. And if you wish to invite me, go ahead: luisjorge@brandorganizer.com

More information here.

Tags: branding // Add Comment »

More here. Very interesting resources.

Tags: branding // Add Comment »

Read this carefully and think about your brand. How could this strategy be useful in user experience design?

Tags: brand experience // Add Comment »

David Armano.

Tags: branding // Add Comment »

The portrayal of the american president in international ads.

Tags: branding // Add Comment »

Lets see if this really works.

Tags: twitterfeed, bloggng, web2.0

Tags: internet marketing // 1 Comment »

This is a list made by Seth Godin in his new book, Meatball Sundae. I had to show it here to stress the importance of New Marketing in the success of our branding efforts:

1. Direct communication and commerce between producers and consumer. Organizations can now eliminate the middlemen.
2. Amplification of the voice of the consumer and independent authorities. Everyone is a critic nowadays, so you have to create products that satisfy critics.
3. Need for an authentic story as the number of sources increases. Don’t get caught saying one thing and dong another: you will be dead.
4. Extremely short attention spams due to clutter. Forget complex messages.
5. The Long Tail. Read Chris Anderson.
6. Outsourcing. It’s now easy to find products and services without geographical limitations.
7. Google and the dicing of everything. By atomizing the world, Google destroys the end-to-end solution offered by most organizations, replacing it with a pick-and-choose, component-based solution.
8. Infinite channels of communication. Or the decay of old media.
9. Direct communication and commerce between consumers and consumers. eBay started it, others are following.
10. Shifts in scarcity and abundance. Scarce things become common, and common things become scarce. A challenge to organizations.
11. The triumph of big ideas. Small improvements are not enough. The marketplace demands ideas that force people to sit and take notice.
12. The shift from “how many” to “who”. Now, for the first time, marketers can focus on who is hearing their message, and no longer use mass as a placeholder to their communication.
13. The wealthy are like us. More rich people, wider gaps between rich and poor, and far greater diversity.
14. New gatekeepers, no gatekeepers. Big companies wanted to work with other big companies. Now they want to be on YouTube.

Further reading: Meatball Sundae

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Tags: branding, viral marketing, advertising, customer experience // 5 Comments »

Twitter is a great tool to keep in touch with friends, partners, consumers and clients. Here is a list of some great resources to help you become a power user:

1. Twhirl: a desktop client for Twitter, based on the Adobe AIR platform.
2. Tweetscan: a real-time search engine for Twitter.
3. Tweetahead: a dashboard widget for Mac Os X, TweetAhead allows you to schedule messages in advance.
4. Twitterverse - Lets you search through archived public timelines and tweets.
5. Twittersearch - Search Twitter and tweets by word.
6. Quotably - Follow conversations by username.
7. Twittervision: a poetic view of the world of Twitter.
8. Twitterholic: who are the greatest twitterholics of the web?

Further reading: Mashable’s Twitter Toolbox.

Tags: twitter, resources, tools, marketing, branding

Tags: branding // 2 Comments »

Executives need to deliver short-term financial results: those who hit quarterly profit targets are rewarded, and bad numbers will get you every time. The problem is that brands are long-term assets. So, you can boost profits while damaging the long-term health of your brand. It’s easy for brands to get caught in a branding loop doom, usually starting with a price promotion:

1. Business results are soft
2. You reduce prices
3. Reduce service and marketing to pay for price reductions
4. Short-term sales improve
5. Competitors respond
6. Customer price expectations shift
7. Customer experience deteriorates
8. Business results are soft…

The bottom line is: managers must balance driving short-term numbers with building a long-term brand. That is the challenge of cash.

Further reading: Kellogg on branding.

Tags: pricepromotions, branding loop doom, branding, challenge of cash

Tags: branding // 1 Comment »

Founded by two city workers in London, Pret A Manger has now expanded internationally. McDonalds recently acquired a 33 percent stake but promised to stay hands off to preserve the unique culture of the brand. These are the secrets of its huge success:

1. Focus on the need: the founders of Pret A Manger conceived the idea when they despaired at being able to find a wholesome sandwich at lunchtime.
2. Be obsessive about the quality of the the ingredients.
3. Pamper your employees shamelessly: with higher salaries, incentive rewards, appraisal and promotion programme, Christmas and summer parties.
4. Choose only the best: with experience days for recruits, 10-day training for all recruits, graduation pin and pay rise on completion of training.
5. Encourage feedback: with employee feedback on customer comment cards, tifanny and silver stars for customer mentions.
6. Keep in touch: with team briefs every morning, and head office staff working in shops five times a year.

Further reading: Uncommon Practice, by andy Milligan and Shaun Smith.

Tags: uncommonpractive, pret a manger, branding, powerful brands, marketing