Stories By REL

It’s NOT the economy, stupid!

By Mark True

Small business owners aren’t buying the doom and gloom spewing from the mass media. They’re taking charge and making things happen.

What are you doing today?

• Making new connections with people who can tell your story?
• Talking with customers to learn what’s on their minds?
• Listening to customers to identify new opportunities?
• Meeting with employees to see who needs additional training or motivation?
• Looking around your business to see if your brand drives everything you do?
• Digging into [tag]competitor websites{\tag] and related blogs to discover new opportunities?

Or are you watching the mass media?

Flickr photo by Tishay

Technorati Tags: mass media, taking charge

1 comment July 2nd, 2008

Somebody had to say it!

By Mark True

A cliché is a cliché because it’s used over and over and over and, eventually, it doesn’t mean much. Such is the case with quality, trust and innovation as brand attributes. And the guys over at Branding Strategy Insider call it like it is in this post about the worthless brand attributes.

If I hear "we’re about quality, trust and innovation" once more, I think I’ll puke.

There are many other relevant brand attributes available to organizations willing to take a few minutes to look around.

What about fast? In the go-go world of 2008, getting something done faster than the next guy has opportunity written all over it. Wouldn’t you like to go to a bank that has a speedy drive through? Wouldn’t you buy - and pay more - from a furniture manufacturer that delivers in two weeks? How about a car-buying experience that takes less than 30 minutes? And get this: speed - as long as it maintains an acceptable level of quality - often demonstrates innovation better than any ad campaign or tag line!

What about convenient? The convenience store is an American institution for a very good reason: we want things fast and just around the corner! I don’t mean to pick on banks, but don’t you believe that a 24-hour bank - even a 24-hour bank drive-through - would be a huge success?  What about a county government office that stayed open until 7 p.m., or allowed a would-be business owner or car owner to complete everything they needed online, 24 hours a day? How much extra do you think business travelers would pay to be picked up at work and driven to the airport before their flight? In an inconvenient world, convenience can be synonymous with quality.

What about responsive? Wouldn’t a doctor’s office, services firm or a construction contractor who calls back within 30 minutes garner huge brand loyalty? How about a customer service center that doesn’t require you to enter an account number before they ask you for an account number? How about answering "I don’t know" and then getting back to the customer quickly with the answer when you do know? Being responsive gets a brand on the road to establishing trust! 

And what about  passionate, educated, friendly, cool, green, elegant, fun, connected, dependable, creative, family-friendly, humble, courageous, wacky, cheap, memorable, or a million other attributes. Surely you can find one that fits you better than quality, trust and innovation.

Flickr photo by Куртис Перри

Technorati Tags: quality, trust, innovation, brand attributes

Add comment June 30th, 2008

Don’t abdicate your brand

By Mark True

My first draft of this post featured another rhetorical question that begged a political answer that I didn’t want to address in a blog about telling great brand-based stories. So, I’ll skip the question and make it an instructional post. 

Don’t do this!  On the heals of my last post, which encouraged self-directed branding, I’m disappointed that a group of high-tech businesses in Massachusetts would look to the government to take care of business.  The sector:

• is responsible for 331,000 jobs,
• has the largest economic impact of any state industry,
• can draw young people like flies to the urban excitement of Boston,
• is in the backyard of several leading high-tech universities, and
• has to be making gobs of money.

With all this in its favor, the sector is "at risk of being significantly diminished in the decades ahead without greater industry-university collaboration and targeted state investment." The details are in the article, so please read it and learn how NOT to manage your brand. 

Don’t get me wrong: I believe forming partnerships and collaboration are good for business, but asking government to take on the brand management tasks of business is a waste of effort, in my opinion. In fact, I’d say that MassInsight is abdicating its brand by trying to bring everybody together and get someone else to pay for it. Any one of the companies in the sector, I suspect, has the ability to invest in the industry, take a leadership position and get the lion’s share of the benefit while helping the rest of the sector at the same time. That sounds like a win-win situation to me.   

One of the report recommendations, for example, is creation of a Talent Development Bank to expand connections between the tech industry and college campuses. Why wouldn’t one of the companies do that for themselves, make a call to MIT and say "let’s make this happen?" Why not lead the way for the rest of the industry? Why not create a category of one?

I’ve given this same advice to regional marketing groups in the state of Iowa several times. After working with them in our Brand Discernment Process, it became apparent that these regional groups can do well by discovering what’s different, inviting and relevant about their area of the state, and then working hard to communicate that truth and provide opportunities the citizens to take ownership of that brand. The Iowa Department of Economic Development may have some resources that will support that brand, but they can’t be the ONLY resource a group uses. It has to start locally!

The high-tech leaders could learn something by reading this Business West article to see how it’s done. The article was published in Western Massachusetts!

Technorati Tags: branding, partnerships, collaboration, brand management, MassInsight

Add comment June 25th, 2008

I want YOU…to be a brand warrior, too!

By Mark True

I once gave a brand presentation to a professional communications group, and talked to a veteran communicator after the meeting. ”We’re all about brand,” he said, proudly. He worked for one of the large, very visible insurance companies in Des Moines, so I asked him if he felt his company’s brand was different, inviting, relevant, and truthful, and if he and his co-workers knew how to live the brand daily. His eyes narrowed slightly and his brow creased when he realized the answer. He told me, “You’re right. We aren’t about brand”. His chinned dropped and the smile left his face when, after discussing it a bit more, he discovered his insurance company employer was about brand identity, not brand management.

As he walked away, I felt bad. I realized that I didn’t help him. I didn’t encourage him. I knew he wasn’t in the leadership postion to dictate change, but I also know I didn’t arm him to become a brand warrior inside his company.

I didn’t tell him to become subversive, to go on the offensive! That’s what it takes to move organizations down the road to being a great brand. As a brand warrior in a consulting position, all I can do is train people to be brand warriors and arm them with the tools to take the battle to the marketplace. I’m more of a brand mercenary, I guess. And I’m looking for other brand warriors.

Here’s what I should have told him:

Start gathering intelligence – Make sure you’re getting out into your organization, listening to co-workers including executives and the front-line staff. If you’re a large corporation, travel to other offices, participate in different task forces and groups. Watch and listen how sales people engage customers on the trade show floor. Listen to the production staff talk to each other. Review the mission/vision/values statements and annual reports and advertising. Begin to define your organization’s brand. If it’s already been articulated, learn it. And document everything! (If you want to make this a formal process, we’re equipped to help you do that.)

Infiltrate the front lines – Start conversations with the executives, the front-line staff, the sales team and the production crew. Talk with the guy in the mail room and the person at the front desk. Begin to actively refine your organization’s brand promise and get it down on paper. Build relationships with those who are in a position to easily communicate it.

Initiate probing attacks – Try the brand promise out on co-workers, on managers, on customers. See if it’s comfortable with everybody, if they can live it. If you get push back, probe a little deeper. See if it’s because that specific employee can’t live up to the brand or if the company can’t live up to the brand. Only by using it in conversation and communication will you determine if the brand fits, if it’s authentic and believable in the marketplace.

Be a leader – Once you’ve determined that the brand that fits, start using it to drive your communications and to drive your behavior. Lead the way, and get noticed. When others notice, share your story, your findings and encourage them to take it to heart. Hold others accountable when their actions conflict with the brand – even those above you on the organizational chart. This is how to build your personal brand. Let people know that you’re a brand warrior!

And be ready to bold if the brand is not embraced by others. If your organization doesn’t want you, others do.

Technorati Tags: brand, live the brand, brand identity, brand management, leadership, mission/vision/values statements, annual reports, advertising, communications, personal brand, brand warrior

Add comment June 19th, 2008

Wow! Here’s your list for the next 100 days.

By Mark True

I think blogger Chris Brogan just filled up my ticker file! His recent post about 100 personal branding tactics using social media is three months of blog posts just waiting to be written. I doubt I’ll be able to write something on even a quarter of them, but what a treasure trove of blog ideas, self-improvement tips, sales tips, brand management tactics and brain fodder.

Among the categories he addresses are these:

• Listening
• Home Base (blog/website)
• Passports on other social network sites
• Outposts (Facebook, MySpace, RSS tools, etc.)
• Content
• Conversation
• Community
• Face to Face
• Promotion

And at the very end, under the promotion category, is a very simple truth, written simply…

"Sometimes, just doing really good work is worthy of others promoting you. Try it."

Check it out for yourself and see what you can do with them!

And thanks, Chris!

Technorati Tags: blog ideas, self-improvement tips, sales tips, brand management tactics

1 comment June 17th, 2008

The high cost of saving money? Or brand ownership issue?

By Mark True

I walked into a Best Buy store recently to spend a portion of my economic stimulus check on a new computer. The guy at the front door asked me if I needed any help finding anything, and I should have said "yes, how about a sales person?"

Long story, short: After 10 minutes, I and another ready-to-buy consumer couldn’t find someone to take our money. The other guy settled on a more expensive model because he could find it (although I don’t think that was Best Buy’s strategy) but they lost my $700.

All because they tried to save a little money buy hiring fewer sales people. I say it was an accountant who figured that they needed to keep costs down to keep prices down. And that meant that they could hire one or two fewer clerks. That’s the high cost of saving money.

Cory reminded me, however, that there’s another issue at play: brand ownership. None of the three people I spoke with - the guy at the front door, the clerk in cameras or the person at the customers "service" desk knew how to take charge of the situation and represent the brand.

Why couldn’t the guy at the door be a little more inviting, ask what I was looking for, point me in the right direction, check a screen, see how many clerks were in computers and signal another to deploy to that area if they were short. No, I don’t want the refrigerator guy telling me about a computer, but couldn’t a game console freak also be adequately cross-trained in computers. Couldn’t a computer geek be cross-trained on digital cameras? If not, I’d say you should manpower up or not be selling said item. We’re not talking rocket science here: there should be enough basic "help-you-find-the-box-and-put-it-in-the-cart warm bodies" to serve the people who know what they want, shouldn’t there?

This is a big box store. Shouldn’t there be more people to help you find the big boxes?

Help Best Buy. Give me some ideas on how to solve this problem. Maybe they’re listening.

Flickr photo by realbelgianwaffles

Technorati Tags: Best Buy, economic stimulus check, new computer, sales people

5 comments May 23rd, 2008

Delivering on a promise pays off

By Mark True

Ed Roach is one of my favorite brand voices: I’ve never met him, but he and I speak the same language and I find myself wishing that I’d written what he wrote. It’s no wonder, then, that he’s singing the praises of the Disney brand just like another like-minded brand dude, Drew McLellan]/tag], in this post about the experience. As he describes his recent visit to [tag]Disney, he asks some very direct questions, including this one:

Are your customers willing to pay more for your experience?

We’re not talking about expertise, capability and history, but about the stimulus, enjoyment and feeling you get when you come in contact with the brand.

This is a great question for business owners who believe brand management is an expense, one to be made only after they make some money. I’m a strong believer - as are Ed and Drew - that brand management is an investment and great brands earn a premium price. That’s because, as Ed writes, "when you love something, you’re willing to pay more to prolong the experience." I’d add that you’re willing to pay more because the brand delivers on a relevant promise.

VHS tapes, McDonald’s fast food and, arguably, Apple Computers and iPodsae not the best technology, but the brand experience is right on (okay, with VHS it was right on until DVDs delivered a better experience). People will pay more - or buy more often, in the case of McDonald’s - because the brands deliver on the promise with a desirable experience. 

That should give encouragement to purveyors of ordinary products and services - cars, banks, insurance, widgets, etc. - who think they can’t do any better. After all, isn’t Disney just an amusement park?   

Flickr photo by classy sparrow

Technorati Tags: Ed Roach, brand, Drew McLellan]/tag], in this post about the experience. As he describes his recent visit to [tag]Disney, customers, brand management, premium price, VHS, McDonald’s, Apple Computers, iPods, brand experience

Add comment May 22nd, 2008

Drive your brand message to the streets

By Mark True

My Toyota Corolla is just a means of transportation, but when I’m in it, I get to see how many other brands are NOT using their vehicles to drive their brand messages.

 Some vehicles are mute marketers. Their drivers take them all over town, pass by thousands of potential customers, never saying a word about their brand. I counseled a graphics firm years ago, and it took me forever to convince them to use their own product to wrap their delivery van. Today’s graphic technologies are powerful tools for the marketer who dares to be different. Vehicle wraps get attention! 

Some vehicles are simply incoherent, and they don’t take full advantage to integrate their message or look. I was stopped at a traffic light next to a real estate agent’s car last week. The back window included her company’s logo, her name, a tag line, her phone number and another tagline…in three colors and three different fonts and styles. Only because it was so poorly done did I even notice that it was a real estate agent. Working with a sign company is fine as long as the designer fully understands your brand look. If the company doesn’t commit to doing the work to get to know you, find a designer who will and give the sign company the right files.

Some vehicles are missed opportunities. A few years ago, I was pitching our brand development services to the new owner of an existing driver education company. The business included a fleet of PT Cruisers, emblazoned with the company logo. The PT Cruisers were pretty new, very out-of-the-ordinary and made a fun statement to the teens who were the company’s target audience. He also purchased the businesses’ Hummer, which was more of a ceremonial vehicle which top-performing students got to drive once upon graduation. We outlined a number of ideas to leverage the PT Cruisers and the Hummer, but we didn’t get hired. Within a few months, however, the new owner took the safe route and began to sell the PT Cruisers and buy a fleet of cheaper Ford Tauruses.  We never did find out what happened to the Hummer. Just because you have vehicles doesn’t mean you have to have boring vehicles! Base your vehicle decision on your brand. Ask "what kind of vehicle should my brand be driving?" and pick a vehicle that will drive your brand!

Some vehicles are brand accidents waiting to happen. I realize there is risk involved with putting your brand on a vehicle: the car could be involved in a horrendous accident. The employee could use it in a hold-up of the local convenience store. It could show up on an episode of Cops: Clive. Give me a break…brand management takes courage. With great risks comes great rewards. And this is hardly a greater risk than selling a product or service,  hiring employees or getting a sign permit from your local government!

So, next time you go out for lunch, take a few minutes to look around you. See how vehicles can communicate your brand.

Add comment May 21st, 2008

Watch your language!

By Mark True

I honored my mom and moms everywhere for the key role they play in forming future brand managers in a post at the Des Moines Register’s Business Edge blog earlier today, and then I found some great evidence to make one of my points: "watch your language!"

Brands are created in the minds of various audiences based on every experience with an organization - from  the advertising to the product packaging, from the way the receptionist answers the phone to the way the CEO answers opposing counsel during a deposition! Check out the rantings of Aron Wider, the chief executive of HTFC, an independent mortgage investor that takes loan applications and sells residential mortgages to lenders. Karen Donovan reports the story in Conde’ Nast’s Portfolio.com. Be warned…it’s R-rated.

The rage and defiance evident in Wider’s expletive-laced language sets the reader on edge, and does little to generate any sympathy for his defense. He even uses an extremely damaging phrase to define "HTFC": it sounds like something a crude competitor might use to belittle the company. It cost him a hefty fine from the court and didn’t do anything to dispel the image of a greedy, blood-thirsty mortgage company exec.

It’s an extreme example of what happens every day. Similar brand damage occurs when a cashier complains about her long hours, when a delivery driver drops an f-bomb when complaining about traffic, when a shipping clerk speaks crudely about his job in front of a neighbor. It also happens when the customer service rep can’t clearly tell the organization’s story to a friend over lunch, or when the CEO can’t explain the latest layoff.

Brand happens, so watch your language.

Hat tip to Rush Niget, who pointed me to the Iowa Banking Law blog,  who pointed me to Portfolio.com. Aren’t blogs the best!? 

Flickr photo by MilenaT

Add comment May 8th, 2008

Branding inside-out

By Mark True

It doesn’t take much observation of brand management activities by organizations and communities to see why "branding" is getting a bad name. Many clients are handing over their brand management responsibilities to outside firms…and the firms are saying "sure, we do branding." It’s easy to throw together a logo, a tag line and a brochure. And it’s fast; just whip up something that makes everybody feel good and then cash the check!

Outside firms can’t - and shouldn’t - re-brand the client, unless we’re talking about the first level of branding, which we call brand identity. Change in the culture, the reputation or the experience - real brand management - comes from the inside of an organization. Outside agencies can help identify actions necessary to change the brand…over time…and build communication tools that demonstrate the brand story, but it’s up to the organization to make the changes a reality.

We believe an outside consultant is paid to go deeper to understand the brand - the promise made by the organization - and provide courageous counsel about how to use that brand to tell a great story. We help the create the narrative that demonstrates their brand. And, because it’s in our DNA, we help them tell their story in engaging ways, including print, new media and, now, the latest in high-definition, scalable video.

It’s up to the client, however, to drive that bus…to make sure that once the direction has been determined, everybody is moving the same way (and that it it’s not off a cliff!).

It requires discipline and it requires answering some questions you might not feel comfortable answering.

Anything less creates blands, not brands. Anything less is a very expensive way to do business.

Flickr photo by Collins83_john

Technorati Tags: brand management, logo, tag line, brochure, brand identity, client

Add comment May 7th, 2008