Grow My Company

Facebook Places: How & why to adjust your settings

Facebook launched their own geo-tracking service today, called Places. This video explains this new functionality and shows you how to adjust your own Facebook privacy settings to take advantage or disable this service. Christine Pilch, 413.537.2474, Christine@GrowMyCo.com

This video is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 License.

Logo follies: how taking liberties with your logo damages your brand

Although your logo itself is not your brand, since it is one of the most instantly recognizable elements of it, your logo is very important. Despite this, sometimes companies disrespect their logo, taking liberties with it that damage their brand by presenting an inconsistent delivery among mediums.

When your logo was developed, if the work was done by a someone who has experience with corporate identity development, you likely received an accompanying identity guide or manual. The degree of detail contained in this document varies among companies. For example, the ID manual for the Boy Scouts of America is 45 pages. But the guide provided for your small business is likely just a few pages, usually containing such information as acceptable fonts, stationery design, colors, and appropriate logo versions. This document structures the delivery of your graphic presentation so it remains consistent across various media, and its compliance is typically mandated by the president or CEO within the document.

Unfortunately, sometimes companies don't receive an identity guide, or perhaps the person handling marketing doesn't understand it. Such a breakdown of understanding, or of missing information, often leads to graphic mistakes like the following.

Logos are typically designed with specific colors. 4-color is expensive to print, so 1 or 2-color logos are most popular for small businesses. Your ID guide should contain all acceptable renditions, including black, reverse (white on black,) a 1-color version for each color of a 2-color logo, solid versions and shaded versions, and a reduced version with all elements clearly visible down to 1 inch size. Without guidance, sometimes a logo is recolored inappropriately:

 

Sometimes a logo doesn't perfectly fit a space, and inexperienced marketers may opt to stretch or squish it to fit the space without regard to maintaining proportions. For example, it may be tempting to squish a logo when creating today's avatars for social media, which are typically square. It is also tempting to stretch a logo to better fit the space of a sign or banner:

  

It is also inappropriate to rotate your logo or flip it:

 

And you should be careful to respect the white space requirements stated in your ID guide and not put anything too close to it or place it on a field:

Your logo is often one of the most prominent graphic elements of your brand, and people get used to seeing it consistently displayed, but it's easy to misuse it. Since consistency is one of the most important components of a brand, you would be wise to respect the integrity of your logo and refer to your ID guide whenever you create any graphic marketing messages.

- Christine Pilch 

Avoiding inappropriateness to safeguard your brand

A Facebook friend recently updated her status, "Anyone else think it's improper to reply to a business email "always at your service, mylady?" Yes, I thought so." She was a bit shocked and offended to be treated so unprofessionally by someone who obviously had a different sense of humor than she did. He crossed a line and likely forever damaged his reputation in her eyes.

Of course, the comments rolled in rapidly as people expressed their enthusiastic agreement. One male friend hit the nail on the head when he responded, "Sounds a bit sexist and patronizing, even if not intended."

In another example, a media representative friend of mine called me a while back all in a tizzy because he had received and email from an advertising agency owner who had requested media coverage of a client and signed the email, "Love, Lisa, (not her real name.)" He was stunned by the inappropriateness of this signature and wanted to justify that he wasn't over-reacting. Although it seemed she thought it was a cute way of sweet-talking him into getting what she wanted, she acted unprofessionally and misinterpreted the level of their relationship.

Both of the above examples were likely innocent mistakes, however they illustrate how easy it is to damage your reputation by simply crossing a line. Your reputation is very closely intertwined with your brand, which is a reflection of your constituency's perception of you. To illustrate my point, consider how BP's reputation over the past 3-months has affected their brand.

Your brand is critical, so be careful to avoid any inappropriateness that could potentially damage it. Resist the temptation to be cute because it might not be perceived that way on the other end.

- Christine Pilch

 Image Credit: Microsoft

LinkedIn - what's the point?

Of the big-4 social media platforms, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and YouTube, I believe that LinkedIn is the most underutilized. Many consider it to be an online resume, and it is, but it also has so much marketing potential that people leave largely untapped.

Sure, LinkedIn can offer a snapshot into the benefits of hiring you as an employee or consultant. It has such a huge and powerful database that your LinkedIn profile is usually one of the top results when someone Googles you, and I've heard that people are actually using its PDF conversion tool to produce their resumes these days. As long as you've committed the time and effort into developing a complete profile, there is maybe no better way to represent the benefits you bring to the table right now.  

But it is equally as powerful as a personal marketing tool. It provides many opportunities for you to demonstrate your expertise, cement your place in your industry, and create professional introductions that can turn into business potential.

Group participation is an easy way to raise awareness of yourself. Pose a question for discussion, answer another member's question, and post interesting news items. The key to maximizing Groups is participation. You'll get little value out of them if you don't read and respond to posts.

Answers are similar to Groups, but participation is open to the entire LinkedIn community, whereas participation within Groups is limited to their membership. Like Groups, however, successfully using Answers a business tool revolves around your commitment to participation. Monitor the questions people ask within your area of expertise, and answer as often as you can. This soft-sales technique can help distinguish you as a helpful leader in your field. You can also pose questions in industries outside your area of expertise, For example, a small business owner may pose an employment question within law & legal / employment & labor law. 

Polls are a great way to sample the LinkedIn community about any issue. It's easy to create one, and the statistics are surprisingly robust and insightful.

You can also gain insight into the business models of your competitors or the internal hierarchy of a company you're trying to sell something to or gain employment with by utilizing the Companies component. Imagine how much easier it is for recruiters these days than pre-LinkedIn.

LinkedIn also has terrific aps that can enhance your profile. I like the Slideshare ap to upload presentations and videos that help promote my brand. I also like the TypePad blog ap, which seamlessly integrates my blog posts with my LinkedIn profile.

These are just a few of many ways you can use LinkedIn to promote yourself. So how about building a little time into your schedule each day to tap into LinkedIn's powerful marketing potential?

- Christine Pilch

YMCA, NPR...really rebranding or simple name changes?

YMCA announced today that after 166 years, the Young Men's Christian Association will now be rebranded as "the Y." Similarly, National Public Radio recently launched an initiative to formally rebrand itself as NPR. Both acronyms have enjoyed widespread use within the public sphere for years, so these seem logical progressions, however, are they really rebrands or simply name changes?

First, let's review what a brand is. Your brand is the public's sum total experience with your company, product, or service. It's the feeling people have when they think of your company or see some physical manifestation of it. It's not your name, or your logo, or your letterhead, as many believe, although all are elements of it. Your brand exists in people's minds, and it doesn't really much matter what you think of it. Only your constituency's opinions count.

Rebranding, therefore, is dependent upon changing the public's perception of your company, product or service. Is "the Y" changing the way the way that they treat the people they help? Will those people enjoy a significantly altered experience in the future than in the past? Will this already wonderful organization provide something really different? 

In this age of 140 and 160 character communications, shorter names leave more room for the message, so NPR makes perfect sense. But when you're already commonly referred to as YMCA, "the Y" is actually one character longer, adding a slight social media disadvantage.

So does a name change really change anything at all about your customer's or client's experience? No, it doesn't. A name change may accurately reflect what your constituency already calls you, and there's certainly no harm in that, provided the common name is acceptable. But a name change, unsupported by a change of customer experience, is just a name change, not a rebrand. So lets call a spade a spade, shall we? 

- Christine Pilch

iPad = iPublic iOpinion iFlop

Yes, I've been lax about posting on this blog as other projects have consumed me, but I just couldn't let Apple's collosal branding failure go unaddressed.

Within an hour of Apple's announcement yesterday, one of the top trending words on Twitter was iTampon, and it went downhill from there.

iPad. Really? Huh? Tilt head, and try to let that one sink in. Blink eyes a few times. iPad. Seriously?

iJust don't get it.

How could one of the world's savviest brands go so far off the ranch? How could they miss the iTarget, not by an inch, but by a mile? Did they finally get so big, and so bold, and so iArrogant that they forgot that an iProduct has to be iPositioned?

Gosh... iPad. Women hate it because of the iInference of something that has iInconvenienced them and iInterfered with their lives for years. Men hate it because it's an iFeminine product that most won't even iPurchase for their wives and girlfriends. But iDigress...

Let's start with what positioning is. Positioning is determining 3 things to find the niche of clients who are most likely to purchase services from you, then building an identity that is so attractive to those prospective customers that they wouldn't dream of purchasing anywhere else.

1. First determine who your clients are. I mean the specifics about them; demographics, likes, dislikes, tenancies, pain, problems, etc.


2. Next figure out what they get from you. By this I mean what need or desire your service will satisfy for them. (What's in it for them)


3. Find out why these clients buy from you instead of your competition

Once you answer these 3 questions, you are ready to build a brand as your best clients see you. You can craft an image of yourself that is exactly as they want you to be, so they perceive you as the perfect solution. Only at this point can you most effectively name your company or product to appeal to those prospective customers. Anything else is premature and almost 100% guaranteed ego driven.

At this point Apple should have known who would be most likely to purchase this product. They should have looked at their position statement, which they had probably spent several hundred thousand dollars developing, and had a creative team come up with something that would appeal specifically to those most likely to purchase their tablet. 

iPad. Seriously? Even all my iTech, iGeek friends, (and I use that word with the utmost iAffection,) are laughing about this one and have publicly iCriticized it. Those who will iPurchase it, will do so iRegardless of the iNaming iBlunder, but I'm betting that they might quickly find an iAlternative pet name for their new iToy. Nobody wants to say "iPad" out loud for fear of rolling iLaughter from all within iEarshot.

So what's the take-away here? Even a company as brilliant as Apple can make a colossal mistake. They seem to have forgotten the primary rule of branding: know your position and be true to it in all things. Some people will certainly buy this product, but how many others won't bother taking a look because of the negative publicity, the jokes, and the snide remarks? Can you afford to risk even a single customer by making such a mistake? 

And finally, remember that your brand is what people perceive you to be, not how you perceive yourself. What you think doesn't matter, and no matter how cool Apple thinks this iPad is, if the public thinks it's an iJoke, it's iJunk.

 

by: Christine Pilch
Christine@GrowMyCo.com
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Building your brand by blogging

How to Build Your Brand by Blogging

View more documents from cpilch.

When your own employees sabotage your company's brand

I know I've said it many times before, but I have to repeat it again: your brand isn't your logo or stationery, although they may be physical representations of it. Your brand is the way you are perceived. It's about how people feel when they hear your name or see any physical element of it. It is built entirely from one's experience with your product or service and is the sum total of all touch points that they have ever been exposed to.

So, have you thought about the potential damage your employees can inflict on that brand?

One of the most critical elements of any brand is in setting up expectations of behavior. Think of Wal-Mart. You expect to be greeted in a friendly manner by a smiling someone at the door. Consider McDonalds. You expect those fries to be perfectly cooked and piping hot. Think of the receptionist at your doctor's office. You expect her to be helpful and polite.

But what if the Wal-Mart greeter scowls, the fries are brown and cold, and the receptionist is rude? In an instant, your expectations aren't met, and you feel uncomfortable or perhaps a bit cheated or angry. Your experience doesn't match the perception that you have created about that product of service, and the brand begins to erode in your mind.

Now think about your own business. Are all of your employees on the same page? Do they all deliver a consistent experience to your clients at every touch point?

Your employees are your brand's champions or the undoing of it. They must always present a professional, tactful, classy front. Clients are affected by their tone, attitude, and even the way employees dress, so be careful of who is on your front-line. For example, your accounting person may be terrific with numbers, but if his people skills are poor, he shouldn't handle clients' inquiries. Even if an employee is having a bad day, that's not an excuse to inflict a rotten attitude on the public.

Also consider how toxic a bad attitude is internally. Can one bad apple spoil the whole bunch? I have seen a few organizations that were turned into glum, depressing places by people who made it their mission in life to spread their own misery. If you've got such an employee on your staff, think about addressing him or removing her.

Your brand and your reputation are wrapped up very tightly together. Make sure you protect them by employing the right people.

by: Christine Pilch
Christine@GrowMyCo.com
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Image Credit: Microsoft

Who is your brand cop?

I recently read Tom Kane's blog post "Does Your Firm Have a Marketing Cop?" and it got me thinking about brand protection. Do you have someone in-house who is thoroughly versed in all aspects of your company's brand and in possession of the authority to reprimand internal offenders? In my experience, many companies do not.

Your brand is the feeling that people have when they hear your name, see your logo, or come in contact with any of your company's, product's or service's touch points. It is the sum total of their experience with these things. It is entirely about their perception of you, not necessarily the image that you want or intend to project.

So what happens when someone within your organization puts out something that is disharmonious or in conflict with your brand? Confusion, discomfort and perhaps a feeling of distrust may occur. Is this something you want? Can you afford to risk it?

It's surprisingly easy to undermine a brand though inconsistency. One department might develop materials that don't conform to your corporate ID manual, so they look and feel different. An employee might slap a logo that is oversized, out of proportion, altered, against a forbidden background, etc. on something. Your receptionist might be unfriendly or rude. A client might be put on hold for too long. Phone calls might not be promptly returned. All of these things damage a brand by delivering a customer experience that is outside of expected treatment. And when you start delivering an inconsistent experience, your brand becomes a lie, trust evaporates, and you start losing clients.

It is very important to empower someone within your organization with the authority to control your customers' experience through careful management of all client touch points. This person must thoroughly understand your brand strategy, respect your ID manual, and have the guts to stand up to anybody who abuses your brand in any way.

So who fills this capacity within your organization? If your answer is "nobody," what damage is being done to your brand through the delivery of an inconsistent customer experience? How much more business could you earn and retain if your brand was rock-solid?


by: Christine Pilch
Christine@GrowMyCo.com
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Image Credit: Microsoft

5 website mistakes you can and should avoid

I look at a lot of websites when I research competitors while doing positioning work for my clients, and I see a lot of websites that need help. Unfortunately many small businesses make the same mistakes. Are you guilty of any of these listed below?

1. Believing that your website should be under the control of your IT department. Your website is a function of marketing. It is one of the most prominent reflections of your brand and must be protected as a precious asset. I have yet to encounter an IT person who understands branding. Actually, web development is also a different skill set from IT, so it is unlikely that your IT department has the competency to build a website that is up to today's standards. You'll need a good web developer and a strong marketer working together if you want your web presence to be as good as it can be. Your website is your company's primary marketing vehicle. It is a 24/7 representation and usually the first destination when people hear about you. Can you afford to not present the best possible face?


2. Displaying content that is poorly written. Good writing is a skill that not everybody possesses, and web content writing is its own unique animal. Not only does your content developer have to be proficient in the rules of grammar and spelling, and respectful of tense and flow, but web content writers are specialists who know how to incorporate keywords for search engine optimization. They also know how to relax the feel while retaining a professional flair. They know how to cut out the fat and get to the point because they understand and appreciate the short attention spans of your visitors.


3. Allowing multiple departments to have control over web content. This can work sometimes, in the event that everyone has sufficient training and adheres to specific guidelines. But almost invariably, somebody learns a little HTML and decides that this would look pretty in pink, and this would stand out more bolded and in a different font. Then before you know it, people hardly recognize your company when they go to your website because everything looks disjointed. Pages are a mishmash of inappropriate creativity. This damages your brand by breaking the cardinal rule of consistency.


4. Launching a site, then forgetting about it. I'm sure you were very proud of what you accomplished when your site went live, but how long has it been since it was updated and refreshed? The evolution of web design is so fluent that old sites look really dated to anybody's eye. We all go to the same internet every day. We all experience new and exciting technology that constantly looks and works better. When we come to a site that is old, there is an instant discomfort, dislike, or dare I say, distrust. The visitor may feel that if you don't care enough about your own website, you might not care too much about his business either.


5. Building a website that is all about me, me, me. Clients don't care about you. They ONLY care about what they get from you. Read your home page and count how many times you use the words we, us, our, I, me, my, and mine. The actual number of times all of these words should be used is zero. Now look at the rest of your pages. Pretty much the only time you should be talking about yourself is on your about us page because that's the whole point of it. When people go there, they expect to read about you. The rest of the time, people want to know what they get when they hire you. They don't care how great your service is, how long you've been in business, or how wonderful you think you are. Tell them how your service will benefit them and how you can do that better than anybody else if you want to earn their business.

Website development is a specialty best left to the pros. You probably have a lawyer handle your legal work. You probably have an accountant handle your taxes. You probably have a doctor diagnose your illness. So does it make sense to trust your company's primary marketing vehicle to someone who isn't qualified to provide the best possible product on your behalf?

by: Christine Pilch
Christine@GrowMyCo.com
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Image Credit: Microsoft