Tag Archives: Brand Development

New World Networking

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New World NetworkingIt’s coming.

It started with Bit Coin.

Now there’s AirBnB, and Etsy and Task Rabbit.

Slowly but surely Block Chain Technology is edging out the Internet as we know it.

Here’s a great explanation of the technology:

https://blockgeeks.com/guides/what-is-blockchain-technology

This technology is the next step in the evolution of networking for business development.

Most people agree that people do business with folks they know, like and trust and that trust is based on reputation.

The more secure your reputation, the easier it is to get to trust.

This technology will make building a reputation and maintaining it easier but your brand will have to be carefully nurtured along the way.

Block Chain Technology is more secure than the server based internet. There is no central place a hacker can go to mess with your reputation. It is hosted by millions of computers, simultaneously.

Block Chain Technology is more up to date as it reconciles all transactions on all the stored blocks about every ten minutes. Your information is embedded and updated in the entire network not in a single place.

Block Chain Technology is more collaborative. The network operates on a user-to-user (or peer-to-peer) basis. An entire team can make changes in a document at the same time.

Block Chain Technology enables peer to peer payments.  You won’t have to go through an intermediary like Uber. OpenBazaar uses the technology to create a peer-to-peer eBay.

Block Chain Technology is transparent (nothing is hidden) and publicly accessible. Imagine if it were used for elections. Governance, even in the corporate world, could be managed in the block chain.

Block Chain Technology can protect your intellectual property. You could use smart contracts to protect copyright and automate the sale of your creative works online, eliminating the risk of file copying and redistribution.

Block Chain Technology will protect your reputation. Identity verification is critical to on-line transactions in the sharing economy. Applications currently in development will allow you to have a digital identity for you and your business deliverables that is secure well beyond what is currently available.

Are you ready for New World Networking?

Jerry Fletcher Keynote in ColombiaJerry Fletcher is a beBee ambassador, founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

Get all the Brand Success Stories. Sign up at http://www.brandbraintrust.com/home.html

 

Your Brand is Your Secret Funnel Story

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Story FunnelYou can’t sell anything if they don’t buy your story.

You can talk at people until you are blue in the face and it won’t do any good.

You can “logic them” and “feature them” and even “benefit them” but your results will still be negative.

If your Web site or landing page starts with an “I” you are going to lose.

If you don’t make yourself memorable, communicate the problem you solve in their terms, tell them how you do it in their language and explain how to get your help in a couple minutes or less, you lose.

If you don’t make it easy for them every way you can, go back to your day job.

The secret is your story.

It makes no difference whether you are doing e-commerce for a product or a service. The distinction doesn’t matter.

Passion is what matters.

Why are you passionate about this thing you are selling? How did that happen? Want to bet that your experience is similar to other folks that might be interested? Have you watched someone’s eyes as you tell them the concerns you had about it? Have you noticed how they start nodding when you talk about how the change it made in you made you feel about yourself and your family? Have you noticed how you don’t have to sell but rather just take orders.

Your passion plus your story plus a formula.

Imagine you are in a room with a crowd of other folks that are entrepreneurial– consultants, coaches, professionals, guys and gals starting companies and people charged with launching a small company’s new product.

The speaker says:

Target “Are you the one that has to be sure that there is paying business in the pipeline? Do you find yourself looking for another place to network or a trade show to attend just to meet a few new prospects? Are you tired of waiting for leads from your web site or all the social media stuff they told you would work?

And even if it did isn’t that little voice in your ear saying things that make you doubt you’ll ever get this thing off the ground? Makes you feel like a failure that doesn’t take care of his family doesn’t it?

Ever wake up in the middle of the night worried about money to keep the business afloat and to be able to give your kids a college education?

We all know that people do business with people they know, like and trust.

Problem Would you say that your problem is building trust fast enough especially if your budget is zilch?

Guide I know what that’s like. I was the CEO of an ad agency dealing with national and international clients but my board and I agreed to disagree and I went from the corner office, the BMW and the expense account to a makeshift office in a spare bedroom.

I felt rejected. Put out to pasture. Trapped. I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to pay the bills.

I knew that I could help the little guys, the small businesses that couldn’t afford a big agency. I knew I could help them do it without breaking the bank.

First I had to get to trust. I had to find a way to reach them without looking desperate. But I had more bills than money.

I resorted to asking those pearls of contacts I had to help me get some business.

I sent a letter to just 60 golfing buddies. Six responded. Two wished me luck. Two referred me to prospects. And two gave me engagements.

That was in 1990.

I’ve learned a lot along the way. The most important is this:

  • What you know is significant
  • Who you know is important
  • But the single most critical factor in building a business, a career or a life of joy is who trusts you.

You can do what I did.

I can show you how.

It’s called Marketing Without Money.

Would you like to hear more about that?”

Jerry Fletcher Keynote in ColombiaJerry Fletcher is a beBee ambassador, founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

Get all the Brand Success Stories. Sign up at http://www.brandbraintrust.com/home.html

 

 

5 Professional Speaking Secrets

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Jerry Fletcher Keynote

Jerry Fletcher Keynoting in Bogota, Columbia

I’m a professional Speaker. I’ve been an NSA (National Speakers Association) Member since 1993. I’m also a consultant. Before that I was CEO of an ad agency.

When people are looking to get into speaking, they get referred to me so they can, “pick my brain.”

Here’s what I tell them:

  1. This ain’t no picnic. When you see a great platform performance it looks so easy. You just stand up and “let ‘er rip. It’s not that way Bunkie. What you don’t see is the years of preparation to get to the level of expertise needed to really craft winning remarks. What you don’t see is the hours spent rehearsing and the days spent marketing to get those few brief shining moments.
  2. Go with your passion. Every Successful speaker I know is not only an expert in some area, they are passionate about it. Most have been known to speak on the topic even when they are not being paid. Their zeal comes through in a simple conversation or in a packed auditorium. It is the reason a meeting planner or program chair selects one speaker over another. It is obvious in a video a webinar or a phone call.
  3. Practice shameless self promotion. This is the hardest for most beginners and even some of the old pros. Until your speaking business (Yes it is a business) reaches a sustainable level you will probably be on your own. You won’t have an office manager to handle booking phone calls. You won’t have a full time marketing person. You will be the manager of sales, PR, Advertising and the Grand Poobah of all promotions. So you have to suck it up and do it yourself. The best advice I can offer is to emulate as much of the form of promotion used by successful speakers as you can. And never be afraid to ask them what works for them now as well as how they did it getting started.
  4. Maintain your expertise. Each day I check a full array of marketing information resources to see what is new, what is being commented on and what, if anything, is being injected into the conversation from the periphery. I look for hard data—-surveys, analytic summaries, data compilations, analyses, research reports and any non-statistical data cited as “proof of process” or standard practice. Then I step back to see how the new data fits with what I know. If a contrarian approach is warranted, I may blog about it or fit it into a speech.
  5. Never stop believing. Today a young man (an Army Officer) who wants to be a speaker was looking for advice. He noted that in the military he had been training people from the time he started as a private. He trained people at every rank he held as he rose from the ranks to be selected for Officer Candidate School. I told him his abilities would stand him in good stead as he moved toward a speaking career. In addition, I pointed out that the leadership skills he had developed and demonstrated would give him first hand knowledge and experience he could draw on in speaking about his passion: the impressive capabilities and practical skills that vets have to bring to industry. And I told him to never stop believing in himself, his comrades in arms, and the men and women of the companies and associations he will serve with pride as he has served his country.\

Jerry FletcherJerry Fletcher is a beBee ambassador, founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com
His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

Get all the Brand Success Stories. Sign up at http://www.brandbraintrust.com/home.html

 

 

 

 

 

How to Build a Killer Brand

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How to Build a Killer Brand

Heart in sightsIt has been one of those months this week.

Planning. Candid conversations. Decisions to hire and fire. Web site assumptions and dialogues. Quality constraints and requirements. Analytics that spiral positive and those that went down in flames.

Brands suffer the impact because brand building is really not for innocents. Either you really understand marketing or you don’t.

Taking careful aim is at the heart of killer brand development.

What not to do.
Here are some mistakes I witnessed this week:

  1. Put a group of strangers in a room, brief them and expect them to walk out as a functioning collaborative team.
  2. Drop the ball on a project because of bad digital filing habits.
  3. Give a web developer 6 chances to respond to basic direction before deciding to fire him.
  4. Consider video approaches without looking at cost as part of the equation.
  5. Become ecstatic over an increased click through rate that didn’t generate sales.

The Killer Solution

Experience over the last 50 years tells me that to build a brand that captures hearts and minds successfully you have to understand how marketing professionals work in teams and their expectations of management. Clarity is what will make you successful.

Be perfectly clear that :

  • The owner/founder/CEO/President—the leader of any small firm owns the brand. Her or his understanding of the Vision, Mission, Position and Value Proposition is what will be applied to all organization communications.
  • Direction on any major project should be in writing and agreed to in advance. The directional document should be the reference point for approvals. Staff can provide additional information but is encouraged to do it before any work is done. If there is concern over the materials delivered the reference point is the direction.
  • A digital “paper trail” needs to be kept and used as the reference when anything goes sideways (as well as a way to assure continuing process improvement). With small clients I had eliminated my Action Reports on all meetings. I’m reversing that decision.
  • Budget, Quality and Outcome are interrelated. There are significant differences in delivery of digital capabilities, video production, and all communication vehicles based on what a firm is willing to pay, the level of excellence of the work and what the expectations of the item are. Too often, even though we have much better visibility of analytics the end results are not the key factor in evaluating marketing efforts.
  • Business Development objectives are the real measurements. Everything done in marketing needs to acknowledge contribution to the target numbers. Be as concrete as possible. For instance:
  • Optimize web site to make it as easy as possible for visitors to self-select the action which will give you a way to connect with them over the time to build a relationship leading to a “sale.” Track all actions. Track actual “sales” to determine the apparent customer journey.
  • Direct Social Media activities to continually tested landing pages that capture data to build relationships over time. Track actions by landing page. Track “sales” as with web site. Review results and test all contact activities to find the ones that lead to “Sales.”
  • Build better ongoing relationships with customers by monitoring opens, comments and direct contacts due to blog and newsletter postings. Modify content to take advantage of proven highest interest. Keep tracking.
  • Test automated sequences in support of direct sales staff. Monitor results.

Trial to buy ScorecardPost status versus your corporate goals on a scoreboard visible to all members of the firm.

Weekly results usually work best. Keep it simple: New info sign ups, New trials, New customers/clients.

Those few items will keep everyone in the game.

 

Jerry FletcherJerry Fletcher is a beBee ambassador, founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

Get all the Brand Success Stories. Sign up at http://www.brandbraintrust.com/home.html

The Journey From Mad Man to Brand Poobah

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Two MartinisKen asked me over lunch, “Was it really like Mad Men back then?”

Let’s just say I have a little more mileage than he does. He wasn’t born when I went to New York. He was fascinated by my experiences in the era popularized by the TV Series Mad Men.

Yes, I was there. I climbed the stairs from the IRT stop and walked a short distance to the entrance to 420 Lexington and the Offices of J. Walter Thompson when it was the largest advertising agency in the world. I still have the brass medal every employee was awarded on the 100th anniversary of the company.

That job, for a boy reared in southwestern Ohio, was a real eye opener. Everybody smoked. Men. Women. Youngsters like me. I’d worked construction to pay for college and picked up the habit, Phillip Morris Commanders—strong like Camels but longer. The scent of tobacco was everywhere.

Working in the mail room I was too young and too low on the totem pole to participate in the sexual hijinks but then I had a sweetheart back in Ohio.

Naïve? Yes. Stupid? No. I figured if I couldn’t get in on the physical side of things I could learn the lingo so I became the confidante of secretaries and traffic girls. I wound up having those lovely creatures buy me drinks since they made more than me.

I lucked out after a while and wound up becoming a TV paste-up guy who put the storyboards together for presentation and that put me into contact with some heavy hitter art directors.

That lead to my first (and last) two martini lunch. Ted took pity on me and asked me to join him for lunch on him. We went to an Argentine place he frequented. The waiter never asked. A martini for each of us showed up and so I clinked glasses and tried not to react. I thought I was going to be okay and then a refill magically appeared.

Ever see one of those cartoon rabbits that seems to have no bones and slide out of a chair to the floor? That was me. I believe the correct term is Blotto.

Working there was a great way to learn that even though I was getting a degree in Advertising Design the art side of the business was not where the power was. I quickly decided that being an Account Man with heavy knowledge of the art side of the business was what I wanted to do. I was lucky. That was the time when boutiques were giving the old line agencies fits. Powerful creative was being done by the upstarts that are now considered to be icons of the industry. That paid off when I made the switch.

Back then they had open training for all employees over lunch and you could learn about all and any parts of the business. I took advantage of the opportunity and made some friends at the VP level who gave me great advice on how to cross the divide from the creative to the management side of the business.

Ken really stirred up the memories including the summer of New York World’s Fair. The Ford exhibit became a Disney ride. The IBM exhibit synced up a battery of 35mm projectors and a couple of movie projectors. I think that was my first experience with that whole idea of multi-media. Years later I would use the same techniques with original scores for multiple clients.

The mileage check version of how I got here is straightforward:

  • Get job interviews for account work at 42 ad agencies at their expense based on a direct mail letter. Take the position offered by Campbell Mithun Minneapolis.
  • Become the fireman (one of the guys that pulls troubled accounts back into the fold).
  • Work in multiple offices and win your spurs as a new business guy.
  • Decide to leave CM when the agency is purchased by a British Conglomerate.
  • Move to Portland and in time become CEO of the largest B2B agency.
  • Hang out a shingle as a solo when you and your board agree to disagree.

I seldom ever look back even though those were great times. It takes a trigger like hurtling down the mountainside from the Medellin airport in a cab with Don Pepper and learning how often we just barely missed crossing paths. But that’s another story…

Jerry FletcherJerry Fletcher is a beBee ambassador, founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

Get all the Brand Success Stories. Sign up at http://www.brandbraintrust.com/home.html

Brand is Collaboration

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Brand is collaborationMom’s birthday card to me summed it up perfectly,

Cover: It’s your Birthday and it’s all about you today, so enjoy it.

Inside: Because tomorrow it goes back to being all about me.

Personal brand is a collaboration.

It is all about you…and all those that come into contact with you. Mom’s card, cogent but acerbic is what you have to keep in mind about those personal contacts. She trusted me to see the humor. She trusted me to know she was just joshing because we’ve been collaborating for more years than either of us care to reveal.

A product/service brand is also a collaboration.

It, too, is based on trust.

Brand is the outcome of Trust.

If you own, manage, consult, coach or serve an organization professionally you are part of a collaboration.

To make that collaboration work, you have to trust:

  • Yourself—Overcome that little voice that niggles at you asking you to reconsider or go back to zero or just doubt. Find that part of you that can evaluate an idea, act or gesture based on maintaining the integrity of your mission and commit to sticking to it.
  • Your Staff—These are the people that make things happen for the organization particularly those in direct contact with buyers, clients, customers however you refer to them. Staff makes the personal connection. You all need to be on the same page.
  • Your organization—It doesn’t matter whether it is for profit or not, small, large or somewhere in between. The organization is the part of the equation that can provide the consistency of integrity and honesty that are the hallmark of Trust and a positive Brand.
  • Your clients/customers—In today’s social media world they have a greater capability (and responsibility) to help others see your brand accurately. Their reviews are important. They can make or break you. Make sure you stay up to date on what they are saying about you.

There is one simple way to assure effective collaboration.

Listen.

Listen to what your brand partners have to say.

Listen.

Pay attention to their questions, concerns and problems. Delve into their secret desires and what they think feel and believe.

Practice active listening.

Play what they say back to them. Make sure you heard what they actually said. Too often we proceed based on our own expectations and assumptions.

Collaborate. Your brand will be better for it.

Jerry Fletcher is a beBee ambassador, founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

Jerry FletcherHis consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

Get all the Brand Success Stories. Sign up at http://www.brandbraintrust.com/home.html

 

Brand Building in Bad Times

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Get real!

You know you’re going to have a Brand whether you like it or not.

You know that a certain number of people are not going to like your product or service no matter what you do.

You know that there is a large number of folks that quite frankly don’t give a damn.

Evaluate!

Put your efforts where they will do the most.

Do a customer analysis. Determine their geography, demography and psychography.

In other words:

Geography—Figure out where they come from. This applies whether it is within a few miles of your location, via the internet from anywhere on the globe to specific parts of the city or the country in question. Knowing where your customer lives, works, shops and plays will give you insight into marketing, product development and Brand building opportunities.

Get out of your office and immerse yourself where your customers are. Go there and find out what their lives are like. Get firsthand knowledge of all the factors that make up their brand experience.

Demography—Understand the basic information about your customers specifically: age, gender, sexual orientation, race, income, education, marital status, religion. All of those factors can, in part, control their interaction with your product or service.

For instance, is your gender specific product most frequently purchased by a spouse as a gift? Can your packaging or promotion be changed to make it easier for older folks to read and understand? What if College is not the objective they have in mind for the kids? The more you know the easier it will be to build your brand.

Psychography—That’s just a fancy word for understanding what they think, feel and believe and not only about your product or service. In the USA there are only two major political parties but within them there are divisions which, if they gain ground, could make the country similar to most other democracies where the rule seems to be multiple parties.

The point is not the possibility of multiple parties but rather the clusters of opinions that set factions apart. Can you tell the folks that build your brand exactly what your best customers think, feel and believe? The better picture you can paint of their desires, dreams and desperate cravings, the better you can build your brand. Better still, have your marketing staff or consultants join you when you go visit customers.

Concentrate!

Marketing is best defined in my view as

“Go where the money is. Sell what they want to buy. Do it again.”  
           Jerry Fletcher

Put your marketing and sales efforts where your customers are geographically, demographically and psychographically.

Do you want to sell the farrier or the horse owner? Are you oriented to the soccer mom or the city socialite? Do you want to sell the technology phobic 60 plus business owner or the offspring that will be taking over the business?

You decide. The better you understand your customers the better you’ll be able to build your brand.

Jerry Fletcher, Speaking in olombiaJerry Fletcher is a beBee ambassador, founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

Get all the Brand Success Stories.
Sign up at http://www.brandbraintrust.com/home.html

Is Brand Relational or Transactional?

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Funnel DiagramYes
No
Relational
Transactional
All the Above

Yes. If you believe that Brand inevitably comes down to someone taking an action you desire it has components of both.

No. Only if you are not interested in connecting with someone or the connection would prove to be unprofitable or too complicated or won’t allow you to make more than one sale. (For the record, my definition of marketing is “Go where the money is. Sell what they want to buy. Do it again.”

Relational. This is what is commonly being preached in the on-line marketing world. First you build a relationship with a potential client or customer by providing significant information (Content) at no cost and using e-mail to affirm your connection before you ask them to buy from you. This is the Common knowledge approach whether you are engaged in B2C (Business to Consumer) or B2B (Business to Business) marketing.

Transactional. This is for those folks that believe in getting people to act now. And for some situations it is the right approach, particularly when use of your product or service or approach will lead to a relationship afterwards.

All the above. Last week, explaining a sales funnel to a young man I found myself illustrating the difference with this page out of a presentation. (The Capital Funding Alliance Brand story is on BrandBrainTrust.com)

His problem was that he was trying to get his client to sign up for some online/Digital marketing without a visual reference to what his plans would entail. Building a brand is, in every case something that can be charted in this way.

The Capital Funding Alliance situation was first transactional and then relational. You can see from the graphic exactly how it worked. The key, many times, to building an on-line marketing plan is understanding how the potential client does what it is you want to help them do.

In this case the company was partnering with an organization that provided services to credit unions to develop partnerships with individual credit unions across the country to provide loan services the credit union could not.

First the credit unions had to be contacted with a reason to begin the relationship and a way to get the materials that would simplify having their customers work with the new strategic partner. The diagram maps the process and the branding.

How are you connecting with your customers? Can you diagram it like this? Do you know the triggers for a transaction? What decisions can they make? How can you try again? What happens if you repeat your actions? Is it worth it?

A-B Split tests can help you answer these questions. More importantly you can find out if the common knowledge is correct. Here’s a tip: Test Transactional triggers with a personal touch first.

Jerry FletcherJerry Fletcher is a beBee ambassador, founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

Get all the Brand Success Stories. Sign up at http://www.brandbraintrust.com/home.html

 

The Skin in the Game is Your Brand

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Success All the e-mail said was, “Being successful developing and commercializing technologies and start-ups is a given or I wouldn’t have contacted you. I appreciate your offer but I don’t do business with people or groups that don’t have skin in the game.”

Skin in the Game according to Investopedia

A term coined by renowned investor Warren Buffett referring to a situation in which high-ranking insiders use their own money to buy stock in the company they are running.

Your Brand is at stake every time.

Every consultant puts skin in the game every time they accept an engagement. If their recommendations fail they will lose Trust with that client and with every one that client tells. The skin they have in the game each time is the lifetime value of their brand. That value is always greater than being allowed to invest in the startup without having legal control.

Value, like Brand, is perceived.

Your value to clients depends on their situation, how much information you can elicit to make a proposal and how strongly you believe in yourself.

Here’s the suggestion that was rejected:

“I’m not a stranger to new products. I stopped counting successful introductions at 207 and that was years ago. I’m willing to invest an hour on Skype to determine how viable I think the product is. But, full disclosure, I’m too busy on paid retainers to take on any additional work without getting paid for it. If I believe your product has the positive value that Digimarc had (I named the company) I will give you the same deal I gave them, a monthly retainer plus a stock bonus. Call or e-mail if you want to take the next step.” 

Skin in the game is a two-way street.

In my experience, the proposition is always essentially the same: Give the start-up the benefit of your time, knowledge and wisdom for a percentage of the company in the future. In other words, we want all your value for as long as it takes but we don’t want to pay for it and, oh yes, you’ll have no say in how the company operates.

Does that sound fair and balanced to you?

Without candor there is no trust

In a conversation with any entrepreneur or start-up if they do not believe in their offering it will show. If they are not cognizant of a marketing problem I may be able to help merely by pointing it out. Should they have been short-sighted about how the company will be run as it moves into the future I may be able to suggest both interim and long term solutions. My initial conversations with start-ups are based on both of us being truthful with each other with the objective of making them successful.

The skin in the game is your brand… and theirs.

Your Brand has established value or they wouldn’t be talking to you. Theirs has little or none. In my view the fees for services is a negotiation.

They need to build a business. You need to be paid.

How you get paid is another matter. If you believe in your brand you should be able to determine the value of your services to the prospect and be paid at that level via any combination of cash, stock or ownership you can agree on.

What say you?

Jerry Fletcher Keynote in ColombiaJerry Fletcher is a beBee ambassador, founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

Get all the Brand Success Stories. Sign up at http://www.brandbraintrust.com/home.html

 

 

 

Brand Clarity. Say What?

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Business card Brand Clarity

Pull one out

Reach into your pocket or your purse or that fancy carrying case and pull one out. That’s right, get one of your business cards in hand.

If you don’t have one, that is your first mistake.

I’ve heard every argument you can imagine from the adherents of the digital world about why those little bits of pasteboard are obsolete. But when confronted with the need for their people to network to build the business even one of the largest companies in that sphere relented and allowed two divisions to have business cards.

Your business card is the most basic item in your brand development toolbox.   

It must answer the contact questions, sure, but look at what else you can glean from one:

  • The company name may be well known, memorable or ho hum
  • The logotype may tell you if the company or individual is inspired or insipid
  • The title will tell you whether the person or organization is imaginative or ordinary
  • The weight of the paper can influence your perception of how strong the business is.
  • The colors will indicate how approachable they are
  • The address, if you know the area, may tell you how solvent they are
  • The positioning/tag line should tell you what they do, how they are unique, and who their product or service is for

A business card can touch three senses:

Sight is the most obvious

Touch is not considered as often but

  • The weight of the paper can make a significant difference in how the person or organization is perceived.
  • The slickness of the card can be interpreted as a level of sophistication
  • Raised ink, once considered high quality is now seldom felt

Smell is used very infrequently. Women in fashion have been the primary users in my experience.

Look at your card. How clearly is your brand represented?

  1. How would you describe the name? If you are the entrepreneur/founder/owner of the business? Does it have your name in the company name? Does it include a generic descriptor? (Dot’s Bookkeeping, Feingold Financial Planning, Maxfield Marketing Counsel).
  2. Look at the design. Is the logo professionally designed? Is it an original based on your company’s information? Too often people go for the low-cost on-line option and wind up with a design that has been sold over and over printed on low-cost stock that is used for high print runs. Does it reflect your company? Does the perception provided the prospect meet their expectations?
  3. Study the positioning/tagline. Is it the same one used in other marketing materials? Are you comfortable with it? Does it naturally lead to conversations about you, the company and the products/services you offer? If you were a prospect would it separate you from your competitors?

How clear is your business card about your brand? What say you?

Jerry Fletcher Keynote in ColombiaJerry Fletcher is a beBee ambassador, founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

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