by admin | Feb 16, 2011 | Blog, Design
“Most people can agree on what Santa Clause looks like – jolly, with a red suit and a white beard. But he did not always look that way, and Coca-Cola advertising actually helped shape this modern-day image of Santa.
2006 marked the 75th anniversary of the famous Coca-Cola Santa Clause. Starting in 1931, magazine ads for Coca-Cola featured St. nick as a kind, jolly man in a red suit. Because magazines were as widely viewed, and because the image of Santa appeared for more than three decades, the image of Santa most people have today is largely based on our advertising… Before the 1931 introduction of the Coca-Cola Santa Claus created by artist Haddon Sundbiom, the image of Santa ranged from big to small to fat to tall. Santa even appeared as an elf and looked a bit spooky…
The Cocacola Company began its christmas advertising in the 1920s with shopping-related ads in magazines like The Saturday Evening Post… At this time, many people thought of Coca-Cola as a drink only for warm weather. The Coca-Cola Company began a campaign to remind people that coca-Cola was a great choice in any month. This began with the 1922 slogan “Thrist Knows No Season”, and continued with a campaign connecting a true icon of winter – Santa Claus – with the beverage.”
Many of the older brands have rich histories that make them “legendary”, however new and small brands can benefit similarly if they follow the rules of being interesting and authentic. Keep in mind these “legends” were also just a small business, with nothing more than the vision and passion of their founders.
Did Coca Cola really invent Santa Claus? Maybe not but it certainly made him their brand ambassador and part of our popular culture for ever!
by admin | Feb 16, 2011 | Blog, Content, Promotion, Strategy
Cover via Amazon
People love stories from children’s fairy tales to books and movies. A story is more memorable than a straightforward message. A story is easy to re-tell and pass on to other consumers, hence providing your brand with more Word of Mouth Marketing opportunities.
A brand story needs to be:
- Real and authentic
- Colourful and interesting
Advertisements are nothing more than stories with the best ones engaging their audience. Famous brands such as Virgin and Apple have real stories surrounding their founders and form an important element of their positioning strategy.
Most common marketing stories:
Blake Snyder (professional screenwriter) has story scenarios that align to Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs:
- Physical Needs
- Safety Needs
- Social Needs (Buddy Love & Rights of Passage)
- Self Esteem Needs (Fool Triumphant & Superhero)
- Cognitive Needs (Everyman v Big Brother)
- Aesthetic Needs (Look good, Feel Good)
- Self Actualisation (Search for Meaning & Personal Salvation)
Gerald Zaltman, author of “How Customers Think” and Professor at Harvard Business School identifies deep metaphors in the minds of consumers in “Marketing Metaphoria”:
- Balance
- Transformation
- Journey
- Container
- Connection
- Resource
- Control
and Christopher Booker’s book, “Seven Basic Plots – Why We Tell Stories” (which took him 35 years to write) has the following:
- Overcoming the monster: Defeating a force which threatens safety, existence, success – David v Goliath
- The Quest: A group in search of something (who may find it or something ‘better’)
- Journey and Return: The hero journeys away from home and comes back (having experienced something and maybe having changed for the better)
- Comedy: Not necessarily ‘haha’ funny. a misunderstanding or ignorance is created that keeps parties apart, which is resolved, by the end, bringing them back together
- Tragedy: Someone, tempted (vanity, greed, etc), becomes increasingly desperate, or trapped by their actions, until the climax where they usually die
- Rebirth: Hero is captured or oppressed (a living death existence) until they are miraculously freed
- Rags to Riches: Overcoming a state of poverty, want, and/or need.
By telling your brand story you can differentiate your business and form a stronger connection with your customers and prospects. By understanding why you started the business, or for example why you named it in a certain way, customers will feel like they know you and understand you. After all it is hard to connect with someone you don’t understand.
by admin | Feb 13, 2011 | Blog, Strategy
Having a brand personality is important because brands are an emotional connection between your products and services and your target audience, and we now know that this emotional connection is critical in attracting and retaining customers.
Having a brand with a personality allows marketers to deliver communication that stands out from the “sameness” of their category and connect much faster and on a deeper level with prospects and customers. People can relate to things they feel have a personality, especially one which they can identify with. From the cars we drive to the pets we choose, we are subconsciously guided by our reflection in them.
Brand personality is usually a function of the following:
1. Personality and values of the founder
2. Personality and values of the current leader
3. Personality and values of the company’s most loyal customers.
Brand Personality is a critical input into the design of the overall brand, especially the:
– Brand Name,
– Brand Story, and
– Positioning Statement.
Brand Personality should flow right through the company and be positively reflected in the customer brand experience.
To work out your brand personality, you can engage the help of your best customers, colleagues, employees, suppliers and even friends, asking them to describe firstly your personality in 5-8 adjectives and then do the same for your company or organisation. In most cases you will find that they align. Alternatively there maybe a good reasons why you do not want them to align. What ever the outcome it will assist you greatly in projecting the right perceptions for you business to its target market.
The brand personality is the BRAND!
Here are a few famous examples: Virgin, Body Shop, Walmart, Oprah, Dr. Phil, Beckham Paul Newman’s Own, and most fashion designer label brands are all intrinsically linked to the personalities of the founders.
Although this has worked tremendously well for these and other businesses naming your brand new “baby” after yourself has many drawbacks, especially if you don’t have the name recognition of a super star athlete and in general naming the brand has a number of criteria that you need to consider a strategic process you should follow.
Here are a number of brand personality examples that have been created through focusing on a specific niche; great brand naming that reflects these personality traits:
– Geek Squad is both a consumer as well a USA SME technology company owned by the giant Best Buy retail group, assisting customers with everything from installing in home theatres to computer networking in their businesses. It’s great name and personality that permeates the company has now been copied in various formats all over the world yet none of the copycats can dream of the same success.
– Mr. Mutual Fund – Vern Hayden is one of the top financial planners in the USA specialising in mutual funds (superannuation). He got to be where he is by focusing and being the greatest expert on his area of expertise – mutual funds! However he chose a more traditional name for his company http://www.haydenwealth.com/ and decided not to link it directly to his personal brand of Mr. Mutual Fund.
– Ms. Megabyte and Gadget Guy are 2 independent Australian technology experts who entertain and inform Australians by providing reviews and demystifying technology. Everyone knows who they are, yet few would know of Yvonne Adele and Peter Blasina. This illustrates the power of correctly branding your business.
– Bounce Back Fast is a consultancy and training organisation that focuses on building resilience to pressure and stress.
– The Productivity Queen needs no explanation,
– Powerful Points is a leading Powerpoint training organisation that counts some of Australia’s top companies and their C-suite executives as it’s clients
When we look at most of the examples above, it quickly becomes apparent that these sometimes “one man bands” have a number of things in common:
1. They are specialists, they are “the only” in their market
2. They are easy to remember
3. They are easy to promote because they have a great name, a personality and a STORY to tell
4. They are famous amongst their intended target audience.
The next entry will cover the importance of telling your brand story!
Image via Wikipedia
by admin | Feb 9, 2011 | Blog
Examples of campaignable Brand Names, Logos and Positioning Statements
by admin | Feb 9, 2011 | Blog, Strategy
When examining examples of good and bad brand names we must use a set of reasonably objective evaluation criteria. As these were discussed in the last post, I will summarise all of them like this:
“It’s not what it is, but how you use it – your brand name that is!” This is especially true for small businesses that do not have multimillion dollar budgets to “make their brand synonymous” with a particular product or service through the sheer weight of their media investment.
Hence ‘campiagnability’, how the brand name provides the business with creative flexibility to promote it’s services and more memorably and emotionally connect with its customers is paramount.
Let’s look at a few examples:
Radio Rentals – the iconic Australian electronics retailer’s brand name may have been great when it was founded in the 1930’s in the UK, but today this functional or descriptive name is no longer relevant and is in fact very limiting. No brand consultant would ever recommend changing it unless there was a multimillion dollar budget and a great reason to do so, because the brand equity built over the years is too great but ‘radio rentals’ lost its relevance probably by the early 1950’s.
Most SME brands are today still named after their founders or are very descriptive in nature, a benefit when the business is starting out and the name tells the target audience exactly what the business is all about, e.g: John’s Plumbing Supplies, etc. However as the business grows the name doesn’t lend itself to be easily promoted…
The Shaver Shop franchise – a great concept – looks like it is facing a similar dilemma. What started as a focused category player is now selling a number of product categories that are no longer about shaving. Only time will tell if this “brand extension” will be successful. The brand name again was most likely too descriptive and limiting in the first place.
Let’s compare that with one of the world’s most famous and successful brands like Apple – which was never a name that sounded like it was in the computer business. Jobs came up with the name “Apple” after visiting an orchard and having a wonderful experience, an experience he wanted his customers to have with an approachable company, which the name Apple fit perfectly. Experiential names and names that tap into consumer emotions are more likely to become much greater assets. Branson did the same with Virgin in the music industry!
Here are some of the names we have developed for our clients:
D&M – A brand of natural skin care products
Fighting Fit For Life – A Personal Trainer that specialises in boxing and martial arts training
Room to Improve – For an interior designer and decorator
Money Rules – A debt reduction educational program and software
Sirius Business – A business coach
Meaningful Exchange – A multi-lingual translation service
Guys Domain – A psychotherapist specialising in men’s issues
Schoffered Tours – Personalised Wine Tour Operator
Everyone of these names creates a myriad of promotional possibilities for many years to come and this is further complimented by the brand positioning statements / slogans. You can see the names, logos and the positioning statements on the next post.
Finally a great name is worth protecting – ‘Trade Marking’. Do it through a professional IP lawyer, you may pay more but it is worth doing it correctly the first time around. There are a number of legal issues than can make the DIY approach more expensive in the long run.
For example in the Australian market place there are 2 “Women at Work” and 2 “The Extension Factory” businesses that obviously didn’t protect their great names when they started their business. If your name is worth using it is worth protecting.
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