Every great brand evokes some sort of emotion from consumers. Brands spend millions to achieve this passionate connection between themselves and their audience. Carefully crafted campaigns, stunning visual graphics, catchy tag lines, and the promise of satisfaction all contribute to the emotional punch behind our favorite brands.
How do you arrive at the one element of [...]

When selling a commodity, whether it be insurance, lumber, or apples, branding strategy is more important then ever. Most times, when consumers are making a commodity-based purchase, they are looking at price, convenience, and not much else. How do you shine above the overcrowded marketplace of businesses willing to undercut you to gain a customer? [...]

The recession has been bad for just about everyone. For some it has meant slowing sales and for others it has meant an end to a business. As the economy moves forward and we recover, how do we do business in a new and different marketplace?
For those businesses that have weathered the storm, there is [...]

Complicated brands often need to be architected to be understood. If an organization has more than one brand or one brand with several sub-brands, they must be organized in a way that each portion of the brand maintains scalability, yet remain associated with the parent brand. There are three prevalent ways to structure a brand’s [...]

One quality of effective branding strategy is a brand’s visibility within its marketplace. A brand must be accessible to its marketplace therefore be visible. Maintaining a visible brand is important not only for potential customers, but existing customers as well. Consumers need to be constantly reminded of the brand so it remains top-of-mind when it [...]

In today’s society, we are bombarded with messages. Some are invited, messages we want to/have to read or watch, but the majority are unsolicited, forced upon us around invited messages.
Nobody wants to read long copy. Especially in a marketing piece.
Since most people receive more than 2,000 unsolicited messages a day, sending a brief message as [...]

A Web site’s keyword strategy is an important part of the organization’s overall branding strategy. Most companies work extremely hard to articulate their branding strategy and their position within their marketplace and carefully extend that work throughout their marketing collateral and Web site content.
However, the portion of a Web site seen by web users is [...]

When it is time to position products and services, organizations often do not know where to begin. The most obvious starting point is  the branding strategy, but once the new product or service has been aligned with the brand, is there a logical next step?
Consider the audience and how the product or service will serve [...]

We measure a CEO’s performance on profitability, return on equity, and share price. But while striving to achieve these milestones, the brand is often overlooked.
Some of the most successful brands are founded on the vision of a CEO who understands the importance of sending a powerful and consistent message to the marketplace.
John Hancock. CEO, David [...]

A brand is more than just logo and corporate stationary. It is intertwined within the entire organization—from how employees answer the phone to how the stationary is designed to the style and tone of the emails that are sent. An organization’s long-term business plan is no exception—the backbone of the plan should include the plans [...]