Blogs

Just as we expect the sun to come up tomorrow, or for there to be no one approaching us head-on in our lane when we round a hairpin turn, or that when we toss something up, it will come down, we come to expect certain things from brands. It’s just like the law of physics.…

Your brand is the sum of your actions, your words, how others experience you, and how they perceive you. This holds true whether you’re an individual (personal brand) or you represent an organization (company brand). Your brand is your reputation. It sets expectations, and it’s based on first impressions and lasting impressions, whether those impressions…

Success comes from being able to tell the story of your brand and engage audiences in ways that are creative, non-intrusive, and fun. Below is how we tell our brand story at Barrel O’Monkeyz. As our name suggests, we are energetic, nimble, and don’t believe business has to be stuffy to be effective. Our formula…

What does the story of your brand tell your audience about your products or services . . . about your company? Is your brand nothing more than a logo, a tag line, and a business card, or does your brand connect emotionally with those you serve? (Hint: If it doesn’t, it should.) Your brand represents…

I never know, week to week, from where the seeds of my next blog might come. Sometimes, something will catch my eye—a news article, TV show, chance encounter, LinkedIn post, or some other social media share. It’s all part of the creative process, and this week I’ve been thinking about creativity—go figure!—which brought my attention to…

As marketers, we’ve probably all faced one or more of these situations: We’re not converting Web traffic to sales No one’s subscribing to our email list Our free download just sits there with no suitors, like a wallflower at the high school dance We’re getting no takers on our offer of a free consult No…

A blog on the topic of personal branding seemed like a natural follow-up to last week’s “I Know My Brand … Do You Know Yours?” As I started to ponder what to write, I had the strangest sense of Déjà vu. Seems I’d touched on that subject a few years back, so why re-create the…

We’re all pretty much attuned to the notion of company brands and positioning, and to a certain extent, we’ve all heard about personal branding—which has become especially important these days with the pervasiveness of online and social media activities. Whether we’ve actively cultivated it or not, we all have a personal brand. It represents what…

Marketing 101 teaches us to define our ideal client or customer (our “target audience”) and to gear our communications and marketing efforts toward that broad group. Not to the exclusion of others, of course, but the idea is that if we communicate what we need to the people we most want to be our customers/clients,…

News this week that Apple has up to five new/updated product releases in the works for 2013 got me to thinking about product life cycles again. I mean, I hardly got to know my iPhone 4 before the 4s and 5 made their respective appearances . . . and now the 5s is on its…

When you were little, I’m sure a parent, teacher, or other authority figure in your life, at one time or another, told you “Honesty is the best policy.” The words might seem trite now, the sentiments a little corny, but give them another read while thinking about all those times in your life when circumstances…

“Content is King.” That’s what Bill Gates wrote back in 1996 while Microsoft was still the king of software and the Internet, and Google was still toddling in diapers at best. Of course, a lot has changed in 16 years, from the ascent of Apple and the departure of Steve Jobs for his next gig;…