Archive for the ‘Business/Branding Advice’ Category

“It is a poor workman who blames his tools – the good man gets on with the job, given what he’s got, and gets the best answer he can.” And I suggest that by altering the problem, by looking at the thing differently, you can make a great deal of difference in your final productivity because you can either do it in such a fashion that people can indeed build on what you’ve done, or you can do it in such a fashion that the next person has to essentially duplicate again what you’ve done.

It isn’t just a matter of the job, it’s the way you write the report, the way you write the paper, the whole attitude. It’s just as easy to do a broad, general job as one very special case. And it’s much more satisfying and rewarding!”

From You and Your Research

“Your brand statement tells who you want to be. Your customer service says who you really are.

How you treat your customers, employees, and vendors tells the truth about your brand. Just as actions speak louder than words, there is no way you can proclaim yourself a “people company” unless you prove it by living the values that look so good in print.

Who you hire, what you celebrate, and the values you live tell more about your brand than any fancy brochure.”

From Your Brand Can’t Hide Behind Poor Service

“Let me tell you something about scaling.  McDonalds is scalable.  It’s also as boring as holy hell.  However, my local coffee shop, The Bean, is not very scalable but they are awesome and everyone loves them.” AJ Leon

“There is a difference between ambition and greed. Ambition drives us to be extraordinary, reach higher, and do outstanding work. Greed is the byproduct of a scarcity mentality that tells us our gains must come at the expense of others.” The Slow Growth is Smart Growth Manifesto

Deluxe: How Luxury Lost Its Luster is a fascinating albeit slightly depressing read for anyone who has in the past loved luxury or service. Shopping in boutiques has always been something I’ve loved to do because I would get the best and most knowledgeable service. The sales people would learn my name, they’d put things aside when they came in, they could tell me the little details, they’d wrap up my packages and make shopping an experience whether I was buying something for $20 or $200.

Living in Santa Monica with neighbors like Los Angeles and Malibu, “luxury” boutiques are all around. Every name designer and brand is within easy reach of me yet service and knowledge within those companies is pretty elusive. Even more so during the recession, which you think would be opposite.

During tough times, when foot traffic has slowed and dropping cash is slower still, you’d think companies would regroup, get rid of unproductive, knowledgeable people and train those that stay on how to treat and engage customers, how to explain the products from a t-shirt to a ring to a Bentley and then train them on how to present it upon check out.

But I can’t tell you how many luxury stores I’ve been to where the sales people just kind of do their own thing from gossiping with each other, to letting merchandise just unfolded on shelves to saying, “Um, I don’t know” when asked a question. In a store shelling out luxury products and I as their only customer in sight, it’s frustrating. I’m actually a European shopper in the sense I generally like to be left alone to browse but when I have a question, someone better have an answer. And if I’m going to spend money I don’t take into consideration just the price of the item but the entire experience. If the sales person makes it less than, I walk.

Yesterday a girlfriend and I went to the new J.Crew Collection store in Malibu, one of three in the country. We were the only customers with 5 sales girls running around. To their credit, the nicest woman came over and was genuinely interested in helping us and talking to us and we were genuinely happy to be petting the pretty things – specifically the luggage.

With a trip coming up to Europe, my girlfriend wanted to buy it. She hesitated at the price and asked my opinion since I’m a frequent traveller. I tried asking the sales lady a lot of questions but the first problem was it took 4 sales women to figure out how to open the special lock system. And then they each just gave a quick blurb about how it was hand made for the Royal Family and limited edition. I asked a few more questions but didn’t get answers to those. It was, however, a stunning piece of luggage and I had read up online about it a little so I knew the quality was high and could totally see my girlfriend with it.

But with such a big purchase, she wanted to make sure she knew what she was getting. And you’d expect from a store – especially a high-end retailer – to be able to get your every bit of information and present it in a totally confident way. But when she  asked the price it took four women and about ten minutes to try to figure out the price of the bag. When she asked to see the inside, it took about another 10 minutes to figure out how to open it. When she wanted to know all the materials used, it took scrambling around to find out what the material was (we were told the shell was made out of leather even though it clearly wasn’t). Totally in-love with the product, my friend hesitated in buying it because the whole experience in the store seemed uncertain. The staff wasn’t making it easy for her to say yes to buying. Their confusion made her confused about buying.
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BabyCakes, the Book of Recipes: It’s Here! from BabyCakes NYC on Vimeo.

Erin McKenna the smart, savvy, passionate entrepreneur behind the successful bakery Babycakes NYC, has a book coming out, BabyCakes: Vegan, Gluten-Free, and (Mostly) Sugar-Free Recipes from New York’s Most Talked-About Bakery.

She made the above video to let people know and what I love about this video is you see her, you see the bakery, you see the glee and fun and then you see what you can make if you get the book. It’s all so slick but it feels completely authentic – like you want to be a part of it even though a company is selling you something. I love that kind of marketing.

What Every Good Marketer Knows by Seth Godin:

1. Anticipated, personal and relevant advertising always does better than unsolicited junk.
2. Making promises and keeping them is a great way to build a brand.
3. Your best customers are worth far more than your average customers.
4. Share of wallet is easier, more profitable and ultimately more effective a measure than share of market.
5. Marketing begins before the product is created.
6. Advertising is just a symptom, a tactic. Marketing is about far more than that.
7. Low price is a great way to sell a commodity. That’s not marketing, though, that’s efficiency.
8. Conversations among the members of your marketplace happen whether you like it or not. Good marketing encourages the right sort of conversations.
9. Products that are remarkable get talked about.
10. Marketing is the way your people answer the phone, the typesetting on your bills and your returns policy.
11. You can’t fool all the people, not even most of the time. And people, once unfooled, talk about the experience.
12. If you are marketing from a fairly static annual budget, you’re viewing marketing as an expense. Good marketers realize that it is an investment.
13. People don’t buy what they need. They buy what they want.
14. You’re not in charge. And your prospects don’t care about you.
15. What people want is the extra, the emotional bonus they get when they buy something they love.
16. Business to business marketing is just marketing to consumers who happen to have a corporation to pay for what they buy.
17. Traditional ways of interrupting consumers (TV ads, trade show booths, junk mail) are losing their cost-effectiveness. At the same time, new ways of spreading ideas (blogs, permission-based RSS information, consumer fan clubs) are quickly proving how well they work.
18. People all over the world, and of every income level, respond to marketing that promises and delivers basic human wants.
19. Good marketers tell a story.
20. People are selfish, lazy, uninformed and impatient. Start with that and you’ll be pleasantly surprised by what you find.
21. Marketing that works is marketing that people choose to notice.
22. Effective stories match the worldview of the people you are telling the story to.
23. Choose your customers. Fire the ones that hurt your ability to deliver the right story to the others.
24. A product for everyone rarely reaches much of anyone.
25. Living and breathing an authentic story is the best way to survive in an conversation-rich world.
26. Marketers are responsible for the side effects their products cause.
27. Reminding the consumer of a story they know and trust is a powerful shortcut.
28. Good marketers measure.
29. Marketing is not an emergency. It’s a planned, thoughtful exercise that started a long time ago and doesn’t end until you’re done.
30. One disappointed customer is worth ten delighted ones.
31. In the googleworld, the best in the world wins more often, and wins more.
32. Most marketers create good enough and then quit. Greatest beats good enough every time.
33. There are more rich people than ever before, and they demand to be treated differently.
    Organizations that manage to deal directly with their end users have an asset for the future.
34. You can game the social media in the short run, but not for long.
35. You market when you hire and when you fire. You market when you call tech support and you market every time you send a memo.
36. Blogging makes you a better marketer because it teaches you humility in your writing.