How bland is your brand?
Discover your identity
Developing a brand, and more importantly a brand strategy, can be one of the most subjective and difficult steps in the marketing process. It's often the element that causes businesses the biggest challenge, but it's a vital step in creating the company identity.
Branding is essential to give your company personality and creates the opportunity to engage with your target audience on their level and build loyalty. The brand image and characteristics are one of the key building blocks of an effective marketing strategy and should warrant your attention.
So, what is a brand?
A logo is often wrongly referred to as the brand, but it is a vital component in the overall branding proposition. The visual element of a brand can include the use of fonts, photographic style, supporting colours and the way in which the logo is used and is crucial to success. But remember, a well executed brand goes well beyond the visual.
Words are also key to a successful brand and this management of communication is often overlooked. The brand messages and tone of voice will determine the way in which the company is communicated to the outside world and the words people use to describe your company to others. It is not just how your brand looks that is important, but also how it sounds.
Before the creative team can grab their markers, roll up their sleeves and get stuck into creating another exciting brand, a clear definition of the brand's objectives need to be established. Who is the brand trying to reach? What is the proposition? How will the brand be used? More importantly, how will the effectiveness of the brand be measured?
These are only a fraction of the questions that need to be answered before work can begin to create the brand, but taking this time at the beginning of the branding process will save time and frustration later down the line and also ensure that your brand doesn't miss its mark.
Understand your audience
To achieve your brand objectives it is important that you know your target audience and how you intend to reach them and this may require some market analysis and research on your audience. The depth and detail of this market analysis largely depends on the complexity of the brand objectives and the scale of the business or organisation, but it is essential that you obtain the information you need to reach your target effectively.
By knowing your target audience you will be more confident in the steps you take to connect with that audience.
The complete picture
A strong brand is essential as companies and organisations battle it out to get their messages across and it's important to invest time in researching, defining, and building your brand. After all, your brand is a promise to your audience and a fundamental piece in your marketing communication jigsaw, a piece that is vital in presenting the complete picture.
Want your brand to make its mark? Contact Paul Haidon.
2012 – an Olympic year for advertisers
Where did 2011 go? In marketing terms, it disappeared somewhere between a Royal engagement and an even bigger Royal wedding. Brand after brand battled it out for ground, frantically shoehorning the nuptials into their marketing campaigns, desperate not to miss the wave of patriotism sweeping the country.
The 2012 marketing landscape is looking equally as . . . patriotic. So what if the Queen is celebrating her Diamond Jubilee? (thanks for the extra day off), the eyes of every advertiser, communicator and PR strategist in the UK will be otherwise engaged - firmly on their marks, desperate for that first glimpse of an Olympic torch. It goes without saying that early 2012 is going to be a busy time, with the global advertising market predicted to see significant growth as brands follow suit behind the likes of UPS and VISA who have already kicked off their Olympic campaigns.
However, according to the Telegraph, ITV boss Adam Crozier is suggesting the expected boost in TV advertising around the Olympics has been overblown saying that Britain should not expect the same level of increase as other countries that host the Games: "We will get a positive reaction from the Olympics but not as much as some people say."
One thing is certain – the Royal Wedding made big bucks for some brands, and the Olympics look set to do the same.
To find out how advertising can make a difference to your business, contact Dan Slinger.
YouTube wraps up Christmas
T'is the season to be jolly, and what is Christmas if not an annual opportunity for big brands to battle it out for social supremacy? At the top of our list (for no reason in particular, at all, honest) is our beloved Old Spice man. Just a few months after being catapulted to stardom with the incredible “Man Your Man Could Smell Like” campaign, Isaiah Mustafa is back on YouTube and back in our lives with Old Spice's festive offering – MANta Claus.
Sticking with the old adage - if it's not broke, don't fix it - the campaign, which is tipped to be the top viral campaign of the season, sees the 'Abs'olutely marvellous Mustafa on a mission to hand out gifts to everyone in the world – armed with nothing but biceps and a bath towel. The '1 Man, 7 Billion Gifts' YouTube campaign is supported with a series of location/genre-specific videos which, after just a few days, have attracted hundreds of thousands of views.
YouTube provides an unparalleled opportunity for extensive brand exposure, the key to which is appealing to either the heart or the humour of the viewer. Old Spice may have got humour checked, but a nod needs to go to the advertising dynamos over at John Lewis who this year proved the value of a 90-second tug on the nation's heartstrings. The creative team took a £6million budget, a doe-eyed seven-year-old and a rehashed Smiths song and turned it into an overnight sensation with their Christmas campaign. It has racked up over three million views on YouTube plus countless mentions on Twitter and Facebook, cementing the John Lewis brand in the minds of its target demographic this Christmas.
To discover how online advertising can put your brand in the spotlight, contact Jon Fryer.
Google vs......everyone?
Everyone's heard of Google, it's mentioned on the TV, in films and its even become acceptable to 'Google yourself'! As a search engine it pretty much dominates the market. Google held over a 90% share of the market as of October this year, and it's worth remembering that providing search results is only a small part of what Google can do.
Anyone with a website should fully understand the importance of advertising online, as without advertising your website effectively, how are people going to find you? This is where Google AdWords comes in. Whenever you perform a search, you will see 'Sponsored Links' along the top and down the right of your search results, these are links businesses have paid Google to display.
Google dominates this market too, but there's an indication that times may be changing and that there may be a challenger (or a few in fact) on Google's horizon. Microsoft, Yahoo and AOL have teamed up to rival Google, who earned a massive £18 billion from advertising alone in 2010. As of the New Year, the three companies have agreed to start selling ad space on each others' sites, but insist their sales teams will remain separate and competitive.
This attack on Google's dominance could result in additional exposure for online advertisers in the future.
To find out how online advertising can benefit your business, contact Jon Fryer.
RIP Flash
There was a time when Flash was the only choice for companies wanting the 'wow' factor on their website. The proprietor software became the de-facto standard for presenting video on the web, and was installed on over 98% of machines accessing the internet. Then Apple decided not to support Flash on the iPhone, or iPad due to its proprietary nature, and security/performance issues – overnight the game was changed.
Many boldly predicted that Apple's refusal to support Flash would be the death-knell for the software and so, just 18 months later it comes as no surprise that Adobe (who now own Flash) have halted development of Flash for mobile devices.
While this doesn't affect companies who have adopted 'classic' HTML sites, many businesses who once opted for the 'flash' factor are now finding themselves in a poor position in the burgeoning mobile arena. With mobile usage set to grow at a fantastic pace, those with Flash sites are needlessly excluding customers (with iPhones at least).
While it's certainly not 'game over' for Flash sites, businesses who haven't yet made the move may want to give some real thought to embracing a Flash-free future, and take their place in the mobile world among their competitors.
To find out how mobile-friendly your website is, contact Pete Jones.
What's in a name?
The moment you've all been waiting for . . okay, so you've probably seen it already, but we're still very excited about it – it's the new Petersen brand.
This new look reflects our commitment to providing measurable and cost effective joined-up marketing services to our clients. If you like the brand, you'll love the rest of the website, so take a look around.
In other news . . .
It seems Petersen isn't the only brand with big news. After four years in the shadows of Google, Apple has finally overtaken the internet search engine to become the world's most valuable brand.
According to annual BrandZ study of the world's top 100 brands, the increase in iPhone and iPad sales has helped catapult Apple's brand value to £93 billion. Of the top 10 brands in the report, six are technology and telecoms companies: Google at number two, IBM at number three, Microsoft at number five, AT&T at number seven and China Mobile at number nine.
Fast food became the fastest-growing category with McDonald's rising two places to number four, while Coca-Cola slipped one place to number six, Marlboro dropped down one to the number eight spot while General Electric was number 10.
But Apple and Google beware, social media platforms are making their mark, with Facebook entering the top 100 at number 35 with a brand worth £12.2 billion in just eight years.