Company Branding and Corporate Identity

Brand Tiger Woods

Saturday, December 19, 2009 by Tony Fannin

by Tony Fannin, president, BE Branded

This blog is a bit different, though, in the end, it is about branding. The news about Tiger Woods is all over the media. His transgressions are becoming more and more public. His image and personal brand is taking a hit. Almost all of the marketers who are using Tiger (the brand) in their marketing campaigns have gone dark. In fact, there's been only 1 ad to air on TV and that's for Gillette. This is such a drastic dip from a few weeks ago when you couldn't watch or read anything for a length of time before seeing an ad with Tiger Woods as the pitchman. I know some believe that his personal business is his own private business and it should stay that way. I don't agree with that viewpoint. Here's why:

• Tiger Woods is a brand – Tiger gave up the "personal" part of himself when he decided to market brand Tiger and sell that brand to other marketers. When Tiger signed his first endorsement deal, he became a public brand. As with other brands, we as consumers, expect the ones we believe in and buy from to always fulfill their promise and to never do anything that is contrary to what that it stands for. Personal brand is no different than a company brand.

• Brand Tiger affects his partners – Once he agreed to represent another brand and accepted a fee, he is responsible on how is actions affect his partners. You are judged by the company you keep. It's no different when two brands decide to partner in a joint promotion or marketing campaign. For example, if McDonald's offers a toy from Mattel, but the plastic parts contain a chemical that exposes children to high levels of toxins, McDonald's takes the lion's share of the hit in the public's eyes while Mattel escapes with minor damage.(This example is completely hypothetical.) Brand Tiger does affect his partners, so he is no longer afforded the luxury of keeping personal issues private because his issues becomes his partners' issues.

• Tiger Woods' actions affects his value – When that happens, you know you're a brand. When you're a brand, you're actions have value, both positive and negative. In 2008 Tiger Woods made about $12 mil. playing golf and about $110 mil. in endorsements. This also has a direct correlation to his advertising partners. Their value rides on his actions as well. That is another reason why his personal actions are open for review, especially by his partners.

I don't wish any misfortune on Tiger Woods. From hearing opinions from various people about whether his personal business should be off limits by the media, it got me thinking about whether is that really true or not. I my opinion, an individual gives up the privacy card when they decide to sell their personal brand to other partners. As soon as you hit the marketplace as a brand, you are treated like one and held to the same expectations and judgement as other brands, corporate or otherwise. All brands must live their brand promise 24/7/365 or you will lose one of the most important thing you've been building over the years, credibility.

www.bebranded.net
317-797-7226

Blogging For "Business Owners Just Like You"

Monday, November 23, 2009 by Rhoda Israelov

Business consultant and coach Lois Creamer's positioning statement™ is an elevator speech with a plus. If you're at all interested in building your business, says Creamer, you'd better polish up your own positioning statement post haste.

A positioning statement™ promotes you by concept - who you are and what you do - and (here's where most "60-second commercials" miss the mark) by outcome.

Creamer's own positioning statement serves as the perfect model:

"I work with small business owners and entrepreneurs who want
to book more business and make more money."

In my Say It For You blog posts, I've often described blogs as extended elevator speeches. After hearing Lois Creamer speak, though, I realize that's not enough. For blogs to be effective, they must more closely resemble positioning statements, clarifying and emphasizing outcomes. At the same time, positioning statements as part of your marketing strategy and tactics development, are SEO friendly, utilizing the key words and phrases that most accurately describe your company branding and your corporate identity.

True, business blogs, being shorter, less formal, and more personal than websites, are the perfect venue to showcase your products, the services you offer, and your unique approach to your field. Always remember, though - your potential clients and customers are still thinking "So what? What's in it for ME?"

"People aren't concerned about remembering your web address or even your name or brand," says Chris Baggott, CEO of Compendium Blogware. "Search engines like Google have opened up a wonderful new world for consumers where they simply have to enter their wants, needs, or problems." And with whom do consumers want to do business? As market research overwhelmingly demonstrates, "People like me", Baggott points out.

Every single blog post gives you a new opportunity to explain what outcomes result from working with you and your company, answering the "so what?" and the "Why you?" even before your target customer formulates those questions.

(How's this, Lois?) I work with business owners and entrepreneurs just like you who want to attract customers and clients they would otherwise never meet and who want to make more money. I Say It For You!

Does brand affect stock price?

Thursday, June 11, 2009 by Tony Fannin

by Tony Fannin, president, BE Branded

Most marketers know that brand is important. Most know that it's the emotional quality of who your are or what you stand for. So, does brand have any affect to the bottom line? The answer is yes. Brand does have true monetary value. Most corporations list the value on their annual report balance sheets. In Nike's 2008 annual report, their brand is listed at a value of $659 mil. A company's brand makes up about 20% of their stock value. That's significant. How many of us would love to earn 20% just because our brand is out there?

Brandings' black box

There are four components that branding efforts affect. This in turn affect's the stock price:

1. Perceived Value: This is made up of familiarity and favorability. A great brand allows a company or product to ask for more money and customers still feel like they are getting value.

2. Contribution: Margins and incentives. A successful brand position allows corporations to increase their profit margins by adding an emotional incentive to select one brand over another. This is how a brand contributes real dollars.

3. Cash flow: Great brands provides excess cash flow by enabling companies to dominate their niche or industry

4. Shareholder value: Great brands brings emotional benefits to shareholders in the form of pride of ownership and association. These emotional issues, along with tangible revenue make up the total value for shareholders.

Brands have value. Great brands not only have enormous value, but provide powerful leverage in both good times and down times. In bad economic times, people tend to go to brands they trust. There's less experimenting and less risk taking with an unknown product or service. It is during these times, progressive brands make their greatest increases in both market share and awareness. Because most marketers tend to cut back in slow economic times, the bold ones make their move and advertise more. For example, Dr Pepper and Geico have increased their ad budgets over the last year and have reported gains in market share and revenue. When the good times roll in, these companies who have advertised and established their brands while everyone else went "dark", are now set to accelerate their growth. They've build a great foundation of awareness and trust. When the economy is good and everyone begins to advertise again, there's more competition for share of mind and wallet. The brands who never went "dark" are already ahead of the game because they have the awareness and share of mind they've gained.

Even if your company doesn't sell stock, you can still take these ideas and apply them to your business. A great brand, as well as a bad one or none at all, will still affect your bottom line. The biggest advantages of a great brand is that it will give you credibility and it makes you money on it's own.

www.bebranded.net

317-797-7226

The Four P's Of Business Blogging

Friday, March 20, 2009 by Rhoda Israelov

Fellow blogger Rick Short, Indium Corporation’s Director of Marketing Communications, says that, before beginning a business blog, it’s important to have a goal and then work backwards. When Rick started his corporate blog, he began with no fewer than four goals in mind:

Gain market share
Improve the company brand
Learn from the customer base
Let customers talk to the company

Rick Short lists the four P’s of blogging:

Point
If your blog doesn’t have a specific point, don’t even start.

Passion
If you don’t have a burning passion about the topic, don’t even bother.

Personality
A blog needs opinion, likes and dislikes, not just a dry, dull review of the facts.

Perseverance
If you can’t keep up the discipline of posting frequently, find a new hobby!

Rick Short’s company, Indium Corporation, provides materials to the electronics assembly materials industry. He explains that the executives have many opportunities to speak and to present good content. Since sometimes the events don’t draw a big enough crowd to justify a personal appearance, he says, blogging has become an alternative method for Indium to stay in touch with its customers.

One unique factor about the Indium blogs has to do with the fact that the electronics industry uses lead in its soldering products. There is constant discussion from customers on legislation having to do with lead. The customers typically don’t want to let their competitors know what they’re doing, so rather than posting comments on the Indium blog site, they send direct emails to the blog authors.

A professional ghost blogger must epitomize all four of Rick Short’s P’s. Before becoming the "voice" of the business, I must be crystal clear on the business purpose to be expressed in the blog posts (the point).

A ghost, I'm fond of saying, must use her "third ear' hearing not only what the business owners want to say (their passion),

but picking up on their unique style of expressing the corporate "personality".

Since frequency of posting new content is important in web rankings, perseverance comes into play through the ghost blogger's "drill sergeant discipline".

Point + passion + personality + perseverance = profit!