Branding & Marketing

Posted by Chris Brown on November 17th, 2008 in Branding, Marketing, strategy

Do you struggle with branding yourself on line? As a branding expert, I find social media challenging from a branding standpoint in that my name means something totally different to about 99% of the population under 30. (In case you’re over 30 and have been living under a rock, Chris Brown is an extremely popular hip hop, R&B singer/entertainer.)

Imagine my delight when I found a website that can check, in just seconds, the availablity of user names on social media sites. Usernamecheck.com helps you find out where your username is registered and checks user name availablity across multiple websites very quickly.

That said, I’ve decided to change my Twitter branding from CMcBrown to ChrisBrown330 which is both my area code & my birthday… http://twitter.com/ChrisBrown330. I didn’t realize that it was so easy to change my name: Change your Twitter user name anytime without affecting your existing updates, @replies, direct messages, or other data. After changing it, make sure to let your followers know so you’ll continue receiving all of your messages with your new user name.

Hat tip to Norma Rist for telling me about it and TechSpikes for helping me find the link.

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Posted by Chris Brown on November 13th, 2008 in Companies, Marketing, New Products, strategy

Many companies want to do the right thing with green business, but find it is just too expensive.

While sustainability of our people, planet and prosperity can not be compromised, somehow it is hard to “do it now” if the price seems just too high.

Pictured (left to right): Terry Roberts, George Longcoy and Michael Sumpter from Johnstone Supply.

Overcoming the Price Objection
One company who may have found a great ROI story to overcome the price objection to going green is Johnstone Supply. I just heard about their motors with a variable speed control that can provide customers with an incredible 60% ROI in electricity savings in less than one year.

Tim Ferguson, a motor and pump specialist, explained how it works at a recent “Green Business” breakfast in Cleveland, where more than 250 business professionals met to discuss critical environmental issues facing Northeast Ohio, sustainable strategies and how to remain profitable.

“The building we are in (Ritz Carlton Cleveland) has 380 motors as an example. Just one 20 horsepower motor that runs all the time uses $14,024 per year in electricity –assuming 10 cents per kilowatt hour,” he explained. “By putting a $3,000 control on that motor, you would experience more than a $10,000 savings in just same year.”

With math like that, why everyone isn’t racing out to change their motors right now?? Maybe they haven’t heard about it.

Johnstone Supply has a challenge to build awareness of the ROI solution with their potential customers. The hardest part? Often the person in charge of buying a motor is not the same person who pays the electric bill. Both accounts payable and the facilities manager must be made aware of this ROI solution and work together. I hope that many CFO’s in the room will go back to those two people in their corporation and ask to do the analysis.

Marketing Case Study: What to do
In an effort to build awareness, Johnstone Supply sponsored the event, got Tim Ferguson to become one of the panelists and placed their literature at each person’s seat at the event. All this in an effort to help build awareness of their solution to the sustainability issue. I hope that whoever answers the phone in their sales department asks the question, “where did you hear about us?” so that they will know how much this marketing investment paid off in helping them to build awareness of their motor solution.

What lesson can you learn from Johnstone Supply?
Does your potential customer have a problem? How does your product or service solve it? And how do you let them know about the solution? You can’t just expect people to KNOW you have the solution, you have to build awareness of both their problem and your solution.

What’s the lesson from Johnstone Supply:

And, don’t forget to ask where they first heard about you in order to measure your marketing effectiveness!

Not knowing their marketing program… I would guess that they’d also include some press releases, direct mail pieces and search engine optimization techniques to make sure that this one marketing event investment pays them back a nice ROI as well!

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Posted by Chris Brown on November 12th, 2008 in Marketing

The other day I wrote about the differences between Gen X and Gen Y moms in their use of the internet. I thought that Technorati’s David Sifry made some interesting points in Brands Enter the Blogosphere:

I predict that this, combined with the shift of the mom demographics and the way they view online activities, will have far reaching implications for brands and their marketing managers.

It will be interesting to see how more and more brands will shift from offline activities to online activities to try to capture the attention of this next generation of Moms. But it will be even more interesting to see the reaction of the Moms.

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Posted by Chris Brown on November 10th, 2008 in Marketing

I was thinking about the toy buying experience this weekend. The holiday selling season is fully upon us in the stores. Now that Halloween is out of the way, the stores are filled with wrapping paper, gifts, and Christmas music piped over the PA. I could swear that I was even the smelling cinnamon, cloves and mulled cider wafting in the air. All of this was intended to incite spending, I’m sure.

It’s been more than 10 years since I left the toy industry, and I can’t help but think about how things have changed. I was wondering how internet marketers are addressing the two generations of moms who are buying for their young children: GenX and GenY.

Each group has their share of toddlers, preschoolers, young children and tweens. These are the groups of women born between these years:

Gen X born: 1965 to 1982 (43 years old to 26 years old)
Gen Y born: 1982 to 1994 (26 years old to 14 years old)

According to the US Census bureau, most babies in the US are born to women ages 25-29. Which means that in the next couple of years, the shift from Gen X moms to Gen Y moms is here. It seems like this would be something of interest to marketers. This could be especially significant since the GenY group is a much larger group than the GenX… sometimes called the Echo Boom or Boomlet.

I found one study from Parenting.com’s survey of over 800 moms that explains how the two groups use the internet differently. GenY sees online activities much more integrated into their life, whereas GenX moms seem to use it more for specific tasks. Makes sense.

With the uncertain economy, it’s predicted that many consumers are tightening up their spending this year.

I predict that marketers whose products are sold to moms and have authentically embraced the age of conversation, web2.0, blogging, twittering, facebook and social networking with the the GenY moms are going to have a much more successful “selling season” this year. Marketers who insist on selling via TV advertising, printed holiday flyers mailed into the mailbox — and are wondering what the difference between Twitter & TweetDeck is — will find their numbers slipping.

Let me know if you see any studies or know of a group studying this phenomonen.

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Posted by Chris Brown on November 5th, 2008 in Creativity, Marketing, Marketing - General, strategy

If you had a product to sell nationwide, at first glance you might consider blasting out mass media nationwide in big sweeping layers to coat the entire country. This mass approach may have some merit.

But last night’s historic election showed that pinpoint marketing — focusing strategically on key segments — makes the difference. It’s not coincidence that most of the blue counties are where the Ohio cities are: Cleveland, Akron, Toledo, Youngstown, Columbus, Dayton, and Cincinnati. This map doesn’t break it down by city or precinct, but that precinct-by-precinct focus was a key strategy for the Obama campaign.

I’ve never had as many phone calls asking if I’m going to vote. We even had someone drive into the driveway last Friday to make sure the 3 voters in my household had a ride to the polls. It was a young man from my town whose Boy Scout troop meets at my church.

A friend of mine told me the story of her daughter who is away in Vermont at college. When she volunteered to make phone calls, she received a list of names and phone numbers of the neighbors from her street back home in Hudson, Ohio.

I think it was the strategic, affinity and close knit ties that made the difference in this election.

What does this mean for your marketing?
Using referral sources who believe in your service and products. Testimonials from people your potential customer knows and trusts. Finding common ground with your potential customers. No one wants to buy from a stranger, so how can your company become an acquaintance? A friend?

By the way, you can take a look at the individual county results in your state… just click on the individual states in the 2008 general election state results map at this link.

Source: NBC News via msn.com from an article link via RealClearPolitics.com

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