Award-winning branding, rebranding and package design
How brands outshine, outlast and outperform their competition
This is about branding only a mother could love. I know you’re awesome. Your mother knows you’re awesome. That’s part of the problem. Because it may take a little while for a complete stranger to recognize your “inherent awesomeness.” Don’t Become a Victim of Branding Only a Mother Could Love Whatever you do, don’t make …
The 3 worst words in branding are Obscurity. Anonymity. Mediocrity. These words form what I call “The Bermuda Triangle of Branding Death” and they form the hell known as blending in. It’s as true for existing brands as it is for product launches. Your Brand Has Haters? No Problem. This is your actual problem. If …
Rebranding challenges result from using wrong reasons to start a rebrand or arbitrary (questionable at best) criteria. For example: Someone new comes into the company and decides to change the brand to match “the way things worked in my previous company” (without observing what’s working in the new company) Someone simply has a hunch “we …
Branding and basketball. Each is a sport with avid fans and onlookers waiting to see the next astonishing move. As if you needed me to connect sports with branding any further, along comes “Coach Julz.” She is, in a word, one amazing basketball coach. Since 2010: Scholarships: 30 out of 39 (76%) of her players …
They’re 3 words that kill any brand. Nobody Deserves Anything. Now, Embrace the Hustle. (If you have only one minute, scroll down to watch new video. Otherwise, read this. It will add value to watching the video below.) Our culture (and business) has become infected with a debilitating disease. It’s called “Entitle-tosis” and it’s spreading …
Just when you thought Jeff Bezos could do no wrong, here comes Amazon Prime Music. Tonight after dinner, I opened up my Amazon Music app and was faced with this (don’t tell me I didn’t warn you): Huh? “The only music streaming service with free two-day shipping”? WTF? Streaming? Shipping? Hello? Is there anybody in …
In life (as distinct from branding), the three most used and most powerful words are, “I love you.” Together, they are definitive. Unambiguous. Powerful. (These three words, like The Beatles, are most effective when united.) So what about your brand? Do clients feel that strongly about your brand? Or is it a little diluted, falling …
“Money goes in but it never comes out….” That was uttered by Kevin “Mr. Wonderful” O’Leary from Shark Tank speaking about a pitch which had brand failure written all over it. I’ve got to say, when he’s not eschewing his “tough love” negotiations, Kevin has some very good one-liners. Is Your Brand Infested? Brand strategies …
Sir Richard Branson is someone who knows a thing or two about elevating a brand and rising above the noise. In his own words, he wrote, “The key to generating loyalty and rising above the general noise seems to be all about creating an authentic voice.” Brand Elevation and Rising Above the Noise There are …
Found those words on the Internet this morning. How w-i-d-e is the gap between hard-won expertise vs. the hype-driven tactic-du-jour we each read about each and every day? It’s often not fully appreciated until it’s too late with a lot of money lost. Man… the pain and “wisdom scars” some CEOs and entrepreneurs carry around …
(This is the 9th installment in celebration of the power of words and language. To see the whole series, links are at the bottom of this article.) I stopped in my tracks. I. Couldn’t. Move. Of all places, it happened in my local health food store. I saw a package and, being an avid package …
Honestly, you as a client deserve better. Too many good companies waste money or worse — they fail — for an overlooked and absurdly simple reason. (And too many potentially great companies get stuck for a very stupid reason shown below.) The video below shows you why. Press play to learn: At 31 seconds, what …
I ran into an amusing little checklist of the top social media channels. It was a handwritten checklist on a whiteboard. Brilliant. It nailed what each channel is known for and its use and value. You Better Nail This Before Social Media This inspired me to delve in a bit more for those who lose …
Want a more effective rebrand? Read on. Rebranding done well (like life and young love) is a dream. Done badly and it results in something only one word can describe. Before the word and the new video that exposes it in all its glory, the following teenage confession explains everything. Her name was Randy (last name omitted …
In my Fast Company blog, I discuss the nearly $1 billion dollar loss J.C. Penney had in 2012. I also discuss the ignorantly shortsighted comments by Abercrombie & Fitch’s CEO Mike Jeffries about only serving “cool and good-looking kids” (i.e., nothing for women larger than 10 or larger than 34 for men). America. The (Almost) …
Marketing today is filled with so much double-talk and corporate marketing-speak that it makes the DaVinci Code look like a simple crossword puzzle. So, when I was asked by Randy Bowden to be interviewed about branding and other marketing-related questions in straightforward conversation, I was thrilled (though a little hesitant since I find some of …
I think we all need a pep talk (thank you Kid President). Social media has become one of the most abused channels of communication currently out there. Partly because everyone and their mother-in-law can post anything anywhere, for whatever reason. Another key reason is, people simply post anything with no quality check, or without any …
Startups rule, yet so much is stacked up against their success. (Fact: in the next 24 hours, there will be 18 new businesses that open their doors with 17 of them violating what’s covered in this presentation.) Startups need reliable guidance (like a precision GPS that gets you from point A to point B). That …
When I was asked to speak at the American Marketing Association 2 years ago, I decided (following the live presentation) to share my presentation online. That was over 75,000 views ago (nearly doubling in views since that blog post was written less than 4 months ago). I decided it was time to do another one, …
You knock yourself out to close that client. They close. You’re pumped. Yet, once the project ends, you never hear from them again. So you rinse and repeat: Close. Deliver. Sell more. Month after month. Year after year. Never gaining the traction or brand recognition you rightfully deserve. There are various possible scenarios why. But …
I was reading a good article in the Huffington Post that explains in understandable English what’s meant by the term “fiscal cliff.” It is explained this way: “This whole situation is the result of an ongoing fight in Washington over how to improve the economy (in the short term) and bring down the national debt …
With the presidential election and political debates on everyone’s mind, this video message has a certain timeliness about it. Committees: Where Good Ideas Go To Get Slaughtered Yes, this video immortalizes something I actually said in public, “Committees — famous for vanilla outcomes, exhausting debates and mindless meetings — have destroyed more good ideas than …
“We’re here tonight with two world-class opponents. “In this corner is the current champion, Social Media, the reigning and defending Champion holding the professional world record for endless wins (and numerous controversial losses) standing at 6-feet-2-inches tall, weighing in at 225 pounds. The Challenger and former World Champion is Branding from the East Coast, standing …
In a video I recently saw by James Wedmore, he reported that every single minute, there are: 2.8 million videos viewed on YouTube 277,000 logins on Facebook 100,000 tweets sent on Twitter 100 new accounts created on LinkedIn On top of that, there’s a reported 550,000 new businesses started in the US alone, each and …
Branding mistakes are awful. Some are worse than others and hard to live with. The Beatles, Western Union and Steve Jobs The famous guy who said “No” to signing on The Beatles since “guitar music was on its way out,” well, that was a bad one. (Thankfully, The Beatles knew to say “No” to such …
