brand_matters_article001

Articles on Brand Matters:

Brand Building 101: Does Your Business Card Build Your Brand?

Are you losing credibility and damaging the brand of your business through lack of attention to one of your critical marketing tools in your business, your business card? Discover how your business card can enhance your brand and ensure that you stand out from your competition.

When we are at a networking event or meeting a client, it's almost guaranteed that we will exchange business cards.

Very often, without realising it, we are assessing our colleague by their business card, and asking ourselves:

- Is the business card professionally designed?
- Is the business card crumpled at the edges?
- How does the weight of the business card feel - substantive or flimsy?
- Does it look like the business card has been made on their PC - or worse still does it have a message at the bottom of the card to say where you too can access free cards?

I have collected thousands of business cards over my time in business and every time I am sub-consciously assessing the professional status of them and their business when I receive their business card.

We review someone's card at least 3 times:

1. once on receiving it
2. a second time when we put it in our pocket, folio or bag as we leave the meeting
3. and a third time as we make a decision to keep it, transfer the information into our data bank or bin it!

Our business card is a critical part of our marketing collateral and even if you can not afford to put in place other marketing materials, short changing the investment in developing a professional business card is definitely not something we should do if we are looking to develop a professional brand.

When meeting someone in person, alongside how you present yourself in person, your business card can enhance or devalue the strength of your brand and how you are perceived by others.

Here are four tips to enhance your brand through your business card:

1. Ensure that you work with a professional designer to develop your business card. It's not whether you like the design, it's about whether it will represent your business effectively and professionally to your target audience

2. Ideally have your business card printed on 400g card and by a traditional lithographic printer. Yes it is more expensive than digital printing, but the quality is worth investing in and a litho print gives far greater definition to your corporate identity and the colour of your brand

3. Matt laminate your card on the reverse for extra stability and style. Don't laminate both sides as people will not be able to write on your card - we often note down things to remember about the person we met on their card

4. Use the valuable real estate on the back of your card to provide a call to action, for example, how to access your white paper or special report on your web site.

Take action:

Over the next 30 days, take the opportunity to review the business cards of your contacts and assess their card against yours.

1. What can you learn from other peoples business cards?

2. How could you take those learnings and further enhance your business card?

Your goal is to ensure that your business card is a positive reflection of both you and your company, and it represents a strong brand.

Invest in your business card, distribute it widely and you will be sure of expanding your professional success.

Krishna De
07 Mar 2007

Krishna De invites you to join her in conversation with experts from around the globe to discover how to build your brand and grow your professional services firm at http://www.bizgrowthlive.com/. You will also receive access to Biz Growth Express a weekly newsletter bringing you strategies, inspiration and tips to grow your professional services practice. Register today at: http://www.krishnade.com/.

©Krishna De, Oneocean Ltd 2006. All rights reserved Worldwide. Reprint Rights: You may reprint this article providing the article is printed in it’s entirety, you leave all of the links active, do not edit the article in anyway and include the copyright statement.

Are You Brand Worthy?

Branding is one hot topic, although it is wildly misunderstood. To make things even more confusing, branding is often tossed in the same basket as marketing which makes its application to an entrepreneur or sole-practioner even more unclear.

While out speaking on branding, the question that I hear most is "How do I know if my business or service is brand material?" With businesses opening left and right, and more and more closing each year, I'm glad there are smart business owners open to understanding the issue.

If you've found yourself asking the same thing, don't worry you're not alone. Perhaps, this can shed some light.

At a recent luncheon, the same question came up again in a different way. I was seated next to an attorney whose sole practice focuses on elder abuse cases, he asked me in rapid succession (a manner that showed me he'd be great in court):

"Isn't branding for businesses that make a lot of stuff?"

"Doesn't branding apply only if you want to sell a lot of stuff?"

"Isn't branding pointless for my kind of business?"

Smiling, I fired back, "yes, yes, and... no".

Yes, branding is most often associated with businesses that make a lot of stuff. Yes, branding is advantageous if you want to sell a lot of stuff. No, branding is not pointless because every business makes something (or offers a service) and wants to sell it. Branding is about making your product or service known to as many potential customers as possible, consistently, with the most effective use of your time and money. Branding is about repeat business. Branding is about effortless referrals. Wouldn't that be a benefit to ANY business, especially yours?

To help you gain more brand-worthy clarity, ask yourself the following questions:

Am I really passionate about what I am doing with my business, service or product? And I mean REALLY! If not, is there something more you can be doing in it to turn your passion switch on? It takes an amazing amount of energy and persistence to make a business take hold in the customer's mind. With more and more businesses competing for headspace, it's imperative that you set yourself apart. If you are not cooking with the fuel that passion gives you, you're missing out on a very crucial element that could mean the difference between thriving and closing.

Do I have a big vision of my business, service or product? Do you dream of reaching lots of customers in different ways with your product or service? Do you see a way to deliver your product or service to an increasing amount of people with less and less effort? Did you create a mindset or special approach in your field that can be delivered in a variety of mediums, i.e.- speaking, books, audio CDs, consulting, etc. Do you envision moving beyond an hour-for-hour way of providing your service? All of these support a big vision. , Not only do we begin from the inside out, when approaching your brand, we create from where you will be in five years as if it is now. Small vision does just that, keeps you small. The choice is always yours.

Is my product or service a real benefit to lots of customers? It's important that you answer this one as honestly and openly as possible. I was very passionate and had a huge vision for a career as a mime! (Yes, you read that correctly... a mime.) However, no amount of passion and vision would make people buy it on a large scale. Thanks to Marceau Marceau, the mime card had been played out. You may find that by being truthful with your answers will lead to branding even better products and services.

Am I prepared to surround myself with a team or the knowledge to accomplish the business success that developing my business as a brand delivers? The plus side of being an entrepreneur is that you may wear many hats in your business. The negative side is that you feel like you have to! The truth is, you don't! You're an expert in your field and you need to honor that expertise by supporting it with a variety of other skill sets to make your indelible mark; logo design, copywriting, website design, your marketing plan creation and execution, and others. The important thing is that you realize...you're in command...because it's your ship! And being a commander takes knowing where you want to go, gathering the maps to make the journey, and the crew to make it happen.

If your answers to these questions are yes, then you have the makings to develop your business as a brand. You just need the knowledge and practice to do so. If you're shaky on some of the questions, find out why. Even if you never develop your business as a brand, solid yeses to these simple questions will only make your business more successful and more enjoyable. After all, isn't that we all want?

Kim A. Castle, Co-founder BrandU™, Co-Author of Why Brand: Big Business Success No Matter Your Size, and BrandU™ Bible, the only step-by-step workbook for developing your business as a brand.

www.whybrandu.com
© 2004 Castle Montone, Limited Reprinted with Permission.

Kim A. Castle
15 Mar 2007

Kim A. Castle has worked at several top-advertising agencies in New York and Los Angeles; including Grey Advertising, DMB&B, DB Needham, Kovel Kresser & Partners and Omnicom’s Direct Partners. Wanting more creative hands-on with her clients, she started her own design firm Castle Graphics in 1991, which merged with Eagle Communications in 1999 to form the Los Angeles-based marketing and multimedia company Why Communications where she currently serves as Vice President and Creative Director. She has worked for such clients as; Digital Domain, DirecTV, IBM, M&M Mars, Gramercy Pictures, Kwontify Films, O’Hara Klein Productions, Entertainment Business Group, ,General Motors, Screen Actors Guild, Chase Manhattan Bank, Dominos Pizza, Pedigree/Sheba, Higher Octave Music, Disney Interactive, Baskin Robins and Blue Cross to name a few. She created the redesign and retail launch packaging of the million dollar-selling Hollywood Celebrity Diet, was the creative voice behind the award-winning website Concept:Cure for General Motors, created the marketing and packaging campaign for the Emmy winning short film The Question, Her exceptional feel for layout and concept, her outstanding ability to tell a story with words and visuals, and her innate ability to communicate the heart & soul of a project allows her to excel in brand identity, packaging, direct mail and marketing communications.

Kim A. Castle, Co-founder BrandU™, Co-Author of Why Brand: Big Business Success No Matter Your Size, and BrandU™ Bible, the only step-by-step workbook for developing your business as a brand.

www.whybrandu.com
© 2004 Castle Montone, Limited Reprinted with Permission.
info@whybrandu.com