In searching for the true essence of brands, we often journey, sometimes physically and at other times virtually, to mythical lands of their origin stories. Consider some recent places we have visited in our imagination: Xanten in Rhineland where St. Norbert was born, monasteries of Holy Cross in Southern France where Blessed Basil Anthony Moreau […]
In our view, branding is the process of: attaching an idea to a product or service e.g. achievement for Nike, freedom for Southwest Air. creating expectations and promises around a product or a service creating strong to impenetrable differentiation in the marketplace What’s your definition?
Colleges and universities have found brand religion. However, branding of higher education institutions is more challenging than creating consumer product brands. Why? Because higher education institutions serve an extraordinarily large number of stakeholders and make decisions by building consensus. Following these 10 steps to build a college brand may be harder than it sounds: Recognize […]
One simple truth, so many ways of saying it. Here are a some you may recognize and others you may not: “Keep your eye clear, and hit ’em where they ain’t” said the baseball legend William Keeler. “The purple cow”, a book written by Seth Godin of “Permission Marketing” fame. “Zag when others zig”, the […]
Appeared in Enrollment Manager on 10/18/2010. What’s the difference between a college with an abundance of applications and one with an unacceptably high acceptance rate? Sometimes, it’s curiosity and nerve. Adversity — brought on by geographic isolation, shifting demographics, deep-pocketed for-profits and other Goliath competitors — can inspire a college and university to challenge assumptions […]
The bad old days of expensive brand monitoring tools are finally coming to an end. Here is a listing of a few free tools that you may want to bookmark: 1. Google Blog Search 2. Nielsen blogpulse 3. Tweetdeck 4. Tweetbeep 5.Twitter Search 6. Google Alerts 7. Compete.com Happy brand and buzz tracking!
If you think about it, we trust great brands for very simple reasons. They: 1. create an emotional response 2. resonate with us 3. listen to us and talk to us 4. embrace simplicity 5. pay attention to details In a nutshell, we are willing to reach deeper into our pockets for great brands because […]
Just wrapping up a touching book titled ‘Management Lessons from Mayo Clinic’. Few takeaways: 1. the needs of the patient (customer) come first. 2. Teamwork isn’t optional; it powers integrated multi-specialty excellence. 3. Deliver care with time-condensed efficiency. 4. All touch points, systems, and processes are aligned with the first three values. 5. Build leadership […]
Unlike in personal life, in business, familiarity breeds trust. The art of marketing is for your prospects and customers to find your brand at all relevant touch points: in search results, on review sites, on analyst reports, in industry forums, in discussion groups, in blog conversations, in slideshares, on twitter, and other social media sites. […]
Purely aside from the fact that I love this concept, the question raised is increasingly important, and increasingly broad. It used to be that you were the sum of what the people in your sphere of experience knew of you. And while that hasn’t essentially changed, the sphere has expanded, and now what people know […]