Tuesday, February 26, 2013
Thursday, February 14, 2013
Wednesday, February 13, 2013
Random Cookies of Kindness: Building a Personal Brand
Random
Cookies of Kindness: Building a Personal Brand
The idea of personal branding consists of leaving a
consumer with a uniquely
distinguishable, and ideally memorable, impression about yourself or
your business. Establishing a personal brand is a vital part of any kind of
business. It’s not rocket science but it seems like many business are
forgetting this step of the selling process. Between the ups and downs in the
economy and the rising costs of living businesses are doing everything possible
to keep people coming through their doors.
Many places are throwing coupons at consumers
in desperation to lure business into their store, giving away merchandise in
hopes it will bring in new customers, and purchasing flashy signs to place in
front of their stores. While these advertising tactics have a place in the
scheme of things it seems as though a piece of the puzzle is missing. Loyal
customers are worth their weight in gold to businesses yet they seem to be
forgotten in the rush of bringing in new customers. FL!P SiDE Café, located in
Gadsden AL, is trying a new approach to keep the customers loyal to their
brand.
On
Tuesday Feb. 12th FL!P SiDE café rolled out the Random Cookies of
Kindness campaign. We visited 22 local businesses and surprised them with a
hand written thank you card for their loyalty to our products and a box of
cookies to brighten up their afternoon. All of the businesses that were visited
have either used FL!P SiDE for catering services or have employees that visit
the café frequently for their morning coffee or lunch breaks. They are the
definition of loyal customers and we thought it was time to reward them for
supporting us.
The
key to this campaign is not only to reward those who support FL!P SiDE but to
also build our brand image in a positive light. The reactions from office to
office were incredible resulting in many smiling faces, a woman who actually
danced upon receiving a FL!P SiDE goodie box, and a phone call from one of the
businesses letting us know that we have made their day with an afternoon
pick-me-up. I challenge to you find a coupon that has ever generated that kind
of response.
There’s
something to be said about showing your customers that you care about them, not
just their money. FL!P SiDE Café plans to continue going out into the community
to reward our loyal customers and put smiles on people’s faces. People are the
most important part of our business and it’s time we showed them how much we
appreciate their business.
Sunday, February 10, 2013
Ambushed By Social Media
We are living in a world where more kids are sitting at home on their computers instead of outside playing with friends. Computers are a continually growing trend and so are the social media sites that go along with it. Right now I am working with CH&B on making social media a prominent part of their company. Over the past 2 weeks I have “tweeted” countless messages, posted various facebook statuses, and uploaded a large amount of their portfolio on Flickr and Picasa, online photo sharing websites. I do believe social media is important as it is part of the future of advertising, although I believe if we shift all of our focus onto computer generated interactions we will lose a large part of what advertising really is.
How many times do you sit around the dinner table and discuss how awesome somebody’s tweet was about something? Although it’s possible to be crafty and creative with the copy of a tweet you’ve got 140 characters to get your message across. Not a lot of space for a meaningful message.
Now on the other hand, how often do you sit around the dinner table and discuss how funny a TV commercial was or how creative a magazine ad is? That’s more like it. We even have a full evening every year dedicated to TV commercials; some people refer to it as the Super Bowl.
What is always on the “must see” list while visiting NYC? Times square of course. Thousands of billboards and flashy signs creatively designed to catch our attention.
I think I’m making my point clear. Social media definitely has its place in the industry. It’s cheap, quick and easy to use. It’s great for making connections and posting events and news. There have also been some amazing uses of social media such as Jell-O Pudding monitoring sad faces ( L ) in Twitter messages and sending the person with the sad face a coupon for their product. But how often is an ad on the computer, or an event posted on facebook, or a message tweeted on Twitter so appealing that you remember it and bring it up as a conversation piece?
The thought behind a social media site like Twitter is that a business can tweet about their latest product, investment, achievement or clients. Unfortunately, according to MarketingSherpa Research “nearly two-thirds of marketers aren’t monitoring or responding to comments (both positive and negative) about their company.” It’s something that a accompany gets excited about but forgets about in the long run.
Once again I would like to reinstate that I am totally for social media marketing, but my passion for advertising definitely doesn’t lie in the form of social media. That’s one of the reasons I’m so grateful for this internship. It’s given me the opportunity to realize that sitting at a desk by myself tweeting and posting isn’t really for me.
While working on an NSAC campaign for JC Penny I discovered the joy I get from being creative and working together in teams to come up with creative ideas. All three of my commercial ideas were chosen for the plans book as well as a print Ad and 2 billboard ideas. I’m hoping one day you’ll be sitting around your dinner table reminiscing about one of my TV commercials that you’ve seen on TV.
We also get so wrapped up in the online world we forget how big of a statement something such as outdoor advertising can make. Just like I mentioned above the advertising that takes place in NYC makes Times Square a destination. Now just think of how effective advertising would be for your company if you could provide an ad for each client that was a destination, some place where everybody would want to go to see it. Obviously I live in the real world and know that it would be impossible to do that for every ad produced but it also reels my brain to think how powerful a medium like that for advertising could be. That right there is the kind of work I want to be involved in. Check out this page of billboards created for various companies. I know for sure I would take a second to stop and look at the message that was being given by these billboards:
It’s ok that we begin to take a step into the virtual world of social media, as long as we keep one foot planted in the real world. I believe successful advertising is a compatible mix between traditional advertising and the online world of social media. Luckily for me I am getting an inside look at both mediums and learning from professionals how they work together to complement each other. It’s time to get excited about the future, but also to remember where the roots of advertising have been planted for many years.
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