I recently sat through a lecture from Vancho Cirovski from Peak Consulting – a culture specialist for sports organizations. The topic was ‘Leadership Culture.’ It was a fascinating discussion and it got me thinking about how it relates to branding. Since my take on branding positions a business as a leader, Vancho’s perspective on leadership culture particularly hit home with me. His comments on authenticity and genuine leadership are the foundation of every successful brand. Imagine identifying an organization’s true influencers. These individuals are not always the obvious ones. They are none the less talents that must be nurtured and…

Break through the mind-numbing fluorescent lights and white walls of a standard office and create a space that encourages innovation and collaboration.  The following tips provide some ideas for making sure that you maximize the potential for innovative thinking among employees at your office.  Experiment with the ones that make sense for your company and see what happens! 1 – Promote Semi-Anonymous Idea Sharing Create a safe space where ideas can be freely thrown around without judgment or criticism. Semi-anonymous brainstorming, either in workshops and sessions or through independent posts at a designated workstation, offers the security in sharing ideas…

A successful brand is all in the details. It’s easy to get caught up in designing that perfect logo or snappy tagline for your business, while ignoring the finer points of your brand strategy. Fonts are often overlooked. Many people take them for granted while dashing off e-mails or memos, but underestimate the importance of typography and risk devaluing all the hard work you’ve poured into your brand. It’s important to get things right the first time. Choose a font style and color that best represents your business and then stick with it. Consistency is key. Keep these points in…

How often do you get the opportunity to make a strikingly positive impression on people only to quash it with a bout of selfishness? An acquaintance of mine recently had the unfortunate circumstance of having their home burn to the ground resulting in the loss of everything. You can imagine their shock and sense off loss. This person had on their schedule a booked and paid for networking workshop. In their state of affairs they contacted the organizer and requested a refund since they were in no state at this present time to focus on the event. The facilitator of…

The rate at which brands succeed and fail in today’s ever-changing society is mind blowing. With our fast-paced evolving world, brands are discovering that their previous strategies are no longer effective. While simply slapping a logo everywhere may have been a successful approach several years ago, today it is simply ineffective at cutting through all the market noise and attracting consumer attention. The market is overcrowded and consumers are inundated with logos on a daily basis. Brands now need a connection with the consumer. In our current marketplace, simply slapping your logo on everything just won’t work anymore. Consumers want…

The other day I saw an interview with Magic Johnson. Magic was talking about his coach, Pat Riley. He said that Riley was a great coach because he provided honest feedback. Riley yelled at Magic just like everyone else. He corrected his mistakes and provided honest analysis and feedback. Now, I’m not insinuating that Magic Johnson or the Los Angeles Lakers were successful only because feedback was given. (Skill had quite a bit to do with it). But what I am suggesting is that a constant stream of objective feedback helps any organization—auto shop or NBA team—improve. Giving Feedback If…

With the growing popularity of using high-tech mediums to connect with customers, one might assume that former, more traditional methods would be rendered obsolete. However, phone calls aren’t simply being replaced by emails and text messages; they’re actually evolving right along with them for a more complete marketing system. In an effort to stray from the bad reputation of telemarketing, a new process called live transfer takes a streamlined, customized and cost-effective approach to marketing. Since this technique is relatively new, it might be helpful to better understand what distinguishes live transfers from telemarketing, and why the former is a…

All of your activities both on AND off-line should involve a personal involvement. That connection is what my brand stands for and it should be yours. Within my marketplace I have a respectable amount of awareness. That in turn develops leads. Depending on where you are in your business circle, it would be unwise to take your market for granted and reply on past glories. Searching you out shouldn’t have barriers. Minimal activities leave the impression you’re not the leader you claim to be. I enjoy meeting people and finding out what they do and how they manage their sales…

Whether you want to admit it or not, your business makes mistakes. Maybe the quality of your work wasn’t up to par (just one time, of course:). Perhaps, your billing was incorrect and your customer was charged too much. Maybe, a job took too long, or there was something wrong with a product you sold your customer. These things happen to customers of every business. Statistics show that customers are pretty resilient. All of these things are pretty much forgivable. Your customer will forget about billing disputes, quality issues and pretty much everything else you throw at them. But, statistics…

There is no such thing as a business that isn’t looking to cut corners, at least in some capacity. This is thanks mostly due to the current wintry economic climate. Many American businesses are still struggling to shake off the detrimental effects of the global financial meltdown that started in September 2008. Businesses have to had to slash advertising costs, freeze payroll increases, and in worst case scenarios, lay off people who work for them. However, there are some costs that businesses need to maintain in order to function. Business owners may have cut the budgets, sure, but obviously no…