[Originally posted at 'Round the Square]

Have you ever thought of your brand that way?

Think about it…

Independent media channels provide a distinct voice, and view the world through a particular lens not shared by others. Independent media channels engender trust and loyalty, giving audiences reasons to connect above and beyond particular programs.

Your brand can––and should––do the same!

You’re a content publisher, after all. Your brand, by way of your website, blog, e-newsletter, Twitter stream, YouTube channel, and Facebook wall provides a mosaic of content that audiences (ideally!) find engaging, useful, and worth talking about to others.

And out there on the inter-webs, information disseminated solely in support of commerce doesn’t cut it. You have to engage and hold your audience’s attention. In fact, your ability to engage––to spur people to respond in some way and come back for more––is more important to brand-building and your bottom line than anything you say about your programs, products, or services.

Why? The web has rolled content, commerce, and entertainment into one. Going forward, successful brands––for profit, non-profit, retail and B2B alike––will be those whose audiences view them as an independent media channel… providing a differentiated mosaic of content that engages, entertains, and encourages action.

Is your channel coming in clear? Does your mosaic of content reflect a greater “picture” of your brand people can understand and connect with?

Some tips…

Define your voice

If your brand was an independent media channel, what would you call it? What would its tagline be? While you might not put it out there for the world to see, a concise notion of your identity will help guide your content decisions: who are you… and what are you trying to say?This is where your content strategy comes in. What are the “story lines” that you can credibly advance about your brand––and that people will tune in to? Where is the content coming from? Who’s in charge? Do you have an editor in chief?

Draft an architecture

Knowing what you want to say, and where, means creating a digital content architecture. What platforms are you going to use? Who are the target audiences for each? What messages make sense, given audience / platform combinations? What is your metric for engagement and response? Answer all these questions, and you’re well on your way to creating an effective structure for your “programming.”

Bring ‘em home

Far flung outposts on YouTube and Facebook are great for meeting people where conversations are starting, but your website needs to be at the core of your digital media strategy. Drive people to the place you can most effectively communicate “one-on-one”, and find out who they are––and how you can help.

Know your stats

How are people responding to your content? What messages hold their attention the longest, and keep them coming back for more? Where do they stick––and where do they “bounce”? By keeping a close eye on your stats and analytics, you can tell where things are working, and where they’re falling flat. And there’s no sense in experimenting if you can’t gauge the success of your experiment.

People want more than the latest information on your new widget. They want to connect with you and with others, and be both informed and entertained. You need to keep their attention, foster deeper connections, and move them to take action. If your channel isn’t doing all those things, you’re not taking full advantage.

So, what’s on?!? You have a voice, use it!

[Originally posted at 'Round the Square]

I operate in two worlds. By day (and often into early evening) I craft brand-focused communication programs for a variety of mission-driven organizations. By night (and often into early morning) I write, perform and record with a band as part of Boston’s vibrant independent music scene.

There’s always been a synergy between the two, as I often draw on my marketing and branding experiences while managing promotions for my bands. The last year or so, however, I’ve noticed the tables have turned a bit.

Nowadays, however, I find myself bringing my DIY music marketing experiences to bear on my branding projects at Sametz. Music blogs focused on independent artists have become an excellent source for current thinking on building connections in our increasingly noisy, fragmented world.

With limited resources, independent bands must make the most of every opportunity. At the same time, they’re less encumbered by red-tape and drawn-out decision making processes, and more willing to take calculated risks. As a result, musicians and bands are out in front of many mainstream marketers. Consider…

One step beyond…

Bands understand from the get-go that their music effects different people in different ways, and often fulfills a variety of needs beyond the simple “entertainment” a particular genre offers.

Bands purposefully promote the social aspect of their music: the emotions it triggers; its power to inform and educate; its ability to conjure memories; and so on. Businesses should take a similar approach. While they are undoubtedly important, take a step beyond your core value proposition to see what surrounds it. Your constituents aren’t monolithic, after all, and neither are you.

People are people…

Artists have always understood that personal connections drive success. Putting on a great show is important, but it means nothing if you aren’t building personal connections in the process. And playing a show is often the easy part; it’s the time before and after the set spent hanging with the club staff, the sound person, other bands––and the audience––that really makes a difference.

Organizations should follow suit; people aren’t likely to become loyal to your brand unless they have a (positive!) sense of the people behind it.

I want my ____ TV…

Successful bands understand their role as mini-media companies. Via websites, photostreams, Twitter, blogs, video channels and other social media outposts, bands produce a mosaic of content with a particular voice––one that people find valuable and regularly worth tuning in to.

Businesses must understand that on the Web, entertainment and commerce are quickly becoming one and the same. The ability to engage is more important to brand-building and the bottom line than anything you can say about the “speeds and feeds” of your programs, products, or services.

It takes two to make a thing go right…

Bands are always collaborating: sharing audiences, leveraging resources, and cross-pollinating ideas. Whether they’re working with an engineer, a producer, a club owner, or other musicians, artists are constantly moving and existing outside their immediate orbit.

As a result, bands (independent, working bands anyway) rarely become isolated. They are in constant touch with what’s happening creatively around them. Business should look for opportunities to work outside of thier comfort zone; to experience new ideas and new ways of doing business.

Here, there, and everywhere…

Bands have always understood that it’s far better to be discovered by fans than forced upon audiences. When a listener “discovers” a band, they feel a sense of ownership which soon breeds feelings of loyalty and advocacy. By being everywhere it matters to be––from social media sites, to blogs, to internet radio, to soundtracks of all kinds, and beyond––bands strive to be visible enough to “get found.”

Marketers, of course, now call this “inbound marketing”… but bands have been doing it for years.

Looking for cues to help craft your inbound digital marketing strategy? Instead of reading xyz marketing blog, take a few minutes to study how your favorite artist (or the local band you keep hearing about) is using their website as the hub of a broader inbound strategy.

Independent artists aren’t so “starving” anymore. Many are savvy marketers who could teach us a thing or two about communicating effectively in our complex world. And chances are, someone you know or someone within your organization is a working, independent musician.

Learn from them… and then, please, buy a CD.

[Originally posted at 'Round the Square]

Putting customers first, and brand second, can be somewhat of a tough pill to swallow for marketers.

Sure, most understand the need to build communities around their brands, and to nurture those who cluster around the experiences their brands enable. For many, however, it largely remains lip service. Marketers talk about putting customers first, yet many continue to focus on the more transactional tactics of marketing products, programs, and services to build their brand.

They’re missing out.

Human nature doesn’t drive us to connect with brands. Rather, people desire a sense of connection with other people. (Does anyone really love Facebook? What people do love is the easy means of connection Facebook affords.) Your brand, informed by those communities around it that matter most, is a means to an end—a platform for interaction among like-minded individuals.

It’s not about you, it’s about them.

Armed with new tools, and more timely constituent information than has ever been available before, businesses (nonprofits and for-profits alike) can effectively put people first and build their brands in the process—increasing loyalty, decreasing costs, and bringing important feedback and new ideas to the fore.

A few things to keep in mind:Putting people first means (drumroll…) putting people first.

Your brand program should be informed by the values and lifestyles of those who interact with your programs, products, and services. Use social media and RSS readers to set up listening posts to hear what people are saying, not just about your brand, but among each other. Interact with customers in-person wherever and whenever possible. Invite a group of high-value constituents over for tea.

If you come to understand the nature of those clustering around your brand, you’ll inevitably come to understand the nature of your brand as a platform for community. Institutionalize that kind of thinking above and beyond the walls of the marketing department and re-organize around it if possible. It’s a more effective, and cheaper, brand-building practice than marketing product “speeds and feeds.”

Your constituents aren’t monolithic, and connections must be reinforced.

Those who cluster around your brand likely share a common, high-level set of values—yet each has their own personal reasons for showing up to the party.Some may participate for social, emotional, or spiritual reasons.

Some may be indulging passions, pursuing particular goals, or exploring new ideas. Determining your constituent segments remains vitally important, but you must do more than pump out perfectly tuned communications.

Your brand program should advance opportunities for people to interact among themselves along those resonant wavelengths, and to help them realize their personal visions—however big or small. Doing so strengthens the community around your brand, in turn building your brand.

Don’t try to control the cluster.

People that cluster around your brand will most certainly talk. In fact, you want them to, and it’s far better if conversations are within earshot. If people are critical of your brand, wouldn’t you rather hear it firsthand? Rather than seeking to control or edit the dialogue, embrace it and engage in it.

Peoples’ criticism may in fact be spot on (Domino’s anyone?) and your brand community could become a crowd-sourcing tool for improvements and bold, new ideas. Rather than control, seek to steward those who cluster around your brand by providing context and content that maximize engagement.

By putting people first—really putting people first—marketers can truly bring brands to life. More than just putting a “community” button on your website, more than just amassing 4,000 followers on Twitter, building your brand around people means a strategic shift in thinking.

It requires literally decreasing the distance between you and those who matter most, listening, engaging, and not being afraid of what you might find—because it’s likely true, and it might be the spark of a great new idea.

How is your brand putting people first?

[Originally posted at Marketing profs]

You’ve done your homework and designed a strategic brand program. You’ve found insight through research, learned what makes your constituents tick, established a strong brand foundation, developed a framework for messages, and evolved a system for visual expression—all necessary to help your organization realize its goals and vision.

Now it’s time to build.

An Architecture of Action

So how do you translate your planning and strategy into tactics that drive desired outcomes?Although you can define your brand in a corner conference room, it doesn’t really exist unless your constituents “get it.”

For that to happen, you need communications—both outbound and inbound, articulated and acted out. And those communications must address the needs and opportunities presented by target communities; they must help people see their personal brand in the context of your corporate one; and they must get the right information to the right people, in the right format, at the right cost, at the right time.A “communications architecture” is your best tool for planning and then executing the communications most likely to achieve those goals—and eliminating the ones that aren’t.

Continue reading at Marketing profs >>

[Originally posted at Marketing Profs]

Know whom you serve, and why they care.

Much more than just “your customers” or “your audience,” your constituents are all the people for whom your work is meaningful—the internal and external populations whose interest, participation, and advocacy are important to your stability, growth, and long-term success.

Many of these people know you through your products, programs, and services—or because they’re staff or volunteers—but some know you only through how you communicate and through the reviews, posts, tweets, and comments of others.

Whether you’re a for-profit or nonprofit enterprise, your goal is to have relationships with your constituents—to move beyond transactions. But as your organization evolves and engages in more areas of endeavor (it’s rare for a business to do one thing these days), the challenge is to start and nurture more relationships than ever before.

Doing so successfully requires that you have two-way conversations with your constituents—dialogues. It’s not enough to push out communications from headquarters. To have conversations that are meaningful, you need to know who your constituents really are. You need to learn what they care about, what moves them, what keeps them up at night, how they like to be communicated with, and what your value to them is—or could be.

Read more at Marketing Profs >>

[Originally posted at 'Round the Square]

Back in December I posted an entry entitled, “What carbs can teach us about branding.” With the holiday feasts around the corner, I thought it would be good fun to walk through brand relationship strategies using snack isle brands as examples.

To briefly recap, businesses—for-profit and nonprofit alike—typically manage a family of products and programs, and the perceived relationships between those offerings and the “master” brand matters. That’s ultimately how credit and equity accrue in the right places.

With that in mind, snack isle mainstays Mars, Nabisco, Pepperidge Farms, and Entenmann’s provided a clear set of examples to help frame thinking around brand relationships, which exist on a continuum from product-focused to master brand-focused.

So what does this mean in the world of social media?

Social media provides marketers and brand stewards myriad new opportunities to engage those that matter most in meaningful, two-way dialogues. Some say the price you pay for this increased engagement is a loss of control. While you can’t control the conversations, you can work to control the brand context in which they take place.

Social media involves people just as much as programs and products. How you connect to and leverage the power of your people will play a huge role in your success online. And with brand diffusion a continuing threat, managing how your social media outposts are positioned verbally and visually is vital.

Continue reading at ‘Round the Square >>

Is the social media explosion a “big bang” that’s creating a whole new brand communications paradigm, or is it part of an ongoing evolution where focused brand-building principles are not only still relevant, but more important than ever?

The more things change…

Social media is indeed changing the ways though which brands can be built and expressed––and how they connect with, and influence, key constituencies. But successful brands have always been––and will continue to be––the ones that are understood and valued by their constituents, deliver on their promise, are differentiated in the competitive landscape, and are enthusiastically recommended by engaged brand advocates. No sea change here.

What’s evolving is the nature of brand discourse––from predominately one-way, out-bound organization-to-constituent monologues, to two- and three-way conversations among your organization and constituents, the latter often talking to each other beyond your hearing. This has significant implications around how your advocates proselytize, where you put your brand communication resources, and how you build trust and relationships.

Continue reading at Sametz.com >>