• What can be measured can be improved.
• More eyeballs is not always better.
• Sales are the ultimate metric.
• Vision is more important than tactics.
• Luck is Labor Under Correct Knowledge.
• Marketing is an investment in yourself.
• Different is usually better.
• Belief is more important than strategy.
• Attention is a valuable asset.
• Trust is the ultimate asset.

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Which tastes better, Coco-Coal or generic brand cola?

Does Coke really taste better?

Which is better for doing everyday computing, a 15 inch top-of-the-line Macbook Pro, or an off-brand machine running Windows XP.

Would the average user know the difference if it weren’t for marketing?

Here’s my point… Every industry and every product has a brand.  Whether you like it or not, you’re either name-brand, generic brand, or somewhere in between.

And believe it or not, you do have control over how people view your brand, and it’s not just about how much you charge compared to your competition.

There are dozens of factors that influence how people see your brand.  Here are some things to consider.

1. Is your brand consistent visually? Do you have standard colors that you use on signage, business cards, and other marketing materials?  Do you have standard fonts?  Believe it or not, these visuals work on a subtle level to reinforce awareness in your brand.
2. Is your message consistent? Enjoy, Coke.  Nike, Just Do It.  iPod, 1000 Songs in Your Pocket.  Mazda, Zoom Zoom.  You remember these slogans, because these companies have consistently driven them home.  Just because you’re small doesn’t mean you can’t be just as consistent in your branding.
3. Do you have a clear customer service mission? I don’t like the term ‘mission statement’ because I feel it is a bit vague.  I prefer the term ‘customer service mission’.  This is how you define how you and your employees serve customers.  Everyone in your organization should be aware of this mission.
4. Do you have a consistent communications plan? Are you on Twitter, Facebook, TV, or Radio?  Do you put a lot of stock into email marketing?  There is no right or wrong way to get the message out, but it is extremely important that you are effectively reaching your target market on a regular basis.

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Let’s say you’re an established regional brand. You’ve been in business 10 or 20 years and you operate from a fixed geographic area. You’re generally well-known by most people who use your kind of service, but you’d really like to increase your market share.

Here are some tips to help make that happen using electronic media.

1. Start with your database. Do you know who your best customers are? Are you working to increase permission with your best customers. Step one is definitely to put together a list of the biggest fans of your business or organization.
2. Consider a frequency strategy using email. If you’re not sending frequent email newsletters, you’re probably missing an opportunity. I use MailChimp, because it is a great value and has great features. Consider content that is of real value to your list. Frequency is important, but quality is key.
3. Create a facebook strategy for your employees. If you’ve got sales or customer service employees, they can be a great asset. Chances are they have great relationships with your customers already, so it’s not too big of a jump to allow them to friend customers on Facebook and post relevant content on their pages, providing they are comfortable doing this.
4. Get your business on Twitter. It might seem like Twitter is silly and you won’t understand it at first, but it’s a lot like other tools that don’t make sense at first, but become powerful once you learn to leverage them. Ask your customers if they’re using Twitter and engage with them there. It’s great PR.
5. Get a flexible website. I use wordpress for all my websites, because it makes it easy to incorporate my website into marketing initiatives, because I can easily change content, create signup forms, post blogs, etc. I realize that a new website is a substantial investment, but it is one that will yield a lot of dividends if you learn to leverage it effectively.

Obviously, there’s a lot more strategy that goes with these tools, but this is a great start.

Let’s say you’re an established regional brand.  You’ve been in business 10 or 20 years and you operate from a fixed geographic area.  You’re generally well-known by most people who use your kind of service, but you’d really like to increase your market share.

Here are some tips to help make that happen using electronic media.

1. Start with your database. Do you know who your best customers are?  Are you working to increase permission with your best customers.  Step one is definitely to put together a list of the biggest fans of your business or organization.
2. Consider a frequency strategy using email. If you’re not sending frequent email newsletters, you’re probably missing an opportunity.  I use MailChimp, because it is a great value and has great features.  Consider content that is of real value to your list.  Frequency is important, but quality is key.
3. Create a facebook strategy for your employees. If you’ve got sales or customer service employees, they can be a great asset.  Chances are they have great relationships with your customers already, so it’s not too big of a jump to allow them to friend customers on Facebook and post relevant content on their pages, providing they are comfortable doing this.
4. Get your business on Twitter. It might seem like Twitter is silly and you won’t understand it at first, but it’s a lot like other tools that don’t make sense at first, but become powerful once you learn to leverage them.  Ask your customers if they’re using Twitter and engage with them there.  It’s great PR.
5. Get a flexible website. I use wordpress for all my websites, because it makes it easy to incorporate my website into marketing initiatives, because I can easily change content, create signup forms, post blogs, etc.  I realize that a new website is a substantial investment, but it is one that will yield a lot of dividends if you learn to leverage it effectively.

Obviously, there’s a lot more strategy that goes with these tools, but this is a great start.

Johnnie Firari posted a blog on Smaller Indiana that I found interesting. It contemplates whether content is still king with the great explosion of content that is currently out there.  He made some excellent points and I left this comment in response.

@garyvee is right. Content is valuable is you are the absolute best.  The best way to be the best is to create an extremely narrow niche.  The narrower the niche, the less competition.

Secondly, I think frequency is the most important factor with content.  Short, frequent blasts of content (whether video, podcast, or text), allow viewers to check in with you more often, because it takes less time to consume.

The other half is that obviously content alone is not going to be enough.  You’re going to have to couple your content with a distribution strategy.

I think the main argument that the ‘content is king’ crowd is making is that all the distribution in the world will be wasted on shoddy content that has little inherent value on its own.

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