A couple of months ago I gave a workshop on my topic “Brand as Business: How Companies Drive Business Growth by Operationalizing Their Brands.” Feedback was so positive I thought I’d get a brief video of excerpts made to share with my readers here. Please check it out and let me know what you think (run time: approx. 8 minutes).
denise lee yohn brand as business workshop from Denise Yohn on Vimeo.
Earlier this week I posted some key takeaways from the keynote speakers and panelists at the Southern California Business Growth Conference. As a panelist on the marketing track, one of the things I said during the “Brand Implementation & Impact: Bring your Brand to Market” session seemed to spark some interest of its own – and so I thought I’d say more about it here.
Attention: fast food marketers – you’re wasting half of your advertising!
But I’m not talking about the waste that John Wanamaker was referring to in his famous quip about not knowing which half of his advertising was being wasted. I’m talking about the average of 48% of people who say there’s a big difference between what you promise in your advertising and what they experience at your restaurants.
I’m working with a client to develop a new brand platform and thought I’d share one of the tools I used in my engagement – Brand Obituaries.
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Later today I will be presenting the new strategic brand platform to the Board of Directors for an organization I’ve been working with. I thought I’d take this opportunity to share my approach to brand strategy.
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Right before the holidays, MarketingSherpa released its “2010 Social Media Marketing Benchmark Report.” 
The report indicated that “improving brand or product reputation” and “increasing brand or product awareness” did not rank highly in the list of social media objectives targeted and measured by U.S. marketers. This confirms my own findings that companies are overlooking the importance of using social media tools for strategic, proactive brand-building. (more…)
When it comes to mishaps, most companies seem to have adopted Discovery’s song “It’s Not My Fault” as their anthem – but it would be so much better for them to follow Akon’s lead and plainly state “Sorry, Blame It on Me.”
To be clear, I’m not talking about issuing apologies for the sweeping mistakes companies have made for, say, running our economy into the ground — nor about mea culpas for the indiscretions of executives with poor personal judgment. I don’t even mean the situations in which a company clearly screwed things up for a customer, like failing to provide a promised service or selling a defective product. By now, companies who haven’t figured out the importance of an appropriate apology in these situations are just helpless and hopeless.
I’m talking about saying “sorry” for little things – the millions of seemingly-forgettable occurrences that happen every day as companies go about their business and end up inconveniencing, or disappointing, or causing some trouble for their customers.
I recently had two experiences that exemplify the right and wrong way to handle these apologies.
While you are reading this, I’m attending the Consumer Electronics Show. 
I’ll be meeting with clients and prospects, attending educational sessions, and walking the show floor — the last activity is one that I always find both exciting and frustrating. Exciting because there always so many new and cool gadgets and technologies to check out; frustrating because so many of these new items tend to blend together into one big, indistinguishable, unmemorable morass of technology. The brands suffer from the lack of remarkable and sustainable differentiation. (more…)
I read with great interest an article in SmartBusiness about Red Mango and the yummy yogurt chain’s founder, president, and CEO of Red Mango, Dan Kim. 
I’m fascinated by the frozen yogurt chains that have emerged on the cultural landscape in last 5 years. Pinkberry has probably gotten the most coverage in the press, with its high design aesthetic and celebrity fans, but there are plenty of others in the game including Red Mango. The category is very crowded with operators of all sizes competing in a relatively small niche with punch cards and discount days. Building brand awareness and shoring up a loyal customer base are particular challenges, which is in part why I’m so interested in the category (liking fro yo also has something to do with it too!)
In the SB piece, Dan explains his thinking and approach to building the Red Mango brand. Clearly, this is a guy who gets it. He believes in the power of his brand and he actively nurtures and protects it. Here are my reactions to his comments, along with some suggestions for how he might ensure his brand-building efforts continue to be successful as the chain grows. (more…)