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Here's a selection of our latest articles on marketing, design and digital issues, and our latest news. If you would like to add an opinion or join the debate please do leave a comment. If you would like to find out more please click the link to the author.
Short marketing workshops - book now!
Do you feel that the last few months have been more of an uphill climb than a walk in the park? And does that mean that you've not been able to think about your development needs as much as you wanted or fit them in around your busy schedule?
If so, you'll be pleased to hear about some great BITE SIZED training which will fit neatly into your day, and help you update some of those important skills. Priced from £99 for a morning workshop, you'll find this a great value way to boost your performance.
The workshops are brought to you by expert marketing training consultant Liz Barnes (DipM FCIM) in association with Preview, a specialist marketing company with 18 years' experience helping businesses to achieve their sales and marketing ambitions.
For full details visit our Training page.
We provide in-house training for many of our clients, a great cost effective solution at prices from £375 for a half day and £650 for a full day.* With our extensive marketing training experience, we can bespoke courses to meet your needs and offer a range of alternative courses. Please email training@preview.co.uk or call 01273 834434.
*Price excludes travel expenses at standard rail travel or 45p per mile. Training rates apply where training is delivered within a 60 mile radius of our Head Office.
'Brand Me'
The last five years have heralded the era of ‘public me’! We can’t help it – we already exist in the e-cosphere (have you ever tried Googling your name?).
And there are those who long to publish on every available platform and those who despise such flagrant self-publicity as pure vanity.
Given that these days, your personal brand profile (or ‘reputation score’) has become an important way in which you determine the impact you make – have you considered how you are going to influence what is seen or said about you?
Features of a brand
Here are some things we know about brands:
- Brands have meaning
- They are well recognised
- Brands have a personality
- Brands are attractive
- They command a price premium
- They represent a short-cut for quality
- Brands have long-term value
Is this true of you? What is your personal brand and what does it communicate about you?
Selling your service
The way in which we ‘place’ our trust in professionals has altered in the 21st Century, and whilst credentials and word-of-mouth reputation are still key factors, the mechanisms for developing these are now more profoundly linked to our ‘online reputation / publicity’ than ever before.
Top 10 criteria for selecting a service provider
The following list provides a useful checklist to assess your own performance but it is NOT in any particular order because of the differences between services:
- Previous experience (industry and functional)
- Qualifications and membership of professional associations
- Understanding of nature of problem / sensitivity to needs
- Testimonials of previous satisfied clients
- Personality and integrity
- Fees incl. transparency
- Clarity about deliverables and results
- Communication and presentation skills
- Responsiveness
- Quality, reach and accessibility of published material
We have long-standing experience with several of our clients who sell their expertise as a service (lawyers, insolvency practitioners, recruitment consultants, accountants, academic professors, hairdressers, HR consultants, trainers, teachers to name a few) and all have to consider how they express ‘brand me’. Typically, one of their biggest challenges is how to produce high quality published material that reaches the right target audience and is cost effective.
Quality, reach and accessibility of published material (content management)
Your brand reputation is now being determined in part by what you choose to publish – from Twitter posts, to LinkedIn discussions, blogs, newsletters, videos on You Tube or podcasts on your website, Q&A forums, case studies, white papers or even webinars. Whilst this list can feel overwhelming, we have successfully helped many of our clients develop and implement a media rich ‘content’ plan – and often it is just one small step at a time, helping them to reach new clients and influencers.
If you don’t have the time to plan, write or publish – but you are keen to develop your brand presence, give me a call on 01273 834434 to have a no-obligation chat as to how we can help.
Extract from presentation by Liz Barnes to Institute of Consulting – 21st June 2011
Refreshing the Parts Others Cannot Reach
Q. What links the Mars Bar, Hallmark Cards and accountants Ernst and Young?
A. As brands they have all celebrated their 100th birthday in recent years. And they are all successful and relevant to buyers today.
Quick quiz
Can you put the following brands in chronological order from the oldest to the youngest? Some are over 150 years old and going strong! We’ll send a bottle of fine wine to the first person to email us the correct answer at hello@preview.co.uk
- Santander
- Hamleys
- Cow and Gate
- Douwe Egberts
- Ikea
- Ericcson
And the bonus question…which brand used the ‘Refreshing the Parts Others Cannot Reach’ strapline?
In the eye of the beholder
Whilst beauty (and visual identity) is always judged by the beholder, it is also true that preferences evolve, almost unnoticeably over time as fashion moves on. You only need to dig out a few snaps from five years ago for you to see how clothes and hairstyles have changed.
When it comes to visual identity, branding and styling, we need to be confident that we still stand out from the crowd and that we are still communicating the messages and values we want our customers to hear. Sometimes, a very simple refresh of a logo is all that is needed, other times, more radical changes are required.
Not just about the cosmetics
The need for a brand re-fresh can come about in a variety of different ways. Sometimes there is a strategic imperative, other times it is tactical. Perhaps the owner of the company has simply got bored with the current logo or your competitor has just launched a stunning new website.
We work closely with our clients to clarify the rationale behind a brand re-fresh, ensuring that it achieves their key objectives.
Here are just some reasons why our clients’ have asked us to update their visual identity:
- Developing a new strategic direction
- New competitors or existing competitors’ redesign
- Wanting to reach new clients
- Serving a new market or new product development
- Awareness that the branding is looking tired particularly versus today’s styling
- Moving to a new technology platform e.g. a content management system
- New name or ownership
- Building a corporate image from which to conduct new PR and marketing
- Need for new signage, equipment or vehicles
And it can be helpful to have a third party involved in the process who is prepared to challenge the premise on which you’ve decided to go for a brand re-fresh. Sometimes we recommend research first, perhaps ascertaining your current position in the marketplace versus your competitors or what your clients currently think about you as an organisation and your service.
Metamorphosis
The Starbucks case study is a great example of how a brand evolves. A radical early step followed by a subtle brand development, then recently, a big change with the removal of the brand name. This was a confident move on behalf of Starbucks, sending a clear and strong message (following Apple and Nike’s lead).
If a brand’s identity is no longer determined by the visuals of the brand name, it has evolved to a state that is almost untouchable.
So if you identified with any of the reasons for a re-fresh above, whether it is strategic or tactical, we would be delighted to have a no obligation chat with you about how we can help design your visual identity and translate this onto any of your marketing materials.
Protecting Your Brand
Building value
Just 3 months ago, Google’s brand was valued at a cool $111.5 billion. But what is fascinating about the Google brand, is that its typography changes almost daily and is indeed recognisable without any lettering – remember the outstanding tribute Google made to Les Paul?
Your brand should become your customer’s belief in what you stand for as a company. A strong brand enables you to charge a little bit more, be sold through more channels and be the product / service of choice because of its quality, reliability and reputation. This ‘little bit more’ spread across a wider customer base, who have a higher loyalty translates into incremental future cash flow i.e. building brand equity. And this is one of the best ways to create long-term value for shareholders.
What to protect
A picture paints a thousand words and your logo offers an immediate link to your organisation, with all of the positive emotions associated with it. So you need to think about how to protect your brand – the name, logo, design features, strapline to prevent it being copied or misused by another organisation.
In terms of visual identity, you can think of the brand as composing these different elements, all of which need protecting;
- The brand name. Made up names (e.g. Google) are more protectable than everyday names (e.g. Apple, Orange, Blackberry). But you will need to check that the name hasn’t been previously registered, and indeed that it makes sense and conveys the right messages to your customers.
- Strapline. An important way to summarise the key buying proposition and can be incorporated in the brand / logo design.
- Logo. This may or may not use the brand name and is an icon which is consistently used wherever the product / service or company name is depicted.
- Styling. Colours, fonts and layout all add to your visual identity. It is better to use a Brand Manual to avoid the inevitable desire of staff to edit these elements as they see fit.
How to protect
Here at Preview, we have teamed up with Future Copyright to help make it easier for you to protect your visual identity. The more supporting proof of your brand, logo, and its use that you can evidence the better.
Historically, the only way was to formally lodge or register your brand with a professional agent / safe-keeper such as a bank, document archive or 'copyright offices'. As copyright, by definition, comes into being automatically, you are not required to register your material at all but in doing so, you now have more solid formal proof that can be legally evidenced if required.
Registering your copyright by the ways suggested above, although effective, can be archaic, laborious, and expensive. Although you get a certificate of your registration, your material remains locked away in a dead end, black box filing system – to the point that you may not exactly remember what the material was you filed in the first place! What’s more you may be charged to obtain a copy of your materials and some file services will periodically re-charge you a subscription cost you to keep your files on record.
Future Copyright offers a far more efficient versatile solution that puts powerful authentication and management of your copyrighted works completely under your full retention and control with direct interfacing for licensing and publishing – all at a fraction of the price of standard services. From £1.25 per file it is also cheaper than sending your work you yourself in an envelope!
If you’d like to give Future Copyright a try we can offer you a special promo code that will give you 5 free credits, just contact Liz@preview.co.uk or 01273 834434 to find out more about how we can help you copyright your brand.
'Spot' the Snow Leopard
Have you seen a snow leopard meandering down your street recently? Probably not a real one, but you may well have seen one of these...
Preview helped sister company PVL (specialist manufacturer of vehicle livery) with the design of this stunning livery for AVC Group. PVL has printed and applied the graphics to a fleet of over 300 vans so far nationwide. We are so excited about this powerful branding that we want to share it with everyone!
Help Save the Snow Leopard
If you spot one of these vans, let us know via Twitter /email and why not just take a quick photo and post it for all to see? #spotthesnowleopard or email it to us spot@preview.co.uk
Sponsoring ‘Spot’ the Snow Leopard
When we reach 100 tweets / emails – we’ll sponsor a snow leopard and if you send us your details, we’ll enter you into the prize draw to receive the sponsorship in your name for which you’ll receive a cuddly toy leopard, an adoption certificate, a photo fact book and updates during the year.
Your Brand Reaching More People
Vehicle wrapping is becoming a very popular way of advertising brands whether aimed at consumer or B2B. From just a few vehicles to large fleets, this is a cost effective medium for advertising in front of a wide audience in prime locations and as you can see – can be quite spectacular.
Easy for the Experts
Vehicle wrapping is actually quite a technical process, requiring specialist design, materials, inks, printing equipment and of course expert fitting. PVL has years of experience in manufacturing and applying vehicle livery using the best fitters. So like all experts… they make it seem easy. You’ll be surprised at just how little it costs for such massive exposure for a mobile advertising campaign.
Just call us on 01273 834434 to chat about the options for you.
And don’t forget to start tweeting those photos! #spotthesnowleopard
Making your mark at trade shows and exhibitions
Having worked with us previously to produce a number of smaller banners, the marketing team at the Financial Management Centre came to us when they needed a new large format pop-up banner too. To be used at exhibitions for new client acquisition and franchisee recruitment, the banner needed to advertise the TFMC parent brand as well as the three services they provide; The Local Bookkeeper, The Online Bookkeeper and The Local Accounts Department.
We designed and delivered the final result within their tight deadlines ready for a forthcoming franchise exhibition. From our initial design concept the final artwork was produced and signed off and then given to our supplier who we worked with closely in order to ensure a high quality and accurate finished end result.
Are you exhibiting this year?
If you are exhibiting this year, have you got the right materials to make the most of the sales opportunity? We have produced a range of large format exhibition materials from simple pull up banners to stands like the one above for TFMC, to posters, exterior banners and even full size wall artwork. With design support from us, our sister company PVL produced large backdrops for their own exhibition stand which featured a beach buggy with its own custom vehicle livery on display!
Find out how to get customers on your stand at your next exhibition visit our design page here and don't hesitate to get in contact if you have any exhibition requirements.
You can find out more about the work we have done for the Financial Management Centre in our Portfolio section, including Website design, digital personalisation and email marketing.
Are you adapting to your audience?
In a recent survey conducted by EA, 6 in 10 under-25s thought Facebook founder, Mark Zuckerberg had a more important impact on history than Sir Isaac Newton and Martin Luther King. This clearly shows young people’s strong relationship with online communication and social activities.
The way young people interact with technology is constantly evolving:
With 500 new mobile devices and 100 new tablets being launched this year, so are their online attitudes and habits. Not only do they enjoy communicating with their peers, they’re also open to communicating with brands. Branded apps such as Barclay Card’s Waterslide app, with 10,000,000 downloads, are massive business and encourage repeated consumer engagement.
Engage with change:
Teens and those in their early 20s are a highly sought after target audience due to their relatively high rate of disposable income. Brands need to earn this audience’s attention and meet them where they already are: online and on their mobile devices.
- The average student spend is £185 a week
- Over 650 million people access the internet only with their mobile phone
- 18% of iPhone users are on their handset for at least 4 hours a day
Soon, the Mobile Generation will have more buying power than all other generations combined - a fact your brand can’t afford to ignore. We can create an app to meet and engage your audience on a platform they are rarely without.
Make yourself available:
Apps are commonly used by young people as a method of passing the time, perhaps when there is a lack of Internet: on the train, in a lecture even. They can be practical tools aiding the user with tasks. It is estimated that approximately 125 years worth of Angry Birds is played every day and that 70% of consumers having already downloaded a branded app.
With this high level of consumer involvement with applications, it is clear that there is a large audience ready to be engaged. Through a functional or entertaining app, a brand can ensure a constant and positive association as well as a deeper relationship with its audience.
How an app can help your brand:
In education, apps can be used to assist in many aspects of student life, for example:
- Providing an accessible and offline prospectus
- Maps, timetables, jobs board, events and information for current students
- Open day guides for prospective students
- Near by attractions and offers, as the location can be as important as the faculty
- FAQs and a help forum directly linked to faculty staff
All of which will enhance the student experience, encouraging new applications and recommendations from current students.
Let us help you:
Young consumers are bombarded by many opportunities to explore and decisions to make. A branded app could ensure your target audience chooses you over a competitor by making you readily available in their preferred medium. Here at Preview, we recently created the Careers 4U App, commissioned by East Sussex County Council, which has been designed to get young people between the ages of 14 and 18 to start thinking about the wide range of careers available to them once they leave school or college. Take a look to see how we have engaged the consumer through this app and increased the presence of Careers 4U. Contact us so we can do the same for you.
East Sussex County Council Careers4U App hits the iTunes App Store
The newest addition to our growing digital portfolio has gone live on
the iTunes App Store after passing Apple's strict
development guidelines. The 'Careers 4U' App,
commissioned by East Sussex County Council, has been designed and
developed to get
young people between the ages of 14 and 18 to start thinking about
the wide
range of careers available to them once they leave
school or college. The iOS application is free to download and
use so if you have an iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch, please make sure you take a look at the Careers4U App now.
We're continually focused on keeping up-to-date with the growing
possibilities that electronic based applications bring to our
clients and the creative industry in general. Be sure to keep
up-to-date by coming back to our site regularly as it makes for some interesting reading.
The Future of Connectivity
Recently I attended the 2011 Internet World show at London's Earls Court. Among the usual array of stands from various SEO, hosting and email marketing software agencies, were a series of key note speeches from some of the worlds leading online technology businesses. One that caught my eye in particular was a seminar by CISCO's CEO Phil Smith about the future of connectivity and 'the Internet of Things'.
As we steer toward a future in which all our objects and environments are connected we will eventually find ourselves living a technologist’s dream, with everything part of the network. But how will people experience and interact with it? Will users see it as a logical step in the evolution of the WorldWide Web? Or is it going to be understood as something radically different from anything we have seen before? In a modest way, the 'Internet of Things' is already here. During the second quarter of 2010, more than twice as many connected devices as people were added by carriers in the US. Different kinds of gadgets and gizmos are gradually turning into hybrid devices that are services, as much as they are physical objects.
These days, the pads and pods - in all their different shapes and forms - are also expected to be the portals to an integrated ecosystem of services and applications changing the way people work, learn and play. And the trend is spreading to devices such as TV's, hi-fi equipment and even cars. Is this the beginning of a new era of innovative, intertwined, combined products systems and services that utilize the power of the networks? Perhaps, but first there are some problems to address:
The Internet has run out of Internet addresses… sort of. Perhaps you’ve heard the news: the last blocks of IPv4 Internet addresses have been allocated. The fundamental underlying technology that has powered Internet Protocol addresses since the Internet’s inception will soon be exhausted. When IPv4 was set up with a capacity for 4 billion unique addresses, the technologists of the time could not have conceived they would need to revise the protocol within their lifetime. Now, a new technology will take its place. IPv4′s successor is IPv6; a system that will offer far more numerical addresses reaching units that sound like something from an Arthur C Clark novel (approximately 340 Undecillion*) or 3.4×1038. 'If you think of IPv 4 as a golf ball then IPv6 is the sun'.
*Wikipedia
So what does this mean?
The internet has undergone a series of revolutions in it's short history. A business revolution took place early in it’s inception, in which companies realised the potential benefits of an online presence. Next, the power and focus shifted towards the consumers with information instantly and freely available on an unprecedented scale. Now, with 500 million people moving into cities of the future, the world is urbanising and the internet is set to undergo a new industrial revolution. When you talk about the future, you can talk about smart, connected communities. Intelligent urbanization.
Such large scale urbanisation will inevitably lead to numerous social, economic, and environmental issues, but planning with the future of connectivity in mind will give us the opportunity to create intelligent cities with architectures that address everything from green initiatives, smart electricity, productivity, government services such as education and health care, intelligent transportation and smart buildings.
Imagine a central command and control that receives information from an integrated Sensor Technology Network which connects every function of the urban environment. Data is combined and aggregated to produce information, which in turn is analyzed and inspected to derive knowledge and insight. This allows city management to collect data about everything going on in an urban environment and retain this information indefinitely.
Not only does this help the city to react in real time to situations and conditions, but also the amount of history stored enables continuous optimization of all city functions, giving the ability to predict the outcomes of events. This includes examples ranging from traffic control to climate and energy management to home automation.
Consistent architecture of information means new applications and features can be added inexpensively and conveniently. Extending the management of cities and service offerings to residents and visitors, these new applications leverage the information provided from sensors, mobile devices, and people interacting with systems in the city. This unlocks the creativity of developers, and provides for new revenue streams and business models to be generated on an ongoing basis.
There are examples of intelligent cities already in place in South Korea’s Sondo City, intelligent motor control in Lisbon, Portugal and intelligent electricity systems in Germany to name just a few.
This new industrial revolution is NOT set to take place in the future. It has already begun.
How to reach more customers via Facebook without buying an Ad
Launching a Facebook page for your company or brand is an extremely powerful tool to connect with new and existing customers. The easiest way to grow your Facebook fan base is with Facebook ads. These are powerful, specific and targeted ads that can increase fans tenfold. Facebook advertising can be very low cost, but if it's not in your marketing budget at the moment here are 5 easy tips you can apply to your Facebook channel immediately.
1. Promote your Facebook page
Make sure your social media is not only an online presence but that you promote it throughout all your traditional media, be that print, radio and TV or email marketing. Encourage customers to interact with your brand or business through these social channels. With social networking accounting for 1 in every 4 minutes spend online you can't afford to not be apart of the conversation.
2. Encourage sharing
We know that the most powerful method to increase growth is via word of mouth, so encourage your fans to share your page on their feed. This can be done by incentivising them with deals if your page grows to a certain number - update with content that will encourage others to share the news or offer. The reach through other people's networks is endless.
3. Engagement
This is key. Keep your page updated 3-4 times a week. Old news is no news. Make sure you keep the updates varied. No one wants to be bombarded with sales messages all the time. Ask questions, be helpful as well as giving fans news on promotions or sales. The most important thing is to be relevant so that fans 'like' or comment on your status - first and foremost to encourage engagement. When fans 'like' or comment on your update then this will be visible in their friends news feed. The more visibility your page gets the more potential customers will see your offers.
4. Respond
Your Facebook page needs monitoring. If someone comments, or posts on your Facebook page respond to it immediately. News on Facebook moves so quickly and you don't want to miss the chance for interaction with a customer or potential customer. If no immediate reply is required then at least acknowledge the post by liking it or simply thank them for the mention. This shows to your other fans that you are active and engaged with your page and you are listening to them.
5. Measure
As with all marketing activity, the most important aspect is the measurement. Make sure you measure and review your Facebook account regularly. Monitor the amount of likes and dislikes when making posts. Monitor the posts that work and don't work. With this data you can then adjust and fine tune your type of posts and the frequency.
Facebook is a great way of reaching new consumers, but social media also continues to grow in B2B markets too. In both arenas it's a low-cost route to reach new customers when used cleverly.
If you would like advice on which platforms are relevant to your marketing, creating content or managing advertising call us on 01273 834434.
