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What about Market Research?

Rosemary Senjem — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 09:21:14 +0000

The Competition

I'm not a big fan of inspecting your "competition" in order to figure out how to "position yourself in the market." It just doesn't make any sense to me.

You are marketing your own company, products, services, information or storage space.

Does this deep investigation of other people, who are not doing exactly what you do, help you share with others who you are and what you do? I think not. I believe it actually gets you started off on the wrong foot altogether.

Your Niche

I am a HUGE fan of getting to know your customer and knowing who you want to have more of as a customer.

It is far more useful to know who you are, your company, your services, products, etc. I'm not talking about being able to recite your company mission or knowing your address. I'm talking about the kind of self knowledge that supports consistency.

And remember consistency is the foundation of integrity. Integrity is what makes your company real. Integrity feels solid, reliable, long lasting, trustworthy. How does self knowledge bring integrity? When you know who you are, you are unlikely to over-promise. You have accountability with yourself. Your customers can count on you to hold yourself accountable for your actions.

Remember when you were a kid and you would whine to an adult and say, "Billy's doing something ..." Do you remember the response? "Quit focusing on him and pay attention to yourself." This advise still applies.

Logos that WORK for You

Rosemary Senjem — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 15:28:34 +0000

When I am working with a client to get to the heart of their business and create a logo, it is rather common to have to first shed all the notions they have about their company that come from looking around them, instead of inside themselves.

They give me generic descriptions of what they do and often describe themselves in comparison to others. When they are talking like this, I learn a lot about these other people's companies and very little about them.

The whole logo session shifts when we focus on how the company feels in the human body. No matter if this person founded the company or adopted it through a merger or acquisition. (If this person feels the life of the company in their body with love and affection, we have the right person in the logo session.)

When we access the visceral experience of the company, we begin to get to know this spiritual entity residing with the person. And then we get to the essence of it. That is the stuff of great logos.

For more info about logos and what they need to do for you, read articles in the Reference Materials category.

Handling a Name or Logo Transition

Rosemary Senjem — Sat, 05 Nov 2005 15:29:30 +0000

Let's imagine you've had a certain look for quite some time and you want a change. Now let's add the challenge of having been in business for a while already. If you go radical with your change ? color your hair bright pink, shift from contacts to glasses and change your wardrobe completely ? most people won't know who you are. In fact they may find you a bit scary and untrustworthy and avoid you altogether. If you make changes that enhance your inner beauty ? really bring out your personality and make you sparkle ? you will be even more recognizable than you were before. Everyone will say, "Oo! La La! Mon Cheri! What have you been up to, Darling?" Now let's say that coloring your hair bright pink, shifting from contacts to glasses, and changing your wardrobe completely DO enhance your inner beauty. Yet you know that to go that far in one fell swoop will leave you un-recognizable to anyone who knew you before. What you have on your hands are some "Transition Issues." You have decided to change your name ? maybe a little, maybe a lot. This is a big change no matter how small it may seem that demands some attention to transition. Add to that a change in logo (and possibly color scheme) and we've got an identity crisis on our hands. Why is this a crisis? Everyone in your group or company likes the idea of changing this much. ?? Think of it this way. The members of your group or company are like the family of the person going through the change. They are internal if you will. The customers, vendors, partners, legislatures, insurance companies, professional associations, etc. with whom your organization needs to work are external. At home, we can wear our favorite pajamas amongst our family, feeling really good about it. However, we wouldn't dream of going to Capitol Hill or presenting ourselves on a stage that way. The trick is to wear something that:

feels as genuine and full of who we are as our favorite pajamas,
looks like a million bucks,
is appropriately impressive to the folks we need to impress,
AND is recognizable to everyone who knew us before.

Here are the ingredients to create a workable solution that can actually take you to the next level of maturity in branding. Much like creating a soup from scratch, you create a time table for the transition made of these ingredients. Decide how much of each ingredient to use and for what stretch on your time table.

Pairing: This means using BOTH the new and the old, side-by-side to show the relationship on EVERYTHING: web site, stationary, business cards, email, brochures, newsletter, etc. Shape: You can decide that the new logo needs to have some similar shape to the one you have now.
Colors: You can decide that the new brand needs to use the same color scheme in place now, even defining it more specifically.
Announcements: You can advertise the transition heavily and use it as an opportunity to get your message out anew.
Tag Line: You can keep the taglines currently in use with your old name and apply them to the new name.
Branding Policy: If not already outlined, you can map out the old branding practices, based upon historical experience and then craft a new branding policy that consciously works to strengthen the organization.

We are never invisible. That is total fantasy. In reality we show up consciously or unconsciously. No matter how conscious and conscientious we are, one simple fact remains: There are many people unknown to you who indeed know and talk about you.