brand Archives - Hostetler Public Relations

A client wants a new brand/image/facelift. They hire professionals (either employees or consultants) to give them an honest opinion and guide them so they look great with a solid message—the foundation of their marketing program. Once they see and read the brand graphics and message, respectively, they want to go back to where they were. They resist the advice they’re paying to hear. The reason: they say people recognize their colors, fonts, logos and more. But do they?

Change is hard, but the fact is company owners that want to build a brand might be missing their target market. They might be marketing to themselves, not their target audience. Here are tips to avoid influencing yourself … and instead influencing your audience to buy:

1. Get other’s opinions.

Sometimes you get so close to the brand, you forget what’s important and have a hard time deciding on logos, graphics and language. Stop and ask people you trust for their opinion. Most of the time, there’s consensus. That certainly makes the decision a lot easier and helps to discover if the current brand/logo still resonates with your buyers.

2. Watch your language.

We all have our own industry language. Do the people you’re trying to influence to buy from you understand what you’re saying or are you talking a different language? Are you talking to yourself? You’d be surprised.

3. Trust that the people around you want you to win, too.

Wringing your hands and thinking it over for weeks on end as professional colleagues and consultants work to move marketing forward and create ROI simply delays the process to increase sales—the net effect of marketing. TRUST. Everyone is on the same team. They all want to win. They all want to see ROI.

4. Clean out the clutter.

Resist the urge to tell every detail of your story to make the sale. It can become overwhelming for the reader/listener. Clean out the clutter. Get to the emotion and tell your story—simply. Hit the high points for the prospective buyer and tell more details as you go.

5. Listen to the professionals.

Marketing communications employees and consultants are being paid to give sound advice. Listen to their opinions and recommendations.

I confess! I’m a geek. I read promotional materials, FAQs, website copy and more. I like to see how people write and couple words together for maximum effect and impact for their brand. Do they really say who they are or do they use buzz words? Alliteration is one of my favorite devices to use in writing… for those scratching their heads that’s when you put words together that start or end with the same letters. It makes an elegant effect.

Anyway… because I like reading various words and copy, I tend to notice words and phrases that are overused. One of my favorite pet peeves is the word… solution. Everyone has one… and apparently every company thinks we have a problem they can solve with theirs. For every person I tell about this phenomenon, they come back to me within days and say, “Wow. You were right. Everyone’s got a solution.”

I also don’t like words and phrases that are under delivered, which could go one of two ways.

1) You’re talking to yourself. Too many business owners write their own copy for letters, brochures and other promotional stuff. They end of writing in their own jargon… often customers and prospects don’t understand what they’re reading and why they should care.

Look around my website. It’s designed to make fun of the words the public relations profession uses. We talk about “pitching” the media. That means selling them a story idea. Not throwing a ball for them to hit. And yes, I do find myself using that word in client meetings. YIKES.

2) Your words represent the real company. There are many business owners who work hard to write their own promotional materials, but realize they don’t know what to say. So they make it up. Problem is when customers are asked if their statements are really true… they find out the truth– maybe not. The word use PR people use there… authentic. Is your brand authentic to your customer? On the flip side some business leaders are humble and don’t want to talk about their expertise and/or successes. It’s ok to talk about yourself.

So what’s the “solution” to these problems? If you’re a non-PR person reading this blog… it’s called messaging. Us PR people are great at helping companies through research methods to determine what’s real and what’s not. It’s so important to weave a real story and run it through every piece of communication the same way. It’s just like using your logo and company colors the same way and place on every piece of marketing material printed. It’s the words that help communicate your image as much as the graphic image. And that’s why I love words!

Who are you marketing to–yourself or your prospects?

Words make your brand