VerveCast

A few weeks ago, I stumbled upon a glorious new product at Pick ’n Save—Peanut Butter Cheerios. Previously I hadn’t been buying Cheerios because I thought the flavors were bland. But I just had to check out this new one. And let me tell you… ah-mazing. I was so happy with my new find that I’ve been eating them every day since. That was, until yesterday.

After work last night, I once again found myself scanning the cereal aisle for a box of my favorite new treat, and what do I discover? Drum roll, please… Dulce de Leche Cheerios! I could not believe my eyes. (Side note: I have a minor obsession with Dulce de Leche after last year’s trip to Puerto Rico in which I found myself eating it daily.) Needless to say, I’m in heaven.

Okay, enough discussion about breakfast cereal. What these recent findings reinforced for me is the importance of expanding upon a brand and its offerings. Yes, it is essential to stay true to your company and product, but in certain cases it is just as important to reinvent yourself from time-to-time. This will keep your current customers interested and draw potential customers back to your product. Now, what can you do to put a new spin on your brand?

As a recently engaged woman, I’ve been doing a lot of research within the wedding industry. And I have to admit, the amount of terrible marketing in the field has been fairly shocking. Some examples…

(Note: these observations/suggestions could easily transfer to many other industries.)

Photography

The wedding venue my fiancé and I chose is beautiful, charming and rustic… but you’d never guess from the photography on its website. Photography should be the Number One sales tool for wedding venues. How else will potential clients get a feel for your space and envision themselves choosing your facility for one of the most important days of their lives? (Luckily, I heard about my venue from a trusted friend, or I may have missed out completely.)

Salespeople

I attended a bridal show a few weeks ago and encountered the worst salesperson I have met in my entire life. As I approached his booth, where he was sitting on the table, he immediately told me how much he didn’t want to be there. He then asked where my wedding was to be held. After I told him, his head immediately dropped. “Not there,” he says. “You should consider choosing another venue.” Not something an excited bride-to-be wants to hear mere hours after she signs her contract for the venue. The guy goes on to explain that they don’t like the place because it’s up on a hill, it’s hard to get equipment to, it’s on the smaller side, yada, yada, yada. Really, dude? Make sure you keep your employees in check. That first impression of your company could easily make or break the sale.

Websites

Or shall I say, lack thereof. I’ve looked up multiple vendors only to find their profiles on YellowPages.com, and nowhere else. Hello! Get yourself a website. Hire a freelancer, ask a friend for help. Anything to have some presence in cyber space. That’s where I’m doing most of my research, and I’m assuming most other brides are doing the same.

Taglines

This is a more minor one, but just something I noticed. Taglines such as “Photography you can live with,” are not the most convincing. Maybe run your tagline by a few people (or anyone, for that matter) before it goes live? This idea also can translate to your company name in general. For example, alliteration using letters that aren’t actually in the correct spelling of what you are trying to say. Often seen with “K”s used in place of “C”s.

As a marketing/communications professional, I might be a bit more sensitive to these blunders than the average bride. However, I think most others in my position would appreciate the improvements.

I like Wisconsin… I’ve lived here my whole life, and I’ve visited plenty of places in our fine state, but not all of them. There’s plenty I’ve never even heard of, but Project Wisconsin is making it fun to discover them.

A lot of them are really well done, and a lot of them are pretty funny… Of course, the best are the ones that are well done and funny.

Here’s a few that stood out for me:

It’s a really fun project, so check out projectwisconsin.com for more…

I come from both the design world, and the publishing world, and with all of that I ended up in the branding world, and now they are all somehow being smashed together, thanks to the Internet… which is another world I’ve been involved with. Worlds Colliding!

But besides all that, check out this great slide deck titled The Practitioner’s Guide to Creating Content Like a Publisher.

A couple Z2 staffers had the opportunity to spend time at the impressive World of Concrete trade show in Las Vegas earlier this week with one of our newer clients, Putzmeister America… and it was a blast.

Over the past few months, we have worked on many projects for the show, including the booth itself, brochures, product videos, press kits, sales sheets, and much more. It was great to see it all come together, and to help Putzmeister stand out at the event. A special thanks to the Z2 staff for the hard work that went into the show, and to our client for a valuable new partnership.