The Hard Truth About Brand Awareness Advertising

Let’s start by debunking some common myths:

1. Brand awareness is a “goal”.
   Sure, advertising platforms will let you set up your campaign based on this hazy term, but remember: A goal is an exact aim or desired result. Unless your desired result is to spend advertising money with nothing but impressions to show for it, it should probably be avoided.
2. Brand awareness will get us in front of a larger audience.
   This statement in and of itself is true! But a larger audience doesn’t mean more potential business. Don’t let “partner networks” fool you! You don’t need a larger audience. You need the right audience and the right message.
3. Look at all these impressions! What a great campaign.
   Brand awareness is a perfect scapegoat for a failed campaign since there is no metric of success if you’re only concerned with being seen. Impressions don’t tell you about intent. If you don’t learn about intent, you can’t meaningfully improve your advertising efforts, and more likely than not, you’ll be running another brand awareness campaign next quarter with the same lackluster bot impressions.

If you’ve read all of that and you’re still not convinced – if your goal is truly to get the word out about your brand – there are a few common ways that people become aware of brands:

• Astronomical ad budgets (like Coca-Cola)
• Word of mouth (referrals and reviews from existing clients)
• Identity (they are emotionally engaged with the brand)

Plastering your logo all over with vague, broad messaging typically won’t translate into new business. You aren’t connecting with your potential clients by advertising to anyone and everyone. Let’s face it, whatever it is you offer is not meant for just anyone anyway.

“If you want to be more liked,
begin by liking.”

Seth Godin

Quality Over Quantity

So what can you do differently this time around? Shift your priority from quantity to quality. Instead of measuring success by the number of eyeballs your ad attracts, focus on the quality of interactions and the depth of engagement. A handful of loyal customers who truly believe in your brand are worth more than thousands of fleeting impressions.

Focus your efforts on reaching the right audience with the right message at the right time. By better understanding your audience’s needs, desires, and struggles, you can create meaningful connections that resonate on a deeper level.

Here are some pointers for deepening your relationships with your existing and new clients:

1. Collect Feedback Regularly: Use surveys, reviews, feedback forms, and follow-up emails to gather insights about client experiences and uncover trends.
2. Create Buyer Personas: Develop detailed profiles of your ideal clients based on demographic, psychographic, and behavioral traits. This exercise seems silly, but it’s well worth the time commitment vs. repeatedly dumping funds into a failing ad campaign.
3. Encourage Open Communication: Establish channels for clients to provide feedback, ask questions, and share experiences, fostering trust and transparency. This can be through discussion boards or forums, social media (if that’s your thing), or even customer reviews. A 2-star review might be just what you need to adjust the way your business operates for the better.

“People trust those who understand them, and they trust brands that understand them too.”

Donald Miller, Building a StoryBrand

Rethinking Success

While brand awareness may have its time and place, it’s far from what you should be focusing on. Small businesses must avoid the trap of chasing empty metrics and hollow impressions. Instead, focus on building genuine connections with your audience, understanding their needs, and delivering value that sets you apart from the noise. Remember: a message for all is a message for none.

— W

<p>The post Brand Awareness: Stop Wasting Money and Time on Failure first appeared on Soloist Systems.</p>

Business is Not a Competition

It’s essential to recognize that despite appearances, business is not a competition. Business, like life, is fundamentally about collaboration, innovation, and value creation. Adopting a non-competitive mindset allows for a more holistic view of doing business. Instead of constantly looking over your shoulder, focus on fostering partnerships, engaging in ethical practices, and contributing positively to your industry and community.

This approach acknowledges that success is not a zero-sum game. Embracing a mindset of abundance over scarcity encourages businesses to explore new opportunities for growth. By emphasizing collaboration and cooperation, businesses can transcend the limitations imposed by a competitive mindset and unlock untapped potential for collective success. Just as it’s impossible to keep up a white lie, participating in a grift economy is not sustainable in the long run and it does not scale. Sustainable success is built on trust, integrity, and a positive approach to business practices.

Customers value and trust integrity, and this trust becomes the bedrock of long-term relationships. The journey to success involves not only achieving financial milestones but also cultivating a positive reputation that resonates with customers and partners alike. Paradoxically, refusing to engage in competitive business practices will provide you with the biggest edge! A fun side-effect is that you’ll be much happier seeing opportunities rather than obstacles on the horizon.

Your “Competitors” Are Already Winning

Your so-called “competitors” are already winning. They’re winning in their own ways, based on their individual journeys, resources, and perspectives. Attempting to replicate their strategies might lead you down a path that doesn’t align with your business’s core identity. Engaging in competitive analysis can inadvertently shift your focus away from your unique strengths, values, and experiences that make your business distinct.

Rather than fixating on external benchmarks, concentrate on understanding and leveraging your own strengths. Embrace the diversity that makes each business unique, and use that distinctiveness to carve out your niche in the market. Your true competition should be your past self, continuously striving for improvement and growth based on your evolving understanding of your business and its place in the world.

Remember the Pepsi Challenge?

Did Pepsi win by trying to trick people into thinking Pepsi was Coca-Cola?

This was probably far less effective than telling folks Pepsi was simply
“the taste of a new generation”

Chasing Metrics That Matter

In the pursuit of success, it’s easy to get caught up in chasing metrics that seem to define industry leaders. However, focusing on these metrics alone can lead to a misguided sense of accomplishment. Instead, redirect your attention to why you started your business in the first place.

Identify your biggest fans—the loyal customers who resonate with your brand, values, and offerings. Cultivate a customer-centric approach, putting your dedicated supporters at the forefront of your business strategy. By prioritizing those who appreciate and value what you do, you build a community that transcends the transient nature of competitive trends.

In conclusion, success in business is not about outdoing others; it’s about becoming the best version of yourself. A non-competitive mindset, a celebration of uniqueness, and a focus on meaningful metrics will not only set you apart in the market, but also contribute to a sustainable and fulfilling business journey. So how do we redefine success? We can start by shifting our perspective from competition to collaboration and from imitation to innovation.

<p>The post Competitive Analysis: The Wrong Angle first appeared on Soloist Systems.</p>

Why Technology Has No Impact on Creativity

What do I mean by this? Creativity is the process that forms something novel and decidedly valuable. Creativity is when we step outside the role of human-being and into the role of human-becoming. Put more simply, creativity is the courageous act of trying something new. By this definition, creativity is quite literally taking part in the evolution of our species. We try things with the looming threat of failure at every turn, because we have an insatiable (and fool-hearty) curiosity.

The signal-to-noise ratio of genuine creativity vs. information exchange today makes it seem as though people are more creative than ever. Output is certainly at an all-time high! But this barrage of data might actually mean our creative legacy is getting lost in the crowded train station. The information age may be hampering our focus for meaningful information intake, thought, and creative output. Just try counting all the hours you spent on mindless television, social media scrolling, or pointless meme sharing. These are hours our ancestors might well have spent on more meaningful leisure activities, or perhaps their own creative works.

The Secret to Painting Your Masterpiece is You

Think of it this way: would giving everyone a brand new paintbrush in the Renaissance have made everyone of the era a great artist? While there would have absolutely been an impact on the volume of art created, the ratio of paint brushes to artists would have simply skyrocketed. Moreover, there would have been some miserably confused boobs spending a decade realizing they couldn’t paint worth a darn, and well… maybe they didn’t really like it anyhow, but someone gave them a paintbrush, so they figured they may as well master it.

New tools and techniques don’t make experts. Deliberate dedication, discipline and consistency do. There are no shortcuts to quality, and you won’t stumble on it blindly by grasping at everything. The creative act is pure in the sense that no external factors can make it any better or worse. The only lever to pull is the passion, dedication, and hard work of the creator. For any creative work to be truly great, it requires a lot of heart from the creator. It almost requires nothing else, because every other necessary factor will be willed into place by its creator (YOU).

Influencers: The Noisy Bunch

The role of the influencer promises to simplify discovery of that which is novel and valuable (the stuff creativity produces, remember?). And they do it all with a digestible, cultural edge. They also carry the risk of perversion. Even influencers with the purest of hearts eventually need to pay the bills, and sell some of their influence to keep the lights on. Society, as a result, has no choice but to adopt ever-increasing levels of skepticism. One wrong move as an influencer, and you’ve lost the grift. The jig is up. The skeptic moves on to the next talking head.

It’s problematic to assume people will verify every bit of information they take in, but as a collective, our society has a mechanism built in to weed out the BS. Information quickly becomes distorted and diluted as it spreads from its source. Some ideas translate better than others through this permutation, while seemingly insignificant details tend to be truncated. As a result, society adopts fragments of strong ideas from moments of genuine creativity, and forms them together into something either novel and decidedly valuable… or a Trojan horse of novel ideas with the sole purpose of exploitation. Fortunately, the latter example is fed back into this cycle, where the insignificant or irrelevant fragments fall through the sieve and back into the noise.

In short, we should avoid becoming influencers (part of corporate marketing structure) and strive toward being thought leaders. It’s not necessarily about having only original ideas, but it’s about connecting the ideas that resonate with us, trying new things, and sharing what works.

What Can We Do?

Our innate drive toward creativity is our most defining trait as humans. And instinctively, when we stumble across a novel idea which carries the promise of making our lives better, we assign value to it. Unimportant details that don’t meaningfully contribute to a better life or society are weeded out, and thankfully forgotten over time. The creative cycle feeds into itself and plants the seeds for future generations.

Don’t lose sight of our societal responsibility to make life better for those that come after us. While it’s typically not lucrative to be a pioneer, it’s by pioneering ideas and trying new approaches to old problems that we push society forward. There are more powerful motivators than fortune or prestige, and fortunately, they seem to be a part of our DNA. Our creativity is the fuel that has helped us overcome countless obstacles and hardships. The obstacles and tragedies ahead are inevitable, but the resourceful and creative spirit of mankind will continue to guide us safely through the ages. What’s one creative act you can express today to help drive society in the right direction?

Here’s to the next cycle of human creativity!
— ws

<p>The post Creativity Matters: Today’s Urgent Need for Meaningful Content first appeared on Soloist Systems.</p>

Something to Sell

• Product or Service: First and foremost, you must have a product or service that adds value to customers’ lives. This should be something that meets a specific need or solves a problem.
• Quality Matters: Ensure that your product or service is of high quality. Customer satisfaction is crucial for repeat business and positive word-of-mouth marketing. Leave the budget selling to the big companies that can afford to have their ideas flop. You’ll beat them every time in quality if you make quality your focus.
• Differentiation: Consider what makes your offering unique in the market. Identifying your unique selling proposition (USP) will help you stand out from the competition crowd. (life is not a competition) Again, this is an opportunity for you to weave authenticity into your public offering. Who are you? Why are you doing this? Your customers care about these things!

Someone to Sell To

• Target Audience: Define your target audience clearly. Understand their needs, interests, pain points, and preferences. This information will guide your marketing efforts.
• Market Research: Conduct thorough market research to identify potential customers. Understand their needs and preferences to tailor your offering accordingly. Hint: Market research can pair nicely with a cocktail, beer, or glass of wine if you’re into that sort of thing. Getting involved in social functions tailored to your target audience is the best way to immerse yourself in their culture, and understand them better.
• Build Relationships: Building and maintaining relationships with your customers is key. Focus on customer retention as well as acquisition. You don’t need to bend over backwards for difficult customers, but for customers that bring joy to what you’re doing, you should always provide just a little extra value. These are the seeds you’ll want to sow for your business to really grow. THIS is marketing.

Digital Marketing Essentials (Keep it Super Simple)

To be fair, while you don’t need a website to run a business, it’s probably a good idea to maintain some level of online presence, even if most of your business is coming from referrals and/or a killer “Something to Sell”. People need to know how they can buy from you, and increasingly, that’s done online. Here are the very basics of digital marketing, laid out in the order they need to be done. You can knock these out in a weekend, and go on running your business knowing people who want what you have to sell can find you.

• Consistency: Maintain a consistent brand image across all online platforms. Use the same logo, color scheme, and messaging to build brand recognition. Creating a single-page style guide first will take significant decision-making effort out of the rest of these tasks.
• Professional Website: Consider creating a simple yet effective website that highlights your product or service offerings. It should provide essential information, such as what you offer, contact details, and a clear call to action.
• Google My Business Listing: Optimize your Google My Business profile to appear in local search results. This includes accurate business information, operating hours, and customer reviews.
• Social Media Profiles: Create and maintain social media profiles on platforms relevant to your target audience. While you don’t need to obsess over them, use these platforms to share occasional updates, showcase your work, and engage with your audience.
• Customer Experience: Ensure that potential customers can easily reach out to you. Display your contact information prominently on your website and social media profiles. Implement a straightforward contact form for inquiries.
• Simplicity and Quality: Focus on simplicity and quality over quantity when it comes to online content. Share meaningful updates and content that resonates with your audience. Don’t just blog or write email newsletters for the sake of content. Share what excites you, and what you feel your customers will enjoy as well.

A Simple Website Speaks Volumes

Do you need a website? Of course you don’t need a website. But it couldn’t hurt to devote a weekend or a few marketing dollars to one. A professional-looking website shows your existing customers as well as your next customer that you take doing business with them seriously. Creating a website is easier than ever since WordPress introduced full site editing, and multiple other very capable website builders. Do you need to hire someone full-time to manage your website, social media presence, and put together monthly email newsletters? If you haven’t needed to hire a Human Resources Director yet, probably not. You aren’t competing with Apple, Google, or Amazon for business, and if you are, maybe try something a little less ambitious and a little more niche!

If you’ve read this far, but really don’t have the time to put together a logo, style guide, website, and/or other digital marketing materials (trust me, it’s not that hard), consider dropping me a line. I’d love to hear more about your business and help you develop these basic items so you can go back to focus on running your business – selling your “Something to Sell” to your “Someone to Sell To”.

<p>The post Do You Need a Website? first appeared on Soloist Systems.</p>

As a marketer, it’s easy to fall into the trap of believing that you have the power to single-handedly propel a product or service to success, a.k.a “move the needle” if you’ve been talking with business executives. However, a seasoned marketer knows that this perspective can be misleading, and downright dangerous. The key to effective marketing lies in understanding that products and customers tell the story, while the most skilled marketers invest in understanding and documenting that story to engage with others.

Discovering & Crafting Narratives with Authenticity

Products and services possess individual qualities. They have their own stories and engage with customers in unique ways. Marketers must enhance their performance rather than rewrite the script, understanding the product’s essence and how it benefits its customers.

Effective marketing involves listening to what the product or service tells you. It’s about understanding strengths, aligning efforts with inherent qualities, and crafting a narrative that authentically highlights value, addressing customer needs and desires. There are no shortcuts here, and I don’t say this lightly: any product or service that doesn’t uniquely engage with customers should be either reworked or thrown out entirely.

Letting Products and Customers Tell the Story

Due to proximity and the emotional work of getting a product or service off the ground, businesses often become too close to their products, hindering their understanding of how customers perceive them.

Marketers must bridge the gap between their business’s perspective and customers’ realities. Active listening and meaningful interactions reveal valuable insights into how products genuinely impact clients’ lives.

Marketers should shift their perspective from imposing ideas onto products to understanding their true nature. Success lies in letting products and customers take the spotlight, while marketers skillfully direct the show behind the scenes.

While the idea of a generic customer survey probably doesn’t appeal much to you, consider the ways in which you can start conversations with existing customers as well as prospects. What are some patterns and trends that emerge when you hear from your target audience? And more importantly, how can you stretch to meet any unmet needs?

The Power of Customer Referrals

It can not be stressed enough that the most effective marketers for any business starting out are its very own clients. This doesn’t mean you have to get it right immediately, but don’t ignore it when you do get it right. Trust me, you’ll know. Client referrals are a potent source of new business, underscoring the importance of satisfied customers.

Should you be offering incentives for people to give your business a 5-star review? No, of course not. But there are gentle ways to remind your customers that their opinion matters to you as well as others. Mull on this for a bit. Perhaps privately soliciting opinions from customers will make them more likely to share their opinions publicly.

By encouraging satisfied clients to refer new business, marketers harness the power of word-of-mouth marketing, further amplifying the impact of understanding and delivering what clients genuinely need and desire.

What Next?

In summary, effective marketing is an interplay between product essence, customer experiences, and the marketer’s role. Recognizing and appreciating the authentic value a product brings allows for the creation of resonant marketing strategies.

I’ve been working in sales and marketing for over a decade. However, the lessons I have learned consulting over the last year far outweigh anything I was taught on the job working for larger corporations. The fact of the matter is that marketing is not a one-size-fits-all discipline, and every business has very unique needs.

Applying cookie-cutter corporate solutions to digital marketing works fine for corporations with deep pockets, but fails miserably at a smaller scale. More often, the needs of small businesses are met with simple course-corrections in their marketing approach. If you feel like you’re not getting the most out of your marketing efforts and would value the outside perspective of a professional marketing consultant, don’t hesitate to reach out to me. I’d be more than happy to take a look at your business and offer you very personalized recommendations.

<p>The post Marketing: ‘Moving the Needle’ is Not Your Job first appeared on Soloist Systems.</p>