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1 Minute Advice: Brand Growth Stems from Positive Associations

Fighting for brand attention and, even more importantly, the growth of a brand is always a major challenge for brand marketers. Two marketing experts believe that brand growth doesn't necessarily come from traditional brand marketing tactics, such as Internet or point-of-purchase advertising. "Rather, it takes place in the subconscious mind of prospective customers. And their purchasing decisions are much more malleable and easily influenced than many brand leaders realize," write marketing psychology professor Michael Platt and brand growth strategist Leslie Zane in an opinion piece on Knowledge@Wharton.

They continue, "Brands that dominate and are growing in their categories are bursting with a myriad of positive associations." Based on the Human Connectome, which is a complete map of the neural connections in a brain, Platt and Zane have come up with something they call the "Brand Connectome." They suggest that "every brand has its own mini-network of associations composed of every memory a customer has of the brand. These accumulated memories, both positive and negative, form what we call the Brand Connectome.  Think of the brand as a tree planting its roots in customers’ subconscious. As the brand grows, it adds more associations and more branches to hold them. And as the branches take root in our memories, the tree spans more of the brain’s terrain."

Platt and Zane believe "The more similar and positive a Brand Connectome is among customers, the more likely they are to recall it — a key component of brand equity and major driver of purchases. In fact, a robust Brand Connectome filled with positive memories is actually the source of what is often referred to as the “emotional connection” to a brand."

Pretty heady stuff... and certainly worth considering.

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1 Minute Advice: Do You Make These Email Marketing Mistakes?

Common mistakes in marketing are... all too common. They can be campaign killers, especially if they are made unwittingly. One of the more obvious places mistakes can be made is email marketing. Email  continues to be very effective as a marketing medium, but it must be used properly.

Writing for MarketingProfs, Erika Taylor Montgomery identifies thirteen specific email marketing mistakes that you should avoid. Among them are:

• Not making use of personalization
• Not taking the time to segment your email list
• Not taking full advantage of automated emails
• Failing to review analytics
• Overlooking mobile email users
• Ineffective email subject lines
• Overdoing it on sales language.

For more about the above seven email marketing mistakes, as well as learning about the other six mistakes, read Erika's informative article (free sign-up required): https://www.marketingprofs.com/articles/2018/40171/13-common-email-marketing-mistakes-to-avoid?

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1 Minute Advice: Video Marketing Growing in Importance

A report entitled "The State of Video Marketing" indicates that 83 percent of marketers say video content is becoming "more important," according to coverage by Marketing Charts. The use of video across many marketing formats is growing as well: Now 85 percent of marketers use video on their websites, 84 percent use video on social media, 55 percent use video in email, and 55 percent use video in webinars.

The majority (59 percent) of responding marketers believe that video converts sales leads better than other forms of content. The majority (55 percent) of marketers increased their video marketing budget in 2018.

The report was based on a survey of 271 marketing executives, 50 percent of whom work in B2B companies, and 21 percent of whom work in a mixture of B2B and B2C companies.

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1 Minute Advice: Treat Your Customer Like Your Mom

Customer service expert Jeanne Bliss has authored an intriguing book, Would You Do That to Your Mother? The "Make Mom Proud" Standard for How to Treat Your Customers. Bliss shares numerous stories in her book about companies that engage in both excellent and poor customer service.

In an interview for the Knowledge@Wharton newsletter, Bliss discusses three key shifts that are causing companies to be more sensitive to their customers:

1. Organic growth among existing customers is "ten times more profitable" than acquiring new customers
2. Social media is holding companies accountable because customers themselves are talking about the company's values
3. Silos in a company "don't organically unite," so the entire organization needs to focus on "customer math" by asking such questions as, "Did you bring in more customers than you lost?" and "Are you keeping more customers than you're losing?" 

Bliss also makes the following insightful observation: "We're finding that the more high-tech we get, the more humanity we need." Read her full interview here: http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/would-you-do-that-to-your-mother/

 This post is brought to you by 123eGuides.com. 123 eGuides are a series of authoritative guides about branding, marketing and small business published exclusively in electronic format to provide maximum value at minimum cost.