June 27th, 2009
Michael Jackson is an icon of our time who will always be remembered as the King of Pop. Pepsi is the King of (Soda)Pop, especially in social media. The combination of these legendary icons resulted in a series of commercials that will go down in branding history as a marriage made in heaven.
Here is a sampling of their work together:


Pepsi continues to be influenced by Michael Jackson even today and is primed to make the most of their heritage:
If Pepsi can create a Jacksons World Tour can back in ‘84 they surely can create a
Michael Jackson Tribute can. This is an epic moment in history for everyone especially them:
Generation Y.
Millenials.
Me, I’m a part of the Pepsi Generation.
RIP MJ.
Tags: brand, branding, commercials, consumer, consumers, core values, design, generalities, generation y, heritage, influencer, interactions, jacksons, king of pop, legendary icons, marketing, marriage, marriage made in heaven, media, michael jackson, mj, origins, pepsi, pepsi generation, personalities, personality, sampling, selling, social, soda pop, tribute, video
Posted in branding, business, featured, life | No Comments »
April 21st, 2009

© Anita Gould
The colors you associate with your brand are extremely important.
Even if someone isn’t aware of who you are or what you do, your brand’s essence is conveyed right away by what your colors tell them. Many different feelings are associated with individual colors. Picking the wrong color could turn a customer away before they have the chance to become one. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: attempts, best friend, brand, branding, business, businessman, clue, colors, communicating, communication, communications, consensus, conveyance, design, designers, desire, doing business, emotional color, emotional effect, feelings, friends, generalities, gould, headway, lists, Lost, marketing, Peers, science, strategy, tagline, usability, Value, verbal message, visual representation, visuals, words
Posted in branding, featured | 5 Comments »
April 18th, 2009
Businesses are often so focused on selling and making money that they stray away from their core message. The way your customer receives you is crucial for sustained sales over time. If you’re operating with the short term just in mind you’re setting your business up for failure.
- Why did you get into business?
- What are your core values?
- What sets you apart from your competitor?
- Why should your customer favor you over anyone else?

Selling is easy. Cast a wide enough net and you’ll catch some fish.Catching a specific type of fish and plenty of it is a whole different story.
- What is your customer telling you?
- Do you know their lifestyle inside and out?
- Have you bought their mindspace?
- Will they give you your exact message or something completely different when asked?
Your customers don’t just exist for you when they buy your product. They always exist. How do you always exist for your customers?

It’s important to keep your lines of communication open with your customer. Constant feedback is the only way you can know exactly how they feel about you. Their word isn’t the whole picture but it is a major part of it.
Some tools you should be using to gauge your business impact are:
- Buying patterns
- General industry & product consensus
- Word of mouth in social media networks
- Feedback on relevant bulletin boards
- Comments on blogs
- Customer service surveys
- Face to face questioning
When was the last time you asked your customer what they thought and felt about your business? What did they say?
What can you do RIGHT NOW to find out how your business is doing?
Tags: blog, brand, brand message, branding, bulletin boards, business, business impact, commenters, communicating, communication, communications, competitor, consensus, core message, core values, customer service surveys, different story, exact message, failure, feelings, generalities, lifestyle, making money, media, media networks, mindspace, network, networked, networking, productivity, relevance, selling, social, thoughtfulness, type of fish, Value, when was the last time, word of mouth, words
Posted in business, featured | 3 Comments »
January 20th, 2009
Customer value, not control, is the answer in the digital economy. ~Don Tapscott and Anthony D. Williams in Wikinomics (p.143) Value Shmalue. I have noticed many people speaking of value lately but no one speaking of what exactly is value. I decided that before the word “value” goes to the 2.0
hype graveyard like many others have (see: the cloud, Whatever X.0) I would get to the bottom of it all. I asked my followingers what value meant to them in order to get to some basic tenets of why they valued something. Needless to say this all took place early in the morning whereupon i did forgo sleep to see where this line of questioning led me. I ended up valuing a lack of something in gain of something else, which speaks to the myriad of answers that people gave. The following are my conversations broken down with people based on person and categorized into points each person contributed to the discussion on value. While it is not the end all be all definitive go-to guide to delineate value, it is a start:
Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: amp, brand, branding, business, categorization, chat, clue, collectibles, communicating, communication, communications, conversation, Conversation Ecosystem, conversations, customer value, design, designers, digital economy, discussion, don tapscott, downloading, experiences, experiment, follower, fool, generalities, graveyard, hype, interaction, interactions, iTunes, knowledge, left hand side, life, limited, listening, live journal, marketing, media, mediums, myriad, network, networked, networking, Peers, perception, permanence, personalities, personality, plans, Principles, reading, reply, responsibility, signs, sleep, social, social media, streams, Tenets, thoughtfulness, tweets, twitter, uniqueness, Value, visuals, weirdness, wikinomics, word value, words
Posted in business, featured, life | 3 Comments »
Is Your Business Communicating The Right Brand Message?
Businesses are often so focused on selling and making money that they stray away from their core message. The way your customer receives you is crucial for sustained sales over time. If you’re operating with the short term just in mind you’re setting your business up for failure.
Selling is easy. Cast a wide enough net and you’ll catch some fish.Catching a specific type of fish and plenty of it is a whole different story.
Your customers don’t just exist for you when they buy your product. They always exist. How do you always exist for your customers?
It’s important to keep your lines of communication open with your customer. Constant feedback is the only way you can know exactly how they feel about you. Their word isn’t the whole picture but it is a major part of it.
Some tools you should be using to gauge your business impact are:
When was the last time you asked your customer what they thought and felt about your business? What did they say?
What can you do RIGHT NOW to find out how your business is doing?
Connect with me on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.
Tags: blog, brand, brand message, branding, bulletin boards, business, business impact, commenters, communicating, communication, communications, competitor, consensus, core message, core values, customer service surveys, different story, exact message, failure, feelings, generalities, lifestyle, making money, media, media networks, mindspace, network, networked, networking, productivity, relevance, selling, social, thoughtfulness, type of fish, Value, when was the last time, word of mouth, words
Posted in business, featured | 3 Comments »