Trade show survival tips.
It’s that season once again where companies test their endurance in one of the toughest habitats in the business world—the trade show. According to the Center for Exhibition Industry Research (CEIR), while companies in 2011 allocated 40.2% of their marketing spend on B2B exhibiting, they have just 3 to 5 seconds to capture someone’s attention on the trade show floor. This affirms the power of face-to-face marketing, but it also means that trade-show messaging must be powerful and effective.
Are you open to innovation and change to dominate in the marketplace? Some say companies should “never listen to their customers” because reacting to customer requests stifles innovation. But one iconic company listened to their customer feedback and the result was a huge payoff.
When poets hand you lemons.
How cool would you feel pulling up to the stoplight and revving the engine of your new “Pastelogram” coupe? Believe it or not, this unfortunate name is a real world example of brand strategy misalignment.
The numbers are in for the Super Bowl 2012 ad-stravaganza, and by all reports, it was a media success. M&M’s came in as the OnMessage office favorite. But statistics we've read aren’t just measuring ad viewership; they are also measuring online chatter.
According to the Brand Bowl report, for example, the Doritos cat-burying dog spot garnered the earliest post-game, morning-after tweets — 48,536. The David Beckham ad had more than 109,000 combined social media comments. This is the buzz that advertisers want, but does it impact the brand perception?
At OnMessage we fervently believe in the power of storytelling. Stories have tremendous transformative power across every age and culture. They encapsulate complex concepts; they teach; they capture the imagination. Stories are also powerful tools that savvy marketers take advantage of when striving to connect with their target audience.
Recent research suggests storytelling is a powerful persuader because it engages both sides of the brain. Its emotional components engage the right-brain, while the plotline transports the left-brain past its typical, logical barriers. For a real-world example of how storytelling works on a grand scale, look no further than last week’s State of the Union address. One speechwriter examines the speech and points out powerful ways the president used storytelling to draw in his national audience.
