Build a better brand
by Allison Carter
Branding is an incredibly hard concept to define. Not because it’s complicated, but because people like to throw self-aggrandizing puffery and empty words like “synergy,” it becomes a thing of unfathomable mystery.
Contrary to popular belief, a brand is not simply a logo. Seth Godin has a long, but clear definition:
“A brand is the set of expectations, memories, stories and relationships that, taken together, account for a consumer’s decision to choose one product or service over another. If the consumer (whether it’s a business, a buyer, a voter or a donor) doesn’t pay a premium, make a selection or spread the word, then no brand value exists for that consumer.”
Ultimately, building a brand is about differentiating yourself from your competitors who provide similar goods or services. Take a look at Target and Wal-Mart: both are big box retailers. They both sell roughly the same merchandise. Yet their brands are vastly different. Target is hip and trendy, while Wal-Mart is the champion of the working man and moms everywhere.
Don’t limit your branding efforts to just a logo. Work to build a bond and a story with customers, and show them why your company will fit their needs better than any other.
Stop limiting your branding efforts to your logos and physical appearances–you need to tell consumers a story that will make them pick you over dozens of similar competitors.
If you hold an event and no one comes, is it still an event?
Small business owners often consider running a special event as a way of introducing their business to prospective clients. They hope the event will generate PR and create BUZZ. Our new intern Allison Carter shares some thoughts on how to structure the event to attract the attention of both the media and the community.
By Allison Carter:
Holding an event is a great way to raise your profile in your community. It gets your name out there, and lets you meet face-to-face with potential customers and share your expertise. But even the best event in the world won’t help you if no one attends! So here are a few questions to ask yourself when planning your event:
- Who am I trying to attract? Am I trying to gain new customers from the community at large, strengthen my relationships with existing customers, to network with other businesses?
- Is my event interesting or important? Is it relevant to the people that I want to come to my event, and geared to their level of knowledge?
- Am I going to charge for the event? If so, is this something that people would actually pay for?
- What is the best way to communicate with my audience? Do they read the newspaper? Do they Tweet? Do I have an email database of potentially interested people? Meet your audience where they feel most comfortable.
If you answer these questions honestly, know your audience, and truly have something interesting and unique to share with the community, you’ll find people lined up out the door for your event.
It’s Time to Move Forward – Always
Written by Neil Chaggar
“Be not afraid of growing slowly, be afraid only of standing still.”
I didn’t fully understand the quote when I read it but half-way through writing this blog post, I knew exactly what it meant. I came to the conclusion that most things change overtime, including technologies, economies, businesses, even people. What’s important is moving forward and adapting to those changes.
Over the course of my internship, I gained the knowledge that there’s always ways and opportunities to do things not only differently but better and faster. For example, Lorraine decided in addition to writing blog posts, she wanted to reach her audience through another medium called Podcasting. Though we started from scratch, we learned enough about it for Lorraine to now create weekly podcasts episodes.
Another technological change we’ve recently come across is CoolIris. This modern tool has the potential to change the way we display media such as pictures and videos on our websites. Though we’ve played around with the software only for a short period of time, we look forward to many innovative ideas and features it’ll present us with in the future.
So as I end my internship here at Roundpeg and say farewell to my boss and my co-workers, I’d like to remind you all to keep moving forward, always have room for improvement and try new things in life.
Neil C.
And if you have enjoyed Neil’s post’s here be sure to check out his personal blog as he continues to see his next assignment. http://neilchaggar.wordpress.com
CoolIris in Progress
We showed off how we could use CoolIris to display videos. It works equally well for graphics. Here are just a few items from our design portfolio displayed with CoolIris.
Cool CoolIris
Written by Neil Chaggar
With so many new applications being created almost daily, it is rare to come across something which makes you say: “Wow… that is cool!” I had one of those moments just the other day when Lorraine showed me CoolIris.
What it is: CoolIris is a simple yet innovative software which showcases media on your website. It displays both images and video in a manner of an interactive 3D wall in which you can drag your files to go back and forth, and make them bigger or smaller. Did I mention the installation is a breeze?!
How it works: CoolIris works with various different third party websites for your images such as Flickr, Picasa etc. and YouTube for videos.
Once you have uploaded your pictures and or video to these accounts, you can select just the content you want to feature on your website. It works well with social media sites like Facebook and MySpace too. You can even customize the wall with your own background!
Why use it: If you deal with lots of images and/or videos on your website, CoolIris may just be what you’ve been looking for to organize and uplift your media content.
If I haven’t sold you on this cool new web feature yet, please go on CoolIris website and check out how simple it is to use and what it can do for you.
And check out the video wall I created for Lorraine.
Neil Out
Tie Your Shoes
Today’s post is by our intern Neil:
Have you ever tried running in shoes without shoelaces? It is difficult, and risky as you can easily trip and fall on your face. 
Running your business website without taking advantage of SEO tools creates a similar scenario. While you are unlikely to be in danger of physical injury, the risk to your business is real. Without a solid focus on SEO, you will find yourself tripping and falling as you attempt to drive traffic and connect with potential prospects and clients.
SEO (Search Engine Optimization) according to Wikapedia
is the process of improving the volume or quality of traffic to a web site from search engines via “natural” or un-paid (“organic” or “algorithmic”) search results as opposed to search engine marketing (SEM) which deals with paid inclusion
There are many tools you can use to improve your position with search engines such as Google, Yahoo and BIN. Moving to the top of the search list means potential customers find you faster and easier compared to your competitors. This in turn will improve the quantity and quality of traffic to your website.
I have been researching SEO tools for the past few weeks and here are two of my favorites.
- Google Analytics which analyzes your web site’s performance by helping you understand what terms drive traffic, what information visitors search for when they arrive, and how long they stay. By looking at the data you can make adjustments in your site to improve your performance.
- Linkscape from SMOZ.org In the internet world you are judged by the company you keep. These relationships are measured in links. Using this tool you can discover who links to you and more interesting, who links to your competitors.
At Roundpeg we rely on these tools to help our clients rank higher on Search Engines and drive more traffic to their sites. Do you have a favorite SEO tool?
Neil out!
Are You Using Social Media?
Written by Melinda Cooper
According to this survey, you aren’t.
The article states that:
The study found 76 percent of small-business owners polled were not using social media or finding it helpful in generating business leads during the last year, and 86 percent said the did not use such sites to get advice or information.
It seems the reason for this is business owners feel they didn’t have the resources (time or money) to learn to use it properly.
Is this true? Shouldn’t businesses make time for new technology seminars or attending them to fully use all resources. Twitter and Facebook are FREE. There should be no reason to pass up a FREE opportunity to get your business across.
In November, Rainmakers University is leading two popular seminars on how to use Twitter and LinkedIN and one on general marketing, visit rainuniversity.com to sign up.
[side note: The journalist in me - who also took an Economics course featuring "How to Lie with Statistics" - noticed that only 500 small businesses were contacted. Perhaps, they were all in Appalachia where businesses with access to the Internet was few and far between.]
The Beginning of a Podcasting Journey
Written by Neil Chaggar
There are many ways to inform, educate, and communicate with people over the internet. However, there’s one medium that literally gets your voice across to your audience; it’s called Podcasting.
Podcasting works similar to blogging; however it can be far more effective if the presenter is an exceptional speaker rather than a writer or if the audience prefers listening to their media/feed rather than reading it.
Earlier this week, Lorraine expressed an interest in Podcasting to compliment her written blog.
I was excited to work on this project since I already knew how useful yet simple this medium is to get your message across. I’ve listened to Podcasts in the past but didn’t know exactly how to set it up on our website; so began the Podcasting research.
I soon learned many people choose iTunes to publish their Podcasts so they are easily available to anyone and everyone. In addition, there are many other things to consider before you can start Podcasting. To begin, you need to have a quality recording tool. While most computers can record sound into a WAV file, you need additional software to save your files as MP3s.
Turns out, there are many software options from which to choose from but finding a cheap yet efficient one was tricky. Finally, we settled on Audacity, which is free and has decent effects and features, along with capability to save and convert MP3 files.
Another issue Podcaster face is choosing a third-party server where you can upload all your files and material along with RSS codes so iTunes can publish your Podcasts. After looking at several website, some more expensive than others, we chose www.solidcasts.com, which allows users to have first 100MB of space for free and reasonable monthly prices for up to 20GB of space.
Now we have all the precise tools and software to create and publish Podcasts, you can soon listen to Lorraine Ball has to say, literally. Furthermore, if you already publish Podcasts on your own website, feel free to check out the websites and software mentioned above to see if it can improve your Podcasting activities.
Neil out!
Perfect Score
Written by Neil Chaggar
Creating a website takes a lot of hard work, patience, and creativity… but how do you know if your website is serving its true purpose or how effective it is according to your customers? While there are a number of tools out there, we have found www.WebsiteGrader.com to be very helpful as we try to determine if a website set up to attract traffic, if it is connected to the larger internet community, and how it compares to your competitors.
In just in few seconds, the site evaluates your website on a number of set criteria such as Google page rank, Alexa trafffic rank, links, keywords, images, content, blog etc. The detailed report identifies areas for improvment, with suggestions and links on how to make the changes.
I have been using Website Grader to evaluate websites we have designed for clients, including new sites for www.uhasinc.com and www.investsfip.com and have been able to improve their score thanks to this helpful and free website.
So if you are wondering how your website ranks among millions of others just like yours, give Website Grader a try. You may not be able to get into the 90th percentile right away, but you’ll have enough info and the right tools to get there sooner or later. Neil out!
How to Innovate
Written by Melinda Cooper
Jennifer Alsever presents a step-by-step guide to fostering business creativity in the October 2009 Fortune Small Business. Her process includes suggestions and comments from authors, entrepreneurs and consultants:
Step 1: Look Behind You
Steve McKee, author of When Growth Stalls, sums this step up best when he says – “It’s like trying to catch a baseball….you’re in a better place if you know where the ball has been. Then study the needs of your customers. Where are their frustration points? Where is their productivity being hampered?”
(side note: Really? When does history not repeat itself? People are wearing LEGGINGS of all things again!)
Step 2: Lose The Routine
Robin Chase, CEO and founder of Zipcar and GoLoco, says , “Time wasting in an excellent source of innovation… Make time to read widely, and cultivate a variety of friends and online groups who send you wacky articles.”
(side note: I long to be a master of this. Ha. Let me know if you want some wacky articles.)
Step 3: Use The Brains You Hired
Thomas Koulopoulos, author of “The Innovation Zone” says, “You need to give people the license to take risks and to fail often enough to realize that they will not be punished for doing the right thing even though the outcome might not be what they expected…Small failures encourage big success.”
(side note: Devil’s advocate: So… hire people to fail for you and then after they do trial and error… you use this information and come out victorious? Sounds good to me, just make sure to give credit where it is due.)
Step 4: Get Cozy with Customers
David Fields, managing director of Ascendant Consulting says “You can’t be too close to your customers… Your customers are your lifeblood. The heart of innovation is understanding what problems they have that you can solve.”
(side note: This seems obvious to me. And David should maybe talk to his HR department because… you can sometimes be too close to your customers.)
Step 5: Share The Load
Getting outside feedback doesn’t have to be expensive or time-consuming. Dig into your Rolodex and find a partner or vendor who might be interested in sharing time and/or money. Travis Hollman, a serial entrepreneur in Dallas, Texas encourages business leaders to find student interns who work for credits. Why? Because they will tell you the truth when it comes to market research since “they don’t work for you, so they’re not afraid to tell you something is dumb.”
(side note: Unpaid interns will also tell you when something sucks. E-mail me. I’ll tell you.)
Step 6: Try to Fail Quickly
If you have a good idea, move on it rather than sit around on it. Sometimes moving from brainstorming to action can be tough. Set goals and benchmarks – time or money – for your idea so you know when to quit. And Kirk, the CEO of Path Forward International warns, pf getting trapped in “shiny-penny hell” where you become enamored of too many great ideas at once.
(side note: At least be optimistic about it and try to MAKE MONEY quickly rather than fail…)
