Bill introducing Josh and Libby at the 2010 HatlingFlint KNOW event.

As big of a deal as it has become, social media remains a mystery to so many of us. We pretend to know what we’re doing when we post a status update, a link to a favorite blog, and press “like” once in a while on Facebook. But, navigating Facebook is just the tip of a giant iceberg.

Do you know how many characters are in a Tweet? How many friends does the average Facebook user have? What percentage of companies use LinkedIn as a recruitment tool? Every minute, how many hours of video are uploaded to YouTube?

Some of the answers are shocking, others are just no brainers. Attendees of our KNOW event on Thursday, Oct. 7 at Territory Golf Club got these questions answered and so much more. Our topic again this year focused on social media: blogging strategy and the importance of Facebook. Our presenters Libby Hall, New Media Strategist, and Josh Lysne, Digital Strategist, both with the Flint Group did an awesome job.

Two hours flew by with some pretty frantic note-takers burning a hole through their notebooks. We failed to remind them that a copy of the slides would be available. Ooops! We remembered and reminded everyone that the slides will be available for download.

Many of our attendees expressed interest in a “How to create a LinkedIn strategy” seminar. We’ll be posting information on this event as we make plans. Don’t forget to check back.

By the way, there’s 140 characters in a Tweet. The average Facebook user has 130 friends. 80% of companies use LinkedIn as a recruitment tool. And, 24 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute.

Josh speaking to those eagerly awaiting golden nuggets of information.

Libby explains how Facebook and contests can lure someone in...we got you with our contest, didn't we?!

In yesterday’s post about the proper care and feeding of your creative team, I linked to a TED talk from Simon Sinek, who is the author of Start with Why. I stumbled across the video in my Twitter feed, and thought it was relevant to what I was writing. It’s a fantastic presentation. If you haven’t seen it yet, it’s a great way to spend fifteen minutes of downtime.

Understanding why you do what you do is essential food for great ideas. I thought I’d share it once again, just in case you missed it the link in the last post. Watch the video, and share whatever thoughts you have in the comments.

Kimberly Wold Janke sits down to talk about what brought her to Flint Communications, her educational background, and what keeps her ticking everyday. She shares insights about working with clients and balancing work time with family time.

Welcome to another edition of 5 Question Friday! Today I sit down with Ken Zakovich, WestmorelandFlint Creative Director, to discuss brands that inspire him, the creative process, keeping up with changes in the advertising world and life outside of work including birding and playing guitar. Enjoy!

Many people think that branding is just for companies or celebrities. But each of us has our own personal brand, whether we realize it or not.

The term “personal branding” was first mentioned in an article by Tom Peters http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/10/brandyou.html more than 10 years ago. By definition, personal branding is the process by which we market ourselves to others.  It’s the complete package comprised of many parts – body language, posture, clothes, accessories, facial expression, communication skills, and reputation.

With the advent of social media, it’s easier than ever to build or damage your personal brand.  Here are a few simple tips to discovering and creating your personal brand.

Discovering Your Brand

The first step in creating your personal brand is doing an in-depth analysis of you – this really isn’t as scary as it sounds. While some of us are self-aware (or think we are), others may struggle in this area. Here are a few questions to ask yourself or those close to you:

• How do friends, family and co-workers typically describe you and what characteristics do they attribute to you – funny, honest, classy, professional, laid back, serious, creative?
• Do those characteristics align with the image you hold of yourself? If not, why not?
• How do you want people to describe you?
• What do you need to do to achieve the image you want?

For example, if you want to be viewed as “classy,” does your appearance, actions and reputation support that claim? Personal branding really is about creating a niche for yourself and living it.

The key to developing a successful personal brand is authenticity and self-awareness. Be your real self, but make an even better impression.

Creating Your Brand

Once you’ve spent some time thinking about your personal brand, put it to paper. Write your own personal mission, vision and brand statement. Make sure you also set some specific goals and a plan for achieving them.  Some basic tools for marketing your personal brand include:

• Wardrobe/accessories
• Blog/website
• Social media profiles – LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter
• Resume/cover letter/references
• Portfolio
• Business Card and V Card
• Personal presentation

There are many tips on how to successfully use each of these tools, but keep in mind the basics. Does your appearance in person and online through photos match your personal brand statement? Are you writing in a tone (funny, serious, sarcastic) that showcases who you are? For example, if you want to be viewed as professional and sophisticated, do you have pictures on your Facebook page that support that image or do you have photos and comments from a party you’d rather forget?

Get Started Today

Spend a few minutes thinking about your personal brand and how you want to be perceived. For more specific tips, check back at westmorelandflint.com  in late April for a complete presentation on personal branding.

Not long ago, a few business associates of mine and I were out for dinner at a local restaurant. While we know the food at Sarello’s is consistently very good, I was looking a little advice for something other than a typical entree. After asking for the opinions of my tablemates, I consulted my Droid and my newly loaded app, Foursquare. I have to admit that I was not expecting the restaurant would be listed, much less that there would be any entries.

To my surprise, Heavy Table completed a check-in and posted an entry touting that visitors should try the sea bass. The Heavy Table is a Twin Cities-based magazine reviewing restaurants and bars in the Upper Midwest. Their review reads, “The tender and perfectly cooked sea bass is a top seller. It’s oven broiled with citrus buerre blanc and accompanied by wild rice and seasonal veggies.” Granted, this was a professional review, but there was also an entry from a recent ‘patron.’

This event provided a practical example of how a simple technology provided an augmented discovery that made my whole experience more pleasant. Foursquare promotes itself as “a cross between a friend-finder, a social city-guide and a game that rewards you for doing interesting things.” Foursquare is just one of several applications that can provide similar experiences. As the build out of technology advances, and additional apps are developed and introduced, the biggest challenge for brands is monitoring posts on the various sites.

And if you think that living in a medium sized Midwestern community will isolate you and your brand from the growth of consumer generated comments, just remember the sea bass is sensational in Sarello’s.

Your audience could care less about your product.

It stings a little to hear that, but the sooner we embrace it, the quicker we can relate to people.

Don’t get me wrong. Your features and benefits are awesome. I know they are. But your audience is really smart, a little self-centered, and ignores much of what marketers say.

Steven and the bullet points

There’s a big difference in how we get to know people and how we get to know our brands. To communicate effectively, you have to close the gap a little through storytelling. Let’s explore this difference with a guy I know, Steven. Below are some of the mundane details of his life. Notice how quickly a personality starts to unfold:

• He is 32 and single
• He is looking for a promotion
• He was crushed by the Vikings’ NFC championship loss
• This weekend, he will crack his friends up at a karaoke bar by singing Billy Squier

After learning a few things about Steven, you can start to make a judgment about him, and discern whether he’s your kind of person or not. Now let’s take a look at some typical bullet points for a product:

• It’s easy to use
• It uses the latest technology
• It costs less than the competition

photo by Mykl Roventine: Out & About on Flickr

You get the idea. Based on those bullet points, which of the preceding stories do you want to follow? Steven or the product? If you asked me, I’d go with Steven.

People have an infinite number of things going on that make them different, interesting and likable. Products, however, usually look and sound much like the closest competitor—with one or two points of distinction. It doesn’t have to be that way.

Maybe Steven doesn’t know that your product would make one hell of a prop in his story. We can do that by taking what we’ve learned about him, the culture, the world and your brand, and relating to him.

Maybe if we gave Steven some interesting details of our own, we’d draw him in long enough to realize that your product will save him time and money. Maybe then, he could work up the nerve to ask for that promotion, which would help him afford season tickets for the Vikes next year, or a couple of nights out with friends and Billy Squier.

A great creative team uses creative ideas (sometimes far-out ideas) to tell those stories about your brand—because people like Steven are busy, unconsciously thinking where am I in all of this? Their attention is shifting to their own little story: lunch, the dog, and fantasy football.

Good creative isn’t “fluff” or a devious agency scheme to win awards. A strong concept allows your audience to dream. It helps them relate to your brand and fit it into their life’s narrative. It primes their brain for rewards they seek.

Creativity, and a good story, can tell Steven that you’re his kind of people. It’s powerful stuff if you care to use it.

Phil Hunt is a Flint Group copywriter, and thinks that Steven and the Bullet Points would make a good band name.

After last week’s blog posting, how did your brand clean up? Here are five more questions to see if it’s time to brush up.

Have you acquired new companies or shed divisions?
When your company acquires new ones or divides, it may mean a shift in business strategy or it may not. Regardless, it may mean you’ve left your brand behind.

Has your revenue growth stalled?
If your category is dying, you can’t necessarily blame poor performance on your brand. But if your sales growth doesn’t match your category’s growth – and it hasn’t in awhile – it could be time to overhaul your brand.

Has your market changed around you?
Lots of new players, new developments and new customers in your market? Your brand may be well-positioned to take advantage. Or it may not. Time to figure it out.

Has your senior management restructured?
Brands belong to the people, but brand development begins at the top of the food chain. When there’s a lot of change at the top, there’s bound to be some confusion below. A strong brand development process is a great way to get everyone on the same page.

Has your company turned 20 years old?
Okay, this one belongs to my friend Jim Hughes, of the Brand Establishment, who’s been doing this a long time. Jim swears a high percentage of established companies that come to him for his brand development expertise are about 20 years old. Why? His hypothesis is that at about the 20-year mark many companies find they’ve lost their focus, the market has changed around them and maybe there’s been some senior management change. Whatever. Maybe it’s like the 17-year locust or seven-year itch. But I’m guessing that if your company’s about 20, some of the other nine clues are making themselves evident.

So where does your company stand? Healthy brand or unhealthy? For most successful companies, working on brand building – understanding it, delivering on it, communicating it, measuring it – is an all-the-time thing. If your organization has a clear vision of your brand and is acting on it, you’ve probably already stopped reading. If not, you’ll probably find yourself nodding yes to a number of the clues; it may be time.

Starbuck’s, Target, Wal-Mart and Bloomingdale’s are just a few of the major brands that have been engaged in brand tweaks, tests and teasers in-store, down the street and around the corner in several markets.

In the case of Starbuck’s, three “stealth” stores opened as a test in the Seattle area as reported in Entrepreneur magazine. The strategy was to introduce a new store concept that was “inspired by Starbuck’s,” and as a possible strategy to a larger rollout of “unbranded” cafes.

Bloomingdale’s created a “pop-up” Nespresso coffee bar brand in the center of its recently renovated cosmetics department in New York’s 59th Street location. Bloomingdale’s officials described the strategy; “cosmetics sharing space with a coffee company is a little out of the box,” an unexpected discovery that Bloomingdale’s holds core as an approach to keeping loyal customers – well, loyal. The boutique functions as a location to make a few gift purchases and enjoy a free specialty caffeine drink and learning a bit more about the specialty coffees.

Target Corporation introduced four temporary “bodegas” in Manhattan in the fall of 2008. The high-profile spaces called attention to a collection of design-inspired products. None of the products were scheduled to appear in the traditional Target stores until much later.

Even Wal-Mart has been tinkering with the notion of reaching out through a Latino-themed warehouse, based on its more traditional format. The Mas Club opened in August 2009, as part of an attempt to lure recent immigrants, hungry for familiar foods from home, to buy products in bulk-sizes, ala Wal-Mart style.

While it’s important to note that brands must evolve to remain relevant and continue to engage consumers, the articles referenced for this post suggest that either leaders of the brands are trying much harder to keep their image fresh, or they are becoming more active in the search for new consumer markets.

From a research perspective, imagine being able to drop your brand into a new location, observe consumer interactions within the environment, study the results and rollout a bevy of new “tested” products to your target audience. It must be working, otherwise these brand leaders wouldn’t be going through such efforts.

What are the 2009 top brands? A quick search on the web will give you numerous lists to choose from as defined by various criteria. All of us know that strong brands directly result in business value. But what do we mean when someone says a company has a “strong brand”?

It’s easiest to start with what a brand is not. It is not a logo. It is not a company name. It is not a product. A brand is the sum total of all the interactions, good and bad, an audience has with a company or product. It is the gut feeling a person has about the company or product; the place the company or product holds in the person’s mind and heart.

Your brand is not what you say it is, but rather what your audiences say it is.

So, if the brand is not what you say it is, how do you build a strong brand? Branding is creating an emotional bond with your target audiences. To do this, you need to know your unique distinctions and how you bridge the gap of what your target audiences need or want and what you uniquely offer. Once you develop a solid, relevant brand promise, you then need to deliver it consistently. One of the core building blocks of brand delivery is your employees.

Your employees are your brand’s biggest ambassadors and are an extremely important internal audience in brand building. Branding is experiential and is everyone in the organization’s responsibility. Branding starts from within and begins with commitment. In the brand development process, it is vital for communications to work with human resources to develop strategies, processes and tactics that engage employees and create a shared understanding of the brand. This activity should identify brand behavior for employees and show them how to “live the brand”.

So, how do you live your brand promise?