1) Recommendations: Are essentially ‘transference of trust’. Merriam Webster defines it as, “the act of saying that someone or something is good, and deserves to be chosen.” So once you’ve had a positive experience you are more likely to vouch for that yourself.

With every sensory experience we encounter with a brand, it tallies up towards the overall perception of that brand, and the future likelihood of it being recommended to others.

We’ve all had a first-hand experience with recommendations at different stages of our lives:

• Whether it was in the form of an ex-boss talking to you about an exciting opportunity at his new firm
• Staying away from a restaurant because your partner had a terrible service there
• Going with your friend’s personal experience while choosing a daycare for your child

It’s this interdependency and reliability quotient that comes forth when choosing a product/ service based on the power of a recommendation!

2) Reviews: Consumer awareness is at its all time high. The findings of Local Consumer Review Survey revealed that approximately 72% of consumers trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations. A Siegel+Gale report shows a direct correlation between higher consumer awareness to 31% greater revenue growth for 10 most-known B2B brands. It all goes to prove that people today like to make educated choices when it comes to investing their money or their resources.

Every comparable B2B or B2C product or service goes through a lens of closer scrutiny and quality check in the form of online reviews. Consumer opinions are highly valued and play a dominant role in influencing future buyers.

As an online shopper myself, I tend to gravitate towards those products that have received a multitude of online reviews versus the ones that do not have any reviews listed. I attribute this to the power of crowdsourcing!

3) Ratings: Ratings reflect a quantifiable benchmark of what’s considered as superior quality compared to the sub par products.

Porter Novelli’s ConsumerStyles report finds that 60% of Millenials and 56% of Gen Xers are more likely to rate items they like than those they don’t like. So getting the product right is the foundation of great ratings.

In our day-to-day lives every decision we take is influenced by how everything is rated and ranked around us:

• Health regulations – Influencing our personal care and household products we use
• Consumer reports safety standards – Key decision making tool for buying your next SUV
• Movie Ratings- Dictates appropriateness of which movie to watch with your kids
• Performance evaluation at work – Determines your bonus package and promotion eligibility for the next quarter

So while we live in a consumerist society where every choice and decision is subliminally influenced by a recommendation, review or rating, its the collective power of customer advocacy that can ultimately make or break your product and its direct impact on your bottom-line!

I’d love to hear what influences your choices and decisions?

Photo by Christopher Dombres

We have been progressively evolving as an online generation, a far cry from the Flintstones in the Stone Age! Just looking back at our contemporary historical periods since the past few decades, we have made major strides through the years.

We’ve evolved from the Machine Age dealing with gigantic mass production machinery to the Information Age which has been about digitizing our economy, dispelling volumes of information using technology. This era also brought the onset of computers – a game changer in the way modern society started communicating. The rapid evolution of computers and the web in our daily life meant dissolving boundaries. It meant faster and more real-time communication, international knowledge exchange and learning, exploring and tapping into personalized needs, changing how we do business via e-commerce.

The Information Age gave birth to a digitized world mimicking and surpassing all that transpires through our physical interactions. What we see, hear, learn, who we befriend, share with, communicate and collaborate with have been made available electronically.

You can like, dislike, comment, poke, vote, buy, sell, promote, recommend..and much more digitally! This led to the metamorphosis of our Social Age. An era that has humanized technology focusing on the many forms of societal interactions and amplifying our inherent need to communicate, express, show and tell.

You can now make a new friend on Facebook, date online via Match.com, look for a job on Monster, connect with a business associate on LinkedIn, buy your latest book on Amazon, share your vacation pictures on Flickr, tweet about what you ate for lunch on Twitter, look up your ancestors on Ancestry.com or even publish your life history on Blogger.

The World Wide Web has made us a closely knit modern society leaving behind a huge digital footprint of our lives. So while my generation might still make a trip to the Smithsonian museum to look at the first species of dinosaurs, there’s no telling where the future generations might look to learn about us a species!

Standing on the bridge of Big Dinosaurs to Big Data the future landscape appears infinite! There’s no telling what this new era will bring with it, and the potential implications of Big Data for our future?

 So what archaeological finds do you think your great, great great grandchildren will find, while digging for your information? What’s your prediction?!

Photos by JD Hancock and algogenius

Just like the Matrix our virtual online world is growing in leaps and bounds given the instant access and power to connect with millions with the click of a button. New age gadgets, smart phones and digital apps have enabled us to become digital journalists and evangelists in our own right. But just like Uncle Ben would constantly remind Peter Parker, Spider Man’s alter ego, this is a constant reminder to us too that “with great power comes great responsibility”.

Whether you are in-focus in front of the camera or behind the lens using your smart phones, it’s important to watch how you portray yourself in front of others. With our increasing participation as an invited speaker or as an active audience member we ‘all’ have a role to play particularly while attending corporate events and conferences. Here are some quick and easy dos and don’ts to keep in mind.

Don’t let your Surrogates get larger and overtake you. (I’ve hyperlinked to the movie wiki incase you’re now curious about this movie.) But getting back to the point, keep the decorum and maintain your tweeting etiquette especially while live tweeting at events. Be your own PR proponent and try not to get yourself in the foot-in-the -mouth predicament.

Easy tip – Unlike Vegas, what’s stated on Facebook or LinkedIn travels all over the digital world and back! So keep it professional, friendly and informative.

People do judge a book by its cover – Let’s face it, we live in a multi-tasking era with “time” being a precious commodity than ever before. So why waste time in creating your first impression that would detract away from ‘who you are’ as a person. Make it easy on others and dress appropriately keeping your end goal in mind.

Easy tip – While attending formal events, don’t dress per your mood or climate, dress per the occasion. Leave your guests with a positive lasting impression vs. a haunting impression!

Don’t ever lose track of the limelight – Yes, when it comes to participating at corporate events, you do have a role to play. You are a brand ambassador for your company no matter what your job title states. A lot of factors contribute towards how a company’s brand image is created. Their ‘people’ play one of the largest roles as it has a direct correlation to a good customer experience.

So project yourself in the best possible light, both literally and more importantly figuratively. You never know when you are being watched and by whom, especially when most of the events these days are being livestreamed and posted on YouTube.

Easy tip – Stay away from inside jokes and gossip instead stay cheerful and project a positive image.

Stay mindful of these easy tips and you’d be a superstar at any given event! Can you think of any others to add to this list? Let’s hear from you!

Photo by Hamed Saber

Point I’m trying to make is businesses today are very much at par in being technologically savvy and in-tune with what their competition has to offer, and matching that. What that translates into for customers is a whole array of products that look pretty identical in their features and capabilities. So going back to my original question, how do you think she chose one type of coffee over the other? It was quite simply the brand she preferred.

So what constitutes the brand? I see it as the aura, the vibe, the sentiments attached and basically the essence of your product that emerges which forms to be the differentiator! In traditional marketing, it’s all about getting the 4 P’s in the perfect proportion – Product, Price, Place and Promotion. There is a lot of planning, strategy, research, science and advertising amongst other things that is involved in the making of a company’s brand image.

It’s dealt with strategically, scientifically and purposefully, in a kind of ‘causal relationship’ between the initiators within the company and their external audience. This all happens in a streamlined and structured fashion, feeding the external audience with the finished product in the form of the ‘agreed upon’ image, identity and messaging the company would like its audience to accept as the brand.

While this model still works in several cases, we have been witnessing a rising trend in how brands are being created and perceived lately. Like the advent of spring, social media has infused a new life into how a brand is born and defined today. People are no longer simply accepting this definition of a brand that is presented to them like a perfectly packaged shining trophy that they can only admire, but not touch. They are more interested in getting up close and personal with it even if it means getting your fingerprints all over it.

Brands are no longer produced in a sterile, climate controlled environment.  With the explosion of social media the sheer definition of – ‘what is a brand?’ has evolved and now grown organically.

The users are no longer looking for a picture perfect image because that seems sterile and made-up. For companies it’s about being more vulnerable not necessarily in a negative opportunistic kind of way but appearing more real, approachable and accessible to its audience. The digital age has shifted the paradigm from a funnel type communication, to a much more intertwined and overlapping model. One where each of the factors: be it the opinion of your competitors, support from your partners, the chatter from your user communities, the online product reviews, or the strategic press releases and marketing campaigns, all infuse with one another influencing the brand image today!

Today’s social media has given each of us a voice that collectively determines what morphs into a company’s brand image and identity. Brand has become this multi-faceted and multi-dimensional entity today that has the colors and flavors of numerous stakeholders.

The onus lies on the companies to not fight or defy this flow but to embrace it and cultivate it by truly building an empire targeted towards your customer centric needs and solutions. This is when you stop ‘talking over’ but start truly ‘engaging with’ your audience.  So do you believe you have that green thumb?

This movie reminded me that the success to consumer acceptance, product saleability and ultimate bottom-line lies in finding the pulse of your audience and honing your efforts in that direction.  Now that requires a play of ingredients that need to be added just in the right proportion to make it click. Kung Fu Panda 2 seems to have gotten that recipe right. Packaged optimally in a span of 90 minutes this movie displays a colorful canvas of comedy, adventure and drama all wrapped in one. The animation is visually spectacular with an amazing eye to detail in every character’s emoticons, their colorful attires and even the aura each of the characters bring to the screen with the use of voice-overs and background music.

The PG rated movie eloquently depicts spirituality with central message about ‘finding your inner peace’ tied in with the yin and yang iconism throughout the movie. It has brilliant comic timing tied in with action sequences centered on the protagonist Panda ‘Po’. There is the underlying reflection of the cultural nuances tied in with one’s heritage and ancestry, and a sense of adventure, thrill ride and triumph, by gaining mastery over your weaknesses, in this case by using Kung Fu! All these elements are wonderfully threaded together using the ancient art of story telling and narration creating a mental vacation for the viewers.

As humans, we all connect and relate with each other through our life experiences and the stories we share with one another. This movie (I think) has that cross-generational and cross-cultural appeal that is not just a visual entertainer but also one that has a wonderful moral attached to it. One that reminds us to elevate towards our full potential no matter where we come from, by ultimately finding our inner peace. Who knew a big furry panda, a tigress, a monkey, a crane, a snake and a mantis could possibly teach us that. Its true when they say movie making is truly a magical experience! Let me know what you thought of the movie when you see it!

One unique trait of us as humans is our resilience and creativity in the face of adversity. Our ability to think creatively towards a solution is challenged the most during extraordinary times. This ability comes from our instinctual survival techniques right from our Stone Age that has taught us to not just to survive but thrive over the centuries.

Different factors such as the environment, economy and society have gone through several cycles of change raising with it our stakes to discover, improvise and reinvent ourselves with the times. Changing times have given rise to changing needs – giving birth to new opportunities for growth and development, on a personal level as well as a sociological level.

Today, we live in a technology-driven society that dictates how we interact, communicate and do business with each other. We have all become creatures of modern comfort in a gadget-friendly world allowing us to fulfill our different needs and aimed at making our lives easier. However, on a fundamental level our primary needs have always been centered on survival and sustenance.

That got me thinking about what skills are needed to thrive and sustain in today’s modern workforce? I reached out to a few of the thought leaders while at SAS to seek their advice and opinion. I was looking forward to hearing what they had to say coming from different backgrounds, sensibilities and with over 140 years of collective experience! What I learnt in return was both surprising and delightful. Sharing their collective revelations below:

Adele Sweetwood – Vice President, Americas Marketing - The one skill would be communication – all forms, verbal, written, presentation… With the right communication, you will enable all aspects of growth and leadership. If you were to ask me about the one ‘trait’, I would say, authenticity. People respond positively when you are genuine.

Diana Levey – Marketing Director, JMP - You need to be flexible. Whether you’re at home or in the office, things seldom go as planned. So being able to change on a dime without getting flustered or having your nose out of joint is about as important a trait or skill as I know of.

Jenn Mann – Vice President, Human Resources - Regardless of your industry, it is important to not only be competent in your area, but to have the right attitude. Talent is not enough! Attitudes have the power to lift up or tear down a team. The right attitude also could refer to a “positive attitude”. What I mean by the right attitude is:

• Willingness to admit mistakes
• Seeing strengths in others and nurturing those strengths
• Not taking yourself too seriously
• Living life with some humility
• Having a “can do” attitude

Paul Kent – Vice President, Platform Research and Development - Be useful! You have to combine your technical skills with your sensory ones. Identify an area this is being underserved and apply yourself to it. (Cheerfully is always a good modifier). Your peers and hopefully your boss too, will recognize you for this. The harder question is how does one learn/practice/polish their “useful bone”…that’s usually called work-experience!

Radhika Kulkarni – Vice President, Advanced Analytics - Communication is a very important skill in all careers. Listen to all the input and be open to all the feedback given to you. Learn to articulate your message in a language that is understood by your audience. This is especially important when you work in a cross-functional team with diverse skills where everyone contributes one piece of a larger picture.

Scott VanValkenburgh – Senior Director, Alliances - Empathy. It may sound a bit strange, but empathy towards your own life, its limits and possibilities and empathy towards others. This helps bring perspective, balance and understanding in both your personal and professional relationships. Today, the need and positive effect of human interaction and connection is at an all-time high, and unless you have empathy, one’s career and life will fall short of its full potential.

Suzanne Gordon – Chief Information Officer and Vice President of IT - If you are a ‘manager’ I would say, it’s building an atmosphere of trust where collaboration can happen easily and swiftly. You need to listen to the people that work for you, you need to encourage them to work out issues amongst themselves and not run to you with problems. You need to support and trust them and hire good people! If you are an ‘individual contributor’ I would say its persistence, not giving up if you have a good idea.

Suzanne sums it best for us by sharing this quote, “Success seems to be largely a matter of hanging on after others have let go.” – William Feather

Did their advice resonate with you? Can you think of any other skill you believe is vital to thrive and sustain in today’s economy? Let’s hear it.

Photo by country_boy_shane

Live tweeting offers a great way to stay plugged in to the key happenings around an event both for attendees and for those unable to attend the event physically. Typically, when it comes to large events it’s nearly impossible to hit all the places when there are concurrent presentations or workshops happening at different places. You have to pick and choose and prioritize one over the other. Here’s where live tweeting serves as a great online collaborative platform to catch a glimpse of what is happening on the other side of the hall.

So why would you want to live tweet? Well, your reasons may be multifold but the consequent benefits all drive back to relationship building. Twitter is a wonderful new age tool to create, nurture and build on those relationships. Through live tweeting you may gain new like-minded followers and establish new relationships with them at the conference. It can be your initial step to building on your network and forming new contacts at such events. It further allows for an opportunity of collective learning from each other and strengthening your online identity and reputation.

Live tweeting is very similar to sending a typical tweet that involves sharing timely updates on the twitter stream during an ongoing event, workshop or keynote to reach and engage with a broader audience. Different people follow different tweet styles. Some people like to tweet every event status such as – “Joe speaker just entered the stage.” Others may choose to describe the mood in the room: “Joe speaker addresses a room full of excited attendees cheering him on.” Then there are others that tweet direct quotes from the speakers versus the ones that like to opine or tweet out their own two cents about the speaker and the event. The visual learners may choose to capture moments by uploading and tweeting photos on the fly. While there is no ‘one-tweet-fits-all’ formula, I offer some collective advice to help maximize your twitter experience at large events. Listed in no particular order:

1. Use the official Hashtag: Many events these days promote an official hashtag for the entire conference or even individual breakout sessions. While this might sound like an obvious one, using the hashtag in your tweets helps streamline all connected conversations on that topic making content easily searchable by the users. Here’s an example: Insightful presentation by Joe speaker on the future of Business Analytics #abaws.

2. Reference who you are quoting: If you are quoting or referring someone who you know has a twitter handle make sure you use it by adding the @ followed by their twitter name. For example: @Joespeaker: what’s new with the cloud computing world? It allows for them to engage and participate further in those ongoing conversations.

3. Make it interesting, relevant and resourceful: Just like engaging in any cocktail party, try to ensure that when you speak/ tweet you have something witty, useful or insightful to add to those conversations. Aim to add value when participating. Don’t tweet for the sake of RT’s (retweets). If people find it interesting they will pick it up and spread it on, but that should not be your motivating factor.

4. Listen and engage: Twitter etiquette is very comparable to our physical standards. We try not to interrupt someone when they are talking. No profane language to express our displeasure, or yelling over another person while they are trying to make their point. Why should we behave any differently when it comes to our virtual chats?!

5. Make it conversational: Treat Twitter as a social exchange platform versus a one way channel to push your content. Look out for responses. If people react to your tweets or ask you a question acknowledge it immediately and make it a priority to respond to them. It’s all about creating a dialogue with your audience rather than making it a one-sided broadcast.

6. Lastly but most importantly, be your genuine self: People will naturally gravitate to you online if you show them your natural self. Don’t try to project a side of you that you are not in real life. If you like humor, or are the pensive kinds let that side of you reflect online. Let your tweets be a reflection of who you are in real life, that will make these conversations that much more fun and engaging!

Can you think of other tips or tricks to add to this list? Feel free to respond with your comments.

Until then, happy tweeting!

Related posts –
7 Tips to Live Tweet an Event Effectively
Tips For “Live Tweeting” An Event
How to Live Tweet an Event

Photo by: wissam_ali

Although they have been around for nearly two decades (since 1994, originating in Japan by Denso Wave to help track vehicle parts), they have become prevalent in the recent years given the widespread usage of smartphones that have inbuilt QR reader capability if used with the right QR reader app.

What makes QR code interesting and relevant is their widespread (potential) usage in our modern lives. You can create a unique QR code and make it do a number of dynamic things for you, based on your needs. Such as, personal-branding, attach it to your resume or business card and connect it to the ‘About me’ or ‘Contact me’ section of your blog. It could also be used to drive profile information and status updates on your social media handles (LI, FB, Twitter).

Imagine the possibilities if your designer clothes could talk for you! Just scan the embedded QR code on the fabric and find out all about the winter collection along with the catalog listing from the Designer’s website! Wondering what the nutrition value is for a bag of kale you bought the other day, while sifting through your cookbook for a new recipe? Just scan the printed QR code on the package and voila!

Looking to buy a house but don’t have the downtime to make all those physical trips, the QR code printed in the newspaper ads or billboards as you are driving by can make your life simpler. Simply scan the code using your smartphone and get a video tour of the house or neighborhood right at your fingertips.  It’s Friday evening, and you are standing outside the movies trying to decide which show to go to? Just scan the poster with the QR code and watch the movie trailer or Director’s cut and pick your show!

While this might sound like a common, mundane lifestyle for the Japanese, the rest of the world is still at different stages of the adoption cycle. It’s not only futuristic in its appeal and applications but can be a huge global step in our efforts to go green and lean worldwide with less paper consumption!

The possibilities are limitless with tremendous interactive opportunities in the world of marketing and advertising. Whether you are an established business or just starting out, QR codes can help bridge the gap between the physical world and the virtual one allowing for a richer customer brand experience irrespective of, whether you are physically present at the store or sitting back at the comforts of your house on you smartphone! …Have I gone Matrix on you yet?!

Have you used QR codes? What has been your experience with it?

Photo by CoCreatr

Somewhere along the way we get tricked into thinking we need to ‘add more’ when it comes to a marketing layout. We tend to squeeze in more data, wanting to optimize every square inch with dumping all the possible content there is, feeling the urge to explain or elaborate every little component about a piece. Sometimes backtracking is a good thing! We need to step back and remind ourselves why the old-fashioned ways of storytelling still hold true even today!

When it comes to designing any marketing piece – a flyer, a brochure, booklet or maybe even a blog post, look at it from the lens of a good storytelling template. I dug up and went old school trying to see what that meant –

Rule book-

1. Specify your goal upfront : What is the key purpose of this document? What is it meant to serve? Is it informational, awareness creation, to sell your product, or promoting an event? Keep that in focus and steer your overall content and layout keeping that goal in perspective.

2. Key takeaway: What is the ‘one thing’ you want your audience to do after they read this collateral? I say one thing vs. things, as you don’t want to confuse your audience by giving them more than one actionable item to follow-up on. So think hard and assess what is it that you want them ‘to do’, in order to get better results. Many a times, we feel compelled to add several action items in our call to action hoping for ‘more results’. End result, your target audience might slack, as it might seem like a lot of work their end. So keep it easy and really simple for them.

Imagine, how daunting it may seem to you if you came home from work to a long list of to-do list, you are most likely to procrastinate and try to get to it later. As for the type A personalities, they may get farther, probably getting to the first few vs. hitting all of it. So keep it short and easy for your audience and they are more likely to do it!

3. Give your audience and their intelligence some credit! : People are smart in filling out the smaller details and making sense of things for the most part. So don’t patronize them by inundating them with every little tiny detail and information. Respect people’s times, nobody really has the time to read every word and process it in their heads. Stick with the bigger pieces of information you want them to remember, and have the confidence that your intelligent audience will plug in the connecting pieces.

4. Gift wrap it well! : Everybody likes & enjoys a good presentation. So keep your layout pretty. So what does that mean? It could mean a bunch of things here’s a quick list of some of the obvious ones –

• Always include visuals - People register visuals better. Try to incorporate a relevant picture, graph, table, pie chart, anything will help the reader register the content  visually too. Nobody likes staring at a plain black and white document for too long (yawn!)

• Typography – Try breaking the monotony of the plain text using different font styles  and font sizes making it easier on the eye to read. Also try not going to verbose on them  using long paragraphs (again yawn!) try breaking it down into bite –sized paragraphs.

• Cohesive color scheme – We have used colors all along to describe our emotions and show how we feel. They’ve played a vital role in setting the mood and ambience of our surroundings. Same principles apply in marketing. Use appropriate colors to set the ‘right mood’ and ensure it is cohesive with your overall goal and purpose of your marketing effort.

• Don’t get greedy, leave some white behind – Resist the temptation to fill out every white space left and load it with data and information. Keep it pleasing to the eye. The more you fill it with data, the higher the likelihood that your audience may skim over it, or maybe even ignore it totally. So if you want them to read all your content, space it out, break the monotony and leave some blank space. It makes the layout look cleaner, less crowded and more attractive to read through.

5. Humanize your content : This one is the most important in my mind. We tend to get so caught up in the thick of things that we tend to stray far from the classic methods that have always worked! Tell a story, no matter what type of document you are working on. Give them something that they can hold onto and seems tangible. Try to weave in a story, making it relatable. It could be your own experience, what you heard, a customer success story anything that breaks the sterile exterior shell allowing people to latch onto something. If you are successful at creating an appeal you are that much more likely to get a response from them. If they ‘feel it’ they will ‘act on it’ whether it be picking up the phone, writing back, approving, accepting, buying it, whatever it is that you want them to do. You were able to stir a reaction in them.

Got more to add onto this rulebook? Feel free to chime in and share your knowledge!

Additional resources to refer -

Twelve Tips for Writing Better Marketing Brochures – by Julia Hyde
Tips for improving your marketing collateral – by Teresa Wright
Some Tips In Creating Consistent Marketing Collaterals – by Elmar Sandyck  

 
Photos by Pratham Books and Pierre Pouliquin