Welcome to our branding and marketing blog
This is the best place to learn how we think as creative and strategic communicators. You’ll find various observations and best practices about branding, design, client relations, and communications, in general. We try to keep things instructive and advisory. However, we can’t guarantee that there won’t be a rant or rave once in a while. So, please cut us some slack.
FEATURED BLOG POST
15 marketing reality checks (Don’t let #9 hurt your feelings.)
by Step2 Branding & Design
Over the years, we’ve been offering helpful tips and best practices advice through our branding blog. Here, we’ve collected a number of the more salient points and are presenting them as a marketing reality check. A good number of these apply to new or small businesses. But you’ll also find that some of the largest corporations in the world take many of the same missteps.
Branding and marketing blog posts
Wrestle that marketing axe away from your CFO
When businesses slow down, CFOs begin to get nervous. If they decide to tighten their belt, marketing budgets are usually the first to get cut. This is often a shortsighted and reactionary move. If marketing is the fuel for your sales team, the last thing you want to do is suck all of the oxygen out of the room.
Five ways to give your marketing a Spring cleaning. (Number 5 is easier than you think.)
Spring is a season of renewal and rejuvenation. So, shake off the rust, get out the broom and add some polish to your business. Here are a few things you should consider at least once a year to tidy up your marketing.
A great brand requires enduring vision
Ask yourself how your current challenges and objectives align with your long-term vision. Have you lost your way, or are you sticking to your Brand Promise? Is it still meaningful to your customers and prospects? Have you allowed yourself the room to evolve with their needs, or have you boxed yourself in?
Be more like Mickey
Without answering these four questions with authority, your marketing won’t connect with your audience in a meaningful way that distinguishes you from your competitors and puts you in their corner.
What do you want your business to look like five years from now?
If your brand cannot adapt to change, you could end up burning cycles recovering what you lost instead of spending your time building on what you have. As Ben Franklin once put it, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”
Nine marketing tips to end your year with a bang!
As the calendar year winds down, it always a good idea to take a step back to revisit and refresh your marketing. Your business will be better off by doing so. But, don’t go overboard and be too disruptive.