The Credibility Branding Blog

Blogging, List Building and Brand Building

If you are an entrepreneur or even if you are a larger company, having a good qualified opt-in list is increasingly becoming a foundational marketing program. For those focused more on online sales it is your lifeblood. There are a lot of people out there discussing how to build a list, here are a few things I have learned using some of the obvious and also incorporating more strategies using my credibility branding model.

Blogging:

Blogging is a great way to establish your brand by using content to establish expertise and personality. I call it a networking and branding building platform. Your web site is a brochure, your blog is you own personal magazine that can illustrate your point and show what you know.  The networking part is leveraging the power of your voice and the audience you are building to improve your relationship with influencers who by association can improve your brand. Here are a few hints to do that:

• Re-post articles of those you want endorsements from or influencers you would like to form relationships with and tell them you reposted one of their works
• Do a review of these same people content and blogs and ;et them know you did so
• Ask readers to join your email list / blogger list

Blogging is a great way to drive a new audience to your newsletter list, if they like your blog they want more.

Squeeze pages and Bonus Gifts:

Squeeze pages are designed to build your list; you give away free stuff on the squeeze page in exchange for an email address. I recently created one for my credibility branding audit (you can check out here). You can use is as a broader strategy; start with a squeeze page to build a qualified list for a specific product. Then offer a phased approach of phased products to that audience.

Try out social networking sites

There are a number of social networking site that will drive traffic and if done right can drive the right traffic to create new subscribers, here are a couple:

• List Bandit - List building networks; one I recently cam across is List Bandit. It is a group of like mined individuals building lists on top of each other, it is worth signing up and trying it. It is a little confusing to start but you get a series of emails that start to walk you through how it works. Also a hint… at the beginning they offer you a special deal that only comes up at the time of signing up they are right and it is a good deal if you can afford it.
• Stumbleupon is a downloadable toolbar that embeds into your browser and gives you the      chance to surf through thousands of excellent pages that have been stumbled upon by other web-users. You can drive traffic by telling the right audience about something that is relevant to them (maybe your blog).
• Del.icio.us is a place to store your bookmarks in one place, bookmark things for yourself and friends and check out what other people are bookmarking. The key is to drive people to your bookmarks      and also get onto other peoples lists. This is another one of those credibility branding things, if you can get on an influencers list it drives traffic and builds your credibility by association.
• Twitter a mini blog based on only 40 characters per post based on the premise “what are you doing” build a following here too.
• Squidoo build a page about your passions create a specific lens of your product here is mine. You      can also start you own groups, I started one that is starting to slowly build.
• MyBlogLog, one of my favorites this is a blogging networking community. Bloggers are      influencers and are ahead of the curve, MyBlogLog allows you to meet and interact with fellow bloggers. A great site where you meat great professional friends that are doing the same thing as you. I have gotten many newsletter subscribers from here and fans and I have become fans of      some pretty awesome people.
• There are a lot more… please leave comments with ones you have found to work and how they work.

Pop Ups

The days of pop ups are waning, however apparently they still work. The key is to have it pop up at the end of their stay as they are clicking away and offer a gift to incent them giving their email.

Bottom line with all of this is to go after the audiences that make sense for your product don’t get an email address just to get an email address. Use these practices to drive a pre-qualified audience to you products. Use them to further establish your credibility and to get those points of credibility across in your messaging. Be careful not to get distracted by these tactics by doing too much of this and not running your business.

Direct Mail Might Just Work Better

While email is the marketing vehicle of choice for many there is still room in your repertoire for direct mail. In fact the following article out of Media Post Media Research Center validated this (see below or click here to go to the source).

Email has become an art form… getting the right subject line will entice readers to open it, having the right copy in the email body that will drive traffic. But email is perceived as a very personal thing, and anything that you send that is remotely considered spam is dangerous to your brand. I think we are becoming too reliant on email, it is cheap and easy which makes it so ubiquitous, but that is also why it is becoming such a coveted place and a tactic we need to be careful with.

The following article really offers another reason to reinvestigate direct mail as a viable option to support you marketing goals.

DM Mail More Likely to be Opened Than Unsolicited Email

A recent survey by International Communications Research, commissioned by Pitney Bowes found that 73 percent of consumers prefer mail for receiving new product announcements or offers from companies they do business with, as compared to 18 percent for e-mail. Mail was also preferred by 70 percent of respondents for receiving unsolicited information on products and services from companies with which they are not currently doing business.

For confidential communications such as bills, bank statements and financial reports, 86 percent of respondents preferred mail as their channel of choice, as compared with 10 percent for e-mail, identical to the response in the 2004 survey, which also showed consumer preference for mail at 86 percent.

Stacy DeWalt, vice president, Vertical Market Development and Marketing, Pitney Bowes Management Services, said "The research... shows that consumers still prefer mail over e-mail... we continue to find that mail is the most effective marketing tool businesses can use when communicating with their customers."

The survey also found that 31 percent of consumers are less likely to discard unopened mail, including new product brochures, catalogs or other advertising materials, while 53.2 percent are likely to discard unsolicited e-mails about new products.

"In an environment crowded with marketing messages, it's important for marketers to utilize the most effective mailstream tools available," said Jeff Marshall, vice president of customer marketing for Pitney Bowes Global Mailstream Solutions. "While mail is the preferred vehicle for reaching consumers, businesses and organizations need to remember that it is critical to target consumers with relevant messages at appropriate times to get a meaningful return-on-investment."

Specific advantages consumers see in mail versus unsolicited e-mail and telephone calls, according to the report, compared with other communications channels, survey respondents found mail to be:

· Less intrusive... doesn't interrupt other activities (45.3 percent)

· More convenient... can be saved and considered at leisure (40.2 percent)

· Less high-pressured... lets you consider your decision (30.2 percent)

· More descriptive... lets you picture the offer (22.7 percent)

· More persuasive... encourages you to respond (12 percent)

What Venture Capital Wants – Credibility Branding and Marketing

I apologize for my absence… I have been working a couple of big projects of late and attending some conferences. I recently attended the OCTANe VC conference in Orange County and thought you might appreciate some for the insights I garnered. I attended several panels for those looking for funding presenting to a panel of VCs looking for hot new investments.

Here were some of the more relevant and general take aways:

• Most companies fail not because they don’t have a great vision but because of lousy execution
• Passion and vision is not enough you must deliver
  • Deliver on the promise
  • Deliver an actual product (and on time)
  • Deliver to the market need
  • Deliver on a specific pain the market is feeling
• There should not be an obvious storm of competition in the market in the near term
  • Early to market wins
  • New ideas not a “me too” product
  • Even if it is the best new widget, if it is in a pool of many similar widgets it is to hard to differentiate (and get funding)
• Must have a demonstrable team
• Customers that have signed up to the concept

Many of the VCs mentioned that they don’t even call the references you provide—they know they will be positive. Instead they go to potential clients (not on your list) and ask their thoughts. So do your due diligence, and do the same; go outside of your normal references and ask potential customers what they think (especially those you know that the VC you are working with might have hooks into). Find out what they might say and address those objections in advance.

I am putting together a series of VC panels at an upcoming conference in Santa Clara. The Flash Memory Summit VC Sessions are occurring August 7^th. If you are in the flash memory space and are looking for funding you can sign up to participate. We are also offering and open invitation to VC looking for companies in that sector to join one of our panels. There are three early morning, afternoon and late afternoon. Just send me an email and your credentials and I will get you on board.

I will be back on Tuesday with a more regular posting schedule. 

IS YOUR LOGO REALLY WORKING ON YOUR WEB SITE? (Special Offer!)

This is for the first 25 respondents only (so hurry up)!

As we all know, making sales on your Web site involves a lot of factors. Ever consider your logo as part of the success (or not) of your Web site?

Our logo expert, Dr. Bill Haig, has done some interesting research on this and has determined that your logo must be credible on your website to be effective. For example, company logos designed with specific company credibility traits will increase the conversion rate 2x to 4x compared to logos which are not credibility based. That could mean increasing sales 2x to 4x.  It is all a matter of trusting the company behind the website. This is the focus of his recent PhD dissertation.

Following up from yesterday's excellent post by Bill, he is offering a no cost logo evaluation for your company to the first 25 people who respond. This is a good opportunity to receive an expert opinion about your logo.

Bill provides a three page evaluation report, including background as to why Credibility Based Logo Design works. He gives examples of credible logos. His objective is to give small business an understanding how logos contribute to the bottom line when they are credible. The flip side, of course, is that a company logo can actually be a distraction when customers cannot trust a company when it does not look credible.

Here is what you do:

1. Send Bill a full description of your company business. Just ramble as if you are describing it to someone who knows nothing about it.

2. Include why your business is unique. What do you do that your competitors do not do.

3. Send your logo.

Bill’s email address for this special no cost logo evaluation is

bill@haigbranding.com

For more about Bill’s proven Credibility Based Logo Design strategy, please read the articles which appear here regularly. His website is www.powerlogos.com and he can be reached by phone at 808-922-4042 Hawaii Time after 9 am.

Logo Design as "Surface" Credibility

By Dr. William L. Haig Chairman, CEO Powerlogos Design Co-author, The Power of Logos: How to Create Effective Company Logos, NY: Wiley, 1997 (fifth printing.)

Two questions often asked are: (1) why is the principle of credibility in communication persuasion important to logo design, and (2) how does graphic design communicate credibility, or more specifically, how does a company logo convey its credibility? Logo design must be credibility based to be effective. Consumers look as logos as a form of visual "surface" credibility in a similar manner as they judge how people look from simple hair or clothing cues.

Credibility Based Logo Design

The underlying theme throughout the work of Powerlogos Design is that source credibility principles in communication persuasion applied to non-verbal graphic design forms to express the company personality, also known as the company's credibility image. Most research in source credibility has been in interpersonal, or people-to-people, communication. The research I pursued is in source credibility in company-to-people communication, with the company as the source.

An early study in source credibility research relative to company to people communication was my MA thesis in 1979, Credibility Compared to Likeability in Marketing Communication: A Study of Company Symbols. The conclusion was that company logos which were perceived as predominately credible would have more persuasion value than company logos which were perceived as only likeable. The thesis was written into a marketing book, The Power of Logos: How to Create Effective Company Logos: NY: John Wiley & Sons, 1997. My PhD dissertation in 2006 also concluded that credibility based logo design has persuasion value. In fact, my research with credibility based logo design and company websites was very convincing. A company website with a credibility based logo design was up to four times more effective in influencing clickthroughs to a product or service purchase than a company website with a non-credible logo.

What is meant by source credibility or source credibility communication persuasion? In its simplest terms, credibility means trustworthy (sometimes referred also as believability.). People are more inclined to purchase from a company or a salesperson if they believe the company or person is trustworthy and hence honest. Credible sources have attributes of expertise/competency and are believable/ trustworthy. Credible sources are high or low in these attributes, meaning a range of dynamism. For example, a successful speaker would be competent about the subject being discussed, is trustworthy, and have a dynamic delivery. Company personalities are often discussed in terms of people metaphors. Thus a successful company would be competent relative to its core business, trustworthy, and use its logo to communicate these traits as a dynamic non-verbal graphic design message.

When discussing source credibility applied to company logos it should be pointed out that there are four categories of source credibility which Dr. B.J. Fogg of Stanford University first identified in his book, Persuasive Technology.

Four Categories of Source Credibility

Surface credibility is believed from a "simple inspection or first hand experience." We form surface judgements about various things which come into our perception world, such as a person's looks, hair style, clothing, manner of speech, manner of walking and so on. This is the world of non-verbal visual cues, such as expressed in graphic design, to infer that the source is ‘believable/honest’ and ‘competent/expert’. We look at product packaging this way. A computer software package which is dated looking, or looks like someone printed it in their garage, will be skipped over at a computer store in favor of a "professional" looking package design. A website which is poorly or amateurishly designed will also be skipped over as not being from a credible source. It is the same with logo design. And it is the most easily type of credibility a company can control because it is planned, created and implemented by company management on a consistent basis. It is important to note that logos fit into the 'surface credibility' category initially, but can ultimately be part of any categories which follow.

Presumed credibility is believed from "general assumptions in the mind of the perceiver." We form presumed judgements when we interact with a source and presume from stereotypical generalities that the source is credible, or not credible. For example, car salespeople are generally not considered credible, while other stereotypes are generalized as being credible, such as the clergy, or physicians.

Reputed credibility is believed from "third-party endorsements, reports, or referrals." We form reputed judgments on the basis of labels, such as an MD or PhD following one’s name or other endorsements such as awards, referrals and reports on people or things. A link from a respected website to another is another example.

Experienced credibility is believed from "first hand that extends over time." This is considered the most powerful form of credibility. The cornerstone of this form of credibility is consistency over a period of time. When a person is reliable we infer that our dealings with that person can be expected and will be consistent with each encounter and over a period of time. It is the same with companies. We want our experience with McDonalds to be the same each time we go for a quick meal down the street or in another state. McDonalds has Hamburger University and detailed manuals to learn and follow. Other areas of consistency are the strict use of the company logo, and compatible graphics which convey the same credibility based image. For example, a company's logo design and stationery design must convey the same defined credibility traits. This is further explained in my article, Consistency: The Key to Branding.

In summary, company logos which are credibility based will be successful when implemented up to four times greater than logos which are not credibility based. This is because we want to know that the company we are dealing with is competent and can be trusted to work with. Surface credibility allows a company to build its credibility on a consistent basis from managed visual cues expressed through its logo and various marketing communications. This is management controlled branding to achieve Brand Credibility.