Think about your favorite restaurant.  That place you go when you have some extra time, maybe a little extra jingle.  Not the place you take the visiting in-laws (unless you actually like them, but then that would be an oxymoron), but the place you take your BFF or closest couple friends.  The guys who know how to complete your lame movie quotes or Seinfeld one-liners.

Why did you choose restaurant X?  What makes it special?

Maybe it’s the handy valet or the great view.  The local suppliers, free-range meat, or nods to the diet du jour on the menu. It could be the funky interior or the layout just made for comfortable conversation.  You may have made the pick because of the interesting fare and prompt, thorough customer service.  The relaxed atmosphere or music may be your thing.  Or it may be the right combination of good food and reasonable price.  I just hope it’s not because you’re one of those people who like to drop a Benjamin for what amounts to a cup of frou-frou food on a sauce-drawn miniature plate. Puh-leeze!

The fact is, there’s a secret combination of ingredients working together to create a certain chemistry that just works for you (hopefully those that you’re entertaining, too), and likely many other diners like you.  That certain elusive je ne sais quoi that Micky D’s doesn’t capture, even with extra props for the new fruity smoothies.

You’ve had good times there, eaten good food there, taken refuge there when nursing a few wounds (I completely agree, you *should* have snagged that promotion.).  Some of the rational benefits of your choice are getting folded into some of the emotional accoutrement.  Things get melded together.  The restaurant is much more than simply a place to snag a sandwich.

When rational benefits meet emotional responses, transformative developments take shape for business.  Making and keeping a believeable, consistently achieveable (through a focused model, regimented training, tested process, and feedback loops) brand promise will play out in earned credibility.  The kind that spreads organically.  If you mix in “surprise and delight” variables often associated with service – being greeted by name, receiving special accommodations, garnering personal attention, and exclusive or special occasion offers – and a business can rise above a mass of peers.  It can attract and fulfill a clientele ready, willing, and able to spend $20 on the lunch that wasn’t.  Lunch at your favorite restaurant with your best girl friend who needed a pick-me-up isn’t lunch. It’s soul food.

A business intent on building lasting affinity with customers will recognize that success is sometimes not about achieving scale, but rather about delivering special.  I’ve paid extra for that.  And I’ve referred friends with confidence, too.

What about you? Where have you dined recently – or received any personal service – where you felt the brand was really paying attention to the details, and the front-line staff knew how critical it was to execute according to the secret recipe?

Image of Comme Ca from Zagat.

I heard a lady say last week that she and her company had given up on LinkedIn. They started a group and it was going no where. She said the only people who were participating in the group were her competitors and frankly, her company wasn’t there to play with them. While I don’t know the details of her particular situation, I’ve run into this issue before.

Most companies interested in LinkedIn start a group about their company, then maybe a group about what they do. So if you’re an accounting firm, you start a group about accounting. The problem is that your prospective customers probably don’t go to LinkedIn looking for accountants to hang out with. They go looking for people like them.

The problem with this approach to LinkedIn groups and conversations is that you’re focused on you, not your customer. Try turning the idea around and taking a different approach to groups.

• If you’re an accounting firm, start or join groups for or about running a business, being a CEO or a CFO of a corporation.
• If you’re a jewelry company, start a group focused on fashion.
• If you’re a car insurance company, start a group focused on travel or road trips.
• If you’re an internet marketing consultant, start a group focused on small businesses.

Turn the table and spend your time focused on what your customers might be looking for, not what you are. Because if you do, you’ll find what you want.

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Thanks to the Twitter tip from Jon Steinberg, I came across this great presentation from Rashmi Sinha, CEO / Co-Founder of Slideshare.  In it, she talks about the trials she went through in finding the right mix of business models for SlideShare, ranging from advertising to Freemium.  Great read for any start-up.

2 days and done – thanks to everyone for coming.  Before you walk away too far, click http://bit.ly/cqy31x and complete this quick online survey.  Tell us what you liked about the Digital Non-Conference and what you didn’t like, or what was missing.  Registrants will get a longer survey in their e-mail next week.  We really appreciate your advice and your participation in these surveys to make next year’s event even better!

Off to Midpoint! Rock on!

4:51pm – Q to Jerry:  What’s the biggest project you’ve worked on?   A:  It’s cool to work for a prestigious high-end client (beautiful liquor ads, for instance), but the best ones are where the brand is making a difference.   Femcare in sub-Saharan Africa is now allowing females to go to school a 4th week of the month, which was a cultural no-no before this.  I’m always most smitten with the project I’m working on right now.

4:50pm – Jerry:  Internet has become an archive of everything – that makes it troublesome for brands.  Old logos, old colors, old spokesmen. 

4:46pm – Jerry:  We’re dealing with extinctions, but more and more we’re dealing with mutations.  TV didn’t kill radio, it just changed it into a medium for music.

4:45pm – Jerry:  Interesting there’s now a community of people who will comment on your logo, even offer to redesign it for free.

4:43pm – Jerry:  Moving to brand design.  The visual repository of the goodwill that we associate with a brand.  (Shows a slide of UC Football last year.)   It can also work against you – BP was the “Beyond Petroleum” green brand, but now they’re known more for “Broken Pipeline.”

4:36pm – Jerry:  4) Emotion.   Pampers, started in 1961, now an $8 billion business.   The brand had become stale.  They were focusing on technology.  The arena for winning was “get the hell out of the factory and get into the nursery.” This was a problematic franchise.  We focused on an “out-of-control, joyful moment of having a baby”.  PampersVillage – baby registry, baby showers.   They migrated from radio to television to online.  It’s about emotion.

-> Video of Pampers’ “A Parent is Born” series: http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=1146149546714

4:33pm – Jerry:  3) There is no such thing as a mature brand, or a static brand.  Most brands have to be bringing out new ideas.  Olay is an amazing story.  The brand began small, but has grown huge over the past 50 years.  It’s now a $3 billion brand, and even more successful in China than it is in the United States.  Very strong commitment to innovation and building new products.  Some of Olay’s products are available online, and they’re experimenting with online channel exclusivities for some.  Brands must relentlessly pursue innovation.

-> Real women promoting Olay: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4gSxeALDRU

4:26pm – Jerry:  2) You do need to leverage your visual expression.  We live in a visual culture, and we’re visual learners.  We’re in a constant assault of visual information.  For Gillette, we helped them manage their visual expression.  Great brand, but their visual was all over the place.  Gillette is a “male standard” brand.  We asked “what will men like” in design?  We created a new aesthetic called the “Super G”, now over their entire portfolio.  You need to understand what you look like.  This requires you to manage the design on social media too.

Funny video from Gillette:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-PhVHC-3zCI&feature=fvsr

4:24pm – Jerry:  Back to our factors:  1) Leadership brands incorporate and a brand strategy and inculcate the entire workforce.  Example:  Maker’s Mark.  They had a strong sense of themselves, and that helped them.  We helped them launch Maker’s ’46, one of the biggest stories in bourbon right now.   

4:21pm – http://youtu.be/D3qltEtl7H8 - user video – guy eating 25 Pringles at once

4:21pm – Jerry: Brands need to be authentic and transparent – the ethos of the age.  Constancy, customization, speed and currency, balance in the conversation.

4:21pm – showing this video: http://youtu.be/D3qltEtl7H8  — The Break-Up … video is 2 years old, but still appropriate

4:16pm – Jerry:  Amazon, ecommerce, customization (Lego – create your own product) — really interesting ideas as we retreat from a mass-marketing model

 4:16pm – Jerry:  retailers have consolidated (from 200 major world retailers 20 years ago to just a few now, including Walmart)

4:14pm – Jerry:  Consumers are changing, retailers are changing, brands are changing.

4:14pm – Jerry:  Now, new circumstances, new realities.  Technology is revolutionizing our work.  Significant impact because of ever-emerging technology.

4:13pm – Jerry:  P&G pioneered radio branding (soap operas) and then move to TV

4:11pm – Jerry:  Where did branding start?  No one will agree where branding started.  This town is where some important building blocks of branding were invented.  P&G was the first company to commit to scientific research with their consumers.  They started to understand how consumers were using their products – went door-to-door.  90 years ago.  The concept of brand management was invented in Cincinnati in 1931 – Neal McElroy (sp?).  Neal:  we’ll set up each brand as its own company, let them compete against each other.

4:10pm – Jerry:   We like brands, because they help us make choices.  They assure us of quality, reducing our risk as consumers.  Brands increase our pleasure, involved in our self-expression.

4:09pm – Jerry:  Four factors I’ll focus on:  1) Who you are, 2) Visual expression, 3) Innovation, 4) Emotion

4:09pm – Jerry:  We observe some brands lack the commitment, will to be leaders.  I’ll show some points from an article I wrote 20 years ago, and they still hold up.

4:08pm – Jerry:  Why do some brands end on death row?  Is this natural, or do we make choices along the way that determine life or death.

4:07pm – Jerry:  Why have some brands been successful extending themselves around the world, or extending their reach (shampoo -> skin cleanser)?  Why have some brands successfully navigating these emerging platforms while others have failed?

4:05pm – Jerry:  We work on some of the world’s largest and most beloved brands.  Olay, Expedia, for instance.  We work around the world.  (Shows pic of an Olay store in Warsaw.)   In China, Olay is a luxury brand.   Also, we help our brands navigate online.

4:04pm – Jerry:  We’re an independent company, employee-owned, offices in 6 countries. 

4:04pm – Joe Long from Enquirer Media introduces Jerry.

Our lunchtime keynote speaker, Tim Westergren from Pandora, offered some additional thoughts in this one-on-one interview.

The final set of breakouts Friday afternoon includes the following 4 choices:

• Brands Love Music  (AJ Correale/Frost Brown Todd)
• Digitally-Driven Change: The Collapse of Higher Education as We Know It (Glenn Platt/Armstrong Institute)
• Online Brand Management Strategies (Krista Neher/Cincinnati State)
• Mobile-Sifting Through the Noise (Michael Carter/MyThumb)

Here are the top tweets.  Chronological from bottom up, although it may not affect your enjoyment or the utility of these fine tweets.

adclubjudy: To deal with negativity – Humanize your brand. Listen. Thank them for caring. Be transparent & explain. Krista knows her stuff! #dignc

MikeBoehmer57: Humanize your brand. It’s easier to hate a company than a person. @kristaneher #dignc

MikeBoehmer57: Your advocates will defend your brand for you. @kristaneher #dignc

MikeBoehmer57: Tell bloggers thanks for positive mentions. Comment on their blogs. @kristaneher #dignc

jessemoyer: Perhaps getting rid of tenure would encourage innovation and acceptance of failure? #dignc

MikeBoehmer57: Lots of tools like brandwatch.com to measure sentiment @kristaneher #dignc

NKYmomof3: @MolsonFerg just saw really cool video on #molsoncoors mobile, social media, email success. during #dignc here in Cincy.

 EmpowerMM: Key to mobile marketing is making it permission based to address privacy concerns. via @MyThum #DigNC ^KD #DigNC

jessemoyer: Professors need to primarily be “doers” and teachers, not researchers. #dignc

reneemmurphy: The new professor should be an experience designer, creating opportunities for critical thinking – Platt & Faimon #dignc

MikeBoehmer57: Can use paid monitoring tools such as Radian6 @kristaneher #dignc

jessemoyer: The new professor is more of an experiece designer, not a teacher. 2020 Learning Agents anyone? #dignc #2020forecast

MikeBoehmer57: Monitor tools… Google alerts, Twitter search, and Google yourself, competitors, industry terms @kristaneher #dignc

ShanaDouglas: With #SocialCRM we will have more insights from consumers to make better decisions about our brands. <—Amen. #dignc

EmpowerMM: Molson has more wireless consumers opted in than some wireless carriers have customers. #DigNC ^KD #DigNC

lauradahlberg: Social media does not create the problem. It merely reflects what people are already talking about. #dignc #onlinebrandmanagement

adclubjudy: Social Media Brand tools: be consistent, be transparent, assume everything is public, set clear expectations. Krista Neher #dignc

ShanaDouglas: Projected mobile commerce transactions for #eBay in 2010 are $1.58 Billion – #mobilefact #dignc

Ashley_Walters: QR codes are on the rise: recently saw more scans in one month than in all of 2009 #mythumb #dignc

MikeBoehmer57: Be transparent. Acknowledge complaint. Respond promptly. Listen and take action. @kristaneher #dignc

CincinnatiJim: Great presentation by Michael Carter of MyThumb interactive. Canadians know mobile for sure. #dignc

eachnotesecure: Speaker suggests that advertisers “never” contact the artists. Only contact the label. Let them be “creative” #dignc

EmpowerMM: Mobile: niche marketing to mass audience. Text message at bottom of pyramid w/ apps at top w/ least reach, but most engagement #dignc #DigNC

MikeBoehmer57: Managing and monitoring social media is increasingly important because it shows up in search results, @kristaneher #dignc

eachnotesecure: Sadly this talk seems totally geared towards major label artists only, no mention of independents yet #dignc

EmpowerMM: 1 in every 7 minutes of media is consumed via mobile channel — per @MyThum ^KD #DigNC #DigNC

ShanaDouglas: 44% of mobile users check their cell phones every 30 minutes #dignc

CincinnatiJim: 37% of 18-24 yr olds checked their phones in the last 5 minutes. #mythumb #dignc

MikeBoehmer57: Your brand is how people perceive you. Is in their hearts and minds. Emotional and logical. Soc media to showcase @kristaneher #dignc

JoeKikta: Social Media can help with emotional portion of branding #dignc

EmpowerMM: Love hearing people suggest audience/strategy 1st. Shiny new as it makes sense from there. Wish more folks practiced it. ^KD #DicNC #DigNC

jessemoyer: Most universities are failing, but they&apos;re working very hard at doing the wrong things better. #dignc

jessemoyer: Collapse of higher education as we know it…should be very interesting! #dignc

EmpowerMM: Strategy/Technology/Connections – 3 key buckets when organizing around mobile. via @mythum #DigNc #DigNC