NO FEAR, NO APOLOGIES VIRTUAL CONFERENCE

(Celebrating Emotional Nudity Awareness Week)

LIMITED SEATING - REGISTER TODAY!!

WHAT IS A VIRTUAL CONFERENCE?

This event is not held at a physical location, in order to participate you only need a functional email address and internet & telephone access. Content will be delivered directly to you via email or you can connect to the conference online.

HOW MUCH DOES THIS EVENT COST?

There is no fee for this event.  It is an introduction and celebration of the Emotional Nudity Lifestyle.

Event Date:

December 2-7, 2012

Event Location:

Virtually Anywhere.

LIMITED SEATING - REGISTER TODAY!!

EVENT SUMMARY:

Emotional Nudity is a highly personalized lifestyle that promotes authentic living without fear or apologies.  Founder Jai Stone plans to introduce this incredible approach to abundant fulfillment to the world during the 1^st Annual Emotional Nudity Awareness Week. If you would like to live a more authentic, congruent life, this event is for you.  Our speaker’s will share their secrets and stories that have allowed them to take an organic approach to living and excel in areas of finance, physical fitness, life balance and more. All you need is an email address and a telephone to participate.

LIMITED SEATING - REGISTER TODAY!!

I learned a valuable life lesson from my 13-year old niece the other day.  I was so moved, I had to record a video to express my feelings. Enjoy!

I would like to solicit your comments on my recent interview with Alfred Edmond, Jr. , SVP/Editor-at-large of Black Enterprise Magazine.  I was given 10 minutes to interview Mr. Edmond about the challenges facing minority/women entrepreneurs.  Please review the video link below and add your comments to the website.  In the next few days, your comments will be tallied and the blogger with the most comments will be given a pass to the Black Enterprise Conference.  It is conferences like this that have allowed me to grow my own business as well as introduce new trends to clients.  I would be greatly appreciate it if you would share with friends and encourage them to comment as well.

ONLY COMMENTS ON THE WEBSITE WILL COUNT TOWARDS MY FINAL TALLY. 

http://blackloveforum.com/our-founder-would-like-your-comments/

Most of us think of celebs in terms of entertainers.  But the category is far more vast.  A celeb is anyone who has notoriety with the general public or a select group of people.  So the range of celebrity talent goes from famous actors, dancers and writers to hair stylists, inventors or maybe even an industry expert. What determines brandability can be summed up with two questions. WHO would be interested? WHY would they care?

My determination process may seem a bit crass, but it cuts to the chase and saves loads of time.  Once we determine theWHO, the WHY is almost as important.  Its the WHY that dictates longevity and level of success.  A fly-by-night sensation will lose its shine once the 15 minutes of fame or over, that is unless we keep giving them more WHYs.

EXAMPLE: Last year we were all singing the "Pants On the Ground" song courtesy of General Larry Platt.  The General appeared on the season 9 auditions of American Idol.  Platt then embarked on a whirlwind media tour that included appearances on The View and Ellen and even spawned his own You Tube Channel (click here to visit).  There were posters and t-shirts and even an attempt at a iTunes single.  Let's face it, General Platt became an epidemic.

Now fast forward one year.  We could care less about the "Pants" (on the ground or otherwise).  So what made the excitement fizzle?  No rocket science required here, the reason WHY the General WAS famous, but ceased to be current or interesting.  Of course there are other factors that contribute to brandability, I made a quick list below.

Here are the key factors to be BRANDABLE:

1. Be Clear -  clearly determine your fan base
2. Be Interesting -  can you keep the fans interested long term
3. Be Personable -  can you connect to your audience on a personal and emotional level
4. Be Authentic -  fans don't care if you are an angel or an ass, they just want it real

Remember Branding is all about 'promise of value'.  Determine your value, and you determine your brand.

One of the biggest challenges that Small Businesses face is creating effective marketing collateral.  In addition to a challenging budget, there is just the question of what to communicate.  My motto is K.I.S.S., Keep It Seriously Simple! Don't make the mistake of over communicating your product or services.  Consumers are a lot smarter than you think, but they don't want to be bombarded with tons of messaging or content.  It takes too much time to sift through the clutter.  So in order to help you avoid overkill, I will offer you some Tips in Marketing K.I.S.S.

1. Avoid Hokey Taglines - If you can't afford to hire a marketing consultant, then leave off the tagline all together.  As cleaver as you might think you are, customers can always tell when your tagline is homegrown.

2. Get to the Point - Don't waste time with too many details on your materials.  Your collateral should communicate four things immediately.  1) Who you are, 2) What you do, 3) What is unique about your offering and 4) How to contact you.  Anything more is TMI (too much information).

3. Minimize Images - Too many images can be a lot of the brain to process.  Keep your collateral to 1 or 2 images that communicate your focus at a glance. If you need to show multiple images, then stick to one main image that draws the focus.  Keep the other images subordinate so they con't compete with the main focus.

4. Use the 3-Click Rule - When it comes to your website or blog be sure not to bury your content and confuse visitors.  The 3-Click Rule states that a visitor should be able to get to any content on your site within 3 clicks.    Does your site measure up?

5.  Eliminate Business Card Clutter - While your business card has a lot of 'real estate', its important to stage the content carefully.  Stick to relevant contact details on the front, such as your name, title, email address  and phone number.   Put all other details on the back (but don't make the mistake of printing a book back there).

There are lots of other ways to Keep It Seriously Simple, but its easiest just to keep the customer in mind by asking a simple question.  If I had 5 seconds what would I want my customers to know? I have included a sample ad that we designed for a customer utilizing Marketing K.I.S.S.

Happy Branding!

You can continue this conversation on Twitter @brandcoachllc or on Facebook.com/TheBrandCoach

Small businesses and start-ups put forth great effort to appear stable and established.  But often times they have a 'tell'.  Business cards printed at home, an AOL email address or ...a tri-fold brochure.  No matter how great your company/ service may be, you simply sell yourself short with these marketing flubs.

Marketing Faux Pas

While the tri-fold format in printed collateral has long been a a staple in marketing, in recent years the layout style has become a faux pas.  We live in the age of 'instant' success, consumers want to get information at a glance. That means they are looking for a Visual Snapshot. Its a big risk to assume that someone will take the time to comb through the folds of a page just to find out what you do, and how it will benefit them.

The Visual Snapshot

If you are wondering what a Visual Snapshot is, then imagine yourself in line at the supermarket.  When you glance at the magazines on the shelf you make a decision on whether or not to buy, just by looking at the cover.  The same thing happens when  a person looks at your marketing collateral.  I mean we don't want to have to read the

entire magazine to determine if we should buy it.

The first page of your brochure should state the following (very obviously):

• Who are you?
• What do you offer?
• What is unique about your product or service?

I'm not saying that the triple dipper doesn't have its effective uses.  It can be quite helpful as a pamphlet and its a wonderful tool in the health care industry.  But for small businesses, it just makes you LOOK small time.

I have included an example of a Sell Sheet.  Whether single or double sided, its a sure fire way to impress prospects.

Happy Branding Everyone! (http://thebrandcoach.com/ or @brandcoachllc)