Build A Brand In 30 Days with Simon Middleton

Simon Middleton is promoted as ‘the brand strategy expert’ in his new book, Build a Brand in 30 Days.

Brand is serious and important to your business: but it’s also very simple in its essence. Brand is about meaning. In short, your brand is the sum total of all the meanings that all your possible audiences carry around about you in their heads and in their hearts.

Build A Brand In 30 Days is divided appropriately into 30 days each with a clear exercise to follow.

I am always sceptical about self or business help books that attempt to sell you a concept on the basis that anyone who buys this book and follows these simple steps can reach their goal’.

Life isn’t as simple and straightforward as that.  If it were, anyone who put any effort or dedication into running a successful business would indeed be…. successful.

Branding is probably something that many small business owners overlook, believe is not approrirate to their business due to size or cost.  But theis book shows it is important and can ve applied for less money that is often perceived; and like all good business books, it helps you to focus on a strategy and a way of thinking.

Aimed at new enterprises, businesses struggling to stand-out from the crowd or in need of reinvention, Build A Brand In 30 Days shows you how to create, manage and communicate your brand profoundly and effectively, in just 30 days, by following 30 clear exercises.

In his introduction Simon Middleton states the reader can use Build A Brand In 30 Days to:

•    Educate yourself fast in the art of branding
•    Actually build a proper brand for your business or for any of its products or services
•    Build a brand for a charity or public sector organization
•    Build a brand for your team or department within a bigger organization
•    Build your own personal brand in order to enhance your career

What I like about Simon Middleton’s book is the way he has broken down the exercises into bite-size chunks, allowing the small business owner or would-be entrepreneur to see the wood from the trees; and by undertaking these 30 exercises, even if it takes longer than 30 days, the focus you will achieve with your company brand will for sure raise your company profile and help you onwards, towards business success.

Build A Brand In 30 Days shows you how to:

•    Establish your brand values and positioning
•    Get the all-important name right
•    Bring your brand to life
•    Turn your customers into your advocates
•    Manage your PR and use your marketing budget wisely
•    Inspire your staff to live the brand
•    Deal with problems when something goes wrong

One of the exercises explains how to create a ‘Personality‘ for your business that customers will respond to.  Reading some of the points also helps you to look at why you like other brands and  to apply that to your own brand.

Build A Brand In 30 Days is the ideal guide to branding for entrepreneurs, small and medium enterprises (SME’s). Published by Capstone, price £12.99.

The project will allow young people across the capital to gain invaluable experience within the arts and includes partnerships with London’s leading art galleries, Hayward Gallery, Royal Academy of Arts, South London Gallery, Tate Britain and Whitechapel Gallery.

The investment will facilitate a three year programme that will give young Londoners aged between 13 – 25 from across the city unique access to the museum directors and curators, artists and collectors who shape the British contemporary art scene.

Holiday makers and business people alike were stranded around the world waiting for the ash to clear the sky-ways of Northern Europe before they could embark on their journey home.

The television news programmes appeared to be revelling in the grief of stranded passengers as they turned up at various air and sea ports to report on the latest situation.

Many travellers were willing to pay extortionate amounts to get themselves closer to home, while others simply had no choice but to sit and wait for the skies to clear.

While insurance companies and the UK Government argued about who was to blame and where compensation should be paid, it was reassuring that the UK’s largest credit card provider responded by announcing that it would re-imburse card holders with any charges they had incurred when withdrawing emergency cash abroad during the disruption.

While these charges may be minimal in the scheme of things it is none the less commendable given how sceptical of the financial institutions we have become during the credit crisis.

The financial institutions really need to show that they are helping out their customers in these difficult times and while others are withdrawing their zero percent transfer offers on credit cards, MBNA still offer this service along with other low APR credit card offers.

Re-imbursing charges incurred while drawing cash to cope with the volcanic disruption may appear a token gesture, but it is also a good business move, helping restore a little faith in an industry that has dragged us all through the mire during the financial crisis. It may well be worth remembering next time you apply for the best credit card deals that MBNA at least did something for their customers while others chose to blame everyone else.

But depending where your business is based face-to-face meetings are not always possible, and with more and more business being conducted over the internet, it makes perfect sense to look further afield for discount printing and other services now readily available on the World Wide Web.

Of course, it isn’t cost always going to be cost-effective to use online services from abroad for small digital print runs such as business cards.  But for any large orders it may well surprise you how much money can be saved by comparing online services to your local, convenient, and in some cases overpriced printers.

Furthermore, more and more print companies are now offering other services.  CD and DVD jewel cases, direct mail services, and the very popular vinyl banners for exhibition stands, as well as the more obvious calendars, postcards, leaflets, posters and graphic design services.

So before you place your next order with a local business consider whether online services as far away as the United States or China could help you generate success by saving you time and money.

The social network software that is available online has meant that however comfortable you are using the internet and the products that are found there, you can still take advantage of the benefits that are on offer. Whether you have the confidence to create the ideal network for yourself all on your own, or you could do with a helping hand every step of the way and wouldn’t dare to create anything online all on your own, you will find that the services that are available will give you the correct level of assistance that you require.

If you are a seasoned developer then you can choose to go it alone and select the DIY method, where you can set up your network and have it running smoothly and efficiently and the way you want it to. Once you have had a look at the benefits that are on offer and the simplicity that is part and parcel of creating and setting up your own network, you can choose your own web address and get cracking right away.

There is always help on hand in the form of a help desk that is open to answer your questions right around the clock, whilst the video tutorial library can be accessed before you start so that you can get an idea of what work is required from you. If you are still left feeling out of your depth then you can decide to get some assistance setting the network up, or you can go even further and get the five star treatment, where the network is designed for you.

If you feel that you need help setting up a business social network then plenty is available, as an expert can work with you to setup, design and launch your social network. If you don’t have the time to spare setting up a social network or would just like the task completed for you, then you can take advantage of the concierge service where all the work is done for you for a small fee.

Whatever level of assistance you require the choice is up to you, but whichever path you take you will still end up with the same result. A slick looking, ultra professional social network will be the result of the personal support given and consequently you will have a unique and fully customised social network, where you can draw in and build your network of business clients.

All UK businesses are looking to cut costs, spend less and hang on to their customers. But while certain expenditure can most certainly be contracted or cut altogether, whether a corporate golf day or lunch time visits to Marks And Spencer, there’s one area that many businesses look to cut when I recommend they increase their budget spend, especially in times like these.

Internet Marketing will help your business by attracting more customers through visibility.

Furthermore, as businesses stop trading you will need to be accessible, easily found on the web and listed high in Google, if you are going to capitalise on gaining their clients.

For those of you without a company website – where have you been?

Your business not only NEEDS a website but a professional looking, highly functional website should be at the hub of every business marketing plan.  Not having a company website is almost as bad as having a badly designed website!

For those businesses with a good website, you need to promote it with an internet marketing strategy. Internet Marketing should be responsive to your business and sector requirements, but must always include a strong strategic link building focus and an emphasis on ranking as high as possible in Google for your specifically targeted keywords.  Inbound links, topic relevancy and site authority all go towards ranking your website higher.

Now, if you are already employing an internet marketing consultant or company to manage your online marketing but are not getting a ROI (Return On Investment) or new business from this service, then it’s time to question whether they are doing a good job!

Many so-called SEO companies have sprung up in the past 2-3 years in the UK are not experts in the field of web marketing.  Most use automated tools and send pages of next to useless data showing SEO (Search Engine Optimisation), but this is not going to help you or your business without a managed strategy and analysis.

What your business needs is an internet marketing program being managed by experts who manually monitor and recommend what is right for your business to acquire more visibility, more traffic, more leads, and ultimately more customers; and the most important consideration is to analyse the results.  To do so, your online marketing strategy will need to harness the power of web analytics.

Armed with a good website analytics tool and an expert internet marketing team to build, monitor, manage and offer recommendations, your internet marketing program will help you  to beat your competitors and survive the recession.

In this current economic climate there will be more businesses going bankrupt and more redundancies to come, that’s for sure.  But this needn’t be viewed as bad news for everyone and can actual generate online business success if you stayed focused and deliver quality goods and services.

Unless you are in a niche market, competition will increase as businesses battle to keep their heads above water.  But unless you already compete on price alone, be careful not to lose sight of your current business success.

It’s true, your potential customers are possibly being more cautious with their budgets and may be spending less on products and services not earmarked as a priority.  But your customers will still be looking at the quality and service you provide.

Of course you need to consider any changes in price by your competitors but you should also keep a strong focus on what makes your business different from the rest of the market.

What is your USP (unique selling point)?

To survive this difficult time in business you need to make sure you promote and deliver your USP.  If you haven’t got a USP, this has just become your priority, if you are going to reap the benefit of business opportunities on the Internet in 2009.

Think about what you offer.  How is it different or better than your nearest competitors.  Consider why potential customers would choose to buy from or work with your business.  Even better, ask existing customers what was the reason they chose your business over others, especially any recent customers, as this should give you a good starting point to consider your company’s USP.

Once you have agreed on your business USP promote it as much as you can.

Your market may well have shrunk and become more competitive.  But in every market there are winners and losers.