Category View (Branding)

The Girl Scout cookie sale is off and running. I was approached to buy some cookies when it occurred to me that the Girl Scouts are great marketers. Just think about this for a minute. The brand is easily recognizable They have a sales force of thousands of willing and eager girls (and their families) running around the country selling This sales force creates product placement that can't be beat They sell huge quantities of their product with almost no overhead There is a sense of scarcity - only sold a few weeks a year The product selection and pricing model is simple to understand and communicate Almost everyone more...

Today I was named Brand Champion of the Day by Rex Whisman.  It is an honor to be recognized by a peer and I encourage you to read Rex's blog.  He covers branding with some interesting angles.  While it is great to be the Brand Champion of the Day the job of brand champion is an ongoing role.   This is also not a job for just one person and I share the responsibility with everyone at TrumpU.  When you are building a brand make sure every employee in your company feels as if they are brand champions. Do you think it is easier more...

Going once, going twice... Yes.  If you have $2.7 million to spend on a 30 second ad you too can advertise on this year's Super Bowl. Well it is probably too late but you could have. Do I recomend it for most businesses?  No.  Does it pay off?  Hard to tell.  Many of the advertisers on the big game do it to get their brand out to the millions of viewers.  It would be interesting to look at companies who advertised on the big game to see if the compaines are:  still in business (remember the sock puppet) they are still advertising year after year more...

OK, I admit it.  I am not a branding specialist but in the world of marketing everyone gets involved with branding from time to time.   I am lucky to work for a business that carries the Trump brand which is well known around the world.  Even with our recognition we still pay close attention to our marketing look and feel. Everything we do needs to stand up to the Trump brand.  If you have a business you have a brand.  Do you know what your brand says about you and your company? To help our students we created a free report to more...

Michael Sexton, Cybelle and I were recently working on a new mission statement for TrumpU. We went back and forth a few times drafting the statement. When we thought we had a final product I sent it to a friend and marketing associate for some feedback. Jeff Simons pointed out that what we had created was plain vanilla and could have been used at any company. It didn't scream Trump. It feel flat and did not accomplish what we had hoped. Here is one of Jeff's comments everyone should think about when writing a mission statement: "Like so many mission statements, this more...

A newly found blogger friend of mine, Jack Spirko posted a challenge on his blog to his top 25 bloggers.  He wants to see which bloggers were monitoring his posts and their name across the web.   I was/am honored to be included with some of the bloggers he has listed in his top 25. This is an interesting challenge for me since this blog is still relatively new.  Jack's blog posting and my guest posting might help generate some buzz for this blog and Trump University.  I think there is a lesson in this challenge for any entrepreneur or marketer building a more...