Build your own BRAND! Create your own customers. The kind that pick you over all other alternatives. Delight them to no end, they will share their delight with others because it makes them FEEL GOOD to share something special.
N&C: The text above was a comment I wrote to a Seth Godin post I sent to my Evernote account. His post can be found here.
Earlier today Cisco announced it was shutting down their Flip division and that 550 people would be out of a job. Normally this would not be big enough news to generate the volume of conversation I’m seeing on Twitter. There must be something that the Flip really tapped into regarding people and their relationship with the Flip. Perhaps it has to do with strong branding, built on making a great product that was simple to use.
When people tell friends about products and services that turn out to be crappy, the relationship suffers, trust is eroded away. That same erosion of trust happens to companies that associate with or promote low quality products and services (ads).
Ads like those pictured above are not doing readers any favors. One might even say, ads like these damage the brand of The Wall Street Journal.
*The screenshot of ads above were from the right sidebar of the Wall Street Journal website on 2/28/2011 at 12:15 P.M. EST.
D.L. Damore 