• Blog,  Brand Management,  Business Strategy & Growth

    Why Do Most ‘Brands’ Fail?

    To begin with, I want to clarify the distinction when I say a ‘brand’ versus a business in this article. A brand although may be closely related to the overall business and in some instances the brand is the business, but not always one in the same. A brand needs to be created and built such as the operational aspect of any business. The brand and the business start on parallel paths and eventually if you succeed they merge into one, it creates a synergy. So why do most brands fail? They fail to merge. Building a brand that resonates and merges with the overall business isn’t a simple task.…

  • Advertising,  Blog,  Brand Management,  Business Strategy & Growth,  Personal Branding

    Will Instagram’s New No ‘likes’ Count Update Ruin the App?

    Will Instagram really take your like counts away? Will this ruin Instagram? During the F8 conference this week, one of the many features Facebook announced was Instagram removing their ‘like’ counts on users posts. “We want people to worry a little bit less about how many likes they’re getting on Instagram and spend a bit more time connecting with the people that they care about,” said CEO, Adam Mosseri, Tuesday during Facebook’s annual developer conference, F8. Instagram has already started their testing by launching this new feature in Canada this week. The new no ‘like’ feature will display users posts as it would normally, but the public will not see…

  • Blog,  Business Strategy,  Marketing,  Personal Branding

    Key Questions to Ask Yourself When Understanding Consumer Behavior

    Human Psychology is the foundation of a good marketing strategy. Everyone has a vague and simple definition of marketing but my honest definition is, it’s the art of persuasion and seduction of the mind. You might think that’s manipulating and wrong of marketers, but you’re doing it every day. The Mind + Marketing Series When if comes to building your personal brand, your daily actions require you to persuade and seduce the mind of others.  That doesn’t necessarily mean you’re lying to others, you’re just finding ways to sell your truth.  More commonly, we do this while dating.  For example, the outfit you choose to wear is to help persuade…

  • Blog,  Brand Management,  Business Strategy & Growth,  Case Study

    What is “Brand-mas”? – Why Amazon Broke Records This Holiday Season

    According to multiple sources that track holiday spending (Mastercard Spendingpulse & Amazon), consumers spend increased 5.1% (Nov 1 – Dec 24) this holiday season verses 2017. Total sales were close to $850 Billion!! Amazon also reported this holiday season was their record breaking season as statistics show they shipped more than a billion items just in the United States! (They have not yet released their global numbers) But first… WHAT IS BRAND-MAS? The more I thought about consumer behavior during the holidays, I realized that purchasing habits for Christmas time holiday’s are a bit different than the shopping craze of Black Friday sales. Yes, many consumers purchase their holiday presents early on Black Friday but purchasing behavior is a…

  • Advertising,  Blog,  Brand Management,  Business Strategy,  Marketing,  Personal Branding

    What Can We Learn From Steve Jobs? A Marketing & Communications Genius

    There’s not many people in the world that don’t recognize the name “Steve Jobs” – the man that changed how we live our lives forever. We’ve all been influenced by his work in one way or another.  Most of you, because of his entrepreneurship, inventions and brains that made Apple one of the largest, most valuable brands ever.  Although, Apple isn’t what it is today just because of it’s products. A large part of their success is due to their successful marketing strategy.  If you didn’t already know, Apple wasn’t always successful, it was actually failing for a long time until Steve Jobs rejoined the company and brought along something…