In this episode of Connecting The Dots we discuss how short-term decision making hurts your marketing and stops you from growing.

When I say Cadillac, what do you think of? A Bicycle or a Car?

All of these companies, and thousands more, have fallen for a cardinal sin of branding and marketing. The fallacy of line extension. All of them have spent millions of dollars on products that did not align with their brand positioning and have not only failed with new products but as a consequence have also lost large amounts of market share. Let me explain...

Brand and Marketing Consulting.

Learn more at adambarbaro.com

Instagram: @adamebarbaro

LinkedIn: Adam Barbaro

In this episode of Connecting The Dots we discuss the biggest and most common marketing mistake made by businesses and how to stop it.

What is the biggest and most common mistake for marketing businesses? Easy, it is prioritising short term and expensive tactics like new websites, content, and ads before understanding the bigger strategy they need to make those deliverables successful.

Brand and Marketing Consulting.

Learn more at adambarbaro.com

Instagram: @adamebarbaro

LinkedIn: Adam Barbaro

In this episode of Connecting The Dots we discuss the using the Market Map model to find gaps in competitors positioning and using that to your advantage.

According to Nobel Prize winning psychologist Daniel Kahneman most people rely on intuitive thinking in order to make decisions. Unfortunately while this feels like the right thing to do, often leads to bad decisions that are not based on the information available and logic. 

Brand and Marketing Consulting.

Learn more at adambarbaro.com

Instagram: @adamebarbaro

LinkedIn: Adam Barbaro

In this episode of Connecting The Dots we discuss the formula for creating a successful brand that stands out and wins a large share of the market.

If your company has direct competitors that are eating away at your market share then this is a solution for you.

In the mind of the customer, there aren’t competitors, there are just options. The human mind deals with options, in a lazy but effective way, by blocking out and discarding difficult to consume information. The mind looks for reasons why to pick one product over another, often looking for familiarity in a brand. This is why Brands are important in today's market. They allow you to build recognition in the minds of the customers, but how do we ensure our brand stands out amongst the rest?

We are now, possibly for the first time in history, in a period where due to the plethora of options available for consumers; now more heavily reliant on effective branding. It is no longer about pushing out generic products onto the market, it is about pulling people in to choose and be a part of your brand.

The question is now how do we create a brand that pulls consumers to us. Allowing us to avoid trying to sell them on buying our products. We achieve this through a simple formula...listen to hear all about it!

Brand and Marketing Consulting.

Learn more at adambarbaro.com

Instagram: @adamebarbaro

LinkedIn: Adam Barbaro

In this episode of Connecting The Dots we discuss the importance of a brand identity in making associations in the mind of the customers. We go into the 4 components that make up a brand identity.

Branding, a term that is thrown around a lot today, with a lot of different meanings. It traditionally referred to a company's visual identity in the form of a logo. However, like most things in the marketing realm the term ‘brand’ has organically developed to encompass and represent so much more meaning and thinking. A logo today represents just one component of a brand's visual identity.

The ‘Brand Identity’ has a whole representing a brand and its positioning in a visual way to the consumer. This visual representation of a brand has 4 separate components that are aligned to present the deeper strategy of the brand to the consumer in a clear and appealing way. Let me explain…

Brand and Marketing Consulting.

Learn more at adambarbaro.com

Instagram: @adamebarbaro

LinkedIn: Adam Barbaro

In this episode of Connecting The Dots we walk through the importance of understanding competitive landscape and how doing so provides you with the ability to find gaps in the market and become a leader.

It is through understanding the competitive landscape that we find whitespace and develop clarity in how to best serve consumers and what products bring them the most value. This not only brings with it financial benefits but also assists us in gaining more experience in a specific area. The more experience we have the more expertise we develop, making the company less able to control your niche/submarket.

Less competition, more work, and the ability to charge more? Why haven't you started to understand your competitors better?

Brand and Marketing Consulting.

Learn more at adambarbaro.com

Instagram: @adamebarbaro

LinkedIn: Adam Barbaro

In this episode of Connecting The Dots we walk through the importance of understanding your customer and the 4 components to creating a customer persona.

The evolution of marketing shows us that the successful brands today are ones that understand the importance of a customer focused approach. The advantages of focusing on the unserved customer rather than the product are too numerous to quickly mention now. However, I do want to talk about the need to understand your customer deeply, in order to be able to truly provide value and be positioned to build a tribe of fans around your brand.

The 4 components that make up a good customer persona are the demographics, the psychographics, the geographics and the customers behaviour. 

Brand and Marketing Consulting.

Learn more at adambarbaro.com

Instagram: @adamebarbaro

LinkedIn: Adam Barbaro

In this episode of Connecting The Dots we walk through how the emphasis of branding, marketing and advertising has changed over the last 100 years, and how we can take advantage of this change to create a awesome strategy for 2022 and beyond.

There are thousands of new products and services entering the market every year. Modern technology has changed the way we market and has provided new products and services with endless opportunities for advertising. These new opportunities for advertising are no longer restricted to our tv, radios, and billboards. Ads have now infiltrated all aspects of our lives, resulting in a constant barrage of advertising in everything from the games we play, the music we listen to, the movies we watch and even when communicating with friends and family.

As the number of advertising opportunities has increased, the cost of advertising has decreased in many areas. A decrease in the costs has brought an increase in the number of competing companies. The need to be effective at branding, marketing and advertising to match the competitive environment of the modern day market has never been more apparent. For our products and services to succeed we must utilise strong marketing principles and understand how the marketing environment has, and in what direction it will continue, to change.

Over the last hundred years we have seen an increase in branding, marketing and advertising complexity. Growing competition creates an environment that rewards a company that specialises and differentiates itself. Brands that find whitespace are able to be first in the mind of the customer and set themselves up for success early before the competition arrives.

This is reflected in how companies have been marketing themselves, and how the emphasis continues to adapt from a product focused analytical approach to a customer focused empathetic approach. How we position ourselves externally has evolved from “what it has”, to “what it does”, to “what you’ll feel”, to “who you are”. [Marty Neumeier - The Brand Gap]

Brand and Marketing Consulting.

Learn more at adambarbaro.com

Instagram: @adamebarbaro

LinkedIn: Adam Barbaro

In this episode of Connecting The Dots we walk through the key elements of implementing some Branding and Marketing fundamentals of creating a Brand Personality.

Personalities have significant influence over who we attract and who we repel. A personality plays a big role in the type of work we do, the type of activities we enjoy and importantly the type of businesses and brands we associate ourselves with. A personality is also a measure that others use to decide if we are the type of person that should be a part of their tribe.

We create a brand personality by starting to think of traits of our brand as if it were a person. For example, if we were to think of traits that would describe Apple we could use words like Different, Imaginative, and Creative. Red Bull’s traits could be described as Rebellious, Dangerous, Adventurous and Brave.

These traits exemplify these brands and their approaches to marketing and are always foundational in any marketing deliverables. Almost like they have thought deeply about these beforehand and allowed the brand personality to flow from their brand through marketing and into how they present and position themselves in the market.

Once we have come up with a comprehensive, but focused, list of traits we are ready to use these to better understand our personality archetype. Personality archetypes are universally repeated and recognisable personalities that we are hardwired to connect with. Peter Walshe further speaks about how all good brands have personality archetypes. There are 12 archetypes that are commonly used; these are the Innocent, Everyman, Hero, Outlaw, Explorer, Creator, Ruler, Magician, Lover, Caregiver, Jester, and Sage.

Now that we have worked out our personality archetype what do we do with it? We do something that most businesses fail to do, implement and execute consistently. We use our archetypes as filters for our decision making.

For our visual branding we use archetype to inform what colours we choose, what our logo should look like, our fonts etc… For our marketing strategy we use our brand archetypes to inform our messaging, our offers and more. When creating marketing objectives we use our archetypes to inform how we design the User Experience, how we create funnels, and how we go about achieving our marketing goals. Finally for our deliverables our brand personality archetype must be reflected in the content we create and at every touch point we have with a customer.

Brand and Marketing Consulting.

Learn more at adambarbaro.com

Instagram: @adamebarbaro

LinkedIn: Adam Barbaro

We are in an era of consumers making decisions based on identifying themselves as a apart of a tribe. You want your customers to join your tribe?

The first step in achieving this is to ensure you portray your brand with authenticity and consistency.

We create a brand personality and persona is order to achieve this.

In this episode of Connecting The Dots we walk through the key elements of implementing some Branding and Marketing fundamentals of creating a Brand Personality.

Brand and Marketing Consulting.

Learn more at adambarbaro.com

Instagram: @adamebarbaro

LinkedIn: Adam Barbaro