One thing I swore I’d never do is teach. Blame it on my stint working as a preschool teacher. There’s just something about getting in front of a group of people (potty trained or otherwise) and claiming to be the expert that never appealed to me. Until I became the Marketing Eggspert. And basically, that’s what I’m doing. Standing up and saying “I’m the expert. Listen to me.”

And so lately, I have gotten into teaching seminars. I’ve done this online over the past few years, but never in person until recently. I was fortunate enough to participate with Microsoft Office Live and Kirtsy’s Hands on Small Business events, where I got a taste of in-person teaching.

Teaching a seminar or course is a great way to show your stuff, to establish yourself as an expert.

How you can teach a course:

1. Decide what you want to teach. It should be something you know intimately, and that provides others benefits. For me, it was using internet marketing to grow a business.

2. Find a venue. It may be the local university or community college (I went through Continuing Education). It might be the library or small business resource center. Ask your Chamber of Commerce if you don’t know where to start.

3. Introduce yourself. Send a brief email introducing yourself, mentioning your experience (again, briefly) and your interest in teaching a seminar on X. Ask if this is of interest.

4. Follow up. If you don’t hear back in a week, call the contact. They’re busy. Follow up to see if it’s possible to work with this venue to offer a course. It may be next semester before they can fit you in.

5. Start planning. Once you get your course set up, plan your seminar with a syllabus or outline. Market it. Reach out to the Chamber and any business organizations (the venue may also have a database of contacts they can tell), and invite them to your course.  Promote it up through the date. Facebook has a good tool called Eventbrite that you can use to get people to register.

FAQs

Should I charge for the course?

• This may depend on the venue. Most non-profit and government agencies (read: universities) won’t let you charge or promote yourself. You may just do it out of the goodness of your heart and then follow up with participants via email after. Your students will be impressed with you and will be more inclined to buy whatever it is you’re selling.

How long should my course be?

• Don’t keep participants longer than their attention spans can handle. I suggest 2 to 3 hours, with breaks. Provide refreshments to keep people happy.

What time of day should my seminar be?

• I held mine in the morning and had about 10 students. Many people expressed a wish that it was in the evening after work. Determine who your audience is and what their availability is. Or do 2 classes.

Aaron Brazell made me ask myself:

• Who do I influence?
• What do I bring to the internet
• Do I really want to be internet famous and dirt poor?
• Am I helping (for free) or doing (earning $)?
• Do I have a goal for my blogs?

He told us that trying to be someone else just makes you a bad facsimile of yourself. I often look to Chris Brogan as my model of what I’d like to do. But maybe that’s not it. I couldn’t have Chris’ schedule, traveling so much. I’m sure he sacrifices a lot. I have to figure out what the brand of  Susan Payton looks like.

Chris Brogan gave a great presentation and told me (us) to be self aware, not self involved. He made me realize that people come back to me because I can help them. How can I better help them? He also said that no one is going to give me permission to move on to the next big thing. I have to give myself permission. And that struck a nerve, because I think I’ve been hanging back from whatever that next big thing is. Fear? Yes. Laziness? Sure. So I’m processing this.

As you can see, I have a lot to chew on. I’ll spend this week answering some of these questions (and you should too).

So each week I want to check in on Branding Friday to tell you what I’m doing to brand myself (I figure I don’t want to suffer the embarrassment of checking in with no update, so I should get some stuff done).

This week my focus has been on writing.

It’s funny how a few opportunities fell into my lap. A few days after I declared my niche, Bill Stoller of Publicity Insider called me. Now, if you don’t know who Bill is, he’s a PR genius. I started paying attention to him early in my PR career. And he’s explaining who he is to me. Bill Stoller does not need to tell me who he is. He read somewhere where I was quoted about using Twitter to reach journalists to follow up after a press release pitch. He wanted an article from me. Gladly. After more talking, he asked me to write another about what I’m doing now: connecting bloggers and brands. Double gladly. This was an amazing opportunity to show what I know in front of the proper channel. You can read the article on Twitter and PR here.

I also pitched Mashable, to write about the same topics. They bit. I will be guest blogging on how to use social media for PR, as well as blogs for brands. I’ll keep you posted as I’m published.

Two major wins as soon as I set my intentions.

My goals for the upcoming week: I will be working on writing a whitepaper about how brands need blogs. I’m traveling later next week but will do my best to write next Friday on my progress. I’ll be at the Type A Mom Conference if anyone cares to meet up.

I help bridge the gap between PR and bloggers.

I’ve talked on this subject a bit on this blog, but not in depth. Still, it’s what I pitch to 90% of my clients. I help them garner product reviews and giveaways on targeted blogs to help expand their reach.

That’s a niche, right??

And so I’ve decided to work on branding myself as this bridge between the two. The branding will involve writing articles, giving presentations, doing interviews, writing more blog posts…the list will be endless.

And to help me stay on task, I’ve decided to inaugurate every Friday as Branding Friday. You’ll get a behind-the-scenes peek at what I’m doing to brand myself and I’ll discuss ways you can brand yourself as an Eggspert in your field. Deal? Each week I’ll give myself a task to do in the upcoming week. I’ll report back the following Friday.

What do you think? Do you have questions I can answer about how your company can use bloggers as a media resource?

We all get those giveaways at trade shows. Pens. Notepads. Hats. Crap we throw away as soon as we get home.

I'd much rather get this than a cap.

Don’t get me wrong. I think promotional items can be very effective…if done right.

Last year I blogged about the amazing stuff I got from BlogHer.  I still wear some of the cool shirts I got.

Promotional items work well to spread the word about your brand…if they’re interesting or useful.

Let’s take some examples from Paragon Marketing Products. They offer a wide variety of promotional items you can get your logo on, such as silicone bracelets, USB drives (especially useful), even blackjack tip cards. Talk about something that’s a conversation starter at a convention in Vegas!

Why not forego the pen with your logo on it for a foam finger with your brand on it? Or a dart board people can use in their offices? Give them something they’ll appreciate and I guarantee it won’t end up in the trash.

I haven’t used Paragon before, but being presented with the opportunity to write a sponsored review about them, I’m liking what I see. Their website says they carry over 250,000 items (so please find something besides a pen to buy), and you can get 10% off your first order.  I’m always looking for egg promo items and check out what they have!

If you’re new to buying promotional items for your business, ask Paragon’s logo merchandising programs. I’m sure they’d be more than happy to help you find items that best fit what you’re looking for. As long as it isn’t a pen. And you can tell them I said so!

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbKrNWfU-x4[/youtube]

If you have examples of good product packaging, leave a comment and we’ll discuss.

My rebranding came about because a few important people told me my egg logo was sophomoric. Initially I was hurt, because as we all know, Egg is my baby, and anyone who ridicules the way my child looks is up to no good. Eventually I came around, and got egg-cited about the possibility of having a sleeker, more professional look for my brand that has evolved over the past nearly-3 years.

So I asked my husband/(sometimes) silent partner to write a description of what Egg used to be and what it is now that we’ve rebranded. Here’s what he wrote (warning: totally inappropriate language, but it’s so funny and spot-on I just can’t edit it):

Egg Before:
Seat of the pants low cost marketing campaigns.  Guerilla warfare, no job too big or small.  Egg marketing does it all, from event planning to press releases.  Cost-competitive, for the cost-conscious entrepreneur.   Need to increase sales TODAY?  Egg is the firm for you.  Not sure of your commitment level to your business idea?  Give us a call, we would be happy for you to waste our time trying to nickle and dime on a $200 marketing campaign.  We do shoestring marketing.  Did I mention we are inexpensive and we do shoestring marketing?

Egg Rebrand:
Egg marketing caters to an entrepreneur of a certain sophistication level.  If you dont have any ballpark figure for a marketing budget, don’t call us.  If you are not prepared to spend at least $1000 over the course of 3 months, you are not worth the time.  If your secretary’s double duty as “marketing person” is wearing thin and you don’t have the budget for a well known firm, call us.  We can give you $100,000 worth of marketing for probably less than you pay your secretary annually.

Do your marketing needs ebb and flow seasonally?  You should call Egg.  We learn your business, we look for ways to give you the most bang for the buck, and we deliver.  On time every time.  Just make sure you pay us on time bitch.  Money talks and bullshit walks.  If you are not committed enough to your business to spend a few hundred dollars on marketing every month, I swear to god I don’t want to talk to you.

So, you spend a couple thousand a year on radio ads, and you want to scale that back, and instead put that into something more “internet related”.  You should call us, because we can take a portion of your $10,000/yearly marketing budget and make it SING on the internet, giving you a full web presence and branding.  We do these awesome youtube contests but none of you numbnuts have been brave enough to even try it.  Dickheads.  Anyway, this is the new Egg.  We do less shit, but we do it better.  We take less shit and will not deal with your bullshit avon/monavie/arbonne/MLM if you are not willing to drop some serious coin on it.

Still with me? Keep reading to see our new look!

So, I think you get the point that Egg, its focus, and its clientele have changed over the years. We wanted a logo and a website that showed that, as well as our sophistication in social media.

New Website

Check out Egg’s new site. I’m pretty proud of having designed it (using a very cool tool called SnapPages.). I like the blog and vlog additions.

New Logo

We wanted to get away from the cartoony-ness of the logo. Toni Peck of Art Tested Graphics did an amazing job of simplifying the logo while keeping it sophisticated:

The brown, in case you didn’t notice, is the color of brown eggs. Subtle, but nice touch.

Business Cards

My previous cards were a train wreck. I designed them and I really have no business designing anything. I love the skinny cards Moo and Zazzle print, so I asked Toni to make me something cool. And she did:

Overall, I am exceedingly happy with Egg’s rebrand. It better last a while to come!

What do you think? I really want feedback!

Want to know a secret? I’m working on rebranding Egg Marketing. From the feedback of an impartial panel (read: husband and best friend), I have determined that my current logo is too basic and childish for the positioning I’m going for. Since I want to work with larger companies than I started out with as clients, I need to make my branding more polished and professional.

So we’re working on the logo, the business cards, the letterhead. Stay tuned for it to be unveiled.

Here’s where Egg started out:

Egg was a one-person firm, focusing on small businesses and entrepreneurs. Egg was cute, with the cartoon egg logo.

Here’s where Egg is now.

Egg has a staff of four, and works with more medium sized businesses. Egg is professional and sleek. It’s more about insinuation than blatant references to the egg.

So you can see my company’s positioning shifted, and my imaging must too.

What about you? Are you still aiming at the same audience you were five years ago? Is your logo reflective of this shift? If not, you might consider rebranding. It can be gradual, but a rollout like I plan (all at once) can be more dramatic.

Here are some previous posts on rebranding examples.

Branding to Rebranding: The Art of Marketing Reinvention

Successful Rebranding: Hampton Inn

Burger King, What Went Wrong?

Here are the brands I talk about in this video:

PRWeb

Constant Contact

Relax Wine

DHC

And some great articles about brand evangelism.

Chris Brogan talks about The Tricky Path of Brand Relationships

Dobney.com talks about brands and relationships

Jason Whitman talks about how smart USA rallies fans around its brand

So how about it? What are the brands that you love? What do you promote for free?

The room was affordable at $99. You never know what you’ll get for that price. In San Francisco, it will buy you the slums. In Springfield, it was perfect.

The staff was extremely courteous, and the room was outfitted in luxurious sheets and bathroom accessories that you’d expect at a higher end hotel.

My point is, it is possible to change people’s impression of you. It takes a bit of work, but it will pay off. Where Hampton may have charged $49 for a room, they are now able to command a higher price and prove the value.

Think about your brand. Especially in light of the current economy. Is there a different positioning you would do better in?

Florida hasn’t even been declared yet (don’t get me started; I’m biting my nails that we can pull through and get our sh#5 straight this go ’round).

Anyway, I’ve been thinking about Obama as a brand. You see t-shirts that say “Obama Mama.” You see “Change” bumper stickers and signs everywhere. Will it go away once he’s president? Will we embrace a president that is a brand? Or as my hub says, a rock star?

Clinton was a rock star/brand in his own way. He showed us that all presidents aren’t stuffy white guys. Some play the sax (and have affairs but that’s a different brand altogether). But social media has propelled Obama to a level of brand never before seen. Everyone on Facebook and Twitter is talking about the election. Not just intellectuals. 18 year olds. Moms. Plumbers. Electricians. Everyone.

And they’re picking sides. But with Obama, it’s not just picking sides, like in a presidential election. It’s like picking a brand: Coke or Pepsi (or rather, old, flat Pepsi). You’re saying something about who you are when you proudly say you support Obama. It says you’re:

• hip
• liberal
• open-minded
• creative
• have a sense of humor

I’m interested to see how far he carries the brand in his politics. Or how far we carry it in support of him.

Viva Obama!

So what is cobranding? It’s when two (or more) brands team up to offer a new product or a hybrid of an existing one. Your Cheer detergent may feature Downy fabric softener. Your Ford Explorer may be designed by Eddie Bauer. Your Pillsbury brownies may have Nestle chocolate chips in them.

Why cobranding? Cobranding does a few things:

1. It expands a brand’s market reach. If you love Godiva chocolate but have never tried Orville Redenbacher’s popcorn (I’m making this up), you might want to try Orville/Godiva popcorn chocolate treats. (mmm. that would be good).
2. It boosts a brand’s reputation (well, it can. Or it can go the other way). Say you have a line of yogurt products no one has heard of. But through some kind of act of God, Kashi wants to partner with you. Now you can label your products (and ads): “Now with Kashi goodness.”  People identify with Kashi, even if they don’t identify with you. By being tied to such a well-known brand, you are boosting your reputation (and sales).
3. Cobranding enables you to take on a feature or quality you couldn’t otherwise possess. If what you do is make really good yogurt (can you tell I’m eating breakfast?), you probably don’t want to take the R&D time to develop really good granola. But Kashi already does that, so it’s win-win.

• The marketplace is constantly evolving, which creates opportunities to create new niches.
• Companies do better NOT following in the footsteps of a predecessor, but rather to forge their own path. Create a need.
• Converging (car + airplane= flying car) is often a bad idea. Many businesses fail because of this.
• Diverging is usually smart. One brand can’t carry the weight of a diverse product mix.
• Sometimes you have to prune your brands. One bad apple can, well, you know what it can do.

The book gives some great case studies of ideas that succeeded (Apple’s Macs) and those that flopped (video phones). If nothing else, it’s an amusing walk through the history of brands. Expect to learn something from the successes and failures of others.

• Make your logo and branding cool. That way people don’t mind advertising for you. I get shirts at blogging conferences because they’re just damn cool. So now I’m promoting cafe press, b5 media, typepad (sorry Wordpress) and lijit.
• Anything that goes out your door should have your logo on it. Every pen, paper bag, napkin, toilet paper…
• Find ways to get your brand on an item people use every day.

How do you get your brand out there?

Check out my video posts and I bet you’ll buy one too!
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yum8rZAMHTI[/youtube]

Go to the next page to see Part 2 where I print from my backyard.

Business Card Makeover

Letting Your Logo Work for You

So here’s the test to see if you were paying attention. Wendy Piersall is giving away an Epson Workforce 600 and a logo (re)design to one lucky winner!

Entering is easy. You can either post a comment about why you should win on the post or write a blog post on your blog sharing the best marketing advice you received when you were new to starting a business.

What are you waiting for? Contest ends October 24. Go, go, go!

a) because they lured me in with a free iced coffee (it was so-so but my mom swears by them)

b) my 3-year-old needed somewhere to tire himself. Their playgrounds do the trick.

So last week I was there and was impressed with the new decor (more coffee shop than grease pit) and the colorful posters advertising the new chicken sandwich and fancy card swipe payment method. I caved and decided to try the sandwich.

It was still a McDonald’s sandwich. And the fries were waaay too salty. So I kicked myself. Sure, Mickey D’s has a lot going for them. It’s obvious they put a lot of time and money into marketing. I’ll give them that:

• Their current campaign with Ronald McDonald is promoting healthy activity among children
• They’re offering more options than just fries
• They redesigned their stores to have an upper middle class feel
• They advertise online in smart places, like AOL’s IM bar
• They’re hip to podcasts

But no matter how much they put into marketing, they’re still a crappy food chain. And in my mind, not a very good one at that. Some of the less tech-savvy, greasier spoons are much better in my book, but that’s just my “eggspert” opinion!

So take this lesson to heart: you can pour your heart and bank account into marketing but at the end of the day, will people come back for your product? Only if you’re a major multi-bazillion dollar industry. Otherwise you might want to look to improving your product quality.

Truly I felt the same about a franchise business as a whole. I built Egg Marketing & Public Relations from the keyboard up, and a “turnkey solution” just never appealed to my entrepreneur spirit.

Enter my husband. Entrepreneur, lover of all opportunities, big or small. He convinced me to buy a Marble Slab Creamery near our home (not really: 20 minute commute) in Orlando. I was skeptical, but I love ice cream, so hey, how bad could it be? And since I am a Marketing Eggspert, I would handle the take-out-of-the-box marketing.

Except it was more than that. Sure, the franchise company provides us with instructions and posters for each promotion (which is actually refreshing: we don’t have to hire a graphic artist to handle each promotion!). They walk us step-by-step through when to hang the posters and how to make the most out of it.

But then there are so many other ways we can market. We can take cakes to local businesses as a means of introduction (trust me: that gets me a smile and half off a massage at the Massage Envy in our shopping area!). We can put coupons in the apartment complex newsletters. We can send the schools free coupons and tell them about our fundraising. The possibilities make me dizzy with marketing fever.

So here are the lessons I’ve learned about franchise marketing:

1. You are not restricted by franchise marketing rules (well, they discourage you from posing nude with the ice cream, but beyond that, it’s fair game).

2. You are only limited by your own creativity.

3. Free ice cream goes a long way. (Thanks for lunch every day, Panera!)

4. Be open to partnerships with other businesses, and your marketing will go even further.

5. Listen to employee ideas (maybe not the Karaoke night one, though).

6. Utilize your resources. The franchise firm is there to provide you with marketing assistance. In fact, you’re paying for it, so use it!

7. Everybody loves ice cream.

8. After a hard day’s work in marketing, nothing hits the spot like Coffee ice cream with Heath and caramel in a waffle bowl!

I’d love to hear from you! Do you own a franchise? How do you market outside that box?

We all love the little tschotschkes we get at conventions. But think for a minute: which did you keep and which did you throw away? Chances are you got a lot of cheap pens, which you didn’t need. But I’ll bet you got a few items that you told others about simply because they were either:

A) useful
B) innovative

I’ll share a few I’ve gotten recently.

I spun the wheel at a GEICO booth recently and won a set of speakers for my MP3 player. While that might not sound all that exciting, they were made of paper, like a Chinese take-out box. Very unique (and useful).

My husband worked at Yahoo! until very recently. They do something interesting. Usually a company reserves the expensive promotional toys for potential business, but Yahoo! gives them to employees. That makes them feel worthwhile and lets them share in the excitement of the brand. They have dozens of great examples, but this one is an old-school Slinky:

And then finally last Christmas I sent these egg-shaped clocks to my contacts and clients. They’re fun and useful.

My point? Don’t be cheap and stick to traditional pens or notepads. Think creatively. There are so many products out there, there’s virtually no limit to what you can do. Save the more costly items for potential customers but don’t give away something people will throw away.
-Susan

Like this post? Subscribe to the Egg Marketing Blog RSS Feed

Chick-fil-A is sponsoring a contest, its “Biggest Fan Video Contest.” Entrants make a video one minute long showing why they’re the restaurant chain’s biggest fan. They upload the video to Chick-fil-A’s website and viewers vote.

Let’s see if you’ve been paying attention on this blog. Why is this a great use of Web 2.0 for marketing?

–It’s interactive. Anyone who is a fan of Chick-fil-A (or anyone who’s just creative and has a little time on their hands to make a video) can participate. Rather than just dropping an entry form in a box, the participants are, well, participating.
–It’s affordable. Even though Chick-fil-A could probably afford to spend quite a bit on advertising, it chose to go this route, unveiling a whole slew of chicken fans (who knew they existed).
–It puts the customers in control. Giving power to consumers creates a stronger brand, and Chik-Fil-A understands that.

But most of all, this contest is fun! Who can resist those cows? Now go eat some chicken!

-Susan
For even more on interactive marketing, read David Meerman Scott’s The New Rules of Marketing and PR: How to Use News Releases, Blogs, Podcasting, Viral Marketing and Online Media to Reach Buyers Directly.
Like this post? Subscribe to the Egg Marketing Blog RSS Feed