Does advertising really work?

This morning, Karen Renzi blogged about a discovery she made last week in the sketches of her 5-year-old daughter. In her words, “In the top is a “house” on blue, next a “fan” on pink, and last but not least, on the orange: Verizon. Ahh, the power of the brand: inspiring young minds everywhere.”

Ha! By the mid-80s, I’d been in the ad agency biz for several years. I was cynical about the effectiveness of my own snappy copy and “stunning” visuals. I figured I knew all the “tricks” so I couldn’t be tricked myself. Then, I found myself in a Home Depot one Saturday morning. A guy asked what I thought of the lawn mower we were both looking at. I didn’t have a clue, had never owned this kind of mower, didn’t even have a lawn. But there I was, telling this guy all about it… selling the thing like I was gonna get some huge commission if he took one home.

Yes, it’s a little scary that Karen’s little one is drawing Verizon’s logo on a Post-It note, but it’s harmless enough. At least she’s not selling lawn mowers at Home Depot based on deeply engrained subliminal messages from the advertising team at Toro… yet. :-)

What does this brand mean to you?

Since the name was trademarked in 1903, cubic dollars have been spent to build, support, expand, refine, and engrain the Pepsi-Cola brand in the mind of “cola” drinkers everywhere. It is reasonable to assume that near cubic dollars have been invested in marketing research to learn how effective the efforts to build, support, expand, refine, and engrain the brand have been. The results of this research have been, of course, proprietary. That was then, this is now….

Analyzing the blogosphere.

OK, so maybe you have a budget for marketing research. Most of my small to midsize clients don’t, but larger companies do. Fine. Check out Umbria, recently acquired by the customer opinion folks at J.D. Power & Assoc.

Umbria focuses its marketing intelligence technology on social media—blogs, message boards, Usenet, and product review sites. They deliver data plus analysis of the potential effect of online conversations on brands, markets, consumers and trends.

How can a small businesses build its brand?

I spotted an interesting question on LinkedIN today, “For Small – Medium Size Business Owners, what is the #1 Marketing tool they should be using to build their brand.”

A lot of the responders talked about techniques… writing articles, blogging, networking, direct mail, “the internet.” It occurred to me that the #1 tool that every small to midsize business should use to build their brand is attitude. My suggestion…