Social Media Brand Integration

How important is your brand? If you're like me your brand image is one of your most important assets.

The number one lesson of all branding is consistency. That simple rule (which can be the nemesis of all creative people who want to re-create) is what a branding is all about.

So why are brands, after years investment in brand development, being left at the curb as everyone races to build their ultimate social media?

I was at a Sales Seminar this month and listened to a "so called social media expert" explain how for 4 hours of billable time he could create a social media platform to an audience of over 800 sales professionals... What he was actually offering was customizing a facebook page using FBML, that is not a network and definitely not a branding platform... this pitch of over simplifying probably land the "expert" some one time business for some nice looking non-brand oriented facebook pages that will not get much traffic... but more importantly it attacked the essence of what brand design is all about.

Now in sharp contrast, a week earlier I had the opportunity of spending a day with a true social media expert, James Burchill. James presented his thoughts and strategies on developing a complete social network, with a strategic approach and demonstrated measurable results. Now that is marketing!

Taking both of these presentations into consideration, I questioned myself:
"How can a brand be integrated into a social media network?"

It is obvious that traditional brand marketing of the "this is who we are" approach will not work in the conversational environment of social media, but the importance of knowing our core brand values and communicating those values has never been more important. "Brand is what people think of you™" is what my good friends Greg de Koker and Ted Mathews state in their book "Brand: It Ain't the Logo", and that rings loud and clear to what a conversation is all about and it is a brandSimple idea on how to integrate a brand...

Our solution, was to create a "7 step road map" that defines the brandSimple approach that we use for "Brand Integration into a Social Media Network". This is a basic plan that defines the stages, which are fine tuned for each client. The key aspect of this system is that "it all begins with a brand" and that brand is expressed consistently.

The most important thing that I believe is that "a brand is a terrible thing to waste".

cheers
grant

grant ivens, rgd
Say What! Communications Corp.
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