Author: Nadeen Sanad

Have you ever wondered how branding started? What was the first practice of branding and how revolutionary has such a concept evolved till today? Well, we’ve gathered all the answers just for you. Branding is not just a part of your startup or business, It’s also not just a component in your marketing plan, it’s the base of it all. Without it, everything else would basically crumble.

In this article, you’ll discover what has historically started the root of branding, and how it evolved throughout the years while also giving you a few examples along the way. Let’s jump to it then!

How it all started

Going back to 7000 years ago, artists in India, China, Greece, and other cities, created symbols and engravings to distinguish their work. By the 15000’s, it was popular to brand cattle using a hot piece of wood to show ownership. Where each mark had its own simplicity, distinctiveness, and recognizability, you guessed it right, it’s the foundation of any true brand.

When it comes to the word “brand”, researchers say that the word originated from the Scandinavian language, where “brandr” meant to burn.

Industrial revolution

During the 1750 – 1870’s, as mass production was introduced to the world due to higher efficiency and technology, this resulted in a variation in products, thus more options for the customers to choose from. For that, companies had to stand out in the midst of competition.

That’s where a “trademark” came in. Consisting of design, colors, symbols, and words, trademarks had to be legally resisted to be represented as an official product or company. This was the first case of branding as intellectual property, enabling businesses to publicly identify their products as their own while avoiding copycats and competitors.

The birth of iconic brands

Moving to the 1800s-1900’s, legendary companies like Coca-Cola, Colgate, Channel, and Lego were iconic to both the customers and competitors. They were all innovators and identity builders who created a novel idea. To increase awareness, such brands spread out in magazines and newspapers.

Afterward, branding became even more noticeable through the usage of radio stations, utilizing jingles, target messages, and catchphrases.

Modern branding

As TV advertisements evolved, such an opportunity opened the door to many forms of brand recognition, like billboards, product packaging, and subway signs. Around the 1950s, companies developed the concept of brand management while considering emotional advertising, to reach their audience with a smart edge.

Rebranding

Since the 1960’s, companies started adopting the concept of rebranding, in order to give the brand a fresh look and be able to connect with the customer with a stronger approach. The idea of rebranding grew as people’s tastes were ever-changing while staying unique in a constantly growing area in the market. Did you know that around 74% of businesses get to rebrand in the first 7 years since they launched?

Let’s take Dunkin Donuts for example. Competitors like Starbucks and Tim Hortons, who tend to change their menus at low costs, are considered a threat to Dunkin’s presence. For that, the company decided to rebrand its logo and make some tweaks to its menu. First, they added healthier options like fruit smoothies, vegan items, and more tea varieties.

Another bold, quite smart move is that instead of the logo “Dunkin Donuts”, they turned it into “ Dunkin’” to avoid linking it with an unhealthy dessert.

So, there you have it folks. There’s no doubt that branding affects us all, whether you’re the customer, the employee, or the CEO. branding is the gem that should stay shining despite anything. We hope you gained some takeaways on how branding all started and how it escalated to where it stands today.

When it comes to work or job hunting, people often fill their CVs with their experiences, practical skills and interests, rushing to showcase their talents and expertise. Although practical skills are very important when you want to get a job, soft skills are what make or break your actual job experience, but mostly go unnoticed because people tend to think that they come naturally or can be acquired easily.

Today we hope to remind you of the importance of soft skills and the fact that you need to constantly work on yourself to develop and grow in the way you handle yourself, tough work situations and others.

Outside tasks and deadlines, creative and critical thinking are very important for having a good relationship with your co-workers and finding new ways to open opportunity doors for yourself. To hack into creative thinking, you need to throw yourself outside  your comfort zone -we realise it’s a bit cliche- but it’s true.

2. Work with a team and communicate well:

Work is not a place for the stubborn, angry and lone wolves. In order to have a happy, healthy work environment you need to be able to work with people in an effective and efficient manner. If you waste too much time on trivial arguments, how much work can you actually get done? Understand that you can’t always be right. Here are some tips to help you navigate your way with teams or for when you need to communicate your needs: listen well, think before you speak, don’t shoot down ideas, be willing to compromise and be a sponge. Being a sponge means that you need to get yourself ready to absorb opinions, ideas, requests etc. Another important aspect of team work is filtration; listen to all, but benefit from some, know what to take out of a conversation and what to leave out.

3. Good work ethic and voice of reason:

This is a tough one, we all think we are doing a good job almost all the time. In order to master the art of work ethic, you need to be able to be honest with yourself, being your own critic from the smallest to the biggest of things. Do you come on time? Get your tasks done in a timely manner? Do you keep your quality as consistent as possible? Do you help your coworkers? Etc. The answer to those questions does not have to be a 100% yes, but you need to keep a decent percentage. Work ethic is hard to teach, but people who have a strong work ethic possess certain qualities that include: Attentiveness, dedication, competitiveness, motivation, multitasking, punctuality and reliability. Make a checkpoint with yourself and see if you have any of those qualities, and if not, ask yourself how can I add this to my skill set?.

4. The art of leadership:

Leadership is such an important quality for seniors and juniors alike, because you never know when you will need to hold the centre-stage.

But being a leader is tricky business, because you need to walk the thin line between being bossy and being a leader. This is what researchers call “Gentle Leadership”. Also defined as “Not the exercise of power and authority, but rather the exertion of influence over the feelings, thoughts and actions of others”. Sounds pretty, but how? Some attributes of great leaders can be summed up in 11 Cs: Character, Charisma, Conscience, Convection, Courage, Communication, Compassion, Commitment, Consistency, Consideration and Contribution.

5. Be quick on your feet and adapt:

This is something everyone around you in the workplace will come to appreciate, because nobody likes that one person who whines about every single task and only sees the worst in everyday office mishaps.

Being able to adjust quickly and having the flexibility to work in different environments and under different circumstances is an invaluable asset in work, especially in fast moving digital industries, where something new is discovered everyday, with changes and updates happening day in and day out. Being able to adapt requires a personal skill set with curiosity at its centre.

Some related skills you can work on that will ultimately lead to maximum adaptability include: Self-management, Decision-making, Calmness, Optimism, Open-mindedness, Analysis, Self-confidence, Organisation and Self-motivation. Meaning that you don’t have to wait for the perfect circumstances to do your best work, instead you must learn to work with what you have and make the best out of it.

To conclude, we suggest you never lose sight of your soft skills and always try to find new ways to develop internally; as it will reflect on your work relations, work-life balance and highly improve your office experience and open new doors of opportunity and exposure for you. Whether you choose one and work on it or make tiny improvements in all 5 aspects, it’s definitely worth the effort!.

Community management is one of the major roles in advertising agencies, but it is sometimes overlooked in the digital field because other positions could be louder or busier. In this article, we will explore the hidden gems of community management and how you can explore the world of your target audience and walk in their shoes with ease.

User-generated content will  help your current consumers remain engaged with the brand, instead of falling into the trap of focusing too much on acquiring new customers and forgetting about those that already exist. Sparking individual interest will also add more value to your brand, which will increase consumer satisfaction, brand loyalty and advocacy.

2. Create your own community

If your brand targets a niche group of consumers, you can always use that to your advantage because creating a community out of your target audience will almost always work in your favor. In addition to empowering your target audience, making them feel heard and prioritized, creating a community will also help humanize your brand. 

Humanizing your brand will help you greatly when you need to change negative perceptions, address concerns, or even simply reinforcing your brand personality and tone of voice.

Another major benefit of creating a community of loyal customers is that it allows for creating a personal connection with your brand, helping your target audience link together through you, giving you higher brand resonance.

Creating a community can be achieved through a lot of ways, but our favorite is creating a closed group on social media where they could share stories, interact with and respond to each other and the brand. This creates an immediate sense of belonging and opens a door for your brand to listen in and gather more target audience insights (which is also a key role of community management).

3. Listen, respond and use the right words

This may seem like a common community management role. Which is true, but there are so many tips and tricks you can use to maximize the benefit of what may seem like a simple response.

For example, many brands have addressed legitimate concerns and used them to their advantage; handling customer anger in a way that will reflect positively on the brand. 

In addition to addressing concerns, smart brands also take every opportunity they get to toot their own horn and highlight positive feedback and use it to create engagement. 

The comments people leave you are essentially what helps you understand how your communication is affecting your target audience, what you need to say and what you need to stop doing. Giving you the greatest tool that brings your brand personality to life.

4. Look out for insights

Listening to your target audience is also very important, you never know when an insight will come to your rescue. 

The most successful campaigns are the ones that come from something someone noticed. As a community manager, you need to always keep your eyes opened for the little details that will end up creating remarkably effective campaigns!

In addition to giving you the “wow” factor that creates your campaigns, reporting regularly with results and insights will help you maintain your success or make the necessary adjustments you need to perfect your campaigns (or completely abort missions). 

Which is why we believe objectives come from insights. Reporting on-going campaigns will help you greatly when determining what your audience needs to see from you next. When you know what your audience expects, you design messages that are tailored to them, which will get you desired results depending on how good you are at listening to your target audience.

Community management is full of hidden gems that can bring any business closer to its target audience, giving them a sense that they are part of something bigger. We are always looking for ways to understand, relate to, and address our audience in ways that make sense to brands we manage. Never losing sight of our objectives.

First, our most valuable tip would be that you get out of your own head.

We recommend that you take a break, get up from your desk, and start engaging in random conversations with workmates or people outside the office. Ask about their day, listen to their anecdotes, laugh with them and just have a good time. But always remember to be ready, in the middle of conversation you may hear a phrase or a story that will spark your interest; take notes. Carry around a small notebook or even use your phone to write down interesting things you hear from people around you instantly. Doing this will accumulate later on and give you a bank of ideas to use for now and later. You will also stay aware throughout the day, with your mind trying to get you the idea you were looking for without getting too worked up about it.

The second thing you can do when you are literally at a loss of words is to take a dive into social media. Social media is magic when you need to see what people are currently talking about, the recent trends, social issues, or even brand complaints. You can learn a lot through watching; try to find links between what is happening now and what you need, or try to establish patterns. Is there something happening now that is similar to a previous event? Are there certain causes on the rise? How are people responding to trends?. Asking yourself those kinds of questions and finding the answers on social media give you insight on your target audiences’ reactions, what they will expect from your brand and will surely help stir the creative waters in your brain. Trust us, ideas can pop-out when you least expect them!.

If you can’t find inspiration from the real world, it’s time for Netflix. Watch a documentary, movie, series or stand up comedy. You can go with familiar favorites or something you’ve never watched before, but always remember to keep the previously mentioned notebook close by. You know where we’re going with this; it’s time to start taking notes again. If you hear a catchy phrase, watch an interesting scene, or an epic plot twist, write down where you found it and what you thought about it.

Look deeper into the creative structures and story lines, try to link your campaign to any interesting sequence or story you can find. You will be surprised how much fiction can link with reality.

All the previous methods were non-work related, and we are strong advocates for finding creativity in everyday life, because we all know googling “creative ideas for….” sucks out all the creativity out of everything. Once you see what someone else has done, you become fixated on their idea and try too hard to exceed expectations you put on yourself.

But if you need a faster, more direct industry-related method, you can opt for looking at campaigns executed for different industries, break them down yourself and read their existing analysis, see if you can identify what made them unique and catch their insights. If you need to, try to explore visually rich and creative platforms; take a behance trip, explore vimeos of your favorite industry directors, dip into youtube etc.

You can use all our 4 methods when you need to find creativity on slow days because we swear by it when we need an instant shift of mindset. Waking up our brains and helping the team get those creative juices flowing; which is all we need for ideas to start emerging out of the darkness.

Although our ways work when you find yourself stuck and in need of a quick creative fix, they work just as well (and even better) when you create a routine out of them!.

Using those techniques regularly will help ideas come easier to you when you’ve already fed your mind everyday with stories, ideas, incounters, and created a library inside your own head that will make invisible links to reality and spark ideas when you need them.

1-Interactivity is everything

Brands that speak to their target in a fun way that actually makes them want to respond always win. As the internet is getting more and more opinionated and vocal, interactivity will give your target audience the feeling that they are heard, appreciated and understood. 

Coming up with fun interactive content like trivias, giveaways, games, memes, polls etc. will not only reflect your brand personality well and give it a familiar humane side but more importantly, interactivity can also significantly increase user engagement and enjoyment, as well as increase the time users spend on your page and view your posts. 

Although this method has been around for a while and is one of the greatest advantages of the digital world, it has increased in popularity over the years due to the fact that it has proven to give incredible results in terms of user experience.

2- Be aware of what matters & be inclusive

We’ve established that people are passionate, vocal and opinionated when it comes to expressing their views on social media, they like brands that are also expressive. People support brands that have values, notice things that matter and speak up when a relevant issue surfaces. Make sure that your brand does not only keep up with fun trends, but you must also follow and address important worldwide issues such as the environment, human rights, political stands etc.

This will go to show that your brand cares about the bigger picture and that it is not deaf to the real world.

Another key related concept brands should adopt is inclusivity; showing acceptance, diversity and understanding.

Welcome representing different people that come from different backgrounds, lifestyles, circumstances etc. and say goodbye to old homogeneous approaches and one-size-fits-all content. People will appreciate diversity in your visuals, content and values.

3- Add more to your ads

In a time where ads are usually skipped or blocked, smart brands need to find a way to work around it. Instead of forcing ads on your target, you should find a new way to deliver your message that is easier to swallow.

Most brands now drift towards influencer marketing because it can give your audience all the information they need to know in an easy, fun storytelling approach. After all, who wouldn’t listen to their favorite internet icon?

Influencer ads are usually carried out in a variety of ways, including (most popularly) reviews on PR packages, collaborations, hands-on experience, takeovers etc. depending on your product or service and what you want to say; you just need to pick a format that is short, friendly and simple!
When done right, influencer marketing will help you catch and hold the attention of your target audience, increase traffic on your page and create awareness of your expected product or service experience as well as establish brand trust.
However, brands should always remain truthful to their customers.
Do not fall into the trap of overreaching and making promises you can’t keep, but instead make sure your brand quality is up to standard and is lined up with or even better than what your influencer advocates.

4- Easy = purchase

What makes digital advertising such a key tool in driving leads is because it is easy. You can view the product, click, and purchase within seconds.

Make sure that your pages are all optimized to give your customers easy-access to the product and the simplest possible steps for them to make a purchase.

In addition to easy-access and easy purchase, your platforms should have instant communication with your target audience; make use of chatbots, store features, feedback, visual or audio-visual product-representation etc. to make sure your consumers’ questions are answered quickly and in a variety of ways and that your target enjoys a user friendly experience.

Chatbots are particularly important because it allows customers to complete a purchase or ask about a product without interacting with actual people; which leads to less overall conversation duration, less error and a more efficient experience. Which is what we are all looking for; smooth purchase with minimum problems, doubts or regrets.

5- Personalization

We decided to go for a timeless familiar favorite to end our list, because it is still key in all successful digital advertising we see.

Because personalization has been around for a while, it has become what people expect to see from your brand. This means that people appreciate it when the content they see is based on previous interactions they had with the brand.

A key concept that comes hand in hand with personalization is segmentation. Instead of creating a large campaign that targets all your audience, break them down into little segments and create smaller campaigns that target each group individually. This way, your content will feel more personal to each segment, and you will be able to gather the right detailed insights of your buyer personas. Which will ultimately help you improve your content and targeted ads.

On point personalization is not easy to do, but it has its advantages. For instance, it will most definitely increase purchase (new and repeated) as well as boost your ROI and develop higher levels of consumer loyalty.