Are powerful Brand Mantras really helping increase Brand Equity?

The answer is straightforward; YES, they can magically increase the brand equity and its vital components such as brand awareness, brand resonance, brand perceived quality, and brand loyalty. Brand Mantras are 3-5 small word phrases (not a Tagline or Slogan) that confine the overwhelming promise and essence of the brand and its values.

The term Brand Mantra was initially coined by an American advertising executive, Scott Bedbury, former Nike and Starbucks marketing specialist. It encapsulates the point-of-differences (PODs), point-of-parities (POPs), and the competitive frame of reference into one brand idea. Fundamentally, the brand mantra is an imperative part when marketers design the strategy to position their brand. Great brand mantras can effectively position the brand in prospective buyers, creating highly perceived overall value of the brand.

Mercedes – “Quality and Prestige”

According to Scott Bedbury, he invented this term during his tenure in Nike, giving probably the best brand mantra ever for Nike, i.e. “Authentic Athletic Performance.” Remember that brand mantra is something different from slogans and taglines, because Nike’s slogan or tagline is what everybody knows, “Just do it.”

Actually, marketers derive taglines from brand mantras and they serve as a critical building block not only for the brand tagline, but for the complete brand equity or organization itself. When brainstorming mantras, marketers should focus on their core values, vision, mission and the corporate culture of the organization, without compromising on the brand positioning aspect as well. Your brand and your values should incorporate with each other. If there is something tricky between these two elements, then on off the chance that you’re on wrong track and your customers might perceive the branding as negative. Some people also describe brand mantras as the DNA of the organization that can effectively help in decision making process for branding strategies and user expectations.

In my experience, creating great brand mantra could help you hit the targeted audience smoothly in positioning world of brands. The mantra is an emotional attachment of a brand that let people knows how uniquely it will benefit them and how they feel using the certain branded product. So you can say that powerful “Brand Mantra” not only provides the brand positioning and brand image, also helps decide the prospect of the brand and organization.

Are powerful Brand Mantras really helping increase Brand Equity?

Importance of Business Process Outsourcing

Before going into an in-depth detail about outsourcing, let’s clear it here that the concept of outsourcing is not new at all, but the term dates back to the 1970s, when enterprises started outsourcing some subordinate processes of their businesses to outside forces.

Did outsourcing work well at that time? The answer is yes, it did well, and the practice of outsourcing started getting popular across boundaries. With the passage of time and success stories of outsourced business processes, companies got into the culture of outsourcing major parts of their business processes. Today, it can be easily noted that big corporations as well as mid-level companies outsource 50% to 60% of their business content to outside firms.

It is worth-mentioning that most of the large organizations outsource half of their IT operations, while some other prefer outsourcing their all back office operations including IT, HR and accounts. Chances are in the near future all business functions would be outsourced because currently companies are outsourcing different horizontal and vertical business units. The cross functional approach adopted to follow a process horizontally across a company is called as Business Process Outsourcing (BPO).

With the emerging trend of business process outsourcing, it is no more only a method of sharing your responsibilities with outside sources, but it has become a strategic move. Big organizations do not even hesitate quoting business process outsourcing as the secret behind their business success.

How BPO Contributes in the Success of Company?

The answer may need long detail, logical back up or evidence; while keeping it short and simple it can be noted that there are two major parts of every organization namely, administrative functions and strategic planning.

Administration functions contribute in running, monitoring and management of all business units. Be it finance and accounts, human resources function, production team or IT support all these are part of administrative functions. Tough schedules, project deadlines and meeting stress and all other business functions, take focus away from strategic planning that result in static business position. It means that a business keeps on running smoothly, but it does not show growth because companies lack focus on strategic planning.

Secret behind success of most big corporations is that they outsource all efficient processes and keep core focus on strategic planning for the company. They keep on expanding their visions and targeted goals and then formulate strategies to achieve those goals and keep growing in the competition.

The JLC Group provides diverse service portfolio for business outsourcing, including but not limited to:

1)      Marketing & Corporate Sales Strategy

2)      Brand Awareness

3)      Public Relation Consultancy

4)      Social Media Campaigns

5)      Corporate Sponsorships

6)      Competitive Analysis

7)      Strategic Partnerships

8)       Corporate Web Design and Development and more

Importance of Business Process Outsourcing

Learning is Proportional to the Accountability

New research proves that people only confront failures when they cannot find ways to attribute failure with something – or someone – else.  But when we avoid accountability, we detach ourselves from learning.

In the recent working paper of HBS (Harvard Business School), researchers identify, “How internal attribution and ambiguity of responsibility affect learning from failure.” Almost every one of us have had heard many quotes from intellects, emphasizing on the connection between “Success & Failure,” “Failure & Learning”, and “Experience & Failure.”

For instance, take a look on Bill Gates’ famous saying, “It’s fine to celebrate success, but it is more important to heed the lessons of failure.”

To explain why most of the saints, scholars, and other super minds always link success with failure is straightforward, because they never found a way to success other than failed experiences. In other words, they got learning from failures and sooner or later, make themselves accountable to combat failure without giving excuses and reasoning or blaming external circumstances.

But in some cases, where a person is unclear if he/she is directly responsible for the failure then there is chance that a person would not attribute the failure internally and ultimately less likely to learn from failure. The dilemma of real world is that we cannot easily decrease the ambiguity of responsibility when it comes to failure because most of our assignments and projects involve team players and colleagues as well.

So is there any way managers can encourage learning without accusing others of responsibility?

One of the authors of working HBS paper, Christopher G. Myers, gives some recommendations;

1)      Remove barriers creating ambiguity in the priority.

2)      Carefully designing the job roles, scope of responsibilities and reporting structure.

3)      Creating a psychological safe culture within the organization, where employees are encouraged to accept and learn from failure.

4)      Make a norm of experiencing new tasks as the challenging opportunity for learning process, rather than as a threatening stress.

5)      Analyzing root-cause of the failure without penalizing anyone when team fails, this can increase the thirst for learning among employees.

In my experience, learning is more about failure than success. When a person fails, his curiosity for success increases but the person should be sincerely curious about his work and life. In the end, all we need is to prepare ourselves to be accountable and responsible for the particular failed attempt rather than pinpointing others and uncontrollable external factors.

How beautifully it is summarized by Zig Zigler in just once sentence,

“If you learn from defeat, you haven’t really lost.”

Learning is Proportional to the Accountability

Palantir: Goes Boldy Where Marketers Had Only Dreamed Of

As profiled by the most recent edition of the Sunday New York Times, 10-yr old Palantir Technologies, a software company whose investors include the US Central Intelligence Agency-backed venture capital firm In-Q-Tel, Palantir helps clients unlock secrets. In the world of marketing, and more specifically, within the context of marketers who now foam at the mouth when provided tools to extrapolate insight from tons of metadata, for those Mad Men (and women) intrigued by the rhetorical question”What’s Next?” within the framework of marketing technology and applications, Palantir is very possibly the next generation’s Google Inc; irrespective of the assortment of privacy-related concerns that go hand in hand with the company’s secret sauces.

An audacious call perhaps, but this blogger was [presciently] one of the very earliest proponents of Google search technology in the late 1990′s, well before this company went public in 2004. It has forever since become a ubiquitous tool for research, and of course, a Wall Street darling. Now this blogger is banging the table and shouting “Pay Attention to Palantir.”

Palantir’s offices in Palo Alto, Calif., house computer monitors galore, not to mention more unusual desk décor, a cot and games. Credit Peter DaSilva for The New York Times

Though Palantir’s CEO Alex Karp says he eschews the notion of monetizing this business enterprise via a public stock offering (much to the chagrin of its early and latter stage venture investors), the company’s list of corporate clients now extends across every industry, including the world’s biggest financial companies, manufacturers, and healthcare concerns. For those using Palantir tools to analyze buying decisions, trends and for projecting just about anything a business (or government) would want to forecast with reliability, Palantir software is seemingly light years ahead of Google and the assortment of other tech czars focused on number crunching and data analysis.

For the full story from the NY Times, please click here.

Palantir: Goes Boldy Where Marketers Had Only Dreamed Of

Social Media, Meet Financial Services; Blog, Tweet and Link-In To Be a Thought-Leader

Norb Vonnegut

Norb Vonnegut, author extraordinaire of Wall Street crime novels (no surprise given his last name is synonymous with literary largesse) and a fellow who is fluent in the world of financial services wrote a compelling column for the Wall Street Journal this week in which he framed the relevance and import of social media within the world of financial services.

Before offering a synopsis of the column and Norb’s “take-aways”, in the spirit of Wall Street’s emphasis on “full-disclosure”, I’ve broken bread with Norb on more than one occasion, initially in connection with my inviting him to lunch with the goal of enticing him to collaborate on a crime story that I had penned. I think Norb is not just a great fellow, but he’s also a smart and thoughtful guy. I also happen to be a fan of his books, which tend to focus on fictional financial malfeasance; necessarily inspired by the ample supply of real-life stories emanating from the bowels of Wall Street.

Below extract from Norb’s WSJ column starts with “It’s not clear to me how anybody can use social media to build a financial advisory business, especially in the high-net-worth sector. Referrals, targeted cold calls, expert speaking engagements–that’s where the action is.

But I might be wrong.”

Norb then points to the reason why he might be wrong, and along the way, two particularly observations jumped off the page: the import of thought-leadership techniques (“newsjacking” 3rd party content to help emphasize a point..one of this writer’s favorite tactics), and the most important form of communication: listening!

“..Sebastian Dovey, whose firm Scorpio Partnership recently surveyed 3,477 wealthy people about how they use the Internet, says, “The wealthier the individual, the more connected they are digitally.”

Determined to keep an open mind, I recently spoke with Michael Zeuner of WE Family Offices. His firm manages about $2.7 billion in assets for wealthy families. Mr. Zeuner is bullish about social media, though not fanatical.

He regards it as a channel, one of several, to teach people and provide transparency about the markets because “the playing field has not been leveled between advisers and investors”–that is, advisers usually have information most other people don’t. When it comes to building long-term trust with wealthy clients, “caveat emptor” just doesn’t work.

We discussed Twitter TWTR -4.59% and LinkedIn in detail. We skimmed over Facebook, FB -0.83% which Mr. Zeuner sees as more of a “personal” site. And we did not spend any time on Google+ or YouTube.

Twitter: I asked the obvious question. How can you educate investors in 140 characters or less about the Byzantine securities and the assorted biohazards that crawl out of Wall Street’s trading floors?

Mr. Zeuner said he curates thought leadership. Using his personal handle, he primarily tweets third-party content that contributes to capital markets transparency and investor expertise. ….

I get that. It’s the right way to tweet. The strategy focuses on value, not volume. What I didn’t expect was Mr. Zeuner’s follow-up. He emphasized Twitter is a great place “to listen.”

The full WSJ column is available via this link.

 

Social Media, Meet Financial Services; Blog, Tweet and Link-In To Be a Thought-Leader

GROWTH HACKING: A NEW SUCCESS CODE CRACKER FOR ONLINE MARKETERS

The term GROWTH HACKING was first coined in 2010 by Sean Ellis, CEO and Founder of Qualaroo and GrowthHackers.com. It now became a marketing technique, often used by growth hackers to blend the creativity, analytics, and social metrics to bring in high sales and expand online marketing exposure.

The emergence of companies like Dropbox (file-sharing service website) and Airbnb (home renting service website) demonstrate the significant shift of online business growth. Wall Street Journal reporters highlighted that both the companies spent almost nothing on online advertisement, but they still managed to drive a lot of traffic on their respective websites. So, what’s the secret behind their dramatic success? The answer is Growth Hacking.

How Growth Hacking helps boost businesses?

Talking about the Dropbox, instead of using traditional advertising techniques – marketers designed a marketing referral program that facilitated the users get extra storage on inviting a new member to the site. On the other side, Airbnb opted for multi-posting method of promotion, unlike traditional advertising, they allowed their existing clientele on Craiglist.com to cross-post the listings of featured post that brought heavy traffic back to Airbnb.com.

The above two strategies proved to be excellent growth-hacking marketing tactics. Unfortunately, there is no rule of thumb for any business to follow certain growth-hacking tactics as Ivan Kirigin, a former product manager at Dropbox, said, “Focus on a goal and run tests to find what will help achieve that goal”.

Growth hacking is now becoming one of the best podiums for online marketing. Gone are the days, when traditional marketing helps you stand out in the competition. Another great example of Growth-hacking success is Facebook.com, likewise the former software engineer of Facebook, Mr. Kirigin, said, “Facebook found out that users are much more likely to stay on the site if they acquired at least seven friends in 10 days”. Based on the fact, Facebook uses algorithms to suggest “people you may know” and sends emails prompting users to add their friends.

Every day, we witness growth hacking in the digital world, when suddenly a joke, picture, video, website, or business idea goes viral on the internet even in microseconds and people start owning the idea before their peers or friends do. Growth hacking is all about the idea that works like a magic bullet to hit the target audience and create a uniform and passive perception.

GROWTH HACKING: A NEW SUCCESS CODE CRACKER FOR ONLINE MARKETERS

Telling Your Story: Brand Strategy 6 Words at a Time

Story-telling is one of the most effective way for brands to extend their value proposition, after all, the impact of story-telling is part and parcel to every culture since the beginning of time. Whether in metaphor, anecdotal, or short-form narrative, story-telling sells.

Don’t just believe us, NYT’s Stuart Elliott visited this advertising industry topic in a recent column profiling Ritz-Carlton’s latest campaign courtesy of Team One Advertising.

“..A chain of luxury hotels and resorts is borrowing from an Internet meme to extend a marketing effort that celebrates the accumulation of experiences and memories rather than the trappings of wealth.

The campaign, scheduled to begin this week, is for the Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company division of Marriott International. It is intended to expand upon ads that Ritz-Carlton and its agency, Team One Advertising, introduced in 2011 with the theme “Let us stay with you.”

The new campaign, also by Team One, is called “Six-word wows,” after a popular online creative exercise known as six-word memoirs and six-word stories. All those efforts at producing among the shortest of short stories — “flash fiction,” as some describe it — are inspired by a moment in literary lore when, the legend goes, Ernest Hemingway was challenged to write a story in six words and replied, “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.”

The “wow” in the Ritz-Carlton campaign invokes the company’s parlance when referring to a goal to “wow” its guests. The capsule tales are taken from anecdotes that are shared two ways….”

For the full story (its a great read and very inspiring!), please visit the NYT story

 

Telling Your Story: Brand Strategy 6 Words at a Time

Financial Services Marketing: New Business Intelligence Portal Aims At Global Investment Crowd

BrokerDealer.com Launches Broker-Dealer Business Intelligence Portal for Global Bankers, Qualified Investors and Entrepreneurs Raising Capital

For Immediate Release

New York, NY—May 28–Broker Dealer LLC, a provider of financial industry corporate intelligence and qualified investor databases, announced today the launch of a new, broker dealer web-based portal that incorporates 100,000 broker dealer, investment banker and securities dealer profiles as well as upwards of 20,000 qualified investors extending across 35 major countries, including capital formation brokers and deal investors based in North America, EU, Eastern Europe, China, Pacific Rim, the Middle East and Africa.

Apart from detailed lead generation and decision-maker metadata, the company’s platform incorporates a range of social media applications, including a “deal room” forum that enable capital-seeking business enterprises to share their business plans with professional deal-sourcing bankers and private funding sources that include qualified angel investors, hedge fund managers, private equity and venture capital firms and family offices seeking investment opportunities. The firm’s investor database is available for free and is accessible via http://BrokerDealer.com.

According to Jay Berkman, head of the financial services practice group for marketing consultant The JLC Group, “Brokerdealer.com could be the right domain for this new player in the business intelligence space when considering the evolution of the JOBS Act in the U.S., the global embracement of crowd-funding in advance of traditional investment bank capital-raising techniques and the depth of global contact information available within the brokerdealer.com database.” Added Berkman, “The social networking function within its subscriber-based platform is compelling, and it’s advertising-free.”

Brokerdealer.com was designed to help connect companies seeking broker dealers, funding, underwriting, or lead manager assistance for debt and equity offerings. The platform was created out of the need to give entrepreneurs, investors and data providers the ability to connect with one another. The broker dealer databases found on brokerdealer.com includes information such as broker dealer’s name, address, phone, URL/emails, and most important, a description of what the broker-dealer actually performs. If a company is seeking to raise capital for a real estate project the user will be able to filter the broker dealer databases – on a global scale – and reach out.

Brokerdealer.com anticipates adding 45 additional securities dealer and broker directories, giving network members of brokerdealer.com upwards of 75 of the world’s most popular broker dealer lists.

For Additional Info

Corporate Communications

Broker Dealer LLC

30 Wall Street

Suite 800

New York, NY 10005

Tel: (212) 380-1371

Email: brokerdealer@brokerdealer.com

Twitter: @broker_dealer

Financial Services Marketing: New Business Intelligence Portal Aims At Global Investment Crowd

New Trend: Social Media Savvy Youngsters Fill Reverse-Mentor Roles To Corporate Exec GreyBeards

You’re a corporate titan, and your marketing execs are pushing you to be more proactive in your use of social media, but you still don’t get it..Well, as reported by Sue Shellenbarger in today’s WSJ Home & Digital column, the new trend in corporate mentoring is finding youngsters in corporate settings taking on a reverse role; they’re now doing the mentoring. Whether its best practices when it comes to Twitter, Blogging, the use of Linkedin or Facebook, we’re reminded of the adage, “..out of the mouths of babes..”  The JLC Group endorses this new movement! (P.S. We’re also looking for interns to mentor our corporate clients!!!)

“There is a growing digital divide in workplaces—between twentysomethings with social-media savvy and tech-impaired older managers. To address it, more companies are trying reverse mentoring, pairing young employees with older colleagues to work on tech skills.

 

The practice “is up quite a bit in the last three or four years,” says Didier Bonnet, a global practice leader in London for Capgemini Consulting. “The main aim is to raise the digital IQ of business leaders in the firms.”

The pair-ups don’t always work, Dr. Bonnet says. They are often intimidating to young mentors and awkward for older colleagues, who may be embarrassed to reveal how little they know. Clear goals, good chemistry, a time commitment and an open-minded attitude among senior executives raise the odds of success, he says…”

For the full story from the WSJ, please click here.

 

New Trend: Social Media Savvy Youngsters Fill Reverse-Mentor Roles To Corporate Exec GreyBeards

Crowdsourcing and Crowdfunding: Connecting The Tag Line to the Bottom Line

Extract courtesy of WSJ CIO Journal May 27

“..The goal of crowdsourcing is to not only reduce costs—compared to turning to a traditional consulting firm, for instance—but also to connect quickly with specialists and scale resources up or down as workloads change….

….Companies that need software developed in a short timeframe might go to technical crowdsourcing sites such as Assembly or uTest. Marketers needing a tagline for next month’s promotion can turn to Crowdflower or Trada, among many others….

Types of Crowdsourcing

Tongal Crowdsourcing

There are a few different models for buying and using crowdsourcing services. In some cases, companies don’t pay a dime until a desired result is achieved. Colgate Speed Stick conducted a crowdsourcing contest on Tongal to spark a Super Bowl ad for the cut-rate price of $17,000. Platforms also incorporate bidding systems where freelancers can present a proposal and price for a project. Then there are transactional-based projects with large volumes of people working on your behalf. A consumer products company could pay small fees to thousands of individuals for testing products or auditing their stock in stores, using mobile apps to report results. The beauty of crowdsourcing is that it takes the hassles of talent search and management out of a company’s hands…

Crowdfunding. A hot topic among the investment community is crowdfunding, in which entrepreneurs ask for capital from the crowd to develop ideas, products, and businesses. Indiegogo, Kickstarter, and OurCrowd are three of many platforms in this space. Israel-based OurCrowd  has helped 33 companies raise a collective $35 million; OurCrowd investors receive equity stakes in the companies they fund.

For the full WSJ CIO / Deloitte article, please click here.

 

 

Crowdsourcing and Crowdfunding: Connecting The Tag Line to the Bottom Line

Brand Burnishing Warren Buffet Style: Dairy Queen Case Study Includes Social Media

Below extract courtesy of Stuart Elliot, New York Times

THEY are not long, the days of wine and roses. Nor, as Madison Avenue knows, are the days of summer selling, which are vital to companies in areas like fast food, beverages and tourism that must gather their rosebuds — and revenue — while they may. For marketers, summer typically runs from Memorial Day through Labor Day; this year, that makes 99 days to wheel and deal.

A marketer that may be a symbol for those whose sales surge in the summer is the American Dairy Queen Corporation, a division of Berkshire Hathaway that has 6,450 Dairy Queen stores in 27 countries. A campaign to begin on Tuesday for the American market, where Dairy Queen has about 4,800 restaurants, has one goal: to make those few summer days count at the cash register.

To that end, the campaign will focus on promotions of what the industry calls L.T.O.s, or limited-time offers: a menu item, the S’mores Blizzard, returning from last summer; a second item, the Chips Ahoy Blizzard, new for this summer; and a free bacon upgrade for the $5 Buck Lunch, Dairy Queen’s value meal. The campaign will carry a theme, “Fan food, not fast food,” that was introduced last year and is the handiwork of the Kansas City, Mo., firm Barkley, which became Dairy Queen’s creative agency in December 2012.

For the entire story, please click here to visit the NY Times article

Brand Burnishing Warren Buffet Style: Dairy Queen Case Study Includes Social Media

Canvassing 101: How to Find Out What Makes Sense So That You Can Make Dollars

Does your “brilliant design choice” for your corporate logo actually resonate with your targeted audience? How about your corporate slogan? Does your website design deter conversions (i.e. do you know where and why your site visitors are dropping out before they make a purchase (or respond to your “call-to-action”)?

I’ve lost count of the number of clients who have created the “next great idea” and invested tens, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars in branding strategies that fell flat, simply because they couldn’t see the trees through the forest and neglected to actually canvass their targeted audience BEFORE committing significant resources to an idea. Leading me to suggest that RJ Metric’s Robert Moore contribution in today’s NYT “You’re The Boss” column is a must read for those who aspire to be true innovators.

The take-away is simple: If you don’t ask, you don’t get. Per Moore’s pointer, conducting a survey to sanity check your idea is critical. Monkey Survey used to be my particular favorite tool because its a simple and zero-cost tool that allows you to canvass those you know.  But those you know, even if completing the survey anonymously, may not be the ones you want to canvass vs. surveying those who are already profiled to have an interest in the type of product or service you are offering.

To reach the latter group, the cost of canvassing is now strikingly affordable, best illustrated by Survata.com . We haven’t tested it yet, but its on our immediate action list.

What about your web site design. Do you really know how your visitors are navigating your site, and which pages prove to have the longest visits and/or the last page visitors viewed before they decided not to buy your product or respond to your call to action? Yes, many of use the free Google Analytics (most of us use only 20% of the features), but because Goog’s tools can prove to be complex to implement, a new entrant, CrazyEgg.com, seems to be a very intriguing and very inexpensive (starting at $9/mo) tool that makes analyzing your web design and the impact on visitors simple and straight forward.

Canvassing 101: How to Find Out What Makes Sense So That You Can Make Dollars

Summer Internship Available at CT-based Corporate Marcom-PR Boutique

The JLC Group is offering a spot (starting immediately!) for a smart, savvy and social media-friendly individual who aspires to be a modern day MadMan (or MadWoman).  Our clients include highly-demanding and successful entrepreneurs and corporate executives operating within financial services, technology, insurance, consumer products and risk management sectors.  Our clients engage our firm to help increase brand awareness and further position their respective products and professional services.  You can presume that we are even more demanding than our clients; a quality that sets us apart from others in our space.

The principals of our firm have served as mentors to dozens of young men and women in the course of their college and post college careers. Many of our proteges have since become leaders within start-ups, fast-growth companies and major corporations. Either we’ve always picked the right interns, or we’ve done a great job providing a spring board for people who know how to listen, enjoy learning, are multi-tasking, are able to think out of the box and are not easily-intimidated by challenges or obstacles.

Requirements:

1. You must read the entire listing herein before replying. Applicants who are unable to meet the criteria herein need not apply.

1a. You must be able to follow instructions and also be self-directed.

1b. You must be accomplished using web-based search tools to locate answers and/or uncovering information that is often hidden.

2. Currently pursuing marketing communications as a major course of study, or recently graduated from college  during which time your primary focus of study was within areas that included marketing, marketing communication, English, finance, and/or related fields.

3. You are well-versed in best practices i.e. corporate use of social media applications. This means you are familiar with strategies that best position brands using blogs, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and similar social media outlets.

4. You are necessarily tech-friendly and proficient in the use of .doc, .xls, .ppt.

5. You must have strong creative writing skills.

6. You must be able to work without supervision; as your tasks can be accomplished from your own location (work remotely). Otherwise, we are happy to provide work space for you in our Westport CT office.

7. Those with knowledge of the financial services industry and financial markets, along with above criteria will be given special consideration; much of the tasks you will be assigned will be in support of clients  operating within the financial industry.

COMPENSATION

Internships are called internships for a reason; they are typically non-paying opportunities to learn and practice a skill set in advance of pursuing your chosen career.  That said, we are offering a stipend (paid bi-weekly)  of $250 per week. If you do an outstanding job, we provide bonuses based on performance.

How to reply:

1. Send a cover letter along with your current resume.

2. If you prefer to create a video-resume with the goal of “wowing” us, that’s fine.

3. If you can’t figure out how or where to send your application to, you’re not qualified for the opportunity described above.

All applications will be held in strict confidence, and all applications that meet the above criteria will be responded to.

 

Summer Internship Available at CT-based Corporate Marcom-PR Boutique

Beverly Hills Boycott of Brunei: Ct PR Firm Offers Pro Bono Service For Pro-Human Rights Companies To Shout Out Protest of Billionaire Dictator

The headline says it all. Feel free to retweet. Ok to hit “like”..Forward this link.. Westport Ct consulting firm JLC Group is offering its public relations services as a professional courtesy (aka free of charge) to corporate brands who wish to publicly demonstrate their protest of new laws that violate all presumed norms of human society imposed this week by by the Sultan of Brunei , the de facto leader of the world’s 5th richest country. According to the reincarnated view of Sharia law, the new edicts on this Islamic-led monarchy imposes corporal punishment on any accused homosexual, dismemberment for those found guilty of petty theft, and let’s not forget : death by stoning of any woman determined (by a court of religious zealots) to have committed adultery. Did we forget to add, according to this law, their definition of adultery (which could easily be a copyright violation from a Game of Thrones episode), does not accept an act of rape as a defense against the charge of adultery.  It doesn’t matter how; if you got screwed, you are screwed. You could be gang-raped by Islamic militants with bombs strapped to their backs and pointing AK-47s at your child’s head, but you’d still be guilty of adultery. And, your punishment will have you stoned to death. How’s that for modern civilization?

There are a variety of reasons why aspiring and accomplished brand leaders across the spectrum of industries (well, maybe not all industries or companies..) should want to further define your corporate ethos, if only to your stakeholders, by taking a public stance in protest of the Brunei madness. Presumably, you’ll want your message to be more impactful than simply announcing your boycott of private and corporate events taking place at the Beverly Hills Hotel.

 

Beverly Hills Boycott of Brunei: Ct PR Firm Offers Pro Bono Service For Pro-Human Rights Companies To Shout Out Protest of Billionaire Dictator

How to Succeed as a Financial Industry Thought-Leader: Case Study

Financial Services Brand Marketing 101: For those who aspire to be considered thought-leaders within the financial industry, this interview clip courtesy of CNBC is a perfect example of thought-leadership..and underscores the [obvious] need for aspiring 'experts' to be fluent in the subject matter and to frame your thesis in a crisp and clear manner. Kudos to Neil Azous of Rareview Macro re his 'CNBC debut appearance' (fast forward to the 2-minute market on the video for his presentation)

Risque Brand Names: Risks (i.e. Envelope Pushing) Can Reap Rewards

Kudos to NYT John Grossman re today’s front page (business section) story profiling companies that have embraced risque words within corporate name.

And, hats off to the disruptive entrepreneurs who have successfully pushed the envelope and proven that shock and awe within their brand promotion schemes can push them to the top of mindshare. Best case in point: Richard Branson use of “virgin” within each of all of his corporate brands

Per article (link below), when the artisian maker of non-allergenic, high-fiber breakfast cereal changed the name from the bland tasting name “Hapi Cereal” to “Holy Crap”, sales rose 10x (that’s TEN-FOLD!)….One example doesn’t make a story, but the number of examples cited by the NYT reporter strikes at the heart of why risque is not only tongue-in-cheek-fun, but can prove very rewarding to those who focus on connecting the tag line to the bottom line.. And yes, that last phrase happens to be The JLC Group corporate slogan.

Fat Bastard and SassyBitch wines, Kickass Cupcakes, Big Ass Fans (formerly known as “HVLS Fan Company”), “Master Bait & Tackle Co. (a fishing supply firm), a construction company that changed its name to “Mammoth Erection” from “David Hall Construction” and “HelloFlo” (a feminine hygiene brand) are all cited in the article for having enjoyed spiked sales subsequent to migrating from plain jane monikers to shock and awe approaches.

Caveat: if your email domain emulates the risque phrase, you’re at risk of corporate emails winding up in recipient spam folders. Another caveat: if you market to global audience, the name you select could insult a local culture and incite a riot..and not the laughing kind…

Here’s the link to the NYT article:

Risque Brand Names: Risks (i.e. Envelope Pushing) Can Reap Rewards

The Next Place to Insert Ads: Email Calendars!

What will push-advertisers think of next? The latest strategy: inserting ads into your email calendar!”

Courtesy of NY Times April 22 by Andrew Adam Newman “For a New Burt’s Bees Line, Check Your Calendar”

“..WHILE it may seem that advertising is everywhere, one place marketers have not infiltrated is the popular calendar software on computers, smartphones and tablets. But now, in what Burt’s Bees says is a marketing first, the natural personal care brand is introducing promotional messages that will appear as appointments in electronic calendars like those by Microsoft, Apple, Google and Yahoo…

The calendar promotion is by Baldwin& in Raleigh, N.C., the agency of record for Burt’s Bees, with interactive development by RecCenter, a digital agency in New York. Burt’s Bees, which was founded in Maine in 1984, is now based in Durham, N.C., and owned by the Clorox Company.

Katharine Belloir, a Baldwin& account supervisor, said she believed this was the first time a brand was interacting with consumers via their online datebooks, and that it could prove more intimate than social media.

The Next Place to Insert Ads: Email Calendars!

Financial Industry Boutique Turns to JLC Group for Brand Burnishing

The JLC Group is pleased to announce that Rareview Macro LLC, the Stamford, CT-based advisory and publisher of “Sight Beyond Sight”, a daily macro-strategy newsletter subscribed to by leading investment managers and hedge funds focused on global events and related investment strategy ideas and insights, has engaged JLC to advise the firm and implement a menu of brand awareness, business development, corporate public relations and marcom-centric initiatives.

Rareview Macro LLC principal Neil Azous is a 20-year financial industry veteran who, prior to forming Rareview, spent much of his professional career in senior, trading market strategy roles for the world’s leading investment banks.  Since launching “Sight Beyond Sight” in late 2013, Mr. Azous has been frequently cited by leading industry news publications for his expert insight to global geo-political and macro-economic events impacting equities, fixed income, commodities and currency markets.  In addition to proffering opportunistic, yet objective alpha-generating and risk mitigation ideas to highly-sophisticated investment managers and hedge funds, Mr. Azous also provides consultative portfolio management guidance to clients of Rareview Macro.

Financial Industry Boutique Turns to JLC Group for Brand Burnishing

Macau Hotel-Casino Marketers Go All-In To Recruit WPT Celeb Spokesman Vince Van Patten

Now that Macau has become the gambling capital of the Far East, the Near East, Western Europe and of course “The West”– all courtesy of the Las Vegas legacy and Vegas-style, star-studded attractions emulated by every casino venue on the Planet Earth,  more than a few of Wall Street’s top gaming industry’s analysts, along with the entertainment industry’s branding gurus, Hollywood talent agents and corporate sponsorship sales genies think its time to bet big that at least a handful of the major Macau hotel/casino marketer will want to import Vince Van Patten, aka World Poker Tour (WPT) Celebrity Spokesman/Star to promote their venue.

For those handicapping celeb spokespeople and Vegas caliber whale-catchers, Vince is someone with more than a few extra cards up his sleeve; aside from a 5-star celeb rating and for being the top gun calling the shots at major poker tourneys broadcast to global viewers, Vince’s CV includes his being a world-ranked professional tennis ace, a celeb-pro-level golfer who is close-to-scratch-on-the links, thanks to a mean 9 iron, AND two dozen+ credits as a major film and TV actor.

Let’s not forget, Vince is without a doubt, one of the most entertaining folks you’d ever want to cross paths with…Now, Vince Van Patten’s lawyer/talent agent has tapped The JLC Group’s corporate sponsorship practice to field inquiries from Macau-located major hotel/casino venue EVP marketers and sponsorship execs who know that your deck needs to be stacked and that it requires star power to rake in the whales, and in turn, the chips. If you fall into that category, you’re cordially invited to dial us in; but only the smart ones who know that American icon celebs are the biggest brand magnets for high-rolling whales and your 4-star guests. 

To Shelly Adelson’s exec team re Sands Macao: Don’t stand on ceremony, even if your stock price keeps heading higher; Vince is who you want on your team..sign him up now–before one of your competitors shoes him in.  All you need to do is watch the sizzle reel below to know this is the safest bet you can make.

Let’s not forget, Vince is without a doubt, one of the most entertaining folks you’d ever want to cross paths with…Now, Vince Van Patten’s lawyer/talent agent has tapped The JLC Group’s corporate sponsorship practice to field inquiries from Macau-located major hotel/casino venue EVP marketers and sponsorship execs who know that your deck needs to be stacked and that it requires star power to rake in the whales, and in turn, the chips. If you fall into that category, you’re cordially invited to dial us in; but only the smart ones who know that American icon celebs are the biggest brand magnets for high-rolling whales and your 4-star guests. To Shelly Adelson’s exec team re Sands Macao: Don’t stand on - See more at: http://thejlcgroup.com/macau-hotel-casino-moguls-go-sign-tennis-ace-wpt-poker-celeb-vince-van-patten/#sthash.4DvIy3kI.dpuf

Let’s not forget, Vince is without a doubt, one of the most entertaining folks you’d ever want to cross paths with…Now, Vince Van Patten’s lawyer/talent agent has tapped The JLC Group’s corporate sponsorship practice to field inquiries from Macau-located major hotel/casino venue EVP marketers and sponsorship execs who know that your deck needs to be stacked and that it requires star power to rake in the whales, and in turn, the chips. If you fall into that category, you’re cordially invited to dial us in; but only the smart ones who know that American icon celebs are the biggest brand magnets for high-rolling whales and your 4-star guests. To Shelly Adelson’s exec team re Sands Macao: Don’t stand on ceremony, even if your stock price keeps heading higher; Vince is who you want on your team..sign him up now–before one of your competitors shoes him in.  All you need to do is watch the sizzle reel below to know this is the safest bet you can make. - See more at: http://thejlcgroup.com/macau-hotel-casino-moguls-go-sign-tennis-ace-wpt-poker-celeb-vince-van-patten/#sthash.4DvIy3kI.dpuf

Let’s not forget, Vince is without a doubt, one of the most entertaining folks you’d ever want to cross paths with…Now, Vince Van Patten’s lawyer/talent agent has tapped The JLC Group’s corporate sponsorship practice to field inquiries from Macau-located major hotel/casino venue EVP marketers and sponsorship execs who know that your deck needs to be stacked and that it requires star power to rake in the whales, and in turn, the chips. If you fall into that category, you’re cordially invited to dial us in; but only the smart ones who know that American icon celebs are the biggest brand magnets for high-rolling whales and your 4-star guests. To Shelly Adelson’s exec team re Sands Macao: Don’t stand on ceremony, even if your stock price keeps heading higher; Vince is who you want on your team..sign him up now–before one of your competitors shoes him in.  All you need to do is watch the sizzle reel below to know this is the safest bet you can make. - See more at: http://thejlcgroup.com/macau-hotel-casino-moguls-go-sign-tennis-ace-wpt-poker-celeb-vince-van-patten/#sthash.4DvIy3kI.dpuf

Let’s not forget, Vince is without a doubt, one of the most entertaining folks you’d ever want to cross paths with…Now, Vince Van Patten’s lawyer/talent agent has tapped The JLC Group’s corporate sponsorship practice to field inquiries from Macau-located major hotel/casino venue EVP marketers and sponsorship execs who know that your deck needs to be stacked and that it requires star power to rake in the whales, and in turn, the chips. If you fall into that category, you’re cordially invited to dial us in; but only the smart ones who know that American icon celebs are the biggest brand magnets for high-rolling whales and your 4-star guests. To Shelly Adelson’s exec team re Sands Macao: Don’t stand on ceremony, even if your stock price keeps heading higher; Vince is who you want on your team..sign him up now–before one of your competitors shoes him in.  All you need to do is watch the sizzle reel below to know this is the safest bet you can make.
- See more at: http://thejlcgroup.com/macau-hotel-casino-moguls-go-sign-tennis-ace-wpt-poker-celeb-vince-van-patten/#sthash.4DvIy3kI.dpuf

Now that Macau has become the gambling capital of the Far East, the Near East, Western Europe and of course “The West”– all courtesy of the Las Vegas legacy and Vegas-style, star-studded attractions emulated by every casino venue on the Planet Earth,  more than a few of Wall Street’s top gaming industry’s analysts, along with the entertainment industry’s branding gurus, Hollywood talent agents and corporate sponsorship sales genies think its time to bet big that at least a handful of the major Macau hotel/casino marketer will want to import Vince Van Patten, aka World Poker Tour (WPT) Celebrity Spokesman/Star to promote their venue. For those handicapping celeb spokespeople and Vegas caliber whale-catchers, Vince is someone with more than a few extra cards up his sleeve; aside from a 5-star celeb rating and the top gun calling the shots at major poker tourneys broadcast to global viewers, Vince’s CV includes his being a world-ranked professional tennis ace, a close-to-scratch-on-the links, thanks to a mean 9 iron, AND two dozen+ credits as a major film and TV actor.
Let’s not forget, Vince is without a doubt, one of the most entertaining folks you’d ever want to cross paths with…Now, Vince Van Patten’s lawyer/talent agent has tapped The JLC Group’s corporate sponsorship practice to field inquiries from Macau-located major hotel/casino venue EVP marketers and sponsorship execs who know that your deck needs to be stacked and that it requires star power to rake in the whales, and in turn, the chips. If you fall into that category, you’re cordially invited to dial us in; but only the smart ones who know that American icon celebs are the biggest brand magnets for high-rolling whales and your 4-star guests. To Shelly Adelson’s exec team re Sands Macao: Don’t stand on ceremony, even if your stock price keeps heading higher; Vince is who you want on your team..sign him up now–before one of your competitors shoes him in.  All you need to do is watch the sizzle reel below to know this is the safest bet you can make.
- See more at: http://thejlcgroup.com/macau-hotel-casino-moguls-go-sign-tennis-ace-wpt-poker-celeb-vince-van-patten/#sthash.4DvIy3kI.dpuf

And The Best-In-Class Winner Is: Hat's Off to JLC Group's Award-Winning Financial Service Industry Clients

Not 1, but 2 of The JLC Group’s clients were recognized for their excellence by a panel of financial industry peers who were assembled by top financial news media platform Pageant Media (which has 11 mastheads in their digital and print portfolio) to weigh ‘best-in-class’ service providers…in a competition that fielded 100 of Wall Street’s best known firms.

Taking home the gold medal in the category “Best Research/Broker-Dealer” the 2014 Wall Street Letter Institutional Trading Awards went to Mischler Financial Group–which also happens to be the industry’s oldest and largest minority firm owned and operated by service-disabled veterans.. ..

WallachBeth Capital LLC Mgn.Dir. Tom Quigley (l) accepts industry award for Best DMA Offerings

In the category “Best DMA (Direct Market Access) Offerings”, which recognizes top gun trading technology capabilities–a category typically over-weighted by firms whose names are ubiquitous across the global trading market landscape, the industry judges gave the gold to boutique execution specialist firm WallachBeth Capital. Runner ups were Bloomberg LP’s Tradebook, among others.

Both of above-noted firms were also “in the medal” and short-listed nominees for perhaps the most important of the WSL 2014 award 20 categories: “Best Client-Service/Broker-Dealer.”    The winners were awarded their honors during a gala event attended by 250+ of Wall Street’s finest in NYC on Feb 24.




And The Best-In-Class Winner Is: Hat's Off to JLC Group's Award-Winning Financial Service Industry Clients

Marketing 101:Metaphors Matter (When Telling Your Story)

  It seems the flavor of the week for marketing wonks is story-telling, which is   necessarily the art of using metaphors to articulate what sets you apart from the rest. Enough can’t be said about the impact of using metaphors within a business setting, whether in the course of internal discussions to relay the importance of a new product or initiative,  in a ‘client-facing’  mode, or my favorite: when making a large audience presentation.

Once you accept the above premise, here are some pointers:

The metaphor should necessarily be one that will resonate with your recipient.

Reminding us of the “know your customer/prospect rule.”

i.                 Before engaging in a dialogue,  you either already posses, or you will research and capture as much intel (business as well as personal interests) that will enable you to make an educated guess when selecting appropriate metaphors that illustrate your value proposition.

ii.                Even if you believe you know your customer, be deferential and solicit your target to share what his/her ‘hot buttons’ are.

iii.               Present yourself as being objectively informed, not presumptuous as to the intentions/motivations and goals of your target.  

7 Signs You Need A Metaphor

1. Your listener is confused.


2. Your client is stuck on an objection.


3. Your client sees no difference between you and your competition.


4. You want to drive home a point vividly and memorably.


5. You have to wiggle out of a difficult situation.


6. Your client is stalling.


7. You want to wow or motivate a larger audience.

Marketing 101:Metaphors Matter (When Telling Your Story)

2014 Top 8 Rules When Choosing a Brand Management/IR/PR Consultant

If you’re outsourcing B2B and IR-related brand management services, you obviously want to use a firm (or expert consultant) that “gets it” when it comes to you, your business and what you want to accomplish, even before you do. Someone that is fluent in your industry, what you do within that industry, your competitors, your customer base, and most important: the most innovative ways to influence how your enterprise is perceived. You want someone that is both a corporate-level sales guru and marketing madman, and also sensitive to your cost/benefit concerns.  And of course, someone you can trust to manage your expectations properly, which means they under-promise and over-deliver more often than not.

If you find yourself switching ‘agencies’ too often, or if you have ongoing frustration with what you expect vs. what you are getting from your ‘consultant’,  its likely those vendors were (are)  missing 3 of the most critical qualifications noted above.

2014 Top 8 Rules When Choosing a Brand Management/IR/PR Consultant

News Media Lays Egg With Duck Dynasty Coverage; Social Media Steps to New Lows

  Will somebody tell me why major news media outlets are hosting ‘experts’ to continuously debate the “rights” of Duck Dynasty patriarch Phil Robertson??

I’ll tell you why-or rather, if only because nobody at CNBC  knew how to put the issue into real perspective: its because Duck Dynasty has in just one year, become a $400 million annual revenue business. That’s right, the real story, not the reality TV version, is that the brouhaha that has since taken over any remaining intellect on the part of CNN’s programming team, is about money. Do-Re-Me. $400 million a year’s worth.

It is not about any so-called debate as to whether Phil Robertson’s constitutional rights have been violated; A&E, the network that airs this modern version of Beverly Hills Hillbillies, is a corporation whose business is business. Like any other entertainment company, they pay for content that entertains, but they reserve the right to cancel those payment agreements if they, in their sole determination, determine it is not in their best business interest to continue to broadcast said content. This happens when too many members of the audience voice their displeasure and protest, and in turn, causes sponsors/advertisers to cancel their agreements in conformance with standard clauses.

Let’s put this into perspective. The Ducksters attract the world’s biggest retailer’s audience. We’re talking about Walmart.  Walmart is the store du jour every day of the week for a vast majority of our country’s underemployed, “economically-disenfranchised” and financially-challenged. This includes a vast population of rednecks such as the personas the Robertson family works hard at emulating. Along the way, their raking in $400 million a year (or at least their ‘brand’ is courtesy of multiple licensing, advertising and sponsorship deals on top of merchandising deals).

Which brings me back to the opening rhetorical: why are seemingly intelligent news organizations dedicating so much air time to this issue, and more important, why are they framing it as if A&E’s corporate decision should be misconstrued for being anything more than a corporate decision?

Is it because programming execs are focused on maintaining the highest standards of journalism, and reporting stories that have a meaningful impact on society? Do these media czars really and truly believe that this issue even deserves consideration for being a ‘constitutional rights’ debate?  Help me by emailing me and telling me this can’t be true.

Or, have the lunatics taken over the asylum and we can attribute this latest insert into the news cycle for the latest rendition of an industry that is merely focused on serving up crap that advertisers are happy to underwrite, simply because the diners are zombies who happen to like eating crap and the other low-priced items those advertisers happen to sell?

By the way, the Ducksters and the folks at A&E are salivating because this ‘incident’ has just added a 2x factor to the value of the Duck Dynasty franchise. The major news networks will simply be remembered for their irresponsibility for profiling this most current example of human stupidity, while the Ducksters laugh all the way to the bank.

News Media Lays Egg With Duck Dynasty Coverage; Social Media Steps to New Lows

CEO-Centric Social Media Bootcamps; R U Clueless in the C-Suite Cubicle?

Courtesy of today’s WSJ, reporter Melissa Korn regurgitates an earlier story re: bootcamps for corporate bosses who, despite their leadership roles,  remain clueless about social media technologies and best practices–whether blogging, tweeting or how to position yourself properly and leverage social networks.

Excerpts from the WSJ story below..the bold/italicized comment is the take-away–and one that every/any C-Suiter should subscribe to:

“….Boardroom commanders are being assigned to basic training….Fearful their companies will fall behind because top bosses don’t have a firm grasp of technology or digital media, senior managers are taking lessons on how the Internet works….

Some firms are pairing individual leaders with young mentors, while others are spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to teach the entire c-suite how to use social tools that most of their entry-level employees use without a second thought…

The goal isn’t for the CEO to parse the difference between a “like” and “share” on Facebook or take a spin on the company Twitter TWTR -3.60% account, though that is covered, too. Rather, instructors and managers say, a basic understanding of the digital landscape helps leaders make better decisions about what to invest in, as well as how to talk about it…” 

Below video provides insight courtesy of a “young-in” whose business is teaching grey-beards the ropes. Click here for the WSJ article

CEO-Centric Social Media Bootcamps; R U Clueless in the C-Suite Cubicle?

Bitcoin Accepted Here!

   Its official, JLC Group, the corporate marketing, branding and advisory to disruptive thought-leaders is now accepting Bitcoin in connection with payment for services, or if you simply want to send us some.

Yes, those of you who remain skeptical re: use of bitcoin in lieu of government issued currency are justified for wanting to wait until bitcoins become ubiquitous, i.e. when PayPal creates a means to transact with bitcoin, or when FaceBook Bank opens for business (the latter is an idea that we proposed last year, but has not yet resonated with FB execs), or when Jeff Bezos bites into the bitcoin apple.

All of that said, we like to be part of first-mover movements, particularly those that exhibit all of the signs of disrupting (in a positive way) the way in which do business. We were one of the first to extol the use of Google when it was still a garage project,  we were a first-wave wonk re LinkedIn’s march to fame and fortune, and we’ve been way ahead of the curve when it comes to embracing video applications as a means of enhancing brand awareness and corporate value propositions.

Caveat: We don’t recommend speculating in bitcoins the way some folks speculate in FX or futures trading. That’s a fool’s errand!

 

Bitcoin Accepted Here!

Awareness Strategy of The Day: Short, Subliminal Bursts

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/02/business/media/mob-city-uses-twitter-to-build-suspense-for-a-premiere.html?ref=todayspaper

From the “How To Create Awareness Today and Now” department, today’s news bulletins point to 2 unrelated stories aka case studies from New York Times reporter Andrew Adam Newman [Building Suspsene on Twitter for A Television Show About the Mob]  and WSJ’s Farhad Manjoo’s piece “Why Everyone Will Totally Read This…”

Before you click on either of above, the take-away is that both articles coincidentally profile “this week’s weapon of choice” for today’s “Awareness Creators.”Both also profile derivative forms of what this blogger suggests is a time-proven, “before-there-were-neuroscientists” narrative/story telling approach.

Tag-lines are out; in-vogue are tactics that leverage multiple mediums (traditional, new, digital and social media) and deliver “short-burst” messages over a series of days (i.e. single frames from a film clip, using Twitter to link to upcoming scripts of a widely-promoted TV show (i.e.AMC’s upcoming “Mob City”), or a series of 15 second video vignettes that are ‘episodes’ that tell a story that subliminally promotes a brand

Regardless of the specific weapon of choice, the objective is to assault the target audience with a string of increasingly intriguing (short!) messages such that each subsequent ‘hit’ leads to increasing degrees of recall and resonance..such that your audience, desperate to know “what’s next” proactively seeks you out. That folks is a Holy Grail for the current Madmen Generation.

Awareness Strategy of The Day: Short, Subliminal Bursts