As you know I know a little something about the usage of animals within a logo. Take note of my company logo below.

There’s something about a dog or a cat or panda bear used in a companies branding that adds a little something to it. In my opinion it tends to bring life to a logo. It almost turns the logo into a living breathing creature.

Below are some more examples of animals being used in logo design.

Credits:
Buffalo Stampede by John Slabyk
13 Zebras by Dan Spencer
Answer by Mitch G.
Clanx Festival by Fabian Frech
Drinking Animal by Katharine Y.
Flamingo by Hugo den Ouden
Foxhead by Steve Rigby
Gallo by Maximo
Hedgehog Lab by Leon Howes
Kemang Paragon by Prima R. Bardin
Koala studios by Christina Ahlheim
LandMarc Press by Jerron Ames
Pandavisual by David Sparks
Polara by Gregory Grigoriou
Undersea Productions by Josiah Jost
Unpugged by Michael Spitz

We’re all smitten with social media. We can talk to people all around the globe, we can grow our businesses, and we can reach out and touch our neighbors without leaving the comfort of home. We chat, we tweet, we post, we blog, we share, we comment, we Skype, we’re up on all the latest social media platforms, and we’re happily and proudly engaged.

But have you ever thought about how your social media activity affects your brand? How exactly are you managing your brand in the social media age?

Branding is evolving, courtesy of the social media age. Let’s use an example shall we?

Scenario1 We’re all aware that when we send out a formal letter in the mail, we need to check it for proper spelling, punctuation and grammar. We also make sure there’s a proper salutation and closing with a signature. We also print letters on branded letterhead, with a branded envelope, and any attachments usually have a visible company logo. A complete, pretty little branded package of printed communication.

Scenario 2 When you send an email to a client or a prospect are you making sure all these same criteria are met? Too many professionals are not paying enough attention to the subtle communication of their brand when it comes to email. How many times have you received an email with a too-casual salutation, misspellings, improper grammar, and no closing, but a signature line full of social media contact info? It’s somewhat neat, easy to distribute, but a not-so-hot sounding piece of communication, yet it still affects your brand 100%.

Scenario 3 Your Twitter account is under a business name, you have a Facebook page for business, and you’re LinkedIn to your professional network. You tweet a mix of personal and business info, but it’s abbreviated and quick so you misspell too often, might go on a rant, chat socially with your friends, etc. Your Facebook fan page still has personal posts, but you can’t help it, after all, that was the whole point of Facebook. It’s purely social. LinkedIn is for professional, formal communication. However, you use Twitter, Facebook and texting most frequently so you unconsciously send informal messages and post comments on LinkedIn, even though it’s the most professional platform.

Review these scenarios. Does each instance reflect your brand? Absolutely! The question becomes, how are you reflecting your brand when you communicate on social media? Are you paying as much attention to your Facebook fan page posts as you would to a client email? What weight do you place on a formal letter versus your LinkedIn group comment? As we develop more platforms by which we communicate, you must remember, if you’re using any of these platforms for business, your brand is reflected in all that you post, so be cognizant of your brand reputation online. Your first impression is still important, and in the age of social media, you don’t know when, where, or how our first point of contact will happen with a prospect. Online posts last forever.

I had the pleasure of spending my lunch time with LaKesha Womack for her appropriately named blog talk radio show, “Lunch with LaKesha“. We discussed some key points in building a successful brand. The points we covered were:

• Consistency
• Positioning
• Professionalism
• Image
• Communicating the right message

Click below to get the details of everything we talked about during lunch.

When developing an ad campaign, using emotion is a very important element to include when conveying a message. In rare cases, however, the message itself delivers it’s own emotion. This is the case in State Farm’s Empire State of Mind 9/11 Tribute Commercial.

For the 10th anniversary of 9/11, state Farm along with director Spike Lee put together a moving piece. The commercial featured 150 children, ages 8-11, that visited four firehouses in the New york City area and paid tribute to them through song. The song was a rendition of Alicia Key’s version of “Empire State of Mind”.

There’s not much else I have to say about this. It speaks for itself.

I remember a time when my dad would take us on trips and have his arsenal of maps. At his disposal he had the entire United States in one atlas book to guide us from state to state.

Those days are long gone. Electronic, satellite driven navigation is now your guide into unknown territory as it speaks each highway and turn to you.

To promote their new line of GPS systems, Sony put together a couple of ads that more so resemble music videos. The music artists sing travel directions imitating an actual GPS navigation but with a musical feel.

The actual navigation doesn’t sing to you but they do have a USB port and Bluetooth capability to connect you to your digital music player.

The music video type ad draws you in just long enough to figure out that it is actually a commercial for GPS navigation. It also shows that, just like most electronic devices nowadays, it serves a dual purpose (navigation and music).

Do you think the Sony ad used a creative method of showcasing their product?

Have you seen a font that you wanted to use but did not know the name of it?

Searching the hundreds of fonts on your computer trying to match one with a font that you have seen can be a frustrating  job. MyFont.com has a free service called “What the Font” that will analyze any graphic, identify the text and match the text to an available font.

The process is simple.

1. You will upload the image you want “What the Font” to analyze or provide the URL to the image.
   
2. “What the  Font” will decode the image and break it into parts based on the text within the graphic and gives you an opportunity to identify any text that it was unable to recognize.
   
3. A list of matching fonts are provided that are available on MyFont.com for download.

It’s just that easy! An excellent tool for graphic designers or anyone trying to recreate the look of an image.

You know your business needs a strong, solid brand to compete in the marketplace. You know the basics of building a brand. You’re active on various social media platforms, like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, StumbleUpon, Digg, About.me, etc. How do you manage to develop a cohesive brand across all these different platforms? Hint: it’s more than using the same logo pic on your profiles!
Here are some critical points to ensure your branded online presence is consistent at all times. Remember, your brand is accessible 24 hours a day. You never know when, where, or how your next client will find you.

Post with consistency

There’s a fundamental lesson you have to understand as you  develop your brand on social media: you have to use it consistently! You can’t put up a profile and walk away. The old adage “build it and they will come” no longer applies. The sea is crowded, and you have to stay engaged in order to stay in front of your customers. For business, a general rule of thumb is Monday-Friday to share content. Update your LinkedIn status at least once a week, and you need to tweet/FB several times daily to maintain an active presence.

Your website is the foundation for your social media brand.

Be sure to include all the sharing buttons on your company website. Post snippets of your blog as an RSS feed, include widgets to show what you’re talking about on Facebook, etc. Show which social media platforms you’re using and include the usernames. Include select employees’ profiles when it’s appropriate. Let your site visitors know where they can find you, and they just might search for you and become your newest followers and future clients.

Engage with others across the various social media platforms

Interact with your peers and your prospects. Do this by posting useful comments on blogs. Follow others and share their information. The important key is to share relevant content. Your prospects will appreciate learning new tips and tricks to better their business, and they will come to see you as the go-to person for answers. This is a primary goal of your every move in business isn’t it? To become the go-to company, excuse me, go-to brand for expertise?

Create a visually cohesive brand

The look and feel of your brand must be cohesive from a visual perspective. For example, if your profile pics are similar, I don’t have to guess who you are. If your bios are similar, again, I’m not guessing if I’ve found the brand/person I’m looking for. Don’t leave this to chance. Create a great bio for yourself as an individual, then create one for your company. Next, merge the two and create a captivating keyword-rich bio that will attract your target and use this bio for your profiles!

Content should have an identifiable voice

When you’re online your posts and comments should all have a unifying theme, related to your brand. When people read your posts, they should be able to identify and/or recognize the voice behind the words. For example, my blog/ comments/ tweets/ FB posts all sound like the same person. I don’t write formal on Facebook, then turn around and forget grammar rules on Twitter because it’s only 140 characters, then comment on others’ blogs like I’m a scientific theorist. All my online chatter sounds like my blog, not too formal, straightforward in my approach, with a little of my sassy attitude thrown in, because that’s the person you’re going to be looking for when you meet me. Believe it or not, I’ve had people actually say to me “you sound just like your tweets” when they meet me in person. This is one of the biggest compliments you can get from a branding perspective.  Mission accomplished!

Keep your fans up to date with your activity

When you know you’re going to be super busy and forced to be a bit inactive online, whether you’re preparing for a major event or going on vacation, tell your online fans. Remember, consistency reigns at all times. If you go offline for a period of time, or start posting less frequently, there is a chance you will be forgotten if you don’t give a heads up. Simple tweets like “Can’t wait to go on vacation next week and decompress, looking forward to going offline and relaxing with a mai tai” will inform your followers that you’ll be absent. A Facebook post letting your friends know you’re starting a new job so you won’t have as much time to check in during business hours not only explains your upcoming plans, but also why you’ll be posting less frequently or changing the times you’ll be posting. In other words, we won’t mark you as “absent”.
Social media is an official part of your marketing strategy, so why not learn how to use it strategically to build your brand? Build your credibility as an authority in your industry, stay consistent, and you will have a powerful brand that you can leverage to grow your business!