Don't let lemons turn you sour

For years I've carped on my kids about how to deal best with tough situations:

"When life serves you lemons it's time to make lemonade!"

Branding guru Seth Godin has a new twist on this common tale in "The Lesson From Two Lemonade Stands." Given the ever-increasing importance in creating the best possible brand experience for our customers, I thought Seth's story deserves a second look:
http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2010/01/the-lesson-from-two-lemonade-stands.html

The Drumbeat Continues

PC Magazine has been a powerful publication, successfully chronicling the digital age. Effective this month, PC Magazine published its last print edition, signaling a significant change in direction since its inception in 1981.

Like others before it -- and many more to come -- PC Magazine is now an online-only play. Previously, the Christian Science Monitor and the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, among others, announced the move to online-only editions.

The loss of conventional media outlets places ever-greater emphasis on companies and organizations to operate what used to be called "news bureaus" to get the word out to customers, prospects and other key audiences.

Luckily, advances in the Web -- and increased Internet literacy -- makes this easy to do. Clear, concise, credible communications via the Web, social networking media and directly to key audiences is needed for a company to create, maintain & enhance relationships.

It's easy to chop marketing in an economy like this. The best companies, though, recognize the importance of maintaining open lines of communications. Market leaders see in this era a great opportunity to differentiate themselves from the competition.

And differentiation is at the core of every terrific brand.

Seasons Greetings

Don't let the headline above fool you. We are in the "season of business survival" right now. Our economy is in deep yogurt, and will be for many months to come.

So what's going to get a business through this? It's certainly not one thing (no silver bullet), but rather a combination of actions.

Does your business survival kit include the following?

1. Planning better.
2. Scrimping, saving and scrutinizing every expense.
3. Pricing so everybody wins.
4. Paying closer attention to clients and customers.
5. Taking a long term view.
6. Marketing relentlessly.

To that last point, when we checked the home voicemail recently there were back-to-back robo-messages from two retailers.

One was from a local Chevy dealer who keeps our family car on the road. The owner of the dealership announced the return of Saturday service hours, free car washes and a co-marketing agreement with a sub shop.

The second message was from a pet shop owner. The message was plenty cutesy, but offered nothing very compelling to distinguish it from the big box pet stores with better prices and broader product choices.

Guess who's going to get my business next?