Brandwidth Blog

Is there any other industry that likes buzz words and anagrams more than the “ad game”? In our Q-Score, DNK and SNK, OBT, QVC, STD, BVD, integrated marketing, prezo, convert, retain, lather, rinse and repeat world is there anything left that hasn’t been branded so? I don’t have the answer, mind you; I’m just putting that notion out there before introducing you to the notion of “brand response.” As buzz-wordy as it may be, the inherent concept of “brand response” really speaks to the heart of what Brandwidth is – and isn’t.

A lot of folks – from clients to resource partners – have commented about our description of ourselves on our homepage: We’re not a web agency that “does ads too.” We’re not an agency – or worse, a PR firm – that “does websites, too.” We’re more. Of both. (Incidentally, folks really get a rise out of the PR part, what with so many PR firms out there really making a royal cock-up out of their web marketing forays).

What we’re addressing here is the notion that somehow pursuits supporting your branding and your brand ID and image and personality are somehow mutually exclusive from response strategies that actually translate to “attracting” a prospect, ”converting” that prospect to your product or service or sales proposition and then “retaining” that prospect for future business.

I would like to propose that these precepts aren’t mutually exclusive, that one can, indeed enjoy the best of both worlds – branding and a workable response mechanism – and live to tell about it.

Don’t tell that to those “precious” agencies that think affecting some manner of response and results-oriented work for a client is somehow counter to their creative pursuits, detrimental to their creative awards agenda or, worse, “uncool.” And don’t tell that to one of those poor, fumbling PR firms who are still managing to foist the notion that the web is somehow a public relations function. A little strong? A chip on my shoulder? You betcha’. The business is changing, baby, and some folks don’t want to get on the new bus. Or off the old one. Hey, this is my blog and I’m entitled to my opinion and my opinion is: even most traditional agencies who claim to understand the new paradigm – and who say they offer web marketing as a core service – essentially do the cosmetics of creating a home page design or email template and then outsource the rest of it to a web development firm anyway. And at a significant markup to their clients, I might add. And while there are, indeed, a few good shops out there – of which we are one – most traditional agencies (and PR firms) positively suck at creating a strong “integrated” initiative that provides both brand support and response/results.

There, I said it. The point is, marketing expenditures on web-centric, response-driven initiatives are expected to surpass broadcast advertising by 2010. And web marketing is the single fastest-growing medium in the business. The industry simply can’t afford to look at web response and integrated branding and response strategies as mutually exclusive any longer.

Which brings me back to the notion of brand response – the combining of branding initiatives and strategies – sound traditional strategies based on an understanding of your audience, your brand, your competition, compelling creative, good, smart ideas – with the more response-oriented strategies afforded by a web-centric marketing and communication approach or other in-ad response mechanisms (a custom 800# for instance).

That’s what brand response is all about. And that’s where “more” comes from. More good, smart work. More traction with your key targets. More return on your marketing and communications investment. And in a word, more client “satisfaction.”

This entry was posted on Monday, September 17th, 2007 at 4:46 pm and is filed under BW Bloggers, George Evans. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.