Brand Reputation

How to Cultivate Trust in Your Strategic Partnerships

March 12, 2021 by Workdom Strategist

Picture this: business is booming. Your customers love what you have to offer and profits are at an all-time high. But you feel as if you’ve hit a plateau. There are only so many hours in a day and it feels like your business as a whole has reached its limit. You want to expand, but you’re not sure where to look or how to go about the process of finding partners you can trust.

Trust in strategic partnerships is one of those things you can’t see, but you’ll definitely know whether it’s there or not. When discussing a strategic partnership between your brand and another brand that offers complementary products or services that don’t directly compete with your own, a strategic partnership can be a great way to help you both grow.

But just like with any business relationship: trust is a must.

Of course, on the surface, it’s easy to assume that the trust will simply “be there”. After all, this relationship benefits both of you, and you understandably want the very best that your organization has to offer to be at the forefront of this collaboration, not to mention the ongoing goodwill that both groups will build up between each other.

Trust that Stands the Test of Time

At some point during your strategic partnership, suspicions will arise that perhaps the other side is gaining more from this than you are, not to mention the issues that inadvertently crop up between the two companies because of misunderstandings, a different work culture, or simply different priorities.

For example, if one company has a payment term of 30 days and another has a payment term of 90 days, it may seem like one is pressuring the other to keep the cash flowing, while the other, longer-term company is wondering what the rush is all about and can find their accounting department scrambling at the last minute. Situations like these generally happen without one side or the other intending to disrupt the balance of the strategic partnership.

But there are also those who see that the doors between both companies are wide open and ripe for exploitation owing to their vulnerability. It’s entirely possible that one party discovers a problem and, rather than discuss it openly, does everything they can to milk the value out of the partnership before their activities are uncovered. When this kind of behavior is seen at the senior level, don’t be surprised if other employees start to emulate what they see.

How to Create and Maintain Trust Over Time

To that end, it’s more important than ever to create and maintain trust between both companies in a way that not only reflects their most cherished values, but also gives the other company every reason to confide in them and trust that they’re delivering their absolute best. It’s easy to tell companies that they should cultivate trust, but few will ever go the extra mile and tell them how.

Fortunately, Workdom has you covered. Here’s how to make your strategic partnerships ironclad, with a foundation built on trust and mutual reciprocity.

Be Authentic

It’s not vulnerability, it’s a refreshing openness that demonstrates your goodwill and your good intentions with regard to the partnership. Some might see authenticity as “showing all your cards”. But you are still very much in charge of your business.

Go the extra mile to live the values, mission, and philosophy that you have highlighted on your website. Clear up anything that isn’t clear. Define expectations and leave no room for doubt, error, or misunderstanding. Authenticity goes an incredibly long way in cultivating honesty, and honesty goes a long way in building and cementing trust in a strategic partnership.

Be Honest

A lot of companies say that they’re honest, but when push comes to shove, they’ll do whatever they can to save face or simply ignore the situation until it becomes too big to ignore. Be unapologetically honest.

This may involve having to root out some bad apples, reshuffle some structures or simply lay out what’s happening even if it’s uncomfortable. The other side will appreciate your candor and by bringing up issues before they are exacerbated and morph into considerable problems, you can help avert a crisis before it happens.

Be Responsible

At the core of your strategic partnership, be responsible. You are still the captain of your own ship and you have quite a degree of autonomy to make your own decisions with regard to how your organization will come out of this partnership. You want to trust in your partner to perform to the best of their ability, and you want to lend whatever help you can to see that through to fruition.

At the same time, you’re not responsible for the whole partnership. When you act in the best interests of both rather than solely what is best for your company to the exclusion of everything else, it gives the impression that you’re not as invested in the partnership as the other side, and this can lead to disagreements and distrust.

As you can see, cultivating trust in a strategic partnership is easier said than done. However, with the right team on your side, you can not only locate potential partners or distributors, but also foster relationships between them that are fully built on trust and mutual cooperation.

How Can Workdom Help with your Strategic Partnerships?

Contact our senior advertising professionals at Workdom today and let’s take a deep dive into where your business is and how you’d like it to grow, using our cutting-edge and proven advertising and marketing techniques.

How Can Strategic Partnerships Help You Grow Your Business?

January 22, 2021 by Workdom Strategist

Strategic partnerships offer numerous benefits for your business, as well as the business(es) you choose to partner with. Together, complementary, non-competitive companies can help each other in ways that neither of them could have likely accomplished on their own. So what are some of the benefits of forming such a strategic partnership? Let’s take a closer look:

You Can Tap Into New Markets

Strategic partnerships allow you to tap into markets that you may otherwise have not considered, known about, or even tried to crack yourself but just couldn’t get the response you were hoping for.

Your partnership aligns you with another brand that has established itself well in that space, and as is often the case, their clout and presence in that market will reflect well on you, giving both of you new advantages in markets that need what you have to offer, but also have a foundation upon which to build a business relationship with you.

You Can Reach New Customers

In addition to allowing you to establish a recognizable presence in new markets, a strategic partnership done at an opportune time, allows you to reach new customers. These customers may have heard of your brand, or this may be the first time they’ve ever had the experience of knowing who you are, but your alignment with the more well-known or well-established company in that sphere already gives you a leg up over those who are still trying to wriggle into that market and find their place.

You Grow Your Brand Awareness

Although you’re allied with another company in this partnership, your company also gains the benefit of added brand awareness. People come to associate your brands with each other, not in a merger-type way, but more as a complementary way.

For example, McDonald’s only serves Coca-Cola products because of a strategic partnership between the two. No one believes that Coca-Cola is going to go into the fast food franchising business, nor is McDonald’s going to come up with a line of icy cold soft drinks any time soon.

This kind of strategic partnership allows both companies to concentrate on what they’re best at, without looking at their strategic partner as a competitor. Both companies gain from the partnership and are able to do more business working together than separately in their own “brand silos”(no matter how well-known or big those silos may be!)

Customers Enjoy Added Value from Their Purchase

Going back to our McDonalds example, it’s rare that a customer will order a burger and fries, but not a soft drink with their meal. Partnerships like this add more than just vague “value”. They add convenience, savings, entertainment, or other benefits to the consumer, and when the consumer has a good experience, again and again, they remember it and look to repeat it.

Strategic Partnerships Build Trust in Both Companies

Finally, one of the biggest unseen advantages of strategic partnerships is that over time, they help build trust in both companies. Such partnerships help create a strong foundation as they branch out into new markets as well as solidify their hold in existing markets.

But identifying whether or not a partnership would be beneficial to both companies can be difficult. How do you find complementary products or services that aren’t competitive? How can you be sure the mission statement and philosophy of the business you’re looking to partner with aligns with yours? Finding companies worth forming strategic partnerships with can be a challenge, but these unicorns do exist!

Fortunately, help is here! At Workdom, we’re always looking for companies that would be the perfect strategic fit for each other. We can help you grow your business by finding like-minded, forward-thinking companies who complement what you have to offer without being competitive so that you can both grow and expand your respective visions together.

Contact us today to learn more about what opportunistic partnerships might await you and how to get started with the right kind of outreach that generates the responses you’re looking for. Our senior advertising executives are standing by and ready to help as we work together to navigate the new normal and help ensure that the bonds of business remain strong and firm in any situation.

2021 Marketing Predictions and Trends to Watch

December 25, 2020 by Workdom Marketing Specialist

In what has been the longest year of our lives, many business owners are understandably looking towards 2021 with a mixture of both excitement and trepidation. With so many small businesses still reeling from the effects of 2020, what might we have to look forward to in the new year?

Here’s what the experts, including those of us here at Workdom, have to share with you.

The E-Commerce Boom Will Continue

If it’s one thing we can definitively say about COVID, the silver lining on this very thick and heavy dark cloud is that e-commerce businesses are booming. Even households that never considered online shopping before are now having their groceries delivered, among other things. Amazon, Google, and Walmart, among their other competitors, are the undisputed kings of the hill here, but there’s also a massive recognition that small businesses also need, love, and lots of it.

You can expect in 2021 that the boom in e-commerce will continue, and now, more than ever, people are recognizing that the handmade and homemade way of life is disintegrating before our eyes if we don’t do something. No matter what you sell, proven conversion-boosting perks like free shipping, free gifts or other discounts when a certain value is reached are always welcomed, but this year more than ever.

Get Ready for a Cookie-less Future

Chrome, Google’s popular internet browser, will stop supporting third party cookies in 2022. Although that’s still a ways away, marketers are still debating how a lack of cookies is going to affect their advertising.

With a lack of third party cookies, consumers can no longer be tracked the “traditional” way. But that doesn’t mean that all cookies are forbidden, nor does it mean that consumers can no longer be tracked. There are, of course, many other technologies in use and they’re just as widespread and just as adept at tracking users as cookies are.

Also, Chrome is not the first browser to support the lack of third-party cookies. Safari has been doing it for years, and advertisers have understandably found workarounds that work just as well, if not better. As with any technology that affects privacy, consent is the name of the game. When you have something valuable and important to share, getting expressed consent from your targeted customer is enough to say “I don’t mind you having access to certain data about me in exchange for this information.”

The key is to make the information valuable enough in this give-and-take relationship so that the customer understands what they’re giving and what they’re getting in exchange.

Opportunistic Partnerships will Thrive

Corporate brands and celebrities have always been known for their partnerships, but now, the effects of this kind of collaboration are trickling down to small and medium enterprises as well. In 2021 and beyond, expect more brands to ally with social media influencers, in creating win-win partnerships that highlight and draw in ever more eager and interested audience members.

The challenge at this point, is finding those opportunistic partnerships and creating a situation where both parties get something of value. Fortunately, this is one of our many specialties here at Workdom, and if you need help getting your product out into the world while amassing a dedicated following, we invite you to reach out to us and learn more about our services and how we can help you with your business.

Embrace Social Responsibility

This year was also marked with a great deal of social and societal upheaval while drawing attention to lost or forgotten causes. Ever looking to position themselves as the champions of doing right in the world, many well-known brands and businesses, particularly those keen on attracting members of Generation Z, are stepping up their social awareness game and embracing social responsibility.

For many brands, this type of consciousness is deeply rooted in their actions and is not simply paying lip-service to a cause, but rather uprooting the company culture and more tightly weaving it within a cause that many can support and feel allied with. Companies that just scratch the surface of social responsibility as a way to pat themselves on the back are quickly forgotten and labeled as fakes, while those who take a keen interest in improving the situations of others not only ally themselves to a cause, but find that the cause allies itself to them as well.

These are the things that advertising and marketing experts, including those of us at Workdom have noticed as we look to close out 2020 (with a great deal of hindsight). We all learned difficult lessons this year and much of it has shook our foundations to their core, but that’s not to say that marketing is dead. Those companies that are agile, flexible and have a finger on the pulse of what’s to come will be the ones best-prepared to take on this new year, and the new normal that comes with it. So reach out to us today and let’s work together to get you head start in growing your business further in 2021.

How On-Demand Marketing Can Help Grow Your Business Over the Holidays

November 14, 2020 by Workdom Marketing Specialist

With this holiday season admittedly being like no other in recent memory, the rush is on for businesses to innovate but still remain flexible and adaptable. The good news is that even if you’re on a budget and you’re wondering how to get the most for your money, on-demand marketing is a great way to stretch your marketing dollars further. Here are a few ideas of how to make it work for you.

What is On-Demand Marketing?

In short, on-demand marketing involves hiring a small group of marketers who are experts in their related fields, to help you with preparing, launching and supervising your campaigns. Not only that, but this team will also be responsible for making course corrections, adjustments and provide support as needed.

So whether you need email marketing, social media marketing, brand building or one of many other marketing channels, on-demand marketing gives you the help and resources you need to make every campaign effective and successful.

With that in mind, here are a few ideas that can help you grow your business over the holidays, while staying on-track and within budget.

Personable Conversations on Social Media

With lockdowns, quarantine and social distancing becoming part of our everyday vocabulary and new-found way of life, people are understandably craving connections. Fortunately, social media can foster just that. Don’t just invite discussion on your Facebook page, do a live broadcast where you share updates, connect and engage with your customers and much more.

Since majority of your customers can’t actually be in your store, why not bring some of the store to them by previewing new products or fun gift ideas at lots of different price points. Remember, don’t just talk at your customers or prospects — talk to them, as if they were right there next to you. Your customers will appreciate this gesture as it is time and resource invested in creating a space where you connect your customers to what’s currently going on with your brand. This lets you create a sense of coziness and help build a stronger business relationship with the people that actively want to hear from you.

Hosting a Q&A or a Challenge

Another great idea for leveraging Facebook Live, Zoom or other forms of broadcast social media is to host a Q&A or a challenge. With a Q&A, you invite users to submit questions ahead of time, and after a couple of days you read and answer them live over the air. By asking users to submit their questions beforehand, you’ll have a chance to delve deep and really think about the answers so that you can perform at your best in front of the camera. Above all, don’t be nervous! You’ve built this business and brand, so now it’s time to showcase all of the wonderful things that make it memorable to your customers.

Meanwhile, a challenge works the same way but it encourages your users to participate alongside your brand. Challenges that run for a short time (like 5-7 days) can be a remarkable way to build your brand and get your audience actively involved in somehow using your product or service to better their lives in some way. You’ll be surprised at how many people will finally step up and take action when you challenge them to do so!

Don’t Forget About Retargeting

Retargeting is often forgotten as a method of bringing potential customers back into the fold and reintroducing them to products they may have noticed and forgotten about. This is especially relevant over the holiday season since they may be doing some preliminary gift shopping, searching and comparing across many different sites.

When retargeting in these cases, it’s a good idea to leverage urgency as it gets closer and closer to the holidays. Limited time offer, limited stocks available and limited faster shipping time to ensure the product arrives on time can all be methods of helping close the sale and convert the customer. The good news is that on-demand marketing can help you set up a profitable retargeting campaign so that you can keep your business front-of-mind with these prospects and cash in as the season gets closer.

Showcase Your Brand, Not Just Your Products

Finally, remember that you’re not just showcasing your products, but also making a statement about your brand. What is it that you want to be known for? What qualities does your brand possess that exude themselves through your products, and that people will remember you for?

Remember that on-demand marketing can showcase your brand in a light that perfectly aligns with your products and the audience that you’re speaking to, so don’t hesitate to reach out and experiment with unique ideas that position you as the name to know in your particular industry.

Still Have Questions About What On-Demand Marketing Can Do For You?

On-demand marketing encompasses a wide variety of services that can come in handy whether you’re feeling the crunch of holiday marketing needs, or you need to properly gear up and launch your campaigns flawlessly. Having the right team on hand is crucial before, during and after the holiday shopping season. With more people shopping online this year than ever before, we invite you to reach out to our senior advertising specialists today and learn more about what our comprehensive online marketing services can do for you to help grow your business!

The Complete Brand Messaging Checklist from Workdom

June 26, 2020 by Workdom Marketing Specialist

A brand is so much more than just a tagline and a logo. Of course, when you add up all these things that encompass the brand itself, it can feel rather overwhelming. Brand messaging? Brand tone? Brand style? Fortunately, although these things take time to develop, by having a concrete strategy, brand messaging overall can be distilled into a checklist of sorts — a formula or a framework wherein once you go through it, ensures that you have all of the boxes ticked!

So how can you be sure you’re on the right track when it comes to your brand messaging?

Here’s our complete list of the things you’ll need in order to make sure your brand messaging is on point with your target audience.

First, it’s important to note that we’re not delving deep into specific brand assets, like your logo, tagline, typography/style and color scheme. All of those are important, but they’re like the icing on the brand messaging cake — you can’t develop them until you have nailed down the points below.

Your Unique Selling Proposition

One of the most important aspects of building any brand is the USP or unique selling proposition. It’s what’s truly unique about your product or service that makes you different (and worth paying attention to) in a competitive and crowded market.

In other words, your USP answers the customer’s question, “why should I buy from you?” Be careful about competing on superficial things like price, since saying “we’re the cheapest” can easily be attacked by another competitor, and then it’s a race to the bottom – which in turn hurts your revenue and brand. The same applies to quality — it’s an intangible thing and someone, somewhere, can always build a better mousetrap.

Your Brand Promise

A brand promise is a facet of brand messaging. It’s what you want your customers to know about your brand. For example, Domino’s pizza built a brand promise around “30 minutes [delivery] or it’s free”. Even though they haven’t offered that standard for years, they’re still known for it, demonstrating the stick-ability of a good brand promise.

Another example is clothing retailer Men’s Wearhouse. Their brand promise is that they guarantee that you’ll look good in their suits. If you don’t like the fit, style, or look, they make it easy to change it, which gives consumers more confidence when doing business with them, that they’ll get exactly what they want.

Your brand promise answers the questions — what will customers get as a result of doing business with us? And how will they know when they’ve gotten it? How does that reflect on our company?

Your Brand Values

This is what your brand stands for. It’s essentially designed to shore up the previous points in a way that makes it abundantly clear how you differ from your competitors. Even more than that, your brand values should resonate with your target audience. These shared values when meant sincerely, draw you closer to your target audience. As long as you’re able to demonstrate those values through every step of the process, you’ll be able to make genuine connections with the people that share them in which potentially results to building up your customers’ loyalty to your brand.

Your Position

This is where you “fit” in the overall marketplace. Not just in terms of price or quality but in terms of the value you offer. As you might imagine, it’s tied very closely with your unique selling proposition. When you offer a unique experience to your customers, your position helps cement your commitment to making that experience happen for your customers every time they do business with you.

You might even share certain values with other competitors in your space, and that’s perfectly acceptable. What’s going to set you apart is your USP. As you hold true to your values and maintain your brand promise, you’ll naturally find a place where your brand is comfortably “settled”.

Your Authority

Finally, there’s authority, or the proof from outside your company that your brand is every bit the promises, values and statements you’ve made about it. That means getting your customers excited to talk about it. Encourage them to leave testimonials, to share their success with your product or service on social media, and to become something of a “brand ambassador” as a case study.

There are lots of ways to build up authority, but like all good brand messaging initiatives, it takes a consistent effort over time to make it happen and make it stick.

If you need help with any of the points mentioned here or you feel like you’re not quite hitting all of your prospects’ buttons when it comes to writing brand messaging that perfectly fits your company’s style and goals, why not reach out to our senior branding professionals and let our team here at Workdom help you to refine and realize your vision? Contact us today to learn more about the services that we offer and let’s help you get started further your brand’s growth!

Why It’s No Longer Enough Just to Have a Professional Logo and a Catchy Slogan

June 12, 2020 by Workdom Marketing Specialist

You’ve finally done it! You’ve got a professionally-designed logo and a catchy, clever slogan. You’re ready to release your brand onto an unsuspecting world!

Not so fast!

It used to be that having a trustworthy logo and a memorable slogan were enough to ensure that your brand was competitive and high quality. With countless brands all vying for the same users both online and off, it has become much harder today to make your brand voice recognized over the din of “me too” competitors.

So what should you do?

Bring Out Your Brand Personality

If your target audience is starting to waver, it’s likely because your brand’s personality isn’t showing (or showing enough to make them notice). Your brand personality isn’t a mission statement and it’s not a slogan — although parts of your slogan can be considered a facet of your brand personality.

Rather, your brand personality is how you want others to perceive your company. Fun and quirky? Stalwart and sensible? Rugged and dependable? Your brand’s logo and everything that makes up the brand itself should be positively dripping with this personality. You want it to come through on letterhead, on profile photos and cover photos, on everything that makes your brand what it is.

If not, it’s just going to be viewed as another voice in an echo chamber of competitors.

Adhere to Your Brand Values

Your brand values differ from your brand personality in that your personality is what you showcase to others, while your values are the rules that your brand lives by. These two things are often relatable to each other.

For example, if you sell climbing equipment, you might want your brand to be perceived as rugged and reliable. But your values are likely centered around safety and quality. Although all of these things can make up a brand, you want people to associate your brand with its values. Logos and taglines might change over time, but values are tried and true. They’re like the anchor of what makes your brand unique and memorable.

It’s also worth noting that you can’t fake brand values. Nothing causes your target audience to flee quite like a mismatch between your brand’s voice and the values it claims to hold dear. And unlike times in the past, words spread faster than ever today. That’s why having and maintaining a brand positioning that’s clear, concise and truly embodies what your brand means is of vital importance.

Stay Informed of Your Brand Positioning

Your brand’s positioning is your competitive edge; what makes you, you. It’s something that competitors can’t easily latch onto or copy as their own. Remember a few years ago when several fast food restaurants all hopped on the breakfast train at once to try and take away some market share from McDonald’s? Many of them failed spectacularly.

It probably wasn’t that the selection wasn’t good or the food wasn’t tasty. It was that nobody associates tacos with breakfast (unless we’re talking about breakfast burritos and even those have limited appeal). The brand positioning was off, and people just didn’t go for it. This demonstrates that even major corporations can have brand positioning problems, no matter how much their focus groups assure them that they’re on the right track.

So what can you do? First, you can stop stressing that your logo isn’t perfect or that your slogan isn’t catchy enough — those are more marketing tools than stalwart reflections of your brand itself. Sure, they may need a tune-up from time to time, but overall they’re like ingredients in your favorite dish. They lend themselves to it well, and without them it would be incomplete, but they don’t make the meal.

Need help defining your brand values, positioning or personality? Reach out to us at Workdom today and let our senior marketing consultants and branding professionals help you build a brand voice that’s unique, authentic, competitive and memorable.