OK, I’m old. I was only a few months old when that film was released. But like most classics, it reveals a lot of great truths.

And we have to start at the beginning (in business) to make sure we’ve got a good foundation. Here are the 3 Basics:

1. Vision. Every great entrepreneur has a vision. Either it’s a solution to a problem or it’s a path to helping people. But if you can’t clearly state your vision for your company, stop everything! Then work on a short (!) sentence that explains your reason for being. Perhaps you’ve lost your way in your business, and you need to align yourself with the original vision again.

2. Positioning. Every business/product/service needs a brand. And everyone’s product/service has competition. Of course, you think yours is the best. But how do you quickly let someone know THE thing that makes you the better choice? Start by listing your features, then convert them to benefits (in the minds of your potential customer). The hard part is next: choose the one benefit that is so compelling that your audience will convert to your product/service. It should then be edited down to 3-5 words and that becomes your positioning statement (or tagline). This is the fast way to your customers heart.

3. Consistent Brand. Then you need your logo. Simple, easy to draw, and most of all, easy to remember. It shouldn’t be an illustration, but rather a symbol that can easily be reproduced in black and white. But of course, you’ll want a color version too. And from those colors, you create a color palette that you use consistently along with the same fonts. Over and over until your customer feels comfortable with your brand. The design needs to be consistent so that the information is “larger” than your copy/text/words in it — but rather the feeling is professional and it “becomes” the look of your vision.

I can’t say it any more plain! And that’s what we do. We help you create the brand and then take it to print, social and web mediums. Consistently. Let us know if you need any help!

We decided, since we have two teenage sons, that we’d go with a funky, modern decor.

That’s easier said than done. We don’t want it so modern that we have to change it in the next 5 years, and we wanted it to “fit in” with the rest of our house.

So how do we do that? And what does this mean for business?

These are decisions that businesses have to make regularly — the color of a logo, the color of your business decor, the colors that you use with your promotions.

Here are are 4 recommendations to make your life easy:

1. Research. Look at what others are doing. Magazines, online, in person. Look around — what are the color combinations that others are using, what are the current trends, what is your competition using, do you want to do the same or different?
2. Consider what colors “mean”. Every color has psychological impact. Red is appealing, yellows are declassifying, blues are believable and dreamy, grays are business hardcore, greens are environment and neutrals are just that… neutral!
3. Choose 3 colors. A Primary, Secondary and a Tertiary scheme. In our basement, we used a beige as our primary color. This tied the basement with the upstairs which also uses that color. It’s also fairly “life stable” so it’ll be around for awhile. Then we chose black as our secondary color with lime green as the tertiary. None seem that wild, but the combination creates a great up-to-date look.
4. Consider the use. Now that you have the colors selected, start thinking about where the colors should be used. Think about the function. Like white carpet isn’t practical, or if you have lots of text, you want a big contrast for readability.

I’m pleased with the way things coordinated for our little downstairs room. And we can easily freshen it up later when we outgrow the look. For a business, I would try to use colors that last 7-10 years — unless you’re a very trendy product. Colors are a lot of fun and add so much to your “look”. The more you plan, the better off you’ll be!

In my family, we always waited to mid November before even mentioning the Holidays!

Well, no matter what you feel like, it’s time for you (as a business owner) to think Christmas. If you’re a retailer, it’s already too late. But for most businesses, now is the time to plan for a successful Christmas season.

Here’s what you should be doing right now!

• Start a List. Christmas is a great time of the year to thank your clients/customers. Start considering who should be on that list. It’s always good to have 2 lists: one for the best clients, another for the majority of clients. This can be divided in several ways, but I find that it should be based on profitability.
• Produce a card, decide on a gift. Your card goes to everyone, the gift only to a special amount of people. Consider what your card will look like, what it should say, will it be custom or will it be store-bought. Then decide on a creative gift that will be appreciated by the majority of your “profitable” audience. It should be branded in some way — and the more “multi-use” the better.
• Plan on a good date to send the material. After Thanksgiving is good. If you’re too late in the season, it gives a subtle message that you were late thinking about creating/buying it. Then do a work-back schedule for printing, addressing, postage, mailing, etc. After you know everyone has received it, you can make a personal call to your very best clients to personally wish them the best of the season and say “thank you”.
• Other options for Christmas: Consider a festive theme for your website or sending an appropriate eblast for thanksgiving, Christmas and New Years.

It’s always good to “thank” your clients and this is a perfect time! It’s also a relevant reminder that you want to do work with them (however, refrain from too aggressively mentioning this at Christmas!). And as a final word, have fun! Play up the spirit and enjoy yourself. This is the most wonderful time of the year!

PS. We’d love to help you with any of these steps — it’s always best to make sure your promotional material looks like the rest of your marketing material! Contact me today!

Saturday morning we woke the kids (they love to sleep in), had breakfast and then started to remove all the furniture, etc. from the room. My wife and son patched holes and dug out/repair cracks in the walls. Then we cleaned and got all the tools out. Because we got started a bit later than we thought, we had to break for lunch before we really got started.

Why does everything take longer than you imagine it will? This must be a “law” that’s akin to Murphy’s.

We’re not sure what paint is on the walls of our old house (oil or latex) so we prime the entire room with a thick covering coat of oil-based Kilz before painting. This gives us a fresh canvas for our new decor. We want to do it right!

It’s rare that we ever have everyone in the family join in the renovations. And to be honest, I think it’s harder to have so many people in a small space. Management is often harder than doing it yourself; however, I’m trying to teach my sons how to do these chores, so it’s worth it. Like all management, it’ll eventually pay off to teach someone else how to do it the right way!

From renovating houses for 20+ years, I’ve learned that there’s a certain order to painting a room: 1) prime 2) tape/cover the floors 3) paint the trim 4) “cut in” the walls 5) roll the color on the walls. I’ve done it that way for so long I’ve practically forgotten why it’s best to do it in that order.

Yesterday, because the rest of the family can’t or won’t “cut in” (the process of brushing the color on next to a border or boundary) on the walls or trim, we decided to mix up the order. We felt that we’d get the most done and feel great going to bed.

Late last evening, we crawled into our bed having everything done except the trim. Yep, the first thing that we should have done, now the last. We had a great feeling of accomplishment; but didn’t realize the aggravation we created.

Today as I finished the painting, I realized how (almost) impossible it is to paint trim last. I cut in and got the trim painted and ended up having to touch up the walls because of the random brush marks that made it onto the other colors. It took almost 3 hours to complete. I wasn’t happy.

There’s a reason for order!

In business, there’s a way (a process) that you develop a brand. Excited entrepreneurs try to complete it in what they think is the easiest way. And then, after trying and failing, they ask us to help them “fix” it. And we end up having to redo a lot of work and it often takes us a lot longer to tie in the existing “brand”.

Professionals who make a living doing what they do, have tried shortcuts, different paths and even tried to re-invent the wheel! After years and years of trying, they’ve developed a really good process to make their clients successful.

At PinPoint we have a process for developing a “brand” that we know will work. We’d love to share that process with you and help you achieve great things. In the long run it’s less expensive and will be far more successful than something you do on your own.

Now that I think of it, the next house we decide to renovate, I think I’m going to hire a professional. I’d have few less gray hairs and a lot more time on my hands to do other things.

I don’t know what that means to you, but after having several of them, it means a lot of work, for a minimum payout. Sounds fun, eh?

Well, yesterday we held (hopefully our last) yard sale.

We followed a successful plan:

1. Look at everything obvious in our home to decide if we needed it.
2. Looked in the hidden areas, boxes, storage and closets.
3. Labeled, separated, organized, priced.
4. Advertised well. Played on benefits of coming to our sale.
5. Got up early! Before the early-birds descended. 5:30 am. Ugh.
6. Negotiated and had the philosophy to get rid of stuff, not to get rich.

It worked. We cleaned up clutter, met neighbors, had lots of people. As a bonus, we even made more than we’ve ever made on a yard sale. Now, we have a nice budget to renovate the basement! Success. I love it.

As a business, it’s easy for your marketing message to get cluttered. You need to simplify!

It’s always easier to start simple and keep it simple, than to take something complex and make it simple.

Here’s a plan to simplify your message:

1. Identify the clutter. Look at the obvious and the hidden things. Start asking the question, “If I only had one simple element to be purchased, what would it be that my customers want?”
2. Decide what your one or two benefits are. Easier said than done.
3. Trim the fat on your website, advertising and interactions with customers. Simplify the message so that the simple benefit shines through.

Clients have a way with adding the complications. They love to request more. Think about the simple idea of twitter and how fast the audience developed. Companies and products sprung up around the simple idea. But only after the audience was quite large. That’s when you can add product lines. AFTER the success of your simple product idea.

Don’t fall for the lie that you have to have a complex puzzle of interlocking products to attract a crowd. Simplicity sells.

After working 23 years in the Graphic Design field, I’ve decided that my design life can be described in this one word:

Organization.

When I was in high school, I always liked to draw, move things around so that people thought they looked “cool” and I loved coming up with cool “ideas”.

I went to a great college where they honed my skills and gave me some ideas for being better and doing thing more effectively. It was before computers assisted us, but for the most part, little has changed now, except it’s easier to control the many details that are part of our design careers.

• Organization is a complex word now that I think of it. It means so many different things — especially as it relates to great design. Here are 3 concepts of how I organize or encourage our team to:
• Lining things up or grouping. I’m amazed at how easy this seems to come to good designers, and how difficult it is for a lot of people. Every design job has details and components. Sometimes they come from us, sometimes from the client. But all those “things” have to be organized in such a way to make them effective, remembered and “designed”. Most feel that it’s good to fill the space, but a great designer sees the white space as a benefit. Groupings are always better. Hierarchy of importance is also critical. We call it the 1, 2, 3 of the design.
• Consistency. Ah, my favorite word. Organization is about creativity within the bounds of consistency. A great design has a style sheet (fonts and visual elements) — and a great designer knows this style consistency factor so much that it can be broken for the benefit of the design. Rarely.
• Seeing the forest AND the trees. When God (the greatest Creative Director!) looks at us, the Bible says He knows the number of hairs on our head. Yet for some, He allows the hairs to be clumped together so that they make a great hairstyle. Which is more important to the design? The individual hair? Or the grouping. Just have one hair not “organized” in the right way and it’ll drive most crazy! Or have it turn gray or fall out. Each and all are important. Know your details and how the overall message is perceived!

I guess, when I look back over my career, I still want to organize better. It’s a never-grasped skill that will make my life interesting until my wife installs the tombstone over my burial place.

Mark MacDonald
Consistently, He Organized Every Detail.
RIP

Here are 4 of the criteria that we examine:

Easily Read. Have you ever had someone mispronounce your company name when they look at your logo? It’s not a good sign. Your logo HAS to communicate your name properly and then your brand promises. If it doesn’t easily state your name, change it. There are so many readable fonts to feel forced to use indecipherable ones.

Simple to Draw. I often say that an elementary school child should be able to “doodle” your logo. Think about some great brands (Apple, Pepsi, McDonalds, etc). Their logos are so simple that you could draw them easily so that others could know what brand you’re thinking of. What about yours? Overly complicated logos are forgettable. Simple isn’t always easy, in fact, it takes us longer to develop a simple design than a complex design. We feel it’s worth spending the extra time!

Memorable. The purpose of a logo is to be a visual image that “sticks” in the mind of your audience or potential audience. The sign of a good logo is a symbol that becomes a “skeleton” that a brand’s meat can hang on. If people don’t remember the “hangar”, they won’t remember the “stuff” of the brand.

Current. Even the great brands update their logos. Pepsi has changed it’s logo almost a dozen times since they were created. The same for many other brands. The reason? Because a brand has to look current. Or people will not see you as product for today. Fonts, colors and design need to updated on a regular basis. I’m not saying to make a brand-new design every time, but subtly “tweeking” the design is necessary from time to time.

Sometime being so close to the design is not a good thing (think how parents think their kid is the best looking). So ask someone (or us!) about your logo. If it was not professionally designed, chances are that it’s in drastic need of change. And please, let us off the hook… it’s hard to say that your “baby” needs some work.

Remember him?

He presented ad campaigns to various companies in the episodes that centered on him. He’d have his marker storyboards and creative ideas ready for the meetings. But something always went wrong and the client rarely liked his creative work, so his wife, Samantha (the witch) would be sitting on a filing cabinet in the background and with a wiggle of her nose, make everything right.

In the 27 years since, you wouldn’t believe the times I wished for a witch in the corner to help with my presentations. But we know that’s fiction.

So how do we, mere mortals, become creative?!?

When it comes to being creative, I remember back in high school that I loved to draw and “come up with ideas” — but only if I “felt” creative. Been there? Once I landed my first agency position, reality became my teacher — and I discovered that you have to be creative all the time.

Here are 5 ways I’ve learned to be creative “on the spot”!

• Realize that EVERY idea can be creative. It’s really the ability to take an “angle” on the idea that makes it “clever”. Stop reaching for THE best creative idea, and start writing every idea that comes to your mind. Don’t judge them as you do this. Allow each idea to breed a different angle. After awhile, start to be critical and one will jump as “more” creative. And stop thinking that every creative product is unique. A totally new concept is rare, but often springs from the process. “Uniqueness” shouldn’t be the goal or it will discourage you because the bar is too high.
• Know your Creative spot. We’ve all been in situations where you feel more creative. Start being conscious of these situations. Is it in the morning? Afternoon? Right after a Mountain Dew? Where are you located? What did you just do? I can tell you that most times, you need to be well-rested and well-fed. Need a “special” creative idea? Try to simulate the “spot”. For me, caffeine plays a large role in this process. And let’s not forget the importance of a deadline. Many an idea becomes creative when it HAS to be delivered!
• Scattergram. This is something I learned in an English class in College. Start by writing down the key point (or benefit) of the product that you’re trying to be creative about. Then draw a line from that word (or concept) and put down the first word that pops in your mind. Continue the process, from your original word or from any word that you’ve written. From this process has sprung MANY campaigns. A great Mac program (that’s free!) to help you do this process is available here. Another alternative is to write your concept word down AND a seemingly disconnected noun on the opposite side of the page. Then try to figure out the correlation.
• Don’t do it alone. Most of my best ideas came from a group. I don’t like a large group — say only 2-4 people. And set some rules. This is the process we use at PinPoint. Someone explains the dilemma, the audience and the expectation. Then the first round is a “nothing’s a dumb idea” discussion followed by us paring it down. Don’t rush the first part but realize the goal is to find a solution, so we try to set a time limit, and the person with the dilemma walks away with our ideas and they decide which direction to go.
• Keep your eyes open! I’m amazed how little people notice. It’s sad. So many ideas and concepts interact with us on a regular basis and we don’t even notice. We see a great TV campaign and moments later we hardly remember it. Or a magazine ad concept that captures our attention until we turn the page — then it’s gone! When something attracts our attention (possibly for the humor, or for the way it communicated), break the thought process down. Quite often you’ll see the processes (list above) in practice. A benefit of a product tied to a seemingly separate idea. And it’s that connection that makes it noticed. If it’ll help you, keep a notepad or an iPhone app (or similar) that allows you to quickly jot down the process. Then it’ll give you a starting point the next time.

So go ahead, and be creative in ALL you do. The more you practice the better!

The best part of being creative is, it’s fun! Perhaps it’s too logical to say that “creative is the byproduct of a process“. But until I find a little witch to take to my meetings, I choose to follow a process to get a creative product. Granted, because I’m also an artist, I break the process on a regular basis. But at least I know I do it when it happens.

Start looking for creative moments in your life!

Last week, we got the clubhouse ready for demolition. Josh (my 14 year old) did a great job stacking the loose lumber into a pile that would dry out after a winter of a lot of rain and even snow this week.

After breakfast, all I had to do was quietly say, “Want to burn the house today?” and Josh and his 13 year old brother, Isaac, shot to their rooms to get ready for the big day. There was  a lot of anticipation.

I got both of them to place wads of newspaper on opposite sides of the clubhouse, add some easy-to-burn sticks and shingles on top. Then I thought, just in case, we should get the hose ready and a bucket of water. This was very fortunate.

Josh was the first to light “his side” and in a very scary matter of seconds, we had 5 feet of flames shooting into the air. Isaac backed away and suggested he didn’t need to light “his pile”. Exactly. In what seemed like a second later, the flames were well over 10 feet.

I must admit I don’t have a lot of experience as a pyromaniac. But I got my fill today. Within minutes, I had such a massive blaze on my hands I was yelling to the family to get more buckets of water as the flames quickly took over our cedar hedge (which is next to an acre of dry fields).

After one tree was partially consumed and the nearby holly bushes started to brown and catch flame, a gust of wind added to my panic. My father-in-law (visiting from Canada) calmly asked “how much does it cost to have the fire dept come to a call?”

Then the neighbors arrived, asking if we needed help. I tried to act calm, but Josh saw through it. He asked his Mom, “So, has Dad had fire problems in the past? Because he’s yelling a lot.”

Business life is similar.

Like preparing for the “fire day” today, we wait patiently for the economic signs to be right. We prepare for it. The economy is going to come back — that’s guaranteed. Are you anticipating it? If so, how are you preparing for the business that’s getting ready to come your way?

1. Take this slow time to take a step back to see what your core competency is. Are you doing it the best possible way? Now is a good time to hone what you do — and become the best in the business.

2. Develop a plan for your employees. Start with accessing if each person is doing the best job, it may be time to make changes or encourage better performance. There are a lot of talented people looking for work — perhaps now is the time to hire one or replace an underachieving employee.

3. This is also a great time to develop a solid Marketing plan. Sadly, the majority of companies don’t have a marketing plan. Oh, they have a “logo” that’s been developed by an employee or a relative. And this logo doesn’t help them compete as a professional company, since the average person realizes the company didn’t even make the effort to use a professional to design it. Hire a great marketing firm to develop a brand package for you. Once that’s in place, create a PLAN to take your message to your audience (print and web). And you should know quickly what that message and audience is.

Once you are prepared for the economy to fire up, the anticipation is amazing. And best of all, it’s my experience that good things come to those who are prepared. Sort of like us today. I never expected the strike of the match to have so much FAST impact. But it did, because we made the right preparation.

Then God supplied the gust of wind… and WOW!

Together, and I’m still including God in this, we managed to get the flames out. And we didn’t even have to use the local fire department. The clubhouse is reduced to a pile of black cinders and half-charred lumber. I’d like to say I felt in control. But no. The fire got the best of me for awhile.

That another thing to be concerned about — be prepared for more than you’d ever expect. We worked with a Church for several months preparing a plan to expand their congregation. We developed a great branding package and then we aimed all marketing toward a specific Sunday. The church prepared for a 30% growth.

The day arrived and people started to arrive. And the church was caught blind-sighted. They doubled their size that day. Which made for some awkward moments (not enough seats!).

Always be prepared for more. I wish I had today! …when I burned our clubhouse down.

When I was standing in front of the audience of about 200, I found myself watching reactions and odd people things. It’s almost like people forget that I’m actually looking at them, and I’m not on a TV screen.
I’m an animated talker and I love to do things that get people’s attention. It drives me crazy if I see someone nodding off. But I’ve come to believe that no matter what I’m talking about and the compliments I get, a few people lose interest. And to use the TV analogy, they grab the mental remote control and “turn me off”.

Wouldn’t it be great if you could watch where your customer’s eyes go when they get your marketing material? What if you could have the ability to “look back” at them from inside the brochure or direct mail? That way you could determine what is being looked at and the places to put important material.

It’s the age old desire of every marketer. But now we can!

Well, maybe not in print, but we can online. That’s the joy of the web.

Eye Tracker technology has been around for several years and these professionals who have this ability (to see where people look) have tested various online viewers (all demographics and psycho graphics) on all kinds of websites. And the results are in.

We know where the eye goes when the surfer pulls up a website.

Armed with this knowledge, it allows us put the right messages in the right places so that you reach the visitor quickly and efficiently.

In fact, we know that the average person spends less than 10 seconds on a page and will usually only click 3 times before determining if they want to stay at the URL.

Scary.

It’s defines the necessity of knowing your audience and putting the message to where they look.

I’m hearing, “so… where do they look?”

I’m simplifying a bit, but ultimately, upon opening a page, a person looks to the upper left, then the middle of the page, then to the middle left before checking the top out. Then the bottom, and lastly, the right hand side.

In fact, very few people will ever get to the right hand side, because of the “unnecessary ad” paradigm that we’ve gotten used to.

So, there you have it. All that needs to be done is align the importance of your messaging into the appropriate positions. That’s what we do every time we work on a website. We’re professionals. We know our stuff.