If not anything else print a simple quote on the back of your card. To promote your business you can add lots of information at the back of your business card to make it a potent marketing tool for you. Here are a few ideas that you can try at the back of your business card to look it more attractive:

A professional looking full color business card should be printed on quality paper with high quality ink. You need to hire the services of a professional printing service provider to ensure high quality work.

According to company spokesperson Louise Callagy, the new logo was intended to signify the San Francisco based retailer’s transition from “classic, American design to modern, sexy, cool.” But the new logo looked more like Microsoft clip art than “modern, sexy,” or “cool.” Remember the logo is for a retail fashion company – it needs at least to have some style.

New logo fails to resonate.

The public outrage and ridicule was immediate and harsh. And management demonstrated even greater lack of sophistication in their response to the backlash by announcing on their Facebook page, “We know this logo created a lot of buzz and we’re thrilled to see passionate debates unfolding! So much so we’re asking you to share your designs,…We love our version, but we’d like to see other ideas. Stay tuned for details in the next few days on this crowd sourcing project.” What? They “love” the Microsoft clip art? Really? This response speaks volumes about the Gap management. And sadly, it’s not positive.

The Brand Channel commented:

But ditching the classic logo, recognized by everyone, in favor of whatever that new monstrosity is, demonstrates a prototypical brand panic move. With things not going in its favor, the brand decides to change the one valuable element it has going for it.

Ironically maybe, the new logo is perfect for the brand. It communicates exactly the values currently embodied by Gap: A sense of being lost and a lack of clear vision and creativity.

Crowd sourcing logo design.

It didn’t take long for management to discover that crowd sourcing logo design is not an effective solution and they abandoned it returning to the original logo design after one week.

This has generated a considerable amount of comment in newspapers, magazines and blogs. Let me point out something that hasn’t been mentioned: Your brand identity lives, not in the board room or the headquarters office, but rather, in the marketplace.

This reminds me of the introduction of a reformulated sift drink by the world’s leading soft drink marketer a couple decades ago. We learned a similar lesson at that time. In response to public demand, they reinstated “the original formula drink.

Customers and the brand.

We need to recognize that the way people relate to and interact with brands has changed dramatically over the last decade or so. The power balance has shifted in favor of customers. They now have the upper hand. Companies must understand that their brand messages are in the hands of customers. Gone are the days when a company could “push” any marketing message they want. Today customers do not automatically respond with open arms. They are accustomed to “pulling” the information they want.

Companies must be much more sophisticated in their attempt to influence their identity because it is held by customers in the marketplace. Brands today are built by those who use and endorse them. No longer do companies have complete control their own message. They must now entrust their message to customers who will make it exciting and interesting – they invigorate the brand – or not.

Customers can identify with a logo.

The Gap logo fiasco reveals that customers identified with what the existing Gap logo has come to symbolize. And by removing the symbol and replacing it with a banal substitute, the company removed a valuable connection to a significant meaning. A meaning that the new logo did not contain.

Gap management appears to be completely clueless about the value of branding which is typical of industrial companies but very unusual for a California-based consumer retailer.

These are a few reasons why some companies opt for logo clothing. Logo is as important as the company name. People identify a company by its logo. It serves as a guide for consumers. Logo uniforms are important in the organization because these clothes make workers feel their importance in the company. Businessmen want to have a clear identity in the market and coming up with a logo is an important aspect of creating a marked identity. But logos are not only important in product packaging and labeling. Putting logos on company uniforms creates the right impact both to consumers and employees.

A company can have different branches but it should have a single logo in all its products, brochures, leaflets, and uniforms. That’s because a logo is a sole identification no matter if you have a branch in another city or another country. Logos on shirts, tunics, or uniforms of employees should match in color, size, and design no matter which branch they are working at. Customers can quickly spot differences in logo design and they usually will identify that design for a long time. Businessmen should not be quick in changing their logo.

It is always a perfect move to consult a clothes making company for logo uniforms to find out what logo designs may create the greatest impact for your company. This is especially important if you are having logo clothing and uniforms done for the first time. You have to keep in mind that there are two basic important aspects here and these are the logo and the clothing itself. Your employees can wear tunics or uniform shirts with or without logo, but imagine if they encounter a customer or client who happens to be wearing the same kind of shirt or suit. Other customers might mistake him for your employee. But you can save your customers from this troublesome confusion if your workers wear logo clothing. It is actually a basic thing in many companies and businesses around the world that their employees wear logo clothing.

Now a logo can be printed using paint or ink, or it can be embroidered on any part of the clothing. Usually, the former is offered at cheaper cost but many people don’t like the outcome of painted prints on shirts or tunics because the part will be troublesome during washing or ironing. Prints also wear off easily and become chipped after a while. In no time, print logos look dull and worn out. Worn out logos make your uniforms look frayed as well. On the other hand, embroidered logos look more elegant and they don’t wear off that easily since they are made of sewn threads that last much longer than paint or ink on the fabric.

Employers should also be concerned about the location of logos. The classic spot where logos are usually found is somewhere in the chest in either left or right side. You can also find big logos on the middle or on the back of the clothing. You can try having your logo on the lower corner on the front of the shirt or tunic or on the sleeve.

Although fashions have changed and online communication gives the opportunity to send brief messages or information instantly, the postcard is as popular as ever it was in providing a medium to send brief, to the point messages or communication of a concise set of information.

Sending a post card is an eye-catching way to communicate a personal message or news. Post cards can be used as invitations, announcements and general greetings. They can convey news and additional information or can be simply a pleasing design on which to send your own wording.

News of many family events can be conveyed quickly and easily with a customised card – change of address, thank you, birth announcements, parties and events and more.

Cards can also be used to advertise events or facilities, both commercial and private and can be sent or distributed personally They can be used as advertising ‘fliers’ for businesses, placed in stands on counters in shops and other establishments or at exhibitions.

Postcards created by online postcard design services can be customised to different sizes, again making them a versatile addition to business marketing or an eye-catching addition to business or personal messages.

Online stationery suppliers offer postcard printing facilities, with many providing galleries of designs to choose from and personalise. Some site offer the facility for self-design, with options for customising the colour scheme and adding personal images which can uploaded onto the site. The reverse of the card can also be customised to give a traditional postcard format, plain or with text to maximise the space.

If you wish to use postcards for business purposes, make sure you are clear about the message you wish to convey, the audience and the timescale for design, print and circulation. All these factors may influence the decision making process and the ordering time line. Many online postcard printing services offer a convenient way to achieve all that is necessary to ensure that businesses are able to use this marketing tool efficiently and effectively.

If the cards are to be used for personal purposes, again, choosing the design, wording and overall ‘message’ that you wish to convey is important. The size of the card can be varied and the style custom made to reflect whether the information to be conveyed is serious or a light-hearted event or set of news – joyous, congratulatory or simply information.

Choosing an online postcard printing service is cost effective as they can provide a minimal quantity at an economical rate, while increasing the economy further with larger orders. The order can be placed easily and the cards received with the minimum of fuss in a reasonable timescale, right to one’s door. The postage costs can be kept to a minimum or, for a slightly increased postal rate, delivery timescales can be drastically reduced, with some offering next day delivery.

Why You Need a Great Looking Logo Design

There are many different kinds of bakeries and cake shops that target all sectors of the market. Once you have a good understanding of what kind of bakery or cake shop you want to be, and understand who your customers are you can then work on developing a brand.

A professional looking logo design is one of the key components of your brand development strategy. It can help to bring new customers into your shop and it can encourage existing customers to remember you and to return. It will help people to identify exactly what kind of bakery you are and it will help you to stand out against the competition.

A Variety of Uses

A bakery logo has to serve a variety of purposes. The most important uses for a bakery or cake shop are typically on signage and the bags or packaging that are used to sell products. Of secondary importance are business cards, advertising and other marketing purposes.

Common Images on Logos for Bakeries

It is helpful if people can quickly glance at your logo and immediately determine that you are a bakery or cake shop. The best way to do this is to use an image or symbol that is related to baking. The problem with this approach though is that some images such as a bakers hat, a cake or a loaf of bread have really been overdone and would make it difficult for your logo to be truly original. However, a talented designer should be able to put a unique angle on one of these cliched images and come up with something that looks fresh.

Look at a variety of bakery logos and you will soon get an idea of what works well. Aside from the obvious, some bakeries have gone for images that match their name or their location. Some bakeries that focus on a certain theme such as ‘French’ or ‘Italian’ bakeries have a logo that enhances their theme.

Usage of Color

A good designer will keep color usage to a minimum as this keeps a logo simple and reduces printing expenses for bags, packaging and promotional materials. Two colors is fine and three should be the maximum.

Bakeries typically stay away from brighter colors, preferring natural colors or pastel shades. Cake shops on the other hand tend to favor brighter colors. These colors relate to the products in general but there are no rules really when it comes to color and anything can work well if the overall design concept is sound.

A Font Can Send a Message

The style of lettering that is used on a logo is important as different styles can convey different messages about a business and its products. One thing that we picked up on with bakeries and cake shops is that they either brand themselves as being old fashioned or modern. There are some great old style cursive scripts that can convey the message that your shop sells baking just like grandma used to make. On the other hand, other more contemporary looking fonts can convey the message that your bakery or cake shop is modern, fashionable or organic.

Tips for Choosing a Designer

The best option for getting a logo design online is to use a custom logo company. With the custom approach you will get an original logo that is tailor made especially for your business. You also get input into the design process and can make alterations to your design until you are satisfied.

Most custom logo firms have extensive portfolios of their work on their websites. Check out their previous work for samples of bakery or other food and beverage industry logos to get an idea of what they are capable of.

Let your designers know who your main competitors are so that they can come up with some concepts that will stand out in your local market. Give them as many details as you can about your bakery or cake business and the kind of customers that you hope to attract.

First, you must decide where to have the party. It is a great idea to have the party outside of the office if you can. When sitting among cubicles and computers all day, this is the last place most employees want to celebrate. Many types of sites can be rented for holiday office parties including country clubs, restaurants, convention centers or even a more unique venue like an art gallery or arcade. If your budget will not allow for a rental fee, many restaurants have party rooms that can accommodate a large group and cost will most likely be for food and drink only.

Next, decide when the party should happen. Some companies choose to do a luncheon type of party to limit the guest list to just the employees. This is a good way to host a special party on a smaller budget keeping the celebration more intimate among just the employees. If you choose to have an evening party, it is nice for employees to be allowed to bring a guest. This gives your employees the chance to have a special night out.

The theme is an important part of the party planning as well and starts with the invitations. Just as important as the company holiday card is the invitation to the company holiday party. Invitations should be fun and set the tone for the party. Whether the theme is a casino night, a decade party, or a dance party employees should sense the excitement the moment they see the invite. Be sure to give all necessary details as well as any special instructions for the party such as theme attire or bringing a gift or donation of some sort for a charity collection. A quality promotional products company will come in handy with creating an invitation.

What about food for the party? The type of food you choose to serve will depend on the number of guests who will attend. A smaller company might be able to host a more intimate sit down dinner and larger groups might want to consider serving food in a buffet style. If you are going the sit down dinner route, be sure to avoid letting it become high pressure like an office meeting. Try to find ways to make it fun by providing activities for guests to lighten the mood.

The food should be a lead in to the big event of the night, the entertainment. Having a DJ or live band and dancing can be a fun addition to a holiday party. You may even have musical people right there in your company who would love to perform! Be sure that your activities match the theme of your party and provide fun for guests with a variety of interests.

Finally, don’t let your guests leave empty handed. Be sure to have a party favor for guests to take as they leave the event. There are many branded holiday items that make great gifts for your employees and can go with the theme of your party. A custom logo ornament or other personalized holiday item makes a great favor for all of your guests. Hiring a promotional products company to help in selecting these items is a great place to start.

I have one of those glasses still today. It sits on my bar in my dining room.

Imagine how your clients would feel if you decided to give engraved champagne glasses to each of them at your company’s end of year party? How much “good will” would you show simply because you choose something that is a bit unique and classy?

Promotional crystal gifts have some of the strongest “staying power” of any gift you can give. I recently walked into the board room of one of my clients that had two engraved crystal glasses on display which they had received over a decade ago.

The company that gave them the engraved glasses was still getting brand recognition from those two glasses a full ten years later. What company would not want that type of return on investment?

It helps that crystal is great to display and catches the eye of anyone who is looking. It very easily helps to commemorate any type of special occasion and of course is a great promotional gift for any company party, including the year end party that most organisations hold.

You are of course not limited to end of year gatherings. Crystal can be engraved very easily with whatever message it is that you are trying to get across.

Perhaps you want some variety in the crystal that you give out to your clients or staff. The sky’s the limit. You may choose to start with engraved champagne glasses. Then you could follow this up with engraved decanters, engravers glasses or even engraved crystal bowls.

You are also not limited in what you have engraved. Engraving is easy and can usually meet whatever requirements you have. I recently scanned a map for a customer which followed the route of one of their roadshows. We then redrew the map and engraved it on some end of show crystal gifts.

Are you tired of giving the same old promotional gifts at your year end party? Do you want to say something special to those that have helped your business’s success this year? Clients love to know they are appreciated by you and your organisation. Engrave champagne glasses can really get that message across.

Think about crystal as your “thank you” at your end of year get together. You will love the reaction you get.

Having a good picture is important because it affects how the customer sees your product. Before a customer buys your product, he will first look at the logo of your company. If the logo has a poor design, the customer will have a bad impression. Many customers judge the performance of a company by looking at the logo. The brand evokes expectations in the minds of your customers. It communicates the promises that your company made.

Your brand gives the customer the reasons why your product is better than the competitor’s products. You will lose a lot of potential customers if your company has a lousy brand image. Most customers will prefer to shop with other stores if they find that your company has a lousy pic.Many companies perceive the brand as a simple tagline for recognizing their product. The tagline of the brand represents the concept of the products in the customer’s mind. The tagline tied the good experience of the customer with their purchases. It acknowledges the special experiences that the customer have when using your product.

For example, MasterCard tagline hints at the customers that the MasterCard is a solution for items that cash cannot buy. An effective brand will provide positive reinforcement for the product. Positive experiences are reinforced through the constant promotions of the product.The brand image is used to capitalize the demand which the customers associate with the product. Many customers purchase a product because they are emotionally attached to it. The brand image have to show that the company cares for the welfare of the customer.

Just as you invest time and money to promote your product, you must also be thoughtful in creating a strategic brand that represents your product. Professional brand image will help your company to reach a new level. Companies that have difficulties in coming up with a unique brand image can seek the help of a brand consulting agency. By investing in brand consulting agency, you will be able to provide customers a clearer understanding of your products or services. When shopping around, make sure you get quotes from different brand agencies so that you will be able to compare the prices.

“You need a website in order to brand your product, services or company!”

“Standardize all the colors for all of your printed materials and your website to build a brand!”

“Print booklets, flyers and posters to build your company brand!”

It all sounds simple enough, doesn’t it? If building a brand is about printing 5,000 leaflets, a couple of booklets, hand out a few thousand flyers and posting posters everywhere you can, the big question would be this – why on earth would big successful brand names like Nike, McDonalds, Kaspersky, Adidas, Nokia spend billions of dollars to build their brands?

Why aren’t they just printing out posters, creating websites and putting up posters like everyone else?

And renowned author of ‘Building Strong Brands’, David A. Aaker, has this to say about it – there are three levels of brand awareness in the general consumer’s mind.

The first level is brand recognition: Familiarity and liking. At this level, consumers do not necessarily remember where they first saw the brand name. They do not remember why it is different from all other brands. They have a faint memory of ever seeing it…somewhere. In fact, they may not even remember what it is that you are selling or offering! How astonishing, huh?

On a personal level, many years back, when people talked about an Anlene milk powder commercial, I had no inkling as to where I saw the brand before that. I can’t recall why it was any different from other milk brand names. If someone asked me for a recommendation for milk powder, Anlene would never have been at the tip of my tongue.

The second level: Brand recall and the Graveyard. At this level, consumers CAN remember the brand name when a type of product or service is referenced. For instance, names like ING, Great Eastern Life or AIA would come to mind whenever someone mentioned life insurance in Malaysia. But consumers need a trigger in order to recall the brand name.

The third level: Brand name dominance. This is when in the consumer’s mind, the name of the brand replaces a whole type of service or product. When asked about a photocopier, Xerox instantly pop into their head. If someone was suffering from a headache, Panadol comes to mind.

As mentioned in previous newsletters, the marketing world is getting intensely crowded now. It is harder than ever before to build a strong brand name – but it is not impossible.

In order to create awareness and help consumers remember your brand, it boils down to one important factor – frequency. You don’t stop marketing yourself and reminding your customers or potential customers about what you are and what it is that you are doing. By understanding our neuron system, you will understand more about why we need to continuously repeat ourselves.

There are approximately one-hundred billion neurons in a healthy adult’s brain and each of them connect with approximately another ten-thousand other neurons. The role of neurons is, in a nutshell, to help store memories.

If you walked past a bakery and smell freshly baked bread coming from the oven, multiple neurons react to it and associate the smell of freshly baked bread with the bakery. And they all set a pattern. The next time you smell something similar, the neurons in your brain will react in the same way.

Without making things complicated, suffice to say that you will need to be subjected to the same smell over and over again in order for the memory to stick. It all depends on the number of times the signal comes through, how frequent this neuronal pattern is fired up.

Based on the above, we can safely say that it applies to our marketing efforts as well. We need to create strong, important messages…frequently! That is because cells live and they die. The cells that once helped create the neuronal pattern will die off and the memory may break down.

Does that explain why large companies NEVER stop advertising? Despite how established and well-known their brand names are, they understand the human brain too well…they have studied consumer behaviour and know that people forget and they have to keep reminding them.

So, ask yourself – will 5,000 leaflets help you build a strong brand? Will a single website help strengthen your position in the industry that you are in if you did not update it often?

And last you forget, let me remind you that there are at least a few thousand new brands being created every single day. What are the chances of your brand standing out among all of them and more in the future if you did not keep at it?

With the internet, it is almost impossible to build a strong brand name without going digital too. Well, this is something that we are going to look into in the future newsletter.

If you already have a logo and other promotional pieces that convey a consistent marketing message, then getting a quicker return of investment and an increase in sales is not that difficult. This is because of the grounds on your need to have your own brand identity scheme and these include:

Your business logo will make you appear professional and knowledgeable. These two elements alone will already work well towards cementing the credibility of your business. If you would like people to see as an authority in your industry, then establishing your reliability is the primary thing you need to do.

Professionally printed and designed marketing pieces and an exceptional logo will make people see your commitment not only to your business, but also to your clients and prospects. This will show them your stability as an organisation.

It is a fact that some people, numbering to almost 50 percent, will remember things they’ve seen better compared to what they’ve read or heard. You should take advantage of this and use graphics on your logo and marketing pieces. Having these graphics consistently displayed on all of your marketing tools will result in placing your brand image on minds of your prospects, especially those who need the solutions you are offering.

A company that has a well-defined brand identity attracts more prospects and customers. In fact, a number of them may rely on the appearance of a business before they decide to avail of its services or products. Because they will generally be impressed by promotional pieces that are professional-looking, ensure that your logo and other marketing pieces will prompt them to do business with you.

If you do not want to be seen as small-time, then do not give your target market the idea that you are. Even if you are operating a small business, go for marketing pieces that are designed and printed professionally. They may cost more, but the returns and profits they bring are more than worth it.

When paired with a marketing plan that is strong and well set-up. Your exceptional logo and brand identity scheme will create a distinction for your business that is more than up to par. This makes sure that you stay a step ahead of your competition.

Presenting a package that encompasses everything about your business will show its being well rounded. If you have an outstanding logo and graphics-laden marketing materials, you will have a more complete appearance to your business.

Another ground for your having a brand identity scheme for your business is to establish a solid brand for it. If you are in the service industry, you will definitely need a logo that will establish your brand image, so that it will appear bigger than your personal identity. Combined with all the other reasons for getting a system up for your business, this will definitely make your target market sit up and take notice.
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