Tag: marketing

April 17, 2023 – What Your Beer Says About You

April 17, 2023 /

My points here are that brands have some reflection of the consumers and that it is difficult to tell what brands are cloaked in conglomerates. This is some of the issues that I tackle today. Maybe I will talk about beer again, the research was kind of fun and informative.

End Your Programming Routine: Pepsi Clear didn’t kill Pepsi, New Coke didn’t kill Coca-Cola. OJ Simpson didn’t damage Hertz. But, all of these companies recognized the damage that was done to the brand and did something about it. Will InBev do the same or is this the signs of change? I guess time will tell but I think we have seen the end of Bud Light.

February 8, 2023 – Marketing and White Hatters

February 8, 2023 /

That didn’t take long. I put in the work to understand a little bit of Garage Band for iOS. Some things I found easier, while others were chores but I guess that is how things go. One thing travelling can do is leave you with a lot of time to think and that is exactly what I have been doing.

End Your Programming Routine: While I said it once, I will say it again… no promises here. That being the case, in order for me to get to the next level with this I need to do something different. After all, I could have 1000 true fans and not even know it because I have no constant interaction of even a good way to gauge interest. Hopefully this becomes more than talk, don’t expect it tomorrow, like my Garage Band editing.

May 3, 2021- New Feature: End Your Programming

May 3, 2021 /

Last week I was listening to a podcast about ‘how easy it is to build a digital brand’. A quick aside here, there is a difference between easy and simple. Digging a 4 x 4 x 4 foot hole is technically simple even with a shovel, but it requires a lot of digging which is hard work. At least for me, I equate easy with not a lot of hard work. It is a bit of a stretch for someone that has been doing it for over 10 years that it is either easy or simple.

I haven’t found this endeavor easy or simple. The technical parts are pretty easy, not simple (for me). The discipline to post routinely is simple but not always easy. The actual brand building is neither. If it takes what I think it takes, I will probably never be successful because I don’t want to engage at the appropriate level. I have tried social media and I don’t really like it. I don’t want to be glued to my phone, I don’t want to be posting cute or snarky comments day after day. I don’t even want to login and scan the posts routinely, I find them boorish and trite for the most part.

However, this is not going to be about all of that other than one particular aspect of building a brand. A tagline, preferably quick, easy to remember and relevant. I was thinking to myself, I already have a tagline but I don’t leverage it at all. I never mention the phrase ‘End Your Programming’. I never correlate what I am saying to how that relates.

‘End your programming’ was something that was personal to me. Yes, there is a backstory and it is more intricate than it might appear on the surface. I write a little bit about it in the About section of this site, but it is more than that. I was the one that wanted to end my programming. I wanted out of the rat race. I had become something that I didn’t want to be. I felt trapped in a high paying career that owned me. I went from running my business unit with full reign and contentedness to having to report daily to someone else and executing their new vision.

It wasn’t that I was not successful before, I was wildly successful. I transformed a business unit from underperforming at best to a team operating at the highest level of the company. My team saved jobs and relationships that my company had bailed out on. I did it with very unorthodox techniques and people that didn’t fit in anywhere else. I was so successful that the company brought in consultants to leverage what I had built and take us to the next level by providing managed services. In the process, they trampled on what made it work and the people in the way. I am planning on talking more about this later because I want to give it the proper focus it deserves.

So, how does this relate to the new feature and what is it? The new feature is the ‘End Your Programming Routine’. A little play on programming but essentially, it is taking the information for the day and putting it into practice. As I wrote about last Monday, I need to find a way to relate my writing or videos or podcasts or whatever I do with this into actionable things people can do to end their own programming. Each day, at the end of the post I plan on creating a segment to apply the topic or at least make suggestions as to the relevance. It is doubtful that this is the secret sauce to success but I hope that it that it changes this from seemingly random topics to something more helpful.

End Your Programming Routine: I like to think that I am self-reflective. I would suggest that continued personal growth is driven by evaluating the things that are important to you. Don’t be afraid to admit when something needs to change to be better or more productive.