Here are some lessons that Donald Trump’s shocking victory has hammered home again:

1. Know your target audience and their hidden desires: Trump recognised early on the disaffection and frustration among the White Americans who have grown up with a sense of entitlement.
2. Offer solutions to problems: His radical solutions that included building a wall on the mexico border and restricting entry to muslims received a groundswell of support.
3. Tap into the power of Single Minded Proposition: Trump zeroed in on one issue (the private email server fiasco of Hillary) and kept talking about it till it gained a currency of its own. On the other hand, Hillary talked about dozens of his misdemeanors, in the process losing focus. Trump’s tagline “Make America Great Again” resonated even with those who did not really subscribe to his polarising and unsettling approach.
4. Position your brand as the underdog: In a strategy typically adopted by challenger brands (like Apple in the 80s), he garnered sympathy for himself as a victim of the leader brand (in this case, the establishment). He also positioned the leading brand as the villain by virtually hanging the sign “Crooked Hillary” on her forehead and hammering it again and again till her campaign started bleeding.

The best communication is the one you don’t just read or hear or see, but experience. Don’t you agree?

Here are some brilliant examples of communication that you can never ever forget…

We sometimes forget the cruelty involved in the leather industry. To drill home the point, a store in Bangkok was roped in. People walked in to buy the good looking leather items. But they were in for a shock…

 

---

 

What a simple idea, isn’t it? And yet so so effective!

---

 

Want to feel like James Bond… well, here is your chance!

---

Unbeatable in Impact, the only drawback of campaigns like these is the limited reach. But with the advent of Social Media (especially youtube), even that is taken care of.

Every day, a typical consumer in the west is exposed to over 2000 selling messages! Naturally, it has become a tough task for advertisers to get noticed and to stay memorable.

Here is some advertising that broke the mould and created a wow effect!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So what does it need to create such attention grabbing communication, you ask?

It’s simply an ability to use the medium itself. Be it the zebra crossing lines by McDonald’s, the yellow safety lines by Wonderbra, or my favourite – the Frontline flea and tick spray for dogs.

Go ahead, ask your communications agency to be playful and look beyond the obvious.

 

How important is your logo to you?

Your logo is the very foundation for your brand. And great logos reflect its soul. They tell a story about the lineage, the character, the culture of the company it represents. In the end, what it says can be the difference between whether the brand flies or falls flat.

Here are 4 things that you should keep in mind while getting your logo designed:

1. Follow the KISS principle (Keep It Simple Stupid).
   Simplicity does not mean boring. It gives power to your design. If you are not able to select between 2 equally good logos, pick the simpler one. It’s that easy! In the Fedex logo, the first thing that strikes you is its simplicity. But look again, and you will also see a forward pointing arrow. Spotted it yet?

   

2. Uniqueness pays.
   The easiest way your logo can be one of its kind is by making it specific to its core truth – what is it offering and what are its ethos. Make the logo bring out the unique story that your brand wants to tell. In the logo of the dog shelter above, it not only clearly communicates the service, but also brings out the friendliness angle in a highly simple, elegant manner. If you are a law firm, you’d like to connote trust. If you are a play school, you’d like to connote the joys of childhood. If you are an IT company, you could be about confidence, or expertise. The more unique your logo is, the more it will stick in your audience’s mind. Please avoid the temptation of using sites like fiverr which that generate logos as per existing templates and can easily get lost in the crowd.

   

3. Who is your target audience?
   This is THE big question that you need to answer. If you are redesigning the logo for your company, it is possible that your target audience is not your customers, your vendors, your prospective partners, but your very own employees! Think about it before you brief your designer. The Methodex logo is not just a clever interpretation of the letter M, it also became the symbol for the resurgence of the company by subtly telling the employees – “we are ready to soar”.

   

4. Make sure it is scalable.
   Your logo is going to do a lot of heavy lifting for your brand, especially if you are a Business to Business company. It has to look equally good on your business card as well as a big hoarding. Even though the logo of this quaint lodge in the himalayas looks busy, it is not only unique to its location, but also looks equally good when scaled down.

Yes, one of the most effective ways to tell your customers that you are serious about your business is your logo. Make sure it speaks volumes about you.