Can countries or regions have a brand?  You bet. Anything or anyone can have a brand—even places.  Take Italy.  The mere mention of Tuscany evokes an image of the good life—sipping wine in a hilltop villa surrounded by cypress trees and lush vineyards.  Naples, on the other hand, brings to mind purse thieves in a [...]

Although I was a judge for the first-ever Silicon Valley Brand Impact Awards, I had to miss the associated Liquid Brand Summit 2007 due to a conflict.  The Liquid Agency (the founder and host of the Summit), however, has done a great job documenting the May 15 event.   Check out the Liquid website to get [...]

Branding non-profit organizations can be a difficult task for some marketers because there is rarely a large advertising budget and the marketing sophistication of the staff is often limited. Girls for a Change (GFC) is a non-profit organization based in Silicon Valley and Phoenix that has built a strong brand despite having no advertising budget. [...]

In February 2007, I wrote a newsletter/blog entitled “Full to Empty: The Jet Blue Brand” on the airline’s fall from grace, but I predicted that strong brand loyalty and excellent crisis response would buy them a second chance. Not only did Jet Blue get another chance, but the brand recovered more quickly than one could [...]