Several years back, when The Cluetrain Manifesto hit the bookstores, it spoke of a new era where consumers play a more critical role in controlling brand messaging and perceptions. With the rise in social marketing opportunities, brands would lose some control of the messaging that hit the public as a new forum for sharing thoughts would continue to emerge. Essentially, a brand is decreasingly what the corporate marketing department professes it to be—instead it is a sum of the influences, both good and bad—that it has on the consumer.

Case in point is www.brandtags.net. This experiment by Noah Brier enables visitors to "tag" brands with top-line thoughts of what they believe the brand to stand for. Visit the site and you'll see a vast listing of popular brands. Click on a brand and you'll see a variety of words and phrases that individuals attribute to the brand. You can also "tag" a brand with your own words or phrases. Of course, with any open forum, you'll get your share of junk phrases and comments from people who get their jollies out of spewing profanity in public. But look a little closer and you'll see clear themes in consumer perceptions. Sites like this are an increasingly effective barometer of whether the brand promise is resonating with consumers, or if other issues are overtaking the message the brand hopes to promote.

The site also underscores the importance of staying connected with your customers and prospects to learn what they really think of your brand. If you're not taking the time to ask customers what they really think of your brand, and whether you're delivering on your promises, investing the time in that research is critical—if you're truly interested in shaping your brand destiny. Failure to do so could result in someone else shaping it for you, and the results may not be what you're hoping for.

Are you getting the most from the Web forms used to gather leads or increase customer and prospect contacts?

With so much emphasis on offers, on lists to drive traffic, and on creative to capture visitor attention, Web forms can get short shrift in the grand scheme. Keeping a few issues in mind when creating forms can make a difference in converting visitors into subscribers.

1. Less is more. It's tempting to gather as much info as possible from a prospect. After all, it'll help segment and better target messaging to your audience. But much like the 17-year-old boy getting grilled by his date's father at the front door, asking too many questions can be intimidating, or make the subject decide it's not worth the effort. Instead, especially when it comes to e-mail subscriptions, a couple of basic questions – name and e-mail address – can start the conversation. Follow up with additional e-mails down the road as part of an on-boarding campaign so you can glean more information once a relationship is established.
   Sometimes additional information is needed – for instance, when a follow-up by snail mail is required. Before adding extra fields, ask yourself whether each question is critical to the task at hand. If not, save it for later.
2. Design for the basics. A simple, vertical format is best for eye flow. But don't be afraid to test. A recent study by Interwoven shows that switching between vertical and horizontal layouts can bump response rates.
3. Compel action. Just because they've arrived to a request page doesn't mean they're sold on filling it out. A short, sweet benefit-laden headline can reassure the visitor to complete the form. Keep it simple, though. Too much copy can be distracting.
4. Don't forget the privacy promise. Though few people read extensive legalese, reassurance is important. You can get the point across with a few words, i.e., "We'll never share your name," or "We respect your privacy." You can always add a link to a detailed policy that spells out the details.
5. Make the action big. Don't make them search for a "submit" or "subscribe" button. Testing sizes and colors can make a difference, so shake it up occasionally to see how your audience responds.
6. Don't forget the confirmation. Never make them guess whether you've received their request. ALWAYS follow up with a confirmation and next steps, whether it's a confirmation screen or an e-mail. Include a way of getting in touch with you in case they have additional questions or needs as yet one more way of keeping the conversation going.

As new media opportunities continue to proliferate, it's no wonder many marketers are left scratching their heads wondering how to manage the mix between the old standbys and the hottest new media tools on the radar.

There's no doubt that new media has its place, and in order to connect with customers, it's critical to incorporate new trends and technology to share your message. That's not to say, though, that some of the oldies might not still be goodies if they're served up with a twist.

Take, for instance, coupons. A recent Cellfire study shows that mobile couponing is on fire in the Miami-Fort Lauderdale market among 18-34 year olds. Though the concept of couponing is the same—delivering great deals with redemption—the medium is updated. Codes are text mailed to cell phones, which users can redeem at retail. No longer restricted to clippings from the Sunday paper, this clearly ain't your granny's coupon.

Deloitte & Touche released results of a study reporting that despite an affinity for new media across a wide variety of demographics, old media still works. But it works even better when it involves interactivity, which explains why the rate of visitors to TV network web sites continues to grow.

The long and short of it—it's not necessarily the medium that gets old. It's how you use it. Looking for new ways to use tried and true methods can help you keep them fresh for new audiences that come along, as well as the old audiences that may have stopped responding.

Let's say you're ready to announce a new brand initiative…introduce a new product…announce a major corporate change…or perhaps you have a communication crisis that needs to be addressed now. In the flurry of activity that follows in developing talking points, strategies, and channels for delivering the message, too many organizations forget one critical audience in the communications tree—their own employees.

Often times it's not an intentional omission—when things are happening fast and having a competitive edge requires keeping tight lipped until the 11^th hour—containing information can be important. But before you share your news with the world or even your customer base, it's critical to make sure you have a clear internal communications strategy and that you've shared the right information with those nearest and dearest to you. Nothing makes an employee more frustrated than being blindsided by an outsider asking about internal happenings heard through the external grapevine or general media.

Giving your internal audience the facts up front can help ensure that they have the information they need to address questions from the outside once the news hits outside of your walls. If you're announcing a price increase, for example, coaching your staff on how to address complaints and questions can not only relieve their anxiety, it can help them explain the logic behind the increase. Maybe it's due to an increase in raw materials, a product upgrade that customers will rave about, or the result of external economic factors. Giving your employees talking points to use in their conversations prevents them from giving a "deer in the headlights" response to a simple question.

Your employees should be your biggest cheerleaders. In his brandautopsy blog, John Moore cites Apple's efforts in giving all US-based full time employees iPhones to build on the remarkable brand evangelism that's prevalent in the company. In another example, a healthcare client that offers an innovative treatment method offers that treatment at no cost to employees and their immediate families. That can turn into a large mass of foot soldiers telling your story in a very positive light. Nothing speaks to customers better than an employee who can speak about the benefits of your product from their heart and soul because it's made a difference in their lives. That passion can't be faked.

Too often we see qualitative and quantitative research erroneously positioned by companies as, "we need to do one or the other, which one should it be?" The right answer should always be, "We need to incorporate both." They both serve very different functions, yet complement each other perfectly. Use the qualitative portion of the work, up front, to unearth new insights from your customers or prospects. Then take the most compelling learning and validate it with the much more statistically valid quantitative research.

Building customer connections in a relevant, interactive way can create brand relationships and trust. But making sure it makes sense to your audience and overall mission is critical—so before you leap—spend time developing a solid creative strategy that addresses why the media makes sense and your goals for including it. Are you blogging for the sake of having a blog, or are you spending the time and resources to make it worthy of gaining attention and having something relevant to say? Are you posting and soliciting content that enhances your brand message, or is just filling space and creating a "me too" message?

Web space is increasingly becoming saturated with UGC—good and bad—giving visitors ample choice where to spend their time. Unless your content and platform make a good solid brand connection and linked to a strategy, you risk spending resources that could simply get lost in a growing sea of content.

This week's unveiling of the 2012 London Olympic and Paralympic games logo in the UK struck a note…by most accounts bad…about the power of good and bad branding—especially as it relates to brand identity or logos. Please look away … it's the 2012 logo | Special reports | Guardian Unlimited

There's no doubt the 2012 logo has attracted attention. Following a star-studded unveiling in London, online petitions to change the logo, sites requesting new design ideas and blogs discussing the failure to capture the spirit of the event quickly emerged. So did news accounts addressing the development costs (estimated at $800,000 USD), the hidden images—some comical, some naughty—found in the logo, and one unforeseen side effect of viewing the logo in motion—apparently the animation caused seizures among some viewers.

Not exactly what the committee had in mind, I'd guess, when they chose the winner. So what went wrong? Obviously there is a certain amount of subjectivity when choosing a logo, and there will always be critics. In this case, having roughly 50,000 (and counting) signatures on a petition calling to change the logo goes beyond the typical push back.