We were knee-deep in both proofreading and brand standards projects last week, so I thought it fitting that I should stumble across a Huffington Post article on the importance of  brand style guides. In it, author Dave Standen argues that companies should act like publishers and set guidelines and standards for their digital and print content.

Why? Well, there are lots of good reasons, but in a nutshell,  according to Standen, “A good style guide lays the foundations for consistent, on-message brand content to be created (be it in-house, agency or freelance) and approved.”

If you are considering creating a style guide for your brand, read on for six steps you can take to make sure your guide is useful and easy-to-use.

Choose an external style guide like the Chicago Manual of Style, The AP Stylebook or, the new kid on the block, The Yahoo! Style Guide.  (At Next-Mark, we use the AP.)

Decide upon internal style guidelines. This is especially useful for the consistent use of product names and industry terminology (e.g., Is it ‘healthcare’ or ‘health care’?).

Clearly define your tone and voice. Are you formal or pithy? Provide examples, so your writers really know what you mean.

Describe how you write for the Web. Don’t assume that your writers know how to write for the Web; be sure to include guidelines for SEO and metadata.

Set a style for social media. If your brand has a social media presence, lay out the differences between writing for each of the different platforms.

Visual content. Content isn’t just text. Provide standards for things like video and infographics, too.

Many of our clients already have content style guides that are part of, or used to augment, their brand playbooks.  I am comforted by the fact that I have somewhere to turn when deciding whether or not to use a serial comma and when to use sentence case. (Confession: It doesn’t follow AP, but I love the Oxford comma.)

Sometimes the simple way is best; at least, that’s how we feel about creating brand strategy and identity for clients.

Some firms use toys, paper dolls and noisemakers to stir the creative juices of clients during brainstorming. We prefer to keep them on track simply through their interest in/passion for what they do and hope to accomplish. The result is a carefully thought-out strategy, as well as an accurate – and current – identity.

Of course, the process for start-ups is different than that of existing companies looking to reinvigorate their businesses and images. Since most of our clients fall into the latter category, though, that’s what we’ll address here.

The fact is that many organizations trying to move ahead don’t realize they’re shackled by their past. While growing and changing, they’ve neglected to communicate this growth and change to clients and potential customers. Thus, their web sites, tag lines, descriptors, marketing collateral and sales materials are less compelling inducements and more historical documents.

That’s where we come in, working with our clients to supercharge them, creating the content and visuals that puts them on a trajectory to a successful future. We would, of course, be happy to do the same for you and urge you to contact us soon to get started. In the meantime, though, here are a few tips you can use to clear the rubble off the road to a better organization.

– Make it someone’s business to insure your web site is current and that it meets or exceeds the look and substance of your competitors’.

– Ask yourself if you’ve outgrown your tagline or ways you describe your company, then take measures to make changes that connect who you were with who you are today.

– Look for dated messaging in materials, updating for fact and phrasing.

– Invest in great design. Just because anyone can use clip art doesn’t mean they should.

– And most of all, don’t work in a vacuum. Keep everyone – especially those in direct contact with clients – aware of what’s new and how it should be described.

There’s more, of course, but that’s a good start.

According to those who watch these things, strange days may be ahead in the business world. For instance, in the spirit of everything old is new again, Megan McArdle, blogging over at Bloomberg, noted recently that, well, old folks may rule. Swimming against the tide of conventional wisdom that advertisers aren’t interested in fogies, CBS (or at least CEO Les Moonves) apparently believes the young demographic is “highly overrated.” McArdle explains that this may be because “(y)oung people are a shrinking percentage of the population, and thus represent a shrinking percentage of the nation’s disposable income. And right now, a lot of them are living at home and working intermittently ….”  Skeptical? You’re using your DVR to record your favorite programs for later viewing so you can speed through the commercials, right? (Don’t bother denying it!) That may be partly so you can avoid all those ED ads and other pitches that are filling the airwaves and are directed at the end of the spectrum longer in the tooth. Take a quick survey some evening of the commercials out there and you will see what we mean.

And, yet, Justine Griffin writes in our hometown Sarasota, FL, newspaper that Gen Y millennials are so important to the market that retailers are focusing on them and trying hard to please these finicky,  tech-savvy shoppers. Griffin points out brand promotion targeted at this group, but it goes far beyond that. While coupon-clippers may still approach shopping scissors in hand, the smartphone set long ago embraced the digital age and now have stringent demands for barcode scanners and shopping apps.

So, who’s right? Maybe both? There’s no reason old dogs can’t learn new tricks and a brave new world of cross-generational wired and wireless shoppers eagerly awaits. The response of the market is and will continue to be entertaining.

IMHO, “perfect” is the new “like” when it comes to over usage. It’s driving me nuts. I spell my name for someone, and he or she says, “Perfect!” Of course, it’s perfect; I know how to spell my own name! I give someone my phone number, which is, of course, “Perfect!” Where exactly is the perfection – in the sheer beauty of the assembled digits or my ability to remember 10 sequential numbers? Grrr.

Anyway, this rant was brought to you courtesy of my initial distrust of a recent Content Marketing article about creating “perfect” content product. It turns out, however, that while perfection may be hyperbole, the piece offered some good guidance, promoting copy that is:

Real-time: Taking advantage of current trends and relevant news stories to remain topical.

Fact-driven: Leveraging creditable statistics and solid information for credibility.

Visual: Remembering that visual content gets processed much (much, much) faster than the written word.

Efficient: Having the right people and right number of people in place to do the job well.

Curated: Using content from others to create useful information for your audiences.

What it boils down to is the thought that has to go into content creation and management, being constantly on alert for news you can announce or share and getting it out there in a form people want to access.

A perfectly good pursuit at all times.

Apple’s new operating system iOS7 comes out in Fall 2013. The redesigned operating system will be attractive to new users; however, it maybe unsettling for those familiar with Macs.

The “flat” design is based on simplicity, pushing aside heavy textures. “Flatness” also means a more streamlined interface that will, potentially, better stand the test of time. For instance, the yellow notepad found in the current iOS Notes app may not resonate well with younger users.

The interface changes include an all-new icon set for the Apple’s native apps, and

newly designed tool bars, tab bars, and other fundamental interface features across the system. Mac devices using the next-generation software reportedly have polarizing filters to decrease viewing angles of on-lookers.

Some say the new interface loses all signs of gloss, shine, and flashy design seen across the current and past versions of iOS. Others say the new iOS is very similar to Microsoft’s Windows Phone “Metro” UI.

http://9to5mac.com/2013/04/29/jony-ive-paints-a-fresh-yet-familiar-look-for-ios-7/

According to Apple.com as they were reconsidering iOS, their purpose was to create an experience that was simpler, more useful, and more enjoyable-while building on the things people love about iOS. Ultimately, redesigning the way it works led them to redesigning the way it looks.

The unnecessary bars and buttons have been removed. When taking away design elements that don’t add value, suddenly there’s greater focus on what matters most: your content. Apple adds features only when they’re truly useful, and they add them in a way that makes sense.

With iOS 7, Apple took something millions of people already love and refined the ,experience to make it even more effortless and useful.

Mark your calendars for Fall 2013 for the release of iOS7!

http://www.apple.com/ios/ios7/design/

For more information about the flat design trend, see:

http://www.awwwards.com/flat-design-an-in-depth-look.html

http://www.creativebloq.com/graphic-design/what-flat-design-3132112

Inspired by an uptick in the number of website development projects we’ve been working on here at Next-Mark, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how user experience – everything from a website’s usability to its error messages – relates to brands. So, I was intrigued when I came across Co.Design’s article that takes David Ogilvy’s rules for developing advertising campaigns and, by changing a word here and there, changes their context from campaigns to user experiences.

David Ogilvy, often called the original Mad Man, wrote Confessions of an Advertising Man in 1963 when big one-way, top-down campaigns and splashy print and TV ads were the dominant trends in advertising.  How do Ogilvy’s principles hold up fifty years later, in an era of digital products and services, customer engagement, and two-way conversations? As it turns out, very well.

I’ve summarized three of the new rules below; however, I encourage you to don your smoking jacket and your best English accent and read them all.

1. What you say provide is more important than how you say provide it.
For Ogilvy, advertising was about making sales. What helps people decide to buy isn’t the beautiful design or soaring copy, it’s telling them about product’s value. Similarly, digital services and products must provide real value, utility and content.

By now, many of you have seen the Internet images of one premium coffee vendor’s panel-van logo mishap. When the van’s sliding door was opened, the company’s logo was inadvertently shortened to, well, something else. This embarrassment-by-van syndrome has since spread to another vendor, the second involving a certain kind of mushrooms.

In the spirit of the fact that everything tells us something, this is a corporate life lesson in ensuring that your message gets through the way it was meant to be, no matter what.

That’s why, when all is seemingly said and done, we here at Next-Mark like to slide open the doors, take a step back and view the product from outside the box … just to be sure.

At Next-Mark, we use Associated Press style, unless we’re asked to do otherwise. This works well for me, as my roots are dug deep in journalism. It also works well for our clients when we’re talking to working journalists via press releases, news alerts or advisories. It’s a matter of not wasting their time and respecting what they do by speaking the same language.

The latest version of the AP Style Book (“The journalist’s bible wherever you are”) was released this past May, “optimized for the desktop, laptop, smartphone and tablet.” The version sitting next to me has a copyright of 1977, handwritten changes and a stamped reminder to “return to” a newspaper that went belly up in the ‘80s.

Yeah, we’ve both been around a long time.

I was taught that AP style was created not only in the name of consistency, but also brevity – using the fewest punctuation marks and shortest accepted spellings to allow for more copy per space. That’s why its perhaps most recognizable trait is a long-held disdain for the use of a comma before “and” in a series. Today, that also extends to having only one space after a sentence.

Of course, you don’t have to know AP style or be a former journalist to write a press release, but it does go a long way in making it easier for editors to accept, as rewriting corporate announcements are not exactly the dream they hoped to live.

In later blogs, we’ll talk about other roads to journalists’ hearts. For now, though, remember there’s a method to the madness of getting press attention – and sometimes it’s a matter of style.

This post is part 2 of a 2-part series on email marketing best practices. This week, we present ten tips for creating effective marketing emails. In Part 1 of our mini-series, we focused on the current landscape of email marketing.

1. You Don’t Need the Kitchen Sink

With marketing emails, less is, emphatically, more. Take care to limit the amount of copy in your emails; only provide the most pertinent information; and, feature your call to action prominently.

2. Be True to Your Brand Promise

As with other aspect of your marketing plan and your business, your marketing emails should be true to your brand. Your emails should reinforce your brand’s unique promise and reflect your brand identity.

3. Know Your Audience

Select the optimal email list to appropriately target your audience. If time and resources allow, test your campaign on a random sample of recipients from your list then use your findings to tweak your email before sending it out to the whole list.

4. Monitor Your Results

Most email partners (e.g., Constant Contact , SilverPop) collect metrics such as open and click through rates and provide you with tools to monitor results. Be sure to share these results with colleagues and stakeholders.

5. Integrate Social Media

Give your recipients the tools to share your email on their social networks and follow your company on your social networks.

6. Don’t be an Email Nuisance

First up, know your company’s rules and policies on spam. Many companies require that marketing emails or newsletters make it easy for recipients to unsubscribe or opt-out. Getting lots of un-subscribes? It’s probably a sign that it’s time to move to a different list.

7. Select an Optimal Email Partner

There are a lot of email marketing software providers to choose from. Some solutions for small businesses include: Vertical Response, MailChimp, Constant Contact and iContact. Large businesses can turn to enterprise systems like Silverpop, Eloqua, Marketo, and Pardot or opt for CRM integration.

8. Keep Mobile Applications Top of Mind

A large portion of people opening your email will be doing so from a mobile device. Keep screen size in mind when writing and designing your emails – use simple subject lines, streamline your design and prioritize content.

9. Create Sustainable Templates

Using your brand’s look-and-feel, create a simple template that you can re-use for different campaigns. No need to re-invent them each time – a template will make it easy for you to create your emails and make them recognizable.

10. Emails are only One Solution

Emails are only solution in an arsenal of many marketing communications tools.  Be sure to integrate your email marketing efforts with other strategic marketing initiatives for powerful results.