The key to a very successful brand launch is keeping the promise made to the customers. Delivering what the brand promises is the first step in winning the trust of the target customers. Setting a high expectation and not matching the same only backfires.

Successful brands of our times like the search engine giant, Google has managed to deliver just the same. Deliverance of its promise to its millions of online customers. A brand requires various supports if it has take off smoothly. Constantly adding value to the brand through innovation would deflect competition. Monitoring consistently and frequent engagement with its target customers is just another way to bring success to your brand. With the wide choices the customer has, surely they are bound to expect a lot more. Rightly named the customer as the “King”, merely delivering the promise isn’t just enough. The customer experience and the overall appeal must be positive too.

More brand activities must become a part of your marketing plan as the brand grows old. Your brand needs rejuvenation as well. Relaunches takes place and so does brand extensions. For example, Nestlé’s most successful brand Maggi, has widened its market and customer base through brand extensions in the soup and ketchup segment.

Relaunches of popular brands include P&G’s Vicks Action 500 balm and Close-Up toothpaste.

Indeed, successful brands need to keep their promises to their customers. However, like in every other relationship where promises are made, brands too need a facelift once in a while, and keep their customers interested and involved for success.

Via: Livemint

Here is a fairy tale success story of ‘Bacon Salt’, a brand name which spread through social media networks like MySpace, Facebook and Twitter and achieved a grand success. ‘Bacon salt’ began as a joke between two buddies before it became an actual product marketed entirely through social media. Now it’s become an example of how social media can play a powerful role in brand building.

The only investment of these two buddies was online time. They just spread the word through social media networks and innovative online tools and applications. Even in the past, for small new entrepreneurs, word-of-mouth has been best low cost advertising option. Now with the aid of social media simple word-of-mouth spreads with great speed across the globe.

Yet this success cannot be put into formula and replicated by one and all. Same social media can work negatively too. Many a big brands have failed to harness the power of this new social communications and have gone back to their trusted PR agencies and old advertising and marketing strategies. This new trend of advertising using social networks and blogs to create a buzz and hope it gets amplified into success is nevertheless interesting!

Via Adweek