Love your brand product and your audience will fall in love with it too.

No they won’t was Shelley Ann’s answer in her post last April 2009.

So what does it take for them to come after you’ve created a brand and released a product?

Here’s my very short high-level list that I share with anyone who cares to know how we do things at Mavin Digital, Inc.

• Who? Know who your audience is and who you are building for.
• What? Understand the market landscape and the problem you are trying to solve. What will make your product stick? What is your secret sauce?
• Where? Map out an assertive acquisition strategy. What else are my users reading, interested in, where else do they go to get information, do we need to adjust our approach based on geographic locations and language?
• When? What are your product’s goals within 60/90/120 days? Make a tactical list and be prepared to add, delete and revise as necessary.
• How? Execute, implement and be ready to make adjustments as you learn more about your audience, your market environment and your competition.

And it works! The simple formula can be applied to small businesses, startup brands and global brands. Remember, it requires a lot of patience, testing what works and what does not and lots of TLC for your brand to be the product that resonates with your audience. Love your brand product and your audience will fall in love with it too.

As a service provider, I witness a number of areas that make it more challenging for a product to succeed. Too much too soon is a common syndrome and power play among the characters of a client group is simply not healthy for a product. The latter, in my opinion is a source for errors and costly mistakes.

Focus, KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid) and teamwork are essential ingredients in the “back-office” for a brand product to achieve its goals.

Recently, we launched a new startup brand, Just Kite It dot com. Unless you are an outdoor adventurist or are curious, the soul of Just Kite It dot com won’t resonate. So far, we’ve been receiving great reviews from our global community for version 1. We’re very excited to execute on version 2. More to come! We’ll share our progress in a case study format soon!

Our first corporate reel focuses on our roots in New York, our new brand message and how we personify a company that engages and connects people with brands. You’ll also see some of our work. Watch the video below or you can visit our You Tube channel.

Mavin Digital, digital branding on a dime is about helping companies achieve the WOW factor and performance on any digital marketing and advertising budget.

In the coming months we’ll be sharing more news via our You Tube channel that showcases how our spitfire team, our belief in creativity without boundaries, inspirational digital branding delivered with the right dash of expressionism help organizations achieve their marketing and advertising goals. We hope to share conversational interviews with clients both startups and recognizable brands.

Much gratitude and applause in the completion of our first corporate reel goes to Stephanie Coggin our Communications Strategist and dear friend for the support and guidance in shaping our brand messaging, Sami Eddaikra our Iphone Lead Developer and dear friend for the original music, Jae Lee our Video Associate and Motion Graphics expert , Michael Kelly, our Technical Lead Director, Christopher Lorn our talented intern, our Advisory Board, with special thanks go to my mentor and trusted friend, Nanske Wood, our teams in Estonia and Bangladesh, friends near and far, clients and supporters.

Thank you for trusting and believing in the potential of Mavin Digital. More news coming soon, so stay tuned!

~ jessica valenzuela

After voicing my concerns with Apple and the Mac Support Store on separate occasions, my plight was quickly resolved. Another customer perspective: anger and frustration when bringing in a complaint to your brand won’t get you anywhere. Master the art of complaining and you’ll get more than what you asked for without trying too hard.

Apple responded quickly by replacing and upgrading my Mac Book Pro, while the Mac Support Store sincerely apologized for depending on the reseller and third-party guidelines without examining what would be a better experience for me, their manufacturer’s customer and their customer. They failed to ask the question “how can the Mac Support Store” live to its mission while upholding the brand experience standards of the manufacturer they represent?

If I were Apple what steps would I look into to ensure that the Apple Customer Care experience extends to the Apple Reseller Experience? Here are my recommendations:

• Review their reseller work-flow process. An obvious breakdown between the reseller and the Mac Depot.
• Put in place a Reseller Customer Service Compliance Standard
• Require reseller training. Apple should charge for this in my opinion, make it part of the reseller agreement.
• Quarterly check-ins
• Random customer polls serviced by resellers
• Reseller performance review
• Non-reseller compliance should lead to points deducted from a reseller’s performance. Once a threshold is reached that contract should be cancelled. Gives a reseller incentive to truly focus on meeting the Customer Compliance Standard.

Sounds very cut-throat and restrictive for resellers, but if I were a brand like Apple I would do everything in my power to ensure that proper brand management at every possible customer contact point is available. After all, I AM Apple.

How are you managing your brand’s customer experience?

~ jessica valenzuela

It is a blessing that I’m very good at backing-up with Time Machine! Immediately rang Apple Customer Care my worried voice received with an impressive response from the Apple Care Customer Service agent who walked me through the process of restoring the screen. It didn’t go into cardiac arrest. Screen simply went blank. We’re guessing the video card is toast. Unable to revive the screen with the usual help desk tests my next option was to take it to the closest genius bar, which was at least an hour away in Portland, Oregon or wait till I get back to New York City. I had to endure two days of not hearing that familiar sound when you turn on a Mac product. Kiting filled in the gap and eased my worry.

Back in New York, first thing on the list was to drop off my ailing Mac Book Pro to the Mac Support Store, an authorized reseller for Apple since an immediate appointment at the genius bar was not available. I expected it to be an in and out arrangement by going to the Mac Support Store. This assumption and trust I placed on them being an extension of the  Apple brand, I discover three weeks later and with a $300++  loaner fee was an error on my part. This is where the irritation sets in.

The Mac Support Store promised an approximate 1.5 week delivery of my Mac Book Pro, three days FREE assessment and five days of actual repair. The only diagnosis of a communication they send you is email, so if you missed it tough luck! It just means your repair will take longer and if you took a loaner, it means you’ll probably end up with rental fees enough to pay for a new machine! It just happened I was out in Montauk for another long weekend and missed the email. I finally get around to calling the Mac Support Store when I got back only to find out that they’ve been waiting for my go ahead to send in the Mac Book Pro to the Mac Depot, oh and by the way do you want to keep the loaner? I said yes, quite frustrated with myself.

On the third week, this time I am genuinely peeved. At each follow-up (twice a day this past week), Mac Support Store asked me to call back or they would promise to call me back, which NEVER happened. At the end of each conversation I would be asked by a cold robotic voice on the other end of the line, by the way do you want to keep the loaner? Finally some sense kicked me in the behind, I said yes, but please can you give me the case number so I can personally follow-up on this. Reluctantly, the Mac Support Store gives me the case number.

Yesterday, my plight came to an end. First contact with Apple’s Customer Care after explaining my situation in less than five-minutes and ten-minutes of fact-checking into their system Nicole Massey (my Apple Customer Care hero of the day!) said, we will replace your Mac Book Pro with a brand new one and upgrade its memory, battery life, etc. It was painless and a new Mac Book Pro is on its way! Bravo to the Apple Customer Experience, specially when you have Apple Care! )

The point of this post, should Apple allow third-party vendors to have such an assumed brand extension without the same being able to deliver on the Apple Customer Care Experience and brand promise? A small gap that can be remedied with more training and customer service compliance from their third party vendors. At best, the Mac Support Store should have advised me to ring Apple Customer Service after the first week of delay to request for a product replacement. Well, of course they won’t do that, how silly of me…they are raking in fees on the loaner! And to you Mac Support Store, I think you need to revisit that mission  of yours:

“Help our neighbors who also own Apple products by providing outstanding local repair service.”

I certainly did not receive the help and service that you so promised.

~ jessica valenzuela

Writing about the importance of differentiating your company and personal brand inspired me after a conversation with a client. So here goes. We’ve witnessed iconic brands like Microsoft and Apple go at it with their catchy and funny advertising – Microsoft whacks Apple over prices while Apple simply dismisses the attack by focusing on the under performance of Windows PC. Both brands have millions of dollars to spend unlike early stage startups. Differentiating your brand and how it sets you apart from the numerous brand voices is not a simple task regardless of your company size. I thought sharing our experience at Mavin Digital could help spark an idea or two for entrepreneurs.

Like everything else setting your brand apart takes time, effort and a whole lot of TLC to the community you serve and are a part of. At Mavin Digital discovery was very much part of defining our brand ethos. Numerous conversations with clients after a pitch on why they chose to work with us (or not) and counsel with very close friends helped define our key differentiators as an early stage service and media organization. Here’s how we differentiate our brand:

Genuine engagement

We’re a consultant first before a product or marketing vendor partner. We’re engaged with our clients and prospective clients before the scope of work and beyond the completion of a project or a program. We’ll get up at 7AM or sooner for conference calls and bring pizza to your home office for brainstorming sessions. There are days we’ll even make a 24-hour coast to coast trip so we can speak with you in person to learn more about your idea and challenges around getting your idea off the ground. We’re engaged from the moment we meet.

Macro concepts with micro solutions

Our 360 degree approach helps guide our clients to make the proper decisions for their brand and programs. We help them define the macro concepts or ideas then drill down to the micro solutions. We’re big picture people with an eye for the finite details. Best of all we love seeing the sparks in your eyes after we share the different options on how we can help shape your idea. Our approach is very collaborative and inclusive.

We love what we do and we do it well

A client asked me casually over lunch “what do you think of Zappos?” Unknowing that my answer could make or break our engagement I smiled back and exclaimed wildly “oh i love Zappos” and so does my client for the same reasons of taking a simple model of shoe selling to the best model for customer service. The key learning: when your company does what it is expected to do and does it fabulously, regardless of how crowded that space is you will get noticed. A standard we look up to when creating and delivering products and programs for our clients.

When your brand is memorable, ownable and a trusted source, you create a natural stream of opportunities. Clients and friends are more than happy to send leads your way. Then the next brand decision you face is growth, which is always a great problem to have. I will save that story for another post.

I hope you find this helpful or at least inspiring.

~ jessica valenzuela

Three client levels, including her royal icon Gwen Stefani, numerous Creative Directors (Five at least) and our rad developer teams co-working in multiple time zones (New York, Chicago, New Jersey and Europe).

My team and I built and launched Gwen Stefani’s L Lamb Fragrance in TWO WEEKS.

Find out how. Write jessica at mavin digital dot com

This project was very personal in many ways. It was what gave me the courage to start my own company now known as Mavin Digital, Inc. The same team that delivered L, Lamb Fragrance with me is behind our success and growth at Mavin Digital, Inc.

L, Lamb Fragrance was released in conjunction with Fashion Week and Gwen Stefani’s world tour. It received an impressive amount of traffic in the first few weeks and fashionistas raved. Sweepstakes and viral marketing was part of the package at launch and are now turned off.

Technology used include Action Script 2, After-effects, ASP.net and HTML.

We delivered this project in behalf of Dogmatic, Inc., MKTG (formerly US Concepts) and Coty, Inc.

Insights from Amy Millman on Adding That Sizzle to your Entrepreneur Brand

• OWN your brand and yourself every second of the day. Every moment.
• Share your story with a compelling narrative, gusto, energy and passion. As entrepreneurs always be in your razzle dazzle Shirley Temple character.  SPARKLE and people will take notice.
• Insight is key. Know the person at the other side of the table. Know your audience. When you know your audience only then will you be able to share a compelling narrative about your brand.
• Always be ON. Network. Make that connection in any space you are in. It is a relationship game. When asked about my business development efforts on how I find the clients for Mavin Digital, Inc. I always refer to the growing network in my contacts database. Behind each connection is a story. It could be a Linkedin or Facebook connection. A small conversation at a cafe, an art exhibit, a networking event, a house party, referrals, the elevator and lately the laundry room in my new building. Absolutely! The power of your “rolodex” is an ingredient to your success.
• A business case with your brand’s personal touch is necessary. Amy noted that most women entrepreneurs have a tendency to focus on sharing their brand story by focusing on the feature lists and functions. A feature list and function set does not captivate the investor audience. An investor always wants to hear the punch line. How do you make something interesting and exciting? How will you help transform and change lives?

“A solid business case, powerful network, your sparkle and a little bit of luck are key ingredients to your success as an entrepreneur”, Amy Millman. Gia Machlin, President and CEO of her latest EcoPlum (she previously sold her software company) also added “make sure to know what your goals are”. I personally thought that I would want to scale when the opportunity came. Though the advantages of maintaining a boutique digital media operation is more lucrative at the moment. I achieve scale by reinvesting the value of our services in startup companies that sparkle while delivering for medium to large advertising agencies and brand relationships.

Yesterday was a very special day for me. Besides getting to see Amy Millman in action, I had the opportunity to meet and engage with accomplished women entrepreneurs. To name a few:

• Gia Machlin, President and CEO, EcoPlum
• Tami Kesselman, President, Ivy Girl Advisors
• Kaia Peterka, Designer Kaia Peterka
• Kathleen Rhew, Counsel
• Paula Schafer, Special Events

The event was organized by Columbia University’s Entrepreneurship Program and sponsored by the Eugene Lang Entrepreneurship Center at Columbia Business School for all women entrepreneurs in the tri-state area.

What is your brand’s grade on the sparkle scale?