Internet is viewed as the new media brands should invest in. Just take a look at the amonts of advertising that are invested right now … and it’s supposed to triple in the next 2 years !!!

What a progress ! Great opportunities lie ahead of us. But we all know that progress does’nt come without changes. And the people who will be able to forecast these changes will have the keys to great business opportunities.

Here’s one forecast that I think is crucial in understanding what advertisement can be in the next 10 years: internet is not a media, it’s a tool. WE ARE THE NEW MEDIA.

Indeed, through the community networks, we see that information, content in all its forms (audio, texte, video, …), is spread throughout the web at an incredible speed through community networks.

We’ve seen the power of website like digg, technorati, in filtering and spreading information, and we still need these amazing sites to give some order to so much content on the web. But with the arrival of blogs and now social networks, I get more information from my friends (I hate this word because I have friends which I don’t even know … what a paradoxe!) than from my favorite sites (actually, I just read the content coming from my friends first…and that takes already a lot of time).

As said before in my article “Why brands need Brandinity?”, if I tell you I love your brand, I probably will tell my friends (the real ones this time) that I love your Brand.

Now, what if I were to tell ALL my friends (the real ones and the ones I’ve got through my social networks) that I love your Brand ? Would’nt that be the best advertisement possible for a Brand ?

Once this is said, all we have to think about is : what is the best vehicle to give to people like me, that has a brand message, and that I’m able to pass to all my friends ?

The answer is obvious : widgets, gadgets, applications, …

Where can we give/get these widgets ? On websites such as Facebook, Myspace, igoogle, Yahoo widgets, or directly on widget plateforms such as clearspring, widgetbox or Rock you ? Certainly not, it takes too long to browse through 15 000 widgets on Facebook because once again, it’s not the widget that I’m looking for rather than the content and the brand giving the content.

That’s what we’re doing on Brandinity. Tell your favorite brands you love her … we’re giving them the plateform to address you with the content (widgets) you’re craving for.

Talk to you soon, cheers,

Alexandre M

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Like I said, I’m going to give U some inside news on the Brandinity.com website and today, I’ll start with a simple one :

It all starts with your BRAND DNA (your Brandinity)

Définition: Your Brandinity is your Brand DNA, meaning a list of brands that represent you, your tastes, your habits, the way you look, what you eat, what music you listen to, …. you get the picture, don’t you!?!

Your Brandinity is presented as your list of Brand logos. This step is the starting point to access to information on and about your favorite brands.

Your Brandinity serves as an ID on the site.

• With it, every one is able to connect immediatly with anyone else having a “Brand Likeness” similar (or close enough since you’ll be able to determine the exact % of brand likeness you wish to compare to). The simple idea being: people with same taste are easier to make friends with.
• With it, you access to and ONLY to your brand’s pages.
• With it, you are able to get your favorite brand’s widget.

At the end of the day, the more people have taken a brand in their Brandinity, the bigger the brand community is. And the bigger the brand community is, the more chances the brand itself will want to interact with you and release specific content for you. Finally, the bigger the community, the bigger the noise you’re able to make on the net.

That’s what we want ! We want to make enough noise on internet on the brands we love so that the brand hears us… and gives us information, goodies, exclusivities, news, coupons, etc …

To do that, we’re going to give you a buzzmeter that you’ll have to bring to high levels of buzz. Stay tuned, I’ll give you some inside news on the buzzmeter later on.

Here’s my Brandinity, check it out if you want to know me better !

My Brandinity

More inside news about Brandinity very soon …

Got some ideas for Brandinity on this subject, go ahead, this blog is for U !!!

Here are some definitions of a brand:

“The intangible sum of a product’s attributes: its name, packaging, and price, its history, its reputation, and the way it’s advertised.” Ad agency founder David Ogilvy

“Simply put, a brand is a promise. By identifying and authenticating a product or service it delivers a pledge of satisfaction and quality.” Walter Landor, one of the greatest of the advertising industry

“A name, sign or symbol used to identify items or services of the seller(s) and to differentiate them from goods of competitors” Dictionary of Business and Management

“A trademark or distinctive name identifying a product or a manufacturer” another dictionary

There are many other definitions and I will not develop this subject and talk about brand equity, brand extension, branding, mix, etc … Others have done it many times and much better than I.

I fancy the brand definition found on wikipedia because it points out the essence of a brand as well as its value : the customers, clients, brand lovers, … in other words “us”.

“Brands were originally developed as labels of ownership: name, term, design, symbol. However, today it is what they do for people that matters much more, how they reflect and engage them, how they define their aspiration and enable them to do more. Powerful brands can drive success in competitive and financial markets, and indeed become the organisation’s most valuable assets.”

I have the feeling that a brand and me is an indivisible “whole”. Actually, I think that we are the brands we use, drink or drive ; that WE build the brands rather than locked up marketers in their shinny office building.

I even beleive than I’M A BRAND! (actors and actress are, even Paris Hilton is !!!!)

For this reason, Brandinity will place everyone of us at the same level as all these brands that we like.

And at the end of the day, I hope that I’ll be able to have my car (whatever it’s brand) co-branded with my brand (name) : here comes the NEW Alex-BMW !!!

Cheers, talk to U soon.