Consumers are not just looking for value, they are looking for inestimable value, an entity within your proposition that will enhance their lives in some format or other, this may sound a bit flouncy, but this is where challenger brands can really come into there own.

Challenger brands are about finding an alternative value or proposition within the category, look at method their entire category (cleaning products) was saturated with “kills 99% of bad bacteria” esk advertising. Eric Ryan (founder of method) understood it would be next to impossible to compete against the leaders with their massive budgets so had to find a way to connect to his audience. He chose to look at the high involvement relationship you have with your home, and how there is a huge consumer trend to make your house more beautiful, both very emotive in their nature. From this method developed a product that had far more naturally derived values, both in look and the product itself. They have also marketed the company using a word-of-mouth philosophy, this may have less of a mass impact but has also helped generate the love and loyalty for the brand.

Having the foresight to create a products that consumer’s love, method has set itself aside from the saturated market place and has seen staggering growth, triple digit in some constituent categories.

If Challengers can find the Love they’re onto a winning recipe.

www.bethehurricane.com – The Challenger Brand Agency (and my employers)

If you follow me on twitter @brandjoe you may notice that I fairly regularly post a “What I’m reading:” tweet (above), I thought I’d share with you how I do this, I took about 5 mins to set up and it means it’s nice and automated. Plus you won’t have to think about tweeting too often, it also means that my followers are getting some form a value from me, rather than just tweeting inane BS, that noboby has any interest in.

So here’s how to do it, firstly you’ll need a Google Reader account and a Twitterfeed account. Once you have these go to your Google Reader and the settings and click on the “Folders and Tags” tab, now set “your starred items” to public as shown below.

Now “view public page” and you will be able to access and copy the RSS link from that page.  Access your twitterfeed account and set it up so that your starred RSS feed pushes to your twitter account.

It’s best to select the “Advanced Settings” (see below) when creating your feed and I personally choose to only push 3 tweets every hour (anymore I think people just get annoyed). Also you may add a prefix and suffix to each tweet my prefix’s are “What I’m reading:” (from Google Reader) and “Worth a Read:” (from My Blog)

I use suffix hash tags:

#fb – this pushes my blog only tweets to my facebook status using the “selective twitter status” app in facebook

#in – pushes the tweets to linkedin (reader starred items) which you can set up in the linkedin profile settings

So that’s it your all set up to go, now google reader does provide it’s own method to share posts, but this is not nearly as simple and streamlined as my method (well at least I don’t think so).

So all that’s left to do is test it, simply star an item that you have read or you think will be of interest to your audience and then watch it automatically appear in your status streams. An Example Below:

Hope you All have a Great Christmas and NewYear!

Sites mentioned:
www.bethehurricane.com – marketing communications agency and my new employers
www.palmhills.co.uk – boutique hotel in Ascot
www.carolinesandry.com – personal trainer to the stars, author and presenter
www.recruitmentrevolution.com – recruitment the smart way
www.brandjoe.com – me
www.ustream.tv/channel/brandjoe – my new streaming show full of interestingness goes live in 2010

Other props must go out to:
www.strikedesigns.co.uk – my old design company – cool guys always worth tapping up whatever design project you may have.
www.foxycakes.co.uk – my wifes new employers and damn nice cakes – trust me

I will start producing more content in the NEW YEAR so watch this space – it’ll starting filling up quickly ;-)

BrandJoe (soon to be HurricaneJoe)

Hi Guys….. yes that’s right, I’m writing to tell you that I’m growing a moustache in the month of November (better known as Movember) for a charity called SSCD (The Southern Ski Club for the Disabled), which teach disabled how to ski at local dry ski slopes and then take them away annually on a ski trip – like all charities they need money so any donations would be greatly appreciated.

As if growing a moustache and looking like an idiot (ok more of an idiot than normal) for a month is not enough, I’m also doing a 12 hour ski-a-thon at the end of the month, that’s right skiing for 12 hours straight at a local dry ski slope (well may have to stop for the odd toilet break but that’s it!!)

So please please make a donation today, to help me raise as much money as possible for this great charity. To find out more about the SSCD just visit the site

DONATE VIA PAYPAL IT’S EASY!

or contact me and i’ll give you details of how you can pay me by cheque or cash

Oh and i’ll be posting photo’s on my twitter, facebook and flickr account so you can see the progress

I will be writing a good long case study about this site shortly, but thought I was worth me posting something up now.

Included full interface design for both client admin areas and brand site. Love to know what you think of the new site, your feedback would be much appreciated.