The Credibility Branding Blog

Identifying and Leveraging The Points of Crediblity

 

Companies must work to identify the credibility criteria and ensure that these are incorporated into messaging directed to press, analysts, influencers, and customers. The criteria for success are illustrated by The Credibility Pyramid. (I have had several conversations about his concept recently so revising an older post.)

 

Each level of the pyramid is a factor in the perception of credibility and potentially a point of competitive differentiation. Each of these criteria for success is used by editors and analysts, influencers and customers (consciously or not) to determine the validity of a company and its products. Word-of-mouth credibility often starts here. If the foundational perception is continually validated through each level of the pyramid, word-of-mouth credibility soon follows. This model encourages a closer look inward to identify the areas where the company needs to reinforce its standing and authority.

 

This does not mean manufacturing “spin” but employing a business strategy that enables the company to “be” credible, not “do” credible. This process becomes the starting point for market acceptance and ultimately generates the kind of awareness that influences market perception and acceptance.

 

When an influencer, analyst, media representative, or venture capital firm is auditing a company, these two core areas (management team and a great product) are the first things they will review, and it is important to have these pieces in place and to have messaging that accurately describes this important information. Oftentimes a company in the early stages of its lifecycle will not place enough importance on these foundational points of credibility. For example, the product may be amazing, but the company executives may not have taken the time to identify the deeper market opportunities or to offer information that expresses the clear benefits and return on investment customers will experience. They may not have clearly articulated the market need; even if the market need may be obvious to the founders, it may not be to the investors, the press, or the influencers you want to attract.

 

Next on the pyramid is identifying key customers and high-profile partners who can attest to the strengths of the company and its products. These are two crucial criteria for gaining credibility within the press and analyst communities and customers for that matter. If customers like IBM or Coke are saying yes to your product in the corporate world, or well-known influencers like celebrities or industry experts are saying yes in the consumer world, then new customers will say yes and say yes much faster.

 

Sometimes you might be in a position to pursue or choose the “right” customer, let me give you an example of what that means. I was working with two clients that offered complex technology solutions. We were charged with generating press articles for them to increase the credibility factor and attract customers. One company had done very well with sales and garnered a decent volume of customers. The other had one customer. Now, who do you think got the most press coverage? You would think it would be the one that had a volume of customers, right? It would make sense that more people were buying from that company, so it would seem to be more successful and thus have more credibility. In fact, the client with one customer received the most press articles. That was because that company had a board of directors that had industry luminaries on it, it brought in a CEO who was well known in the industry, and its one customer was one of the top 10 brand names in the world. Having this well-known customer added tremendous credibility. “If that brand-name company will buy it then it must be good” is the thinking in the market.

 

The top of the pyramid —the unique market trends—is a little harder to control, so it is almost more important to manage. Doing homework and identifying the trends that are unique to the sector, is an important tactic for credibility PR. A focal point is identifying what competitors are doing, not from a feature/benefit standpoint but from a perception analysis. For example how are they positioning themselves through their press releases and publicity programs? How is the editorial community covering these companies, are they buying the spin or not? (See post “Market Research – Moving Beyond the Calculator --and a case for Credibility Branding” for additional details) From this market intelligence identifying how to position the company within this landscape is an easier more comprehensive exercise.

 

Credibility Pyramid tool to identify the holes in your company’s credibility criteria. Leverage these points of credibility wherever possible to capture the imagination of new customers, impress the influencers, and overcome the objections of the skeptics. By using this model and establishing more credibility for your company and products, you will see a marked change in the speed of sales. You will have the tools at hand to allow your sales team to convert sales faster –credibility (AKA trust established through influencer endorsements) is often the factor that closes the sale.

This is part of the Crediblity Branding model, you can learn more about influencing the influencers with a new CD (FREE) that you can access at: www.brandperceptionaudit.com.

 

Does Advertising Still Work

When done right advertising is still an important marketing tool and still works, especially according to a recent study done by MediaWeek. They key is however to have lots of money. If you don't have that, there are all kinds of alternatives, but this is interesting to review and remember (from 5 Blogs Before Lunch quoting from a MediaWeek article)...

Strong Correlation Between Ad Spending and Buzz Generated in the Blogosphere

Here's more proof that integrated advertising works. Since the dawn of advertising, multi-media campaigns (television, radio, newspaper, magazines, and now online and buzz marketing) have shown the best results for advertisers.

Now, a new study reports that for new brands, there is a strong correlation between ad spending and buzz generated in the blogosphere.

A report by Nielsen BuzzMetrics and Nielsen's BASES research division shows that traditional advertising and online word-of-mouth are very closely connected. After analyzing 80 consumer packaged goods brands launched in 2005 and 2006, Nielsen found that the top 10% of products with the most buzz spent on average about four times as much on advertising than those in the bottom 50%.

From Mediaweek:

Among 80 consumer packaged goods brands launched in 2005 and 2006 that Nielsen studied, the top 10 percent of products with the most buzz spend nearly $20 million in advertising. In contrast, the products that accounted for the bottom 50 percent of buzz generated spent roughly $5 million, or a quarter of what the most buzz-generating brands spent.

However, ad spending is not the only factor in play, found the report, as certain brands simply lend themselves to more buzz. Just 10 percent of the brands studied accounted for 85 percent of total buzz generated, indicating that select brands drove more than their share of interest. Nielsen said it discovered that over the counter drug brands - given consumers' high involvment with them - along with brands with edgy image drove a disproportionate amount of buzz.

“Most CPG products are everyday items, lacking in distinction and therefore propensity for buzz,” said Kate Neiderhoffer, director of methodology, Nielsen BuzzMetrics. “However, there are some exceptions to the rule, as evidenced by brands like Red Bull, Altoids, Crystal Pepsi and Viagra. The CPG industry should challenge itself to bring more innovative products to market, cultivated with more innovative marketing. The buzz will follow.”

Here's more proof that integrated advertising works. Since the dawn of advertising, multi-media campaigns (television, radio, newspaper, magazines, and now online and buzz marketing) have shown the best results for advertisers.

Now, a new study reports that for new brands, there is a strong correlation between ad spending and buzz generated in the blogosphere.

A report by Nielsen BuzzMetrics and Nielsen's BASES research division shows that traditional advertising and online word-of-mouth are very closely connected. After analyzing 80 consumer packaged goods brands launched in 2005 and 2006, Nielsen found that the top 10% of products with the most buzz spent on average about four times as much on advertising than those in the bottom 50%.

From Mediaweek:

Among 80 consumer packaged goods brands launched in 2005 and 2006 that Nielsen studied, the top 10 percent of products with the most buzz spend nearly $20 million in advertising. In contrast, the products that accounted for the bottom 50 percent of buzz generated spent roughly $5 million, or a quarter of what the most buzz-generating brands spent.

However, ad spending is not the only factor in play, found the report, as certain brands simply lend themselves to more buzz. Just 10 percent of the brands studied accounted for 85 percent of total buzz generated, indicating that select brands drove more than their share of interest. Nielsen said it discovered that over the counter drug brands - given consumers' high involvment with them - along with brands with edgy image drove a disproportionate amount of buzz.

“Most CPG products are everyday items, lacking in distinction and therefore propensity for buzz,” said Kate Neiderhoffer, director of methodology, Nielsen BuzzMetrics. “However, there are some exceptions to the rule, as evidenced by brands like Red Bull, Altoids, Crystal Pepsi and Viagra. The CPG industry should challenge itself to bring more innovative products to market, cultivated with more innovative marketing. The buzz will follow.”

Discovering What & Who Your Ideal Client/Customer Is

I am a huge fan of Eric Albertson, the advice in his newsletters are spot on and his professionalism is beyond measure. With that I am posting his most recent newsletter verbatim, and check out the info at the end for his workshop it is worth looking into (No affiliate programs here just admiration)! This pretty much covers the steps, there  is a depth of strategy that is behind this and could be applied a bit more, but this sums it up nicely.

Success Tips Newsletter - In this issue: Case study: question from a reader

by Eric Albertson www.SucceedingInBusiness.com   

The question:

I'd like to talk with you this week about the profile of my ideal client. Until I took your Marketing Fast Track class, I would have said, everybody with more than 5 staff can use our services, therefore everyone is a target, right?

My guess is: "Wrong." 

I would like to clear this up and set up my elevator speech as clearly as possible.  I am the guy who sets all the appointments for my firm; everyone is counting on me for sales appointments.

I know that I need to narrow my target market and tighten up my message but I am not clear on the best way to do this. Today I rely heavily on cold calling, seminars and networking to create leads. It is lots of work for relatively few leads and fewer sales.

The website we have is a shambles, it creates no leads. We do quite well out of referrals but considering we have a 500+ client base I am sure we could do a bit better.

What steps do I need to take to quickly get into action and get better results?

Eric's Response

First, I would figure out some basic characteristics of who has purchased from your firm in the past (industry, turnover a.k.a. annual revenue, what they bought, how long they have been a customer, etc) and chart that out.

Consider the fictional example:

• 80 percent of our buyers come from four types of      businesses:
       1. Import/export firms
       2.  Freight forwarders
       3.  Drayage operations
       4.  Port storage operators
• They average 200 employees per firm
• They are usually 20+ years old
• They have at least $10 million in annual revenues
• They are all on the East Coast
• They are all growing slower than the rest of their      industry

Describe your top three ideal clients, according to what the customer data suggests:

Example

East Coast import-export firms, averaging at least $10 million per year in revenue, who are struggling to grow as fast as the rest of their industry.

Next, build a list of everyone who looks like your ideal clients. The library is a great place to start. Get as many on the list as you can.

Next, I would take a quick inventory of the testimonials and stories you have from your ideal clients. If you don't have two to five testimonials and two or more stories for each ideal client, get more as soon as possible.

Inventory the top three problems your company addressed for each ideal customer and the top three aspirations or goals each had.

Now list the outcomes each ideal customer sought when engaging your firm, and the results they got. (They did keep buying didn't they?) For example:

· Wanted to grow faster than our industry

· Reduce our turnover

· Increase our net margin

· And so on.

Next, build an inventory of 15 - 25 benefits you offer each member of your ideal customer set.

Now create two to five statements that make the case for why your firm is able to address these needs and aspirations. These can be very simple, such as:

"We have been delivering great results to global importers for more than 20 years." Follow this with a quote.

Now make a brief statement that describes the process you follow to deliver the results.

Finally, jot down two or three next steps you want the client to take (e.g., read this, call me, set an appointment, etc).

Your elevator speech or audio logo will consist of the following:

"We help ____________________________(ideal customer targets #1), who are struggling with _____________________________(ideal customer targets #1 typical problem).

When they say, "Tell me more," you've reached first base.

Now you simply repeat the audio logo again and say, "We helped them get ______________________________ (ideal customer target #1 desired outcome)".

Perhaps a brief story will help.

Some of the benefits customers report getting are: _______________________________________________

People come to us because: ______________________________________ (List your points of credibility.)

May I suggest _________________________________________ (call to action appropriate to your base location on Marketing Ball).

The process above will give you a great start for your elevator speech and audio logo. And it will be your foundation for a web site that converts.

Next, we want to put a lead source on all 500 of your clients, so we have a clear idea of which marketing efforts have been working in the past. That way we can be careful to not stop doing the things that have worked.

After that, we take all the businesses in your funnel and put them in one of the following buckets:

· Strangers

· Affiliation

· Attention (a.k.a. "Tell me more.")

· Familiarity

· Information

· Experience

This is not the whole fix, but it's a powerful start to getting out of the business of cold-calling, and working too hard for too little.

If going into depth with something like this is of interest to you and would help you get more business, you can register for the Marketing Fast Track class starting TOMORROW, July 10^th at 12 noon, Pacific Daylight Time. Each session is recorded so that, if you have to miss a session for vacation or an impromptu golf date, you can still get the value and stay on track.

I have only two spots still open, so register fast if you think this will help you get out of the cold-calling business. Our next class won't start until September or October. Register NOW !

Blogging, List Building and Brand Building

If you are an entrepreneur or even if you are a larger company, having a good qualified opt-in list is increasingly becoming a foundational marketing program. For those focused more on online sales it is your lifeblood. There are a lot of people out there discussing how to build a list, here are a few things I have learned using some of the obvious and also incorporating more strategies using my credibility branding model.

Blogging:

Blogging is a great way to establish your brand by using content to establish expertise and personality. I call it a networking and branding building platform. Your web site is a brochure, your blog is you own personal magazine that can illustrate your point and show what you know.  The networking part is leveraging the power of your voice and the audience you are building to improve your relationship with influencers who by association can improve your brand. Here are a few hints to do that:

• Re-post articles of those you want endorsements from or influencers you would like to form relationships with and tell them you reposted one of their works
• Do a review of these same people content and blogs and ;et them know you did so
• Ask readers to join your email list / blogger list

Blogging is a great way to drive a new audience to your newsletter list, if they like your blog they want more.

Squeeze pages and Bonus Gifts:

Squeeze pages are designed to build your list; you give away free stuff on the squeeze page in exchange for an email address. I recently created one for my credibility branding audit (you can check out here). You can use is as a broader strategy; start with a squeeze page to build a qualified list for a specific product. Then offer a phased approach of phased products to that audience.

Try out social networking sites

There are a number of social networking site that will drive traffic and if done right can drive the right traffic to create new subscribers, here are a couple:

• List Bandit - List building networks; one I recently cam across is List Bandit. It is a group of like mined individuals building lists on top of each other, it is worth signing up and trying it. It is a little confusing to start but you get a series of emails that start to walk you through how it works. Also a hint… at the beginning they offer you a special deal that only comes up at the time of signing up they are right and it is a good deal if you can afford it.
• Stumbleupon is a downloadable toolbar that embeds into your browser and gives you the      chance to surf through thousands of excellent pages that have been stumbled upon by other web-users. You can drive traffic by telling the right audience about something that is relevant to them (maybe your blog).
• Del.icio.us is a place to store your bookmarks in one place, bookmark things for yourself and friends and check out what other people are bookmarking. The key is to drive people to your bookmarks      and also get onto other peoples lists. This is another one of those credibility branding things, if you can get on an influencers list it drives traffic and builds your credibility by association.
• Twitter a mini blog based on only 40 characters per post based on the premise “what are you doing” build a following here too.
• Squidoo build a page about your passions create a specific lens of your product here is mine. You      can also start you own groups, I started one that is starting to slowly build.
• MyBlogLog, one of my favorites this is a blogging networking community. Bloggers are      influencers and are ahead of the curve, MyBlogLog allows you to meet and interact with fellow bloggers. A great site where you meat great professional friends that are doing the same thing as you. I have gotten many newsletter subscribers from here and fans and I have become fans of      some pretty awesome people.
• There are a lot more… please leave comments with ones you have found to work and how they work.

Pop Ups

The days of pop ups are waning, however apparently they still work. The key is to have it pop up at the end of their stay as they are clicking away and offer a gift to incent them giving their email.

Bottom line with all of this is to go after the audiences that make sense for your product don’t get an email address just to get an email address. Use these practices to drive a pre-qualified audience to you products. Use them to further establish your credibility and to get those points of credibility across in your messaging. Be careful not to get distracted by these tactics by doing too much of this and not running your business.

Direct Mail Might Just Work Better

While email is the marketing vehicle of choice for many there is still room in your repertoire for direct mail. In fact the following article out of Media Post Media Research Center validated this (see below or click here to go to the source).

Email has become an art form… getting the right subject line will entice readers to open it, having the right copy in the email body that will drive traffic. But email is perceived as a very personal thing, and anything that you send that is remotely considered spam is dangerous to your brand. I think we are becoming too reliant on email, it is cheap and easy which makes it so ubiquitous, but that is also why it is becoming such a coveted place and a tactic we need to be careful with.

The following article really offers another reason to reinvestigate direct mail as a viable option to support you marketing goals.

DM Mail More Likely to be Opened Than Unsolicited Email

A recent survey by International Communications Research, commissioned by Pitney Bowes found that 73 percent of consumers prefer mail for receiving new product announcements or offers from companies they do business with, as compared to 18 percent for e-mail. Mail was also preferred by 70 percent of respondents for receiving unsolicited information on products and services from companies with which they are not currently doing business.

For confidential communications such as bills, bank statements and financial reports, 86 percent of respondents preferred mail as their channel of choice, as compared with 10 percent for e-mail, identical to the response in the 2004 survey, which also showed consumer preference for mail at 86 percent.

Stacy DeWalt, vice president, Vertical Market Development and Marketing, Pitney Bowes Management Services, said "The research... shows that consumers still prefer mail over e-mail... we continue to find that mail is the most effective marketing tool businesses can use when communicating with their customers."

The survey also found that 31 percent of consumers are less likely to discard unopened mail, including new product brochures, catalogs or other advertising materials, while 53.2 percent are likely to discard unsolicited e-mails about new products.

"In an environment crowded with marketing messages, it's important for marketers to utilize the most effective mailstream tools available," said Jeff Marshall, vice president of customer marketing for Pitney Bowes Global Mailstream Solutions. "While mail is the preferred vehicle for reaching consumers, businesses and organizations need to remember that it is critical to target consumers with relevant messages at appropriate times to get a meaningful return-on-investment."

Specific advantages consumers see in mail versus unsolicited e-mail and telephone calls, according to the report, compared with other communications channels, survey respondents found mail to be:

· Less intrusive... doesn't interrupt other activities (45.3 percent)

· More convenient... can be saved and considered at leisure (40.2 percent)

· Less high-pressured... lets you consider your decision (30.2 percent)

· More descriptive... lets you picture the offer (22.7 percent)

· More persuasive... encourages you to respond (12 percent)

What Venture Capital Wants – Credibility Branding and Marketing

I apologize for my absence… I have been working a couple of big projects of late and attending some conferences. I recently attended the OCTANe VC conference in Orange County and thought you might appreciate some for the insights I garnered. I attended several panels for those looking for funding presenting to a panel of VCs looking for hot new investments.

Here were some of the more relevant and general take aways:

• Most companies fail not because they don’t have a great vision but because of lousy execution
• Passion and vision is not enough you must deliver
  • Deliver on the promise
  • Deliver an actual product (and on time)
  • Deliver to the market need
  • Deliver on a specific pain the market is feeling
• There should not be an obvious storm of competition in the market in the near term
  • Early to market wins
  • New ideas not a “me too” product
  • Even if it is the best new widget, if it is in a pool of many similar widgets it is to hard to differentiate (and get funding)
• Must have a demonstrable team
• Customers that have signed up to the concept

Many of the VCs mentioned that they don’t even call the references you provide—they know they will be positive. Instead they go to potential clients (not on your list) and ask their thoughts. So do your due diligence, and do the same; go outside of your normal references and ask potential customers what they think (especially those you know that the VC you are working with might have hooks into). Find out what they might say and address those objections in advance.

I am putting together a series of VC panels at an upcoming conference in Santa Clara. The Flash Memory Summit VC Sessions are occurring August 7^th. If you are in the flash memory space and are looking for funding you can sign up to participate. We are also offering and open invitation to VC looking for companies in that sector to join one of our panels. There are three early morning, afternoon and late afternoon. Just send me an email and your credentials and I will get you on board.

I will be back on Tuesday with a more regular posting schedule. 

The You In Your Brand

There is always an aspect of you in your brand and in your business process. Who you attract to you business as a partner customer or employee is a reflection of you. Look around your business right now. Take look at your employees and customers. What do they tell you about the personality of your brand? Are they empowered, are they needy, are they intelligent are they followers are they entrepreneurial? There is no judgment but there is insight here.

These constituents can tell you more about who and what your company is right now than just about ay other intelligence you can gather. Now do the same investigation of your competitor. Do they have a clientele and employee base that feels like it is more in alignment with your brand than your current constituents? Perhaps it is time to take a closer look at why that might be happening. How is your personal showing up in you company? Where can you be more authentic as a manager, partner and brand?

Is It Time To Go To The Next Level?

What tools are available to take your business to the next level? There are two in this post to explore…

I just finished a branding audit for Carolyn McCormick, and what is so great about this consulting process is hearing directly from customers their experience of my client’s products and services. The customers know better than you ever will how great (or not so great) your product is. The branding audit process get’s you that feedback and additional insights into what your customers are looking for. If you are interested in this process check out the overview of the different services I offer.

 

For example in the case of Carolyn what we discovered was not necessarily surprising but it confirmed many things. Now we are able to use the descriptors her customers offered to explain her services. When a company uses these dialogues to add this customer generated content to their messaging there is a new authenticity and trust tone that is added, and new sense of crediblity. It is a subtle but powerful.

I want to bring up Carolyn specifically because she is offering an upcoming business boot camp in mid June that is not to be missed. If you are an author or a speaker or trainer (or and aspiring one), she will walk you through the step-by-step process she has spent the last 20-years developing working for the biggest names in the industry. She worked with Tony Robbins for 8 years and has also worked on the inside with Mark Victor Hansen, Bob Procter and John Gray among many other luminaries. She has been there and done it, and is now passing along this insider knowledge to the rest of us… trust me, I will be there!

Carolyn is the “Tiffanies” of the coaching world. She is a business and life strategist who works with those that are truly committed to taking their businesses to the next level of influence, relevance and revenues. There really is no one on the planet that has her depth and breadth of expertise creating programs and business models for the greatest minds in speaking and training.

So… the other thing that happens when I do these branding audits (with the really good companies) is I am hooked and become a loyal customer in the process.

Two things to do today… consider attending Carolyn’s Business Boot Camp, and pursuing a brand audit. PS... If you mentioned I sent you you might get a price break!

Ok that was my commercial for the month <grin>.

Does Your Product Rotate?

I love finding the marketing meaning in something as simple as; sales changes if deserts rotate or not. Nathan Detroit bet on the type of deserts that where eaten in the musical Guys and Dolls. This particular Nathan is Nathan Dintenfass of The Venture Geek Blog who wrote about this in his March post. There is a fascination with deserts in just about all cultures… what can you add to your product and service that is the sweetener, the desert, to close the deal?

I think what this post also speaks to (beyond focusing on the details as Nathan lays out) is; what is the marketing opportunity. Where in your business is the “non-rotating desert” and how can you rotate it so more is visible to more of your customers? How can you display your products and services in the most appealing way (i.e. benefit statements; how you can change their lives) directed to the most number of relevant customers.

Thanks Nathan for getting us to consider things more carefully with this elegant analogy.

The Rotating Dessert Issue

March 31st, 2007 by Nathan Dintenfass - The Venture Geek Blog

I enjoy listening to This American Life. I don’t often get to it on a Saturday afternoon (when it’s on my local public radio station), but today I happened to catch it. It was all about the people who come in and out of a diner called The Golden Apple in Chicago over a 24-hour period. But, that’s not what this post is about.

No, this post is about rotating desserts. You see, on the day the This American Life crew was in the Golden Apple the dessert case that would normally be spinning desserts around and around was broken. You know, the kind of thing that looks like this:

So, yeah, it was broken — the desserts weren’t spinning. When the desserts weren’t spinning the Golden Apple sold 50% fewer desserts. Think about that for a moment. Take stationary desserts and start them rotating slowly and double your sales.

Why do I care about desserts, rotating or otherwise?

Because this is such a great lesson in why details matter. They matter in retail environments, and they matter in software — and from now on I think I will always think of that as “The Rotating Dessert Issue”. When I used to build custom web applications for a living we were constantly faced with clients looking at the “buy vs. build” decision. One of our strongest pitches was that off-the-shelf systems may get most of it right, but it’s the details that really end up mattering. Now, of course we had a vested interest in taking that stance, and there are plenty of good arguments against building custom software in many situations, but it doesn’t change the fact that details matter.

Click here to go to the source of this post.

G Cred, Social Media and Credibility Branding

John Follis a prolific advertising entrepreneur wrote a great article on G Cred (Google credibility) in his Art & Commerce column in Adweek (and quoted me no less).

This story is about Google as an increasingly important point of credibility.

The path to being included in the article is also part of the social media world and my credibility branding model. I found John’s blog The Follis Report through the great blogging social networking site MyBlogLog. I read his article which I re-posted on the Credibility Branding Blog in March, then let John know about it. He contacted me and we had several discussions about his G Cred theory. I offered a quote for an article he was writing and he was eventually able to use it here.

See, this stuff works J

Here is the article from Adweek; John offers an important marketing consideration…

Art & Commerce: Do We Have G Cred?
May 21, 2007
By John Follis

In this hype-happy, what-to-believe world, it comes down to a very basic, fundamental thing: credibility. How does one get it? How does one convincingly communicate it? And is there a Good Housekeeping Seal of the 21st century?

"Street cred" has been one recent barometric buzzword. Defined by the American Heritage Dictionary as "acceptability or popularity, especially among young people in urban areas," the legitimacy of street cred should not be minimized. As discussed in Malcolm Gladwell's The Tipping Point, the urban environment of street cred has been the birthplace of more than a few trends that have found their way into the mid-American mainstream. As true as that is, however, in today's high-speed cyberspace, street cred is … well … so 2005. There's a new cred in town, and it's called "G cred."

If you haven't guessed, the "G" is for Google. And while the term G cred may be new to you, it's been in the Urban Dictionary for over a year.

G cred (n.): Google credibility. What someone sees when they Google your name, business, product, organization or whatever. It's an increasingly important measure of legitimacy and how seriously someone will take you.

More than the cred of the day, G cred is the cred of the next decade. In her new book, The Credibility Factor, market communications strategist Jennifer McLean offers support for that claim: "While there are multiple forms of credibility found within a company or product, Google is playing an increasingly important role in the perception puzzle. The bottom line is: Credibility fosters trust, and Google is here to stay as a measure of that credibility."

As Google and the Web continue to mature, online visibility will equate to credibility on every level. It does now, through blogs and a myriad of social media sites that have become a respected, easily accessible and exponentially expanding source of cred. In short, word of mouth on steroids. What's important to realize in this Web 2.0 world is that G cred doesn't just apply to every business, product and organization. It also applies to every professional. And that's not a new thought. Respected marketing gurus like Tom Peters and Seth Godin have been preaching the value of building one's "personal brand" for years. Godin's Purple Cow champions the value of standing out and "being remarkable." Similarly, in The Brand You, Peters explains how career survival is not about blending in but about standing out:

"Regardless of age, position or the business we happen to be in, we need to understand the importance of branding. We are CEOs of our own companies: Me Inc. To be in business today, our most important job is to be head marketer for the brand called You."

If that was true when Peters wrote it back in 1997, just imagine how true it is today. And that means visibility online. If you do a Google search on yourself and little comes up, or it's dated, well that's not good. If you happen to be someone in the marketing communications business and that happens, you'd better hope it's not your clients who are doing the searching.

As Google continues to rattle the cages of traditional media ("Google Gooses Big Media," Time, March 16), traditional agency execs had better start focusing more attention on the online model, regardless of their success at immediately monetizing it. In less than a decade, Google has gone from $0 to $3.1 billion in after-tax profits. With that, the new reality is that "nontraditional advertising" ain't so nontraditional anymore. Regardless of who wins this latest Clash of the Media Titans, I would venture to say that no media company, or ad agency, should expect to win long term if they don't fully understand and embrace the new rules of the game.

As much as this is sounding a lot like an ad for Google, it's not meant to be. I have no business or personal ties to Google, no direct or indirect company connections and, unfortunately, no Google stock. My point is simply that, as I hear a growing number of CEOs and business owners refer to advertising as "the A word," I've come to realize that it's no longer enough for agency execs to merely know about the curve. We'd best be ahead of it.

Got G cred?

Click here to read it from the source.