It’s your baby. You’ve nurtured it with love. It’s brought you joy and kept you up during sleepless nights. Throughout its lifetime, you’ve been stretched thin trying to do it all, but you’ve charged ahead – designing, copywriting, marketing, advertising, packaging, selling – you name it, you tackled it. No one’s worked as hard as you to make your product as successful.

Here’s the rub. Looking back with a critical eye, you’ll probably find a hodge-podge of brand inconsistency in your path of all that hard work – inconsistency that can deaden your chance of landing your product on the shelves of your dream retailer. As hard as it may be, it’s time to relinquish some control and put it in the hands of an agency that can take you barreling ahead and into those venues you want to command. Here are the steps your branding firm should take to get you there.

Dial in your positioning

Great design is meaningless without a unique, ownable brand position on which to base it all. If you’ve built a loyal customer base, there’s something uniquely wonderful about your product. It simply needs to be communicated in its most pure form.

The best marketing strategists will have a proven process to extract that unique greatness from the most important people in your company and distill it into your simple, clear, compelling brand essence. All the answers are already in the minds of management. It just takes the right questions to pull them out and bring clarity to the thinking.

Insist on consistency

Moving forward, every piece of communication should be based on that simple truth you uncover. After a detailed assessment of your existing marketing materials, your branding agency may find many of the elements you’ve already created are usable in some form – especially if you’ve built a recognizable brand identity for customers. In the same regard, they may find the need for a complete overhaul. Trust in their recommendation.

There are two key reasons for absolute consistency. When you’re on the inside looking at the same messaging and visual identity day in and day out (as you’ve been doing during the development of your brand), it’s easy to tire of it and want to freshen it up all the time. Fight this urge at all cost.

While you may be bored of your message, it’s only a blip on the radar for the rest of the world. If you continue updating it, you’ll only further taint your chances of becoming a recognizable brand, and you’ll wreck the opportunity to grab the attention of the retailers you want to inhabit. The most useful service your agency can provide is to establish a voice, and a look and feel, then clearly communicate them with utter, unquestionable consistency. Ideally, the same people in the branding agency who develop the positioning should be the ones to write and design the communications, ensuring the strategy never gets watered down in execution.

The second reason for brand consistency is that the retailer of your dreams is likely a large, sophisticated player who has their positioning and branding well put together. Perfect brand uniformity will give you an automatic leg-up on other, less refined companies that come knocking on retailers’ doors. They’ll feel like they’re dealing with a major player at their own level.

Develop a succinct presentation

We’ll never understand why the single most important sales tool for a meeting – the visual presentation – is put together by an internal team. Allow your agency full freedom to create a door-opener tool and presentation that has a lasting effect. You’ll likely have one shot, either directly with the retailer or with a distributor who represents them, so do something innovative to open eyes and doors.

What should be included in the presentation? The good news is you don’t have to develop every piece of marketing communications to wow your audience – and none of it has to be real. If you’re a packaged goods company, have your agency render the packaging to look as if it’s ready for shelves – even if it doesn’t actually exist. Photoshop the product onto a shot of the retailer’s shelves to show them its attention-garnering power. Create in-store merchandising and print advertising. Show them how you’re going to drive customers to the product on their shelves. Paint a vivid visual picture.

From a nuts and bolts perspective, make sure to include an educated analysis of their current product mix and how you serve a need not currently being met. It should be easy to articulate your competitive advantages if your brand positioning was developed correctly. To fill out the presentation, you should include category trends, detailed information about your marketing strategy and a financial summary that all point toward embracing your product. Whet the appetite and you’ll get in the door.

Over the past few years, thousands of brands from the miniature to the mighty have sponsored campaigns featuring user-generated content (UGC). Why do some fly while others flop? It’s not about the money they spend. It’s about using three proven strategies to ensure a big return, no matter what your marketing investment.

1 – Target the diehards

Don’t expect everyone who sees your invitation to join in. Let the 1% Rule guide you. Referenced in several studies of online communities including Yahoo, the Wiki projects by Comscore and others, the phenomenon shows only 1% of a community typically contributes content to that community – the rest act as bystanders.

When you stop to think, aren’t the diehards the ones you want contributing to the campaign anyway? They’re the most passionate about your brand and the most predisposed to helping you create something wonderful and memorable. If you’re collecting email addresses through your website, that’s a great place to start building a list of fanatics to target.

2 – Get them to put skin in and reward them

People are busy and you’re asking them to go out of their way to make your brand look good. The first trick here is to prevent them from backing out of giving you what you want – inspired user-generated content. Ask people to commit to your advertising campaign verbally, communicate the importance of the promise they’ve made back to them, and consider producing a written list of participants’ names on your website or another public place to deepen your expectation that they come through.

Secondly, make it worth their while to play the game by rewarding them properly. While big, glossy prizes are great, some people just want their name in lights – to be acknowledged for their creativity – requiring little to no financial investment from you. Know your audience, and you’ll know what turns them on.

3 – Ask them to do what they already do well

This plays back into targeting your brand evangelists and requesting them to do something they naturally do without prompting – talk about your brand in a positive light. The final task is left up to your advertising agency to create an intriguing, buzz-gathering campaign worthy of everyone’s time and effort.

There’s an interesting movement afoot in the way savvy marketers are using their offline media to drive customers to their websites. Now that all the simple, memorable URLs are gone and companies must settle for long or confusing web addresses, smart brands are replacing their printed URL addresses on posters, print ads, TV commercials and other offline media with something new: Search boxes filled with recommended search terms.

The trend has taken hold in Japan in a big way and is beginning to trickle over into other countries, including the UK, Israel and just recently in the United States. People have become more versed in online searches, and this trend plays naturally into the way they’re seeking information on the Internet. Pay attention to how often you type a specific web address into your browser versus searching in Google, even for those sites you visit daily or weekly. Our bet is that you most often use Google to find exactly what you want.

Of course, the whole movement banks on your brand’s website being search engine optimized for the key terms you want to own – making the importance of pairing SEO with this new offline media strategy a powerful combination in increasing marketing ROI.

According to the book 50 Simple Things You Can Do To Save the Earth, Americans receive almost 4 million tons of junk mail every year. While we don’t necessarily agree with their recommendation to stop direct mail entirely (that’s how we make our living, after all), we do agree that nearly all four tons of direct mail sent out yearly is junk. The reason? It’s ineffective and, therefore, a total waste of money. Here are three widespread direct mail problems and three sure-fire ways to increase your direct mail return on investment.

Problem 1: Nearly every piece takes the same form. Postcards are cheap to print and cheap to mail, so people always send postcards, making them easily forgotten.

Solution 1: Change it up for a better response. One of the most interesting ways to keep your piece flat like a postcard but to add some bang is to use ShipShapes. This unique company worked with the post office to create durable, die-cut plastic cards that can be printed with messaging and mailed without a separate envelope or box. They’re more expensive per piece, but the response rates, and in turn your return on investment, are exceptional compared to typical postcards.

Problem 2: It never gets past the gatekeeper. Typical direct mail’s worst enemy is the gatekeeper, who could be a spouse, secretary or anyone else filtering the junk. It’s easy to spot everyday direct mail, which means it’s easy to immediately throw away – before the person you sent it to ever sets eyes on it.

Solution 2: Sneak it under the gate. Oftentimes, when our clients are interested in getting the attention of A-list prospects, we create a stealth mailing. This could take several forms – by being packaged inside a FedEx envelope, delivered by courier or disguised in a sophisticated, high-end envelope that contains no exterior messaging. Regardless of the shell around the sales piece, this is a guaranteed method to get your materials in the hand of the person you want to solicit.

Problem 3: People don’t spend time with direct mail. And more than likely, you need them to spend at least a few minutes digesting what you or your agency has spent time writing and designing.

Solution 3: Make it worthwhile for them. Develop your direct mail in concert with great writers and designers who can craft the messaging and concept so it’s sticky. Making the piece interactive (so recipients have to spend time revealing the ultimate message and are rewarded by it) and/or dimensional are great ways to heighten interest and recall.

Our formula is to break the formula with direct mail. Poke around our website to see how we did it in real life for our clients.

Great ideas die every day. Sometimes in someone’s mind. Sometimes in conversation. And at other times, really tragic times, great ideas die after millions of dollars have been spent trying to save them. It’s our contention, and if you study the landscape you’ll agree, that great marketing has the ability to save (almost) any great idea from failure. Here’s how to launch your product or service using marketing to drive success.

Partner up

Before anything else, schedule meetings with communications agencies in your region – even if your idea is still young and immature. While many agencies tout they can do anything for anyone, don’t believe it. Demand that your agency has experience in your category. If they’re well versed in launching new products, services or brands in your industry successfully, all the better. They’ll understand the landscape more intimately, speeding up thinking and saving you from free-spending with the hope of lucking out on a solution.

Get in position

After choosing an agency, push them hard to do what the good ones do best. Specifically, they should be helping you carve out a distinct niche and develop key messaging around the unique, ownable benefits of your product or service. Some people call it brand discovery or brand essence. Be willing to adapt your idea according to their recommendations, but make sure the positioning and the story they craft are head turning – with everyone who hears your pitch uttering, “Tell me more.”

Create a compelling presentation

A business plan is great, it’s a given. But your agency should turn that business plan into a presentation that’s visually and verbally stimulating. Whether you’re going for buy-in within your company or funding from an outside corporation or venture capitalists, your positioning, story and presentation will make or break the meeting.

Open the door

Getting a meeting inside your company with the right people to present your concept should be a natural. Getting meetings as an entrepreneur – meetings with people who can truly make your idea explosive – is much more difficult. A great agency will develop and recommend a list of key people you should be talking to. Additionally, they’ll get you in the door by creating a direct mail piece that slips under the gatekeeper and into the hands of someone who simply can’t say no to a meeting after seeing it.

We’ve told you what you should do to successfully launch a product or service. Poke around our website to see how we did it in real life for our clients. It all started with a great idea.

Xylem is proud to announce the launch of Corazonas.com. Don’t forget to sign up to win a free butler for a month.

We announced today an advertising campaign for Jack Link’s Beef Jerky. The animated micro-site features different scenarios where Sasquatch is ‘messed with’ through a series of winter and holiday-specific pranks. Set to a classic rendition of The 12 Days of Squatchmas, admirers of Jack Link’s long-running ‘Messin’ With Sasquatch’ campaign are treated to a fun, entertaining visual medley. After one play-through, visitors can open the animated advent calendar doors to create their own version of the holiday tune.

The effort seeks to lighten the mood during the stressful holiday season, reminding those who get hungry that they can find both health and happiness in Jack Link’s Beef Jerky. The holiday campaign breaks in mid-December – with distribution through email, Twitter, Facebook and MySpace. The work targets a male-skew, 18-35 year-old audience. Check out the micro-site to spice up your holiday season with Jack Link’s and Sasquatch.

Jack Link’s is an international beef-snack purveyor located in Minong, Wisconsin.

We are proud to announce that we have 4 of the Denver 50 spots this year for the Red Robin Customizer, Dots Lookbook Facebook application, Jimmy John’s Studio, and Chiquita.com.

Xylem Digital, Denver has just launched a fun, interactive, educational and immersive online environment for Chiquita at Chiquita.com. Chiquita sought a new site that balanced an engaging, fun and entertaining consumer experience with information critical to educating its target audiences about its array of healthy fruit offerings beyond bananas alone.

The new Chiquita.com merges the iconic Chiquita brand heritage (The Chiquita Banana Song and Miss Chiquita) with an updated web environment meant to appeal to a new demographic of fruit lovers. Unique digital elements include a karaoke application that allows users to record video via webcam, upload and share through social media portals including YouTube. The site also features a “Show Us Your Stickers” photo-sharing page that incorporates Flickr, where consumers can display their Chiquita sticker photos.

Denver, Colo. (Vocus/PRWEB ) September 22, 2009 — LeeReedy, a Denver-based innovation, brand and design consultancy, today announced its investment in Xylem Digital, one of the Rocky Mountain region’s leading digital agencies. The two companies will continue to operate separately, but will collaboratively team on all business moving forward, leveraging one another’s capabilities to service clients across categories and disciplines. Together, the two organizations boast vast creative experience in industries including consumer-packaged goods, financial, medical, technology, retail and travel.

Patrick Gill, current President of LeeReedy, will assume the role of CEO of Xylem Digital. Scott Snyder will remain a Principal and Chief Strategy Officer of Xylem Digital, and John Gilbert will continue as Xylem Digital Creative Director. Xylem clients include Chiquita, Red Robin, Jack Link’s, Fresh Express, Molson-Coors and Dots, among others. The firm specializes in full-service digital advertising strategies and campaigns, including websites, mobile, social network marketing, online media campaigns and more.

In the process of building our own interactive division, we decided it was simpler and more valuable to instead invest in a proven creative digital powerhouse. We found this in Xylem DigitalWe are very confident in the creative firepower this new partnership creates. Both LeeReedy and Xylem clients can look forward to a new level of efficiency and brand development expertise.

Clients continue to push us to integrate our offerings to better expand our reach into their businesses. Collaborating with LeeReedy will enable our common vision of seamless brand innovation, while allowing both companies to continue to flourish and better meet the needs of our respective clients “In the process of building our own interactive division, we decided it was simpler and more valuable to instead invest in a proven creative digital powerhouse. We found this in Xylem Digital,” said Patrick Gill, LeeReedy Principal and Xylem CEO.

“We are very confident in the creative firepower this new partnership creates. Both LeeReedy and Xylem clients can look forward to a new level of efficiency and brand development expertise,” added Kelly Reedy, LeeReedy Principal and Creative Director.

LeeReedy promises its philosophy will remain the same. The firm specializes in discovering the true essence of a brand, whether it’s a new brand or one that needs repositioning. Once the essence is understood, the same people who positioned the brand create the execution. There are no layers between strategy, copy and design. There’s nothing lost in translation, no matter the medium. LeeReedy’s client roster includes Atkins, The Clorox Company, Proctor & Gamble, Dr Pepper/Snapple Group, Sports Authority, Hunter Douglas and others.

“Clients continue to push us to integrate our offerings to better expand our reach into their businesses. Collaborating with LeeReedy will enable our common vision of seamless brand innovation, while allowing both companies to continue to flourish and better meet the needs of our respective clients,” said Scott Snyder, Principal of Xylem Digital.