Registration has just opened for the August edition of our successful Beg to DIFFER Brand Strategy Boot Camp – brought to you by the Ottawa Centre for Research and Innovation (OCRI) and Brandvelope Consulting. Register here at the OCRI Web site. This  boot camp is for all managers and executives with marketing, PR, or communication responsibility–whether in [...]

This morning’s Twitter outage, is only one of the many problems facing brand Twittter. Back in June, early in my Twitter career (yes, the Twitterverse is turning quickly my friends) I blogged about this – No Twitter Brand, what are YOU doing? But now that I’ve had time to think about this some more (thanks [...]

Here we go again. In June, we blogged about Pizza Hut experimenting with becoming “The Hut” (Pizza Hut drops the Pizza.. again - spoiler alert, Jabba was not pleased). Now Radio Shack, fresh off its announcement that Lance Armstrong will represent it (blog entry here), has announced that on August 6, it will be rebranding as – wait for [...]

First off, happy Canada Day to everyone!  And to Timmies, welcome back! There couldn’t be a more fitting time for such an iconic Canadian brand to return to its roots in the Great White North.  Sure, you’ve stated that your move back to Canada is for tax reasons alone, but I know the real reason, [...]

A Rant about Canadian Brands for Canada Day 2009 So you ask: “Mad at Switzerland? What could anyone possibly have against the Swiss” – those lovely Alp-ine purveyors of Rolex watches, Nestle chocolate, and fastidiously discreet banking services? Sorry Switzerland. It’s not about you. It’s about you beating the pants off Canada in the global branding [...]

Last week, Palm released the much-anticipated Pre. Hailed as the iPhone killer, the Pre is loaded with features that further push the limits of the smartphone category. Today, Apple is anticipated to release a new iPhone 3G with bumped hardware specs and new software to directly compete with the Pre. Two smartphones with near-identical hardware [...]