Author Archives: Nick Westergaard

Previously I’ve noted the importance of decking your brand’s halls for the holidays and establishing rituals as a means of building stronger connections with your customers and community. A great example of both is Nordstrom. Holiday decor in department stores … Read More →

Setting up a Facebook Page for your brand is deceptively easy. In just a few clicks you can have an outpost on the world’s largest social network of over 800 million users — a population big enough to be the … Read More →

It’s the most wonderful time of the year. To the perplexity of many, retail brands across the country have been decking their halls since just before Halloween. Holiday decor has become so ubiquitous that Nordstrom’s actually makes headlines by declaring … Read More →

It happened again. One of those defining moments where we’re reminded why it’s important to be brand-driven. High-end yoga apparel maker Lululemon is enduring a storm of controversy from fans for selling Ayn Rand’s book, Atlas Shrugged in their retail … Read More →

As regular readers of this blog can attest, I like to talk about what I call Brand-Driven Communities. This is a phrase I use to describe that audience of rabid fans that you can build around your brand that is … Read More →

If there’s a downside to the rise of social media it’s our increased ability to ‘pile on’ creative work. We all talk about the increase in connections and conversations but we forget to caution against the risk of increased negativity … Read More →

I’m not a perfect blogger by any means. In fact, I’m writing this because of my experiences quitting blogging through the years. I started my blog about branding and new media in 2005 but have wandered on and off the … Read More →

WARNING: What follows could be classified as something of a rant. I’ve cautioned against blind adherence to the social media rules before. I’ve always said that rules are a beginning to a social media plan but may not always be … Read More →

Remember after the Prisoner of Azkaban, when the Harry Potter books got fat? I thought about this recently as I read the latest from Seth Godin, We Are All Weird. Remember when Seth’s books shrunk? In a bit of literary … Read More →

If you’re like me you’ve probably seen a wide array of responses to Google’s new social network, Google+. What would I do with another social network? I haven’t logged into Google Plus in days/weeks. I am abandoning Facebook for Google+ … Read More →