An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Be customer focused which leads to loyalty. Find out what your customer pain points are. Ask questions to understand better what their needs are and then begin creating strategies around the information you discover. This shows that you have gone above and beyond to serve them in a way that most brands won’t. It also communicates that you are listening to your customers and taking action to solve those problems. This helps customers feel connected to your brand.

As part of our series about how to create a trusted, believable, and beloved brand, I had the pleasure to interview Regina Lynn Jaeger.

Regina Lynn helps Brands through creating compelling visual media so that they can establish strong first impressions with consumers and be the leading expert in their field.

She is the Founder of Regina Lynn Visuals, helping brands to have representation of themselves that stands out through photography and video. After working in the luxury event space for 10 years and with various brands, Regina Lynn uses her experience to help others show up in a way where they can get past the noise and be seen. She’s worked with companies including, Martha Stewart, House of Kirschner, Origins Healthcare, and various fitness franchises.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?

Since I was a young girl, I was always fascinated with creating content. I remember playing on my Windows Movie Maker trying to create entertaining videos. It wasn’t until I went off to college and discovered how much I really enjoyed and thrived at creating stories that I decided to pursue creating content for business’s.

After graduating, I went straight into editing full time for a Non-profit organization. Creating their marketing and advertising content. I watched them more than double their growth nationally and internationally, within those 4 years of working for them. It was an unforgettable experience to play a leading role using video marketing and advertising to drive sales and build brand awareness.

Can you share a story about the funniest marketing mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

My mistakes were more created around making a grammatical errors. I happen to be one of those writers that isn’t the best speller. Fortunately, I’ve always worked with very detailed teams and organizations that catch things like that which has helped me get better.

What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?

My company is huge on making sure the details and the bigger picture are communicated effectively to the audience. We also like to make sure the client feels supported and clear through the process of working together.

Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?

I am gearing up to launch my branding department in a bigger way. I have years of experience creating digital marketing and sales content for brands and private companies. Reopening these services allows me to better serve my clients in a greater capacity.

Ok let’s now jump to the core part of our interview. In a nutshell, how would you define the difference between brand marketing (branding) and product marketing (advertising)? Can you explain?

Branding is a way of identifying your business. In essence, it’s your identity. It’s about how you show up, how customers experience your look, language, and company culture. All these elements are how your customers experience your brand. Advertising is about the promotion of a specific product or service to gain sales and attract interest. Product marketing is about the process of bringing a product to the market and knowing what message to convey and to who. You are defining the target market and value proposition in the marketplace and driving the demand and usage of the product.

Can you explain to our readers why it is important to invest resources and energy into building a brand, in addition to the general marketing and advertising efforts?

How your brand shows up matters and can ultimately impact your bottom line. By making the choice to invest your resources and energy into your brand, you are solidifying your position in the marketplace. This can lead to more sales, attracting better customers, and commanding a premium price. Strong branding boost the overall value of your company and creates a long term connection with customers.

Can you share 5 strategies that a company should be doing to build a trusted and believable brand? Please tell us a story or example for each.

  1. Get clear on what your brand identity will be and start to align your organization around those values. Allow your customers to experience your brand at every touch point. This will reinforce who your brand is and their values every time a customer comes in contact with you.
  2. Be customer focused which leads to loyalty. Find out what your customer pain points are. Ask questions to understand better what their needs are and then begin creating strategies around the information you discover. This shows that you have gone above and beyond to serve them in a way that most brands won’t. It also communicates that you are listening to your customers and taking action to solve those problems. This helps customers feel connected to your brand.
  3. Share reviews and testimonials. 74% of consumers identify word of mouth as the key influence in their purchasing decision, but only 33% of business are actively seeking out and collecting reviews (see reference below). Share what people are saying about your brand and show people experiencing your brand. This creates social proof about your company and continues to solidify the experience customers have with your brand.
  4. Show up on social media. This can sound daunting but it’s not once you understand where your customers are. This allows you to be very specific on which social media channels you show up on. You are then able to start interacting directly and building your connection to your customers via social media. This is a very powerful tool that brands can leverage in many different ways.
  5. Create content. Provide information that educates them on a problem that your brand solves. Give away tips and other information that show customers how to make informed purchasing decisions. Create content about your company culture, inviting them in to who you are as a brand. Create content that provides value. In return, this elevates your authority and expertise in your field, making you the expert.

In your opinion, what is an example of a company that has done a fantastic job building a believable and beloved brand. What specifically impresses you? What can one do to replicate that?

I think of Disney. I love how I feel every time I make a purchase from them or interact with their team members. They always go the extra mile and it shows at their theme parks and on the big screen. I appreciate how they’ve stayed relevant as the marketplace has shifted. They are very present with their customers and have mastered the art of selling through story, providing amazing customer service and an incredible brand experience. Whether we are attending a theme park or watching a movie we leave with the Disney experience.

A brand can replicate this buy honing in the brand experience they want to create for customers and fine tuning the customer service. Using story to sell products or services is also a powerful tool that helps create a more engaging and entertaining sales process. It also builds trust and rapport and positions you in the seat of influence during the buying decision. These three components executed in your company, position you to be the leading voice in your industry.

In advertising, one generally measures success by the number of sales. How does one measure the success of a brand building campaign? Is it similar, is it different?

Branding is about your brand identity. Advertising is about promoting your brand, product or service. You will measure the success of an ad campaign by your sales before, during and after the campaign. In a branding campaign you are looking to measure how much engagement the brand received. On social media platforms that’s looking at the engagement rate, impressions, likes, shares. You also want to look at the click through rate and see how many people landed on your website. This information gives you how effective your branding campaign was.

What role does social media play in your branding efforts?

Every company should be on social media. Unlike traditional marketing, social media is a way to get your brand in front of people more quickly and easier. Some of the benefits of social media include building brand awareness and conversations around your brand. Promoting and marketing your services and products, and it allows you to gather data from audience research directly from the platform. Social media will only continue to grow and is a great tool for your brand to show up and engage with prospects and current customers. It’s a great place to incorporate advertising, marketing and branding strategies to grow your brand and create long term relationships with customers. I highly recommend jumping on board and utilizing this powerful tool.

What advice would you give to other marketers or business leaders to thrive and avoid burnout?

Make a plan. Marketing, at first can sound daunting, especially to someone that isn’t a marketer, but with anything that’s new you’ve got to decide what’s best to keep in house or hire out. When hiring, take your time as you get to know the company you are considering working with. I have seen business’s hire out their marketing and see a huge drop in the brand’s engagement, following, and even have been locked out of their accounts. Get to know the company you are hiring and make sure it’s a right fit for your brand.

You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂

Show up for your brand. There are so many great brands out there that do a lot of good work that don’t get seen because they haven’t understood how to effectively market themselves. You owe it to yourself to make sure your brand is seen and people know you exist.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“Life doesn’t happen to you, it happens for you” by Tony Robbins

This is the perspective I use whenever I am working through low points in life. It reminds me how powerful I really am. Often times we can feel like because things didn’t go as planned or we didn’t have the same opportunities as others that we are powerless or we start to victimize ourselves. This quote reminds me to keep going, lean in and decide to make it to the other side of whatever I may be facing at the time.

We are blessed that very prominent leaders in business and entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world with whom you would like to have a lunch or breakfast with? He or she might just see this, especially if we tag them. 🙂

Kris Jenner, Maye Musk and Sara Blakely– All very smart women. Have either raised or are raising kids and have built a legacy. I would love to go to lunch with them, let my hair down and pick their minds about their journey in life and laugh a lot.

How can our readers follow you on social media?

Website: Reginalynnvisuals.com

Instagram: @reginalynnvisuals

FB: https://www.facebook.com/regina.lynn.967

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/regina-lynn-jaeger-30374a61/

Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/reginalynnvisuals

Thank you so much for joining us. This was very inspirational.


Regina Lynn Jaeger: Five Things You Need To Build A Trusted And Beloved Brand was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

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