Category Archives: Branding
Nordstrom’s Unconventional Holiday Tradition (Interview)
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 … 
Deck Your Brand’s Halls — Online and Off
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 …
Lululemon, Ayn Rand, & Avoiding Brand Damage
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 …
The 6 Traits of Brand-Driven Communities
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 …
Building a Brand-Driven Community with Social Media
Branding is important. I gotta get me some of that. Social media is critical. I gotta get me some of that, too. Branding and social media are kind of squishy things. Industry thought leaders wax philosophically to the point that …
Branding the User Interface (Fwix Interview)
As Creative Director for Fwix, Jordan Gadapee is responsible for the geotagging start-up’s brand development across all platforms including web, mobile, and the app marketplace. As we consider the impact that all of these screens have on our business, Jordan …
Remembering 9/11 with Visual Simplicity
Less can be more. But sometimes it can be so much more. A timely example of this is the 9/11 Memorial logo above. I missed this when it was first introduced last year, replacing a more complicated and less memorable …
Building a Brand-Driven Community at APPA
Slides from my keynote at the APPA National Conference in Chicago. Building Community with Social Media View more presentations from Nick Westergaard NOTE: These are my slides and not my presentation itself as they don’t make a whole lot of …
A Branding Story from Winnie the Pooh
On Saturday I took my kids to Disney’s new Winnie the Pooh movie. That same day I received a handwritten thank-you note from a colleague. At the crossroads of these two events is a take-away as you consider your own …
Why Good Photos Matter on Blog Pages
As you may have noticed, I recently had some new professional photos taken for the About, Work with Me, Speaking, and Contact pages on this blog. Why did I do this? It’s simple. When you look at your blog’s traffic …
