The Importance of Branding

[nicosnack]

Branding is of utmost importance for any business. For instance, if I show you various logos, such as "golden arches" you all know who and what I'm talking about, and experience feelings.... (as someone astutely observed: "PR is all an illusion, it's feel-good BS. But your customers want feel-good BS...").. indeed I didn't even have to show you a picture of golden arches, only mention them, and you all know what company I'm talking about.

Here is where Ms. T does branding well: popcorn, candy, scented pens, magnets, lapel pins, "baking" the juice... good logo, good color scheme, good fonts, great labels. Have you ever gotten a hand-written note on your receipt? How did it make you feel? When Ms. T herself responds it is all love and "smooches"... I cannot emphasize enough how important that is in addition to having a great product. She comes across as friendly, loving, caring, inviting. She is happy, loves what she is doing, loves her customers. There is a humor and whimsy to it all. Colors, fonts and logo: warm and inviting. Again, friendly.... We all produce an image of Ms. T working... and it elicits positive feelings.

Whoever came up with her logo, chose her color scheme and fonts, decided on popcorn and adding candy to orders, did a very good job.

Just something to think about.

 

[Kenzi]

All very true , but will it be enough when the customer relations person threatens to throw us off site for questioning where out orders are?

just saying

 

[jdrewry]

All very true , but will it be enough when the customer relations person threatens to throw us off site for questioning where out orders are?

just saying

For any small company, it's a learning experience. No one ever knows what they're gonna do in the situations they were in this past month, or how they're going to react. I'm sure they'll take things from this past month, and be prepared a lot better if something like this happens again.

 

[Rachy_B]

For me, its all about the customer service...having found a supplier i like, i stick with them because i know they'll look after.me and my order. Their packaging could be as dull as dishwater but as their customer service is second to none, I'll stick with them.

I think the proof of this is their contact info...not only is it a 'sales and advice' line, but it isn't an 0845, 0870 or 0800 number (geographic numbers in the UK) which cost a fortune to call from a mobile phone. They're also really good by email and always write thank you on the receipt...its the little things that please me!x

 

[schismz]

Wow, you write many things that I strongly agree with, thus, obviously, you are a gifted genius nicosnack

This is, pretty much dead on.

1- Product: hovers between really good and excellent!
2- Branding: also really good - excellent!
3- Infrastructure/business itself: flaky & inconsistent.
4- Customer Support/PR: abysmal. Hovers between silence/no news, and way too much information with overall hostile undertones. There are in fact, CONSTANT hostile undertones in your public-facing image. The overall vibe is that customers are the enemy who are ruining Ms. T's life and making unreasonable demands/wanting things they have no right to. Noap, sorry, we're making you money so you can have a better life. Your inability to deal/inexperience with handling your own infrastructure is your problem, not mine.

Yes, luvz tha Ms. T's branded drugs I am addicted to. Your mixing/flavors do wonderful things to kick off that nicotine rush I require. Will keep buying. Yes, haz had images of baking/mixing lady Creating my awesome vapes, produces additional feel-good feelings upon using product. Yay.

But, again, just to clarify... Ms. T isn't my Speshul Friend. Never met her. Never will, because there is no Ms. T's, it's all part of that wonderful branding. Won't be calling Ms. T's when significant life events happen for me, won't call up or send email to complain about my internet connection or the 101 problems I had last week. You're not actually my friend ... I don't know you. You sell products that I wish to buy. That's it. That is the nature of our relationship. You sell a product that isn't actually cheap, I am willing to pay for it and not complain about the money I'm spending. It's your job to use that money to figure out how to train someone else to help you process orders on a timescale that is measurable in days, not weeks/months/epochs. I realize that next week your dog may chew through your internet connection, thus causing another set-back as you get it fixed and spend a week nursing your dog back to good health becuz eatin's tha internet hurt his tummy, but, seriously, I don't care. I don't actually want to know. I just want the stuff I ordered in a timely manner, that's it.

 

[nicosnack]

Wow, you write many things that I strongly agree with, thus, obviously, you are a gifted genius nicosnack

This is undoubtedly because you are a person of rare, subtlety nuanced perceptive depths of insight and perception unknown to most people, shismz.

 

[nicosnack]

All very true , but will it be enough when the customer relations person threatens to throw us off site for questioning where out orders are?

Both product and image have to be consistent at all times.

 

[HarmonyPB]

Wow, you write many things that I strongly agree with, thus, obviously, you are a gifted genius nicosnack

I strongly disagree, FWIW

 

[schismz]

Hey Harmony...

That's very vivid and emotional; bordering on histrionic. It's not really life and death. I'm not out of Ms. T's, or anything else, as mentioned. Providing constructive comments about how a dysfunctional business might run better, doesn't really qualify as trolling. I agreed with his message, I responded.

Everybody who perceives a problem is not an ENEMY OF THE STATE. Perhaps they are communicating and sharing their opinions. Yours is obviously very emotionally entangled with the proprietor of an online store, mine is not. It's a business I order from online. Clicking the [okay, charge my credit card immediately!] button, doesn't murder a baby seal or send a puppy to hell forever, on the obverse, with the margins on her product, it's quite likely paying for many of the founder's personal expenses. Which is fine, viva capitalism, I'm all for that. It's a business transaction. You're articulate, and obviously intelligent enough to grasp this concept, so I'm sorry if you choose not to understand an opposing viewpoint to the "we're all a big family!" <group hug!> paradigm.

It's an online business that I order from, which is not succeeding at infrastructure/delivering the product according to their own schedule, and presents customer service with a siege mentality/constant undertones of hostility at the moment.

I'm not even freaking out, or angry... I'm sharing my perspective, which differs from yours in this instance.

Anyway, I'm not going to continue in this vein, because the further it moves out from the initial constructive comments (at least in my opinion), the sooner I'm going to guess it will devolve into nothing useful. My desire isn't to argue with people, it's pointing out very basic problems and agreeing with another individual whose message I read, who articulated essentially my own beliefs with regards to the current situation, in a constructive manner.

 

[HarmonyPB]

Hey Harmony...

Everybody who perceives a problem is not an ENEMY OF THE STATE. Perhaps they are communicating and sharing their opinions. Yours is obviously very emotionally entangled with the proprietor of an online store, mine is not. It's a business I order from online. Clicking the [okay, charge my credit card immediately!] button, doesn't murder a baby seal or send a puppy to hell forever, on the obverse, with the margins on her product, it's quite likely paying for many of the founder's personal expenses. Which is fine, viva capitalism, I'm all for that. It's a business transaction. You're articulate, and obviously intelligent enough to grasp this concept, so I'm sorry if you choose not to understand an opposing viewpoint to the "we're all a big family!" <group hug!> paradigm.

It's an online business that I order from, which is not succeeding at infrastructure/delivering the product according to their own schedule, and presents customer service with a siege mentality/constant undertones of hostility at the moment.

I'm not even freaking out, or angry... I'm sharing my perspective, which differs from yours in this instance.

Anyway, I'm not going to continue in this vein, because the further it moves out from the initial constructive comments (at least in my opinion), the sooner I'm going to guess it will devolve into nothing useful. My desire isn't to argue with people, it's pointing out very basic problems and agreeing with another individual whose message I read, who articulated essentially my own beliefs with regards to the current situation, in a constructive manner.

You are entitled to your opinion as much as the rest of us are. I was simply replying to your post and stating my opinion. If you took it as a personal attack I apologize, it was not intended that way. In fact I agree with many things you say in the post I quoted here. I'm sure Ms. T and staff appreciate constructive criticism. I just disagreed with one statement you made and omitted the rest of your post. I didn't include any of your constructive criticism in my post for that exact reason.

 

[nicosnack]

bordering on histrionic.

25 year old drama major (literally) + butthurt + Vapor4Life = histrionic personality disorder.

 

[adamgdup24]

I agree 100% with nicosack. I ordered from an online business. They didn't keep the schedule that was posted. I was out if juice because the order that I placed is still pending 15 days later. I had to order from another vendor and spend.$20.on shipping so I could have juice. The very least they could do is post updates without having hostile undertones toward the paying customer. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion and harmony you seem to bash others because you don't agree. If you want to wait a month for every order have fun. I ordered from a different site at 9pm last night it shipped at 8am. Less than 12 hours. Ill tell you that you don't have to wait for quality and they are very friendly.

 

[munkey]

I've been a pretty reliable customer of Ms. T's for over a year, and I have no problem waiting for things to get settled down after the move. I understand chaos, delays, unexpected events, and all of that. But, what I can't STAND is the extremely poor presentation of the the "please be patient" message. All we really needed here was a simple "I'm so sorry, but I'm still behind on orders and doing everything I can to catch up. If you'd like a refund instead, that's fine. I'll keep you posted every few days."

Instead, we get this absolutely ridiculous sermon about internet connections, label printers, and other things that I really don't care one bit about... but worst of all, it comes from an intermediary with the seeming intention of shielding the sensitive business owner from criticism. Why the go-between/middleman using some strange blend of first, second, and third person voices? I have close to $200 tied up in this thing, but the communications I get seem to have the objective of trying to make ME feel sorry for THEM, instead of vice versa! Should I send a get-well-soon card, expressing my sympathy for the difficulties this small business is obviously encountering? That's the tone that I'm perceiving. The damage control here has been TERRIBLE. I know this is unsolicited advice, but any communication needs to be phrased as "WE are sorry", not "Ms. T is sorry". The attempt to diffuse blame by creating an artificial distinction between Ms. T's (personal messenger) and Ms. T's (the actual business/person) is flat out insulting. You either speak for the business, or you don't.

I have plenty of extra juice. There are plenty of other suppliers who can tide me over. We all know T's product is good. I don't even need the money as badly as some people might. I'm just really annoyed by the tone conveyed from this business that we need to have some sort of personal sorrow for all the difficulties they are facing. I certainly UNDERSTAND the difficulties, but I still don't really care about anything except eventually receiving what I paid for.

I know some of these are harsh words, so I want to close by saying that Brandon has been awesome to me. The customer service and email responses I've gotten when I needed help or something was wrong with my order were spectacular. When I have complained about a batch or questioned whether a flavor was mixed incorrectly, they have sent me new juice for no charge in record time with no questions asked. My complaint here is about the horrible PR copy and NOTHING else... but, when I read an update from a company that makes me more mad than if they had said nothing at all, something is very very wrong!

 

[HarmonyPB]

I agree 100% with nicosack. I ordered from an online business. They didn't keep the schedule that was posted. I was out if juice because the order that I placed is still pending 15 days later. I had to order from another vendor and spend.$20.on shipping so I could have juice. The very least they could do is post updates without having hostile undertones toward the paying customer. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion and harmony you seem to bash others because you don't agree. If you want to wait a month for every order have fun. I ordered from a different site at 9pm last night it shipped at 8am. Less than 12 hours. Ill tell you that you don't have to wait for quality and they are very friendly.

Who did I bash? As far as I remember (given my memory isn't all that great) I was just stating my opinion like everyone else. In one thread I did go on quite a rant defending Ms. T, but that was my purpose, not to bash or attack anyone. Now as far as the guy you agree 100% with, I can find several of his posts that are bashing several people including the people who run this sub-forum. He even created a thread with the sole purpose of bashing people, it was deleted of course.

 

[Wondertwin]

Personally I view Ms T as a niche vendor and accord her some slack. She's got a great product and is clearly not looking to start an empire; so while I don't like to wait, I will. I wouldn't do the same for a large online vendor like zappos or amazon for instance. Hand crafted items by a single (not for long though!) person relies on them solely, so when life happens thems the breaks. I don't see it as a group hug mentality but as an accordance for the reality of ordering from her. Same thing happens when I order machined custom crochet hooks and other niche items. Frankly I'm just glad she's stuck around! I can think of easier groups to craft for than us nicotine junkies!

 

[adamgdup24]

Mrs t may be a (niche vendor) however it was posted that the wait time was 4-6 days. Not 15 or more days. That's and the fact that it took me 4 emails and a text to get the response is my issue.

 

[Wondertwin]

I don't disagree that it sucks, I just can't hold her to a corporate level of professionalism when she's never marketed herself as so. As far as I know it's her and Brandon, no shipping dept, HR, website administrator, manufacturing consultant, certified nicotine mixologists(?), PR people, or designated customer service department. When I hit enter on that order it's with a hope that I'll get it in a week and the knowledge that it will likely be at least 9 days and probably longer. Then I get it and my friends pass around my Stardust conveyer of Ms T's goodness like it's not flu season and I'm down to one alcohol wipe. If there was a VIP Zappos-like substitute I'd go that route, alas there's not. We can always get our money back and cancel the order though. Frankly if her product wasn't great "Ordergate 2012-13" wouldn't have spawned the amount of angsty posts it has. So maybe it *is* about a group hug. Or at the very least sympathetic hand pats.

 

[jdrewry]

Frankly if her product wasn't great "Ordergate 2012-13" wouldn't have spawned the amount of angsty posts it has.

Ordergate---I like that.

When she gets things in order, and the orders start flying out again, I honestly believe so much of this will be forgotten. Right now, all we can do is hope she doesn't let the headache of dealing with the situation(s) get to her. For those who have never done it, it's a LOT of hard,thankless work to get a self-business off the ground. And, while there might be a general guideline on how to start self-businesses, you've got to be adaptable as hell, and take a few chances. Looks like Ms T is doing that, so instead of ripping her apart, support her, folks.

 

[adamgdup24]

I have supported Mrs t this time and the last time. She makes a great product. However I would have zero gripes if the website said expect a serious delay. It said in bold red letters that process time was 4-6 days. I like Mrs. TS product some of my favorite juice but cmon man this is getting pretty ridiculous.

 

[jdrewry]

From the Web Site:

***READ BELOW BEFORE ORDERING!!***

12/27/12: E-JUICE PROCESSING TIME BEFORE SHIPPING IS CURRENTLY LONG. PLEASE BE PREPARED TO WAIT A WEEK OR MORE IF YOU PLACE AN ORDER.