Where the Company Name Meets the Company Brand

Peanut butter without jelly? Grilled cheese without tomato soup? There’s no denying that the Bruce Clay blog won’t be the same without Lisa’s creative words and unique insights. But I see a more broad symbolism behind these analogies. It comes down to this: a company name is almost worthless without a company brand.

If Lisa has taught us anything, she taught us that, for better or worse, a company’s brand is integrally linked to its name. Luckily for us, she didn’t leave before she helped mold the Bruce Clay, Inc. brand into what it is today. Lisa infused the Bruce Clay blog with:

• The significance of branding and pro-active brand management.
• The importance of knowing who your customers are, listening to them and giving them what they want.
• The value of ethical responsibility in the search industry.
• A vast amount of cool ish you can find on the Interwebz. (Okay, maybe that one’s not as relevant to this discussion, but hello, Friday Recap? The girl started a grand dynasty.)

In a post last week, Matching Your Online Brand to Your Offline Brand, Lisa explained the key to successful branding: “Figure [it] out and then bleed it from every pore.”

I guess you could say that at the beginning of this new chapter of the Bruce Clay blog, one of the hardest steps has already been taken for us. There’s no need to figure it out. It’s clear what the Bruce Clay blog stands for, as I pointed out above. I’d venture to say that this is the same place where most newer companies find themselves today. Top-quality products and services. Superior value in the marketplace. Positive customer service experiences. You’ve figured it out. Now what?

Well, here on the Bruce Clay blog, there’s only one option: get that blood flowing. The beauty of branding is that, if done right, it will be ingrained in the very fabric of the company. A successfully executed brand makes a mark on everyone involved. Just like the imagery suggests, the message of what the company stands for has been burned onto everything it touches. That includes the employees, the products and the customers. Customers know what they’re getting. Products and services meet those expectations. And employees have a deep understanding of the value of the services they provide. Thanks to Lisa’s nurturing of the blog and her affectionate attention to what the blog stands for, we in the Bruce Clay, Inc. writing room can take over the reins and trust that the course will stay true.

Virginia Nussey is the director of content marketing at MobileMonkey. Prior to joining this startup in 2018, Virginia was the operations and content manager at Bruce Clay Inc., having joined the company in 2008 as a writer and blogger.

See Virginia's author page for links to connect on social media.