Intel Inside: How One Company Got Inside Our Brains

Branding campaigns are challenging. The best ones stick with you for years, if not decades. The worst are forgotten in minutes.

Now, clearly, the former is far better than the latter. So with that in mind, here’s how one major company pulled it off. That and more in today’s Social Media Roundup:

A branding Success Story

MT @chatterbachs  (opens in a new tab): #Marketing  (opens in a new tab) Backstory: How @intel  (opens in a new tab) Became A Household Name by @GaryShapiro  (opens in a new tab) http://t.co/BJd7nvcg  (opens in a new tab) #assnchat  (opens in a new tab) #dctech  (opens in a new tab) #ces  (opens in a new tab)

— Kim Kishbaugh (@kkish) January 8, 2013  (opens in a new tab)

This week’s CES is the perfect time to look back at one of the consumer electronics industry’s greatest success stories — the tale of how Intel, a brand that rarely sold directly to consumers, became a household name. Consumer Electronics Association CEO Gary Shapiro, writing in Fast Company,  (opens in a new tab) takes a trip back in time to the “Intel Inside” campaign, explaining how it differentiated what was already a major player on the market in a groundbreaking way. “With the proliferation of PCs, and with consumers at a loss in trying to figure out what made one better than the other, Intel saw an opportunity, and so it took a major risk,” Shapiro writes. “Intel’s leadership was convinced this was the way to grow market share, however, and the company invested hundreds of millions of dollars in the effort.” In the end, the marketing endeavor, innovative for its time, totally paid off. It paved the way for other marketing efforts that may not touch consumers directly but greatly affect their lives. Your association might not be known to the average joe, but with a little inventive marketing, could it be? (ht @kkish  (opens in a new tab))

Stop Worrying, Learn to Love It

How do #associations  (opens in a new tab) let go of control when it comes to social media? http://t.co/iDQb6hu8  (opens in a new tab)

— XYZ University (@XYZUniversity) January 8, 2013  (opens in a new tab)

Maybe you’re on social media already, but you haven’t embraced it fully, because you have a hard time accepting that you can’t control what happens there. XYZ University’s latest piece, by Shannon Neeser, explains that you have to make your peace with that. That’s OK, because the benefits are huge  (opens in a new tab). “Perhaps you haven’t opened yourself up on social media because you are afraid of what people will say publicly,” Neeser writes. “But people are talking about your association, whether you know about it or not. The conversation is happening.” Is it happening without you?

What cool stuff have you read online today? Let us know in the comments.

(Michael Kwan/Flickr)