Braatzy’s Thoughts

Be true to your brand, your team and yourself

Written by Kyle Braatz on February 10th, 2010

It took us three months, many mistakes and some good friends to get Netgen focused again.  It was time to highlight our strength:

YOUTH (I am actually the oldest member of the Netgen Team at 25)

Netgen had to revisit the mandate we originally outlined - digital brand marketing focused on engaging students and the net generation across Canada. 

Lessons we learned:

1. Use the social model:  Social media is all about dialogue, sharing information, getting feedback and supporting each other.  Business is the same way.  We re-found our identity after reaching out to mentors, family and friends.  We opened up and recognized the power of collaboration offline. 
2. Help yourself before you help others:  Take the role of outside consultant when reviewing your own company.  For some reason we found it a lot harder to do this for our own brand, but utilizing the social model, we were able to reposition ourselves in the market we hoped to be in.
3. Have a unique business model:  The marketing industry is saturated with experts, experience and organizations with amazing track records.  How could we offer a unique business model that would offer value to our clients?  Yes you guessed it.  The social model…...

The Social Model and the Netgen Network:

Connecting with the net generation across Canada and communicating messages that benefit this audience is something we are very passionate about.  The Netgen Network helps us do this effectively, benefiting both our client and their customers.

The Netgen network spans across Canada with connected students engaged in each major city for the purpose of education, communication, crowd sourcing and collaboration between members. We believe life experience and collaboration is what breeds creativity.  This network exists on two levels: 

-A tool for seeding information, videos, and content
-A tool for communication and collaboration

We have one of the brightest, largest, collaborative, creative teams in the marketing industry.  Students who understand students. 

Closing Thought

At Netgen we hit some bumps over our short business life, but we realized the power of the social model.  The social model helped us better understand our brand, better understand our customers and develop a network/creative team that can rival any agency across this world. 

- Braatzy
twitter.com/braatzy | facebook.com/braatzy

Google’s Superbowl ad speaks to the net generation

Not many would have predicted that Google would launch an ad during the Superbowl.  The hints, yesterday, from Google CEO, Eric Schmidt, built curios expectations, but there was still a lot of mystery around what the ad would feature. Not surprisingly, Google told a digital story focused on their bread and butter…Search. 

As @ChrisBrogan tweeted, Google did it in a way that was Illustrative, told a story, demonstrated features, and maintained simplicity. 

The story Google told, is what brings this ad into a category of “elite marketing”.  In 52 seconds Google was able to tell a story about adventure, love, and passion that the Net Generation can relate to and wants to relate to.  Google understands their target audience and developed a story that excites, inspires and provides hope for the net generation.  Enjoy! 

Google - Search on