– Draeke Weseman, Weseman Law Office, PLLC

On Monday, the University of Oregon and The Ohio State University will play in college football’s first College Football Playoff championship game. DuetsBlog has previously covered the trademark issues surrounding BCS Properties’ attempt to register College Football Playoff as a trademark in connection with college football playoff games here. Even if College Football Playoff ultimately fails as a trademark, Monday’s championship game will be awash in trademarks and intellectual property. Consider this your DuetsBlog guide to the game.

UNIVERSITY OF OREGON

We’ll start with Oregon, and begin with a little history. In 1859, Congress required Oregon to set aside land for a state university as a condition for admittance into the Union. Oregon chose land in Eugene, and, in the mid-1870s, began building what is today the University of Oregon®, or Oregon®, or just UO®. Although all eyes will be on the Oregon Ducks’® football team on Monday night, Eugene may be better known to many as Track Town USA® thanks to the success of Oregon’s track team under Bill Bowerman in the 1960s and 70s. During that time Bill Bowerman introduced jogging to the American public, coached the legend Steve Prefontaine, met Phil Knight, and started Nike, Inc.

Nike has maintained a strong relationship with Oregon ever since, hiring grad Tinker Hatfield in the 80s to design Air Jordan shoes (but not the ones blogged about here) and grad Dan Weiden’s agency Weiden-Kennedy, to coin the tag line “Just Do It” while developing TV ads like “Bo Knows” to sell newly invented cross-training shoes (also designed by Tinker Hatfield.) Today, Nike designs not only Oregon’s football uniforms, but also the special uniforms for all four teams that played in the College Football Playoffs, branding them from head to toe, and even hands:

For those interested, these uniform deals are influential, lucrative, and signed on a team-by-team basis.Continue Reading Topics of Conversation for Your College Football Playoff Party

Neil F. Anderson, Founder & President, The Courage Group, Inc.

Now days, it’s tough for any business, regardless of size, to successfully compete and win new business.

The days of signing up new clients or customers with ease are long gone. The past recession, the anemic economy, the fierce competition and impact of the internet have all made it very difficult to close the sale. Now you have to fight “tooth and nail” to get more new customers.

Breaking News: The reasons really don’t matter. What matters most is generating revenue, continuing to pay the bills, grow the business and stay out of the business failure graveyard.

What will help? Three words-offer more value. Try this strategy on for size, always give people more value for their hard earned money.

Eight Offering More Value Tips

1. Do Your Homework-To win new business, by adding more value, you first need to know what the other guy is doing. That means updating or writing your business plan.

A business plan is simply a written description of what you are going to do and how you are going to do it. It is your roadmap to success.

One of the best reasons for writing a business plan is that it will force you to examine your competition. You can’t add value to your products or services until you have a strong understanding of what your competitors are offering.

Note-Check out the below entrepreneurs, who recognized the value of writing a business plan. Recognized the opportunity to add more value, based on their knowledge of the competition, then delivered it in order to win business and successfully grow the company.

* Phil Knight/Founder of Nike/Annual Revenue-$24 BB/44,000 employees

* Fred Smith/Founder of FedEx/Annual Revenue-$46BB/300,000 employees

* Jim Koch/Co-Founder/Sam Adams/Annual Revenue/$794MM/840 employees

* Jeff Bezos/Founder of Amazon.com/Annual Revenue-$74MM/132,000 employees

Continue Reading Show More Value, or Lose The Sale

Tiger Woods drives by Allison.jpg

The impact of the Tiger Woods scandal in branding can be viewed from two different perspectives. The first perspective comes from the point of view of the companies that paid Woods to endorse their products. The second perspective is how the personal brand of Tiger Woods will be impacted as the smoke clears from this series of events.

Two professors in University of California-Davis’ Economics Department attempted to measure the impact from the first perspective. They claimed that shareholders in publicly traded companies that Woods endorsed lost $5-12 billion in the weeks that followed the car accident in Florida that set off the scandal. They undoubtedly have an interesting perspective, but there are limiting factors in their research. However, an undisputable fact of the Tiger Woods scandal is that it put a lot of brand management teams in a very delicate situation. Brand managers at firms where Woods served as an endorser had to consider how their brands would be perceived by their target consumers if they were to continue the relationship. It is not an enviable position. 

When a brand chooses to link arms with a celebrity endorser, it must consider which celebrities will be effective endorsers. It is essential to select celebrities that will positively contribute to revenue growth and profitability. I believe that a celebrity endorser is most effective when the target consumer perceives them as attractive or desirable in some fashion and the product is related to the expertise of the celebrity. For example, Michael Jordan was an effective endorser of both Nike and Gatorade because of his status as an elite athlete and the fact that both brands are related to athletic performance. Gisele Bundchen is an effective endorser for Dolce & Gabbana fragrances because scent is an important aspect of appearance and she is the embodiment of phenomenal appearance. She would be far less effective as a celebrity endorser for the Toyota Camry. With regards to Tiger Woods, he is most effective in endorsing Nike Golf products and any other golf related brands. His effect is diminished for brands like Gillette and AT&T.Continue Reading The Roar of Tiger Woods in Branding