You see, for the first few months at this location, we were debating on if we should have a sign and, if so, how elaborate it should be. The first question was easy to answer – yes, we probably should put out a sign so at least clients and visitors could find us. But how elaborate, and how expensive? Custom signage can get spendy in a hurry. Despite our attempt at frugality, we finally decided to shell out some bucks and get something nice. And within a matter of weeks of the sign going up, wherever I went in town and mentioned Kear Stevens, someone would chime in “oh, you’re the guys over on Speer.” I spent years trying to get the word out about our business, and this stupid hunk of aluminum and plastic had done in inside of a month or two. Go figure.

Signage is an afterthought for many companies, and unfortunately it shows. It’s often the first impression you make on strangers, and depending on your location(s), it could be a place where many, many strangers pass by. Now, not all signage should be big, bright and blinking. For example, the restaurant below us has positioned itself as an intimate, charming hideaway, so their signage is more cryptic and speakeasy-ish (if that’s a word). And it works great for them. On the other hand, if you’re a strip club, bold and flamboyant are what your customers expect, so give it to them (within zoning restrictions, of course).

Your sign has to fit your brand and how you position yourself. Even if street or foot traffic is minimal, a sign is a reflection of your pride in your business. And often the most important traffic are those who are visiting your office (prospects, clients, investors, etc.). So give them something to remember you by when they enter and leave.

When most marketers, branding professionals and ad people devleop and execute a plan, we feel a sense of permanence about it. “There,” we say, “that’s finished and set in stone, ready to be released to the world where it will make an indelible impression.” Similarly, when entrepreneurs and business owners create a product or launch a service, they feel they have created something that is worthy of lasting and that will stick around (unfortunately, we have many landfills that prove some of these inventions are a little too long lasting).

We all fool ourselves into thinking what we create and promote will last, if not forever, well beyond our lifetimes, probably because of our unquenchable desire to outrun death as well as our unexplainable urge to leave a footprint. But all footprints are eventually erased, and so too are our Web sites, print ads, Facebook pages, billboards, media kits, radio spots and Twitters. Everything we do to market our businesses and serve our customers starts to fade as soon as it is set free.

So with such little time, as we make such evanescent gestures, it’s important that what you write in the sky be important. More than important, actually. Vital. Vital for you, for your customers, for the world. Because if all we can write is “Viagra” or “Low prices” or “Buy now”, than we’ve wasted a valuable opportunity to say something meaningful, something worthy of being writ across the big broad sky.

Waiting for commercial breaks to end is old news, of course. But what struck me was this desperate attempt to entertain. Granted, the advertisers tried to fit the tenor of the shows I was watching – funny, irreverent, edgy. But I could still feel the desperation and anxiety in these spots, and especially the spots by Quiznos – a company that has committed such heinous acts of misguided advertising that somebody should write a book chronicling the damage they have inflicted on hapless TV viewers (with spongmonkeys taking the top prize).

Ad agencies have been trying to entertain for years, but ever since the BMW Films “The Hire” series of sponsored-content shorts back in the early 2000s, the ad industry and their clients have upped the ante in trying to entertain. And they’re all still pissing down their collective leg.

Here’s the problem. For decades, people thought advertising and branding were synonymous  …  which couldn’t be further from the truth. Branding is the big picture, the raison d’etre for companies; advertising is just a mouthpiece, a one-way bullhorn, the showoff who tries to one-up everybody else by being louder, brighter, more clever, more stylish. Long ago ads were successful in reaching a larger audience, but in the intervening years they have not proven themselves as a viable way of building a brand. That’s because people simply don’t trust advertising anymore. Again, old news.

So what’s a company to do? I’ll travel back to my frat boy days for an analogy. There was this alumni (who will remain nameless) who always came back for Alumni Weekend and drank himself in to such a blinding bender that he pissed himself every weekend. It was like clockwork. Once he even wandered into my room and passed out on my loft before, of course, passing out and pissing down his own pantleg. I’d recommend to any companies – small or large – to do what this young man couldn’t – abstain. Act as if advertising weren’t an alternative. Act as if it doesn’t even exist. Then start to figure out how you can build your brand without it. You may have the DTs for a while, but you’ll thank me later, because it will force you to explore how you can grow your brand through creating things of value, through creating conversations, through developing tools and ideas that people will want to talk about and share with each other.

Companies that are hell bent on being the hippest, hottest and most talked about have the same problems, in that hipness is something that comes and goes (and often rather quickly) and the pursuit of being hip actually takes your focus (and that of your employees) away from how to best build a brand.

You see, the people who will stick through your brand through thick and thin are the ones who like you for who you are and what you represent for them, not for your flashy Web site, irreverent radio spots or decked out store or office. They like you because you’re honest and true to yourself and because your goal isn’t to be the most popular but instead the most personable, most reliable and best company in your class.

So let people see your quirks, your foibles, even your imperfections. They make you more human, more personable, and oddly more likeable. Most importantly, they distinguish you from other companies. And when you marry these to your (hopefully) outstanding products and services, they will create loyalty that lasts long beyond today’s popularity contest.

You know what I have found interesting about each of these scenarios: the person doing the talking isn’t the one with the best ideas, they simply have the biggest mouths. The same is true about brands.

Those brands that plaster their name over everything, that pull publicity stunts to gain media attention, that spend and spend and spend on advertising … they often aren’t the ones with the best ideas. They simply have the biggest mouths/budgets. And that’s not really a sustainable competitive advantage.

Listening, ahh, now there’s the key to a great brand. Listen to your customers, discover what they want and need. Find out their likes and dislikes. Let them sing your praises. Let them be openly critical of you. And once you’re done soaking it all up, deliver what they want and listen some more. Small businesses and medium-sized companies can be great at this, and it makes you so much more likeable, memorable and trustworthy than your blowhard competitors.

And we all know people do business with brands and companies they like.

This is equally so in marketing and branding. Many companies are taking this time to re-evaluate themselves and how they do business. Others are howling at the moon and blaming everything else for their problems. Such negativity can often lead to ugly marketing, where companies believe that beating up their competitors will gain them an advantage. And they are dead wrong.

Negative marketing works in politics, but that’s often because you only have a choice between two products (and sometimes neither of them are ideal). In the marketplace, there are usually many competitors, so beating up on one or two won’t necessarily help you, and it in fact may backfire and help them (via the sympathy vote from their loyal customers screaming “unfair”).

Besides the fact that too much can go wrong with negative marketing (and that karma’s a bitch), it runs counter to why most of us are in marketing and branding in the first place. We are motivated and driven to build things, not tear them down. We aspire to create, not destroy. History has shown over and over again that the marketplace rewards those who build and create. Spend your energy on building your own brand, not slamming someone else’s.