Brand Consultant

The brand is the personality that identifies a product. Brand consultants manage the physical representation and consistent application of brand identity across visual identity carriers. This can include signage, uniforms, liveries, interior design and branded merchandise. Brand implementation encompasses facets of architecture, product design, industrial design, quantity surveying, engineering, procurement, project management and retail design. Companies engaged in branding seek to develop or align the expectations behind the brand experience, creating the impression that a brand associated with a product or service has certain qualities or characteristics that make it special or unique. A brand is one of the most valuable elements in an advertising theme, as it demonstrates what the brand owner is able to offer in the marketplace. The Brand Consultant Co performs the art of creating and maintaining a brand. Branding is becoming increasingly critical for businesses in today's competition. Brand Positioning Taps into Consumer Emotions This year consumer's balance between needs, wants, and brand positioning is the best way to remain relevant in the buyer's mind with certain brand positioning techniques a product can become both a necessity and a want for the price conscious customer. Careful brand management seeks to make the product or services relevant to the target audience. Brands are more than the difference between the actual cost of a product and its selling price - they represent the sum of all valuable qualities of a product to the consumer. There are many intangibles involved in business, intangibles left wholly from the income statement and balance sheet to determine a business's worth. The learned skill of a knowledge worker, the type of mental working, the type of stitch: all may be without an 'accounting cost' but for those who truly know the product, for it is these people the company should wish to find and keep, the difference is incomparable. A brand widely known in the marketplace acquires brand recognition. When brand recognition builds up to a point where a brand enjoys a critical mass of positive sentiment in the marketplace, it achieves brand franchise. One goal in brand recognition is the identification of a brand without the name of the company present. Consumers may look on branding as an important value added aspect of products or services, as it often serves to denote a certain attractive quality or characteristics. From the perspective of brand owners, branded products or services also command higher prices. Where two products resemble each other, but one of the products has no associated branding, people may often select the more expensive branded product the quality of the brand or the reputation of the brand owner.

Working the Night Shift

Try to limit night shift work, if that is possible. If working the night shift, the following tips may help people sleep better and avoid sleepiness:

• Increase the total amount of sleep by adding naps and lengthening the amount of time allotted for sleep.
• Use bright lights in the workplace.
• Minimize shift changes so that the biological clock of the body can adjust to a nighttime work schedule.
• Get rid of sound and light distractions in the bedroom during daytime sleep.
• Use caffeine only during the first part of a shift to promote alertness at night.

If sleep does not come during the day and all else fails, talk with a doctor to see if it would be wise to use prescribed, short-acting sleeping pills to help sleep during the day.

Dealing with Jet Lag

Eastward travel generally causes more severe jet lag than westward travel because traveling east requires people to shorten the day and the biological clock is better able to adjust to a longer day than a shorter day. Fortunately for globetrotters, a few preventive measures and treatments seem to help some people relieve jet lag.
Adjust the biological clock. Several days before traveling to a new time zone, gradually shift sleeping patterns and eating times to coincide with those at the final eastern destination. People can also adjust the biological clock by using light therapy. This involves exposure to special lights, many times brighter than ordinary household light, for several hours near to the new wake up time. Alternatively, after arrival, spend a lot of time outdoors to make sure the body gets the light cues it needs to adjust to the new time zone.
Avoid alcohol and caffeine. Although it may be tempting to drink alcohol to relieve the stress of travel and make it easier to fall asleep, people more likely to sleep lighter and wake up in the middle of the night when the effects of the alcohol wear off. Caffeine can help keep people awake longer, but caffeine can also make it harder for people to fall asleep if its effects have not worn off by bed time.
What about melatonin? The body produces the melatonin hormone to make the body drowsy. Melatonin builds up in the body as the night progresses and decreases when daylight arrives.
Melatonin is available as an over-the-counter supplement. Because melatonin is safe when used over a period of days or weeks and seems to contribute to feeling sleepy, it is a treatment for jet lag. Nevertheless, the effectiveness of melatonin is controversial and its safety when used over a prolonged period is unclear. Some studies find that taking melatonin supplements before bedtime for several days after arrival in a new time zone can make it easier to fall asleep at the proper time. Other studies find that melatonin does not help to relieve jet lag.
Be aware that adjusting to a new time zone may take several days. If traveling away for just a few days, it may be better to stick to the original sleep and wake times as much as possible, rather than adjusting the biological clock too many times in rapid succession.

Gambling Studies

Researchers conducted telephone surveys with 8,467 adults in the Toronto area and questioned people about their opinions of how to best understand gambling disorders. Researchers asked if gambling disorders should be treated as a disease or illness, a wrongdoing, a habit, not disease or an addiction similar to drug addiction. Researchers also inquired if people with gambling disorders can get well on their own or must seek treatment to improve and polled adults on whether people with gambling disorders can reduce their gambling to that of a social gambler or if they need to quit altogether. The survey also gathered information on the gambling behavior and demographics of the respondents.

The researchers found that most people viewed gambling disorders as an addiction similar to drug addiction, with one-third seeing gambling as a habit and 17 percent viewing gambling as a form of wrongdoing. Responses to whether gamblers needed treatment to recover showed a split jury, and three out of four thought that abstinence from gambling activities must happen for recovery. Examining the demographics, the researchers found that being female, married, younger and without gambling problems paralleled believing that treatment and abstinence were necessary. In addition, people who viewed gambling problems as a disease or addiction also believed that treatment and abstinence for recovery are necessary.

The researchers noted that public perceptions reported in their study mimic the results of a 2003 study that examined the views of the public on alcohol use, with 71 percent of respondents saying that abstinence must occur for recovery. This popularly held belief is also the view of much of the scientific community as reflected by the upcoming changes the American Psychiatric Association is making.
Finally, researchers concluded that people with gambling disorders were less likely to think that treatment and abstinence were necessary for recovery. This may be because many people who meet the clinical guidelines for a gambling disorder do not think they have a problem and even those who believe they do have a problem are unlikely to seek treatment.