Find Things

Search

Archive for the ‘Strategy’ Category


The Importance of a Good Landing

Monday, August 2nd, 2010

Imagine boarding a plane for a trip to Los Angeles. You’ve purchased your ticket. You’ve made it through security. You’ve squeezed yourself and your carry-on into spaces you never thought they would fit. You’ve finished your complementary beverage and the “fasten seat belt” sign has come on in anticipation of your landing. After the plane rolls to a stop, the flight attendant’s voice warmly welcomes you . . . to Atlanta.

You were expecting to arrive in L.A. When you ask the flight attendant about this, she replies that you can still get to L.A. You’re just going to have to fly a little more. You deplane and get on another flight that deposits you . . . in Dallas. Finally, after short stops in Denver and Seattle, you arrive in Los Angeles.

What’s your mood?

Unfortunately, many businesses put their prospective clients through a variation of this drill. They send clients a mailing or an email, or a tweet with a special offer (it could be a report or a coupon for a special discount). But instead of taking them to a landing page that talks specifically about the offer, they dump these prospective clients on their home page.  Sometimes there’s a button there that will lead readers to the special offer. But sometimes the information is buried on the home page—leaving the visitor to wander around until they finally find it—or leave in frustration.

In business, it’s extremely important to give people a good “landing.” Make sure people end up where they think they’re going to land. Make it fool proof. Don’t make customers jump through hoops to get where they want to be. That’s where you want them to be too.

Pilots sometimes say that any landing you can walk away from is a good landing. But in business, you don’t want your customers to “walk away” at all. Give them a good landing and keep them where you want them.

Make sense? What do you think?

Tags: , ,
Posted in Direct Marketing, Strategy | No Comments »

Show me the Numbers!

Monday, July 26th, 2010

Over the past six months or so you’ve heard a lot from us about Social Media. We’ve talked about Twitter. We’ve blathered about blogs. We’ve focused your attention on Facebook. But have we practiced what we preach? Have we been “eating our own dog food?”

Actually, we have! We’ve been blogging and tweeting and posting on Facebook. So what kind of results have we seen? Let’s take a look at some of the numbers. In the six months since we began doing Social Media for ourselves here’s what we’ve observed:

  • Our overall website traffic is up 63%
  • The number of unique visitors to our site is up 51%
  • The number of page views is up 51%
  • The average time spent per visit is up 65 seconds
  • Our bounce rate is down 4%

In other words, more people (including new visitors) are spending more time on our site, and they are looking at more content. We’re pretty pleased with what’s happened so far. Of course, it raises another important question.

Can we show you the money? In the spirit of transparency and full disclosure, the answer has to be: “it remains to be seen.” We knew that an increase in business wouldn’t be immediate.  But we also know that the goal of Social Media isn’t just to increase website traffic: it’s to increase the amount of business we do. One other thing we know is that if we’re not staying in front of existing and potential customers, we won’t have a chance to increase our business.

We think we’re on the right track and we’ll keep you posted about the specific impact on our bottom line.

What do you think?

Posted in Blogging, Facebook, Social Media, Strategy, Twitter | No Comments »

To Blog or Not to Blog? (Part 2)

Tuesday, July 6th, 2010

Last time we talked about three reasons it might make sense for your company to have a blog:

  • Establishing yourself as a thought-leader
  • Grabbing mindshare
  • Taking advantage of word-of-mouth

Those are good reasons, but there are a few key questions you still need to ask before you start blogging your brains out!

Do you have anything to say? That may seem like a really silly question, but there are blogs out in the blogosphere that are a complete waste of time because they don’t have any valuable content. A blog isn’t a place to share ignorance. It’s also not a forum for repeating things everybody already knows. You need to be able to bring new ideas or new perspectives to issues that people struggle with. You don’t have to have all the answers, but you need to give people help they haven’t found somewhere else. Here’s the good news: You probably do have something to say. But you have to be able to say it in a fresh and helpful way.

Do you have the discipline to keep it going? It takes time (weeks, months, sometimes years) to build your audience. Blogging once or twice and then quitting won’t accomplish your goals. As a matter of fact, it can have the opposite effect. If you quit early, people are inclined to think that you really weren’t that much of an expert. It’s better to blog regularly (weekly/bi-weekly/monthly) with quality content than to just throw “something” out there. Before you start, you’ll want to come up with an “editorial plan” that maps out what you want to cover for several weeks. You can always change it, but it’s agony to stare at a blank screen when your deadline is looming.

Do you have the necessary skills? We all learned to write in school . . . right? But do you have the skills to clearly and succinctly get your point across in a way that’s helpful to others? You don’t have to be a Pulitzer prize-winning writer to create a blog. It’s not about being flashy. It’s about being clear. And make no mistake: the thoughts need to be your thoughts, but you may want to enlist some help.

Are you willing to engage in a conversation? Many people misunderstand the nature of blogs. A blog is not a monologue. It’s not your chance to preach. It’s a dialogue. You present an idea and ask people to respond, to challenge, to ask follow-up questions. You need to be prepared to answer those responses.

If you answered, “yes” to these questions, you—and your customers—would probably benefit from a blog.  Ready to write?—or do you have questions and or comments?

Posted in Blogging, Copywriting, Social Media, Strategy | No Comments »

The Importance of Being Real

Monday, June 21st, 2010

We all want to be respected. We all want people to think we’re smart. And if you’re in business, you want your clients to look to you for expertise. Hey, it’s one of the things that keeps them coming back—right?  But nobody likes a phony. Nobody respects someone who pretends to know more than they really do. And it doesn’t take long for your customers to figure out if you’re bluffing.

It’s important to be real. It’s OK to admit that you don’t have all the answers. But just because you don’t have the answers doesn’t mean you can’t help customers or prospects. Sometimes the best advice you can give your customers is to encourage them to talk to someone else.

The way business is done has changed a lot over the last few years. Perhaps the area of marketing has seen some of the biggest changes. Traditional forms of marketing and advertising continue to have less and less impact. The emergence of the Web and Social Media dramatically impact how businesses get their message out—and move their business forward.

We try to help businesses use traditional, web-based, and social media methods of marketing. But we don’t have all the answers. That’s one reason we encourage clients to read what companies like Hubspot are saying about inbound marketing. It’s why we send tweets with links to articles about how other businesses are using social media tools. Do we run the risk of losing clients to other experts? It’s possible. But the information is helpful. And ultimately, an educated client will be a more successful client.

So get off your high horse. You don’t have to know all the answers. It’s OK to point your customers to a place where they can get better information. Chances are, they’ll thank you for it and come back to you for help in implementing it.

How are you helping your clients get better educated?

Posted in Direct Marketing, Real, Social Media, Strategy | 2 Comments »

ARE YOU A FATHEAD?

Monday, June 14th, 2010

In case you haven’t noticed, the business world has changed in the last few years. It’s not just the economy that’s troubling businesses. The fact is that the way people do business has changed. What used to work (especially with regard to marketing) doesn’t work today. What does it take to succeed in today’s marketplace? Based on what I’ve been observing and reading lately, I think it requires that you be a FATHEAD.

Here’s what I mean.

Flexible: Companies need to be flexible today. That means they can’t cling to the things that they are used to and comfortable with. It’s not about you. It’s about your clients. What are they comfortable with? The methods you use to reach your audience need to work for them.

Adaptable: This is a bit different from being flexible. This is more of an “on-the-fly” reaction and adaptation. This reflects the ability to move from one method to another. Today we constantly hear: “Print is dead”; “Advertising is dead”; “Direct Mail is dead”. Chances are (even if these things are dying) the corpse is going to twitch for a while and companies need to be able to adapt messaging to what works—or combinations of methods.

Transparent: One of the major characteristics of new, inbound marketing is that marketers need to be transparent. The fact is, that we are anyway. People (eventually) see through us and our clever schemes. And people don’t like to be tricked. They want to be treated with respect. And people don’t like it when we’re not transparent—it sends the message that we think we’re smarter than they are. Guess what? We’re not!

Honest: This is related to being transparent, but it’s even more basic. It starts with having a good product. If you lie about how good your product or service is it will become apparent pretty quickly. It also extends to making mistakes. If you make one, admit it and make it right. Don’t make promises you can’t (or don’t intend to) keep. Under-promise and over-deliver.

Empowering: Marketing today is about empowering your clients/customers—not trying to sell them something they don’t want. Consumers want to be empowered to make the right choices based on good information.

Active: You can’t just throw something out to the market and wait for the results. Today’s consumer wants to engage with other people. Your marketing messages need to be two-way conversations—not sermons. This means (among other things) asking your clients what they want and then doing something about it—including closing the loop with them.

Disciplined: If you are going to engage your clients and prospects in a new way, you need a plan—and you need the discipline to keep at it. You can’t start and then let lit lag. Having said that, don’t forget about being flexible and adaptable. Just because you make a plan doesn’t mean it’s set in stone. You will probably have to make adjustments—but you can’t abandon your plan—you just need to make mid-course corrections.

Any “FATHEADS” out there?

Posted in Direct Marketing, Direct marketing creative, Strategy | 2 Comments »

Too Much Information?

Tuesday, June 1st, 2010

In business, we’re always looking for fresh, compelling ways to get our message across. But is it possible to share too much information?

Absolutely. Let’s look at a couple of ways businesses do this.

Assumed Interest
An 8-year old boy once asked his father, “Dad, what’s sex?” The father swallowed hard, wiped his sweaty palms on his pants, took a deep breath, and launched into a 45-minute detailed description of the birds and the bees. When he finished he asked his glassy-eyed son if he understood. “I guess so,” said the boy, “but on the sign-up for soccer camp it says, ‘SEX: M or F’ and I still don’t know what to circle.”

In business, we sometimes provide much more information about our products and services than our customers ask for. And not only do we bore them to tears with our answer, but we don’t even give them the information they really want. When you communicate your message to your customers, make sure you’re giving them what they really want to know—rather than trying to impress them.

Enough is Enough
In “traditional” marketing (direct mail, print ads, catalogs, brochures, etc.) there has been a long-standing debate about whether long copy or short copy is more effective. And there are studies that validate both positions. The real answer is: Your copy is too long when people STOP READING IT. If what you’re saying is truly interesting or helpful, you can talk about it all you want. As long as your customers respond with “Tell me more”, you’re safe.

The same thing is true with new media like blogs and Twitter. Some people post a new blog daily. Some people send numerous tweets every day. If they are providing helpful, interesting content, their audiences will come back for more. Some industries change so rapidly that constant updates make sense. Most industries move a little slower. For most of us, quality is much more important than quantity. Wouldn’t you rather read one good idea a week than five useless ones? What you want to hear from your customers is, “Tell me more!” not “TMI!”

What helps you get the right amount of the right information to your customers?

Posted in Copywriting, Direct Mail, Social Media, Strategy, Twitter | No Comments »

Who’s Using Social Media?

Tuesday, May 25th, 2010

Do you sometimes wonder if all the uproar around Social Media is overblown? Do you find yourself thinking that all this hoopla about blogs and Twitter® and Facebook® is all fine and good, but it’s not where you’re audience is?

Before you dismiss Social Media out of hand as something for kids, you might want to take a look at who’s actually using Social Media tools to look for goods and services like yours. There’s a very interesting article about the types of people using social media that you can check out for yourself. But here’s a quick summary.

• 48% — of Americans age 12 and older are now members of at least one social network
• 30% of Americans age 12 and older who have a profile on at least one social networking Web site use those sites “several times a day
• 42% of all Americans say the Internet is essential to their lives

Add to those statistics that the fastest growing segment of Facebook® users is women 55 years of age and older. You may find Social Media “interesting”, or even terrifying. But chances are, a significant portion of your target audience finds it extremely helpful in making purchasing decisions.

Are you using Social Media? Why or why not?

Posted in Facebook, Social Media, Strategy, Twitter | 2 Comments »