Practical Marketing

Viral Differentiation and Promotion

2011-06-07T14:46:00.000-07:00

Here's an example of viral marketing from a theater that trusts itself and its target audience.

Sure, they're mocking an irate customer. But can you imagine how much fun the theater's true customers are having sharing this content? For that matter, can you imagine how much fun the theater had making the video?

Once upon a time, the customer was always right. Implicit in that statement was the premise that every customer was always right.

YOUR customers may always be right, but if you are properly differentiated, not everyone is your customer. Take advantage of that fact, if you dare, and create a viral video for yourself.

If you do, let me know: I'll post it on Facebook and tweet it on Twitter!

Too Much Marketing

2010-12-09T11:28:00.000-08:00

Last Saturday afternoon, I awakened from a nap to discover a lovely rainbow in my back yard. A quick turn to the left and I discovered the cause was a high-pressure leak spraying out of my hot water heater.

I shut off the water to the house, and called my plumber. That's when things went bad. You see, my plumber had sold out to another company. A marketing company.

I knew it as soon as their telemarketer picked up the phone and said "Thank you for calling XYZ Plumbing, how can I provide you with exceptional service today?"

She didn't know too much about plumbing, but tried to sell me a new hot water heater and a service contract. I demurred.

Her response, edited for brevity, went something like this: People with service contracts get priority service. Was I sure I didn't want the contract? No? Well, we'll have someone there in an hour to give you an estimate. By the way, you'll save money on the estimate with a service contract.

Before ringing off, like any good telemarketer following a script, she asked me if she could help with anything else.

An hour later, another one of the firm's telemarketers called to say the plumber would be delayed. "Should be another hour or so."

Two hours later, I called and reached a supervisor who explained that they had a man in Downey who would come by just as soon as he finished up the job he was working on.

Later that evening, the plumber finally arrived. From the moment he stepped out of his truck, he had his marketing hat on. He hadn't seen the water heater yet, but said I needed a new one. At the very least, a heater flush, with an anode replacement. And a new shut-off valve. And a new shut off valve for the whole house. And a pressure regulator. And a few more things. And of course, a service contract.

He made the pitch verbally. He wrote it up informally, and pitched it again. He asked me to appeal to my wife. He wrote it up in contract form. He mocked me for not purchasing what he deemed to be essential plumbing system upgrades. He and his company had consumed my Saturday afternoon and were well on their way to consuming my Saturday night.

Finally, he installed two 18 inch hoses, charged me $400, and left (but not before offering me a deal on the whole plumbing package if I bought within seven days).

What did I do? The same thing any of your customers would have done: I asked people I know for referrals. Within an hour of posting my query on Facebook, I had two solid recommendations, and a new plumbing company.

Too much marketing. Not enough service. Your first marketing priority must be delivering a product or service people want at a competitive price.

Post Script:
My wife called the company the next day to complain. After being transferred four times, she was offered a 10% discount on the invoice (she declined).

The day after that, we got a call from one of the company's telemarketers, asking how we liked the service. I ended the call before she had the chance to sell me a service contract.

Post Post Script:
After writing this blog entry, I checked out the company's Yelp listing. As of this writing, they have been rated by 12 customers (7 visible, 5 "filtered"). Amazingly, every single customer rated the company 1 out of 5 stars. They'll have a perfect 13 for 13 in just a few moments.

I predict they'll be out of business in no more than two years. You read it here first. Too much marketing. Not enough service.

Post Post Post Script (1/20/11):
An attorney who found out about this post has contacted me about bringing a class action suit against the company because of their unethical practices. We declined to participate, but it's another example of how bad service costs more than ever in the era of social media.

Be Careful What You Ask For

2010-10-04T17:35:00.000-07:00

Conventional marketing wisdom says "know thy customer."

True enough. Whether you're creating a new product or service, repositioning, or trying to improve your web page's search results, you need to know your customer (and for that matter, your prospects).

What's the best way to get to know them? Ask them, of course.

But be careful what you ask for.

The problem is, your customers and prospects don't always know the answer. When they don't, they have to figure one out.

Here's what can happen. Remember the "SpokesApple" campaign by the Applebee's restaurant chain? Yeah, didn't think so.

It's a safe bet Applebee's asked well-intentioned questions of well-intentioned customers about the spokesapple before its debut.

But here's what they overlooked: no matter how they phrased the question "will our new spokesapple make you want to eat our food," their customers didn't know the answer.

They might have thought it was funny, they might have thought it was cute, it might even have made them hungry.

But the road from those "favorable brand impressions" to having dinner at Applebee's is long, and the mental steps between the two is not as direct as it may appear. Base decisions about spending your limited resources on questions that deliver a more apparent payoff.

Ask yourself a couple of questions before you start:

Will this question generate actionable information?
Does this question ask my target about something they have direct knowledge of or experience with?

Examples

Don't ask "which charities should our company support?"
----->Ask "which charities do you support?"

Don't ask "will this advertising make you more likely to buy our product/service?"
----->Ask "tell me about the problem our product/service solves for you."

It's good to know your customers. It's good to ask them questions to learn more about them. But be careful what you ask for... or you could end up creating the next spokesapple.

And that's practical marketing.

Added Value Networking

2010-09-28T14:31:00.000-07:00

You probably attend a lot of networking events. Breakfasts, lunches, dinners, cocktails, grand openings, golfing, baseball games and tree plantings... the list goes on.

It can sap a lot of your time and energy, but you do it because you think it's worth it.

Is it? Here's a test:

Think back to an event you attended more than a few days ago. Picture where you were, and the organization that sponsored the event.

How many of the people you met can you name?

Now, put yourself in the shoes of the people you met. How well do you think they remember you?

Right.

We'd like to remember everyone we meet at networking events, but it's hard to do short of pulling various Lindsay Lohan style stunts.

So how can you make it happen?

Add value to the organizations and people you're networking with. It'll take time and several meetings. Here are some ideas (if you have more, please add a comment to this blog post!):

Volunteer for the board or join a committee.
Create or host an event.
Help people make the right connections.
Provide memorable door prizes.

Bonus points if you can add value in a way that reflects the things that make you (and your business) unique.

And that's practical marketing.

Persona Worksheet

2010-08-03T18:06:00.000-07:00

I've been working with a client to develop personas for her business.

I looked around the Internet for some worksheets to use as a starting point, but didn't find much. So, I created a persona worksheet, and have posted it here, just for you.

If you aren't sure why you'd want to use personas in your marketing, check out my review of The New Rules of Marketing & PR.

Or, give me a call (562) 537-0678. We'll talk about how you can use personas to get more leads and sell more stuff.

2010 SoCal BizDev Conference Report

2010-07-29T20:24:00.000-07:00

I went to the 2010 Southern California Business Development Conference today.

The conference targeted small businesses, and covered everything from the economy to raising capital to SEO. Blake Christian, CPA, gave a fact-filled presentation on using tax credits to reduce the cost of everything from buying equipment to hiring staff (contact him for a copy of his presentation).

There were a couple of thoughts from the speakers that I wanted to share.

The first comes from Eloy Oakley, Superintendent-President of Long Beach City College. After citing some of the statistics on unemployment (12.2% in California for June 2010), he charged us with solving the problem. You, he said, "are the answer to growing this economy."

Wow, how great was that? Let's not look to government. Let's not wait on someone else.

Instead, let's each of us take on the mission of getting more leads and selling more stuff.

I can't imagine a better way to get back to robust economic growth. How many new customers or clients do you need before hiring someone?

It made me want to sell something to somebody right on the spot!

The next speaker was California's Lt. Governor Abel Maldonado. He told the story of his own rise from farmer to City Councilmember to Mayor to State Assemblymember to State Senator to Lieutenant Governor. It was an inspirational story, and spoke to the potential in all of us.

But here's my favorite part: he called for legislators to be reasonable, open-minded and pragmatic.

I think that'd be good for politics, both in Sacramento and in Washington. I know it'd be good for business.

Book Review: The New Rules of Marketing & PR, Revised

2010-07-22T11:12:00.000-07:00

Unless you’ve been living under a marketing rock for the past few years, there won’t be much new stuff in this book for you.

That being said, David Meerman Scott provides enough material in enough depth for everyone to learn a thing or two.

The highlights:

One to one messaging is in. One to many messaging is out.
Focus on content, not aesthetics.

I appreciated his presentation of “personas” - how they’re created and used to get more leads and sell more stuff. More than listing the whats and hows, he used them to bring the chaotic and oft-hyped elements of “new marketing” together in a strategic, coherent way.

I would have liked more details and depth in his examples, and examples and analysis of cases where "new marketing" techniques didn't work.

With Twitter analytics claiming a cacophony of 50,000,000 tweets per day, it takes more than a persona driven strategy to be heard above the noise.

How many web pages do you need to create? How many blog postings? And, if you’re going the Twitter route, how often do you tweet?

Yeah, I know: “it depends.”

I’d like his next edition to give more insight into what’s required to get “critical mass” in the new world of marketing.

Despite its shortcomings, this book is a good introduction to “The New Rules of Marketing and PR.” If you haven’t read it yet, pick it up now.

You’ll be creating personas by next week!

Business Has Never Been Better

2010-07-09T20:23:00.000-07:00

That's a direct quote from an LA Times article about a guy who runs a fleet of milk trucks.

The milk Jim Pastor's fleet delivers costs 20 to 30 cents more per gallon than you'd pay the supermarket, so you'd think he'd have a tough time picking up new customers.

He picked up 300 customers last month.

The secret? His customers like the milk he delivers from Rockview Farms better than the milk they can buy at the supermarket.

It's fresher (generally delivered to the customer's door within 48 hours of milking).
It's local and organic.
Customers say it tastes better than "supermarket milk".

Jim Pastor and Rockview Farms know that only a certain kind of person is willing to pay "a little more" for their service and quality. Sure, they could try to get into supermarkets, and sure, they could spend big bucks on advertising and promotion.

But they're not.

Nope, they're looking for a few good milk drinkers cities of where (my Google search showed) there is no super-fresh milk delivery option: Marina del Rey and Santa Monica.

I'll bet Jim Pastor is going to be picking up way more than 300 new customers very soon.

Drink up!

Does SEO have to be Ugly?

2010-04-22T13:29:00.001-07:00

Ever noticed how even though a web site might be super-ugly, the company behind it figures the site is successful because it attracts a lot of visitors?

What’s the point of dragging (er, attracting) someone to your site if you’re just going to scare them off when they get there?

Sure, there are cases where aesthetics and SEO compete.

Designs that use Adobe Flash are an obvious example: it offers lots of design options, yet is opaque to search engines.

Another example is the use of text: search engines like fresh content and lots of it. Aesthetics suggest using less copy, designed once to the highest possible standard.

Even so, you can populate your content with search engine bait and still have an attractive, effective design.

Maybe the reason we see so many ugly web sites that rank well (and beautiful sites that don't) is that SEO is more the province of the engineer; aesthetics more the province of the designer.

The bottom line: a successful web site requires the right marketing strategy and building a team to implement the strategy across all needed disciplines.

Boosting Sales with Packaging

2010-02-15T08:49:00.000-08:00

I attended the LinkedIn Long Beach networking function last week, and as usual, had a great time meeting new people and renewing relationships (more about LinkedIn Long Beach).

This month, Yasemin Altuner of Maya Trade Corporation was on hand selling olive oil and spice imports. She had a nice display, but ordinarily, I wouldn't have bought anything from her. I buy olive oil and spices at the grocery store.

But Yasemin didn't actually sell me olive oil. She sold me a solution for Valentine's day.

Thanks to Yasemin, I found a reasonably priced, beautiful gift. She wrapped the gift bag using special Valentine's day paper (click the photo to see more of the wrapping accouterments).

My wife loved it. I can only hope next year Valentine's day goes as well as it did this year!

Now, back to you: can you repackage what you're selling and solve a problem? If you can, maybe you'll end up with a little extra revenue, just like Yasemin!

And that's practical marketing.

Learning from the Movie Biz

2010-01-22T17:47:00.001-08:00

Like every other business, the movie business is being reshaped by a new economy and new marketing.

In the not too distant past, studio executives would spend big advertising bucks to generate “boffo” box office. Now, with the reactions and reviews of other movie-goers at their fingertips, prospective audiences can’t be swayed by big ad budgets.

As John Horm of the Los Angeles Times writes:

Marketability (can you sell it?) no longer trumps playability (will audiences like it?)

The declining power of advertising isn’t unique to the movie business, nor is it news that “hot” products and services can get a big bang from social media. If you don’t have a product or service people really want, you might as well close up shop.

But there is good news: now you can use social media to get the information you need to make your product or service so great it’s worthy not just of purchase – but of conversation.

Your company moves forward on great ideas. Leverage the conversations you find in social media to come up with a product or service so great you’ll be the buzz of the blogosphere, the toast of twitter, and the prince of Plaxo!

And that’s practical marketing.

Study: Women & Social Media

2009-12-16T18:02:00.000-08:00

Most forward thinking organizations are already active in social media. Unfortunately, many of their social media efforts are suffering from mixed results.

This was proven recently in a study by ad:tech Chicago and Q Interactive. The study focused on women's participation in social media, but in my view the study's findings are absolutely gender-neutral.

Here's what they found: even though over 50% of women surveyed said they'd "friended" a brand, only 17% said their online experience with the brand was positive!

The survey concluded:

Brand marketers still have a fundamental misunderstanding of what a social environment actually means-people are communicating on their own terms.

[Marketers] need to find a way to disassociate the brand from product and associate the brand with lifestyle or something that has more meaning on a personal level.

I know, I know: it's corporate marketing-speak. Translated into practical marketing terms, the study concluded that the majority of social media marketing isn't very interesting to its target audience.

The reason: marketers want to talk about features and benefits, and ummm... not to put too fine a point on it, but nobody cares.

To get people interested and involved, make your social media efforts about lifestyles, or something else with personal meaning. Leave the hyping of features and benefits to those who aren't reading this blog.

And that's practical marketing.

Can You Wiki Your Brand?

2009-11-24T18:27:00.000-08:00

Branding has changed through the years.

In its first form, it was nothing but a trademark. Businesses put it on their products so their customers would know who they were buying from.

As branding evolved, it went from something you buy to something you trust to something you want to something you prefer to something you love (please forgive the run-on sentence, I just covered over 200 years of branding history!)

Now, we're moving to the next generation of branding: Wiki Branding.

What's that, you ask?

It's a brand that's driven by its community, much as Wikipedia's 14 million articles have been written collaboratively by volunteers around the world.

In order to have a Wiki Brand, you'll need a community to nurture it, to advocate for it, and ultimately to help shape its direction. If you're not sure how to build your brand's community, you're in luck: we wrote about how to do it in our most recent newsletter.

And that's practical marketing.

Pizza Hut's New Logo

2009-11-13T17:17:00.001-08:00

Pizza Hut has rebranded, including a new name and logo.

In an attempt to resonate with those pesky "leetspeaking" Millennial/Gen Y folks, and to expand the menu to include such delivery delights as hot wings and pasta, they've shortened the name of the company from "Pizza Hut" to "The Hut."

I'm going to do you the favor of skipping right over all my snark-filled references to Jabba the Hutt, or wondering if the Long John Silver's chain will rebrand itself as "The John."

Instead, I'm going straight to why it's wrong.

First thing, I know what Pizza Hut sells. It sells pizza. What does a hut sell? I'm thinking fruity drinks on a remote beach...

And, given that a hut is "a small or humble dwelling of simple construction, esp. one made of natural materials, as of logs or grass", why would I want to buy pizza, wings, or pasta from one?

I get it that it's a nickname. Lots of companies have successfully dropped the formal name in favor of a nick:

Federal Express --> FedEx
General Motors --> GM
Kentucky Fried Chicken --> KFC

But there's a difference! In each of those cases, the public was referring to the company by its nick before the change was officially made.

Trying to force a nick onto a public won't work, even if the new roof on the new logo looks like a nipple. Just sayin'.

And that's practical marketing.

Next Generation Networking

2009-11-05T12:35:00.000-08:00

Last night, I attended a networking mixer for a group called "Linked !n Long Beach" at Kavikas Grill & Bar.

The group brings together the powerful online networking facilities of LinkedIn with old-school "f2f" networking. The combination of new-school and old-school delivers a surer, faster way to make deeper connections with the people you need to know.

It was a great mixer at a great location, and the the restaurant provided excellent service and an astoundingly affordable happy hour.

I was surprised, however, by the number of people who could not, quickly and simply, explain the nature of their business and what made them unique.

With f2f networking, the question "So, what do you do?" comes up pretty fast. It's best to have a solid, well-rehearsed answer before you're asked; one that makes immediate, obvious sense to someone who knows nothing of you or your industry.

If you'd like some help creating a solid answer, drop me an email. We'll get together for coffee (or a happy hour beer at Kavikas!) and come up with something Fresh!

And that's practical marketing.

Social Media Strategy

2009-10-26T17:25:00.000-07:00

In a prior post, I confessed that I think of social media as a tactic rather than as a strategy. Because I say such things publicly, some folks think of me as a social media curmudgeon.

So be it.

That being said, social media can consume an enormous amount of your time, energy and money. Of course you should have a social media strategy.

The question is, where to begin?

First thing, take a few breaths, and a few steps back. If you’re in the tweeting trenches without a clear idea of how you're going to funnel your missives, social media's array of features can swallow days of your time before you even know they're missing.

From a distance far enough to give you a strategic perspective, think about the things that make you different; think about the passion that drives your organization forward.

Now, think about what makes social media different: more than any other kind of outreach or advertising, it demands authenticity.

Put those together and you can visualize a social media strategy driven by your core values, not the available technology. You'll be more likely to hit your target, and much more likely to make a real connection when you do.

And that's practical marketing.

I'm a Social Media Curmudgeon!

2009-10-23T15:51:00.000-07:00

I’ve been called to task by Max Chafkin of Inc. Magazine because I got a little snarky about his magazine’s praise for Twitter.

I’ve been dissed for preferring to meet my clients and prospects face to face instead of via technological hook-up.

And most recently, an SEO advocate emailed me wondering if I thought SEO wasn’t an important part of a comprehensive marketing strategy because I got a little snarky about SEO advocates in my newsletter.

I fought it.

“I’m no social media hater,” I told myself.

I’ve been building web sites for over 10 years. I’ve been blogging since 2005. I have accounts on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Plaxo, PingFM and goodness knows where else.

I couldn’t possibly be all that curmudgeonly. Right?

I was in denial.

The first step towards recovery is to admit you have a problem, right? So here’s my problem: I don’t see social media as a marketing strategy. I see it as a tactic.

Underlying all revenues are human relationships.

Social media advocates point out that social media is all about relationships; that it’s transforming their very nature and blurring the boundaries between entrepreneurs and their organizations.

True enough.

But when we focus on media and technology at the expense of authentic human connections, our relationships suffer.

And so do our revenues.

If putting human issues above the technology that’s driving them so fast and so hard makes me a curmudgeon, so be it.

And that’s practical marketing.

SEO: Just Sayin'

2009-10-02T21:43:00.000-07:00

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a terrific way to get people to your web site. Many companies hire folks to write their web pages and blogs in order to bring home the high ranking Google bacon.

But if you're thinking of hiring someone with SEO writing skills, how can you tell if they'll bring that Google bacon home?

Not for nothing, but here's a screen shot from my computer this evening. Note that this blog is ranked 1, 2, 8 & 9 for my keywords (practical marketing).

Just sayin'.

And that's practical marketing.

Rockin' the SEO

2009-09-30T17:27:00.001-07:00

I use the dashboard version of Google to keep track of things, including my blog's rank according to google's blog search tool for my keywords (practical marketing).

Today I saw two of my blog entries ranked way high:

I know, this isn't much of a blog posting. I kept it short because I'm working on getting out what will be a most excellent edition of my newsletter.

If you're not signed up for my newsletter, you can sign up here.

And that's practical marketing.

SEO vs. Promotion

2009-09-29T10:45:00.000-07:00

These days, we hear a lot about how Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is vital for web success.

SEO delivers measurable results, but still, I wondered: how does SEO compare with promotion?

I used this blog to perform a test.

On Tuesday, September 22, I blogged "Saving the Monte Carlo," and used PingFM to let my network of friends and followers on Twitter, FaceBook, LinkedIn and Plaxo know about it.

On Thursday the 24th, I blogged "Getting Practical with Social Media," and loaded it up with my keywords ("Practical Marketing").

Then, I sat back and watched Google Analytics (the chart above is a screen capture with some notes added in PhotoShop).

It's clear that I got more "absolute unique visitors" from my PingFM notice about Saving the Monte Carlo, even though Getting Practical with Social Media remains the #4 ranked post on BlogSearch.Google.com.

Blog rankings change frequently so if you click too long after this writing the post may no longer be ranked.

The bottom line: promotion still works.

In this test, it worked twice as well as SEO.

Does that mean I'm no longer a believer in SEO? Well, let's just say I'm adding a signature line to my future blog postings.

And that's practical marketing.

Getting Practical with Social Media

2009-09-24T12:29:00.000-07:00

One of the raps on social media is that it can be very time consuming.

You can manage this down side with a practical marketing strategy and the right tools.

For example, you can drive more people to your content by letting people know about it via LinkedIn and MySpace and Flickr.

The problem is that going from Facebook to Twitter to Plaxo and the rest is not only time-consuming, it can become a metrics nightmare. Which comment on which network drove which visitors to your blog?

Enter ping.fm. Once you sign up for this free service, you can update your status (or highlight your brilliant blog post) on all of your social networks with a single click.

Even better, if you link to your newsletter or blog post, it tracks all the clicks on the link and reports them to you by network. So, you know how many clicks you got from twitter, facebook, etc.

I used the service yesterday to broadcast my latest blog post.

It got the highest number of hits in a single day any blog post of mine has ever had.

Now that's practical marketing.

Saving the Monte Carlo

2009-09-22T14:37:00.000-07:00

In a prior blog posting, I predicted that the Monte Carlo hotel on the Las Vegas strip is headed for tough times because it doesn't deliver on its brand promise.

In a nutshell, they promise a high-rollin' hotel on the strip; a TRAY SHEEK venue for 20-somethings to engage in DUH BOTCH OR EE (click the image to see the ads), but deliver a fairly ordinary Las Vegas hotel experience.

I'd like them to succeed. The hotel is affordable, and the room was clean and comfortable. Much of its service was excellent.

As social media shines a spotlight on the lie that is their advertising, they're either going to have to change strategy or lose more money than they already are.

Why not embrace Monte Carlo as their brand? Make it real! Reject being just another hotel on the strip!

At its core, the new brand strategy would be to make the experience of being at the hotel as close to being at Monte Carlo, Monaco as possible.

Here are some practical suggestions for making it happen:

Replace the existing, generic artwork around the hotel with images of and from Monte Carlo.
Replace the way-finding signage with one that has international style illustrations, plus text in French and English.
Update the retail stores' inventory to include a few things that might be found in Monte Carlo.
Replace one of the fast food offerings in the food court (currently the likes of Rubio's, McDonald's, Subway, etc.) with La Boulange Bakery or something similar.
Wouldn't it be great if the roulette wheel had just one 0 instead of 0 and 00, just like they do in Monte Carlo? Betcha they'd pack the roulette tables!
Dump Magician Lance Burton. It's not that he's a bad act: he just doesn't belong at a Monte Carlo that's actually branding itself as "The Monte Carlo." Replace the "Lance Burton Theatre" with a top Jazz club or even a Flamenco show (both popular in Monaco). If six other Las Vegas hotels can offer versions of Cirque du Soleil, it seems to me that the Monte Carlo can get closer to Monaco than a magician, yes? And hey, they can always see if they can get Les Folies Bergere from the Tropicana.
Replace the generally empty, yet spacious Brand Steak House (click here to see the floor plan) with a tribute to the Monte Carlo Grand Prix. This could be an attraction in and of itself, if done right: wrap-around imagery of the race, a real Formula One car, perhaps a simulation that gives guests the experience of racing the famous course, and finally, a Las Vegas style "Pit Crew" running the location.

The competition in travel and tourism is intense. Without a strategy that differentiates them in a meaningful way, they can only compete on price.

On the other hand, if the marketing folks choose to make a visit to the Monte Carlo... a VISIT TO MONTE CARLO, no place else will be able to compete with them.

Better yet, they'll be capitalizing on who they truly are, to a target audience with a desire for what they're selling.

Do You Deliver (on your Brand Promise)?

2009-09-22T12:07:00.000-07:00

We recently vacationed at the Monte Carlo hotel on the Las Vegas strip.

Their web site and advertising lead us to think WOW, this will be a swank hotel brimming with glamour. We even dared hope for a touch of the real Monte Carlo, with its famous casino, grand prix, etc.

Fact is, the Monte Carlo is a thoroughly generic hotel with no link to Monte Carlo other than its name.

The headlining entertainer is the thoroughly generic Lance Burton. The premier restaurant is a thoroughly generic steakhouse called "The Brand." The menu gets a little "French-er" at Andre's Restaurant & Lounge, but other restaurants include Diablo's Cantina, a pseudo-Irish pub, a Subway, a McDonald's and a Starbucks.

There were no references to Monte Carlo's famed art, architecture, design or culture anywhere.

For all of its "Monte Carlo-ness," the place could have been called "Vegas Bob's."

Once upon a time, big marketers could spend big bucks to make a mediocre product or service successful.

Thanks to social media, however, the power of big spending on advertising and promotion is declining. Social media sites like Yelp are allowing more and more prospects to get the real story.

The bad news for the Monte Carlo is good news for entrepreneurs. If your marketing and promotion reflect who you are, and if you've positioned yourself properly, bigger competitors won't be able to win your customers just because they out-spend you.

Instead, when your prospects check you (and your big spending competitor) out in social media, they'll find that you (and NOT your big spending competitor) are the real deal.

It's always been important to have your brand aligned with who you are as a company.

Now that the truth of your brand can be checked out by anyone with access to the Internet, it's more important than ever.

Adding Value: The Restaurant

2009-09-18T17:24:00.000-07:00

I've blogged about the importance of adding value to whatever it is you're selling (else you're only competing on price). But, it's not always obvious how to do it without breaking the bank.

We recently vacationed in Las Vegas and had dinner in an upscale restaurant. Fabulous dinner; they did a great job.

But here's the kicker: after we got home to Long Beach, we got a personal, handwritten note (talk about old-school!) from Brian, our server, thanking us for having dinner there! He even spelled our names (Luis & Litha Maimoni) correctly!

It didn't take a lot of time; it didn't take a lot of money. But it sure added value, didn't it?

Meantime, if you'd like to read my review of the restaurant, click here (it'll be the 2nd review). To see Brian's note, click the Del Frisco's graphic.

If you've seen a low-cost, value add for any business (here's another example), I'd appreciate your comment in this blog. Thanks!

Social Media and the Steakhouse

2009-09-15T03:31:00.000-07:00

There's something you should know about me: when it comes to fine dining, I'm all about the steak.

I'm not talking "petit filet" or "surf and turf." I'm talking slab of Meaty-Meat-Meat!

During my recent stay in Las Vegas, I planned a pilgrimage to one its legendary Temples of T-Bone. The problem was choosing the right Cathedral of Cow, as all the major chains have "missions" there.

Enter social media in the form of consumer review site Yelp.com:

Ruth's Chris: good steaks, bad Vegas location.
The Palm: a definite possibility.
Delmonico's: sounds good but it's got that Emeril thing. Meaty-Meat-Meat don't need no stinkin' "Bam!"
Morton's: another definite possiblity.
Smith & Wollensky: One review says it's practically empty on a Friday night, and another says "My $47 steak tasted like an over-marinated hunk of Spam soaked in soy sauce." Next!
Brand Steakhouse: It was right in our hotel; no social media needed to know it was always empty, all the time.

As I reviewed the reviews, I found Del Frisco's Double Eagle. I'd never heard of the place (there aren't any in California), and its name didn't exactly inspire confidence. But holy cow, the reviews!

So we went. It was fabulous.

I'm neither the first nor the last to jump on the Yelp bandwagon, but my experience made it obvious how powerful social media has become. Its ability to guide buying decisions and confer trust is rendering it into an online kingmaker.

Social media: it's what's for dinner!

How Good is SEO for Lead Generation?

2009-09-04T12:51:00.001-07:00

Turns out, not so good, at least according to B2B marketers surveyed by Marketing Sherpa earlier this year.

Respondents were asked to rate the quantity and quality of leads generated for each of several search tactics (click the chart to see it at full size).

It seems respondents' feelings about SEO were mixed. While 71% of the respondents said they use it, only 13% said that it generates a high volume of high quality leads. Almost twice as many said it generates a high volume of low quality leads.

This brings me back to my post yesterday, where I asked about trading off of quality vs. quantity when you're blogging.

I'll bet better content creates better leads. It'd sure be interesting to measure.

9/15/09 PS: HubSpot just published data supporting the premise that SEO generates leads... but not always the leads that convert to sales.

Note: The total percentage of each column reflects those who are using that tactic. For example, 71% of respondents use 'Search engine optimization'. The remaining 29% do not use this tactic.

How Long Does It Take to Write a Blog Post?

2009-09-03T16:04:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I came across a blog entry from Compendium Blogware saying that it only takes 10 minutes to do a blog post.

Wow, I thought to myself. That's pretty good. It usually takes me a couple of hours (or more!) to write a decent post.

So, I commented on their post, asking if 10 minutes was really enough time to create "prospect worthy" content. Not to put too fine a point on it, but it seems like 10 minutes is about enough time to throw some keywords into a recycled thought and post it as one more bit of internet info-junk.

Unsurprisingly, my question didn't make it past their moderation, so it never saw the light of day. Heh.

Even so: can you have a successful blog if you only put 10 minutes into a typical posting? Can you really grow relationships with your target audience using "off the top of your head" thinking?

A day or so later, they posted:

There is a misconception that each blog post you write has to contain unique content - but that is not true.

They go on to explain that if you're trying to get followers, then sure, unique content is good. But, they say, followers aren't the point of blog marketing. Instead, you're trying to attract visitors by blogging regularly, and inserting your keywords as much as you can. Blogging, in their view, is another form of Search Engine Optimization (SEO).

Fine. They're not interested in growing relationships. They're interested in getting click-throughs.

The problem is, as with other forms of SEO marketing, getting people to your web site (or blog) is only half the solution. Once you've brought your prospects to the water, you still have to get them to drink.

But will they, if your content is the product of (a perhaps over caffeinated) 10 minutes? Or, not finding anything original, or insightful in your posting, will they simply click away?

Here's what they said:

Still not sold on the idea of generating good content within 10 minutes? Consider this: Who knows your company best? YOU. You are the one that can write the most meaningful information about your company the quickest.

True enough, but: nobody really cares about my company but me. If I'm going to keep attention, I'm going to need to be writing about the issues my target audience deals with.

Here's the thing: the folks at Compendium are not alone. There are plenty of people pumping out quantity content over quality content.

Obviously, in an ideal world, we'd all write top-quality, original, insightful posts. But Compendium is right when they write:

In a world that's so fast-paced, every minute is precious.

At some point, everyone has to trade off quantity for quality, or vice versa.

As a blog reader, I'd like to hear your opinion about where we business bloggers should invest our time. Once you're reading our blog or web site, do you do a quick scan and then decide whether or not to buy? Or do you do a lot of reading and thinking before going forward?

Go ahead and post your comment. I don't moderate; your thoughts will show up immediately for the world to see.

Creating an Irresistible Offer

2009-09-02T15:17:00.000-07:00

Congratulations, you’ve gotten Mr. or Ms. Prospect to look at your web page or advertisement or flyer, and now you'd like him or her to take the next step in your selling cycle.

How can you make it happen? Should you restate the benefits of your product or service in powerful selling language?

I say no.

You must move the prospect from thinking intellectually to feeling emotionally. Your prospect needs to move from appreciating the benefits to "WOW! I should really DO this. NOW!"

It may be hard to think of ways to emotionally connect with a "target market." After all, a target market isn't a person, a target market is a concept.

Instead, imagine an individual who is likely to buy from you. Make the person real. Give them a family, a job; give them wants, needs, and attitudes. Make more than one persona if you need to.

Next, take a page out of Dr. Linus Pauling's book and brainstorm. Here are some thoughts (and snarky links) to get you started:

Make them an offer they can’t refuse (remember Don Corleone?)
Shock and surprise them (remember Howard Stern?)
Make it obvious.
Solve an urgent problem.
Show a big payoff.

Brainstorm until you've got a lot of ideas. Having trouble picking which one to use? Try the simplest one.

Now go sell something!

Book Review: The Designful Company

2009-08-25T16:15:00.000-07:00

It wasn't that long ago that a company could manufacture a mediocre product and use mass advertising to succeed in the marketplace. According to author Marty Neumeier, those days "have come to an end." [p. 61]

It's innovation that's driving opportunity and market share -- think iPod, Google, Prius and NetFlix.

How do you radically differentiate, as well as solve all the other persistent, pervasive, slippery problems facing business today?

The answer to that question is the central theme of his book. According to Neumeier, you'll need to adapt design principles into your management processes, fundamentally changing the way you do business.

Easier said than done, of course. How do you

"trade the false security of best practices for the insecurity of new practices?" [p. 47]

He has a lot of ideas about how to make it happen. I loved his good/different chart, as well as the identification of the "levers of change."

This is a book about creativity and business, and it's crafted like one. Fun illustrations, text that goes over pages, and a solid index. For photos of some of the spreads (plus another review of this same book), see the Designer's Review of Books.

The book isn't as much fun to read as something from Jack Trout, but if you're thinking strategically about how you'll need to shape your organization to thrive in the future, you should give this book a serious read.

Thanks to Catherine Stickel, Academic Director for Graphic Design & Advertising at Art Institute of California for giving me a copy of the book.

NBC Brands Itself GM Style

2009-08-06T16:19:00.000-07:00

An article in today's Los Angeles Times reminded me of a line in Al & Laura Ries' The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding.

In describing some of GM's many branding boo-boos, Ries & Ries wrote (p. 170):

What's a Chevrolet? In truth, a Chevrolet is a large, small, cheap, expensive car or truck.

The short version of the long, sad story is that Chevrolet tried to be all things to all people, and at the end of the day, didn't mean much of anything to anybody.

Fast forward to present day: Angela Bromstad, president of NBC's prime-time entertainment, had just told a room full of reporters and critics that one of NBC's problems was that it had strayed too far from its brand.

Later in the news conference, Paul Telegdy, who is in charge of the network's unscripted programming, was asked about NBC's brand. Here's how he responded:

Well, that's something that we have spent a lot of research and focus on, in terms of core pillars on what is and where is it an NBC show. We refer to certain key identifying characteristics of NBC shows. That they be human first, deal with real people, people that our cast, our viewers identify with. That are fundamentally positive and that embraces our comedy brand but also, an optimism....

Well, you get the idea. There is some content in his answer but the average listener's eyes would have glazed over long before he got to his third sentence.

So, what's your brand? Do the people who work for you know what it is, and can they articulate it in a meaningful way?

Can you?

Banging the Drum in Social Media

2009-08-05T14:32:00.000-07:00

More and more, entrepreneurs are banging their drums using Twitter or FaceBook or LinkedIn or Plaxo or.... Mostly, that's a good thing. Social media is an increasingly important marketing tool.

Even so:

One trainer I follow tweets a tidbit of wisdom or exhortation of some kind just about every hour.
A brand attorney I follow tweets every detail of his workout plan.

Why do they think I care? Why do they think anyone cares?

If you're using social media to promote your products or services, ask yourself:

Are you creating awareness with the right target audience?
Are you creating the right kind of awareness?
Does your activity increase the perceived value of your brand?
Does it generate referrals?

Don't measure your success by the number of tweets, blog postings, or comments you create, nor the number of followers, friends and connections you have.

Measure your success by the leads and revenue you generate.

Which brings us to the bigger question: what's the social media metric that's the most likely predictor of leads and revenue?

How about: measure the number of meaningful conversations you have.

If you've got a better idea for a social media metric, please post it as a comment in this blog. Thanks!

Driving Social Media with Print

2009-07-16T15:36:00.000-07:00

The campaign for the Bixby Knolls Dragster Expo and Car Show was mostly in print: flyers, posters, advertising, etc.

So, I was pleased to watch the event take off in social media, and crowds that resulted from the additional visibility social media provided.

It was featured on various web sites:

And, it was all over facebook (this is not a comprehensive list, and you may have to log in to facebook to visit the links):

It got blogged about, and according to TweetDeck, saw plenty of action on Twitter. People even tweeted photos of the event!

Why the social media payoff? Three key reasons:

Attention getting visuals (nobody tweets what they don't see)
Lots to talk about (a Speed Expo, a mechanical bull, beautiful show cars and fabulous dragsters with a rich history tied to the community)
The campaign branded it differently from other car shows.

Vroom!

Are You a Dinosaur?

2009-07-15T15:04:00.000-07:00

I was reading discussions on LinkedIn earlier today and found a photographer complaining that people don't want to spend money on photography, and a graphic designer complaining that people don't want to spend money on typography.

Obviously, these are broad generalizations, but they have a core of truth: technology has made it so anyone who can afford a computer, laser printer, and digital camera can produce photos and type.

The folks on LinkedIn argued (correctly) that the unwashed masses don't take photos (or set type) as well as professionals do.

But, it doesn't matter that they're right, does it? If people don't see value in what you're offering, they're not going to buy it, are they? And if they can do it themselves, for less: that's what they'll do.

Now, what about you? Is the market you serve as robust as it used to be? Have you been blaming it on the recession?

Well, it could be the recession. But it also could be that the emerging economy is making your market extinct.

According to the theory, the dinosaurs went extinct when a giant meteor hit the earth. They never saw it coming.

Even if they had, there wasn't much they could have done about it.

You, on the other hand, still have time to adapt. New markets are emerging even as existing ones disappear.

If you'd like us to check out why your sales are down, plus get some recommendations for markets you may be able to capitalize on, ask us about our Brand Scan Plus.

Or, do three tweets and a blog post, and have your paleontologist call me in the morning.

Is Advertising Dead?

2009-06-29T10:14:00.001-07:00

I've read in many places where "Advertising is Dead."

But, according to BrandWeek, at a recent conference, top marketing executives begged to differ. Sure, advertising spending is down. But:

All of the panelists said marketing and advertising are more important than ever to their organizations.

A big theme that emerged from the panel: it's time to rethink, recalibrate, and innovate. With spending going to more and more places, measuring results becomes more important (and more difficult) than ever.

How are you changing your marketing and advertising to reflect the new economy? How are you measuring results?

Adding Value: the Pet Sitter

2009-06-26T16:36:00.000-07:00

The recession has led many revenue hungry organizations to cut prices.

It's not a good idea. It commoditizes their products and/or services, reduces their margins, and can attract the wrong customers/clients.

So, what's an entrepreneur to do? Add value.

But: how can you add value to what you're selling without adding to your costs?

I blogged earlier about how a remodeling contractor did it.

Just the other day, I came across another example.

We'd hired Amber from Alpha Pet Care to take care of our doggies and kitties while we took our summer vacation.

Like many pet owners, we worry about our pets while we're away and want to know that they're being well cared for.

Amber not only took great care of our pets, she took several digital photos of them!

The photos cost her nothing, gave us something we valued, and showed us how much fun our pets had while we were on vacation.

How can you add value to what you're selling?

How's Your Email Campaign Going?

2009-06-17T19:18:00.000-07:00

If you're marketing with email, you probably have information on things like open rates, bounce rates, and click-throughs.

Would you like to know how you're doing compared to others in your industry? Thanks to Constant Contact, you can!

Take a look and see how you're doing!

Creating your Value Proposition

2009-06-15T13:50:00.001-07:00

I'm working with a friend of mine on her value proposition. Your "Value Proposition" is your answer to the question of why should I buy from you?

It's pretty easy to come up with an answer, but much harder to come up with an answer that is unique, powerful, and resonant with your target audience.

Like many entrepreneurs, she had many, many thoughts in answer to the question. For her to get control of her own process, I suggested she write stuff down.

In no particular order, she's writing about:

Her target audience: what they're like, how they live, and what their clients/customers want and need.
What makes her different.
Projects: the kinds she wants, and the kinds she wants to avoid.
Emotions: what she wants her clients to feel like at the beginning and end of engagements.
Results: how her company has created value for its clients.

She wants to clarify, edit, and otherwise perfect her language as she writes. I encouraged her not to: better to create for now.

Critiquing will be next!

So... why should I buy from you?

Dell's Twitter Success Story

2009-06-12T12:53:00.000-07:00

There are a lot of twitter success stories out there. Google the phrase and you'll get pages and pages of results.

The problem is, most of the results people are raving about are something other than revenues.

Today, however, Jack Mixner pointed me to an article referencing Dell's claim to have generated $3,000,000 using twitter.

Holy cow, that got my attention! Good for Dell!

But what about 'tweens?

Is there a revenue-boosting story you've heard about small to mid-sized companies boosting revenues with twitter? Who were they? How'd they do it?

Getting Attention Old School Style

2009-06-11T11:07:00.000-07:00

Getting attention, I often write, is the hardest part of marketing.

Many companies focus on new-school "Web 2.0" techniques: search engine optimization, social media, and the like. Those are all good, and they work.

But old school works too: big visuals capture attention like nobody's business.

We recently created this poster for an event coming to Bixby Knolls in Long Beach. It's 3 feet tall, 2 feet wide and grabs your eyeballs as you walk by. It expresses action, excitement and power in a way that doesn't come across on the video screen.

We printed 500 for just a little over $2 each. How does that cost stack up to what you might spend on SEO or PPC advertising?

Thanks to Tom Daniels for allowing us to use his illustration.

ConAgra Follows Our Design Lead

2009-06-03T19:01:00.000-07:00

ConAgra has a new logo. Interestingly, given a similar set of design criteria, we came up with the same "smiley face" concept for Stephan Insurance Services.

Here's what ConAgra Corporate Communications VP Teresa Paulsen said the company wanted from the new logo:

We wanted to make sure it was uncomplicated, that it felt approachable, so there is a sense of happiness and simplicity there, but it also was important to us that it felt fresh.

Well. If she was looking for Fresh!, she could have found it right here!

And probably a lot cheaper. Anyway, here is the new ConAgra smiley-logo, for your consideration:

Book Review: Precision Selling

2009-06-02T10:25:00.000-07:00

Entrepreneurs know that selling is a core part of everything we do in business. If you’re like me, you’ve seen books, seminars, and web sites claiming to contain the secrets of sales success.

Here’s my problem with most of them: they’re old-school, and many of the key techniques they pitch don’t work, and haven’t for years. With Precision Selling, author Patrick McClure explains how to succeed at selling in today’s world.

Because there are so many ways to be successful in sales, it’s not always easy to know which activities pay off. McClure brings ruthless clarity to the issue, however, and then directs us (with some enthusiasm) to toss the time-wasters.

I believe the hardest part of selling is finding qualified prospects. Once you’ve found a group of people who need what you want, every other part of selling becomes much, much easier.

McClure breaks down the process for finding qualified prospects in a way that you’ll be able to apply to your own organization.

Old school selling says find the customer's pain and sell to that pain. McClure points out that strategy’s “critical flaw. Most potential customers have no idea what their pain is, and even if they did know it, they'd be reluctant to share it with an outsider.” (p. 119)

Old school sales training says sell the benefits (not the features). McClure says sell value in the eyes of the prospect, and illustrates how to find it.

He also brings a “new school” approach to networking, explaining how to build and maintain your network so that you can use it to reach the people you need to close business.

In Closing

The book uses a subtitle of “21 Winning Strategies to Achieve Peak Performance,” but that’s something of misnomer. The book presents an overall approach to sales that is broken into many interrelated components.

You won’t use everything in his book, in all likelihood.

But if you use enough of it, I'll bet you’ll sell more stuff.

The Invisible Objection

2009-05-29T10:51:00.001-07:00

Last week, I attended a panel discussion hosted by the Association of Professional Consultants. The panel accepted questions from the audience, and I queried:

How must sellers and marketers adapt to the economic challenges and changes taking place?

The speaker that gave the best answer was Pat McClure of the Connexia Group. Pat is an author, speaker, and consultant. His practice is built around helping clients improve sales performance.

His answer: beware the invisible objection.

Now, I've taken a fair amount of sales training and have a pretty good understanding of objections. Originally, I thought he was talking about "hidden" objections: the ones the prospect won't share with you.

But he wasn't.

Invisible objections, Pat explained, are the objections that we agree with.

We don't see "invisible objections" because the thinking behind them mirrors our own.

Because we don't see them, we don't respond to them.

Because we don't respond to them, we lose the sale.

What's that got to do with adapting to what’s going on? Plenty.

We've been barraged with a steady drumbeat of bad economic news on every media outlet for a very long time. It's only natural that we've come to believe the message.

Layoffs, plant closings, bankruptcies, lost savings – they’re all great reasons to not buy anything right now, aren't they?

But here’s the rub: if we agree that the economy is so bad that people should hold off on buying, then we'll hold our tongues in silent agreement as our prospects talk themselves out of deals.

According to Pat, here’s what we gotta do instead: make sure our prospects understand why they need – and will get value from – our products and services right now.

Thanks, Patrick. An excellent recession fighting tip!

Book Review: The New Positioning

2009-05-24T10:01:00.000-07:00

Jack Trout's books are always an entertaining, easy read, and The New Positioning is no exception.

Sure, some others reviewers gripe because (despite the title) there's nothing particularly new in his book. Some suggest you read The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding instead.

I say they're spoiling the fun. Anyone who's good at anything knows that success comes from repeating the basics. The fact that you've heard this all before (especially if you've read work from Jack Trout and/or his partner Al Ries) doesn't mean you shouldn't read it, or that you'll get nothing from it.

Here are some tidbits that are worth revisiting:

If your assignment... is to change people's minds, don't accept the assignment. (p. 36)
Think small and don't tinker. (p. 55)
Today, the marketing wars are being won by the well-focused specialists. (p. 64)
A picture is not worth a thousand words. (p. 101)

Sure, it's focused on big-company branding for companies with $zillions to spend. Even so, there is a lot for the 'tween entrepreneur:

If you don't have a simple, differentiating idea to drive your company or brand, you'd better have a great price. (p. 167)
Don't trust your customers to give you all the answers. Trust your instincts. (p. 137)

Despite my overall agreement with his content, I took issue with his claim that positioning/differentiation is basic common sense.

If your differentiation is obvious, someone else is probably already using it! Why else would so many organizations believe that they're differentiated on the basis of quality, service, or commitment to their clients/customers?

As an aside: if there's anything less common than common sense, I'd like to know what it is!

Differentiation is difficult for 'tweens. Your organization works the way it's always worked, which is the way it should work!

Am I right or am I right?

Your approach and processes are different, but the differences are transparent to you because they're such a natural part of who you are.

Sure, once you understand your differentiation, it'll be obvious. But that puts differentiation into a very broad category: that group of understandings which is much clearer in hindsight!

To Tweet, or Not to Tweet?

2009-04-21T18:37:00.000-07:00

Will tweeting on twitter help you get more leads and sell more stuff? If you're a Business to Business (B2B) marketer targeting 'tweens, here's my answer:

No.

Heresy, I know. I've been called out before on this topic by no less than Max Chafkin, staff writer for Inc. Magazine.

If you serve consumers, the situation is different. CNN and Mr. Demi Moore generated a million followers in no time flat. Two questions:

Are those millions of folks likely to buy from you?
How do your chances look for racking up a million followers?

Moving back to B2B marketing: put yourself in the shoes of the decision makers you're trying to reach.

What do you know about their demographics, what they need to accomplish in a day, and the amount of time they're spending reading tweets?

Riiiiiiight.

That's not to say you can't use social media tools in positive ways. Blogging is social media, and I'm convinced blogging works on many levels.

Keeping up with twitter can easily consume vast quantities of your most precious resource: your time.

I'm not saying you can't get anything out of tweeting. I'm just saying I'll bet you can find a "higher ROI" use of your time.

PS: I know twitter is popular and growing fast. According to Brandweek, there were approximately 6 million twitter users in the U.S. in 2008 -- or 3.8 percent of all Internet users -- eMarketer estimates that number will jump to 18.1 million in 2010, representing 10.8 percent of Internet users.

I'm not saying twitter isn't fast, free and fun - because it is all that. I'm just saying its not the place you'll find the highest ROI on your marketing time.

Review: Brian Tracy Seminar

2009-04-10T13:12:00.000-07:00

On Monday 4/6/09 I attended a seminar featuring noted speaker Brian Tracy.

He's an excellent speaker. I picked up pointers on giving presentations just by watching him speak. I loved the way his storytelling engaged us, and the way he used odd facts to spice up his delivery.

That being said, if you've had good sales and motivational training before, you've probably heard 90% of his content.

My favorite line from the session:

There's no such thing as a successful procrastinator.

I was a little surprised to see so little had changed (at least in his view) in selling since I went through Professional Selling Skills (PSS) training from Xerox back in the 1980s.

The context of selling has certainly changed. We live in a world where there is much more messaging, and much more skepticism. I was expecting something more strategic insofar as sales techniques such as cold calling and overcoming objections.

He also spent a fair amount of time pitching his online courses, including reading through a testimonial that read something like:

Since I enrolled in his program, my sales are up 50%! In another year, I expect to double them again!

I know sales people don't always excel at math, but geez!

A couple of of other points:

When you pay $hundreds to attend a seminar, the coffee oughta be included.
He could really benefit from our Brand Scan, followed by a thorough makeover of his marketing materials, handouts, and web site. He is far more polished and professional than his materials make him appear.

Despite these negatives, it's a good seminar, especially if you've not taken motivational or sales training, or if you want to watch a master of his craft doing what he loves.

For me, it was worth it for the latter.

Are You Campaigning with Coupons?

2009-04-09T16:11:00.000-07:00

Do you use coupons to attract customers? If so, here's a way to evaluate your coupon campaign, and to improve its performance over time.

Identify your target audience and the appeal your product or service has for them.

In other words, coupons or not, why should anyone buy from you? (OK, this isn't technically part of your coupon campaign, but in my view, all marketing starts here.)

Establish the “current state.”

What do the coupons look like? Color? Size? What is the nature of the offer(s)?
Where are you running them?

For each method you're using to distribute the coupons, identify the offer, the quantity of coupons distributed, the cost to produce and distribute them, and the target audience.

What is the overall redemption rate?
Are you tracking redeemed coupons by source?

With your "current state" documented, begin your analysis. Start with the basics: how well does your coupon meet the basic AIDA (attention, interest, desire and action) test? Use your common sense to make sure your coupon's design and content is likely to move your prospect to action.

Take a hard look at what you're spending, and what you're getting. Use ROI to guide your thinking about whether your campaign is making the right offers to the right people in the right places. With some rough ideas of what your campaign is making (or costing) you, take a fresh look at what you're doing.

Did you consider all the ways and places your coupons might be distributed?

Valupak, PennySaver, MoneyMailer
Newspapers, magazines, newsletters
Internet coupons, web sites, mobile devices, and your own web site

Do you see any obvious opportunities? If you do, go ahead and grab that low hanging fruit.

You may wish to wait until you get fresh metrics from your reconfigured campaign before you go to the next step.

Now you're ready for the final step. Use "split testing" to continuously improve your results. This is where you really make your money.

Split testing allows you to try out different combinations of distribution, offers, and designs to maximize your ROI from your campaign. Here are some articles on split testing if you'd like more information.

Happy couponing!

Thinking of Cutting Prices?

2009-03-02T14:10:00.000-08:00

With purse-strings tightening all across the land, you may be thinking about cutting prices.

Don't do it.

Noted marketer Peleg Top says everything is negotiable, and that's truer than ever. Even so, negotiate by adding value rather than by discounting price.

Here are a couple of reasons:

A recent Brand Keys study published in BrandWeek concluded that Value Trumps Price Among Shoppers.

By adding value, you'll get the customers/clients you want, instead of the ones looking for the discount of the day.

How can you add value? Here's an example of how one company did it.

How are you going to do it?

How's Your Logo Working?

2009-02-27T11:01:00.000-08:00

Coke and Pepsi simplified their logos recently.

Do you suppose they were taking the advice we published last year in our newsletters?

Many businesses want to tell the whole story in a logo, but they're asking the logo to do too much. In today's commercial environment, complicated logos get lost in the noise. Your logo should stick to its purpose: to announce who you are at a glance.

The snapshot at right illustrates the point. The simpler Pepsi logo stands out from the rest of its retail competition on your local grocer's shelf.

That's not to say that a logo can't put across a strong message. Design Guru John McWade recently posted an excellent discussion of that topic in his DesignTalk blog.

You can do more with a simpler logo. Here's a link to an earlier blog post with an example.

Which brings us to today's question: How's your logo working for you?

Putting LinkedIn to Work

2009-02-20T11:29:00.000-08:00

The other day, I got a call from Michael Wegge, CFP.

Michael is a financial advisor for the Northwestern Mutual Financial Network. In order to succeed, he must constantly meet new people and speak with them about the products and services he offers.

But, it's not easy: when was the last time you willingly talked to a financial advisor?

Right.

He (and others in his line of work) have a very tough time breaking through the "filters" we put up to insulate ourselves from sellers of financial services.

Mike is breaking through his target market's filters by using LinkedIn to power up his prospecting!

Here is his process:

He found me by talking with a tennis buddy who is also a user of LinkedIn, and who happens to be a client of ours.

Next, he asked my client to identify some good contacts. Since I'm linked to my client, my name was one of those passed along.

Mike then contacted me and asked for an appointment. When we got together, he had a printout of all of my contacts on LinkedIn, and had selected several he thought might be good for him to know.

Then, he asked me to make the introductions for him.

Cold calling is enormously difficult. People don't accept the calls, and when they do, they're generally unreceptive. Put a call or email from a trusted contact in front of that email, and he's able to bypass the standard "gatekeeping" and get through to the people he needs to meet.

It's working for him. Can you make it work for you?

You, Me, and Harvard

2009-02-05T11:50:00.000-08:00

In a recent article from Harvard Business Online, John Baldoni discussed the right way to cut a budget. The short version: keep what's core and trim the rest.

Subscribers to my newsletter read the same advice in a newsletter we published last year.

As I explored the Harvard Business Online site, I found an article called The Secret to Getting Your Message Out. The gist of it: with shorter attention spans and overloaded inboxes, most messages don't sink in. Repetition, they said, was necessary, if you want your word to be heard.

Betcha knew that already, didn't you?

I wrote about the topic in 2004, and provided a strategy for cutting through the clutter way back in 2005. This doesn't make Harvard wrong (you do need to repeat your messaging). But repetition alone won't get it done.

I'm not saying I'll always scoop Harvard Business School.

I am saying you might want to sign up for my newsletter.

Because sometimes I do. Heh.

Use of Social Media

2009-02-03T04:52:00.000-08:00

The results of our January survey are in. Kudos to those who took the poll: you're using social media and feeling pretty good about it!

The poll allowed for people to say they weren't using social media, but nobody picked those choices.

7 Steps to Blast through the Down Economy

2009-01-29T16:18:00.000-08:00

Markets are down, credit is tight, and confidence is low. Consumers and businesses are holding on to cash. Big companies are tumbling and the Internet is flattening the playing field. As old business models fail and new ones emerge, ask:

What opportunities are being created?
What communities will emerge? What partnerships?
What will the next “big ideas” be?

With $trillions being pumped into the economy, a come back is certain. You can be in position to capitalize on the come back by following these seven steps:

1. Make Sure You’re On-Target
It doesn’t matter how good your gun is if your aim is off. Before you do anything else, make sure you’re clear about why you’re the best choice for your customers or clients, and that you’re adding value to what you’re doing or selling. Once you’re sure your message is on-target, make sure you’re saying it in a resonant way.

2. Focus on the Basics
More is not better. In this economy, value trumps a more extensive (and expensive) feature set. Focus on what you do best and on where you deliver the greatest value.

3. Toot Your Horn
The easiest way to save short-term cash is to cut your marketing budget. Unfortunately, a revenue drop will follow 3-6 months later. By then, your opportunities to gain market share are long gone, your workforce knows you’ve thrown in the towel, and you’ll have an uphill battle to get back to where you are right now. If you must cut back, continue to promote your core offerings.

4. Look for Opportunities
The drumbeat of bad economic news drowns out the fact that some sectors of the economy are doing pretty well. Can you sell to the security industry? To health care? Can you help people or businesses “go green”? Can you help businesses find cash (in their processes, or in their inventory, or ….) Can you help them with credit? Can you sell to outplacement firms or debt consolidators? Can you make a “Staycation” a “real” family experience?

5. Embrace New Media
If you’re not blogging or using social media, and if your target audience is something other than grandparents, you need to ask your kids about facebook, twitter, YouTube, and the like. Learning to use them isn’t difficult, but knowing how to get more leads and sell more stuff with them can be. And by the way, when was the last time you analyzed the ROI from your online marketing efforts?

6. There has never been a better time for PR
Even if you’re not good at writing, you can use free services such as helpareporter.com to get a shot at media exposure as a “guru” in your field.

7. Sell to your existing customers
Make sure your customers know all the ways that you can serve them. Taking care of your customer is “marketing,” not just “service.”

Good luck and good selling!

This article first appeared in Your Advocate, a quarterly publication of the Long Beach Area Chamber of Commerce.

Integrity as a Differentiator

2009-01-27T08:19:00.000-08:00

In a post about the changes going on in today's society, I asked what trends are emerging, and how might business capitalize on them.

Could it be that you can differentiate yourself by acting with integrity?

We've gotten to the point where lying by business is so ordinary we no longer react to it. We expect it. Mitch Albom cited several lies in his column today.

He didn't list my personal favorite: listening to the "hold" soundtrack of a company's phone system tell you how much the company values your time.

Integrity. Make it one of your differentiators.

Weirdest. Recession. Ever.

2009-01-19T16:57:00.000-08:00

Halfway through January, NBC had sold over 90% of its available Super Bowl advertising.

At $3,000,000 for a 30 second spot, the price is at an all time high.

Yes, I realize that the Super Bowl is a premier advertising venue.

But who's got $3,000,000 to spend for 30 seconds if the economy is as bad as the pundits and the press are making it out to be?

I don't think the economy is as bad as it seems. But $3,000,000 for 30 seconds?

Where's the ROI?

I'm just askin'.

Be a One-Person Focus Group

2009-01-16T17:52:00.001-08:00

In Jack Mixner's blog, he talked about how Akio Morita had to fight off the rest of the company that became SONY in order to bring the Walkman to market.

Similarly, the products of Apple Computer represent the singular vision of Steve Jobs.

Jack called Morita and Jobs "one man focus groups" because they dictated the concept, most of the specs, etc. In so doing, they brought products to market that nobody had ever thought of.

Much of marketing talks about knowing your customer. Focus groups, surveys, interviews, and other forms of knowing your market are good things.

But you can't focus group, survey, or interview your way to a Walkman or an iPod.

You have to capture and express your own singular vision and passion.

It's a tall order, but it worked for them, right?

How can you make your vision innovate for you?

The End of the Four Ps?

2009-01-14T15:31:00.001-08:00

Back in the day, we learned that the four Ps of marketing (also known as the marketing mix) are:

Product
Price
Promotion
Place (meaning either product placement, or more traditionally, distribution)

Now that so much of marketing is online, Duct Tape Marketing blogger John Jantsch has decreed that social media marketers should apply the four Cs:

Content
Context
Connections
Community

You can download his document Social Media for Small Business by clicking the pretty blue picture above.

The four Cs is a good model for social media, but it's important to keep the big picture in mind when you're developing marketing strategy.

Most of social media today falls under just one of the Ps (promotion), though that's changing (see here for an example).

Today's marketer must blend both online and offline tactics in a strategic and coherent way. So, start your marketing answering the fundamental question: Why should I buy from you?

The four Cs can be a useful model, but so can the seven Ps and the five Is. Let your strategy be driven by what you're selling, what you're saying, what you're hearing, and who you're trying to say it to.

Because even though this weeks set of letters (the four Cs) is a good set of letters, there'll probably be another set of letters along next week.

The Economy: Not That Bad

2009-01-09T15:39:00.001-08:00

Every day, the news tells us the economy is failing. Bailout $billions, unemployment, banks going under, and the rest. The media aches to portray these times as a revisit to the Great Depression of 1929.

But how bad is it really?

Unemployment is at 7.2%. Not good, but historically, it was worse in the 1970s. And the 1980s. And the 1990s.

Retailers found that their holiday sales were off. But Amazon had their best holiday season ever. Ever.

Nielsen Online reported that online shopping figures gained 40% in two years (download .pdf). Using holiday sales figures for brick and mortar retailers is using yesterday's yardstick for today's economy.

Do you remember the lines to acquire the iPhone? Or the gPhone? How bad can the recession be if we're lining up for hours to buy expensive tech toys?

And, there's Calavo, seller of avocados, tomatoes, pineapples, papayas, mushrooms and other tropical produce items. According to the Los Angeles Times, their sales were up 10%, and profits for the fourth quarter of 2008 tripled to $4 million!

Nothing fancy: no new technology, no big viral success. They just used their existing infrastructure to sell more stuff to companies who were already buying their stuff. If they can do it, why can't you?

In 1929, international trade plunged by half to two-thirds, as did personal incomes, tax revenues, prices, and profits.

I'm not saying the recession isn't real, or that it isn't serious.

But it's not 1929, either. Don't let the drumbeat of a 24/7 media cycle tell you otherwise.

Google Extends Search Dominance

2009-01-06T07:18:00.000-08:00

One of the challenges of new media is knowing where to put your time and money. The core of the problem is that your time and money are finite, while the web provides infinite (and expanding!) opportunities to spend.

According to Mediaweek, Google has extended its dominance in search. Google handled 64% of all searches in November 2008, up from 58% the prior year, gaining ground against both Microsoft and Yahoo!.

Advertising requires a certain "critical mass" to be effective. If your Pay-Per-Click advertising budget is stretched over two or three vendors, you may be able to boost your Return on Investment by focusing on just one or two.

Growth Sectors for 2009

2009-01-05T12:53:00.000-08:00

Our December 2008 poll asked which sectors of the economy will have the most growth in 2009. The leading sector, as chosen by respondents, was Federal Government. Health Care came in #2.

While the media continues to paint pictures of economic disaster, many professionals think we are at or near the bottom of the current crisis.

What It Means
In November, we asked readers of this blog when they thought the recession would end. 58% said this year or next.

When it ends for you will have a lot to do with the steps you take right now.

$Billions in Federal spending are coming. How can you position yourself to get a piece of the pie?

Infrastructure projects are likely to get a big boost. If you're not in construction or engineering, consider the whole supply chain. Can you provide goods or services to their suppliers?

Capitalizing on the Recession

2008-12-22T09:18:00.000-08:00

The news about the economy seems to get worse every day. Still, some companies are thriving. Is it a coincidence that they're the ones thinking creatively?

Greeting card maker Order of St. Nick has been doing blowout business selling holiday cards with themes like Lost My 401k and The Worst is Yet to Come.

Can you put the recession to work for you? With humor, attitude and a little luck, your campaign may go viral, just like it did for them. Some of the places they've appeared:

You'll need to get creative, so here are some earlier postings to jump-start your brainstorming:

Inflection Points

2008-12-14T16:10:00.001-08:00

I had lunch with my friend Shannon Barnes Friday.

Oddly enough (unless you get to know us), we spent a lot of time talking about "inflection points."

"Inflection points" refer to big changes in the direction of lines on graphs. They mean the end of the old and the beginning of the new.

According to Andy Grove:

...A strategic inflection point is... when... fundamentals are about to change. That change can mean an opportunity to rise to new heights. But it may just as likely signal the beginning of the end.

Here's the part that Shannon and I found interesting: the three dimensions of our society - political, economic, and social - are at inflection points right now.

We don't have "an" inflection point. We have a "perfect storm" of inflection points.

What trends will emerge? What opportunities will arise, and what businesses will serve them?

Shannon and I had some ideas about what it all means. But, I'd like to hear from you:

What are the "next big things" going to be, and
how are you going to capitalize on them?

Success with Spam!

2008-12-11T14:51:00.001-08:00

It had to happen: Linzie Hunter figured out how to make money off the spam emails jamming her inbox.

Her illustrations of spam messages started out as a fun experiment. After she posted them on social media site Flickr, they got noticed by John Martz, a contributing blogger to drawn.ca.

Next thing you know, a couple of other blogs picked them up: kottke and Boing Boing. One month later, she was profiled in Wired and The New York Times Magazine, and requests for prints and posters came flooding in.

I confess I find her illustrations hilarious. You can a buy framed version of your favorites at ThumbtackPress.com.

As you kick around your marketing plans for 2009, you may be thinking of adding a dash of viral. If so, consider Linzie's formula: do what you love, do something unique, and do it with a dash of humor.

Viral marketing can pay off big. But, it's risky to swing for a viral "home run" until you're executing on the fundamentals.

Once you know you're hitting singles (your ongoing marketing is generating leads and revenue), you'll have the breathing room to swing for a home run (viral success).

By the way, while we're on the topic of viral marketing, most people have a favorite. Mine is Burger King's subservient chicken. What's yours?

The Right Tool for the Right Job!

2008-12-10T16:36:00.000-08:00

In Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, Engineer Scott admonished a junior technician to use "the right tool for the right job!"

It's good advice for marketers, but there are so many tools it's hard to know which will work the best.

The movie was made in 1989, back when print and broadcast were the only games in town. With web sites, email, social media and blogging all offering promise, which tools are the right ones for you? You don't have time and money for them all, yet each one has proponents singing praises.

Forrester Research has some input for us. In a recent study, they found that only 16 percent of consumers trust what they read on blogs -- less than direct mail and message board posts. Traditional media, on a whole, still garners more trust from consumers than digital outlets.

This doesn't mean you shouldn't use the new media, or that it can't work for you. But, make sure you're following Scotty's advice and pick the right tool for the right job.

For example, if you're looking to keep a lot of Gen X/Gen Y (aka millennials) abreast of what you're up to, Twitter might work. If you're trying to express a complex message to Baby Boomers, it might not.

How can you figure out what will work for you? Think about the following:

What am I trying to say?
Who am I trying to say it to?
What are they doing right now?
What are they thinking about right now?

Remember, whatever your message is, your target audience is going to be distracted when they first receive it. If you can figure out what they're thinking and doing, you'll have a much better chance of getting inside their heads.

Getting Attention in Times Square

2008-12-08T10:55:00.000-08:00

If there's a tougher place to get attention than New York's Times Square it's hard to imagine what it might be. How do you compete with electronic signs that wrap around entire buildings?

Here's how Scholastic, the publisher of the Harry Potter series, did it. On Halloween, they brought in Steven Clarke, an elementary school teacher, to carve pumpkins.

Imagine, carving pumpkins in the middle of all that electronic madness!

But, it worked: people stopped and watched him for as long as twenty minutes, often with smiles on their faces.

The lesson: if you want to capture attention, do something different, like an old-fashioned pumpkin carving in the middle of of Times Square!

How are you going to get attention?

The Recession Ends...

2008-12-06T13:29:00.001-08:00

Last month, I asked readers of this blog to tell us when they thought this recession will end. The bad news: 42% said 2011. The good news: nobody answered after 2011!

But, there is one additional silver lining in the survey results: with 29% of respondents saying 2009, and another 29% saying 2010, the majority of respondents said the recession will be over before 2011.

Hurrah! Because personally, as far as this recession goes, I'm already done with it!

Inc. Magazine is All a Twitter...

2008-12-05T12:52:00.001-08:00

Inc. Magazine kicked off its "Entrepreneurial Year in Review" gushing over Twitter and its CEO Evan Williams. Here's why Twitter is amazing:

It forces users to boil down the complexity of what's going on in their lives to 140 character (max) "tweets."
According to the article, Williams admitted he still hasn't figured out how to make money.
The company raised $15,000,000 in 2008.

Now that, ladies and gentlemen, is marketing.

Even so, he didn't get the nod for being the #1 marketer. Who did? Well, you should have known: Barack Obama!

Let Your Life Speak

2008-11-17T07:26:00.000-08:00

When Parker Palmer wrote Let Your Life Speak, I doubt he expected me to endorse its message of differentiation. In fact, he probably wasn't thinking of his effort being cast as an entrepreneurial tool of any sort.

That's because the book is intended to help readers take on spiritual issues, such as finding a sense of meaning and purpose in their lives.

It's not a "how to" manual. There are no step-by-step instructions, nor pages titled "The Four Things You NEED TO KNOW about Vocation." Instead, the book is mostly about him: the zig-zags his life took as he learned (many times, the hard way) the nature of his true self. He uses his own personal journey to illustrate the nature of vocation, and the conflicts that confront us as we seek to understand it.

It's quite a journey -- he leaves UC Berkeley to become a Washington D.C. based community organizer, and from there goes on to become a Quaker, and then a writer, speaker, and activist.

If you're going through a period where you're asking questions like why you're here on this earth, his reflections will be meaningful to you.

If you're trying to figure out how to get more leads and sell more stuff, you've come to the good part. He writes:

Our problem as Americans... is that we resist the very idea of limits.... Our national myth is about the endless defiance of limits.... We refuse to take no for an answer.

Perseverance is vital, and it's important to know real limits from apparent limits. But, unless we take some time to reflect on who we are, of what we do well, and what we're passionate about, our temptation (and cultural inclination) is to try to be all things to all people.

Many years ago, Jack Trout wrote Differentiate or Die.

What I'm writing, right now, is that your differentiation must harness your passion. If you're not sure what it is or where it's coming from, you could do much worse than to spend some time reading this 109 page book.

twitter? facebook? plaxo? LinkedIn? YouTube?

2008-11-10T14:25:00.001-08:00

Social networking sites (e.g., LinkedIn, facebook, YouTube, etc.) are all the rage. Seminars, webinars, books, and newsletters carry on about how well they work, how valuable they are, and so forth.

Remember how it was in the early days of the web? How much money got poured into web sites? How little revenue was generated?

It's happening again, only instead of losing money, people are losing something far more valuable: their time.

Entrepreneurs who think of these new sites as "free" alternatives to broadcasting or advertising send out "feeds" offering free training, hyping a web site, or announcing how EXCITED they are about the new content in their teleclass.

It makes me wonder why they think people are listening. It lets me know they don't get social media.

Social media is about having conversations. Yes, one to one, the old fashioned way.

It's just like real life: before people will buy from you, or refer you, they have to know you and trust you. Pushing for sales comes last.

Lessons from Obama's Victory

2008-11-06T17:00:00.001-08:00

A Business Week article talked about what business can learn from Obama's victory.

I'll leave it to others to talk about the rest of your business, but here's my take on the marketing take-aways:

Stay on point. It's tempting to broadcast all the reasons you're the right choice, but it gets confusing. Stick to the basics and repeat them over and over. And over. That's assuming, of course, that you have the right message in the first place...
Execute. Somewhere, you have a marketing plan with objectives and action items and dates. Are you on target? Did you get out those newsletters? Did you do those events? The Obama campaign found a way to send an email out almost every single day. Are you busier than they are?
Find an underserved market. Obama beat Hillary Clinton in the primaries in part because he worked the caucus states while she focused on the big states (Ohio, California, etc.). For an example of how to find an underserved market, see this earlier blog post.

Follow these examples and you'll make enough money to have your taxes raised!

It's Not as Good. It's Better.

2008-11-05T18:05:00.001-08:00

In tight economic times, high end quality and an array of features can be trumped by simplicity and lower pricing.

Here's an example: Pure Digital's "Flip" line of camcorders retails for about $150-$180, depending on model. By comparison, market leader Sony's start at $250.

Movies made with the Flip may not be as good as movies made on a Sony. And, Flip's list of features is woefully short.

But, according to Business Week, they've sold over a million camcorders since May 2007.

By now, technology (whether camcorders, software, or toothbrushes) has outstripped the ability of most users to fully use it.

Simplicity is a compelling option.

If you're thinking of introducing a new product or service, resist the temptation of trying to dominate the high end. Instead, go for simple and cheap.

Fine. Inexpensive.

No problem.

Which Comes First? Marketing or Sales?

2008-10-30T14:40:00.000-07:00

Even though I'm a marketing guy, I have to confess that sales comes first. No business can start before some kind of a sale is made (even if that sale is to an “investor”, rather than a customer).

Even so, good marketing can act as a “force multiplier” for every selling effort. To not take advantage of marketing is to add time, effort and expense to the sales cycle.

This doesn’t mean sitting people responsible for sales down and lecturing them on “the power of a brand.” Sometimes marketers, when talking with (to?) sales people, spend too much time emphasizing the academic.

Sales folks just want to know the fastest, easiest way to get more leads and sell more stuff. This attitude can (and some times does) make marketers crazy.

But let’s face it: sales people who get overly analytic are unlikely to make their numbers. Thus, the burden is on the marketer to deliver clear, pragmatic, actionable information to the sales team.

Is it all about sales? Is it all about marketing? No.

It’s all about making the top line sing, and for that to happen, you need both.

Once-in-a-Century Credit Tsunami

2008-10-23T11:56:00.000-07:00

If you're like me, you're about ready to slap the next person who employs the euphemistic phrase "economic uncertainty" in the face of $700 billion bail outs, free falling housing prices, wiped out retirement portfolios, and businesses struggling to meet payroll.

Alan Greenspan has referred to "the meltdown" as a "once-in-a-century credit tsunami" and admitted he was "partially wrong" and in "shocked disbelief."

Obviously, his words got our attention, but the outlook is not entirely bleak. Products such as the iPhone (and now the Gphone) are flying off the shelves, proving that there is still demand from consumers for the stuff they really want (be glad you're not selling SUVs!)

How can you cut your marketing budget while still keeping your message in front of your target audience? Check out our newsletter for our answer, and then drop me a line with your own!

Capitalize on the Credit Crunch

2008-10-14T16:18:00.000-07:00

It's much easier to get your prospect's attention if you join the conversation going on in his or her mind.

It wasn't that long ago that everyone was worried about the price of gas. So, I blogged here and there about how to join that conversation.

Today, though, the financial crisis is what's on everyone's mind. Uncertainty has paralyzed decision making, and cash is King (or Queen, if you prefer).

How to get attention when all your prospect is thinking about is where they can find the cash to make the next payroll?

Show them the money, of course!

Or rather, show them how you'll show them the money.

Our client Acuity Consulting recently published an issue of their online newsletter which capitalized on this "opportunity." Its message? Hire Acuity Consulting and they'll help you find cash hiding in inventory.

Now, what can you offer to do to help your customers and prospects find some cash?

PS: Here are some web based tools you can use to find out more about what's going on in your prospect's mind.

How Good is Your Headline?

2008-10-10T17:04:00.000-07:00

A good headline helps out with the toughest task in marketing: getting attention. Done right, it gets past your target's filters and joins the conversation going on in his or her mind. Done wrong, everything after it never gets seen or heard.

So, whether you're sending out an email or creating an advertisement, it pays to spend extra time perfecting your headline. If you've ever struggled with the process, I've got good news for you: the folks at the Advanced Marketing Institute have created a free tool.

Though it will never take the place of creativity and critical thinking, it's fun to run headlines through it and see how they get scored for "Emotional Marketing Value."

If you try it, please let me know how it works for you.

The Debate and Target Marketing

2008-10-08T08:15:00.000-07:00

Last night, millions of people watched the Presidential candidates debate each other. Who won?

According to an MSNBC poll, 88% of viewers felt Obama had won, while 12% felt McCain had won.

According to a Fox News poll, the results were the opposite: 88% felt McCain had won, while only 12% felt Obama had won.

A CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll delivered more neutral results.

How can opinions about the same "product" differ so widely? It's all about who's watching. Different audiences react differently to identical offerings.

Though it's natural to want to appeal to everyone, people are different. To try to appeal to everyone will result in a soft, mushy "brand" that doesn't offend anyone but doesn't engage anyone either.

As Jack Trout once wrote: Differentiate or Die. It's even truer now than it was then.

Taqueria La Mexicana #5

2008-09-22T11:42:00.000-07:00

With the economy going the way it is, it's tempting to try to sell more stuff by adding new products and services to your inventory.

Don't succumb to the temptation.

The success of a recently opened taco stand at the corner of Carson and Cherry in Long Beach illustrates why.

A few years back, the location was known as the "Carson Freeze." The owners had built a nice business selling fast-food and a whole lot of soft-serve ice cream.

When they retired, they sold the place to a guy who named it "The Backyard Grill." It quickly went out of business.

New owners came and went but the cycle repeated itself: grand opening, no business, closure, repeat.

One day, a sign went up declaring that the location was now to be known as "Taqueria Mexicana #5".

Gradually, the place got busy. Now, there are frequently lines at the counter and outdoor tables are full.

Their secret? They focus: basic Mexican food, clean, fast, competitive prices.

Because they've kept the menu limited, they have a small, fast turning inventory. Operations are so simple that they use just about one third of the kitchen and counter space that prior owners used.

Overhead Low + Revenues Up = Good Profit!

So, before you expand your product or service lines, remember Taqueria #5 is booming by focusing on what they know and do best.

I miss the soft-serve ice cream, though.

Adding Value to What You're Selling

2008-09-17T10:36:00.001-07:00

In Jack Mixner's blog, he occasionally writes about the subject most dear to my heart: boosting the top line.

In a recent post, he talked about how one of his clients - a company that installs granite counter tops - created a "free" offer as a way to get attention and differentiate.

As part of the installation process, they cut a hole in the granite for the kitchen sink. Instead of discarding the cut-out, they trim it, polish it, and present it for "free" as a cutting board. The cutting board matches the decor of the entire kitchen, and adds real value by protecting the client's investment in the new counter top. It allows them to advertise a "free" offer with genuine value, differentiates the client from his competitors, and costs almost nothing to provide.

Here's my question for you: what are you creating, as a process of delivering whatever it is that you deliver, that you can tweak and make into a no- or low-cost freebie?

Act on Your Values

2008-09-16T16:59:00.000-07:00

In his blog, Jack Mixner wrote about the importance of keeping true to your values.

He told the story of the catastrophic results of a board room battle. Alan Hirschfield, the CEO of Columbia Pictures, lost his job because he failed to do what he knew to be the right thing.

Personalities played a large role in how things came out. Details are in the blog, but here's how it relates to practical marketing:

Personality counts
Act on your values

When people have a lot of choices offering products/services similar to yours (and they do), they're going to buy from the people they like the most.

If you're not being true to yourself, that falseness is going to hurt your sales because it'll be harder to define, create, and grow relationships with your target audiences.

What's Going On In Your Prospects' Minds?

2008-08-05T09:32:00.000-07:00

It's notoriously difficult to break into the mind space of your target audience.

How do you do it? One way is to join the conversation that's already taking place in their minds. But, how do you know what's going on in there?

Sure, you know how to Google, and you've used it to find all kinds of answers. But for this, you're not so much looking for a web site as much as a place where your prospects express themselves freely.

Ideally, the place you're looking for will have your target audience speaking on their own terms and in their own words about service, pricing, and features. The good news: online (or vitual) communities, blogs, and internet forums and discussion boards host these sorts of conversations 24/7.

Here are a couple of tools to help you find the conversations meaningful to you:

blogsearch.google.com - you not only get what's going on in blogs, but also in online forums. It works just like the Google you're already familiar with, but excludes web sites from your search results.
technocrati.com - you can search for posts with key words. This is particularly helpful if you're doing any online marketing.

Once you know what's going on in your prospect's mind, you'll know what you'll need to say to break through.

Now, hit those town halls, crank up the volume, and break on through.

Walmart's New Logo

2008-07-30T12:05:00.000-07:00

Without much fanfare, Walmart has introduced a new logo, replacing the one they'd been using since 1992. According to Walmart's Press Release, "This update to the logo is simply a reflection of the refresh taking place inside our stores and our renewed sense of purpose to help people save money so they can live better."

But does it? Let's break it down.

By changing from heavy, block ALL CAPS type to gentle, thinner, upper and lower case type, they've gone from being so powerful and intimidating to being so friendly you want to offer them a glass of warm milk.

The star, which would have been at home on many national flags as a symbol of power, has been reduced to an innocuous burst. It does nothing except provide a visual link to the prior logo.

So, what's the real purpose behind the logo? Is the company trying to put a more eco-centric foot forward, as some suggest? Are they freshly committed to saving consumers money so they can live better?

A trip to your local Walmart will reveal that Walmart remains Walmart.

Then why spend the huge money to put up new signs, re-do packaging, updating the web site, etc?

Perhaps the purpose of the new logo is to put a friendlier face on the next 175,000 square foot super center, coming soon to a town near you.

What I'd Do if I Published a Community Newspaper

2008-07-24T14:19:00.000-07:00

The newspaper business is changing rapidly. Newspapers are shrinking, the web is exploding, and the lines between news, opinion, and entertainment have blurred. Industry consolidation means locally owned community newsweeklies compete against media giants with far greater resources.

None of this has escaped the attention of Neena Strichart, publisher of the Signal Tribune, our local newsweekly. In today’s column, she wrote about a meeting where the Gazette’s Associate Publisher and Executive Editor Harry Saltzgaver slammed “nearly every other publication… and form of web news in town.”

With Saltzgaver planning to invade her turf with a new publication (the Uptown Gazette), she asked what we readers would do if we were in her shoes.

Here are my six recommendations.

1. Value Proposition
Before making any changes to the way you're doing your marketing, make sure you have a solid answer to sales and marketing's fundamental question: why should I do business with you? Write out answers to questions like:

Why should anybody advertise in the Signal Tribune?
Why not some other publication?
Why shouldn't they promote some other way?
Why shouldn't they just keep the money?

Be specific. Validate your answers to the best of your ability.

Exposure to your readers is the “product” advertisers are buying. More readers means more exposure for your advertisers, so be sure to analyze the value you deliver to your readers too.

2. Find Time and Money
There are only so many dollars and so much energy. It isn’t reasonable or practical to take on sales and marketing initiatives without adequate resources. Review your marketing and sales activities and eliminate activities and spending that aren’t on target.

3. Differentiate
As Jack Troutman says, “differentiate or die.” Here are some ideas for differentiation:

As the local dailies continue to shrink, there will be fewer and fewer stories on the neighborhoods you serve. Run more stories on them, and fewer on the ones you don’t.
Update your tag line. “Your Weekly Community Newspaper” is true as far as it goes, but it’s just as true for any weekly community newspaper. How about something that would resonate more deeply with your readers?
Make known the services you provide to your advertisers.

How many potential advertisers for your newspaper are aware of everything your staff will do to help them get the best possible results?

How many know that Signal Tribune staffers will do the legwork for legal notices such as DBA filings, including follow up filings?

4. Review Your Advertisers
Who are they? What sort of return are they getting? What do they have in common? Can you break them into categories for analysis?

Once you can identify the kinds of organizations that get good results from advertising with you, you’ll know who should be advertising with you (target market, anyone?). Even better, you’ll be armed with very persuasive information when it's time to make the sales calls.
Make sure your advertisers are aware of the return they’re getting on their investment.
Create advertising packages that combine web and print advertising.

5. Web Site
Have your web site better reflect your newspaper and the communities you serve.

Incorporate your visual identity (logo, colors, etc.)
Add community specific features and links.
Foster discussion of the articles on your web site.
Create pages on social networking pages such as Facebook, MySpace, orcut, Yahoo! 360, etc., that link back to your publication’s web site.
Find and fix broken links.

6. Take Your Own Advice: Advertise
In each issue, run a display ad to grow the connections between your publication, your readers, and their communities. It wouldn’t hurt to advertise the success some of your advertisers are having, either.

Good luck and have fun.

Blogging Success Study

2008-07-18T17:44:00.001-07:00

With all the buzz about blogging, and so little hard data about what makes blogs successful and/or cost effective, I was excited to learn about the Blogging Success Study conducted by Northeastern University and Backbone Media, Inc.

They interviewed 20 successful bloggers and identified five success factors.

Culture - If you have a company culture that is interesting or cool, but not as well known as you'd like, or conversely, if you have a bad reputation you'd like to overcome, blogging can be a good way to get the word out.
Transparency - If you're not committed to being completely open, you'll won't get the credibility and trust you need to succeed.
Time - As any regular blogger can attest, blogging takes lots of time. Be ready to commit to it.
Dialogue - Talk about what your audience wants to talk about, even if it isn't what you originally thought you were going to be talking about.
Entertaining Writing Style - Make your blog a fun read, or give it enough "human" content to engage readers emotionally.

For all that, the survey was a little disappointing.

They only analyzed successful blogs. It would have been good to know what bloggers that quit or failed had to say about the reasons why.
The findings are the product of a self-assessment by the chosen bloggers. If you want to ask someone what makes a blog successful, shouldn't you ask the folks who read blogs rather than those who write them?
There were no metrics. I'd have liked to see things like "bloggers who posted five times per week grew the readership of their blogs, on average, twice as fast as bloggers who only posted once a week," or "we spent less than 1/2 of 1% of our revenues on our blogging effort but it's boosted sales by 10%."
There was no systematic discussion of how the blogs tied into overall marketing strategies. Were the blogs linked to on company web sites? Were they promoted in mail or email? Did anyone promote their blogs through banner ads or Pay Per Click campaigns? Was there a payoff for advertising a blog vs. not advertising?

Overall, it's a nice study and you can download it from the link that's at the top of this blog entry. But, the bottom line is that what it tells you, you probably knew: be honest, post regularly, engage your target audience, and be a decent writer.

As for me, I blog on.

Tale from the Retail Trenches

2008-06-27T15:28:00.001-07:00

The other day, I was visiting a friend who has owned a hobby store for 10 years.

He sells models of everything from planes to trains to automobiles to submarines and aircraft carriers.

His rows of shelving display colorful model kits. Behind and under the counter he has all the supplies you need - paint, glue, brushes, knives, etc.

Dangling from the ceiling are lots and lots of model airplanes of various sizes, from vintage to futuristic. I noticed that as I entered the store, I walked under a World War II era bomber dropping bombs on my head.

He's closing his store now, and I listened as he shared stories from the trenches. In one of them, he related how he'd host model building evenings as way to get today's tech-savvy kids to sample his old-school wares.

At at the end of the session, parents would come to pick up their children. They'd go through the store from front to back, find their child, and then, nearly ready to exit, would ask my friend "Do you sell airplane kits here?"

It was all my friend could do to keep his mouth shut and point at the ceiling.

To be fair to the parents, we should mention that they were often on the way from picking up one child from sports and on their way to dropping off another at a music lesson. And, did I mention they were on the phone?

There's a lesson for all of us in his story.

Given the level of distraction in the lives of your target audience, are you sure they know what you're selling?

Getting attention: it's the hardest part of marketing (and sales), and it's getting harder.

Advertising Vs. Packaging

2008-06-10T14:06:00.000-07:00

As advertising reaches suffocating levels, consumers are responding by protecting their “mind space” with everything from the mute button to iPods and TiVo to sheer force of will. If you’re advertising, you’re probably struggling to get and hold consumers’ attention.

If your message is being muzzled, consider spending more on packaging. It’s the one place you can be sure your message is on hand when your prospect is willing to process it.

How effective can packaging be?

Earlier, I blogged about how Pepsi recreated its packaging to better resonate with target audiences. By all accounts, it’s been a success.
Pom made thier packages in the shape of a pomegranite. Are you more, or less likely, to pick out Pom's packaging or something in a traditional round or square package?
Way back in 1968, Pringles introduced a round can to hold potato chips. Even though other companies have imitated the packaging concept, Pringles remains the category leader.

Redesigning your packaging will not be enough to capture attention in the hyper-competitive retail consumer marketplace unless you think big. Don’t just redo the color scheme or slap on a new logo or slogan. Create something new that’ll reach out and grab some eyeballs by the retinas.

You want attention, you gotta go get it.

The Limits of Advertising

2008-06-09T13:43:00.000-07:00

Last weekend, I attended "Scout-O-Rama".

Scout-O-Rama is, among other things, an intra-scouting competition. Various scouting organizations compete for new members with the all the traditional promotional tools: displays, banners, activities, flyers, etc.

Some added advertising to the mix by putting a kid out in front of the booth calling out to passers-by.

As luck would have it, right next to the climbing tower you see in the photo was a young lad offering the chance to fold and fly paper airplanes. He did his best: "Fold them! Fly them! Experience the miracle of flight!"

Did it work? Nope.

Kids and grown ups swarmed past the poor kid hawking paper airplanes so they could scramble up the tower.

The moral of the story: it doesn't matter how much you advertise if your audience wants what someone else has got.

WaMu and Whoo Hoo

2008-06-05T18:32:00.000-07:00

WaMu's Whoo Hoo campaign is putting up some good numbers. According to BrandWeek, the bank attracted 145,501 online checking applications from January though April. (Note: I looked for, but did not find, the number of applications recieved before the campaign.)

In an earlier post, I explained my reservations about this campaign. Never mind that Homer Simpson started using the term WAY before WaMu did.

The success reported in BrandWeek is the result of a multi-million dollar advertising spend. But, if you have enough money to hire TBWA/Chiat/Day and Razorfish to create your campaign for you, you probably aren't reading this blog anyway.

Your investment in marketing needs to bring in customers/clients that will stay clients/customers over the long term. "Whoo hoo" is not a credible brand promise, and the bank's offer of free checking doesn't make it so. How likely is it that these new customers will stick around over the long term?

And another thing: what's up with being a "fun" bank? Isn't the most important thing that the bank be safe?

WaMu: the fun, safe bank.

How's that sound to you?

Cashing in on a Trend

2008-06-02T14:01:00.000-07:00

On May 15, 2008, The California Supreme Court struck down the state's ban on same-sex marriage. Result: the market for everything marriage related grew substantially.

If you're a wedding planner, a bakery, a venue where a reception might be held, etc., you've just been gifted a whole new (generally affluent) market with an urgent desire to spend money.

What are you going to do about it?

If your target audience is not affected by the gay marriage issue, see earlier posts on how to capitalize on the rising costs for food and fuel.

A New Take on "Customer Centric"

2008-05-28T16:14:00.000-07:00

Once upon a time, designers designed products for consumers, and "social networks" such as MySpace and Facebook hadn't been invented.

Now, two twenty somethings from Chicago have created a roaring T-Shirt business with no professional designers, no sales force, no retail distribution, and no advertising.

After starting out in 2000, they hit $100,000 in revenue in 2002, $5 million in 2005, and $18 million in 2006. Inc. Magazine estimates they've hit $30 million by now.

According to Eric von Hippel of MIT's Sloan School of Management, the two have built an entire business around the idea that an online community can drive innovation.

Their customers not only design the product, but also choose which designs are put into production. They've never had a flop.

They're not using fancy software. Unlike Facebook or MySpace, their online community supports no virtual friends, no messaging features, and no status messages.

What makes it work is that both founders spend lots and lots of time in their community, looking over designs, commenting on blogs, etc. As a result, Karim Lakhani, a professor at the Harvard Business School says

The customers end up playing a critical role across all its operations: idea generation, marketing, sales forecasting.

I know that sites like MySpace and Facebook may not be your cup of tea. However, many professionals (including members of the baby boom generation) find and grow relationships through sites like LinkedIn and/or Plaxo. Communities also exist for specific industries. For example, I'm a member of Dezumo, an online community for creative types.

It may be unclear about how you can best use online communities to get more leads and sell more stuff. What is clear, however, is that this trend will grow as Generation Y and the Milennials grow in purchasing power.

Ignore social networking sites at your own risk.

Seed Companies Grow Revenue

2008-05-27T15:59:00.000-07:00

It's no secret that the cost of groceries is going up fast, and the result is that more and more folks are "growing their own."

One result: The seed business is blooming.

The Associated Press reported that W. Atlee Burpee & Co., the nation's largest seed company, has sold twice as many seeds this year as it did last year. Jeff Watson, manager of Rohrer's Seeds in Smoketown, Pennsyvania, hasn't seen this much traffic tromp through his place in two decades.

Which brings me to the point of this blog entry: What products and services you might you be able to offer that would, like seeds, be in greater demand now than they were a year ago, thanks to changes in the economic environment, prices, etc?

If you can't think of anything, check out my earlier pos t for ideas about promoting your product or service in these times of skyrocketing gas prices.

How to Change a Mind

2008-05-20T16:25:00.000-07:00

It's not easy to change someone's mind once they've formed an opinion. But, by utilizing research by UC Berkeley Associate Professor Michael Ranney, you may be able to.

He's found that by providing information that's both credible and unexpected, you can change the way someone thinks or feels about an issue.

The research may not help you persuade someone to change from Pringles to Fritos, but let's say you're trying to get people to spend money on after school programs. You can prove that money spent on after school programs fights crime, but maybe the person you're trying to persuade doesn't think crime is an urgent problem.

Here's what you do: ask your target to estimate the incarceration rate in the United States, and then to write the number down. Then, ask how low or high the number would have to be to surprise them.

According to the Pew Center on the States, the actual incarceration is just over 1 per cent. If your target's guess was close to that, you won't get a change in opinion or behavior. But, if they're surprised (and many people are), Ranney says your target is likely to shift his or her opinion in order to accommodate the new information.

If that happens, you're more likely to get your donation for after school programming.

Trend in Online Ad Spend

2008-05-20T14:30:00.000-07:00

Borrell Associates says that advertising spending on online display ads, banners and pop-ups has flattened out at $37 billion annually. Paid search is facing a similar spending trend, peaking next year at $16.9 billion and then gradually declining.

Where's the money going to go? Online promotions, including contests and coupons, are expected to triple from $8 billion last year to more than $22 billion by 2012!

If you're using online advertising to get more leads and sell more stuff, maybe it's a good time to review your ROI on ad spending and consider recasting some of your budget for online promotions.

Gas Prices = Marketing Opportunity

2008-05-09T15:44:00.000-07:00

We all get bombarded with so many marketing messages that blocking out 99.999% of them isn't just a convenience -- it's a survival skill. This makes it very hard to get attention.

How to do it? Know what's going on in your prospect's mind.

You don't have to be a mind reader. Just look at what's going on in the world and capitalize on it.

At the moment, most Americans - in your target audience and not - are stressed out over gas prices. Think: what sorts of promotions can you do around the price of gas?

If you're a travel destination, offer to pay for a tank of gas.
If you sell a product, offer free (or discounted) delivery.
If you're a supply chain consultant, discuss your experience with optimizing distribution.
If you're selling training or education, tout your online offerings.
None of the above? Registrations of hybrid vehicles are up 38% from last year. How about developing a promotion where the winner gets a fuel efficient vehicle?

Point is that if you're trying to break into your prospects mind space, figure out what's going on there and target it.

And don't tell me you can't think of anything. I just gave you a bunch of ideas!

PS: Dodge just went live with this idea. They're calling it the "Refuel America" program. Using a special card, program participants pay $2.99 per gallon for a maximum number of gallons. Better buy or lease fast, the program ends (and the link will probably expire) June 2, 2008.

PPS: Suzuki has jumped on the bandwagon as well, offering a "Free Gas" promotion. Ford & General Motors are staying out of this round.

PPPS: In a different industry, but capitalizing on the same issue, Microsoft is building a dashboard application for its much-touted Microsoft Dynamics AX ERP system that charts energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions.

PPPPS: OK, now EVERYONE is jumping on the bandwagon! According to US News and World Report, Free Gas is EVERYWHERE! Just remember you read it here first!

PPPPPS: The editors of Brandweek apparently read my blog, as they've just published an article on this topic.

Starbucks Takes Our Advice

2008-04-30T16:01:00.000-07:00

In a recent newsletter, we wrote that when you have to cut your marketing budget, validate that your core business is the right business, and that your marketing is aligned with the core reasons people do business with you.

The struggling Starbucks chain took my advice to heart the other day and announced that, in addition to cutting out the breakfast menu, they're putting the music/entertainment business under the budget knife.

Like many other organizations, 'Bucks extended their brand in an attempt to increase revenue and market share. Like many other organizations that push brand extensions too hard, the results were weak: yesterday, the Associated Press reported that Starbucks' net income dropped 28%.

Starbucks is going back to basics. "As part of our ongoing transformation, we are committed to examining all aspects of our business that are not directly related to our core," Howard Schultz, company chairman, president and CEO, said in a statement.

It's good to know Schultz, like Applebee's, is taking my advice.

If you'd like to take it too, subscribe to our newsletter!

Pray to the DQ Logo!

2008-04-29T15:17:00.000-07:00

Brand-builders work to create positive relationships between brands and customers. Sometimes, though, they seem to believe a little too much in their own PR.

For example, Michael Keller, chief brand officer for International Dairy Queen, said:

Our original DQ logo is one of the most revered in the quick-service restaurant industry...

Revered? He thinks we pray to the DQ brand?

Maybe he needs to cut back on the sugar.

The Death of Telemarketing?

2008-04-25T19:18:00.000-07:00

According to Entrepreneur Magazine, telemarketing is one of the 10 Businesses Facing Extinction in 10 Years.

With industry revenues in excess of $300 billion annualy, telemarketers aren't going away any time soon.

Even so, if you're using cold calls to get more leads and sell more stuff, you may be facing an uphill battle.

Why? Most folks don't like getting cold called, and so they set up barriers to keep them from getting in. More and more cold calls just roll over to voice mail.

If cold calling is working for you, consider an updated script, and make sure you learn enough about your prospect to make your call directly relevant before you pick up the phone.

What else? Consider this: a targeted marketing campaign can raise your prospect's temperature before you call.

Good luck.

How to Find Your Niche

2008-04-24T16:24:00.000-07:00

It can be intimidating to take on a global giant, but in today's economy, there's no choice. No matter what you're selling, someone bigger than you is probably selling it too. A key to success is to sell to the undeserved niches the big guys haven't found yet.

I was reminded of that truism as I browsed through today's "newspaper stuffer" brochure from Home Depot.

Here's the background: Like many Southern Californians, we're converting our yard to something that will demand less water. It doesn't make sense to keep a lush, green lawn in the middle of the desert. And, the City of Long Beach has placed restrictions on water use. So, big green lawns are disappearing in the City of Long Beach, and around the Southland.

Long Beach is not alone. Converting to low-water gardens (xeriscaping) is a huge and growing trend, driven by population growth and limits on supplies of fresh water.

As I reviewed the brochure, I found good news and bad news. The good news: the plants shown on page six of the brochure under the banner "Create an Oasis of Fresh, Vivid Color."

The bad news: only one of the eight was suitable for "low water" gardens.

The Home Depot web site doesn't seem to provide a solution either. I went to Garden Center/Plants and Bulbs, and saw nothing on xeriscaping.

After hunting around a bit, I found, towards the bottom of the page in pale green small type, "Drought Solutions." Even so, there wasn't much information about how much water the plants they were selling needed. There was no way to search plants by the amount of water required, nor did they have categories for cactus or succulents.

So, this is a niche that's open for the enterprising entrepreneur.

You can find your niche by thinking about the trends that are affecting your customers/clients that your competitors haven't capitalized on.

Get in fast and get your market share, and you'll have an irreplaceable advantage.

Bumillionaire.com

2008-04-23T17:27:00.001-07:00

Here's a new idea for a web site: raise enough money to turn a New York street bum into a billionaire.

I kid you not.

The bum in question is named Guy Richie (no relation to Madonna's husband).

The premise of the site is that if a billion people donate $1 each, Guy will become billionaire #1126 on Forbes' list.

While I don't think Warren Buffet and Bill Gates are overly concerned about losing their respective places on the list, the site makes for an interesting social experiment.

If people donate (and as of this writing, Guy is over $600 richer), does it prove that you can get anybody to do anything if you build a cool web site? If it fails, does it prove that the web, even with its ability to reach billions, has its limits?

The site's creators are anonymous at the moment. If you know who they are, or have a good guess as to why they built the site, drop me a line!

What's in a Value Proposition?

2008-04-08T17:31:00.001-07:00

An email I got from a professional society promised that if I attended their meeting, I'd learn that:

Your Unique Selling Proposition is last year's concept.
Your Value Creation Proposition is this year's concept and is more powerful.

Apparently, up until last year, you could sell without conveying value, as long as you were unique.

Now, you have to show that you're going to create value.

I say showing value creation is no longer enough. It doesn't brand you, it doesn't differentiate you, and isn't a strong enough reason to buy from you.

Why not? Because everyone in your line of work is is going to add more or less the same value, unless you're differentiating in another (less analytic) way.

Yes, of course it helps to credibly quantify the value your services will add to your customer or client. But getting to yes is an emotional process. Spend too much time on the wrong side of the brain and what you'll get is a prospect that's dubious and/or bored.

If you're working on your value proposition, by all means quantify the value you can deliver and/or create within your client's or customer's organization. It's important.

It's just not enough to get them to buy from you.

They'll buy from you because they like you, and trust you. To get to that, you have to be working the other side of the brain.

Do You Deliver: Whoo-Hoo!

2008-04-08T14:59:00.000-07:00

When marketers talk about "value proposition" or "unique selling proposition," they're talking about the reason someone would want to buy from you. Ideally, it should be something unique, and something your customers want.

Washington Mutual has chosen "Whoo-Hoo" to transmit the reason you should do business with them.

Think about it. Is this a credible brand promise?

I can see it working for the Iowa State Lottery. But for teller lines, holds, incessant fees, short hours (compared to yours), and bank reconciliations?

More like Waaaah, waaaaa!

Another International Design Award

2008-04-04T15:57:00.000-07:00

Another design contest has come and gone, and HOW Magazine has proudly announced their "Best of Show": a series of posters for underground music promotion firm Blue Skies Turn Black, by Seripop.

I totally get it that I'm not part of this particular project's "target audience." Even so, this project reeks of the kind of "Arteest" sensibilities that drive me nuts.

According to How's Editor Bryn Mooth, the project emerged from the competition

because of its magnitude... but also because of its craftsmanship and style.

What? Are we supposed to be creating "art?" Yes, they're very cool, and yes, the crowd they're targeting won't respond to a "traditional" marketing message.

But does that make it OK that there's no reference to what these posters are purportedly promoting? Without knowing the band and the event, how would the rest of us even know who or what these posters were about?

Judge Nathan Hendricks enthused that

There's almost nothing between their nervous system and the work. It just gushes out."

Apparently, in his world, and in the world of design competitions, that's a good thing. Call me "old school", but I believe commercial design ought to be judged by the results it generates.

Ya wanna be an Arteest, get yourself a black beret, grow a goatee, smoke long, thin cigarrettes and take an art class.