Unlike the big fish we know the needs of our customers. Our customers “trust” us to guide them in a specific direction that benefits them. We don’t have fast talking sales people who only care when a sale is made. Take Walmart as an example, we all watch their commercials of the smiling employees who love their jobs. We all laugh at these commercials, knowing that this isn’t our typical Walmart experience. You will never be greeted by your name at Walmart or asked how that new tie helped you in your sales meeting. So how have they become the largest retailer in the world? Mass advertising. So now that I have depressed you and made you realize that you can’t compete with them, now what?

Remember you have the same influence power as the big fish, just in a smaller pond. Your customers come back to you because of trust, expertise and personal attention. This is where a goldfish swallows the flounder. When done right a small business can beat out the large competition, but only if they have a plan. They need to sell their-selves as the expert and separate their-selves from the big fish.

Point out the differences and tell stories of success. How did you help a customer last week? Did you save them money because of knowledge you shared? Get a testimonial from the client and share the story. Social media is a great “story telling” platform. It is available for free, and can help you keep your small pond, filled with expert knowledge and power. If you add items like: e-mail marketing, referral campaigns and direct mail to your tackle box of tools, you can be more influential than the big guys and more importantly, own your part of the pond.

I have been doing I.T. work for sometime and I am always amazed at how many pc users choose the self-help route instead of calling in a pro, like yours truly.  There is nothing wrong with that option to a point but when you’re reinstalling your systems over and over and still not really fixing them, it’s time to call. Doing your own Pc trouble shooting, very often results in data lose even from very simple issues. A bad memory chip can appear to be a virus,to the average user, and no matter how many times the system is reloaded, it will very soon show the same symptoms again. I have seen pc’s tossed in the trash for issues like this, when, simply put, a labor charge and a $30.00 ram chip would have made all the difference without all the headaches.

Another perplexing issue to businesses these days is ,”When do I need a server?”. If you have more than 5 pc’s on a network and your customer and financial data are important, the answer is NOW !  Servers provide network stability and security beyond that of any desktop pc on a simple workgroup . Most servers (if not all) have at least 2  mirrored hard drives, which means your data is safe even if one hard drive completely fails. Not all servers have to be prohibitively expensive and these days some are not much more than high-end desktop Pc’s.

Keeping up with technology is a daunting task, and most people do not have the  time nor the desire to do so. We do this for you by working closely with our partner companies like, Microsoft, Intel ,Western  Digital. Partner company webinars and newsletters help us keep up so we can help you keep up.

Imagine going home today and finding your pc completely down. All your home videos,music,pictures and financial data are on your pc but now they are totally inaccessible! Happens more than you most people realize. You thought about a backup last night but were too tired or busy, now what?  We work with our clients to set up easy backup plans that run without user intervention and plans to fit any budget.  Backups do not have to be hard nor expensive. In fact a lot of clients have at least 2 backups, this way no matter what your data is safe.

The hot times are the wonderful times of the year that we are happy to look at sales reports and our biggest concern maybe how we keep up with demand. Unfortunately, if this is your thought process you are missing out! Let me try to retrain your brain or should I say; retrain your brain on the consumer. During your busiest times of the year a phenomenon is happening. Your ideal prospect is actively looking for your service. They are comparing quotes and searching the internet for a fast solution. They don’t understand that you are busy, but they expect service just the same. This is the time of fast action and a concentrated effort of marketing. If done well, these clients can help support you during the slow times.

One thing all companies have in common is:

All financial problems can be resolved with more sales. So let’s get selling!

If your work is seasonal, your marketing efforts need to be outlined just the same. You may need to adjust your marketing approach during the off-season. Like a summer vacation spot. If I owned a summer-house, I would market to families who have kids in year around schools. These families tend to vacation while the rest of the world is in school. Everyone goes after the retirees but don’t over-look all those cities who promote year round education. These families have available time for vacations typically every 6-9 weeks to travel. They also prefer to travel during the “slow” times. Less tourist to fight with and the best deals!

Ok, so being an AC company may not have the same creative strategy and is based on local geo-graphics. Yet my focus would be to spread out maintenance in the off-season. Make special offers during the off-season to get them thinking they need service now and acting now can save them money! If you can spread out your work load during the busy times, than you can save yourself layoffs and concentrate on the “hot” prospect during the “hot” times, so they can become the client that gets you through the slow months.

Whatever the strategy, be creative & fun. Keep your marketing valuable to the recipient.

We all focus so much on the design of a piece that we forget the importance of a good, solid mail list. Like many things in this world where technology is changing at the speed of light, so are mail list and their capabilities.

You can now create a mail list that eliminates the unnecessary trash that isn’t relative to your campaign. Thanks to smart data technology advancements and new market research & reporting, you can now create a list generated with your specific buyers habits. These list can be generated down to specific streets in a neighborhood and include the important aspects of your buyer. Maybe your best prospect is a female age 25-40, dog owner, homeowner, with an income of $100,00 and above, that has 2 teenagers living at home.

Scary, but this list can now be easily generated with their name & address.

Many people over-look the importance of the data.

You can have an award-winning designed direct mail piece but if you are selling dog food and mailing to cat owners, you have only increased the meaning of junk mail. The best responses will come from relative information given on a personal level.

My definition of Junk mail:

The Right Message sent to the Wrong Person.

I don’t have to tell you that the largest struggle for small business is a short fall of marketing dollars. We aren’t like the fortune 500. We look for ways to get our message out with little to no investment. This would explain all the buzz about social media, a very low-cost alternative to traditional marketing. Facebook has grown in so many ways that it has changed our thought process in relations to marketing. With all the buzz, have you asked yourself if it is worth the time? The biggest downfall with social media is time. We like the word free but time isn’t free and is limited to us all. I am seeing businesses, try to play, with social media as a new marketing outlet with little to no response. If you are business to business, you will find that social media doesn’t have instant results. It will help build your brand but if you are looking for instant results, it doesn’t create a clear path for doing that.

Whatever you decide to do, make sure you aren’t dabbling on too many tasks. It is easy to run thin as we try new things. Make sure you have the time and do your research. Create a solid marketing plan for the year. Nothing happens over night and sticking to a path will help build your results and keep you away from being a dabbler.

Outlining a marketing plan:

1. Social media needs daily attention. Make sure to post daily with blogs and general posts of product education and company news worthy stories.

2. If you are going to write blogs, you need to update a minimum of once a week. Feed through social media.

3. Traditional marketing need not be overlooked. Create a customer retention plan and a new customer plan through direct mail advertising.

4. E-newsletters are a fast and cost-effective way of getting your message out. Send out at least once a month. Remember that a small percentage will read the content.

5. Contact Marketing Monster for your marketing support!

First is to be prepared. Don’t allow yourself to be prisoner! You paid for the website and the domain name. Always have access to the control panel. You will need to know all the login information including user name and passwords. Make sure you are also in control of the domain name. There are many websites that allow you to host the domain with low yearly charges, like GoDaddy.com.

When signing contracts with web design companies make sure that you have complete access in case they go belly up. Aliens have been famous for abducting web designers. They fly down on their space ships and look for savvy computer experts that have creative talent but no business knowledge and scoop them up. They must be forming a panel of experts to take over our web pages! Sadly, this is very common.

Finding a reputable website company can be a daunting task. We all want to save money, but and I mean but, you should not just look at the bottom line cost. Get referrals from others and ask for referrals. You will find that aliens tend to pick up the same designers, over and over again. They can not run from their past. Do your homework. Call the samples of work that they have on their website and have a list of questions ready for them.

1. How long did it take to complete your website?

2. Do you feel like you got what you paid for?

3. How was communications? Timely? Slow?

4. Would you refer your web designer to your best friend?

5. Did they stay within budget?

Sadly once a designer has been abducted you may be at a loss. Don’t let yourself become a victim. Marketing Monster gives all key information to all of our website clients. We want you to come back to us. Not because you have to but because you want to.

PURL sample would be: www.yourname.marketme.com

Like adding personalized URLs (PURLs) to a direct mail campaign creates a personal message that tells the recipient that you know them and understand their needs while capturing valuable information like e-mails, opinions, and also personal data like when their birthday is or what their kids names are.

Embed your blogs and social media onto the personalized landing pages and now you have not only captured their attention for a few minutes but now they have invited you to stay in-front of them on a weekly basis!

Remember the devastation to telemarketing companies when the “do not call list” came out? How about asking someone if you can blast them with information everyday and see what their reaction would be. This allows you to do just that. The best part is they gave the permission and asked you too! Now here is where the average marketing manager fails, they have no plan of action to stay in-front of the recipient.

Create a plan before you get started is my first piece of advice. Remember all the ingredients that make up the perfect casserole:

1. Social media like blogs, Facebook & twitter

2. E-communications like an e-newsletter with special offers or discounts that create urgency

3. Make engaging by adding a fun contest (avoid the survey’s, they won’t tell you the truth anyhow)

4. Direct mail-still builds value & credibility to the recipient

For samples of campaigns visit: www.mmpventuresgroup.com

]]> http://marketingventures.wordpress.com/2010/02/23/marketing-success-is-built-on-a-casserole-of-mixed-media/feed/ 1 marketingventures green_bean_casserole_1 http://marketingventures.wordpress.com/2010/02/15/free-marketing-doesnt-give-you-the-green-light-to-throw-away-branding/ http://marketingventures.wordpress.com/2010/02/15/free-marketing-doesnt-give-you-the-green-light-to-throw-away-branding/#comments Mon, 15 Feb 2010 17:45:14 +0000 Marketing Monster http://marketingventures.wordpress.com/?p=91 ]]> If the average person receives over 3,000 messages a day, how do we think they will remember ours? We are bombarded with; buy this… sell that…follow me…be my friend…join us… twitter about me!

With all this chaos, how do you grab the attention of anyone? Are you getting lost? Many business owners give marketing ideas a test drive but don’t make an actual long-term commitment therefor they quit before they succeed.

You have been told, over and over that the secret to marketing is having your message everywhere. There is no one answer. If you are launching a new product you have probably created some brochures and thought about tweeting about the product and maybe even throwing in a video on how it works. I am not hear to tell you what will work but rather how it should appear. No matter what the solution to your marketing endeavor is, your message must be branded properly to gain the momentum it needs to succeed.

The masters of marketing all have one thing in common, repetition.

Maybe you select social media like Facebook to create an initial buzz about the new product. Then maybe you write a blog on how it works. Next you advertise the product on tv. Then you send a direct mail campaign to your existing client base to create action.

Finally, you get a sale.

What actually caused the sale? Was it the urgency (last chance offer) in the direct mail piece or was it when they heard about the product first on Facebook? The truth is it all goes hand in hand when done correctly.

No matter what your efforts are to get your message out there, remember to always brand your message. If repetition is the marketing secret than all the messages must appear with the same imagery, same style and same theme. Otherwise it is like they are reading your message for the first time every time.

I recently was asked to look at a start-up businesses website and social media sites. It was shocking to me that they had no corporate logo/identity on anything and their company name wasn’t even consistent by colors or fonts. Branding is a basic idea. You ever heard of a dog looking like his owner? After time a brand presents itself everywhere. It is everywhere you go and everywhere you have been. It is your footprint to success!

For examples of custom brands, check out ours!

What would you do?….you make the choice. Don’t look for a punch line, there isn’t one. Read it anyway. My question is: Would you have made the same choice?

At a fundraising dinner for a school that serves children with learning disabilities, the father of one of the students delivered a speech that would never be forgotten by all who attended. After extolling the school and its dedicated staff, he offered a question:

‘When not interfered with by outside influences, everything nature does, is done with perfection.

Yet my son, Shay, cannot learn things as other children do. He cannot understand things as other children do.

Where is the natural order of things in my son?’

The audience was stilled by the query.

The father continued. ‘I believe that when a child like Shay, who was mentally and physically disabled comes into the world, an opportunity to realize true human nature presents itself, and it comes in the way other people treat that child.’

Then he told the following story:

Shay and I had walked past a park where some boys Shay knew were playing baseball. Shay asked, ‘Do you think they’ll let me play?’ I knew that most of the boys would not want someone like Shay on their team, but as a father I also understood that if my son were allowed to play, it would give him a much-needed sense of belonging and some confidence to be accepted by others in spite of his handicaps.

I approached one of the boys on the field and asked (not expecting much) if Shay could play. The boy looked around for guidance and said, ‘We’re losing by six runs and the game is in the eighth inning. I guess he can be on our team and we’ll try to put him in to bat in the ninth inning.’

Shay struggled over to the team’s bench and, with a broad smile, put on a team shirt. I watched with a small tear in my eye and warmth in my heart. The boys saw my joy at my son being accepted.

In the bottom of the eighth inning, Shay’s team scored a few runs but was still behind by three.

In the top of the ninth inning, Shay put on a glove and played in the right field. Even though no hits came his way, he was obviously ecstatic just to be in the game and on the field, grinning from ear to ear as I waved to him from the stands.

In the bottom of the ninth inning, Shay’s team scored again.

Now, with two outs and the bases loaded, the potential winning run was on base and Shay was scheduled to be next at bat.

At this juncture, do they let Shay bat and give away their chance to win the game?

Surprisingly, Shay was given the bat. Everyone knew that a hit was all but impossible because Shay didn’t even know how to hold the bat properly, much less connect with the ball.

However, as Shay stepped up to the plate, the pitcher, recognizing that the other team was putting winning aside for this moment in Shay’s life, moved in a few steps to lob the ball in softly so Shay could at least make contact.

The first pitch came and Shay swung clumsily and missed.

The pitcher again took a few steps forward to toss the ball softly towards Shay.

As the pitch came in, Shay swung at the ball and hit a slow ground ball right back to the pitcher.

The game would now be over.

The pitcher picked up the soft grounder and could have easily thrown the ball to the first baseman.

Shay would have been out and that would have been the end of the game.

Instead, the pitcher threw the ball right over the first baseman’s head, out of reach of all team mates.

Everyone from the stands and both teams started yelling, ‘Shay, run to first!

Run to first!’

Never in his life had Shay ever run that far, but he made it to first base.

He scampered down the baseline, wide-eyed and startled.

Everyone yelled, ‘Run to second, run to second!’

Catching his breath, Shay awkwardly ran towards second, gleaming and struggling to make it to the base. B y the time Shay rounded towards second base, the right fielder had the ball . the smallest guy on their team who now had his first chance to be the hero for his team.

He could have thrown the ball to the second-baseman for the tag, but he understood the pitcher’s intentions so he, too, intentionally threw the ball high and far over the third-baseman’s head.

Shay ran toward third base deliriously as the runners ahead of him circled the bases toward home.

All were screaming, ‘Shay, Shay, Shay, all the Way Shay’

Shay reached third base because the opposing shortstop ran to help him by turning him in the direction of third base, and shouted, ‘Run to third!

Shay, run to third!’

As Shay rounded third, the boys from both teams, and the spectators, were on their feet screaming, ‘Shay, run home! Run home!’

Shay ran to home, stepped on the plate, and was cheered as the hero who hit the grand slam and won the game for his team

‘That day’, said the father softly with tears now rolling down his face, ‘the boys from both teams helped bring a piece of true love and humanity into this world’.

Shay didn’t make it to another summer. He died that winter, having never forgotten being the hero and making me so happy, and coming home and seeing his Mother tearfully embrace her little hero of the day!

AND NOW A LITTLE FOOT NOTE TO THIS STORY:

We all send thousands of jokes through the e-mail without a second thought, but when it comes to sending messages about life choices, people hesitate. The crude, vulgar, and often obscene pass freely through cyberspace, but public discussion about decency is too often suppressed in our schools and workplaces.

If you’re thinking about forwarding this message, chances are that you’re probably sorting out the people in your address book who aren’t the ‘appropriate’ ones to receive this type of message Well, the person who sent you this believes that we all can make a difference.

We all have thousands of opportunities every single day to help realize the ‘natural order of things.’

So many seemingly trivial interactions between two people present us with a choice:

Do we pass along a little spark of love and humanity or do we pass up those opportunities and leave the world a little bit colder in the process?

A wise man once said every society is judged by how it treats it’s least fortunate amongst them.

You now have two choices:

1. Delete

2. Forward

May your day, be a Shay Day.

With the economy squeezing budgets tightly, we look for new cost-effective opportunities. Don’t run from the traditional marketing that made you a success. Yes it is true that these days it may not be working as well as in the past, but it still works. There are less buyers out there. Many less people looking to spend money but things are improving out there. Those who have stayed concentrated on marketing during these trying times will be the first to see their businesses bounce back.

Gaining market share will become the name of the game. For those companies who never turned their back on marketing, will see positive results build faster. Remember that the average consumer will actual make a purchase after they have been touched by the company 7 times. Most give up way before they touch someone 7 times. Don’t be confused, this doesn’t mean you call someone 7 times or that you send a postcard 7 times. The real plan is to first have one! A plan that is! Stop dabbling with your efforts and get a plan. Gather the prospects email address, home address, birthday and favorite stores. Once you have the proper data, a plan can be put to action.