New Business 2009
January 5, 2009 on 3:09 pm | In New Business Primer, Referral Marketing, Public Speaking, Networking, Brand, Personal Branding, Positioning, Customer Retention, Public Relations, Marketing, Social Media, Branding, New Business, Advertising | No CommentsAre you out looking for new business? Who isn’t? I wrote a series on the topic some time back. You may want to check it out if you missed it the first time around.
New Business Primer - Part 1 - Introduction to the new business primer.
New Business Primer - Part 2 - An organization’s brand identity must be a reflection of three things: market perceptions, the organization’s acumen, as well as its aspirations. Positioning is where these three elements overlap.
New Business Primer - Part 3 - My marketing mentor, Bill Loeffler, once said the the best new business program is doing great work for current clients. He was right.
New Business Primer - Part 4 - Let’s get past this strategic stuff and to the tactics that got you in front of prospects. First on my list of ways to get in front of prospects was referrals.
New Business Primer - Part 5 - Here is the best piece of advice I’ll ever give you, although at first blush it may not seem that astounding: focus. Did Harry say “focus”? Yes, he did. Wow, that’s deep!
New Business Primer - Part 6 - Let’s talk about social networks. In order to be most effective, you must select three to four networks and focus your efforts there.
New Business Primer - Part 7 - Cold calling is a waste of time and there are better ways to spend your time.
New Business Primer - Part 8 - Network It. Now that you have your client defined and you have looked at your list to identify those folks who can help you, you need to contact them.
New Business Primer - Part 9 - PR professionals know about reputation. But so often they don’t spend any time building their own reputation and brand. Step back and take a look at yourself as if you were a client.
Could You At Least Help Out A Little?
January 5, 2009 on 8:12 am | In Brand, demographics, Marketing, Creativity, Advertising | No CommentsI just saw something that reminded me of this old joke: a man prayed every day for weeks to win the lottery. No luck. Finally, God said to the man, “could you help me a little? Try buying a lottery ticket!”
What brought this to mind? A post to MarketingProfs Know How Exchange from a cruise line member who wants a new tagline. That was the extent of the information. Nothing about their business, what makes them different or who they are trying to reach.
Too often clients or prospects of ad agencies don’t want to do any of the lifting - heavy or otherwise. Not my clients, of course. But when you ask some clients or prospects about their business, target audience or uniqueness, they look at you in wide-eyed wonder.
If you want good work from your agency, you need to provide a solid audience definition, at the very least. The audience definition is never “all carbon-based units.” If you want to really make your marketing efforts pay off, try developing a positioning statement, or be willing to work with your agency to develop one.
Otherwise you’ll be likely so many other lame businesses out there which wonder why their marketing efforts never pay off.
Top 10 Posts of 2008
January 2, 2009 on 12:34 pm | In Consumer Behavior, Media Relations, New Business, Customer Retention, Customer Service, Newspapers, Media, Journalism, PR, Marketing, Public Relations, Social Media, Blogs, Advertising | 1 CommentTHINKing’s top stories of the past year are listed below. Our blog tends to be an eclectic mix of advertising, PR and social media stories, and our top 10 posts reflect that. We might be on to something.
#10 - Know Your Media - Newspapers
#9 - A Bigger Logo Necessitates A Smaller Idea
#8 - Great Employees = Happy Customers
#7 - Patience? No, Let’s Kill Something!
#5 - What Customers Want
#4 - It’s The Relationship, Stupid
#2 - Top 10 Story Starters For Blocked Bloggers
#1 - Newspapers: Dig The Grave
What were your top 10 of 2008?
I’ll Alert The Media That People Don’t Like Them
January 2, 2009 on 8:14 am | In News, Media, Journalism | 1 CommentMy predictions is that we’ll see a lot of media outlets going down in 2009. There are many reasons, of course, ranging from bad management to media bias. This just in: Americans really don’t like the media.
A new study indicates that 77 percent of Americans think the media is actually making our economic malaise worse. MediaDailyNews reports,
The vast majority of Americans believe the U.S. media industry’s coverage of the faltering economy is actually contributing to the economic crisis by “projecting fear into people’s minds.” That’s the finding of a survey of 1,000 U.S. adults released Thursday by Opinion Research Corporation.
Here’s a case in point: before the holidays a reporter called me to ask what our agency was doing to survive the downturn. I told him, we’re not having a downturn. 2008 was our best year ever. My comments were not included in the story - only comments from agencies having trouble. Hmmm.
What do you think of the US news media’s reporting on the economy?
Twittering Journalists List Redux
December 31, 2008 on 1:22 pm | In My Creative Team, News, Buzz, Twitter, Media Relations, Media, Public Relations, Social Media, Journalism, PR | No CommentsTwittering JournalistsI’ve had several reports that people can’t see the Twittering Journalists wiki I set up. If you are having trouble, go to the bottom of the upgrade page. In small type it says “No, not now, take me to my wiki.” Click on this and it takes you to the list.
Or, I’ve copied the list into a Word document that you can download. Happy New Year.
Customer Retention Strategies
December 23, 2008 on 8:39 am | In Customer Retention, Marketing | No CommentsAfter my prediction yesterday of increased attention on customer retention in 2009, I thought I’d provide some links to related articles on customer retention. Here you go:
Patience? No, Let’s Kill Something!
Customer Retention: Be A Relationship Leader
Surveys Help In Customer Retention
2009 - Back To Basics
December 22, 2008 on 9:45 am | In Brand, Content Marketing, Customer Retention, Branding | 1 CommentPrediction: In 2009, marketers will get back to basics and will suddenly fall in love with their current customers again.
I’ve been saying it for years, marketers want the thrill of new business and spend way more money on it than they do on retaining the business they have. But every time there is a hiccup in the economy, you customers start to be a marketers new BFF. It’s back to customer retention in the new year.
Any marketer worth his salt has never taken his eye off his good customers in the first place. Marketers who have ensured that their brands have maintained their relevance and who have not resorted to promotional activities that devalue the brand will weather the storm fine.
It’s not a soft economy that is affecting many brands, it is soft marketers.
Email, the best customer retention tool, will make a comeback in 2009. So, content marketers, brush off your content, retool it for email and serve it up. Restore those connections with current customers and they might just introduce their friends to you.
Read more 2009 marketing predictions at Junta42.
All About Email
December 18, 2008 on 11:09 am | In Charity, Customer Retention, Email Marketing | 1 CommentI’m a big believer in email for customer retention, so I’ve been reading a lot about it recently. Thought I’d share some links for you. If you are interested, My Creative Team produces a monthly enewsletter. Here’s our latest.
Email Is The Most Popular Online Activity
Email Fundraising Success Story
How To Sync Email With Customer Lifecycles