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creative briefs |
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There is one thing that I know for certain: your best prospects are going to look a lot like your best customers. So, identifying prospects should be easy - that is if you have done a good job of defining your good customers.
This article at Go-To-Market Strategies will help you sort it all out. |
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Press releases - as we've discussed before - have new life thanks to the Internet. But you have to know a few secrets to get the most out of them online. For instance, do you know what to do to ensure search engines will find your release? If not, read these tips that will help you shine the searchlight on your next release.
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Bloggers offer a new target for PR people. But you can't treat them the same way you do journalists.
You need to know the blog and its author's interests before making contact. Tailor your pitch accordingly. Give specific reasons you believe the blogger might be interested. Provide links for background and research. Ask if it's OK to follow up.
Here are a few more tips.
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As a holiday diversion you may want to go Elf Yourself. Once again, Office Max is going viral with its digital, dancing elf, and upping the ante by adding Scrooge Yourself.
You can upload your own photo, turn yourself into a digital elf - or a digital Scrooge - and bust a move. Last year, the Elf Yourself website received 40 million hits. I'm still struggling with how this builds the Office Max brand, but it is fun nonetheless.
Here's my elf. |
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Hello. Christmas is upon us and you are probably ready to get on with your holiday. So, we'll keep it short this month. We'll address 2008 marketing trends, and we have our usual briefs. If you don't have time to read them now, they will be here when you get back from your time off.
Now, let's get going. |
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Creatively yours,
Harry Hoover
harry@my-creativeteam.com |
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Get Trendy |
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By Harry Hoover
Every pundit is making predictions about next year's trends on which to capitalize. I've seen 2008 predictions about going green, going mobile, using out-of-home advertising, gaming, widgets and so forth.
You'll find I have a different view from most. While they focus on the tactical trends, I'm still focused on the strategic approach which should drive your tactics. Not the other way around.
So, it's back to basics in my view, and corporate marketers seem to agree. A recent study by the Marketing Executive Network Group found that 60 percent of participants said marketing basics was at the top of their list for 2008. How refreshing.
In 2008 - as in every other year - the successful marketers will be those who:
- Set clear, measurable marketing objectives that support business objectives
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Survey says...  |
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By Mark Harrison
As individuals, companies, and product and service providers, we can benefit from introspection, especially at a milestone like the arrival of a new year. In fact, there's no better time than now to do just that.
While you're looking back at the business year and analyzing successes, near-successes and setbacks, one thing to seriously consider is to augment that thinking with input from those who know you best, your customer or client base.
There are many types of surveys and other methods to engage your customers in a productive dialogue. Customer satisfaction surveys can help you define or update a benchmark measurement and are valuable in assessing your products, operations and even associates. For marketing, branding and message development, however, a quantitative satisfaction survey has limited value.
What we want to do is get a fresh insight into who you are in your customers' eyes. What does your role in their business mean to them? We need to determine whether the features and benefits of your offerings, which you spent hours and dollars developing, are really the features and benefits that keep that customer interested in conducting business with your company.
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