There is a greater opportunity for DM now than at any other time

Three reasons for this:

Firstly, media proliferation, increased segmentation, media creep, increased content, time challenged public, consumer cynicism, increased access to information etc

Secondly, and most importantly, the consumers “capacity enhancement’, eg Look at a Bloombergs screen or watch a 14 year old make a phone call, watch TV and be on the internet at the same time

Thirdly, the immediacy. increased response, infalable media metrics, enhanced media mining opportunities, dialog not monolog opportunities and more importantly dramatically lower cost of new technology communication ( simple example SMS)

Need for a paradigm shift in approach to DM

Most communication programs are still limited and simplistic in their approach to target groups who have moved on.  Most businesses/agencies still anchored in traditional marketing.

DM’s need to do a better job of communicating advantages of DM

Not just immediate sales results but data mining and multi channel approaches that continuously increase the dialog, the lifestyle connection and build a bridge in every communication between the  emotional desire to buy trigger and the pragmatic ‘show me the data as it applies specifically to me’ purchase decider.

What most DM’ers describe as “Cutting Edge” is not cutting edge at all.

Cutting edge is not more inventive stunts, personalisation, unique envelopes, creative ideas, better copywriting, more testing.  These are the basic minimums today of any DM.  DM today requires enhanced customer knowledge, improved data mining, more knowledge of the potential customer.

This is true whether using traditional vehicles – such as print, for example.

Today, variable data multichanneling enables data to talk individually to people using any channel.  For example, it allows for highly complex and highly creative direct mail packages to be fully personalised, with names, dates, an individuals usage information, savings, graphs, even photos etc. in headings and all body copy to be totally customized to every specific customer within a normal print run.

Examples include a program in September 2005 for a fixed line phone carrier who received a 36% response rate from a print DM using one to one variable data technology to over 340,000 customers, against a “traditional DM” response rate for a similar program of 1.7%.

Or using new communication vehicles.  Three simple examples:

SMS/Radio broadcast.

By tieing SMS response into radio advertising and radio station loyalty clubs, advertisers are data mining potential customers and interacting with them one-on-one to buy a pizza, attend an event or even enhance the radio audience at a specific time.  This cross communication DM is achieving responses of up to 38%.  This DM format is being widely utilized in US radio and television.

Upselling Chat.

Chat technology enables real time immediate post purchase on-line messaging and voice chat with permission, in order to upsell.

Behaviour Triggered Emailing –

Software analyses data, both real time and historical, to launch immediate automated opt-in campaigns based on in-store, catalogue, on-line purchases, biographical data, events, dates or customer behaviour.

Traditional response rates are no longer acceptable

Many DM’ers are getting response rates of 20+% and 30 and 40% rates are no longer uncommon.  Direct comparisons between an identical campaign using “traditional” methods and new variable data and new technology methods in some cases show increased performance of 2000%.

Need to be more analytical when choosing communication channels

As key product and service offerings become similar and response times to market change become shorter not enough direct marketers are using their skills to identify the communication channels that are having the most effect on influencing customer acquisition, buyer behavior or decision making, customer loyalty and retention and least of all providing ‘advice’, education and specific instance comparisons tailored to specific customers, as opposed to ‘hitting them with yet another creative message’

Some questions to ask yourself:

Do you fully understand the DNA of your existing customers?

How about your potential customers?

When did you last mine this information for trend patterns?

Can you tell me the ROI of the last 3 DM campaigns for a specific customer and how much this analysis improved each subsequent program as they were rolled out?

How sophisticated are your campaign measurement tools?

How inventive is your ‘in-program’ data capture?  Do not tell me “our systems will not accommodate this type of analysis”.  Without it you are cheating yourself, your client and setting yourself up to lose the account.

Summary

Your target consumer is able to consume more, having been conditioned to do so by technological advances.  If you think a short term clever stunt, mailer or communication of any sort can capture and influence this new mentality for more than a fleeting ‘entertainment interlude’ then consider that one on one, variable data, multi channel communications are performing at response rates in excess of 15-20%  not the traditional 1%-3% levels.

WHY?  Because increasingly focused personalized intellectual advice is far more effective and motivating over along period than a short term impact, no matter how clever.

 

1. Add social bookmark links to your most important web pages and/or blog posts to improve sharing.
2. Build blogs and teach conversational marketing and business relationship building techniques.
3. For every video project purchased, ensure there’s an embeddable web version for improved sharing.
4. Learn how tagging and other metadata improve your ability to search and measure the spread of information.
5. Create informational podcasts about a product’s overall space, not just the product.
6. Build community platforms around real communities of shared interest.
7. Help companies participate in existing social networks, and build relationships on their turf.
8. Check out Twitter as a way to show a company’s personality. (Don’t fabricate this).
9. Couple your email newsletter content with additional website content on a blog for improved commenting.
10. Build sentiment measurements, and listen to the larger web for how people are talking about your customer.
11. Learn which bloggers might care about your customer. Learn how to measure their influence.
12. Download the Social Media Press Release (pdf) and at least see what parts you want to take into your traditional press releases.
13. Try out a short series of audio podcasts or video podcasts as content marketing and see how they draw.
14. Build conversation maps for your customers using Technorati.com , Google Blogsearch, Summize, and FriendFeed.
15. Experiment with Flickr and/or YouTube groups to build media for specific events. (Marvel Comics raised my impression of this with their Hulk statue Flickr group).
16. Recommend that your staff start personal blogs on their personal interests, and learn first hand what it feels like, including managing comments, wanting promotion, etc.
17. Map out an integrated project that incorporates a blog, use of commercial social networks, and a face-to-face event to build leads and drive awareness of a product.
18. Start a community group on Facebook or Ning or MySpace or LinkedIn around the space where your customer does business. Example: what Jeremiah Owyang did for Hitachi Data Systems.
19. Experiment with the value of live video like uStream.tv and Mogulus, or Qik on a cell phone.
20. Attend a conference dealing with social media like New Media Expo, BlogWorld Expo, New Marketing Summit (disclosure: I run this one with CrossTech), and dozens and dozens more. (Email me for a calendar).
21. Collect case studies of social media success. Tag them “socialmediacasestudy” in del.icio.us.
22. Interview current social media practitioners. Look for bridges between your methods and theirs.
23. Explore distribution. Can you reach more potential buyers/users/customers on social networks.
24. Don’t forget early social sites like Yahoogroups and Craigslist. They still work remarkably well.
25. Search Summize.com for as much data as you can find in Twitter on your product, your competitors, your space.
26. Practice delivering quality content on your blogs, such that customers feel educated / equipped / informed.
27. Consider the value of hiring a community manager. Could this role improve customer service? Improve customer retention? Promote through word of mouth?
28. Turn your blog into a mobile blog site with Mofuse. Free.
29. Learn what other free tools might work for community building, like MyBlogLog.
30. Ensure you offer the basics on your site, like an email alternative to an RSS subscription. In fact, the more ways you can spread and distribute your content, the better.
31. Investigate whether your product sells better by recommendation versus education, and use either wikis and widgets to help recommend, or videos and podcasts for education.
32. Make WebsiteGrader.com your first stop for understanding the technical quality of a website.
33. Make Compete.com your next stop for understanding a site’s traffic. Then, mash it against competitors’ sites.
34. Learn how not to ask for 40 pieces of demographic data when giving something away for free. Instead, collect little bits over time. Gently.
35. Remember that the people on social networks are all people, have likely been there a while, might know each other, and know that you’re new. Tread gently into new territories. Don’t NOT go. Just go gently.
36. Help customers and prospects connect with you simply on your various networks. Consider a Lijit Wijit or other aggregator widget.
37. Voting mechanisms like those used on Digg.com show your customers you care about which information is useful to them.
38. Track your inbound links and when they come from blogs, be sure to comment on a few posts and build a relationship with the blogger.
39. Find a bunch of bloggers and podcasters whose work you admire, and ask them for opinions on your social media projects. See if you can give them a free sneak peek at something, or some other “you’re special” reward for their time and effort (if it’s material, ask them to disclose it).
40. Learn all you can about how NOT to pitch bloggers. Excellent resource: Susan Getgood.
41. Try out shooting video interviews and video press releases and other bits of video to build more personable relationships. Don’t throw out text, but try adding video.
42. Explore several viewpoints about social media marketing.
43. Women are adding lots of value to social media. Get to know the ones making a difference. (And check out BlogHer as an event to explore).
44. Experiment with different lengths and forms of video. Is entertaining and funny but brief better than longer but more informative? Don’t stop with one attempt. And try more than one hosting platform to test out features.
45. Work with practitioners and media makers to see how they can use their skills to solve your problems. Don’t be afraid to set up pilot programs, instead of diving in head first.
46. People power social media. Learn to believe in the value of people. Sounds hippie, but it’s the key.
47. Spread good ideas far. Reblog them. Bookmark them. Vote them up at social sites. Be a good citizen.
48. Don’t be afraid to fail. Be ready to apologize. Admit when you’ve made a mistake.
49. Re-examine who in the organization might benefit from your social media efforts. Help equip them to learn from your project.
50. Use the same tools you’re trying out externally for internal uses, if that makes sense, and learn about how this technology empowers your business collaboration, too.

This Months Article- Let the ‘4% Factor’ Change Your Business

Budgets continue to be slashed. Brands are disappearing. Media is getting more fragmented. The only thing getting bigger is our federal deficit. So as a marketer, how do you capitalize on a world that is getting smaller in so many respects?

You could ignore it and keep doing things the same way — reaching wide and hoping for the best. Or you can face the fact that the world is changing and figure out how to benefit from it.

There are growth opportunities out there for those brave enough and diligent enough to dive into the data right in front of them: customer databases, profiling and enhancement data, real-time research, predictive modeling. You name it, readily available sources of information about your customers and prospective customers are voluminous. To date, brands from Yahoo to Coca-Cola have used transaction and behavior data to sort out their best consumers, targeting specific types of messages via specific channels of communication.

What marketers are starting to discover is that the target universe is smaller than originally thought. So small, in fact, that 4% of a brand’s consumer base is driving most of the business. This deeper dive into audience targeting is what I call the 4% Factor. Simply stated, it is another level down from the typical 80/20 rule of prioritizing (80% drive, 20% of the business) because, well, everything is getting smaller.

Four is the significant digit because it is this relative number that seems to rise to the surface every time a study is conducted or a program is measured, proving that those impacting your brand (typically characterized as volume, margin or advocacy) tend to be a relatively small number of the whole customer universe.

Examples as to the success of using this strategy are becoming more prevalent. For instance, Catalina Marketing, with its Checkout Coupon system, recently identified that 1% of Iams’ pet-food buyers accounted for 80% of the annual volume of the brand’s sales via the supermarket channel. And other marketers have experienced similar results, such as LaRosa’s Pizzeria chain, in which a small percentage of pizza consumers account for significant portions of various menu items (for example, 4% purchase 65% of calzones).

So what do you do about it? Embrace it. Start thinking about ways to employ addressable media, digital media, one-to-one marketing and, of course, social media to reach that core 4% of consumers who have the greatest propensity to identify and recruit others to your brand franchise.

The 4% Factor goes well beyond a loyalty strategy — it is a penetration strategy — designed as a competitive approach to protecting and growing your business. Simply put, start smaller to get bigger faster. It also tends to be a much more sustainable approach than traditional strategies of casting a really wide net, going through trial and then hoping to retain a percentage of new customers.

If you want to grow a business or product line that can react and adapt more quickly to future opportunities, consider these specific steps:

• Find: Discover and define your main source of volume, margin or advocacy by tapping into existing customer data. Combine that with outside resources such as enhancement data (information that can be appended to consumer profiles to shed additional insight about their demographics, psychographics and potential purchase behaviors) and details gathered via social media and other research tools.

• Filter: Sift through the data and intelligence by segmenting, profiling and using predictive modeling to develop a pool of target segments and markets.

• Magnify: Examine, select and prioritize the top three to five target groups. Test and refine through methods, such those found at iModerate, a company with research technologies that allow moderators of online conversations to dig deeper and go beyond the standard questions to gather detailed insights, as well as other primary interactions.

• Expand: Build out the selected communities via holistic communications strategies ranging from broadcast to social media in order to establish dialogue and grow the universe of new entrants and new advocates.

Today, brands are built by communities of like-minded individuals who share their brand experiences with others and those with whom they have some connection. Pinpoint those communities — or markets of business opportunity — and find creative ways to get them to help recruit your next customers.

This concept might not sound new, but this way of thinking used to be categorized with “below the line” strategies. It needs to become “above the line” to enable social media, mobile marketing, proximity marketing and other one-to-one approaches to be viewed as critical to brand and business building, as broadcast and print used to be. Call it a reordering and rethinking of the marketing-tool hierarchy. That is what I would call a smarter and faster way to grow, particularly in these economic times.

I have outlined below the points that are important with respect to advertising and any form of communication. The following elements drive successful communication, be it advertising, a letter, email or other form of communication aimed at eliciting a sale.

There are ten critical elements in the composition of the communication. Every communication should be evaluated against these criteria to determine its likely level of effectiveness. This is a self-test that every client using an agency or designing his or her own ads should do. These are listed below in order of importance:

• Heading
• Photograph, illustration, graphic
• Caption
• Consumer Purchasing Benefit
• 2 – 3 additional benefits
• Risk Reversal
• Added Value
• Call to Action
• Test, test, test
• ALWAYS measure results

Prior to discussing the importance of each of these elements, it is important to understand that different vehicles are used for different purposes and therefore while the ten elements are still equally as important, the message of the communication will vary to achieve the desired purpose of the medium being used.

For example:

Newspapers

Newspapers are an information medium. They are not time dependent such as television or radio. The aim of a newspaper advertisement is to communicate powerful information in a form that involves emotionally and justifies pragmatically. The aim is to get people to ‘tear it out’ and put it on the fridge or in their wallet. It is an ‘information rich’ source.

When placing newspaper ads, ensure that you have selected the best day and that the newspaper reaches your target market.  Daily newspaper circulations can very widely depending on the daily inserts, sports, TV guides etc. and are certainly not consistent across cities.  Some suburbs may have high readership while others may be negligible.  Also, make sure you are on a right hand page, preferably lower half.

Radio

This is an immediacy medium. The aim is to paint a picture that people can interpret in their own way to suit their own needs or circumstances and get people to act now! It is not a brand awareness medium for two reasons. Firstly, the average person only recalls one radio ad they hear each hour and in 72% of instances while they may remember the ad and the subject of the ad, they cannot recall the name of the advertiser.

Secondly, recent studies have shown that while recall increases exponentially from 7 – 12 hearings, after 12 hearings, recall actually begins to decrease.

Again, the audience demographic can vary not only from station to station but also program to program.  Ensure you are getting the most bang for your buck.  I also never recommend buying “run of station”, that is where the station selects your time slots over a week.  It is a little more expensive but it is much more effective to place each ad exactly where you want it.  Also, don’t forget contests, in-store tie-ins, (relationship builders) can be more effective than 15 or 30 second slots.

Television

This medium conveys color, excitement and emotion. People watch television; they do not tend to ‘listen’ to television ads. It is therefore a medium that needs to convey, in your case, depending on the audience targeted, for example, the bonding of a family, the fun and the relationship. This is not an information or an immediacy medium unless deliberately producing a direct response commercial, which requires a totally different philosophy.

Don’t buy a national or even regional advertising if a local ad better suits your business.  In the US in particular, you can almost nominate the suburb you want to advertise in.  Again, watch the program demographics and always try to be first or last ad in a break.  The first ad in a break can have up to 10 times the audience of the 3^rd or 4^th ad.

Website

The website, or an ad (be it a banner or triggered by a search) that directs to a website is again an information medium. People who utilize the web have usually decided to seriously consider the purchase and are usually looking for information and answers.

I recommend that you engage a specialist in web advertising.  There are a lot of tricks to this trade, it continues to evolve, but it can be a phenomenally inexpensive medium per eyeball or outrageously expensive.

Don’t just concern yourself with traffic; it is conversion rate that counts, what do they buy, what’s your ROI.  Ideally today you should “pay per click”, not the number of people that see your ad, how many click through, then get closed!

Mobile Marketing

Again, my recommendation is to use an expert.  Mobile Marketing is everything from ads to text  message voting campaigns, SMS prompts to buy pizza tied in with a radio ad, games, gossip, news, updates, etc.  This is very effective and has very high response rates.

Social Media

Social media is a powerful communications medium that reaches over 500 million people a day. So what is social marketing? It is a marketing opportunity that is:

• Disseminated via social interaction
• Uses highly accessible channels
• Publishes through scalable techniques

Social media marketing is pull, not push.

• Traditional marketing is push marketing and is old school.
• Traditional marketing is expensive.
• Pull marketing is results driven, cost effective and measurable.

Using techniques such as blogs and SEO are critical.

Top 10 Social Media Tips for Beginners

1. The time for Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn is now. To maximize your opportunities, you need to be present on the world’s most popular social-networking sites.

2. Be one with Google. Register your website with Google and Google Maps so customers can find you. Use Google Alerts to see what the media and bloggers are saying about you.

3. Post every day. Commit to blogging/updating your social media presence as part of your daily business routine. Get your followers into the habit of looking at your latest blog.

4. Find followers. Read blogs and visit websites to seek those interested in what your company has to say.

5. Engage in conversation. Comment, post, update your status, and offer content that compels responses.

6. Be visual. Utilize video/YouTube to show customers what makes your business different.

7. Social-media content should not be the same as your advertising message. Advertising and social-media content are not the same. Provide real insights into your expertise, not a phony brief message.

8. Find out what your customers think. Encourage customers to ask questions, report concerns, and give feedback on your service.

9. Pace yourself. You can always increase frequency of content but slowing down can be a red flag.

10. Be patient. Success requires effort and a willingness to adapt to changes you may face. As BusinessWeek recently stated, “Millions of people are creating content for the social web. It is highly likely that your competitors are already there and your customers have been there for a long time.”

It is critical that you create a focused plan to leverage social platforms to achieve real business goals. You need to think about your overall business strategy and the role social media might play in achieving these goals.

There are a number of ways to leverage social media:

• Public relations
• Customer support
• Market research
• Brand marketing
• Promotions
• Consumer education
• Sales
• Product development
• Customer relationship management

The best approach to this highly effective advertising medium is to hire a consultant, at least until you are fully conversant with the medium.  But, do your homework, many consultants are learning on the job.

Postcards

Postcards are a combination of emotion, information and call to action. Because they have less ‘authority’ than a print advertisement and are frequently regarded as ‘junk mail’, they need to be specifically targeted to address their intended purpose, catch attention so that they are even read and then they need to provide information so that they are retained and acted upon.

Preferably you want people to retain postcards so you can offer monthly prizes to a specifically numbered postcard.  That way many people will retain them.  You also need to be able to track your response source, so you should code cards so you know who is responding.

Brochures

Need to be informative, but focus on addressing the potential customer’s specific issues. The information needs to be presented in simple form, and easy to read. Photos need to be relevant to the point being made with captions reinforcing the points. Never assume that the customer will make the correct assumption. The information needs to be sufficient but not excessive.

Let’s address each of the critical elements in some detail:

Heading

The heading is the most critical part of any communication, whether it is a newspaper ad, a radio message or an email. If the subject matter doesn’t ‘grab’ the reader or listener, they will switch off. Between 81 – 100% of people, depending on age group and the environment in which they are exposed to the message, do not read or listen past the headline.

The headline must powerfully address the primary issue that you want to convey and that is of major issue to the potential customer.

For example: We had an experience recently where over 94% of respondents to a survey thought that there was no real difference between our client’s product and a competitor. So as part of a 3 ad series, one of the headlines was:

‘So you think there is no difference between Product A and Product B.  Think again!’

Then the copy went on, to create a difference in the potential customer’s mind.

‘XYZ Wins the 2005 Best Product Award Over 343 Competitors’

The most effective headlines are these that provide a testimonial or state a ‘fact’. If there are a number of competitors that the potential client is likely to perceive to be similar in the area, the Headline should focus on a real OR perceived, point of difference.

Photograph, Illustration, Graphic

After being ‘grabbed’ by a powerful headline, nearly 85% of people next look at the photo, graphic or illustration. This needs to be relevant to the headline and reinforce the headline’s message, giving it an emotional hook. If you don’t have a graphic that reinforces the headline, don’t use any.

Caption

Never allow the potential customer to interpret a photograph, graphic or illustration. Always provide a caption that strongly reinforces the message being conveyed. Real life situations the reader can readily refer to are very powerful. For example:

“John Brown has an impressive 30 year history in the ‘ABC’ industry.”

Always choose your words carefully. For example, always use positive, happy words for a vacation, never use a negative word.

Always speak in regular ‘people speak’ not technical or ‘cute copy writer’ speak.

Consumer Purchasing Benefit (CPB)

The ‘Consumer Purchasing Benefit’ is the most powerful sales tool in the marketers’ armory. It is the driving force in differentiating your company from your competition and research shows that a good CPB can influence over 77% of purchase decisions. Of the Fortune 500 companies, 487 of them have a CPB for the company or its major products. By contrast, less than 3% of SME’s have a CPB.

It is critical to realize that a CPB is NOT a slogan; the CPB is the most compelling reason that a person should purchase your product or service rather than your competitors. It usually takes one of two forms:

• It is the major advantage (real or perceived) that your product or service has over your competitors.
• It emphasizes the real or perceived weakness of your competition.

It is important to note that slogans and logos have recall rates below 5% (except in very exceptional instances like Nike’s swoosh or the Target circles), whereas effective CPB’s have recall rates of over 80%.

The other critical element of a CPB is that most of the most effective are emotional, directed specifically at the customer. As ALL decisions are made EMOTIONALLY and then only later, justified PRAGMATICALLY, an emotive CPB obviously has much more chance of being effective.

Some effective CPB’s:

Coppertone ‘Tan don’t Burn’

This expresses your emotional desire and eliminates your fear in just 3 words, extremely powerful!

Visa ‘Anywhere you want to be’

Subconsciously reinforces your experience that not everyone takes American Express.

BMW ‘The Ultimate Driving Machine’

Says it all.

Nike ‘Just Do It’

Appeals to the independence and rebellion of youth.

Wheaties ‘The Breakfast of Champions’

If you are not eating Wheaties, you aren’t a champion.

Avis ‘We Try Harder’

Differentiates them from the others whom it suggests ‘Don’t care as much’.

Each of these appeals strictly to their target market, address a customer issue and differentiate themselves.

The CPB doesn’t have to be real, for example Blue Omo Soap Powder became the number one powder in every country in the world in a highly competitive category where research has shown little difference in results, by using the CPB ‘Washes Whiter Than White’.

It is a non sensical statement, but conveys very clearly that ‘you simply can’t get any cleaner than this’.

We created the CPB ‘Affordable Bathroom Elegance’ for Flair Bathroom Vanities because they couldn’t differentiate themselves from their competitors. By stating forcefully that they were Elegant, thus addressing everyone’s desire, yet everyone who really cares about style and elegance really CAN afford it, they increased sales by 37% in the first year of its adoption.

Your CPB, known locally – respected nationally is OK, but ‘known’ is a weak word. It needs to be stronger, lots of people are ‘known’, it is not a compelling reason to do business with you.

Additional Benefits

A recent very extensive study by Pfizer of the messages communicated on drugs to both the public and to doctors and pharmacists made very strong conclusions:

• Despite being a complex issue, – drugs having side effects, different benefits, results of trials, approvals etc etc, – the most effective messages contained no more than 3 benefits. Prior to the study, Pfizer produced comprehensive advertisements and brochures, often with a dozen or more important points or issues. They found that emphasizing 1 – 3 benefits was increasingly more effective and once more than 3 benefits were promoted effectiveness declined considerably.
• Emotive benefit descriptions, supported by hard facts, statistics etc, were over twice as effective as just stated facts. People related to the emotional benefits much more readily and, once justified, accepted the findings as fact where often when just facts were quoted they were skeptical.

In any communication designed to ‘sell’ a product or service, every single sentence must contain a benefit to the customer. Otherwise eliminate it because it has no point and simply wastes valuable ‘message’ time.

Risk Reversal

The inclusion of a risk reversal has been shown to increase closure rates by up to 57%. At the time a person is confronted with a decision they automatically get the collywobbles. And the value of the decision doesn’t matter. Whether it is an average Joe buying a car or a wealthy person buying a $3.00 item, all people question the purchase and the majority errs on the side of caution.

For example, ‘Can I afford it?’ – ‘Do I really need it?’ – ‘What if I find it cheaper somewhere else?’ – ‘What if I get it home and my spouse doesn’t like it?’ – and so on! In your case it is assurance that this is a great holiday destination that while not cheap, is really, really worth it!

So the more you can reduce the risk of the decision, the more you increase the chance of the decision going your way.

There are many ways to reduce the risk. Some of these are:

Money Back Guarantee: Totally removes the risk – why shouldn’t I buy it?

30-Day Trial: As above

Testimonials: Other people that I either respect or who are ‘just like me’ have done it successfully.

Awards: On an important night out are you more likely to go to a restaurant that ‘American Express’ have awarded three Gold Plates to, or one that has won zip?

These are the most popular. For example:

Video Ezy – When ‘If you don’t like the movie, we will exchange it for free’ was recommended to Video Ezy, their first reaction was that people would take advantage and constantly get new movies. However, the actual result was a rental increase of 212% and an increase in returns of ¼ of 1%.

Aussie Alarms – The endorsement of Aussie Home Alarms by a swimming gold medalist increased the percentage of respondents who would ‘definitely buy one’ from 4% to 23% and who would ‘consider buying one’ from 17% to 38%.

Thomas Tank Engine Beds – The promise of free home delivery, free trial for a month, free pick-up if not satisfied and a bonus of ‘you keep the 2 pillows, doona and sheets’ for free turned the business from near bankrupt to a six month waiting list with no returns!

Added Value

Adding value to the purchase can increase sales by up to 67% BUT only if the added value is directly related to the offer. Added value can also take many forms, for example:

• Additional product e.g. 20% more.
• Buy one, get one free.
• Complimentary service e.g. complimentary DVD player in cabin.
• Beneficial information.
• Related offer – an offer that compliments the work you are doing. E.g. ‘Call us now and we will forward you an interest rate ready reckoner with my compliments’.

Call to Action

It has been clearly demonstrated that at the end of any message, whether it is a print, television, radio, postcard or even a letter or email, if you don’t tell the recipient, clearly and precisely what you want them to do, they won’t do anything. So there needs to be a clear course of action.

The lack of clear contact details in an advertisement also creates a level of nervousness in people. They want to know that you have an address (ideal if you have been there for a period of time), near a landmark they know, a phone number and ideally someone to call, e.g. Call Vicky today. Each of these elements increases the potential respondent’s comfort level and hence their likelihood to respond.

Payment

Lessening the pain of payment is an important part of the call to action and credit card payments, pay by the month interest free, all assist to close the sale. Payment options often take creative forms.

Test, Test, Test

This is the most important element of all. Once you have determined your advertisement, email or letter, that meets the criteria set out above, then you need to test it to be sure that it works. This is done with a sample group and the results and the return on investment (ROI) evaluated. We will frequently create 3 or 4 advertisements, test them in the same target market and compare results.

It is also important to compare against competitors. For example, if the competitors are running print ads, you should paste each of them on a card separately, and then pay 20 target audience people to sort them in order. Put the ad that appeals most on top and so on. Then they need to tell you why they chose the particular ads. You can then modify your ads until you are the favored one. We usually pay $20 to each respondent for his or her input. There is no use running an ad if you don’t know it will get the best response.

Measure the Results

The results of every initiative MUST be measured, preferably according to target market parameters depending on the initiative. These can be geographic, socio economic, employment, sex, age, etc.

Each respondent should be asked why he or she responded to the particular initiative. One reason is good, more is great!

One Additional Killer Closer … NLP

The one additional element that will greatly enhance your marketing and advertising is to incorporate the elements of Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) which can dramatically enhance your results.

NLP is difficult to describe in a few words, but there are literally dozens of great books on the subject at Barnes and Noble, Waterstones, Borders, Dymocks and Amazon.

Early next year I will get an NLP practitioner to write an easy to understand article on it.  Watch for that.

Branding to Create Profit

Successful design must be built around a strong backbone of meaning.

In today’s world we are flooded with images, messages, graphic design and advertising from every direction all day every day. There are so many logos and brands out there, but many lack meaning.

What does your brand mean? What does it make you feel?

If you don’t know then it is costing you money, not making you money.

That brand, along with any marketing involving that brand, is then costing you money.

Change your graphic design bill from an expense into an investment that creates profit.

What your brand should achieve:

1.     Attract the correct audience

2.     Define a simple but important message

3.     Consistency across mediums

… and in turn equals Efficient communication.

These outcomes or goals need to be considered strategically by both you and your designer if you are going to create a strong and successful identity for your company.

Here is a quick explanation of the importance of each consideration and how it can make or break your business;

Attract the correct audience

You must nail this first step if you are to capture the slice of the market you want. Who do you want to attract to your brand? Consumer or corporate, cheap or expensive.  Do you make your money from selling to the masses, or a select exclusive group. This needs to be defined clearly through your brand before you open your doors.

Define a simple but important message

Once you have the attention of your audience, tell them what they want to hear! A potential customer has to feel something. They really want to know that you are traditional or innovative, technical or relaxed, bold or conservative. You can thoughtfully include many different messages to give a sneak preview to the feel of your brand, essence of your product and the culture of your company. If it’s done right, this message can be communicated strongly even without words.

Consistency across mediums

Your brand should be something you can use and apply effectively across everything. It can now be combined with other elements across mediums that take your brand to the people. Your brand needs to be consistently applied to all print and digital marketing to continue communicating your message. There are many tools we can now use to promote your brand.

Efficient Communication

Efficient communication can only be achieved once the first three crucial considerations are in place. Without the strong brand, anything you spend on advertising will be money wasted – you will just be wasting energy yelling at deaf ears. With the right brand, you have already attracted the correct audience and told them something they want to hear, your halfway there with a full tank of fuel remaining. They are already a qualified lead and interested in your business. You can still utilize a marketing budget if it’s available, but it’s now going to be twice as effective.

We need a new brand, but how do we do it?

Imagine your brand in a human form… What would it look like, sound like, smell like? Give your new brand human characteristics, bring it to life with feelings, emotions and messages so that it can connect with a real person.

We can give a brand a unique persona through shape, color, weight and balance.

Once we have your identity sharp, let’s use some clever tools to push it out to the people.

Ask us to transform your brand into a successful communication tool that really does speak for itself.