Building a website is only the first step toward online success. Attracting your target audience and staying relevant so they come back again and again is an ongoing process. Watch our quick Marketing Minute video below for a few tips.
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Marketing Your Website
Monday, April 12th, 2010The Importance of Packaging to the Brand Experience
Tuesday, August 25th, 2009When you think about shopping at your favorite retailer, what things move you about the experience? Is it the way the staff treats you? The products they sell? What about the way your purchases are packaged?
In writing a new On Hold Marketing script for a client who specializes in retail packaging, appropriately named Packaging Specialties, it struck me that packaging is an essential component of the brand’s value and an intrinsic part of a shopper’s experience.
Take Tiffany & Co. for example. It doesn’t matter what’s in that light aqua colored box tied with the white satin-faced ribbon. You know instantly that it came from Tiffany & Co. and that it will be special. But what if their packaging was a plain white cotton-filled box? There’s no magic in that presentation.
Think now about the purchases you’ve made recently. Have you purchased groceries? Clothing? Jewlery?
Your groceries were probably packaged in a generic two-handled plastic bag printed with the store’s logo and/or slogan, just like every other big-box store. There’s no magic in that generic plastic bag.
My favorite neighborhood grocer offers paper bags, and I don’t even recall if the bags feature the store’s logo. ButI love those paper bags because they remind me of grocery shopping with my mom in the days before plastic became the popular, if not the only, option. Those simple brown bags reinforce the notion that Churchill’s is a simple neighborhood grocer– a place where you might not be able to get exotic spices, but where the cashier knows your name and remembers that you like apples.
When you’re planning your packaging program, think about the nature of your business and the types of products you sell. Focus on how you want your customers to feel.
For luxe clothing boutiques, structured boxes, coordinating tissue and shiny Euro-totes with ribbon handles fit the packaging bill. Natural fiber bags printed with soy inks perfect for organic beauty stores.
These days, if you can think of it, someone can put your logo on it, so be thoughtful. Choose packaging that will make an impact and help your customers remember why they choose your store.
Everyday vs. Every Day: Part Two
Monday, July 20th, 2009Between email, text messaging, blog comments, and other forms of social media, the rules of the English language have taken a serious beating over the last few years. Punctuation is out, abbreviations are in, and many Americans, including some marketers, are having a hard time putting together a decent sentence.
What’s the big deal? Stick with me. There’s a larger point.
I’ve read in several places, including this blog, that, when engaging in social media, we needn’t be as concerned with the formalities of the language. Maybe. But I lean toward the belief that, when presenting your company to the public through your marketing copy, it’s always important to make sure you’re using the language properly.
That brings me back to one of my pet peeves: the improper use of the adjective “everyday” and the phrase “every day.” (Read my first post on this subject here.)
I know I should take up a more exciting hobby, but over the last few years I’ve collected examples of this misuse. Here are just a few:
Here’s the rule: “Everyday” (one word) is an adjective. Example: These are my everyday shoes.
“Every day” (two words) is an adverbial phrase. Example: I go to work every day.
And here’s the larger point I promised. True, many people won’t notice if you’ve made the error, but many people may. Those who do might wonder, “If this company is careless about the messages it puts in front of the public, what other details do they ignore when no one is looking?”
Is that really the question you want prospective customers asking themselves after reading your marketing copy?
13 Steps To Get Started Marketing With Twitter
Tuesday, July 7th, 2009
So everyone’s telling you to get started marketing with Twitter. Easier said than done, right? Actually, it is easy when you use the 13-step approach offered here courtesy of Debra Ellis and her MarketingProfs.Com article on how to Use Twitter to Attract Prospects and Engage Customers:
1. Create 50-100 tweets that fit your brand and objective. Keep them to approximately 120 characters so they can be easily retweeted (re-posted by others). In the case of the gardening example, tweets could range from planting times to frost warnings.
2. Open your user account with your business name as your user ID. Complete the profile, including the bio, and include the names of all those who post. People connect with people best. You want a personal connection. (Don’t panic. This doesn’t mean that you will be having tea with your followers… unless you want to.)
3. Add an avatar. Some choose to use their corporate logo, whereas others use their own photo. Choose what feels right to you and fits your brand.
4. Create a unique background that represents your company. There are services available to do this, but you can do it in-house. You want it to have the same look and feel as your corporate website. Make sure that the background-text details are visible on different types of monitors. Not everyone has the latest and greatest technology.
5. Determine the best days to tweet. These would be the days that your customers or prospects are most likely to be online. Select a scheduler to post your tweets. Remember that the world is open 24/7. As Alan Jackson and Jimmy Buffett remind us, it’s five o’clock somewhere. Running the tweets for an 8-12-hour cycle and then repeating them expands your coverage.
6. Make sure that some of your tweets have links back to your website. Make it easy for people to find you. Don’t expect them to go to your profile for your link, and don’t overdo it. If every tweet has a link, people resist following you.
7. Start the Twitter test. Consistently tweet for a minimum of 30 days (90 is better). Watch your traffic and sales to ensure that you’re receiving a return on your investment. At the end of the trial period, decide whether to continue or quit.
8. Don’t be a hit-and-run tweeter. Check in periodically on the days that your messages appear for comments, retweets, and new followers. Respond when appropriate. The idea is engagement, not blasting.
9. Resist becoming addicted to Twitter. Your objective is to create and enhance relationships, not be tethered to an electronic device.
10. Always remember that your tweets are a reflection on your brand, and they are permanent. Twitter has a delete option, but the tweets still show up in a search.
11. Don’t worry about the number of people following you. Think about the quality. When I first started acquiring followers, most were “get rich quick, let me tell you how for the low price of” marketers. I noticed that if I didn’t respond to their tweets, they stopped following me within a week. I’m sure that those who follow me will always include similar folks, but my focus is on the people who read my tweets and connect with me.
12. Have fun. You are meeting new people, broadening your horizons, and hopefully gaining new customers. If that isn’t fun, you are in the wrong business.
13. Ask for help if you are unsure how to proceed. There are people available to guide you.
Read, Then Write For Better Marketing Copy
Tuesday, June 16th, 2009
If it’s your job is to create marketing copy, here’s a great tip from the weekly newsletter of Daphne Gray-Grant, a writing coach and one of my favorite wordsmiths. When you’re having trouble getting started on a writing project, begin by reading someone else’s work. And before you think I’m advocating theft, here’s what she means:
The main idea is to find a piece of writing that provides a suitable model on which you can base your own work. Not only is this not procrastinating, it’s not even plagiarism provided you’re not looking for content. Instead you should be looking for style and writing architecture.
Gray-Grant suggests building a “swipe file” – a collection of some of the best work of other writers – to use as inspiration when you’re starting a project. If it’s true that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, any author would be proud to have you base your next ad or sales letter on their style.
Stressing Benefits Over Features
Wednesday, June 20th, 2007BusinessVoice president Jerry Brown sent me a blog post today about a topic many of us can identify with: trying to buy a product you know relatively nothing about.
It’s called “Excuse me, do you speak English?” and it suggests another way marketers can stress benefits over features to help consumers make good buying decisions and, in the process, create customer loyalty.
Everyday vs. Every Day
Tuesday, June 19th, 2007The word ‘everyday’ seems to be everywhere lately, but in all the wrong places.
In the last few weeks, I have seen the word ‘everyday’ used incorrectly on the menu of a regional restaurant chain (“Our lunch specials are just $6.95 everyday”), on the binding of a pad of notebook paper (“Value Plus. Your Best Value…Everyday”), on a digital billboard for a local newspaper, on a P-O-P sign at a national pizza chain, in a script for a TV commercial, on a T-shirt, and twice on the homepage of a website.
According to the book Common Errors in English Usage:
“Everyday” is a perfectly good adjective, as in “I’m most comfortable in my everyday clothes.” The problem comes when people turn the adverbial phrase ‘every day’ into a single word. It is incorrect to write “I take a shower everyday.” It should be “I take a shower every day.”
At BusinessVoice the words we write for our clients are most often heard, not read, but if you’re going to print or online with new marketing copy, remember to run it past several pairs of qualified eyes.
