Category View (Strategy)

A few weeks ago I wrote about the $600 tax rebate and the potential for marketing to use this 'free' money to help generate sales.  The current rise in gas prices presents a similar opportunity for marketers.  Some business such as hotels are offering fuel subsidies to lure guests to take vacations at their locations.  As gas prices continue to rise I bet people start thinking twice before just jumping into their cars.  If people need to drive to do business with you, it might be time to start thinking about providing reasons it is worth the drive to your business more...

...or to at least consider when you are planning your marketing activities for the rest of this year.  If you are trying to get your message across to your target audience you need to keep your eye on the calendar (nationally and locally if you have a local business) to see if you are going to be fighting for share of mind. This year we have some extra 'fun' to work around.  We have a contentious Olympics taking place in China, two major political conventions and a Presidential election to follow.  So here are some of the additional dates I recommend you more...

Have you started to think about how you are going to use your$600 economic stimulus rebate check? Or, how you are going to use this opportunity to sell more products and services? As a marketer I started thinking about how this cash could be used to sell more products and services.   My team and I will be thinking about promotions we can use to help people invest in their education. Do you remember the last rebate checks the government gave out?  There were all sorts of promotions from retailers who offered to double the value of your rebate, advance credit for the amount more...

I know, I know, Hannah and Miley are the same person.... For those who don’t know this weekend has two major activities happening. The Super Bowl on Sunday and the beginning of a one week run of the Hannah Montana 3D movie. Maybe Disney holds the ‘magic’ behind the genius of Hannah Montana but whoever thought of the latest marketing has done an incredible job.    The movie is basically a recording of Hannah’s concert tour with some back stage coverage. The movie is only in theaters for one week and almost all theaters have sold out of tickets in advance. What is so great about the more...

Looking to generate some quick marketing results? If you have a database of customers or prospects then you have an opportunity to build a relationship and get personal with your direct marketing. Michael Kaselnak wrote a short to the point piece on this topic in the latest issue of Direct Magazine. His point is so simple that it is often overlooked. Use personalized handwritten notes to communicate with a target audience. Here are the main points to effectively use handwritten notes: Use your client or prospects name Hand write the note or if you have too many to do by hand find a font that replicates a handwritten more...

Over the years I have seen many different marketing strategies and media channels  but the one that was waiting for me when I returned from my ski trip takes the cake. ATM receipt advertising. I guess this makes sense if you want to waste your marketing money while people take out their own... How many people look at their receipts for more then a second to make sure their transaction went through correctly? On that note how many people still take their receipts? It makes sense to advertise in this medium if you are the bank and want one additional touch point but do you more...

Do you test everything you can to increase your marketing conversion or response rates? Are you using control groups? If not, you aren't testing effectively.  You might be guessing, assuming or just throwing caution in the wind.  I know many people who have said "we are testing X,Y or Z"  but when you ask about a control group they answer, "we are going to see how it performs to what we did last year".  What!?  You are comparing what you did to something that happened a year ago.  Did nothing change?  Obviously this doesn't make sense and is a bit of an exaggeration but more...

Yesterday I wrote about a paper that published a biased piece about our company.  They even referred to an ad we ran in their paper for the purpose of trying to appear unbiased. This paper clearly doesn't appreciate our products or services so should we continue to advertise in their publication? We know pulling our ad budget is not going to be noticed by the paper but there is the principle of the matter to consider. What would you do? more...

One week to go until Blog Action Day... I read this case study in Marketing Sherpa that is worth sharing even if you are not thinking about the environment.  They highlighted a catalog company which understood that many of their customers were concerned with the environment and moving away from paper based catalogs.  To help boost response and maintain their customer base they put together a marketing strategy that addressed their users concerns and increased the company's bottom line.  You can see from this case study that going green can produce  "green" results. The key take away / reminders for me are: You always more...

Let's face it.  People are lazy.  If given the choice between thinking through a problem and watching TV most people would opt for the TV.  There is nothing wrong with some down time and this is not a judgment about you or your customers, we are all lazy by nature.  Add to this how busy people are these days and you have a tough challenge if you want people to listen and act upon your marketing. To create successful marketing you need to think about your target customer and one aspect is their mental state.  What is going to make them take more...