Marketing Trenches

Whether you live in the Baltimore/Washington area like we do, or have only heard about it on the news, everyone knows we’ve been hit here by record snowfalls.  I saw yesterday that Baltimore just passed Syracuse NY for first place as the snowiest city in the U.S. this winter.

While technology has allowed me to continue working on just about everything I would in a normal day, some of the down time “snowed in” got me thinking about how people might use some of that down time to address items on the “marketing list” (you know, that list some people never quite get to).

With that mind, I went back through some of our posts to highlight 5 pretty tangible and actionable items you can think about, evaluate and improve right away.  And while I tried to avoid the “clip show” format — Didn’t you always hate when sitcoms did those episodes that were just recycled material? – It did seem to work best in this format.

So here you go – 5 Marketing Fixes for a Snowy Week.

1). Fix Your Core Messaging:

We all know how important it is to have a clear and consistent message – But do you have a messaging problem?

Your Marketing Message in 30 Seconds

2). Diversify Lead Generation:

In an ideal world, you are managing multiple buckets of leads, each bringing a different volume, a different quality, and a different set of metrics.  But are you putting all your eggs in one basket?

Buckets of Leads

3). Convert More Visitors to Leads:

Make sure you are getting the most from your online visitors.  Tune up your contact forms and landing pages by looking at 5 common problems.

Better Contact Forms = More Prospects

4). Improve Your Search Marketing:

Writing ad copy for pay-per-click ads, particularly for Google AdWords, is an extremely challenging task.  Are you getting the most from your paid search campaigns?

The Most Challenging Copywriting Job in the World

5). Update Your Website:

Your company may have all kinds of exciting things going on - new customers, partners, upcoming events, etc.  But if from the viewpoint of the random website visitor, you’re not doing much lately it may not be worth taking the next step to get in touch.

Keeping the Newsroom Fresh

Implementing these 5 fixes will help you to upgrade your marketing — And give you a reason to avoid that snow shovel.

Will Davis is Managing Partner of Right Source Marketing.  Don’t hesitate to drop Will a comment on this post.  If you liked this post, follow@willdavis on Twitter for more commentary like this.

I was speaking with a few colleagues the other day about the different benefits of social media as a whole, and blogging in particular.  The folks in the room had varying levels of social media involvement, from no involvement at all to heavy involvement.  Each of us discussed what we hope to get out of social media, why we blog or might consider it, and how businesses can benefit from blogging.  The discussion went on for some time, covering the wide ranging benefits from SEO opportunities to more frequent customer touch points and everything in between.  After a while, it quieted down a bit and somebody asked me if they had missed anything on the list.

Skip the First Meeting

While our blog serves many purposes, one of them I hadn’t heard mentioned by the group was one of the things that I find most useful.  Having a well planned blog and social media presence, with what we hope is interesting and insightful content, allows us to Skip the First Meeting.

So what do I mean when I say Skip the First Meeting?  Unfortunately, despite how well you may try to vet things ahead of time, inevitably in our business you run into an opportunity that 5 minutes into that first meeting, after you’ve sniffed each other and gotten a bit more of a sense of your businesses –  you both know isn’t a fit.  You don’t think alike, you don’t value the same things, really whatever those components may be.  Of course generally by this time somebody has ordered food, or driven out of their way, or fired up a PowerPoint or laser lights show, or something else entirely, and it’s too late to do anything but spend the next 45-60 minutes or more there despite you each knowing this isn’t going to work out.

Now, we often head this meeting off at the pass.  We’ll send a contact or prospect a link to our blog ahead of time, and also encourage them to connect with and follow us on social networks, and ask them to read through these pieces ahead of time before scheduling that first get together.  By doing this, we make much more efficient use of their time and ours.  We try to convey the idea here that we want to be involved in strategy and planning and believe in taking a holistic view of marketing, and that shines through in our posts.

When we discover the poor fit, we each save ourselves the time of an unproductive meeting where we just won’t be a fit for each other (although sometimes we do miss those laser light shows).  And just as importantly, for those that could be a fit, we’ve fast forwarded over the glossy part of the first meeting and are digging right into the important and meaningful parts that are usually saved for a second meeting.

So while there are probably 100s of reasons to blog and to get involved in social media, if it works for your business you may want to try to Skip the First Meeting.

About the Author: Will Davis is Managing Partner of Right Source Marketing.  Don’t hesitate to drop Will a comment on this post.  If you liked this post, follow @willdavis on Twitter for more commentary like this.

So you’ve managed to create a marketing program that is generating leads.  Real, ready-to-be-qualified, hopefully big budget leads.  Fantastic.  What do you do next?

If you’re structured like a lot of organizations, that lead is entered into a CRM system, perhaps assigned to a sales or marketing representative, and the dance begins.  A small percentage of those leads will become hot, sales-ready, take-the-next-step type leads.   A larger percentage of those leads will become qualified but not ready to fully engage type leads.  An even larger percentage of those leads will not be ready to engage with anyone at all.  That could indicate a host of different things, but never assume that means the lead is unqualified.

All three categories - the hot lead, the warm lead, and the cold lead - require lead nurturing at this point, yet the average organization fails to nurture leads effectively.  Why?  Too many organizations still assume that their primary lead nurturing weapons are a salesperson and a phone call.

Let’s take a look at a 4-step lead nurturing plan, and briefly describe why each step is important and how you can begin to address each one.

1. Understand why lead nurturing is important.

It’s no secret that the average B2B buyer prefers to work with someone they perceive as a trusted advisor, as opposed to just a sales representative.  So how can your sales representative become that trusted advisor?  The trusted advisor is able to prove the following over time:

• That the advisor - and the company in general - is an expert in the field being considered.
• That the advisor - and the company in general - understands the problem or issue facing your company, and can help solve it.
• That the advisor - and the company in general - will be easy to work with.

You think all three of those things can be established in a single phone call?  No chance.  Those three components are generally proven out over time.  Sure, referral business may move quicker through this process, but they still need to check off all three stages.

2. Identify the tactics you can use for lead nurturing.

This is typically the area where sales/marketing organizations sell themselves short, and ultimately revert back to using phone calls and email as their primary lead nurturing tactics.  If you’ve read this blog previously, you know that content is king in marketing.  Here’s a partial list of all the different forms of content that can be used to nurture leads:

• Case studies
• Press releases
• Free trials
• Whitepapers
• Webinars
• E-Newsletters
• Printed newsletters
• Events
• Third-party articles
• Phone calls
• Emails
• Research reports
• Blog posts

The list could go on and on.  Make your own list.  You likely have some of these materials already, and some you’ll want to develop.  Next comes the easy part - use them, and use them without abandon.  If your content is well-developed, most prospects will appreciate you sending it.

3. Schedule your lead nurturing activity.

You understand why lead nurturing is important, and you’ve now identified the materials you have at your disposal.  What now?  Make a schedule for when and how you will touch each lead.  This doesn’t have to be complicated.  It may be as simple as the following:

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Seth Godin blogged Friday on Things to Ask Before You Redo Your Website, and like most of his posts it was enlightening and made you think.  Seth provides just under 25 bullet points on the difficult and most important questions you have to ask before you redo your website.  While it’s a great post, I do have a small difference of opinion on one part.

The questions are right on track, with the focus on the strategy of the website vs. the technology.  Too many folks go wrong right out of the gates by making their first website conversation about the technology requirements or having the website look JUST LIKE a website they like, vs. the strategy and business objectives.  Once those are in place, the other items can fall out of that next.

So I think the approach and the questions are right on, and taking the time to do this is the right first step.  However, there is one place where I differ slightly with Seth.  Many companies will be able to ask and answer these questions themselves.  In my experience though, many more need additional outside assistance to help them step through this process.  In many organizations there is still a deer in the headlights look as we start talking about the web.  In the best ones they realize this and bring the right folks onto their team to help to navigate this.  A client recently described themselves to me as “They don’t know what they don’t know” when it comes to the web, and I think that is often an accurate assessment.  While these questions should serve as the starting point for redoing your website, I think it’s just as critical to make sure you can provide the right answers – or get somebody on the team that can help you get there.

If you tried to plan a new home from the ground up without an architect, I’m sure there are things you would miss.  Making sure you have the right plan in place out of the gates is the only real way to succeed in your website project.  Understanding what is important and what doesn’t need to be a focus right up front is critical.

After all, as Seth closes, everything is not an option.

About the Author: Will Davis is Managing Partner of Right Source Marketing.  Don’t hesitate to drop Will a comment on this post.  If you liked this post, follow Will on Twitter for more commentary like this.

We’ve written on this blog previously about the importance of content and how writing is often undervalued, whether for a press release, website, social media, email or really anything else.  Just as important as having the right content and writing well is having the right tone.

People connect with – and buy from – people, or at least the brand’s personality.  Make sure your approach to your content represents your company’s personality.  If you are a creative services company and a bit irreverent, your tone should reflect that.  At the same time, you probably don’t want your medical institution to attempt to be hilarious.  And, if you don’t know what your company’s personality is, this exercise did a great job fleshing out a bigger issue.

Then, make sure you are consistent.  Mike talked about this a bit earlier this week in his post Fall Cleaning: Clean Up Your Online Brand.  Ensure your content and tone carry over from one vehicle to the next, from your website to your emails, to your interviews.  Too many times we see this sacrificed — the classic mistakes of needing to get an email campaign out now and not having  the time to make sure it’s written right, or the belief that you need as much content as we can throw up there to help our SEO, it doesn’t matter how it reads are just two common examples.  Make sure you take the right approach and stay consistent.

Earlier this week we had a great meeting with a firm.  One of the first things they mentioned was that they wanted to meet with us because our website read just like it was written by them, that the tone was right in line with theirs.

Too often I end up reading content that reminds me of the boring guy in the corner at a party.  Sure, that person may have a lot of facts and information, but with zero personality it’s tough to really make an impact.  Think of that next time you write content yourself or hire a writer, it demonstrates that the tone is often even more important than the content.

After all, didn’t everyone like Norm better than Cliff Claven?

About the Author: Will Davis is Managing Partner of Right Source Marketing.  Don’t hesitate to drop Will a comment on this post.  If you liked this post, follow Will on Twitter for more commentary like this.

So you’ve gone ahead and set up a blog for your company.  Or maybe you are just starting to think about it but aren’t sure what to do – or whether you should even have a blog.  No matter which of these camps you fall into, it’s critical to your success that you don’t just create a blog, you nurture it.  While an exhaustive list here could be a few hundred tactical points, these are the big keys that will help you to be more successful with your blog:

1). Start with a Strategy

This sounds incredibly obvious but amazingly isn’t usually the case.  Most blogs fall down because there is no strategy in place on how and when to communicate, what you want to say, who you are trying to reach, and all the other crucial elements.  All too often, businesses start a blog without a well-defined strategy and it all falls apart from there.  Make sure you have a plan in place for what you will discuss (more below) how frequently (at least enough to keep your audience’s interest) and that you have the time and people to write well.

2). Write What You Know, And Please — Don’t Sell, Educate

One of the basic tenets of writing has always been to write what you know.  Hand in hand with that, on your blog make sure you aren’t just pushing a sales agenda.  Use the blog as a forum to educate visitors on your area of expertise rather than a hard sell pushing your company.  Nobody wants to go to a cocktail party and listen to someone talk about themselves the whole time, and nobody wants to read your blog if it’s just a hard sell for your company.  Instead, be interesting and educate your visitors.

3). Make Your Blog Accessible

This really spans a variety of items on your page.  On your page, make it easy to search by having items such as a prominent search box, categories, tags, easily sorted archives and clean design and navigation  – it’s really surprising how often that basic is missed!  If visitors can’t figure out what to do on your blog because your design is screaming at them then your content is nearly worthless.

4). Make It Easy for Visitors to Interact and Share

The whole idea of a blog as a social vehicle is to be, well, social right?  So, make it easy for visitors to do just that by providing easy access to tools that let them share your post with their networks (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Technorati, social bookmarking etc.), post comments, and contact the authors.  Link to other interesting blogs in your blogroll so your visitors get even more value out of your blog.

5). Let People Know You Are Out There

Again, this covers a number of items.  On the simple side, make sure you are submitting your blog to search engines, relevant directories, industry specialty sites, providing visitors an easy to use RSS feed, and promoting it on your website and in email.  Additionally, consider utilizing your online and offline networks to make folks aware of your blog and latest posts.  Share a new post if you are on Twitter, but also tell people at your networking meeting if it is relevant.  Add a blog app to LinkedIn (such as the WordPress app if you are using WordPress) but don’t be afraid to mention and send a link to a relevant post to a client or prospect.

While there are hundreds of additional tips to enhance your blog, make sure you are first nurturing your blog with these 5 easy keys.

Have other key steps you would like to add?  Add it to the comments below.

About the Author: Will Davis is Managing Partner of Right Source Marketing.  Don’t hesitate to drop Will a comment on this post.  Follow Will on Twitter for more commentary like this.

Content is king from a marketing standpoint - now more than ever.  Can you really market anything without some form of content?  Think about it for a second.  Review every marketing vehicle you use, and try to identify one that doesn’t involve some form of content production.

If content is king, then what is the king’s most important weapon?  Another easy answer.  Writing.  And it’s not even close.

Writing is one of the most undervalued pieces of the marketing puzzle.

Let’s do a quick review of some marketing vehicles and how poor writing impacts each:

• Press Release: Don’t even write it if you’re not going to do it professionally.  Journalists and your consumer/business audience will stop reading when they hit the first piece of evidence of poor writing.

• Website: You know that rule, the one that says you have 10-15 seconds to capture a visitor’s attention and convince them to dive further into the site?  You know what can expedite that departure time?  Poor writing.

• SEO: Writing is far more important for SEO than most “experts” are willing to admit.  Here’s one simple reason.  Let’s say you rank #1 on an important keyword, but your meta description tag (the one that smart people read to determine whether your site is relevant to the topic) is too long, which is often the case.  Fewer clicks.  Fewer leads.  Decreased ROI from that SEO effort.

Let’s check out an example.  When I search on “copywriting” on Google, here are two description tags associated with top 10 results:

Tag #1: “Copywriting advice for bloggers and online marketers.”

In case you’re wondering, this is an effective description tag, which happens to belong to a very popular marketing blog.  No surprise.

Tag #2: “Blues icon BB King was once asked how he found his heart-warming, bone-chilling sound. It’s simple, he said. I only steal from the best. After.”

This may lead me to a very cool article or blog post, but doesn’t matter.  I’m not clicking because I don’t understand how this description is relevant to my search query.

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These are infamous words, generally spoken by infamous people.  Or at least people that are about to become infamous.

There are literally hundreds of ways organizations arrive at the decision that they need to build a new website.  Sometimes the decision is simply dictated from the CEO.  Sometimes the decision is driven by a change in ownership or control.  Sometimes the decision is driven by the poor performance and usability of the current website.  For the point I am trying to make here, the driving factor of the decision doesn’t matter.

What does matter is the mistake that at least 20% of small and medium businesses make: I call it the “All I need is a web designer” mistake.

Really? No, I mean really?

Listen.  Perhaps you just want a brochure site.  Static.  You don’t care about driving “new” traffic.  You don’t care about using the site as a lead generator or customer acquisition tool.  You don’t care about using the site to become a thought leader in your industry.  That’s cool – go find a designer – there are thousands of great ones out there, some of whom we work with on a regular basis.

But if you’re interested in making your website a complete, living, breathing, fluid marketing vehicle, then please don’t say things like the following:

“We don’t need any help with our messaging.  We’ve got that down pat. “

Really? No, I mean really? Strangely enough, the companies that usually say that are the ones that DO have their messaging down pat.  Down pat in the CEO’s head.  And only his head.  And the messaging is in his/her head equates to 10 pages of messaging if you could extract it.

“Don’t worry about the copy.  We have all kinds of brochures, and if the information isn’t there we can always use all the copy on the current site.”

Really? No, I mean really? Brochures aren’t websites.  And if you don’t have any formal messaging plan, then that copy that resides on your site probably doesn’t make any sense.

“Not sure that SEO matters to us.  All of our customers come through referrals, and that seems to work out pretty well.”

Really? No, I mean really? That’s probably one of the reasons why your business isn’t growing.  You’re maintaining a business, not growing it.  If you’re good with that, then forget the SEO.  It will probably drive all kinds of new leads into the business, and you’ll have to figure out how to deal with these new leads instead of always handling “warm” leads.  Who would want to deal with that problem, after all?

This brings us back to my favorite:

“All I need is a web designer.”

Yup.  And when I build my next house, I’ll just get someone to paint the outside real nice.  Plumbing doesn’t matter.  Working appliances don’t matter.  Electricity? Who needs it.  Just make it look nice on the outside and we’re good to go.

Seems that on a weekly basis a new article or blog post arrives on my desk that puts forth the idea that the press release is becoming useless as a marketing tool.  Not surprisingly, these articles or posts are often authored by “social media experts” or those that believe that embracing and executing a “social media plan” is the holy grail for businesses in this day and age. 

Our old friend the press release still serves some very important purposes for the average business.  I’ll give you an example.  Last week, a new company/service was launched in a similar space to one of my ventures.  Surprise, surprise…this company still believes in the press release, so they issued one via one of the popular wire services.  I wouldn’t have known about the press release or the company, but within 24 hours the following happened:

• Three separate colleagues delivered the press release to me, so clearly they found it somewhere in their daily web travels.
• I received it via RSS feed from a tech blog I subscribe to.
• Someone in one of my LinkedIn groups posted the release, and when I logged into my account I discovered the post and the release.

Guess what?  I don’t think any of these three things would have happened without the creation and distribution of a press release.  It turns out that this new company looks like it may represent a complimentary partner for our new venture, so this press release not only drove some awareness, but it may turn into direct revenue for the issuer.

And we haven’t even addressed what the release may have generated from a media coverage standpoint.  Still think the press release is dead?

I spent the last few days reviewing a variety of documents that I’d put into the general “proposal” category - services proposals, product proposals, service and product proposals, requests for proposals (RFPs), etc.  What always amazes me is the wide range of overall quality, structure and writing styles that appear from each proposal to the next.  I am not here to advocate some type of standard proposal structure as that would be impossible (and would eliminate the already decaying value of creativity), but there are some simple tips that should be considered in just about any proposal:

• Be as brief as possible.  There’s no magic proposal length.  I’ve seen effective 1-page proposals and effective 20-page proposals.  Proposal writers know when they’re including irrelevant information, but we often get sucked into the idea that saying more means the proposal will look more impressive.  Not so. 
• Include background information on company, staff, approach…but do NOT regurgitate the entire company history.  I always include this information even if the recipient knows me well for one simple reason:  there’s always a chance the proposal will land in the hands of other staff members or advisors, and a proposal without some background typically leaves something to be desired.
• If there is a product involved - be it software or hardware - provide some level of detail on the software or hardware.  Brief written description, screen shots or photos work well, as long as it’s not overkill.  This may not be necessary if the product is not unique to the solution being presented - if the proposal revolves around the use of a specific piece of CRM software (and all other vendors are proposing solutions around that software), then there may not be a need to describe the software in detail.

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