Get tough in 2012! Here’s six ways to boost your 2012 marketing.
1. Measure, measure, all is measure
Don’t you wonder why we still don’t know what we get for our advertising and marketing investments? Go figure. But unless you make up your mind to measure everything you do when it comes to marketing, you’ll never know what works or doesn’t work.
For example, we studied over 3,500 leads for a client and found a professor in the batch – but not just any professor. This was the Department Chairman in the field of our client’s product category! Our client missed the lead, but in other instances, we have seen clients throw away leads like this as “education” or “students.” Are you kidding me? Cultivating that inquiry would have benefited the client in so many ways! Look and measure everything!
2. Channel, Channel Burning Bright
What channel isn’t being disrupted today? If your regular channel isn’t working, try another. Or, try something different in the channel you are in. People are looking – and finding – information everywhere. They want to be treated like wholesalers, like consumers, like designers or contractors.
For example, you will see that social and digital media are a lot less expensive than traditional channel marketing tactics (i.e., direct mail). But all isn’t what it seems to be. Just because it’s new doesn’t mean it works better! So before you abandon what’s working because you want to Twitter your way to the top, think twice! (By the way, Twitter is a channel, too.)
3. I see YOU!
In some circles, it’s becoming more in vogue to concentrate on engagement – not the customer you are engaging. Well, think again. We had a client who recently developed a product based on research, only they developed it based on exactly the opposite of what the research said the customer wanted. Apparently, the company knew better what their market wanted than the market itself did. Can you guess the outcome? Remember who the customer is!
4. How much is too much?
Buzz words like “big data” can be confusing. We all know there’s a lot of it out there, and it’s getting worse. But remember, there’s gold in that data!
It’s about looking closer. Underneath. For example, doing a simple overlay on your data file can be revealing. We appended SIC codes to a client’s file recently, who believed it was comprised of one type of customer. Our appending revealed that the majority of his customers preferred to classify themselves as something entirely different – and gave us the opportunity to pursue an entirely different line of thinking.
5. Value — de gustibus non est disputandum
While you can’t argue about taste, you can also say that value is in the eye of the beholder and you can’t argue about that either. But value is really what sales is all about; our CEU for designers Staying in Front of Your Customers brings this home.
Therefore, you have to look at each of your customers as an asset – something of value. Peter Guber, one of the most successful and powerful producers and executives in Hollywood, put it this way: “Don’t aim at their wallet. Aim at their heart. Think of what audiences want. They want experiences, not comedy.” He added, “Trying to sell something or get a new client? Look at that person on other side of the table as an audience, not a customer.”
6. Lead, Follow or Get Out of the Way
Herds are interesting, and so are groups. There’s safety in numbers, which is the basis of herd philosophy. But herding is what we do in society. All herds need leaders, and leadership is one of the singular principles that determine whether the herd survives. Take the herd down the wrong road, and things go south pretty fast.
So enters trust. If you trust in the leadership, you follow. If you don’t, you take another path. It’s been the story of business since business began. For example, entering into social media as a leader or as a follower – which is best? The answer is often somewhere in between. If you move too fast, you’ll miss as many of the opportunities as moving too slow. But move you must!
For more thought leadership on this topic, contact Jim Nowakowski, President, Interline Creative Group, Inc. at 847 358 4848, or http://intrln.com/contact.