Many businesses are turning up the heat on their direct marketing for the holidays or are at least busy planning and crafting marketing strategy for the New Year. Unfortunately many are still focusing on the wrong metrics.
Republican or Democrat, business owners must recognize Obama's victory was a win for technology and delivers a poignant lesson in harnessing the latest tools and tactics.
Local businesses and entrepreneurs need to be aware that business listing service Google Places as we know it is going away.
Google Places has been an important citation platform for getting found on mobile, search and improving local SEO and a must have part of any local company's marketing strategy. However, this is now being replaced by Google + Local.
Google + Local ties together Google+, local business listings, maps, and Zagat ratings for enhanced mobile, search and social media marketing all in one place.
Facebook's share price dove almost 10% again yesterday for over $35 billion in lost value since the IPO. An announcement of a new acquisition could make things even worse. What does this mean for business owners debating marketing on Facebook?
Social media has a huge impact on your business and product branding. Companies can choose to both engage and take control of this or let others do the positioning.
Not having a social media presence speaks volumes about a business. Most notably, suggesting that there is little credibility. Plus, others will talk about you and your brand on social networks whether you want them to or not.
The most prevalent mistake when it comes to a social media marketing strategy is the failure to have a solid plan. The really sad part is that not only are organizations missing out on the fastest and most affordable means of generating new business but they are setting themselves up to be overtaken by their competitors a lot sooner than they realize.
1. Underestimating The Need For A Toll Free Number
1. Real Estate
While there is no industry or company that cannot benefit from toll free numbers, real estate companies and agents definitely should not be in business without one. Building credibility and branding are perhaps the top two concerns of the many real estate agents that are rushing back into the business. Taking advantage of the rebound and toll free vanity numbers are the easiest and most cost effective way to achieve this.
2011 may mark the year of the return of direct marketing. The importance of this promotional method is apparent. Direct marketing allows your company to interact with customers without any barriers. Some of the tactics that fall under this marketing strategy are:
Catalogs: Because printing costs are continually coming down, more companies are enticed by the possibilities presented by catalogs. Glossy, sophisticated, and attractive: catalogs are a direct marketing method that can easily entice.
Email Marketing: Traditional salesmanship still matters when you take your campaign on the Internet, but not by much. The key to having a successful email marketing campaign is to have accurate data. Once you know what the customers want, need, and desire, it becomes easier to target your email messages.
Social Media: Get responsive leads through social media. If you are like most companies, you rely on a certain demographic to generate most of your sales. Social media allows you to be in touch with your target market during people's “downtime.” When they visit social sites, they tend to feel more sociable themselves.
Basically, the main reason why direct marketing is so effective is because salesmen don’t make far-ranging assumptions. The campaign is based on detailed data that is gathered from the customers themselves.
Business columns and business coaches often dedicate much of their time to telling entrepreneurs and business owners that they must be revolutionary in their advertising strategy and be unique if they want to win.
However, the reality is that as an entrepreneur or marketing executive, achieving a successful advertising strategy can often be a difficult tightrope walk between doing what is working for others and offering a unique proposition.
There are two problems with developing your own advertising strategy from scratch. First, it can mean ignoring the facts and figures and the tried and true methods that are working in the current market. Choosing just to learn from your own mistakes rather than others is costly and can result in losing any lead time you had on your competitors. Secondly, creating an advertising strategy that is too far away from the norm can be confusing to prospects and consumers, not only reducing your advertising effectiveness and the ROI of your marketing budget but alienating many viable customers.
In order to develop a truly successful advertising strategy, you really should take the best of both worlds. If a certain marketing strategy, channel, or platform is proving to be incredibly profitable in your industry, you shouldn’t ignore it. Consumers will be looking for some of the similar attributes in order to find your product or service and judge it’s value and credibility. However, at the same time you need to be different enough from your competition to differentiate enterprise and stand out from the crowd. The perfect example is books. While self-publishing is becoming more popular than ever and has turned out many of the best sellers in the last couple of years, it remains an independent way to produce books; nevertheless, authors can definitely benefit from promoting their books on reputable sites like Amazon or by using Facebook likes and a familiar blog or website format for promoting it. What will you take from the proven and comfortable way of doing business in your industry and what will you do differently to develop the ultimate advertising strategy?
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