Are Your Marketing Channels Working?

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1. Identify Your Marketing Channels

What marketing channels are you using right now? When were they implemented? If you marketing channels are more than two years old, you need to measure their effectiveness. Social Marketing and Social Networking tools have become more effective and easier to use. How much Social Marketing is included in your marketing plan?

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Write down all your marketing channels, when they were implemented, the cost and finally the $ cost that channel converted.

For example:

  • you commissioned your website design in 2001, it cost $2,500 and has brought you $8,000 worth of business
  • You started your e-mail newsletter in 1998, it costs $250 a month to publish it  and has brought you $2500 worth of business
  • Your business cards cost were designed in 2005, and cost $100 a year to  print, estimate a percentage of the business you receive from face to face networking.

2. Where are Your Clients?

Next take a look at all your clients for the past year and ask yourself, where you can reach these folks in the most effective, least invasive way. Do they respond to an e-mail campaign? Are they on twitter or Facebook? Are they more conservative and respond to direct mail? The social marketing and social networking sites search can be use to find your clients. Does your e-mail newsletter have a satisfactory open rate?

3. Design and Implement a Real Raw Relevant Marketing Plan to create conversations

If the marketing channels you’re using right now arenot converting, it’s wasting your time and resources and you need to design a new marketing plan to include more effective marketing tools. Once you’ve established your clients are using the social networking tool such as twitter or Facebook, ensure the new tools fit well with the marketing channels that are in place. Watch how others are using the new tools effectively and start slowly. Test weekly to ensure you’re reaching your niche market.

DON’T SPAM ever .. social marketing and social networking is used most effectively to start a conversation, to engage and listen.

Are you Marketing Channels converting? When was the last time you did an audit of your marketing channels?

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Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-05-16

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Are you an Inbound or an Outbound Marketer?

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….so, which is it? Is your style of marketing Inbound, where people are looking for you, or is it Outbound, where your focus is on finding (or, sadly, chasing) prospective customers?

If you are using traditional techniques – what we would call ‘Outbound’ marketing today – then cold-calling, print advertising, T.V. advertising, junk mail, spam and trade shows may be concepts you have used.

While these approaches have been successful over time, many of them have been over-used to the point where we, as consumers, have become increasingly adept at avoiding their message.  We may not ‘kill the messenger’, but we are certainly happy to delete an email, silence a commercial, ignore the pesky dinner-time phone calls, or take the shiny mail flyers directly to the recycling bin.  The reality is double-barreled here = these are expensive tactics, and they don’t work like they used to.

Technology has turned much of this upside-down.  In the last couple of years, the stars have aligned and the technology, the tools, and the public’s use of them have converged at the point where Inbound Marketing is practical, economical and mainstream.

Hubspot CEO Brian Halligan applauds Inbound marketing because it maximizes results while it minimizes the impact on your budget.  The reality has been to level the marketing playing field; now if you have the skills to communicate with your customers – your content will count more than a giant advertising budget.

In 2006, a man in a New Jersey liquor store started talking to people about wine, online, using video.  Legendary now is the fact that it took him quite a while to get traction, but in two years Gary Vaynarchuk used his Wine Library TV to create a $50 million dollar/year business.  Was it work?  Of course.  Was he consistent?  You bet.  Did he deliver good content? Absolutely. 

Just think about it, though. What Gary did showed the world that using tools (good content, SEO, a flair for social media) which have become mainstream ……. the scale of your business can become unlimited.  What’s the ROI on that?

So, if Inbound marketing is sounding attractive to you, here’s a clue: tell the truth (give people good content that relates to what you do), give people a reason to self-select themselves and look for you, and invest in quality content so they keep coming back.

Think about someone you really, really, really liked in High School.  Which felt best: you chasing them….or them liking you?  That’s the key to Inbound marketing.  You may find it’s the start of a beautiful  relationship.  Enjoy!

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-05-09

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  • RT @MoniKanada: Interested in my 'Mother's Day Reflections' http://bit.ly/9A0h0G or my blog "In Honour of My Mom?" Happy Mother's Day!!! #
  • on the patio at the English Bay Boathouse with @mande2 @chillaschater and @Howard_Olsen – Life is good!! #
  • #EE @elizabethmcqueen @modworkingwoman @petequily @amuseconsulting @mainleyfungshui @LifestylePro #
  • #FF @monikanada @cybelenegris @ddougan @georgemoen @byzhubowen @livingFree CDN #
  • RT @MAinleyFengShui: Items that 'hold' things – vases, bowls, plates, trays – hold energy, and can stimulate the energy of wealth. #
  • preparing for first video shoot here at Strut Studios .. and it's in Japanese .. exciting!! #
  • Looking forward to the Courage to Come Back Awards Dinner tonight. We're in good company .. #
  • RT @MoniKanada: Join @LivingFreeCND free during May & use online coupons at great discounts to live a fun and healthy life style. Enjoy! #
  • I'm Attending the @hubspot webinar on Fri 5/7 @2:00pm ET – How to Use SEO and Social Search for Lead Generation: http://bit.ly/ba3Mqy #
  • looking forward to @Amuseconsulting 5th Anniversary Party .. have you bought your ticket yet? http://bit.ly/cKhelK #
  • RT @MAinleyFengShui: Facial structures = instinctive behaviour. What does your face say about you? http://bit.ly/ajQP55 #
  • RT @JohnChow: First Hotel to Offer iPads in Rooms Charges $3,000 a Night. Where do I book? LOL http://ow.ly/1H5A0 #
  • Apple Could Face Antitrust Inquiry Over Flash Ban [REPORT]http://bit.ly/b2bgJD Things are getting ugly #
  • "Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail." – Unknown #
  • talking biz with @amuseconsulting at the Buzz this AM .. have you signed up for his 5th Anniversary on VanTweetup: http://ning.it/9CWaKx #
  • RT @hlooman: Thousands of Guitarists Attempt Guitar Playing Record in Poland ~ ultra jam session :) http://bit.ly/aHm7tv #

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Book Club Pick – Marketing in the Age of Google

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Vanessa Fox’s well written book is a must-read for businesses. Why you need to keep up with trends in Marketing.

Amazon Product Description

“Search has changed everything. Search has become woven into our everyday lives, and permeates offline as well as online activities.

Every business should have a search strategy. How a business appears online can impact consumer influence as much as if not more than offline advertising like TV commercials. A business’s search strategy can have a dramatic impact on how consumers interact with that business.

But even more importantly, search engine activity provides amazingly useful data about customer behavior, needs, and motivations. Accessing search data is like conducting focus groups with millions of people for free. Search isn’t just for marketers and techies. It can provide valuable insight on business strategy and product strategy.

Companies of all sizes – from startups to global enterprise level corporations, and even businesses without web sites – can benefit from understanding how consumers are searching for them and talking about them online, both as a powerful acquisition channel and a vast repository of market research.

In this non-technical book forexecutives, business owners, marketers, and product managers, search engine strategy guru Vanessa Fox-who created Google’s portal for site owners, Googgle Webmaster Central -explains what every marketer or business owner needs to understand about how search rankings work, how to use search to better understand your customers and attract new ones, how to develop a comprehensive search strategy for your business, and how to build execution of this strategy into the businesses processes. This isn’t another book about paid search for advertisers. This book focuses on organic listings – the unpaid results that receive 86% of searcher clicks.”

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Have coffee with “Tall, Dark and Handsome”

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                                         j0406570 

 If you believe, as we do, that your brand is the sum of the conversations about you, then what do you say to get a conversation started?

Nicole, a Marketing Expert and Dating Coach we know, asked me recently about personal brands and how to craft an approach to your online presence. That started me thinking about a cheeky way to engage people, create interest and add a dash of humor to everyone’s day. In some circles, that answer might be to start a rumor…..and there’s nothing to say you can’t start a rumor about yourself. Heaven knows, lots of Hollywood starlets employ Press Agents to do little else. For the rest of us, however, a safer approach might be one that employs original humor. Here’s one idea to ponder.

Suppose you read a blog post from ‘Mary’ that began “I have a guilty pleasure to confess. I started my day with ‘Tall, Dark and Handsome’”. For one of Nicole’s single female clients, that might be an affirmation of hope or a true confession. Why share that information? How well do you know this gal? Do you care, and whom might you tell? These are all good questions. Did she want to get a conversation started, or was this an unintended share’?

Let’s suppose the post is from ‘Anne’ – she has a great partner, and he meets the criteria. No harm, no foul here – everyone who knows her will fill in the blanks, chuckle, maybe comment or send a Tweet. What happens, however, if no one who knows ‘Anne’ knows who Tall, Dark and Handsome might be? Is there more interest, now? Did this pique some curiosity? The answer to this identity question does reflect on branding, though not the way you might think.

The concept of a ‘tall, dark and handsome’ man is pretty well engrained in Western culture. Iconic leading men have built careers on those elements many times in the history of film. Tell the truth, now. When you read those words…whose face or name come to mind for you?

Here’s MY guilty little secret. See if it’s what you would have guessed. I do start my day with ‘Tall, Dark and Handsome’. He hails from Lansing, Michigan, courtesy of a company that distributes coffee – Joe Coffee, to be exact. They are an employee-owned company with a charity sponsorship program and some great coffee blend names like ‘High Test’ and…..yes….my friend ‘Tall, Dark and Handsome’. I bought my first pound for the name on the label, but it’s actually good coffee, and I just can’t pass up the mileage from the name. Their creative brand could enhance my social proof….or start a great rumor. If my brand is the sum of the conversations about me….where do we go from here?

What brand ARE you? Are you listening?

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According to marketing leaders BrandLogic, brands “act as a point of coalescence for needs, aspirations, ambitions, and self-realization; they can have an emotional effect like no other asset in an institution’s portfolio.”

Graphic designer Teak Sato tells us “your brand is NOT your logo”, and Vancouver Marketer Darren Barefoot once wrote a post about brands referencing possible song lyrics as tattoos – a very branding experience, to say the least.

OK, so I’m confused. The good folks at BrandLogic are experts at what they do, but I don’t understand what their prose really means to me, personally. Darren’s perspective was entertaining, and took me on a philosophical tour of the brands I recognize or own, but I have no plans to get a tattoo. Teak’s talented and his comment makes sense to me, but tells me what a brand is not.  I have some work to do.

The best definition of brand I know is one we quote at Duet Media. I don’t know the original source, but it relates to social media platforms and the online world very well. It goes like this: “Your brand is the sum of the conversations about you”.

So, what brand ARE you? What are the conversations that are going on about you? Where are they happening? Who is involved? How would you know? Why would you even care?

Those are all good questions. Today, if you write a blog, make a comment on a site, have an account on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn – there could be many conversations going on that include your name or ideas. That may be what you want. You did link all those sites together, didn’t you, so that could happen? After all, increased exposure IS part of your marketing plan!

However, if those conversations are going on without you, perhaps there are some other things you should know. For example, if someone pays you a compliment – you would want to acknowledge them for taking the time and extending the courtesy. If they ReTweet your comments on Twitter, you will want to check them out, follow them and maybe say ‘Thanks’ with a mention on Follow Friday yourself. If it’s your company they are talking about, your ‘Thank-you’ may include a coupon or other reward. That’s all well and good, but what if what they are saying is not? (good, that is).

If you are not paying attention, how would you know? Remember the viral video about United Airlines and the now-historical affair of the broken guitar? They handled that rather badly….but how long did it take for them to even know something was going on? During the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, our friend and Blenz Coffee Pres., George Moen, caught a comment on Twitter from a customer with a problem in one of their stores. The customer had a laptop, Blenz had free wireless…..but there was not a power outlet free, at that time, in that particular store. Seeing that he was just a few blocks away – and being an avid user of Social Media for his chain – George seized the opportunity and responded directly. He tweeted ‘help is on the way!’, unplugged a power cord from his own office, and ran three blocks to deliver it himself! The customer was delighted, and lots of great ‘conversations’ ensued.

Your brand is the sum of the conversations about you. Do you know what they are saying, today?

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Old Media is Dying – Start A Conversation

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Are you still marketing using old media and one way conversations? Do you have a static website that hasn’t been updated in over a year?What’s the ROI (return on investment) on your expensive Yellow Pages ad? Do you still read a Newspaper? Magazine? Even television is loosing share.

Your clients and colleagues have moved on.

  • Call it web 2.0, social marketing, social networking, folks using the internet expect a conversation. Respond to folks you take the time to comment on your blog.
  • Linkedin has made some significant changes in the past year – update your profile and join in conversations in groups. Don’t be shy to give recommendations to all those amazing folks who help you.
  • Take the time to share information and articles on twitter. Retweet messages that will be of interest to your followers.

What are you doing to start a conversation online?

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Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-04-25

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  • Dr. Patricia Porter on The best and easiest way to help your child learn, guaranteed! http://shar.es/muxZ3 she’s the expert #
  • Calculated Presentations Entrepreneurs know that to meet potential clients and create interest about their service… http://bit.ly/b7SPxY #
  • Twitter Spam: "How to Use Twitter to Make You Money Like a Vending Machine:" :) :) Creative .. but #FAIL #
  • RT @JaniceTomich: Twit Cleaner is cleaning the junk from my tweetstream. Check it here: http://thetwitcleaner.com #
  • RT @georgemoen: Social Media Addiction…interesting research just out http://bit.ly/dCzdWFHow about they meet friends face-to-face??? #
  • with >50giga available on my C: drive, wonder why fragmented files are almost exclusively from iTunes .. it’s W7 .. wonder if I care .. #
  • RT @JohnChow: Tomorrow’s Dot Com Pho will be at Happy Pho at 4136 Main Street at 12:30. @mande2 and I will be there #
  • chatting Chaces casino at #XPO2010 in Squamish .. they are having a party on the 1st of May .. #
  • #XPO2010 Squamish Chamber Twitter Challenge launch – follow @squamishchamber and say ‘Hi’! GOAL= 500 new followers! #
  • off to XPO2010 in Squamish today – if you’re in the area come by and check out the new CN Roundhouse Convention Centre http://bit.ly/bbS2zX #
  • #FF @MoniKanada @CathyBrowne @DunbarDogWalker @John_C_Davies @leoraw @alison99 @ddougan @thejemgallery @OutSmarts @iglooqueen @hlooman #
  • #FF @JaniceTomich @nancyhamilton @Amuseconsulting @georgemoen @cybelenegris @mande2 @CraigAddy @ByzHubOwen @ProWorksPaint @joshrimer #
  • we had a great day at XPO2010 today .. looks like we’ll have a full hour tomorrow .. http://bit.ly/ah5cMg #
  • At Squamish Chamber Xpo2010, in the new CN Roundhouse. @squamishchamber twitter challenge rocks! #
  • @DunbarDogWalker we’ve drained the batteries in the Wii setup to sporlight the Squamish Chamber golf tourney .. oops :) :) in reply to DunbarDogWalker #
  • at #XPO2010 in Squamish .. we have a Wii in our booth .. no work for the rest of the day:):) #
  • not only did I check Google maps for driving directions, I turned on the street view so I can identify the intersections #NOGPS #
  • @John_C_Davies Car co-op is good for periodic use and way cheaper and greener than owning a vehicle – check for vehicles in your area first in reply to John_C_Davies #
  • It’s Earth Day and @mande2 and I (both car-free) need a car all day .. it’s from the Car Co-op and a hybrid. Ironic #
  • talking Social Media Strategy with @georgemoen at Mi Terruno Wine Tasting event earlier @GeorgeLounge – guy’s mind is diabolical :) :) #
  • @VancityBuzz love the chili chocolate pudding dessert at Burgoo ..not so thrilled the Main St cafe raised rates for Olympics #FAIL in reply to VancityBuzz #
  • Looking forward to meeting Gabriel Baigorria, owner of Mi Terruno winery in Mendoza, Argentina at @george .. he’s @ Wine Festival tomorrow #
  • Pandora Partners with Facebook for Social Music http://bit.ly/dqnlNY.. used to use Pandora all the time .. time to go check it out again .. #
  • RT @howardolsen: keynoting in Saskatoon on Thurs just secured a spot on John Gormley’s Radio Show at 10AM . I’m Stoked! http://bit.ly/bf2Pom #
  • think this means I’m a major geek .. Google Wave has added formats to waves .. meeting, brainstorm, discussion, task tracking (my fave) #
  • RT @webnames: Cybele looking snappy with her Influential Women in Business award. Congrats Cybele! http://twitpic.com/1h53rs congrats! #
  • @DennisPang staff at the Flying Beaver in Richmond are also sporting playoff stubble .. in reply to DennisPang #
  • working on my XPO2010 presi with @janicetomich this AM … Janice is a genius presentation coach!! #
  • excited to be working with @janicetomich on my presi at the end of the week .. she’s the best!!! #
  • 4 Ways to Make Your Cororate Website More Social http://bit.ly/b3PjxO Not so sure even these tips will help some corporate sites #
  • Ford’s SYNC AppLink Brings Android and BlackBerry Apps to You.http://bit.ly/aqQjIT handsfree? shouldn’t you be concentrating on driving? #
  • RT @LesleyChang: More photos of Iceland’s Eyjafjallajokull volcano: http://bit.ly/clYZKi #wow #MountDhoom amazing collection of photos #
  • RT @DanielleVPP: Just posted a new video for a client of mine: http://bit.ly/cI1iqH nice job Danielle .. and hulagirldesigns has a .tel!! #
  • RT @LifestylePro: 4 Keys to Selling In a Buyer’s Market . These tips will get you started. http://bit.ly/9H8qfh useful tips #
  • business meeting at the Flying Beaver this afternoon .. having a before the long drive back Vancouver .. #
  • RT @JaniceTomich: How to conduct at blog interview: @leoraw — http://ow.ly/1AkTy lots of good tips! #
  • Great Article! 9 Critical Tasks Before Launching Your Small Business Blog http://bit.ly/dC7lnk Are you doing them all before a blog launch? #

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