No I'm not abandoning this blog (to all you faithful anonymous viewers).There's been a lot of crazy stuff happening on parliament hill, and I promise you a detailed analysis on the political marketing issues and what this means for our country, and why you the voter, should care.
A week is truly a lifetime in politics, and it's hard (even for a political junkie like myself) to keep up.
More to come...
This is just another nail in the traditional marketing coffin:
"It looks like 2008 will be the first year in 48 years that TV-station
advertising will decline in a presidential election and Olympic year.."-Michael Nathanson, media analyst, Sanford Bernstein
If your still using traditional ads, whether they be on TV, Radio, or Print, you seriously need to revaluate your marketing strategy and what you really hope to accomplish.
We as marketers, are no longer in control. Cue the new marketing.
2. Tell a remarkable story
3. Treat People Differently
4. Test and Measure
Still need help? Give me a shout (top left) and I can steer you in the right direction.
Contrary to popular belief marketing is not all about the sellers side. Consumer empowmerment is just as important - marketing yourself as one who can't (won't) be taken advantaged of:
1. “What’s your name?” Without a doubt, the single most important thing you can ask in any customer-service conversation is that simple question. Using the agent’s name during the call also keeps things friendly and reminds him that you know who he is. (He knows that he can’t put you on permanent hold or hang up without repercussions.) The more information you can get about the person—his call center, years of service, hobbies—the better. Of course, make sure you write it all down in case you need it later.
2. “Be calm.” This is something you say to yourself. No matter how frustrated you are or how badly you’ve been treated, you must keep your cool. If you don’t, you’ll give the company you’re dealing with reason to dismiss you without taking care of you. When you feel like shouting, start talking softly. The harder someone has to listen, the more likely he is to hear what you have to say. Sometimes the most compelling words are those said most casually. Just remember Anthony Hopkins’ smiling recollection about “fava beans and Chianti” in the movie Silence of the Lambs. Was anything ever so ominous?
3. “We…” You’re more likely to get what you’re asking for if you enlist the agent in your cause. Statements such as, “I know we can find a satisfactory solution,” dilute the adversarial nature of the conversation. The feeling of teamwork you impart creates a framework in which you and the agent are working together to solve a common problem.
4. “My goal is…” Be specific and realistic about what you’re seeking. You should ask for your money’s worth—a product that works as advertised or a service to the standard you paid for. Asking compensation for your time, punitive damages, or letters of apology are not realistic demands. State your need clearly. “If you can ship me a replacement within a couple of days, I’ll be satisfied.” The more you help the agent see her way to making you happy and getting you off the line, the closer you will be to achieving your goal.
5. “I’m not going away.” This isn’t a threat; it’s a promise that you aren’t going to give up easily. Customer service agents toss out phrases such as “it’s our policy” and “there’s nothing I can do” in hopes that you will accept their version of reality and go away. When you don’t hang up the phone, they are forced to continue dealing with you.
6.“Escalate.” This is customer service speak for “take me to your leader.” Using professional jargon indicates that you are a knowledgeable consumer. Telling the agent that if she can’t help you, you’d like her to “escalate the call,” is equivalent to asking to speak to a supervisor. Agents get dinged for every call they have to bump upstairs. So let her know that’s your intention while giving her one last time to give you what you’re asking for.
7. “Thank you.” While it’s sometimes difficult to remember that the agent is a human, too, and not just a cog in a corporate machine, you will enhance your position if you express your gratitude for her efforts. This positive reinforcement doesn’t mean that you are giving anything up or taking less than you deserve. It does make you stand out as a good guy in the endless chain of complaining customers that the agent deals with as the regular part of her job. Simply put, people are more likely to help those who are nice to them.
The common element here: The more you appear to be a reasonable person willing to accept a reasonable solution, the better your chances will be at getting what you’re asking for. Remember, you’re coming from a position of strength—you are in the right, and you’re only asking for what you deserve.
It's no coincidence that the human body has two ears and one mouth. To be really good at marketing, persuading, or selling you must find ot how to use these natural listening devices in proportion: Listening twice as much as you talk.
1. Listen to someone selling to others, or trying to sell to you.
Pay attention to what his words are doing. While you're listening, ask yourself these questions:
2. Record yourself with a customer (ask for permission first)
You may be shocked at how much chatter you cut out (I know I was). To detect what you need to cut, consider the following:
As you discover more about listening well, the phrase "putting your foot in your mouth" will gain a totally new meaning. After all, you can't put your foot in your mouth if it's closed. So close it, and listen more!
One of the most important steps in the selling cycle (which goes hand in hand with marketing), is listening and responding to your prospect's/customer's concerns.1. Hear your customer/prospect out.
Don't be quick to address every phrase your prospect utters. Give her time: encourage them to tell you the whole story behind her concern. If you don't get the whole story, you won't know what to do or say to change their mind.
2. Feed the objection back
By rephrasing your customer's concern, you are in effect asking for more information. You want to be sure that they have aired all of their concerns, so no other objections come up after this one (this is often one of the most overlooked problems when people deal with assumptive closes!)
3. Question the objection.
Subtlety and tact come into play here. Be sure to find out what feeling is behind each objection and reassure our prospect that you product/service is right for them.
4. Answer the objection
When you're sure you have the whole story behind her concern, you can answer that objection with confidence (leadership matters!)
5. Confirm the answer.
"Does that answer your question Jenn?" Not completing this step will often make your customer raise that objection again.
6. Change gears with "By the way..."
These three words are some of the most useful words for persuading, or showing a person your side of the story. Use these words to change gears - to move on to the next topic. Blathering on, will not help you stay focused on solving you target audiences needs or make your presentation purposeful.
1. Scope Out the DamagePublic relations strategy doesn't have to expensive, but it can be if you don't invest enough time on a consistent basis, to check whats being said about you.
First, determine what damaging information exists. Enter your name at Google, MSN and Yahoo and see what turns up in the first four or five pages of results. Anything troubling? Mark it for action. Then sign up for the alerts available at spots like Google Alerts; when information about you is added or updated, you’ll find out via email.
2. Request Removal
You may be able to have the material removed, but remember that much of what appears online is archived at the Internet Archive, a nonprofit initiative designed to be a resource for historians and researchers.
Just be sure to learn as much as possible about the site before making your move. If you’re dealing with an in-your-face blog, sending an email to the blogger requesting that something about you be removed can backfire. Bloggers have been known to post those emails, so be aware that your request could end up casting more unfavorable attention on you.
As for search engines, don’t bother. You won’t have any luck asking them to rig their results in your favor.
3. Hire a Cleanup Service
A growing number of services can help you manage or clean up your online reputation. Along with ReputationDefender, these services include Defendmyname and Naymz. ReputationDefender’s reports, for instance, include a “destroy” option; choose that, and for $29.95, ReputationDefender will attempt to have a particular item about you removed. “We aim to save our clients time,” Chanin says. “We can do in two or three hours what it might take you from 72 to 96 hours [to do].”
But managing your reputation doesn’t always come cheap. ReputationDefender offers another level of service for $10,000. Under this plan, the company uses a variety of tactics to improve your online rep and ensure that the positive material about you rises to the top of search-engine results.
Find an ad that really appeals to you and then present your findings to the class, using the arcane categories provided (I won't list them for your sake).
When marketers were in control of the message, and people's attention was plentiful, all this minor stuff matters. But in an attention deficit world attempting to discern consumer behaviour techniques from traditional advertising is a complete waste of time.
We've all heard countless ways of attracting, and retaining our customers, but has anyone thought of spelling out the ways to kill your business?1. When you have a great product that’s selling well - look for ways to make it cheaper – your customers won’t really be able to tell the difference.
11. Use focus groups – don’t engage in real conversations with customers.
18. Don’t empower your customer service people to make wise decisions that make customers happy.
47. Make sure everyone in your company understands that people are loyal to products and brands, NOT other people.
48. When marketing – shoot for the masses – you know – the biggest audience – like the Super Bowl.
71. Only hire big “well-known” consulting firms to help you. After all, they’re the only people who know anything.
86. Punish those who challenge the status quo of your organization
101. Always charge for ice. If a customer refuses to pay for ice with his/her tea – give them hot tea without ice. How dare they try to pull one over on you!
I would love to know what sick bastard at Kellogg's came up with this genius idea. I just spent the first three years of my sons life trying to get him not to eat blocks, and now you're telling him they taste like f***ing strawberries. Thanks a lot a**holes. Seriously, how in the hell did this ever get past their legal department. You can't tell me that this isn't a lawsuit just waiting to happen. I can only assume that their next product is fruit flavored thumbtacks.
Getting a sale at any cost was traditional marketing. Creating customer value and satisfaction is at the very heart of modern marketing. Creating this value while dealing with a noisy and cluttered marketplace is what new marketing is all about.
It's often been said people don't have enough time and they need more space.
But it's really about a time & space continuum that forces us (or not) to pay attention:
Sure they may be 9 million plus people on facebook but how many of them are identified with any political party? Or even care to hear about traditional ideas from traditional political parties? Judging by the numbers (and my own network) very few.Canadian politicos are fascinated by the campaign's use of social networking.
“There's eight million Canadian accounts … on Facebook,” says Nammi Poorooshasb, federal New Democrat director of communications.
“We've been looking at ways to mobilize these people in those communities.”
WHAT'S IN? WHAT'S OUT?
One-to-one marketing "Dear customer" letters
Permission marketing Spam in your e-mail
or regular mailbox
High quality, creative papers Boring, impersonal or
with a handmade, hand-touched mass-produced looking
look direct-mail pieces
Community involvement Thinking your cheque
beyond your cheque-book. is enough.
Personalized, anticipated, "Take a number..."
relevant service
Long-term branding Short-term product movement
Customer retention Customer churn and burn
Marketing to consumers who Focusing all your marketing
care about your product; efforts on the mass consumer.
who can easily spread your People that hardly care about
message to others you; who are only with you
because of price.
and decreasing brand loyalty,
“Given Crispin's track record, it's tough to argue with the choice of agency – unless, of course, you don't think Microsoft's problem is one an ad agency can solve.”This is EXACTLY the problem with Microsoft and companies that think throwing a little (a lot?) of dough to solve a communications problem, is all that's really needed.
Microsoft needs to keep focused on improving products. The biggest factor in Apple's success in the past few years has been its ability to get people into its stores with products like the iPod and then entice them to buy computers and more
Well we all know how not to do public relations thanks to Greyhound. Here's a great example of Maple Leaf Foods handling a public health nightmare properly.
Yup those are wants. Sometimes we have a hard time distinguishing between what we actually need vs. what we actually want. You can thank marketers for this.
1. Pricing Your Products to Cover Full Costs will Make you ProfitableThis idea works on the notion that people make thier consumer decisions in a vacuum of knowledge. Nothing can be further from the truth than with the proliferation of the internet and water cooler conversations. You should instead determine your target customer's perceived value of each offering. After all it's the market that ultimately determines if your price is worth or not. One should determine if you are selling commodity (average) or extra-ordinary (niche) products. This will determine your volume distribution, and whether you will be focusiong on the "who" or the "how many"
2. Pricing to Grow Market Share will Make you Profitable
Market share is determined by the value of your offering and subsequent message. Mass marketers often get caught in this trap, trying to sell thier products to everbody. Finding a specific share of the market that you can profitaby serve, is much more effective in the long term. Yes this involves a bit of business planning - but don't let that scare you. Writing things down can be a great motivator to actually accomplishing your goals.
3. Pricing Your Products to Meet Demand Will Make you Profitable
There are plenty of busineses willing to compete on the lowest common denominator and go bankrupt in the process. Resist the urge to join them in their russian roulette pursuits. Instead of competing on price, try to find ways to add value to your product to justify your price. Dynamic pricing (think multiple pricing tiers) can help give your customer different levels of opportunity cost of doing business with you.
Despite what many Economists think, price is not overriding factor to purchasing behaviour compared to quality and other benefits. People care more about the pre/post sales support, delivery (on time), shipping, and what emotional bonuses you're willing to put into the relationship.
In short, instead of cutting prices, add value, and do it at every stage of the relationship. Don't wait for your audience to complain or react. Be the proactive leader, and champion your cause. Doing the right things is far more important than doing things right - especially with with early adopters/innovators.
Start with that, and your customers may end up marrying you!
Police cruisers are also getting a new look. Traditionally, cruisers have been plain white with red and blue stripes. The new cruisers are two-toned in blue and white -- something (Chief) Thomlison said will make them more visible.
If you thought the Greyhound tradegy was vile, just consider the marketing strategy PETA was going to leverage, off the death of Tim Mclean.
Yes, emotional and controversial ads breed attention and discussion. However, you have to ask yourself if this is the attention you wish to convey? At what point does your consdcience and ethical side kick in and realize you are in essence profitting off someone else's tradegy?
PETA has clearly demonstrated their extreme poor taste in marketing, and lack of sensitivity for tragic deaths. This is why when one markets, you have to approach marketing as if your mother or father is watching. You must look at ALL side effects of your message and heavily consider current events.
In the online era, everyone can become a critic (or supporter) of your brand. Past loyalts is no longer a given for continued loyalty, and I think that PETA will lose much loyalty from current and future supporters.
Don't make the same mistake.
I apologize for the lack of sticker shock, but sometimes brevity in marketing is all that is needed.Under Promise and Over Deliver!
Beef sandwiches were a hot commodity in the second quarter, and Tim Hortons got in on the action with its Slow Roast Beef offering.
It faced fresh competition, as McDonald's Canada launched its Angus Burger and A&W introduced its Sirloin Burger for a limited run. (All carried the same $4.99 price tag.) The A&W offering was popular - and led to a quarterly same-stores-sale increase of 9.1 per cent. Tim Hortons' sandwich, however, didn't last very long, despite heavy marketing
Now do you think introducing more sandwiches to the menu is going to boast sales when your real specialty is coffee and doughnuts?
How bout throwing endless marketing dollars to interrupt people, screaming pay attention!?
Line extension can work for some brands, however it doesn't work for most. This is why playing to your core strengths is so important. And why A&W has succeed with the Sirloin burger, after all they are in the beef business and that's what their target audience is looking for.
Do you think Tim's existing audience really thinks about sandwiches, let alone beef sandwiches when they have their caffeine/sugar fix? Not to mention the sandwich is way over priced ($5) for such a small portion. This isn't fine dining folks, portions = value.
When you attempt to promote a premium product when you are a value based chain, and then believe heavy marketing is all you need to be successful - you've got a serious problem.
Would looks matter? Would brands matter? Would you feel compelled to go buy the most fashionable clothes to look good, even though you can't see what you look like?
I don't envy Greyhound Canada's position they are in
Posts
All Comments
