easy marketing strategies

Do you have a 'Post-Event Marketing Strategy'?

A Post Event Marketing Strategy is what you do after you had a live event and you want to continue building the relationship with your event attendees.

Here are four easy ways to keep the conversation going after your event.

**Note** Most email marketing software will allow you to prepare mailings prior to the event.  This way while you're relaxing and restoring, work is automatically being done for you!

1. During the Event: Announce to the the participants that they can take advantage of a special offer  or discount because they took the time to be at your event.  (Give an expiration date of the special offer that goes two weeks after the event.)
2. 24hrs post-event: Send an email, thanking the participants for their time...(always say thank you!) and remind them of their special offer and include the link to the website to learn more and make a purchase.
3. Two weeks post-event: Schedule a free tele-seminar, taking one or two of your topics a bit further into detail and promote the special offer again and how it will support your customer's needs.
4. Monthly: Keep in touch through a regular scheduled newsletter sharing valuable information and updates on specials and product offerings.

Single Column Newsletters - Tested and Proven

Single column newsletters are getting higher results from readers.

Why? Our list is made up of very busy individuals, inundated with emails and offers each day. They want to receive clear, linear, scannable pieces of information.

Our readership is mobile. Most individuals are grabbing their email from a hand held device. Be sure that your mailing is readable from a Blackberry as well as a laptop.

Bold the important words or phrases. If your list likes what you have to say on a topic, they will go back and read the finer details.

Test a single column template for your email newsletters for three months and see your statistics improve.

As always, know your list's needs. Deliver information that is helpful with compelling offers.

Improving your website traffic.

There are two objectives of a website, 1) get visitors to give you their contact information or 2) get visitors to purchase something.

If you would like someone to give you their email, then you have to offer them a gift or information in exchange. (Make a compelling offer to get an email on your list). If you want them to purchase a service or product, then make sure they understand you can solve their problem.

If your visitors are not completing one of these two actions, then the strategy of your website needs to changed.

There is plenty of material on the web to walk you through optimizing your website for the search engines and traffic, but to simplify the quest, ask yourself one question. Is your website clear? 

Track the statistic reports for your newsletter, blog and website. Understand the activty that is happening (or not happening). If you don't understand your statistics, give me a call, I can help you.

Ask yourself, is your website clear? Would someone who visits your website, understand what you do and which ACTION you want them to take?

Is Facebook a waste of your time?

Struggling with the amount of time it takes to build relationships in the online social networks? Prepared to send 800 tweets before you can encourage one follower to visit your website and sign up for your newsletter? Tired of the deluge of useless status updates making them ready to un-follow many on their list?

Is it all worth it?

With the millions of people searching LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook, for information, why shouldn’t your business be present in these online networks? And in most cases, your out-of-pocket-expense is zero.

The challenge is to know what to talk about in the networks.

Here’s some quick tips to avoid the feeling that you are wasting your time with your status updates: 

1. Develop a social networking style that supports your personality and aligns well with your business brand and service offerings. Know which networks are best for finding your ideal clients. Where are your clients hanging out? Spend more time building relationships in those networks.

2. Know what to share to improve the quality of your exchanges. 

3. Here is a helpful guideline to know what to share and how much:

        • 30 %: Tips that help make people's lives better
        • 10 %: Information that keeps them informed
        • 30 %: Anything that makes people laugh
(according to the source: http://www.Fark.com is a great site for humorous content)
        • 25%: Compliments and praise
        • 5 %: What you're doing

Source: Perry Belcher

Got a boring newslettter?

 

 

If putting your newsletter together has become your least enjoyable marketing task ...then rest assured your readers are having difficulty too.

How to freshen your copy? I picked up an easy tip from Constant Contact, the fast growing email marketing service, who offers the 2-2-2 Principle.

The summary is, your reader takes 2 seconds to decide if they want to read an email. The first two words in your subject line, are the most important . Ask yourself, of all the information you are sharing, which matters today?

The article offered clear examples and reminds us to see the newsletter from your reader's perspectives. Also note, that you don't need to make ALL your email messages urgent. Be wary of the 'Spam Filter No- No's',  such as using all caps in the subject line or excessive punctuation.

If you aren't using an email service, be alert to how your business emails are appearing.Will your subject line encourage someone to read NOW or hold for later? ('later' usually results in a direct swoosh, into the recycling bin.)

Read the full article  here.

ROI

The rate in which we will receive a return on an investment, is an obvious concern these days. Market conditions beg us to consider every campaign effort and spending decision. At new levels, consumers are pressured to cut back and slow spending. Most times, ROI's are not recognizable dollars.

To allow room for hope in an unusual, unfamiliar economic condition, look at your return to be a way to leverage growth, increase efficiency or maintain customer trust.

How can this be done easily?

Look to establish relationships with businesses outside your industry but who share the same market.

One Case Study: A travel agency builds upon an existing relationship with a local flower farm. Together they design special programs that will be attractive to their markets. They will explore co-marketing each other's services to circumvent having to take on the load of a new campaign alone. This relationship offers each business a chance to explore markets not yet established.

Together they make it easy for their customers to travel to unique locations to explore innovative garden designs that they can bring back to their homes.

ROI: Maintaining customer trust, growth and efficiency.

 

Signage: No Humor

Signage: Using humor

 

 

 

Read this with a sweet Savannah, Georgia accent.

You get the point? And maybe a laugh too?

Review the Audio

Have a webcast coming up? Tele-conference?

Next time you have an interview or hosting a tele-conference...hit the record button.

Have someone from your marketing department listen to the recording and take notes. Why? Your talk could hold nuggets of wisdom that can be woven into your next email campaign, blog post or article.  Repurpose the presentation to support other marketing campaigns. (saving $$ and time)

Use the recordings as tools to evaluate your presentation. Ask someone you trust to quantify your delivery so you can sharpen your next tele-conference. (constructive feedback = priceless)

And if you capture a good audio, share an excerpt (not the whole thing....zzzzz) of the recording on your website.

Blended and Retooled

What I learned on a rainy day with the NYTimes.

Murketing, a new coined phrase by Rob Walker .

It's how companies market to the generation that is impervious to  'in your face' advertising. A way to appeal to the non-mainstream, anit-capitalist consumer. Advertising without looking like your not.

Using my finance head...to have the ability to 'murk' one most definetly have funds in a marketing and advertising cost center.  The consumer that buys a product from a company because they appear to be a non-confomist...is actually buying into the company's marketing plan.

I like to learn from the retooled, blended vocabulary that pops up now and again. It's like when I heard mompreneur, for the first time.

In my mind, if you listen more to your clients.... you are murketing. Then you can apply what you learn to your marketing strategies.

What is murking around in your markets? Is it time to retool your service or blend something new into your product offering?