Archive for September, 2017

If Your Content Isn’t Working in Concert, It Isn’t Working!

Thursday, September 28th, 2017

Business strategy organizational charts and graphs

Despite talk about multichannel and omnichannel marketing, the reality is that content creation and dissemination are often still siloed within organizations. That can lead not only to conflicting messages, but potentially negative brand impacts. Ideally, every consumer experience with an organization-regardless of how large it is-should be aligned and seamless. Messaging should be consistent in terms of content and quality. Clearly, that’s not an easy outcome to achieve, particularly between seemingly disparate parts of an organization (for instance, billing and HR). But what about between marketing and sales-two parts of most organizations that are outward-facing? Wouldn’t it seem logical to assume that their messaging would be aligned and consistent? (more…)

Marketing: It’s Not Just For Getting New Customers

Tuesday, September 19th, 2017

media relations, PR, Beloit College Mindset list

 

When businesses think about marketing, it’s typically and understandably in the context of attracting business. People who will pay you money. But marketing your business to potential employees — those you will pay money — can be just as important. And yet, so many employers overlook the importance of such marketing. As Wes Gay writes for Forbes, “Businesses are familiar with investing in consumer marketing, yet rarely consider investing in marketing for new employees. This is especially important for companies looking to recruit top millennial talent, as reaching the millennial generation can be challenging for older companies.”

 

With that in mind, we thought we’d provide some tips on how to market yourself to potential employees. The process is very much the same as any form of marketing. Here’s what you need to know. (more…)

Email Marketing Still Works: If Done Effectively

Tuesday, September 12th, 2017

mail marketing single large imageTracking the engagement of potential customers on a website has become second nature to most marketers. Even a relative novice to online marketing understands the fundamentals: time on page, conversions, shares, scroll depth, etc. But, it’s important for marketers to go beyond the basics.

One of the issues, or areas of misunderstanding, that we often come across is the lack of consideration of the pathway that a consumer will follow in the earlier practice of email marketing. There is a process that most follow as they engage with the email messages that crop up consistently in their inboxes on a daily basis (if, that is, those emails aren’t stopped at a firewall or relegated to a junk mail folder).

Here we take a look at that process:    (more…)

The Proof is in the Metrics: If You’re Using the Right Ones!

Thursday, September 7th, 2017

marketing analyticsToday, virtually every business has a webpage, sometimes multiple pages. Not to mention social media accounts. But, while getting your name and your brand online is a crucial first step for raising awareness and preference for what you have to offer, it’s just one piece of the marketing puzzle. To be truly effective, you need to develop a process and method of tracking how effective your online marketing actually is. (more…)

Taking a Long View of B2B Customer Relationship Management

Tuesday, September 5th, 2017

Customer relations is a crucial aspect of any business strategy. And for good reason. Amy Gallo of Harvard Business Review writes, “Depending on which study you believe, and what industry you’re in, acquiring a new customer is anywhere from five to 25 times more expensive than retaining an existing one.” The importance of customer relations is especially true in the B2B context. Typically, B2B companies are working with a smaller pool of customers than B2C companies, and each customer, therefore, makes up a larger share of revenue.

McDonald’s doesn’t want to lose customers, but it’s a lot less painful for McDonald’s to lose a customer than for Boeing to lose one. Similarly, many businesses serve both consumers and businesses. Consider a rental car or hotel company. They obviously have many individual consumer customers, but they also serve large organizations, such as corporations with staff who travel regularly.

So how do you maintain those crucial strong relationships with B2B customers? Here are some tips. (more…)