Moving forward with communication tactics without a good understanding of the target audience, their current attitudes and beliefs, and the drivers that might lead them to positive action relative to your product or service is never a good idea.
On the other hand, many companies—particularly small companies—don’t have the time or resources to invest in expensive research activities.
It’s a conundrum—but one that can be addressed Read the rest of this entry »
On July 17 I got the daily Wordle word in just one try.
I did what I always do in the morning after waking up. I immediately grabbed my phone to check messages (like real people are emailing and texting me during the night; no, my messages are primarily ads and spam but I compulsively check every day anyway). I drank my first cup of coffee for the day. I read the daily paper (yeah, I still read a hard copy local morning paper even though about 99% of everything else I read is digital). I caught up on Words With Friends—and then I played Wordle.
Every morning when it’s time for Wordle I launch the app and then I just stare at the 30 boxes on the screen for a few seconds until a five-letter word “comes” to me. Read the rest of this entry »
If you’re not on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook or other social media sites —and believe it or not, many, many people are not!—you may be missing out on some very important conversations. Some of these conversations may be about you!
In working with a client recently, we did some quick online research and they were shocked Read the rest of this entry »
Throughout my career I’ve been involved in numerous naming and branding initiatives and am always struck by not only the intrinsic challenges of getting a group of people to agree on a particular name/brand for a company, product or service— but also by the enormous amount of angst and emotion that becomes part of the process.
In truth, the process of coming up with a name—whether for a company, a product, a campaign, a department, or whatever is a process Read the rest of this entry »
What is an article about your company in the Wall St. Journal worth? How about in Nursing—or your local newspaper? Is the Wall St. Journal worth more?
Well – as in many things in life the answer is Read the rest of this entry »
I gave a presentation on employee communications recently to a group of about 80 HR people representing about 60 different organizations. I asked the group, through a show of hands, to indicate how many had an internal communication plan. None. Wow. Conversely, a majority of the group had Read the rest of this entry »
Sometimes it can be the smallest of things that leads to a lost opportunity from a marketing or sales perspective. Small things that can, I think, be easily corrected.
I had a personal example of this recently while working on a proposal for a branding project. I needed to gather some price information for some elements of the project. In two cases, I contacted two different individuals, asking for some estimates. In each of these cases, one of the people got back to me right away—the other, not at all. Read the rest of this entry »
“Fast follower” is a term used in marketing circles to refer to a company that moves quickly to do what its competitors are doing, or to do what one specific, extremely innovative competitor is doing. But I’ve never really liked the idea of
You’ve no doubt heard the definition of insanity: “Doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting different results.”
It’s a common malady in the business world, and particularly evident these days during tough times. Companies know that the results they’re getting aren’t what they’d like to see and are not likely sustainable, yet they don’t quite know what to do about it. So they keep doing what they’ve always done in tough times – they Read the rest of this entry »
Identifying the key benefits that answer the question of WIIFM (“What’s in it for me?”) for your customers and prospects, the first step in writing compelling copy. The second is positioning what you have to offer relative to what your competition has to offer.
In considering your competition you need to Read the rest of this entry »
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