Marketing Migration

Rather than trying to keep up with two blogs, I have migrated all posts over to The Marketing Spot. Please check it out for small business marketing advice here: The Marketing Spot blog.

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Form a Strategic Partnership

Lindsay Polson of the stuff4business blog has a great idea, team up with another business and form a strategic alliance. To see his idea, click here.

In Lindsay's example, one business hands out appreciation coupons for a free coffee at a nearby coffee house. The business handing out the coupons pays for the printing of the coupon, the coffee house pays for the coffee. Both businesses create good will with the customer.

But it doesn't have to stop there. You can form strategic alliances to save money on advertising. For example, team up with a nearby business and purchase a billboard together. One of you takes the left side, the other takes the right side. This works well if you use the board for giving directions and both business are near each other.

There are almost limitless ideas on how to maximize marketing partnerships. Hey, who says you can't share websites?

If you have another idea, feel free to share.

For small business marketing advice and lessons, see our other blog: The Marketing Spot

Our company website is www.themarketingspot.com

Seed Your Existing Customers' Next Purchase

Businesses are often caught up into trying to get new customers to spend new money with them. But don't forget your existing customers. Show them a little love and prevent them from becoming someone else's new customers.

Here's an idea to reward them, and nudge them along to their next purchase. Give them a seed. Not a literal plant seed, but a figurative one. A free small item that will be appreciated by the customer, yet at the same time cause them to want to buy more from you.

For example, if you have a tree trimming service, give all your good customers a small seedling to plant in their yard or give to someone else in their neighborhood. Along with the seedling, remind your customers to schedule a trimming before the busy seasons starts.

If you are an accountant or you have book keeping service, send desk calendars to your clients with the important tax days marked. Also, on each important tax day, promote an additional service you offer that the customer could use.

How else could you see your customers? Think about and watch your existing customers grow.

For marketing advice and lessons, see our other blog: The Marketing Spot
For more about our company, see our website: http://www.themarketingspot.com/

Advertising a Seminar

Case Study: The Research Coaches, Chicago
Challenge: Increase attendance at upcoming live seminars in October
Idea Wanted: Creative, hopefully free, ways to advertise the event.

The Background: A successful research firm has branched off into a research coaching firm and is holding two live seminars in October. Most of the budget has been used for the venue and an email campaign of 25,000 emails being sent to businesses in the Chicago area.

The seminars are titled: "Know Your Customer" and presented by Ed Erickson, owner of the company. Attendees will learn segmentation, how to identify their customers, and what their customers want. The promotional material promises that the seminar "...will provide you with no-nonsense practical tools to better understand and serve customers," and that you can take what you learn in the morning "...to increase sales and profits by the end of the day."

The targets for the campaign are:

• Small to mid-sized business owners, managers, marketers
• Entrepreneurs planning to start a new business
• Consultants who serve the small business community

Advice: After reviewing some promotional materials for the seminar, we felt that publicity was not the only thing needed to attract attendees to the seminar. We felt the four page promotional brochure needed to be condensed and needed to have more impact.

With little or no budget left to advertise the seminar, what we are really talking about here is public relations: getting free publicity. The way to get free publicity is to offer something of value to get the free publicity you want. Distribute a press release with some valuable information to small businesses.

Our Ideas:
1. Distribute a press release to all area media outlets and local publications. This press release will feature "How to leverage sales data into new customers" or valuable information such as a "Top five questions to answer about your customers." At the end of the press release, promote the Research Coaches website and upcoming seminar. Without valuable information, a press release is unlikely to get publicity. Use this press release generator tool to format your press release.

2. Distribute the press release through free internet press release sites. Here is a list of free sites. Media outlets often search the internet for story ideas and articles. In addition, Chicago is a huge metropolitan area and business owners that might be interested in this seminar would have a propensity to spend time on the internet searching for ideas.

3. Launch a new blog titled "Customer Mining" or a title that relates to a common theme from the seminar. Have daily or frequent entries to the blog demonstrating authority on the subject. Don't be afraid to give away some of the material from the seminar. With each blog entry, countdown to the next seminar and provide a registration link. You can also make reference to the blog in your press release. Blogs are free to create, but take time and effort to maintain.

4. Re-work the promotional material for the seminars. We didn't feel it had a compelling call to action or exciting visuals. One visual we brainstormed was to use an enormous sea of people with a few, select people glowing in the crowd. The caption is "Can you see your customer? Yes you can."

We also recommend making the titles of the sessions more dynamic, and even possibly renaming the seminar from "Know Your Customer" to "Find Your Customer"

The Lesson:
Free advertising is about getting publicity that you can't pay for. This means the information you offer has to be of value to the recipients. Don't just send press releases. Think of the value angle and turn your press release into a news story.

The other key component to your press release is your authority. Why do you deserve publicity on this subject? Anything you can do to increase your authority, increases the value of your press release. Are you president of a related organization? Have you been recognized for your expertise in this field? If you have a history (such as the blog we recommended) of being an authority on this subject, you are more likely to get some media play from your press release.

If you have any other suggestions, please comment below.

Want your free marketing idea? Fill out this form and submit.
For more small business marketing advice, see our other blog: The Marketing Spot
Our website is: http://www.themarketingspot.com/

More on Business Cards

Then of course, there is the contrarian approach to business cards, where you do none of what is described in our previous entry on business cards, yet you achieve greater impact.

Exhibit A: John Moore, Brand Autopsy









Know of any other great business cards? Send them to us.

Business Cards

Marketing Idea: Maximize the marketing potential of your business cards.

Here is some useful advice from Karen Saunders' blog about business cards.

1. Choose some cover stock with some meat (thickness).
2. Create a focal point to attract the reader's eye.
3. Have a strong, clear logo.
4. Don't include too much text, use white space for balance.
5. Use a highlight color sparingly, don't overdo it.
6. Make sure the color is appropriate for your business type.
7. Don't use more than two different fonts on your card.
Thanks Karen!

More Tips: Business cards are a great way to market your small business and an inexpensive way to gain a competitive advantage. Your business card says a lot about you to potential customers. It's the first message that communicates how you take care of your business.

8. Put your picture on the card, don't be a faceless company.
9. Use both sides of the card so you can say more about your business.
10. Print your mission on the card, or say something important about what you do.

Sounds like a lot to fit on a little business card, which is why you should use both sides of the card. This can get expensive if you are using a local printer, so consider using an online printer.

Two printers that offer reasonably priced, quality business cards are:
VistaPrint
48 Hour Print

With each of these you can upload your logo and picture and create a card. You can also use PhotoShop or another graphics program that allows you create a pdf file of your card to upload. You can get 500 quality business cards printed on both sides for under $60.

Now that's cheap marketing!

To get your free marketing idea, fill out this form and submit.
For small business marketing advice and musings, see our other blog: The Marketing Spot

To contact us, see our website: www.themarketingspot.com

Restaurant Experience

Case Study: Small restaurant in Central Texas
Challenge: Build a customer experience consistent with the brand.
Idea Wanted: Advice on building a customer experience that is consistent with the brand promise.

The Background: This restaurant first opened last year. It's brand promise is Fine Dining, Home Atmosphere. It has fewer than 20 tables, located in a downtown warehouse-type structure without much exterior decoration.

The menu has an Italian flare, but not exclusively. The interior decoration is somewhat homey, but inconsistent. All employees are dressed in matching black restaurant t-shirts and blue jeans. The food is served quickly and is very tasty.

Advice: Develop a theme based on the brand promise and then turn that theme into a customer experience consistent with the brand.

We divided the theme up into two categories based on the brand promise. First we discussed a theme that would match Fine Dining. Then we worked on a theme for Home Atmosphere using an Italian home as our model.

We then merged the two together for the following ideas to be implemented as soon as possible.

Our Ideas:
1. Checks are paid at the table in fine dining restaurants. Give servers the responsibily of processing payment. This removes the cash register from the front door and eliminates a bottleneck of customers coming in the restaurant trying to get around people paying their bill and trying to leave the restaurant. This scene did not have "fine dining" written on it.

2. Change the dress of the servers. The concensus on our team was "casual but nice." We generally did not approve of jeans and a t-shirt. Again, it just doesn't say fine dining. We suggest keeping the jeans but adding pressed white dress shirts, maybe even with black bowties.

3. Carry the experience outside the restaurant. As your customers enter the door, prep them to enter an experience that is something other than every day. Have some Italian music playing outside the front door. Our recommendation, budget permitting, is to re-paint the outside of the building with some more traditional Italian colors. But go easy and don't get cheesy Italian, say painting the Italian flag on the outside.

4. Presentation: Add tablecloths, cloth napkins, and painted dinnerware in a traditional Italian style.

5. During the meal: Social interaction is a big part of meals in an Italian home. The owner should be strolling through the dining room and socializing with the customers. He should have Italian toasts and expressions ready and use one at almost every table.

6. The servers: Be polite and attentive, yet friendly and sociable, just like in an Italian home. Servers should also be taught some Italian sayings that they are to use on cue. For example, after the order is taken, the server exclaims "perfetto!"

7. The decor: Texture the walls and add a glaze for a Tuscan feel. Add a hanging fresco here and there. Change the light fixures, no florescent tubes. Add a wine rack on the wall, change the floor to large tiles. Add some greenery.

8. Raise the prices of the meals. You cannot get fine dining for $4.99. Your customers don't believe that either. Raise the price of the meal and you raise the perceived value of it. Remember that your customers are paying one price for the food and another for the experience, add those two together for a higher price.

The Lesson: Think in themes. The easiest way to develop a consistent customer experience is to develop a theme based on what you want your customers to say about you when they leave. In this case study, the theme was easy because the brand promise was well developed: Fine Dining. Home Atmosphere.

If you are having trouble developing a theme, imagine how you want your customers to describe your establishment after they leave. Pretend you are the customer and you are about to describe your business. Use this simple sentence: Your business name is __________.

For example: Starbucks is ___________.

Now, what do you think. Are we off? On? Did we miss something?

For more small business marketing advice, see our other blog: The Marketing Spot
You can also see our website at http://www.themarketingspot.com/