Dare to be DiFfErEnT

In this image ... what catches your attention?

Go to any of your branches. My bet is that if you walk 5-10 minutes in any direction, you're likely to find at least one other bank or credit union.

There are nearly 20,000 individual banks and credit unions in the US - most with multiple branches. When most all financial institutions offer free checking, debit card, retail loans and savings, how do you stand out to get consumers attention?

• Do something fun and unique at every transaction
• Package or bundle your "usual"products in a way that shows you understand the consumer's needs
• Train your staff to do something that truly helps the customer save money
• LISTEN to what the customer says, HEAR the needs, and consultive sell a product to help them
• Make your branch look more like a retail store than a bank
• Jazz up your website - focus on what a consumer would be looking for and less on your products
• Become known for something fun ... anything fun
• Write personal notes to customers
• Replace suckers with popsicles

Most of all, look at what your competitors do and do everything better.

This year more than any other, consumers have been switching banks. There is "Money in Motion" in your community. The zebra among horses will gain the market share.

Take are,

Eric

3 ways to measure your social media efforts

Many people have been using social media because they "think" it's what they should be doing. After all, it's all the rage. Everyone seems to have a Twitter or Facebook account. But social media may not be the right channel for some businesses. Even more disturbing, some businesses are putting all this time and effort into SMO because "everyone else is doing it" and they're not even measuring their efforts to see if all this work is really paying off.

It's not that they're lazy or sub par marketers, it's just that they may not have a direct response or PR background -- in other words, they're not familiar with how to measure ALL of their marketing efforts ... including social media.

Well, I'm here to shed light on this important topic.

Below is an article I wrote while I was VP of Marketing and Business Development at Early to Rise.

Check it out…Have a question about measuring social media or using social media for profits? Drop me an email!

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Measuring Social MediaBy Wendy Montes de Oca, MBA

If you’re an online marketer or publisher, chances are you’re well aware of the power of social media optimization (SMO). If you’re new to the world of Internet marketing, you’ll be interested to know that this breakthrough method is a truly inexpensive (practically free) way to create buzz about your products, increase traffic to your site, build trust about your company, and boost your sales.

Today, I’m going to show you a simple way to get started in social media marketing – and an easy three-step process you can use to measure how well it’s working.

In a nutshell, social media is an interactive platform where people can correspond – via chat rooms, forums, bulletin boards, networks (as in MySpace, Facebook, Classmates, LinkedIn, Bebo), user-generated content sharing (as in Digg, StumbleUpon, Reddit), wikis (interactive online encyclopedias), and blogs – with like minded individuals who share similar interests, whatever those interests may be.

Cutting-edge businesses and marketing-centric companies have jumped on the social media bandwagon to leverage the increased popularity of this phenomenon. Companies large and small got their marketers to create MySpace, FaceBook, or LinkedIn profiles in order to have their fingers on the pulse of the market, correspond with consumers, and create buzz about their products.

Here at ETR, we’ve been on the Web for some time now, dabbling in all sorts of social media activities with content syndication, viral marketing, and online PR efforts.

Recently, we started leveraging the presence of our individual team members on LinkedIn. If you’re not familiar with this site, it’s a network community for business professionals. Users can set up profiles highlighting their corporate experience and areas of expertise.

Edwin Huertas, one of ETR’s search engine marketing specialists, answers select questions on LinkedIn that are related to his area of expertise. He also uploads blog posts about a variety of search engine optimization (SEO), search engine marketing (SEM), pay-per-click (PPC), and social media practices. This helps create buzz about ETR (through Edwin’s profile and position at ETR). Plus, he sometimes supplements his posts with links back to relevant articles on our website – which helps drive traffic to the ETR site.

This is a practice you can emulate easily. Simply register as a member of one of the social media groups. Then begin to participate in the discussions. For instance, if a LinkedIn member posts a specific question about SEO, Edwin will try to find an article on our ETR site that addresses that issue. He then answers the question in his own words, but recommends that the member also read the ETR article, which has more valuable information. By answering questions posed by your fellow members (making sure you add relevant links back to content on your website), your posts will begin to generate “free” traffic.

Another site that works well for us is StumbleUpon.com. This site directs Internet surfers to Web pages based on the surfer’s pre-selected categories every time they click on the “Stumble” icon on their toolbar.

You can install the StumbleUpon toolbar on your own computer and recommend articles on your own site. This allows you to give any page a “Thumbs Up” or “Thumbs Down” rating. It also allows you to include a brief description and category for your submission. If you rate your article, it will appear in the StumbleUpon rotation – which, again, means ‘free’ traffic to your site.

Getting started is super-easy. But the key to making social media work for you is the same with any marketing medium: You need to have a way to find out if it’s working.

Although many marketers have been going all out with their social media efforts, most haven’t a clue as to how to actually measure the campaign’s success or failure.

Let’s say Early to Rise just published an article on goal setting for 2009. The article is followed by a related product ad in the ETR issue, as well as by a separate e-mail promotion for a related goal setting product, like our Total Success Achievement program. Product sales are generated from the e-mail and from the ad. Meanwhile, the social media aspect takes over.

The article content is syndicated via RSS feeds, as well as top article directories (like EzineArticles, GoArticles, ArticleBase, Buzzle, and others) and user-generated content networks (such as Digg and Reddit). Readers may also discuss the article on goal setting and self-improvement blogs, forums, and bulletin boards.

So how could you measure the social media aspect of such an effort?
It’s easy. By using the same metrics that are used to measure a public relations effort: Outputs, outcomes, and objectives – what I like to call the “3 O’s.”

1. Outputs (measures effectiveness and efficiency)
For our example, I’d look at Google Analytics for spikes in traffic to the Early to Rise homepage in the days following the article’s publication. I’d look specifically at traffic sources, visits, unique visits, and visit percentages. I’d also look at referring sites and search engines to see whether the traffic is coming directly from social media platforms. And I’d look for an increase in new ETR subscriber sign-ups (leads) during that same time period.

2. Outcomes (measures behavioral changes)
For this metric, I’d look at feedback from our customers… e-mails, phone calls, comments posted on our ETR member forum. I’d also do some reputation monitoring by searching the Web for keywords like “ETR,” the article title, and the product name to see if others were talking about it in chat rooms, external forums, and bulletin boards.

3. Objectives (measures business objectives/sales)
The most obvious and directly related metric is direct sales of the product that are tied to the editorial. Orders generated from an e-mail link or ad link are coded for tracking, so attributing sales to those sources is definitive. If the sales come from a product page on our website where the true “source” cannot be tracked, I’d look at the sales during the corresponding dates of the campaign for correlations.

Finally, for each of the above, I would compare the current campaign data versus the year-to-date (YTD) average and year-over-year data to clearly illustrate pre- and post- campaign performance. In other words, I’d check out website traffic, unique visits, specific product sales, etc. – all for the same time periods. That way, I’d have an established benchmark against which to measure our current social media efforts.

Social media is a low cost and effective way to spread the word about your company and products, as well as to conduct market research. By understanding the “3 O’s” and how they work, you can actually quantify your efforts with hard data… a critical component for any direct marketer.

[Note: This article appears courtesy of Early To Rise. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com.]

"Alignment" Woes

Greetings on a Friday afternoon! I was thinking about being a bank marketer today; remembering all the ups and downs, the joys and the fun and the frustrations as well. My biggest frustration when I sat in the marketing director's chair for a major bank was when our senior management team wasn't all focused on the same goal.

Usually, this was not a problem at that bank because each year's goals were clearly articulated to us all and the expectations were clearly set. This was reiterated weekly and reviewed monthly and if you were not progressing properly, you were probably getting "help" to rethink whatever it was you were doing.

But there were times when people had personal issues, or there were some real obstacles to our functioning as a team. Differences in beliefs about whether we could actually achieve the goals, differences in how we should get there, differences in how we could or should work together and who should take specific roles or responsibilities and always, opinions about whether they were getting enough support from marketing.
Sound familiar?
When the team's alignment is not there, it feels different. You can feel disoriented, you start looking at what your personal goals are versus the bank's goals. You lose focus. You start blaming others for shortcomings. You start down that slippery slope of negativity that kills a team.

If you are a leader of a team or bank or any other group that is trying to achieve something big, something more than you are, don't let this happen!
The cure is available through a great process that I have seen work in other's peoples lives and in some of the world's biggest organizations, and has certainly worked in mine. It is a process called your "Best Year Yet".

The magic happens when alignment is in place; whether for yourself personally, in a marriage, or in a team trying to reach the top of Mount Everest. Find out more at www.bestyearyet.com.

Have a wonderful, aligned, and enlightened weekend!
Sharon

Don’t Plan to Fail in 2010

Avoid the Top 3 Strategic Planning Pitfalls

Not all strategic planning is created equally. The majority of companies find a mere 63 percent of the goals outlined in their strategic plan are achieved each year. Why leave all of that opportunity on the table?

How can you pull the extra level of growth out of your strategic plan? Make strategic planning an ongoing process rather than an annual event combined with a golf outing or Board retreat.

Most companies see goals fail because their strategic planning process lacks three basic components necessary for success.

• A chain of leadership involvement that extends beyond Executive leadership to include those business leaders actually responsible for producing results.

• A defined accountability program to achieve the goal and detailed process for ongoing progress reviews.

• A platform that includes ongoing monitoring and review to take strategic planning from a onetime annual event to an evolving growth process.

Incorporate these three elements into your planning and you’ll achieve more next year. Or, consider successful planning programs like Best Year Yet®, a strategic planning process that achieves significant, measurable and relevant results by generating alignment to move everyone in the same direction. Best Year Yet is a program that changes behavior, culture and performance to deliver success year after year.

Want to find out more about Best Year Yet – email Sharon Lovejoy at slovejoy@marketmatch.com and plan for success in 2010.

Deanna

Top 4 Things You'll Need to Consider Before Starting 2010 Planning

It’s that time of year again. As you sharpen your pencil to start 2010 planning and budgeting, consider the following:

4. Local Economy: By making a few simple clicks or calls to your city or county, you can quickly assess the local economic environment. Also try calling a local college economics department for local data. Consider:

• Are jobs growing or shrinking today in each of your markets? What will they be doing in the next 6-9 months? What businesses are doing what? Use this information to target your business development strategies.
• What are the overall local economic trends? Look at real estate, household income, employment, retail sales, etc.
• How does all of the above information drive Product Need? Are there specific products that you can focus on in 2010? Do you need to create new products or services?

3. Existing Customers: It costs far less to increase penetration with your existing customers than to acquire new ones:

• How are your current customers using your products and services? Look at services per household, checking penetration, loan penetration, available lines of credit, debit card usage, online banking usage, etc.
• Identify your most profitable customers and target those who look just like them.

2. Competition: You can hire an outside shopper or simply take a day or two and shop the competition yourself. It’s important to understand:

• What new competition has entered the area? Who’s left?
• Review your key competition’s Product Mix.
• How are they Packaging their products? Do they have Relationship Pricing? Are they bundling products?
• Make a list of all of your competition’s Advantages and Disadvantages.
• Use this to Differentiate yourself!

1. ROI: By truly understanding and reporting your marketing ROI, you can brand yourself and your department as the greatest profit center in the bank or credit union.

• Set measureable ROI goals for each promotion as well as overall annual goals. Track regularly - not just at the end - this will help you know if you need to deviate from the plan.
• Look at everything: fee income, product profitability, brand equity, etc.
• Become your greatest spokesperson! Report everything … even the tactics that didn’t meet expectations and share what was learned.
• If your institution has one dollar to spend, show then that the highest return on investment is through marketing.

Take care,

Eric

Finding a Way...

As you may know, I am a HUGE Ohio State Buckeye fan and also a Bengals fan.  To many, the success of the Buckeyes is great...and the pain of the Bengals is tough to take.  Both, however, have had equal shares of triumph and heartbreak...but recently they have also Found A Way!

My message is about finding a way...finding a way to victory even when the times are tough, the competition seemingly insurmountable and the odds stacked against you.

The Buckeyes and the Bengals both came back from heartbreaking last second defeats from a week ago...both have been pinpointed by many awaiting an even bigger failure. However, they both circled the wagons, talked about the team spirit and rode the wave to victory...DESPITE the odds, the competition and the neysayers...they found a way!

The economy is tough for bankers right now...the budgets are slim for marketers and the demands of customers never bigger...but YOU CAN FIND A WAY to victory.  It just takes three words to be repeated as often as necessary.  This will sound VERY trite, but it is true and it works...ready?

The three words are...

YES I CAN!

Yes you can....

• Make an impact with the budget you have
• Overcome the competition
• Make it through the fall planning sessions
• Grow you loan base
• Positively impact your attrition rates...
• and MORE!

You can do it!!  We have faith in you....but you need to take the 1st step....Repeat after me...

YES I CAN...

If you need a daily re-affirmation...call me...I would be glad to help!  After all, a Bengal's fan is used to saying "tomorrow will be better!!"

Cheers!

Bruce

The Problem of Silos

I have just returned from a National Arts Strategies seminar entitled Managing People. One of the many things I love about their seminars is that they force you to take a hard look at strategic planning, and how strategic planning influences everything from marketing strategies to, in this case, human resources.

Upon my return from the seminar, I started to think about a common structural problem that many organizations encounter -- the problem of silos, particularly silos between the marketing and development departments. As non-profit arts organizations became more and more sophisticated, there began to emerge two distinct entities: a marketing department tasked with maximizing earned revenue streams and a development department responsible for overseeing all contributed revenue streams. It can be said that "marketing" departments have existed for much longer, and that even for major arts organizations, development departments are somewhat of a recent development (Arena Stage hired its first development director in the late 1980s). With two distinct departments tasked with being responsible for all revenue coming into an organization, all too often, the strategies devised by each department are done so with minimal thought to how they will affect or interact with the strategies of the other, causing the silo effect. As a consultant, I see this with many of the clients I work with, and it makes it difficult for an organization to make the best overall decision on how to move forward strategically.

In the last decade, many organizations have experimented with the "external affairs" model where one large department, housing both development and marketing, is tasked with revenue management. The problem with this model is that in most cases, although the department is united under one leader, there still exists marketing and development silos under the external affairs banner. Again this creates a problem because it doesn't allow an organization to view a complete picture of the customer as one side will look at a customer from a ticket sales perspective while the other will see his potential as a donor. Given the experience of the external affairs director, many times one division is stronger than the other depending upon the director's history.

So remembering a session from this summer's TCG conference, I thought what would I do if I had no rules to abide by and I were running the zoo? I believe I might blur the lines between development and marketing much more than they have been in the past in an effort to view the customer holistically and therefore provide better service. The heart of most of the roles in each department rely upon the same set of skills -- messaging, selling and promoting. Below would be a possible org chart for an external affairs department:

Director of Business Development (not so hot about the title, so it might change): This person would be responsible for all new business development. Chiefly responsible for getting new audiences into an organization, growing the reputation of the organization in targeted segments and organizing audience development events.

Direct Reports:

- Group Sales

- Inbound Sales

- Telesales

- Audience Development

Director of Loyalty and Retention: This person would be responsible for taking the current customer base, and moving them up the loyalty ladder from single ticket buyers to multi-buyers to donors. Also responsible for audience retention programs.

Direct Reports:

- Customer Account Managers: These individuals would oversee a given number of customers and would be responsible for their customers complete care with the goal of moving the customer from a multi-buyer to a subscriber to a donor, and then renewing them the following year. They would track the participation of each of their accounts, and provide customized personal strategies designed to enhance the relationship between the organization and the customer.

- Planned Giving

- Capital Campaign

Director of Brand Management: This person would be responsible for the overall brand of the organization from institutional messaging and design to public affairs and media relations.

Direct Reports:

-Media Relations

-Publications/Art Department

-Marketing/Communications

-Sponsorships

-Special Events

Director of Government & Institutional Affairs: This person would be responsible for being the liaison to all government offices (local, state and national) as well as foundations.

Direct Reports:

-Grant Writers

-Lobbyists

-Foundation Officers

8 "Must See" Tips For Smarter and Cheaper Online Media Buys

With the current economy the way it is, many marketers and business owners are opting to forgo online media buys in their marketing mix and spend more time on little-to-no cost tactics such as search engine marketing/optimization and social media marketing.

It doesn’t have to be that way. There are plenty of cost-effective tricks to ensure you’re getting the most bang for your buck when buying online media.

I say, “market smarter, not harder … or more expensive.” Media buying (albeit pay per click/display ads, banner ads, text ads, paid newsletter sponsorships, and email list rentals) should always have a part in your online marketing plan…even if the percentage is small.

Like an investment portfolio, never put all your eggs in one basket.

Having a variety of online marketing tactics, strong creative, and always testing helps put the odds in your favor for meeting or exceeding your overall goals.

Below is an article I wrote while I was VP of Marketing and Business Development at Early to Rise. Now, more than ever, the tips are invaluable! Check it out…

Have a question about your online marketing mix? Drop me an email!
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Muscle Media Buying
By Wendy Montes de Oca,MBA

If you’ve got have a strong e-mail campaign going but you’re looking to expand your direct-response tactics to include online ads, chances are you will do some media buying. Why? Because purchasing banner, text or other display ads can be a very cost effective way to attract customers.

As a multi-channel marketer, many of my responsibilities over the years have required me to buy ad space in magazines, newspapers, radio, TV, and the Web. Along the way, I’ve become an expert (especially with online media), and picked up a few techniques that could save you hundreds, maybe even thousands, of dollars.

But before I explain further, I’d like to point out that there are differences in online advertising.
You can focus your ad to be direct-response-oriented, which includes lead generation (acquiring e-mail names) and product sales. Or you can focus your ad on branding. Branding isn’t direct-response marketing – meaning it doesn’t require an immediate action from the consumer. Its goal, rather, is to build awareness and name recognition of a product over time and help it stay in the minds of prospects. In the offline world, think the battle of the cola giants. In the online world, it’s typically video ads like the ones you see for a new car or truck.

Because results are harder to measure with branding, many online marketers lean toward the direct-response model.

Your job as a media buyer is simply to try to get the best bang for the buck when purchasing media units. It involves allocating money for advertising in various outlets, print or online, and negotiating the actual advertising agreement with the publisher. This agreement is known as an IO (insertion order), and will cover the ad unit cost, size, placement, and other critical components (which I’ll address shortly).

Here are some helpful hints to keep in mind when buying media for your sales campaigns.

Hint #1: Keep up with the industry.
Sign up for free industry trade papers, such as DM News, Response Magazine, and Target Marketing, and as many free e-letters as you can read. One of my favorite e-letters is Clickz.com, because it covers the online marketing world in a comprehensive and dynamic way. I also like mediabuyerplanner.com, which keeps you abreast of the latest media-buying news, and DoubleClick.com, which provides some of the marketing industry’s best practices, trends, and forecast reports.

One current trend is flash banners. These ad units support audio/video use (which engages the viewer and is great for branding), but they are more costly than standard flat (no animation) or animated banners.

Hint #2: Know the ad units.
There are many types of banner ads to choose from: leader boards, skyscrapers, buttons, micro banners, and more. You can find a full list of types of ads, as well as industry guidelines for how and when to use them, at iab.net. All of these ad units are available on most websites, but not every type is effective.

For instance, it has been my experience that leader boards (ads that run horizontally across the top of a Web page) or skyscrapers (ads that run vertically along the side of a Web page) are the least effective. The best placements are typically LRECs – large rectangles, such as 300 x 250 IMUs, at the top or middle of a page or within the content. (IMU stands for Internet Marketing Unit.) Putting an ad inside the body of an article is a great placement, since the reader must breeze over the ad while absorbing the content. A recent eyetracking study by The Poynter Institute supported this observation, indicating that banner ads at the top left of the page, as well as ads close in proximity to the body of an article, garnered the most attention from viewers. This is where you want your message to be!

Hint #3: Master the art of negotiation.
You will be required to analyze many proposals when you’re looking for the right ad space. You’ll need to determine if the prices are cost effective and comparable to industry rates. If you’re looking into buying ad space on CNN.com, for instance, check out the prices for that same ad unit and timeframe on similarly ranked news websites. Also, check out various ad networks to see if any include CNN.com in their coverage. (For more on ad networks, see Hint #7.)

Since many variables can affect ad prices, I recommend starting an "ad unit matrix" to keep track of rates. Break down a spreadsheet into columns for ad unit type, size, placement, website, impressions (how many times the ad unit appears on the website), and CPM (cost per thousand impressions). Click here to se a great tool that easily calculates the CPM for you.

Another factor that can affect pricing is seasonality. Internet traffic typically drops during July and August (because so many people are on summer vacation) and, depending on the industry you’re in, can be slower around the holidays as well. So, when you’re negotiating your media buy, try to get lower rates during those times. If you’re running near a typically slow time, let’s say around Thanksgiving, you may want to pause your ad unit the day before the holiday and the day after so you don’t waste impressions.

To help ensure that you’re getting a comparable rate, check out each site’s traffic ranking and page views to see where it stands in relation to its competitors in terms of popularity and reach. It’s best to get this information from a subscription ranking service, like Nielsen//NetRatings or ComScore – but if you don’t have access to such services, consider the free Alexa ranking website (Alexa.com).

Hint #4: Reporting rules.
Make sure, especially if you buy media from an online ad network, that you have full access to the OAS (online ad server) reporting system. Look for key performance indicators, such as impressions served (ad units that ran), and click-thru rate (the percentage of people who saw your ad and clicked on a link in it). If you are testing various ad units and sizes, each one should have a unique tracking code. If your advertiser doesn’t give you access to their OAS, ask about getting daily or weekly reports from your account executive. These reports will be critical in refining your ad to get maximum results.

As a general guideline, the average click-thru rate for a banner ad/text ad is 0.5 to 2 percent, and the average click-thru rate for a dedicated e-mail (an e-mail ad that a third party sends to their subscribers on your behalf) is 7.5 percent.

Hint #5: Know when to hold ‘em and when to fold ‘em.
In your insertion order, have a clause that allows you to terminate your advertising commitment without penalty at a given time (an "out clause" or "termination right"). For instance, most online campaigns can be optimized in about a week. If you’re watching your reporting daily (which I suggest you do for the first two weeks) and notice that not many viewers are clicking on your ad, then you should switch to a different ad. If the second ad is not working, you may want to initiate your termination right, end the campaign, and pay only for the impressions you were served.

Not all advertisers will offer this option, but you should certainly ask for it.

Hint #6: There are no stupid questions.
If you’re buying banner ads or other advertising spots on a website, it’s key to find out a few things from your account executive:

Will your ad be ROS (run of site)? Typically, this means your ad will randomly appear on a site’s home page and most (if not all) subpages within the site. This is more cost effective than a targeted ad in a specific section of the site.

Will your ad position be fixed or rotated (shared) with anyone else’s ad? If shared, what percentage of impressions will your ad receive?

If you’re considering buying a dedicated e-mail from a third-party, find out the size of their e-mail list, how often the list gets mailed, the AUS (average unit sale) per subscriber, and whether or not there will be an introduction or implied endorsement by the list owner. (According to copywriting genius John Forde, this can often help boost response rates by 25 percent or more.)

All of these factors will help determine the value of the list and, ultimately, the cost you’re willing to pay to access the people on it.

Hint #7: Be on the lookout for low-cost options.
If you’re targeting a specific audience or a niche buyer, go directly to the website’s publisher for an advertising quote. Cutting out the middleman (ad broker) may get you a better rate. PLUS, it will help you build a relationship with the publisher – which can be advantageous for you down the road.

If your goal is to reach the biggest, broadest audience possible, and you want to run an ad on various websites that have a distinct "channel" or genre (such as entertainment, finance, health, etc.) within the broader subject range of the site, consider an ad network.

Ad networks have an agreement with a variety of popular websites to serve up their ads, and they can sort by website type. Since they typically buy their ad units in bulk from the publishing sites, the networks can pass the savings down to the advertiser and charge a lower CPM rate. Some popular networks include Advertising.com and ValueClick.com. You can find a full list at iwebtool.com.

Just remember to get proposals from more than one network. Some of the lesser-known (Tier 2) networks are looking to make a name for themselves, and may offer better rates. But be wary of "micro" sites, which have little traffic or Web presence. Be sure to ask for a sample of the network’s site listings. I always go for quality over quantity.

Depending on how many impressions you buy from these ad networks, your average cost for an LREC can range from $2 to $5. For blog ads and blog networks, you can often find CPMs lower than $1 or even 50 cents. And if you’re looking to save even more money, ask if remnant inventory is available. Remnant inventory is simply an advertising unit that is not as popular as other ad units on a site and is unsold. Depending on your marketing goal, these ad units may accomplish your objective – and to make them more attractive, networks usually offer them at a lower rate.

Hint #8: Show your poker face.
In this industry, it’s all about confidence and knowledge. If you come across as someone who is savvy to media buying, you’re less likely to be taken advantage of.
Do your homework and follow some of the recommendations above… but your best lessons will happen as you buy.

[Note: This article appears courtesy of Early To Rise, a free newsletter dedicated to making money, improving health and secrets to success. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com/.]

Sun in San Antonio...

Arrived in San Antonio for the ABA Marketing conference on Friday...had a couple of meetings on Friday that went really well!

When I landed, it was rainy and gray... I thought I was back in Ohio!  However, everyone was ecstatic that it was raining.  See, in San Antonio, they have been in a pretty serious drought and have very stringent water restrictions.  In Ohio, we have had plenty of rain and a pretty temperate summer....very few days in the 90s. 

My point is that the perspective is 180 degrees opposite even around the same issue....rain.  I was disappointed in the rain, and San Antonians were excited!

Keep this in mind when you talk with your customers.  Come from THEIR perspective in your communications, know THEIR thoughts and feelings, and ensure that you are communicating in the manner that will be best be heard by your audience!

PS...the good news is that San Antonio got their rain, and today is a sunny day for me!

Cheers!

Bruce

It's all in 24 hours...how will you fill your card?

Greetings...

Happy Wednesday, the middle of the week.

Today, I will share about 24-hours... recently their value has increased tremendously to me!  24 hours...seems like a lot, or very little, depending on your outlook.

The key is "how" you look at them...and "how" you use them!  I am definitely a Glass-Half-Full person.  Perhaps you are a Glass-Half-Empty person, or a close friend of mine that is a "what friggin glass!"

Any way you are, its important to fill your 24-hour time card the best way possible.  For a typical person:

• we work for 8-10 hours
• sleep for 6-8, 
• and have 6-8 hours of family or personal time.

For me...I minimize sleep, rearrange my work hours and recently have tried to max my family time.

At work, I maximize my efficiency and find that late at night or early morning are "knock it out" times for me when I can focus and have minimal distractions.  To me, sleep is overrated...but important to catch up when we can.

We all have 24 hours and HOW we fill them is critical to our health, wealth, and well-being.

Find your balance and fill your card out...and remember, the 24 hours are either VERY quick or VERY slow....pending your outlook!

Cheers!

Bruce

"Partner up" for leads, sales, editorial and more!

Trying to think of new, cost effective ways to grow your list, get added exposure, tap into another market, or increase sales?

Many business owners and marketers completely overlook leveraging editorial, lead generation, and sales opportunities with synergistic “partners” because they are either afraid of the competition or think it’s a waste of time.

I say, “test it out” and see if you have a winning strategy.

If you find the right list to go to, the possibilities are endless and you could forge a long-term, mutually beneficial venture for both you and your “partner”.

And best of all, it’s virtually at no advertising cost.

Below is an article I wrote last year while I was Vice President of Marketing and Business Development at Agora Publishing/Early to Rise. Although the article is a year old, the principals are timeless.

Check it out…

Let’s Get Reciprocal: Maximizing Ad Swaps, Guest Editorials, and JV Opportunities
By Wendy Montes de Oca

Now is a great time to look to your competition for opportunities to help grow your list and add extra revenues to your bottom line for little or no cost.

For example, here at Early to Rise I just completed media buy (i.e., outside advertising purchasing) recommendations for all of our newsletters – Early to Rise, Total Health Breakthroughs, and Investor’s Daily Edge. My advice was to reduce them to help control costs through the end of 2008, as the tough economy continues to impact everyone. But my number one focus is, instead, for each marketing manager to concentrate on leveraging the marketing and editorial relationships we have with our fellow publishers and aggressively pursuing ad swaps, guest editorials, and joint ventures (JV).

The idea is to develop synergistic relationships that are mutually beneficial – to look for areas of deficiency in your competitors and think of ways your company can fill the void.

One potential partner may have a great front-end product (e.g., a low cost e-book) but no up-sell (e.g., a higher-priced related kit containing DVDs, CDs, and workbooks). Another potential partner may have an innovative back-end product but no cost-effective front-end product to bring new customers in the door. Still others may have large, qualified lists but need editorial to bond with their lists. (This frequently happens when marketers collect names through their websites or direct mail, but don’t have a regularly scheduled publication – such as an e-newsletter – to offer people who sign up.)

Some tips to keep in mind when looking for potential partners:

• Do your homework. Find out, in advance, who will be at industry events that you’ll be attending. (Check the program for speakers, vendors, and participants.) Sign up for their e-newsletters. Read their promotional e-mails. Maybe even purchase some of their products.

• Look at EVERY opportunity as a way to maximize your company’s brand. When you go to industry events, don’t eat dinner alone in your hotel room. Go to functions. Mingle. Network. Have a genuine conversation with a potential partner… then, if there’s a synergy between your two companies, exchange business cards.

At this year’s ETR Info Marketing Bootcamp, I noticed that attendees were really taking advantage of all the opportunities to network with each other and the ETR staff…during presentation breaks, lunch time, cocktail parties – whenever and wherever – making the most out of the experience!

• Before you contact a potential partner, get familiar with his products and target audience and figure out how your company may be able to dovetail with his product line or marketing efforts.

So, once you’ve made the connection, now what?

Ad Swaps
Assuming you both have e-newsletters, you can test the waters and see how your lists will react by doing an advertising swap. In other words, you run an ad in his e-newsletter and he runs an ad in yours.

To make sense out of the results of that test, you have to know your “opportunity cost” – the “cost” you will incur for running an outside ad to your list instead of your own ad. If you normally sell ad space in your e-newsletter, this cost could simply be the flat rate fee you typically charge. Or, if you know the average revenues an issue brings in, you could calculate the potential “missed opportunity” of letting another ad run to your list on a given day.

You should also agree to share important information with your partner. Before his ad runs in your e-newsletter, point out any creative issues. (Perhaps the copy is too inflammatory for your list. Perhaps it’s too competitive.) Provide your partner with your e-newsletter’s sent and deliverability sizes, open rate, and ad click rate. Exchanging performance data is critical to a long and mutually beneficial relationship. It has to be a win/win situation for the partnership to work.

Whether your goal is to attract names for your e-list (lead generation) or to make sales, reciprocate in kind. If your partner is letting you do a name collection ad to his list, for example, let him run the same kind of ad to your list. But first make sure his list is approximately the same size as yours. If it’s substantially smaller, you may want to hold off on an ad swap with that publisher until he builds his subscriber base. You don’t want the initiative to be one-sided.

However, on a case-by-case basis, it doesn’t hurt to extend “good will” to a fellow publisher with proven marketing muscle. For example, when Total Health Breakthroughs launched in summer of 2007, I reached out to several industry friends and colleagues, asking if we could run a lead generation ad to their lists to help us build our subscriber base. We had little to offer in return at the time. (We barely had a list of our own.) But, thankfully, many agreed. The THB list grew in no time, and we were soon able to reciprocate.

Guest Editorials
You can also look into doing guest editorials in other publishers’ e-newsletters – with an editorial note or byline that links to your offer. This is a great way to get introduced to a new list with the “implied” endorsement of the publisher. His endorsement gives you credibility. And if you provide his readers with good, solid, useful information, they will bond with you quickly.

This is a soft-sell approach that may or may not yield results on its own. But when coordinated with either a dedicated e-mail (if your partner is on board with a revenue split) or an e-newsletter ad the same week, your conversion rate (the number of people who go on to buy your product) will dramatically improve.

Joint Ventures (JVs)
I’ve got one more idea for you: joint venturing. This is a quick and cost-effective way to make money with your list even if you have not yet developed any products.

With a JV, you have an instant product line with no overhead costs. Your partner will supply the products, fulfill orders, and provide customer support. All you have to do is promote the products to your list and split the net revenues with them. For an even a more turnkey approach, you can sell e-reports through sites like Clickbank.com, where everything is automated.

To determine the viability of a potential JV product, there are several strategic marketing variables to consider. I like to think of them as “PPPGS”:
P = Product quality
P = Price point
P = Performance (when promoted to your potential partner’s house list, as well as to outside lists)
G = General market demand
S = Subscriber interest (when promoted to your list, as determined by feedback, surveys, etc.)

Remember – you’re looking for long-term partners, not one-hit-wonders. So carefully select the people you approach, making sure their products make sense relative to your business…and, together, you can reap the unlimited profit potential of reciprocal marketing!

[Note: This article appears courtesy of Early To Rise, a free newsletter dedicated to making money, improving health and secrets to success. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com.]