Branding ... It's Not Rocket Science.

... And Rocket Science isn't branding - it's two totally different industries!


But seriously, whether you're branding a retail bank, commercial bank, credit union or coffee shop, the basics remain the same.


Strategy
In its simplest form, brand strategy comes down to one simple recipe:

• One part: know thy self
• One part: know thy competition
• One part: know thy audience
• Shake well and pour over differentiation

If you follow this blog, you've probably read one of our branding blogs. If not, here are some good ones:
     What if?...
     Brand YOU Day.
     Marketing & Branding
     Branding...It's Not What You Say, But What You Do.
     Is It Time To Relook At Your Brand?


Communicate
"If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?"  As a true marketer, I say...who cares?!?!  No one heard it!


Any change in brand requires a focus on awareness.  Your key target audience(s) should have better top-of-mind awareness of your institution AND understanding of your brand message. This requires pre and post brand research.


Your creative doesn't necessarily need to win awards, but should be focused:

• On the right audience
• On your key point of differentiation
• Benefits, Benefits, Benefits

Employee Engagement
Advertising and logos are great, but your brand lives and breaths with the experience.  And the experience resides in your staff.

• Every employee MUST understand the brand
• They must understand how the brand is designed to make the customer feel
• They must know their role in the brand and what is expected of them
• They must be provided tools and training to make brand delivery second nature
• Experience must be measured, monitored and tweaked for improvement
• Consistency, Consistency, Consistency

See, branding is really not all that hard!

MarketMatch is a full-service marketing consulting firm, dedicated to the credit union and community banking community.  We utilize knowledge-based strategies to help you FOCUS on the efforts that will generate MOMENTUM and yield the greatest RESULTS for your bottom line.

Learn more here.

Chat with me LIVE!

Or contact me directly (click here).

Five Ways to Improve Your Marketing in 2012

Bloggers love lists, and we're told that blog posts with titles like, "Five Secrets to. . ." or "Four Sure-Fire Tactics for. . ." are appealing to readers. Bloggers who write about business also seem to share another characteristic. About now, many feel compelled to make predictions about the new year. When you combine these inclinations, the results are lots of blog posts with titles like, "Six Game-Changing Marketing Trends for 2012,"

I'll leave the prognostications to others, but I will offer a list. I have five recommendations for improving your marketing efforts in 2012.

Before you do anything else, develop a marketing strategy.
You've heard this one before, so I won't repeat all of the reasons that strategy is necessary for success. At its most basic level, marketing strategy is a simple thing for most B2B companies. First, you need to identify all of the significant ways that your product or service can create value for customers and identify the kinds of companies that can obtain the greatest value by purchasing and using your product or service. Second, you need to determine the best ways for communicating your value propositions to potential buyers. This step includes the selection of marketing tactics and channels and the creation of marketing messages. Companies tend to spend most of their time and attention on step two, but step one is even more important. I discussed the "value identification" aspect of marketing strategy in an earlier post titled How to Make Difficult Marketing Questions Easier to Answer.

Shift primary responsibility for lead generation from sales to marketing.
I've explained my rationale for this recommendation in two earlier posts - Stop Depending on Your Salespeople to Generate Leads and Why Marketing Should Take the Lead in Lead Generation. I don't contend that traditional sales prospecting doesn't work at all or that you should completely abandon it. I do contend that traditional sales prospecting is an inefficient use of resources and that you should strive to become less dependent on it.

Increase the number of leads acquired via inbound marketing.
There is little doubt that inbound marketing has become the tactic of choice for lead acquisition. Buyers now control the buying process, and they are performing research and gathering information about products and services on their own, usually via the Web. Therefore, traditional outbound lead acquisition techniques such as direct mail and e-mail don't work as well as they once did. It's just good sense to make yourself easy to find when a prospect begins looking for the kind of solution you provide. Research firm SiriusDecisions says that 80% of new sales leads will come from inbound marketing by 2015. Your objective for 2012 should be to substantially increase the number of leads and the percentage of total leads acquired via inbound marketing.

Develop and implement a sound lead management process.
Consider these facts:  (1) Acquiring new leads is becoming increasingly difficult. (2) 50%-75% of new leads are qualified but not ready to buy. (3) Up to 70% of these lukewarm leads will eventually buy from someone. Put these facts together and one thing is clear - leads are valuable and must be managed with care. An effective lead management process will address several key issues, including lead nurturing, lead scoring, and marketing and sales alignment. A well-designed lead management process will enable you to maximize the sales you obtain from your pool of leads.

Implement a content marketing program.
Having and using the right kind of content is now essential for B2B marketing success. By "the right kind of content," I mean marketing content that is:

• Primarily educational and non-promotional
• Customized for the types of buyers you sell to
• Customized for where the potential buyer is in his or her buying process

I've discussed these requirements in a white paper titled, Two Powerful Ways to Make Your Marketing More Relevant. If you haven't already seen this paper and would like to get a copy, just send an e-mail to ddodd(at)pointbalance(dot)com.

That's my list. Do you have other plans to improve your marketing in 2012?

Top 10 2011

A big Thank You to Just Marketing readers. The blog was launched in late March 2011 with the hope of addressing "why we do what we do" in a crowded blogosphere of marketing blogs that mostly tell us "how to do what we want to do." 







The blog has had
a great first year. We’ve had distinguished guest posts by Dan Ariely, Mark
Binns, John Bradley, Mike Dover, Jay Lebo, Martin Roll, Jeff

What?? It's 3:00 am!

What?  It's 3:00 am... do you know where your prospects are?

Yes, its 3:00 am, but an interested marketer that cannot sleep is searching our site and sees things they like.  The key is engaging him/her NOW...when their interest is piqued!

At MarketMatch, we are always looking for ways to engage clients, intrigue prospects and demonstrate our leading edge capabilities and insights...

Our newest addition?  Workface

It is a new software that allows adding an engaging button on your website, email, blog, etc. to start instant interaction. In the words of Workface themselves, "Workface empowers your sales force to dramatically increase their visibility and engagement potential with clients and prospects. It's our unique way of making Internet commerce a lot more human."

• Our take....really cool (and cheap) way to initiate interaction and engage an
  interested party WHEN they have the interest!

If you are online, it establishes an online chat connection instantly...if you are away, it allows your profile and message to be displayed to the prospect and a message of interest for you to respond.  The best part...all this is done FOR YOU without effort or monitoring your website 24x7x365.  

Don't let people slip away when they are interested in learning more about you...and what better way than to be able to share one-on-one and in a live conversation!

Check it out on our blog, email tags and website (Team Member contact)...

Test drive the interface...  Chat with me LIVE!

Cheers!

Bruce

MarketMatch is a full-service marketing consulting firm, dedicated to the credit union and community banking community.  We utilize knowledge-based strategies to help you FOCUS on the efforts that will generate MOMENTUM and yield the greatest RESULTS for your bottom line.

Learn more here.

Contact me directly.

PS: Happy Holidays...Hard to believe its almost time for the Holidays to kick in with a furry and the new year is right around the corner!

Christmas cards that "stand out"

With Christmas only a couple of days away, I thought it was fitting to display some awesome and unique holiday card designs to get you in the creative Christmas spirit.


Very simple clean design. The Volkswagen logo converts into snowflakes when the card is opened...very cool!























With this design it mails flat in a regular envelope to save on cost. By cutting it out and sliding the 2 flat pieces together it becomes a dimensional piece.






















This example shows a multipurpose piece. It mails flat - as a decorative ornament (that can actually be used). It then opens up to the message inside. Clever!






















This one is another multipurpose piece. It mails flat in an envelope - as an elegant card. It then opens up to the gift teabags inside.



















Hope you have a wonderful Christmas.

Until next time,
Jeremy

MarketMatch is a full-service marketing consulting firm, dedicated to the credit union and community banking community. We utilize knowledge-based strategies to help you FOCUS on the efforts that will generate MOMENTUM and yield the greatest RESULTS for your bottom line.

Learn more here.

Santa Claus, The Real Thing?

Spoiler Alert: don't read if you believe in Santa Claus.





In the 1920s, The Coca-Cola Company was looking to nudge consumers into drinking more of its eponymous drink during the winter months, when sales traditionally slumped. In 1922 the company launched the “Thirst Knows No Season” slogan. 

Then someone hit upon the idea of associating the brand with that icon of winter, St. Nick (

Who are your best customers (and why many don't know)?

Some time ago, I was at the box office when a major donor who lives out of town came up to the window. I instantly recognized her even though she hadn't visited us in quite some time. After warmly welcoming her back, I stepped away briefly to attend to another matter, and when I returned to continue our conversation, I was startled to see that she was being charged an exchange fee to transfer into another performance. When I inquired, the box office associate rightly told me that she wasn't a subscriber, and that waiving exchange fees was a subscriber benefit. In this case, the patron wasn't a subscriber because she lived thousands of miles away, however she was an incredibly generous donor, giving both to our annual fund and our campaign. Her giving over the years easily made her one of our most valuable customers, but because she wasn't a subscriber, the box office didn't grant her one of our entry level benefits.

This wasn't a human error, but a systemic one. At the time, we were operating a ticketing software that didn't reflect giving history, so there was no way the box office associate could have known the patron's lifetime value. And even if the ticketing system notified the box office associate of the patron's giving history, the associate would have had to override the benefits structure we had in place as complimentary ticket exchanges were a subscriber benefit, not a donor benefit.

We had a problem. Fundamentally, how we defined our best customers changed depending upon which department was asked, and the company as a whole had yet to identify our best customers in a holistic manner.

Two years ago, we took the first steps to address this issue. First, we replaced our antiquated ticketing software with an integrated database that housed all transactional data across our various departments allowing users to see an overall picture of each patron. Once in place, we had to develop a system for defining our best customers from the perspective of the entire company. We hired Target Resource Group to develop an algorithm that incorporated all transactional possibilities with our company, and then apply that algorithm to our database to develop a Patron Loyalty Index score for patrons in our system based upon transactions over the previous five fiscal years. The index scores allowed us to separate our database into four major categories, and today, certain overriding benefits are assigned to the higher level categories.

If the aforementioned major donor were to come to our box office today and request an exchange for a single ticket purchase, an associate would enter her information into our database, and the database screen would immediately turn red--our signal that we are interacting with someone with a very high Patron Loyalty Index rating. The associate would then know that an exception to the exchange rule would be in order as a result of the major donor's lifetime value to the organization.

The way the communications and development departments do business at Arena Stage has fundamentally changed over the course of the past two years. We view ourselves as full partners in building patron lifetime value. We work together to increase loyalty, reduce attrition and grow revenue. Subscriber renewal rates are at an all-time high, patron churn has decreased by 7%, the number of full season subscribers has increased 18%, and our membership program is pacing well ahead of last year.

Knowing who our best customers are has made all the difference.

Know the Lingo

You're chatting with your printer, designer or creative department about a current job or project... all is going well in the conversation until they start spatting out words like raster, kerning, cloning, hexadecimal. While you think to yourself what is a "hexawhodidhuh", here are a few resources to help with these terms.

• Graphic Design Dictionary
• Print Industry Glossary
• Proof Reading Marks
• News Print Terms
  

As always, if you need help making sense of a "hexawhodidhuh" we are always available to guide you through whatever challenges you might encounter.

Until next time,
Jeremy

Managing To The Customer's 1%

Lets face it.  Regardless of your great checking product or competitive rates or fancy branches, when it comes down to it, customers really want convenience and assurance.

 

The convenience is the acquisition phase. In most cases, the FI with the most branches wins market share.  But we can get into the discussion of covering the footprint vs brand awareness and differentiation in a different blog.

Today, I want to discuss retention and relationship depth … the assurance phase.

When it comes to existing customers, here’s the REAL secret …

99% of the time, your customers just want you to do your job!  Don’t screw up!

It’s what happens in the other 1% of the time that really helps you to stand out. That other 1% -- when they’ve mismanaged their budget, want to make a major purchase, are experiencing a significant life change, need guidance.

Our rally cry as bankers should be to shine during the customer’s 1%.

• Train to spot the 1%: Your staff should understand this 1% rule and know the difference between a need to simply do their jobs and a need that will change a customer’s life.
• Life Stage: To help identify many of your 1% situations, understand the events in a typical life cycle that impact someone’s finances.  Define the events, understand the customer needs, present solutions, provide front-line tools and train, train, train.
• Tell your story: Your staff impact customer’s lives every day.  Your bank or credit union has helped many customers tell their life stories.  You’ve helped them buy their first home, manage their budget so they can keep their home in times of trouble, you’ve helped to retire early or restructure finances when priorities change with the birth of a child.  You should share these stories inside and outside of your branches.

Being prepared for the customer’s 1% will help to create more loyal customers, will increase referrals, and will help deepen relationships.  Keeping their accounts accurate and not charging ridiculous fees is expected – for the day-to-day stuff, people only notice when you drop the ball.  But, being there for customers when they REALLY need you is what gets them talking and keeps them with you.

MarketMatch is a full-service marketing consulting firm, dedicated to the credit union and community banking community.  We utilize knowledge-based strategies to help you FOCUS on the efforts that will generate MOMENTUM and yield the greatest RESULTS for your bottom line.

Learn more here.

Chat with me LIVE!

Contact me directly.

Four Tips for More Effective Business Blogging in 2012

With the end of 2011 less than three weeks away, most of you are probably well into planning your marketing programs for 2012. If you don't already have a blog, you should plan to begin one next year. If you already have a blog but you haven't been posting to it frequently, you should make that a priority in 2012.

As I wrote in an earlier post, a blog can be a highly effective marketing channel. It provides a great way to introduce prospects to your company and your content, and it can improve your organic search results. To maximize the benefits of your blog, you must post new content regularly and frequently. Therefore, publishing an effective blog requires a commitment of time and attention.

The suggestions I'm including in this post are the result of first-hand experience. I launched this blog in early 2010. For the first three months or so, I added new content frequently, but then I ran out of steam. By mid-August, I had stopped posting entirely. After a hiatus of about nine months, I "relaunched" the blog in May of this year. This time, I had a better plan, and the plan has worked well.

There are several keys to successful blogging, but these four are among the most important.

Create a schedule and stick to it. Writing a blog post is a task that's easy to put off. So, to be successful, create an "editorial calendar" for your blog that contains specific publication dates. Just saying "twice a month" isn't specific enough. Posting regularly is almost as important as posting frequently. So, start with a schedule that you feel comfortable with (as long as you are posting at least twice per month). You can increase the frequency as you get accustomed to writing posts.

Create and maintain a "reserve" of completed posts. Before launching your blog, write enough posts to fill your schedule for at least two months. This will give you some breathing room before you need to create additional posts. In addition, you should always maintain a "reserve account" that contains one or two months of completed posts. If you run into a "dry spell," this reserve will give you some time to work through it.

Always be looking for topics. One of the biggest challenges for any blogger is identifying enough topics to write about. This can be particularly intimidating when you're just getting started. I don't have a silver bullet for this challenge, but I can offer a few suggestions:

• Tap internal resources - Get all of the people in your company involved in suggesting topics.
• Use your experience and read - The inspiration for my posts comes from two primary sources - my work with clients and what I read. If you're involved in a major project for a client, use that experience to create one or more posts. It's also important to read other blogs in your field regularly. On several occasions, I've been inspired to write a post by one sentence I've read in another blog.
• Write down your ideas - Whenever you think of a topic for a post, take a moment to write a couple of sentences that capture the essence of your idea. Don't be judgmental, just get the idea down on paper. Some of these ideas won't work out, but some will.

Promote your blog. To attract readers to your blog, you'll want to use two basic strategies. First, you'll want to configure your blog so that readers can subscribe via both RSS and e-mail. You'll also want to configure your blog so that "social sharing" buttons are included in every post. Second, every time you publish a post, be sure to announce the new post in appropriate social media venues. Since I have relaunched this blog, I have followed this practice religiously. Every time I publish a post (including this one), I announce it in appropriate discussion groups at LinkedIn, and I tweet about it 4-6 times. Since following this process, the readership of this blog has increased by 400%-500%.

Effective blogging requires work, but the more organized you are, the easier the work becomes.

Lousy choices

In a free market, the choices consumers make guide the
allocation of the economy’s resources. But what happens if consumers make lousy
choices?




The consumer is king. We’ve all heard that. To some, it may mean that
front-line salespeople should treat consumers well - that the consumer is always right. But it has a larger meaning too:
the consumer’s choices backed by dollars guide producers

Lessons From The Cheshire Cat

“One day Alice came to a fork in the road and saw a Cheshire cat in a tree. 
‘Which road do I take?’ she asked. ‘Where do you want to go?’ was his response.
 ‘I don’t know,’ Alice answered. ‘Then,’ said the cat, ‘it doesn’t matter.’”

~Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

By now, you no doubt have your 2012 plan complete.  And that plan, no doubt contains annual objectives with month-by-month plans on how to achieve them.

Like Alice, you will encounter forks in the road on your way to December 31, 2012.  Setting smaller, periodic goals will help you to know where you want to go at each fork.

“The uninformed must improve their deficit, or die.”

~ Cheshire cat

You don’t need to drown in information, but each month and each quarter, what is the data that will help you best track your progress towards your annual institution goals?  The answers are as varied as the goals themselves and the means to access data.

Are you looking to drive awareness?  Quarterly, conduct a quick 100 blind phone survey exercise asking responders to name the first 3 financial institutions that come to mind.  Is your institution coming up more each quarter?  Is it showing up as number 1 more often?

Product and balance growth are as easy as a core report, but were is the balance growth coming from?  If it’s loans, are they favorable, or at least variable, rates?  If it’s deposits, are the core deposits?  How much are you paying for them?

Customer/Member growth is also as easy as a core report, but what is your product penetration with new customers?  What products are bringing them in?  Are you getting them into checking and at least 2 access products?

By collecting and regularly analyzing the right data, you will know which road to take when you reach the fork.  Then you can ignore the Cheshire cat and his mischievous grin.

MarketMatch is a full-service marketing consulting firm, dedicated to the credit union and community banking community.  We utilize knowledge-based strategies to help you FOCUS on the efforts that will generate MOMENTUM and yield the greatest RESULTS for your bottom line.

Learn more here.


Chat with me LIVE!

Or contact me directly (click here).

Want To See What's Inside Bestseller, Content Is Cash?

If you haven't had a chance to read the Internet marketing bestseller, Content is Cash: Leveraging Great Content and the Web for Increased Traffic, Sales, Leads and Buzz [Que Publishing], then check out the full Table of Contents.

Then you can decide if there's information in the book that appeals to you.

Take a sneak peek here: http://books.google.com/books?id=ANR1dLr3aeAC&pg=PR10&lpg=PR10&dq=content+is+cash+table+of+contents&source=bl&ots=g6ZtFcGen8&sig=g_MXb-cgMhXKAMymRqNUFgbLi1g&hl=en#v=onepage&q&f=false

Internet Marketing Bestseller, Content Is Cash, By Wendy Montes de Oca, On Amazon Top 100 List For Ten Weeks

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

CONTACT: Precision Marketing and Media

media@precisionmarketingmedia.com

http://www.precisionmarketingmedia.com/

Internet Marketing Bestseller, Content Is Cash, By Wendy Montes de Oca, On Amazon Top 100 List For Ten Weeks And Focuses On Leveraging Great Content And the Web

December, 6, 2011 Palm Beach Gardens, FL Looking for proven, powerful and cost-effective ideas to get the most out of great content? ‘Content Is Cash: Leveraging Great Content and the Web for Increased Traffic, Sales, Leads and Buzz’ [Que Publishing, Paperback, ISBN# 0789741083 http://www.quepublishing.com/store/product.aspx?isbn=0789741083], by Fortune 500 and top publishing marketer, Wendy Montes de Oca, MBA, contains the formula for online success for virtually any business in any niche.

Content Is Cash has been on the Amazon ‘top 100’ best seller list for more than 10 weeks since it’s August publication date. The book hit #1 and #5 simultaneously in Internet Marketing (Kindle and paperback, respectively), #13 in Business and Culture, and #1,806 in Amazon’s entire universe of over 8,000,000 books on September 26, 2011. Content Is Cash was featured by Newsmax.com and Target Marketing Magazine as well as being on Website Magazine’s ‘Hot Reads for Web Marketer’s’ list and PracticalEcommerce.com’s ‘25 Top-Selling eCommerce Books in August 2011’.

Content Is Cash describes several high-performing, organic (free) strategies which are part of a comprehensive, systematic method known as the SONAR Content Distribution Model, to help increase website traffic, visibility, and more. SONAR marketing is similar to article (content) marketing, but more comprehensive and has an extended reach.

According to Montes de Oca, “The book centers around a synchronized strategy of using great, original content that is ‘UVA’ (useful, valuable, and actionable) which business owners and publishers have already created, then repurposing and distributing it to targeted, relevant locations on the Web, based on target audience and business objectives”.

She continues, “SONAR represents five organic online channels: S (Syndicate partners, content syndication networks, and user generate content sites), O (Online press releases), N (Network [social] communities, social bookmarking sites), A (Article directories) and R (Relevant posts to blogs, forums, and message boards).”

Content Is Cash has received praise from some of the most respected marketers, publishers, and entrepreneurs in the industry including Michael Masterson, Bob Bly, Martin Weiss, Ph.D., Marc Charles, MaryEllen Tribby, Brian Edmondson, Conrad Hall, Dr. Jonny Bowden, and more.

Says Montes de Oca, “The book has been embraced by consumers and colleagues alike. I think what resonates with people is this powerful, yet easy-to-implement strategy which leverages great content for virtually no cost. And in the current economic environment, business owners are looking for free and creative ways to create visibility and website traffic for their business.”

She concludes, “It really is all about the power of great content and that content is king.
Creating solid, original content will first and foremost provide valued information to its readers and encourage bonding; but it can also help the publisher (business owner) with increased website exposure and visits. That increased traffic can then be harnessed for online product sales, advertising sales, and more.”

Content Is Cash is available at Amazon.com, QuePublishing.com, BarnesandNoble.com other book retailers and e-tailers world-wide.

For more information visit http://precisionmarketingmedia.com/book/wendy-book.html.

About Wendy Montes de Oca, MBA
Ms. Montes de Oca’s diversified background includes nearly 20 years of experience in direct response and online marketing, media, publishing, financial services and law. She’s worked for renowned publishers and Fortune 500 companies. Ms. Montes de Oca is an Internet marketing expert with a proven track record for both acquisition and retention efforts. During her career, she has generated over $150 million in total revenues for various corporations, consulting clients, and her own consulting firm, Precision Marketing and Media, LLC.

###

It's Time to Fix the Marketing Supply Chain

Improving the productivity of the marketing supply chain probably won't be near the top of most marketers' list of new year's resolutions for 2012. Marketers are facing extraordinary pressures to drive increased revenues and maximize the return produced by every dollar invested in marketing. So, it's understandable that they focus most of their attention on developing more effective marketing campaigns, creating more compelling content, and generating more qualified sales leads, rather than on "mundane" issues like the production and distribution of marketing consumables.

In reality, however, the marketing materials supply chain represents a large, and largely untapped, source of both cost savings and revenue-enhancing improvements. The marketing supply chain in most companies is highly fragmented and filled with manual, inefficient processes that result in excessive costs and a lack of both responsiveness and reliability. If not completely broken, the average marketing supply chain is dysfunctional and in serious need of repair.

Research by the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) Council and Forrester Consulting (part of Forrester Research) shows both the economic significance of the marketing materials supply chain and the opportunities for improvement.

• A majority of companies spend at least 20% of their marketing budget on marketing consumables, and almost a third of companies devote at least 30% of their marketing budget to such materials. (CMO Council)
• Four out of five companies distribute marketing collateral documents and similar materials to salespeople and other sales channel participants, and a majority of companies distribute such materials on at least a weekly basis. (22% distribute on at least a daily basis) (Forrester Research)
• Just 25% of marketers have performed a comprehensive analysis of the costs and process efficiencies in their marketing materials supply chain, and only 11% have implemented new workflow systems to reduce costs and inefficiencies. (CMO Council)
• Fifty-nine percent of salespeople and other sales channel participants still rely on e-mail to request marketing materials, and nearly half (47%) still rely on telephone requests. (CMO Council)
• Sixty-five percent of salespeople say they over-order and stockpile marketing materials because it takes too long to receive ordered materials. (CMO Council)
• Only 17% of companies are using eStores or sales portals to support their marketing fulfillment process. (Forrester Consulting)

The good news is that companies no longer need to tolerate an ineffective and inefficient marketing supply chain. Marketing asset management technologies, combined with on-demand manufacturing capabilities and state-of-the-art warehousing, inventory management, and fulfillment services, can eliminate waste from the marketing supply chain, while simultaneously improving responsiveness and reliability.

To determine how much your company would benefit from an improved marketing supply chain, you need to perform a comprehensive audit that identifies the strengths and weaknesses of your current supply chain. Such an analysis will also enable you to quantify the cost savings and other benefits that an optimized supply chain would provide. You'll probably be surprised by the results. Even in relatively small companies, we've seen benefit values that reach well into six figures.

We've developed a process for quantifying the major cost savings that a "marketing asset management solution" will produce. This doesn't take the place of a comprehensive supply chain audit, but it is a good way to begin your evaluation. If you'd like to see a sample version of our cost savings calculator, send an e-mail to ddodd(at)pointbalance(dot)com.

Where do you find your most useful ideas?

Where do you get your best ideas? Are they all from within your industry? 

Many of the managers I know and speak with are constantly curious -- they seek out ideas, incessantly ask questions, read the business press, attend conferences, network, seek out consultants, or even sign up for
training and management development courses. Their goal is to find new ideas, the best ideas, and take them

Why Customers Should Be the Heroes of Your Case Studies

Customer case studies are one of the most popular and influential kinds of marketing content used by B2B companies. New research by Eccolo Media shows that case studies are the fourth most widely consumed type of marketing collateral (behind product brochures, white papers, and video/multimedia files) and the second most influential type of marketing collateral (trailing only white papers).

Case studies are potent marketing tools because they're good at performing several jobs.

• They help establish your credibility.
• They educate prospects about the benefits of your product or service.
• Most importantly, they can lower a prospect's perception of the risk associated with purchasing your product or service.

The good news is that case studies can boost the effectiveness of your marketing efforts. The not-so-good news is that the use of case studies has exploded, and therefore your case studies are facing more competition for attention and mindshare. If they don't stand out from all the others your prospects see, they simply won't produce the maximum benefits.

I'm often asked by clients to review and comment on their customer case studies. All too often, what I read is self-promotional "brochureware" disguised as a case study.

The mistake that many companies make is to cast themselves, rather than their customers, as the heroes of their case studies. The storyline in many case studies resembles the old silent movie where the villian ties a helpless damsel (the customer) to the railroad tracks, and the hero (the selling company) rides in at the last minute to rescue the damsel in distress from an oncoming train.

A well-written case study will cause readers to identify with the customer. You want readers to empathize with the "pain" the customer was experiencing and the success the customer achieved. In essence, you want readers to finish the case study believing that they can achieve the same success, if they will just let you help. When you make yourself the hero of your case studies, you are asking readers to identify with your company, not the customer. And that's much more difficult to achieve.

It's easy to tell when the selling company has made itself the hero of a case study. Lots of sentences begin with "We" or "Our" and the story focuses on what the selling company (or its product or service) did rather than on what the customer was able to accomplish.

So, when you prepare a case study, you can give yourself a strong supporting role, but always let your customer be the star.

We've created a "mini-guide" to writing compelling customer case studies. If you'd like to get a copy of Seven Tips for Writing Customer Case Studies that Sell, send an e-mail to ddodd(at)pointbalance(dot)com.

Mixing business and beliefs

Lululemon, the Starbucks and Whole Foods of the yoga market,
has stretched too far according to some of its customers.


Elevating the world from mediocrity to greatness


The company’s shopping bags carry a cryptic “Who is John Galt?” line taken from Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand’s objectivist opus. This
has created a bit of a storm in the media teacup.



Should businesses trying to sell stuff

Turn Your Website into a Powerful eCommerce Machine

The current economic environment has been hard on both brick and mortar & online sales. But there are a few simple, yet powerful, things you could do to boost online sales and gain loyal customers.

1. Make Sure Your SSL Seal is Prominent. SSL or secure socket layer is a sign that the site is encrypted…that the information consumers enter, such as personal and credit card information, is protected. Most eCommerce sites must file for an SSL certificate from vendors such as VeriSign, GoDaddy, eTrust, TRUSTe, and others. It’s a good practice to display the vendors logo on your order page, as well as make sure in the browser window the “https” or image of a lock is present. This is a clear and comforting sign to consumers that they can order on line with confidence.

2. Encourage Online Sales vs. Other Order Mechanisms. Offer special “Internet Only Pricing” to customers. It could be a discount of 5-10%. This reduces any potential overhead costs for staffing fees such as telesales or order entry personnel.

3. Offer Free Shipping. Many eTailers already factor shipping into their published price, so when there’s a big, flashing banner next to the item saying “free shipping” it gives consumers that extra little push to move forward with the transaction. It boils down to basic psychology. Everyone likes to feel like they’re getting something for free.

4. Use Buyer Feedback To Your Advantage. Have an area on your website or next to select items that says “Customer Favorite” or “Hot Item”. Also, have some glowing customer testimonials next to the product for potential prospect to see. Consumers like to feel good about the item they are about to purchase. To see a great testimonial and knowing that others purchased the product is a validation and comforting feeling. In addition to helping the conversion, this tactic also helps reduce buyer’s remorse and product returns.

5. Make Sure Your Product Pages are Optimized for Search Engines. After doing some keyword research on actual search behavior for your product, refine your meta description, meta keywords and title tag of your product pages. This will help consumers find your product in the organic listing of search engine results.

6. Have a Special Coupon Code Banner on Your Home Page. This is a best practice with online fashion retailers. There’s typically a banner ad on their home page stating something like, “Summer Blow Out Sale, Use Coupon Code 1234”. This is another great way to offer a special discount for your online customers that makes them feel good about the purchase. You can also encourage viral activity by having a “forward to friend” text link that opens a MSOutlook email window with the coupon or coupon code. Make sure to have some great intro copy mentioning how customers should “pass on the great savings to friends, family, and colleagues.”

7. Consider Payment Plans. For your higher ticket items, consider setting up extended payment plans that allows customers to pay for an item over a few payments. If an item is let’s say, $200, you might want to offer a flex pay of “6 easy payments of $33.33” that is conveniently auto-billed to their credit card. Just be diligent when calculating your payment prices as well as creating your return/refund policy for these items. The general rule is that your actual production costs/hard costs should be covered in the first 1-3 payments.

Remember to keep testing methods that help improve sales and drive prospects to your storefront. Make note of when you implement new tactics, such as the above, and then after a month of being live, compare sales results year-over-year to see if you found the sweet spot in your eCommerce efforts. I’m confident that you will see an improvement in online sales.

9 Great Ways to Build Your List

Whether you're an entrepreneur, corporation, or publisher - the power of the "lead" is critical in growing your business. Leads, also known as prospects, are typically the entry level point of the sales funnel.

A popular business model by many online publishers is to bring in leads at the free level (i.e. free report, free newsletter, free webinar), then add those names to their "list" and usually over the course of 30 - 90 days (the bonding time) that lead will convert into a paying customer. This practice is known as lead generation, name collection or list building efforts.

Today, I'm going to share with you some proven online marketing methods I've used and had great success with at some of the top publishers in America. And bonus ... many of these tactics are little or no cost!Here's the list, in no particular order:

1. Teleseminar or Webinar. This is a great way to collect names. Promote a free teleseminar or webinar to prospects (that is not your internal list). Remember, this is for lead generation, not bonding. So your goal is to give away valuable information in exchange for an email address. The trick is to promote the event in as many places as possible without incurring advertising costs.

2. Co Registration. Co Reg is another way to collect names, but involves a nominal fee. Co Reg is when you place a small ad on another publisher's site after some sort of transaction (albeit a sales or lead gen offer). So for instance, after someone sign s up to AOL Travel eNewsletter, a Thank You page comes up with a list of sponsors the reader may find interesting as well - other free eNewsletter offers. The text ad is usually accompanied by a small graphic image representing the sponsor. The key here is to pick publishers and Co Reg placements that are synergistic to your publication and offer. Another important note is to make sure you follow up quickly to these names so they don't forget who you are. I suggest a dedicated autoresponder series. Co Reg efforts can cost you around $1 - $3 per valid email address.

3. Affiliate Partnerships. This includes JVs (joint ventures), affiliate marketing, guest editorials, editorial contributions, and reciprocal ad swaps. This tactic is extremely effective and cost efficient. The key here is having some kind of leverage then approaching publishers that may want your content or a cross-marketing opportunity to your current list (note: this only works if you have a list of decent size another publisher will find attractive). In exchange for content or revenue share efforts, you and the other publisher agree to reciprocate either eNews ads or solo emails to each other's lists, thereby sending a message to a target, relevant list for free. Well, if you agree on a rev share, it's free as far as ad costs, but you are giving that publisher a split of your net revenues.

4. Content Syndication. I've written about this many times, but can't stress it enough. Content is king and you can leverage it via my SONAR Content Distribution Model TM . SONAR is a cost effective, yet powerful, method of repurposing and synchronizing content (albeit text, audio, video) distribution into various, targeted channels. And it allows companies, publishers, entrepreneurs ... basically anyone with content on their website ... the ability to ultimately turn traffic into sales. SONAR represents the following online distribution platforms:
S Syndicate partners, content syndication networks, and user generate content sites
O Online press releases
N Network (social) communities
A Article directories
R Relevant posts to blogs, forums, and bulletin boards. SONAR works hand-in-hand with your existing search engine marketing (SEM), social media marketing (SMM), and search engine optimization (SEO) tactics.

5. Search Engine Optimization. In order to drive as much organic traffic as possible to your website you need to make sure your site is optimized for the correct keywords and your target audience. Once you optimize your site with title tags, meta descriptions, and meta keywords, you need to make sure you have revised your site to harness the traffic that will be coming. That means adding eye-catching email collection boxes to home page, relevant banners, and obvious links to get to product pages. You don't want to miss any opportunity to turn traffic in to sales or free newsletter subscribers.

6. Media Buying. To compliment your "free" online efforts, you may want to consider targeted, low cost media buys (paid online advertising) in the form of text ads, banner ads, blog ads, or list rentals (i.e. eNews sponsorships or solo emails). You're paying for the placement in these locations, so you must make sure you have strong promotional copy and offer for the best results possible. If you're thinking about buying online ads and want to make sure you get the best rates around, then check out my new ebook, Muscle Media: The Complete Guide to Buying Online Ads For Less.

7. Pay Per Click (PPC). Many people try pay per click only to spend thousands of dollars with little results. Creating a successful PPC campaign is an art - one that I've had success with. You must make sure you have a strong text ad and landing page and that the ad is keyword dense. You must also have a compelling offer and make sure you do your keyword research. Picking the correct keywords that coincide with your actual ad and landing page is crucial. You don't want to pick keywords that are too vague, too competitive, or unpopular. You also need to be active with your campaign management which includes bid amounts and daily budget. All these things - bid, budget, keywords, popularity, and placement - will determine the success of the campaign. And most campaigns are trial and error and take anywhere from 3-6 weeks to optimize.

8. Viral Marketing. Make sure you have a "forward to friend" feature in your eNewsletter to encourage viral marketing. It's also important to have a content syndication blurb in your newsletter, this also encourages other websites, publishers, editors and so forth to republish your content as long as they give you author attribution and a back-link to your site. In addition, the SONAR model above incorporates viral buzz in its strategy, so deploying SONAR will help you increase your website visibility and reach.

9. Polls. Incorporating a poll on your website, or having a poll on another site or eNewsletter (via a media buy or ad swap) is a great way to build your list. It's important to spend time thinking about your poll question - something that a hot topic, controversial, and relevant to the locations you're placing your poll. You want to pull people in with your headline and make the poll entertaining. Your answers should be multiple choice and have an "other" field which encourages participant to engage with your question. I've found this "other" field as a fantastic way to make the poll interactive. Many people are passionate about certain subject matters and won't mind giving you their two cents. Then to show appreciation for talking the poll, tell participants they are getting a bonus report and free eNewsletter subscription (which they can opt out of at any time). And of course, make sure to mention - and link to - your privacy/anti spam policy.After you kick off your list building efforts, make sure you start tracking them so you can quantify the time and resources spent. This involves working with your webmaster on setting up tracking URLs specific to each website you're advertising on. It also means looking at Google Analytics for your website and corresponding landing pages to see traffic and referring page sources.

When deploying social media or SONAR tactics, it's important to look at which sites are linking back to you. You can check this with several free back-link tools such as http://seopro.com.au/free-seo-tools/link-checker/ , http://www.iwebtool.com/backlink_checker , http://www.backlinkwatch.com/index.php . As well as set Google Alerts for related keywords to your marketing efforts. You'll then be notified when someone republishes your content as well as general buzz about you.

This will get your visitor's attention every time...

Whether your goal is cross-selling or lead generation, interstitials are a great way to get someone's attention. An interstitial is not a pop up ad. And typically doesn't get blocked, like pop up ads, by many website or search engines. (For example, Google Adwords won't approve an PPC campaign if the redirect URL goes to a website that has pop up ads).

An interstitial ad is a full-page ad that appears before the actual webpage. Your webmaster or web programmer can put in place via an html script. In a nutshell, it's an ad in the front/center of the screen (some sites even keep the ad in place if you scroll up or down, which I find annoying).

The ad is in color and typically has a strong headline, call to action and graphic. Then the background of the ad is greyed-out where you can still see the website behind the ad, but it's faded - so your focus is on the main ad - the interstitial. There's also a clear and obvious way to close the interstitial. No tricks or hard-to-find 'x' buttons.

Interstitials are ideal if you don't have room for banner or text ads on your website or you don't want to affect the current layout of you home page.Not all interstitials, however, are created equal. I've seen some implemented that are not only unattractive, but are also ineffective with its copy and execution.A text book example of an interstitial ad can be found at EarlytoRise.com. if you go to the home page, wait 10-25 seconds, the ad will appear in the center of the page with the backdrop shaded.

The beauty of this is that you can make your actual ad space as big or small as you need. Your offer can be to sell something or to obtain an email address. You can include eye-catching images or have a countdown box to an event.

Whatever your offer or need ... an interstitial can deliver. And best of all, you don't have to wonder if your website visitor saw the ad or not. It's no doubt they did. You are just giving them the option to act on it OR close it.

Customer Service as a Competitive Advantage

I’ve just returned from the National Arts Marketing Project Conference, the annual gathering of arts marketers convened by Americans for the Arts. I’ve gone to the conference for the past seven years to reconnect with colleagues, learn from case studies and catch up on new trends. As I return home this year, I am mindful that some arts marketers have limited control or influence over mission critical decisions, many of which affect audiences, revenue streams and branding. As marketers position themselves as growing agents of influence in their various organizations, I can’t help but think that perhaps our energies should be spent concentrating on the underperforming areas in which we can be the most impactful.

In this new environment of reduced resources, the ability for an organization to identify its competitive advantages is vital. Some of which, marketers have no responsibilities for. Others, we lead. In listening to Scott Stratten's opening keynote address at the conference, I was reminded that the general woeful state of customer service provides a prime opportunity for arts organizations to distinguish themselves. In short, Scott reminded us that we should always look for "opportunities to be awesome."

Some thoughts on how we can achieve awesomeness…

Awesomeness comes from humanness. We have our rules. Our policies and procedures. It is easy and efficient to train automatons. But the greatest value of human interaction from a transactional perspective is our unique ability to empathize, reason and trouble shoot. We have to encourage front line brand ambassadors to use their judgment. Empower them to solve problems. Reward them for breaking the rules when required because by design, rules are created for routine situations, not exceptional ones. Why hire smart and caring people if those attributes don’t influence operations? I left the conference thinking that if we all treated our customers like we would our mothers, our spouses, our best friends, that we might have lifelong relationships with them as well.

Awesomeness is unexpected. In the spirit of a random act of kindness, what if we asked our brand ambassadors to perform one act of unexpected awesomeness each day? It doesn't have to be a splashy show, as even an understated, thoughtful gesture can make someone's day. Imagine a scenario where a man calls the box office to get tickets to a performance for his wife to celebrate their anniversary, and the box office associate makes a note and leaves a few chocolates and an anniversary card waiting in their seats when they arrive. Wouldn't that be awesome? and don't you think they would remember that gesture for years to come?

Awesomeness doesn't wait for approval. Many times awesomeness is a derivative of authenticity. If corporate policy dictates that brand ambassadors need to get approval to provide extraordinary customer service, then the window of opportunity to be awesome disappears. Great customer service comes from authentic responses. If we hire caring and helpful brand ambassadors, managers need to step out of the way and let them do what they do best. Don't lose an opportunity to be awesome because you have to send it up the ladder for approval.

Awesomeness often results from a mistake. We all make mistakes, even the best of us. Even when we have the best intentions. What really matters is how we respond to our mistakes. Mistakes must be viewed as opportunities to provide great customer service. An extraordinary response to a mistake can provide for a lifelong memorable experience for a customer. In 2008, Arena Stage had to cancel a performance due to a substantial snowstorm, and although we contacted all the patrons we had contact information for, we didn’t get through to everyone. Prior to leaving their house in Philadelphia, one particularly adventurous couple called the sales office, and were informed the performance in question was still scheduled to perform. When they arrived, and discovered the show was canceled and the weather had deteriorated, not only were they disappointed, but they were stranded as well. We should have canceled earlier to give our patrons more notice. But before us was an opportunity to be awesome. Without being asked, our sales office worked with a partner hotel to arrange a room for them free of charge that evening using some trade rooms available to us from a previous cross-promotion. We reseated them into the following day’s performance, and the couple headed back to Philadelphia with a fond memory of their visit to Arena Stage. The moment immediately following a significant mistake is crucial. Don't hesitate. Own the mistake, and resolve it above and beyond a customer's expectations.

Arts organizations are charged with building communities. Communities are centered around relationships. We are in the relationship-building business. As such, we should approach each patron interaction from a position of "yes" rather than "no." Policies and procedures should be built with a focus on deepening our relationships within our communities. And each day as we go into work, we should look for opportunities to be awesome.

Don't ask consumers what they want

Asking consumers what they want is so passé.



There was a time when brand and marketing managers would not
think of making a decision about the product, its features, packaging, and even
pricing without asking the consumer first – mostly through surveys. Lengthy
questionnaires were always being designed, tested, administered, analyzed, and
interpreted. Management meetings were called to

Take the Survey: B2B Marketing Trends in 2012

With 2011 coming to a close, what do you think will be the major trends and priority shifts for B2B marketers in 2012?

Take the 2-minute survey to share your thoughts:
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/Marketing2012

You will receive a copy of the survey report as a thank you!

What "The Challenger Sale" Can Teach Us About Content Marketing

The Challenger Sale by Matthew Dixon and Brent Adamson is one of the most important books on selling that's appeared in the last several years. The book is based on an in-depth research project conducted by the Corporate Executive Board. The research involved an analysis of over 6,000 sales reps from all major industries and geographies.

The objective of the CEB research was to identify what skills, behaviors, knowledge, and attitudes separate top-performing sales reps from average performers. What the researchers found runs counter to much of the long-held conventional wisdom about what drives sales success.

The first major finding is that salespeople fall into one of five distinct profiles:

• The Hard Worker
• The Challenger
• The Relationship Builder
• The Lone Wolf
• The Reactive Problem Solver

The second important finding is that one type of sales rep - The Challenger - clearly outperforms all of the others. Thirty-nine percent of all "star" salespeople are Challengers. One of the major surprises in the research is that Relationship Builders are the big losers. Only 7% of all star reps fall into that category.

The Challenger Sale is written from a sales perspective, but it has a lot to say to marketers. The connection to marketing becomes clear when we look at what causes Challenger sales reps to be successful. Dixon and Adamson found that Challenger reps excel because they provide customers and prospects new, valuable, and unique insights that help them compete more effectively in their markets. Challengers pressure their prospects and customers to question their assumptions and think about their business in new and different ways.

It turns out (as shown by other Corporate Executive Board research) that this is what prospects and customers really want. Buyers say they highly value sales reps who:

• Offer unique and valuable perspectives on the market
• Help them navigate alternatives
• Provide ongoing advice or consultation
• Help them avoid potential land mines
• Educate them on new ideas and outcomes

These are exactly the things that Challenger sales reps do. Rather that just asking a bunch of questions to identify needs and then offering a solution, Challengers bring new insights (and therefore value) to the conversation with the buyer.

Today, marketing content must perform many of these same functions. Because business buyers are doing more research on their own, your marketing content must act as your "surrogate sales rep" early in the buying process. This research shows that your content needs to be a "surrogate Challenger sales rep."

Those of use who write about content marketing emphasize the importance of using content that is primarily educational, that is customized for specific buyer personas and that speaks to where a potential buyer is in his or her buying process. All those things are important, but what really separates great marketing content from content that is merely good is that great content also provokes new thinking. Great marketing content provides unique and valuable perspectives that prod potential buyers to consider new alternatives for improving their business.

How much of your marketing content would pass the "Challenger" test?

Marketing, dreams, and Hollywood

I was watching Inception for the fourth time the other day –
it was like being in a dream (inside (inside a dream) a dream). I finally got it. I think.



Hollywood and the marketing industry have a lot in common: both
create fantasy worlds that spark our imagination. Both build dreams.















Hollywood’s goal is to entertain (and some of the more
ambitious movies also aim to make us

List Building 2.0: Polls For Prospecting

By now most people know that Web 2.0 is simply the evolution of the Internet into an environment of interactivity, reader participation, and usability. Web 2.0 opens up the dialog between user and website or blog. This connection can help generate traffic and a viral buzz.

But from a search engine marketing (SEM) standpoint, the benefits are clear and measurable: More traffic and frequent interactivity (or posts) equal better organic (free) rankings in search engine results. Getting good organic rankings is a powerful way to find qualified prospective customers.

So what online tactic encourages Web 2.0 principles as well as helps with search engine results page rank, visibility and listing building efforts? Targeted online acquisition polls.

Online acquisition polls can help you collect names and e-mail addresses, gauge general market (or subscriber) sentiment, and generate sales via a redirect to a promotional page. They also allow for interactivity, where a user can sound off about a hot topic. I've been including polls in my online marketing strategy for nearly a decade now, and have rarely been disappointed with the results. Some websites, like surveymonkey.com, allow members to set up free or low-cost surveys and polls.

However, they may not allow you to include a name-collection component or a redirect to a promotional offer. If that's the case, either ask your Webmaster to build you a proprietary poll platform or use a poll script. (You'll find examples at hotscripts.com, bgpoll.com/, ballot-box.net/faq.php, micropoll.com, and 2enetworx.com.) Here are eight ways to help make your online poll a success:

1. Make it engaging.Your poll question should engage the reader, encourage participation, pique interest, and tie into a current event. And be sure to have a "comments" field where people can make additional remarks. Sample topics: politics, the economy, health, consumer breakthroughs, the stock market, foreign affairs. Sites that highlight the most talked-about (and searched) topics on the Web include buzz.yahoo.com/, 50.lycos.com/, and google.com/press/zeitgeist.html.

2. Be relevant.Your poll question should also be related to your product, free e-zine topic, or free bonus report topic. This will greatly improve your conversion rate (the number of people who actually participate in your poll) and your up-sell rate. Let's say your free offer is a sign-up for an investment e-zine and your up-sell is a redirect landing page promotion for a paid investment newsletter. In that case, your poll question should be market related, something like "Where is gold headed in 2012?"

3. Offer an incentive.After people take your poll, tell them that to thank them for their participation you're automatically signing them up for your free e-zine or e-alerts... which they can opt out of at any time. To reduce the number of bogus e-mail addresses you get, offer a free "must-read" e-report too. And assuming it's your policy not to sell or rent e-mail names to third parties (and it should be), indicate that next to the sign-up button. This will reassure people that it's safe to give you their e-mail address.

4. Tag the responses.Having your poll question somehow tie into your product line makes the names you collect extremely qualified for future offers. Each name should be "tagged" by your database folks according to the answer they gave. Segmenting the names into such categories will make it easier for you to send targeted offers to them later. Let's say your product line includes an investment e-zine on equities. In that case, your poll question might ask people which investment product they think has the best returns: money market, gold, equities, or options. Those who answer "equities" will be prime candidates for a promotion for the e-zine.

5. Use the results for new initiatives.In addition to collecting names, online polls will help you gauge general market opinion - and could help you come up with new products. Keeping with our above example, you would flag all of the responses that come in. Then, if an overwhelming number of responders indicate an interest in an investment product you don't have - maybe one on gold - you should consider developing one. Because you now have an instant market of people to sell that product to.

6. Strengthen your new relationships.You need to reinforce the connection between the poll people just participated in and your e-zine or e-alerts. So make sure each name that comes in gets an immediate "thank you" (for taking the poll). Then send an automatically generated e-mail with the link for the downloadable free e-report you promised. Consider sending a series of "bonding" e-mails to them too - to help them get to know who you are, what you do, and how it will benefit them. This will help improve their lifetime customer value.

7. Gratify participants with the results.Don't just leave poll participants hanging. Make sure you tell them that the results will be published in your free e-zine or on your website (to encourage them to check it regularly). This will help increase readership and website traffic.

8. Publish the best reader comments.On your poll landing page, mention that some user feedback may be published (anonymously) in your e-zine or on your website. Pick the very best, most powerful responses to use. Republishing user feedback is fundamental to the Web 2.0 concept. And it has been extremely successful for social networking communities and blogs.

Marketers have used polls internally (on their own company website) for years. But now more than ever, with its cost effectiveness and efficiency, polls should be used to collect leads and interact with prospects. Polls aren't just for finding leads, either. They are also great for measuring market sentiment - which, in turn, can be insight that impacts your customer retention and service efforts.

Create Market Demand And Visibility

If you're about to launch a new product, book, website, or whatever and don't know where to begin - then you MUST read this...

After launching multiple products, websites and creating the marketing launch plans for several books that hit Amazon #1 best seller status in record time -- such as books by Michael Masterson, Bob Bly, and my own book, Content Is Cash -- there's a proven formula that works every time no matter what the actual "thing" is you're launching. Even better, many of these tactics are low to no cost. It's coordination and synchronization of online marketing efforts all culminating around a specific time period (i.e. certain a day of the week).

These efforts include:

--Staggered messages. These will go to your list and other external, synergistic lists such as affiliates, JV partners, friends, and industry contacts and include solo emails, ezine ads, editorial contributions (with ed. note) and social marketing efforts. The goal is to build anticipation and create a pent up demand about the "thing" that is going to be launched. Efforts should start 2-3 weeks out and pick up intensity and frequency on the designated launch date. Qualified people that demonstrated an interest during your pre-launch "teaser" efforts can be added to you hot list can also be the first to know about future new releases, beta testing and similar "insider" privileges. In addition to your regular bonding efforts and auto responder series, these names will then have potential to also be your top buyers new products.

--Social media. Start seeding relevant blogs, message boards, chat rooms and forums with information about your soon-to-be-released "thing". Record a video of yourself and your product on YouTube. Push out relevant, useful and actionable editorial that ties to your "thing" on top social media sites like Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. Ultimately, create messages that have the potential to go viral and create buzz around your launch.

--Content Marketing. Write a few keyword rich articles that tie into the theme of your launch and upload to top tiered article directory sites. Link all to your launch promo page (or wherever you want to drive traffic to for consumer to take action). Make sure you start your efforts a few weeks prior to launch so can gain momentum and exposure in search engine results pages.

--Pay per click. If you have the budget, bid on your relevant keywords to your launch theme and have a pre launch page that collects names to build your hot list. Offer a free report that also ties into your theme to help start the buy in and create demand. This is a great way to gauge general market interest in your product, but note, that this is a lead gen effort and not an immediate sale. So be prepared to pay for the lead. The sale should happen within 30 days of your launch, after proper bonding efforts are established and your normal sales funnel commences.

--Online PR. Get your message out quickly and cost effectively through free online press release distribution services. Make sure your release is truly newsworthy and not just fluff, if you want it to be credible. These efforts should occur the day of your release. If you have a budget, you can compliment free online PR efforts with a paid service, such as PRWeb.com, for a nominal one-time fee, and it will greatly increase your reach and exposure. Either distribution channel, the release will get picked up by bloggers, media websites, industry websites, and online news aggregators (such as Yahoo and Google) and not only increase awareness, but also give you back-links (SEO!) as well as have the potential to go viral.

--Online Classifieds. Increase your launch exposure by placing free text ads on sites such as CraigsList. The ad can be about your "thing" and link preferably to your promo webpage. Just make sure you select the right (relevant) category to put your add under in order to ensure you capture the right audience.

--Webinar/Teleseminar. Have a post-launch date free event to help increase visibility, leads and sales. Promote it through social media, internal lists and external partners. Again, the theme must tie into the "thing" you've launched as well as include an added value such as free Q&A session or workshop where participants can text in questions either real time or before the event (depending on how you set up your event). This also helps with bonding and credibility.

All of these efforts together tend to create an "avalanche" effect by picking up speed and getting bigger the more the efforts roll out. This helps create momentum and online traction. In a nutshell, you're creating market demand and interest poising yourself for optimum results.