Archive for the ‘Marketing’ Category

11th September

Building Your Own Personal Brand

Last night I had the opportunity to speak at Fairfield University about user personas. Before I began my talk, the class watched this excellent 20-minute presentation on personal branding by David Armano. David was a featured presenter at the Chicago Convergence conference back in March.

Besides the emphasis on personal branding, there’s a lot of great information about using social media to effectively influence market perception. David also makes excellent use of visual diagrams to explain his points. Enjoy and have a great weekend!

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28th July

User Experience Marketing

happy_customers
In a recent blog post, John S. Rhodes suggests that user experience design and direct marketing are the same. While I don’t agree they are identical disciplines, I do agree they have a lot in common. I also believe that blending the two creates a powerful concept I like to call User Experience Marketing, or UXM for short.

More Sales and Happier Customers

UXM reflects the total online user experience. It is about attracting ideal customers and giving them such a great experience they simply have to come back for more. It’s all about them.

Think about your favorite restaurant. Why do you keep coming back? Is it the food? The ambiance? It’s probably the way you feel when you are there.

The table setting, the candlelight, menu and mood make you feel great. And then the food is a total slam dunk. You can’t wait to return and tell all your friends. That’s user experience marketing in action.

Better Online Experiences                        

On the web, UXM is about creating relevant, useful online experiences that reach customers at an emotional level. Just like your favorite restaurant, coming back for more of what you have to offer not only feels great, it feels natural. 

Marketers with a solid understanding of UX principles and UX designers who have studied direct marketing are in the best position to help design teams achieve the best user experience, especially as the social web becomes more prevalent. These UXM practitioners have the ability help ensure more effective communication between marketing, creative and technical teams. This ultimately leads to better design and execution simply because people are talking to each other.                      

Measurable Results

All of this doesn’t happen magically. It requires careful testing and analysis in the real world. User testing combined with regular team feedback needs to happen early and often. The only thing that matters is results. If a preliminary concept or creative direction doesn’t stick, teams should lather, rinse and repeat until it does.  

Executives may balk at this iterative approach since additional cycles may add more cost to the production schedule. But which is better, to save time and money and launch a product that misses the mark, or to make planned course corrections as you go and hit a home run with customers? 

Research by Mauro New Media states, “For every dollar you spend improving the visual design or style of your site, you will receive virtually no improvement in sales. The same dollar spent on improving core behavioral interactions with your site’s critical way-finding and form-filling functions will, however, return $50-100.” 

Focus On The Ideal Customer                    

From the way your website looks, feels, communicates and behaves all the way through the final email or confirmation page, every step is carefully orchestrated for your ideal customer. The results are more sales from more qualified customers and customers who become evangelical toward your product or service.

This focus on creating the ideal customer experience keeps the door open for future opportunity. Every time they deal with you they know they’ll get even more value. Companies that practice user experience marketing offer a seamless, practical and pleasant customer experience. Who wouldn’t want more of that?
 

Perception and Reality

While it starts with the offer and ends with the transaction, the experience is what customers remember. Was it good? Was it bad? Did you go the extra mile for them and was that their perception? Make it the best experience you can for them and they’ll spread the word for you. 

What do you think about User Experience Marketing? Please share your thoughts in the comments.

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Posted in Marketing | 2 Comments »

21st July

How To Write A Basic Marketing Plan


Business Charts & Graphs

Marketing plans are critical for any size company, especially in this economy. An effective marketing plan helps you identify your sales goals and position your product or service within the overall competitive landscape. Over time the plan can become an ongoing blueprint for business development.

A well-written marketing plan helps you think through how you will reach prospects and customers with your message. It demonstrates how you will acquire leads and convert them into paying customers. While high-end Harvard MBA-type marketing plans have their appropriate place, I’m going to show you how to create a quick n’ dirty marketing plan that you can use right now. Assuming you have already developed your product or service, this very basic plan will help you get your business going and growing.

Executive Summary

Like a business plan, this section gives a short description of your company, product and/or service, and should state your high-level marketing goals. An example of a high-level marketing goal would be something like “We plan to sell 100,000 units online by the end of our fiscal year and achieve a 10-15% profit margin”.     

Target Audience

Rather than trying to sell to everyone, identify the people most interested in your product or service. Ask yourself these questions and write down the answers in your plan:  
  • Who is your audience? What are their demographics?
  • What are their hot buttons?
  • What will move them to take action?
Products and Services 

Use this section to describe your products, services and pricing in more detail.  
 

Competitive Advantage    

What is it about your product or service that truly separates you from your competition? Who is your competition, and what is your remarkable difference?

 

Core Messaging Strategy
 
What’s the core message for your product or service? Is it the right message? How do you know? You may think you know what your audience will respond to, but it’s much more effective to prove it in the real world by doing research. This is the best way to develop the right messaging for your customers.   
 
Customer Research    

First, identify the most promising target audience in as much detail as possible. In other words, find these people in the real world and find out what makes them tick. How do you do that? There are two main ways, both of which are equally important:

1) Online research such as Google News Alerts, relevant blogs and forums
2) Interviews with 5-10 potential customers (you probably have them in your database or existing network)

These two steps will help you identify issues that are important to your audience. They will also help identify online communities, trade associations, publications and any other vehicles you can use to reach them with your message.

Next, test some preliminary messages to confirm they resonate with your target audience and elicit the desired response. If they don’t, revise them until they do. Once you get the messaging locked you can start getting the word out.
 
Tactics

Based on your research, your marketing plan might include the following proposed tactics:   

  • Elevator pitch with the key value proposition
  • Key benefits/selling points
  • A sales kit with a powerpoint presentation, business cards, company backgrounder
  • Viral marketing through Twitter/Facebook
  • PR
  • Testimonials
  • Email marketing
  • Blogging/community building
  • Trade shows
  • Test Plan
Each proposed tactic should be fleshed out in more detail stating how it will be executed and measured.
 
Budget 
 
You need to understand why you are going to spend money on a given marketing tactic. Some companies redesign their website because they saw it in the latest marketing newsletter. That’s not a good reason to shell out your hard-earned cash. Instead, ask yourself, for every dollar you spend on marketing, what’s the expected return? Go in with the expectation that marketing dollars and associated projects must generate revenue. Each tactic will have an associated cost, whether it’s your own time or outside costs such as email vendors, printing costs or consulting fees. So make sure your plan is both practical and within your budget.
 
Success Metrics 
 
How do you know if any of these things are going to work? Effective online marketing is easily measured. It either works or it doesn’t. This is why Google is so successful and traditional advertising is dwindling. For every tactic you use to support your marketing strategy, make sure you can measure its overall effectiveness. Google Analytics and services like Crazy Egg are best for websites and blogs, and many online marketing vendors have dashboards that let you measure things like open rates and clickthroughs. Just remember that what gets measured gets managed. Know what you want to accomplish before you launch your campaigns.
 

Test and Test Again

Finally, keep testing and revising your message and tactics as often as possible. Stay close to your market and listen to what they say. Successful marketing is all about fulfilling customer needs. Ask your customers what they want and deliver it to them in a memorable, professional, and profitable way.

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