New Year New Marketing:
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Ahh, new year's resolutions. How many of you have these? We
usually set goals like "lose weight, eat healthy, spend
more time with the kids" for ourselves. But goal setting
for your company is more than achieving a sales number. It
requires people-powered activities, and people can be distracted,
sidelined and unfocused. This month, we have some ideas for
you that will help you keep your resolutions. Here's one tip
we love:
Assign Deadlines
Things that have deadlines tend to move you to take action.
Things that are scheduled for "as soon as possible" wind
up in the "as soon as possible" pile and get procrastinated,
or worse yet, never done. (Did you ever make a New Year's resolution
that you failed to follow through on? Come on, be honest!)
A powerful motivator is to set deadlines realistically
and then add on a buffer of time, just in case. Things
always
seem to take longer than we planned. By giving yourself
a margin
of error, you will reduce stress and, even better, you
will deliver before the promised deadline and look
even better.
(Promise a lot but deliver a lot more.)
From the "Free Timely Time Management Tips List," sponsored
by Dr. Donald E. Wetmore and the Productivity Institute. Free
Time Management articles are available at their homepage: http://www.balancetime.com
Goal Setting
Another powerful motivator is to write down your goals.
Early in the year, we set aside time to outline five
major goals
for the year. Here are my five goals (and deadlines)
and how you can apply them to your firm: by Ann Siegle
Focus on top prospects - those with outstanding proposals
How many proposals did you write last year?
If you did not get them all, did you call to find out
why? Asking the client about the proposal one month
after you
submit it, means they're probably not so close to the
decision that
it's painful to discuss, but not too far that they've
forgotten who you were. NEVER bid on a blind proposal.
If you don’t
know the person, get to know them before the bid.
Focus on migrating existing clients to the next level
Everyone knows the adage "it's easier to sell an existing
customer 'up' than it is to sell to a new customer." We
rank customers from A to D, A clients are the ones who refer
us to others, and who are our closest clients. B clients are
solid, reliable, trusted clients who have been with us for
years. C clients are newer clients who could still, if a bad
situation arose, leave for another firm, or they're existing
clients who don’t use us exclusively as their design
firm. D clients are those that are difficult, pay slowly and/or
demand unreasonable attention or significant discounts even
when they have urgent deadlines. We try never to have a D client
in house (if you're reading this you're not a D client).
We
like the book Getting New Clients by Dick Connor
Focus on 2nd tier prospects, ones
that are not yet close, but have potential—utilize
whitepaper and educational marketing efforts
There are a number of you on our list -- and
I'm sure you have these very same prospects on
your
OWN lists
-- the
prospects that are out there, but aren't in a
buying mode, but still
need contact. Graphic design (like many custom,
higher value services) is not something someone
needs every
day. It's
a
relationship based business, like an attorney
or accountant. So it takes longer to establish
a trust
level with
prospects. We try to show them we're smart about
what we are good
at, and persuade them to consider us when they
DO have a need.
Remember
sales starts with visibility so get to events.
A local marketing expert, Malinda Barr of Get Up
and Grow tells clients to give up cold calling. Why?
Out
of every
100 cold
calls, 3 are potential clients. Out of 100 warm calls,
60 are potential clients. Now, what makes the most
fiscal sense?
To
court the 3 or the 60? But in order to get warm clients
you've gotta meet people. Joining and becoming active
in a number
of business and social groups one way to do that.
We're joining the Chamber's Small Business Council;
and I'm
the 2nd VP
of Membership with the Lansing Advertising Club;
and Post Commodore
of the Lansing Sailing Club. Further, I'm considering
making my own bike jerseys sponsored with my company
logo, because
everyone I talk to seems to be a cyclist!
Perfection
is key in marketing deliverables
If we don’t proof (see our proofing checklist
below) and our work is sloppy that's what people
will see. Producing
shoddy work (in-house or with an outside supplier)
is a common problem for many otherwise great firms.
We see it every day, a company with a wonderful,
and expensive product or service, produces
work that's not up to the
level of what they're pricing their product
or service at. A rule
of thumb is to spend 3-5% of your gross sales
and 25%
of your gross man-hours on marketing. You're
better off saving
your
money, getting to events and handing out business
cards than producing a bad marketing piece.
This includes
your web site
too. We see more glaring errors in image, content
and communication here than almost anywhere
else.
Great work can also be marketing
If you've got a great product and service,
simply showcasing what you do with your clients
is marketing
in itself.
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It's a
new year, is your marketing working for you?
If you're unsure, try our Tria Mini Marketing
Communications Audit FREE. It's a two-hour
session; first we meet
with you in your office and review
all of your marketing communications;
and then, at our office, we perform
a quantitative review using a process developed by the
independent Boston-based
consultancy
Creative Business. It won't tell you
all
that you need to
know, but it will illuminate opportunity
areas and highlight success
areas so you know where you need to
refocus your efforts.
After the review, if you find you have
some 'issues,' we can work with you
on our Tria
Tandem Communications
Audit
-- which
is a stepped-up level of interactive
review. We have several 'levels' at which you can
pursue this, depending
upon your
budget and your timeframe. At the end
you'll have a plan that outlines what you're going
to do, to
whom
you're
going to communicate,
what results you'll expect and when
you'll expect to get them.
If you're considering whether you need
to hire a marketing or design firm
(or a combo
firm
like Tria)
or ad agency,
you might first ask yourself the
following questions, then check
out the following resources:
Do you have your own marketing communications
plan?
- If you do, you might consider
a design firm over an agency or
marketing
firm
Do you need media buying services?
-If so a full service agency might
be the ticket
Do you need to manage sensitive
issues?
-Politicians, companies with 'issues'
to manage (where public support
is needed)
might be better
suited
to a PR firm
Do you need to develop a marketing
plan?
Either an agency, or a design and
marketing firm like Tria can help
you develop
your marketing plan.
========
Other
helpful links:
http://sherpastore.com/store/page.cfm/2131
How to Select & Compensate the Best Ad Agency for Your
Needs
How to create a short-list, compare
agencies, scientifically judge
their presentations,
and negotiate to pay the
fairest price for services. Also
includes legal advice for your
contract. Useful for all types
of clients and accounts (online
and
off.) These guides run $24.99 each
FREE resource:
Why
Hire a Creative Supplier,
How
to get Great Work out of your Creative Supplier
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Pricing online advertising
http://www.workz.com/cgi-bin/gt/tpl_page.html,template=1&content=2298&nav1=1&user=ffffffffffff
http://www.inc.com/articles/2000/01/15965.html
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How do you want to hear from us?
In an effort to help you control
telemarketing, and spam,
we're asking each of you
to reconfirm your
preferences with us.
Watch your mailbox for a postcard
to send back to us about how YOU
want to
be contacted.
We won't
call or e-mail
if you
don’t
want us to.
========
Proofing
a project? There's more to proofing than
running spell
check.
Linda Brennan, Tria's
guru of grammar & style,
provides this month's
proofing checklist,
which you can
download from
our server. It is a
handy checklist that
you should
use for EVERY
project you
produce, whether internal
or with Tria. It's
FREE and you can download
it here.
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Featured Project
of the Month:
Visit our site to
see the featured
design project
of the month.
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Two Upcoming Events to Note
Lansing Ad Club - Craig Harper VP of Simmons Research on Understand
= Relationships = Branding - Janury 21st 5:30-8pm
Lansing Ad Club - Addy Advertising Award Preview Party - View
all the creative entered in the 2004 competition before the
judges get to it. January 23rd 5-8pm.
For more
info about these events email us
========
If you like this newsletter
and think a colleague or friend would like it, just use the "send
to a friend" button at the bottom.
Don’t forget, every
month we give you great downloadable resources, like
"Why
Hire a Creative Supplier,"
"How
to get Great Work out of your Creative Supplier,"
and our famous "Marketing
Projects: Planning & Pricing Guide"
which helps you schedule and budget print and web projects.
The first two are from an independent Boston advisory company.
The third we've developed over a decade or more of working on
projects with clients.
Thinking of design & marketing night & day,
Your friends at Tria,
Linda, Ann and Tina
If you want more information on these articles or anything else
related to design or marketing, please e-mail us at info@triadesignfirm.com
