Brand One Marketing

Social Networking 101

I found this post online. It echos what so many small business owners are feeling at this moment in time:

Over the past couple of months I have been muddling my way through setting up a social media marketing “strategy” (both personally and corporately) here at SamePage. Currently, my strategy resembles the equivalent of a bunch of “digital post-it notes”:various bookmarks, URLs, links what-have-you scattered across my desk(top), browser, iPhone, etc. How do you scrape all this together into a coherent, useable, package? RSS, Twitter, tehnorati, ning, FB….a couple of times I have literally deactivated my FB account because I felt a responsibility to maintain it even though I found most of the content completely irrevelant.

IMO, there’s no one answer, or a single course of action that’s guaranteed to bring marketing Nirvana. What seems to apply best to small business marketers is outlined here:

1. Make your blog the centerpiece of your social networking strategy.

A “well connected” blog can feed content to other platforms such as Twitter and Facebook, and do so automatically. Fresh content on your blog has the added advantage of improving ratings on search engines such as Google. Google loves fresh content, that is rich in relevant keywords. From a larger picture/strategic standpoint: the blog is the a natural place to generously share your expertise with the world and create a network of fans.

2. Tie your blog closely to your website and overall web presence.

The best thinking about the new web puts you in the middle of an online community. Websites built to function only as an online brochure likely won’t do much to generate buzz about your products and services.

3. Don’t start until you have something worth talking about.

No amount of clever online strategy will create buzz if your product or service itself is boring, commonplace or irrelevant to the world. As master marketer Seth Godin says, being remarkable is at the center of it all.

You Lie!

On Building Trust:

The world doesn’t trust you. It no longer believes the claims you make about your business. Why should it? Capitalism at it’s worst makes a big splash in the media almost daily. Product claims are made at the expense of our health and safety. Even everyday events drive home the point: pay more for a smaller package… EPA Highway Mileage (downhill with a tailwind)… immunity boosting cereal (it doesn’t), and the list goes on.

To an increasing extent, talking up your own company doesn’t matter.
Instead, listening seems like a better strategy these days. Find out what customers are saying about you, both online and face to face. The reality (not the spin) of your place in the marketplace is now more than ever the space where success lies. Beyond that, an attitude of sharing and generosity goes a long way today. By freely sharing your expertise, you provide value and build relationships. And you get people talking.

The Secret and Marketing Presence

A lot of folks treat marketing and advertising as a form of insurance, a sort of protection against the crisis day when the phone stops ringing and the nobody walks through the front door. In fact, that dreaded day came for many a business over the past few months; frequently their insurance policy failed to pay off.

Some wait until their showroom floor resembles a morgue before thinking about doing any marketing. They’re thinking: “Dear Lord, what will we do if this offer doesn’t pull in some business.”

Will your work be creative and innovative while a cloud of doom hovers over your head? If you’re advertising under duress, the universe responds in kind and brings you what you dread the most. It’s as if your customers can smell panic.

On the other hand, if you enjoy the marketing process, stay the course through thick and thin, proceed with positive long term expectations, keep a calm and quiet mind, and focus on remaining thankful for the myriad gifts we so often overlook, the universe will bring you more to be thankful about.

Here’s the math: Q=SM2. The quality of your work is geometrically proportional to your state of mind. It’s the Secret Formula for Success. Along these lines a quote from Eckhart Tolle:

When you are present in this moment, you break the continuity of your story, of past and future. Then true intelligence arises, and also love. The only way love can come into your life is not through form, but through that inner spaciousness that is Presence. Love has no form.

Writers of Short Sentences

by Bill Alpert

Perhaps you’re old enough to remember video of John Cameron Swayze delivering the iconic Timex slogan: Takes a Licking and Keeps on Ticking. Fans of the recent TV series Mad Men were recently reminded of the classic Think Small print ad campaign for Volkswagen. Both ads were conceived and penned by the legendary copywriter Julian Koenig.

Seems like great copywriting is largely a lost art. A recent blog post by from a well known e-mail marketing company posited that “e-mail copy that sells” must include benefits, subheads, short blocks of conversational copy, a well crafted subject line, etc. All of these elements refer to form, and little falls to content. There’s nothing about reaching out to the reader with a single coherent message. Nothing about capturing the readers’ imagination. Nothing about ideas that are compelling and memorable.

And then there’s the disturbing adulation of psychological trickery in web marketing content as well as the ascent of highly paid Google AdWords strategists. All of this seems to nicely coincide with the collapse of our economic system. It’s like the dot com bubble all over again, this time accompanied by credit default swaps and insanely over-leveraged financial institutions. Lack of substance might be the appropriate words to sum things up.

In the good ol’ days, marketers were gifted writers who worked in a commercial setting. Though these writers of short sentences (a phrase credited to Mr. Koenig) weren’t revered by their peers, today one can find much to appreciate in their work. A fascinating account of the advertising world, including a contemporary interview of Mr. Koenig can be heard on a recent installment of This American Life.

Today’s e-conomy can be looked at as a house of cards. Much is free or cheap on the internet, and the temptation to do-it yourself is the order of the day. The problem is that talented graphic designers, skilled commercial artists and great copywriters (for that matter all stripes of writers) need to eat too. Ironically, their talents are needed now more than ever.

Weak Starts

These days patience runs a little thin, especially when inept telemarketers call. Actually, I’m happy to take a call from a skilled phone marketer who is respectful and brings information concerning a high value offering. It’s like hearing a concert violinist in action. Unfortunately most callers manage to annoy you before they finish a single sentence. Here are a few offending openings that don’t make the grade:

“How are you doing today?” (great ‘til you called)

“I’m going down the list” (yes, and so are the other 20 other people I hear in the background)

“May I speak to the owner” (do your homework before you call, buddy)

“I’m related to such and such company” (he/she isn’t)

“I’m calling about your credit card” (you got my home phone from Visa, and now you’re pitching me)

“I’m calling for the local firefighter fund” (which receives about .02% of the proceeds)

“I’m doing a survey” (survey the wart on my big toe, if you like)

“I’m from the local high school” (Funny, you sound 40 if you’re a day. Sorry kids, you need to do your own fundraising)

The golden rule for telemarketing still needs to be written. Perhaps its first provision should read: “do not pitch another with that which you wouldn’t want to be pitched yourself!”

Telemarketing by nature has an inherent weakness: it’s usually better if your customers call you first. That’s the value of a targeted, demographically relevant direct mail. It enables marketers to connect with their customers in a non-threatening, relationship building context. Over time, that amounts to marketing gold.