Leading a Horse to Water

I've been blogging since 2006. Yeah, I know... where has the time gone?

Considering how pressed for time everyone is these days - myself included, I've somehow managed to come up with over 60,000 words of content in 132 posts, spread over 2 blogs.

The topic of conversation typically centers around marketing, or with some sort of a marketing flavour. But, sometimes it's just for fun.

When writing about marketing, I don't hold back any information - while trying to explain a concept or process I try to be as descriptive as possible without writing a novel. It's important not to be superfluous, it's a blog after all and brevity is key. The KISS principle is applicable in nearly every situation, rocket surgery excluded.

With over 20 years experience, I think I've got a lot to share. And, share I do. In fact, much of what's posted is advice that customers typically pay for... and I'm giving it away here for free! No loss-leaders here folks, it's all laid out here for you to read and hopefully implement in your own business. The writing is not technical by any stretch, it's in plain speak and I try to include examples where I can.

Here are a few of the marketing posts that I think are key reading if you are looking to make improvements on your marketing:

• Your Brand Motto, perhaps the most important of all is to understand your brand.
• Meeting Expectations is so important in creating your brand.
• Understanding the importance of Branding, in general terms.
• Everyone wants to know what Works in marketing.
• Creating a memorable Brand Experience for your company.
• Do you even know what your biggest Asset is?

Now, these are just a sampling of some posts I've written over the past 4 years, take from them what you will. But, know that they are there for the reading, they're free and what you do with the information is up to you.

Direct Mail Advice

I love checking the mail. And, I get to do it up to three times a day - at work, at home, and at the post office.

There's something about not knowing what's going to be behind the tiny door - usually bills, but getting letters, cards and money are some of my favourite types of mail and make my day when they arrive.

Sometimes direct mail falls into that category too, but that all depends on how well it speaks to me - is it relevant to what I am looking for or think I need at that particular point in my life/day/week? Also, does the piece stand out visually and look like a legitimate product or service that I would use? I like a good piece of direct mail.

There's a few things that I've learned over the years when it comes to direct mail and it can be summed up pretty easy:

1. Frequency - you need to do several drops, a minimum of 3 drops with a consistently branded piece should do the trick.
2. Target - carefully select the area you want to target and only focus on the areas that you feel would be best to use your product/service.
3. Offer - don't just tell them who you are and what you do - tell them how you can do what you do right now for less or with some kind of added value.
4. Design - your mail pieces should be in line with your other advertising as well as your brand, consistent messaging and branding is important.
5. Timing - the offer you are presenting should be appropriate and relevant to the time of year that you are doing your campaign.

Without going into too much detail, those are the 5 key things to focus on for your direct mail campaign - your design team should come up with something that will stand out from the hoards of mail.

I'm a huge fan of online marketing, but direct mail has it's place and there's nothing like a tangible piece to give some products a bit of legitimacy and credit.

If you really want to take your direct mail to the next level consider building a micro-site that specifically handles the task of the offer in the direct mail pieces. For example, your call to action becomes, "visit do-something-now.com and sign up for free something today!" Now, the recipient can check out your site (no sales pressure or obligation, like a phone call might be perceived), which can answer way more questions than a post card ever could, and now provide you with contact information through a form.

Like in any other form of advertising and promotion - keep it simple. One offer, one form of contact... you don't need to clutter the piece up with info - direct them to a site for more information - the piece should be designed to do one thing, and one thing only: get the consumer to act... and they need clear directions on how to and why to.

We've done several direct mail pieces at Francomedia, some extremely successful (followed above advice to the letter) and others that were complete disasters (decided to self-deliver to save .09¢ and only got a few hundred pieces into the market) - it's surprising when clients don't follow the paid advice given by professionals. So, today the advice is free - take it and use it or ignore it.

Direct mail is inexpensive, but can be a costly endeavor if you get no results. Like anything in life, you need to do things a certain way to achieve results - not every try will be successful, but this only helps you refine the right approach. Above, I've given you 5 things to focus on that will help make your next campaign a success.

The Bottomline: Direct mail works and it works well, if it didn't people would have stopped a long time ago - you just have to follow the above free advice.

Heed the Advice

Too many times we see customers come to us for advice only to disregard it to do things their own way.

I'm sure every professional has to deal with some unwillingness to take advice. I believe our profession, the creative profession and more specifically, graphic design, is at the far end of this chart with maybe lawyers and doctors at the other end. You see, most people tend to follow the advice put forward by their doctors and lawyers, but when it comes to marketing and design, everyone has an opinion. And, this is where things break down.

Opinions are like... well, you've heard the saying. Everyone has one, and when it comes to design and creative, most peoples opinions are based on their personal feelings and what they like and don't like. When you come to a professional, you are getting opinions and advice based on expererience, training and knowledge... that's what you pay for. If Deirdra, your personal assistant, doesn't like blue because it reminds her of her first bike that was supposed to be pink, it's not a good enough reason to change the packaging design that was put together by a group of trained professionals - they chose blue because that's what will make an impact with the customer and cause them to take notice and action. There is a lot of thought that goes behind colour choice.

The same goes for fonts. Many hours are spent on font selection alone, in fact, a lot goes into selecting the right font for a treatment, one that will create the ambience, feeling and characteristics of the message and the brand. Some people think that you just scroll down the list and pick one of the 25 fonts that they see in their Word program. Truth be told, a typical designer has access to over 5,000 fonts and picking the right one is not only important but critical to the success of a design. Then there is the time in adjusting leading and getting the kern just right only to hear, 'did you try ariel?'

When a designer sits down to begin a job, they get into character, at least I did when I designed. I would get myself into the head of the customer. I should point out that a customer is the person buying the product or service, this is different from the client, who we deal with directly. Understanding what will motivate the customer to do something is half the battle in coming up with the design. If you can be the customer, even for a few hours, you can truly do something impactful and meaningful... something that will result in sales. And, sales results is the byproduct of our opinions and advice.

Don't get me wrong, we have some very good clients that listen closely and follow our advice when we give it. This usually works out in their favour and that's when we get a thank you card and maybe some donuts. These clients should be commended, following others advice is not always easy, especially if it puts you in a place you've never been before.

It's frustrating to go through all the motions only to have the work or ideas not acted on as they were intended for. Quite frankly, it's a waste of our time - remember, this is time we're getting paid for, so ultimately, it's a waste of money.

It's sometimes tough for business owners to accept or or take outside advice. Sometimes, it requires a leap of faith.

So, when my accountant began asking me to change elements in our accounting, including software and hardware, I was a bit leary about making changes to our procedures. Then I remembered the clients that didn't listen to us and... well, needless to say, we're going to do whatever he tells us to do, afterall, he's the expert, right?

As I stated above, we charge for our opinions and advice, it's taken years to know what we know and we share the pertinent points for a fee. But, you're probably here looking for something pro bono, well, here it is: Listen to and act on advice given to you by the professionals you hire.

Changing the way we do things with our accounting is a scary proposition, especially for me, but I know and trust, that I'm in good hands.