Effective Email Creative webcast

I heard about this webinar through the AMA and found it incredibly informative so I will now pass it on to the 1 or 2 people that have miraculously found my blog.

It was titled "Top 10 things you need to know about effective email creative" and was put on by Jordan Ayan, CEO of SubscriberMail.

I recommend if your business runs email marketing campaigns you have a listen as Jordan brings up some interesting issues that could help you with future emailings.

I was especially intrigued by the information around optimizing an email so when the recipients have images turned off you are still able to get your message to them. I have had the problem in the past where i've received emails back from people saying our messages are tough to read, etc., etc. and the returned emails always show the recipient as having images turned off. As Jordan also points out, the majority of business consumers (90%) have their images disabled on their email accounts. As my company is primarily in the B2B field this is a huge portion of our targets that may be having trouble viewing our emails. I think its time to optimize!

Here is the full presentation: http://blog.subscribermail.com/2009/03/30/video-webinar-top-10-things-you-need-to-know-about-developing-effective-email-creative/

True Service

Kal-Tire has got it right.

And their brand/image is incredible for an industry that is typically seen as a bunch of grease pigs that rip off the consumers.

Kal-Tire's slogan,"True Service.", is a bold statement. But one they back up.. To be honest, I have never heard anyone say anything bad about them because they treat each customer great, and clearly have a strategy of building an ongoing relationship with every individual that walks through the door. Everyone needs tires, and they will need tires throughout their lives. Why not build a good relationship with every customer.

Now when someone walks through a tire store's door they are at the company's mercy, they are more than likely frustrated, and they are probably irritable.

Yesterday I had the good fortune of waking up to a flat tire and after figure out my jack and lugnut wrench I threw on the magnificent looking donut of a spare tire. With this in place I headed to Kal-Tire to see about repairing the flat or getting a new one. I dropped it off and heard from them after 2 hours. "Your front one is not repairable, but we were able to fix your right rear tire which also needed it." So they went above and beyond to make sure the rest of my tires were okay, fine i'll gladly pay the extra amount for that service. They didn't have the tire I needed to replace the damaged front tire but were quick to refer me to a place that would have them. Perfect.

So I went in after work to pick up my car and got to the counter, "Here is your total charge and that includes a discount too." Huh? What did I do to deserve a discount? Nothing, I chose Kal-Tire and they know the value in having a happy customer who will bring their car back to them for any future tire problems.

That my friends is True Service, and truly an impressively run company.

Something to think about the next time you are trying to figure out what image your brand should project in your customers minds. How can you build a better relationship with customers to extend your customer lifecycle?

Powerpoint, the rubix cube of technology? I don't think so

I am from the younger generation, the web saavy generation if you will so it is tougher for me to grasp the concept of not being able to work technology. But is there really an excuse for not knowing how to work a powerpoint presentation???? It really should be unfathomable. It's not like as a presenter you don't think about the talk you are going to give and maybe write out some notes in preparation. So why would you not take the 5 minutes to learn how to use powerpoint? I say this because I was at a symposium yesterday and 1 out of 6 speakers seemed fully capable of using their powerpoint. 1 out of 6!!!!! That is an embarassing number. These were all BUSINESS PROFESSIONALS who were experts in their field, yet they struggled with issues such as exiting a presentation and opening their own.....come on. There is no excuse for not knowing how to work a powerpoint presentation on a laptop. You could put a monkey up there with 30 minutes of instructions and he could pull it off almost flawlessly. His hands might mash the keyboard a little too much but he would get through his presentation on climate change.

Just a little bit of ranting on a hump-day from this guy.

Sales promotion a true art form

With the recession in full force across North America it is tough to walk down a street and not see some kind of sign in a businesses window offering a sales promotion to entice prospects into purchasing. But what happens as we start to work our way out of the recession? People will have become addicted to sales because thats all they will know. Will there be a worldwide Intervention by major retailers to inform you that the sales no longer apply???? If so, I hope Jack Von Vonderen runs it, now thats an interventionist. Great mustache too.

What is the effect that these sales promotions will have on a company's brand image?

For example, I am part of Banana Republic Canada's e-mail database and they send me information on sales, etc. For the first 4 to 6 months that I was on the list I got maybe one offer for a 20% off one day only sale, which still seemed like a good offer. They make good quality, fashionable merchandise, at a mid-level price. There clothes are not cheaply priced, nor are they in the league of a Harry Rosen. That was until now. In the last 3 months I believe I have gotten at least one offer every month for a MINIMUM of 30% off, most of the time for an entire week or weekend.

Now obviously most people understand why they are doing this, the economic times mean you have to entice more consumers to purchase your products to meet your organizations sales goals. So you put items on sale and get more people in the door that way, including those that are not usually your regular market.

So what does that mean for the future, does this erode Banana Republic's brand image now that more and more people can afford to buy it? What happens when the sales dry-up? How many customers will they lose and will it lead to a counter-effect where they need to start producing clothes cheaper to hold on to these consumers that expect their items to be cheaper.

I assume there is quite a struggle going on between marketing and the sales teams at Banana Republic these days, but it is probably overshadowed by the increased volume they do everytime they push out another sale. I just wonder what the future consequences may be.

Magnifique Re-Gift!

After I just created my post on re-gifting your brand yesterday, this pops up

http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2009/mar/02/pompidou-centre-vides-exhibition

An exhibit of nothing!

Now from what i've heard it is normal for there to be some empty rooms at the Pompidou Exhibition Centre because they don't always have pieces to put in them. So why not combine them all together and turn it into a PR landslide, by claiming it is actually a new exhibit!

No its not, it's an empty set of rooms. You can have as many artists saying it is a radical concept and explaining in their ramblings that it allows people to be "free for a moment to think about what we are going to do".

It's a series of empty rooms, because you didn't have anything to put there. Congratulations to your marketing team, a brilliant Re-gift. Not many people can pull off the re-gift of nothingness and turn it into a huge win for their company.

Re-Gifting your product

As I was watching commercials the other night and a Bounty select-a-size ad came on, I was struck by what must be one of marketings most impressive feats. The Re-Gift, or re-package, or re-whatever you want to call it. Basically taking your regular product and re-packaging it or re-marketing it as a brand new entity. The Bounty select-a-size isn't the greatest example because there is some innovation in the product, but it does offer a bit of a re-gift. Select a size basically takes paper towels and cuts the regular sheet in half and allows it to be tearable every half sheet instead of a full sheet. This is not a remarkable new technology or even a genius piece of engineering, it's a simple well thought out way to market their product that makes people feel like they are saving money by using less paper towels while at the same time their conscience gets a pat on the back because that means they are throwing out less garbage too. Thats win-win for the customers and definately a win for the marketing team.

But think about it, being able to re-market your product to an entirely new market or for an entirely new purpose is extraordinarily genius and creative, even if some may think of it as pulling the wool over someones eyes. But the majority of the time these new applications for your product/brand provide something to the target market your aimed at, otherwise they would fail miserably.

Probably the best ever representation of this was when Arm & Hammer realized that people were using their baking soda to neutralize the smells in their fridges. They now have a variety of products that are directly designed just for putting in your fridge/freezer to help keep them odor free. Genius.

Now unfortunately not all products/brands provide marketers with the ability to re-gift them to consumers, but maybe yours does. Does it?

Twitter Update

Earlier this week I wrote about Twitter and whether it would become too much for a lot of people in the near future.

While scanning my google reader today I came across this FastCompany, The Week that Twitter Tipped, talking about how there has been a huge boom in the notoriety of Twitter in recent months and especially this current week.

The one thing in the article I really found interesting was one company's attempt to create an ad format that will allow Twitterers to put advertising in their tweets

Web advertising company Adjix has announced that it's creating a new ad format that will allow individual Twitter users to embed ads in their tweets and monetize their popularity on the service.

Overall, it seems like advertising through these social networks has not been hugely beneficial for most companies or the network itself. Things such as display ads on Facebook have not been announced to pull huge numbers or huge revenues, and MySpace does well in terms of ad revenue but the effectiveness of it has never blown anyones socks off.

The real question is, will advertising in people's messages end up hurting Twitter in the long run? Twitter obviously needs some revenue because as the article points out they have had $55 million in venture capital invested and don't have much revenue to speak of. But at what cost? Will tweets with advertising included end up angering a large portion of the users and therefore pushing them to a newer and greater Twitter clone that has just risen?

I personally think that companies will get more value from using Twitter like they would a Facebook application, give the consumers something to do with it. In the article it mentioned Skittles and what they are doing with Twitter, but instead of them paying someone to include a skittles logo in their tweet, create a Twitter feed that allows people to "Tell us what your doing as you eat your skittles" or something along those lines. I'm sure consumers will get a kick out of some of the crazy shenanigans going on as people taste the rainbow.

Hope floats

Reading through the various FastCompany postings and came across Barack Obama doing some more marketing work. Check out the new logo that will be floating around the U.S. and stamped on anything that is part of their stimulus package.

As strong as marketing is, apparently the new logo leant no help to the financial markets which dipped lower again today. Damn those financial people and their numbers! Come on! They've got a new logo, what more do you want?

Tweet Tweet Too Much

When does Twitter become too much?

I am a fairly new user of the much vaunted Twitter and it has made me think about a few things.

Firstly, what happens when every single company you know starts Tweeting? Remember that thing about why advertising is working as well, because everybody gets harassed by 8,000 messages a day or whatever the number was? Well with Twitter you could seemingly receive 8,000 messages in a matter of an hour depending on who you are following. Granted, Twitter offers consumers the power to select who they follow and don't follow but the majority of them probably won't pare down their list once they have added someone.

So what happens when everyone is on Twitter???? I think it will probably lose the a major chunk of its appeal because how do you cut through the clutter of the hundreds of messages you receive to find the good stuff? How do you follow hundreds if not thousands of people?

Twitter is definately still in the beginning stages of its adoption, but it is starting to go like fire. It will be interesting to see what happens in the next year or so and how long of a life it has as a result of its success.

Using your blog for good or evil

Let me preface this post by saying I understand writing your own personal blog is about building your brand and promoting yourself. But if you have developed a loyal following of people reading your entries when does too much selling yourself lead to a drop off.

I have followed the Pow! Andy Nulman blog for 7 or 8 months now and there was often some very interesting entries. He would talk about recent marketing campaigns that had used the Power of surprise to catch peoples attention and thus land themselves a good return. It was thoroughly interesting and I always looked forward to his newest post until.......

He got a book deal.

Now pretty much every single post is selling his book. Now he does mask it with promotions he is offering with the book, and contests he is running, and how he is trying to Pow! sell his book. But it all feeds back to being about his book, and in reality trying to sell more copies of his book.

Fair enough. You built your blog up, you built the brand of it, you got a book deal out of it so why not use your blog readers to sell copies. But what's going to happen when those loyal readers start to tire of seemingly the same thing every day. I know I am.

It's just like an overused advertisement. Wassssssupppp!!!!