Unruly Fonts

rodenas — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 23:47:40 +0000

Every time I teach a class, whether it be in Word, InDesign or Publisher, I always include a section on fonts…how they’re used and abused. A student of mine sent me the link below. Hilarious!

http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1823766

Networking – The Dreaded Necessity

rodenas — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 22:23:59 +0000

Networking is probably one of the most powerful (and inexpensive) marketing tools you can use. Because networking is not one of my stronger suits, I went in search of networking professionals and found Shirley Makela, former Director of Membership Services at the Greater Sudbury Chamber of Commerce.

Shirley explains networking as, “a continuous process of meeting new people, identifying where they fit into the scheme of things, and then putting them in touch with other people who can contribute to their success”. When stated that way, networking sounds almost easy. But, once you’re out there face to face, even people who are not shy can have a difficult time networking.

“Most people” Shirley states “are apprehensive about the unknown. Couple that with the fact that we’re not taught during our early lives to talk about ourselves and you can see where the hesitancy to network stems from”.

Any sales or customer service professional can tell you that the first rule to good networking is having the ability to actively and effectively listen. When you listen well, you pick up on what a person does, how they do it, and what they feel they need to do it even better. Chances are either you or someone you know will be able to help that person fill that need.

To the shy business owner, Shirley offers this advice; “Find a mentor that will help you to develop a networking comfort zone. A wise and dedicated mentor encourages you to take your first steps instead of becoming a crutch for you to lean on”. She also wants people to realize that “most people are not interested in judging or criticizing you but finding out enough about what you do to figure out how you fit into their lives. One of the best things you can do for yourself is realize that there’s more to be gained by meeting people than by shying away”.

What signs can you look for that will let you know you’re an effective networker? Shirley provided three benchmarks to help you rate your success. You know you’ve got networking under control when:

You are able to find the information you are looking for with three phone calls or less
You or someone you know can use the information you gain from networking to your advantage
A room full of strangers and a few friends turns into a roomful of friends and a few strangers

To really make the most of networking Shirley states that you have to find the right avenue. “Everybody wants to network with a certain group that matches or compliments their business. You have to find a place where your reference group is going to be”.

This “place” can range from the café down the street, to the bowling alley on a Thursday night. Once you’ve found the place, then you have to find the courage to walk up to someone you’ve never met and turn them into a contact that you may be of service to someday.

What’s Your Position?

rodenas — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 15:30:35 +0000

For many small business owners, the thought of “positioning” seems ridiculous at first. We tend to associate this part of the strategic planning and marketing process with large corporations. However, positioning provides small business owners with a realistic vision of where they stand in the market, and the most direct way to reach their best potential customer.

As small business owners we provide unique, personalized, and affordable products and services. Often, we feel that those features alone are enough to insure our businesses survival. In addition, we tend to think of ourselves as alone in our field, and steer clear of declaring ourselves as competitors of the larger, more established businesses. When we do this we are subconsciously selling ourselves short.

Successful positioning requires that you first answer the following questions:

Where does your business stand today?
Where do you want your business to be in five years? What about next year?
Who are your competitors and how are you planning to handle competition?
What are your market weaknesses, and how can you plan ahead to counteract those weaknesses?
Who is your best potential customer, and how do you want them to perceive your business?
What benefits do you offer that are unique?

Once you have planned out answers to the above questions, you are ready to prepare your positioning statement. Your positioning statement is one way of inspiring the confidence of your best potential customer. In your positioning statement, you will be creating a concise, coherent image which will serve as the basis of your advertising and marketing.

By using what you learned about your target customer, your benefits, and your competition you can be sure that your positioning statement will adhere to three basic rules – focus, consistency, and longevity. Focus on what your best potential customer will see as a benefit to working with your business. Don’t try to be everything to everyone but be consistent in what you offer to your customers. Once you have fine tuned your positioning, leave it alone until market circumstances demand that you update.

Since you will have spent a good amount of time, energy, and thought creating your positioning statement, use it. Put it on your business cards. Put it on your letterhead. Use it when you introduce your business. Print it out and put it over your desk, or in your storefront.

Refer to your positioning statement when you are working on any marketing task. If the medium you are using matches with your positioning statement, you can be sure you’re heading in the right direction.

A final few words of advice. Positioning statements can take a number of re-writes and you may need some outside input from friends, family and customers. Don’t get discouraged. When it starts to come together, the result will be worth the process.

Key Messages

rodenas — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 01:01:06 +0000

Your key message is an essential part of your positioning. It is the single idea that you are trying to get across – the one thing that will encourage customers to buy your product instead of someone else’s. It’s not necessarily about what you do, but how you do it.

To really understand how this whole concept works, turn it around. Listen to, read or watch one of the major company’s key message. Television commercials are probably the best medium to illustrate this point. Have you ever watched a commercial and thought to yourself “I don’t get it”? You can pretty much guarantee that if a key message does nothing for you, it’s because it was never intended to.

Now, pick a commercial that really appeals to you. Take it apart. Why does it appeal to you? Can you, as part of a target market, pick out the key message? What is the one thing that they are appealing to and how did they send the message so you would receive it?

Let’s try taking a key message apart. One of my favorites is “Have It Your Way”. There’s a whole bunch of you out there that are singing the jingle right? That’s a powerful key message. But does it make you buy? Well, if having choices ranks high on your list of priorities, yes, it will have an impact when you go out to buy fast food. This particular message doesn’t appeal to me because speed and convenience rank much higher on my priority list. And you know what? That fast food chain doesn’t care if I like their key message or not because I am not part of their identified main target market. Even without me and the rest of the people that fall into my market group, they have sold billions of meals.

That fast food chain may have better tasting food. They may be able to serve a meal just as fast as everyone else and they may be even more conveniently located than their competitors. But, their target market wants customized fast food. That was the customer’s number one want and need, and so that one thing is what the fast food chain concentrated on getting across in their key message.

Think about what is most important to your customer. If you’ve done your research this will be easy. Make a list of everything your research has told you that your customers absolutely require. This could be anything from affordability to exclusivity, from custom-made to off-the-shelf. Rank the requirements from most important to least important. Your key message must speak to the number one need or want identified by your target. Every target market will have a different list that is very specific to their wants and needs. When you develop your key message, keep asking yourself if what you are saying tells your best potential customer that you can meet that need or want.

The way you get your key message out to potential customers is another story. You will use your key message as a headline in a news story, as an advertising header, as a jingle in radio or television advertising, as part of your introduction in your personal selling introduction, as a tag line on your promotional materials and as a slogan. Keep your key message brief and clear, and use it consistently. Your target market will thank you.

Advertising Agencies

rodenas — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 00:58:39 +0000

Sooner or later the day will come when you just won’t have time to take care of all your marketing needs because you’ll be so busy globetrotting and taking care of your customers. So, who do you turn to when you have to get that big promotion rolling? We’ve already talked about how a graphic designer can help you out. There is also another alternative which works well for business people who don’t feel they have a flair for marketing.

An advertising agency can provide you with everything you need in order for your large (or small) promotions to be highly successful. Ad agencies are considered full service providers. In other words, an agency will handle everything from coming up with marketing and promotional strategies to putting together the tools and setting the plan in motion. What I’ve found in the past is that smaller businesses shy away from agencies for many different reasons – the number one being cost, the second being fear the agency will think their business is too small to work with. Yes, some agencies will be expensive to work with, and yes, some agencies will work only with large corporations. However, the majority of agencies are worth every penny and will work with businesses of all sizes. One more word on cost…when you sit down and calculate how much time you will spend researching, writing, laying out, printing, and taking care of all the details of your promotion, you will find that you may actually save money by working with an agency.

First things first – you need to find an agency that you are comfortable with. Ask around. Talk to big companies and small businesses. Talk to local printers to find out who they work with most frequently, and who they would recommend. Then, set up an initial meeting with the agency – a “get to know you” meeting.

The agency will assign a project manager to your business. This will be your main contact and the person you will give direction to. Again, it’s very important for you to feel comfortable with this person or your agency experience can become more expensive than it needs to be due to lack of understanding or communication.

When working with your project manager it’s very important to be honest about your budget. Along with your budget for your promotion, you need to give your project manager a good idea of what the end goal of the promotion is to be. You can use whatever you want for a benchmark be it sales, awareness, or leads generated.

Your project manager will ask you questions about your corporate philosophy and image, your current promotional tools, a copy of your marketing strategy and business plan (if you already have them prepared), and your corporate vision. Usually around two weeks after your meeting, the project manager will return with a “pitch”, an idea that the agency has come up with. At this time, you will also be presented with an initial budget for the project.

Working with an agency can be a very rewarding, positive learning experience.

Consistency in Marketing

rodenas — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 00:38:15 +0000

Consistency is the simplest marketing concept there is: Visual Consistency means “keep everything looking the same all the time”. Consistency in Actions means “do what you say you’re going to do – every time”.

Don’t let the simplicity factor fool you though. Consistency ranks right up at number one on the business owner’s Most Important Things To Remember list.

Knowing that this is such an important concept, why is it that business owners often seem to completely disregard it? In my experience, this phenomenon always stems from one of three reasons:

The business owner is impatient and when an image isn’t providing immediate returns, they want to try something else.
The business owner makes unrealistic promises.
The business owner has never been told about why consistency in marketing their business is so important.
To understand why consistency is so important you have to understand the following human traits. Remember that we are working with generalities and that there are exceptions to every rule.

People are busy. Because of our increasingly hectic schedules, and time that is split between home, work and family we want to be able to find what we are looking for quickly and with the least frustration possible.

People are creatures of habit. Once we become accustomed to the way something looks, we will continue to associate that look with that product or service. If we are used to finding information in a certain place, we will continue to search for that information in the same place.

People don’t like change. On the most part, once a comfort zone is attained people tend to stay within that zone. Think about when the New Coke was introduced. Coca Cola felt the public resistance and soon New Coke was nothing but a memory.

People talk. If you make a promise in your advertising you had better be able to back it up. If you can’t, you want to believe the word will get around – fast.

In every part of marketing, there are very simple rules to consistency. With printed materials, make sure people can tell at first glance that each of your promotional materials belong together. You accomplish this by always using the same colour scheme, the same logo, the same typeface and the same basic design. Include your business cards, letterhead, and envelopes in this list as well.

Once you have developed a slogan, always use it. Use it in your advertising, on your promotional materials, on your letterhead. Don’t vary your slogan or only use it here and there. Always or never is the hard and fast rule.

Don’t ever forget to follow up your words with actions. This is the most important aspect of consistency. If you claim to have fast, friendly service, make sure you give your customer fast, friendly service. Every time.

In some cases, businesses will need to update their image. Although this goes against all the rules of consistency, it is possible and even very successfully done. If you find yourself in need of a corporate facelift, talk to a graphic designer or corporate image consultant. These professionals will help you make the transition as smoothly as possible.