Our firm’s analyzes 100 clients dating back to the earliest history of the firm and looks something like the illustration below, which is done in Excell. Your 1st year billing and billing information is in your accounting package – we use QuickBooks and can readily get the information. If you are really ambitious, include annual purchasing history over the past five years and see what kind of changes are taking place.

Click to enlarge our sample client census

Separate in to top 20% of sales volume and compare to the average. This analysis help you identify your target market on a demographic and geographic basis. With a five year sales history, you can identify the low hanging fruit that used to spend $300,000 with you but is now only doing $100,000 – can you recapture this.

What segments or markets can contribute to your new reality in 2011? Where will you find some low hanging fruit?

Now – you can better define your target market just by looking at your top 20% of customers. In addition, you can find opportunities by identifying customers with declining sales, customers that are not using or purchasing across your product or service offering. Do you see any low hanging fruit? Do you see opportunities that if you start now could be fruit in the second half of 2011?

Here is their old site:

GAPA Website Before

And here is their new site:

GAPA Website After

As you can see, the color palette changed quite a bit. Over time we had started using this nice, soft blue and wanted to use that as a dominant color in the new site. It brings a clean, warm professional feel to every page. We also brought in 4 large buttons to help direct people to the 4 main areas of the site. We also noticed that over time a lot of information had been posted to the homepage which we hadn’t really planned on when we built the last site. To better handle this we created a news feed on the homepage that could showcase all the important news. Also, conferences are very important to GAPA and its members so we wanted to include sidebar items that could advertise the upcoming conference opportunities.  Also while redesigning the website we did a lot of SEO (Search Engine Optimization) work as well as integrate a lot of social media making it easy for visitors to share every page and all content with their friends online.

Visit the new GAPA website now!

Today, I want to concentrate and establishing some milestones and deadlines for completion your new marketing plan.  You can use the marketing plan schedule as a framework to drive your marketing plan toward completion.  As you look over this, feel free to offer any recommendations you might have to improve upon it:

What else needs to be added to your marketing plan?  Can you stay on this schedule or do you need to accelerate this process?

So you can imagine my complete and utter dismay at the thought of compiling an analytics report for my client, the Southern Museum of Civil War and Locomotive History.  I needed a stiff cocktail when I saw the umpteen spreadsheets…sheets and sheets and sheets of web, attendance, revenue and visitor demographic data that I had to sift through and from which I was to create charts.  Not only did it take me a scadzillion hours to finish, but I thought my coworkers might commit me at the point when I wandered aimlessly around the office muttering random sequences of numbers like Rainman, but with no cognitive thought behind them whatsoever.

Once my comprehensive review of the clients’ 2009/10 marketing efforts was finished (and I regained my sanity), I was really excited to know what the data revealed.  For instance, I was able to conclude that website activity for the Museum has increased dramatically.  We have had nearly 10,000 more visitors to the site this year over last.  Suddenly, all of my yammering on about web presence and social media engagement was validated!  The Facebook and Google ads we created were the top referrals to the site.  The other good news was that our Facebook and Twitter followers have doubled this year.  The Museum has nearly 800 followers!  Now that’s a number I don’t mind looking at!

All in all, I have concluded that numbers and figures really aren’t so bad.  Even though I much prefer to write and create, the numbers are necessary so that I know that where I lead my clients will promote brand awareness and drive revenue, especially in this “bad news” economy.  So, as I wrap up my analytics report and kick back with a much-needed adult beverage, I wonder if I can get those Facebook followers doubled again next year.  Wait, what’s 800 x 2 again?

Making a Difference, Summer 2010 edition

The Summer edition of Making a Difference, a quarterly publication of the Georgia Council on Developmental Disabilities (GCDD), has just wrapped up. In addition to it’s stellar design (hey, a designer should be able to toot their own horn) the magazine is full of inspiring articles and information.

The summer edition features the Children’s Freedom Initiative, which aims to move children with disabilities under the age of 22 out of state-run facilities and closer to home. The initiative was formed in 2005 after advocates with the Georgia Advocacy Office (GAO) discovered 141 children under the age of 22 living in state-run facilities and other nursing facilities. Mathew Harp, featured on the cover with his mom and sisters, gives an inspiring message about what it meant to him to return home after having to live in a nursing home when he was 21.
Other articles included in this summer edition are:
• Summer Fun for Everyone – summer camps for kids of all abilities
• State Legislature Summary and Outlook
• 20th Anniversary of Americans with Disabilities Act
• Success on the Court – young tennis star soars to the top

A PDF of the magazine can be downloaded here.

Etwoah Landscape Homepage, Designed by O'Neill Communications

Above shows the home page of the new Etowah website. As you can see it focuses heavily on the beautiful, lush landscapes they’ve created and maintained for their clients. Luckily we had some stunning photographs to really bring the site to life!

We also added a link on every page to Etowah’s Kudzu and Yelp listings so that current customers can quickly go on and review Etowah’s services and prospecitve customer can click to see what others have said.

Etowah’s stellar service has also inspired people to write in with kind words and testimonials. To share some of these we created a page of testimonials as well as a widget in the sidebar of every page that rotates through some snippets of the customers’ quotes.

In addition, we also created and installed a customer feedback survey, seasonal calendars and a sign up form for the Etowah Landscape newsletter.

Visit the Etowah Landscape Group website now!

Why?  A good marketing plan focuses resources and efforts.It’s not about advertising or social media.  It’s about penetrating target audiences with compelling messages.  It should involve your sales force, your employees, the customer service department, your web site, and every communications vehicle that your company uses – the plan needs to be a comprehensive approach to penetrating your target markets.

A solid plan will benefit your company by:

• Clearly defining your target market
• Focuses resources on reaching your most productive markets
• Effectively positioning your company and its products and services
• Using innovative, cost effective marketing channels
• Controlling your marketing spend

To get started:

Gather New Information from trade journals, economists, competitor web sites, trade and professional associations, and federal, state, and local business regulators that often have very valuable information.  It is time to open your eyes and open your ears to what’s really going on in your markets – and don’t fall into the trap of depending on long-held assumptions?

Evaluate Key Performance Ratios by taking a fresh look at your own numbers.  How have these ratios changed.  What are the numbers telling you?

Involve Accounting – a good marketing plan should involve the CFO and accounting department.  Ask them what needs to change to dramatically improve – and don’t settle for anything less than their best effort, their best recommendations.

Look At Your Customer Base, old and new, and learn.  What characteristics are common among the different customers?  What is the average order among different groups?  Is it rising in some markets – falling in others?  Who isn’t ordering from you any more – but once was a good customer?

Whether you are a “low cost leader” or “the Mercedes of the industry,” the information you glean from a refreshed external perspective and good financial analysis will prove invaluable in developing a good marketing plan.  You can’t just sit there – do the analysis and put together a really good marketing plan that will allow you to create a new reality.

How will you begin planning your new reality?  More importantly, when will you begin?

In the B2B realm, the exact same thing is going on, key executives are pre-tailing their purchasing, professional services, and hiring decisions.  With today’s smart phones and new apps, your B2B prospect can research your competition, determine price ranges, and solicit recommendations from their friends (that’s the power of social media) right in front of you – even in your office.  That is called “In-tailing”, competitive research done in a store or in a meeting using smart phones, applications, text messaging, and the Internet. The consumer is more and more in control.

In the retail food industry, new strategies have emerged to respond and keep customers in the store.  They are personalizing the shopping experience and enhancing in-store ease and convenience. They are also providing consumers more information (healthy choices, complimentary menu choices, matching wines, etc.) and more “price transparency” – which is exactly what consumers (business and retail) are demanding – more information and truth in pricing.  Crazy?  Look what all the insurance companies are doing in their TV ads, asking consumers to “come to our website and we will provide you competitive pricing information” – that’s price transparency.

But what if you’re B2B?! Well know this, your B2B prospects are pre-tailing, too! Remember the data showing business people in their 50s and 60s are using the Internet – on average – nine hours a week.  The Forbes article I mentioned in my earlier blog clearly states that “C-suite” executives use the Internet to do research and about half do their own research.

As a B2B sales company, it is important to reconsider how you can use the web, online tools, and apps to enhance ease and convenience for your prospects and customers.  Understand, as I said before, how “combining relevant web content and search engine optimization is the very essence of a strong Internet presence today.”

In today’s pre-tailing B2B world, you need to ask yourself, if 50% of my prospects are pre-tailing via the internet, are they finding our website, are they finding our product information?  What are you doing to keep your pre-tailing customers and prospects doing business with your company?  When someone Googles your industry or your products, where does your company rank in the listings?  And, with social media, is your brand represented where they are searching – Facebook, 4Square, etc? And how can you find the answers to these questions?

Putting politics aside, marketers would do well to take a few pages out of Obama’s marketing playbook.  Why? It’s classic marketing with a flourish. Here are a few of the keys to Obama’s election marketing success; each can be related to your own business.

Consistency in brand message and positioning

Key to Obama’s success was having a consistent message which relates back to brand positioning. Unlike some brands that change campaigns as often as changing socks, Obama remained consistent and true to his brand positioning and message. From the onset, brand Obama carved out a position that adversaries couldn’t really touch: change. Specifically, “change that we can believe in.” He was the first to grab this banner, and he was successful in using this message to differentiate his campaign. His competition, first Hillary Clinton, then John McCain, struggled to find a message with traction. Both tried the “experience” angle, and Clinton even tried to copy Obama with her “Countdown to Change” message before migrating to “Solutions for America.” McCain, too, struggled to find a message that his audience could relate to, moving from “maverick” to “experience” to finally “Country First”, which never seemed to connect with voting consumers. Both tried to focus their messages on “I can do change better than him” but “better” rarely works in marketing and this was no exception. Obama clearly pre-empted the change concept in consumers’ minds so his competitors could never take it away from him.

Harnessed the power of the Internet

Team Obama was pitch-perfect in understanding the keys to appealing to all of his audience segments, especially the younger market that is often unattached to political parties, and, at least prior to 2008, somewhat apathetic to elections. He knew how to reach this group on their terms via the Internet and social media.

The centerpiece for Obama’s Internet voice was his website, and his team left nothing untouched. Their strategy was to first build a massive “opt in” email list. Once captured, he was able to circumvent traditional (and expensive) media and communicate with his community directly. Almost 4 million supporters opted in. When you first landed on the Obama website, you were immediately asked to join his mailing list and they made it incredibly enticing to subscribe by providing specific reasons to sign up (does your website do that?).  They also aggressively asked for donations on every page and kept the threshold affordable for all (e.g. only asking for $5). Once visitors contributed, they became engaged and involved, and served as the backbone of a grass roots army of volunteer workers and “brand ambassadors.”

Leveraged social media

Blogs are one of the best methods of communicating and building relationships with consumers and Obama used them very effectively to communicate with supporters on a daily basis, even providing a channel for supporters who prefer to only consume news through RSS feeds. He took advantage of their social media consumption employing every high traffic social networking site including Facebook, Twitter, Digg, Eons, Myspace, YouTube, and Flickr. Not surprisingly, each of these accounts drove traffic to the main website for further engagement.

Messaging with mobile

Obama used mobile marketing to further his message distribution, and even introduced an app for Apple’s iPhone, the Countdown to Change calendar that ticked off seconds until Election Day. Perhaps, the “pièce de resistance” was his regular use of text messaging announcements prior to the news media having it. Social media also allowed him to almost instantaneously counter negative advertising by his opponents.

When a negative story broke on the news, his online community not only knew about it but had already heard Obama’s side of the story! It was “reputation management” at its finest.

Inviting tone and language

Obama’s communications were, for the most part, confident, consistent, professional, and reassuring without being slick or in-your-face. His Internet voice was always conversational – interacting like a human, not a brand – inviting two-way dialog. Team Obama also encouraged user-generated content, allowing people to feel like they were participating in the campaign process as well. Most importantly, the Obama staff was not afraid of potential negative comments, instead taking the opportunity for transparency and allowing users to share feelings and concerns. This allowed Obama to respond in a rational way to refute opposing arguments using reason and logic. It appears users appreciated that.

What you can do

Consider addressing your own marketing efforts like Obama’s team did. Here’s food for thought:

• Evaluate your brand message and positioning. Is it relevant? Is it ownable?  Does it really differentiate your brand?
• Are you consistent in your messaging? Have you avoided switching a campaign theme just because you’re personally tired of it?
• How well do you know your target audience? Are you reaching them in the right voice and in the right venues? What are their media habits?
• What are you doing to turn passive website visitors into avid supporters and fans of your brand? Are you providing tangible reasons for consumers to return to your website on a continuous basis?

In reviewing Obama’s 2008 presidential marketing efforts, he not only brilliantly executed the basics of marketing, but took advantage of new media technology to efficiently and economically build his brand. How does your marketing campaign compare?

General Overview Brochure

The General Overview brochure is a 14″ x 8.5″ parallel folded, full color brochure. The focus of the piece to is showcase what the gardens are about and what visitors can expect to see and experience during their time in the gardens. The photography for the piece was provided by the gardens and were of such a high quality that they really helped make for a beautiful piece.

Download a PDF of the Smith-Gilbert Gardens
Overview Brochure

Garden Tour Brochure

The Garden Tour brochure is a 25.375″ x 11″ french folded, full color brochure. This piece contains the map of the gardens with detailed explanations of the different points of interest around the gardens as well as a listing of all 30 sculptures, their creators and date of creation.  Once again, all the photography came from the gardens and looks terrific.  Smith-Gilbert Gardens was so happy with the interior map that we were asked to blow it up to poster size so they could display it in their welcome center.

Download a PDF of the Smith-Gilbert Gardens
Garden Tour Brochure