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?

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?

Wonderful – but you should be asking, “How do I reach out to my targeted customers on the Internet?”  People using the Internet share a lot of information about themselves and their interests by completing profiles for Linked-In and Facebook and through their own online behaviors.  This allows marketers such as Google to use keywords and search patterns to target them specifically and to offer a compelling reason to respond or visit your website.  This might be “authoritative” content on demand such as webinars, blogs, etc. or, it could be a special offer – “50% off your next round of golf at your favorite resort.”

As a “C-suite” executive, you and your company can identify and reach target markets using four different parameters to focus and direct your online marketing messages and campaigns:

Geographic:  You can target a very narrow set of zip codes in one market area such as a city or around specific store locations in specific zip codes.  Online marketing can easily be expanded to the state, national, or international level.

Demographic:  Since so many fill out online profiles, you can target age, gender, income, occupation, and education – these last two are very important in business-to-business marketing.

Psychographic:  The life style, motivation, benefits sought, and loyalty characteristics – what websites do CPAs, lawyers, and small business executives visit?  Remember from my last post, “The C-Suite is probably one of the most passionate personalities… They are not only passionate about their businesses but about their hobbies, families and causes.”

Behaviors:  What needs are they seeking to fill, how do they do their research, what websites do they frequent?  What websites do they visit to satisfy their professional interests, learn more about their hobbies, enhance their family life, and support their causes?

For example, one of our key markets is the chief executive, chief operating, or chief marketing officer in small to mid-sized food manufacturers.  They tend to be strong family men or women, generally conservative, many play golf or tennis, and most enjoy wine.  Professionally, they depend on select websites for insight and information. They are active in Food Marketing Institute, Institute of Food Technologists, and other professional organizations.

Generally, I can tell you the annual sales of the company and the size of the marketing budget as well as their target markets and common strengths and weaknesses.  In addition, they tend to travel and are typically in their 50s but can be in their 40s.

In the past, I would use this “client profile” to select “industry specific” trade publications, direct mail, and some trade articles but today, I can target them by selecting the right Google Adwords based on their “likely search words” and websites they are likely to visit within a defined geographic area.  Limiting or expanding these different variables allows you to better manage the budget while reaching the proper target market.

This ability to focus Internet and search engine marketing on targeted markets allows you to deliver your “targeted message” to your prospects and create an immediate, measurable response.  Targeted online marketing campaigns employ a battery of metrics to closely measure response allowing us to adjust or modify messaging to improve response rate.

The Internet and its ability to reach out to your targeted customers is a powerful tool that should play an important role in reaching and cultivating new customers.

How can these four segmentation strategies be applied to reaching your targeted customer? Let us know in the comments.

• 93% of business decision makers use the Internet for business every day and most of them have taken action as result of seeing an ad on a B2B website.
• 84% of business people use the Internet to research products and 71% buy products.
• Forbes/Insight reports the Internet is the C-suite’s top information resource for locating business-related information
• Over half C-suite execs search for information themselves and continue “clicking around” to locate the right information
• The “researcher” needs information to “sell” others in the decision-making path – provide the information needed and they will become your champion.

How Do I Reach My “Target Decision-Maker?”

First, make sure your website is relevant and stays relevant.  Ensure it is fully (search engine) optimized and that you keep it up to date.  An active blog is a good way to achieve both goals and can establish your company or firm as a “thought leader” or “innovator” by sharing information on routine basis.  You can provide information of interest to the C-suite, engineering department, or purchasing and serve multiple target markets.

Combining relevant web content and search engine optimization is the very essence of a strong Internet presence today.

Reaching Out to the C-Suite

Beyond relevant content and search engine optimization, consider search engine marketing and ad words.  But before scurrying into search engine marketing, consider Antonio Altamirano’s insight.

“ . . . We need to understand one thing clearly. The C-Suite is probably one of the most passionate personalities that you will find online. They are not only passionate about their businesses but also about their hobbies, their families and their causes. They have an unwavering belief on what they do and a flawless commitment to their duties. Furthermore, personal improvement in many aspects of their personality is continuous. This constant evolution strengthens their character and deepens their core beliefs.”

So, you can reach him or her through SEM syndications focused on business and finance, sports interests, professional networks and associations, vertical niche market websites, local publications, and personal and CXO level blogs and wikis.

That’s how to reach the CEO and, as Antonio suggests, strengthen your marketing credibility by placing relevant ads that will compliment the content being consumed – if it’s a golf site, speak golf; if it’s a finance site, talk money.

Marketing Your Business and Products

To help B2B prospects find your company and its products, you need an effective website and must invest in search engine optimization – to assure an online presence.  Both the website and your search engine strategy will need to be maintained – they can’t just be developed, posted, submitted, and ignored.

Make your website a valuable tool or resource to your target markets or use it to get feedback or input from customers.  For instance, airlines make flight schedules available to plan travel, allowing you to print boarding passes, and sells tickets.  How often do you go to your favorite travel site because it offers 24-hour convenience and valuable information and/or services?

So, rethink the role and purpose of your website.  What do you need to do to tailor it to you multiple target markets?  How can you make your company and its website more relevant to the C-suite and your target markets?  What are some strategies you’ve used in the past?

Bibliography

The Rise of the Digital C-Suite, Forbes Insights in Association with Google, copyright Forbes 2009.
B2B Marketing and Understanding the C-Suite, Antonio Altamirano, Facebook
B2B Online Marketing Guide:  5 Critical Principles, B@B Marketing Online
Estimated Internet Usage Differences by Basic General Social Survey Demographics
Seismic Shift in Internet Age Mass, Jack Loechner, Feb. 11, 2009, Research Brief From the Center for Media Research.

Do you know about Bowser, the Miniature Schnauzer?

Meet Bowser.

Bowser came into my life when he was seven weeks old. I was fresh out of college, adjusting to living on my own and the 40-hour workweek. He fit in the palm of my hand and looked more like a rat than a puppy.

Anyway, I was looking at Bowser the other night (he’s now almost three years old and gets fatter every day), and I was thinking that Bowser knows the secrets to all anyone really needs to know about marketing. After the jump, allow me to explain.

1. It’s all about image. When I’m out with Bowser, people love him! They want to run up and pet him. And he looks super cute. He looks cuddly and friendly. But the truth is that he’s a really mean guy. He’s always trying to bully me out of my bed, and he really doesn’t like strangers. He loves bossing other dogs around. In fact, Bowser’s kind of a jerk. But that doesn’t stop people who should know better from trying to get on his good side every time they see him. My one friend is always bringing him cookies while my grandmother plies him with toys. Bowser knows his image is very important, so he is always just nice enough to keep people coming back for more.
2. It’s all about looking for innovative ways to solve a problem. When his tennis ball rolled under my bed the other night, he first tried to solve the problem by pulling my sheets off of the bed. When that didn’t work, he tried to crawl under the bed but found he was too fat to fit. Finally, he tossed another toy under the bed to knock the tennis ball closer to the side so he could grab it with his paw. Instead of leaving the problem or waiting for me to fix it for him, he took matters into his own paws and came up with a method that worked for him.
3. It’s all about planning …
4. … and it’s all about going with the flow. Bowser is a creature of habit; he gets his dinner on time every night. He goes on his walk at the same time. If I’m five minutes off, he’s very vocal about letting me know. But he also knows when to just roll with things – I’ve moved around a lot in the past three years, and he always handles that well. So while he is accountable for sticking to a schedule, he can also adapt to challenges thrown his way. An important lesson for marketing!
5. It’s all about relationships with key people. This relates to #1. As I’ve mentioned, Bowser is not really that “Norman Rockwell” dog – he’s talkative and a bully. But he knows who the main people are – and he knows how to butter them up. He knows my mom will give him treats from the table and he knows my dad will roughhouse with him. He knows my one friend will always scratch his belly. With these people, he builds on his positive image and continues to cultivate those key relationships. (Maybe you could call those people his target markets.)

Bowser also understands the value of an online presence – he currently blogs and tweets.

Is Bowser a marketing genius? I don’t know – but I think he’s on to something. Even if you don’t think you can learn much about marketing from him, you can learn how to pilfer off as many cookies as possible before people realize just how many you’ve had.

And that information is priceless.

What marketing information is Bowser missing? Do you think his marketing strategies are decent or do they need some improvement? What’s your favorite kind of cookie?

Marketing genius?

At O’Neill Communications, each client is assigned a senior level account supervisor with extensive marketing experience who generally reports to a c-level executive representing the client. The firm’s account supervisor is responsible for managing the work-flow and creative development process to assure the proper execution of marketing projects or plans and the satisfaction of the client. In addition, the account supervisor’s expertise provides higher level planning capabilities and campaign management skills needed for today’s competitive environment. This sensible approach assures good brand management and sound, consistent implementation at a reasonable cost.

Click to enlarge

Outsourced marketing really is about focus – yours and ours.  Many CEO’s are tempted to hire a vice president of sales and marketing, expecting 80% of their time to be spent on sales and 20% marketing.  Generally, it turns out just the opposite – all the emphasis is on marketing when the CEO needs a strong focus on sales.  By hiring a vice president of sales, you can focus internal resources exclusively on sales and retain a marketing firm to focus on marketing.  The CEO gets the focus and expertise needed in both disciplines.

Outsourced marketing is a very efficient package of talent and capabilities that can save you from possibly hiring four positions for an internal marketing department – a savings of $280,000 or more in personnel expense.

Whether annual retainer, short-term project, or a time and materials client, you get a lot of talent and know-how for about the cost of just one employee.

Trot on over to DogwoodVet.com to learn more about the great services that they offer.

Curious about developing a direct mail campaign? Consider these following tips:

• Use a targeted mailing list – don’t promote the latest potato chip flavor to health-conscious consumers.
• Repetition is key – a series of postcards over a determined period of time is more effective than one or two postcards sent haphazardly throughout the year.
• Allow for all costs – including postage.
• Invite recipients to act – always have a call-to-action, whether it’s inviting someone to your business’ Web site or offering some type of incentive.

For more information of direct mail campaigns – and to learn about how you can put the Power of How to work for you – contact O’Neill Communications!