Thursday, June 23, 2011

Evaluating Print Advertising Effectiveness


When evaluating the potential effectiveness of different print campaign ideas, you should ask the following questions:

* Does the ad offer a high degree of visual magnetism? An ad should be constructed so that a single component dominates the area -- a photo or screenshot, the headline or text but not your company name or logo.

* Does the headline immediately grab the reader? In Ogilvy On Advertising, advertising guru David Ogilvy states that five times as many people read
headlines than read body copy. Ideally, the headline is nine words or less. Promise prospects a worthwhile reward for continuing to read.

* Does the ad talk person-to-person? Copy is more persuasive when it speaks to the reader as an individual -- as if it were one friend telling another friend about a good thing. The terms should be the term's of the reader's business not the advertiser's business.

* Is the ad easy to read? Text type should be no smaller than nine point. It should appear black on white. The writing style should be simple: short words, short sentences, short paragraphs, active rather than passive voice, no advertising cliches, with frequent use of the personal pronoun you.

* Does the ad reflect the company character? A company's advertising should portray the company's personality -- the things that will make the company liked, respected, admired. A messy ad tends to indicate a messy company. A brag-and-boast ad suggests the company is maker-oriented, not user oriented.

* Does the ad focus on "What's in it for me (the prospect)?" How will the prospect benefit from your product?






Monday, June 13, 2011

The Conversation Opportunity


As online conversations are a growing, new marketplace, you must first understand how your customers and prospects behave online. While social media users meet in different places (Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, etc.), they still evaluate brands based on content. People still buy products to accomplish something.

Companies that understand this behavior are able to communicate directly with customers and prospects to influence their perception of their brand. Here's what you need to do to make this happen.

Research where your customers and prospects are located online to join these communities.

Establish a listening campaign ot figure out who's doing the talking and what's being said.

Consider how you will connect with the more influential "conversationalists" within those communities. Do you need to create your own Facebook page or Linkedin profile? Or do you need to comment regualarly on select blogs?

Share whatever is going on in your offline world with your online community (photos and videos).

Reach out to other bloggers (guest blogging).

Respond quickly to comments and feedback on your own blog.






Wednesday, June 8, 2011

How To Approach Content Strategy



As you brainstorm your own content strategy, ask yourself these questions:

Which primary niche do I want to be known for most?

What are my prospects' challenges?

What kind of content do they like and consume?

How can I create interesting yet consistent content that will attract new customers and retain old ones?

When all is said and done, what business results do I want to achieve for all my hard work?

How will I know if this stuff is working?

More next time.

Reference: Patricia Redsicker

Friday, June 3, 2011

Content Strategy Before Social Strategy


No matter how far you're along in the social media experience, you hopefully understand that social media marketing is not just about having a Facebook page or Twitter profile. You can't succeed in social media if you don't have something interesting to say.

Social media is the vehicle for communicating and distributing interesting stories (content) across the Internet. In turn, your customers and prospects share the content they think is compelling.

So, what does content strategy have to do with it?

The purpose of content strategy is to facilitate the consistent delivery of interesting stories. The end result is that you will attract and retain the attention of the targeted audience that you want to reach. Preparation is important because social media is a very active space. There's a lot to do and a ton of conversations taking place. It is a very distracting environment, and everyone has a very short attention span.

You have to figure out what kind of conversation you're going to spark that will make customers and prospects pay attention to you because social media attention is very hard to get (or retain for that matter).

Your competition isn't just the company that sells the same stuff that you do. Your competition is every brand, every company, every politician, every celebrity and everybody that thinks they have something interesting to say.

That's why it's important to have a plan (content strategy). And that's why your plan must be put in place before you show up on any social media channel. Otherwise, you'll be wasting the opportunity.

More next time.

Reference: Patricia Redsicker

MY OBJECTIVE:

To share common sense lessons learned with 40-plus years experience in marketing, sales and as a B2B publisher.

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