Marketing for Success - Mike Vilimek

A Message Relevant for the Times

Companies spend countless hours refining and perfecting their marketing messaging. Sometimes these messages can be massaged or altered to reflect changes in products or business models. But for the most part, core marketing messages and value propositions remain constant. What would cause a shift in your marketing message? How about a global economic crisis?

In order to stay relevant and to have your marketing message resonate within your market, sometimes a slight shift is required. In times of economic uncertainty, companies as well as individuals want to know how you can help them save money, conserve resources, reduce risk and essentially weather the economic storm.

A good example of a company subscribing to this strategy is Elance.com. In a recent email campaign, Recession-Busting Tips for Small Businesses, they positioned there online outsourcing service as a way for small businesses to connect with inexpensive freelancers to help save money and increase efficiency. 

Often the best indicators of how to create appropriate messaging that will resonate with your market lie outside the walls of your company. Take a look around. What can your product do to help people deal with issues they’re facing today?

Savvy Marketing by Obama

There is little doubt that the Obama campaign will be considered as one of the best examples of presidential marketing in US history. The campaign was dominant in online marketing with Obama having around 3 million supporters on Facebook, 4 times as many friends as his Republican rival, Sen. John McCain, on MySpace.com, and an email contact list of almost 10 million addresses.

What’s even more impressive is that within 24 hours of last week’s historic vote, Obama’s team launched a new web site, Change.gov to reach out and connect with the public. In addition to a countdown to the January 20 inauguration, the site has a newsroom and even a blog. The site is also very interactive allow visitors to share their vision of Obama’s presidency and even apply for jobs.  

 

Obama is the first president in a long time to have such a tremendous following among the youth of America, and he continues to do the right things in order to maintain that following. A recent poll by the Pew Research Center found almost half of Americans ages 18 to 29 turned to the Internet as their major source of election news in 2008.While I have no proof, I would image the majority of them voted for Obama.

Time Sensitive Offers

In a recent blog post tilted, The plight (and the pox) of the undecided , Seth Godin mentioned how for many us marketers, the competition we are facing is our customer’s natural inertia to push off making a decision.  

Godin writes,” We think that people are undecided because they don't know enough about our features or our competitors, or because they don't have enough money or they are waiting to hear from their friends. In fact, most of the time, they're undecided because they are afraid of deciding. No is scary and yes is scary.”

So how do you fight this inertia? With a ticking clock. Time sensitive deals are a great way to force customers into making a decision. “Buy now and save, or buy tomorrow and pay more.” Time sensitive offers have been around for decades and will continue to be used because they work. They force a Yes or No decision.  Remember, a No today is better than a No a week from today.

Art.com is a company that uses time sensitive deals very well. They often send out promotional discount codes for free shipping, 15% off, 20% off, or 25% off once you have setup a shopping cart. Each code has an expiry date (3-5 days usually), after which they are no longer good, encouraging you to make a purchase decision. If you are scared of making a Yes or No decision, 25% off today makes the choice a little easier.

Direct Marketing vs. SEO

There are countless companies that invest a significant amount of their marketing dollars in direct, outbound marketing initiatives. Direct marketers try to send their messages directly to consumers, without the use of intervening media. The most popular forms of this communication are direct mail, e-mail, and telemarketing. The main drawback of this practice? It is almost always unsolicited, resulting in a low percentage of positive responses (often 1-2%).

Compare this to SEO techniques, where the purpose is to reach customers at the exact moment they are actively seeking information about a product. If a customer is searching for a product you supply, isn’t that exactly when you want to reach them with your marketing message? For this reason, more and more companies are making SEO techniques a priority over direct marketing. That’s not to say that direct marketing vs. SEO has to be an either or, but if you’re spending a lot on direct marketing, try spending some of that on SEO. To learn more about SEO techniques, try reading SEO: Search Engine Optimization Bible by Jerri L. Ledford