the Bridge

Producing a great brief is the first critical step towards an effective direct marketing campaign. The brief can be compared to a road map which allows your agency to understand what your goals are and how best to achieve them.

To overcome the challenges of producing a great brief we look at guidelines that will get you started. We also include a briefing template for you to use.

 
What are the key factors of an effective direct marketing brief?

Strong briefs:
1. Have clear objectives
2. Are focused and specific
3. Are logical and brutally honest
4. Are rich with insight
5. Are the sum of client, agency and research input

Weak briefs:
1. Lack a strong product offer or enough detail to develop one
2. Are focused on the client’s needs, not the customers
3. Are vague and incomplete
4. Include unsubstantiated claims and benefits

 
When developing your brief try to include the following areas of information:

1. Establish what you know about the target customer

Where information is available, try to paint a picture of your customer. Describe who they are, what they are like, what they like doing, their attitudes, preferences and behaviours. This can include:

a. Providing the raw target data
b. Providing psychographic and demographic information
c. Outlining why customers make their purchasing decisions
d. Establishing what the customer is solving, what is their pain area
e. Providing any customer feedback and commentary you have
f. Establishing the tone of voice that is appropriate
g. Outlining any customer segmentation you have used

 
2. Outline the competition

Describe who your competitors are and what you know about them. Outline the product or service they offer in competition to this campaign.

a. What is their market position?
b. Are they a; market leader, budget supplier, premium provider?

 
3. Communicate your product or service benefits.
Describe how your product or service benefits the customer:
a. Include primary and secondary benefits
b. Outline the unique selling proposition USP
c. Provide any existing customer testimonials and feedback
d. Provide any third party endorsements
e. Show how your product is different from the competitors

 
4. Define your objectives and what success looks like

Make sure you effectively describe what marketing or business objectives will be achieved by this campaign.

Objectives should be SMACO – Specific, Measurable, Actionable, Clear, Ownable

Examples of this are:
Generate x number of sales leads
Raise customer awareness from x% to y%
Increase number of sales calls by x% in y months
Enroll x new members by y date

 
5. Provide a powerful call to action
How will you encourage customers to take action or make contact with you?
a. Are you going to use any specific contact or conversion channels i.e. drive to web, free call, pre-paid reply etc.?
b. Are you planning to incentivise actions with a special deal or offer to motivate the customer?
c. Do you have any offer history to show what worked in the past and what didn’t?
d. Are there any examples of successful competitor campaigns that had a successful call to action?

 
6. Included external considerations and mandatories
Are there any:
a. Legal, regulatory, social, economic, seasonal or environmental factors that should be considered in developing a response to this brief?
b. Design, size, format, distribution or production considerations?
c. Graphic guidelines, logos and other graphic support required?
d. Concepts that should be avoided or has not worked well in the past?
e. Wording or language that must not be used in the copy?
f. Other communications planned/happening around your campaign period?

 
7. Provide a budget for your campaign

Where possible, provide an indication of your budget to allow the agency to provide a realistic response. This can be as a total campaign cost or as a cost per lead or cost per sale.

 
8. Include timings
Let your agency know:
a. When do you require the initial agency response by?
b. When is the activity scheduled to go live?
c. What does the agency need to allow for in their timing plan? E.g. Internal approvals
d. How does the timing of this activity tie in to other marketing activity?

 
We hope that this information is helpful when you next brief your marketing partner.

 
If you would like to use our free briefing template just visit our resources page and click on the agency briefing-long link.

 
Stay tuned for more direct marketing insights from The Bridge

If you are new to our direct marketing best practice communication you can review previous topics via the links below.

1. Data is #1
2. Who is your customer anyway?
3. What is your proposition?
4. Get your message right
5. Creative designs that gain customers
6. Creative briefs that work
7. Relevance is everything
8. Which methods and why
9. Conversion and success
10. Why measure?
11. Systems and support
12. CRM for you
13. Your next steps

Each topic is posted on our marketing blog and linked above for easy reference.
 
Let us take care of it!
Let us produce your next successful direct marketing campaign. Contact us to discuss your marketing programme requirements or visit our website.

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Obtaining more paying customers in today’s economic climate is both challenging and a must for you to keep your business doors open. How can you produce fantastic direct marketing that will pull in the customers and get your message out there?

To produce and design direct marketing that works for your specific business requirements the first step is to reduce the chance of a hit or miss result when working with your agency. Provide a good creative brief and develop a clear understanding of what you require the output to achieve.

Creative design in direct marketing can be subjective; however you can increase your success rate by applying the following principals:

a) Make it relevant
b) Test for results
c) Utilise a structured format
d) Style and tone
e) Media type
 
Make it relevant

Ensure you maintain a creative relevacy throughout the design process. Make sure that you keep your target audience front of mind when briefing and reviewing creative outputs. Will the output achieve the desired response you are looking to achieve? If the answer is doubtful, start again.

Ask yourself; will you’re creative output be:
1. Appropriate for your target audience?
2. Appropriate for the task?
3. Appropriate for the medium?
4. Appropriate for your brand?
 
Test for results

What constitutes an effective creative concept can vary between specific audience types and their demographics. The bottom line is – if you achieve your desired result, then the creative solution was valid. Hence assessing the creative qualities can only really be done by testing. Using a test group to see if they like and engage with the concept can allow you to fine tune or validate your ideas. You may decide to do a split test with 2 or more variations to find the best version.

Audience results to look for:
1. Grabbed their attention
2. Compelled them to find out more or read on
3. The message felt relevant to them and their situation
4. The creative idea felt consistent with their expectations and brand perceptions
 
Utilise a structured format

Developing a format that facilitates the required response is important when designing effective direct marketing. Try to structure your copy and design so that the recipient feels and increasing desire to act as they read through.

Does your design have?
1. Smooth flow between headline and call to action
2. Clear and concise outlines of the benefits for taking action
3. Copy that pre-handles objections which would naturally arise
4. Easy to understand call to action
5. A response mechanism that’s suited to the recipient type
 
Style and tone

In order to use the most appropriate creative style and tone for your target audience you need to know as much as possible about the receiver. Using the wrong tone or creative style in your communication can result in a failure to engage or can even illicit a strong negative response.

Junk mail only becomes junk when it is poorly targeted and fails to relate to receiver in a way that is personal and appropriate. When developing a creative solution will your style and tone be

appropriate to:

1. Your audience demographics
2. Your brand positioning
3. What you’re asking the audience to do
 
Media type

Choosing the right media type for a direct marketing campaign will depend on a number of factors, including how well you understand your target audience. Consider the following:

1. Your audiences communication preferences and where they will receive it
2. How will the creative concept work in the chosen media type
3. Can you execute your creative concept to a high enough standard
4. Can you maximise the particular strengths of your chosen media type
5. Do you have the budget or skills required to utilise your chosen media
 
Creative execution example
The direct marketing example below appears thoughtfully executed and is engaging.

A direct mail letter sent by a Hospice using a “Christmas to do list” concept. They introduce the idea of choosing hospice gifts from their website. The concept is appropriate and authentic to the situation, the mad rush of Christmas when people are actually making must do lists before the big day. The concept flows throughout the pages and is well executed.

A4 Direct Mail letter

 
Stay tuned for more direct marketing insights from The Bridge

If you are new to our direct marketing best practice communication you can review previous topics via the links below.

1. Data is #1
2. Who is your customer anyway?
3. What is your proposition?
4. Get your message right
5. Creative designs that gain customers
6. A creative brief
7. Relevance is everything
8. Which methods and why
9. Conversion and success
10. Why measure?
11. Systems and support
12. CRM for you
13. Your next steps

Each topic is posted on our marketing blog and linked above for easy reference.
 
Let us take care of it!
Let us produce your next successful direct marketing campaign. Contact us to discuss your marketing programme requirements or visit our website.

In the age of Twitter and web 2.0 the power of the written word is fast becoming an underrated concept. The basic knowledge of how to craft compete sentences with engaging and effective messaging is a dying practice. Who was it that said, “The pen is mightier than the sword”?

So let’s dust of this ancient weapon and find out how to create a powerful message that delivers the desired results.

Make it fit for purpose

The nature of your message will often be determined by:

A) The recipient and the subject, i.e. appropriate language for the receiver
B) The specific channel you are using, email, direct mail, SMS, newsletter

 
Develop benefit based headlines

An engaging headline communicates “what’s in it for the customer” and effectively describes the value or benefit your customer will receive from your product or service. The headline fulfills an essential role as the ‘hook’ for customers to read on and find out more.

 
Sell the sizzle

When developing your sales message it’s always good to remember to:

Keep it simple – so it can be understood clearly
Keep it short – so it can be understood quickly
Stress the benefits – sell the ‘sizzle’, not the sausage

 
Stay customer focused

Define your benefit statements in terms of the customer. Remember it is about your customer not your business – Use “you” and not “I” or “we”.

Keep it legal, decent and honest – it’s the law and in the Code of Practice

 
Creating engaging and relevant copy

The primary goal is to communicate your message effectively in order for your customers to make an educated buying decision.

Don’t get sidetracked by design and creative style – ultimately it’s the text that convinces your customers your offer is too good to miss. Imagery is of course important and supports you’re messaging, however using the right tone of voice and creating effective copy should be your primary focus.

 
Eye tracking research

The art of effective online and offline communication has benefited greatly from eye tracking research. The study of how the human eye registers and perceives visual communications has delivered some fascinating insights, especially on how we automatically filter the information. Take your communication to the next level with eye tracking research by Professor Siegfried Vogele of the Institute for Direct Marketing in Munich.

Using typeface:

Create effective messaging with the knowledge of how we scan and perceive typography and copy. The right choice of type face, use of colour and layout can be viewed in our post.

Using Imagery:

Our focus can be affected by the placement of imagery and graphic elements. The results of this study have real implications for the design of marketing communications. View this post.

 
A unique selling proposition

The USP is central to your message and to your overall communication strategy. How to develop an effective USP is covered in our developing a unique selling proposition post.

 
Free from jargon

Remember the golden rule of creating content that’s appropriate and relevant to your target audience. It is not uncommon for a business that specialises in a specific technical area to overuse jargon and technical speak. I recommend using an external copywriter to provide a laypersons viewpoint on the clarity and comprehension of the content. An external writer is more likely to interpret your information like a real customer and be able to ask the right questions.

 
Endorsement

Endorsements and testimonials increases customers’ trust and gives them confidence that your business is capable of delivering on your promise.

 
Reduce the barriers

Barriers to customer purchase or action vary depending on your product or service type. Reduce the barriers to improve your sales conversion rates. Providing guarantees, free phone numbers and support services can help to smooth the customer decision process.
You may include:

- Additional information
- The enquiry process
- Purchase or business processes

Allow the customer to understand what is required of them and what the next step is likely to be.

Calls to action

Encourage the customer to take action or make contact with you. Include all relevant contact information in your call to action and double-check that the details are correct – there’s nothing worse for a customer to visit a website that doesn’t exist. You may also consider incentivising your customers to take action now. Time restricted special offers can be effective in generating increased demand.

If you address some or all of the above tools for creating powerful and engaging messages – you will be streets ahead of your competitors. You will also be more effective in achieving the results you want.

 
Stay tuned for more direct marketing insights from The Bridge

If you are new to our direct marketing best practice communication you can review previous topics via the links below.

1. Data is #1
2. Who is your customer anyway?
3. What is your proposition?
4. Get your message right
5. Creative design
6. A creative brief
7. Relevance is everything
8. Which methods and why
9. Conversion and success
10. Why measure?
11. Systems and support
12. CRM for you
13. Your next steps

Each topic is posted on our marketing blog and linked above for easy reference.
 
Let us take care of it!
Let us produce your next successful direct marketing campaign. Contact us to discuss your marketing programme requirements or visit our website.
 
 

Creating an engaging and relevant market proposition is a crucial step in the process of developing a direct marketing campaign. It is essential that you fully understand the uniqueness of your businesses offer and can express its value in a way that the customer understands.

Ask yourself why should the customer choose you?

Defining your Unique Selling Proposition (USP) from the outset can help you to refine your sales messages and effectively communicate the core essence of your competitive advantage.

So how do you identify your USP?

Look for all aspects of your product or service offer that makes your business unique or different. Determine what is special about your offer and how it will benefit your customer.

The business landscape

Increasing your knowledge of the marketplace in which you operate as well as your key competitors is good business practice. Yet how many small businesses really invest enough time into understanding their comparative market position? A potential outcome for low market awareness can be the development of “me too” products. An undifferentiated product may need to compete on price, reducing margins and profit.

 
 Six simple steps to developing your USP
 
1) Review your business processes and key product and service attributes

Remember that you need to view your business offer from the customer’s point of view. What are the benefits they will receive from your offer? What is in it for them – why should they care? Compare the key benefits of your product or service with that of your competitors.

 
2) Review competitor businesses

Start reviewing your competitors and other comparable businesses via the internet and any other promotional material you can access.

A) How do the companies position themselves and how do they communicate their key benefits?
B) What is their tone of voice and writing style?
C) What products and services are offered and what do they specialise in?

The insights that you gain from this process will help you to determine where you fit amongst your competitors and what you need to say about your business in order to communicate your unique offering.

 
3) Outline your competitive advantages

Using your competitor review and comparative benefits, create a list of key features that your business or product offers which:

A) Deliver unique customer benefits
B) Establish you as a preferential supplier
This list of benefits will form the foundation of your USP statement.

 
4) Develop a draft USP statement

When creating your USP statement you need to define the benefit statement in terms of the customer. Remember it is about your customer not your business – Use “you” and not “I” or “we”.

An ideal length for your USP is about 30 to 40 words or less as this will allow you to use it in online business directories and supplier lists where space is at a premium. You may also develop additional versions with various lengths to suit different applications yet still retain the core message.

If you find that your offer is not unique or is at risk of being duplicated you may wish to put some more thought into creating new benefits and how you can make your offer different or superior.

 
5) Review and refine your USP

Compare your new USP against other competitor’s statements to see how it stacks up.
Seek feedback on your draft USP from staff, customers and advisors. Ask them if this statement represents what your business offers its customers and does it effectively communicate all the key customer benefits.

 
6) Finalise your USP and positioning

Refine your USP statement until you are happy that it communicates the essence of your business in the eyes of the customer. When you have finished give yourself a huge pat on the back as you have achieved what many businesses struggle to do.

As a result of this process you will have:
1. Greater awareness of your marketplace
2. More knowledge of who your competitors are
3. Greater understanding of:
- Your strengths and weaknesses
- What makes your business different
- Your key marketing and sales messages
4. Greater consistency in your marketing and sales communications
 

With your USP top of mind, you will now have a much better idea of what to communicate in sales messages and promotional offers. In the future your emails, direct mail and other direct marketing activities should be consistent with your core USP.

 
Stay tuned for more direct marketing insights from The Bridge

If you are new to our direct marketing best practice communication you can review previous topics via the links below.

1. Data is #1
2. Who is your customer anyway?
3. What is your proposition?
4. Get your message right
5. Creative design
6. A creative brief
7. Relevance is everything
8. Which methods and why
9. Conversion and success
10. Why measure?
11. Systems and support
12. CRM for you
13. Your next steps

Each topic is posted on our marketing blog and linked above for easy reference.
 
Let us take care of it!
Let us produce your next successful direct marketing campaign. Contact us to discuss your marketing programme requirements or visit our website.
 
 

It seems an obvious question – but do you know who your customers really are?

Developing an accurate picture of your customer is a fundamental basic for developing a successful direct marketing programme. The ability to describe your typical customer in a few short sentences is a valuable skill.

 
Four key reasons for building a customer profile

1. Having an accurate picture of your customer helps you determine how to market your offer to them effectively – from creating relevant messages to knowing how to reach them and when it’s a good time to talk.
2. Knowing who buys your product or service can help you to make informed product decisions – such as introducing a new product line, new customer service hours, enhancing an existing product offer or being aware of what features are important to which customers.
3. Understanding which customers are the most profitable and the level of servicing required to retain each piece of business.
4. Knowing which customer types are the most loyal and who will switch to competitors because of a price or benefit promotion.

Customer profiling can provide a range of insights to a business willing to invest time into this process.

 
Building a customer profile

When building up your profiles the “who – where – what” questions are likely to vary depending on whether you are targeting consumers or other businesses. You may be surprised by the level of existing information you already have about your customers and how they interact with the business.

 
Consumers:
1. Is the decision-maker for your product male or female?
2. How old are they?
3. Where do you they live – urban, semi-urban, rural or remote? Are your customers in NZ, other international countries or are they global?
4. What is their average income?
5. What is their family size – single, married, children, grandchildren?
6. What other products do they buy? – this could provide insights on a joint promotion opportunity.
7. What lifestyle and purchasing insights do you know about your customers – such as their hobbies, where do they holiday, are they health-conscious, are they environmentally friendly, are they price-sensitive?
8. How do they like being communicated to – post, e-mail, telephone, SMS?
9. When is a good time to talk to them?

 
Businesses customers:

1. Who is the decision maker?
2. What industry or industries is the business in?
3. What size business – SMEs or corporate?
4. Where are they located? Are your customers in NZ, other international countries or are they global? – this information can help you with geographically based targeting and resourcing
5. What is their procurement process for this type of purchase?
6. What other products/brands/companies do they use? Identify bundling opportunities, joint promotions opportunities and likely price comparisons.
7. What other insights do you have relating to their purchasing decisions – are they price sensitive, service conscious, do they consider total cost etc.
8. What are the current business objectives – customer acquisition, retention, new product launch etc.
9. How do they like being communicated to – post, e-mail, telephone, site visit?
10. When is a good time to talk to them?

 
The ideal profitable customer

When you analyse your current customers you may realise that they are far from your ideal customer. Your customers may be costly to serve or have a high cost per acquisition. In the same way as you profile your existing customers, it’s important to develop a profile of the ‘ideal customer’ for your business.

A useful example that was relayed to me was of a large accounting firm reducing the number of clients they served from 1300 to 30. This new strategic decision was based on an insight gained from auditing the cost of servicing each customer. The reduction in customer base increased their profitability and allowed them to define their ideal customer for future acquisition.

 
Stay tuned for more direct marketing insights from The Bridge:

1. Data is #1
2. Who is your customer anyway?
3. What is your proposition?
4. Get your message right
5. Creative design
6. A creative brief
7. Relevance is everything
8. Which methods and why
9. Conversion and success
10. Why measure?
11. Systems and support
12. CRM for you
13. Your next steps

Each topic is posted on our marketing blog and linked above for easy reference.
 
Let us take care of it!
Let us produce your next successful direct marketing campaign. Contact us to discuss your marketing programme requirements or visit our website.
 
 

Accurate customer data is the cornerstone of a successful direct marketing programme. The right data obtained from your current customer base or an external source can provide you with an important and insightful view of your existing or potential customers.

The insights provided by your data resource will help you generate a better picture of your target customer. The more you know about your customer – the more likely you are to send relevant, timely and engaging information that results in a purchase or an intended action.

 
In this first post of the series we discuss the key considerations for developing your direct marketing data resource.
 
Key questions when building your database
- How do I want to communicate with my customers or prospects?
- Do I need their email, physical address, phone number, preferences or demographics?
- How will I track my activities and the resulting customer actions?
- What kind of customer details will help me deliver the right service or product in a way that leaves the customer completely satisfied?
 
Planning for success

If you know from the outset the type of information you need and how you will use it, you are already ahead of the game. Over time you may alter your business requirements and therefore your data system will need to adapt to meet this change. Creating a data plan and purpose will give your data collection a focus. A rule of thumb says that your next sale is most likely to come from an existing customer, therefore utilising your customer database for promotional activity is a real opportunity.

 
The age of your data

It is a common practice for companies to let their databases go out of date and become inaccurate. What most people don’t realize is how quickly your data can degrade. It is said that you can expect about 16% of emails addresses to become invalid each year from changes in circumstances.

- Do you know how old your database is and each individual record?
- When did you last validate the contact details you have?
 
Buying data

There are a number of data suppliers in the NZ market and they each have their own areas of expertise. A free database report is provided by Kompass to download, giving you a solid grounding into who the providers are. Commercial data can be expensive, making a blanket campaign costly. It is important that you are clear about who you want to target, making sure that your offer is focused and relevant in order to keep the cost of acquisition down.

 
Permission based data

Avoid spamming your recipients by making sure your communications are compliant. We recommend that you review the best practice guidelines. This information and a range of resources can be found at the Marketing Associations website. If you are sending an email communication, remember to always give the receiver the option to opt out from your database.

 
Storing your data
- Is your data secured and can you protect your customer privacy?
- Do you have a backup strategy and can you protect your data from damage?

Finally, building a good customer or prospect database is well worth the effort it takes in order to send relevant and timely communications.

 
Stay tuned for more direct marketing insights from The Bridge:

1. Data is #1
2. Who is your customer anyway?
3. What is your proposition?
4. Get your message right
5. Creative design
6. A creative brief
7. Relevance is everything
8. Which methods and why
9. Conversion and success
10. Why measure?
11. Systems and support
12. CRM for you
13. Your next steps

Each topic will be posted on our marketing blog for easy reference.
 
Top tip of the month – for business owners.

I thoroughly recommend reading Michael Gerber’s The E Myth revisited. This must-read book provides fantastic insights into running a successful business.

 
Let us take care of it!
Let us produce your next successful direct marketing campaign. Contact us to discuss your marketing programme requirements or visit our website.
 
 

Developing an effective sales brochure can help you to communicate your product or service benefits to your customers and as a result increase sales success rates.

Producing a brochure or piece of sales collateral is a fairly common business task; however in my experience many businesses struggle with this aspect of marketing. There are a number of reasons for this difficulty and they can vary case by case, including access to the right skills, limited budgets or the ability to convey technical messages.

 
When you develop your next brochure consider these 10 steps:
 

1) Benefit based headlines

Creating an effective headline is the first step to producing a successful brochure. The headline communicates “what’s in it for the customer” and should be engaging and describe the value or benefit your customer will receive from your product or service.

2) Sell the sizzle

When developing your sales message it’s always good to remember to:
Keep it simple – so it can be understood clearly
Keep it short – so it can be understood quickly
Stress the benefits – sell the ‘sizzle’, not the sausage
 

3) Customer focused

Define your benefit statements in terms of the customer. Remember it is about your customer not your business – Use “you” and not “I” or “we”.

4) A unique selling proposition (USP)

The USP is central to your brochure and to your sales communication strategy. The development of an effective USP gives you the ability to focus your messaging and sales pitch around what you are really good at. This process will help you distill the key sales messages in your brochure.

Your USP might be specific to your product or service, or an overarching aspect of your business, giving you a competitive advantage. Look for all aspects of your offer that makes your business unique or different. Ask yourself why the customer should buy from you and not your competitor. If you would like to know more about developing your businesses USP see our post on developing a unique selling proposition.

5) Fit for purpose

When developing your brochure bring your sales force into the design loop and involve the people that will use your brochure as they will often have key information. Giving your sales people some project ownership is a good idea and can make a real difference in sales tool adoption and use rates.

Those companies that produce effective sales brochures and collateral often use a user centric development process which means that the company’s customer experts (sales people) are involved right from the start of the development process.

6) Engaging and relevant content

When producing your brochure, remember that the primary goal is to communicate effectively and get your message across. This will allow your customers to make an educated buying decision.

Don’t get sidetracked by design and creative style. Ultimately your brochure contains text and it is this text that will convince your customer that what you offer is too good to miss. Imagery is of course important and supports you’re messaging, however using the right tone of voice and effective copy should be your focus.

Your ability to create effective brochures can be greatly improved with the knowledge of how we read and perceive typography and copy styles. We discuss how using different type styles and layouts can directly affect your success in our post on effective copy.

7) Endorsement

Endorsements or testimonials reduce the customer’s perceived risk and can provide them with confidence that your business is capable of delivering on your promise.

A strong customer endorsement is hard to beat when it comes to marketing or sales communication. You do however need to make sure that your testimonials are relevant to the product or service area and that they are up to date and well written.

Companies that make endorsement collection and utilisation a key part of their business processes tend to prosper.

8 ) Reduce the barriers

Barriers to customer purchase or action vary depending on your product or service type. Barriers can be created around high price/risk, geography, service levels, complexity or anything that gives the customer reason to take stock.

Reducing barriers or eliminating them can help to improve your sales conversion rates and this applies also to your brochure. Providing guarantees, free phone numbers and support services can help to smooth the customer decision process. You can include additional information on the inquiry process, purchase or business process to create greater customer confidence. Allow the customer to understand what is required of them and what the next step is likely to be.

9) Call to action

Remember that the sales brochure is not just a customer information resource; it can also be used as a tool to encourage customers to take action or make contact with you. Make sure that you have all the relevant contact information included and consider incentivising actions with a special deal or offer to motivate the customer.

10) Measuring success

Finally make sure that your brochure has some form of measurement or tracking system so you can measure its success. Use a specific phone number, email or mail address to measure response and conversion rates for a specific brochure. This strategy will allow you to gain a clearer idea of your return on investment.

 
Why not let us produce your next sales and marketing brochure and remove the frustration. For further support in developing your next brochure or to discuss an effective marketing programme contact us or visit our website.
 
 

The digitalization process is continuing to drive the proliferation of media around the world. The result of this development is an ever increasing choice of marketing channels. Choosing the right marketing channels for your SME business is not an exact science, in many business cases it will be a matter of trial and error. However we can narrow down the choice to a few likely options that match your budget, time frames and specific requirements.

We have provided a marketing channel choice matrix for you to refer to. Although this resource is not exhaustive it covers most of the channels you will use and provides a good starting point for thinking about which channels might suit your situation.

It’s in the execution

Remember that even though channel choice is an important factor in the likelihood of campaign success it is not the only factor. It is possible to choose a less suitable channel for your marketing efforts and still get good results because the campaign execution is excellent. Alternatively it is also possible to pick the most suitable channel and do a poor job on the campaign execution with poor results. So channel choice is by no means the end all and be all for marketing success.

It is also important to consider other aspects of your campaign like the tone of voice used and the application of effective copy and imagery. You will also need to give consideration to campaign planning and the measurement of your results so you know what success looks like.

Repetition

Effective marketing campaigns that get customers to take action often rely on frequency to drive home the message and deliver results. There is no substitute for repetition when it comes to promotion especially in a cluttered promotional environment. People are literally exposed to thousands of marketing messages each day so you can’t always expect your audience to remember your offer.

Using multiple channels

Effective marketing often involves the use of multiple channels to communicate an offer. The combined use of different media types allows you to reinforce your message and leverage the combined effect of these different channels. Using online and offline media together can have great results. See our post Choosing Email or Direct Mail for the benefits of combining these channels.

 
Below is a basic campaign example combining different channels:
1) Start with an initial targeted email campaign to generate awareness.
2) Follow your email with a direct mailing to provide greater detail and reinforce your benefits. This mailing could also include personalisation for each individual or customer type.
3) Concurrently you support your mailing campaign with advertising in the press, trade media or use PR to increase your message saturation in the target market.
4) Finally you complete the process with a series of sales calls to convert your prospective customers.

Convincing your prospective customer of the benefits you offer could require you to generate as many as 7 or 8 touch points between your brand/business and the customer. This level of exposure will depend on the nature of the product or service and extra reinforcement may be required in the case of high value purchases or complex offers.

To deliver a successful marketing campaign you will need to consider more than just choosing the right channels. To gain a greater level of success you will need to maintain focus on the quality and detail of your campaign execution right to the last moment.

 
For further support in developing your campign or to develop an effective marketing programme contact us or visit our website.
 
 

 
You’re USP

Developing an effective Unique Selling Proposition (USP) is one of the key foundations of creating a competitive and successful business. Getting your USP right from the outset can make your marketing and sales activity a lot more effective. It also makes it easier for you to communicate a consistent message in a variety of different mediums.

The Wikipedia definition of a USP is: “The proposition must be one that the competition either cannot, or does not, offer. It must be unique—either a uniqueness of the brand or a claim not otherwise made in that particular field…” for example FedEx’s proposition is “When your package absolutely, positively has to get there overnight”.

Knowing your competitors, customers and your marketplace seems like an obvious requirement. However not many small businesses really invest enough time into understanding the comparative market position of their products and services. The likely outcome of such low awareness is the development of “me too” type products and services that look alike. Therefore the business is forced to compete on pricing rather than well developed customer benefits.

 
How do you identify your USP?
Start by reviewing your businesses’ key strengths, weaknesses and overall market position. Look for all aspects of your product or service offer that makes your business unique or different. What is special about your offer and how will it benefit the customer? Ask yourself why the customer should buy from you and not your competitor.
 
An example of defining a Hotel’s benefits:

Location is always a big factor in market positioning in this type of business. The hotel in question has old world charm and is considered boutique accommodation. There are a small number of uniquely decorated rooms and the overall atmosphere is eclectic.

The Hotel owner looks at the business and deduces that the key benefits for the customer are:
1. Proximity to the waterfront with a picturesque outlook
2. Boutique features with a unique atmosphere – the hotel has a real personality
3. Like no other hotel – ideal for people who want to experience something different.
 

In the process of defining your USP you will also need to consider the wider market context within which you operate. If we take the example of running a railways business, this could be widened to the context of transport. The change in perception will fundamentally shift the way you look at what you offer the market. The U.S. rail industry failed to make this readjustment last century and suffered from a market shift that left them almost obsolete.

 
For example a traditional USP for a mail business is:

“Auckland Mail Services provides a fast and efficient mail delivery service. We guarantee to deliver your mail the very next day”

Let’s change the perception of the business to “facilitating the movement of information between people and businesses”, so that AMS is in the business of information transfer. They could use the following statement as a basis for developing their USP:

“Auckland Information Services makes the transfer of information easy. Every hour of the day your friends, family and businesses are connected together.”
 

The ability to future proof your USP is a definite advantage. There is however a balance between defining your market too narrowly and too broadly. You still need to be able to keep your positioning relevant to your target customer. The time you invest in this process is vital for your business as it will provide key market insights into your competitive advantages and can also provide a proof of concept for your customer offer.

 
In part 2 of this blog we look at key steps in developing a competitive USP.
 
For further support in developing your USP or to develop an effective marketing programme contact us.
 
 

 
In part 1 of this blog we look at the benefits of developing a competitive USP.

How to develop a competitive USP

Step 1a) Review business processes and key product and service attributes
This process is best done with the help of someone external to the business that can provide objective feedback. As a business owner or manager you can become so immersed in the business that it is often difficult to remove emotive opinions and you may suffer from blinkered perception.

Remember that you are trying to see your business offer from the customer’s point of view. What are the benefits they will receive from your company? What is in it for them – why should they care?

Not all businesses start with the customer in mind. Manufacturing based businesses can be very focused on the innovation and product development process. They can develop a new product because of a technology or process breakthrough rather than a direct customer requirement. The marketing and sales function is then tasked with trying to tease out the benefits and figure out how to sell the new offer.

Once you have defined the key benefits of your product or service offer then you can start to compare them with your competitors.

Step 1b) Review competitor businesses
Use the internet to review your competitors and other comparable businesses. Look for information about how the companies position themselves and how they promote their key benefits. How do they talk about their businesses? Look at things like tone of voice and writing style. What products and services are offered and what are their specialism’s?

Throughout the competitor review process you are focusing on two things; A) you are trying to understand the specific details of each individual competing business; B) you are trying to map out the industry or sector that you operate in and where your business is positioned relatively. These two pieces of information will help you determine what you need to say about your business to be different and how much competition you really have.

The business landscape is always changing, so the snapshot you are creating can become obsolete overnight. It pays to review your market at least once a year to see how it is developing. In technically fast moving markets you may have to build a continuous review process into your business to try and predict change and keep your business competitive.

Step 2) Outline clear competitive advantages
Once you have completed comprehensive competitor research and understand the comparative key benefits of your businesses’ product or service offer this stage should be relatively easy. Start creating a list of key aspects about your business that deliver customer benefits which are unique to you, which will establish you as a preferential supplier. This list of benefits will then become the foundation of your USP statement.

Step 3) Develop initial USP statement
You can begin to capture these on paper once you are confident you understand the unique elements of your business. A consideration when developing your USP is the application or when/where it will be used. You will often be required to list your business in directories or supplier lists, so having a great USP that is 30 to 40 words is very useful. The USP can be developed from a core version into several different length variations for when you have greater space to describe your business. Be mindful that you do not want to dilute the core powerful message of your statement by stretching it out too much.

When creating your USP statement you need to define the benefit statement in terms of the customer. Remember it is about your customer not your business – Use “you” and not “I” or “we”.

At Big Ed’s shoes we provide the biggest range of shoes in the southern hemisphere.

At Big Ed’s I know you will go crazy over the greatest range of shoes in Australasia.

At Big Ed’s you will find the biggest range of shoes in Australasia.
 

Following your initial analysis you could find that your offer is not unique or is at risk of being duplicated. At this point you may wish to go back to the drawing board to think about how to create new benefits or make your offer different. If your business model involves a discounting strategy or a volume based strategy, then differentiation may not be such a big issue as long as you can maintain your market

share.

Step 4) Review and amend
You can now compare your new USP against other competitor’s statements to see how it stands up. It is a good idea to get a range of opinions on your new draft USP. Try to get some neutral opinions as well as those from friendly customers and key staff. Ask them if this statement represents what your business offers its customers and does it capture all the key benefits you offer.

When creating a future orientated positioning statement which portrays your business as you would like to see it in the future, there may well be a shortfall in how people currently perceive the business. This practical difference in perception can be used to help define the actions required to close the gap between your future positioning and the current position.

Step 5) Finalise USP and positioning
Refine your statement and when you have finished pat yourself on the back as you have achieved what many small businesses struggle to do.

As a result of this process you will have:
1. Greater awareness of your market place
2. More knowledge of who your competitors are
3. Greater understanding of
-Your strengths and weaknesses
-What makes your business different
-Your key marketing and sales messages
4. Greater consistency in your marketing and sales communications
 
You will now need to start to planning your promotional activity and set your marketing plans for the coming year.
 
For further support in developing your USP or to develop an effective marketing programme contact us.