photo credit: ArtemFinland
There is nothing worse than investing time and money in a marketing campaign without the ability to track its effectiveness. Here are 3 scenarios, and some suggestions on how to track them.
A newspaper ad or direct mailer
In the past, you may have put an ad in a local newspaper with your website’s home page and phone number. Or perhaps you went another step further and suggested your reader clip the ad as a coupon or used urged potential customers to “Call for more details.”
By automating your print advertising you’ll be able to see the effectiveness of your advertisement and potentially increase your email database. That means, if the offer is good, but not good enough for them to buy right away, you can retain their information for further offerings or useful information. You can use landing pages to achieve this.
A landing page is a “hidden” page on your website – meaning it’s not on your navigation bar. It has a specific URL, like http://www.vancouvermarketinggirl.com/[insert page here] that is linked to a specific campaign.
Ask for some key information on a landing page – like name and email address. Walk through this promotion if you’d like to see an example in action. Visit ZipLocal and find Salon Montage. Click on the URL on their profile. Fill in the information and within moments you’ll receive an email coupon. (PS, if you did this, you just received a $15 certificate to use on their services). You’ll also be added to their email database which is how you can track how many people participated in your campaign (Don’t worry you can unsubscribe right away if you don’t want to receive their monthly updates).
Ask your web designer or email me for more information on how to create your own landing page.
Many companies also use different phone numbers for each specific campaign. This works well as you can track received phone calls. This could be a good route to go if your company isn’t participating in email marketing.
A Facebook ad campaign
This method can be tracked through Facebook statistics and through your Google Analytics. You can easily see how many people viewed your ad and how many responded. This way you can adjust your message accordingly. Facebook does an excellent job of allowing you to target your campaign by selecting the demographics that fit your criteria.
Email Newsletters
Email campaigns are a brilliant way to keep in touch with current, past and potential customers. Email marketing should be permission based. It’s a good idea to utilize a third party newsletter provider. I use Icontact almost exclusively. I like their pricing, customer service and the ease of their website.
With IContact you can send as many emails and have as many lists of subscribers as you wish. Two good lists to start with would be Current Customers and Potential Customers. This way you can address various topics that are of interest to each group.
When you send your marketing message Icontact takes care of the tracking. You can see in detail how many people opened your email and clicked on links. You can also see who has unsubscribed. I use this as an indicator of the usefulness of the message. In this genre, a straight promotion will usually result in more unsubscribers than a message with useful information as well as promotional.
Feel free to utilize your landing pages through email marketing as well.
Shock a potential customer by doing something unexpected.
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Buy everyone in coffee line up or lunch line something – whether you are the proprietor or a customer
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Or buy someone’s second cup of coffee as you both sit alone in a coffee shop. Most shops don’t refill coffees, especially lattes or cappuccinos. If you own a coffee shop – walk around and refill your regular client’s coffees – they’ll be glad you did.
Random Acts of Kindness Day 2 - Share your toys – even if all you have is information
Random Acts of Kindess Day 1 -
photo credit: Dave Duarte
I recently had a conversation with a business acquaintance where I started sharing information about the strategies I deploy when writing. It wasn’t until he said, “Wow, I should be paying you for this information,” that I realized I wasn’t expecting to receive anything in return for my advice.
This got me thinking about sharing. Whether online or in person both business models offer opportunities to share information, ideas, technology, products and services. And these can be shared freely or with strings attached.
Now I know, most of us in business are driven by the bottom line. But I’ve noticed lately that there are two broadly defined groups of companies: one that is looking inward, holding on to all it has, looking for the next quick sale and the other that is looking outward, letting idea sharing flow, seeing their customers as long term investments.
The first group has its reason for not sharing. When you share you leave yourself open and vulnerable to be taken advantage of. Your competition knows what you’re about. Giving for free takes away from revenues earning potential.
And the second group has its reason for sharing. When you share you leave yourself open and vulnerable to form a relationship. Your competition knows they have to work that much harder to be better than you are. Giving for free keeps clients returning, adding long term revenue to your bottom line.
I’d like to urge each business to share one wise thought or give a product or service every day to one existing and one potential client. Then watch what it does for your company’s popularity and for your own morale.
There is a lot of stuff you can buy or download for free online. I know, I spent a lot of my time investigating new ideas for clients and for myself. But I have found that focusing on these areas (because you can’t do it all at once) has proven successful.
(caution – this is for online newbies – if you’re already well on your way to being online – check out the online marketing blog for lots more in-depth information)
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Get tweeting with Twitter. Follow people online, start discussions, promote products and services and link back to your blog and website.
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Write articles. Submitting articles and press releases will increase links back to you – which search engines l-o-v-e. We have been having success using Article PR’s directory for submission sites.
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Build your links on search engines like ZipLocal and submit your business details there. If you advertise on ZipLocal, you’ll also be able to take advantage of their features – links to Facebook, user written reviews, voting and much more.
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Install landing pages. You’ll likely receive more lead conversions– not just page clicks. Make sure your landing page gets people signed up for your newsletter. Copyblogger has a great post explaining landing pages and giving some examples.
Choose to invest ¼ of the dollars you spent on traditional advertising last year on online techniques and focus time (or hire someone) on nurturing your online efforts. You’ll see changes because you’ll be able to track them using programs like Google Analytics.
I swore off of organized networking last autumn. I had become tired of the repetitious industries, the somewhat banal small talk and –errr- well getting up at 5:30 am just to make a breakfast meeting.
Although I heart networking and meeting new people & going to those breakfast/lunch/after work/cocktail meetings and functions, I was feeling overwhelmed.
And as soon as I put organized networking on hold – I found new ways to meet amazing new people in everyday circumstances. Hey, let’s face it, in every business, you need to keep the pipeline full!
Here’s some things that I found attracted new people to me and vice versa:
1. Being open to work conversations at social engagements. Instead of shutting out shop-talk at dinner parties (etc) let the conversation flow.
2. When a friend/acquaintance asks, “How are you?” answer with something that will lead into a conversation, “I’m so excited! I just met the most amazing [insert the who/what here]. It looks like that [insert whatever you’re working on here] has really paid off!”
3. (A personal favourite here) The Elevator. In the last 3 months I have met 1 new client and a potential client in an elevator ride. Once, while in the midst of preparing for a client appreciation event, I invited 2 people in an elevator to the party. I even had gift cards with the event ticket electronically loaded on them to give.
4. (Brace yourself for what I’m going to say you busy working people everywhere!) Just smiling and making eye contact. Once you’ve mastered this – ask a question. And then listen and respond.
Ask, “How is your day going?” and let a conversation develop from there.
5. Join a social group - dance lessons, an organized sport, or even attending a strata meeting might just result in meeting a networking connection.
Sandra from 
Relationship Building Begins with a Blog Comment
by chenrickson on December 9, 2008
in fresh marketing, relationship marketing
I am often asked to clarify what “exactly” it is that I do for a living. Unfortunately, it would take a long sit down to explain (as my current clients would attest). However, I can share one of the many things that I did today. Today I taught a blogging client the importance of commenting and developing relationships with other complimentary interest bloggers.
When it comes to commenting - its important to have something to say - and be sincere in your comment. Avoid negative “ranting.” And by all means, link back to things you’ve written about -but only if they’re appropriate. The more you comment on other blogs - the more likely you will be remembered and the more readers will follow your links to your blog. Extra bonus - you may get asked to guest write. (You never know!)
So, if you are reading my blog entitled “If You Build It He/She Will Come” you will notice 2 comments that have no relevance to the post – but I like to show people how to do something by actually doing it.
(Don’t think that this is all I do in an hour session. We worked on some sales tips to warm up a “gatekeeper,” analyzed website traffic and decided on what to focus on in the New Year. All in a day’s work for the marketing girl…)
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