If your income depends on networking with other people, this one’s for you.
Don’t bore me with your 5-minute speech about what you do for a living if I don’t ask you. Give me a 6 second intriguing intro about what you do and let me ask questions if I want to. But don’t be offended if I’m not interested or don’t need your services right now.
My point is, develop a 6-second branding statement for yourself. If it’s interesting enough, people will ask questions… questions they want to know the answers to, and they’ll listen.
Your personal branding statement is not your job title. It’s not a 5-minute, 3-minute or even 1-minute speech. It’s the essence of who you are in a nutshell. Mine is: “I help businesses gain market share through marketing and advertising.” That’s simple, short, and it’s enough of a teaser to get a response like: “Exactly how you do that?” That’s your invitation to elaborate more about what you do.
But don’t stop there. Be genuinely interested in what they do by asking them questions. It’s how healthy relationships begin.
Yep. Social Media is a newborn. We don’t really know who it favors yet. Does it look like Mark Zuckerburg? Does it look more like Google+? Does it look like a blog?
And how long does it take to become “an expert” in social media if we’re all still nurturing it in its infancy?
Facebook – 2004
YouTube – 2005
Twitter – 2006
Get my point?
If the word “expert” means that I know a lot more about social media than the average business owner, then… well, let’s just say I’m certainly qualified to help establish social media strategies and put social media plans into action. And I have created my own formula to measure the results of our social media efforts.
Let’s have coffee and talk about your social media strategy and plans.
Dark suits, shiny cuff links, a starched shirt buttoned up to your tonsils… okay, okay… I admit, there are plenty of occasions when wearing a nice suit and all the accessories is appropriate. But let’s remember the bazillion other occasions when a super sharp Nike shirt or a cool contemporary Trax Polo by Ogio with your company brand embroidered may be even more appropriate than a suit.
You can wear embroidered apparel to business meetings, golf tournaments, dining out in the evening, business after hours events, work wear… and the list goes on. The key is to make sure your embroidery is sewn professionally… be picky about how it looks.
The other thing to remember – the high end brand name dri fit material shirts look amazing all the time. Try to steer clear of 100% cotton for embroidered logos… they tend to shrink slightly and might distort your logo.
Want your customers to advertise for you like they do for Nike and other famous brands? Well, embroider your brand on some really cool Nike Caps and give them away. Be sure you stick with top quality caps. The point is to have your customers wearing them… not thrown up in the closet with the other 32 caps in their collection.
Professionally embroidered apparel is a subtle way to keep your brand in front of your clients every time you see them.
You can’t focus on a conversation without looking at your phone every time it buzzes?
Smart phones are awesome. But it would be dumb to lose a friend, a client, or an order because you’re looking at your smart phone during a conversation or meeting.
Looking at your phone in the middle of a conversation tells the person there with you they are not your priority right now.
Wait til the conversation is over and you’ve moved on. Then you can actually use your time more efficiently by answering and/or reading more than one text or email at a time.
“Outbound marketing” is where a marketer pushes his message out far and wide hoping that it resonates with that needle in the haystack. Some examples include trade shows, seminar series, email blasts to purchased lists, internal cold calling, outsourced telemarketing and advertising.
Rather than do outbound marketing to the masses of people who are trying to block you out, let’s do “inbound marketing” where you help yourself “get found” by people already learning about and shopping in your industry. In order to do this, make your website a hub for your industry that attracts visitors naturally through the search engines, through blogs, and through social media sites.
I believe most marketers today spend 90% of their efforts on outbound marketing and 10% on inbound marketing. What if we flipped those efforts?
The correct question to ask if you “need a promotion” is, “Are You Qualified for a Promotion?”
- Diligence in your workplace brings added responsibility.
- Added responsibility brings promotion.
- Promotion brings more cash flow to you.
- Cash flow to you brings more responsibility.
- Responsibility requires diligence & accountability.
If you truly deserve the “promotion” in your workplace, consider this:
- Don’t seek the title. Be great at what you do and the title will seek you.
- Make your position great. Your position won’t make you great.
- Let your title come as a result of your work.
If you’re like the majority of businesses (or salespeople), you think primarily about getting a new sale from a new customer.
Wait. The purpose of making a sale to a new customer should be to acquire a new customer—for the long-term. Is the sale you make today important? Sure it is. But how much more is that newly acquired customer worth to you in the long-term than just for today?
A sale is usually a one-time event with a one-time benefit. But if you are a wise, intelligent and savvy business owner, your focus will be on making the sale to acquire a long-term customer.
The service you provide today will determine if your new customer becomes a life-time customer.
Direct Mail takes the advertiser’s message directly to the consumer.
With targeted mailing lists, advertisers can send their message to specific groups.
Direct Mail puts the advertiser’s message in the hands of the consumer at home where they read all their mail.
Direct mail is not without its problems. Over the years, direct mail also became known by another name: junk mail. Some consumers were tired of receiving numerous ads in the mail each day. Many threw away the suspected ad-filled mail.
Since consumers may have a tendency to throw away mail associated with ads, marketers were challenged to ensure consumers were reading their ads.
That’s why at YourAdTeam, we specialize in producing top-notch over size postcards that don’t have to be “opened” to grab the recipients’ attention.
Now’s the best time ever to develop your direct mail campaign. Let’s talk.
When making a significant purchase, consumers are always seeking validation of their choices from others. But this is hardly something new.
Prior to the advent of the social web, you would have had to rely on advice from knowledgeable friends, or consulted trade magazines. But now, social media allows consumers to tap into feedback from others who have already tried your offering.
This should send an important message to marketers: Don’t forget about the needs of your existing customers after they have purchased a product because they are influencing the decisions of others who are considering it.
It’s really not enough to have a Search Engine Optimized website without developing a social media strategy. Here are a few tips that have the potential to add a high level of success to your SEO Website.
If you don’t have a social media platform for your company, create one! Start with the basics: Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, and a blog.
Gather up content that you already have, chop it up into small bites, then develop a publishing schedule. Add a little spice to your content to make it relevant and fun… things that your target audience would find interesting.
Your Facebook page is a microsite; your YouTube Channel is a video microsite; and your Twitter account is your micro-blog. Driving visits to these pages can drive engagement and create lifelong connections with consumers when they “friend” or “follow” you. Think of fans and friends as people opting into your database.
Post your YouTube channel’s videos and include them on your site.
Promote your social media assets like crazy. Post them on your site, drop press releases about them in the wire services, and link to them from your site and in e-mail signatures.
Track traffic and actions in general using Google Analytics.
