Mad 4 Blog

It’s tradition for businesses to reach out to affiliates and clients during the holiday season to say thank you for one more year together. It is also a prime time to prompt communication, especially if it’s been awhile since you last stoked the existing relationship. And of course, the gesture shows generosity and gratitude. But there are always some questions that come with the process of promotional gift-giving.

What if clients have a no-gift policy?

Receiving gifts from certain work partners may challenge ethical boundaries. Sometimes, companies would prefer just a card. Other times, a company won’t accept tangibles but will welcome a donation to a charity in its name. You may wish to check gift-giving policies with someone like an office manager in advance. This can be done subtly by simply calling to check the address and hours for sending a holiday gift.

What if I can’t afford to give gifts to all of my clients?

Instead of choosing one kind of gift and then deciding who should receive it, you may want to choose three kinds of gifts in varying price points and then break up your client list in terms of priority. Priority can be determined by the amount that the client has brought you during the fiscal year or by the weight of their name and association; it’s up to you to decide. Staggering price points is one way to stretch your gift-giving budget and reach out to more people. Just be on the lookout for clients who are in close contact with one another who may compare gifts. And be sure everyone at least receives a nice card.

What if I’m not sure who should receive the gift?

A related concern is who to address the gift to if you’re working with numerous people from one office—but don’t want to send eight gifts for one client. Sometimes, sending communal gifts like a food basket or an item for the office itself—such as a kitchen gadget or wall ornament—is the best way to handle this situation. Another idea is treating the office to some kind of group experience, such as seeing a show or going out together. It can even be turned into a group event between your office and theirs for networking.

Next week, check back for more of Mad 4’s advice on client gift-giving.

It always makes sense to ask successfully acquired clients and customers how they came to hear about your business. By carefully comparing how well each of your advertising efforts performs, you can bulldoze past a lot of trial-and-error and simply direct your budget toward what works, both in quantitative and qualitative units. For example, if no one’s seen that ad in the newspaper but everyone heard about you from a friend or relative, you may wish to pull your print ads and focus on buzz-generating word-of-mouth campaigns–or even reward former patrons for referring a friend. And if you’re reaching a higher caliber of clientele via brochure than billboard, you’ll certainly want to bring your message down to the smaller scale, which can also cut back cost.

These days, tracking is everything when it comes to building successful campaigns. Online, it’s perfectly easy to determine how a person landed on your page; analytics mark each click-through by its referring links, search engine source, browser type and even the viewer’s physical location—it’s not only effortless, but also automatically built into most website content management systems. But even online there’s always more you can do; when it comes to e-commerce, many shopping outlets utilize codes. Asking buyers to enter a code before they take advantage of a sale helps marketers to track which sales and campaigns were more successful than others, and to help determine if shoppers heard about it from a newsletter, referral or ad. This is why you might see several usable codes available for the same sale, depending on where you hear about it.

In what other ways can coding and tracking be used in your business endeavors? Mad 4 Marketing recently posted job listings on several career search websites. But each posting required us to pay a fee, and since we weren’t sure which websites or which wording would be most successful for attracting the best new teammate, we decided to generate a few different ads. We asked job candidates on each board and posting to reply with a different subject line. This took a little more time and thought, but we were able to see from where we were getting hits, and what kind of prospective employees were nipping the bait. After the first week we cut our ad placement (and cost!) in half and only used phrasing that was clearly expressing our desires to the most qualified candidates.

Another example is Satori’s text message campaign. In 2008, we used a lot of on-the-scene guerrilla marketing to advertise for the newly opening apartment rental community in Fort Lauderdale. We wanted to reach out to those who already lived in and loved the surrounding area of South Florida. At each event (such as street fairs, art shows and the boat parade), we advertised the chance to win six months’ free rent by texting a code to a given phone number. At each event, the code differed. That way, we could see which community event had directed the most participants to our giveaway, as well as which regions or crowds were most interested in Satori. This information turned out to be extremely valuable in later marketing endeavors, such as choosing local ad placement.

The bottom line is that tracking efforts are a smart investment in the future. It means looking past today’s brochure or even tomorrow’s website, toward next year’s entire marketing strategy. Tracking provides you with the tools to always understand and surpass prior tactics–and no matter what, this means that you will ultimately succeed.

When the economy got slammed, big businesses had to evaluate their budget and seek ways to trim expenses. One of the major ways that companies discovered they could save money was by reducing or eliminating their internal marketing staff and instead outsourcing this work to independent agencies such as Mad 4 Marketing.

Why Companies Choose to Outsource
The main reason that this option eliminates cost is because marketing is not a piecemeal endeavor. For any of the components to work successfully, marketing departments must offer comprehensive services. But when companies sustain a full-time, fully staffed internal marketing department, it can be extremely expensive to maintain. By outsourcing to a self-sustaining agency, business can rely on quality performance right when they need it.

Familiarity is another important perk to employing an outside marketing agency. Some companies choose to collect bids and hire freelancers each time they endeavor a new marketing action. Although you may save money by continuously seeking the cheapest options, specialists won’t have a thorough grasp of your business, brand or boundaries. If you use website developers, you’ll need to start all over again when you’d like to run a radio commercial. If you place an ad in the newspaper, you may need to find an entirely new agency when you want to rent a billboard. This strategy won’t benefit your business.

Eliminate the hassle by connecting with one agency that can provide all of the resources, connections and talent to composite any kind of campaign. Your frequent, return business allows them to understand your company, its history of marketing and all of your ultimate advertising goals. Every time you need anything at all, you can just pick up the phone and connect to a friendly and familiar voice, someone who you already trust to stay right on top of your unique business marketing needs. But your business won’t have to shoulder the ongoing operations and finances of an internal marketing department.

Why Mad 4 Marketing
Mad 4 Marketing is an ideal solution for the ongoing advertising needs of large and small businesses because we believe in and practice a concept called 360º Marketing. This means that we don’t just use isolated mediums to reach your audience. We make it our priority to understand what makes each brand unique and how to best approach its clientele. Then we creatively conceptualize campaigns that will reach out from several touch points to insightfully impact your audience.

We offer print, radio, television and nontraditional marketing (such as guerilla and viral marketing). Our interactive department can put your company online, encourage potential customers to visit your site and track responsiveness once you’re live. By utilizing all of these available outlets, your message fixes in the minds of its recipients.

When you are planning to present your company and wares at a trade show, convention, workshop or career fair, the road leading up to the big day is typically fraught with preparation, orders, projects and last-minute arrangements. You get ready for your big appearance for weeks, making sure that everything is in order and clocking long hours. Everyone has horror stories about the night before a big event, when they suddenly realize that they can’t find their booth reservation slip or forgot to order more business cards. But there are ways to eliminate some of the hassle and make the most of your event so that all of your hard work leads to successful results.

Here are some tips that will ensure your exhibition runs smoothly to help make the experience as relaxing and rewarding as possible:

•    Determine a target audience. From design to materials to pitches, one way to rally before a trade show is to determine who you’re trying to approach. Simply making an impact isn’t enough; with a diverse array of attendants, you’ll want to be sure you interact with and impress the correct people. With this goal in mind, it will be easier to streamline your objectives and organize your preparation.
•    Keep a tight budget. Throwing a lot of money at your booth set-up or handouts isn’t the way to achieve success. By keeping a strict, low budget and only investing in what will intrigue and inform your target audience, you’ll walk away with greater return on investment.
•    Train one cohesive team. The same team who will attend your event and staff your exhibition should be on-board throughout preparation. Keeping everyone on the same page and allowing them to participate from the ground up ensures their knowledgeable performance on game day, and also builds team strength.
•    Prepare sound bites. Have you worked on your elevator speech in awhile? Now is the perfect time to train your team how to explain your business in one minute or less. The ability to create a big impact with limited time is key to succeeding on a convention floor. Unenthused or unprepared answers can undo all of the effort you’ve put into preparing for your exhibition.
•    Don’t count heads. Your purpose at an exhibit isn’t just to collect or pass out business cards; you should focus on building relationships rather than speaking quickly to as many people as possible. Although your efforts may be less measurable at the end of the day, you’ll see greater results over time by creating bonds with individuals than by prioritizing the length of your sign-up sheet.
•    Use your time wisely. From the moment you hit the floor, be prepared to work. No matter how many trips to the coffee machine it takes, your team needs to be attentive and energetic throughout the day. From set-up to break-down, trade show dates can feel like the longest days of your work year. But that’s just more reason to juice every moment for what it’s worth. If you’re not going to go for the glory, what’s the point of signing up at all?

Did you meet all of your marketing goals in 2009? Or were there areas where you saw room for improvement? Now is the time to analyze previous successes—and failures—to determine new marketing strategies for 2010.

The past year has been a rocky time for businesses across the board. And in times of economic uncertainty, it’s not uncommon for companies to branch out and explore new strategies to market their products and services. Whether a limited budget meant that your company tried alternative marketing for the first time, or a changing consumer climate introduced you to new audiences, last year was a time for trial and error when it came to advertising and brand promotion.

Whether you ultimately flourished or floundered, there are lessons to be learned from each step you took. In the new year, these lessons can be used to set you up for even greater marketing success in 2010. Here are some tips to help you devise your marketing goals for the year ahead:

Create a vision for the full year.
Looking at your budget for the upcoming year, you may be tempted to plan a gung-ho advertising campaign to get the ball rolling. While making a big impact at the start of the year is one way to go, another advisable technique is to plan a staggered process that creates a lasting, solid impression of your business brand throughout the year. You’ll want to incorporate options from across the spectrum, from print ads to social marketing to interactive website strategies. Plan your pricing and agenda so that all messaging ties together and builds throughout the months. That way, you’ll have the strong, comprehensive results you desire when it comes to January 2011.

Don’t be afraid of change.
Taking new strides can be scary. In fact, you may have already shaken things up last year, and it didn’t quite pan out. This may make you think twice about pushing forward and exploring even more new routes—but then again, what can you gain by doing the same thing you’ve already done? If you devote the time to analyzing previous marketing plans, you can target areas that need improvement to predict results and reduce—or eliminate—your risk. Smart, evidence-based changes will give you an advantage this year.

Learn from past mistakes.
The first step is admitting that it’s okay to make mistakes. In fact, mistakes can be useful. Although it may seem tempting to forget previous endeavors that didn’t quite match expectations, it’s time to haul out old plans and notes to analyze exactly what went wrong and where there was room for improvement. Maybe all you needed was a more accurate sales projection. Maybe all you needed was a different marketing agency. Whatever needs amending must be determined so it can be fixed, preparing you for new successes in 2010.