Online Marketing and Development

I recently presented this topic to my colleagues at the Oakville Networking group, and they found it very informative and helpful, so I thought I would repurpose it and share it with you – not to mention it’s a long overdue blog post for us at Sydcam! Here is Part 1 of a two part series on this topic.

The Customer is King

So what has changed so much in marketing to make it such a different playing field that it has been historically? Simply, the consumer has evolved into a position of power, if not even control by many of the developments in the last 10+ years. The era of the internet has provided consumers with something they never had before – easy access to a plethora of information on virtually every topic under the sun.

From product information to customer feedback and ratings on products and services to direct feedback loops via social media to retailers and manufacturers etc., the consumer has real influence over the marketplace and the products and services offered to them for consumption.

Being “Social” is more than Social Media

Many who read this blog’s title may assume that I was just going to talk strictly about social media and its influence on marketers. Wrong! While social media is an integral part of the many ‘social’ changes affecting society today, it isn’t the only one.

Being social touches on social media but goes much farther. In general, it influences marketers in its ability to enable active engage with your customers, the ability to add value to this relationship on a regular basis, and to broaden the reach of your marketing and communications messages – both on social networking platforms along with other mediums.

Use this engagement to learn more about your customers, and what they need or want from you. Encourage  them to collaborate with you to build better products and services, and to share any ideas and unfulfilled wants they might have.  You’ll build brand awareness, customer loyalty and a whole lot more!

Part 2 of this blog post will follow shortly in February, so stay tuned!

In today’s digital world, where ‘one-to-one’ marketing has been greatly facilitated  by tools such as social networking, many business owners assume that in this highly personalized environment, it’s not a concern if your messaging or positioning is different from one medium, audience or client conversation to the next. Nothing could be further from the truth.

In fact, in such a divergent and complex world, it’s never been more important to have a consistent and integrated marketing strategy for your business. Here’s why:

1)      “It’s all about focus.” – I seem to repeat this statement over and over again when speaking with clients.  Being focused on what your business stands for, how to convey this and where you want to communicate these messages is critical to any business’ marketing strategy. You need to think this through carefully and get it right.

2)      Consistency is King – There is little value and almost no point in saying things one way in the online space and another in your print collateral. If your audience is the same or similar in both mediums, your messaging shouldn’t be very different regardless of which one you’re currently using. Of course, if you’re talking to two different target markets, you’ll need to do this in two different ways.

3)      Reinforce key messages – Products or services that are unique to your business or a cut above your competitors need to be emphasized accordingly. Don’t be afraid to repeat yourself across different mediums, your clients won’t find you boring or repetitive. Instead, this will help to strengthen your positioning (you can always reword your messages a little to make them unique in each channel).

4)      Think holistically and strategically – You always need to think about the ‘big picture’, no matter how deep in the weeds you are. What are your objectives, and how do you plan on achieving them? What could get in your way and prevent you from accomplishing this? Don’t get caught up chasing the latest fad marketing concepts and tactics. Instead, take a step back and look at things from your customer’s perspective – what are they looking for and how can you satisfy this? Plan out your approach as much as possible.

5)      It makes good business sense – An integrated approach to marketing just makes sense. Having that consistency, where messages reinforce each other over multiple mediums can save you a lot of money, and reduce the amount of time it takes to establish and strengthen your brand. At the end of the day, an integrated marketing plan is just a smart business decision!

So if you want to enhance your marketing effort, online or off, be sure to first assess your plans and activities. If you’re currently employing a fully integrated marketing communications strategy for your business, this will come out in spades in terms of the focused, consistent approach you’ve developed.

At Sydcam Marketing Communications, we believe that social media should be an important part of the communications mix for many small and medium sized businesses. And the reason why is simple – it provides a cost-effective strategy to grow your business and build your brand. Twitter is one of the more popular social media tools for doing just this.

To help your business utilize this resource effectively, we’ve provided you with 8 tips we believe are critical to successfully using it.

Rule #1 – Have a communications strategy: know what you want to say, how you want to say it and to whom (i.e. your target market). Try to never stray from this approach.

Rule #2 – Remember, it’s all about them: Twitter, much like every other social media service, is about adding value to your client’s experiences, of giving back in a tangible way without expecting anything in return! Do things differently and you’ll damage your brand.

Rule #3 – Never, ever tweet more that 5 times a day: This way seem counterintuitive for some of you that think you need to be on Twitter 24/7. Remember, you’re a business, not a frat member or a groupie for a band. If you send out too many tweets, especially low value ones, you’ll irritate your audience as you’ll push everyone else’s tweets down the list. Their action to you will be swift and permanent – they’ll unfollow you! It’s all about quality over quantity.

Rule #4 – Make your tweets interesting: Somewhat related to #4 above, if you’re a business and you’re trying to promote your brand and add value to your followers business and personal lives, don’t waste your time and theirs telling them you’re at the bus stop waiting for the 11:30 shuttle to pick you up. They don’t care!

Rule #5 – Multi-tweet posts should be avoided at all cost: These are hard to follow and end up annoying people more than helping them. If you have more of a story to say, write it up in a blog post and link that to your tweet.

Rule #6 – Twitter is in the public domain: Everything you say and write is available to anyone and everyone – so watch your Ps and Qs! Anyone from your mother to your chief competitors could be watching and/or following you on Twitter so be careful what you say.

Rule #7 – Make sure your tweets are informative: As was mentioned earlier, Twitter like most if not all social media is all about adding value. Make sure your content is what your followers would be expecting from you. If you’re a chef, give out cooking tips, great recipes, etc., but not what your dog Waldo is having for dinner tonight!

Rule #8 – Never underestimate the impact of your statements: One of the dangers with social media, especially in the business space, is that many people come there to learn and to be informed. Treating this audience in a flippant and indifferent manner can do you and your business permanent and irreparable damage. Stay focused and on message at all times!

If you would like to follow Sydcam Marketing Communications’ tweets on Twitter, our user name @sydcam_marcom.

What makes a great marketer? Is it above average creativity, a strong business acumen, an ability to think strategically with a big picture approach, or is it a bit of everything? And how do marketers acquire these skills?  Is it by working in various areas of an organization first, by attending a B-school and perhaps getting an MBA, or is it by cutting your teeth first in sales and then translating that training and exposure into a marketing role?

 I truly believe there is a lot to be said about the latter approach, and here’s why. I often feel there is a much more practical way of going about becoming successful at marketing – and that centres around thinking more like a customer! At Sydcam Marketing Communications, we believe that thinking like a customer is at the essence of effective marketing.

Understanding Needs

One of the primary reasons why I think marketers need to think like a customer is that it helps to better understand the needs of the end consumer of your goods and services. I would argue this is even more important when you hire advertising agencies and the like to work on behalf of your company, who have an arms length relationship to the business and its products.

Buyer (i.e. consumer) behaviour is a critical component of the purchase decision and process, which is exactly what most marketers are trying to impact and influence. There is no better way to understand what motivates the end customer to purchase your products or services than to actually put yourself, as the marketer, into their shoes and try to understand why they make certain purchase decisions.

Formulating marketing strategies

When it comes to thinking strategically, or developing a marketing strategy for your business or client, the same tactics and approach apply. It should be based on the perceived motives and intents of your target client. What are they looking for from your given product or service? What are their expectations? What would be the distinguishing factor that would sway them to purchase your products over your competitors? All these questions should be carefully considered and analyzed when coming up with a marketing strategy for your business.

In the end, business and marketing always comes down to the customer. Understand their needs, appreciate what motivates their purchasing decisions, and recognize what actions will resonate with them and you’ll be on the right track. Stepping into their shoes is the best way to assess this effectively. You will then be able to develop marketing campaigns and programs that will achieve the bottom line results you and your company expect.

Thinking like a customer is really no more than a concerted approach to thinking and acting in a very unique way that can have tangible benefits for your business. If you would like to discuss how you can implement this kind of strategy within your company, or if you simply want to discover some simple techniques to incorporate this into your daily marketing routines, contact us at Sydcam Marketing Communications. We’d love to sit down and talk to you about something we’re very passionate about.

Last month, we at Sydcam Marketing Communications spoke to you about why we felt social media was a critical and viable marketing strategy for most small (and medium-sized) businesses in this country. Today we would like to talk to about what we believe are the key social media tools small businesses need to consider in executing on their social media program.

The key elements in your social media strategy

With the myriad of social media tools, resources and options available to small business, the question many owners ask us is which tools are best for our needs? While this is sometimes a difficult question, and one that may vary from one client to the next, the most common recommendations we make at Sydcam Marketing Communications are the following:

Blog: Your social media strategy needs to be centred on the creation of a blog (just like us!).  The ability for a blog to provide fresh, new content to your website on a regular basis is one important reason for its value, especially given the impact it has on your search engine rankings.

Twitter is another fabulous tool that enables businesses to send short, targeted messages of interest to their ‘followers’.

Facebook is great resource for promoting your business to clients – old and new – and most importantly for creating a community of people that ‘like’ your business for what you do, how you do it and what you stand for.

YouTube: No one can deny the power of video in capturing an idea or a moment and bringing it all to life. YouTube does this and so much more by creating a medium to house all your company videos in one neat area, and to then use the video content to put a whole different light on your business. Love that Google juice!

LinkedIn: The odd one in the bunch, LinkedIn, while perhaps not the most obvious social media tool for promoting your business, provides an incredible avenue for promoting yourself, your background, skills and credentials and enabling you to connect with colleagues and associates around the world. It helps to build that personal credibility that so many small businesses thrive on for their success.

So there you have it, a multi-pronged approach to social media that can have a noticeable impact on the success of your small business in the near term. And to be clear, it is not essential that you go an open an account tomorrow for each of the services mentioned above. Pick and choose those that you think can benefit you the most, or better still those that you feel most comfortable implementing yourself.

If you’re looking for help and advice on devising your social media strategy for your business, please contact us at Sydcam Marketing Communications. We’d love to hear from you and provide you with some insight, guidance and support to help you grow your business’ presence in this growing area.

Why achieving a consistent, branded communications strategy is critical in the digital era

I recently came across an interesting article in the Harvard Business Review* (HBR) that I wanted to share with my readers. The article talks about a unique aspect within social media: how it is impacting consumer behaviour (and attitudes), the impact it is having on a company’s brand, and how a consistent communications strategy can resolve consumer confusion and improve your bottom line.

At Sydcam Marketing Communications, we understand that social media is changing the sales and marketing landscape. We hope this article will enable you to better understand this new media and help you devise the necessary strategies to take advantage of this digital phenomenon.

The demise of traditional media

We all recognize that technology, the internet, and most recently social media have all adversely affected both traditional media (newspapers, TV, and radio) and traditional methods of marketing (TV and print advertising). However, many of us don’t realize the extent of the impact.

The online communities created by social media have provided a forum for discussing a company, its brands and products. These discussions often take place after a customer has purchased a product, either in the form of a product review or an online discussion.

Lesson #1: The growing importance of the post-purchase stage

In the article, the post-purchase phase of the buying process is referred to as the “Enjoy, advocate, bond” stage. Social media has facilitated consumer’s ability to advocate for (or against) a brand or product, to bond with it and to disseminate information to a wide audience very quickly. Marketers need to allocate more attention and resources to this critical stage of the buying process.

Lesson #2: Shifting the marketing spend

The research highlights that the conventional approach to using paid advertising in traditional media to influence customers before the purchase decision is not effective anymore. Instead, influencing clients post-purchase will have a much greater impact on their satisfaction with their purchase decision, will expedite their future repurchase decision, and will enable them to advocate for the brand through social media  – positively impacting the purchase decisions for many buyers.

Lesson #3: Keep your “branded” messaging consistent

Today’s plethora of marketing and communications channels creates other challenges for businesses – ensuring product and brand messaging is consistent across all channels of communication, from print to social media to product packaging and PR. One of the key concerns noted by consumers in the HBR paper was inconsistent product information and descriptions across different sources and different media, and how this made the purchase decision more difficult.

It is incumbent on companies that they view product and brand messaging from a strategic perspective, and coordinate it more effectively. Research has proven that centralizing this communications role with marketing results in a clearer and more consistent understanding of the brand by consumers; they are then better able to articulate its attributes.

 Implementing a “branded” communications strategy

If you’re looking for assistance in developing a social media plan to improve your marketing and communications efforts, or you’d like to comment on this blog, please contact us at Sydcam Marketing Communications; we’d love to hear from you.

Together we can work on devising a program that will create consistent messaging across your entire organization, strengthen and grow your brand and your customers’ loyalty to it, while helping you become more profitable.

 * “Branding in the Digital Age: You’re Spending Your Money in All the Wrong Places”, Alex MacLean, Harvard Business Review, December, 2010.

http://hbr.org/2010/12/branding-in-the-digital-age/ar/2

This week’s blog illustrates an important point for all businesses – tough times don’t necessarily mean focusing on the lowest common denominator in the marketing mix – price. At Sydcam Marketing Communications, we truly understand this is often easier said than done, but every business needs to be able differentiate itself to avoid this pitfall.

The Skinny

In the post recession era, where consumers seem to hold all the cards and wield all the power, businesses assume they need to compete on price to be successful. The highly competitive and price-sensitive fitness club industry would seem to be a classic example of such a market, particularly given the recessionary consumer behaviour of shedding discretionary expenses like fitness memberships.

National fitness club chain GoodLife Fitness has decided to buck this trend and instead have turned to aspirational-type advertisements to build their brand and attract new clients. Their new slogan, “The good life. Made easy”, conveys that the “good life” – in all its various shapes and forms, is attainable – when you join GoodLife Fitness.

The strategy behind this campaign is to connect emotionally with customers, and to strengthen and clarify the brand’s image. Their messages, which even encourage people to enjoy pizza, ice cream and beer as part of the “good life” (while also exercising of course), convey a more realistic and balanced approach to health and fitness that is clearly targeted at the average consumer who may not be a fitness fanatic but wants to be healthier, more active and enjoy life and their families more.

Lessons Learned

These so-called “lifestyle” ads attempt to engage audiences by showing them how they can aspire to achieve something that is important to them.

What this says for any business is that connecting on a deeper, more emotional level with one’s clients can be a viable alternative to an all-out battle over price and margins. This strategy may take longer to show results, and often requires a significant commitment to reinforcing the branding messages over time. However, if business owners truly believe in this approach and are willing to stick with it, the end results can indeed be remarkable.

To learn how you can implement a lifestyle branding strategy for your business, speak to us at Sydcam Marketing Communications. We will work with you to devise the right plan to enable you to compete on something better than just price. You can contact us by emailing us at info@sydcamcommunications.com.

Update for our readers: after posting this article, I came across news recently that Amazon.ca has reduced the threshold for purchases that incur the shipping fee down to $25, from the original $39 order amount. Chapters-Indigo soon followed suit as well!

At Sydcam Marketing Communications, we’re always on the lookout for new trends in the world of marketing. I recently came across some very interesting research from The NPD Group that I wanted to share with my readers. For those of you that regularly use the internet to purchase items, you may be surprised how quickly this channel of distribution is evolving.

The “early” days of e-commerce

In the early days of the internet (1990’s), e-commerce was rarely thought of as a critical component of a business’ website. Instead, businesses were more focused on building so-called “brochure” type sites that provided information on their products and services, enabling clients to do research in advance of a buying decision.

They would then go to their traditional distribution channels (retail store, 1-800 number, etc.) to complete the purchase. In research completed by this author at that time, many small business owners expressed concern about cannibalizing their existing channels and upsetting their distribution partners by selling online.

Early in the 21^st century, this attitude began to change as businesses realized that clients were clamouring for increased convenience to cope with the time pressures in their busy lives. Selling online was the perfect solution to this problem. Many manufacturers, retailers and wholesalers developed e-commerce portals to meet this need. The common thread with most was they were merely extensions of their existing distribution channels, offering the same products at the same prices (with shipping fees to boot!).

e-Commerce Today

Fast forward to today where attitudes and expectations have again changed dramatically. The NPD Group’s research indicates that Canadian consumers who shop online do so because they expect to pay less – 60% of Canadians polled said they shop online to save money. More than 50% also said they expected online prices to be lower than those found in a store. As well, 71% said they enjoy the convenience of shopping online as it makes price comparisons that much easier.

Interestingly, this heightened price sensitivity is also reflected in Canadians apprehension to paying the shipping and handling costs associated with online shopping. This was sighted in the survey as the number one reason why purchasers didn’t follow through with their online purchases. It was also found that high shipping costs often drove the customer to browse elsewhere for the products and services they wanted.

Taking Action

So what does this all suggest? First and foremost, business owners and marketers should realize that this shift symbolizes an increased sophistication on the part of the consumer. They have finally figured out what we knew all along – that the costs of distribution through the online medium are much lower than through more traditional channels – and they expect that those cost savings should be passed on to them as opposed to padding a business’ bottom line.

What should businesses do with this newfound information? Clearly, operating your online business as a mere extension of your traditional business will not suffice. Instead, your e-commerce strategy needs to be differentiated and focused on “online” specific niches, such as promoting new and innovative products, as well as providing value to customers by using your website to promote clearance sales and special “VIP” events. Providing reasonable and flexible shipping options and their related costs would also go a long way to decreasing consumer apprehension with purchasing from your site.

Roots Canada is an excellent example of a company that has devised a unique strategy for its online/e-commerce channel, using email marketing to leverage the online shopping experience for their customers. I’d love to hear your thoughts on this topic, so feel free to drop me a response with your thoughts to info@sydcamcommunications.com.

Find out more about how Sydcam Marketing Communications can assist you with your e-commerce strategies or with any marketing initiative you want to get off the ground successfully.