5 direct mail marketing ideas©2018, Colleen Eakins Design

5 Direct Mail Marketing Ideas [ infographic ]

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Colleen EakinsColleen Eakins is a dynamic and creative individual that possess a knack for great design. With over 15 years of experience in the field of graphic design, Colleen is able to effectively brand her clients with great design pieces. Her motto is: “Anyone can make a pretty picture, but is it effective? Will it […]

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integrated marketing©2018, Colleen Eakins Design

What Is Integrated Marketing and Why Do I Need It?

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As technology and the use of the Internet changes and evolves, it’s critical to stay on top of trends to remain competitive. It should come as no surprise that the conversations surrounding marketing and the internet have expanded in response to these developments. No longer is it enough just to do search engine optimization or link building. An integrated marketing strategy is needed.

The broad adoption of mobile devices for internet access in combination with the use of social media and mobile apps require businesses to expand upon marketing efforts on these platforms.

From this, the term “Integrated Marketing” was coined. Integrated marketing is the use of multiple channels to reach target demographics using email, search engine optimization, social media platforms, content marketing, paid advertisements, mobile app support, direct mail, and listing services.

Companies who implement an integrated marketing strategy are more likely to see results than a company that only focuses only on SEO tactics or PPC advertising to drive traffic to their website.

Here we’ll explore some of the different options available for expanding your integrated marketing efforts.

Email Marketing – Email marketing remains a classic method for business owners to keep in touch with prospects and customers. Techniques to build your email list include offering newsletter signup on your website, collecting email addresses at your physical business, adding a content locker to premium or exclusive content. Your email list, especially when it is well-managed, is a valuable tool in your integrated marketing toolbox.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) – Search engine optimization has always been viewed as a pillar of all marketing efforts. Proper SEO is somewhat of a technical and detail-oriented aspect of marketing. SEO includes tracking pixel installations, keyword selection, making sure that all meta data, descriptions, keyword density, calls to action, and other technical ‘best practices’ are followed when publishing a web page or new blog post. Other related tasks associated with formal SEO include assuring the site has TLS/SSL protection and is mobile-friendly, notably since Google announced they are switching to a ‘Mobile First’ search index. This switch gives preference to websites that cater to mobile site traffic and devalues the importance of websites that do not meet their new standards.

Social Media – Social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and others offer business owners the chance to connect with their target audience. Not only can you connect with fans and friends who are using their desktop computer, but you also bridge to a broader segment of people using mobile apps to use these platforms. By sharing funny, helpful, or just content of general interest, you can increase the number of meaningful relationships you build with existing or potential clients. Anytime your friends, fans, and family share your posts, this helps raise awareness about your company with the potential to expand your social network even further.

Content Marketing – One of the longstanding principles in the digital marketing industry is that ‘Content is King.’ By creating compelling, value-added content on a consistent basis, you amass digital assets that can be shared on Social Media Channels or be used as marketing materials. Adding helpful blog posts can assist in building organic (free) search traffic to your website. Ideally, you want your website visitors to share your content in their networks, so you’ll want to be sure that you offer Social Sharing tools on all pages of your blog or site to make the process easier. Fresh content that engages with your visitors helps build your reputation, trust, and loyalty.

Paid Advertisements – No integrated marketing campaign is complete without a paid advertising component. After all, how will people know you have an offer if you don’t make one? Depending on the nature of your business, you might consider using ad programs available on Facebook, Bing, or Google. With multiple types of ad modules available, you or your marketing team can design a campaign that helps you meet your business objectives, whatever they are. Other creative forms of paid advertising include print advertisements, local sponsorships, and even vehicle wraps! The goal is to get your brand in front of as many people as possible. Don’t be afraid to get creative.

Mobile Apps – Mobile Apps offer business owners the opportunity to connect with their clients directly on their mobile phone, without the need to read email, visit a website, or search for them on social media. An investment in a mobile app is helpful for sending push notifications, managing loyalty rewards programs, making special offers, or offering a text club. For food service businesses, additional functionality such as the ability to place orders online offset development and management expenses.

Direct Mail – Direct mail remains a trusted and legitimate method to connect with potential customers and clients in your desired target demographics. Printed mail pieces including postcards, inserts, and flyers are cost-effective and offer a longer shelf-life than it’s electronic contemporary, email. Further, they can be customized with unique URLs, Coupon Codes, and Phone Numbers to track the return on investment accurately.

Listing Services – When you want to make sure that your company or brand is seen by the right audience, listing services are helpful. References and links from authority sites such as Google, Bing, Yelp, Manta, Yellow Pages, Angie’s List, the Better Business Bureau, your local Chamber of Commerce, align you with your preferred audience. These links back are valuable citations to your company! (Pro Tip: If you haven’t given much thought to the importance of listing citations, you should start checking for inclusion and accuracy as soon as possible.) Depending on the organization, the addition to their directory may be free, upgraded, or paid. Free listing services typically offer business owners a basic listing that contains minimal information. Upgraded or paid inclusion listing services often offer business owners more features or value-added functionality from their listing, so be sure to have marketing funds set aside to cover the costs of these listings.

As you can see, there are a lot of working parts when forming an Integrated Marketing campaign. Need help putting all of the pieces together? Get in touch with Colleen Eakins Design today!

increase brand awareness

Increase Brand Awareness [ infographic ]

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Denese EakinsDenese is a lover of knowledge and puts her research skills and creative eye to good use with her infographics. When she’s not researching and designing visuals to present data, she spends time volunteering in her other passion–health education.

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©2018, Colleen Eakins Design

Do You Have A Buyer Persona? If Not, You Need One!

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As a small or medium-sized business owner the more data and information that you have regarding your operations, the better. Especially if you are working to establish a cohesive branding message to appeal to a specific type of consumer.

With the widespread use of technology, companies of all sizes have developed content strategies to build loyalty, trust, and authority within their selected niche

The most significant part of this marketing strategy is fine-tuning your content, whether it is blog content, social media shares, or email messaging to meet the needs and wants of the buyer persona – or ideal customer – you are seeking to attract or retain.

What is a Buyer Persona?

What exactly is a buyer persona, you ask? Typically, a buyer persona gets constructed using interviews with real buyers. People who are interviewed give real-world answers to what prospective customers might be thinking and doing when evaluating consumer options. This data provides valuable insights into the concerns, attitudes, and other criteria potential customers use to help them make a buying decision.

As you can imagine, knowing the motivations that fuel your ideal customer is beneficial for numerous reasons.

  1. Gives you a greater understanding of the language buyers use.
  2. Aligns your messaging to improve company communications with clients.
  3. Helps you streamline your marketing campaigns to appeal to your preferred audience.

Luckily, it isn’t as hard as you might think to establish a buyer persona to define your preferred market sector more effectively.

Who Is Your Customer?

The first step in setting up a buyer persona is envisioning the person in your mind and giving them a name. This imaginary person should broadly represent the demographics of your ideal customer. Be sure to outline the habits, hobbies, interests, values, and other indicators that help drive his or her consumer decisions.

If you already have an existing customer base, you may already have a substantial amount of information available from platforms including Google Analytics, Google Webmaster Tools, internal tracking, Facebook Insights, and Facebook Analytics to learn more about the type of people who are already engaging with your content, products, or services. These comprehensive reporting platforms contain a treasure trove of data regarding your website visitor profiles and your social media audience and reach. Some of the core demographic data provided include location, gender, age, general interests, affinity groups, relationship status, buying habits, and more.

Business owners who have a presence as a ‘brick and mortar’ operation may also use tools like transaction history, customer questionnaires, or feedback forms to gather more invaluable information about their customer base to define the buyer personas of their business better.

For this example, let’s use Sienna the Salon Owner. Whenever someone comes in for services, she gathers information to serve her clients better. The type of information she collects includes the customer’s name, contact information, age, birthdate, how frequently the client visits, what services they have purchased, if other family or friends are customers, the amount of money they spend on average, if they add-on services while at the salon, and if or how often related products get purchased.

Digital Solutions for Real World Business

Using a CRM (customer relationship manager), she saves this information for future use, as well as integrates it with her email marketing software for appointment follow-ups, special offers, promotional offers, and birthday greetings. To streamline her operations, she synchronized appointment setting software that allows customers to book or cancel appointments from the convenience of their smartphone or computer.

When each client leaves, she asks them to fill out a questionnaire or feedback form on that day’s visit. Sienna makes a note of their feedback in her CRM for reference. If a pattern of complaints arises, she is in the first line of defense to handle them.

This information can help detect issues and provide a better customer service experience. If someone had a bad experience, this issue can be resolved quickly and in a professional manner. A prompt and courteous resolution is always better than letting the client leave without saying a word to you and writing bad reviews or comments on social media platforms instead.

Keep the Conversation Going!

Asking what clients think is essential to connecting with them on a deeper level. Many of Sienna’s customers share their thoughts and concerns about beauty, offering an opportunity for her and her staff members to provide their expertise. (Or product and service recommendations!)

Let Data Be Your Guide!

On an aggregate level, Sienna can get a broader overview of her entire customer base. She can figure out, on average, what each client spends at the salon, the frequency of visits, and other data that helps improve the bottom line of the company.

These buyer habits play a critical role in her buyer persona. Knowing this, she can then aim to attract other new clients like her existing ones.

In addition to operating her physical location, she makes sure to maintain the company presence on social media platforms to engage with clients, as well as promote her salon.

She takes the time to ask her clients to leave a review of the salon on her business page, as it helps build trust and authority in the area she serves, which is good for business! By evaluating her insights and stats programs, she can learn more about her audience, so she’s able to adjust her content and share to appeal to them. Since her business has everything to do with image, she learns that pictures and videos always outperform other types of shares. By sharing more photos and videos, she is appealing to her core audience to get more shares, likes, and comments.

Her website plays a significant role in providing more useful visitor data including conversion rates, time spent on the site, the total number of page views, and ecommerce sales.

If you haven’t already established your preferred buyer persona, be sure to contact the branding experts at Colleen Eakins Design for more information today!

Let’s Get Personal–How Emotions and Empathy Play Into Branding and Marketing Campaigns

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As an entrepreneur or startup business, it isn’t uncommon to find yourself wearing many hats during your day to day business operations. Of all the hats you’re likely to wear, probably the most challenging one to slip on is your marketing and advertising hat.

In today’s modern world, that means completing hundreds of technical steps in just the right way. You have to be sure that your business website is user-friendly, that you have a matching mobile app, keeping your social media profiles updated, as well as everything else you have to do to keep your company running smoothly.

You might be thinking, “How in the world can I do all the things I need to do, plus run a successful marketing plan to attract new business?”

Many small business owners, freelancers, mompreneurs, etc. that handle their marketing and advertising campaigns on their own are forced to “think outside of the box” to promote their business without breaking their advertising budget. While this may seem like an overwhelming task, this is actually an excellent opportunity to get your creative juices flowing and create a strong bond with your audience and customers.

Here are a few ideas to help inspire you.

Tell Your Story – One of the best things about running your own business is getting the chance to share the story behind the company. No matter how big or small your Organization is, your story should be woven into the tapestry of your business image and branding to build stronger ties with your target demographics. Don’t forget to mention the ‘When, Why, and How” of your foundation. By sharing your story, people can relate to you and will choose to do business with you instead of your competitors. For example, if your business is a third generation family business, this is “boast worthy.” Tell the story of your family and the company that got built as a result of the hard work and passion of the founders and the generations that came after them.

Branding Elements – In 2017, it’s all about your ‘brand.’ By tying in branding elements with your story, you’re creating something that is truly unique to only you. For instance, if you are creating and selling handcrafted goods, you might consider using your name or your image to represent the business on business cards, product packaging, letterhead, your website, and on your social media platforms. If you have an idea in mind, but you’re not sure how to implement it, the best way to turn your branding vision into a reality is by speaking with a branding professional as soon as possible. Explain to them your basic (or even complicated) branding ideas and let them help you bring them to life. The more you’re able to communicate what you want clearly, the easier it will be to target on your online and offline branding and marketing creatives. If your creative energy isn’t as sharp as you would like, you can trust that the agency that you choose to work with will have their team come up with designs that suit your requirements. Your creative team is your ally in all steps of the branding life cycle.

Colors Matter – It’s no secret that color psychology is an integral part of all branding and marketing campaigns. If you aren’t familiar with the concept of color psychology, this is primarily using specific colors to help elicit the desired response. Usually a purchase. One strong example is McDonald’s. Missing those bright golden arches is hard! While their branding and advertising campaigns have been modified and changed over the years, a few things remain constant. The arches and the colors bright yellow and red. (It should come as no surprise that both of these colors are both known to stimulate the appetite!) Other large brands that use these bright colors in their branding elements include Burger King, Coca-Cola, MasterCard, and many others. Your branding team should be able to work with you to establish a memorable and unique logo that represents your company.

Your Brand Voice – Once you’ve created your basic branding elements, you are in business! The next step in strengthening your brand is finding the ‘voice’ of your company. When I say ‘voice,’ I am referring to the tone and demeanor of language your company uses when communicating with potential clients, existing customers, and your fans on all of your social media platforms, in email, in live chat sessions, and other sales and marketing channels. By staying consistent in your communications, you help establish more trust with the people who interact with you, regardless of whether they are new and existing clients, vendors, or partners. Your brand voice is part of your organization’s identity, so choosing one that resonates with your core demographics is key to your brand. No matter whether you decide to adopt an informal or formal approach in your corporation or organizational messaging, you always want to be sure to keep things professional. Using simple pleasantries including the words “please” and “thank you” are always recommended when communicating in any capacity.

People Like To Do Business With People They Like – It should come as no surprise that people usually prefer to do business with people they like and trust. Now more than ever, personal marketing is a big part of many small businesses who have grown to much larger enterprises. If you are taking on the role of a spokesperson or a salesperson, one of the biggest ways to affect someone’s emotions is for them to like you. If you provide a valuable product or service and you have a great personality to help promote your company, there is unlimited potential for where you can go and what you can achieve!

You Don’t Have To Do It All Yourself – One of the biggest misconceptions is that you have to do everything yourself when working on your marketing and sales. Unless you have years of experience in building a brand and running a successful marketing campaign, there is no reason not to consult with an expert in the field. Colleen Eakins Design is here to help with all aspects of your advertising and marketing needs. Contact Us Today!