Many marketing people and executives are looking to social media as a way to turn up the interaction with consumers. In particularly, there is the idea that social media is “free” except for intense personnel costs and that the e-marketing and direct mail costs can be cut back. Here are some of the comments from social media experts to help you make the best decision about how social media: “I’ll say that again: the quality and value of your efforts …
There have been glaring headlines about large brands dumping their marketing teams or their marketing agencies to move to social media. There have been naysayers that show how few marketers are able to determine an ROI on their marketing budget or even track the path from social media to increased revenue. While I was eager to jump on the social networks to see what they were about, after three years of trying to understand its value in the marketing mix, …
In a recent headline, Credit Card Debt drops 11% in 2011, it hit me once again that a part of what the economy is being hit hard with the generation train wreck. The move away from consumerism by Boomers and the gap left with a much smaller Gen X is making it harder to gain any traction in the economy. Now, while I always understood as a marketer that Gen X was smaller, the Baby Boomer years of supporting the …
When you want to get creative to market yourself, whether with a better written resume, new topics for a personal blog, coining interesting posts on Facebook or Twitter, or updating your LinkedIn profile, remember creativity is like a muscle. It has to be exercised and given freedom to go outside the lines. Here are several ways to allow your more linear thinking habits to take a break: Brainstorm with a friend or co-worker Rearrange your desk Drive a different way …
Throughout time, marketing has been about grabbing someone’s attention and interest to get them to buy a product or service. In today’s digital world, the addition of online channels like email, websites, social media and mobile marketing has madeit even harder to grab attention for more than a few seconds has become harder. Television was the media that attracted the most “eyeballs” until the advent of YouTube. Not only is there an ease of uploading video but anyone could use …
[AMAZONPRODUCT=0470095199]Your one chance to get the attention of a customer/prospect may be a television ad on their favorite cable network. Or, it might be an online ad as they are logging into their personal email at home. Perhaps they receive a direct mail postcard or newsletter in their mailbox. Consumer behavior is spread out across many different channels that when your message does pop up, you only have seconds to grab their attention! Does your marketing message catch their eyes …
It’s the holidays and in thinking how nice it would be to “unplug” from technology, my marketing side knows it can’t happen! The advertising is in high gear from Facebook specials to retailers sending email offers every day to online ads. There are even cell phone solicitations and text offers. Our consumer world is deluged with tech-based marketing As Pew Research Center noted in a recent study, 58% of all adults (or 74% of all online adults) say they use …
According to the Discover U.S. Spending MonitorSM , sixty-one percent of consumers are heading into the holiday season planning to spend less on holiday gifts compared to 2010. So, how can you make it a “Happy” Holiday? Push more marketing activities! Offering a holiday loan? Reduced rate on credit card purchases? Maybe no payments for 90 days for an auto loan? Think that no one does anything during the holidays? Well, for busy, stressed-out consumers, the holidays offers a little …
In the next few years, business growth may continue to be slow due to one factor that cannot be controlled – adult-aged U.S. consumers will experience an 11% drop in population from the aging Baby Boomers to the smaller Gen X. There are just not the numbers to help absorb the slowing spending and changing interests of Boomers in a congested, competitive marketplace. So, is there hope in the wings? Change is in the air! Have you noticed the protesting …
There are Occupy protests across the world, there’s a Bank Transfer Day, and the social media derision during the Blackberry outage. Consumers are showing the new low level of tolerance for inequity, poor customer service, and rising fees. How can marketers be prepared, plan for big swings in consumer loyalty, and even protect their brand in light of this new low level of tolerance? The first critical step is to keep the long-term user, the most profitable group in your …