Posts about Marketing

3 Ways Color Can Influence Buying Behavior

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There are many things that influence human behavior and color is definitely one of them.  The effect is often so subtle that we have no conscious realization that we are being influenced by color.

Research shows however, that color can actually influence buying behavior.  In fact, color has the power to evoke strong emotional responses and depending on your culture and your geographic location, using the wrong color could be enough to turn potential and existing customers away from your business.  As a result many marketers, like myself, have studied the meaning of color and the psychology behind color.  So let’s take a 50,000 foot view of color and give you some tips to help you influence customers the right way.

1. Geography and Culture

Sounds straight forward doesn’t it?  Not necessarily.  You don’t need to be a big company to think about the implications of working in different countries or selling to people of different cultures.  In fact, small business really needs to be on top of localization.

One of the best companies for localization is McDonald’s.  Small business can leverage the work they have done and apply it to their businesses.  For example, McDonald’s has  not only adapted the look and feel of their website to meet the local customer’s expectations, but they have changed their menu.   In terms of color, we see that Red plays prominently on their website in India.  Red is an important color and one that has positive meanings in India.

N&EIndia

McDonald’s Website for Northern & Eastern India

 In Mexico however, red is really downplayed.  The website focuses more on the colors that are seen in the Mexican flag.

McDonald's Website for Mexico

McDonald’s Website for Mexico

And in The Netherlands, green is much more prominent than red on the website.  The golden arches are encased in green, not red.  Again, understanding the implications of color is important so that you can focus the right attention in the right place.

McDonald's Website for The Netherlands

McDonald’s Website for The Netherlands

2.  Age

This little known fact is one that can significantly impact your prospect or customer base. Understanding age and how color influences decisions is important if your business focuses on a specific age group.

According to research, green is a color that is more acceptable to people up to about 50 where as orange is a color that, as a person ages, is generally not preferred.   Additionally, as people age, the darker and strong the color, the more it is not desired.  Blue is consistently acceptable and preferred across all age groups.

If you are marketing to baby boomers, be sure to know what colors to fully leverage and which to stay away from.

Baby Boomer Image courtesy of goinglikesixty.com

Baby Boomer Image courtesy of goinglikesixty.com

3.  Psychological Impact of Color

It is true, colors bring on emotion.  Different colors mean different things.  Silver for example, brings about the emotion of calmness and if more on the gray side, it can bring about an emotional response of security, modesty or even intelligence.  Red in China is a sign of happiness and vitality.  When sending flowers to a family who is grieving and close to their Asian culture, be sure to send flowers that do not contain red.

For more information on the meaning of color, what emotions they evoke and how to use color, check out Using Color to Influence Buyer Behavior.

Takeaways:  Do your homework.  Look at what other companies have done and take cues from them.  Hire professionals who know about localization and understand how color can influence prospects and existing customers.

5 Sales Pitch Lessons from the Shark Tank

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Developing a sales pitch is both complex and time consuming. What may work for some buyers might not be right for others. Time is money and whether you’re selling a product, service, or a full solution, you need to captivate your audience immediately.

Image courtesy of the newsroomtuneup.com

Image courtesy of the newsroomtuneup.com

Nowhere is this more evident than on ABC’s Shark Tank, a reality series that finds entrepreneurs attempting to sell their big idea to a panel of successful investors.

The program is a textbook example of making a successful first impression by being properly prepared to nail your big pitch.

Here are five tips for perfecting your sales pitch from the sharks of Shark Tank:

1.  BRING YOUR A-GAME

 Let’s face it; we get pumped when we talk to someone who brings his/her A-Game. If you are excited about what you are selling, it will come through in your pitch. In the Shark Tank, people who are excited and knowledgeable immediately get the Sharks’ attention.

2.  UNDERSTAND MOTIVATION

 Know what you want to say in the most concise and informative manner that addresses real pain points for your audience. In other words, what will motivate them to work with you? In Dan Pink’s latest book, he discusses how understanding real motivation can transform how you sell. In the Shark Tank, the Sharks are motivated by why something is different and how what you’re offering will fix “something.” If you can’t demonstrate that in the first 40 seconds, you have already lost ground.

3.  USE EXCITING VISUALS

On the Canadian version of Shark Tank known as Dragon’s Den, a team seeking investment utilized gymnasts to demonstrate that their product – add-ons to seeing glasses that would prevent them from falling off – actually worked. This definitely got the panel’s attention. It was interesting, it was different, and it proved that the product worked. Three of the five “dragons” invested in the company.

4.  KNOW THE POWER OF THE MOMENT

When making the pitch know how much room for negotiation you have. Being able to make the deal on the spot could mean the difference between a yes and a no. Like in the Shark Tank, if you capture their interest with a good pitch, you can make a deal right there in that moment. Once you walk out the door, however, it could be over.

5.  NEVER GIVE UP

The most common advice that the Sharks give:  “never give up.”  This applies to everything in life! Perfecting your sales pitch does take time and patience. Be sure to learn from each experience and bring that to the table for your next pitch.

 

Note: a version of this post was previously shared on the salesforce.com blog.

5 Tips for Students to Avoid Looking Like an Ass When Job Hunting

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Whether you are in your first year of college or university, or your last, it’s time to start thinking about your personal brand.  Whether you are looking for your first summer job, or better yet preparing to graduate, you need to think about what your brand will be when you graduate.  And yes, you do need to be thinking about your personal brand now.  Here are 5 tips to get you started:

Student

1.  Think about what your dream job looks like

It is never too early to think about this and be sure to take courses that fit that view.  Don’t be afraid to stray outside your faculty for courses.  Think outside the box and how the new skills will help you get that dream job.

2.  Volunteer

Everyone should volunteer.  Not only does it build character and teach you how to work with people of different backgrounds, but it also enables you to test out what you learn in school.  Be selective however.  Don’t just volunteer for the sake of volunteering.  Think again of the dream job and be passionate about what you do.  Not only will it make the volunteering more enjoyable, but it will likely open more doors for you.

3.  Take time for R&R

Sure you need to relax and restore, but that is not what I am suggesting.  Instead be sure to read and research.  This might sound like a strange thing to tell a student, but you need to stretch yourself.  Be sure to read mainstream news each day.  Research companies, people and trends that you are hearing about in the news.

4.  Contribute

In addition to R&R, be sure to contribute your comments, thoughts, ideas and even pose questions when reading blogs or news articles.  This will not only help you learn more, but it will also begin to establish your name as someone who is knowledgeable and someone who contributes his or her own thoughts.

5.  Think before You Post Online

I saved this one for last and not because it is the least important.  Actually, it is just the opposite.  When thinking about your personal brand, you need to think about everything that you say and do.  You need to be consistent in all channels of your life.  This is particularly important in your online persona.  Remember every photo of you partying can and will come back to haunt you at some point.  Every stupid comment you make will resurface.  If possible, work with a professional to develop your LinkedIn profile.  It might cost a few dollars, but it will be worth it when you outshine your competition.

For more information on social channels and best practices, visit TaylorMade Solutions.

5 Tips for Small Business Owners To Pick a Content Marketing Expert

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Content marketing continues to grow and for good reason. It enables businesses to leverage their expertise in a real and demonstrable manner, at a relatively low cost. So, why aren’t more small businesses taking advantage and implementing content marketing? The answer is simple.  They just don’t have the expertise or the time.  The good news is that there is help.  There are many excellent marketing practitioners who live and breathe content marketing.  At the same time, there are many people who profess to understand content marketing and do not.  Here are 5 tips for getting started when seeking your content marketer:

Content is King

Image courtesy of doublelinx.com

1.  Think Strategically

One of the first things that a content marketer should ask about is your strategy.  Good content marketing consultants will interview you about this and ask thought-provoking questions.

2.  Develop Personas

In order to curate content, it is essential that your content marketing professional be able to develop personas, should you not already have them.

 3. Act with Integration in Mind

Content should not be created only with social in mind.  An integrated approach must be taken.  Be sure that your marketing consultant has the expertise to leverage and implement an integrated marketing approach tied to your strategy.  Don’t be dazzled by someone who knows how to set up a Facebook Page or Group.

 4.  Execute Based on Best Practices

Be sure to ask questions to determine if your consultant knows how to make use of the right channels at the right time.  For example, recommending to post updates to Facebook at the wrong times with the wrong content will result in poor results.  This also applies to quality over quantity.   Always look for consultants that focus on quality first.

 5.  Focus On Long-term Results

As tempted as we are to want things to happen immediately, marketing is something that takes time.  Your consultant should be prepared to guide you through the process and make adjustments as needed.  Remember we are dealing with consumer behaviour and influencing behaviour takes time.

These are just 5 starting points to get you thinking.

Looking for more tips for small business?  Check out:  25 Cool Online Resources to Grow Your Business.

12 Reasons to Do a Communications Audit Immediately

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Communications is at the core of success and therefore, a periodic communications audit is critical to ensure that you are meeting the changing needs to your stakeholders.  Here are 12 reasons to do a communications audit immediately:

Image Courtesy of www.bcrealtysolutions.ca


1.  You are no longer getting the same level of employee feedback as you once did.

2.  Your external stakeholders are no longer engaged.

3.  Repeat Customers have diminished.

4.  Your Top of the Funnel Sales Leads have decreased.

5.  Regulators or legislative bodies claim that they don’t know what you are doing.

6.  The media report that you are not available for comment or did not respond by time of deadline.

7.  Your read rate of online newsletters has decreased.

8.  Employee retention is an issue.

9.  Employee sick time is increasing.

10.  Labor relations is an issue.

11.  Investors are not happy.

12.  You don’t know what medium is the right one to communicate with employees, customers, stakeholders, regulators, media, etc.


The good news is that a communications audit can be done to determine strengths and weaknesses between management and employees and management and external parties. The focus can be exclusively on the internal or external relationship, or both.  An audit will not only determine strengths and weaknesses, but it will also determine the channels of choice for specific audiences, frequency of communication and how different types of communications should be addressed for specific audiences.  

For more information on how to do a Communications Audit, check out:  8 Key Steps for a Successful Communications Audit.

 

25 Cool Online Resources to Grow Your Business

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Small and medium business owners are always on the lookout for great resources to help them grow, but they don’t  always have time to research, read, and sort the wheat from the chaff. So I’ve done the preliminary work for you.

Here are 25 helpful small business resources covering everything from naming your new business to creating content for your marketing strategy, to increasing sales.

Entrepreneur

Image compliments of entrepreneur.com

In no particular order, here a list of SMB resources you’re going to want to bookmark:

1. Entrepreneur Solutions Playbook – 25 Small-Business Challenges [PDF]: A great discussion on the Top 25 Small Business Challenges

2. The Simple Guide to Branding Your Small Business [Infographic]: Looking for great advice on branding?  Check out this visual.

3. 5 Startup Naming Rules from SXSW: This article discusses how to position your business, including Do’s and Don’t’s.

4. Facebook – Small Business Page: Great up-to-date ideas and information for small businesses plus you can contribute your ideas.

5. Six Best Practices for Creating a Content Marketing Strategy: Whether you’re just getting started with content marketing or you’re at it for awhile, this article to shares best practices.

6. Small Business Mobility Meets Big Business Needs: Learn more about BYOD (Bring Your Own Device).

7. Reuters Small Business Resource Center: Looking for a well-rounded source for starting a business, employment law and more, check out this resource center.

8. CNN Small Business Community: Join the CNN Small Business Community for interesting posts from CNN Money.

9. Smart Bizz – Small Business and Startups Internet Technology Resources: Another good source for a broad range of subjects from e-commerce, productivity and more in this resource center.

10. NFIB – National Federation of Independent Business, the Voice of Small Business: From healthcare to sales and customer service to finance and accounting, get topical posts to help you advance your business.

11. Smallbusiness.com – a Free Wiki: Get local-based information based on your State.  Check out this community portal to learn the latest happenings in small business.

12. Wall Street Journal – Market Watch: Looking for an aggregate of great news-related posts for your small business? This is another great one-stop shop.

13. CitiBank Small Business Resources: Learn more about risk and financial security.

14. AT&T Strategies and Insights:  Access posts on how to attract customers, increase sales, build relationships and more on this handy site.

15. IT Business Edge – Small Business Computing: Get how-to guides, small business tips and more on this site.

16. Bank of America Small Business Community: Learn about small businesses of the month, ask the community questions and more.

17. Network Solutions – Small Business Center: Get a roundup of small business news all in one spot.

18. Cisco Small Business Resource Center: This center has articles, customer stories news and more all in one spot.

19. Small Business Guides: Get the latest guides on financing, training and events.

20. Go Small Biz: Looking for a go-to on tax/accounting, sales, HR, risk and tech in one spot?  This could be your go-to.

21. All Business – Your Small Business Advantage: Get access to the top stories, All Business experts and more.

22. Information Week SMB Technology for Small and Midsized Business: Get access to weekly email updates, SMB stories right from SMBs and more.

23. Microsoft Business for Small and Midsized Business: Learn new ways to use Microsoft tools get tips and marketing research.

24. DuctTape Marketing Blog: Blog posts, free ebooks and information on courses abound this site.

25. AMEX Open Forum: Recently redesigned, exchange advice, get ideas and learn small business success.

Note:  a version of this post appeared on the Salesforce blog that I wrote for them in August of this year.

BOOK REVIEW: Danny Brown & Sam Fiorella’s Influence Marketing

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I love that I get the chance to meet really smart, interesting and inspiring people and in the process read great books and do book reviews. Danny Brown is one of those people. Sam, hopefully we get to connect soon too! As I get ready to do my PhD on Digital Influence, I was pumped to read Danny’s and Sam’s book: Influence Marketing: How to Create, Manage, and Measure Brand Influencers in Social Media Marketing. After all it is a bout Influence!

Both Danny and Sam are well known for their marketing prowess and have really developed the conversation around influence. When done well, we don’t even realize that tactics of influence are being executed on us. As expected, this is a well written book chalk full of information.

From the Book’s synopsis:

Influence Book

“Today, you face a brutally tough, maddeningly elusive new competitor: the “wisdom of crowds.” Social media gives consumers 24×7 access to the attitudes and recommendations of their most engaged peers. These are the views that shape buying decisions. These are the views you must shape and use.Influence Marketing won’t just help you identify and enlist key influencers: it will help you manage the influence paths that lead consumers to buy. By sharing empirical evidence of hard-won lessons from pioneering influence marketers, Danny Brown and Sam Fiorella provide a blueprint that moves influence marketing beyond simple brand awareness and into sales acquisition and customer life time value measurement. They integrate new tools and techniques into a complete methodology for generating more and better leads—and converting them faster, at higher margins. 

• Put the customer—not the influencer—at the center, and plan influence marketing accordingly
• Recognize where each prospect stands in the purchase life cycle right now
• Clarify how your consumers move from brand preference to purchase
• Identify key micro-influencers who impact decisions at every stage
• Gain indispensable insights into the context of online relationships
• Recognize situational factors that derail social media brand recommendations
• Understand social influence scoring models and overcome their limitations
• Re-engineer and predict influence paths to generate measurable action
• Master the “4 Ms” of influence marketing: make, manage, monitor, measure
• Transform influence marketing from a “nice-to-have” exercise into a powerful strategy

Additional online resources can be found at www.influencemarketingbook.com”

Now, My Review:

This is one of the most comprehensive books on Influence Marketing that I have come across. From defining what Influencers are to understanding the emotion and logic that drives Influence to role of social media to exploring the shift of power from the brand to consumer and more, Danny and Sam have this exciting topic covered. They even go one step further and offer case studies to reinforce and support their topics.

What stood out for me most? Well, it was really the discussions around Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) and Net Promoter Scores (NPS). This section of the book, like the entire book, was well thought out and got me thinking a lot about how to better measure Influence and the need to incorporate different measures than what have been discussed. This will be an area that I explore much deeper thanks to the authors.

Finally, another part of the book that I particularly liked and will draw upon to support initiatives is the definition of Influencers. As Influencer Marketing becomes more and more the topic du jour, helping people understand who is an Influencer and who is an Advocate, for example will really make a difference in developing ones strategy and tactics to use in an integrated marketing plan, that includes Influence Marketing.

So, you are looking to get an A-Z understanding of Influencer Marketing, I would get this book.

The Ostrich Effect

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In my last blog posting I spoke of people, in general, having a fear of social media. The question is why?

The answer could be as simple as “it is human nature”, but that would be letting me, and you, off the hook way too easily! We need to dig a little deeper. For this posting, let’s look at the issue from the perspective of an organization or institution.

Thanks to research presented earlier this year by Nancy Bain, we know that 75% of all Canadians are now on-line, that there are some 18,620,000 Canadians on Facebook and that the time that we spend on Twitter is up 3700%.

These numbers can be daunting for businesses or institutions. These numbers are significant and it means that decisions makers have to take a hard look at actions that will involve the use of new communications’ tools, new technology and very open and public discussions. This is a frightening thought for many.

The questions that immediately come to mind are: how will we learn to use these tools effectively? Who will train us? Do we need training? What are the full ramifications if we choose to not use these tools and resources? What are the ramifications if we do? Do we need new policies? Do we need to staff 24/7? And most importantly, what if something unsavoury is said about my organization? What can I do? This last question is probably really what would keep managers awake at night. Earlier this year Eisner Amper conducted a survey of Boards of Directors asking them what they felt was the biggest threat to their respective organizations. The result was a clear and decisive statement – reputational risk!

So, we know that reputational risk is a huge concern. That being said, why exactly would so many decision makers choose to not engage in social media? The reason – is what I like to call the Ostrich Effect! If one chooses to bury his head in the sand and therefore cannot hear what is being said on social media, it doesn’t exist, right? Wrong!

The fact is that there are many communications professionals that can assist organizations and institutions navigate the social media waters and prepare a social media strategy that meets your specific organizational needs. We are just a click away! What are you waiting for? Organizations and institutions need to be proactive. Waiting for a crisis to emerge is not the answer.

In my next posting, I will look at crisis communications and how social media can work to your advantage.

Do we trust? What does the research say?

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Trust.  Now there is a word.

Trust.  Who do you trust?  At work?  At home?  As a consumer?  As a person?  Who do you trust?

Trust is an area of interest that has had an interesting evolution.  Over the last decade or so, people and researchers have come to have a fascination with trust, and for good reason.  As people have become more connected and more knowledgeable, they have become more skeptical.   The question is why?  Why are people, regardless of where you are or what socioeconomic background that you have, just not as trusting as they used to be?

Even employers are doing research to understand how they need to communicate with their employees because of this very issue.  IBM for example, carried out a survey in 1997 and then again in 2003 looking at what the most trusted communication tools they had for their employees.  The results are interesting.  News media and employee’s immediate managers were two areas for example that took a big hit between 1997 and 2003.  Employees just did not have the same level of trust when it came to these sources.  On the other hand, executive letters and the company Intranet became the most trusted source in 2003.  Flash forward to 2008 however, and you see yet another picture.  The BlessingWhite Employee Engagement Report 2008 reports that only 53% of employees trust their organization’s senior leaders- not their managers, but the organization’s senior leaders.  In North America only 75% of respondents trust their immediate manager, slightly down from the 2006 report which showed that 79% trusted their managers. (This report is available at http://www.blessingwhite.com/EEE__report.asp).

Let’s look at the consumer side of things.  According to research and Erik Qualman, a marketing expert, 14% of consumers trust advertisements whereas 78% trust peer recommendations.

Why do we see a trend that shows employees and consumers becoming less trusting?

I may be overs simplifying things, but I believe it comes down to the history of control.  Companies, through their marketing and communications teams have traditionally had the control.  They created the message, the timing of the delivery and they held the purse strings.  In other words, they could embark on “campaigns”.  As an employee or a consumer, what could we do?
Enter Social Media.  With mobile devices that can upload stories and images in seconds, a different story could emerge and a conversation could start.  Control eroded as did trust.

In my next posting, I will continue on this theme of trust and explore trust from the employer perspective.

Two-way dialogue, the New Paradigm

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Let me start off by saying that I truly believe that this is the first time in history when there really is the possibility of having a two-way dialogue.  On the one hand, technology has developed to the point where we actually have tools that enable not just word-of-mouth, but world-of-mouth.  On the other hand, we seem to be in an age when people want to speak out and they want to be engaged.

You may have heard this term – world-of-mouth – being used more and more in reference to Social Media.  When you stop and think about what these words mean, they really do have a big impact.  In a previous posting I mentioned the letter to the editor.  Sure, that was an interesting tool and you could potentially have hundreds or even thousands reading your letter on the day that it was published in the paper.  With Social Media however, your “letter” can be forwarded, re-posted, and more importantly other people can comment in real-time and a conversation can emerge.  Rather than a one-time event, depending on the topic, the interest and even the passion of people, this “letter” could become a cause that thousands support.

To emphasis my point, let’s take a real life case.  Back in August of this year (2010) Tanner Bawn, a 10 year old from Vancouver, who has muscular dystrophy and is immobile without his electric wheelchair, travelled to New York with his aunt.  According to an August 5, 2010, Globe and Mail post, when Tanner and his companions arrived in New York, his wheelchair was damaged beyond repair.  This trip was part of a wish request that the terminally ill boy made.  Unfortunately Air Canada was not immediately forthcoming to replace the chair.  In fact, according to the article, it was going to take several days before they could get a loaner.  For Tanner’s aunt, this was unacceptable.  She knew in order to get results, she would have to take action.  She went to Twitter and told her story.  A quick Google search for the terms “Air Canada” and “Twitter” and “wheelchair” bring up 112,000 results and if you read the various articles and postings, there are numerous comments within each.  This was a public relations nightmare for the airline.  Not only did traditional media pick this story up, but it went viral in the Social Media world.  (For those not familiar with the term viral, think of how a cold spreads when just one individual coughs in public – it isviral.)

If this were five years ago, or even 10 would this have occurred? In all honestly, likely not. We didn’t have the tools and perhaps not the wherewithal either. This is just one example where world-of-mouth occurred and forced an action to take place. Again, this information lives on. Unlike the old letter to the editor, in this new world of marketing and communications, opinions, posts and public relations nightmares live on and on in the digital world. Case in point, one Google search today brought me the full picture of what happened to Tanner almost two months ago in just .19 seconds.
Just think about what world-of-mouth can do to your business, your charity event, or quite frankly to your personal brand when you act or react to each and every event in your day!

In my next posting I will continue to talk about the impact of Social Media and world-of-mouth. In particular, I will review what research is telling us about trust.