This document provides stories from marketing agencies about nightmares they experienced with clients. It is divided into chapters with titles like "Dangerous Liaisons" and "Creepy Scope". The stories describe issues like taking on work outside an agency's expertise, not setting clear expectations with clients, and relying too heavily on freelancers without backups. The lessons shared emphasize the importance of having clear agreements, managing client expectations, focusing on one's strengths, and ensuring backup plans are in place to avoid potential project disasters.
15 Reasons Your Customers May Be Jumping ShipFivestars
Â
Are you noticing your small businessâs foot traffic beginning to dwindle? Are you losing customers who used to be regulars? We know 15 reasons why this may be happening.
âA 35-hour week? No! A 35-hour day is what we need
to fit everything inâ
2013: paradoxically, the economic environment for small businesses has never been as dynamic or as complex â from changes to regulations on a virtually daily basis to international competition and demanding customers.
To make ends meet and secure their margins, SME business owners have to adapt to this infernal pace but the working day isnât long enough to fit everything in. What they need is a 35-hour day.
The time has come to change the rules of the game.
The 35-hour Day Collective
Raving Fan Creation by Brad Wolansky FREE downloadnick31m
Â
This document discusses creating "Raving Fans" through excellent customer service. It argues that customer service should be viewed as a marketing investment rather than an operating expense. Traditional marketing is changing from one-way advertising to two-way engagement between companies and customers. Creating customers who rave about a company's products and services to others through social media is important for business success in today's marketplace.
Blackwater Creative is an "un-agency" that prides itself on establishing strong client relationships and providing exceptional service. They consider budgets but prioritize long-term relationships and client satisfaction. Their diverse team supports clients in achieving their goals efficiently. Blackwater operates primarily on a retainer basis to provide ongoing support and spread out costs for clients. They aim to be a true marketing partner rather than just an agency focused on profits.
The document outlines the top 10 advertising mistakes made by businesses. Mistake #1 is not providing solutions to customers' problems. Mistake #2 is creating boring advertising that does not engage customers in discussions. Mistake #3 is failing to analyze customer response data to better target advertising. The overall message is that advertising should solve customer problems, engage customers, and be tested and improved based on data analysis.
The document discusses how the modern information age has led to an overabundance of information and advertising clutter that most people struggle to make sense of. It notes that while the internet provides more content than ever before, people's ability to understand and trust information is declining. The rise of branding and focus on creative advertising is identified as contributing to this problem by prioritizing empty messages over meaningful content. The conclusion calls for focusing on mining meaningful information from within businesses to communicate in a way that cuts through the clutter.
Five simple marketing tips for newbie real estate agents. Instead of complicating things, here are simple things that'll get you results as a new real estate agent.
The document discusses the importance of customer experience and how AI can enhance customer service. It provides data showing that companies with superior customer experience see significantly higher revenue growth. It then offers recommendations for companies to simplify processes, be available across multiple channels in real-time, gather customer feedback to continuously improve the experience, and empower customers with self-service options. While AI for direct customer interactions is still limited, the document suggests collecting unified customer data to prepare for future AI-assisted customer service.
15 Reasons Your Customers May Be Jumping ShipFivestars
Â
Are you noticing your small businessâs foot traffic beginning to dwindle? Are you losing customers who used to be regulars? We know 15 reasons why this may be happening.
âA 35-hour week? No! A 35-hour day is what we need
to fit everything inâ
2013: paradoxically, the economic environment for small businesses has never been as dynamic or as complex â from changes to regulations on a virtually daily basis to international competition and demanding customers.
To make ends meet and secure their margins, SME business owners have to adapt to this infernal pace but the working day isnât long enough to fit everything in. What they need is a 35-hour day.
The time has come to change the rules of the game.
The 35-hour Day Collective
Raving Fan Creation by Brad Wolansky FREE downloadnick31m
Â
This document discusses creating "Raving Fans" through excellent customer service. It argues that customer service should be viewed as a marketing investment rather than an operating expense. Traditional marketing is changing from one-way advertising to two-way engagement between companies and customers. Creating customers who rave about a company's products and services to others through social media is important for business success in today's marketplace.
Blackwater Creative is an "un-agency" that prides itself on establishing strong client relationships and providing exceptional service. They consider budgets but prioritize long-term relationships and client satisfaction. Their diverse team supports clients in achieving their goals efficiently. Blackwater operates primarily on a retainer basis to provide ongoing support and spread out costs for clients. They aim to be a true marketing partner rather than just an agency focused on profits.
The document outlines the top 10 advertising mistakes made by businesses. Mistake #1 is not providing solutions to customers' problems. Mistake #2 is creating boring advertising that does not engage customers in discussions. Mistake #3 is failing to analyze customer response data to better target advertising. The overall message is that advertising should solve customer problems, engage customers, and be tested and improved based on data analysis.
The document discusses how the modern information age has led to an overabundance of information and advertising clutter that most people struggle to make sense of. It notes that while the internet provides more content than ever before, people's ability to understand and trust information is declining. The rise of branding and focus on creative advertising is identified as contributing to this problem by prioritizing empty messages over meaningful content. The conclusion calls for focusing on mining meaningful information from within businesses to communicate in a way that cuts through the clutter.
Five simple marketing tips for newbie real estate agents. Instead of complicating things, here are simple things that'll get you results as a new real estate agent.
The document discusses the importance of customer experience and how AI can enhance customer service. It provides data showing that companies with superior customer experience see significantly higher revenue growth. It then offers recommendations for companies to simplify processes, be available across multiple channels in real-time, gather customer feedback to continuously improve the experience, and empower customers with self-service options. While AI for direct customer interactions is still limited, the document suggests collecting unified customer data to prepare for future AI-assisted customer service.
This document debunks 7 common myths about B2B content marketing. It summarizes that while content marketing is effective, there is a lot of hype that does not reflect real-world practices. Specifically, it argues that content marketing is not just inbound marketing, that social media should not be the sole focus, that selling has its place if done appropriately, that customers care more about their business problems than the marketer's brand, B2B content does not need to be boring, quality is as important as quantity of content, and there is no single best practice for all companies. An effective content marketing strategy requires understanding each company's unique needs.
Event Experience Series: LaughStub & DC ImprovEventKloud
Â
At EventKloud we believe in creating great event experiences. We understand events are about PEOPLE and their experiences. So naturally, it bothers us when we see other companies' event marketing campaigns fall short. As a result, we created this series to show you these obvious mistakes big companies are making that can be easily fixed.
The document provides 13 principles for providing excellent customer service or "Customer WOW". It begins by emphasizing the importance of customer retention and satisfaction. It then lists the 13 principles which include actively listening to customers, maintaining open communication, quickly resolving issues, putting oneself in the customer's shoes, and learning from complaints. The overall message is that prioritizing outstanding customer experiences leads to greater customer loyalty and business success.
Who should read this white paper? Continue reading if youâre selling or marketing a technology solution to the Fortune 1000.
Selling to the Fortune 1000 is an expensive and time consuming undertaking. Smart sales reps and marketers know that it takes time and a high number of âtouchesâ to land a deal. For some of our customers, it can take them 12-18 months to secure a contract and during that time, they can âtouchâ the prospect more than 30 times.
This Selling Into The Big Fortune 1000 Companies guide will help you save wasted marketing dollars by examining where our customers and high tech industry leaders, get the biggest bang for their marketing buck.
- Sales is personal and requires understanding the client's needs on a personal level to build trust through positive communications and a sense of urgency.
- It is important to avoid being too rigid and provide clients with options rather than locking them into one solution.
- Maintaining relationships after the sale through ongoing communication helps nurture trust and allows the company to stay top of mind for future opportunities.
How B2B buying and selling will change in 2020Shruti Kapoor
Â
In this eBook, we have tried to answer questions like...
What are some of the new obstacles faced by other sales teams especially after the pandemic and what can you learn from it?
How has the buying process changed in light of COVID-19?
How can sales teams continue to have meaningful conversations?
Is it ok to be cold-calling or emailing prospects right now?
What type of messaging should be used in cold outreach to build relationships without pissing off your prospects?
What can sales, success & marketing teams do together in this time?
With layoffs dominating your teamâs LI feed, how do you continue to motivate your sales reps?
Lean Planning for Nimble Agences - Mirren New Business Conference 2012The Difference Engine
Â
This was the talk I presented at the Mirren New Business Conference on May 2, 2012 in New York. The audience was mainly small and mid-sized agencies - and we had an excellent, engaged audience. Thanks to all who made it (or watched over the streaming service)!
A business leader must have many strengths, including the ability to motivate others. There are two main ways to motivate: using positive incentives or negative threats. However, positive motivation through goals, incentives and building a collaborative environment tends to be most effective. A great leader can instill motivation in their people.
The document describes marketing and communication services for small businesses and entrepreneurs. It claims to use scientific principles of psychology and behavioral economics to develop customer acquisition, communication, and retention methods tailored to each client's specific business and target audience. The focus is on deeply understanding the audience to create messaging, products, and sales funnels that precisely meet their needs and desires in order to maximize engagement and conversions.
How to write effective emails that translate naturally into sales conversations on the phone.
This PDF is for Birmingham sales people, MDs, managers, sales managers, directors and business owners committed to successful selling.
Tom Mallens
A-Player Sales Team Development in Birmingham and the Midlands
Coaching. Consulting. Training >>> People. Processes. Plans
Tel: +44 (0)121 222 5590
1) Building strong customer relationships is key to business success. It involves developing personal connections with customers and understanding their needs and problems.
2) Ten strategies for building customer loyalty include making every interaction count, following through on commitments, offering value, treating customers as individuals, listening to customers, building a strong brand identity, providing valuable information, having a user-friendly website, rewarding loyal customers, and creating an inviting blog.
3) Implementing these relationship marketing strategies can help businesses connect with customers, ensure repeat sales, and gain a competitive advantage through word-of-mouth recommendations.
New Delhi HUG September meetup held on 25th September, 2019 included a quick recap of the Inbound 2019 sessions, and a deep dive into the latest HubSpot product announcements.
Greysmoke's 11 Maxims on B2B Demand Generation CampaignsBaker Egerton
Â
A visual whitepaper describing 11 fundamentals that every demand generation campaign for the enterprise should consider. Helpful insight for anyone who wants a peek at some of the complex considerations surrounding campaigns.
Blind Sales Curve Article - by Jeff MustardJeff Mustard
Â
The document discusses whether a company can handle increased sales generated by advertising. While advertising aims to drive sales, a company must be prepared to manage new leads and close sales. The author questions if companies have the bandwidth, processes, and systems in place to properly handle an influx of new prospects and fulfill sales. Without these capabilities, advertising spends are wasted and the company's brand can be damaged by an inability to deliver on promises. The key is having effective sales processes and customer relationship management systems to convert advertising leads into closed sales.
The document discusses whether a company can handle increased sales generated by advertising. While advertising aims to drive sales, a company must be prepared to manage new leads and close sales. The author questions if companies have the bandwidth, processes, and systems in place to properly handle an influx of new prospects and fulfill sales. Without these capabilities, advertising investments may be wasted and brand reputation damaged if the customer experience is not satisfactory. The ability to deliver on promises is as important as acquiring new business.
So you want to boost your sales, more specifically your leads 10X. For starters it requires more work and efficiency today. This guide will give you some fresh insights and some old insights to boosting your service business, professional service, startup, etc. Enjoy
Creative agencies are often called in to brand their clients but have a difficult time doing this to themselves. This paper from Swystun Communication provides highly practical and creative lessons for standing out.
A Repeatable Process for Crafting Perfectly Personalized EmailsSales Hacker
Â
Writing a good personalized email is kind of like building out the perfect March Madness bracket, or selecting your own numbers for the next big lottery ticket. With email reply rates below 1% these days, the odds are incredibly stacked against you.
Check this deck to learn from Josh Braun and Ryan OâHara how to create a repeatable process for creating personalized emails that will lead to double digit reply rates and more booked meetings.
CREATING THE PERFECT
A Visual Guide to LinkedIn Company Page
Introduction
Your LinkedIn Company Page is an online beacon for
both prospective customers and prospective
employees.
As such, it is a truly unique space on the
web, one that blurs the lines between knowledgesharing
platform and relationship-building tool.
WHY EXECUTIVES CANâT IGNORE SOCIAL
MEDIA ANYMORE.
Did you know there are as few as 5.6% of Fortune 500
CEOs on Twitter? Additionally, a whopping 68% of
Fortune 500 CEOs donât have any social presence
This document debunks 7 common myths about B2B content marketing. It summarizes that while content marketing is effective, there is a lot of hype that does not reflect real-world practices. Specifically, it argues that content marketing is not just inbound marketing, that social media should not be the sole focus, that selling has its place if done appropriately, that customers care more about their business problems than the marketer's brand, B2B content does not need to be boring, quality is as important as quantity of content, and there is no single best practice for all companies. An effective content marketing strategy requires understanding each company's unique needs.
Event Experience Series: LaughStub & DC ImprovEventKloud
Â
At EventKloud we believe in creating great event experiences. We understand events are about PEOPLE and their experiences. So naturally, it bothers us when we see other companies' event marketing campaigns fall short. As a result, we created this series to show you these obvious mistakes big companies are making that can be easily fixed.
The document provides 13 principles for providing excellent customer service or "Customer WOW". It begins by emphasizing the importance of customer retention and satisfaction. It then lists the 13 principles which include actively listening to customers, maintaining open communication, quickly resolving issues, putting oneself in the customer's shoes, and learning from complaints. The overall message is that prioritizing outstanding customer experiences leads to greater customer loyalty and business success.
Who should read this white paper? Continue reading if youâre selling or marketing a technology solution to the Fortune 1000.
Selling to the Fortune 1000 is an expensive and time consuming undertaking. Smart sales reps and marketers know that it takes time and a high number of âtouchesâ to land a deal. For some of our customers, it can take them 12-18 months to secure a contract and during that time, they can âtouchâ the prospect more than 30 times.
This Selling Into The Big Fortune 1000 Companies guide will help you save wasted marketing dollars by examining where our customers and high tech industry leaders, get the biggest bang for their marketing buck.
- Sales is personal and requires understanding the client's needs on a personal level to build trust through positive communications and a sense of urgency.
- It is important to avoid being too rigid and provide clients with options rather than locking them into one solution.
- Maintaining relationships after the sale through ongoing communication helps nurture trust and allows the company to stay top of mind for future opportunities.
How B2B buying and selling will change in 2020Shruti Kapoor
Â
In this eBook, we have tried to answer questions like...
What are some of the new obstacles faced by other sales teams especially after the pandemic and what can you learn from it?
How has the buying process changed in light of COVID-19?
How can sales teams continue to have meaningful conversations?
Is it ok to be cold-calling or emailing prospects right now?
What type of messaging should be used in cold outreach to build relationships without pissing off your prospects?
What can sales, success & marketing teams do together in this time?
With layoffs dominating your teamâs LI feed, how do you continue to motivate your sales reps?
Lean Planning for Nimble Agences - Mirren New Business Conference 2012The Difference Engine
Â
This was the talk I presented at the Mirren New Business Conference on May 2, 2012 in New York. The audience was mainly small and mid-sized agencies - and we had an excellent, engaged audience. Thanks to all who made it (or watched over the streaming service)!
A business leader must have many strengths, including the ability to motivate others. There are two main ways to motivate: using positive incentives or negative threats. However, positive motivation through goals, incentives and building a collaborative environment tends to be most effective. A great leader can instill motivation in their people.
The document describes marketing and communication services for small businesses and entrepreneurs. It claims to use scientific principles of psychology and behavioral economics to develop customer acquisition, communication, and retention methods tailored to each client's specific business and target audience. The focus is on deeply understanding the audience to create messaging, products, and sales funnels that precisely meet their needs and desires in order to maximize engagement and conversions.
How to write effective emails that translate naturally into sales conversations on the phone.
This PDF is for Birmingham sales people, MDs, managers, sales managers, directors and business owners committed to successful selling.
Tom Mallens
A-Player Sales Team Development in Birmingham and the Midlands
Coaching. Consulting. Training >>> People. Processes. Plans
Tel: +44 (0)121 222 5590
1) Building strong customer relationships is key to business success. It involves developing personal connections with customers and understanding their needs and problems.
2) Ten strategies for building customer loyalty include making every interaction count, following through on commitments, offering value, treating customers as individuals, listening to customers, building a strong brand identity, providing valuable information, having a user-friendly website, rewarding loyal customers, and creating an inviting blog.
3) Implementing these relationship marketing strategies can help businesses connect with customers, ensure repeat sales, and gain a competitive advantage through word-of-mouth recommendations.
New Delhi HUG September meetup held on 25th September, 2019 included a quick recap of the Inbound 2019 sessions, and a deep dive into the latest HubSpot product announcements.
Greysmoke's 11 Maxims on B2B Demand Generation CampaignsBaker Egerton
Â
A visual whitepaper describing 11 fundamentals that every demand generation campaign for the enterprise should consider. Helpful insight for anyone who wants a peek at some of the complex considerations surrounding campaigns.
Blind Sales Curve Article - by Jeff MustardJeff Mustard
Â
The document discusses whether a company can handle increased sales generated by advertising. While advertising aims to drive sales, a company must be prepared to manage new leads and close sales. The author questions if companies have the bandwidth, processes, and systems in place to properly handle an influx of new prospects and fulfill sales. Without these capabilities, advertising spends are wasted and the company's brand can be damaged by an inability to deliver on promises. The key is having effective sales processes and customer relationship management systems to convert advertising leads into closed sales.
The document discusses whether a company can handle increased sales generated by advertising. While advertising aims to drive sales, a company must be prepared to manage new leads and close sales. The author questions if companies have the bandwidth, processes, and systems in place to properly handle an influx of new prospects and fulfill sales. Without these capabilities, advertising investments may be wasted and brand reputation damaged if the customer experience is not satisfactory. The ability to deliver on promises is as important as acquiring new business.
So you want to boost your sales, more specifically your leads 10X. For starters it requires more work and efficiency today. This guide will give you some fresh insights and some old insights to boosting your service business, professional service, startup, etc. Enjoy
Creative agencies are often called in to brand their clients but have a difficult time doing this to themselves. This paper from Swystun Communication provides highly practical and creative lessons for standing out.
A Repeatable Process for Crafting Perfectly Personalized EmailsSales Hacker
Â
Writing a good personalized email is kind of like building out the perfect March Madness bracket, or selecting your own numbers for the next big lottery ticket. With email reply rates below 1% these days, the odds are incredibly stacked against you.
Check this deck to learn from Josh Braun and Ryan OâHara how to create a repeatable process for creating personalized emails that will lead to double digit reply rates and more booked meetings.
CREATING THE PERFECT
A Visual Guide to LinkedIn Company Page
Introduction
Your LinkedIn Company Page is an online beacon for
both prospective customers and prospective
employees.
As such, it is a truly unique space on the
web, one that blurs the lines between knowledgesharing
platform and relationship-building tool.
WHY EXECUTIVES CANâT IGNORE SOCIAL
MEDIA ANYMORE.
Did you know there are as few as 5.6% of Fortune 500
CEOs on Twitter? Additionally, a whopping 68% of
Fortune 500 CEOs donât have any social presence
The organic reach of Facebookâs business pages has been tweaked so much
that the organic reach is way down, as low as 2 percent for some of the largest brands. That statistic is very scary for small to medium-sized businesses that
rely on using Facebook as a free means to market their business and connect
with their clients or customers.
The Evolution of the
Sales and Marketing Relationship
In early 2014, HubSpot and LinkedIn wanted to gain knowledge about current processes and
collaboration between marketing and sales.
Gave a talk at StartCon about the future of Growth. I touch on viral marketing / referral marketing, fake news and social media, and marketplaces. Finally, the slides go through future technology platforms and how things might evolve there.
The Six Highest Performing B2B Blog Post FormatsBarry Feldman
Â
If your B2B blogging goals include earning social media shares and backlinks to boost your search rankings, this infographic lists the size best approaches.
1) The document discusses the opportunity for technology to improve organizational efficiency and transition economies into a "smart and clean world."
2) It argues that aggregate efficiency has stalled at around 22% for 30 years due to limitations of the Second Industrial Revolution, but that digitizing transport, energy, and communication through technologies like blockchain can help manage resources and increase efficiency.
3) Technologies like precision agriculture, cloud computing, robotics, and autonomous vehicles may allow for "dematerialization" and do more with fewer physical resources through effects like reduced waste and need for transportation/logistics infrastructure.
32 Ways a Digital Marketing Consultant Can Help Grow Your BusinessBarry Feldman
Â
How can a digital marketing consultant help your business? In this resource we'll count the ways. 24 additional marketing resources are bundled for free.
This document discusses strategies for delighting clients. It provides six strategies: 1) Send helpful emails with resources and tutorials; 2) Show you care about clients on a personal level by remembering important dates; 3) Provide thorough reports and context on metrics; 4) Ensure all parties understand the vision through visuals and documentation; 5) Think outside the box by proposing new ideas and optimizations; 6) Respect clients' time by providing realistic timelines informed by past projects. Various agency representatives provide examples for each strategy.
We have written a guide that covers all the lessons we have learnt from starting our own agency and supporting other agencies on pricing and packaging their services, get it here.
The document contains responses from various entrepreneurs about their business challenges in 2009 and advice for 2010.
1) Entrepreneurs faced challenges such as organizing growing companies, generating business in a tough economy, ensuring infrastructure supported rapid growth, and managing a multi-directional business approach.
2) Marketing tools used included networking, websites, brochures, social media, and branding. Location and community involvement also helped some businesses.
3) Tips for 2010 included finding a niche, having passion despite economic challenges, balancing work and life, underpromising and overdelivering, and making plans with accountability.
This document describes an incentive marketing program called "Operation Godfather" designed to target "sleeping giant" customers for wholesale distribution companies. The program aims to convert these underpenetrated but high-potential customers into core customers through a highly customized incentive program using desirable "Big Splurge Awards" that can be redeemed for luxury vacations or purchases. The program involves identifying sleeping giants, launching a direct mail campaign to promote the program, tracking customers' purchases over time via scorecards, and rewarding top performers with the awards. The program is intended to increase sales, profits and customer loyalty in a turnkey fashion without requiring upfront costs from participating companies.
Judging creative idea guide, this material will help the marketer especially those who work on advertising or brand to be able to formulate rational and structured thinking of judging creative idea
10 Things Emerging Technology Companies Need to Know to Jump Start Their Way ...Debbie Gee
Â
The document provides advice for emerging technology companies on how to jump start revenue generation. It discusses 10 key things companies need to know, including being wary of hastily hiring a sales force, being objective about their technology offering, knowing their competition, understanding where they are in the emerging technology curve, clearly communicating value to customers, being prepared to invest in winning customers, knowing when to partner, leveraging existing customers, simplifying their message, and being realistic about timelines. It also discusses how companies can execute their strategies through an outsourced sales and marketing option to help reduce costs and accelerate revenue.
The document provides advice from a marketing manager to their agency partners on how to best serve clients and win business. Some key points include: take a genuine interest in clients' problems rather than just selling your own credentials; expose clients to new ideas and help them learn; spend time in clients' organizations to better understand their business; and align your agency's success with your clients' success by linking compensation to client metrics. The overall message is that agencies should focus on truly understanding and helping their clients rather than just completing tasks.
The document introduces Blackwater Creative, an "un-agency" creative firm that prides itself on establishing long-term client relationships and providing exceptional service. It highlights the firm's diverse team, collaborative work environment, and client-focused approach. Blackwater operates on a retainer basis to provide ongoing creative and marketing services including branding, design, development, and media buying. The goal is to deliver high-quality work and support to clients at a reasonable cost through a partnership-based model.
One of the biggest reasons some IT businesses fail is due to the lack of any systematic approach to generating enough high-quality, qualified Leads. However, the real battle is not getting the leads into the sales funnel, itâs an inability to turn these high-quality leads into clients...
This document provides guidance on how to write an effective value proposition. It discusses doing research to understand the prospective customer's needs and pain points. Four key steps are outlined: 1) define the customer's problem 2) evaluate if your solution is compelling 3) measure the difficulty for the customer to use your product and 4) build the value proposition based on the first three steps. The document emphasizes that the value proposition must be written from the customer's perspective and clearly explain what benefits they will receive and how your solution uniquely addresses their needs.
The document outlines 12 common reasons why agencies lose proposals when trying to win new business. It discusses how agencies often treat proposals as a first step in the sales process rather than a final confirmation of discussions. Key reasons for losing proposals include focusing on costs rather than value, not properly qualifying prospects, failing to develop relationships with prospects, not acting like a true partner, using the wrong pricing framing, not having a standardized process, poor expectations setting, lack of follow up persistence, lack of credibility in proposals, and not challenging clients' assumptions about what they need. The document provides advice on how agencies can improve their proposal success rate by addressing these common shortcomings.
What Separates the Best From the Rest: What Makes Great Agencies GreatTim Williams
Â
The truly great agencies share a set of principles and practices that distinguish them from the other 12,000 agencies in America and make them brands in demand.
This document provides 50 business tips from small business owners and experts on topics ranging from starting a business to growing customer base and maintaining reputation. The tips are organized into sections on starting a business, growing customer base, and maintaining reputation. They include advice on creating a business plan, persisting through challenges, partnering with others, promoting the business, using social media effectively, exceeding customer expectations, and communicating regularly with customers. The overall guidance is on running a successful small business through planning, customer focus, and building strong relationships and reputation.
Customer Success & The Value Stream Discovery LoopGuita Gopalan
Â
This document discusses customer success and mapping the customer journey. It defines customer success as customers achieving their desired outcomes through interactions with a company. The customer journey is described as having 7 stages: aware, intrigued, hopeful, convinced, satisfied, trusting, and passionate. For each stage, the document prompts the reader to consider the customer behavior, triggers and conditions, and how to measure success. It emphasizes discovering value streams to understand what customers do at each stage and how businesses can move them to the next stage. The overall goal is to hypothesize the behaviors that indicate what state a customer is in and what a company must do to help them progress along their journey.
We love Lean Startup! Here are 23 Lean Startup Insights that we've collected for you guys to enjoy and learn from. If you got additional Lean Startup Insights, just comment below! We definitely want to hear about it!
MozCon Virtual - Surviving the Covid News Agenda and What It Means for the Fu...Shannon McGuirk
Â
For the past 18 months, my mindset has been firmly set in âsurvival modeâ due to the trials and tribulations that the global pandemic has brought forward. I will be opened up about my learnings sharing insight into how Airaâs digital PR team was able to pivot their link-building activity for clients on a hairpin, whilst navigating an oversaturated news agenda at the same time as being under pressure from clients around return on their investment.
Using âsurvival modeâ experiences, I share clear tactics setting the standard on how to future-proof your digital PR and link building. These tactics will show you how to adapt to the ever-changing news landscape and how to improve your processes from ideation through to outreach.
How Are You Different: Importance of a Strong Marketing MessageJennifer Saunders
Â
The most important step in building a strong brand in a crowded marketplace is to find your unique voice. This presentation by Soapbox Marketing helps companies to articulate a strong message to the right audience on the web and in social media. Also shows some examples of what not to do on your website.
Everything You Thought About Customer Service & Loyalty is Wrong // Toolbox S...LHBS
Â
What we think about in customer service could be wrong, from what customers want to whoâs the best personality for teams.
Technology research firm Gartner Inc. (previously CEB) recently presented findings from a number of studies carried out within the realm of customer service across the world.
The research spanned many different industries and consisted of over 125,000 customers, over 5000 service representatives, over 100 companies and revealed three major findings.
We explore these findings and offer actionable steps and useful resources to begin customer service transformations within any company.
Similar to Hub spot halloween_special-_marketing_agency_horror_stories (20)
Magazines, newspapers, TV stations, radio stations and online publishers â letâs call
them media companies â have been producing news content to attract an audience for
years.
Some might say that media companies were the original content marketers.
And no matter if that content was published on paper or broadcast over a signal;
people are attracted to that content to learn about the dayâs breaking news and to stay
in the know.
The document discusses how media companies can leverage inbound marketing to engage audiences and increase advertiser revenue. It outlines some of the challenges media companies currently face like lack of qualified sales leads, lack of differentiation from competitors, fragmented content consumption, and loss of print advertising dollars. The document then proposes that inbound marketing can help by generating qualified leads for sales, helping advertisers achieve their goals like more car or insurance sales, learning more about audiences to engage them, and introducing new revenue streams through marketing services packages. It includes perspectives from a panel of media company executives on these topics.
When you need to gather information from an entire population, the
best way to do so is to send a survey. Problem is, surveys are difficult
to write. There are so many ways to ask questions, and if you donât ask the
right ones, you wonât get the information you need.
INTRODUCTION
ERIK DEVANEY
Content Strategist, HubSpot
@BardOfBoston
Written & Designed by:
For some, the word âoptimizationâ conjures
up thoughts of complicated mathematics
and data analysis. It can seem like one of
those things that only a true âdata geekâ
could ever hope to understand.
Thatâs exactly what we plan to cover in this guide.
First, weâll briefly cover the basics of creating a follow-worthy Twitter profile. Your profile is often times the first impression others get of you, so itâs important to make every aspect count.
After that, weâll dive into the seven particular tactics you can employ to boost your following so you get more people interacting with you or your company.
INTRODUCTION
Uncertainty is a marketerâs best friend and worst enemy. It simultaneously
forces us to experiment with proven processes to drive success and instills us
with anxiety as we push the âsendâ button on that latest email campaign. A little
scary? Sometimes.
- The majority of marketers do not feel their company is using content marketing effectively, with only 29% feeling their company's use is at a basic level or better.
- Most marketers are still only spending 0-20% of their budget on content marketing in 2014, and plan to increase internal headcount for content creation more than external spending.
- Creating a content marketing strategy and properly measuring ROI of content have been found to be the most effective techniques, but 56% of marketers are still doing content without a proper plan.
The document provides instructions for using Talk Fusion Connect, a video conferencing and presentation tool. It outlines how to log in, customize your profile and dashboard, schedule events, design presentations, invite attendees, host live broadcasts and video conferences, and utilize features like screen sharing, chat, and recording. The summary highlights the key purposes and functionalities of the different sections within the dashboard for managing events, presentations, contacts and more.
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This infographic provides guidance on marketing analytics, helping businesses grow using tools like Google Analytics and AI, measuring ROI, and analysing future trends to track business development.
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This presentation is an invaluable resource for marketing professionals, students, and anyone interested in understanding the dynamics of effective advertising and promotion in the feminine hygiene sector. Explore how Whisper maintains its brand leadership and continues to innovate in a competitive market.
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2. About the Author
Andrea is a marketing funnel optimisation specialist at HubSpot, Dublin.
She is a member of the international marketing team, where she manages
email marketing and lead nurture workflows, as well as list segmentation
and improved targeting. Her data-driven testing informs the teamâs strategic
decisions and contributes to improving the number of leads generated and the
quality of those leads.
@andydidwhat
5. 5
A BOTTOMLESS PIT OF DISSATISFACTION
It pains me to remember this client -- on the outside they
appeared to be a great match, but in reality, it was an evil
pairing. So we began to work together, and despite the amazing
results we were achieving for them, it was never enough.
Time after time we would display exemplary results â and it was
never satisfactory. Regardless of what results we got for them
on a monthly basis, they wanted more. They wanted to know
why it wasnât better, how we could improve the next month and
how we could compensate them for any lost opportunities. It
was insanity. They had no grasp of reality. Our team were close
to killing themselves during the work and it took months for us
to recover our morale even after I had stepped in and delicately
moved them on to another agency
Today at PH Creative, we have a firm rule which arose from
too many similar experiences like this with nightmare clients.
In order to work with us, a client must provide two out of
three of the following criteria: fame, fortune or fun. Itâs just not
negotiable.
Avoid this Nightmare
Always ensure the scope of work and the boundaries of the
deliverables are set in stone along with setting client expectations
firmly in reality⊠Under promise, over deliver and donât be afraid
to fire clients if they become too demanding and will not up their
budget to compensate for the loss of sanity.
Bryan Adams
PH CREATIVE
@PHCREATIVE
âUnder promise, over
deliver and donât be afraid
to fire clients if they become
too demanding and will
not up their budget to
compensate for the loss of
sanity.â
TRICK OR
TWEET
6. In a previous life, I worked at an agency commissioned to develop 6
an e-commerce website for a client. Awesome, except for one
terrifying problem: I never developed, nor did our agency ever
develop, an e-commerce site before! We were experiencing the
agency equivalent of the âbus jumpâ scene in âSpeedâ. I was
Sandra Bullock, blowing by warning signs, gas pedal floored,
white-knuckling it, trying to jump our collective knowledge gap in
e-commerce while the rest of the agency braced for impact.
That knowledge gap was the need to sync tax tables, shipping
and handling fees, bundled pricing, fulfillment, backend CRM
integration, accessorising and check-out capabilities in one
seamless customer experience. Over the course of the project,
we went through three programmers, our client quit, and we went
tens of thousands of dollars over budget doing whatever it took to
deliver a functioning website held together by spit and duct tape.
And just like in âSpeed,â we successfully jumped the gap but not
without extensive damage wrought on office morale, our bottom
line, and the relationship with the client.
Avoid this Nightmare
This mistake couldâve been avoided if we stayed true to our
expertise and played to our strengths. Our agency did great
branding, messaging and design work. Our web development
capabilities were serviceable but not nearly at the level our
client required. Everyone knew it. But we got greedy and fooled
ourselves. Going dramatically over budget wasnât the only pain
we felt. Nerves were frayed. Other client work suffered, and our
teamâs collective confidence took a hit.
Patrick Armitage
BLOGMUTT
@PAT_ARMITAGE
JUMPING FROM A SPEEDING BUS
âAgencies that say
theyâre a âjack of all
tradesâ are a master of
none. Sometimes saying
ânoâ is more profitable
than saying âyesâ.
TRICK OR
TWEET
7. 7
With great intentions of making life easier for one of our
clients, we set up a lead nurture email workflow for their
new web leads. However, we did this without asking if
that was how their sales process worked â a hazardous
mistake. We simply assumed this was something that
theyâd want. As you can probably guess, this was
absolutely not what the client wanted and they almost
fired us immediately â a gruesome end. As it turned out,
the clientâs process was to follow up personally with each
lead â and between getting our nurture emails and the
clientâs personal emails, these leads were getting very
confused, sending the client into a fit of rage with us and
we were terrified we were going to lose their business.
Thankfully, we were able to talk them around by begging
for mercy!
Avoid this Nightmare
Simple; Smarketing. If we knew that our clientâs sales
process was to follow up with leads personally and right
away then we could have planned his lead nurturing
campaigns better. Now we always connect with the
clientâs sales team first to understand their process. And
we get their approval on any emails that go out with their
signature on it. Lesson learned!
Kelly Kranz
OVERGO STUDIO
@KELLYKRANZ
THE MYSTERY OF THE
MULTIPLYING EMAILS
âIf we knew that our clientâs
sales process was to follow
up with leads personally and
right away then we could
have planned his lead
nurturing campaigns better.â
EMAIL WAIL
TRICK OR
TWEET
9. 9
Itâs easy to get caught up in the excitement of inbound and its
possibilities for clients but this can be a dangerous thing. With
new clients, we have often been eager to set their pulse racing
and have set ambitious goals to drive a step change in marketing
performance and ROI.
With all good intentions, we have pulled out all the stops and put
in lots of extra time in order to meet those original goals. Of course,
the problem with such over-servicing is that unless the client is
aware of all the extra work, it is taken for granted which undervalues
our efforts and our inbound proposition as a whole.
Avoid this nightmare
On reflection, during the early stages of offering inbound services
we could have perhaps been more prudent in our goal setting and
managing client expectations. Further, itâs vital to ensure that clients
have a clear view of all the work youâre putting in so that they
understand the full value of your expertise; this builds a platform for
a strong relationship moving forward.
Emma Jones
Katapult
@_katapult
OVER-SERVICE AT YOUR PERIL
âItâs vital to set clear
goals and manage client
expectations from the
outset to ensure that they
understand the full value of
your expertise, and
have a clear view of the work
involved.â TRICK OR
TWEET
-
10. 10
When we at Consilium Global Business first started working with this
ghoulish client, we did not realise what a mistake it would be not to set
up agreements on what we would deliver and what the client would
deliver. We began the project, naively thinking that the client would
step in when required to move the project forward.
Unfortunately, as time went on, it became clear that the devilish client
was not prioritising the relationship, or the job we were trying to do.
Tasks that only they could complete were not getting done and the
project continued to drag on and on. A 90-day project turned into a
180-day nightmare.
Avoid this nightmare
Iâve learned that a reasonable mutual SLA should be established
with auto publish deadlines (or extra-project work surcharges)
outlined before we begin a project. This way, both client and
agency know what they are responsible for and the project goes
much smoother.
Ed Marsh
CONSILIUM GLOBAL
@EDBMARSH
MUTUALLY AGREE, OR DIE
âWe did not realise what a mistake it would be not
to set up agreements on what we would deliver
and what the client would deliver.â
TRICK OR
TWEET
11. 11
As the Inbound Manager at Increnta, I was sending our most
important customer an email with the annual report. I decided to
open YouTube to make it a little more fun. And boy did it! I played my
favourite guilty pleasure song âLa Macarenaâ on repeat.
After listening to it over and over again, I got lost in my own
world and became careless, and swiftly realised I had just sent
the ridiculous video to the customer. My heart started racing
immediately, my hands started getting all clammy and I could feel
the sweat trickling down my forehead. I thought âDear God! Weâre
going to lose our biggest account!â
While writing a letter of apology, the most important email of my
life arrived in my inbox. It was the customer, congratulating me on
the campaign and adding that La Macarena was his favourite song.
My sigh of relief was audible from three streets away!
Avoid this Nightmare
Always check your emails before hitting send if you donÂŽt want
your dreams to become nightmares. Remember that messages
via email can easily be misinterpreted, and you never know how
someone might react. Important communications should always
be made in person or via telephone if possible to avoid this kind of
mishap.
Roberto MoragĂłn
INCRENTA
@INCRENTA
CAN YOU HEAR THE MUSIC?
âRemember that
messages via
email can easily be
misinterpreted, and
you never know how
someone might react.â
EMAIL WAIL
TRICK OR
TWEET
13. 13
Being a small agency, I have a roster of freelancers that I use
for various elements of an inbound marketing program. These
include writers, graphic designers, web developers etc. and they
are all over the world. I was working on an entire HubSpot COS
website rebuild with a freelancer who was usually fast and reliable.
However, as the go-live deadline approached, they disappeared
and did not respond to any form of communication I attempted.
The tensions and panic grew. Whatever could have caused this
mysterious disappearance?
They did respond finally, and when I politely pointed out that the
site was scheduled to be going live at the end of the week, they
imploded and were astonishingly unprofessional. Needless to say,
that relationship ended there and then. So I was stuck without a site
and without a developer. Luckily I had another resource with another
HubSpot partner who quickly took over the project and had it back on
track without any further delays. What could have been a disaster was
saved at the last moment.
AVOID THIS NIGHTMARE
The lesson here is to always have a back-up plan. Iâve found
in some instances that using other Hubspot agency partners as
resources can work better than freelancers. The Hubspot partner
community is somewhat unique in that we often do collaborate
on projects. This can be done transparently with the client or not,
depending on your comfort level and who âownsâ the customer
relationship.
Sarah McIntyre
BRIGHT INBOUND
MARKETING
@BRIGHTINBOUND
FREELANCER FAIL
âThe tensions and panic
grew ... the lesson here
is to always have a
back-up plan.â
TRICK OR
TWEET
14. 14
TECHNOLOGY IS MY BEST FRIEND,
AND MY ENEMY
On a dark, dark day, there was a dark, dark building and
in the dark, dark building there was a dark and suspicious
internet connection.
We had spent weeks planning and finalising a concept for
a new marketing campaign and were preparing for the final
presentation. They were travelling to our offices from afar
- and when I say âtheyâ, I mean all of the key stakeholders.
But on their arrival, once pleasantries were out of the
way, we discovered the internet had gone down - again!
Our presentation, along with our entire company, lives on
the cloud. We couldnât do anything - not even print it off.
Nightmare! The horror on our faces was something you
would never forget.
AVOID THIS NIGHTMARE
Many agencies operate within a serviced building where
one internet connection line feeds all. Our advice would
be to always outsource third party services if what youâre
offered from the managed building is hindering your
businessâ performance. We live in the digital age - and for
a digital marketing agency to be offline is scarier than any
trick or treater to appear at my doorstep!â
Alistair Norman
TOMORROW PEOPLE
@ALISTAIRNORMAN
âAlways outsource third party services if what youâre offered from the
managed building is hindering your businessâ performance.â
TRICK OR
TWEET
16. 16
PROSPECT PROFILING
PREVENTS PROJECT PARALYSIS
Back in the olden days of our agency, we were approached
by quite a high profile client to undertake some SEO work
for them. They kindly sent us some reports from their current
agency with a list of some of the issues they were having.
We spent hours crafting the perfect proposal, referencing all
the issues the client faced, how bad their current situation
was, and how a new strategy was desperately needed.
However, due to whatever wickedness was at play that day,
our emails got mixed up and we sent it directly to the clientâs
current agency. It felt like Halloween had come early! No
email retraction was going to save us from this mess! It was
like a vampire had come along and sucked the life out of us.
Avoid this Nightmare
Five years on from this unfortunate error, not only do
we make sure we never mix up email addresses, but we
also take care to profile each prospect carefully to stop
any potential horror stories. We discuss level of inbound
knowledge, size of team, buy-in from the board, parties who
will be involved, growth plans for the company, if they are
detail or big-picture oriented and most importantly, is there
anyone who we should not contact!
Guy Levine
RETURN ON DIGITAL
@GUYLEVINE
âWe take care to profile each
prospect carefully to stop
any potential horror stories.â
EMAIL WAIL
TRICK OR
TWEET
18. BE EVERYTHING TO SOMEONE OR
BE NOTHING TO EVERYONE
When we first started conducting our own inbound campaigns, 18
we took the standard business owner stance and ignored all
the advice about niching. It could have been RIP for us then and
there. There seemed to be a great deal of fear in targeting a very
specific industry or buyer persona, at the expense of all the other,
non-conforming business profiles that we could also help.
As a result of my own aversion to get specific, we welcomed a
broad and poorly-targeted array of prospects into our marketing
and sales funnel, each of which were subjected to a generic âblahâ
of follow-up information. Unsurprisingly, (with hindsight) conversion
rates were hauntingly low, and we found ourselves talking to
âprospectsâ who werenât really qualified to buy our services. Big
mistake!
Avoid this Nightmare
How we address this issue is exactly how we approach all
campaigns now, both for ourselves and with clients (yes, we eat
our own dog food). We start every engagement by identifying
the primary and ideal buyer personas, and create content-led
campaigns that not only attract the right leads, but which also
pre-qualify and nurture those leads through to sales readiness.
Conversions have improved, and we have a more satisfied
client-base as a result of the subject matter expertise we can
provide across the board.
HERE LIES
Matt Hodkinson
INFLUENCE AGENTS
@MATT_HODKINSON
âWe start every
engagement by
identifying the primary
and ideal buyer personas,
and create content-led
campaigns.â
TRICK OR
TWEET
19. 19
As far as Iâm concerned, there is nothing more horrifying than the
thought of falling behind. We at Online Ventures Group always
strive to be at the cutting-edge in everything we do, from the
software we create and use, to the marketing tactics we implement
for our clients.
We have all heard the almost-cliche âcontent is kingâ. We all know
quality content is integral to advertising campaigns of all sizes,
content marketing especially. Our horror story is that we didnât
embrace content marketing earlier and fell behind our industry
peers. Now that we utilise content marketing as our main tool to
reach business objectives, our clients are enjoying a much larger
return on their investments. If only we implemented it years ago.
Avoid this Nightmare
My advice to other agencies would be to trust your gut. If you hear
rumblings of âthe next big thingâ, do you research and do it quickly.
Then turn it into an plan and implement it double-quick. The feeling
of being left behind is awful. But the feeling of knowing you are
ahead of the curve and seeing the result is one you will never
forget.
James Welch
ONLINE VENTURES
GROUP
@JAMESWELCH_NET
RUN! HEâS BEHIND YOU!!
âTrust your gut. If you hear rumblings of âthe
next big thingâ, do your research and do it
quickly.â
TRICK OR
TWEET
â
20. 20
EMAIL WAIL
âIn the early days of setting up a customer re-engagement mail a
couple of years ago we had something of a mishap. It could have
been a complete freaking nightmare had it not been for how cool the
customer remained, even as some interesting and sinister responses
to our unfortunate mistake poured inâŠ
Imagine if you will, weâve gone through all of the work defining a key
persona for the client. Weâll call her Laura, OK? Well, as I copy write
the re-engagement mail, as you would expect, Iâm considering exactly
what matters to Laura, how would she be thinking about things, how
would this offer be best received by her?
Yes â I wrote âHi Lauraâ at the top of the mail, fully intending to replace
it with first name personalization later. And yes I did, I sent it! I called
over 2,500 people Laura. I break out in a cold sweat just thinking
about it, to this day. You can imagine, there were a fair few replies
along the lines of âIâm only Laura at the weekendâ and some, it should
Jeremy Knight
EQUINET MEDIA
@THEJEREMYKNIGHT
âNever, ever send
anything without
proofing properly, ever.â
IS THAT YOU, LAURA?
TRICK OR
TWEET
be said that were not so humorous. I still have nightmares about it⊠(for a while I think my wife thought
I was having an affair as I groaned âno Laura, no Lauraâ in my sleep).â
Avoid this Nightmare
Of course - it is obvious (but oh so easy to overlook if you are rushing at deadlines and, ultimately cutting
corners); never, ever send anything without proofing properly, ever. Today we always ensure weâve had a
second person in the agency check the work of a colleague before anything is sent out and, Iâm delighted
to say, nothing like that has ever happened again.....has it, Laura?
22. 22
A B2B client had invested heavily in their brand, seeking to
penetrate various market sectors through multiple channels. They
made some initial traction, albeit by taking a scatter-gun approach
to building brand equity. The trade name they were leveraging was
competitive and ultimately unprotected. Whilst successfully winning
some early market share, it eventually backfired on the company,
with the proliferation of cross sector messaging costing them a
significant portion of their marketing budget. The company ended
up in a state of disarray and as a result, the head of marketing
lost their job. Unfortunately for the client, despite having spent
considerable sums on marketing-reach, they ended up needing to
start from scratch.
Avoid this Nightmare
When the client came to Incisive Edge, they had inconsistencies
with messaging and their value proposition coupled with justified
concerns from the costly lessons they had learned. They required a
strategic approach to align and integrate marketing with sales and
to stop deploying activities in isolation.
Our approach to consistent multi-channel digital and content
marketing positioned them as a sector specific thought leader
and put our client back on the road to recovery. We measurably
energised their sales and marketing operations driving return on
investment through clarity.
David Bowler
INCISIVE EDGE
@INCISIVEEDGE
SHOT IN THE FOOT WITH A
SCATTER GUN APPROACH
âIt requires a strategic
approach to align &
integrate marketing &
sales.â
TRICK OR
TWEET
23. 23
THE CHOPPY SEA OF
INEXPERIENCE
We once developed a top-of-the-range inbound marketing
campaign for a client who had difficulty letting us manage the
execution of it. An inbound marketing campaign performs best
when applied consistently, and especially by those who have
experience in implementing the steps involved. The internal
team in this particular case had no prior experience in such a
thing. The delivery was choppy and slow, but thankfully we were
lucky, and it all worked out in the end.
Avoid this Nightmare
Always execute and bring your ideas to fruition yourself. No one
will ever translate vision into reality in the way you can.
Ricardo Molina
BRIGHTBULL
@BRIGHTBULL
âNo one will ever translate vision into reality in the way you can.â
TRICK OR
TWEET
24. 24
EMAIL WAIL
âIâll tell you a story that left me quaking in my boots, a story
that haunts me to this day. Weâve all made mistakes when it
comes to dabbling in a little bit of HTML or CSS in order to
add personalisation or a favourite colour. Oh, I wish it had
been a meaningless string of code that I sent! Instead, I sent
a ghastly un-personalised email for a client that unfortunately
referred to everyone as âHey First Nameâ. Needless to say,
the client was pretty unhappy with that result⊠I was sure that
was going to be the day I met a grisly end!â
Avoid this Nightmare
This mistake can be avoided by not only having someone
look over your emails, but also having them sent to you as a
test as if you are a contact in your system.
Laura Hogan
OVERGO STUDIO
@LALALAURAHOGAN
HE WHO SHALL NOT BE
NAMED
âThis mistake can be avoided by not only having someone
look over your emails, but also having them sent to you as a
test as if you are a contact in your system.â
TRICK OR
TWEET
26. 26
One of the deadliest traps for agencies is the client who is
obsessed with only one thing⊠SEO.
Modern SEO is about an inbound marketing strategy and
that includes being discovered through search engines as
well as other online channels including social. It requires a
strong messaging strategy, a documented content strategy, an
employee advocacy strategy and a comprehensive review of
the clientâs website architecture, authority and linkback status. A
plan needs to be made about what needs to get viciously axed
and what needs to be added to the cauldron to brew the right
enchantment for visitors.
Weâll never enter into a client engagement again that is
one-dimensionally focused on just âsearch engine optimization.â
The notion of âimproving search engine rankingsâ is so 2010.
Itâs an obsolete concept. Alas, there are some clients that are
cursed with not seeing the whole picture of marketing.
Avoid this Nightmare
The new SEO is very multi-faceted. Weâll only work with clients
that understand the breadth of modern inbound marketing with
a willingness to collaborate on all the success factors.â
Bernie Borges
FIND AND CONVERT
@BERNIEBORGES
THE WALKING DEAD SEO
PRACTICES
âThe notion of âimproving search engine
rankingsâ is so 2010. Itâs an obsolete
concept.â
TRICK OR
TWEET
27. 27
STRATEGY IS THE SKELETON OF
SUCCESS
We worked with a client who bought HubSpot software, but
wouldnât invest in any strategy work (beware of such devilish
creatures â they bring with them untold horrors known as
âunrealistic expectationsâ). Despite our forewarning, they
didnât follow our advice to start the process with research
and planning. They insisted they knew the customer and their
market, and jumped straight to the execution phase. .. much
like the grim reaper! They published some content they thought
would be interesting and waited for the leads to roll in. The
results were predictably horrifying and they were shocked to
find they werenât closing a deal each week at the end of the first
month.
Eventually we convinced them to do a content strategy session,
which was informed by a workshop, several persona interviews
and an independent assessment of the marketplace. The
recommendations we presented were far different than the
content theyâd produced and after investing in the process, they
realised what they should have done from the get-go.
Avoid this Nightmare
Want to avoid the same terrifying fate? Spend at least a month
doing research, strategy development, client interviews, persona
development, internal workshops â amass all the data you have
before you start production. Itâs the best way to ensure your
content isnât dead on arrival!
James Cox
TRACEPOINT
@JAMESBUZZCOX
âSpend at least a month
doing research, strategy
development, client
interviews, persona
development, and internal
workshops.â
TRICK OR
TWEET
28. 28
DR. FRANKENSTEIN IS READY TO SEE YOU
Earlier this year, Screwpile was working with a surgical practice
helping them grow their business. Weâll call the owner Dr.
Frankenstein. Dr. Frankenstein came to us with a problem; he
was frustrated that his website was not helping the practice
attract new patients as well as he felt it could. Typically we
measure success with inbound medical marketing in three
important categories: increases in website traffic; number of
leads generated; number of new patients closed.
After a few months of inbound medical marketing efforts, things
were really looking up. Traffic had grown from under 1,000
visits a month to well over 11,000 visits per month. Leads had
increased as well. Before the engagement Dr. Frankensteinâs
office had been getting only a handful of leads every month from
the website. Weâre talking 2-3. As their inbound marketing efforts
ramped up, all those website visitors began to convert into leads
as well. Now, they were getting upwards of 50 every month from
their website alone.
Chuck Malcomson
SCREWPILE
@SCREWPILECOMM
âNow we make sure to press
hard during our consultative sales
process to ensure that the
prospect is a good fit for our
services.â
TRICK OR
TWEET
The problem was that not enough of these leads were becoming new patients in Dr. Frankensteinâs
office. Even though these leads were requesting consultations, the practice didnât have an effective
way to handle new patient leads and get them in office. Dr. Frankensteinâs office didnât have the luxury
of a team of appointment coordinators to effectively follow up. Even after delivering on what we
promised the account ended up churning. Dr. Frankenstein just wasnât able to dispose of that many
patients.â
Avoid this Nightmare
Now we make sure to press hard during our consultative sales process to ensure that the prospect is
a good fit for our services. Do they have someone available to follow up with inbound leads? Do they
have a process in place to effectively connect with the highest percentage of inbound leads? If so,
great. If not, we leave it at that.
30. 30
Klaas Klunder
MARKETING PENGUIN
@MKTPENGUIN
Who is afraid of bad content?
Let me tell you a scary tale
Of a text written to no avail
A blog without a âbodyâ but with a âtailâ
And scarier even more
It was filled with jargon galore
This sucked the life right out of the story
Never to see the morning glory
But there was even more hell to pay
The blog did not have a CTA
So let me tell you in a single breath
The blog was boring its readers to death
Yes, the content was a sure hit and miss
That lives forever in the abyss.
31. ?
IF YOUâRE BRAVE ENOUGH FOR
A DEMO OF HUBSPOT ...
Click Here
â