More Smart Marketing

Presidential-Style PR

I attended President Obama’s visit to V&M Star Steel last week as part of a project we’re working on for the expanding plant.

Although the President was, as usual, a terrific orator — it was the White House organization and “travel team” that impressed me from a marketing perspective.

IT’S ALL ABOUT PERSONAL CONTACT

PR tools like the common press release are important, but that’s the cold, sterile part of public relations. It’s the contact with an organization’s people that makes the best or worst impressions.

The White House “travel team” was an excellent model of “PR personified.” Business owners and mangers and non-profit organizations can apply the same concepts to situations where their people interact with the public.

CALM, COOL, COMPETENT

That’s the first impression you get. We dealt with the White House communications people. We had to arrange video and photography, and were squeezed in among the multitude of press and reporters.

I’m sure our contact person was swamped with special requests when we spoke to him, but he acted like we were the only people in the world when he was talking to us and handling our needs.

At the event, I saw network reporters complain about the limited (but equal to local TV stations) space they were given. Our contact explained it was the fair way and the only way. Minutes later, he got a call from a network executive trying to bully him. He calmly repeated the same line, and thanked the big shot for calling.

POLITE, PROFESSIONAL, VISUAL

The only group from the White House that might have been more impressive than the the media staff was the Secret Service.

They make movies about these guys for a reason. Most are tall, well-built and look very fit. With their buzz hair cuts and their constantly scanning eyes, they’re easy to pick out.

VISUAL IMPRESSIONS

They look like they’re ready pounce on anyone that makes a move against the President. But at the same time, when approached, they’re very pleasant, polite and professional.

The biggest surprise was that they all looked like they stepped out of GQ. Conservative spin, but clearly upscale suits, and neat as a pin. THAT’S the look I want people to have if they represent my organization.

FOLLOW THE LEADER

What impression does your team leave? If you want an example to follow, all you have to do is follow the leader — the White House staff.

Stay Tuned and Stay Smart.

What’s So Special About FREE?

IT GETS YOUR ATTENTION

It’s kind of like being on vacation with your wife and stumbling upon a topless beach. Even if you have no interest, you gotta look when you see the word FREE.

WHY DOES FREE STILL WORK?

Nothing has been more overused in ads than the word FREE. And yes, unscrupulous companies use the word FREE to aid their bait-and-switch schemes.

But if used the right way, the word FREE can make a big difference in your ads. And offering something FREE does not mean your product is low-end or cheap.

Look at the luxury hotels that were built in Beijing, China for the Olympics. There were too many hotels built, and in this economy they have too few overnight stays. So do they lower the $400 room price to attract more customers? Nope. They offer a FREE night when you book two others.

Why? Because they keep the value of their rooms and the image of their hotel high, and suggest the FREE room is a perk for “special customers.”

The hotels know that customers won’t be bragging about having spent $400 per night; rather, they’ll brag about having saved $400 on a room there.

IS FREE THE BEST DEAL?

Probably not. Overall lower prices are probably better in the long run. But subconsciously, you feel like you’ve won a mini-lottery when you get something FREE.

Consider the lowly cardboard coffee cards at gas stations. Next to the license and pictures of the kids, most men’s wallets contain one. Buy six cups of coffee, and if you haven’t lost your card like I usually do, you get a cup FREE.

Have your birthday dinner at certain restaurants and you can eat FREE. Of course the four people you bring with you pay full price and hopefully like the food and service enough to come back again.

FREE BY ANY OTHER NAME

Have you heard of REWARD PROGRAMS? It’s just FREE stuff by another name. Buy

enough products and earn enough Reward Points so you can get something FREE.

High-end cars like BMWs offer FREE oil changes and even brake pads for as long as you own the car. That helps you ignore the $700 a month car payment.

Buy your windshield wiper blades at AutoZone and they’ll put them on your car FREE. You’d pay a lot less for the same blades at WalMart, but the cashier is too busy waiting on the lady with five crying kids to put your wiper blades on.

EVEN FREE, IT NEEDS VALUE

Some firms offer something FREE that nobody expects to pay for, and then wonder why they don’t get response to their ads. Is a FREE ESTIMATE really a selling point if everyone offers it?

BOTTOM LINE: IRRESISTIBLE

Take a quick glance at this article — what word stands out? What kept you reading?

It’s not the right offer for everyone, but just like the topless beach, when you see the word FREE, you gotta look.

Stay tuned and stay smart.

20 Things Research Will Tell You. Two Things It Won’t.

If you don’t conduct research, if you don’t ask the “dumb” questions…YOU are dumb.

Ordinary organizations don’t ask the questions they should be asking. Why? Because they believe

they already know the answers, or
the answers are not important, or
it’s too difficult to get answers, or
it’s too expensive.

All of these beliefs are wrong.

Smart organizations know that research leads to:

increased revenue
security
wiser decisions
improvements in service
a better image
higher awareness
increased value to community and stakeholders
improved employee morale
easier recruiting

NO EXCUSE

There is no excuse for not making research a part of your marketing program. It’s relatively inexpensive, and always returns valuable information. Research methods are now so refined, you can even get results in real time (at least from Farris). You can have surveys conducted, tabulated and analyzed — and recommendations made — in a few weeks.

WHAT RESEARCH WILL TELL YOU

How your customers and prospects “rank” you against your competitors.
Why the top firm holds that spot.
Whether a new product or service is likely to sell.
What the price should be.
Where your prospects look first for your type of product.
When they look — what happened to make them look at this time.
What customers like about your product, service, store or organization.
What they don’t like.
What made them come in in the first place.
Why they keep coming back.
Why and when they use your competitors.
What you can do to get existing customers to buy more often.
What prospects think of when they see the name of your organization.
Why they think what they think.
Whether a levy can pass or candidate can win.
What needs to be done to help a levy pass or a candidate win.
Which media will work best for you.
Which media would be the worst.
The most profitable market for you.
The size of the market and what will attract business from it.
How many more weeks of winter are left. (I’m kidding…just making sure you’re paying attention!)

WHAT IT WON’T TELL YOU

The exact dollar amount your should budget for marketing.
Why the Browns can never get to the playoffs (sigh). Oops, I mean: The one phrase or message that will work forever.

Stay Tuned and Stay Smart.

Hey! Smart Readers —

Paul Gregory, Jim (The Liquidator) Farris, Jeff Barone, Patty Rose

The Clendenin Combination Theory

I was on the therapy table of my favorite chiropractor, Dr. John Clendenin. He was helping me with an injury I sustained during one of my athletic “misadventures.”

This kind of injury is common among males who get older but never actually grow up.

One of my vertebrae was out of alignment and “stuck.” Dr. C was working to get it unstuck. I noticed that besides working on the stuck vertebrae, he was working on the whole spine. I asked why.

“It’s like a combination lock,” said the young but wise doctor. “You get all the tumblers in alignment, and it all works together to open the lock.”

I realized that concept is also true with marketing programs.

MISALIGNED MARKETING

Just like my spine, components of a marketing plan are often misaligned. The result is that the plan doesn’t work. Your marketing does not return what it should.

Examples of misaligned marketing programs are campaigns that depend too heavily on one medium. It may be the one you’re most familiar with, or the one with which you feel you get the best deal.

But soon you’re leaning to the side of the medium that you’ve used over and over. That’s not a bad thing until you lose sight of the main goal — which is to make sure you’re using the media that your target prospect and customer prefers. Don’t be surprised if that has changed over the years.

BALANCED IS BETTER

When you’re sure you’re right to invest 90% of your marketing budget in one medium, that’s exactly the time you need to consider a more balanced approach.

And as I mentioned in a previous column, sometimes the balance is thrown off by too much focus on the media and not enough on the message. That’s where your program may need some therapy.

THE RIGHT COMBINATION

Every marketing program needs the right combination of research, customer and stakeholder input, message development and redevelopment, media planning, advertising, PR, and customer relationship management.

Of course, that’s why you hire a consultant like Farris. We help you find that balance. As Dr. C would say, “It all works together to open the lock.”

(Dr. John Clendenin has offices in Niles and Boardman and can be reached at 330-652-4222.)

Stay tuned and stay smart

“Hey!” to a few of my friends:

Keith Downard • Sonny Sunderland

Don Caspary • Jim Echement

The Message Is Still the Master

MEDIA SCHMEDIA
I’m as guilty as any communicator out there. Everyone is all lathered up about Social Media, WOM (Word of Mouth) and other buzz-word/new techie tools of the day. All the focus is on MEDIA.

Somewhere along the line, marketers have forgotten that the MOST IMPORTANT element in a campaign is the MESSAGE.

THE MASTER INGREDIENT
It doesn’t matter if you’re Facebooking, billboarding, TV-ing or advertising on the side of a bus. The MESSAGE is the master ingredient that will determine the success or failure of your campaign.

GETTING THE MESSAGE RIGHT
There are many technical aspects to making a message work. Keeping it short is usually important, right?

Wrong. Sure Nike succeeded with “Just Do It.” But just as successful is the Vicks Nyquil message “The nighttime, sniffling, sneezing, coughing, aching, stuffy, head, fever so you can rest medicine.”

FOUR WAYS TO SAY IT
Most marketers agree there are four ways to express your message: Functional, Incentive, Emotional and Cultural.

Functional messages usually just explain what the firm does and what it offers, or they may suggest a call to action. Incentive is usually a price discount or other reason to respond or respond soon.

Emotional messages can connect with you because they stand out, you remember them and they may tug at your heartstrings. Nothing, however, can trump the Cultural message, because people really connect to it.

KING OF CULTURAL CONNECTIONS
Remember the crying Indian in the “Keep America Beautiful” campaign? Very emotional,
right? The Functional way was to simply tell people, “Please do not litter.” The Incentive was a $250 fine for littering.

But look at Texas. They found the biggest litterbugs were young males. Do you think a crying Indian stopped them from tossing beer cans out the window? Hardly.

So Texas started its own anti-littering campaign: “DON’T MESS WITH TEXAS.” Suddenly, young males were protecting their homeland. And litter rates dropped 72%. The message had a cultural connection.

JUDGE FOR YOURSELF
When you can get people to rally for your product or cause, you’ve made a cultural connection. It isn’t easy — but it works better in any media. Post that on your Facebook page.

Stay tuned and stay smart.

	4845 Market St. Youngstown, OH 44512
Phone: (330) 782-8061	Fax: (330) 782-7246
E-Mail: Consult@FarrisMarketing.com

Established in 1982, Farris helps your business or non-profit organization find and develop its "best value" message.

Combining this message with the right media and methods, we inspire your audience to buy your product or service or back your cause.

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