A Minute of Video is Worth 1.8 million Words

Trillium Teamologies recently hosted a happy hour style Office 365 event. I’m sure most people would agree that a video is a great way to recap (or promote) an event because you can capture the sights, sounds and excitement of the event. The video below was created by Trillium’s Creative lead with a low quality camera (similar to a Flip) is less than a day.

Another great idea for an event recap is a customer reaction video. Jeremy Epstein of Never Stop Marketing demonstrates that in the video below:

Once you have created a video be sure you broadcast it on your website and through social media (i.e. – LinkedIn, Facebook, Google+, Twitter, etc.). I also included the Office 365 event recap video link in an email I sent to our partners at Microsoft to exhibit how we are promoting their services/solutions; this generated a great response. In addition, I sent the video link to all of the people who registered for the event, whether they attended or not; this also generated a great response. Video in email marketing has been shown to increase click-through rates by over 96%. In response, the number of marketers planning to use video in email campaigns has increased 5x since the beginning of 2009. (Implix 2010 Email Marketing Trends Survey)

Does Your Mission Statement Stink?

Take a look at your company’s mission statement…does it sound something like this:
“Our mission is to provide unsurpassed user-friendly, cost-efficient technology-based solutions to solve your company’s business problems.”

If so, you may want to rethink it and I will explain to you why.

As defined by Wikipedia, “A mission statement is a statement of the purpose of a company or organization. The mission statement should guide the actions of the organization, spell out its overall goal, provide a path, and guide decision-making.” The In lament terms, your mission statement should give your customers a very clear understanding of why you are in business. Your marketing messages and brand image should also revolve around your mission statement.

So what is wrong with “Our mission is to provide user-friendly, cost-efficient technology-based solutions to solve your company’s business problems.” for an IT solutions provider?
It seems to follow the definition of a mission statement. Yet, it contains some common mistakes that make a mission statement stink.

Mistake 1: It’s Too Generalized
Take your top five competitors and ask yourself if your mission statement would work for them also? This mission statement above could apply to any IT Solutions provider. Your statement should be unique and personalized to your company. Think about what makes your company different and how you stand out. Are your accolades special? Do you offer a product that no one else on the market offers? Think….

Mistake 2: Self-Proclaimed Grandeur
You may think you are the best, but doesn’t everyone. Your mission should get to the point and avoid fluff.

Mistake 3: Development Overload

Keep it simple! It should not take the input of all of your employees and several meeting to develop your mission statement. Oftentimes simplicity is the key to clearly communicating the root of what your business is about. If your mission isn’t obvious from the start, then you should consider going back to the drawing board, because you’re not ready to put it into an official statement yet.

Mistake 4: It’ Just Plain Boring
Is your mission statement exciting or peak the interest of potential customers? Your mission statement should tell an interesting story and spark some kind of excitement.

Mistake 5: You Need to Dress It Up to Sell It

Do you need a glossy brochure to get someone to look at your mission statement? A good mission statement should be able to speak for itself without frilly marketing.

Mission Statement Worksheet

Trillium Teamologies – Gold Award Winner of the 2011 ASPIRE Award

Congratulations to Trillium Teamologies!

Trillium has been named the gold award winner of the 2011 ASPIRE
Award! Their marketing campaign was one of the most innovative,
creative, and effective as recognized by our panel of judges.

The 2011 ASPIRE Awards are sponsored by Ready-To-Go Marketing.
The contest was centered “around recognizing partners who have
used Ready-to-Go Marketing resources to create, innovate, reach,
and succeed. As such, if you have used Ready-to-Go Marketing tools
to generate results and run a successful campaign.” 1

Here are the criteria by which the entries were judged:

• Overall Assessment of Campaign Excellence–13%
• Business Impact–13%
• Innovation / Creativity–19%
• Microsoft Ready-to-Go Integration–30%
• Results / Effectiveness–25%

1. http://blogs.msdn.com/b/mssmallbiz/archive/2011/09/19/just-over-a-week-left-to-submit-entries-for-the-2011-aspire-awards.aspx

Does Time Matter in Email Marketing?

Absolutely! You have put together a great email message with an attention-getting subject line and now you are ready to send it. To ensure the success of an optimal open and click-through rate, here are a couple of tips to follow.

• Send your email on Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday.
  Mondays are a bad day to send an email blast because most are playing catch up. Unimportant messages get deleted, so people don’t feel so overwhelmed. Weekends are not the best time either. Generally, weekends are spent away from the office and the email you sent gets stuck in the inbox for Monday opening (or deletion)
  
• Send your email around lunch time.
  While metrics are different for everybody, as a general rule, the best open rates tend to be seen in emails that are sent around noon to 1pm EST. This also makes logical sense as people tend to relax a bit at lunch time, and many eat their lunches at their desk. Between 8:00am – 9:00pm yields the lowest open rates. Most people check their email right when they get to work in the morning, so they are inundated with messages they must respond to. Email messages that seem less important tend to get deleted to reduce clutter.

In summary, you want to send an email campaign out in the midweek, during the midday. This isn’t set in stone, but it can increase your response rates. Do some testing and figure out what works best for you and your company’s prospect list.

Using Word to do an Email Merge in Outlook

Did you know you can use the Mail Merge task pane in Microsoft Word to create a group e-mail distribution through Outlook? I have spent countless hours sending personalized emails one-by-one, so I was pretty excited to learn this tool! This will surely come in handy for sales letters, event follow up and more.

Here is how to do it:

On the Tools menu, point to Letters and Mailings, and then click Mail Merge.

Under Select document type, click E-mail messages.

The active document becomes the main document, where you will type the body of your e-mail message.

The task pane guides you through the rest of the mail merge process. The following are more details, listed in step-by-step order.

• Set up and display your e-mail message
• Locate or create a data source, and then select recipients
• Compose your e-mail message
• Preview the messages and fine-tune the recipient list
• Finalize distribution settings and send the messages

For more detailed instructions, watch the instructional video here

Let’s Lync Up!

If you are not familiar with Microsoft Lync 2010 (available with an Office 365 subscription), it is an easy and effective communication tool that gives you access to instant messaging and presences awareness, along with online meeting capabilities. I had talked about Lync online meeting capabilities a while back…just in case you missed that blog entry, I will touch on how it can benefit marketing professionals.

Lync gives you the ability to conduct online meetings with colleagues, partners and most importantly – your customers. With Lync Online you get the full feature set required to host webinars for up to 250 attendees; this includes audio, video and screen sharing. So what does this mean from a marketing standpoint? With these tools, you have the ability to hold a public-facing webinar to promote your company’s offerings and/or services (a webinar is a Web-based seminar, a presentation, lecture, workshop or seminar that is transmitted over the web). Webinars have become increasingly popular and are an effective way to reach customers and prospects without geography limits. You can present your company’s offering to people all around the country or even around the world.

Lync Overall Key Features and Functionality
(source)

Find the right people, right now See the availability of colleagues immediately with detailed presence information. Easily find others in your organization by name using global directory search, or by interest and expertise using Microsoft SharePoint powered Skill Search.

Communicate how you want Switch instantly among instant messaging, voice, video, conferencing, and application sharing, as needed, during any conversation.

Turn any conversation into a collaboration Whether you’re conversing person to person or in a conference, a single click is all it takes to share an application or your desktop, upload a PowerPoint, open a whiteboard, or transfer a file in real time.

Connect with your social network Communicate your personal status using the status note in the main Lync UI, and keep track of updates from your colleagues through the Activity Feed tab. Use pictures and video calling to make long distance communications more personal.

Dial with ease Dial by name using your Contact list or the search functions, or use the dial-pad in the Lync Phone tab to easily make voice calls. Visual access to voicemail in the Phone tab lets you listen to messages and view the corresponding Outlook item and automatic transcription.

Control how people reach you Use Presence and privacy settings to control how others contact you, and your call forwarding settings to ring other numbers and identify others to handle calls on your behalf.

Communicate directly from Microsoft Office Bring other users in to comment on documents and spreadsheets without switching applications.

Work from anywhere Stay in communication and productive anywhere you have an Internet connection—no VPN required.

Writing a Press Release

Press releases are a low-cost (or free) way to generate publicity for your company. Oftentimes the coverage is far more widespread than anything you could have hoped to say in an expensive ad. With that said, you don’t have to hire a writer or marketing consultant to write a good press release for you, but you do need some basic writing skills, newsworthy news, a bit of creativity and a mastery of structure.

Press releases should be clear, concise and should not exceed one page. When you are writing a release, you should also follow a basic structure:

TOP

Use the words FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE at the very top of the page. Next you should center your headline – be sure your headline demands attention and is bolded or in capital letters. Below your headline, you should put a subhead in italics that elaborates on the headline.

1^st PARAGRAPH

Let’s just assume no one is going to read beyond the first paragraph, so you better make this one count. For starters, ensure you begin this paragraph with the city and state where this news is coming from, along with a dateline.

You want to get the main point of the story out in the first paragraph. The most significant parts of the story should be the first details you read. Make certain the first paragraph includes all the vital information: the where, when, why, what and who. The remaining paragraphs support this first paragraph.

BODY
In the Include some enticing details or facts to spark curiosity. A good press release not only informs but also teases.

To give your release some added credibility, your release should include at least one quote. The quote should come from someone who is knowledgeable about the topic in which you are writing about, such as a company CEO or president. The quote can be used to further explain how your announcement makes you stand out from other companies. Try to avoid general statements about how great your company is; instead, use a quote that provides additional insight into what your press release is about.

LAST PARAGRAPH

Wrap up the last paragraph with a “for additional information” line, a place to find more details. An web site or link to an annual report can be great sources of information.

Center these marks, ” # # #” at the bottom of the page to indicate the end of your release.

Additional Tips

• Make sure you have no grammatical errors
• Press releases are written in block style, so no paragraph indentation is necessary.
• Have an objective person read your press release and tell you whether he or she would be interested enough to read a newspaper story about it. If not, consider going back to the drawing board for a rewrite. Remember, when a good journalist receives a press release they are going to ask themselves, “Why would I care?”
• Send your press release to the reporter that covers the area you are targeting instead of a managing or senior editor. Often, this will turn into a story much faster.
• Keep the tone of your release all business. Don’t go into too much personal or non-business related detail or your press release will likely end up in the trash.

Microsoft Word
Press Release Template

Marketing with Your Best Asset – Your Employees

Let’s face it…social media marketing is an important part of your marketing strategy. Check out a few of these stats I found online:

• 43% of all online consumers are social media fans or followers (Source)
• 53% of people on Twitter recommend companies or their products in their tweets. (Source)
• 1.4 million new blog posts are created every day. (Source)
• 200 million Facebook users access the service from a mobile device. (Source)
• 45 million people view SlideShare presentations each month. (Source)
• 2 billion YouTube videos are viewed everyday (Source)

With these stats in mind, I think you may agree it is almost necessary to put some of your efforts into social media marketing. Now, if you are like most companies, you may run into difficulty getting the time commitment from those expert employees who would be fit the author company blogs and tweets about their expertise and what your company has to offer. So how do you do this? How do you get your employees to get involved in your social media marketing strategy?

Here are just a few ideas…

• Train your people on your marketing message and how you want it conveyed.
  Established guidelines on what and what is not acceptable will help your employees define what is expected
• Write it in their job description.
  Blogging takes up to a few hours a week, but it serves two purposes:

1. Well written material gives your company good exposure
2. It keeps the author up to date on current trends and pushes them to research and learn more about the topic in which they are blogging about. For those of us who constantly want to grow and learn new things…this is a reward in itself
   Find out how to blog with Microsoft Word

• Provide an editor.
  Have a designated editor for all the material that is written by your employees
• Have contests (with prizes)
  See who has the highest traffic on their blog, most comments, most likes, etc. and have a quarterly contest

Recognize the importance of your people – they can truly be your best marketer!

Developing a customer relationship marketing strategy to keep previous customers happy

Sometimes we focus so much on marketing to net new customers that we forget just how valuable our previous customers are…and we shouldn’t. About a month ago, I was running through my planned marketing activities with the Microsoft marketing manager that handles our partnership. After listing no activities targeted to our old clients, she honed in on how important it is to continually reach out to our previous customers. It made perfect sense, so I started thinking of how I can plan a well-executed customer relationship marketing strategy.

After much thought, I came up with these 3 steps

STEP 1:    Obtain an accurate record of your past clients and the work that you completed for them.
This is a simple task if you have been utilizing technology, such as Microsoft Dynamics CRM, to automate your business processes related to sales and marketing.

STEP 2:    Develop a customer appreciation offer or event that will grab the attention of your previous client.
Example –
Several years ago you had numerous clients that bought a particular software program. Since then, this software has become outdated. You can hold a small event and also offer the updated software at a discounted price.

STEP 3:    Create a PERSONALIZED attention grabbing message & get it to your previous customers with a multi-touch approach.
You have already developed a relationship with our past clients, so use this to your advantage. Personalize your message to them using things that you know about them and the services/items they purchased from you. If you are inviting them to an event, sent out an email invite and then follow-up with a call to make sure they received it. The more touched you have, the more likely they are to engage with you again.

Just a side note…

When creating a marketing message, remember the following acronym

A    Attention – Use a powerful headline that demands attention

I    Interest – Intrigue interest and create curiosity

D    Detail – Provide details about your product or service

A    Action – Call for action

Beyond Spellcheck – Reviewing Your Marketing Content for Errors

My old boss would laugh if he read this because I am infamous for typos. One of my worst incidents was sending out 2,ooo+ postcards that stated “Your Invited!” to a Business Intelligence seminar. To my dismay, the postcard was scanned in and posted to a Facebook page that highlighted grammatical errors. From there on out, I never used the word “your” in the wrong context. In the big picture though, it reinforced the process of reading, reviewing, re-reading and then sending to someone else to do the same. In an ideal world, every company would have a good copywriter to review content, but this is not always feasible due to time and cost constraints. Unfortunately, your marketing content loses credibility once the reader finds an error. Be sure to go beyond spell check and make sure you don’t have typos, extra words words (ha,ha…gotcha) and that you use proper homophones.

I also found a great article on Why Content Marketers Need a Good Editor. Beyond typos, this article gives you some great tips on creating good marketing content.