Video can be a very powerful way to communicate with your audience. Just imagine the success you would have if you could have face-to-face conversations with every prospect interested in your company, twenty-four hours a day. Obviously, this is not possible, so video messaging can offer the next best option for effectively connecting with your audience.
Thanks to the recent evolution of video production technology, every organization can now include quality, low-cost video in their marketing communication strategy. This can include everything from websites to social media campaigns to sales presentations, and almost every other marketing strategy in betweSo what are some of the basics of effective video production?
Know your audience — Defining your audience early in the video helps you develop your story line and messaging. When your audience knows you are speaking directly to them, they will better connect with you and actively listen to your message.
Make it worth their time to watch — Just because you have something to say doesn’t mean people are going to listen. Make sure your message is relevant, entertaining and/or provides valuable information designed to keep your audience engaged.
Make your message consistent with your brand — It’s so easy to stray from your brand vision, especially in a video. Always be true to your brand’s guidelines, messaging style and vision.
Keep it short and sweet — Your objective must be to ensure that your target watches your video to the end. The only way this will happen is if you connect with them in a relevant way. Try to keep your message short, sweet and to the point, and remember that your audience only cares about one thing: “what’s in this for me?”
If a picture is worth a thousand words, then a video must be worth several million. Done right, adding videos to your marketing strategy can dramatically increase your messaging impact. We have been seeing the results of our video marketing campaigns increase more and more recently.
All too often, brands try to appeal to everyone. In so doing, they limit the appeal to those they covet most. Knowing what your brand stands for is essential for truly effective Challenger Brand marketing. Being willing to stand for something that is unique and culturally relevant is key to having a successful Challenger marketing strategy. A few examples:
- Costco with its membership-only strategy, where you pay to play.
- American Apparel with its provocative marketing approach that is a turn-off to some and a turn-on to others.
- And, of course, there is Apple with its proprietary operating system and “join-the-club-if-you-wish” approach to marketing.
So, stand for something unique and relevant, or risk standing for nothing.
Consumers are no longer overlooking today’s environmental issues. They feel it necessary to contribute to more eco-friendly societies and economies by changing their lifestyles as well as their purchasing and consumption habits.
As “green” is going beyond the eco-enthusiasts and the LOHAS market segment, it’s not untrue to say that green is going mainstream. For example, Datamonitor reported that during the first half of 2009, 458 sustainable packaged-goods products were launched.
With more mainstream marketers expanding into more categories, experts expect that soon every consumer category will eventually incorporate a green alternative.
But what exactly is green marketing? Green marketing is the process of selling products and/or services based on their environmental benefits. A product/service can be eco-friendly in itself or be produced and packaged in an eco-friendly way.
That said, businesses of any size can integrate green marketing into their existing marketing activities.
One of the direct advantages of green marketing is that prospective customers see a product or service’s eco-friendliness as a benefit and base their decision accordingly. Furthermore, consumers are willing to pay a premium for green alternatives. In fact, studies have shown that the recession has not significantly affected green marketing.
On the other side, one of the challenges of green marketing is the lack of standards in defining exactly what is “green.” In fact, there is no definition of “how good is good enough” when it comes to companies making green-marketing claims. Many see this lack of consensus as an inhibiting factor to the development of green products. However, consumer behavior will ultimately be the major influencer in establishing a conventional approach.
Green-marketing strategies can help all companies across many industries get more customers and drive higher profits. In order to do so, green marketing must follow a methodology.
When a brand decides to align itself with environmental consciousness, it must clearly communicate its vision, motivation, objective, strategy and tactics. It is not good enough to claim to be eco-friendly; consistency and results are required to establish environmental credentials that will allow the green-marketing campaign to succeed. The following is our checklist for creating effective green-marketing campaigns.
Be honest
Green claims must be genuine. Companies have to do what they state they are committed to by ensuring that all their business policies comply with the undertaken green initiatives.
Educate
Marketers should not only communicate to their customers what sustainable initiatives are being promoted but also educate them on the reasons why such initiatives are important. By diffusing information, companies can demonstrate that they actually care. A great way to do so is to offer proof through consumers’ testimonials or test results.
Customer needs
Businesses should shift their focus on buyer’s needs. Green marketing should make consumers understand how using sustainable products and/or services can benefit them as well as the environment.
Customer participation
By eliciting buyers’ participation in green initiatives, companies can personalize the benefits of their eco-friendly actions. This is a great way to establish green-marketing efforts as being more credible.
Right price
While many green buyers are willing to pay a premium, the majority says price is very important in their purchase decisions. Consumers want quality products that are good for them and for the environment at a price they can afford. Companies should closely monitor their competitors, because now is the time to come out strongly against their non-green competitors.
Green marketing also presents some risks. For example, it can be dangerous when not authentically undertaken. Companies must be absolutely transparent about their eco-friendly efforts. If buyers find a green claim to be false or contradicted by the companies’ products or practices, this can seriously damage their brands and ultimately their sales.
Although green marketing is still a “work in progress,” it is demonstrating its huge potential. By implementing green policies and being environmentally conscious, businesses of all sizes will be able to leverage a powerful selling point.
Once upon a time if you had a brand, you stood for something and never wavered. But many brands who have stood by this maxim have become extinct. Why? Because culture has shifted, and the brand’s point of view has become irrelevant. (C’mon, you don’t have to think too hard to come up with a brand that used to mean something to you but now doesn’t.)
If you want your brand to succeed today, you need to develop a brand that doesn’t just make sense to popular culture; you need one that ultimately leads it. Popular culture should be your brand’s touchstone. After all, brands are personalities that live in popular culture. When they tell relevant stories that dovetail with popular culture, people connect with them.
A recent study conducted by the Poynter Institute set out to take a scientific look at how most people go about reading news content, and to learn if there was a significant difference in the way they read content online versus in a printed format.
This may be the first time that a study of this type was conducted at this scale. Of all those who participated in the study, 70% said that they read their news content in either print or online format four times per week.
The study tracked their eye movements in 15-minute reading sessions. These reading sessions revealed how long readers spent with the stories they picked, as well as a host of other details regarding their reading patterns and preferences.
Here are some of the general findings:
- People are drawn to alternative story forms, such as sidebars, lists, captions, Q&A’s and timelines.
- Photos capture a lot of immediate attention.
- Real photos capture more attention than staged or studio photographs.
- 77% of the participants prefer to read their news content online.
- And nearly two-thirds of the online readers, once they selected an item to read, read all of the text.
By the way, this study was partially funded by the newspaper industry. How’s that for irony?
So how does this information affect the typical marketer? It all comes down to the quality of content. As long as you create content that is relevant, on message and valuable to your readers, they will continue to give it the time and attention it deserves.
Far too often, companies get caught up in their own constantly developing spin. This is especially troublesome for start-up firms that have been in the development stage for months or, in some cases, years. They spend so much time listening to themselves chatter about the fun of discovery in the alpha stage, or the positive feedback they get from users in the beta stage, that by the time they are ready for GA they are convinced that there is nothing like their widget anywhere, and the world will undoubtedly beat a path to their door.
Don’t get caught up in the self-adulation game. To ensure a more favorable chance of success, have your marketing department conduct the necessary research to test whether the market place is really ready for that latest innovation to your mousetrap.
Your social media strategy should include a host of different approaches. Many marketers utilize popular media like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn to build their online reputations. Although these are great tools, a well-written blog, with a powerful strategy behind it, can be a valuable and fast way to build your reputation, authority and expert status.
The following are six tips that we use to create powerful blogging strategies for our clients:
1. Carve out your own niche.
You need to make the most of your expertise by developing a blog that talks about your specialty market and its news, participants or challenges. Offer tips and insight and always invite comment from your readers. Your goal is to become the thought-leader within that niche. We call it “becoming famous for something.”
2. Love the niche you’re in.
It’s always helpful to talk about the things you love about your business. Work on providing insight on the latest stuff happening that is relevant and timely to your reader. Report on what your industry is doing well and point out why some things need to be changed. Everything you write has one goal, and that is to become the thought-leader and expert in this niche.
3. Talk with other bloggers.
Don’t live in a bubble. Try to comment on other blogs. Be smart, funny and wise-but always remember to be relevant. If appropriate, add links to those blogs.
4. You want everyone to know about your blog.
If you don’t let everyone know how to find you, they will never read what you have to say. Be sure to include your blog link in your email footers, on the home page of your website and in all forms of outbound communication. Also, be sure to offer a news feed or regular email alert whenever a new post goes up.
5. Think Search Engine Optimization.
Blogs can significantly enhance your SEO results. Whenever you can, try to optimize your blog posts with relevant keywords. These would be words or phrases that you want search engines to find in order to increase your page ranking resulting from organic searches.
6. Keep it fresh and relevant.
Once you start a blog, you have to frequently update it with new posts and content. Blogs that stay idle for long periods won’t show up on the top of search engine results, and anyone who liked your blog on first reading will stop coming back when there is nothing new or noteworthy.
Writing a blog can be a very powerful marketing tool. But in order to make it successful, you must commit to writing or adding worthy thoughts or relevant information regularly. We recommend one to two posts weekly, at the minimum.
We have seen many of the blogs that we have created for clients bloom into powerful marketing and lead-generating strategies. So start blogging today and become “famous for something.”
On a personal note… The Gumas Team would like to congratulate Brendan and Angela Jones on the birth of Harper Louise Jones, born March 20, 2010. Mom and baby (and father) are all doing well!
Not all media is created equal, especially in the digital age. All too often we see examples of media purchases being made as if the end result were predetermined. Advertisers walk away from the media purchase once the decision is made. But monitoring your media investment is crucial if you are to ensure the highest return on that investment. Some media requires a greater sense of commitment than others. In those cases, appropriate research is needed prior to the purchase to ensure that the media being considered is appropriate for your goals, objectives and budget. Digital media is far more agile and can be experimented with and tracked in order to maximize effectiveness. With digital media, course corrections can be made within as little as 48 to 72 hours.
Most everyone in marketing is familiar with the conventional wisdom of the four P’s — Product, Price, Place and Promotion. However, there is far more to marketing success than that. ”Purpose,” “passion” and “persistence” come quickly to mind. As for passionate purpose, are you really charged by what you are doing, the company you represent, the product(s) offered, the strategy, etc.? If not, there is a high likelihood that you are not being authentic, an essential element in today’s consumer-driven economy. Lack of purpose is easily perceived by today’s savvy purchaser.
Are you being persistent? If you know you are pursuing the right people (notice we didn’t say target) in this one-to-one, human-to-human world, then being persistent will pay off. And if you are sure you are focused on the right potential, then persistence will produce results.
We invite you to let us know your favorite “P” of marketing—or select another letter in the alphabet if you so choose.
Recent economic conditions may be fueling a new cultural shift in how consumers are making their purchasing decisions. Consumers that were once willing to make “compulsive” purchases are now shifting toward “considered acquisition” purchases. This simply means that consumers are becoming smarter buyers and are taking more time to research their options before making a final purchase decision.
These trends have been documented in a recent study that tried to determine which factors influence consumers when they are making a typical purchase. Although this study targeted consumer purchases, we feel that B2B marketers should be very cognizant of these trends for their business as well.
The following study results tracked the percentage of consumers who regard each of the following factors as “extremely important”:
- Brands that provide a better quality for the money: 57%
- Brands that offer better quality: 42%
- Brands that are longer lasting/more durable: 40%
- Brands that simplify my life: 34%
- Brands that offer a healthier option: 33%
- Brands that help me save time: 33%
- Brands that are green: 22%
- Brands that are innovative: 17%
As you look at these general findings, we believe it is important to notice the cultural trends occurring and how they may play into or affect your brand position moving forward. We believe the new opportunity for marketers is to better understand the true reasons your customers purchase from you so you can find a way to craft your upcoming promotional campaigns to take advantage of these cultural shifts.
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