Tuesday, November 28, 2006

Benefits before explanations

Two totally different items, apparently unrelated but not if you happen to be an engineer working in marketing. An interview on the BBC breakfast programme today discussed a news item that National Health hospitals were about to begin advertising for patients. The interviewer started with the premise that money was to be spent on advertising and wanted to know how much, so that this figure could then be equated, if invested differently, into more doctors or patient services. The interviewee then explained that advertising was just one aspect of marketing and in fact at her particular National Health Trust, none of the marketing communications budget was actually being spent on advertising. As a marketer and engineer this need to explain what actually you do is something we meet regularly. In fact for as long as I have been reading the IEE journal the letters page has run frequent complaints that the status of electrical engineers is not understood and that engineers are viewed by the general public as repair men. I have experienced this personally in the past when relatives would invite me to fix items of failed electrical apparatus when I visited their homes. So one of the first tasks with any new marketing prospect or client is to explain what we actually do. Of course the TV interviewer’s perspective that marketing is advertising is a widely held view and so we have tended to focus on promoting the benefits first to reduce the whole client educational process to an easy to understand concept. The bottom line is that by investing in marketing you can grow your business and increase profits. Of course that works best when talking to the owner or the person responsible for the P&L account. In larger organizations department managers tend to lose sight of this because they are measured on managing a budget to come in on target which is not the same thing at all. One approach we have used is to write very simple briefings on a range of marketing topics which are both syndicated via other web sites and available to download as a PDF book - Minute Marketing .

Friday, November 10, 2006

Using news as part of a customer retention strategy

Experience shows that for our clients, most enquiries are now made by telephone or via their web site. An analysis that tracks enquiries through to orders and sales value for a company selling capital goods with a long product replacement interval, highlighted two very important facts. First, the highest value was derived from previous customers and the second most valuable group was people already aware of the brand. A central proposition in our marketing strategy for this particular client is to retain ‘top of the mind’ awareness for the brand and reinforce the brand’s value during the long time interval before they need to replace or upgrade. This has the effect of reaffirming the correctness of their original decision to go with the brand in the first place and to prompt their recommendation to others who are actively evaluating options to make a purchase decision. Apart from a continuous press and public relations campaign in the trade press, on industry web sites and news portals, customers and prospects receive personal communications by e-News at intervals of 8 weeks and a news magazine twice a year. The e-News html format has a branded masthead and presents six recent stories, each with an image, headline and news summary, linking to a Virtual News Office on our client’s web site where the full story can be read, typically with additional images and links. The magazine format is designed to offer high retention value, to elevate the piece well above ‘junk mail’ status and to offer an interesting and informative read, with motivation to pass on to colleagues to share. Relevant content is vital and comprises a mix of user product experience and endorsement, product updates, expert opinions and industry and community news. It is designed to position our client as an authority and totally embedded in the user community. This subtle ‘soft sell’ approach is supported by positive customer feedback and most importantly – orders!

Thursday, November 09, 2006

Two thirds of all economic activity influenced by shared opinions?

A recent article claims that ‘today’s savvy consumers often trust a recommendation more than traditional advertising, marketing materials or other company communications.’ The article quickly moves on to Word of Mouth Marketing which perhaps surprisingly, then again perhaps not, has its own association – the The Word of Mouth Marketing Association or WOMMA for short. Amazing – but it does encapsulate long held views that recommendations about a company’s products or services are a powerful marketing tool and putting effort into delighting customers not only helps prompt a positive recommendation but equally valuably retains loyal customers. A third party endorsement deployed through a marketing vehicle such as a case study is a well-proven and useful means of showing others how the product can be used to the satisfaction of a customer and is well used in b-2b marketing. Products sold through consultant or architect specification often need the endorsement of leaders to persuade others to follow. According to WOMMA, two-thirds of all economic activity in the United States is influenced by shared opinions about a product, brand or service. The article the on goes on, ‘Research shows that recommendations that are ‘bought’ (through incentive programs and other similar marketing initiatives) do not yield the same financial benefits for a company as ‘earned recommendations’ do (which result from truly satisfying customers)’. So despite the new terminology, the story seems to be ensure you have satisfied customers because they can often be your most valuable marketing tool as well.

Thursday, October 26, 2006

Marketing from the bottom up?

In the new dynamic it has become fashionable to talk about conversational marketing – different from ‘word of mouth’ marketing – in so far as this is marketing not driven hierarchically by the company from the top down, but by their recently enfranchised customers connected by internet. A world of individual customers inhabiting the blogosphere, connected by hyperlinks and acting from the bottom up. On the other hand few marketers seem to have embraced blogging, suggested by some as a crucial forum for conversational marketing. The Cluetrain Manifesto attributed by some observers as an early starting point for the notion of conversational marketing offers this opinion – ‘Networked markets are beginning to self-organize faster than the companies that have traditionally served them. Thanks to the web, markets are becoming better informed, smarter, and more demanding of qualities missing from most business organizations.’ Certainly there has been a major movement towards the use of the Internet as a research tool to discover product information as a prelude to buying or specifying. In some industries users have long swapped information about experience with products and become a useful source of knowledge in identifying and fixing faults for example. What is suggested now is that this is no longer a one way street but indeed a conversation between company people and their customers. It implies greater transparency with companies opening up more information in return for greater customer loyalty and input of requirements but most importantly customers spreading the word about the company’s products in a positive way. Early days maybe, but could this be a glimpse of the future or merely a hopeful wish?

Marketing from the bottom up?

In the new dynamic it has become fashionable to talk about conversational marketing – different from ‘word of mouth’ marketing – in so far as this is marketing not driven hierarchically by the company from the top down, but by their recently enfranchised customers connected by internet. A world of individual customers inhabiting the blogosphere, connected by hyperlinks and acting from the bottom up. On the other hand few marketers seem to have embraced blogging, suggested by some as a crucial forum for conversational marketing.

Wednesday, October 25, 2006

Integrating print with online

Most marketing budgets still have a significant component for advertising in print, but although the web site URL is usually included, quite often it appears as part of the obligatory address block along with phone and fax details. Another school of thought is to use the URL as part of the response mechanism, then having brought visitors to the web site to make that visit relevant. Offering a ‘landing page’ that is specific to the message in the advertisement can both help continue the conversation and also offer a means of measurement of the effectiveness of the advertisement. In the b-2-b space the ‘call to action’ may not be to purchase a product - although we have clients where this is the case - but where there is more typically high involvement in the sales process the landing page can offer useful, relevant additional information to assist the visitor with the necessary research towards making a specification or purchase decision. Real in-depth information such as a White Paper or catalogue downloads can also be offered as well as a clear next step in the sales process remembering the brand offers the promise of providing a solution to the prospects needs. Visually it is important that the landing page continues the theme as well so it is obviously the right place. Of course integrating print and online marketing also requires effective management of both processes – in some businesses the marketing person does not have control over the web site and that is a problem.

Tuesday, October 24, 2006

Are White Papers a b-2-b soft sell?

A recent article by Michael Stelzner – ‘How White Papers can turbo-boost your sales lead campaign’ picked up on the white paper concept we mentioned back in August under the heading ‘Marketing in the engineering work space’. Then we offered the idea of White Papers as briefing documents to help educate the target audience to have a background understanding of the rationale behind our client’s products. When we think about it, we are often faced with an educational task for clients in technology and engineering businesses as part of an integrated marketing campaign. Then again we have had to also explain to some clients what a White Paper is. According to Stelzner, ‘New research shows that white papers are among the most compelling ways to attract leads.’ Apparently this research shows that 70% of US information technology professionals rely on white papers before making a purchasing decision. The informative nature is important as this influences buyers at an early stage in the sales cycle and can produce good quality sales leads. The key to a good white paper is the quality and content that deals with the issues rather than overtly promotes the products or services. Our view is that the ability to write such a document marks a company out from its competitors, it bestows authority on their expertise and allows them to command the moral high ground in their market. The only mention of products is by way of demonstration, where relevant, and the branding is the authorship. Our thinking is that if prospective buyers are ‘educated’ by our clients then the confidence to buy from that manufacturer is enhanced. One client finds that university engineering departments are particularly interested in white papers and getting them young can be no bad thing.

Thursday, October 12, 2006

Do readers demand biased news?

A recent paper published by INSEAD reports, ‘Bias in the market for news is a well-documented phenomenon. Starting from the assumption that consumers want unbiased information, traditional economic theory cannot explain the existence of media bias in free societies, as it suggests that competition forces the media to be impartial.’ It goes on to report that, ‘Recent research in economics proposes an alternative theory which assumes that consumers want to read (or watch) news that is consistent with their tastes or prejudices, rather than to know the truth.’ May be bias is too strong a word, but people have traditionally purchased newspapers that reflected and re-enforced their own political views. It seems to me this is where the competition works, in choosing a paper where you relate to the editorial mission and perspective, so why the assumption that everyone actually wants unbiased news? What has changed in terms of the UK government’s treatment of news is the so called ‘spin’ more realistically called propaganda that seems to owe much to the Dr. Goebels school of reporting and is recognized as such by most people. Also TV reporters seem to have changed from reporting news to providing the interview themselves by answering questions posed by the studio based anchorman. What we actually get is what the reporter thinks is happening and perhaps that is actually worse. Breaking stories skim across news tickers often based on the flimsiest information while ‘experts’ are quick to pontificate, all without the benefit of any actual facts. Then there’s the campaigns, stories that run and run, but suddenly get dropped – I thought we would all have died of bird flu by now, but despite such dire warnings and doom and gloom it is no longer news. In our world of b-2-b communication the trade press is full of PR derived and increasingly paid for content, that blatantly promotes the benefits of the client’s products. I cannot recall an editor ever enquiring to check any facts, typically for a small financial consideration - traditionally but inaccurately known as a colour separation charge - they seem happy enough to print anything that is vaguely relevant to the publication’s title. For b-2-b marketers getting client ‘news’ into the editorial space of a publication offers the appearance of greater credibility and anyway without the manufacturers buying advertising space most trade journals would fold, few are remarkable enough to exist on cover sales or subscription revenue. But then I suspect most readers know this and it is a convenient means of finding out what is going on in their industry. They can check the facts out for themselves if the product sounds interesting and that after all is the real point – to stimulate interest. Apart from the trade press there are web sites which are even lees fussy about what is published and of course thanks to Virtual News Office companies can be their own publishers free of any editorial intervention at all.

Saturday, September 30, 2006

Experiential marketing – the next big thing?

How often has the technical possibility to do something been heralded as the demise for existing technologies? CDs and web sites would replace print as the medium of choice for example, podcasts, RSS, experiential marketing are the way forward and so on. We have taken the view that being at the cutting edge is overall a good thing, it makes the company using it look as though it is also forward looking. But what we believe must be avoided is only using one method – our view is to play to the strengths that different marketing tools offer and bring them into the mix in the way they work best. Then there is the problem of explaining the new technology to clients. I suspect Alexander Graham Bell had the same problem – ‘but none of my customers have a telephone, so I don’t need one because they can’t ring anyway’. About ten to fifteen years ago the response to making product data available on CD was, ‘my customers don’t have PCs’. But when we showed their customers the benefits they went and bought a PC – they were just waiting for someone to take the lead. Same with web sites, ‘our competitors don’t have them, so why should we?’ That then changed to, ‘all our competitors have a web site – we need one right now.’ Pioneering new technologies can be tough in the b-2-b market with risk adverse clients who still wonder what happened to response cards from magazines. Much of this thought was prompted by an article in the Sunday Telegraph on the subject of company magazines used as a subliminal sales technique by major retailers to entice consumers – a sector of publishing that is apparently booming. Having belatedly adopted web sites, some clients are now so obsessed by the idea they continue to pour in resource and effort in the belief this is now all they need to do – unfortunately encouraged by ‘experts’ that tell them to spend thousands pounds more making the site search engine optimized – but that’s another subject. The newspaper article ran the following quote – ‘more and more companies are realizing that having got their web sites up and running, it is actually a pretty dead experience.’ Wow! So, back to magazines. By definition it is fresh each time – more than can be said of some web sites – and if correctly targeted will have sufficient retention value for the recipient to stop, review, read then pass on to colleagues. Far more subtle and effective than unsolicited junk mail which is destined straight to the recycling sack. We have long endorsed the value to the client company of a magazine or newsletter for their customers – we have just published the 10th anniversary issue for one client. By showcasing how they solved unusual challenges they have established a reputation for expertise, differentiating them from competitors who are just moving the boxes off the shelf. A good company magazine a couple of times a year works as a valuable part of a successful PR programme. So experiential marketing may not be just the high tech stuff – a good old fashioned read could also provide an interesting experience that makes customers favourably disposed to the company publishing the magazine. Why not take a look now at the various PR tools that could also apply and visit Technical Marketing’s web site.

Monday, September 18, 2006

Britain - a nation of small firms, most with no employees!

News arrived this morning from The Small Business Service (SBS) an executive agency of the Department of Trade and Industry, announcing Small and Medium-sized Enterprise (SME) Statistics for the UK 2005. The press release can be found at, Small Business Service web site What the figures confirm is that in numeric terms 99.3% of all the UK’s 4.3 million business enterprises are officially classified as small – that is they employ less than 49 people. Of these, 3.2 million some 72.8% have no employees at all! These are interesting statistics where nearly three quarters of all UK businesses are one-man operations. In theory, plenty of scope to grow small businesses into medium size enterprises, a role where marketing can play a crucial role. The challenge is identifying those businesses that actually want to grow and take on employees with all the legislative implications that goes with it. This is an interesting challenge - the companies that could really benefit from marketing expertise are the least able to invest. We have developed means for working with clients that are highly affordable and where the impact of marketing can be quickly assessed in terms of orders received.

Monday, September 11, 2006

Exhibition time

One of the sometimes neglected tasks of an exhibition or trade show is the Press Pack. In fact trade shows present a number of useful opportunities for publicity – the pre-show announcements, photo opportunities and events on the booth and post show success stories. But what might get overlooked is getting press packs into the hands of press visitors you may not know – especially those from overseas. Of course the traditional press pack is often an expense clients already faced with all types of charges to exhibit, will decline. A professionally printed folder, copies of recent press releases, glossy photo, maybe new brochures – it can be quite an expense. Then who gets them? Experience shows press packs can disappear from the exhibition press room, probably as useful briefing aids to competitors, so stocks need topping up from time to time. The obvious solution is to put everything on a CD – but wait. I checked on a number of CD Press Packs at an exhibition and they all had adopted the same approach of simply dumping files and images on the CD with no explanation – hardly an inducement for a busy editor to open them. Our approach has been to provide navigation just like a web site to include background material, recent press releases, short movies, contact details plus direct links to the client’s web site. We have just delivered a master disk to a client ready or next weeks show. Our client’s e-mail said it all ‘Many thanks for the CD, it looks great.’ To find out more about how we can provide CD Press packs or to request a sample, take a look at at Technical Marketing’s web site.

Such a cool idea

A telephone call today from the editor of an industrial publication covering the world of instrumentation who had decided to use a press release we had sent on behalf of a client. Good news indeed to win the editorial lottery as the more usual response is a fax offering to publish for a £100 or so – to cover the cost of colour separations don’t you know - or the press release had just gone straight in the trash can. As a matter of economy for our clients we have long since stopped sending out printed, double spaced press releases accompanied by glossy photographs, instead we send a branded html e-mail with a small low-resolution image. So when the editor requested a high-resolution image for publication, in less than 10 seconds it was on the editorial PC. How did we do this? Well thanks to Virtual News Office the conversation went like this….
‘Do you have internet access there?’
‘Yes’
‘OK, go to the client web site … are you on the home page?’
‘Yes’
‘See the News Office link?… click on this and you are now on the news index page with thumbnails, headlines and opening lines of each recent story. The one you need is currently second on the list …. click to open and there is the image you want, available at different resolutions and with captions and photo credits.’
‘Great! I am downloading now, thank you.’
Our view is we should make it easy for editors to get the information they need about a company, not just press releases, but background information too. To find out more about how we can help, take a look at Technical Marketing’s web site.

Thursday, September 07, 2006

Two hundred dollars of marketing stuff

An e-mail invitation arrived to attend a webinar, snappily entitled "What's Working NOW In B-to-B Marketing To Drive Leads & Sales." It was sent by an American of my acquaintance who modestly describes himself as a sales lead expert and was introduced by one of our clients. The invite was intriguing on two counts. First the concept of a webinar as a revenue generating business model explicit in the discount offered – ‘And, as a way of thanking you for your past support, I've arranged for you to get exclusive "Friends" pricing. Registration is just $59 if you act by the end of the week. And the program is backed up by a money-back guarantee.’ Secondly the concept of putting a dollar value on marketing tools – ‘plus, when you register and attend you'll receive a bonus package of B-to-B marketing tools valued at well over $200.00. Best of all, this package includes - customized to your exact specifications and free of charge - a 500-record prospecting database.’ The idea of marketing tools worth $200 is of itself intriguing – what exactly would $200 buy in terms of marketing time or collateral? What does $200 of marketing stuff look like? How useful is it? I could go on. Becoming a marketing expert in a 90 minute webinar, empowered to drive previously unobtainable shed loads of sales leads suggests a simple secret formula that can be revealed for a mere $£59 investment, an enlightenment, a pivotal moment when the scales fall from the eyes and the path to a successful future lies bright and shiny in front of you. Is it a similar empowerment offered by desk top publishing to make everyone a talented designer, or the ability to produce web sites for a few dollars? Experience suggests otherwise. A clearly thought out marketing plan designed to implement a strategy to deliver business objectives through carefully executed campaigns and a long term view of investing in an integrated marketing programme exemplified by on-going business relationships might prove more sustainable. To find out more, take a look at our approach to marketing consultancy at Technical Marketing .

Tuesday, September 05, 2006

Copyright free images

Writing on the MK Media Circle e-mail forum, photographer Kevin Sansbury poses the question in relation to the launch of a royalty free image site, ‘can someone explain what fees are given to the photographer when images are used. There is a trend that is killing the professional photographer that royalty free images are being used instead of commissioning a professional photographer.’ This raises an interesting issue, particularly in the industrial b-2-b PR space, as to whether the press release can stand the cost of a professional commission at all. Demonstrating the value of PR investment to smaller businesses is hard enough, plus the demand for an ‘editorial charge’ without the photographer fee on top. Interestingly the Pro-Talk web sites which carry vast numbers of industrial PR don’t publish images at all, whilst the printed journals reject most press releases due to limited space, in turn due to less advertising - so it is little surprise PR agencies are cautious about commissioning photography that may only be destined for the trash can. Interestingly a different conversation took place on the UKEPR forum towards the end of last year where a b-2-b PR agency had been hit with substantial royalty charges for using a modest image somewhere on their web site. Because such images can easily be lifted from the Internet and dropped into another web site does not imply they are royalty free and if they are the property of one of the large image libraries the chances are they will be tracked down and users invoiced. At Technical Marketing we have cautioned our clients to ensure they have the right to use images for publicity purposes and better still to use one of our online ImageBanks to store images online, along with copyright statements, captions and searchable descriptions.

Wednesday, August 30, 2006

Death of the salesman?

We were not surprised by the findings of a recent market research report that engineers are turning to the Internet as their preferred source for product specifications. According to market research carried out this summer in the GlobalSpec Annual Engineering Trends Survey, 90% of respondents involved with purchasing of technical products or services have used the Internet to obtain product specifications, with 56% rating specifications as ‘the most valuable information when searching for products or services’.

This serves to confirm Technical Marketing's view that the Internet is now a vital part of any integrated marketing campaign and highlights our four main areas of service – ‘marketing consultancy’, ‘internet marketing’, ‘press & public relations’ and ‘technical writing, documentation and publication’. We have used web database techniques to enable our clients to rapidly publish and update product specifications and news online – two of the top items engineers and buyers are looking for – and with full search facilities for visitors to quickly identify products and services they want.

The survey also records that 45% now spend more than 6 hours a week on the Internet for work purposes, meanwhile the use of printed trade magazines and attendance at trade shows continues to decline - 18% reported a decrease in use of printed magazines and 51% did not attend any trade shows. The top four reasons for using the Internet were found to be – ‘to find components and suppliers’, ‘obtain product specifications’, ‘research’ and ‘news’.

When it comes to contacting suppliers 42% opt for the web as their preferred medium, 36% for e-mail and 21% telephone and just 1% preferring a sales rep visit!

Monday, August 28, 2006

Is print in decline?

Two sides of the online v print argument this week. On the one hand we are preparing final text for a client’s regular newsletter, on the other, a letter arrived from Process Engineering magazine headed ‘Important Changes’. The important changes it would appear are a less frequent publication, now once every two months and the introduction of a fortnightly e-mail news. The letter goes on to emphasise the benefits that will see ‘an increase in the amount of quality editorial coverage’ and the ability to ‘deliver more timely news via web and e-mail and concentrate on providing greater analysis and application content in the magazine.’ This reflects an approach to news delivery that we have been impressing on our clients for some years – e-mail, RSS, and online news for urgent communication and print for more in-depth coverage – in short to provide an interesting read and add retention value to the publication. In conversation some months ago and in another industry, one company president confided over a cup of coffee, that by the time the monthly industry journal arrived he felt he had already read most of the content. Of course there is another big issue driving this change and that is the economics of the traditional trade press. Not only is news slow to appear, but advertising revenues have been under pressure for years … but that’s another debate. This is the tenth anniversary of our client’s newsletter and from the beginning this was not really about news, but about application stories and helpful technical advice. The use of stories and third party endorsement to demonstrate how customer problems have been solved has been the source directly of a number of new projects and also helped build the company a reputation as being knowledgeable in their industry - especially as they now compete with importers of low cost product from China. It is just one factor in building a differentiated position. So we feel there is a continuing role for the print, providing the content is right. To understand more visit Technical Marketing's web site .

Wednesday, August 23, 2006

Is RSS about to take off as a marketing tool?

From the Technical editor of Pro-Talk this week comes a series of e-mails on the topic of RSS - a subject about which he enthuses. He sees RSS as the third arm of the Internet alongside e-mail and web sites. At Technical Marketing Ltd we have been offering RSS to our clients for at least 2 years now – maybe longer. We agree it is a great facility, but has not really taken off. It gets round the blanket blocking of e-mails by over enthusiastic IT departments that in some cases seem to filter most everything out, not just ‘subscribed for’ e-mail news, but individual e-mails too! And with RSS appearing in browsers such as Safari and reportedly eventually from Microsoft Explorer it will also become more widely used. To find out more about how RSS can work for you, check out the Virtual News Office .

Marketing in the engineering work space

A phone call from a client in the engineering sector this morning raised an interesting topic that, if a true reflection of the industry suggests a major sea change for British manufacturing. We have become used to the political views that Britain has long since ceased to be a serious manufacturing nation and after first Japan, then the so-called tiger economies of the Far East, now China is the workshop of the world. We have also read that British university students have been opting for the softer options and rejecting the engineering and science disciplines as we progress towards a nation of hairdressers and finger nail artists. So how does this affect our client? In two ways. Because so much manufacture is now off shore his sales are increasingly for prototypes or laboratory research projects and not volumes for manufacture embodiment. Secondly the ‘engineers’ he is selling to, are now less well informed. Result – more sales effort to sell less product. One of the ways we have been able to help our client is to create informative material in the form of White Papers and Guides that can be downloaded from the web site and help fill the knowledge gap. To find out more about White Papers and guides take a look at Technical Marketing's web site.