Great Reach Communications - Marketing Newsletters for Printers

Marketing Your Company: 3 Things to Consider

Patrick Whelan — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 11:45:55 +0000

When it comes to promoting your company, if you say “I don’t have the time” or “we’re too busy,” what you’re really saying is, “I choose not to make this a priority.” Lots of active managers and busy companies also find the time to consistently execute marketing plans. Don’t think it, don’t wish it – just do it!
Social media can play a big role in client acquisition, retention and loyalty. Every interaction with your audience is an opportunity to build trust and credibility. Frequency and relevance are keys to the success of any social media strategy.
The one thing you can count on with search engines is that they will change. Traditional SEO efforts that focus on keyword rankings and links are less effective than they once were. If you haven’t already, build your site around a content management system or blogging software. Many of these, such as WordPress, are free. For more on website content and SEO, read this: http://ilnk.me/ef9b

Executing effective outbound, inbound and social media marketing strategies is easy and inexpensive. It just takes a commitment to make it happen.

We can customize an area-exclusive program for your company. Let’s talk.

10 Musings on Marketing

Patrick Whelan — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 14:05:41 +0000

Well perceived brands command a price premium of nearly 9% over brands perceived as just average.
The most popular way to lose a customer is to lose touch with him or her. Industry-specific data indicates that 60% of customer loss is due to lack of communication.
Irrelevant communications contribute to customer defection and alienation.
The cost of implementing an effective marketing program is trivial compared to the cost of not implementing one.
Taking a committee approach to marketing often ends in failure. A group of people agreeing to disagree combined with diluted accountability rarely if every produces a positive result.
“My many years in the printing industry have taught me that the pursuit of trying to craft the perfect marketing piece often ends up being the reason for doing nothing”. – G. Jacobs.
The average person is only capable of retaining 3-5 brands per category in their memory. If you want to introduce your company into someone’s consideration, you need to push another company out of consideration. Repetition is fundamental to success.
The abandon rate for social media is VERY high. Beware of creating marketing graveyards.
Whether or not you’re marketing to your customers, you can be assured that your competitors are.
People will give business to companies they want to give it to and then after awarding the job, find ways to justify the decision. Price is often an excuse rather than a reason.

5 Easy Ways to Differentiate Yourself From Your Competitors

Patrick Whelan — Wed, 21 Mar 2012 14:09:57 +0000

The most important thing you can do to grow your sales is to differentiate yourself from your competitors. Differentiation isn’t just about what you deliver as a product or service. It starts before that and involves positioning your brand as a thought leader and trusted resource. Foster the perception that your company has the most skill and knowledge regarding the products and services you offer.

A few quick things that can help you achieve this:

Communicate often. Utilize a series of high-value content related to the services you provide and that is directly attributed to your company. As Rio Longacre says, “It’s selling without really selling.”

Be unique. Sending out the same materials or having websites that are similar to your competitors helps to commoditize your services. You’ll end up selling on price.

Avoid the “old school” image. Talk about and offer services that are perceived as being leading edge. For example, services such as iflymobi.com make it easy and inexpensive to offer mobile services to your clients.

Embrace social media. Regardless of what you think about it, utilizing social media properly has a huge impact on how your company is perceived.

Keep you website up to date. Having old, dated content on your website is a brand killer. Nothing shouts, “Mayberry RFD” like the use of the term “print shop” on your site.

Don’t Stop the Marketing!

Patrick Whelan — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 14:43:57 +0000

It’s a constant refrain in marketing circles—don’t stop marketing! Times are tough, but keep your marketing program strong.

Your brand is determined by what the marketplace perceives it to be. Not by what you want it to be. If you’re trying to establish your brand as that of a marketing services provider, you had better be proficient at marketing your own services.

Ideally, you want to make sure you are communicating with your customers as much or more than your competitors are. Clients are hearing from the competition more than ever. At the least, you want to neutralize most of this.

Quality matters. Relevant communications help your brand to stand out among the competition. Non-relevant communications help you blend in.

Top of mind is more important than most people give it credit for. I guarantee that a certain percentage of business you gain or lose is simply due to being or not being in front of the contact at the right time.

People notice companies cutting back. It creates a perception that you’re in trouble and makes it easier for your customers to justify listening to your competition’s value proposition. At our core, we all want to be associated with winners, and people want to do business with companies that they perceive as stable, progressive, and successful.

Contraction in the print industry continues. Sad, but true. Recessions always create a redistribution of market share. Seize the opportunity. Top of mind gives you an edge for getting that business.

Bottom line—market smarter. There are a host of methods that companies can employ that cost little or even no money. Email newsletters, blogs, social media postcard/bulletin mailings, and more. You can often outsource this for less than what it costs to do yourself. My company can provide a lot of these services for you. I’m happy to discuss them with you.

One Thing About QR Codes® You Probably Don’t Know

Patrick Whelan — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 18:42:05 +0000

That’s right— the term QR Code® is a registered trademark. While many in the industry have been using QR Code® as a generic term, it is a registered trademark of DENSO WAVE INCORPORATED. Please note that the trademark only refers to the term, not the technology. The technology is, in fact, open source.

Denso Wave, Inc. recently sent the following letter to a client of mine:

In case you are not aware, the term QR Code® is a registered trademark of DENSO WAVE INCORPORATED within the U.S., Japan, Australia and Europe.

We would appreciate your cooperation in making sure all future references of QR Code® within your [publication/website] include the registered trademark symbol (®) after the term “QR Code” and the following text is placed somewhere on the same page as the term:

* QR Code is a registered trademark of DENSO WAVE INCORPORATED.

Please note, a registered trademark is not required when publishing the QR Code® image. It is only required for the words QR Code®.

I have enclosed a copy of the DENSO WAVE INCORPORATED QR Code® Trademark Guide for more detailed information regarding the trademark of QR Code®. In addition, you can find information at: http://www.denso-wave.com/qrcode/faqpatent-e.html.

Personally, I see absolutely nothing wrong with this request. They came up with the term, trademarked it, and deserve the credit and attribution that comes with the mark. The purpose of this article is merely to inform printers, mailers, MSPs, and others of the trademark, and hopefully, save someone from a potential headache down the road.

I also discussed this with a patent and trademark attorney, and just to let you know, playing with capitalization, adding an “s,” etc., does not exempt you from using the trademark. The bottom line is that if you are going to use the term, it would behoove you to give proper attribution.

*QR Code is a registered trademark of DENSO WAVE INCORPORATED.

QR Codes and Mobile Payments: Are You Ready?

Heidi Tolliver-Walker — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 19:40:01 +0000

Right now, the marketing chatter is about QR codes. These 2d codes, which whisk you away from a print or electronic piece directly to the webpage of the marketer’s design, are also indirectly tied to mobile payments. Are you ready?

Why are mobile payments so closely tied to QR codes? If consumers are going to use their phone to access a marketer’s pages, they are going to want to use their phones for making payments. It’s part of consumer psychology. It’s part of the convenience factor.

The global market for mobile payments is predicted to grow to $633.4 billion by 2014, up from $68.7 billion in 2009. Globally, the total value of mobile payments will quadruple from $170 billion in 2010 to $630 billion in 2014, according to Juniper Research.

The types of mobile payments?

SMS payments
Mobile web payments (WAP)
Peer-to-peer (P2P)
Near Field Communications (Contactless NFC)
Mobio open-source 2d barcodes

If this looks like Greek to you, you aren’t alone. Fortunately, there is a great resource to give you some background on mobile payments and the security issues that attend them. Check out Mobio’s free white paper “Mobile Commerce Security: The Mobio Security Solution” here.

If you are still evaluating the power and influence of QR codes, you can also check out Digital Printing Reports’ “QR Codes: The Data Speaks,” an aggregation of all of the available research on QR codes adoption and use.

If you are doing any marketing in the social media, mobile marketing, or QR code spaces, mobile payments are something you need to be familiar with. Even if you’re not ready to pull the trigger, you need to at least be familiar with the issues and be formulating a plan.

Is that on your New Year’s Resolution list?