You won’t see many large companies letting their branding decline during tougher ecconomic times.  But smaller companies often cut their marketing spend at just the time that they should be expanding.

Pleased to say that the IOD Institute of Directors Magazine has recently published and article I wrote on how to market your business even during period of ecconomic decline.  Hope you find it of interest

http://www.director.co.uk/ONLINE/marketing_11_06.html

Thanks to everybody who was able to attend the Marketing Seminar at Hothorpe Hall in Thursday night.  I got a great deal of positive feedback from the evening and more questions that normal about enroling on the Marketing Mentor programme.

Hope that everybody left with lots of positive ideas.

Thought you might like to see this recent marketing article I contributed to the New Business website…

http://www.newbusiness.co.uk/articles/marketing-advice

This Thursday night’s seminar is now fully booked.  If you would like to attend PLEASE don’t turn up on the night as we may have to turn you away and I’d hate to do that!   Instead call 01858 44 55 43 in advance and I’ll let you know if we have any late e-mails from people unable to come.  This usually happens, but I want to make sure that there are seats for everybody and that the room isn’t uncomfortable. I don’t want a repeat of earlier seminar where up to 10 people were standing at the back in crammed conditions!

At the moment around 50 people will be attending which is a nice number and a good event to network at.

If you have booked, I look forward to seeing you on Thursday at the seminar to learn lots of interesting marketing ideas.

You can’t help but fall for the charms of this cheeky new Wonderbra advert.  It is a clasic example of an advert that everybody will talk about and remember – don’t you think?

Just click on this link to see it for yourself… CLICK HERE

Thanks to everybody who came to today’s seminar at Hothorpe Hall today.  It was a great group of people, many of which had some inspiring stories of how they have used marketing to grow their companies.  I have no doubts that they will put many of the ideas that they learned to good use.

Does this powerful advert aimed at young women shows how Amy Winehouse prepares for a night on the town?  Not really, but it puts over a stong message that many will relate to.   

CLICK HERE

In an ideal world, marketing activity would be self supporting, always pay back multi-fold what it costs to execute, and be effective in reaching every potential buyer in the appropriate sector all the time. But in the world where the sky is blue, marketing activities are driven by several factors, including perceptions of the company and the head marketer there, economic forces that drive consumer behavior of all types and factors beyond your control.

As a result of these factors, marketing budgets are at the mercy of the reactions of the company to these perceptions. Many of these perceptions are flawed, skewed, marred by history, personal experiences of senior management, and most have no historical precedent or foundation.

Myth #1 – “Our brand is strong enough not to need support for the duration of the downturn.”

Fact: Few brands are strong enough to survive without advertising, product promotion and customer service support. Brands are like delicate houseplants – they need attention, support, bolstering, and polishing, (the marketing equivalent of nutrients, light and water) – or they will wither and shrivel to a shadow of their former self. This is not a position you want your corporate brand to be in when the growth engine for the economy revs back up.

Myth #2 – “If we cut back on marketing spending, we can use the money for other things internally, and increase the budget when things get better.”

Fact: Studies have shown that once that budget gets cut, it takes a herculean effort and a strong internal champion to boost it back to its former levels, and even if it does increase, there are much stronger conditions of ROI attached to its implementation. Once those funds are allocated elsewhere, they tend to stay there – after all, that other department doesn’t want to give them up either.

Myth #3 – “Nobody’s buying anything, advertising and promotions are a waste of money.”

Fact: Many studies conducted by prestigious business publications and university think tanks have come to the same conclusion based on the data they gathered on U.S. and in some cases global companies: Those that reduce their presence in their key service markets are in a far worse position in terms of profitability, market share and market competitive presence when the downturn eases and profitability growth returns than those that maintain their marketing activity levels. Those companies that are so bold as to increase marketing activity stand a great chance of taking market share from their less aggressive competitors and can rule the category if the downturn lasts long enough.

Myth #4 – “We can cut back [on marketing] now, and then ramp up quickly when things get better.”

Fact: This strategy has proven disastrous time and again, especially for companies that have inefficiencies inherent in their design, or product delivery channel. That inefficiency won’t allow them to “ramp up quickly”, since by that very inefficiency they will effectively always be “late” when timing the market – they are not market leaders but laggards, and thus the ramp-up activity gets started late relative to the buying cycle, and their more nimble competitors have already beaten them to the punch.

Myth #5 – “We should examine what’s working for us, and cut out everything else.”

Fact: This is not really a myth, but a knee-jerk reaction to a short-term slump in sales gross. Good marketing departments should be doing exactly that on a perpetual basis, not just when times are tougher. Why would any marketer worth their pay continue programs that didn’t work, effectively dragging down performance across the board and wasting money.

In addition, there should be metrics built into any campaign so that there is a way to “take the pulse” of its success, and mid-course correction is possible to boost effectiveness and increase ROI on a continual basis. Further, in some channels, there is a cumulative effect that blurs perceptions of what’s working and what’s not – interdependencies exist between channels that are not planned or scheduled but that live in the customer’s mind and trigger sales inadvertently. Cutting out what can’t be measured accurately hampers this effect, dragging down results with no apparent reason.

Myth #6 – “Marketing spends more money than any other department, they have the most room to cut budget.”

Fact: While spending may be a measure of power in some corporate structures, at least informally, return is really what counts when its budget review time. Marketing is one of the few departments that can actually point to contributions they make directly to the bottom line. There is a proven cause-and-effect relationship between sales gross and marketing expenditure for larger and enterprise-size firms. Increased spending in the IT department might yield long-term benefits, but better servers don’t often move more product, unless the product is server space. Cutting the marketing budget only reduces the opportunities available to build market share, boost product awareness and memorability in the mind of the consumer, and dampens profitability in the long run.

Myth #7 – “All of our competitors are pulling back advertising and media expenditures to save money, so we should, too.”

Fact: This kind of lemming-like sheep thinking can destroy your company! Your Mom knew better than this when you used the excuse “All the other kids are going, why can’t I?” and her response was likely something along the lines of “If the other kids jump off the bridge, are you going to jump, too?” Despite being competitors, their financials likely look a bit different from yours, and it’s foolish to think that you can mirror their moves and be successful – at best you will be equal! The smart money here is being used to take market share from your more timid competitors, by increasing presence and exposure, and cutting other less-than-mission-critical expenditures for a short period to accomplish it.

Bonus!
Myth #8 – “We should downgrade the quality of our marketing materials, use a cheaper creative agency, and mail out less frequently to save money.”

Fact: This set of moves will actually cost you both in the short- and long-term. You might save a very small incremental amount on cheaper paper, shorter, smaller brochures, cheaper handouts, smaller tradeshow giveaways – but the damage you’re doing to your brand and the resulting poor reflection on the company as a whole does far more damage than can ever be repaired by spending those few dollars later to try and fix it.

Not to mention shaking the confidence of your customers by giving them a visual representation of how poorly your company is performing! “Gee, they must be in trouble, this looks like cheap junk. Maybe I’d better take my business to the other company that’s likely to be around to support their products down the line,” is the thought you’re promoting by reducing quality in your publicly released materials.

Good design often costs less than bad design, due to fewer creative iterations, fewer miscues, greater effectiveness and higher return. Jumping ship from the agency you’re with if they are delivering on dollars spent just to save a little money is fool-hardy. The ramp-up time for a new agency to learn your needs, your products, your style and your brand will just about be exhausted by the time the average recession is over, and it will have cost you more to get the same level of productivity in that time, just in time to reposition for the new economic conditions.

When times get tough, the tough get going in the marketing department, providing the market with visual evidence of your corporate strength, your leadership role in the sector, your expertise in the market, and the supportive strength you offer for your products and services. Don’t believe the nay-sayers who want to slash your marketing budget, reduce your headcount and reduce the quality of your materials. Everything you do here reflects on the health of your company, and cutting here shows the most and helps the least.

The Right Way to Set Goals

by Ralph Jean-Paul

Ok so you decided that you want to set a goal. Good for you! What is it? Do you want to get in shape? Make more money? Maybe meet someone new and start a relationship? Whatever it is the important thing is that you’ve taken a step towards your goal. Now think about your goal. I’ll give you a second. Ready? Alright. On a scale of 1 to 5 (5 being absolutely confident and 1 being not confident at all) how confident are you that you can reach your goal? If you answered any number other than a five you are off to a bad start. Confidence and belief in your ability is crucial to your success. It’s not being cocky or egotistical but more like being sure of your ability. Read this quote and think about the idea.

“If you think you can do a thing or think you can’t do a thing, you’re right.” – Henry Ford

Why can’t most people keep their New Year’s Resolutions? Every year people make promises to themselves to change or add something to their lives. But by the time May or June comes around, most people can’t even remember what their resolutions were. I was one of those people until about 2003. After being frustrated about how my life was going and not accomplishing anything in my life that I wanted I decided to change. On January 1st 2003 I wrote down a list of things that I wanted to change. And I was determined to achieve everything on that list no matter how long it took. When I learned the right way to set my goals, achieving them became much easier

Write down your goals so they are clear.

Your goal should be clear enough to you that you can write it down. If you can clearly write down what it is you want to accomplish then it’ll be easier for your mind to adjust your thinking in order for you to start moving towards your goal. Reaffirming your ability can make a huge difference in the outcome of goal.

Have you ever seen the movie Men of Honor with Robert Deniro and Cuba Gooding Jr.? Cuba Gooding Jr. plays Carl Brashear who is a man trying to become the first African American Navy diver. Throughout the movie he faces opposition from those who don’t want him to succeed. Well the final test of his training is to assemble a flange while under water. To make it impossible for him to accomplish this, Deniro is ordered to cut the supply bag containing all of the parts and tools Gooding needs to do the job, and toss it into the water.

It’s a great scene because Gooding is under water and he sees his bag cut open and his supplies scatterd all over the river bottom. Hours pass and now it’s dark and cold and Gooding is still under water trying to put this thing together. Deniro is communicating to Gooding by radio saying “Give it up Cookie (Deniro called him Cookie in the movie) it’s not worth dying for”. Gooding answers with “My name is Carl Brashear, I am a Navy diver.” He eventually puts the flange together and becomes a Navy diver. Why am I telling you this? One reason is because I love the movie. The other reason is I want you to focus on what Carl Brashear was saying to himself while he was underwater. He kept on repeating to himself that he was a Navy Diver before he even passed the test.

Now think about your goals. Are they clear enough to you that you can specifically write them down? Are they clear enough to you that you can see yourself already there even though you are not there yet? If you want to advance in your career then you should already be thinking and acting like you are already there. How would you act if you were department manager? How would you dress? How would you treat people? How would you speak? Be as specific as possible even down to what you would smell like. The purpose of writing down your goals and reaffirming them is so your mind and habits can align.

Remove Roadblocks

There are two major types of obstacles that you will come across when you are trying to accomplish a goal or succeed at anything, internal obstacles and external obstacles. Internal obstacles include fear, procrastination, lack of information, denial, pride, or anything that you do to yourself that stops you from reaching your goal. External obstacles are the things that happen that you have little or no control over. When I was building this site I came across so many external obstacles that I was tempted to cancel the entire project. I will have a section on how to deal with the external obstacles but for now let’s look at what you can do to remove your internal roadblocks.

The first thing you should do when removing the road blocks is to identify what they are. Are you a big TV watcher? How much time a day or week does watching TV take away from what you are trying to accomplish. If you are trying to start your own business are there things you could be doing instead of watching TV that will help you succeed? The faster you identify your roadblocks and remove them the faster you will be able to see progress in your goal.

The way you set goals may be just as important as what you do to accomplish that goal. Before I knew the right way to set goals, I would fail miserably at almost everything I attempted. It wasn’t until I realized that the foundation for my goal wasn’t stable enough. It is like trying to construct a building with a weak foundation. This is a common mistake that many people make when they want something. The sooner you can get into the habit of setting your goals right the first time, the sooner you will achieve them with a lot less hassle.

Here’s some good news for a change!

For a limited time, government funding has been made available to help Leicestershire businesses with their marketing. The Marketing Mentor Programme has been launched for business owners / directors who have small marketing budgets – but want big results.

Running over 18 months, the programme offers help, inspiration and ideas in the critical marketing areas that will lead you to greater business success.

There are a few catches, but essentially, as long as enrolment commences by July 25th, you are entitled to 50% funding.

With tougher economic conditions already here, it makes sense to make your marketing budget work harder for you. This comprehensive programme will show you everything you need to know across the key marketing activities. At full price the programme only costs £720 (plus VAT) – but if you claim quickly you can receive the complete 18 month programme for the astonishing price of just £360 (plus VAT).

Please call me on 01858 44 55 43 or e-mail alastair@idealmarketingcompany.com to find out if you can claim this financial assistance for your marketing today.

Finally – as well as being half price, this programme comes with a 100% money back guarantee. If it doesn’t do what we say, then you pay nothing. So there is no risk to you – just the opportunity to dramatically increase your marketing success rate.