Ideal Marketing Company Blog

Marketing Seminar sponsored by Barclays Bank

Free marketing seminar for Leicestershire businesses organised by Barclays Bank

Local businesses are invited to a free marketing seminar to be held in Leicester city centre next month (March). The event will feature a talk by Leicestershire based marketing consultant Alastair Campbell of The Ideal Marketing Company and is sponsored by Barclays Bank which has 13 branches in the Leicester area.

The event is being held on Wednesday March 24th from12.00 pm to 2.00 pm at Mem-Saab Indian restaurant and champagne bar in Highcross Street in the city centre. Alastair will be giving a talk which focuses on the 4 critical marketing activities to grow a business and increase profits.

Monica Mendez, Area Manager for Barclays Business Banking Team in Leicestershire feels that the event is one not to be missed. “Marketing is one of the areas that many business owners forget as often they are so involved in the actual day to day ‘running’ of the business,” she comments. “Alastair will be discussing some simple strategies that businesses can apply, that might just help drive more customers through the door. This event will also provide an opportunity for networking – another invaluable and cost effective way of introducing new business.”

Alastair Campbell is Managing Director of The Ideal Marketing Company and gives talks on low cost marketing solutions for SMEs across the UK. He also runs the Marketing Mentor Programme, a fully funded 18 month support and training course designed for small businesses.

Businesses from across Leicestershire and the surrounding area that are interested in attending should call Pragnesh Sadadiwala from Barclays Bank on 0116 206 2184 or email pragnesh.sadadiwala@barclays.com to reserve a free place for this free marketing seminar in Leicester.

Free Marketing Seminar in Lutterworth

Free Marketing Seminar at The Greyhound Hotel, Lutterworth, Leicestershire.

How to Grow & Protect Your Business in 2010

Tuesday 16th February 5.30pm – 7.30pm at the Greyhound Inn, Lutterworth

With the start of the New Year, you may be wondering about what 2010 holds in store for your business.  Would you like it to great off to a great start? You are invited to a seminar and networking event which offers practical ideas on how to grow & protect your business during the year ahead and beyond.

Part 1 - What are the best ways to grow your business?  The first part of the session covers low cost marketing ideas on the 4 key areas of business growth.  Attracting more leads, converting more prospects into customers, selling additional services to existing customers and keeping customers for longer.

Part 2 – How do you protect the business that you have grown? It’s all too easy to let the wealth and value slip away or to expose yourself to unnecessary risks.  The second part of the seminar looks at how to protect yourself financially and how to use your business to build yourself a financial fortress.

The seminar starts at 5.30pm with presentations commencing by 6pm.  The event is free of charge and you are invited to attend and bring up to 3 people with you. We are anticipating a good level of attendance so PLEASE reserve your place in advance.

To reserve you place please call 01858 44 55 43  e-mail seminar@idealmarketingcompany.com

Tough times ahead?

Who can help in a turnaround?

In a turnaround, businesses often need help from people who are familiar with this type of crisis situation and who possess the specific experience and skills needed. But there are differing types of help available so it is worth understanding who’s who in the world of CROs, IPs, IMs and other professionals you may encounter, some of whom work within your business and some of whom work simply as advisors.

A Chief Restructuring Officer or CRO, is a turnaround professional that management hire on a temporary basis to provide support and assistance.

A CRO’s job is firstly to help the business analyse its position, providing an experienced eye to look over how deep the crisis is, assess the options and make an informed judgement as to whether the business is salvageable.

CROs then move on to help to drive through the actions needed to deal with the situation, acting as a crisis manager to handle issues with the urgency, independence and sometimes ruthlessness required. CROs therefore need to be people who can cope with the challenges and difficulties that this implies in a professional way.

The CRO also brings to the business a body of specialist knowledge of relevant commercial and insolvency issues such as redundancy processes and wrongful trading, so helping to manage these risks.

A CRO brings their experience of dealing with not only a business in crisis, bit also their experience in keeping financial stakeholders such as banks on board supporting the turnaround. A CRO has the ability to talk to the bank and insolvency advisers their own language, so giving the business the best chance that it will receive funders’ support through its difficulties.

The help provided by a CRO is generally therefore extremely ‘hands on’ in nature. The contrast here is with the professional advisers such as the insolvency practitioner or the lawyer who, however close the relationship, do remain outside the business. The CRO sits on your side of the table at meetings and actively works on behalf of your business, often becoming part of your business by taking on the role and responsibilities of becoming a director to take charge and drive through change for the time needed to make the plan happen.

The Institute for Turnaround provides formal accreditation of UK turnaround professionals, and such they may also be a member of the US based Turnaround Management Association. They often work alone but increasingly are operating as teams, often in conjunction with or organised through the firms who are also involved in supplying in specialists on a temporary basis known as interim managers to deal with particular functional aspects of the business (such as a temporary finance or production director) as may be required to turn the business’ performance around.

But there are many other resources available that a business can need apart from CROs. As a turnaround affects all areas of the business, so the business tends to need assistance from a broad range of specialists.

Business owners should always take formal insolvency advice from either lawyers or an insolvency practitioner (or ‘IP’) if the business is in severe difficulty to see whether they are safe to continue trading the business. An IP will be able to advise on use of any of the business rescue procedures under the Insolvency Act such as a Company Voluntary Arrangement; will be able to help the directors in assessing the business’s position. They will also often have a strong working relationship with the bank and so may be able to to help gain bank support for a turnaround, as well as introducing or working with a turnaround professional.

Often there is a need to raise new or replacement finance to provide funds to deal with the initial crisis or to support the subsequent recovery and regrowth of the business. These funds will come from specialist asset financiers either directly or more usually through a broker who knows the market and is used to placing such business.

Legal advice is almost always required and the business will need a recovery specialist as a lead advisor who can call upon expertise within his or her firm across a wide range of areas such as insolvency and debt collection in the early stages; through key issues for restructuring a business such as employment and redundancy, as well as contractual disputes such as problem contracts; right through to corporate finance specialists if there is a need to raise new equity or arrange a sale of the business.

Interim Managers are often used as a flexible resource to meet the changing needs of a business during the different phases of a turnaround. A typical case might require significant assistance from an interim financial controller on tightening up management of its cash to survive an initial crisis. Then the business might need an operations specialist to address manufacturing issues, before then bringing in a marketing expert to provide a boost to regrowing sales, while the whole strategy is overseen by the CRO.

Mark Blayney has 20 years experience in business rescues, is an IfT member and is the author of Turning a Business Around  visit www.markblayney.co.uk for more ideas.

Marketing Seminar

Thanks to all the small business owners and marketing managers who attended my latest marketing seminar at Hothorpe Hall.  Judging from your feedbackforms and the e-mails I’ve since received you got a lot out the day.

Hear what one of the delegates had to say about yesterday’s event by clicking on these links:

Marketing Mentor Feedback

Marketing Mentor Feedback- part 2

Who do you know?

I’m a big fan of Malcolm Gladwell’s book ‘The Tipping Point’  which partly talks about how people’s behaviour can lead to large surges in the popularity of a new product.

In 1967 Stanley Milgram performed an experiment called “Six degrees of separation” which showed that average number of personal contacts standing between you and any stranger is six people. Duncan repeated the same experiment in which 60,000 people across 166 countries were asked to forward an e-mail via personal contacts to one of 18 target recipients. The results were astonishing. The majority of cases required only six steps and the message chains “did not rely on a few highly connected individuals”.

This partly goes against Malcolm Gladwell’s theory which states that different types of people have different types of influence: “Mavens” – experts in the field; “Connectors” – widely networked individuals; and “Salesmen” – passionately persuasive people.

Word of Mouth advertising is one of the oldest and most effective ways of communication as borne out by the 1967 Stanley Milgram and Duncan experiment, but I believe in Gladwell’s point that some people are key to making a message travel quickly and efficiency.

penny wise - pound foolish?

Marketing ways out of recession

I read a YouGov survey recently which showed that small businesses plan to increase their marketing budgets over the next 12 months inspite of the current economic climate.

Marketing is important for SMEs in UK as in a survey of nearly 1,000 small business owners found that 38% plan to invest more in marketing.

SME’s can be shielded from recession by reducing external costs and consolidating suppliers. Further protection can be given by bringing in-house traditionally outsourced speciality tasks, such as production of marketing materials.

The survey by YouGov reveals that only 40% respondents will bring professional quality marketing material production in-house and only a quarter said they’d be unlikely to do so.

“The survey results highlight how businesses are looking to reduce external costs through bringing printing requirements in-house, with the ability to produce professional quality print material themselves, rather than through an external supplier,” said Officejet Brand Manager, HP UK, Beth de Avila.

The survey also reveals that 79% of those businesses that advertise rely on printed and online advertising as their primary means.

Added to the information given by the same survey 40% used print as their primary form of advertising and 7% were with event based advertising.

“These results highlight how UK business owners are not panicking in their attitudes to marketing during the current economic downturn, and are budgeting for the long term as well as the short,” added de Avila.
“Previous recessions have shown that those businesses that market themselves well during fallow periods are significantly better positioned when the good times return.”

It also showed that 13% respondents spend more than 80% of the company’s marketing budget on print advertising and 27% spent more than half.

The research was conducted by YouGov and surveyed 943 micro, small and medium sized business owners from 10th – 12th June 2009.

Sales Growth

Direct Marketing simulates Sales: Survey

With majority of recipients making a purchase, Direct Marketing remains one of the best ways of generating sales as figures suggest.

Almost three-quarters of people who received direct mail advertising from a business responded while the success rate for television was ten per cent lower according to ExactTarget’s 2009 Channel Preference Study.
Print media channels such as direct mail is more popular among younger people.

Robert Keitch, chief of membership and brand at the Direct Marketing Association, told the website: “Direct mail has long been the most effective of all direct marketing channels, which explains why the medium still accounts for 25 per cent of all direct marketing spend.”

Also the consumers are more likely to respond to direct mail promotions.

PMDG Marketing Communications is launching a direct mailing campaign to encourage more Mexicans to cross the border to shop in Texas, according to Business Wire.

I still think that direct marketing is the most effective of all marketing channels and is still popular among the youth. This survey shows further proof that it still works for improving sales.

Marketing Seminar Southampton

Marketing Seminar - Southampton

Thanks to everybody who came to my marketing seminars in Southampton this morning as part of the Venue Master annual event held in Southampton over a 3 day period.  Hope you found the marketing ideas useful and will take back a few ideas to help attract more new business leads.  Hope the rest of the event goes well and that you enjoy the keynote speech on Friday from Ruth Badger in the morning.  It was a lovely venue and it’s always a pleasure to speak to such a lovely audiance. I really enjoyed running thismarketing seminar in Southampton.

Marketing seminar - goal setting

Marketing seminars - When I run one of my marketing seminars I often start with some thoughts of goal setting.  Here are a few through from a seminar I held earlier this year you might find of interest.

Don’t be a clown this Summer

Who wants to act like or be thought of as a clown in their business or personal lives? Yet if you are not clear on what you decide to do with your life, it is all too easy to slip up, look ridiculous or end up having others laugh at your best endeavours.

Clowns date back many centuries and have a noble and important role in society – but you don’t want to be thought of as a clown. We all want our projects to be taken seriously and our efforts to be respected. If we go on a journey, we want to travel at speed and arrive in style – not blunder around with our vehicle falling apart. The purpose of a clown is to make people laugh and engender sympathy – and these are two feelings that you certainly don’t want to provoke in others.

Goal setting is the fastest way to achieve what you want in life, and for many people it has enabled them to become successful beyond what they ever thought possible. From Olympic medallists and successful business owners, to teachers and university graduates, goal setting allows us to work steadily towards what we want in life - once we are sure what it is that we want. By working on areas such as health, wealth and wisdom, goal setting allows us to achieve more than by any other method. Hundreds of books have been written on the subject, but the term CLOWN can help us all in both setting and achieving the goals that we want in life.

Here is a simple five point guide to setting goals for yourself and to stop clowning around with your life.

C is for Clear. There is no point in setting fuzzy, unclear goals which are hard to follow. Any goal you set for yourself should be very easy to follow and you should be clear in your own mind exactly what it is you want to do. Lack of clarity is one of the number one reasons why goals fail, so make your goals simple to follow. For example:

‘I will work harder in my job’ is far too vague. Better to set the goal ‘I will work an extra hour each day and make at least 10 appointments every week’. It is much easier to measure a goal if you are clear about what it actually is.

L is for Long Term. Whilst you might set yourself goals for today or this month, it is far better if these goals are part of a long term picture. Losing 2 lbs in weight this week is fine, but if your longer term, big picture goal is to lose 2 stone before your holiday in July, it is easier to motivate yourself. By all means, set goals to have £2,000 in your savings account, but a goal to have enough money to retire by the time you are 50 - and then work backwards - is far more motivating.

O is for Own. Your goals must be your own. If you are trying to achieve a goal for somebody else, it is actually their goal that you are working on. Goals should always be things that you decide and that you believe in. Let other people set goals for themselves, you need to believe and conceive your goals if you want to achieve them.

W is for Written Down. There is an expression that the cheapest pencil can survive the greatest mind. In order for you to remember and be inspired by your goals, it makes sense to always, always write them down so that you can revive them on a regular basis. There is no point in having great ideas if you can’t remember what they are, so always write down your goals and refer to them every day.

N is for Noteworthy. Your goals should inspire you to do greater things to challenge and excite you. If there is nothing exceptional or exciting about your goals, then the chances are that you won’t achieve them because you won’t be moved and inspired by them. Create big goals that will get you out of bed in the morning and make you want to put in the effort to make them happen.

Follow the CLOWN way to set goals that are:

Clear – clarity is always vital to successful goals

Long term – think big dreams to get yourself inspired

Own – if they are not your ideas you are actually working on somebody else’s goals

Written – if it’s not written down you can (and will) forget it

Noteworthy – make your goals exciting and inspiring to get you motivated.

Getting your goals right is no laughing matter. Use these simple ideas and you will generate the success you want in your life – not the laughter of the crowd.

Working Breakfast members

The networking group I attend every Thursday - called Working Breakfast at the Regency Hotel in Leicester  - has asked it’s member to come up with some practical tips on how the beat the ecconomic downturn.  It’s aimed at small business owners.

The result is an 80 point tips booklet that you can have for free if you call me on 01858 44 55 43 or you can download it at www.workingbreakfast.com  I think that it contains some really good ideas and I’ve been very surprised at how well it’s been received - however numbers are limited to get hold of your copy today before they run out.

Also if you want to ever visit Working Breakfast to see if it’s for you please do so - just let me know in advance and I will bring you along as a guest - which means you get a free breakfast the first time you attend!