August 2009, Issue 49

Is There Value in Marketing that Can Not Be Tracked?

Everyone wants to know if their marketing dollars are being spent wisely. Marketing 101 tells you to track your marketing efforts in order to determine if certain marketing activities are worth while.

Often people will tell you that you must see an adequate Return on Investment (ROI) to justify your marketing expenditures. While this statement is true more often than not; It is important not to discount the value of name recognition marketing.

Name Recognition Marketing is marketing that simply creates awareness. It is the repetitive marketing that keeps your name in the minds of potential customers.

It is important to keep in mind that good marketing is an accumulation of effort.   Good name recognition can increase response rates when you do have a sales event. If people recognize and trust your name, they will find it much easier to do business with you.  

Advertising a special sale or discount is a great way produce a spike in immediate sales and cash flow. A sales event should be a way to boost your sales, rather than serve as your main source of business. If you have too many sales, your customers may decide you are overpriced and not buy from you until you do have a sale!

Blending name recognition marketing and "sales event" marketing produces a healthy balance that will benefit you throughout the year. In between sales events customers will remember you and visit your business as their needs arise . . . remember not everyone needs your product or service when you run a sale. Besides wouldn't you rather sell your products at full price than at a discount? 

The repetitive nature of name recognition marketing lends itself well to creating customer loyalty. People you have done business with will recognize your name and remember. All business owners like to think their customers will never forget who they are, but the sad truth is that many will without continuous re-enforcement!

The problem for many business owners is that results from name recognition marketing are not fast and easy to quantify. Generally it will not produce immediate results in bringing business through the doors, it happens over time. It is a long term investment in your business.

Accurately tracking the results is most difficult! The majority of people will hear about a business several times before they become a customer. Was it the radio spot, newspaper ad or direct mail piece that threw them over the top? More than likely, it was the combination of all your marketing!

Your marketing can be described in two ways, first of all as immediate marketing designed to bring people in now and secondly as name recognition designed to bring people in later; when they are ready.

In considering the fleeting loyalty of many customers coupled with the amount of competition we all have . . . I would have to say "Yes, there is value in marketing that you can not readily track!"

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Tip of the Month

Make It Easy for Customers to Find You! One of the things that never fails to surprise me is how difficult it can be to find contact information for a business.

I often send  letters to business associates and have found some very astonishing things while trying to track down mailing addresses. I have found business cards, phone directory listings, and websites missing vital information like:

• Mailing addresses
• Phone Numbers
• E-mail addresses
• web addresses
• Names

Your in business to do business . . . why make it difficult for your customers to find you?

Take a few moments and look over your marketing materials and make sure you are not the preverbal needle in the hay stack!

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Success Stories

Welcome to the new century! We have been working with a client for a while that is in the process of re-inventing themselves.

They are an old company that had been falling behind in updating their product catalogs, brochures and flyers . . . many of which were last updated 20 years ago.

They first came to us asking if we could help them out by building a website. As we visited we talked about all of their marketing needs and showed them how we could tie it all together with their new website

As we work on updating existing material they are able to present clean up-to-date marketing materials across multiple media platforms. The printed product catalogs are available online as PDF's and (a project in the works) soon will be available in the form of an online interactive catalog.

You may not be able to teach an old dog new tricks . . . but we have found that you can teach an old company new tricks!

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