The Marketing Mix | official blog of the Marketing Mentor community

Must-do weekly marketing

I'm updating the Grow Your Business Marketing Plan + Calendar for 2009 and I need your help.

One reason for the plan is to make sure the most important marketing tasks are on "paper" and top of mind, so that when things get busy, you don't drop the ball with your marketing. Because you know what happens then...you forget what you're supposed to be doing and before you know it, Feast or Famine sets in.

So my question to you: what are the top 3 marketing activities that you do (or know you should do) every week?

When hot prospects turn cold

Do you ever have prospects who are very excited to work with you, so you get excited too, and then nothing ever comes of it?

Is there something you do differently with these prospects? Maybe get a little lazy because it seems like such a sure thing?

I'm working on an article about this "excitability in marketing," so if this has happened to you, I'd like to hear about it.
Please post your story and/or comments.

Do "open rates" matter?

Last month, I was on the panel at the October Taste of Technology session that focused on email marketing (read about that here), moderated by Jennifer Sheehan of Technology Therapy.

During the discussion, we were asked about average "open rates" for email newsletters (that is, now many people "open" the message, according to the tracking through your email marketing provider). As the flood of email increases, open rates seem to be decreasing.

That's when the question came up as to whether, for an email marketing campaign, open rates and click thru rates are even relevant.

I suggested they might not be, based on an email exchange with my client, Bob Bly, who runs a very successful Internet business. (I had asked Bob to share open and click thru rates for his email marketing messages. His response to me: "We don't track that because we don't think it's relevant.")

What do you think? Do you watch yours? What do they really mean? How accurate are they? Does it mean someone actually read your message? Or just that their cursor happened to land on it? And if they do matter, what can you learn from them? How can you use them?

Please answer any or all of these burning questions.

Holiday ideas (already!)

It's time to start thinking about holiday gifts for clients and prospects. But with this strange economic situation, things may be a little different this year.

We're not sure yet what to do. I like to give something useful and relevant and not so expensive, of course. So we're tossing around a few ideas along those lines. (Here's my latest find for something decidedly not useful or relevant, but delicious nonetheless.)

How are you handling holiday gifts? Any different from last year? What are you planning to give, if anything? What resources and web sites do you recommend?

Evolution, not preservation

I love this article in Sunday's NY Times Week in Review section, "How Industries Survive Change. If They Do."

In it, we get a list of characteristics needed to survive the kind of turmoil the global economy seems to be facing. 

There’s no clear route to cheating industrial death. Those companies that have survived technological challenges have in common some combination of perseverance, creativity, versatility and luck. Their precise strategies vary. Some made sweeping changes, and abandoned their original products entirely; others were able to endure by changing little but their marketing.

Do you have perseverance? Are you creative? Are you versatile? How's your luck? Three out of 4 of those items are within your control. 

The article goes on to give example after example of companies and industries that adapted to a changing environment. Did you know that Toyota used to make textile looms and Nokia started as a paper mill in Finland? "These companies survived by keeping their ears to the ground. New customer needs emerged, and smart corporations positioned themselves to meet them."

Are you listening for emerging customer needs? If so, what do you hear? We're working on an article about how creative solopreneurs are doing adapting to the market. If you are, post your comment here and we may contact you for an interview. 

Are you a specialist and no one knows it?

I was recently in Toronto where I had the privilege of speaking at the 9th Annual Design Thinkers conference put on by the Registered Graphic Designers of Ontario. During my talk, called "Design Your Niche," I evangelized about the importance of developing one or two or even three areas of expertise so you can position yourself or your company as the "go-to" experts and charge a premium for that expertise.

I sometimes feel like I'm on a mission to persuade my prospects and clients how much wider the world opens up to you as soon as you start to focus. It's a bit of a paradox.

But creatives are notorious for avoiding focus, especially when it comes to focusing on a market. Why? Here's what I see: 1) You don't want to alienate any potential clients; and 2) you don't want to get bored doing the same work forever.

One excellent point about specializing came out of a conversation I had over dinner with Marketing Mentor clients, Jennifer Neal and Norm Lourenco of K9 Design before the event started (which was good because that way I could integrate it into my presentation). Norm said he thought many people probably already specialize in one or two areas but don't know it or, if they know it, don't position themselves that way, don't demonstrate it in their marketing or on their web site.

That's so true. In fact, sometimes all it takes is a reordering or the categorizing of your client list to show your areas of expertise.

Reader ideas about telling success stories

In my latest tip, with the subject line, "Are your success stories ready to tell," I gave some ideas for avoiding "blank mind syndrome" when someone asks you for "success stories" and linked to a worksheet from our book, The Designer's Guide to Marketing and Pricing, to help you mine your own stories. (If you missed that, read it here.)

A couple readers responded with a few more ideas:

• Bob Bly, longtime Marketing Mentor client and inveterate marketer, wrote, "Here's what I do. I tell the prospect to go to www.bly.com and click on Testimonials. When he is on the page, I tell him: "Here are my success stories."
• Audeliz Perez wrote, "When I first started selling real estate, I didn’t have any success stories, but that didn’t limit my ability to tell one. I would listen to what the other realtors were doing and what success they had. Then I would relate those same experiences to my clients; sometimes I related them in the first person and sometimes I told it as an all-knowing, 3rd person outsider. Ironically, the successes were received the same, as long as I believed in the story. Maybe when you someone asks you for a success story, they are looking for reassurance and maybe they’re looking to be motivated. The morale to this story is: learn to tell a story in any business, even if it’s not your own."

Any more ideas from the peanut gallery?

November Networking in New York

I've said it more than once and I'll keep saying it until the economy turns around: face-to-face, in person, real time, networking is your number one marketing tool. Why?

The impact you make online doesn't hold a candle to the impact you make in person.

And as soon as the holidays hit, the networking turns to partying, which in my opinion, isn't nearly as productive.

So here are a few events coming up that we highly recommend you attend:

November 10 6:30 PM
How to Get Free Publicity for your Business
I have free tickets ($49 value) for the first 10 people who email me (ilise AT marketing-mentor DOT com)

November 13 7 AM - 7 PM
Women's Leadership Exchange: East Coast Summit

November 13 6 PM
Usability & Interaction Inside NYC Taxis: Design Lessons Learned
(part of World Usability Day)

November 18 6:30 PM
Spark Roundtable—Comparing Proposals

November 19  7:30 AM
Crains NY Business Small Business Awards Breakfast

November 19 in Brooklyn NY 6:30 PM
Freelancers Union first industry-specific event for the Film and Television Industry

Any others you know about? in New York or elsewhere?

Join cartoonist, Lloyd Dangle in San Francisco on Election Night Party

Our very own Lloyd Dangle (), syndicated political cartoonist, illustrator of the infamous "terrified" germs on Airborne packaging (featured earlier this year on The Colbert Report), as well as featured speaker at the Creative Freelancer Conference and longtime Marketing Mentor client, is hosting an Election Night Party (on November 4th) in San Francisco. Get all the details here.

Writing articles isn't just for writers

Getting articles published online is one of the best ways to drive traffic to your web site and position yourself as an expert in your field, and especially in your niche.

So if you can't write, hire someone to write for you or let me teach you (through the mentoring program) how to write for online publication (it's not all that complicated). And if you can write, what are you waiting for? Get your articles out there?

Here are recent articles written by a few of our Marketing Mentor clients:

• Ivan Drucker -- Mac Expert for New Yorkers
  First of a monthly column on eWeek
  "The Mac Moment: Apple Advice for IT Support Professionals"
• Colleen Wainwright (aka the Communicatrix) -- Focus Agent
  You, in a Compelling Nutshell
• Dani Nordin -- Graphic Designer and Professional Problem Solver
  "Making the Most of LinkedIn"
• Ann Gallops -- Feng Shui Expert
  "On the Road? Set up for Success" and "The 15-minute difference"
• Jezra Kaye -- Speaker Coach and "SpeakWriter"
  "2 Truths and 7 Tips for Becoming a Great Public Speaker (Yes, You!)"

You'll notice that a lot of these articles are posted on one of our favorite business networking sites, Biznik. Where else have you found to post articles? What other article-marketing strategies are working for you?