The Power of Branding

Branding can be a powerful tool. Everyone wants their brand to be top of mind in the eye of their audience but how do you achieve that? 

We all know that to get your brand out into the world you need to promote it whether through advertising, social media or any other channels your audience frequents but then what? What is the goal of your advertising and promotion? Do you have a call to action? Are you purely generating awareness?

Often, we talk about clever marketing. Clever marketing isn’t just about having a great ad that people remember but it’s branding your product or service so that your audience or potential customer feels a connection with it. 

There are many brands that have created great ad campaigns that have been a topic of conversation at dinner parties but is that the true intent of these ads? Yes, you want people talking about your brand but once they’ve spoken about it, you want them to go out and buy it and you need to give them a reason to do so. You want to create a sense of emotion that makes a person want to go out and try your product or service.

Recently, I wrote a profile piece on St Andrews Golf Links in Scotland for a client. While researching, I came across their new TV ads based on their ‘Write Your Own History’ campaign and can I say I was impressed. Not a golfer myself, I was moved by these ads and felt they encapsulated the spirit of St Andrews based on what I learnt through my research. After viewing these ads, I felt that St Andrews was a place I’d like to visit. I probably won’t play golf there, but I definitely want to visit the place known as the Home of Golf.

In my opinion, if a brand’s advertising and marketing can stir an emotional connection in an audience that has little knowledge or dare, I say interest in their industry then they must be doing something right.

 Other examples of clever marketing include:

We Love Our Lamb – How many people were inspired to eat lamb on Australia day after watching a series of ads featuring well-known Aussies?

Tourism Australia – Aimed at an international audience, these ads make locals want to explore our own backyard.

Slip Slop Slap – While these Cancer Council ads have been around for years, the catchy slogan and the important message has effectively flowed from generation to generation.

 Of course, we can’t forget the catchy slogans synonymous with certain brands. What’s so great about these slogans is the brand name doesn’t need to be mentioned to know who we’re talking about!

 Just Do It – Nike

Because You’re Worth It - L’Oréal  

I’m Loving It – McDonalds

The Burgers are Better – Hungry Jacks

Is there an ad campaign that you felt created a sense of emotion or made you feel good? 

Here's the link to the St Andrews ads if you would like to take a look. https://www.standrews.com/wyoh

What is a Social Media Plan?

A social media plan outlines your strategy and specific objectives for each social media platform you have outlined in your marketing plan. 

Your social media plan should outline which platforms your business is active on and how often you will post content.

A social media plan is effective in: 

-       Maintaining consistent posting schedules across all social media platforms

-       Avoiding last minute panic and rushing to find content to share

-       Allowing you to keep up to date and utilise trending topics.

Of course, it’s important that you recognise the differences between social media platforms when it comes to creating content and the frequency in which you post. You need to also understand that a post that may work on Facebook may not be suited to LinkedIn and some platforms such as Instagram will lend themselves more to visual posts. It’s imperative you acknowledge the strengths of each platform as you put your social media plan together.

As with any type of plan in your business whether it’s your marketing, content or social media plan, it should have some flexibility to adjust with the changes that may take place within your business or industry.

If you would like help putting together your social media plan, contact Absolute Marketing Communications.

Why You Need A Content Marketing Plan

With so many businesses being online today, content plays a key role in driving customers to your website. It’s the means to which you get people to your site and build trust. This is especially important in a time when there is so much competition.

 So, what is content marketing and how do you use it to get people to your site? 

Blogs, video, social media posts and anything else that tells a story, informs, educates or entertains is content. 

Why is content marketing important?

-       It builds trust and credibility by showing you know what you are talking about.

-       It enables people to engage and get to know you and your product before buying.

-       Fresh content with well-placed keywords is more likely to get picked up by Google.

-       It assists in driving more traffic to your website which can then be converted to sales.

 It’s well and good to have good quality content but how do you deliver it so that it plays it’s part in adding value to your brand and entices customers to purchase? The best way is to have a content marketing plan.

A content marketing plan outlines your topic streams and what sort of content you will produce. It may be blogs, video, social posts, live streams etc. It also outlines how and where you are going to publish and promote them.

 How do you go about creating a content marketing plan?

1.     Firstly, determine what is the right content for your business. Conduct a review of your current content to see what performed well and what didn’t perform so well. Understanding the performance of current content will help with planning future content. Try to structure content around key activities in your business. If you are launching a new product or service, create content that supports that. 

2.     Once, you have determined what you will be communicating about, work out what you want your content to do. Your content marketing needs to have a goal. Do you want your content to build brand awareness, generate leads or increase sales? Once you determine the goal then you can create content that aims to achieve that goal.

 3.     Now you need to decide how you will present your content. Content is now so much more than written content. Videos, infographics, podcasts and live streams etc all have a place in the content marketing plan. You need to decide how best to get your message across and how effective that medium is in getting your audience to respond.

 4.     You have your content sorted; how often will you post? Will it be daily, weekly or monthly?

 5.     Promotion is a key part of your content marketing. It’s great to have content available but how will you let your audience know it’s there to view? Social media posts, email, forums etc are effective ways to promote your content. Keep in mind your promotion methods should be based on you ideal customers preferences for consuming content.

Creating a content marketing plan doesn’t need to be hard. It’s all about working out what content is best suited to your business and your ideal customer and how best to promote it.

If you would like help in developing a content marketing plan, contact Absolute Marketing Communications.

Does My Business Need a Marketing Plan?

Every business needs a marketing plan. A marketing plan is a comprehensive document that outlines the strategic plan for your business. 

What is included in a marketing plan? 

A marketing plan should have the following elements:

-       A summary

o   This is a snapshot of your marketing plan

-       A background analysis of your business and your target market

o   Provide an overview of your business and your product or service. 

o   Identify your target market. Include any relevant statistics about the market and any key demographic information. You should also define your ideal customer, discussing their needs, buying patterns and motivation for buying. 

o   Include information about your competitors. Is there a product or service that directly competes with your offering? What are they doing to establish themselves in the market?

-       Your marketing objectives and strategy for your business

o   Outline your objectives, whether they are financial, about building awareness or engaging with customers. 

-       Your marketing mix

o   This section will outline your overall marketing strategy and how you plan to position yourself in the market to meet the needs of your customers. Include all activities and promotion you plan to use such as PR, digital marketing, advertising, blogs etc.

-       Your action plans and budgets

o   Once you have established your marketing mix, detail specific activities to achieve your objectives. E.g.: booking online advertising or producing a media release to announce your product or service.

o   Work out what your marketing activities will cost you. This is best broken down by activity, month by month.

-       Evaluation and monitoring strategies

o   It’s important to establish what works and what doesn’t. Review your marketing activities periodically to determine if they worked and whether you will implement them in future marketing plans.

 Keep in mind that your marketing plan is not a set and forget document. It’s important that you keep it up to date with any new opportunities that present themselves and tweak it to suit the needs of your business. A good quality, evolving marketing plan will make a useful reference document for your business.

If you would like help to develop a marketing plan, contact Absolute Marketing Communications. Contact Us.

Working on My Business. What I've Learnt.

While taking my own advice from my last blog article and working on my business rather than solely in my business, I finally managed to set up my business LinkedIn page. I must say I learnt a lot.

While I know about LinkedIn and its power as a networking tool, until I created a company page, I wasn’t in a position to view the interactions between followers and the content posted.

 Since having my LinkedIn page, I can see exactly how many organic visitors view my posts. Why is this important? Organic visitors are visitors to your site or content that are unpaid, so they are not captured through paid advertising campaigns. They are captured through the quality of the content, SEO etc.

The number of organic visitors can help you gauge the type of content that works. Whether it be the topic or keywords. This is useful when it comes to planning your content as you will be able to focus on topics that are of interest to your audience and further enhance engagement.

Follow us on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/absolute-marketing-communications

Living Vs Existing

Often in life, people talk about only existing and not actually living. It often takes a life-changing event for people to realise they’re not living life to it’s full potential.

The same can be said for small business. Often small business owners get caught up in the usual day to day activities without giving thought to the potential they can unlock to make their business prosper. It’s the whole philosophy of working in the business versus working on the business. Often it comes down to managing the work you have and not creating an unnecessary increase in workload.

While Covid-19 has had a negative impact on life in general, for some aspects of life there have been positives. The big positive is that families suddenly have more time to spend together. While there have been negative effects for a lot of business sectors, in some cases small business owners have had an opportunity to evaluate their businesses and implement some positive changes to help their businesses move forward.

 While no one has enjoyed the down-turn in business, this quiet time has provided small business owners with the time to actively promote their business and look at new ways to expand and grow. Time; that up until now wasn’t available.

What can you do to improve your business during this time?

-       Update websites (re-design, write new copy etc)

-       Update social media pages (re-vamp existing profiles or start new ones on other platforms you have not yet explored)

-       Research resources designed to help you promote your business (business directories, forums etc)

-       Database management (ensure your databases are current)

-       Work on content (blog articles, EDMs etc)

Working on these aspects of your business can give you a great sense of accomplishment and allow you to put processes in place that will ultimately help you to work smarter not harder.

If you would like assistance with any of your marketing communications activities, drop us a line. We’d be glad to help.

Clickbait. What is it?

How many times have you scrolled through your social media posts and come across a headline that sounds intriguing, if not possibly ridiculous? Chance are every time you visit your socials you will encounter one of these headlines and as ridiculous as the headline may sound, you will most likely click on it. 

Once you finish reading the article you may find it has nothing or very little to do with the headline you clicked on and in most cases you may think it’s the most silly or irrelevant story you have read. But you clicked on it and that’s what the poster wanted. That’s clickbait! 

Why is Clickbait used?

Clickbait is very common and used by brands to entice readers to click on the post and through to their website. You may come away thinking that was an interesting read or you may think it was a waste of time. Usually comments on the article will give an indication of what other readers thought. Over time you will come to recognise who the repeat offenders are and possibly just scroll past. 

 Needless to say, over the last few months, a lot of clickbait articles have centred around Covid-19. Articles related to this are nothing more than scare mongering and posters have been called out; not only for not disclosing all the facts but also for it not being relevant to Australian readers.

Do you encounter clickbait often? If so, what are some of the headlines or stories claiming to be about? Do you think clickbait is a fair way to entice audiences to read content?

Woolworths Rewards: The Verdict

So the new Woolworths Rewards program has been active for almost two months now and I must say I think Woolworths may have got it right. There are product categories that give shoppers the opportunity to earn bonus points and including BWS and Woolworths petrol stores in the mix has helped shoppers earn a substantial amount of points.

There are also promotions that enable customers to earn additional points by spending specified amounts of money each week for a certain amount of time if they wish. But even at 1 point per dollar spent, I think Woolworths has gone a long way to try and win back some of the customers they lost to Flybuys.

I personally think that it is now one of the better loyalty schemes out there at the moment. What are your thoughts?

Where Does Your Loyalty Lie?

Loyalty programs can play a big part in our behaviour as shoppers. They are also a valuable tool for retailers when it comes to collecting market research data. A good loyalty program can determine whether or not we shop with a particular retailer. Recently the Woolworths Rewards program has come under fire by shoppers and media.

I have to wonder what the Woolworths marketing department were thinking when they developed this program. In theory they had a good idea but when executed it fell short. If you’re not familiar with the program Woolworths offer a dollar amount cash back on products displaying their reward dollar ticket. Once you’ve accumulated $10, this comes off your next shop. 

There were a couple of problems with this. Firstly, they had a good loyalty program whereby you earned Qantas Frequent Flyer points when you spent over $30 in one transaction. This proved valuable to a lot of shoppers. When they introduced the reward dollars program they abolished their affiliation with Qantas. The other issue is there aren’t many products that are relevant to most shoppers that carry a reward, so to achieve a $10 cash back is no easy feat.

For months now social media has been inundated with shoppers complaining about the lack of reward products on offer therefore resulting in thousands of dollars being spent with no reward. A lot of these customers mentioned they no longer scan their card when they shop there, meaning that Woolworths doesn't get the valuable market research data. Quite a few customers mentioned going back to Coles for their Flybuys program.

While the Woolies marketing department may have got it wrong when it came to the new rewards program, they are at least listening. At the end of the month they will launch their new loyalty program.

They have once again reinstated their affiliation with Qantas and now shoppers will earn 1 point for every dollar they spend in Woolworths, BWS and Caltex. Once a total of 2,000 points has been accumulated, shoppers will get $10 off their shop. My question is: how long will it take to accumulate 2,000 points? It seems they’ve been paying attention to Coles and their Flybuys program. You can redeem 2,000 Flybuys points for $10 off your shop but its not at all hard to get to 2,000 points if you shop at all the Flybuys partners and take advantage of their bonus points offers. 

If Woolworths will be offering bonus points at any given time it may not take long at all to hit 2,000 points but if you base it on an average of $100 - $120 a week between groceries and fuel it will take approximately four to five months to get a reward. Will this be enough for shoppers? Time will tell.

Speak Our Language

Often we forget that we are not the target audience when it comes to what we communicate. While our target audience may require our services, we need to remember that we may be providing them with a service because they do not have the expertise to carry out the function that they hire us to provide. 

When we correspond with our clients we need to remember that we are possibly talking to a lay person when it comes to our field. I am guilty of making marketing and consumer behaviour references that my clients don’t understand. It’s great we know what we are talking about but if your client doesn't know A from B then we need to be mindful and give them the main points in easy to understand terms.

Don’t ever treat your client like an idiot but keep in mind that they may not know what an AB demographic is or what a HDMI cable is. They just need to know that you are developing a campaign targeted at white collar, high income earners or that there is a cable that will give you a great quality image on your TV.

Using easy to understand language can eliminate a multitude of problems down the track. How many times have you thought you were getting one thing but ended up with another simply because you didn’t understand what you were being told. 

So before talking to a client think about what you need to tell them and whether you are using technical terms or if you using terminology that is easy to understand.

Ultra Tune or Ultra Fail?

I recently saw the new ad for Ultra Tune. I must say I’m a little surprised there haven’t been enough complaints to have the ad taken off the air. If you haven’t seen the ad, it depicts two girls driving their car when they break down on train tracks. A train is coming and hits the car yet the girls walk away unscathed. 

The problem with the ad is that it negates everything we are constantly reminded about in the media about the dangers of stopping on train tracks while driving. I think this Ultra Tune ad is irresponsible and I’d be very surprised if there isn’t more of a fuss made about it. What message is it sending to young drivers?

I believe a brand has a responsibility to it's customers to advertise facts. The facts are: if you are stuck in your car on train tracks when a train is coming, you are not going to walk away looking glamourous and Ultra Tune most definitely won't make it in time to save you!

Ultra Tune has come under attack for another ad which objectifies women and allegedly misleads viewers into believing they can win a trip to Wimbledon (the tennis tournament, not the English town). It will interesting to see whether Ultra Tune pulls their ads voluntarily or wait to be told by the ACCC or the advertising standards board.

It makes me wonder, who is designing and executing Ultra Tune's ads?

Too Much Information?

There has been such an evolution when it comes to the creation of ads, especially in print. I was recently researching ads to see what was happening out in the market place and was amazed by the contrast between ads of various companies. Thinking about my own experience in advertising, I realised that the variation in advertising often comes down to the person signing off on the ad before it goes to market.

In my experience, there are two types of print advertising: informational and graphic. A lot of ads are high in written content often communicating all the attributes of a product or company in a single ad. The graphic ads usually have an amazing graphic that tells the story. These I find are the ads that usually stand out in my mind. There are so many avenues that consumers can explore to get more information on a product that it hardly seems worth writing an essay of copy for an ad that may gain 5 seconds of attention. 

Don’t get me wrong, copywriting is important but we just need to know where to draw the line. Consumers can often visit a website or call customer service for more information on a product that its often not necessary to add all that information in an ad. I believe that valuable time should be spent on developing a great tagline and graphic representation to tell the story. 

A great example of this is an ad I found for Burger King. Their ad was a whopper sitting in a too small Big Mac box with the tagline: ‘Silly Whopper, that’s a Big Mac box.’ It was simple but it got the message across in a few words. There was no need to explain the size comparison between the two burgers. The graphic and the simple tagline did it all.

Quite often its not just about whether to have all that information but whether there is space for it. A few years ago I worked on an ad for a product that came in 10 colours. While working with the graphic designers we decided that it made more sense to have a graphic of the product in each colour rather than have each colour listed in the ad. It made the ad more visually appealing as well as less text heavy. 

If you’re fortunate enough to work in an organisation that has in-house designers you often have the luxury of being able to come up with a couple of variations of an ad to see what is more visually appealing. 

So next time you're working on an ad ask yourself: 'Would I stop to look at this ad?'

Knowledge is Power!

People are often surprised when I come out with a tidbit of information that seems so obscure or unlike me. They give a strange look and ask how on earth I knew that. The age old saying ‘know a little about a lot rather that a lot about a little’ is so true. I swear by this saying, not just personally but also professionally. 

When you work in an organisation it is so important to know what your competitors are doing or what current trends are. Especially if you are in marketing. Can you imagine if all your competitors had a Facebook presence and you were still trying to figure out what Facebook was? That’s an extreme example but a valid one I think. 

It is so important to be on top of current trends. This is especially true if you run your own service based business. Just because you’ve held a client for 10 years doesn’t mean they won’t call you tomorrow and say they’re leaving you for the new agency down the street that’s more edgy and on top of current trends. 

It’s not just the mechanics of your business that you should be on top of, it’s all aspects of life. It seems impossible to know absolutely everything and you don’t have to! What I’m saying is if your client is in the electronics industry be aware of what their competitors are developing, where they’re advertising, what sponsorships they’re currently working on. If they’re in the fashion industry know which celebrities are wearing their competitors brand or if there are opportunities for your clients brand to be worn on a red carpet event. Most of the time reading mainstream media will keep you in the know so it’s not really a chore and doesn’t have to take up precious work time. You’ll be surprised what you may discover just by reading a weekly gossip mag!

Just remember: Knowledge is Power!