by Chris Waszczak | Dec 12, 2017 | B2B Sales, Brand Marketing, Digital Marketing, Lead Generation
Welcome to SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales, the most strategically biased B2B Marketing Agency, telemarketing services, telemarketing companies (sales agency) and digital marketing companies, serving Orange County, Los Angeles, San Jose, Sacramento and the Pacific Northwest (Bend, Portland, Seattle). We gladly serve California and all 50 United States!
There are right and wrong ways to go about marketing, and the pitfalls are many. A lot can be learned by seeing how not to manage your marketing. This original blog series weaves together an entertaining story that will help you navigate 21st-Century marketing with a view from “the dark side,” as “Screwtape” teaches his apprentice “Wormwood” via email how to sabotage your marketing. Enjoy…
PART EIGHT:
To: Wormwood
From: Screwtape
Subject: URGENT: Selling Without Selling
My dear Wormwood,
Red alert! The Patient is near to stumbling upon a weapon that could prove disastrous for your budding career as an agent of business sabotage. I need not mention the penalties, should you allow this to happen!
There has been some talk in his earshot of, “selling without selling.” You may ask, as an amateur saboteur what exactly that means. Is it not a contradiction of terms?
It is, but it isn’t. In fact, it is genius that could spell disaster for our cause. You see, most businesses are so focused on selling that they sound like they’re selling; their ads look like sales ads. They do not seem to understand that people today are turned off by sales—they don’t like feeling as if they’re being sold too. This is particularly true of the “Millennial” generation, which is very sensitive to anything they don’t feel to be genuine. (In their youthful idealism, they want to think that business is about more than gaining a buck! Unfortunately, the businesses that believe there’s more to the world than just making money often do better than if they were purely motivated by wealth—and we hate that! It’s so much easier for us to manipulate the materialistic!)
I digress… If you want to see examples of selling without selling, they are all around us; the results have been phenomenally and disgustingly successful.
Just watch the humorous Old Spice commercials with Terry Crews and Isaiah Mustafa. Their ads have won awards, like the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Commercial. Even worse, they have catapulted Old Spice from a stagnant brand to the hottest products in their market. People snatch that stuff up like a starving man at a free buffet. They do it because they’re entertained, because they share these ads with their friends—not because they’ve been pitched in a straight-on manner.
Another example? Well, KFC recently did something brilliant that made waves across social media. Their Twitter account only followed 11 people: six guys named “Herb” and five of the “Spice Girls.” One of their followers cracked the code that they follow “11 Herbs and Spices.” KFC sent the guy a custom painting of him riding piggy-back on Colonel Sanders—the thing went viral and even got picked up by the Media. (By the way, character-based advertising is another dangerous strategy I intend to discuss with you soon.)
Study these examples, as well as the ad campaigns of Geico, Nike, and the ads for the recent Marvel superhero movies, among others. If your Patient figures out that he can sell more by doing less selling, your cause is “toast,” and so are you! I say this with the utmost sincerity.
Your affectionate uncle,
Screwtape
Stay tuned for more relevant content on creating world-class digital marketing strategies and B2B telemarketing sales strategies. We at SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales thank you for joining us in our commitment to unwavering strategic planning, B2B brand marketing and B2B sales execution.
Call today and our “high-touch” dedicated team will assist you in assessing your strategic sales goals to tailor our marketing and sales tactics to your specific needs.
SalesFish Net of Sales Services:
- B2B Direct Sales, Channel Sales and Marketing Strategies
- On-Site B2B Presentation, Negotiation and Sales
- B2B Telemarketing and B2B Telesales Services
- Cold Calls and Appointment Setting
- Online Presentations and Webinars
- Product Awareness and Announcement Calls
- Primary Research: Quantitative and Qualitative Surveys
- Experiential Event Marketing
- Pre and Post-Event Calls
- Audience Acquisition, Exhibit Sales and Sponsorship Sales
by Chris Waszczak | Dec 6, 2017 | B2B Sales, Brand Marketing, Digital Marketing, Lead Generation
Welcome to SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales, the most strategically biased B2B Marketing Agency, telemarketing services, telemarketing companies (sales agency) and digital marketing companies, serving Orange County, Los Angeles, San Jose, Sacramento and the Pacific Northwest (Bend, Portland, Seattle). We gladly serve California and all 50 United States! Enjoy this new blog series…
Have you heard of “Geofencing?” If you haven’t, you need to know the basics.
Geofencing allows you to set up a “virtual fence” around any physical location, using GPS coordinates to define exactly where you want to target customers. This Geofence can be set to run all the time, or set to only run certain times of the day or week.
Once a target prospect or customer enters your Geofence, you are set up to “capture” them via their smartphone or other device’s GPS. It’s a powerful way to generate an audience based on proximity. Once you capture a potential customer, you can target them with ads for up to 30 days. Marketing experts recommend serving no more than eight impressions per day to your captured audience(s).
As you might expect, you can then track and evaluate who sees your ad, where they saw it, who comes into your business, and who converts to a website visit.
Geofencing is a unique way to capture top-of-the-funnel prospects by reaching them at the places they physically visit, as well as where they spend time online. It allows you to target your defined demographic(s) and location(s).
The results of a Geofencing campaign can be compared to a well-performing display ad or retargeting campaign, but you reach your audience much differently with Geofencing. You can’t target general display ads to hit your audience in locations they frequent most, or the times they are most interested in what you have to offer.
Every business, location, and industry can vary quite a bit, so you’ll have to determine Cost-Per-Acquisition (CPA) for your campaigns. Some Geofencing campaigns will get a $10 CPA while other may be $100 CPA, partly depending on how well-targeted Geofencing locations are.
There are a lot of factors to consider to optimize your Return on Advertising Investment (ROAI), and we can help you put together a solid plan. A Geofence that contains 80% of your target demographic will likely perform better than another area (or timeframe) containing 50% target of your target. You can’t know for sure, though, till you test your markets and analyze the results.
Focus on testing a few areas with a modest budget and comparing results before you really dive in. Since Geofencing has a lot of factors to consider and evaluate, testing just one area won’t give you the depth of information you need to make the best decisions on where to spend your money, nor on how effective this strategy is compared to AdWords, display ads, retargeting and others.
Much like serving ads on Facebook, targeting the right demographic and the locations they frequent most will be key.
SalesFish can set up a solid Geofencing plan to round out your marketing and sales portfolio and reach potential customers in a whole new way!
Stay tuned for more relevant content on creating world-class digital marketing strategies and B2B telemarketing sales strategies. We at SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales thank you for joining us in our commitment to unwavering strategic planning, B2B brand marketing and B2B sales execution.
Call today and our “high-touch” dedicated team will assist you in assessing your strategic sales goals to tailor our marketing and sales tactics to your specific needs.
SalesFish Net of Sales Services:
- B2B Direct Sales, Channel Sales and Marketing Strategies
- On-Site B2B Presentation, Negotiation and Sales
- B2B Telemarketing and B2B Telesales Services
- Cold Calls and Appointment Setting
- Online Presentations and Webinars
- Product Awareness and Announcement Calls
- Primary Research: Quantitative and Qualitative Surveys
- Experiential Event Marketing
- Pre and Post-Event Calls
- Audience Acquisition, Exhibit Sales and Sponsorship Sales
by Chris Waszczak | Nov 7, 2017 | B2B Sales, Brand Marketing, Digital Marketing, Lead Generation, Uncategorized
Welcome to SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales, the most strategically biased B2B Marketing Agency, telemarketing services, telemarketing companies (sales agency) and digital marketing companies, serving Orange County, Los Angeles, San Jose, Sacramento and the Pacific Northwest (Bend, Portland, Seattle). We gladly serve California and all 50 United States!
There are right and wrong ways to go about marketing, and the pitfalls are many. A lot can be learned by seeing how not to manage your marketing. This original blog series weaves together an entertaining story that will help you navigate 21st-Century marketing with a view from “the dark side,” as “Screwtape” teaches his apprentice “Wormwood” via email how to sabotage your marketing. Enjoy…
PART SEVEN:
To: Wormwood
From: Screwtape
Subject: Ads that SUCK
My dear Wormwood,
Ah, yes—we’ve now come to one of my favorite missives: How to make ads that suck! In our ongoing battle to prevent the Patient from prospering, we can prevail upon him to produce the sort of advertising that will make him invisible. Most side-slappingly hilarious of all? We can make him think his atrocious ads are something special (and when they produce the expected meager results, we will convince him that advertising doesn’t work.)
So, my minion of mayhem, here is a primer on how to make ads that suck:
- Make sure you stay “safe.” The steadiest road to “suckitude” is to never pass the competition by deviating from the well-worn rut. It feels safe to have your ads look and feel like everyone else’s. I mean, shouldn’t a real estate ad look like a real estate ad? The truth we must never let the Patient discover is that safe ads are the most dangerous kind to his ROI. Safe ads are invisible and do not distinguish one from the competition. At some point, a car insurance company made the move into the fast lane with ads featuring humorous characters, and the result was that Geico became a household name. The other insurance companies are still trying to catch up, but will forever be followers now that Geico has blazed a new trail. Old Spice put the pedal to the metal with a series of ridiculously hyperbolic ads that effectively tripled their sales in short order, and moved them from a musty, old-guy’s product to the most happening name in their market.
- You’re paying for the ad space, so pack in as much as possible. Print ads that look like a mini brochure, video and radio ads that present a yard sale of features. Have the Patient pack it in like a big city bus ride to Sucksville. Nothing makes people flip the page, scroll up the thumb, hit the mute more than information overload. In reality, the brilliance is most often in brevity, and the greatest impact comes from simplicity. One core message conveyed through humor, shocking fact, tear-jerking seriousness or other emotionally-impacting techniques will get attention—and the purpose of ads is to grab attention, not to inform!
- Try it for a little while, then pull it if it’s not performing. Don’t allow the Patient to define what “performance” means. Convince him that if people aren’t lined up at the door after running an ad for a week, then it must not be working. Get him thinking that the only thing that matters is short-term revenue resulting directly from the ad. If he should have the confidence to be patient as a brilliant ad campaign unfolds, then we risk him getting long-term results most companies only dream of. Most radically successful ad campaigns must be run and repeated long enough to catch fire and capture the imagination. They must have time to break through filters (which often takes repetition) and then generate buzz by early adopters. People cannot help but become fans of great ads, and once they start talking about their favorites, the flood gates open.
- Talk about yourself. Too many small businesses owners want to see themselves on the camera—a fact we love! Talking about yourself and/or all the wonderful services you offer is like, as Roy H. Williams puts it, like making people watch home movies of your most recent vacation. In today’s sophisticated digital-media environment, nobody cares about you; they want to see themselves in your ads. It’s a cold, hard truth we can portray to the Patient as selfish and narcissistic on the part of his audience, and blind him to the fact that, by putting himself first, he’s playing the self-centered card perfectly. We know it’s only after you put your audience first that they will turn their attention to you…but let’s not let that get out, shall we?
There are many other ways to make ads that suck, but this is enough for now. You’re a mere apprentice and I know your capacity for such things is limited. Besides, I’m waiting to see how you handle convincing the Patient to walk into these four traps first.
Your affectionate uncle,
Screwtape
Stay tuned for more relevant content on creating world-class digital marketing strategies and B2B telemarketing sales strategies. We at SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales thank you for joining us in our commitment to unwavering strategic planning, B2B brand marketing and B2B sales execution.
Call today and our “high-touch” dedicated team will assist you in assessing your strategic sales goals to tailor our marketing and sales tactics to your specific needs.
SalesFish Net of Sales Services:
- B2B Direct Sales, Channel Sales and Marketing Strategies
- On-Site B2B Presentation, Negotiation and Sales
- B2B Telemarketing and B2B Telesales Services
- Cold Calls and Appointment Setting
- Online Presentations and Webinars
- Product Awareness and Announcement Calls
- Primary Research: Quantitative and Qualitative Surveys
- Experiential Event Marketing
- Pre and Post-Event Calls
- Audience Acquisition, Exhibit Sales and Sponsorship Sales
by Chris Waszczak | Oct 31, 2017 | B2B Sales, Brand Marketing, Digital Marketing, Lead Generation
Welcome to SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales, the most strategically biased B2B Marketing Agency, telemarketing services, telemarketing companies (sales agency) and digital marketing companies, serving Orange County, Los Angeles, San Jose, Sacramento and the Pacific Northwest (Bend, Portland, Seattle). We gladly serve California and all 50 United States!
“On the average, five times as many people read the headline as read the body copy. When you have written your headline, you have spent eighty cents out of your dollar.” David Ogilvy, The “Father of Advertising”
There’s magic in marketing. You can turn strangers into sales, or you can make them disappear. You will do one of these, and it’s obvious which trick you’d like to perform on a regular basis.
If you want to convert crowds into customers, then pay attention to one of the greatest techniques of magic there is. To paraphrase Earnest Hemmingway, “All you have to do is sit down at a [keyboard] and open a vein.” It doesn’t matter what medium you’re working in—print, TV, social media, AdWords, YouTube videos—the Headline is paramount. Start with a brilliant headline, and—presto!—your ad, Web copy, video or whatever is all but done.
Let’s let the headlines do the talking and share a few of the best, shall we?
Apple
Absolute power corrupts.
Enjoy.
Chevrolet Corvette
They don’t write songs about Volvos.
Diesel
Smart has the plans, stupid has the stories.
Durex
To all those who use our competitors’ products:
Happy Father’s Day.
The Health Education Council
No.
Still the most effective form of birth control.
Guinness Beer
Gu_ _ _ess who?
Harley Davidson
Somewhere on an airplane a man is trying to rip open a small bag of peanuts.
Horst Salons
Where the women you hate have their hair done.
Jack Daniel’s
Hand crafted actually has more to do with the heart.
Mercedes Benz
Men talk about women, sports and cars.
Women talk about men inside sports cars.
Ricola Cough Drops
“You (cough) look good’
Make sure good news sounds like good news.
Porsche
What a dog feels when the leash breaks.
The Lung Association
For more information on lung cancer, keep smoking
Swiss Life
She’s my
everything
went wrong.
(For all life’s twists and turns, flexible financial plans).
Wonderbra
You have 918 915 friend requests.
Great headlines like these can do some very heavy lifting. Some of the best can stand alone on a blank background or with a complementary image. Really, simple ads with a strong, engaging message are almost always more effective than informational or promotional ads.
Next time you’re thinking of launching an ad or ad campaign, before you do anything else, spend a day or two (at least) coming up with a list of clever headlines. Then set it all aside and carry a notebook and pen around with you so that you can write down the actually brilliant ideas that will come bubbling up from the conscious mind. You’ll probably find that the first list you generated wasn’t nearly as good as you thought—certainly nothing like “that” idea that wakes you up in the middle of the night, you know..it will be the same one that keeps your audience from falling asleep!
Stay tuned for more relevant content on creating world-class digital marketing strategies and B2B telemarketing sales strategies. We at SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales thank you for joining us in our commitment to unwavering strategic planning, B2B brand marketing and B2B sales execution.
Call today and our “high-touch” dedicated team will assist you in assessing your strategic sales goals to tailor our marketing and sales tactics to your specific needs.
SalesFish Net of Sales Services:
- B2B Direct Sales, Channel Sales and Marketing Strategies
- On-Site B2B Presentation, Negotiation and Sales
- B2B Telemarketing and B2B Telesales Services
- Cold Calls and Appointment Setting
- Online Presentations and Webinars
- Product Awareness and Announcement Calls
- Primary Research: Quantitative and Qualitative Surveys
- Experiential Event Marketing
- Pre and Post-Event Calls
- Audience Acquisition, Exhibit Sales and Sponsorship Sales
by Chris Waszczak | Sep 13, 2017 | B2B Sales, Brand Marketing, Digital Marketing, Lead Generation, Outsourced Inside Sales
Welcome to SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales, the most strategically biased B2B Marketing Agency, telemarketing services, telemarketing companies (sales agency) and digital marketing companies, serving Orange County, Los Angeles, San Jose, Sacramento and the Pacific Northwest (Bend, Portland, Seattle). We gladly serve California and all 50 United States!
There are right and wrong ways to go about marketing, and the pitfalls are many. A lot can be learned by seeing how not to manage your marketing. This original blog series weaves together an entertaining story that will help you navigate 21st-Century marketing with a view from “the dark side,” as “Screwtape” teaches his apprentice “Wormwood” via email how to sabotage your marketing. Enjoy…
PART SIX:
To: Wormwood
From: Screwtape
Subject: Why We Love “Good Enough”
My dear Wormwood,
Our mission to destroy the success of the aspiring businessperson continues, as do your lessons on the most effective tactics. I call this next one the “Good Enough Deception.”
You see, my dear Wormwood, to many, marketing is akin to going to the dentist—painful but necessary. Many a CEO winces at the marketing budget line item because they see marketing as a “soft” area of operations. Creativity, to them is “fluff”; operations and finances are the important things. So, when it comes to getting their marketing done, they are only interested in good enough to get by. They don’t get it, and that give our cause a real boost!
The following are some ways we can use the Good Enough Deception to hasten your Patient’s downfall:
- Cut off creativity: In today’s “attention economy,” being different and radically creative to stand apart from all the other competitive voices is crucial. But convince your patient that creative strategy is a waste of time. Have him cut short the creative process and stifle creativity with the CEO’s get-to-the point view of life. (Skip the gift wrapping, the card and flowers. How romantic.)
- Give impossible deadlines: Have the Patient want it, and want it now. That will ensure that the creative “right brain”—from whence comes the level of creativity that catapults brands and sells out products—has no chance to develop true brilliance. The left brain sucks at creativity, and unrealistic deadlines put it in the driver’s seat to Mediocrity City.
- Hire Low: Advertising legend David Ogilvy gave this advice: “If each of us hires people who are smaller than we are, we shall become a company of dwarfs. But if each of us hires people who are bigger than we are, we shall become a company of giants.” Tempt your Patient into the disastrous decision to hire based on cost, rather than quality. Why get a senior marketing professional, when you can hand the work off to an amateur, a family member, or even a student.
- Micromanage: Ogilvy also said to, “Hire people who are better than you are, then leave them to get on with it. Look for people who will aim for the remarkable, who will not settle for the routine.” True creatives worth their salt do best with a long leash, so convince your patient to control the process. It will feel like the safe thing to do, but of course it’s the worst way to manage.
I could go on, and perhaps we will discuss more tactics in the future. But we can sum up the beauty of the Good Enough Deception with one simple sentence: “We got our marketing done.”
You and I know, Wormwood, that marketing is never “done,” but let’s just keep that our little secret, shall we?
Your affectionate uncle,
Screwtape
Stay tuned for more relevant content on creating world-class digital marketing strategies and B2B telemarketing sales strategies. We at SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales thank you for joining us in our commitment to unwavering strategic planning, B2B brand marketing and B2B sales execution.
Call today and our “high-touch” dedicated team will assist you in assessing your strategic sales goals to tailor our marketing and sales tactics to your specific needs.
SalesFish Net of Sales Services:
- B2B Direct Sales, Channel Sales and Marketing Strategies
- On-Site B2B Presentation, Negotiation and Sales
- B2B Telemarketing and B2B Telesales Services
- Cold Calls and Appointment Setting
- Online Presentations and Webinars
- Product Awareness and Announcement Calls
- Primary Research: Quantitative and Qualitative Surveys
- Experiential Event Marketing
- Pre and Post-Event Calls
- Audience Acquisition, Exhibit Sales and Sponsorship Sales
by Chris Waszczak | Sep 7, 2017 | B2B Sales, Brand Marketing, Lead Generation, Outsourced Inside Sales
Welcome to SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales, the most strategically biased B2B Marketing Agency, telemarketing services, telemarketing companies (sales agency) and digital marketing companies, serving Orange County, Los Angeles, San Jose, Sacramento and the Pacific Northwest (Bend, Portland, Seattle). We gladly serve California and all 50 United States!
“Don’t take my word for it. Watch someone in the airport read a magazine. They whip through, usually backward, at about two seconds per page. They glance at the clock on the wall…They look at a page. They see your ad…If you can get them to take in your visual (or read your headline), your ad is a resounding success.” Luke Sullivan, Hey Whipple, Squeeze This.
If marketing is like dating, then advertising is the part where you walk in the room and see how many heads turn. To get noticed, you have to look good—but is looking good enough? Nope. Even that “love at first sight” moment is more about connection than just good looks. The greatest attraction is when we can see ourselves in someone else’s eyes, identify parts of ourselves in a kindred spirit.
The great English poet Matthew Arnold spoke of the moment when,
Our eyes can in another’s eyes read clear,
When our world-deafen’d ear
Is by the tones of a loved voice caress’d—
A bolt is shot back somewhere in our breast,
And a lost pulse of feeling stirs again.
The eye sinks inward, and the heart lies plain…
It’s a hyper-competitive marketplace out there with a lot of pretty faces; only the most engaging and relatable will get noticed in the crowd. The best brands use carefully-considered imagery to aim at the heart, and woo their prospects by setting them on a pedestal.
There’s no doubt that images can be compelling and are a crucial part of successful brand communication. But it’s not enough to have a nice-looking logo or a well-designed ad. Your visual presentation has to make a connection to something relatable. The best images tell a story, one in which your audience becomes the main character in your brand narrative.
The problem with most brand presentations—from logos to ad campaigns—isn’t a lack of skillful execution; it’s a lack of connection. Form means nothing if it doesn’t express the substance behind your brand and how it relates to our lives. It’s not enough to have nice pictures, sharp graphics or clever ads. We’ve all seen or heard ads that made us laugh or moved us to tears, after which we’ve promptly forgotten the product. There’s a difference between getting people’s attention and inspiring them to say, “They really get me!”
The effective use of imagery in brand communications is a big topic, so I’m going to give you a few timeless tips you can take to the bank, some really useful stuff!
Feel What They Feel
Any time you sit down to create an ad campaign, a Web page or a social media post, you’re going to have to decide how best to present to your audience. Do not function from what you like, from what seems to look nice, or from a motivation to tell people all about yourself and what you’re selling. Instead, decide what you want your audience to feel when exposed to your message.
Veteran ad man and Hey Whipple, Squeeze This author Luke Sullivan advises, “Stare at a picture that has the emotion of the ad you want to do.” If you want to create an ad that will make people cry, expose yourself to ads that make you cry. If you want to create a YouTube video that will make people laugh all the way to their wallets, then spend an afternoon (or three) watching videos that get you rolling on the floor.
The point is, get into the feel before you start creating. Once you are in the emotional position you want to put others into, you are more likely to choose imagery and headlines that will get attention.
Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity!
Do you have the confidence and self-control to make your ads as simple as possible? When it comes to advertising, it’s very true that “less is more.” I cannot tell you how many clients have nodded their heads in agreement at the concept, and then fought me when I sharpened the axe.
Ads were not meant to be brochures. Brochures were meant to be brochures. Effective ads take one benefit and express it in an image (along with, sometimes, a headline and maybe even a little bit of copy).
“Be visual and go short on copy,” writes Sullivan. “Granted, if you interest readers with a good visual or headline, yes, they may go on to read your copy. But the point is, visuals work fast…they translate, not surprisingly, better than words.”
German industrial designer Dieter Rams preaches that, “Good design is as little design as possible.” He advocates a simplicity that concentrates on the essential aspects and not burdening others with the non-essentials.
Certainly, today’s consumer reads less than even a decade ago and is bombarded with a constant overload of sensual stimuli. A simple, bold message stripped down to its essentials is more likely to slip through cognitive filters and get noticed.
But beyond that, “Every element you add to a [design] layout reduces the importance of all the other elements,” says Sullivan. “And conversely, every item you subtract raises the visibility and importance of what’s left.” Aha! You can dilute your own key message with ads that are too busy.
Abraham Lincoln once apologized that he didn’t have time to write a shorter speech. Sure, boiling down your ads to express one key benefit takes work; keeping your Home page from rambling takes skill and discipline. But better to have 100 people grasp one benefit you offer than to have 1 person read through 100 features you sell.
Storyselling
“If your stories are all about your products and services, that’s not storytelling. It’s a brochure. Give yourself permission to make the story bigger.” Jay Baer
Choose images that tell a story your audience can relate to—something true to life—and you’ll have them! Don’t just show photos of your product, show people using it in real life situations…or take the opposite approach. Depict your message with a completely unexpected scenario. I still remember one ad that showed a hippopotamus bobbing in the water, wearing a pair of water skis and holding a towrope. Now, this company could have used a glib picture of some perfect family enjoying a day waterskiing at the lake, and they could have given a rambling explanation of the power of their watercraft. Instead, they used an image that said it all in an unforgettable way. That hippo waiting to get up on the waves told a story.
Show, Don’t Tell
A picture tells a thousand words. If you can avoid adding more words to that 1000, do so. But if words help add impact, then be sparing—take the time to drill down to the best combination of brevity and impact.
Now, that ad with the hippo could have added the words, “our engines are 30% more powerful than the leading competitor,” but, um…yawn.
Stay tuned for more relevant content on creating world-class digital marketing strategies and B2B telemarketing sales strategies. We at SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales thank you for joining us in our commitment to unwavering strategic planning, B2B brand marketing and B2B sales execution.
Call today and our “high-touch” dedicated team will assist you in assessing your strategic sales goals to tailor our marketing and sales tactics to your specific needs.
SalesFish Net of Sales Services:
- B2B Direct Sales, Channel Sales and Marketing Strategies
- On-Site B2B Presentation, Negotiation and Sales
- B2B Telemarketing and B2B Telesales Services
- Cold Calls and Appointment Setting
- Online Presentations and Webinars
- Product Awareness and Announcement Calls
- Primary Research: Quantitative and Qualitative Surveys
- Experiential Event Marketing
- Pre and Post-Event Calls
- Audience Acquisition, Exhibit Sales and Sponsorship Sales
by Chris Waszczak | Aug 28, 2017 | Workplace Optimization
Welcome to SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales, the most strategically biased B2B Marketing Agency, telemarketing services, telemarketing companies (sales agency) and digital marketing companies, serving Orange County, Los Angeles, San Jose, Sacramento and the Pacific Northwest (Bend, Portland, Seattle). We gladly serve California and all 50 United States!
You want to get a wellness program up and running in your organization. But without these 5 essential elements, your efforts will be wasted!
According to the numbers, wellness programs don’t seem to work too well. Not because they don’t actually work. In fact, in a broad range of studies, five common traits were found in successful wellness programs.
Let us show you how you can ensure that your company develops a healthy, successful culture of wellness.
- Clear messaging and company-wide outreach from your organization’s leadership
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that the head controls the body, so it is with your company or organization. As the CEO/President/Management, your attitudes and actions will have a trickle-down effect. If you lead, your organization will follow.
As Mahatma Gandhi said, “Be the change you want to see in the world”.
- Convenience and accessibility
It’s simple, if you make wellness activities accessible, they’re more likely to be used.
It doesn’t make any sense to sign up for an executive program at the snazzy gym that’s half way across town. When people get off work, they have lives to live, children to feed, spouses, extra-curricular activities. In today’s crazy pace, there never seems to be enough time.
Plus, a lot of people like to squeeze in a workout at lunch. If they can. A forty-five minute drive to the gym, plus the workout and forty five minutes back doesn’t quite fit into that hour long lunch break.
- Prioritization by Senior Management
Bluntly put, if Senior Management doesn’t care, the folks below them won’t care. This ties in with the first point. We’ve all heard about how things tend to roll downhill. It starts at the top, then trickles down to management.
Statistically, this is one of the strongest factors in facilitating a successful wellness program. Senior Management is closer to the people in your organization who you’re trying to influence for good. Managers can be more hands-on, encouraging and guiding people to the resources they need.
- Leveraging Existing Health Plan Resources
A cursory search of the top four major insurers show that 4 out 4 of these companies offer valuable Wellness resources for their clients.
These can vary from flyers and brochures promoting employee wellness to on-line programs that can execute health assessments and improvement programs. There are also on-site assessments like flu immunizations and biometric screenings.
They often offer special rates and wellness coaching and classes.
- Employee Feedback
Approaching wellness with a continued quality improvement attitude is valuable in and of itself. But soliciting feedback from your employees is invaluable.
If some aspect of your program is not working, ask your employees. They’re the ones that we want to see gain improvements. Sometimes you can’t see the forest for the trees.
Your employees will be the ones taking of advantage of the program. There may be factors that you cannot see. So, give them a little empowerment and a voice, implement the change or changes, then watch your organization get better and better.
Making wellness a priority in your workplace means healthier, happier and more valuable employees.
And that’s good for everyone.
Stay tuned for more relevant content on creating world-class digital marketing strategies and B2B telemarketing sales strategies. We at SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales thank you for joining us in our commitment to unwavering strategic planning, B2B brand marketing and B2B sales execution.
Call today and our “high-touch” dedicated team will assist you in assessing your strategic sales goals to tailor our marketing and sales tactics to your specific needs.
SalesFish Net of Sales Services:
- B2B Direct Sales, Channel Sales and Marketing Strategies
- On-Site B2B Presentation, Negotiation and Sales
- B2B Telemarketing and B2B Telesales Services
- Cold Calls and Appointment Setting
- Online Presentations and Webinars
- Product Awareness and Announcement Calls
- Primary Research: Quantitative and Qualitative Surveys
- Experiential Event Marketing
- Pre and Post-Event Calls
- Audience Acquisition, Exhibit Sales and Sponsorship Sales
by Chris Waszczak | Aug 17, 2017 | B2B Outsourced Sales, Brand Marketing, Digital Marketing, Lead Generation
Welcome to SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales, the most strategically biased B2B Marketing Agency, telemarketing services, telemarketing companies (sales agency) and digital marketing companies, serving Orange County, Los Angeles, San Jose, Sacramento and the Pacific Northwest (Bend, Portland, Seattle). We gladly serve California and all 50 United States!
I am going to teach you how to create ads that suck more than a five-story vacuum factory. In truth, most of the ads I see are monuments of major suckitude that virtually ensure their own avoidability. They are either so dull and unimaginative that they become invisible, or so obnoxious that they have people trampling one another to get to the mute button. These kinds of ads have no chance of pausing the scrolling thumb on the social media newsfeed, unless it is to tap the even smaller downward digital thumb of disapproval.
Follow any of the following suggestions and you’ll be sure to be unfollowed; follow all of them and watch your business go down faster than a fat kid on a seesaw. (By the way, using terms like “fat kid on a seesaw” falls under point #3.)
- Look like everyone else.
In middle school, being the same as everyone else is “safe.” But in the world of advertising, being the same is death. Most businesses think that their ads need to look and sound like ads. The truth is that feeling safe is the least safe position for an advertiser.
For instance, almost every Realtor I’ve worked with has gone into a fetal position when I’ve suggested not using the ubiquitous headshot. I once had a professional photographer take fun, personable images of a firm’s Realtors. One agent’s photo in particular was fantastic–she and her dog, a very photogenic weimaraner, were both smiling into the camera. It was adorable. Everyone I showed the photo to had the same comment: “I’d work with that realtor!” Unfortunately, she opted instead for the boring, overused formal look because she felt like people wouldn’t think she looked “professional enough.” (Hint: Nobody likes your glamor head shots except you. The rest of us just roll our eyes.)
So, to suck, make sure your ads look like ads, especially like everyone else’s.
- SHOUT!!!
Use bold, ALL CAPS and multiple exclamation points as often as possible!!!!!! Roy H. Williams, the “Wizard of Ads,” says that “Every beginner’s solution is to put an ‘attention getter’ into the ad. Bright colors, loud noises, exclamation marks, and crazy stunts are the sad little attention getters most often used. The effect on your beautiful customer is much the same as sneaking up behind her and shouting, ‘WATCH OUT!’”
Cheap tricks like this are just…annoying. As the Wiz says, “Is that any way to start a relationship?”
- Cross the line
There’s a fine line between humor or impact and just plain offensiveness. Cross the line. Go boldly forward like a raging bull in a china shop. If you think it’s funny, go with it! Don’t give it a second thought, consider the sensitivities of your audience, or run it by diverse sources for feedback, and you’re on the superhighway to Sucksville.
Don’t get me wrong, there is an art to provoking enough controversy and reaction to benefit your business, but it’s risky and it requires a very skilled and experienced professional to pull it off (and sometimes even professionals fall flat on their faces.)
Damn the torpedoes…and watch your reputation sink.
More tips on ads that suck to come in a future blog. For now, these three points, properly applied, will produce spectacular failure.
Stay tuned for more relevant content on creating world-class digital marketing strategies and B2B telemarketing sales strategies. We at SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales thank you for joining us in our commitment to unwavering strategic planning, B2B brand marketing and B2B sales execution.
Call today and our “high-touch” dedicated team will assist you in assessing your strategic sales goals to tailor our marketing and sales tactics to your specific needs.
SalesFish Net of Sales Services:
- B2B Direct Sales, Channel Sales and Marketing Strategies
- On-Site B2B Presentation, Negotiation and Sales
- B2B Telemarketing and B2B Telesales Services
- Cold Calls and Appointment Setting
- Online Presentations and Webinars
- Product Awareness and Announcement Calls
- Primary Research: Quantitative and Qualitative Surveys
- Experiential Event Marketing
- Pre and Post-Event Calls
- Audience Acquisition, Exhibit Sales and Sponsorship Sales
by Chris Waszczak | Aug 10, 2017 | Brand Marketing, Digital Marketing, Lead Generation, Outsourced Sales
Welcome to SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales, the most strategically biased B2B Marketing Agency, telemarketing services, telemarketing companies (sales agency) and digital marketing companies, serving Orange County, Los Angeles, San Jose, Sacramento and the Pacific Northwest (Bend, Portland, Seattle). We gladly serve California and all 50 United States!
There are right and wrong ways to go about marketing, and the pitfalls are many. A lot can be learned by seeing how not to manage your marketing. This original blog series weaves together an entertaining story that will help you navigate 21st-Century marketing with a view from “the dark side,” as “Screwtape” teaches his apprentice “Wormwood” via email how to sabotage your marketing. Enjoy…
PART FIVE:
To: Wormwood
From: Screwtape
Subject: The “Know it All” Deception
My dear Wormwood,
I’m going to lie to you.
“The businessperson is the best person to sell their service or product…”
This falsehood is so burrowed into the minds of businesspeople that it’s often considered a point of common sense. The thinking is that it takes expert, intricate knowledge to effectively reach the consumer. Keep this delusion strong in the Patient and we can sabotage his sales.
The disgusting truth is that the opposite is often the case—the business owner or specialist not the best person to connect the product with the people. Why? Because the expert is almost always too close to his or her subject matter to effectively sell it. For one thing, they have an inherent bias toward their own business that can come across as less than sincere. Secondly, an owner or expert will almost always use jargon the average person doesn’t fully understand or—closely related—not understand which specific knowledge their audience lacks. Conventional wisdom is to write at the 6th-grade level to keep it simple and understandable. (You must convince the Patient the opposite: that people will be impressed by fancy words and displays of deep product knowledge.)
So, who is best to sell a product or service? In a word, an outsider. Specifically, someone with sales skills, but not an expert in the field.
When casting the lead antagonist for the 6th Rocky movie, Rocky Balboa, Sylvester Stallone chose a real boxer over an actor. He explained that he’d rather train a boxer to act than trying to teach an actor to box. In like fashion, it’s easier to inform a salesperson on the essentials of a business than trying to teach a businessperson to sell.
The main advantage to the outsider is that he or she will see the product or service from the point of view of the consumer, by default. The salesperson will have to “dumb it down” to learn it and in the process, will develop the perfect approach to sell it to consumers. (Of course, the salesperson will have to rely to at least some extent on the knowledge of the client to verify accuracy in the message.)
The upshot of all this, my dear Wormwood, is that you must at all costs lead the Patient into the “know it all deception”: to believe that he who knows the best sells the best. In this way, the marketing and sales professionals who actually have the training and experience to best connect the business with the consumer, will be disqualified.
Teach the actor to box, and neither the acting nor the boxing will be good—pretend boxing isn’t boxing. But teach a boxer to act, and they won’t really have to act at all, because they are doing what comes naturally.
Keep this analogy to yourself, for obvious reasons.
Your affectionate uncle,
Screwtape
Stay tuned for more relevant content on creating world-class digital marketing strategies and B2B telemarketing sales strategies. We at SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales thank you for joining us in our commitment to unwavering strategic planning, B2B brand marketing and B2B sales execution.
Call today and our “high-touch” dedicated team will assist you in assessing your strategic sales goals to tailor our marketing and sales tactics to your specific needs.
SalesFish Net of Sales Services:
- B2B Direct Sales, Channel Sales and Marketing Strategies
- On-Site B2B Presentation, Negotiation and Sales
- B2B Telemarketing and B2B Telesales Services
- Cold Calls and Appointment Setting
- Online Presentations and Webinars
- Product Awareness and Announcement Calls
- Primary Research: Quantitative and Qualitative Surveys
- Experiential Event Marketing
- Pre and Post-Event Calls
- Audience Acquisition, Exhibit Sales and Sponsorship Sales
by Chris Waszczak | Aug 2, 2017 | B2B Sales, B2B Telemarketing, Lead Generation, Outsourced Sales, Telemarketing Services
Welcome to SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales, the most strategically biased B2B Marketing Agency, telemarketing services, telemarketing companies (sales agency) and digital marketing companies, serving Orange County, Los Angeles, San Jose, Sacramento and the Pacific Northwest (Bend, Portland, Seattle). We gladly serve California and all 50 United States!
A.I.…A.I.…A.I., has anyone heard this acronym recently? Anyone, anyone? (LOL!) Yep, there certainly isn’t a lack of conversation and enthusiasm when it comes to the new “outer space” of A.I. and Virtual Reality. Like most business professionals, we appreciate new technology when it adds to the productivity and profitability equation, without miring us in extra useless activities.
I’m sure you can relate, but I sat in on a A.I. sales support Webinar last week, and for 45 minutes the presenter droned on about the features (not really benefits) of how their A.I. product could serve a sales professional. OMG, talk about being stuck in the weeds! The presentation could have been twenty minutes instead of an hour. The presenter used very eclectic terms, and seemed to think his product was some sort of “magic bullet,” rather than a helpful sales tool.
Early on in my career, I used to succumb to the ether in the room regarding new technology products. In time, I stepped back to take a second look and ask the question, “is this REALLY going to serve us and our bottom line?” Eight times out of ten, the answer was no. It all seems great at first glance, but we don’t need any more distractions in the sales cycle from what should be a simple, pragmatic process. I’m not trying to diminish those who enjoy a sophisticated sales cycle, but more often than not, a tenured sales team will pull away the minute they see added sales steps that waste their time.
Here’s the key takeaway: People buy from people they like, not robotic transaction-driven sales professionals, which is why at “The Pond” we always keep relationships #1 in mind.
What are we really doing in this life if we take the whole human relational factor out of sales? Yes, we love and use A.I. here at SalesFish, but we also recognize it’s a tool, not a magic bullet. The magic bullet is the people in our not-so-ordinary day-to-day work life who drive us crazy, but at the same time make us laugh—the people who are here to offer kind and encouraging words. Without that human interaction, life is empty.
Call SalesFish today and our high-touch, dedicated team will assist you in assessing your strategic sales goals, and the marketing and sales tactics best suited to your specific needs. And, yes, we will also advise you on the best A.I. tools that actually work and complement the real people in your business!
Stay tuned for more relevant content on creating world-class digital marketing strategies and B2B telemarketing sales strategies. We at SalesFish Brand Marketing & Sales thank you for joining us in our commitment to unwavering strategic planning, B2B brand marketing and B2B sales execution.
Call today and our “high-touch” dedicated team will assist you in assessing your strategic sales goals to tailor our marketing and sales tactics to your specific needs.
SalesFish Net of Sales Services:
- Outsourced Sales
- B2B Direct Sales, Channel Sales and Marketing Strategies
- On-Site B2B Presentation, Negotiation and Sales
- B2B Telemarketing and B2B Telesales Services
- Cold Calls and Appointment Setting
- Online Presentations and Webinars
- Product Awareness and Announcement Calls
- Primary Research: Quantitative and Qualitative Surveys
- Experiential Event Marketing
- Pre and Post-Event Calls
- Audience Acquisition, Exhibit Sales and Sponsorship Sales
