by Belinda Lui | Nov 24, 2013 | Latest, Management
In some professions, it is discouraged to get attached to your patient/client/business relationships. In Marketing and Advertising, however, I would encourage the opposite. A good client relationship management strategy is crucial to maintaining not only a healthy balance for your ROI but also for your professional relationships.
The line can be blurry when it comes to how close and how much is too close.There is such a thing as too much in client relationship management– but hopefully this guide can help you navigate the professional relationship waters to ensure smooth sailing:
1. Communication
Like any other kind of relationship, communication is a fundamental building block to a healthy and long-lasting business partnership. This can come in the form of an e-mail, phone call, newsletter, or better yet, face-to-face. Just keep it flowing and keep the conversation open.
2. Trust
It is important that your clients not only know that you will deliver on your promises, but that you are also the best at what you do. Reinforcing this trust isn’t always easy but can be done by way of blogging, e-newsletters highlighting recent accomplishments, and even maintaining a current, trendy website.
3. Personal
We all get a lot of spam mail in our inbox and the last thing we need (or look forward to) is another impersonal message blasted to a general e-mail list. Alternately, consider personalizing your messages to your clients – addressing them by name and mentioning a specific memory or topics previously discussed to show you care.
4. Time
Like most other things in life, building successful client relationships can sometimes take time. Some people’s shells are harder to penetrate than others. Just be patient, consistent, and in most cases, the client will eventually come around.
5. Integrity
This comes in the form of always delivering on your promises. Things happen that you may not have anticipated – like being unable to make a deadline, but keeping communication open and being honest about expectations will keep you in the clear 9 times out of 10.
How do you keep your client relationship management in healthy balance?
by Belinda Lui | Nov 22, 2013 | Latest, Social Media
In light of all the Rob Ford news that has gone viral (making international headlines), I thought it would be a good opportunity to shed light on some videos/stories that have also gained international traction on today’s post. Viral Marketing campaigns usually involve a story or cause that has the effect of evoking emotion or that the mass community can relate to. This can be beneficial to your business if the emotion evoked is a positive one – consequently reflecting well on your brand.
Here are a few examples of videos that spread a great message:
1. Dove:
Dove’s Beauty Campaign is one of my favourites. They started their campaign with using real women to model for their advertisements, suggesting that beauty can come in all shapes and sizes. This year, they launched a video called “Beauty Sketches” that spoke to women and the, often misguided, way we see ourselves.
2. Pharell Williams: “Happy”
The U.S. musician/producer/fashion icon released a 24-hour music video that promotes being happy and has gained close to 1M views. Now, that’s something to be cheerful of.
3. The Right To Love:
In March, the Human Rights Campaign had a redesign of their logo and encouraged users on Facebook to change their profile picture to support it. It is a red square box with two thick pink horizontal lines and was used among the online community as a way to support the right to same-sex marriage.
These are just a few ways that companies and people have used viral marketing to increase awareness of a cause or their brand. In some ways, viral marketing campaigns are an excellent tool in comparison to traditional forms of advertising. This method is measurable with social metrics, regardless of which platform you choose to use.
What are some of the viral marketing campaigns that you liked most this year?
by Miriam Hara | Nov 22, 2013 | Latest, Social Media
Content creation is used by businesses to showcase their expertise, know-how and provide useful information to their potential target. Many businesses have had to play catch up and in order to “get into social media” have hired an in-house content marketing specialist… and let them go at it…with a huge sigh of relief. Finally, their business is on the platform that so many are talking about, and more importantly, engaging with. But is that really the solution or only part of the solution?
This reactive strategy, I believe, stems from a lack of understanding about social media on a conceptual level.How can you actively participate and showcase your entire service offerings with just one head count allocation? Afterall, social media isn’t only part of the marketing equation, today it’s a big part of the sales equation too. Integrating social media in overall marketing initiatives is now pretty common practice…well, more so than just a year ago. Whether you run a small business, medium business, big business… today, you just can’t ignore the call of social media, especially for sales.
By now we all understand that the thrust to many social media initiatives is mostly about content creation. We’ve all been hearing about content marketing or what many refer to as blogging. Well, it is true and it does work.
Social media and content creation go hand in hand.
In truth, many businesses who have been slightly ahead of the curve also create content for SEO, but that’s a topic for another post. The need for generating compelling content with a wide scope is key to establishing your parameters within the social media environment. This should include as many facets of your business as possible. Customer service, sales, marketing, product development, design, etc…. This allows viewers to see the total perspective of your business. That is why content generation must be part of company culture. So how does one go about promoting and integrating social media in their business culture. Here’s a few tips:
- Define your goal of success in the social media context and develop a plan.
- Identify the qualities of your personnel and make sure to take advantage of their strengths. Not everyone has to write. Content creation largely includes visual content link videos (youtubes, webinars) and photos (Pinterest, Instagrams, info graphics). Embrace the differences.
- Build a team within your organization that will be the social media ambassadors… and be sure to integrate as many of your staff members as possible to provide a depth of content creation.
- Establish a measurement criteria that shows progress and aligns all the efforts. Social media isn’t about hoping for the best. Make sure key strategic players are at the table participating and contributing, if only directionally, to the content that will appear in social media.
- Celebrate the milestones… big and small. The first comment from a post, the number of subscribers on a business blog, the first contact from a potential customer coming from your social media initiatives. Yes it does happen!
It doesn’t matter if your business is b2b or consumer based…whether your business is local, regional, national or international…content creation is playing an increasingly important role in the sales context of any business. If your business hasn’t ventured in social media yet and want to get started, click here to access our ebook. At the speed of business, it’s best to start now. 😉
by Belinda Lui | Nov 21, 2013 | Interactive, Latest
When we think about a Mobile Application, the first examples that might come to mind may be: Instagram, Angry Birds, or Whatsapp. While some applications are great for socializing and passing time, there is a lot of opportunity for apps to make life easier; to accomplishing a task faster; to finding something in mere seconds. Companies are quickly catching on to the effectiveness of implementing mobile application development into their strategy. These are all great applications with easily accessible user interfaces (UI);
But how can you leverage your Marketing Strategy with mobile application development for the growing SmartPhone community?
I’ve done some research on mobile apps that aren’t games or social networking based. These mobile applications were developed to either leverage a product or a purpose, and that’s something worth mentioning:
1. People For Change
This mobile application, developed by Thinkingbox Media & Design, is an application that leaves you feeling good – by making the people around you feel great. You are randomly given a task to complete that involves making a difference in your community and once accomplished, you share it with your peers. Pay it forward, so to speak.
2. Retail
As if online shopping wasn’t addictive enough; now you can browse an entire Fall/Winter line on your SmartPhone device. Major retailers such as Zara, Target, and Walmart have made it easy for you to see what’s new, on sale, and available to be shipped within the week.
3. Flipp
This app is a handy retail flyer aggregator, designed by Wishabi — designed for the flyer-collecting enthusiast. You can choose which major retailers you prefer from numerous different categories and you will be updated with the most recent flyers daily/weekly. Using location detection, the application will be able to update the flyers you receive based on your postal code.
4. ELLE Canada
Instead of wasting paper (save the earth!), download the ELLE Canada mobile application to be updated on the most current fashion trends and some excellent editorial (and they’re Canadian).
5. Airbnb
Developed by Airbnb, Inc., this mobile application gives you a fiscally responsible alternative to getting a hotel room, in almost any city in the world. You can browse millions of properties available for weekend, monthly, even nightly rentals.
What are some of your favourite mobile applications?
by Belinda Lui | Nov 20, 2013 | Latest, Management
I started at 3H not too long ago – and during my job interview with Miriam Hara (Partner, 3H Communications), I already got the sense that she was a force to be reckoned with. I’ve worked with quite a few female executives in leadership roles over the past decade and I always observe the types of people they are and how they achieved such success.
While I’m not an expert on how to be a leader (I’ll write another post when I become one), I’ve been given fine examples to aspire to. With a particular interest in influential women, I wanted to write this post on Miriam Hara and the specific qualities she possesses that, I believe, make her as successful as she is:
1. Client-Focused
Some people are solely business-focused (ROI, efficiencies, strategy), which are all good things, but what sets leaders apart from associate-level, is that the leader recognizes that the client IS the business – thus, everything should surround that.
2. Innovative
Knowing the best practices in your industry is important, but knowing how to stay ahead and be an expert at what you do, is what sets you apart. Know what’s trending in popular culture; what types of activations deliver the most engagement; what is visually appealing and makes the most sense.
3. Unrelenting
If Miriam gave up the first time something didn’t go her way, she wouldn’t be where she is today: Partner at 3H Communications, Author of 3 e-books (Marketing Understood, Branding Understood, and Social Media Understood), and a true expert of all things Marketing & Advertising.
4. Assertiveness
She doesn’t take no for an answer. She doesn’t give up when things get hard. She is right there in the trenches with her team when there is a deadline to be met. She will tell you exactly what is on her mind so that there is little left to confusion. Miriam knows what she wants and how to get it.
5. Fostering Growth
It isn’t enough to just be great if the people working under you aren’t learning from you. It’s important to lead by example but it’s also important to be the hand that guides your employees in the right direction. Having smart and effective thinkers working for you is an excellent ROI.
Of all these qualities, though, I think the most important one is the impression and legacy that you leave behind.
Like most things, it isn’t any good to be in leadership if it doesn’t improve the quality of work or life of those around you.
There are different personalities among the employees here at 3H, but what we all have in common is: dedication and commitment to excellence – something we’ve learned from Miriam. What are some examples you might have of leadership?
by Belinda Lui | Nov 18, 2013 | Interactive, Latest
I’ve always enjoyed analytics and learning about online behaviour; like what interests my readers and what type of content is most engaging. Analytic tools such as that provided by WordPress.org, Google Analytics, and Alexa.com are all great for understanding what works and what doesn’t so that you can find a way to make your site or blog better by implementing a concise SEO strategy.
So how do you design a website or blog that will be more optimized for search engines?
Before you hire a Search Engine Optimization (SEO) company, here is an SEO strategy checklist that will increase web traffic on your own:
1. Keywords:
The basis of any SEO strategy starts with keywords. Ensure that you choose keywords that are relative to your website/blog post so that people who are searching for those topics can easily find you. You can use Google Adwords to learn of a keyword’s competition level and search volume. Aim to use words that have low competition and high search volume for optimal results.
2. Meta-description:
This is what shows up in search engines when you appear as a match. Type a sentence or two that describes your website/post. Be concise. Be interesting. There’s no point in giving it all up front – you want to leave the visitor wanting more so that they will click on your link. Part of any SEO strategy includes good “ad” copy.
3. H2 tags:
A solid SEO strategy includes the technicalities. Make sure that each post/page on your site has a sentence that captures the tone that you are trying to portray. Then make that your H2 tag. This is a technicality that makes your site/post more appealing and search-friendly for Google.
4. Image:
Be sure to provide an applicable image along with your site/post and write your keywords in the caption. This makes the image searchable as well as your site/post since they are linked.
5. Sharing:
After you’ve optimized your site/post, be sure to share it among all of your social media. This helps to increase traffic and engagement.
The difference between a site with SEO strategy and one without it could mean thousands of visitors, hundreds of thousands in website ranking (Alexa.com), and immeasurable exposure that your site/blog could really use.
There are far more tricks than the ones I’ve mentioned above, but this is a great way to get started. Search Engine Optimization can cost you thousands of dollars (and it really makes a difference), but hopefully you’ll see some increase in traffic from the pointers that I’ve provided above.
What are some SEO tips that you could share that would help increase site/post traffic?
