It Makes You Think

Its always good to see things that make you think, so for a little inspiration take a look at:

www.booneoakley.com

Let me know what you think!

Here we go!

So far 2009 has been a very epic year for me, and just today I’ve approved the branding for booguru my new marketing consultancy.
And of course I’m setting up a blog for booguru here on WordPress, so do feel free to take a peek at over the coming weeks.

Twitter where Less is More

Maybe because of the well documented cases of celebrity Twitters, there is certainly no avoiding this latest Internet must use social networking site.

What I really think is clever about Twitter is that it gives you just 140 characters to say what you are doing, this is a great challenge as it makes you focus on what you are going to write. Without this limit people would be free to just ramble on and on and on, which itself is counter to the way many people are living their lives these days. For example, with the Internet and email now easy to carry in the palm of your hand, an application such as Twitter makes more sense as you can update on the move, so short sharp entries make sense.

Of course whether other people will be interested in what you Twitter is a different matter!

It will be interesting to see just how big Twitter gets, and how people use and benefit from the application.

Even more interesting will be to see what comes after Twitter.

I’m back!

Well I’ve not blogged for a while, mainly because I have been busy preparing to set-up my own business. Still lots to do on that front and at the moment I’m keeping things under wraps until I’m ready to bring the beast to life.

So watch this space!

No No No No No……

Something got me angry last night!

So I get home the phone rings and a wonderful computer generated voice greets me with:

Driving Sales Up

In this recession the automotive sector is being hit particularly hard. There are a number of reasons for this, including:

 

New Marketing for a New Era

So 2009 is going to be a tough year and winning sales will require changes in the way we market in order to challenge the decline in consumer confidence.

One Life – Live It

Waiting to drive across a roundabout the other day a 4×4 went past with “One Life  – Live It” written across the back window.  Being the start of 2009 it struck me as one of those beautifully to the point mantras that sums it all up in as few a words as possible.

Pass it on

Next Monday VAT drops to 15% and already the media are speculating that not all retailers will be passing on the 2.5% reduction to customers.

Ways not to spend the budget

Well it’s easy not to spend any budget, but if you add to the challenge ways to gain marketing results without (or at least reducing) the budget then it gets interesting.

 

From experience I firmly believe and know that it is possible to gain marketing results whilst being exceptionally prudent with the marketing spend. In the current economic climate marketers should be scratching their heads not only to find ways to deliver results but to do so in the most frugal fashion possible.

 

To do this does mean thinking laterally and being a little tenacious in order to identify cost effective ways to market your business. For example, previously I managed to generate £150,000 of press coverage in 8 months at no cost to the business. How did I achieve this, well at the time I was marketing manager for a supermarket chain and had sole responsibility for one of its flagship stores, so by contacting suppliers directly I was able to leaver products that could be used as prizes.

 

Now rather than just run these as in-store competitions I offered the prizes to the local newspaper as reader competitions. The result meant that my store was acknowledged with each competition, our logo used and follow-up photographs of the winners were taken in my store and published in the paper.

 

This strategy benefited the store in a number of ways:

·        The store gained extra free publicity

·        The competitions gave an added dimension to the retail experience

·        The winners were always presented with their prize at the store, helping to create a talking point for customers

·        Being seen to be giving things away enhanced the store’s reputation and made it be seen as being more friendly

·        Goodwill was generated between the store, the local media and customers

 

So, other than my time, which was already salaried for, the cost of achieving this was £0.

 

This is just one example of how you can achieve off-line marketing results without immediately resorting to getting the chequebook out.

 

Of course effective on-line marketing activities offer a raft of highly cost effective ways for businesses to win new sales and need to be given full consideration.