Sherri May & Co.

Thanks to all of you who participated in our online survey earlier this year. As you may recall, the question posed was “What is your biggest marketing challenge in 2010?” The results … while definitely pointing to some challenging issues … were not terribly surprising.

Nearly 30% of you responded that achieving higher goals with fewer resources was your biggest challenge this year. We wish we had better news, but indications are you’ll continue to face that challenge into 2011.

One solution to consider is outsourcing. One of our clients chose to leverage her limited FTE by hiring program managers instead of hiring fewer program managers plus production people. That approach severely limits capacity. Our client’s approach gives her the ability to hire all program managers and outsource production. This enables her team to manage more programs than those who split their resources, and get more robust results.

Outsourcing can be very successful, but you need to choose your outsourcing partner carefully. Notice we don’t use the term vendor … for a truly successful match-up, you’ll want a company that thinks of itself as your partner rather than simply another vendor. An outsourcing checklist can help you choose that right partner.

A large percentage of you indicated that defining the right marketing message for customer segments was your biggest challenge. According to Target Marketing magazine, one way to meet this challenge is to take advantage of the fluidness of email marketing.

“The idea of focused messaging isn’t new; we all know that a good message is one that takes into account the customer’s needs and translates those needs into the right offer to the right person at the right time.” Writes Target Marketing. Read more here.

Another way is by implementing voice-of-the-customer relationship marketing to gain results. Read more here.

So, what will 2011 bring? Have your challenges changed in the past 6 months? Take the quick survey again and we’ll compare results.

It’s another beautiful day in San Francisco, and my day started early with coffee at The Coffee Bean on Market Street. One of my favorite things to do when visiting cities is to sit at the local coffee shop and watch the passersby.

Then, it was off to the DMA conference for Day 4. I think today was the best day yet. Lots of really good information, and I left with pages and pages of notes. But don’t worry. I won’t spill it all here.

My first session was titled: How to be More Creative in Three Easy Steps. Sounded intriguing. I’m all about being more creative, especially if it’s that easy. Here’s what I learned:

Step 1: Fill in forms.
Okay … wasn’t expecting that. The point is, completing a well-thought out creative brief can help you think a little differently.
Strategy: For example, think about the #1 reason your audience wouldn’t want to do what you’re asking them to do. It could ignite interesting ideas to meet the challenge.
Offer: Make it unique, personal and/or a high perceived value.
Channel: Think about different ways to reach your customer. For example, a bank trying to increase investments in a college fund reached the client on the child’s birthday.

Step 2: Ask questions.
Ask others not on the creative team how they might solve the challenge.

Step 3: Think like a scientist (or psychologist).
-Use “eye magnet” words like easy, quick, improved, now, soon, free.
-Use the principle of scarcity: limited time, urgent, exclusive, limit 2.
-Personalize. Our own names are eye magnets. But personalization means more than names. Include information like past purchases, previous behaviors
-Use icons to communicate messages instead of words.
-Add a dash of color. Our presenter spoke about color being added to important areas of statements that resulted in customers paying 14 days earlier.
-Provide a reason customers should take the action you want them to take.
-Consider using fear. Avoidance of missing out can be more of a motivator.
-Use the principle of reciprocity. This principle is used by nonprofits when they include the return labels, note cards, or other items to encourage you to “give back.”

I’m not sure my translation of the three steps did it justice, but hopefully it sparked new ideas for you. My second session today was Creative Slamdown. But you’re in luck. I’m not going to try to translate that one … although it was quite entertaining.

Until tomorrow …

Today started with a quick stop at Starbucks … no surprise to those who know me. Then on to the Moscone Center for the second day of the Direct Marketing Association conference.

The morning session was packed with great information and tips on copywriting for a variety of direct marketing channels including email marketing, websites, letters and envelopes.

Our speaker continued to emphasize that our jobs were not to win awards, but to increase respondence. So, to that end, here are quick copywriting hints from our speaker:

Lessons learned:
-Emotion will out pull intellectual appeal
-Asking customers to respond by mail can damage response
-Statistics are cold blooded, examples are warm blooded
-Exclusivity is important … phrases like “only you” are better than “you are among …”

Words to avoid:
-Administration
-Approximately
-Define
-Earn
-Facilitate
-Feature
-Formulate
-Needs (as a noun)
-Product

Effective words/phrases:
-Free
-Free gift
-Limited time
-Right now
-First time offer
-Not sold in stores
-Good only until (date)
-I’ll look for your order

Whew, attending these all day sessions is much like being back in school. It’s exhausting. At the end of the day, I mustered up enough energy to browse the exhibitors and then headed back to the hotel. A run, some shopping, a quick bite to eat and then, I crashed.

Tomorrow is yet another day at DMA.