Are you taking mobile marketing seriously?

As briefly mentioned in a previous post, http://dlhmarketingsupport.co.uk/2010/01/online-marketing-thought-for-the-day/  organisations who rely on their website as a sales or communications tool have to start thinking about how their site looks on the many new mobile platforms that are now hitting the consumer. If you haven’t already looked at how your site looks on your mobile phone then do so NOW.

Recent figures estimate that the value of mobile marketing is set to increase from £1billion in 2009 to £3.8billion by 2014.

An increasingly sophisticated and ‘tech savvy’ customer will be requiring that you speak them as directly as possible. If you don’t, your competitor will. As well as using this blog dlh will be including a section in its new newsletter, Marketing Mentor, to provide news of latest developments.

Continuing marketing tips from dlh

When you are writing copy for your marketing message focus on your most preferred prospective client type. If you message is unfocused it will not motivate or inspire people to respond. By attempting to appeal to a broad audience you will most likely fail to be relevant to anyone. Focus!

Employing young people set to change

This may not be directly related to marketing but I thought readers may find it of interest and I;m interested in any feedback.

As a volunteer board member of an Education Business Partnership the following information on changes in youth employment and training was given to me.

From 2013 anyone employing a 17 year old must ensure that a fully approved training programme accompanies the job and from 2015 this will apply to 18 year olds.

This will have significant impact on SME’s and any organisation that employs young people. Large organisations, particularly in retail, will have to plan their recruitment strategies very carefully.

Make customer surveys part of your marketing

I have just completed a customer satisfaction survey and report for a client. This was the first such survey that had been done for some time and although my client was aware that not everything was perfect they did feel reasonably confident in how they were viewed.

The people my client works with cover a wide spectrum, from  small groups to large multi department organisations. However, because of the nature of their work, the service level should be reasonably consistent across all sizes.

Without going into detail the survey threw up some very interesting issues in terms of communication. It had been assumed, because feedback from a core number of (larger) customers was always well recieved, that their communication lines and marketing were doing their job. However the survey, conducted via email, telephone and focus groups, revealed quite the opposite. Many customers, particularly the smaller ones felt that communication was poor, they felt isolated, even alianated and that much of the communication material had little to do with them. The relationship that was assumed was not there at all. Infact the communication strategy was missing a significant number of clients.

I raise this because it is so easy to fall into the trap of assuming you know how customers or clients feel based on the feedback of a few. When putting your marketing and communication strategy together it is so important to find out what your existing customers think. You can’t assume or second guess otherwise the you end up going in the wrong direction.

david@dlhvisualcommunications.co.uk

Email marketing

Email marketing is a cost-effective, efficient means to get messages across. However, in order to achieve the desired results, you need to plan each step of your activity to develop an effective email campaign: 

1. Contacts

Ensure that your contacts database is as good as possible. Use your existing relevant contacts as a starting point build on those from credible sources. Regularly cleanse the data so that the information is as up to date as possible.

2. Interest

Make sure the information contained is worth reading. Before you send out your communication think relevance, content and frequency.

3. Relevance

It is important that the content has relevance. For example, with SMEs, this will mean providing information that is relevant to their sectors, or providing access to information and views that they may not come across in their normal activities.

4.  Design  

Make sure that your emails are clear, quick and easy to read. It is also important to ensure that the message works just as well without images as some recipients may be using software that blocks images.

5. Your brand

If you are using an email design template make sure that it fits with your overall corporate look and remains an identifiable part of your brand. This will help avoid your e-campaign looking like an afterthought to your marketing plan and also ensure it reflects the organisation and its brand values.

6. Tracking

Track everything that you can for your email campaign – from click-through rates to opt-out rates, clickable links and emails, to telephone calls and faxes received in relation to the mail-out. Also remember to quantify your responses.

Adapted from Ed Weatherall, MD, Concep

www.concepglobal.com  http://twitter.com/edweatherall