Zephyr Selected to Provide Public Relations Support for Security Innovation Network Forum
On March 18, the Security Innovation Network Forum will take place at Stanford University. The goal of this forum is to bring together innovative technology firms and government representatives in an educational and informal setting to discuss the latest developments in cyber security. Zephyr is pleased to announce that we have been selected to manage all aspects of the public relations effort for this event as well as a subsequent event scheduled in Washington DC in June. You can learn more about SINET at www.security-innovation.org.
Small Business Marketing
I was invited recently to speak on The Profit Partner program. This is a local television show focused on helping small business owners succeed.
iGov Launches New Corporate Website
We’ve been working feverishly to complete the launch of iGov’s new corporate website. During the past two years iGov has been realigning their corporate strategy to win more services-based federal contracts. With this successful realignment, iGov also wanted to update their website to match the new company positioning. The original site had been hand-coded in HTML and was difficult to update and manage. It also wasn’t very search engine friendly. We redesigned the website, reorganized the navigation and developed the entire site in Joomla, an open-source content management system. There are numerous advantages to using a CMS like Joomla. Additional capabilities and features are a plug-in away, new pages and content can be added quickly and easily, and the website is now optimized for search. Visit www.igov.com and check it out!
Don’t Confuse Marketing with Selling
This month’s Fortune magazine has an article about how to manage your business in a recession. Like many other
articles, the writer mentions the importance of investing in marketing. “Kohl’s, the big retailer, actually spent more on marketing this past holiday season than it did last year,” writes Geoff Colvin. We’ve received several inquiries from CEOs of small and midsized companies that want to talk about implementing a marketing program to increase revenues. My first question back to them is usually a surprise. I want to know about their sales team.
- Do you have a strong sales leader?
- Do you have an established sales process?
- Do you track your pipeline?
- How many people sell in your company?
- Do you have a mix of hunters and farmers?
It’s not that we’re trying to be difficult. We just don’t want to waste your money and our time. If you don’t have a good sales team, a clear sales process, and a system to process leads through your pipeline, then spending money on marketing is going to be a waste. No deal was ever lost because a sales person didn’t have the right brochure. And (to my knowledge), no deal was ever won because the buyer saw a data sheet and yelled, “Holy smokes, lets go buy this product based on how great this data sheet looks!” (Although this would be really cool if it did happen.)
Building a Successful Marketing Dashboard
The marketing mix is getting more and more complicated. It was hard enough to track the results of advertising campaigns, tradeshows and direct mail programs. Now you’ve got search engine marketing, banner ads, pay per click advertising, social networking, mobile marketing and a plethora of other tools at your disposal. One thing that hasn’t changed though is the need to track your results, monitor the performance of your campaigns and measure the return on investment.
Marketing dashboards are a great way of measuring the efficiency and effectiveness of your marketing programs. Simply put, a marketing dashboard pulls all the key performance indicators (KPIs) that you are tracking for each marketing initiative and displays this information in a graphical format. It allows you to easily identify those KPIs that are not meeting expectations so that you can move quickly to adjust a poorly performing campaign. Conversely, you can also quickly identify the campaigns that are kicking butt - and put more time, money and effort into expanding the successful programs. In addition to providing both recognition and accountability for the marketing function, it creates a stronger argument for budget dollars and larger campaigns when programs are working successfully. Read more
Zephyr Hired for Company Naming Project
Cybertec, a planning and scheduling technology firm located in Trieste, Italy engaged us to help with the branding and naming of a new company they are launching. The new company is offering an online technology that acts as a “virtual sales assistant” to consumers online. The system has been designed around needs-based selling methodology, and improves conversion rates, order size and customer satisfaction when implemented on consumer retail websites. We’re pleased to announce the project has been completed, and the new company, “Sales River Solutions” can be found at www.salesriver.net.
Profit Partners
I was recently a guest on Profit Partners, a local television show dedicated to helping small business grow into larger ones. It was a great experience.
The Profit Partner Presents Kelly Harman from Innovative Video Productions on Vimeo.
Five “Gut Checks” for the marketing plan
This is the time of year when marketeers everywhere are putting the final touches on next year’s marketing plan. A good plan doesn’t have to be complicated. In fact, the simpler the better. Every business I know is tightening the budget and looking for measurable ROI on every activity. So it makes sense to do a few things very well instead of a shallow attempt at 25 different marketing activities. Also, remember that a marketing plan is a guide, not a mandate. Things that appear to be a good idea now may not perform well when actually executed. Flexibility is key and data is everything. If you can’t measure what you do then you probably need to question whether it should be in the marketing mix to begin with.
With that said, here are some things we hope you’ve taken into consideration when finishing up your marketing plan for 2009:
- Collaborate with the sales team. Have you met with the VP of Sales and discussed the objectives for 2009? Have you attended the sales meetings on a regular basis? Do you know how the pipeline works and do you have a written agreement with the VP of Sales that describes exactly what qualifies as a lead from the marketing department? This way, you can avoid the conversation in July when you say you generated 2,000 leads and they say you generated 20. Read more
Interview with Dan Turissini, CEO of ORC, Inc.
Growing in today’s economy
We’re getting asked by clients and prospects alike, “How do I protect my company in this economy?” If you’re wondering who is going to survive the next 12-18 months, look no further than your local trade publications, magazines, newspapers, and business events. Track who is advertising online and in print — who is using direct mail, cold-calling and e-marketing to generate leads. Who is knocking on your door or the door of your prospects. These are the survivors. Those that are continuing their marketing efforts and aggressively working on lead generation, prospecting and customer retention are the companies that will survive and thrive when we come out of these challenging times.How does this translate into actionable tactics for you? Here are some of the strategies we’re recommending to our clients and tactics we’re helping to execute:
1. Focus on your existing customer base first! These are the diamonds in your back yard so figure out how you can grow the lifetime value (LTV) of your client base. Read more
