Fix Your Marketing: Marketing for Small Business and Non-Profits

Manage those unsubscribers and grow your e-mail effectiveness

They love you enough to sign up, so why do you e-mail subscribers leave you? A recent Jupiter Research study says 53 percent unsubscribe because content isn’t relevant to them, and 40 percent leave because e-mail is sent too often.

“That doesn't mean you make it harder for people to leave, however. Instead, learn why people leave, offer them other ways to remain in the relationship, and make the process a great customer experience,” says Loren McDonald of Silverpop on the MarketingProfs site.

A few tips:

• Make it easy for people to unsubscribe. A recent Federal Communications Commission ruling says you can only require entry of an email address (not require people to view an offer, answer any questions, etc.) to unsubscribe. And you really don’t want people subscribed who truly don’t want to be on your list.
• Do offer alternatives – like a less frequent email or one delivered to their mobile device instead. If a page pops up with their subscriber information, it’s easy for them to change to a less frequent schedule or choose a different newsletter if you offer more than one.
• Ask unsubscribers to complete an exit survey. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to actually know why people are leaving so you could shore up those areas?
• Use a thank you page or unsubscribe message to confirm the action and explain when it will take effect.

Communicating Innovation: Making it Make Sense

Check out an article in the July issue of Fast Company. Marketing and concept wizards Dan Heath and Chip Heath, authors of Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die, have a great take on how to present your latest and greatest innovations. So many companies can't figure out how to communicate their latest bells and whistles in a meaningful way to their target audience. The Heaths are calling it Anchor and Twist - anchor your product to the understanding your audience has for existing products or technology, then put your own twist on it. It's a quick read that you can apply whether you are rolling out a new technology or upgrading your own product.

Digital media: danger zone for small business marketers

It’s a small business marketers’ dream world. Digital media gives us immediate access to customers and prospects. We can e-mail, podcast, Facebook and RSS them. Now we can Twitter and Plurk them.

But from a marketing standpoint, there’s a dark side. Just because the technology is available (and fun and cool), doesn’t mean it is right for your company. Far too many businesses are using digital media tools without thinking through the strategy behind them. Equally alarming, many businesses overlook or ignore the basics in favor of adding more digital media capabilities. Three clients we met with recently have Web sites that are woefully out of date. They have no organized way of reviewing and updating, and even worse, no one in house or outsourced who is set up to quickly and efficiently make updates.

We’re not saying you shouldn’t use new media, just that you need to use it with the same thought and carefully analysis you would use with any other marketing tools. Read the whole article.

Don't End 2007 without Some Strategic Goal Setting

Remember when 2007 was still bright and shiny and you were full of optimism about how much you would get done this year? What was on your to-do list (besides losing 5 pounds)?

If you're like many small business or nonprofit marketers, your list is largely untouched. And you may have even have items left over from 2006 that still aren't complete. Problem is there are not enough hours in the day to get it all done. It's not that you weren't busy - thousands of tasks cross your desk each and every day - but it may not have left you much time for some bigger-picture thinking. Don't let your unfinished business cause you to throw up your hands and throw out your hopes for 2008. Instead, as we rocket toward December 31, scan our enewsletter for tips to zero in on realistic goals that will have you celebrating your success at the end of the coming year.

Strategic Marketing Means Tackling More than Low Hanging Fruit

Your house is a mess. It's easy to pick up the dirty clothes, straighten the shoes left by the back door, make the beds. You know, the easy stuff. But when was the last time you reorganized dressers and closets? Climbed a ladder to dust the tops of light fixtures and moldings? Or bent low to clean your cabinet under the sink? Now if you did that, your house would be really clean. But who has time? Or the energy to do all that?

Can much the same can be true of your marketing efforts? Too often we spend our time addressing "low hanging fruit". Like the clothes left on the floor, we spruce up what's easy and not especially time consuming. Get a new logo, ask the agency to come up with some new ads, write a few press releases and leave the harder stuff like market research and strategic goal setting to another day.

Today, Brandcurve.com comments on this very issue. Seems Toys R Us has a cute new logo. Is the logo good enough to hide the fact that their stores are crowded, difficult to navigate and rate badly on customer service? Not really. I'd suggest they are just trying to sweep the bad stuff under a pretty new rug.

Want to know how you can tackle your strategic marketing? Log on to our website for free tools!

Rid your Business Documents of Abstractions

Is your organization a world-class provider of cutting-edge solutions? Do your people offer turn-key robust service? I’m sure you do. Unfortunately, your customers and donors have no idea what all those abstractions really mean or should mean to them.

We might criticize teenagers for talking in a language that defies comprehension (whose BFF R U?), but if you are writing business documents, be careful that your messages can be easily understood. Business language, no matter what the business, is too often laden with meaningless jargon. In fact, it’s so common that we stop recognizing the words as meaningless hype.

If you want to build your brand (who doesn’t) stop using mumbo-jumbo and start talking so that your messages are crystal clear.

Want to know how? Log on to our website and read this month's enews for our top tips.

Write like every word matters

How impactful are your organizations fund development letters? Case for Giving? Annual Report? Do these documents beat around the bush and contain a lot of flowery jargon rather than cutting to the quick? Time to get out your red pen. Slash the jargon. Stop beating around the bush and instead say what you mean.

"We need your money and time to help us save lives."

Before you start editing, take a minute to read Katya's Nonprofit Marketing Blog Is your s*@t detector on?

Nonprofit Marketing Fix

Attention Nonprofit Marketers,

Do you need a helping hand (who doesn't)? We are on the verge of launching a new nonprofit marketing website just for you. It will be chock full of tools, resources, tip sheets and even an ebook.

Since we are still under construction, we want to know what resources would be most helpful to you in your job.

• Does your newsletter or enewsletter need a
  makeover?
• Do you need help building your direct marketing/fund
  development database?
• When was the last time you updated your strategic
  marketing plan? Do you have a strategic marketing
  plan? What's getting in the way?
• Do you need help writing a more compelling case for
  giving?
• Do you need resources to better communicate with
  donors?

What else can you tell us? What do you need to construct a marketing program that will attract clients
and donors and move your organization forward?

Can't wait to hear from you. Please take a minute to post a comment here or send us an email to: info@fixyourmarketing.com

7 Rules for Best Managing the Production Process

Your sales team is screaming for the brochure that you promised in time for their sales blitz. The copy revisions you sent four departments for approval were due back a week ago and no one has responded. The annual report you need for a major board of directors meeting is late coming in from the printer. Your e-newsletter was due out four days ago and you don’t have an idea for a topic yet.

Whether you’re a small business or a non-profit marketer, trying to get materials created, produced and printed on time and with the requisite approvals can be enough to make you hide under your desk.  But before you surrender to the chaos that often surrounds production, here are our top seven rules for bringing some order to your world.

1. It has to be right
2. Plan backwards
3. Be careful what you promise
4. Manage the input, or it will manage you
5. Automate
6. Build in some margin
7. Know thy vendors

Want to learn more? Check out the Fixyourmarketing.com enewsletter for the whole scoop.

What Every Small Business Owner Needs: Insider Advice!

Marketing for your small business? If you need a helping hand (don't we all) and a little insider information (this kind is perfectly legal) check out Inside Small Business from Logoworks. This is an interesting site, chock full of articles and a blog where experts advise on a wide variety of subjects including customer service, website development , credit and taking cues from the giants of Wall Street. And while you are there, you can peruse their logo design services too.